A/N: I am without an excuse for never posting and also for the shortness of these chapters. is sorry
"What do you want, Malfoy? If it's about the plan, it's perfectly good," Hermione said pulling her jacket tighter around herself and looking just to my left.
"No, it's not about the plan, Hermione," I said, digging my hands into my pockets to keep from grabbing her there and then. Her eyes were still glittering with unshed tears, that deep, warm brown glinting in the fall light. I never realized the beauty of her hideous hair when we were in school, and I should have, there was so much more of it then. She cut it off, or someone cut it off for her, two years ago, and she's never tried to grow it out again. "It's about something else."
"Get on with it, I don't want to keep Harry waiting," she said, briskly, but still sounding nervous. I was feeling that way, though. I shouldn't have felt this way, I'd kissed girls before and I'd seduced girls before, but those girls weren't like her. And Hermione doesn't react the way the rest of react to any given situation.
"If I said I wanted to kiss you, would you let me?" I asked her, finally, and her eyes snapped to mine, As if she though I was making fun of her in some way.
"Are you likely to say that?" Hermione asked, taking a step closer to me. I kept my hands in my pockets, even though I felt like I was being pulled towards her. If we were going to do this, I wanted her explicit permission, after everything that's happened to Hermione, she needs to take control of things like this, and I need to let her do that.
"I do very much want to kiss you," I said, and she took another step closer, looping her arms around my neck, but she's done that a thousand times before, of course. Hermione trusted me, and I knew she cared for me, and she shows it when she cares for people. "But I need for you to tell me that I can."
"And how," and here she paused, moving and inch closer, so I could feel her breath on my lips, and she was standing on her tiptoes. "How would I tell you, if I wanted to kiss you, too?"
"You could kiss me," I said, hardly breathing, waiting for the warmth of her to move just those few precious inches closer to me. "Or you could just tell me. Either way, you'd better do it soon before you drive me crazy."
"And, if I said that I wanted you to kiss me, and I'm not saying I do," she smiled, moved a little closer, and now I could almost taste her lips on mine, almost feel their movements. "What would happen then?"
"We'd kiss," I said, "and then I'd go to play the knight in Potter's blessed absence, and we could talk about what happens next tonight."
"And what do you want to happen next?" She asked me, pulling back to make eye contact.
"Honestly?"
"Honestly."
"I'd like to move into your bedroom."
"And what, Malfoy, would we do there?"
"You're a tease, Granger," I grumbled, "tell me if you're going to kiss me or not, or I'm going inside."
"Oh?" She said, "I'm not going to kiss you at all, in that case. You're going to kiss me, you started all this, it's only fair you do the work."
"I started it?" I asked, laughing, I had my answer, and now I could play before I took my prize. It was taking every inch of my self-restraint, but I was going to do this right for once. "I clearly remember you assaulting me on the train in first year."
"And I clearly remember you storming into my room and telling me to either get out of bed or give up and die already," she said. "That started this. Besides, it was your fault for wandering about the train like you owned it."
"I actually do own it now, coincidentally," I grinned. "In some strange, corporate way, in any case."
"Malfoy?"
"What?" I said, or at least I tried to say it, but she moved so close to me that I couldn't even see her face any more.
"Kiss me already, would you?"
So, I did.