Hellooo, I'm so glad you're here. A couple things -
First, I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters but this story idea is my own.
Second, MAJOR TRIGGER WARNING for abuse/assault. Please please mind your triggers.
Third, ...I don't have a third but I feel like two items in a list is a copout.
ENJOY 3
Hermione was exhausted when she arrived home and wanted nothing more than the comfort of her bed. Music was playing from her room and she walked in to see Ron dancing on his lonesome to none other than Dancing Queen.
A feeling of something that can be described only as sunshine filled her body as she silently watched the love of her life jump around in glee. Ron, in mid jump, noticed Hermione standing and screeched.
"Bloody hell, how long have you been there?"
"Mmm long enough to see your air guitar."
Ron buried his head into his hands and mumbled a, "Oh god," before Hermione walked over and wrapped her hands around him.
"And can I just say that it was the hottest air guitar I have ever seen."
Ron broke a grin. "Did you know these things," he showed her the muggle phone she made him get, "Play music? Like good music?"
Hermione smiled at his naivety, lying easily, "No I didn't, tell me more."
Hermione collapsed on her bed after cooking dinner for them, Ron cradling around her. "You seem tired," he mumbled into her ear, "How was the meeting with Kendra this morning."
Hermione paused; grateful he couldn't see the panic on her face. She evened her voice and answered, "Crappy. She's still pushing hard, and I haven't gotten any further on the case."
"You'll solve it 'Mione, I know you will." He pulled her close to him and was snoring into her ear a minute later. Hermione was wide awake, fatigue gone, trying to suppress her guilt. She did white lies often but those were harmless, for the sole purpose of making Ron happier but this lie felt different. It was eating away at her insides. Hermione carefully slipped out of Ron's grasp and stepped outside in nothing but her robe. She sat on the cold steps shivering, trying to breathe in the chilly air enough to extinguish the panic in her chest. It wasn't until Hermione saw the hint of orange start peeking out of the horizon that she forced herself back inside.
Blaise and Daphne were already in the conference room when she walked in the next morning. She felt a little uneasy having literally never conversed with them alone. "Uhm...morning!" She tried cheerily. Daphne rolled her eyes and looked back down at her parchment and Blaise grinned.
"Well top of the morning to ya too!" He said over the top, and Daphne snickered under her breath.
"Right." She nodded, placing herself on the other side of the conference table. They worked in silence until Seamus walked in and the tension immediately broke when he started on how a muggle driver had splashed him on purpose when he was walking to work, and could it be characterized as a hate crime?
"Considering the muggle probably did not know you and that there are puddles everywhere, I'd have to say no Seamus." She answered. He huffed and sat in front of her with a mumbled acknowledgement.
"So, who did you guys submit for Not Couple, Couple of the Year?" Blaise asked. She ignored him, Not Couple, Couple of the Year was a moronic thing that started at the ministry a couple years ago to help inter-colleague relations. She assumed it was because the war had caused such a decrease in wizard population that they were desperate for people to reproduce.
Either way, she always threw out the submission slips when they arrived on her desk. Did people really have nothing better to do? They chatted about submissions for the next couple minutes and Hermione drowned them out until she heard her name come up. She froze.
"Well, I submitted Malfoy and Granger. They do really bring…what's the word…passion." Daphne said. Hermione's eyes narrowed, who was this girl? She swore she had never spoken to her yet she had the audacity to enter her in a raffle without asking.
"You did what?" She spat. Seamus and Blaise's eyes were fixed on them like a tennis match.
"You heard me. Do you have a problem with that?"
"Yes, I do. I don't know about you, but I pride myself in my reputation of being career oriented and you have just dragged me into this stupid thing where my superiors will see."
"I think you mean your reputation of being a bore, at least this way something interesting happens in your life."
Hermione shot up and slammed her file down, "I may be a bore but that is my right to live as I please. This is my life, and you had no right to –."
Malfoy cleared his throat from the door. "Sorry to interrupt the hissy fit, but I do believe we're on a time crunch?" His face was hard.
She took a breath and sat back down, after giving Daphne a final glare. Malfoy walked over and sat next to her without saying another word. The next couple hours passed without any conversation, Hermione tried to work out more theories, but her brain was still stuck on Daphne's audacity. What is with these Slytherins and their inability to process how their actions affect others.
Malfoy slid a note to her without looking up from his pages. She glanced around at the others and their attentions were all downwards.
She cautiously opened the folded piece of parchment.
I can try and get the submission back if it bothers you so much.
She glanced up at him and his face was still hard, his eyes stuck on a spot on his page.
It's fine, she wrote back, people will just think I'm doing a little charity work with the nomination. Maybe this will finally be the year you're not despised.
His harshness broke and he rolled his eyes when writing,
Not everyone needs people to be worshipping the ground they walk on.
Hermione's breath caught in her throat as the words took her back to a dark library corner in third year where this sentence had been spoke before. His hand continued,
Don't tell me you're going to storm out again.
She took a moment, reeling at how much he remembered before she began,
I didn't think you recalled.
She glanced up at him, waiting but he just stared at the parchment. She thought he was about to write something, but he went back to his case. She hid her disappointment by shifting to offense.
I'm assuming you were able to write a competent paper. Considering you're not in Azkaban right now.
He glanced back at the parchment when she slid it to him but made no effort to write anything. It was a whole minute later that he finally wrote,
Yes, sorry to disappoint.
He shifted himself away completely, indicating that their little conversation was complete. Hermione stared at his clean scrawl for a minute more trying to decipher what he could possibly mean by 'disappoint'.
Of course, they've had their banter, but he couldn't possibly think she wanted him in Azkaban, could he?
Seamus got up, loudly announcing that he had to head back to work and the room slowly dwindled until it was just her and Malfoy that remained. He didn't speak nor make any move to leave and Hermione felt as though her heart was going to burst out of her chest.
"Why would I be disappointed?" She whispered so quietly she wasn't sure he heard. Hermione finally looked up at him, "Malfoy?"
She saw his jaw stiffen.
He grabbed his things in one swift motion and was gone before she could blink. What had just happened? Nothing really, but then why was she suddenly feeling guilty remembering Ron.
She buried her head in her hands and did her breathing exercises. She hadn't told anyone that the war had made her prone to anxiety attacks, but it was getting harder to hide.
"You have 45 seconds, Hermione." She mumbled to herself, "45 seconds to get your shit together."
It might have been 45 seconds or 45 minutes, but she finally looked back at the case files when she felt her chest not about to burst. Usually, solving a puzzle was the best way she calmed herself. Allowing her brain to get swept up in the art of problem solving and the outside world to fall away except this time the words blurred, and it wasn't until a single tear fell on the parchment that she realized she was crying.
She screamed internally, over the lies to Ron, the deadlines, the secret conversations.
Daphne walked into the conference room.
"I forgot my purse." She stated, not fazed by Hermione's dishevelled appearance or the tears running down her face. "I would also recommend a silencing charm before you start screaming, word travels fast around here."
Daphne grabbed her bag and left without another word as Hermione's head fell, suddenly exhausted. She couldn't even control her external monologue now? What was happening?
Hermione, barely able to stand, grabbed her things and apparated back to her loft without a second thought about the consequences of missing work.
Ron was fiddling with his phone when she arrived, quite surprised by her appearance.
"Hermione! You're home early, look, I got this thing, I think it's called an appilation, and it's so cool Hermione, you can like pick your character and then …", Ron's voice droned on and she didn't have it in her to chime in with the same excitement.
"Oh wow, cool."
"Er…okay someone's grumpy," He huffed.
"I'm just tired, I'm going to bed."
"Okay well excuse me for trying to be a positive person, bloody hell."
Hermione sighed, "I- what? Ron, I know I'm not fun right now, but I honestly just don't have it in me today."
"Don't have what in you? The ability to talk to your boyfriend who's been waiting for you to get home."
"Merlin's beard, Ron, maybe it's not about you. Maybe I'm just exhausted after spending all my days working my ass off! Maybe not everyone can just sit at home all the time!" There was a lull in time, no one spoke, no one breathed, and Hermione immediately regretted ever opening her mouth.
"Glad to know that's what you think of me babe," he stated blankly turning to leave.
"Shit, Ron, wait," She tried, grabbing his arm. "I didn't mean it; you know I didn't mean it."
His eyes were shut, "You need to get off of me 'Mione."
She ignored him and tried pulling him back to face her, "I'm sorry, fuck, I'm sorry."
"Hermione, get off of me." She ignored him again, moving herself to block him from exiting.
"You can't leave like this; we need to talk this out. Ron, I'm so sorry, I've just been so tired with trying to solve the case and running on almost no sleep, having to wake up early to meet the team in the mornings."
"Team? What team? You said it was just Kendra."
Hermione's breath left her lungs as she scrambled to repair her carelessness, "Yeah, Kendra's making me work with other people. It's no one really Ron, just Blaise, Daphne and Seamus." She said quickly.
"Why couldn't you tell me that."
"Because I didn't think it was important, please Ron." She pleaded.
"Not IMPORTANT," he was roaring now, "Stupid little Ron sitting at home doesn't need to know where Hermione Granger is, he's NOT IMPORTANT."
"That's not what I said." She tried louder, grabbing his shirt and pulling him closer, "You know I didn't mean it like that."
The next few seconds happened over an eternity, in one she was pleading with the man she loved trying to get him to understand and in another she was flying across the room, her back hitting the wall with a smack.
Her hands reached out behind her to catch her weight, but her wrist snapped in the process. Hermione was sitting on the floor, hunched over, trying to fathom how she had landed here. Because it couldn't be because of her best friend, he wouldn't do that. She looked up; wrist cupped with her good hand at Ron who was sitting with his head in his chest.
"I told you to get out of my way," he pleaded, not yet glancing at her.
Hermione tried to open her mouth to speak but nothing came out, her thoughts went back to sixth year when Lavender would show up to lecture with bruises on her arms, laughing, saying that she was just clumsy. Hermione didn't, in a million years, think it was Ron. Could it be? Was this her best friend? She couldn't even recognize him, and her mind was spiraling.
"What just happened?" She croaked, "Did you push me?"
Ron looked up from his hands, for the first time seeing his damage. His eyes travelled to Hermione's cupped, already bruising wrist and her scared eyes. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck." He hurried over to her side, and Hermione shrinked away from him.
"You pushed me." She stated, staring at him, baffled at the man she thought she knew.
"I- fuck, no, I'm so sorry. I wasn't thinking, I was so angry. God, Hermione, please know, I thought I was just pushing you out of the way, I didn't realize that…", his voice broke and his eyes brimmed with tears.
"You hurt me." Her voice was scratchy as she came to terms with the last 20 seconds. "You were angry, so you hurt me."
"What can I say to fix this? Fuck, listen, I lost control, Hermione, I just…"
"Get out," She interrupted.
"Hermione, please."
"You need to leave." She turned her head to stare at his face to solidify her request.
Ron sighed and nodded. "Please telephone me," he said with his voice cracking as he moved to collect his things and exit her flat.
Hermione held her breath until she heard the door close before falling into her lap, sobbing. Her entire world had changed in one minute, why had she even come home? All of this could've been avoided if she had just….
She stayed in the same position, unable to suppress the panic attack this time around. She couldn't breathe and her eyes wouldn't stop shedding tears for some reason.
"Breathe Hermione, breathe." She muttered to herself, over and over again until it was nothing but a jumble of sounds. Her consciousness left her at some point, and she descended into sleep.
Hermione woke up to darkness outside, still sitting on her living room floor. For a second she forgot the morning, for a second, she had woken up as the same Hermione Granger as the day before. She shifted and with it a sharp pain burst from her wrist as everything came crashing down.
Ron. Shit.
Her eyes were dried out now and her head felt less jumbled. First things first, she needed someone to look at this damn wrist. She wasn't sure how it would hold up under apparition, injuries tend to exacerbate themselves, she recalled.
Her clock chimed midnight, had she really slept all day?
Hermione moved slowly to check her phone and realized the 14 missed calls from Ron along with the 11 texts that had stopped coming around 6pm. All of them had the same gist, I'm sorry, I fucked up, it was an accident, please call me etc.
She wasn't sure if she believed him, let alone forgave him. How could one just accidentally push hard enough to merit a broken wrist? The probability was low, but she guessed it wasn't 0.
Hermione realized that in her state she would not be travelling anywhere soon and cast her own diagnostic charm. The fracture light gleamed and upon closer analysis, it indicated that it was a hairline fracture. At least it wasn't broken. Hermione transfigured herself a cast, she would get someone to look at it tomorrow.
Now that that was taken care of…no she couldn't begin to analyze Ron. Even thinking about him brought a new bubble of anxiety. She had to talk to someone though, Harry and Ginny were off limits, she wasn't sure how she felt about Ron, but she knew she wasn't ready to make that decision.
She slowly realized that she had no one else. When had she let herself get so isolated?
Hermione sighed and leaned against the wall again, her only anchor to the world.
Lavender she thought, even though she had died in the war, Parvati might know if anything like this had happened before.
Hermione reached for some parchment and began writing,
Parvati,
I hope you're well.
She paused. She couldn't very well just ask, hey do you remember if your dead best friend ever got hurt due to my current boyfriend. It took her 4 sheets of parchment attempts to arrive at an acceptable enough letter and she sent it off without over analyzing it again.
Hermione put on some tea and stared at her clock until it was a reasonable enough hour to head to work. She examined her wrist, there was an ache, but her cast had held up enough.
She needed to get through today without it causing any issues. There was no way Kendra would be okay with her taking a leave, having already missed a whole day and only four days left to solve the case before her glorious ministry job turned into dung.
Hermione walked into the conference room, positive that she would be the only one present an hour before they had to meet but was greeted by Malfoy.
Well, greeted is a big word, more like he grunted at her before she placed herself across from him. Hermione carefully placed her arm on the table before reaching into her satchel and pulling out the files.
She was an hour into the blissful silence she needed to get lost in the world of mysteries when a sharp gasp interrupted her.
"Granger, what if the robbers – ", he paused abruptly at the sight of her cast. "What happened there?" He asked in a much less enthusiastic voice.
"Doesn't matter, what were you saying? The robbers?"
"What happened to your wrist?" He said forcefully.
"What were you saying?" She tried just as strongly.
Malfoy got up and walked over, gingerly touching her cast. "This is homemade, you haven't even gone to the Healers yet? I thought you were supposed to be responsible." He looked up, his piercing gaze meeting Hermione.
Her thoughts drifted back to Ron and the dreadful morning, thoughts she had worked all night to supress. She could feel her eyes filling with tears and shoved her wall into place.
"It is absolutely none of your business, Malfoy." She tried in the most spiteful tone she could muster, "If you have forgotten, you said that you owe me. I am now cashing that in, so, for the love of god, finish your fucking sentence."
Malfoy gazed at her for an extra second before moving away, "Very well. I was just saying that what if the robbers never left."
Hermione's brain felt like it got electrocuted and, just then, the door opened to let in the rest of their team.
What if they never left, what if they were still there when Gringotts opened up. It would explain how they got in and out without transportation magic available. What if they simply stayed there until it closed, grabbed the loot and left as normal customers the next day, over even after a couple days.
"Seems like we missed something," Blaise said eyeing Hermione.
She opened her mouth and her theory, well Malfoy's theory along with her thoughts, came tumbling out.
"Its possible," Daphne started, "It would require an awful lot of Imperio for the goblins and guards to forget that they let them in but never let them out in the same day, how did we miss that."
"Because we were investigating the wrong guards!" Seamus exclaimed, "If the robbers were smart, the ones of importance wouldn't have been working anywhere near when the loot actually went missing."
The conference room buzzed with excitement and Hermione breathed for the first time in what felt like days. She glanced at Malfoy to communicate her thanks, but his eyes were still lingering on her cast.
Her brain had pushed out Malfoy's weird behaviour by the time she was back in her office, her thoughts completely wrapped up with the case. A couple hours later, she had drafted up a proposal and was precisely checking the timing and facts when a knock interrupted. She immediately thought of Ron, half hoping it was him and half wishing it was anyone but.
"Come in," She called.
A women in a blue healers coat walked in, her eyes were kind. "Hello Ms. Granger, I was called to do a check up on your wrist."
"Oh, what? By whom?"
"A Mr. Weasley I believe."
She sighed, of course Ron was concerned about her even though this was his bloody fault. "Oh, okay, I did put a cast on it but I'm not a healer."
The women, Healer Tringh, she learnt was her name, carefully took apart her cast and performed various diagnostic and healing charms, some even Hermione didn't recognize. Her wrist felt better instantly, she had become accustomed to the throbbing and felt an emptiness without it.
"I'm going to place a new cast on it, but you should be able to remove it by tomorrow. Until then, no heavy lifting Ms. Granger." She opened her mouth to say more but decided against it.
It wasn't until she was at the door, on her way out that she finally spoke up again, her eyes were less cheery and had a heaviness to them, "Ms. Granger, there were some bruises picked up on the diagnostic charm along your back and rear." She paused; her lips tight. "Do you need help?"
Hermione inferred that the healer was not referring to the bruises and answered with a light tone, "Not at all, thank you Healer Tringh, I'm just clumsy."
The healer gave her a curt nod and exited; Hermione left with the hollow of the missing pain. When had she become the woman people were concerned about? Her entire life, she had been capable, the least of anyone's worries.
Even with Harry and Ron…Ron…her mind drifted over their relationship. The strength of their friendship and even still, injured by him, she knew, without a doubt, that if it ever came to it, Ron would give up his life for hers.
She wasn't sure if she could forgive him yet but surely, she owed him a chance to explain. Hermione pulled out her phone and sent him a text asking him to meet her at home and his reply was instant, an affirmation. Her mind both whirring ahead at the possibilities of what their talk could bring and stuck on the fact of seeing him again gave her a headache and she quickly diverted her attention to the proposal to keep her mind busy.
Hermione entered her loft with caution, suppressing the anxiety, looking around to locate the familiar flaming red hair. She saw him before he noticed her, his head on his hands at their living room table and she cleared her throat.
"Hermione, hi," His face looked exhausted with deep bags under his eyes. His hair was dishevelled, and he was wearing the same clothes as the other morning. "Thank you for, um, coming."
"Well yes, I was the one that texted you." Her arms were crossed, and she tried to muster as much confidence she could, trying to mask how desperately she wanted comfort in his arms. She hadn't realized she had already forgiven him until now, hating herself for how easily she was able to do so.
"Um, yes, right." His eyes fell back down to the table and Hermione softened. She knew him like the back of her hand, probably better than she knew herself. She knew he was beating himself over this more than she was, and she believed him when he said it was an accident and that it would never happen again.
"I know, Ron," She whispered, "I was just surprised. I never thought you'd be the one to hurt me."
His eyes closed, and his face fell in pain, his voice cracking when he spoke again, "Me too, Hermione. I've gone through that morning so many times in my head thinking about what I should've done differently and I just –." His face contorted in agony, "I am so unbelievably sorry."
"Okay," she said barely above a whisper.
"What?" His eyes looked back up at her, this time with a sliver of hope.
"I said okay Ron, I believe you."
He walked over carefully, like a sudden movement might scare her away, "Are you sure?"
"Yes. Of course, I'm sure, have I ever been wrong before?"
His face cracked into a grin and he barreled the rest of the way to her, clutching her to his chest. "Brightest witch of her age AND my girlfriend wow," he said into her hair.
Her tension left her body as she accepted him, "I know, how did you get so lucky?"
"I have no idea," He muttered.
His face leaned back, hesitant and Hermione smirked, closing their distance with her lips on his. His kiss was soft, filled with apologies and promises for tomorrow and hers accepting. Because isn't that what love is? To accept the other's flaws wholeheartedly. They made love that night, Hermione completely unaware of the precarious balance her life had just come to.