The Great Hall was decorated more elaborately than they had ever seen it before. Floating candles lit the room in a soft glow, causing everything to sparkle. It was a cold night for this time of year and was pouring rain outside, but it was nice and cozy in the elegantly decorated hall. Tonight was the night of the graduation ball. The seventh-years would graduate in the morning...the first class to graduate into a world without war...
Tomorrow they would have to worry about what to do with the rest of their lives, but tonight they would have one last celebration in the place that held so many good and bad memories for all of them, the place that had sometimes been a refuge and sometimes a battleground.
Violet sat at one of the tables, bored already. She was not graduating, in fact, she still had two more years left at Hogwarts, but most of her friends were older than her and she had come tonight for them.
She had agreed to be Neville's date, but after the first thirty minutes of the dance they had run out of things to say to each other and he had gone off in search of his friends, leaving her to sip her pumpkin juice alone.
Violet heard a familiar voice behind her.
"Dance with me."
It was clearly not a question. She spun around to tell him that he couldn't tell her what to do, but when she saw the look on his face, she could tell that it was not a command...it was a plea.
She glanced across the hall to where her parents stood chaperoning. The last thing she wanted was a scene. Her parents were dancing, her father with his back to her and her mother watching her over his shoulder. Her mother gave her a wink and whispered something in her husband's ear before quietly leading him out of the room.
Violet got up and took Draco's outstretched hand letting him lead her to the dance floor. They had spoken briefly over the past few months...but there was still some distance in their friendship.
"Where's your brother?" He asked as they walked.
Violet looked up to see an angry-looking Ginny Weasley storming across the hall in tight red dress robes. Harry was nowhere in sight.
"I have no idea...he was here earlier."
They started to dance and he pulled her close to him, closer than she had expected him to. She was so close that she could hear him...feel him breathing against her. Her eyes slipped closed as he whispered in her ear.
"I have some things to tell you and I want you to listen...just listen to me until I'm done. I want you in my life, Violet. I've lost everything and you're the only good thing I have left. These past few months you've pulled away from me and I don't know why...only that I can't take it anymore. I want you, Violet. You're smart and you're beautiful and you're kind. I want more than friendship. If you don't want that, then I'll just be the best friend to you that anyone has ever had. But one way or another, I need you in my life. I can't imagine it without you."
She pulled back from him a little so that she could see his eyes.
"I thought you...I thought you weren't interested in me like that. That was why...why I pulled away from you. I didn't want to get hurt."
"I would never hurt you."
She leaned her head on his shoulder and suddenly he stiffened.
She looked behind her to see that her parents had just reentered the great hall. Her father had spotted them and was heading in their direction. Her mother was in his path, buying them some time.
"I should go," Draco said quickly, slipping out of her embrace. He turned to leave, but she caught his wrist.
"I decide who I date. I'll deal with my father."
He pulled his wrist free of his grasp.
"I don't want you to have to 'deal' with him, Violet. You've just gotten to know him and I don't want to come in the middle of it."
She opened her mouth to say something, but he didn't let her.
"Come find me later."
And with that he walked away.
x
x
Hermione sat in the greenhouse listening to the rain. She hadn't wanted to go to the ball and watch the man she loved dance with another woman while she sat alone. She had gotten as far away from the castle as she could, someplace where no one would find her. So she sat elbows deep in the warm soil as she tended the plants.
The rain pounded on the glass roof of the greenhouse. In the darkness, the castle was only a blur of light in the distance through the rain-splattered glass. She would graduate tomorrow and leave this place and go far away from him. She had ignored him since their fight. But she missed him, every single day. The worst part was that despite all the hurt he had cause her, she still loved him. And she knew that deep down, beneath his immaturity and his boyishness, that he was the man she wanted. He had stopped trying to talk to her at least, but she still kept catching him staring at her thoughtfully when he thought she wasn't looking. At least things would change soon. She just hoped that the distance would make it easier for her to move on with her life. She wasn't sure what she was going to do if it didn't...
She heard the door creak up and she turned as Harry stepped into the greenhouse, his crumpled dress robes soaked from the rain. She looked up at him. He stood in the doorway, staring at her and saying nothing as the rain dripped off of him making a puddle on the floor.
"Aren't you supposed to be at the ball?" She asked coldly.
"Yes."
"Where's Ginny?"
"Ginny's over?"
"Over?"
"Over," he repeated, stepping closer to her, his green eyes burning with a conviction she had not seen in him in a long time, not since the death of Voldemort.
"Ginny was an escape. It was all too much for me and being with her was a way for me to forget about everything even if it was just for a little while. She was young enough, removed enough from the war for me to be able to see her without seeing it. But you, you were the war. You were everything I was fighting for. When I saw you, I saw everything that I had to do, everything that I needed to be and it terrified me."
She stood there speechless, so he continued.
"The war's over. I still wake up every day terrified that this has all been a dream and that Voldemort is still alive. I still see the war when I look at you. I still see everything you want me to be and I can't….I can't disappoint you. Ginny has idolized me since I was eleven years old while you've always seen me exactly as I am. As flawed as I am, you've always seen me and wanted me to be more."
"I never.." she choked on her tears.
He held up his hand to stop her.
"You did. You still do. You haven't changed. The only thing that has changed is me. For so long the thought of being the man you wanted me to be terrified me. I wasn't sure if I could do it. You challenge me, Hermione. You challenge me in ways I would never challenge myself. I knew that no matter what I did, Ginny would always look up at me with those brown eyes full of love and admiration. Ginny always accepted me, but you challenge me to be more. You've always seen the man that I could be. I can't promise you that I can be the man you want me to be, but for the first time in my life I can tell you that I want to be that man. And it still scares me, scares me that I will never be able to reach that goal, but I'm going to try."
"What happened, Harry? Where is this all coming from?"
"Ginny and I were talking about graduation, about what I would do after. She suggested I be a quidditch player. She said I was probably good enough to play seeker professionally. Quidditch! As if playing quidditch was a good way to follow-up saving the world. That was when I knew. It was that exact moment that I knew she was a teenage crush and nothing more. It was the moment that I knew I wanted more out of myself and that she would never understand. It was the moment that I realized that I wanted from myself what you've wanted from me all along."
"Harry, I'm leaving. For three years. I already committed, I can't….you can't just come in here and say all these things and expect..."
"I know," he interrupted her, stepping closer until they were nearly touching, "I'm not asking you for anything. You should go, you've earned your place there. I just wanted you to know that I''m going to accept the position that the Ministry has been offering me. I just wanted you to know that while you're gone, I'm going to be working on changing things and that when you get back, I'll be waiting for you if you still want me."
Her anger softened and she stepped forward into his open arms.
"Harry, I'll always want you."
He bent down and kissed her sweetly and slowly. It was the kiss that had been coming since they first met at eleven years old on the train to Hogwarts.
"It's going to be a long three years," she murmered.
"We still have a couple of days left before you leave," he whispered in her ear, pulling her closer.
"What did you have in mind," she teased.
"Dance with me."
She smiled, stepped back and transfigured the dirty t-shirt and jeans she wore into a pale blue dress.
He took her in his arms. And danced in the greenhouse as the glass fogged up and the rain beat down on the glass roof, providing them with music and rhythm.
"I love you, Hermione. I'm sorry it took me so long to figure it out. I'm sorry it took me so long to grow up. I'm sorry I hurt you."
"Just promise me you'll never hurt me again."
"I promise."
x
x
x
Graduation came and went without incident. The morning after, Severus sat at his desk recording the end of the year grades in his grade book. There was a knock at the door and he called for the visitor to come in. He looked up as his godson stepped through the door of his office. As the boy was no longer his student and Severus had already made it perfectly clear that he wanted nothing personal to do with him. That left only one thing for this visit to be about...his daughter.
Draco stood just inside the door and did not approach his desk. Severus said nothing, but fixed his glare upon the boy, daring him to speak.
"Two years. I won't see her for two years while she finishes school. But after that, she will be an adult and there will be nothing you can do to stop us from being together."
Draco turned to leave.
"I watched you grow up, Draco. I saw how quickly you went through toys. You won't even remember her name in two years."
Draco turned back towards him, with a look of quiet determination in his eyes.
"In two years, her name will be Violet Malfoy."
x
x
x
Draco walked quickly through the corridors, his heart still racing from his encounter with Snape. He turned the corner and caught sight of Violet.
"Draco!" she ran up to him and was about to encompass him in a hug when he held out his hand to stop her.
"Violet. I spoke with your father. I promised him I wouldn't see you until you graduated."
"That's ridiculous. He has no say in who I see." She moved forwards towards him and he moved backwards out of her grasp.
"Violet, when the Dark Lord returned, my father chose him, over me, over our family. I hated him for it. I don't want to make you choose. I know you want to keep seeing me, but you have a father who loves you and I don't want to make things complicated between you and him."
She didn't look at him.
"Violet, I think some time might be good. There are things I need to do. I need to get my life together," he pleaded with her.
A tear rolled down her cheek and he couldn't help himself from reaching forward to wipe it away.
"I love you, Violet. Let me have some time to fix the mess my father made, some time to prove myself, to prove to everyone that I'm different from him. Let me prove it to both myself and to your father that I'm worthy of you."
"Worthy of me?"
It was his turn to look away. He hadn't planned on telling her all this yet, but as always, he couldn't stop himself from pouring his heart out to this girl. He took a deep breath and looked into her eyes once again, intensely and honestly.
"I love you, Violet Snape, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I know that, beyond any doubt. When you graduate in two years, I am going to ask you to marry me. I don't want to do that with your father trying to stop me every step of the way. I want him to know that I'm serious about you, that I'm serious about living a different life than my father. I want to be a man who is worthy of being with you and I want him to know that. I just need some time to set things right."
She stared at him for a few silent minutes and then finally whispered, "I'll miss you."
"I'll owl you every day."
"Promise?"
"I promise." He was about to turn to leave when she grabbed him by the collar and pulled him in for a heated kiss before letting him go, watching him walk down the long corridor and out of her life for the next two years.
x
x
A/N: The scene between Harry and Hermione in this chapter was one of the very first once I wrote for this story. It was sort of me trying to work out why he would ever choose Ginny over Hermione. I just hope I didn't make Harry too much of an asshole in the preceding chapters. She forgives him...I hope you do too. Next up: we skip ahead two years.