AN: Thank you all for the support! It is very deeply appreciated!
"What do you mean you didn't ask her about Ron?"
Severus put his hands behind his back and scowled. "It didn't come up, and she was too upset about Lily for me to ask."
"How did Lily come into this?" Sirius was red.
"She and Potter discussed my memories last night, so she was afraid that she was preventing me from reach heaven and being with my beloved or some other nonsense such as that."
"You aren't doing this for Lily?"
"No!" Severus snapped. "I'm doing this so I find peace. The only way I was going to have any peace last night though is if I did not bring Ron up."
Sirius groaned.
"What was I supposed to do?" Severus threw up his hands. "She was on the floor weeping. Was I supposed to yell at her, 'Stop crying and tell me what you're fighting with Ron?'"
"Yeah," Sirius drawled as his hue returned to normal. "Even you're socially intelligent enough not to say that."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"It means you wouldn't know how to talk to a woman if your life depended upon it, although you were smart enough to allow Hermione to cry."
"I had little choice in the matter," Severus replied. "I cannot touch her, nor can I start banging pans to divert her attention from whatever is upsetting her."
"You would actually bang pots together to make a woman stop crying?"
"If that's what it took to dry her eyes, then yes."
"No wonder the ladies flocked towards you," Sirius lowered his voice.
"Fine, it may be an exaggeration to say I would bang pots and pans, but I have little idea of what else I could do. Usually I leave when a woman becomes hysterical, though in this circumstance that would have been unwise."
"It would've been," Sirius confirmed. "Still, I have to give you credit, you're learning how to talk to Hermione. At least you aren't completely hopeless."
Severus pursed his lips together.
"That being said, you can't wait much longer on this. There are some beautiful groupies looking in Ron's direction. You need to make it clear to Hermione that she has something to lose if she does not give him another chance."
"If he's looking at groupies then don't you think that would indicate he is unworthy of her?"
"If he think there's no hope for them, could you blame him for looking at groupies?"
"I can."
Sirius cocked his head.
"If his only interest in her is because she is attractive then we should be helping her find someone who cares about her on a deeper level."
"True." Sirius' glow dulled. "Pausanius does talk about two types of love, the base and the noble. Our only problem is that he thought the noble love was only reserved for an adolescent male and an older man."
"So you have been reading The Symposium."
"I'm on Aristophanes' speech, but I haven't begun to read it."
"That's the best part in my opinion."
"In other words, the most boring part." Sirius shook his head.
"Why do you think everything I like is boring?" Severus furrowed his eyebrows.
"Because it is."
Severus' frown deepened.
"Anyway, I liked how Eryximachus said love governed all things. Under the right circumstances, he claimed it could even cure disease."
"I have yet to see love cure anything."
"Of course you haven't. You've never experienced true love, and you're too cynical to see the effect it could have on anyone's life."
Severus' glow turned blue.
"Anyway, I'm convinced that Hermione's heart is sick, and the sooner you give her the medicine that is Ron Weasley, the sooner we can reach heaven," Sirius concluded.
"If Ron is looking at groupies, why does Hermione need to be the one to reconcile with him?"
"Because we're helping her, not him."
"I know, but asking her to grovel at the feet of a dunderhead seems to go against the spirit of the program."
"There we go." Sirius' glow brightened. "You didn't come up with this idea so it's inherently terrible."
"I'm trying to act in Hermione's best interests," Severus argued.
"Can't you act in your best interests for once and help me implement a plan that will make Hermione happy? You'll leave Purgatory much faster."
"I don't want to leave Purgatory if Hermione isn't happy!"
Sirius' eyes grew.
"I don't want to leave Hermione in the arms of a dunderhead!" Severus continued, his glow more intense than the morning star. "I don't want her to fit into some mold someone else created for her! I don't want her to suppress her feelings. That isn't true happiness, and we both know it."
"You care for her, don't you?"
Severus turned white as his glow faded.
"You do." Sirius pointed at him. "You genuinely care about her."
"I just want to accomplish this mission, that is all." If Severus could've huffed he would have.
"How much?"
"Excuse me?"
"How much do you care for her?"
"Enough to know your plan will never work."
"Prove it."
Severus raised an eyebrow.
"Talk to her about Ron. Figure out what's going on. If you're right, we can focus on finding her virtuous friend. If you're wrong then we reunite her with Ron," Sirius replied.
Severus turned his back to the other spirit.
"We both know that's the only way to get what we want."
"What about what Hermione wants?"
"Neither of us will know what she wants until this Ron thing is out in the open."
Severus glanced back.
"Ron was a major part of her life. It doesn't make sense for him to be absent from her. At least help her make peace with whatever happened."
Severus hung his head.
"Care enough about her to help her through this Ron thing, even if that means you don't get what you want."
"What would you know about what I want?"
"More than you think."
Without a word, Severus took his place on the sofa and put a book in front of him, his glow becoming bluer by the second.
Sirius stared at the man black, realizing that this mission was becoming more complicated by the day.
"Auntie Hermione!"
Before Hermione could react, two blond haired children burst into her office and hugged her, one on each leg.
"I'm so sorry," Draco chuckled. "I told them we would knock on your door to see if you were busy, but apparently I needed to make it clearer that they needed to wait for you to answer it before barging in."
"No, that's fine." Hermione embraced the children. "It's always great to see all of you again."
"We like seeing you too," the child on the right replied.
"Scorpius, Cassiopeia," Draco closed the door behind him. "Let's give Auntie Hermione some space before you knock her over."
The children backed away from her, both wearing sheepish grins.
Hermione knelt until she was eyes level with them. "What brings you here?"
"Daddy said we could buy a book," Scorpius replied.
"I good," Cassiopeia answered.
"That's so great to hear! I love it when you two are good."
"Indeed, they are doing an amazing job of learning how to feed and care for Bandit," Draco began.
"Good fewet," Cassie cut in.
"Yeah, except he ate my socks," Scorpius complained.
"I told you not to put them near his cage," Draco replied.
"I didn't like them anyway." Scorpius admitted.
"Why not?" Hermione asked.
"They were blue."
"You don't like blue?"
"I like blue, but socks are supposed to be white."
"No blue!" Cassie giggled.
Hermione glanced up at Draco. He exhaled.
"What's that?" Scorpius broke away from Hermione and darted towards her desk.
"Don't touch her desk."
The child pointed to a brown paper bag. "What is that?"
"I went to the store." Hermione took it down. "You can see what's in it."
Scorpius pulled out a yellow item. Cassie approached him and glanced at it.
"Measuring cups?" Draco asked.
"Oh yeah, Mummy has some." Scorpius examined them. "I can't play with them."
"You aren't allowed to play with these either." Draco took them from his hand and put them back onto Hermione's desk. "No offense, but why do you need these?"
"I'm learning how to cook."
Draco stared at her as if she'd just announced she was going to become a professional Quidditch player.
"Need coo book?" Cassie asked.
"Maybe," Hermione replied. "But right now I'm taking lessons from a teacher."
"Who?"
"He's uh," Hermione bit her lower lip. "His name is Dante Alighieri."
"He's named after an Italian poet from the 1300's?" Draco asked.
"That's what I said too when he introduced himself, but it's true. He showed me his ID, and it is in fact his name."
"Did he write a book?" Scorpius asked.
"The person who lived in the 1300's did, but my Dante has not."
"I'm sure he gets quite a few comments about his name," Draco noted.
"He does, which is why he likes to keep things secretive."
"I take it there's no chance of meeting him."
"Not in person."
Draco hummed.
"What?"
"Nothing," Draco replied. "It's just that you seem happy."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"It means you have a gleam in your eyes when you mention his name."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Hermione put the measuring cups back in her bag.
"No, you'd probably be the last know if you felt this way about anyone."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"It means." Draco glanced at his children. "We need to pick up your books before your mother gets worried about how late we're staying out."
"Books!" The children ran to the door.
"Stop!"
They both froze.
Draco approached Hermione and lowered his voice. "Thank you for not selling Rita's book. It was a relief to see you weren't participating in her smear campaign."
"I will admit to selling the first seventy-five copies I got, but I haven't ordered anymore. There's no room for that kind of shoddy journalism in a bookstore as respectable as mine."
"Thank you."
"There's no need to thank me," Hermione replied. "It was time I did the right thing."
"You are an amazing woman," Draco replied.
"I wouldn't say that." she sighed. "But I try to be."
"All that being said," Draco glanced down. "Children, say goodbye to Auntie Hermione."
They rushed over and embraced her again.
"Bye Auntie Hermione," Cassie began.
"Bye," Scorpius echoed.
She returned the embrace. "Goodbye. It is always so nice to see you both."
"Me too," Cassie answered.
"Me too," Scorpius echoed.
"Now." Draco began. "We are going to walk into the store and stick close together."
"Yes," they answered.
Draco held out his hands. Scorpius took one, and Cassie the other.
"Tell Dante I said hi and that if he ever wants to come out of his hiding place, I'd love to meet him," Draco replied.
"I'll let him know."
Together, the Malfoys strolled out of the room, leaving Hermione to wonder if she should have told Draco the whole truth.