Hermione's Flat
12 May 2005
Her Monday begins with the dullest workday in existence and ends with a cataclysm rivalling her worst nightmare.
Her mural of lies is demolished by the very person who helped create such a masterpiece.
Post changing into pyjamas, Hermione is brushing her teeth when the Floo erupts to signal a visitor. Her mind reels as she races from bathroom to sitting room, regretting her decision not to put anti-apparition wards and floo blocks up.
She stands face to face with Draco, but he doesn't allow the chide poised on her tongue. Her rant regarding privacy soon turns meaningless.
"You wrote this."
'Heavy Hung' flies down to meet her coffee table. She stares at her bestseller, at the hangman's noose decorating its front cover, and her pregnant pause is an admission, birthing hesitation and a blush that betrays her secret.
He takes it upon himself to continue.
"I thought I was mental – remembering what you told me: how you write in your free time. Seeing that look on your face when I held it up, I just had this feeling, so I bought a copy at Flourish and Blotts. I almost took Polyjuice, so no one saw me do it…"
She wrings her hands, not looking him in the eyes.
"And then I started reading—"
She has to suppress dizzying nausea; his expression defines awestruck as he continues.
"—and holy fuck."
"Stop." Tears prickle her lash line, humiliation rising like bile. Her diary — read by the person gracing all two-hundred-and-forty pages. "I don't … You weren't supposed to read that."
"Why don't you use your own name?" he asks. "They're international bestsellers."
"I like being anonymous," she says, taking a step forward. "The same reason you don't tell people about your drawings. About us –"
"I'll scream it for everyone to hear."
"You and Apolline –"
"I called off the betrothal weeks ago. I'll die living on the streets of Knockturn Alley before I live the life my parents try to write."
"Why –"
"I want the one you wrote. I want that ending."
She stammers, her body trying to regain stamina after shock.
"I-I made it up. That ceremony – "
"I don't care." He picks her up, and her legs wrap his waist on instinct. "I want it."
"Draco. It's fiction — "
"So we'll write a different ending. Or make it non-fiction. I don't care. So long as you're in it until the final chapter."
Maybe life is nothing more than a cluster of choices; each one is both right and wrong. It isn't her job to decipher the unwritten codes of the universe. To predict the future.
It terrifies her because, with this, she can't write and rewrite when the words are messy and don't always flow.
She loves him and forgives him and wants this because leaving feels unfathomable, and maybe her whimsical writings had truth in there a time or two — some things just are.
Right and wrong. Good or bad. Nothing between them is black and white, and the shades of grey dance in his eyes, begging for a chance he doesn't deserve.
She clings to excuses.
"Your parents …"
More like the world.
"I don't care what they think," he says. "What anyone thinks. I chose you."
The words ring in her ears, and she's sure a canon could blow from behind them, and she still wouldn't break eye contact.
Who is she to fight what feels like fate and functions like love?
"I choose you, too."
He tells her loves her for the first time while she's fully clothed, and when she says it back — those clothes end up on the floor within seconds.
Diagon Alley
13 September 2006
Residual spots blur her vision from the camera's flash. The bitter flavour of Polyjuice lingers on her tongue, and she takes a drink of the water sitting in front of her.
"Thank you for doing this interview, Miss Clark. You're quite elusive, aren't you?"
She nods toward the reporter's Quick-Quotes Quill. "What can I say? I like my privacy."
The voice of the randomly selected Muggle sounds foreign to Hermione's ears, but the softness in the soprano eases her worries.
The reporter clears her throat. "What inspired you to write the sequel to 'Heavy Hung'?"
"I didn't think Sara and Philip's story was done. They still faced persecution and a multitude of problems that they had to work through."
"I see. Excuse me for diving straight in — some people are saying their relationship is unhealthy. Toxic, even. Given that Philip almost sold her out for being a witch and regarded her as a 'walking sin'. What's your take?"
"I think life is messy. People are imperfect. It doesn't mean they don't deserve love."
"So, for the record, you're saying you condone it? That a witch could marry a No-Maj who thinks she's a devil worshipper, just because he's handsome?"
"What I'm saying is that people can be more than their flaws. That love can be found — not just despite them — but within them."
"Are you married, Miss Clark?"
Hermione purses her lips.
"Next question."
The interview feels endless, and she takes careful consideration to make her answers succinct. When they do finish, the Daily Prophet journalist shakes Hermione's hand, asking for a signed copy of her novel and its latest sequel.
"Won't be front-page material anymore," says the interviewer, packing up her things. "The elopement between Hermione Granger and Draco Malfoy is all anyone is talking about."
"No problem at all." Hermione can't resist a smile. "Second page will do just fine."
This was the noose she'd die within, soul-bound and strangled by a love that drowned her in one breath and saved her in the next.
Her sisters wrapped their arms with twine as she sealed her fate through an unbreakable commitment. Magic surged, making imprints in their skin as the wrappings grew tighter and as light radiated from the matching gold rings they now wore.
"I chose you," he said as her magic enveloped them both.
Darkness turned to light as black twine became white. The ceremony rang complete, and she stared at her now husband, wearing that smirk she fell in love with. She copied his expression, unable to decipher where she ended and he began as they bled like watercolours into each other.
"I choose you, too."