Draco lets out an audible groan when, a week later, Hermione pulls a fresh set of macaron supplies from her bag.
"More little French biscuits?" he asks. "Really?"
"Practice makes perfect."
"Practice makes perfect," he mimics in that prissy falsetto she remembers so well from his childhood taunts. But there isn't an ounce of spite in it today. She almost chokes when he playfully tugs one of her curls as he crosses behind her.
He leans a hip against the counter and folds his arms across the chest of his light blue jumper. "More pistachio?"
"Nope."
He breathes an exaggerated sigh of relief. "Good. Theo was insufferable when I brought him a tin on Sunday. He and Erik ate a whole dozen. Right before they told me that if the biscuits hadn't looked so terrible, they would've thought I broke into your flat and nicked them."
Something about the fact Draco shared his creation – and publicly admitted that the macarons were their creation – warms her insides in an inexplicably pleasant way.
"You met Erik?"
"Good choice with that one," Draco confirms, and that warm glow spreads from her core to her chest. "Theo seems happy for the first time since…well, since he was thirteen, I'd wager."
"I get the sense that Theo had a bad home life."
He raises a single eyebrow. "You might say that. Thaddeus Nott loved his son. And underage Muggle girls. And the Cruciatus Curse."
Hermione convulses at those last words. Actually convulses, so hard that Draco can't possibly miss it. It's hideously embarrassing, her quaking like that, but he doesn't treat it as such. Instead, Draco's hand brushes the one that she's clutched to the island in an attempt to steady herself.
"Hey. Hey," he murmurs, his fingers moving feather-light against her knuckles. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—"
"No, I'm okay," she wheezes. "It's okay."
He shakes his head vigorously. "Trust me, it's not okay. I know. I've been at the receiving end of both Thaddeus's and Aunt Bella's Crucio, and let me tell you—"
"That crazy bitch Crucio'd her own nephew?"
"Many times," he says, finally pulling his fingers from hers. "The first time was the day after I failed to kill Dumbledore. On the floor of the Manor's foyer."
"And the last?"
"Administered right after yours. For letting you all escape the Manor that day. And for failing to identify Potter beforehand."
She's still shaking, but she manages to pull her spine into something a bit more fitting of a Gryffindor.
"Forgive me for saying so, but I count all of those failures as successes. Not just for my side, but for you, personally."
"Yes, well. Perhaps."
Hermione draws a few more unsteady breaths and then surprises them both by saying, "Hurts like a goddamned riot, doesn't it? The Cruciatus."
It's more of a statement than a question. But Draco nods anyway, tracing his fingers near hers on top of the island. "That it does."
He continues to trace the whorls in the woodblock for a while, until he says, in a low rasp, "I'm sorry, Hermione. For that day. I…know it's not worth much now, so long after the fact. But I am sorry."
She doesn't acknowledge his apology. At least, not out loud. Instead, she says, "I'm sorry I called your aunt a crazy bitch."
Draco releases a puff of air that might be a sigh or a laugh. "Why apologize for the truth?" Then he grins roguishly. "Besides, I quite like hearing the occasional swear come out of that swotty little mouth of yours."
At the word mouth, Hermione suddenly finds herself unable to look away from his lips, so red you'd think he still had blood on them. She has to shake her head, big hair and all, to scare away that damned brain buzz.
"Bollocks," she offers, to distract him from her weird behavior. "Shite. Wanker. Bint. Sod sodding sod."
Draco does this wince-laugh thing that she finds utterly delightful. For some reason.
"How…English of you, Granger."
"Indeed."
They smile at each other until he breaks the oddly electrified silence.
"So, then," he says. "If we're not doing pistachio macarons, what other torture do you have planned for me?"
She really should stop smiling so much in his presence. But Hermione goes on doing it like a bloody, sodding idiot.
"Apple, actually."
A simple "huh" is all he offers. Draco turns his back in a show of setting the oven temperature with his wand, but he doesn't fool her. She knows, even without seeing his face, that he's smiling too.
They work amicably beside each other throughout the morning, him on the batter and her on the filling. When Hermione explains her plan to peel, core, and cut a dozen apples for a spell she's devised to reduce them into a sticky jam, all in less than one hour, Draco calls her a mad bint. Then he winks at her, and returns to his flour measurements and the ongoing story of his first time on a broom.
As he talks, she can almost picture him, racing like a crow through the Manor gardens with a tubby little Vincent Crabbe trailing behind him. Despite the stars of his tale – two seven-year-old boys who would soon make her puberty a hellish one – it's a charming story that he fills with clever analogies, animated hand gestures, and whooshing sounds to simulate flight.
She doesn't comment on the way his voice softens each time he says Crabbe's name, or the fact that he keeps moving closer to her with each spin of his arms. By the time he finishes the batter, which is much smoother this round and fragrant from the perfect amount of vanilla, there's less than half a metre between them. It's a space she's weirdly loath to enlarge.
But enlarge it she must, if her spell's going to work properly. So she sweeps the last of her apples into a stockpot, along with butter, sugar, and plenty of cinnamon.
Draco leaves his own mixture to peek into the pot. "I have to admit, Granger, I don't see how this mess is going to transform into jam in half an hour. Half a week in our larder, maybe. But half an hour?"
Hermione scoffs and lifts her wand theatrically. "Do you doubt the great and powerful Granger?"
The Wizard of Oz reference goes right over his head, but he still smirks. "Doubt you? The 'Brightest Witch of Her Age?'"
She rolls her eyes. "Ugh. Damn the Daily Prophet and its glib headlines."
"Please. At least yours isn't 'Former Death Eater, Rehabilitated?' Always with that bloody question mark."
"Right?" she quips. "I mean, if they know the answer is no, why even ask the question in the first place?"
"So you do read the articles." When Hermione chuckles, he moves closer to her work station. "Are you going to let me watch this newly invented and likely dangerous spell, Granger? Or is it confidential?"
She doesn't answer him directly. Instead, she says a quick internal prayer for luck and mutters Reductio ad Fructus aloud with a circular flick of her wand. The apple-potion bubbles up violently, just once, and then settles into a nicely rolling simmer.
Draco scrutinizes the contents of the pot. "Dammit, Granger. You do realize that it's terribly annoying when a know-it-all actually does know it all?"
"Harry and Ron have been telling me that for ages." She lays her wand down on the counter next to her handbag. "Now, let's get those biscuits dolloped and placed in the oven, shall we?"
"Already on it," he says, reaching for a fresh piping bag and a knife.
Eyeing the knife in his hands, Hermione digs into her handbag, brings out the small item she added last night, and places it next to Draco's station.
He sees it instantly, and his breath hitches. Slowly, gingerly, he sets down the knife. Then he stretches out one hand to stroke the glass bottle. To trace the raised, white letters printed against the amber-coloured liquid contained within.
"It's the smallest size of Ogden's Old Firewhisky they make," Hermione cautions. "I'm not trying to encourage that kind of behavior. But you need steady hands to cut and by the looks of it, you already have a lifetime of scars to manage."
"This is for me?" he asks. His hands still caress the bottle, but he gawks up at her with something akin to awe. Hermione grants him one curt nod. It is for him, even if she already regrets it.
Last night, she had second, third, and fourth thoughts about packing the firewhisky with her supplies. But despite what she just said about steady hands and scars, she's also hoping. Foolishly hoping.
It takes all of her willpower not to dance with joy when Draco palms the bottle, sets it – unopened – against the splashback beside the stove, and returns to his work station. His hands don't shake this time as he cuts one corner off the piping bag.
Only when the macarons are baking, the jam is simmering, and Draco has yet to pour a drop of booze into the tea they now share, can Hermione work up the courage to ask the question that's plagued her for weeks.
"Malfoy, where exactly have your parents been during my visits?"
"Chained up in the dungeons," he deadpans, and he laughs when she blanches. "You should see your face, Granger! They're upstairs in their wing of the Manor, of course. Father's cringing through some Muggle literature for his Ministry-led rehabilitation courses. Mother's probably milling from room to room, mentally redecorating them."
"Do they know I'm…?"
"Here? Yes."
"Do they know about this?" She uses her tea-free hand to gesture widely around them
"This?" he asks, in what she knows is feigned ignorance. "You mean their kitchen? Yes, I'm fairly certain they're aware of the existence of their kitchen."
"Not the kitchen, you prat. This."
He waits for her to explain herself, clearly relishing her discomfort, and she flounders.
What does she call this thing they're doing? Between the tea and the macarons and the whisky, she knows that they've moved beyond the purview of the PTSD Pastry Tour. But her and Draco's – acquaintance? friendship? – is still too elusive to define. She's rather afraid it will pop like a soap bubble if she tries.
"Granger," he drawls, interrupting her thoughts. "Are you asking whether Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy know that their nineteen-year-old son and only heir is learning to bake, practically wandless, with a Muggle-born witch in their painstakingly renovated kitchen? If so, then the answer is yes."
Hermione lifts one eyebrow. "How long did you have to practice using the word 'Muggle-born,' Malfoy?"
"A while." His tone is flat, but she thinks she sees a trace of amusement in his eyes.
"Good," she huffs. "But do your parents know why you're doing this?"
Draco sighs and lowers his cup. "I assume they do. Otherwise my father would have already stormed in here, demanding that I put down the pastries and pick up the firewhisky like a man. And since he hasn't, I also assume that he knows all about the real firewhisky problem."
Hermione nods, albeit unconvincingly.
"You can relax, Granger. They're not going to fly down the staircase together on their broomsticks to hex you into oblivion."
"That's...reassuring."
He studies her for a moment and then heaves another sigh. "If you must know, my mother approves of all this."
"Approves?"
Here, he grimaces. "She's…pleased. About what you're trying to do here."
Huh. Well. Okay then.
Hermione takes a contemplative drink of her tea. It's that floral blend she already liked beforehand but is now growing to love. Draco placed two sugars in it without needing a reminder, and it tastes like bliss in a cup.
"You know," Hermione muses after a few more sips, "I always wondered whether your mother had a heart in there somewhere. After all, look at what she did for Harry."
Draco's delicate snort makes its reappearance. "Didn't you read the papers, Granger? My mother did all that out of pure self-interest. Pureblooded self-interest, no less. To save her own hide, and mine."
"To save her child," Hermione corrects. "Two children, technically. From a certain perspective, your mother risked her own life to save two children. Possibly even more, if you count all the students back at Hogwarts."
"I highly doubt they crossed her mind."
"But you don't actually know, do you?"
"No. No one does, except her." He taps his temple with his forefinger. "Powerful Occlumens and all."
"Maybe you should ask her someday."
"Maybe you should."
"Maybe I will."
"Be my guest."
Hermione's jaw thrusts outward. "What, you think I couldn't talk to your mother? I could talk to her, witch to witch. I could."
"Have at it, then."
Draco matches her challenging expression, but she doesn't miss it when he drops a distinctly satisfied smile into his raised teacup. As though he's happy about the outcome of this conversation. Which, inexplicably, pleases her, too.