Long after their soup was finished, their bottles were empty, and Madam Rosmerta had come to collect their trays (Viktor managed to survive the encounter with the busty barmaid without visible reaction, much to Hermione's private disappointment), Viktor moved their chairs towards the window overlooking Hogsmede's main thoroughfare so they could sit in the bright light of the afternoon and relax in each other's company.
"I am surprised your friends have not come to find you," he observed as they watched a couple arguing on the street below.
Hermione smiled. She was sure that if Ginny or Luna had any issue with Viktor, they would have dragged her away long before now. As it was, they knew her well enough to understand how much she needed this.
"They probably went back to the castle," she replied as she laid her head on the back of the seat so she could look at him. "I imagine they are both waiting in the common room to pounce on me as soon as I walk through the door - even though technically speaking Luna shouldn't go there."
Viktor chuckled, and the sound was warmer than the light on her face. "I know the feeling. Filip and Mikhail wanted to come with me today, but I… I told them not to."
"Why?" Hermione asked with interest. The man on the street below began flailing his arms at his partner, and Hermione watched the lady he was with as her eyes reduced to slits. There was a particular kind of smugness that came from being content and at peace with a person while watching more demonstratively 'passionate' pairings - who the world would generally use as their model for 'in love' - tear strips off each other.
Viktor eyed her smile but didn't ask more details. He did, however, open up his arms and stretch towards her, wordlessly inviting her in for a cuddle. It was an invite Hermione could hardly refuse. She shifted her chair closer to his until their seats were touching, then she laid her torso against his and felt his arms close around her. It was slightly too warm to be truly comfortable, but she was in no rush to make any complaints.
"Why didn't you want them to come?" Hermione asked curiously, and Viktor's arms tightened fractionally.
"I find that my friends like you very much, which is a good thing, most of the time. Filip was annoyed when I said no, but it has been too long since I have seen you, and I did not want to share."
Hermione was pleased with Viktor's reply and more pleased that he couldn't see what she imagined was a rather silly expression on her face. "Softie," she said affectionately and pulled her head from against his chest to rest her cheek on his shoulder. "I'm glad, though. I like your friends, but I like you more."
"Good to know," Viktor replied with amusement and began to play with the end of one of her curls.
"Your parents, on the other hand," Hermione said teasingly, and Viktor snorted.
"Mean."
They lapsed into silence as the couple outside began yelling. They weren't loud enough to be heard entirely clearly, but as the woman suddenly rushed forward to attack the man with a bunch of half wilted tulips, they could pick up enough to realise she was seriously displeased.
Hermione lost interest in the world outside of the small room as Viktor began to rub her back. She snuggled further into his hold and rested one of her hands on his chest. Her fingers pressed against the luxuriously soft feel of his jumper, and her eyes closed as the sun moved higher in the sky. For a moment, she was desperately afraid she might fall asleep and then, peaceful as she would have been, she would have wasted all of their time together.
"Tell me about your matches?" she asked as she blew some of her hair out of her face. "How is everything going with the team." To Hermione, someone that had always excelled when working alone, the idea of being part of a team and the relationships therein being a significant determining factor of success, fascinated and terrified her in equal measure.
"Really?" Viktor asked with mock astonishment. "Are you still my girlfriend who does not care for Quidditch?"
"I am a girlfriend who is interested in the life of her boyfriend, who happens to play Quidditch," Hermione responded primly and Viktor laughed before shuffling down further into his seat so he could relax more.
"Well," he began as if having to think about the question. "We have been winning every game, as was expected of us-"
"-I know that much," Hermione interjected impatiently. Honestly, did he think she took no interest in his career at all? She had no interest in many things, but if it were important to her friends, she would make herself knowledgeable about it, if at all possible. She couldn't count the number of books she had read trying to understand what Luna was talking about half the time, not that any of the additional reading helped.
Against the protests of her comfortable limbs, Hermione wrenched herself out of Viktors' grasp, laughing at his little moan of dissent. She crossed the room to the door where she had dropped her stuff so she could go through her bag. It was, as usual, in a state of organised chaos and it took her a while of sorting through the 'just in case' stuff she carried around until she could find what she was looking for.
"Here," she said eventually and walked back over to their comfortable set up. She proffered Viktor the notebook she took everywhere, and he took it, though he looked at the circumspect front cover with marked confusion.
Hermione settled back into her seat and tried not to be nervous as Viktor leafed through one of her most prized, and personal possessions. His match fixings for the year were stapled to the first page, and she had written up brief notes from each match; the overall score, clippings from papers and some crude statistics. It was a journal of sorts, somewhere for her to put all of the information pertinent to him and his team so that she would remember it when writing him letters or trying to imagine where he was in the world or what he might be feeling. She had never expected to show it to him. Hermione was learning that despite what she might have thought, she was very much an 'actions speak louder than words' type of person.
"This is…" Viktor said as he ran his fingers over a heavily annotated page.
Hermione fiddled with her fingers and tried not to look apprehensive. She had never felt more like a fan-girl in her life. Well, apart from when Gilderoy Lockhart had taught at the school, but the less said about that, the better. At least she had resisted little hearts in the margins this time.
"Weird?" she asked anxiously, and Viktor shook his head.
"No," he replied quickly. "Of course not. I never thought…," he looked up and chuckled dryly. "I think you might think of me almost as many times as I think of you."
Hermione blushed and tried to come up with some kind of witty, intelligent response, but all of her mental processing ability climbed out of the window when Viktor reached for her and splayed one of his large, soothing hands at the back of her head. His fingers pressed against the delicate, untouched skin at the nape of her neck as he encouraged her forward.
The kiss that he insisted against her lips was hard and reassuring, and Hermione sagged against him, marvelling that he was there, that he wanted to see her and most amazing of all, he didn't seem to think she was a couple of almonds short of a fruitcake.
After a while of getting reacquainted, they resumed their snuggled position, and Hermione flicked through the notebook still in Viktor's grasp until they got to the last match he had played. She pointed to a clipping that had been loosely stuck in using a drying out Pritt Stick she found in the bottom of her trunk. It was a small square from a sports periodical that Cho Chang subscribed to. The Ravenclaw had passed it onto Hermione in an act of kindness she wasn't sure what she had done to deserve. There were only a few short paragraphs that mentioned Vratsa's latest victory, and in the last few lines it alluded to Viktor's newest injury, using the words' horror crash'.
Hermione had felt sick when she had found out, the main papers hadn't covered the news in any detail, and she had been beyond grateful to Cho for seeking her out and letting her know, especially as she had done so privately.
"I heard you fell again," she said, trying to sound blasé about the whole thing. She failed. "And this time I knew I wasn't going to get a reassuring letter from you telling me you were okay."
Viktor smiled wryly. "It was not as bad as the one earlier in the year. It just looked worse."
Hermione pouted at him. "That's very bad reassuring."
"Sorry," Viktor said as he carefully folded the notebook shut. "I am not used to it. Honestly, my friends think these kinds of things are… well, cool."
Hermione rolled her eyes so hard she felt momentarily dizzy. "What happened?" she pressed. "None of the English papers were very specific, and the wireless is currently banned as listening to it in the common room constitutes the gathering of a club."
"There was a collision in the air," Viktor explained simply, ignoring her evident bitterness about Umbridge. "I was focussed on the Snitch, and when I was flying in pursuit, one of the opposing team's Beaters bolted out in front of me. I could not move out of the way fast enough, and neither could she. So, the front of her broom hit my chest."
Hermione felt bile rise in her throat. A small part of her was glad she hadn't been there to see it. She had watched enough school Quidditch in her life to get an understanding of how fast they flew during the game, and that was nothing to what the professionals were like. The impact alone would have been enough to break a few bones. Viktor was lucky he hadn't done any permanent damage to his lungs or any other organs.
"Can I see?" she asked finally and sat up from his chest. Viktor was incredibly apathetic about his injuries, he'd been training for this his whole life after all. As far as Hermione was concerned, he wasn't the most reliable narrator. She hated the thought of him coming all this way to see her and then letting her drape herself over him if he was still hurting, but was too nonchalant to say so.
Viktor eyed her for a long moment before sitting upright in his chair. He pulled on the neckline of his jumper, so it stretched, revealing the top part of his chest. Hermione could see an angry red mark running a line from the base of his throat down to where the jumper still clung to his skin.
"How far… how far down does it go down?"
Hermione saw Viktor's hand grip his knee before suddenly he moved back from her and pulled his jumper clear off his head. No hesitation. She could see enough in her peripheral vision to know he hadn't been wearing anything underneath, not unless he had a very tight, unhemmed t-shirt on that was exactly the same colour as his flesh.
Eventually, after a few rounds of reminding herself that she was not eight years old, Hermione forced herself to look, but only as far as his chest. She reasoned that Viktor's exposed torso and what she imagined would be a fairly intense expression would be too much for her to take in all at once.
The raised mark was about the same size as Hermione's palm, and the comparison was easily made once she put her hand across his mottled skin. She hadn't done it consciously, she'd reached out for him without thinking, though she couldn't find it within herself to regret her boldness. His skin was warm and smelled nice in that indescribable way some men did when they picked appealing body washes and aftershaves but managed to stop themselves from going overboard in their application. Hermione could feel his heartbeat against her fingers. For a moment, she thought it might have sped up, but then again, it might have been the pounding of her own blood.
Sat like they were, only inches apart and connected in a way that felt shockingly intimate despite its relative innocence, it was hard to know where she stopped and he began.
"Will it fade?" she asked and was instantly surprised by the choke in her voice. She tried to cough it off without breaking the moment.
Viktor nodded and placed his hand over hers, pushing her palm completely flat and holding it more firmly against his skin. Hermione's breath hitched, and it was nothing to do with her earlier cough. Her eyes kept darting from his hand, covering hers so well you couldn't see her fingers, to his full bottom lip.
"It will not scar. It hurt though, and I had to spend hours in the medical tent. I hate the medical tent." Viktor's tone was as petulant as Hermione had ever heard it, and despite the apparent lack of air in the room, making it difficult for her to breath, she smiled.
"How very male of you."
Viktor raised an eyebrow at her and smirked. "Somehow I do not believe you would be the best patient either."
"Maybe not," Hermione replied with a laugh, and then her gaze fell back to where their hands were joined. It was like she couldn't look away.
Viktor's fingers flexed against hers, and he used his other hand to cradle her chin and lift her face gently. Hermione barely resisted. Their eyes met, and she bit her lip.
"Are you… are you uncomfortable?" he asked and then needlessly gestured to his chest. Hermione shook her head.
"No, it's just… different?" she replied after a beat when she hadn't been able to think of a better word. She could hear Ginny in her mind scolding her for not having something more advantageous to say, but she had no experience to draw from, and the romance novels she had grown up reading had featured heroes and heroines that were every bit as awkward as she was.
Viktor scoffed, and Hermione felt the movement against her palm, it was strange and lovely all at once. "This cannot be the first time you have seen a man's chest? You live in a boarding school."
Well, that was true, Hermione conceded, but not quite right at the same time.
"No, I suppose not, but not like…" she agreed before trailing off. She wasn't sure how to adequately explain why it affected her so much. Was it the private room? The fact that none of the boys at her school she might have seen training or running around in the grass looked like him? Or was it different because she loved him? Or that he loved her? Any would have been reason enough on their own; together, it was almost overwhelming. In the end, Hermione just waved a hand about the room; that explanation seemed the safest.
"Would you like me to put my jumper back on?" Viktor asked earnestly, and Hermione was wholly taken in by the expression on her face. She realised at that moment, despite how off-kilter she felt, that she had all the power. Viktor would do whatever she asked of him.
Hermione bit back the yes she nearly gave on reflex and tried to think about her answer properly. She'd never really asked Vikor to remove it, not expressly, but whatever semantics she agreed upon later, he did strip off at her request, and that request had been fulfilled. She had seen the scar now, but was that all she wanted?
"Erm," she flushed. "No?"
Viktor uncovered her hand and gently lowered it until their fingers were entwined in her lap. "You do not sound sure."
"I'm not," Hermione agreed. The only thing she was sure about was that she was unsure, completely.
"Okay," Viktor said patiently. He reached forward and grabbed his jumper off the floor before pushing it into her idle hands. "Give it back to me when you want me to put it on."
Hermione's hands clawed into the soft knit of his jumper, and she was hit by the sudden urge to lift it to her face to smell it. Thankfully, despite the dense atmosphere, she had not yet devolved into an utterly animal state, and she resisted - just. If he left the room for any reason in the next half an hour… she made no promises.
"Thank you," she said. "Are you, erm... comfortable?"
Viktor rubbed a hand over his face, and Hermione thought he looked slightly pained. "I am not uncomfortable with having my jumper off."
Hermione thought that was an oddly specific answer, but she could see he had a flush on his cheeks and she decided that pushing it would possibly make him more ill at ease with whatever it was that was bothering him.
Hermione fiddled with his jumper and thought back to the time she had seen Viktor at the side of the Black lake all those months before. He had been running with Filip and Mikhail, and all of them had been in their school gym kits. It had been the first time she had ever really appreciated a boy in that way before. It had been such a surprise it had almost scared her. The sight of his bare arms and legs had been enough to give her pause then. It was a lot more affecting now that Viktor was wearing even less and sitting impossibly close to her.
"Can I ask you something? You don't have to answer," she said eventually and wished she had a glass of water nearby.
"Of course," Viktor replied.
Hermione bit her lip and tried to order her thoughts. Certain things she had worried over came to the front of her mind, and she wondered if this was the time to start a conversation that had the potential to be so uncomfortable. Was there ever a right time for these topics?
"Have you… have you ever had sex before… ever?" She had managed to blurt her question, but she couldn't look at his face. He may have been stripped to the waist, but she was the one that felt semi-naked.
There followed the most prolonged pause that Hermione could ever remember. It was as if her words had fallen to the floor like lead around them. The feeling of bewilderment and expectation in the air was worse than she had experienced when Harry's name had been drawn from the Goblet of Fire. Viktor tensed next to her, and she felt awful.
"I'm sorry," she apologies falteringly. She wished she could swallow the words back up and go back to how they had been before. "I shouldn't have asked you. It was rude I-"
"It is okay, Hermione" Viktor interjected softly. "I was only… I was not expecting the question."
Hermione sat up so she could look at his face, leaving her hands resting against his chest. "You don't have to answer."
Viktor swallowed and looked down. "Yes, I have had sex before," he murmured and then straightened as if trying to face the topic more seriously. "Did you… did you want to know more?"
Hermione's fingers tapped restlessly against his skin. She was brought up short. "I... I don't know."
Did she want to know anything? Would it make her feel better or worse? She wasn't dismayed by Viktor's answer, she had assumed as much. He was older and famous; she imagined his options had been… plentiful, not that it did her much good to dwell on it.
"I do not expect anything of you," Viktor said, disturbing Hermine's disordered thoughts and she stilled.
"But you're going without something… something you have had before?"
Maybe that was the crux of her issue? While it was true, it made her feel uneasy when she didn't know something. She was also sure she wasn't ready yet, for anything like that. Would he wait for her, even though she couldn't say how long that would be?
Viktor shrugged as if it was unimportant and Hermione found she couldn't repress her inquisitive nature, even if she already strongly suspected she would regret it later.
"Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?"
Viktor shook his head and pulled on one of her hands to hold it between his. "No."
Hermione wetted her lips and took a measured breath. "How long ago?"
"Ah… Summer, after my fifth year."
It was only a small nugget of information, and yet from now having it, Hermione suddenly had thousands of other questions in her mind that she had never thought of before. She quickly realised that this could drive her mad.
"Did you love her?" She asked before she could stop herself. All of the other things she had swirling around her mind were probably best ignored, but that one, maybe that one she was better knowing.
"No," Viktor replied succinctly and without hesitation and Hermione nodded.
"I don't think I want to ask any more questions," she said finally, and Viktor brushed some of her hair off her face and studied her expression.
"Have I made you upset?"
Hermione kissed his cheek. "No, no of course not it's just…. I've thought about some of… this stuff a bit more lately and I... I suppose I wanted to know."
Viktor's thumb trailed across her cheek, and Hermione leaned into the touch. "Do you wish you didn't now?"
"Not really… although," Hermione hesitated over her words, but in the end, she decided to be brave. Viktor had answered her questions even though he hadn't had to. "I'm realising I'm slightly more possessive than I had previously thought."
Viktor smiled. "I am pleased to be awakening a more possessive side to you."
Then he kissed her and Hermione could only think about his skin and how it felt and how it smelled and she forgot all about the other girl (or girls, but she forgot about that too) who had touched it before.
-/-/-/-
Hermione had no idea of the time, but she knew it was getting late if the fading light was anything to go by. She still had Viktor's jumper in her hands and somehow, in the way of teenagers, or at least the ones she had read about in books, their stilted conversation had given way to kissing, which had resulted in her being pulled onto Viktor's lap rather than sitting in her own chair.
"You have to be careful," Viktor whispered into her ear and Hermione fought down her shudder to focus on his words.
She knew he was right. They had been talking about Umbridge, and the DA, Viktor was concerned that they were all spreading themselves too thin. It went without saying that Hermione shared his view. Given the High Inquisitor's current behaviour, who knew what was next?
"I know," she agreed with a shrug but felt unable and unwilling to say more on the subject. She'd had her fill of talking about the school and what was going on up there. While she had the chance to be away from it all, she wanted to embrace it. "How long are you here for?" she asked. She hadn't braved inquiring before. While she didn't know it had allowed her to hope that he would be here for a few days so she might see him the next day as well.
"Just today," Viktor replied, and Hermione nodded against his shoulder. It was as she expected. She looked at the darkening sky and wondered if he had any evening plans that he had to rush off too.
"Did you have something you needed to do?" she asked. She knew Viktor travelled extensively and she had wondered earlier whether he had been able to take some time for her by fitting it in around another errand or meeting he had planned.
His thumb danced across her cheek, leaving a trail of warmth that prickled on her skin like small electrical charges. "Yes, I needed to see you."
Hermione beamed at him, and Viktor looked down at her with such affection on his face. It made Hermione's chest hurt.
"It is even more beautiful than I remembered," he said wistfully, and Hermione edged closer to him.
"What is?"
"Your smile."
To say that he kissed her until she was breathless would have been accurate, but it also didn't go halfway to explaining it. Viktor didn't just rob her of breath when he kissed her; he seemed to take her senses too. All Hermione could see, feel, touch, taste and hear was him. It was immersive and brilliant. It made her feel as if she were floating above the moment, all while being anchored in it by his strong embrace.
Feeling emboldened by his evident care, Hermione leaned further into his kisses and pushed against Viktor harder than she had ever dared before. She may have been out of her depth entirely, but she knew enough to realise that her actions were… welcome. Viktor straightened and then used his far superior strength to pull her across his lap, so her legs were straddled on either side of his. Hermione thought there was a good chance she would pass out from the blush that went across her face, but she tried her best to ignore it. It was easy to do when Viktor kept kissing her, and hands never seemed to stop moving.
His fingers that had been tapping insistently against her shoulders slipped to her waist and then splayed against her sides. Stretched out like that, his hands felt like they covered most of her torso. She was entirely wrapped up in him, and she had never felt so safe. Hermione put her hands where his had been, pressing against either side of his neck and then she leaned forward until Viktor's head tilted back so she could card one hand through the back of his thick hair.
Viktor's mouth left hers, and he began trailing light, teasing kisses from the side of her mouth to her ear and then down her neck as his thumbs, still stationed against her middle, began moving back and forth in wide sweeping arches. He repeated the motion, back and forth, back and forth until one of them had trailed up her side and was nudging the underside of her breast, over her dress.
The knitted material Hermione was encased in was at once far too thin and desperately heavy. Viktor took everything slow, so slow it was almost unbearable, but his intent was clear. When Hermione arched into his touch, his thumb began moving again. This time on every sweep he moved from the bottom of her bra, across her nipple and back down again.
"Okay?" he asked gruffly, and Hermione sighed. The noise sounded desperately loud in the quiet room.
"Okay," she replied and was immediately embarrassed by how breathy she sounded. Viktor made a slightly pained noise in response, and Hermione kissed the side of his mouth, echoing the kisses he had trailed over her face.
She looked down and saw the flush on Viktor's cheeks, and the darkness of his eyes and it was as if for the first moment she could see what they must have looked like, as if a bird's eye view of them landed into her head. Despite her best intentions, Hermione stiffened, and Viktor noticed. His fingers stilled in an instant, and Hermione couldn't say she was entirely glad of it, but she thought it might have been for the best.
Viktor leant his forehead against hers and then helped her to reposition, so she was sat across his legs once more. At first, Hermione had thought he would set her back down in her chair, but she was glad he hadn't, she imagined that might have felt a little like a rejection.
Viktor looked around the floor for his discarded jumper and pulled it on without jostling her too much. He pressed a kiss against her cheek and then smiled at her in a very mischievous way.
"Is this what it will always be like when I get injured? I might have to start being less careful."
Hermione hit his arm as he sniggered. "Don't joke about that. It keeps me up at night as it is."
Now that Hermione's heart rate had slowed, a lot of her momentary fear had disappeared. She felt rather silly for inadvertently drawing more attention to her inexperience by panicking over where their moment had been going.
"I'm sorry," she offered quietly. "For before, I wasn't sure… I didn't know what was going to happen… or what I wanted to happen, and my brain took over my body."
"Better than the other way around," Viktor said with a reassuring smile. "Nothing will happen until you are ready."
"But what about…?"
"Please do not worry about the other… stuff," Viktor said. "There will be time for… Later."
Hermione rested her head against his and tried to tell herself she was happy his jumper was back on. "Won't it get… frustrating, won't you feel like you are missing something?"
Viktor pulled back from her and eyed her thoughtfully. "You are worried about this?"
"I know it's silly, but… yes, I suppose I am. Maybe it would be different if we saw each other all the time but-" she trailed off.
Viktor rubbed a hand over his face and appeared to mutter something to himself. "I can admit... something that might make you feel better," he grimaced. "But you will accuse me of not being a gentleman."
Hermione scoffed. "I asked you if you'd had sex, that wasn't exactly ladylike behaviour."
Viktor looked distinctly uncomfortable and was avoiding her eyes, but he kept his arm around her back. "I do not feel… deprived. While we are apart, the thought of you, only you, is enough for me."
Hermione smiled. "That's sweet Viktor, but I don't see how it correlates-"
Viktor coloured, going redder than Hermione had ever seen him. "I mean that I… I think of you when I… when I feel that way. I have only thought of you when I… for a while."
Hermione studied his face, and suddenly a hundred tiny fragments of conversations and jokes filtered through her mind. Living with so many teenage boys, you picked up on their conversations, most of them gross in the extreme, whether you wanted to or not. Suddenly all of the little bridges in her mind connected as if there was a click and then, her face must have matched his.
"You mean… oh."
"Oh," Viktor confirmed while glancing out of the window.
Hermione wasn't sure she had ever been more embarrassed in her life or oddly, more flattered. Try as she might, she couldn't hold back a smile, and when Viktor caught it, he pinched her side.
"It is not very nice to laugh at me," he protested, "I only told you to make you feel better."
"I'm not laughing," Hermione retorted and Viktor merely raised his eyebrows. Hermione kissed them in apology.
All too soon, their time together was over, and though it had felt like a lifetime when it was happening, now they were both standing outside the Three Broomsticks, Viktor felt like it had passed by in an instant. Madam Rosmerta had looked at him with a knowing smirk on her face as they had left. It was an expression that made Viktor feel like she knew every dirty secret he'd ever had. He was glad Hermione hadn't seen it.
Hermione had made to say goodbye and Viktor had shaken her off with a smile. He didn't care how many carriages Hogwarts laid on; there was absolutely no way she would be making her way back to the castle without him. For one, he wouldn't give up the additional time for the world and two, despite his best intentions, Hermione was looking a little… dishevelled. Her full lips were red and blurred at the edges from the rush of blood, and her hair was a wild explosion around her face. She looked utterly unbelievable, and if they were to come across anyone that had anything to say about it, Viktor would rather be there to take the brunt of it.
They set off in the direction of the castle after Hermione made only a minimal protest to his plan, which pleased Viktor no end. It was about a twenty-minute walk, but he didn't mind. It was probably for the best that he wasn't on his own in the immediate future. As soon as he was out of Hermione's sight, he was going to have to throw himself off the nearest building. It was the only thing he could do after admitting that he had masturbated while thinking of her, to her face. If his mother ever found out, she would kill him.
He'd also felt her up, which hadn't been the plan when he'd arranged the private room. It was a nice bonus though. Viktor really really wanted to handle this as well as possible, he cared for Hermione dearly. Just seeing her again had made him feel calmer than he had in months. But, that said, her breasts were incredible and much better than his imaginings had been over the previous months. Granted, he'd only felt the one, and there had been a significant amount of fabric that cruelly separated it from his fingers, but surely that was enough to make informed decisions? Maybe he should have pulled away sooner, or maybe it shouldn't have happened at all, but he couldn't bring himself to regret it. He hoped Hermione didn't either.
All too soon, they were at the gates, and he needed to let her go again. Viktor contemplated asking Hermione to come home with him, just for the rest of the weekend. He was sure they would be able to get away with it. He had lived in a boarding school long enough to know that the teachers spent too much of their weekend recovering, and pretending the students didn't exist to notice one wasn't there. Even though the one Viktor had picked was memorable in every way imaginable. But that wasn't fair. He knew how highly Hermione regarded her schooling and attendance was all part of that. It also wasn't exactly smart to go about drawing attention to her right now with the situation inside the castle.
"Feels like a long time ago that we did this before," he said as they stood at the gates and looked at the faint glow of the entryway. By his reckoning, Hermione only had half an hour or so left before they shut the doors and she missed dinner.
"A lot has changed since then," Hermione observed softly, and Viktor pulled on the sleeve of her coat.
"And some things have stayed the same." He pressed his lips against hers and revelled in their softness. He shut his eyes as he tried to paint the image in his mind. It would have to be enough to get him through the next few months.
"Happy Valentine's Hermione."
-/-/-/-
Viktor stood against the gate and watched Hermione go in, merrily swinging the bag of sweets that she had picked out earlier. He wondered how long it would be before she noticed the card and gift inside? He hadn't had long to plan, he'd only known he was definitely coming two days before, but he had already purchased a card. It had been a strange impulse, but Viktor had picked one up even though he hadn't been sure he would have been able to send it.
Most of the choices had been over the top and a bit more floral than he thought himself or Hermione would have been comfortable with. The gift had been easier, in a way. He understood from a conversation with a couple of his teammates that the general idea for Valentines was supposed to be more gestural. So he had eventually decided on the Snitch he caught from the last game.
He knew Hermione was no great fan of the sport - though the notebook she showed him had both surprised and delighted him - it meant something to him, and it would mean something to anyone she showed. It was a bit of a tradition, a relic of a time when ladies offered knights favours, and in turn, they returned from battle with trinkets that boasted of their affections.
He'd never given one away before, not to a girl. His parents had a couple, gathering dust around their house and he was sure his friends had a few over the years, but never like this.
Viktor turned away from the gates long after her curly hair disappeared and walked back in the direction of town.
Two more years. Fuck!
When Viktor opened the door to his flat after opting to walk up from the apparition point, he was not in the least bit surprised to see Filip there. His friend had apparently decided to make himself comfortable. He had his feet up on the sofa and what looked like the remains of most of Viktor's food littered around him.
"Why are you here?" he asked as he closed the door and removed his coat, though he already knew.
"You wouldn't let me come," Filip replied, still sounding like he was sulking. "So I want to hear everything that happened now."
"Where's Mikhail?"
"He went home an hour ago," Filip replied with a shrug. "He said he had better things to do than loiter around your apartment until you got back."
"Fancy that," Viktor sighed and walked into the kitchen, tidying up the mess Filip had made and getting a drink.
As he approached the sofa, Filip dropped the notebook he had been working on and cleared more space.
"Was she surprised to see you?" he asked, and Viktor smiled, thinking of Hermione's face in the sweetshop and Filip jumped up to sit on the very edge of the sofa. "I'll take that goofy expression to mean yes."
Viktor told him about his time with Hermione, leaving out a few key details that were no one's business, and Filip listened with an attention level that would have boarded on the inappropriate if it was anyone else.
"Well, I can't believe it," Filip said, sitting back and gulping down the last of his drink. "You managed to get through the whole thing without any embarrassment. You're getting the hang of this talking to girls thing." Viktor felt flush and tried his best not to focus on it, but he knew it was already too late. "What did you do?" Filip asked with amusement, and Viktor dropped his head in his hands.
"I may have said something I shouldn't have," he admitted slowly as if the words were being pulled from his throat.
"Like what?"
"Something…" Viktor replied noncommittally as he searched the whole of his mind for a way to say this that wouldn't make him sound like an idiot, or worse, a bit of a perv. Sadly, there wasn't anything coming to save him. "Sexual," he finished finally, resolutely staring at the wall ahead.
"You?" Filip asked, with disbelief etched all over his face. "I don't believe it."
Viktor rubbed the back of his neck. "She asked me if I'd had sex before," he explained as Filip's eyebrows rose. "I told her I had and it made her… not insecure exactly but she was worried about it… because we are apart often."
"She doesn't trust you?"
Viktor shook his head. "It isn't that. I think… I know, time apart, it plays on your mind. I wanted to make her feel better."
Filip made a noise of complete exasperation. "For the love of Merlin, stop stalling. What did you say?"
Viktor coughed to clear his throat and pressed his cool glass against his cheek. "I may have… causally implied that I have… masturbated… while thinking about her."
"Causally?" Filip replied wide-eyed.
"That's the bit you have a problem with?"
Filip flopped down on the sofa and picked up another bag of crisps. "This is why I told you I should come."
Viktor snatched the crisps off him and stuffed his fist inside. Stuff the diet, it was one day, and he needed it. "How exactly would you have prevented it?"
Filip snorted. "I would have stopped you from talking for any length of time."
Viktor rolled his eyes. "I don't think that will work forever."
"Not forever," Filip replied with a smile. "Just until you're married, and then it will be harder to get rid of you."
Viktor groaned. Why was this so bloody difficult? "Not helping."
Filip held his hands out in apology. "Sorry, sorry. How did she take it?"
Viktor laid his head back and thought about the moment where he had seen recognition in her eyes. Hermione had been embarrassed, probably not as much as him, but it was there. But then, just when he thought he had severely miscalculated, she got this little smile on her face. If he didn't know her better, he would have said she looked smug.
"Okay, I guess. I think she got why I was telling her."
Filip shook his head and leafed through the stack of magazines next to him. "Of all the ways to flatter someone."
Viktor felt a little defensive. He realised he wasn't exactly a ladies man, but he hadn't ever thought that mattered as he wasn't aiming for quantity. "How would you have done it?" he asked ungraciously, and Filip shrugged.
"Said something like, 'I don't need those things, just being with you, just being near you is enough for me, it will always be enough for me until you're ready for more'."
Viktor thought for a moment and realised how much better something like that would have sounded. "Yeah," he agreed quietly. "That might have been better."
So much for thinking on the spot!
Filip went to get another drink and then by the time he'd eked out all the information Viktor was planning on giving him they planned to go to the pub.
"So," Filip asked as they were standing by the door getting their coats. "These masturbation fantasies…"
Viktor punched him.
Hermione skipped dinner. After getting back to the castle, she had less than zero interest in being in the hall. She wanted to retreat to her room and have half an hour to herself before chaos descended. Selfishly she didn't want to talk about her date, and she didn't want to hear about anyone else's. Hermione just wanted quiet. In the quiet, she could spend a few moments committing the last few hours to memory.
The lights were out in the dorm, and Hermione could think of nothing better than falling into her bunk and closing her eyes. Only her bunk was… lumpy. She let out a pained yelp as something below her wriggled and then she reached for her wand to get all of the lights on, revealing four very dishevelled looking heads all staring up at her.
Ginny, Luna, Lavender and Parvati.
"What are you all doing here?" she asked, exasperated and recovering her breath from the fright.
"You had a date," Ginny replied. "What do you think we're doing here?"
"You were supposed to be at dinner," Hermione chastised, but Ginny merely grinned at her.
"We had it early."
Hermione sagged. Of course they did. This was the cost of friendship; no wonder she had spent so many years on her own.
"Come on, Granger, spill," Lavender said, and Hermione bristled.
"Why should I?" How had her love life become fair game for Lavender and Parvati to squeal over?
"Wait, I need to grab my sweets. I left them on the floor somewhere," Luna shrieked, and the girls darted around the room.
"-one second, where's my hair tie."
"That's my foot."
"Where is my nice pyjama top?"
A few minutes later, they were all sitting back on her bed, still looking expectantly at her and Hermione realised there was no escape. There was a small part of her - a very tiny, weeny part - that whispered that this was nice. Somehow she'd had the enviable date of the day. But she shut it up rather quickly.
Reluctantly, Hermione shared some very scant details of her time with Viktor. She would rather have skinny-dipped in the Black Lake than tell Lavender Brown she'd allowed her boyfriend what the blonde had once called 'over the jumper action.' Though she did privately imagine doing it and watching the girls face gape like a fish. Hermione filed the thought away for more imaginings later.
Eventually, the girls talked about their own days and Hermione took her chance, now the attention was off her, to rifle through her sweet bag, it was certainly better than hearing about how 'affectionate' Ron was, only there were some things in there she hadn't picked up while in Honeydukes.
There was an envelope containing a sweet and straightforward Valentines card Hermione liked very much and a black velvet bag. She knew what it was before she opened it, but she did all the same. The Snitch sat peacefully in her palm, and she saw the back had been etched with the date of the match he had played. The one where a broom nearly impaled him. Even after all that, he had still thought to bring this back for her.
"Uh," Lavender exclaimed looking at the gold sphere in her hand. "I'm so jealous of you I can't see… or maybe that's the sherbet mice?"
"Only Viktor would get such a plain Valentines," Ginny said with amusement. The card had reached her on its little journey around the circle, and Hermione narrowed her eyes.
"His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad-"
"Fine," Ginny interjected crisply. "But I was a child. I had an excuse."
"So does Viktor," Parvati replied with a smirk, "he's a man."
"That he is," Lavender sighed looking decidedly too longingly at the picture Hermione had reluctantly put up at the side of her bed.
Hours later, after far too much sugar and two different seventh years coming to bang on their door to tell them to shut up, Hermione fell asleep with a smile on her face. For the first time in months, it lasted right through till morning.
A/N: Hello chickens! I hope you are all keeping safe and you have enjoyed some teenage awkwardness :) In the next chapter, Harry gives an interview to the Quibbler, Viktor comes up against some tour challenges and Hermione takes matters into her own hands (I feel after this chapter I should make it clear that this is not a euphemism).