Disclaimer: I'm not J.K. Rowling; I'm only visiting her universe for nonprofit fun and edification. (No profit is being made and no copyright infringement is intended).
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She says to Neville, quite seriously, that she knows she's not living up even to her own standards, that she feels jealous of Malfoy, who has seemed to have been adopted by her parents. She resents the attention he's getting, especially from her mother, and she knows that's childish, but she can't help the feeling. It's sibling rivalry, the passions of brothers and sisters.
Neville tells her that it's she who's envied, and not only by Malfoy. Nearly everyone in their Hogwarts generation envies her, because she saved her parents. He knows that for his own part, once he learned the facts of the matter…
He'd wager it's a common daydream among the children born in the late seventies and early eighties: to travel back in time and intervene between their parents and the death-blow.
It's an impossible fantasy of course. None of them remember their parents.
Hermione reaches across and strokes his cheek, and he turns to kiss her hand, and then reaches to keep Teddy from paddling out into deeper water. "He envies you, too," Neville adds, glancing out to the patch of sunlit water where Draco is floating, eyes closed. "He didn't manage it, even with them both alive."
Hermione shakes her head. "I don't understand what this business is…"
"His little sister. He thinks she might be a Squib… or he's afraid that she is, and if that's the case, the rumor is that her mother is compelled to put her out of the way." He pries Hypatia's little fingers from the sharp bit of shell that has fascinated her. "The Malfoy marriage contract is an open secret, of course, in our circles. They say the Squibs are buried in the rose garden."
She shudders; that garden had seemed so serene and lovely under the summer sun.
"And his mother seems to have come around to the notion that Half-blood grandchildren wouldn't be a disgrace, but it's not as if it's going to be a love match. They'll do as they've always done: breed for power, and for the stability of the line."
She frowns, looking out to sea. "So Draco won't have much choice in the matter."
"No, I wouldn't think so. You heard what Andromeda said; his mother is thinking of marrying him off to his Muggle cousin that he's never met."
"His Muggle cousin." That sinks in for a minute. "I'm glad Andromeda cut that off. The girl wouldn't have a nice time of it." She shivers, in spite of the warm sea breeze. "I wouldn't care to be married to Malfoy."
"Nobody would, these days," Neville says.
She remembers that Pansy cut Draco dead, right there in the waiting room at the clinic.
Hermione considers that in silence. She remembers—they both remember—the endless litany of "my father says" and "my father will arrange," and now his father is in prison for twenty years and his family is in disgrace, he's had it drawn for him in the starkest lines, just how little his father counts in the new order of things, and just who it was that had to do with him before for his father's sake and not for his own.
That little display, just now, glancing at her to see if she were watching as he undressed, now seems pitiable; he wants to be noticed. And that glower full of hate and desire: well, that makes sense. You hate what you can't have…
She shakes her head. "I think my father was right about him being in too big a hurry."
Neville says, "I think so too, but that's not the way that Draco will see it."
She considers that for a bit, as Hypatia splashes about, laughing at the light dancing on the water. What it must be to be nothing more than the conduit of a bloodline? She can't remember a single time he ever spoke of himself, really, except as his father's son ("my father says," "my father will do something about that," and then ever so briefly, she imagines, he thought the same of his father's Dark Lord, except he did rather learn better of that).
Even Neville at his most shy and clumsy had had more personal authority than that. He'd spoken in his own person every time that she'd ever heard him, which is why his grandmother's wealth and connections came as something of a shock.
She feels rather ashamed of herself, being peevish about being interrupted… for she and Neville can take up where they left off; Neville's there, after all, and he cares for her. Even if her school friends have busier lives now, they still care what happens to her. She might have broken up with Ron, but after some awkwardness he's still her friend. He's doing right by Lavender, too, which pleases her; he's nowhere near as superficial as he pretended to be.
Neville says, "Penny for your thoughts. Or a knut, as the case may be."
She says, "I was annoyed when he interrupted us… you know. I didn't realize it was something this serious. It's not as if he explained himself, really, but I ought to have been better about it."
"He is annoying, and none of us ever really liked him." (An understatement, she thinks.) He frowns at the horizon. "It's hard not to remember the other things." He shades his eyes against the sun. "I think we should go back soon. The sun's getting a bit high."
She nods, and stands to survey the deeper water, where she last saw Draco swimming. He's nowhere to be seen, and she feels a stab of panic.
Something closes on her ankle, under the water, and Teddy and Hypatia scream at the very same moment she does—as Draco breaks the water, laughing and shaking his drenched hair like a wet sheepdog. The children pile on him, laughing. Teddy, true to form, grabs a handful of his hair, and Hypatia splashes.
"That wasn't very funny," she says sternly. "You could have gotten yourself hexed, startling me like that."
He smirks. "That assumes you have your wand, and the presence of mind to use it." He turns his attention to the children, who traitorously decide he's the most interesting of the three adults. Teddy follows his cousin's example of swimming au naturel, and sheds his trunks; Hypatia plucks at her bathing-costume but hasn't the dexterity to make much headway with it.
Hermione feels piqued both at the bad example, and at being annoyed again, just as she was going to be the noble, grown-up person she sees in the mirror of her dreams.
"I'll watch them," he says.
"I'm not sure I ought to trust you with two children, especially if you're going to be this irresponsible," she says sharply.
He glares at her. "I'm not going to drown them, Granger, if that's what you were thinking." He adds, "I thought you and Longbottom might appreciate a bit of a swim yourselves."
Neville says with equanimity that no one is accusing him of anything, particularly not with respect to his cousin and his sister.
Teddy gets to his feet and wades out into water up to his chest; Draco scoops him up and says, "Enough of that for you until you can swim."
She and Neville take their swim, though close in to shore and keeping an eye on Draco as he splashes through the shallows with Hypatia in one arm, chasing Teddy. There are two children, after all, and magic or no, things can happen. On the other hand, it's amusing to see that Draco's reflexes are more than equal to the task of watching a baby and a lively toddler.
Neville smiles and says it's the Quidditch training. He's seen Harry with Teddy and some of the children with whom Andromeda takes him to play.
Hermione says, "And here I thought it was bosh, that notion that Quidditch is training for life."
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After the mid-morning dip in the sea, there is luncheon on the terrace, under shade. There is adult conversation, and further plans. Andromeda Tonks has a formidable grasp of wizarding law, and the ways in which her personal alliances might be deployed to the benefit of her nephew and niece. Elizabeth and William Granger reveal themselves as no less knowledgeable in the matter of asylum on the other side of the border.
Neville leans over, halfway through the meal, to remark to Hermione sotto voce that he has decisive evidence that she comes by it honestly. Draco overhears, and smiles.
Andromeda thanks Hermione for summoning her, and says that it will be a long and interesting fight, but she has every assurance of winning it. She rather suspects that her sister will not put up real resistance; that she told Draco the truth of the matter is a sign of hope.
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The children have gone home with Andromeda, and Draco has gone with them; Neville has gone up to the villa to see them off.
The air is cool and balmy. Hermione sits on the beach, staring out to sea, and thinking how little it feels like a holiday. She's still not entirely happy with what has happened. She supposes she's done the right thing, but she isn't sure by what chain of events she's ended up with horrible little Draco as a brother of sorts. Her mother and Andromeda have definitely formed an alliance, and she's shut out of it.
No, she ought not to resent that; she has no desire to be Draco's guardian or advocate, or anything like it. The grownups are on the case, and she ought to feel grateful.
For him, the clock-hands point to 'mortal peril' every times he looks at his little sister. It was funny, watching him look after Hypatia and Teddy; she's reminded again that he's Harry's cousin, unlikely though that seems. She's the only one who isn't someone's cousin. Perhaps that's the reason that Gran approves of her keeping company with Neville.
Gran. Yes, she has decisions to make, about what happens next, what path she'll take, and she does know that she is wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice in having so many choices. Draco has a Manor to call home, but very little idea of where to go once he leaves its gates.
In this moment, she has this little patch of sand, and the sky, and a temporary lease on the sea and the marvelous colors of sunset. She has nothing to do but to enjoy herself, and to relax. It's odd to be a child again, or to feel like one, after so many years of managing as a grownup.
She doesn't hear the footsteps behind her, feels only the slight disturbance of the air, and then Neville is sitting down next to her and handing her a glass of the local wine, which she takes and drinks. It loosens the knot in her chest, and the odd tense wrinkles in the state of things.
"You hate having to wait," he says, brushing a curl of hair away from her cheek. She shivers.
"I do," she says. Trying to make a joke of it, "What I want, I want now."
"And what is it you want?" If it were anyone else, she'd suspect him of flirting.
"Time for us... alone. And I know I'm a beast for not being helpful to Draco, but …" No, there isn't any "but"; it's bad enough that Draco is terrified for his little sister, and that he can't trust his mother. On principle, she oughtn't to begrudge him someone who can persuade him of other ways of thinking.
Even with the help of his aunt and her mother, he's afraid for his sister's safety every waking moment. She'd had a taste of that, when she knew at the return of Voldemort that she could not leave her parents in the open.
No, she ought not to envy Draco, except that she does.
Next to her, Neville is sipping his wine, slowly, and considering the colors of the sunset sky-or so she imagines, from his silence. At length he says, "I've waited this long, you know. I can wait a bit longer. Don't be annoyed for my sake."
"No, that's not it…" He's quiet, not a tense quiet but restful and companionable, as if they've stopped, on a very long ramble, and they're considering the landscape. She says, "I'm in a hurry, too, I suppose. On my own account. At least Draco has the excuse that it's his parents foisting it on him. I want it all, everything, before I'm twenty-five. That gives me the rest of my life after to relax." It's a joke, of course, but she isn't sure how serious she is… or if she can imagine resting.
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She remembers Neville as he was when she first met him, the round little boy she met on the train, the exciting train to her new life. Everything about him was round: his wide tearful eyes and his chubby cheeks, his square trunk and sturdy legs … though he hadn't been a pretty child in the least, she imagines holding that little boy on her lap and rocking him. He would have been cuddly, she thinks, remembering the plump warm weight of Hypatia on her lap.
Draco, she is quite sure, had been a pretty child. He isn't a pretty adult; what ruins his looks, she decides, is the look of fear, and misery, and angry confusion. (When he was younger, he was ugly because of the perpetual play of malice across his features.) Looking at him produces a feeling in her akin to damp or clamminess.
She shakes that off, because it isn't right to apply an esthetic judgment to someone else's suffering. She probably had looked like that more than once… certainly she knows that she looks ugly when she cries.
Neville puts his arms around her, very gently, and she can feel the hesitation that is asking permission. She settles into the embrace with a satisfied wriggle, and kisses his chin, and considers how it's he who's holding her, and rocking her gently, so if she liked it could be merely cozy. And if she were otherwise inclined…
She kneels up, her knees digging into the sun-warmed sand, to kiss him on the mouth and tell him that coziness is not what she has in mind. He pulls her into his lap, murmuring something into her hair as she wraps her arms around him. When she releases him he says very softly, "I've waited a very long time for this."
She knows that well; over these last months, she's carefully found her way past all his defenses of honor, and roundabout, and reassurance that he doesn't want to be trouble, that he enjoys her company but wouldn't wish to impose… She never would have guessed that he was both the chevalier pur et sans reproche and the bashful maiden. But then she goes in for chivalry herself, more or less as a matter of reflex, and even in the matter of peevish, ugly Draco, for why else has she opened the door to him at four o'clock in the morning, and more than once?
She supposes that she and Neville are well matched.
Beyond the warmth of his encircling arms, the breeze stirs on her skin. Around them lies the cooling twilight and the smell of the sea, as the little boats put in to port for the evening.
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Author's note: The association of Quidditch with child-minding I owe to J. K. Rowling herself, who remarked in an interview that she'd deliberately designed the game to require the ferocious levels of multi-tasking characteristic of the full-time parent.