A/N: At this point my kink is Draco being sweet specifically to Marilyn (and later their children) and absolutely nobody else, idk what else to tell you. Is it healthy in real life? No. Do I care? Also no.
Flufftober 2022 - Day 12 - "You kept this?"
"Draco!" Marilyn called, searching in vain for her new fiancé as she strode through the bottom floor of their home "Did you steal my phone again?"
"…Maybe," came the not-so-guilty guilty response from the floor above "I had to see if the new model was still compatible with the adapters."
"Why not use yours, then?"
"Inconvenient."
"Well was it successful, or is my phone now utterly fucked?"
"There's a reason I'm annoying you right now instead of grovelling."
Touché, she supposed, but it wasn't like Draco to ever grovel anyway. Not unless something was seriously wrong - which, happily, it never really was these days. That was the beauty of their relationship kicking off with kidnappings, torture, and threats of death; the "stress" of planning a wedding was hardly the be all end all to them that it might've been to other couples. Plus, bickering was practically foreplay for them at this point anyway, so on that basis alone they should have been going stronger than ever.
"Where is it, then?"
"Work coat. Left pocket."
Sighing, Marilyn padded to the entryway and dug her hand into the pocket of his black winter work coat (not to be confused with his black summer work coat), but when her fingers brushed something alongside her phone, rougher and warmer than the cool glass-like material, she frowned.
Going through a partner's pockets was shifty, and going through a Wizard's pockets was downright natural selection at its finest, but she didn't stop to think of any of that when curiosity got the better of her and she pulled out her phone and the mystery object all at once.
A cork. He had a cork in his pocket.
As though sensing a disturbance in the force - she made a note to ask whether Wizards had an equivalent, but braced herself for the possibility of having to explain Star Wars to him, territory they had not yet breached - Draco appeared on the stairs barely a moment later.
"Did you find- oh."
"Has our engagement driven you to day drinking?" She asked drily.
"I'd need something stronger were that the case," he countered "But no, it's nothing."
"All right," she blinked "Should I throw it out, then?"
"No," he said quickly, plucking it from her fingers "It's fine. Forget about it."
Marilyn watched, bemused as he slid the cork into his trouser pocket. Only when she was sure that he really thought he'd be able to made a clean getaway without offering so much as a thoroughly unbelievable excuse did she call after him - although she was somewhat impressed by the audacity of the plan, to be fair.
"Draco."
Stopping, he sighed, and then he groaned, and then he began to look…flustered. It was coming to the end of the day, he already looked painfully handsomely dishevelled, his hair in disarray and his clothing rumpled, but the faint pink flush that threatened to rise to his cheeks really did complete the whole picture.
"You're going to be weird about this, aren't you?" He griped.
"Am I going to be weird about you hoarding mystery corks with no explanation? Yeah, I'm afraid I am," she could help the grin that rose to her face "What the bloody hell are you playing at?"
Head hanging, he produced the cork again, turning it about with long slender fingers before he sighed.
"Do you remember our first date?"
"Which one? We had a few weird denial-fuelled hangouts in the beginning."
"Our first proper one. Once everything was out in the open. Venice."
"Vividly."
It was something she often remembered fondly - even if through a bit of a tipsy haze, but mostly because she'd been high on life. Wearing a dress much to small for the season, his blazer strewn about her shoulders, leaning in close to one another, thick as thieves as they drank and talked about everything and nothing all at once.
"Well," he said slowly, turning to her as she closed the gap between them "We shared a bottle of wine, on a bridge overlooking one of the canals."
He held up the cork between his pointer finger and his thumb, and Marilyn couldn't even tease him - nor could she be weird about it - because she was trying very much not to cry as the pieces fell into place.
"You kept this?"
"It was silly," he shrugged lazily "It signified the beginning of a new era. Honesty, being brave, giving things a shot. I didn't intend to keep it - just put it in my pocket without thinking at the time. Mainly because you'd have given me a bollocking for littering if I didn't."
"I would have," she confirmed with a smile that was ruined by the sniffle that followed.
"Then, the longer I kept it, the more difficult it was to throw it out. Now it seems a waste, considering how long I've held onto it."
"It's like a totem," she smiled fondly.
"Well, I don't know if I'd go that far," he grumbled, his cheeks still pink in his bashfulness.
"You really are the sweetest man alive, you know?"
"Yes, well," he rolled his eyes "Don't bloody tell anybody."
Accepting the cork, she rolled it about in her palm for a moment, regarding it thoughtfully before she stepped closer, slipping it into the pocket of his trousers before maintaining that proximity so that she could loop her arms about his neck and gaze up at him. The look she got back was nothing short of rueful, but that just warmed her heart all the more.
"I won't tell anybody - if we're sharing secrets, I quite like being the only one who knows," she teased "Makes me feel all special and important."
That, at least, drew a smirk from him.
"Good," he said, tilting his head down so that his nose brushed hers "Because that's hardly going to change anytime soon."
