"Wowzers! Just... wowzers!" panted Hermione breathlessly, rolling off her boyfriend. "Give me a minute until I try to remember my name, will you?"
The raven-haired boy exhaled sharply, trying to calm his rapid breathing. "Language, Hermione," he lovingly chided the young woman, now lying on her back, and carelessly draped his hand over her flat stomach, gently brushing her skin with his fingers. His touches electrified the girl's skin and she shivered pleasantly, replaying the events of this incredible last hour in her head.
An unusually warm May night, the windows were wide open, letting in the fresh air and the subtle noises of the nightly village. Their last cry of lust still echoed in the bedroom and in their minds, still unable to manage coherent thoughts, as they were basking in the afterglow of their expert lovemaking.
"Shut the hell up, Potter," Hermione observed him with large, discerning eyes, trying to look hurt and failing miserably. "You see what you are doing to me and what a bad influence you are? I mean... wowzers, you are playing me like a fiddle. You found erogenous zones on me on places I would have never suspected." His index finger traced a soft line from her neck down to her belly button and she shivered again. She almost fainted as she suddenly felt his lips, teasing, gentle, trailing the same line on her skin, igniting fire inside her again.
He met her glance, their eyes still clouded with pleasure. "I meant it, love, when I said I intended to make up with you for all time we had lost. You are the most incredible, most beautiful woman I've ever known and I'm glad I've realized it before starting to resemble Dumbledore on the latest edition of Chocolate Frog Cards."
She draped her arms around his neck and drew his head on her chest. Smiling contently, she gently caressed his unruly hair, not willing the magic of the moment to end. "Then, I guess, tonight will count with a making-up factor of three."
"Hey!" Harry tried to object, his lips still pressed against her skin, so his muffled objection went unnoticed. "I had hoped for a factor four, at least! It's just unfair!" he finally managed to breathe out, trying to sound somewhat hurt.
"Factor four, my dear Harry, is awarded to very special occasions only," she whispered into his ear, trailing small circles on his back with her fingernails. "For example the day when you made love to me in the capsule of the London Eye." She skipped a breath and forcefully pressed her legs together, trying to suppress her quite understandable reaction to this memory. "I knew you had cast wards around us so that no one could see or hear us or enter the capsule but I was still scared as hell. It was, nevertheless, an intense experience, going starkers and being made love to at 400 feet above London, to say the least. That one, sweetheart, deserved a firm 'four'". She decided not to voice her opinion about everything that followed that day; the urge inside her to be claimed by him started growing again and her blood pressure was quickly rising out of the pan.
After half a year of being a couple, every time they were together still felt as if it were their first time. They simply couldn't get enough of each other and slowly lost all their inhibitions, the once-know-it-all-bookworm and the shy, absolutely clueless - when it comes down to girls – boy.
Hungrily searching for his lips, she gently nudged him to roll over until he, carefully as not to hurt her, positioned himself above her. Softly moaning at the feel of his warm skin against hers, she felt her own body react vividly at his presence. "We still have many, many years to make up for, Mr. Potter," she whispered huskily in his ear before he set her on fire again.
** ** **
She was standing at the window, leaning onto the windowsill, her eyes drawing in the serenity of the night. The full moon, now on its zenith, illuminated the landscape, wrapping it into its pale white cover, the contours of the hills on the background eerily contrasting with the blackness of the starry sky.
The silvery moonlight softly caressed her naked form, and to Harry, intently watching her from their mangled bed, it seemed as if her body were glowing with a faint light itself. He rested his eyes on her curvaceous frame, her impeccable, soft skin; he couldn't get enough of her and enjoyed every moment of having her around him. Even the blind could see he was madly in love with her; he had become a completely different person ever since they had finally started dating.
Very slowly, so as not to startle her, he got out of bed and, barefooted, walked up to her, wrapping his arms around her from behind and resting his chin on her shoulder. Hermione slowly leaned back into his embrace and contently closed her eyes. "Hey, Mister," she spoke softly, tilting her head to the left and slightly turning towards him.
"Hey yourself," Harry whispered into her ear, his hot breath escaping with a hiss from between his lips. "What are you thinking about, Hermione?"
"Many things, actually," she relaxed into his arms again, intertwining her fingers with his on her abdomen. "It's a complete fuzz in my head, but for the first time in many years, I'm utterly and completely happy. I'm thinking about how magical this night is and how much I don't want it to end. I'm thinking about how much I love you and how happy I am with you." He rather felt than saw her smile. "So, you see, all happy thoughts, and all thanks to you, my Harry."
"Funny, I was thinking just about the same," he nodded, his fingers trailing lazy circles on her stomach. His mind trailing off, he suddenly tensed up, his hand coming to a halt and the girl sensed the change in his mood. But, before she could say a word, he spoke again.
"I'm really scared about the fact that I'd thrown away 9 years of happiness searching for Merlin knows what and never finding it." His voice became barely above a whisper. "See, when Gin and I got together, just after the war, we thought we were madly in love, and maybe for a time we had been indeed. Only now do I understand, though, that it was partly also the calling of flesh, so to say, and the urge to do something with our freshly obtained freedom, the chance to behave as normal teenagers would do."
"I completely agree with you here. None of us had ever been a normal teenager, not with the constant threat of Voldemort, that blasted tournament, a year on the run, a war... neither of us should have been thrust into this." Hermione's voice audibly trembled. "We should have dated, loved and made love, quarrelled and made out instead of learning how to stay alive and not get us killed at least once a month. I guess the last one applies mostly to you, my dear..."
"You and Ron were there with me all the time, so it also applies to you, if I'm not mistaken. What I was trying to say that after Voldemort was gone I had built myself an illusion that everything should, would, could be normal again. It had been normal, or at least similar to normality, for quite some time, as long as the spotlights were there. When it all ended, Ginny got bored and I couldn't do anything against it no matter what I tried. So, the last 5-6 years it was only routine and some occasional shagging that kept us still together, but not the feeling we should have felt for each other."
"And then... you came into my life..."
"...and you into mine..." Harry completed her sentence.
"...and look where this had led us to..." Hermione sighed contentedly, and then turned back into his hug. "I do not complain, though, on the contrary; it's better to find late the one and only man I want to spend my life with than never. I have found him and I will never, ever let him go unless he says so."
Harry gently removed a stray lock of hair from her forehead, and looked deeply in her hazel eyes. "He will never even think of it, rest assured." He kissed her nose, cheeks, chin; slowly, gently, savouring her taste. "When you came into his life, you changed it, you changed him, and taught him what love, real love feels like, what it is like to love someone unconditionally and to be unconditionally loved. When one gets up and goes to sleep with your name on his lips. When he counts the hours, minutes, seconds to see you again and hear your sweet voice. He's now grown up and knows what he wants."
Hermione thought she had never heard anything so beautiful in her entire life and she may have been just right about it. Harry emptied his heart for her. Her tears, happy tears were now flowing freely, but so were his, she saw and she swallowed heavily. "And what does he want from an innocent girl like me?" She teased him lightly, trailing her fingers down his chest, but her legs were trembling with her emotions.
"Give the lad a break, will you?" Harry groaned, desperately trying to keep his racing thoughts and emotions under control, but his emerald eyes threw a few playful sparks. "I'm trying to focus here, you know, and you are not helping at all!" Inhaling sharply a few times, he continued.
"So, where were we, my dear Harry? Did you want to say something your girlfriend should know about?" she inquired innocently, seemingly not taking care about her lover's objections, tracing his neck with her moist lips, which elicited a soft moan from the boy.
"Hermione, you know I suck at romance and I'm still nervous when I'm around you. It's just that... I would like to take us to the next level and not sure what the right way is to ask... Move in with me, please. Well, you have been practically living here with me, these six months, but..."
"Too late to ask me to be your girlfriend, Mister. You missed the train, so to say, I already am your girlfriend, and as you said I already live here," she abruptly cut in. "You have to come up with something better."
"Like I said," he swallowed heavily, trying not to take notice of the sweet distraction she was providing, "I want us to be more than just dating and, seeing that you are already officially my girlfriend, the only thing I can think of is … As I said, I want to take us, our relationship to the next level and I want to do it right." Letting go of her with his right hand, he reached out, just in time to capture a tiny object levitating to him on his mental summon.
The very next moment the girl felt something made of cold metal slide on her finger and her heart skipped a beat when the boy went on one knee before her and looked seriously into her eyes.
"Hermione Jean Granger, I would consider it a great honour if you'd agree to be my wife."
The stars sparkled brighter in the sky, the diamond in her engagement ring reflecting the moonlight, as she, still incredulously, knelt down too and smiled at him through her happy tears, whispering 'yes' before he took her breath away with his soft, warm lips descending on hers. And then, nothing and nobody mattered anymore; all bad things, all horrors and pain of the past being pushed aside, leaving only the future they had wanted to share to count.