Seventeen
Day: 1400; Hour: 8
Lavender shakes her head and grimaces as the girl holds up a bottle of bright purple nail polish. Hermione can't, for anything, remember the girl's name, though she knows she was in the year below them. Ginny would probably know it, but she hasn't seen Ginny in months, so that doesn't help. She doesn't think Lavender knows her name either; by the way she keeps calling her 'dear'.
Unless her name is Dear. A nickname, perhaps - Deridra, Sandeara, or maybe...
She leaves her mindless thoughts hanging as she realizes Lavender has moved on from her chitchat about robes and gardens, and has taken up something far more interesting. "Not like I can know for sure, but..."
"What about Moody again?"
Lavender clicks her tongue, and sends her a look to let her know she is not pleased she didn't have Hermione's full attention. "I said that I know something is happening. Something really big. Like... the final battle."
Possibly-Dear nods her head, and then frowns when Lavender shakes her own at yet another color.
"Why do you think so?"
"Moody has his office locked down. And Hermione, I mean locked down. The Sneakoscopes go off whenever anyone even thinks of entering his office. He has another room as well, that no one is allowed to go in without him, and the only people who have entered it is Ministry officials, and Aurors I've never seen. His office and that room are warded up so tight, that when Seamus tried to follow Moody inside his office, he was thrown all the way back into the wall."
"He's preparing something then."
"Exactly. Something absolutely top secret. And then I saw Ron and Harry at Grimmauld two days ago, and they went straight for that room, and stayed there until the moment they left. This is it, Hermione. I mean, really it."
Lavender continues twittering on; her voice thick in nerves, but Hermione doesn't hear her. She is too busy thinking of the implications, and what is coming at all of them.
Day: 1403; Hour: 18
His shoulder is soft and warm against her cheek, her nose pressed against his chest as she breathes him in. This has taken some getting used to, touching him after sex in a way that's almost cuddling but not quite. It still feels strange, as if he will push her away at any second, but he never has since he first asked her to stay the night, and she tries to relax. It took them awhile to get to this point, even after she began to stay. They used to lie on opposite sides, not touching, until they learned that just collapsing on top of one another and falling asleep was easier for tired bones.
She likes the change; because there is so much more fulfillment that comes with lying beside him after sex, rather than planning her escape. It makes this whole thing feel so much more normal, and she enjoys the warmth of his skin and lull of comfort.
"Draco?" she whispers.
"Hmm?" he hums, drowsy from their recent activities.
There is a knot in her stomach, because she doesn't want to ask nearly as much as she feels she has to. It has been something that has bothered her from the very beginning, and she is sick of telling herself the answer when she doesn't really know it. She is unsure of what his reaction will be, but she'll ride it out just as she does all of his bad moods. She has to know, and she doesn't know how he will respond or what she will do, but she needs for him to tell her.
"Do you sleep with anyone else?"
His breathing pauses for just a second, and she moves with his movements as he lifts the arm not around her ribs and shifts. "Lola."
She had been holding her breath, but now she shutters it in, dread dropping like a cold weight into her stomach, before erupting with hot jealousy. "Lola?"
"Yes. Slim, tall, brunette. I sleep with her every night."
She stares hard at his navel, unable to stop the images of him with someone else. Before she can process just how she feels and what she should respond with, she realizes there's something popping in and out of the top of her vision. She pulls her head back to look up, watching him seesaw his wand between his fingers.
"Your... wand?" She's confused.
"Lola." He sounds amused, and she looks up at his chin before looking back down at the wand, flushing in embarrassment.
"That's... That's Lola?" She needs the confirmation, but she's already feeling relieved.
He makes a sound that can be a laugh or anything at all. "Indeed."
"So why didn't you just say it was your wand?"
"If I'm honest, I wanted to see your reaction." She blushes again, ducking her head down to his chest.
"Then why didn't you just tell me the name of someone you really sleep with?"
"I do sleep with my wand."
"You're dodging the question," she tells him astutely, and he shoves his wand back under his pillow before relaxing again.
"That's because I don't have sex with anyone but you."
She would like to ask him something lame, like 'really', just to be sure he's honest. But it is Draco, and she knows that if he were sleeping with anyone else, he would have no reason to lie about it. If he didn't want to say, he just wouldn't answer at all.
"Oh."
She thinks he might ask her why she wants to know, but he probably knows it's for the same reason he asked her in the beginning. Which he could go ahead and think, because she isn't about tell him it's because she has begun to care for him, and the thought of him sleeping with anyone else makes her sick and want to beg Moody to transfer her to some obscure Third World country. In secret, so he can't visit. In a locked room, so she can't get out. Or more likely, makes her want to plot some sort of corruption of this other woman, which makes her think his traits are transferable through his sweat on her skin.
She looks at him now in a slightly different light, knowing for sure that she is the only one to have him now. And it might not be in the classical sense of a boyfriend, and fully, but at least it is like this. She runs her hand from his ribs and down and across his chest, in a touch that may be possessive if she knew what a possessive touch was.
He shifts under it, turning his head toward her and breathing out against the top of her head. "Give me a half hour, Granger."
"For what?"
"Sleep, nymph. I'm bloody exhausted."
"Oh." She blushes, wondering if he meant to call her a nymph or a nymphomaniac. But either one would be cause for the blush. "Sorry, I..."
She hadn't meant for the touch to come across that way, as she was pretty sleepy herself, but she rather he thought that, than her explaining it wasn't about that. "Don't apologize. Just... half an hour. Then you can touch me wherever you want. Or you can now, but I'm too knackered to do much about it."
For all his talk about exhaustion, she still falls asleep before him, and it is he who wakes her up an hour later. She finds them both on their sides, facing one another and tangled together, his mouth warm and soft on her neck. He turns her around, her back to his chest, and pulls her leg over his before showing her the benefits of lazy, groggy, wakeup sex.
After several more reasons to be exhausted again, and almost as many naps, she pulls her jeans on and places the key from her pocket onto his chest. He stops his content, half-hooded watching of her getting dressed and examines it for a moment, turning it over in his palm.
"Thank you." He looks at her seriously, and she grins so wide he laughs at her.
Day: 1409; Hour: 6
"Are you scared, Neville?"
"Do you remember, back at Hogwarts, when I used to hyperventilate and shake really bad whenever I had detention with Snape, or after I would blow something up in his classroom? And I would have to squeeze something and breathe into a bag?"
"Yes." She nods.
Neville raises his hand above the table, opening it to reveal a faded yellow ball in his palm that she hasn't seen in years. "I have the bag in my pocket. And at night, I shake so hard I think I might break my bones."
Day: 1411; Hour: 14
Charlie Weasley shakes his head, glancing at his father's worried and worn face in the dining room doorway.
"I'm just ready for this to be over. It's all been a buildup to this duel, and I just want to see what we're going to have to do after. I'm tired of wondering."
Bill shrugs, cocking his head and sitting back into the armchair. "You say that now, but once we get to the aftermath, you might be wishing we were back to before it happened."
"I'm not that pessimistic."
"Harry will win," Hermione says softly, and when they look up at her, she repeats it more strongly. "Harry will win."
Day: 1415; Hour: 15
She takes her anxiety out on Draco, but she thinks he knows what is coming when she starts arguing with him over the superiority of soda to pumpkin juice - despite that she agrees with him. It quickly escalates to attacks on his character, which he returns, and she gets so caught up in her anger as they scream at one another in the middle of the living room, that she forgets why she even started this anyway. But it is a liberation from her nerves and fears about what's coming in her life, and though it is freeing and good at first, she begins to regret starting it the deeper they try to hurt one another.
She makes a single comment about inbreeding when he has had enough, growling and throwing up his hands. He turns from her, but changes his mind on walking away, and goes after her instead. It is just two minutes later, when he's biting into her shoulder, with her nails leaving angry tracks down his neck as her back smacks against the front door, that she forgets the regret this at all.
She now knows just why it is that people go on about angry makeup sex like it could possibly be a good thing, because it is, it is, it is, and she has found yet another reason to argue with him.
Day: 1417; Hour: 3
They are huddled against the tree. The girl is shaking so badly her hands smack herself in the stomach. The other girl is heaving into the snow, and the boy carries his face strong but his eyes are darting too rapidly for him to be anywhere near calm. Another boy stands off to the left, dull and lifeless except for his fast breathing while his friend shakes him by the shoulders and yells something Hermione can't hear.
Some call them fresh blood, others name them newbies, and still others just idiots. She couldn't ever really agree with Draco when he spoke about stupidity and bravery as lovers when she thought of her own actions, but she sees it now in them. She looks at them and wonders why they were so stupid as to have joined the war, yet smiles at their bravery for doing the same thing.
When she was younger bravery was one of the most esteemed traits a person could have. With enough reflection she has realized she thought this because it is what she is regarded as having, and what so many wish they had. Hermione, however, now can't help but wish less people did. Especially newly minted adults who are really just children still with legal ages.
She sees herself reflected back like a mirror that warped her looks. She sees it in the bad aim, the fight against the impulse to run, the shaking, the wild panic that tosses rational thought to the smoke and screams in the air; it is a reflection of herself in the beginning. She also sees it in the raw, uncontrollable, deep and burning fear that twists their faces, because that is all of them always.
She falls suddenly, face first and stiff as a board. She hears a curse yelled behind her, feels a trembling hand on her shoulder before a scream and a crack of ice as one of the new Auror recruits takes off to defend or hide. The snow freezes her skin numb, and she waits and waits for the kid to come back, so cold it is a harsh pain.
It isn't a fresh apologetic face that greets her when she's shoved over though, but Lavender's face all blotched and wet makeup. Her hands shake too as she revives her, and she falls to her butt on the ground with her hand over her heart, choking on sobs and words about death. Hermione has just enough time to sit up before Lavender leans forward and vomits up water, and Hermione thinks maybe there really wasn't much separation learned in the last four years after all.
Day: 1419; Hour: 20
"Are you nervous at all?"
"About what?" He glances away from the program, and snatches back his bag of crackers once he sees that she has them.
"The final battle. It's coming, you know."
"I know. And it's not the final battle. The war will continue on after that. It's just the climax."
"But it's the deciding battle."
"Not necessarily. Whichever side loses it will suffer an extreme loss, yes, but there's still a chance either side will win after that."
Hermione wiggles in her seat, her hands fidgeting with the strings on her pajamas. She is nervous. No, she is absolutely terrified, is what she is. She has had the need to talk to someone about it, but it is only him that she thinks she can. Everyone else either gets twitchy, or paranoid, or has the possibility of falling into seizures. Draco is always calm, even when he's not. He can handle the idea of war, because he has accepted it. People die, he knows. It may be anyone, and it may be him, and he approaches this with a sort of quiet understanding that makes her think he is less human than he looks.
"There's a prophecy-" she starts, not sure if she is allowed to tell him, but not feeling like she shouldn't.
"I know," he answers anyway. "It says that one of them must kill the other, but everyone dies sometime, and someone might kill the survivor after their duel anyway. There is no reason to stop if Potter dies."
She breathes in too hard, and gives her anxiety away. They have been building toward this moment since they were ten years old, and though they have all known it was coming, Hermione does not feel that the last decade has prepared her in the least. Will he walk away, she wonders, and if he doesn't, where is her place in the world if not beside him? Can the Order carry it? Can they stop Voldemort? Harry Potter may only be one man, but everything rests on him, and that includes their hope. It has always been Harry who would end it. What if he couldn't?
"What if Harry doesn't win?"
"We hide, we rebuild. We fight again."
"What if we lose?"
"Then we'll probably be dead anyway."
"That's reassuring."
"Don't come to me for reassuring, Granger. I'm not going to lie to you just to make you feel better. This is war. Suck it up."
She glares at him and then at the television screen, yanking the crackers out of his grasp. "I don't believe you that you're not nervous."
"I didn't say I was or wasn't. I said that Harry Potter isn't the end all of this war. It's the same battle we've fought since the beginning, except that Voldemort is definitely going to be there, and Potter has come out of hiding. All we have to do is win."
"All..." she snorts, and he grabs his crackers back again, shoving the box at her. "That's the only kind I like!"
"They're all the same, twit."
"Oh," she answers dumbly, pulling out another package. "Well the other kind has all different sorts in the box."
He chews slowly and stares at her, and she glares back.
Day: 1422; Hour: 4
She waits restlessly for news. For an owl, or someone to come get her to tell her it's time to fight or time to learn the plan. No one comes.
Everyone is silent in thought, in fear, in anticipation. The knowledge of what is coming is something tangible in the air, and people speak in mutters and half-thoughts, because they are all too busy with waiting.
The missions and battles seem to have come to a standstill, and the pressure is mounting, waiting to break over them all.
Day: 1428; Hour: 11
She opens her eyes to warmth, drowsy and comfortable, despite her growing nerves over where she is. She has spent the night in Draco's bed it seems, and while this is not a new thing, it is the first time she has stayed so late. Normally, if they sleep, it is only for half an hour or so, before they wake to do it all over again. When either of them knows they are too knackered not to pass out for hours, one of them will end up leaving. This time she remembers falling asleep while it was still dark out, but now it is bright and late into the morning.
Draco had not seemed to want to let her go, and twice she tried to remove herself from the bed in exhaustion, and twice he pulled her back. She hadn't thought much of it at the time (his lips and hands had taken care of the thought process), but now she wonders if this is some sort of strange stage in a sexual relationship - where they are comfortable enough with one another to sleep beside each other without having to wake up twenty minutes later for another go of things as an excuse for laying together.
His chest is warm and smooth beneath her cheek, and she can feel the distant, steady beat of his heart near her ear. She thinks he must be sleeping, the beats are slow and strong. But also because his arm is under her, his hand in a fist at the small of her back, and he would have moved it by now if he was awake. It wasn't that long ago when she had woken with a rude yank when he pulled his arm out from under her and muttered his disgruntlement over possible limb loss.
She moves to look up at him, because she has grown a fascination for watching him unguarded in his sleep, ever since she took him injured to her room all that time ago. She starts when she finds him awake, his eyes connected to the ceiling.
"What were you dreaming about?" His voice is clear from sleep, and she knows he has been up thinking for a while now.
She blinks, looking down from his turned-up eyes and to the point of his chin. "I don't know. Was I?"
He lifts a shoulder, and she moves with his body motion. "I was trying to figure out if you had an attitude in a dream, of if you always make those little annoyed sounds in your sleep."
"Annoyed sounds?"
"Your tongue," he whispers. "You suck it off the roof of your mouth."
"Oh. I don't know." She doesn't know her sleeping habits, because she has never slept beside someone like this before. She used silencing charms on her bed because of Parvati's snoring, and though there were a few sleepovers in the Muggle world, no one had said anything to her.
She lowers her head, her cheek brushing over his nipple, and it pebbles and hardens under her skin. She blushes when she realizes she has a hand dangerously low on his pubic bone, and slides it up to his stomach. It collapses under her touch, and she can hear him inhale deeply above her.
"How was the lake?"
"What?" She is too infatuated with the goosebumps that she has caused on his skin to hear what he has said.
"The lake behind this house, that I told you about. Did you go?"
"Oh, yes. Yes, I went."
"Do you remember where it is?"
"Yes."
"Good. I lost my ring there, and I couldn't remember how to find the place yesterday. If I get back you'll have to tell me how to get there."
She pauses, her eyes directed at the scar on his side but not seeing anything, before raising her head. He looks down at her with the motion, his face set in curious lines. He scans her face, looking for the reason, but comes up empty. "What? Did you find my ring? Pawn it, and use the money to fund the fight for house-elf rights?"
"If. You said 'if'."
Something flashes in his eyes, though it is so quick she cannot tell what it is or if it was just the light playing tricks on her. "Yes, if. I haven't been to this house in months, and I don't know if I'll be getting back here before the end of the war."
And for the first time in her life, Hermione can see the lie all over Draco Malfoy's face. She lowers her head back to his chest, realizing that this must be why he kept her in bed so long. He is going somewhere that he thinks is dangerous enough it warrants 'ifs' and an entire night of shagging because he doesn't think he'll be doing it again. He doesn't think he is coming back, and this makes her heart swell and pump hard against the walls of its confines, until she feels nauseous. Fear and anxiety bloat the inside of her throat, and she finds she can't breathe properly.
She wonders if she should tell him that she knows, or ask him where he's going, but he will be angry if she does, and she doesn't want to ruin the comfortable air they are laying in. Instead, she closes her eyes, savoring the feel of him for one more stolen moment before deciding to get up. She does not want to outstay her welcome, and there is a self-conscious part of her that isn't sure if he wants her to leave.
This side of her is quieted when he uncurls his fingers and presses them against her back to stay her movements, and she looks up at him in surprise. He stares down at her for a moment before pushing himself up on his elbow and taking her mouth, slow but determined. Her hand moves from his stomach to his chest as she kisses him back, her eyes squeezed tightly at the thought of where he is soon to be leaving to. He breathes out against her lips at her touch along his torso, and wraps his arm fully around her, pulling her against his chest as he rolls them over.
"Wait, wait," she is muffled against his lips, applying pressure from her palm to his shoulder.
He pulls up and looks at her, his brow furrowed and his mouth tempting. "What's wrong?"
"I...have to go the bathroom." She blushes.
"Oh. Then go." He moves off of her and onto his side beside her, but halts her when she begins to pull the sheet with her. "Do you really need that?"
"Yes." She raises an eyebrow and yanks on it again.
"You're going to leave me cold, just to protect your modesty - which isn't anything I haven't gotten to know in several different ways, need I remind you."
She flushes at the flirtatious leer, and pulls again. "Stop looking for a peep show, Malfoy."
He laughs. "Stop being so bloody self-conscious."
"I'm not self-conscious." She raises her chin, pulling the sheet with her once he's let it go, and peeking over her shoulder by the doorway to find him still watching her.
When she returns, she hesitates too long on the best way to crawl back into the bed, and he rises to pull her in and against him. He raises a brow at the mint taste of her mouth, but doesn't say anything, lowering her down to pry the sheet away from her.
He is slow, his touches are caresses and his mouth like fire, as if he has all the time in the world. She isn't sure if it's because he knows just how incredibly sore she is, if he is sore himself, or just because he knows she likes it like this sometimes. He doesn't speak, sewing kisses across her skin, keeping his eyes trained to her expression, and she watches him back, taking him in. It is a gradual buildup to shattering, and he does this with perfection in his passion, the burn so slow she feels like she is losing her mind.
When they are both a sweating, panting mess of skin and limbs, he rolls them over, pulling her tight against him. He cradles her head, her mouth to the rapid pounding of his heartbeat, and she clutches him like it is the last time she ever will.
Day: 1430; Hour: 8
"'Ello, Hermione."
She points a Twizzler she had grabbed from the candy bowl at Fred's face, then lets it fall to the floor like poison at his grin. "Shoe ah 'e shpitting thith ow?"
"What?" he laughs, cocking his head.
Hermione narrows her eyes at him, strips of red squished between her teeth but not being swallowed. The question is just how long Fred has been in the house, and just where the candy had come from.
"Don't worry, I tested it myself. Of course, that was before I knew he was here, so..." The voice behind her trailed away when she whirled toward it so fast she had to grab the lamp to keep from spinning off her feet.
A piece of the candy fell out of her mouth rather unattractively and she slaps her hand over her mouth and shrieks behind it. "Jesus, Hermione, that was worse than Ron at breakfast."
"Hey!"
She knocks Harry clear off his feet and his breath explodes into the mass of hair that has fallen into his face. He has trouble regaining it with the way she's squeezing him like one of his loony fangirls, but instead of calling over security he only takes away her own breath with his hug. She stumbles to her feet and flings herself at Ron next, a man smart enough to brace himself against the couch. Distantly she registers in her mind that she is calling them both things like jerk, oaf, prat, ass, and though she doesn't know why she is too overwhelmed to care.
"What the hell am I? A Malfoy?" Fred huffs, "I get an evil glare and suspicion, and they get-"
"Ahh! Ooh! You jerk, I love you, you ass! Oooh, aaah, what strong arms you have!" George skips around Fred in a circle, fanning himself with a magazine.
"Oh, your shiny emerald eyes, Harry! Oh, your big, heaving chest Ron!" Fred squeals, grabbing George's arms and throwing himself backward.
"I could just shite myself with glee to have you near me!" George paused, realizing the three pairs of eyes on him at the other side of the room, and Fred falls in a second later.
"You know, mum always said you two were just desperate for attention."
"You two play girls pretty well though," Harry jabs.
"And I do not sound like that."