Chapter 28

Hope everyone had a good Christmas!

When Hermione awoke the next morning, she found herself curled up on the sofa. She had thought that she would awake cold as Draco had the blanket upstairs but she was surprisingly warm.

She made to sit up and felt material on top of her. She looked down to see the blanket from the bedroom draped over her and she grinned.

If somebody had put the cover on her then that meant…

She got up and ran into the kitchen to see Draco leaning casually against the table with a mug of coffee in his hand. His eyes were unfocused and pointed towards the floor. His brow was slightly furrowed and he looked as though he were deep in thought.

Hermione stopped in the doorway to take in the sight before her. His silver eyes looked akin to that of two glowing stars in the night sky. They seemed more alive than before even though he was unseeing with them.

His white-blond hair hung gracefully about the top of his head, a little longer than it had been before arriving in this house. It seemed as though it were a thin layer of snow draped and positioned carefully over his forehead.

Draco suddenly came out of his trance and saw feet in the doorway. He slowly brought his eyes up to see Hermione standing in the doorway, staring at him with the ghost of her last laugh still echoed on her smooth features.

Her eyes were the same chocolate honey colour he had been captivated by for quite some time now and they seemed wild with happiness.

Her now silky looking hair left in small ringlets around her shoulders, shining like every star in the night sky. He smiled at her.

She ran at him and he only just had time to put his coffee on the table so as not to spill it on her. She wrapped him in a tight hug and he felt himself return it.

"I was worried that you weren't going to make it out of that one." She said. You could hear the smile in her angelic voice.

"Well, here I am." Draco replied as she pulled herself back. He couldn't take his gaze away from her face. More specifically, her lips."Uhh...thanks."

Hermione didn't seem to notice that his eyes were glued to her lips as she started talking about something she must have found amusing. Occasionally she would start to chuckle or grin at a particular part.

Draco looked at her as though he were listening intently to her and whenever she would laugh he would let a small smirk grace his lips just to make it seem like he had any idea what she was talking about.

All of her words were flying right over his head like a shooting star and when she would smile at a certain point, he swore he could hear that star twinkle. He vaguely wondered when this change had happened but didn't bother himself with it much.

There was half of him that prayed that she would forgive him soon so that they could leave. The other part begged for her not to so that he could stay with her forever in this land of the past and forgiveness and never have to go back to where his task lay, abandoned, forgotten, like a single speck of dust laying on the mantelpiece after a spring clean.

For now, he decided to live in the present and live for that day. He knew that reality would soon claim him as its own but he was content sitting and letting her words wash over him. For now.

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