A/N: Hello reader. This fic was written for Weeping Willow Fest based on the following prompt.
Prompt: Category [Infidelity] - Prompt ["I deserve better than this."]
I'm sorry for this in advance.
If you don't like infidelity, messy relationships, or characters who are bad at being honest about their feelings, probably skip this one.
Also, I love polyamory, and I hesitate to write it being done badly because I know it's already stigmatized, but I wanted to be honest about how poly people deal with complicated emotions too and here's one of those stories.
Thank you to my betas aureliandreams, circerian, and storyofeden. You all made this way better than it was and I appreciate every one of you.
Thank you to the mods of this fest.
Hermione laid on her back, staring up at the enchanted ceiling above the soft green bed she rested on. A cigarette dangled from her fingers as she blew smoke clouds towards the charmed sky.
"What are we doing here, Draco?"
She felt him shift next to her; wrap his arms around her and pull her close. "Just what we want, Hermione." He kissed her cheek, her ear, her neck.
He was distracting her with sex. With love. Could the two even be separated anymore?
It has been six months since they began this… whatever it was. Two months of her fighting their connection. One month of back and forth. An ending, falling back together, and three months of accepting that neither of them could see a way out of it.
She vanished her cigarette and turned away from him, laying her head on her hands.
"Hermione, please," he begged, a tinge of desperation in his voice. This topic was so old and yet constantly renewed. "I'm trying."
She didn't look at him; gaze silently locked on the door to his bedroom. Their bedroom, she supposed. It belonged to them. Half his. Never hers.
A heavy exhale slipped between her lips. "But when, Draco? Before you move in together? Before you propose? Before you two start saying I love you?"
He said nothing, the sound of his quiet breathing absent as he held his breath. The silence was an answer in itself, but Hermione needed to hear him confirm it. She turned towards him, sick of waiting. "Well?"
He ducked his head in shame as a red flush crept up his neck. "We already say I love you," he mumbled.
Hermione sucked in a breath, the pain beneath her ribcage so sharp that surely her heart was going to implode. He'd never said it to her. Not even the one night in their passionate lovemaking when she'd let those three words slip from her lips. He'd only hugged her in response. The embarrassment of feeling so much for someone whose own feelings had limits had almost been almost too much to bear.
"You're in love with her?" she asked, her voice cracking. "You're in love with Astoria, and, and—?"
"No, I—I don't know," he stumbled.
"You do not tell someone you love them if you don't!" Hermione chided angrily. She sat up on the bed, pulling her shirt back down over her torso.
"I do love her," he said, and Hermione froze, chest tightening. "But I don't know if I'm in love with her. I don't even know what that means. I care about her, as a person. I think we could be a good fit long term if some things changed, but it's too soon to tell."
"It's been a year—"
"It's been ten months." It was definitive. He did not want to talk about it.
Well too damn bad.
"Draco, you can't sit there and tell me you are not in love with her while saying you love her and yet you still won't tell her about what you really want in your life."
He pulled away and threw his arms in the air petulantly. "I don't have to justify it!"
"You do to her!"
He swiped his fingers across his scalp, harshly pushing his hair back. "Why are you concerned about her right now?"
"Because somebody has to be!"
That was it. The truth. The lies. The cost of it all and it was more than she could pay. She'd go bankrupt, drowning in his inadequacies disguised as affection. Connection. Love in its own right.
The silence pressed on. Hermione's chest heaved with angry breaths. Then she spoke.
"I'm tired, Draco. I'm tired of being your secret. It's exhausting. For as long as we have known each other—truly known each other—we have never wanted to be monogamous." And that was true. Both felt drawn to the benefits of polyamory. Hermione knew she was capable of loving many people, and Draco was tired of feeling guilty for feeling more than one should for their friends. But while Hermione had worked to be open and honest with her partners, Draco struggled with the ethical side of ethical non-monogamy.
She continued. "If you want a non-monogamous lifestyle then you have to be honest about it with everyone. I have given you time. I have tried to understand." The resignation was heavy in her voice.
"I don't know how to ask for what I want," he sputtered quickly, sensing her pulling away.
"You have to try," she whispered, tears pricking her eyes. "You can't just go on like this. You're hurting us. It will break eventually and all the magic will pour out and we'll never get it back."
He stared at her, and for the first time Hermione saw the fear she felt at the thought of losing him reflected in his expression.
—
They had become friends years ago. It was a slow and steady friendship. She helped him through the loss of his family. He helped her with hers.
And then, one day, they hugged. It was a strange and stilted embrace at first but her touch-starved body had craved more.
Slowly over weeks they grew closer, tentative touches testing the bounds, exploring where their friendship ended and their feelings began. Each new physical embodiment of their closeness lingering and growing more significant, until one day he was inside of her, and they would never be able to deny it again.
They started dating. Things went well, until they didn't. And so they broke up.
Tale as old as time.
Her heart cracked and shattered as she watched him date other people. First Daphne, then Pansy, then Astoria. Nothing seemed to change as his relationships continued to fail, but Hermione could see the fear in him that he was the problem when Pansy ended it. So with Astoria, he tried.
He tried more with Astoria than he had with Hermione. And it burned. She hadn't understood what she did wrong; why their connection hadn't been strong enough to sustain them.
When they'd been dating, they spent nearly every day together. They went on vacations, met each other's family, spent the night together more often than not. They were primary partners in every sense of the word. Until Draco had dropped the bombshell that he didn't see Hermione that way. He didn't see them reaching life milestones together. Getting married, starting a family, being each other's person. It had hurt; it had seared. But he still wanted to be with her, and she with him. And they still believed deeply that polyamory was important to them both, that there was a way forward together. It had taken time for the wound to scab over as they found their way again, stumbling and crying until they settled in as non-primary partners.
And over time she came to see he wasn't the best person for her to start a life with. Instead, Ginny had taken that spot. She turned out to be exactly what Hermione needed—caring, compassionate, and fiercely protective.
And she and Draco continued on. Still in a relationship that mattered, even though it was different. Still together. Still there for each other, even if they weren't moving towards a future together in the typical way. She'd been content. But even that had been too much for him. And as he pulled away, it was not enough for her.
Now, almost two years later, they were back in a space she could not have seen coming.
Hermione hadn't expected Draco to be more than a friend to her again. After their breakup, they went through months of awkwardness and very little talking. Until slowly it became normal. Slowly they became them again. Slowly the love grew, and they needed to express it.
Which is how she ended up back in his bed.
He'd explained that he didn't think they were wrong to break up when they did, but that he didn't know how to not have her in his life. Just because they wouldn't be primary partners didn't mean he didn't care, that he didn't still want her, that he didn't feel more than a friend should. After days of tears and rehashing old wounds from their relationship to try to heal them, to understand, they had found calm waters. And they wanted the same thing.
Ginny had understood; accepting the change in their relationship without hesitation. She wasn't threatened by Draco's role in Hermione's life. And for Hermione, it felt like a missing piece had suddenly clicked back into place.
But now...now she didn't know what to do. Stuck in the role of the person she would hate to learn about; loving (but not in love with) a man who couldn't find a way to be honest about his desires to anyone but her, and even that had taken a long time. Oscillating between pretending Astoria didn't exist and feeling guilt-stricken over what she was doing to the other witch.
She had cried to Ginny after that first night, asking her more than once over the last few months if she was judging her.
"No," she had assured her. "It's not your responsibility to police his relationship. He needs to talk to Astoria but you can't make him."
Hermione had sat there, defeated. "But I'm participating."
Ginny had nodded. "It's messy, yes. But it's not your job to fix it."
"I feel like a homewrecker."
Ginny had taken her hand. "You are not. Draco is wrecking his own home by not being honest."
Hermione had smiled. Just a little.
But now that things had been carrying on so long, Hermione was more certain than ever that she needed Draco to resolve this. And soon.
—
She knocked on his door.
"Hermione."
She didn't even bother entering. "I deserve better than this."
He stared at her, blinking. And then looked behind him nervously.
Astoria must be home.
Hermione didn't lower her voice.
"I deserve better than this. And if you can't find a way to tell Astoria the truth—to tell her that you want multiple partners, that you love me too, even though you'll never say it—then I can't do this anymore."
Draco stared at her, unblinking. She could almost see the conflicting thoughts running through his head as he weighed the risk of telling Astoria versus losing Hermione. She knew deep down he was waiting to see if things with Astoria would truly lead somewhere before he told her that he was polyamorous. But Hermione couldn't wait anymore.
Finally, he said, "All right."
"All right?"
"I'll talk to her. Tonight. I promise."
A shuddering breath rattled through her chest. Hermione hadn't expected him to try. She thought he'd rather lose her. He had once before.
"Okay," she breathed. Steadying herself, she continued, "Well. Let me know how it goes."
He nodded.
She turned away, heading back into the busy streets of London.
As she pushed her hands into her pockets to fight the November breeze, she smiled.
She had set a limit, and she had won.
Maybe it would work out after all.
