Hermione unlocked her door with her key and was aware of Draco's looming frame behind her. She was walking Draco Malfoy into her home at 7 am in the morning on a Thursday. To meet her parents. Well, to have breakfast, but the byproduct was meeting her parents.

He hesitated for only a second before he crossed the threshold and when Hermione glanced back at him, she fought a smile because he was torn between staring at all the photos mounted on the walls, and keeping his eyes on her.

"You can look at them, Draco." she affirmed quietly, pausing with him in the hallway. A blush pinkened his cheeks and Hermione liked the look of it very much. She flushed and he smiled a little. His hands were clasped behind his back and his spine was stiff as he stood there, as though entertaining important guests in his own home.

"You can try breathing too." she added and his eyes flicked back to hers as his shoulders slumped. She smiled at the movement and came up beside him to stare at the wall of pictures.

"You all seem so happy." Draco said in a voice so small, it sounded like she had heard his thoughts out loud.

"We are." Hermione warmed at the sight of the photos, of her father pushing her on a swing set while her mother was tilted forward, hair in the wind and laughing like a silent movie.

"Your still photos convey so much." Draco shifted as he kept looking. Hermione followed his gaze and saw him smile as he saw her receiving an award for a short story she wrote when she was 13 one summer. She was so proud to have written something and won, but the competition was not all that fierce.

"Have you been to a muggle home before?" Hermione asked, curious more than anything. Her tone was gentle and she hoped it didn't sound accusatory. Draco looked down at her and smirked in that boyish way, pure teasing.

"Yes, Granger. I have been to a muggle house before." Draco's grin faltered. "When we have to go save muggles who interact or come into possession of Dark Artifacts."

"I think it's noble that you're doing that." Hermione said to a picture of herself holding up her OWLs results.

"Noble?"

Hermione looked up at him and found him with eyebrows lifted a little in surprise. "You're doing what you can with the skills and knowledge you have instead of living off your inheritance."

Draco's eyes lit up at the praise. Hermione's cheeks felt odd on her face and she cleared her throat. "I mean, all I'm doing is making Joke Shop items for the Weasley's and hoping I hear back from the Ministry or the Library."

"You-" Draco's grin turned into a wide, bright beam of teeth and Hermione wanted to kiss him. But he was teasing her, and she liked that even more. "You're saying you, Hermione Granger, are creating joke shop items?"

"I am." Hermione tried to muster pride, and yes, she was proud, but under his teasing expression and the heat of his eyes mingling with the pure joy there had turned her into mush.

"You have to show me." Draco said eagerly. Hermione was aware these items, prototypes and finished items, were all in her bedroom. Her cheeks burned again, extending to more of her, flaming hot against her chest and neck at the thought because she couldn't wrangle her mind well enough to stop it from stripping Draco of his clothes.

"They're not-" she was stammering so she inhaled deeply. "They're not prank items, really. I mean, I don't want to get kids out of class or anything."

At that, Draco threw his head back and laughed, not loudly, or booming, but full of mirth and light. What a wonderful sound.

"Because why would you ever want anyone to get out of classes, huh, Granger?" Draco grinned down at her and they stood there, in the corridor of still photographs as their audience, the heat of each other's stares warming the air to an unbearable thickness.

Hermione shifted, her eyes darted to his feet and she cleared her throat that had gone dry.

"Do you want some breakfast now? All we have are eggs, toast, and beans." Hermione chanced a glance up at him and he was simply gazing at her fondly.

"I'd like that very much." Draco smiled. Hermione ducked her head and spun on her heel to lead him into the living room. She loved that he filled her space with so much of himself. That she was aware he was there even when her back was turned to him as she purposefully avoided looking at him out of fear of fucking everything up.

She almost dropped an egg, and she wasn't using magic for any of it, something she half regretted at the moment. She retrieved enough from the fridge to make for her parents too because she heard the ceiling creak under the weight of her parent's feet as they began their morning routine.

Draco didn't seem to notice.

The smell of butter, toast, tea, and finally eggs filled the room and the sounds were calming her heartbeat which she hadn't realised had risen to a deafening pounding in her ears as she tried to steady herself to just make breakfast.

"Hey, Granger." Draco said quietly behind her as she plated the food for herself and Draco. She jumped and the egg almost slipped onto the counter instead of into the plate. She turned and found him reclined on the dining room chair, legs spread like a king and his hair falling into his face as he stared at her with affection. She blushed for the millionth time and his eyes flashed to her lips. "What are we telling your parents?" His eyes flickered upward to the now busier sounds of their routine.

"Uh." Her mind went blank. "We're…dating?" she asked. Draco's mouth widened into a grin and he nodded, satisfied before he got easily to his feet and helped her bring the food to the table, balancing the plates effortlessly in his long fingers and aggravatingly beautiful hands.

"Sugar or milk?" Hermione asked as she returned with tea. She had given him her favourite mug and flushed at the realisation. It was an orange cat that resembled Crookshanks. His eyes noticed the orange cat and Hermione saw that he registered his recognition of the cat before he smiled at her. Crookshanks had passed away two years prior, she was devastated. She bought this mug when it caught her eye displayed in a secondhand homestore window.

"Neither." Hermione laughed. Of course. He was certainly the type. Pure tea after all. "I've never had someone cook for me, you know." he said mostly to himself as he picked up a knife and fork and hilariously started cutting bread. Hermione had brought him a spoon, knife, and fork, just because she didn't know what he would use. She liked to dip her bread (if it was mildly toasted) into the beans, or scoop some with a spoon onto the bread (nice and toasted). She watched him without touching her food at first before he looked up at her, the food on his fork ready to enter his mouth before he turned such a bright pink, she had to grin.

To make her point, she dipped her bread, poured her milk and two teaspoons of sugar, and ate, all the while smiling uncontrollably. They were so obviously different and she couldn't help but feel excited instead of disappointed at the idea that they might be more different than alike; that their feelings were possibly fleeting instead of permanent. Because the way her heart tightened and floated out of her chest in the space of minutes, repeating the cycle whenever she looked at him, or was looked at by him, she knew it would not fade. Not for a while.

She loved him.

And he was here eating her cooking without a grimace or comment, instead little sounds of pleasure. Her food had come a long way since she cooked mushrooms and scrounged-up foraged things from their Horcrux days, but she was still self conscious about it.

The stairs creaked and Draco suddenly went still and formal in his chair, his back and posture even more upright than before. Hermione wanted to laugh but she smiled reassuringly instead. He had met them before at the various balls and social events.

Her parents stopped at the open archway, frozen, their eyes went from the back of Draco's head to Hermione's blushing face and they both made similar expressions of surprise. Draco spun around and stood at the same time, almost knocking over his chair in the process and stuck his hand out.

Jeanine took it and smiled kindly up at him. It was warm, a mother's smile, and the rigidity in Draco's shoulder melted slightly as he smiled, tight, but from mild embarrassment, not because he couldn't. Charles grasped his hand with both of his and positively beamed, shifting embarrassment from Draco to Hermione and she shook her head at her father who was not paying attention in the slightest.

"Sir, it's a pleasure to see you again." Draco said, his smile softening the longer they interacted. "You too Mrs Granger. I'm so sorry to impose on your hospitality at this hour, but…" Draco's sentence faded and he looked over at Hermione, begging for help. Hermione stood and took his free hand with hers and squeezed gently.

Jeanine and Charles looked at the movement and they smiled even wider, like comic versions of themselves.

"He passed by on my walk and I asked him to join us for breakfast. I cooked up some toast, eggs, and beans for you guys. There's tea too." Hermione gesture behind them to the table and Draco's hand tightened around hers. The air had gotten thick, but that might have been because Draco and Hermione had both stopped breathing.

"Welcome!" Jeanine smiled brightly. "I see you've both already eaten. Thank you for breakfast dear. Will you be staying a little longer?"

When the four of them sat around the table and the conversation became easy and more than just pleasant, Hermione was struck by how much she loved this. Like it had always been this way, this was just where he fit. And blessedly, her parents didn't mention marriage, not once, though Hermione did see her father glancing at her finger for a ring.

As they left for the morning, Charles eyed his daughter carefully, opened his mouth to say something, thought better of it, gulped at the air, hummed and got into his car followed by Jeanine in the passenger's seat.

She shut her front door, and she found Draco washing the dishes. With his hands.

"You didn't have to do that." She said quietly. She wouldn't comment on the fact that he was doing it the muggle way, because she didn't want him to be self conscious about it. He seemed so weirdly at ease with a sponge in his hand that she wondered for a wild second if he had practised.

"I wanted to." Draco smiled and Hermione wanted to brush the hair from his forehead where it fell into his eyes as he looked down.

"Thank you." Hermione wanted to wrap her arms around his torso and press herself to him, but didn't risk it lest he drop the soapy dish in his hand from surprise. "I do still want to show you what I work on."

"Oh yea?" Draco looked mildly intrigued.

"It's in my bedroom." Hermione said softly, implying what she meant, but also very curious to see his reactions to her work. Draco cleared his throat.

"Sure." Draco's voice came a bit strained and Hermione was very pleased with that.

She breathed deeply to slow the beat of her heart, the rhythm had run away with her emotions. She barely remembered the climb up the stairs and motioning him in through her door.

Draco was innocent, he immediately saw her workstation and approached it. Hermione wrangled with her thoughts which were wrangling with his clothes and she closed her eyes.

She ignored the tension in her body, the acute awareness that they were alone in her bedroom and emulated Draco's innocence. They had only just agreed to date, how inappropriate would it be for her to coax him into bed right this second?

Hermione opened her eyes and approached him.