The unlikely pair did eventually make it to the Jacuzzi. Hermione lay against him between his legs, her head resting on his chest. Draco's arms lazily draped around her, and he felt her fingers tracing his arm. His left arm, to be precise. It was a habit of hers to trace what was sort-of there. He often wondered if she would be so bold as to touch it if the remnants of his Dark Mark were still fresh and menacing –not this red and raw outline.
"It took up until the end of last summer for it to look like that." Draco said. Hermione's fingers froze momentarily, but they were soon back to its activities.
"I'm surprised. Well, maybe not. I had thought that it would've faded when Voldemort died." She explained. "But all of those Deatheaters that we rounded up...they still had theirs."
"Why aren't you surprised that mine is almost gone then?"
"Because," she said simply as she adjusted her head to look at him. "I have a strong inkling that you never wanted the Dark Mark in the first place. That's why it's fading. Things that are apart of you –that are you –they never go away. It's like a limb. But it's leaving you because it doesn't have anything to cling to."
"Huh," Draco said softly, processing her words. It was almost poetic the way she described it.
But she was wrong. At least partly.
He had wanted it. He had been glad to sign up for it. The Mark had been applied to his skin as easily as all the others. It had become one with him. However, because the Mark was fresh, there had been adverse effects when he had learned of the task Voldemort had wanted him to do. Kill Albus Dumbledore? Dumbledore? It had been a task to set him up to fail and the Dark Mark knew his opposition. It would hurt him terribly. It would burn all day and night because he didn't welcome it.
With Hermione's words swimming around his head, he assumed now that the last part of what she said held true. The war was over. Voldemort was dead. Draco had been properly turned off from all of the atrocious ideas Deatheaters had after having been sickened and burdened by them. Yes, what did the Dark Mark have to cling to? Nothing but skin, and so it would fade.
"Would it have bothered you?" Draco suddenly asked. "My Mark, if it wasn't disappearing?"
She thought for a moment before answering. "It would have, yes. I… That night in your Manor when Bellatrix tortured me? She had rolled up her sleeves some to do it, and I saw it then. It haunted me for quite a bit after that."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't." She admonished. "You're not allowed to apologize for something you didn't do."
Draco opened his mouth to contest, but closed it almost immediately. His mother's words of "You can't take on the responsibility of the world," kept ringing in his ears. He supposed he would have to relent just this once.
"Malfoy," Hermione said hesitantly. "Could I ask you for a favor?"
Draco looked down at her. Her chest was barely covered by the water and it was making him amorous all over again. "Asking for favors after we've had sex?" He chuckled and kissed the top of her head. "That's very Slytherin of you."
Hermione laughed. "Well… I need you to have dinner with my parents and me."
Hmm, definitely wasn't expecting her to say that…
"It's just that they keep pestering me about the 'mysterious blond man' who was fawning over their daughter at the graduation."
Draco raised his brows although she couldn't see it. "Did they actually use the word 'fawning?'"
"Does it matter?"
"No, no, I suppose not." Draco said, a deep breath following shortly after. Meeting the parents. Such an action had never crossed his path before. He'd also never been in a relationship before. He'd also never been involved with a woman for this long period. He did a quick calculation in his head. They had officially gotten together –or rather mutually decided to see each other regularly –in January. It was June now.
Six months.
They'd been with each other for six months.
A slow smile spread across his face at the thought of it. It was wiped away quickly, however, when a discouraging notion crossed his head.
"Have you told them about me?" Draco asked.
"I gave them your name."
"What else? Did you tell them specific things about me?"
Hermione craned her neck some and stared at him oddly. "Not much. It would've been quite the long conversation otherwise. Why are you-?"
"No, not now. I mean...about me before. Before when I was still…"
Hermione frowned. She readjusted herself so that her whole body was facing him. "I have, yes. It's the reason why it would've been a long conversation had I gone into details."
Draco bit the inside of his jaw. "What did they say then when you told them my name?"
"They were...surprised, at first."
"At first?"
Hermione nodded, taking her wet hand and brushing back some of his hair from his face. "And then they were impressed. They wanted to know more about the man who used to make their daughter cry but now makes her blush like an idiot."
Draco laughed, a small one, but a laugh nonetheless.
"See, Malfoy?" Hermione said as she sat on him –an action that they both knew would lead elsewhere. "Not everyone is willing to dismiss you so quickly."
Draco closed his eyes and breathed her in, letting his hands slide past her thighs, up her sides, and across her back so that he could hold her close. She felt so slick in his arms like this, her body shining from the water. He almost thought that she would slip right from him. But they were connected again for the second time in under three hours, and Draco let his head loll back.
Hermione had a touch that rendered him useless. When she was like this, on top of him, riding away what was left of his self-loathing, he could do nothing but succumb. Nothing but keep his arms wrapped around her, emit moans and groans that would only spur her on faster, and listen to her own purrs of satisfaction as she brought him over the edge.
She was, undeniably, both his weakness and his strength.
Author's note: A short, somewhat filler chapter. But where there are fillers, comes drama after (*Slytherin smirk*).
ALSO, I must say that your reviews for the previous chapter made me smile and laugh SO MUCH. You honestly have no idea. It was great :D.
-WP