"I brought you flowers."

His eyes are staring into hers and she wants nothing more than to look away. She thinks his hand might be shaking as he holds the blooms up to her. His hair, his suit, his shoes, everything about him is pristine and she doesn't know if it's for the purebloods or for her and, with a bolt that makes her wish for nothing more than to crawl home or into a cave or death, she realizes that the two will soon be one and the same.

And she's all tight smiles and coiled hair in the entrance hall to the Black's mansion. Alphard's arm is around her waist, her cheeks flushed, artificially and naturally, everything about her sparkling, the dress, the lips. But her eyes are dull, flat, lifeless. Her shining facade breaks with a true look into their golden depths.

She doesn't have a chance to thank Tom for the flowers before Alphard, his drunkenness making him brash, takes them from where they had been gently leaning towards Hermione, dipping slightly in Tom's shaky hands, and swings them over to his side, petals scattering onto the polished marble floor in the wake of his harsh movement.

Alphard's eyes are alight, his mouth smirking, and Hermione knows it's all an act. She can feel the irritation, the tension in his posture, in how his hand tightens on her waist for a second before minimally relaxing once again. He's nervous, but he has a part of play and Hermione is just so, so sorry.

"Tom, aren't you going to congratulate me?"

And he's smiling widely, in a boyish way, releasing Hermione to wrap his arm around Tom's shoulders and pull the taller, paler, angrier man down, seemingly not giving a thought to appearances or consequences, but just being, instead. And he turns towards Hermione and winks at her, his hair disheveled, a small stain of wine on his white shirt, one of his shoes untied, but it makes her smile, nonetheless. It makes her look towards the ground, it makes a light blush dust her cheeks and Hermione knows she's the perfect image of bashful, the perfect image of embarrassed and happy. It's a practiced image, a portrait they've spent hours on. Because she has to be perfect for this to work.

Then, Alphard turns his dark, expectant eyes back towards Tom, his arm loosening around his shoulders, Hermione looking on expectantly at the interaction, praying nothing goes wrong, praying Tom is too busy staring at her to take note of how tense Alphard is, how his left hand shakes, how startling the sobriety is in his eyes at that very moment.

Tom seems to take a breath, whether to calm himself or his anger or simply because he does not like the smell of alcohol on Alphard, Hermione does not know, but he does it, nevertheless.

"Congratulations, Alphard," and then, looking right at Hermione, "You've found yourself a lovely, brilliant woman and you are very lucky to be marrying her."

Hermione has to look away, her throat constricting at the things he does not say with his words, but yells with his eyes. She swallows hard and breathes deep and, when she looks back up, he is still there, still looking at her, and she does the only thing she can think to do: she smiles, politely, amicably, in a way any respectable pureblood wife would smile at any respectable friend of her pureblood husband.

Alphard laughs, too loudly, too closely. Hermione winces and he, her fiance, the man she is to be bound to, releases the man she is afraid of, the man that makes her blood boil, and comes back to her, his hand laying itself gently on her back, he smiles down at her and plants the lightest, gentlest of kisses, even in the roughness and rashness of his state, on her cheek, the thinnest haze of love and lust and who knows what else enveloping his gaze.

"I do like to consider myself fairly lucky."

And he holds her hand, playing with the ring that's cradled on it, the simplest family heirloom Alphard could find, but still a big, ostentatious thing.

Hermione chances a glance at Tom and she cannot tell if he is angry or uncomfortable or nervous, but it looks like it's all of the above. He looks as if he cannot decide whether to run away or charge at them. Whether to kiss her or kill her, whether to hate her or love her.

Alphard releases her hand and turns to his friend once again, his boyish grin becoming a vague imitation of the polite smile of a respectable pureblood.

"Please, Riddle, enjoy the party."

And Riddle, Tom, nods, smiles just as politely, a trained expression, and heads into the bunch of purebloods chattering and drinking away.

Alphard and Hermione turn to each other, Hermione's shoulders sagging with relief, her head rising with happiness. And she thinks the words she hasn't said, the words he deserves, the words his tired eyes and trembling hands merit, thank you, thank you so much.

He hugs her then and she's not sure if it's for appearances' sake or because he can't hold himself up much longer, but she accepts it anyways, his arms enveloping her in a warmth and safety that's only a shadow of home, but the closest she's found in this world so far.

But, of course, they are not done playing their roles. Their night is not over, they must still put on masks and hide themselves, they must still pretend, they must still plaster smiles on their faces and chatter mindlessly and dance and laugh at purist jokes and live. But, most of all, they must not imagine that this is what their world really is, that they should be allowed to live such simple, easy lives is nothing but a fantasy. They have much bigger things to attend to, much bigger duties to respond to.

So, when Alphard's sister approaches Hermione, when she mentions marrying her cousin, Hermione has to shove down her disgust, she has to smile and wave her hand around her perfect primness and reply that, of course, that was the only choice. Who could possibly think of tainting the Black family with anything but a pureblood, relations be damned. And she thinks Walburga almost smiled, almost approved of her, but Hermione knows her doubts remained. No one was certain that Hermione was a pureblood, after all. James was not a pureblood name, but Alphard had assured them that her family simply stemmed from a smaller, less well-known group of purebloods and, when this was not enough to satisfy them, a horrible, angry tantrum from the ever-calm Alphard had shut them up, at least for some time. It did not stop Hermione from receiving hateful looks and jabbing words, but, with her good manners, her good posture, her absolute disgust at anything that was not completely pure, she slowly, so very slowly, was winning these people, soon to be her relatives, over. And every second of it killed her.

He reaches his hand for the hem of her shirt, pulling his fervent lips from hers.

"Hermione."

And she opens her eyes, slowly, hazily, having forgotten that she was not at home, not with Ron, not happy and safe, but in a dark hallway of Hogwarts, fifty years before her shoes would ever step foot in the building, before her eyes would ever set sight on the wall she was currently being held up against by her fiance. By her wonderfully kind, pureblood fiance. By the uncle of the godfather of her best friend. Needless to say, it was a shocking pull back.

But, she doesn't want to think about that. She wants to be lost in the feel of him on her because, if she closes her eyes, if she breathes him in, she can almost imagine that she is where she belongs, that she never had to go back in time, that her war is over.

But it isn't.

And she doesn't want to think about it.

So, she pulls him back to her, she urges his hand to find itself underneath her shirt, to creep up and grope at her breast and she pulls his head back to her and lets her mind go blank and only feel, because she's so very tired of thinking, of worrying, of living.

But, he pulls back again, and opens her eyes again, and she takes in his disheveled hair, his rumpled shirt, his wet lips, his flushed cheeks, his worried eyes.

"Hermione, are you okay?"

And she doesn't know how to respond. No. Not at all. But she can't tell him that, so she nods, a tiny movement, but doesn't say anything, doesn't want to talk about it, doesn't want to even think about it. She wants to forget, if only for tonight.

"Hermione, if there's something wrong, I'm here for you."

And he's not looking at her, but down at the ground, at the grey stone of the floor and shiny black of his shoes.

"I- I care for you. I want you to be happy."

And he's looking at her again and he just looks so sad and she doesn't want to think about it. She doesn't want to think about how much he's doing for her, how much of his life she's taking, how little she can give him in return.

So, she smiles and she shakes her head and she tries to speak, confidently, to reassure him, but she whispers and her voice cracks and she knows he doesn't buy it, but it doesn't matter, because he's back on her in seconds, the heat of him before her and the frigidity of the wall behind her and almost let her mind go blank, almost let her believe it's all okay.

It was just when his hand had finished trailing up her thigh, when he was finally reaching the warmest part of her, that she heard the ending of a quiet click-clack of polished shoes, a polite cough into a fist, the words of the last person she wanted to see or think about or hear or know of.

"I'm sorry to interrupt, but it is past curfew and public displays of affection are-"

And he stops, realizing, as Alphard rests his forehead against Hermione's, as he lets his fingers drop from her underwear but remain on her thigh, as they both take deep breaths, not taking into mind how incredibly bothered and mussed up they look, who these people are.

Hermione looks up at him, sees his mouth open and close before he composes himself once again. Alphard draws away from her, leaving behind an insignificantly tiny gap, but she can't help but suddenly feel unsafe anyways.

It's quiet.

Only a dripping from somewhere down the hall sounding between them and Hermione doesn't want to look at him, but she has to.

And he's about to speak, she knows he is, but Alphard steps in, Alphard recovers, and Alphard saves her, like always.

"Riddle, I know you're Head Boy and all, but won't you let my lovely fiance," he brushes her cheek minutely, looking into her eyes, before turning back to Tom, "Get some head, boy?"

She could swear he almost blushed.

She sees his jaw clench and he shakes his head carefully, as if making sure he doesn't show too much anger outwardly, carefully working to keep his emotions in check.

"I'm afraid public displays of affection are still against the rules."

And, for some reason, maybe because she sees the chance or because she doesn't want Alphard to have to save her again, she speaks.

"Well, if you left us be, it wouldn't exactly be a public display of affection, Tom."

And she smiles at his clenched jaw, at the white knuckles of his fists, at the glaciers of his eyes.

She can see Alphard's amusement, but he only kisses her cheek and says, "It's okay, Riddle, I'll go to my dorm now. Please take care of this beautiful young lady for me."

And she laughs lightly and kisses his cheek and he goes, waving and blowing kisses at her dramatically, and she can sense Tom's irritation and it only makes her happier.

"Do you need me to walk you to your dorm?"

Alphard rounds the corner and away from her view and Tom's words shake her out of the wonderful-ness of her fiance. She stares at his pink lips and white face and shakes her head.

"No, I think I can find my way."

And she begins walking away and, possibly just because she isn't feeling particularly shitty at that very moment, she brushes against him, smelling like sweat and perfume and Alphard, and whispers.

"Thank you for the flowers."

And she feels his shoulders sag and a breath leave him as she walks away.