Hermione insisted Charlie spend the evening after the Hogwarts Alumni Charity Benefit Quidditch Match unwinding in the bath.
"There's no need," he said as she engorgio-ed the bathtub in her parents' house to something closer to the size of a luxury hot tub.
"Nonsense," she said as she gripped the sweaty T-shirt he had worn under his quidditch robes and peeled it off of him. "Especially after that nasty fall you and Malfoy took at the end."
Hermione caught Charlie's arm to examine the green streak over the bruise forming in the usual place. She was beginning to know where and how he was most likely to injure himself on a broom.
"No matter what his parents called him," Charlie said, "that Draco is not a dragon. He's not nearly as fearsome as the creatures I typically fly against."
"Of course he isn't," Hermione said, working at his belt buckle now. "But physical strain isn't the only stress you've had today. What with Astoria turning out to be - "
"Listen," Charlie interrupted. "I'll soak in a bathtub like some effete pretty boy IF you come along with me."
She scoffed through a smile as his trousers hit the floor and she linked her arms around his neck. "Charles Prewett Weasley, you are very pretty. And have you ever got into a bathtub alone? And I don't mean to stand in one having a shower."
"You know, I don't think I have," he said, swaying with her in his arms and faking a frown as he tried to remember, his bare arms around her waist. "And I don't mean it in a sexy way. I'm the second born of a large family that lived in a country house with a small well, so Mum did tend to double and triple us up for baths."
She laughed.
"It isn't funny, Princess Only Child. That's large family life for you. It's not all big parties and full quidditch squads. There's hand-me-down clothes, communal bathwater, we share everything."
At this, she gasped and batted at his chest.
Charlie realized his mistake, stammering. "No, not - I didn't mean to say - it's different with you, of course - Ronnie and I, we never think of it as - "
"Enough," she said, still smirking as she stepped out of his arms. "Stop jabbering and get into the bath. I'll be back in a minute."
"To join me," Charlie insisted.
"I'll make no promises."
She also hadn't refused. Charlie noted it as he eased himself into the water.
Hermione came back to find him looking very comfortably lost in soap bubbles up to his chest, his arms stretched out along the edges of the tub, his hair slicked away from his forehead and curling over his ears and his neck. She had brought back a steaming dish of a dodgy noodle casserole he would be happy to eat, and she sat down to spoon feed his portion to him as he soaked.
"You know," she began when they had finished eating and she was scrubbing at his grass-stained arm, "you've known me almost all of my life. And I think it may be fair to say you already know all the trivia about me you may ever care to know."
Charlie raised his eyebrows and rubbed his face with his wet palm. "I wouldn't say that."
"Well, alright," she said, handing back his stain-free arm. "But what I mean is, sometimes I feel so close to you, I forget there are things - little stories and facts mostly - that I don't actually know about you."
Charlie rumbled a laugh and reached for her hand, dragging it beneath the water, holding it against his stomach. "What do you want to ask, Hermione? Say it."
"I want to know about your first kiss," she blurted.
His reaction was not what she expected. He didn't laugh or roll his eyes. Instead, he grew quiet, sad, patting her hand beneath the water as if comforting her. "Are you sure? It was someone you know," he said. "Or rather, someone you knew."
She leaned forward, slightly over the edge of the tub, smoothing his hair with her free hand. Her voice was quiet, reverent. "Tonks?"
He nodded. "And not because Mum wanted us to," he said. "It was long before Mum knew her, while we were still in school, before either of us joined the Order. We'd already tried it on and ruled it out by the time Mum thought of it. Didn't have the heart to tell her."
The more he talked about it, the easier it got, as if Hermione was watching him process a little grief he had never before reckoned with. She prodded him for more. "You can tell me how it happened."
"Sixth year," he began. "Gryffindor was hosting Hufflepuff for a party in the tower and some randy genius had the idea to play one of those games where you're sent off to snog someone while everyone else waits. Perfect combination of boredom and ick."
Hermione remembered those games, shuddering. "So fate thrust the two of you into a cupboard together at a party?"
"Not exactly," he said. "Tonks didn't want to play the game at all but then someone called her a coward and it was on. So to get out of the snogging part, she had me promise we'd cheat the spin and wind up together, and then just wait out our seven minutes and come back to the party unscathed. But, uh - once we left she - well, she must have changed her mind."
"That's my Charlie's irresistible appeal," Hermione said. "Honestly, have I ever gone anywhere alone with you and not ended up in a snog?"
He breathed a laugh. "Maybe not, but with us, at least half the time it's me coming at you. Not with Tonks." He shook his head, as if he still didn't understand it. "They sent us into the boys' stairwell. We left hand in hand, and once the door closed she didn't let go, like I thought she would. Then after a minute, she had me pushed up against the wall. And I thought it was probably time someone kissed me, so I let her. I liked her and everything, and it was nice enough, but I just felt so - polite about it. We tried it a few more times without both our houses gloating over it, but - I could never go full werewolf on her and it seems that was what she was looking for all along."
Hermione huffed and tossed her head. "You may not be a werewolf but you've still managed to break plenty of the furniture in this house manhandling me."
"Speaking of manhandling," Charlie said, tugging sharply at her wrist, toppling her into the bathtub with him, fully clothed.
She squealed and thrashed as he laughed, gathering her into his arms, sopping clothes and all.
"Charlie Weasley!"
"Oh, let's make the best of it, love. Vanish your clothes. You'll be much more comfortable."
She swatted at him, trying hard to look cross but fighting a grin. "Honestly, I was going to get in on my own in just a few minutes."
"Yes, I should have waited. Forgive me, darling. And let me help you." He summoned a hair tie from the counter.
"Nevermind," Hermione said, using her wand to refresh the bubbles and send her clothes off to dry before binding up her hair herself. "I know what you're doing. You don't want me to ask you about any more girlfriends and you're trying to distract me."
Charlie slid closer to her in the warm, wet tub. "I do admit I am not at all interested in other women at this moment. But if you want me to tell you about Jelena, from Ukraine, who I met in dragonology school - "
"Another time, maybe," Hermione said, letting him pull her close. "For now, I just wanted to know about your first kiss."
"Because you want to tell me about yours," he finished, dropping a kiss on her forehead.
She blinked. "What makes you say that?"
He laughed softly against her ear. "Well, if I was a girl whose first kiss was international quidditch sensation Viktor Krum, I think I'd like to mention it every once in a while."
She didn't laugh along.
Charlie nudged her with his shoulder, sending ripples rolling beneath the bubbles. "It's not supposed to be a secret, is it? Everyone at home knows your first kiss wasn't Ron. That caused a lot of trouble between the two of you, didn't it? With Lilac Bronze?"
Hermione blew out her breath, sending foamy bubbles drifting in front of her face. "I told you, it's Lavender Brown, Charlie. And yes, it did cause heaps of trouble," she said. "It set Ron and I back at least a year. But just because my first wasn't Ron, it doesn't mean it had to be Viktor."
Charlie hummed. "A third person. Intriguing. Someone from school?"
She squirmed slightly. "Yes."
"Well, it's not Harry. But knowing you, whoever he was, he must have played quidditch."
She whimpered. "Yes."
"Do I know him?"
She bowed her head, nearly dunking her face in the water. "Yes."
"Wood? Was it Oliver Wood? Well done, Hermione."
"No, it's not Wood," she said. "Stop guessing and let me tell you - "
"It's Malfoy," Charlie said. His tone was flat, matter-of-fact, betraying nothing about how he felt about it. Whether he was angry or embarrassed or thought it was hilarious, no one could have told.
The water sloshed audibly as Hermione jumped. "You knew?"
He pulled her close again, kissing her cheek, his forehead against her temple. "Not at first but the longer you talked about it, the more the timing of this conversation made sense."
"You're not ashamed of me? For sneaking away from my friends and allies to snog a junior Death Eater?" she stammered.
Charlie took her chin between his fingertips and turned her face to kiss her mouth. What hadn't been obvious in his tone of voice was made clear with his kiss. It didn't matter. Nothing that happened with anyone else in her past mattered. If Charlie cared about that, he wouldn't have married his brother's ex-fiancee. He loved her, the person all of her experiences had made her into in this moment, even the experiences she wasn't proud of. He loved her just like that.
He pulled back, smoothing away the damp curls clinging to her forehead. "Everyone has a past, an adolescence full of questionable decisions. Only yours unfolded in the middle of a life and death crisis in a school full of terrified child soldiers. What kind of monster would blame you for who you ended up finding comfort in during all of that?"
With a great splash, she threw her arms around his neck. "Thank you, Charlie," she said. "For what it's worth, I was never in love with him. We just seemed to stumble across one another whenever Ron and I had a particularly bad falling out. And that first kiss, during the Yule Ball after Ron convinced me Viktor was just using me and made me feel worthless and foolish - it was a stupid place to take solace but..."
Charlie hushed her. "It was what you could find."
She sat back, looking up at him, near tears. "And I wasn't hiding it from you. It's just something I wanted to forget. But when I saw you with Astoria today, your big blue eyes so struck by the sight of her - oh, it's stupid but a bit of me was jealous. She's so beautiful and tragic, and the connection between the two of you, all the feeling there - it's strong."
Charlie held her even closer. "That's only because the circumstances in which we met were so dire," he said. "I'm heartbroken over her loss. But beyond that, I don't even know her."
"Yes, and it's not even that I resent what either of you must have been feeling," she said. "I mean it when I say I was proud and happy that you helped a stranger in distress. So when I tried to figure out why I was jealous, I had to trace it back to my own behaviour. And maybe I was projecting the jealousy I imagined you might have over teenaged me and Malfoy onto myself. Is that crazy?"
"Barking," Charlie said, bumping his nose against her cheek. "Look, as long as you're not involved with Malfoy now, there's nothing for me to be jealous of, right? You don't still want to kiss him, do you?"
"No!" She sat back, covering her mouth, laughing at herself for shouting in the close quarters of the bathroom. "No, I don't. It's not like that. I don't think it was ever Draco himself I was attracted to."
Charlie scoffed. "Oh come now, he's well-fit enough. Ask me. I had a thorough, up-close and personal encounter with him today. Maybe you should be jealous of his feelings for me."
Hermione laughed. "That was a rather racy pose the pair of you were in by the end of the match."
Charlie groaned. "Yeah, can't wait to see the papers. He's completely mad, you know."
"As always."
"Yes, well he felt me up like I was a contraband dragon and he was a black-market beast dealer sizing me up to smuggle me off." Charlie shuddered.
She was laughing louder now. "Is that why you threw him through the air like that? It was quite spectacular. Malfoy. And no, he is not at all my type. What Astoria must like about him - his posh looks and style, the money and pedigree, his excuse for wit - it was never about that for me. It was something more situational. It existed between us rather than within either of us alone. Some kind of..."
"Intensity?" Charlie tried when she didn't finish.
She began to nod. "Maybe that's it. Whatever it was, I never would have touched him if he hadn't appeared in the right place at the right time." She cupped Charlie's cheek with her hand, speaking softly. "Being with Malfoy was something I only did when I was a child in despair. Thanks to time, I'm no longer a child. And thanks to you, Charlie Weasley, I am nothing like in despair."
The interlude in the tub ended as both Charlie and Hermione knew it would. And afterward, in their bed, the sheets still slightly damp, Charlie slept with his head high on Hermione's chest, his torso curved to partly cover hers. The baby was not yet big enough to be crowded by him. The quidditch match and the bath and the round with Hermione had taken more out of him than he realized. His breaths were deep, his sleep heavy and satisfied. From beneath him, Hermione stared up at the ceiling, languidly caressing his hair, almost dry now.
How could he keep doing this - doing and saying things that made her love him more and more? Was there any limit to it? His kindness, maturity, his security in himself and their relationship, his willingness to stay put, to open up and talk until they understood each other as perfectly as two people can - all of it was gorgeous. She loved it even more than she loved his forearms.
She laughed quietly to herself and it was enough to make Charlie stir, rolling away, onto his back to settle into a deeper sleep.
She pulled in a breath and released it, reaching for her wand. Mad, wet, post-bath sex was fun but she really should dry the sheets or they'd never get a good night's sleep. She flicked the drying spell over the bed and draped a quilt over sleeping Charlie. With a light kiss on his shoulder, she left the bed and went to an armchair by the window where her father used to read to her. She had brought a book with her, still reduced to the size of a cube small enough to palm in one hand. It was the book Astoria had lent her.
Flaming Malfoy, she thought to herself as she sat in the chair, the unopened book on her lap. It had been odd seeing him today. In spite of losing the snitch to Charlie, and even despite his and Astoria's struggles with pregnancies, he seemed happier than she had seen him since their fourth year of school. She had expected that, but to see it for herself was something else. It made her glad.
They hadn't spoken to each other since that frantic year of war. And she hadn't touched him since her sixth year in school, the last one he'd attended. It was the week Harry had attacked and nearly killed Draco in a bathroom, gashing his chest and face with a dark spell.
It had added even more violence and tragedy to a school year already full of drama and disappointment. She really had thought things would change between herself and Ron after he was poisoned in Slughorn's office. While he'd lain in the hospital wing, she could swear she'd heard him moan her name in his suffering. Ginny said she heard it too.
But Lavender kept visiting him anyway, watching him sleep, or pretend to sleep. Whatever he was doing, he wasn't breaking up with her. He cared, but not enough. Even after a brush with death, he didn't care enough to be brave and move Lavender out of the way so he could come to Hermione.
She was on her way back from the library, walking slowly, not ready to go back to the dormitory. What she wanted wasn't another night of fretting over Ron's apparent indifference to her, agonizing over when he might stop ignoring Lavender and break up with her. She wanted fresh air and a glimpse of the sky, even if it was dark.
As she reached the top of the stairs to the astronomy tower, she saw someone was already there. Draco was leaning over the railing on the observation deck, the wind ruffling his hair. Even from behind, she recognized him from across the tower. Her foot scuffed against the stone floor as she lurched to a stop. He spun around, wand drawn as if ready to attack, or in his mind, to defend himself.
His cheeks were darker than usual, flushed, his eyes narrowed, squinting through the dimness to find the intruder. She didn't reach for her own wand. She wasn't afraid, but she was curious. Since the fight with Harry, she hadn't been able to take a close look at Draco's injured face. Now that no one else was watching, she would risk it.
Seeing Hermione was alone, Draco lowered his wand. He said nothing as she walked toward him, but the flush in his cheeks stayed. He kept silent even as she got close enough to raise her fingers to the thin, silver line of the cut almost completely healed on his cheekbone.
"Aren't you tired of the nurse act after all that time in the hospital wing with Weasley?" is what Draco said, though he didn't flinch away from her touch.
She ignored his attempt at a cutting remark. "Will it scar?"
The tension in his shoulders slipped a bit, relieved that they were going to play nice when he needed it most. "Hardly at all. Not like the wound on my chest. That's mine for life. If Snape hadn't been so close when Potter tore me open..."
His voice trailed off as the hand she held to his face drifted down to rest on his shoulder, while her other hand settled gently on his chest, touching his shirt lightly over the closed wound. "Yes, it's awful. Harry was very wrong to do this," she said. "I told him so. I kept telling him even after people started piping up to defend him."
"He'll never admit it," Draco said, swallowing hard. "It's been days and he's never apologized and never will. No one's even asked him to."
This was true, and it pained her. How was Harry supposed to learn from his mistakes when no one would call them that? Someone in authority should have DONE something.
In all the talking with teachers and heads of house, there was something else Draco had yet to hear. It was exactly what Hermione Granger had just said: that Harry Potter had been wrong to do it. Draco's friends had said so, but they took his side even when they knew he was in the wrong, so their support lacked something.
And then Potter's punishment had been sickeningly light. No suspension, no written reprimand, just bloody detention and some missed quidditch matches. No, none of the teachers cared. Why would they when Draco's parents - the same people who had leapt to demand an inquiry and justice for him when a hippogriff grazed his arm - they hadn't come near the school this time. They couldn't. His father…
At the thought of his father in prison, Draco slumped forward, his head bowing onto the shoulder of the last person he should have gone to for comfort - the girl almost killed in the incident that had landed Lucius in Azkaban.
Hearing Hermione Granger, of all people, say Potter was wrong and should be sorry was too kind. But he was a greedy child, and he took it anyway. his head on her shoulder, his arms closed around her, and he let out his breath against her skin.
In return, she held him tightly, clasping her arms around his torso. "You didn't deserve this," she whispered.
"I did though," he said, his voice weak, breathy in her ear. "Or at least, I will deserve it. Soon."
"No," she said. "Whatever it is, you don't have to listen to them. Let us help you - "
"I don't want their help. Potter and Dumbledore - all of the teachers. Even if they could help me, no one would want to."
She hushed him, her hands stroking his back. "What about me? What can I do? Whatever is tormenting you, it can't be worse than what I've helped get Harry through in the past. Tell me. Let me help."
He raised his head from her shoulder but instead of standing to his full height, his posture remained tipped toward her, his forehead against hers now. She waited, her breath coming fast. He still smelled like her first kiss, only lusher, older, more alluring. This close, his presence was overwhelming, intense, attractive in a strange way, different from what drew her to Ron, unequal to it, but compelling in a way that made her feel enchanted. If she didn't step away now…
Still she waited, hoping he'd tell her something, put to rest Harry's unhinged suspicions - or maybe confirm them once and for all.
But Draco said nothing, his eyes closed, breathing her breath. The tilt of his neck was slowly changing. He was not going to tell her anything, but he was going to kiss her - or let her kiss him. She bobbed forward in the same instant he did, their mouths meeting with greater speed and force than either of them expected.
Rather than retreating from the accidental intensity of the kiss, they flung themselves into it. He heard a muffled squeal of surprise rise from her throat. He devoured it, and worked at her mouth trying to elicit a second one. It wasn't enough to feel and smell and taste her. He wanted to hear her too.
She pulled her arms from beneath his, letting go of her hold on his back to grip his head, her fingers in his hair. It felt as lovely as it looked, long enough on top for her to sense how silky and luxurious it was, short enough at the nape of his neck to rasp against her palms, like an itch scratched.
She wasn't close enough and he lifted her onto her tiptoes with a fist in the small of her back. There it was, as he boosted her upward, another squeal. He thrilled at it and he lifted her higher, one open hand on the outside of her thigh now, letting her know he wanted her clinging to him, her legs clamped around his waist.
She almost did it, almost hopped up into his arms to fold her body around his, closer than anyone had ever been to her. If she was the kind of person who could stop thinking, she would have done it. And then…
But as it was, his hand on her thigh, pulling at her, jolted her out of the spell of kissing him. She broke her mouth away from his, her eyes open. "I need to leave," she said.
He gave a tremulous nod, closing his mouth as he set her feet flat on the floor again. Just like the first time, he hadn't opened his eyes. Still holding his head, she kissed both of his eyelids. "Draco, look at me," she said.
He did, grey eyes glistening in the tower's moonlight, shadows of dark circles beneath them. "Get some sleep," she said. "And remember to ask for help. Goodnight."
She kissed his mouth once more in parting, intending for it to be quick, maybe even sweet. But they couldn't manage it, and with a final long, hot kiss, they left each other without another word.
In the chair where she now sat, still not yet reading the book Draco's wife had lent her, she shook the memory out of her head. From across the room, Charlie's deep, sleepy breathing cleared her mind of the past.
She was not in love with Draco Malfoy and never had been. But when the time came to visit Malfoy Manor to read the second book, she may as well guard against any strange feelings on either side by taking Charlie with her.
With that, she turned her attention to reading the runes of the book in her lap. She hadn't even finished the first page when she clucked her tongue and flipped it over to read the title from the spine. "No. Oh, what a bother," she muttered to herself.
Astoria had brought the wrong book to the quidditch match. It was an old one, a rare one, but not the right one. It wasn't about Occlumency potions at all. It was a book of spells for human fertility.