Manhattan
Chapter Nine
Draco hasn't had to Occlude in near on five years– not until tonight, when Granger told him about what she'd done to her parents.
What's worse is that she had absolutely done the right thing. Draco may not have been privy to every plan that the Dark Lord had, but he knew that one. He knew that there were plans to find and torture anyone who might've given aid to Potter or his friends. Granger's parents would've fallen under that umbrella– and because they were Muggles, the Dark Lord would not have stopped at just torture.
Draco frowns to himself. Either way, he figures, Granger would have had to lose her parents. He's not sure which fate is worse– death or forgetting.
"Are you hungry?" Draco asks when the conversation lulls.
Granger cocks her head to the side, as if confused, and her eyes seem to flit about. Draco presumes that she is thinking of making some sort of decision which seems much more important than whether or not she is hungry.
"I– sure."
Draco nods, standing from his desk and rounding it on the side that Granger is still leaning against.
"Come on, I'll make dinner," Draco calls over his shoulder, heading out of the library and out to the kitchen.
Draco hears the library door close, and then the sound of feet padding across the wood floors behind him. Huh. He hadn't expected that to work.
Draco digs around in his pantry and refrigerator until he comes up with the ingredients he needs. He fills up a pot of water and sets it on the stove to boil, adding salt before leaving it be.
When he turns back around, he sees that Granger has perched herself atop the kitchen counter beside the sink. He's never had a woman watch him cook before. It creates a strange feeling in his chest, however, he has been cooking for Granger for almost two weeks now and hasn't heard any complaints– and also, this is Granger, who is decidedly not a woman whom Draco is trying to impress.
"You don't use magic?" Granger asks, tilting her head to the side and scrunching her eyebrows as if she is trying to solve a complicated Arithmancy equation.
Draco washes his hands and sets about peeling and deveining the shrimp for dinner before responding.
"I prefer the taste when it's done by hand," Draco responds, decidedly not looking at the witch beside him.
Granger hums– a sound which Draco takes to mean agreement.
"I'm not a very good cook, but I have always preferred to make tea the Muggle way. So, I suppose it's not so different."
Draco nods, moving on to the next steps of preparing their meal. He prefers tea made by hand, too. Who knew– Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger actually have something in common.
"What are you making?" Granger asks, leaning over slightly to look over Draco's shoulder from her spot on the counter.
Draco pours a box of dried pasta into the pot of now-boiling water.
"Penne with pesto and shrimp."
Granger doesn't technically respond, however she does make a content little noise of approval.
Draco is absolutely not unnecessarily pleased at the realization that Granger seems happy with his choice of meal– not at all.
Draco and Granger sit through dinner quietly, however, Draco still counts this evening as a win– he gathered new information regarding both his current MACUSA case, as well as the Granger case, and also managed to have not one, but two civil conversations with a witch with whom he has been at odds since age eleven.
At least, he believes this evening to be a success until Theo Nott happens.
"Yoo-hoo, Malfoy!" the voice of Draco's nightmares sounds from his floo.
Draco's eyes widen and they meet Granger's for a moment.
"Who is that?! Will they come through?" Granger whisper-shouts, sliding her chair back from the dining table and standing, her eyes flitting around the flat as if searching for a place to hide.
"Ooh! Who is that?" Theo's voice echoes throughout the flat. "Doth my ears deceive me or does Draco Malfoy have a girl in his flat?!"
Draco drops his head into his hands, groaning aloud before bringing his gaze back to Granger.
"Just stay here. I'll get rid of him," Draco states, his voice low. Not low enough, evidently.
"Not likely, dear," Theo's voice sings from the hearth.
Draco huffs and rolls his eyes, scrubbing his hands down his face.
Draco mutters curses under his breath as he crosses his flat. He kneels in front of the hearth, willing himself to not strangle his so-called best friend through the floo.
"Oh, come on, let me at least meet her," Theo whines. "Oh! Even better! The reason for my call– I'm throwing another party this weekend. Luna's birthday, this time. You'll come, and you'll bring your girl, too."
Draco glances back at Granger for a moment. She's not looking. She's worrying her bottom lip and twiddling with the ends of her curls.
"I have to work this weekend, Theo. Wish Luna a happy birthday for me, but I will have to pass on this one."
Draco knows that he should attend the birthday party of his best friend's girlfriend. He also knows, however, that he cannot leave Granger alone for the weekend, even in his flat with all of his wards– and he certainly cannot bring her with him.
Imagine that. Draco Malfoy showing up to a party with Hermione Granger as his date– absurd.
"You just want to keep your new girlfriend a secret," Theo huffs, his fire-likeness pouting out his bottom lip like a toddler who isn't getting his own way.
"Yeah– yeah, Theo, that's exactly it. Just want to keep her all to myself," Draco rolls his eyes before immediately locking his floo– effectively cutting his friend off from responding.
Draco stalks into the Auror office and he wouldn't be surprised if his frustration is radiating off of him in tangible waves.
Granger had torn into him last night after he locked the floo on Theo. She ranted for a full five minutes– calling him out for just agreeing with Theo and telling his friend that it was his girlfriend in his flat, and also for 'babysitting' her. She'd claimed that she could handle herself for one night while he was away. The only thing she had agreed with him about was that she would absolutely not be going to any parties with him– even despite the party being for Luna Lovegood.
She yelled at him until she ran out of breath and then stormed off to her bedroom and slammed the door behind her.
Draco spent the entire time cleaning up from dinner cursing both Theo and Granger in his head.
"So, if the centaurs are closed off, then maybe we're looking at this wrong," Mona wonders aloud, flipping through the box of files on Draco's desk.
Draco scrubs his hands down his face.
"Maybe," Draco frowns.
Mona bites her fingernail, flicking open another file to add to her growing pile.
"Did your DRCMC contact happen to mention how the centaurs would react to a couple of Aurors coming to question them?"
Draco shakes his head, pressing the tips of his fingers to his eyes.
"No, but we have to," Draco sighs. "Come on. Let's go."
Draco stumbles through his floo, one hand pressed to his still-bleeding nose.
Draco wandlessly conjures a towel and holds it against his face as he sinks down onto his sitting room sofa.
Draco tilts his head forward and resigns himself to waiting until the bleeding has stopped before he can heal his likely broken nose. Unfortunately for him, Granger has other plans.
"You're home early," Granger grumbles as she enters the room, clearly still displeased with Draco after last night.
Draco would pay anyone any amount of galleons if Granger would just go back to her room and leave Draco and his nose alone.
In the next blink, however, Granger is standing in front of him– wearing… What are those?
"What happened to your nose?" Granger asks, her voice softening just slightly.
"What are you wearing?" Draco blurts out, almost without realizing it, his voice muffled by the cloth still pressed against his nose. He blames Granger for his outburst– Granger and her skin. There's a lot of it staring Draco in the face at the moment.
Granger looks down at herself and scrunches her eyebrows together, as if she doesn't see anything wrong.
"My pajamas?" Granger scoffs, leaning down and pulling the cloth away from Draco's face– and not gently, might he add. A sting of pain zips through the middle of Draco's face.
Granger pulls her wand out of the waistband of the scrap of clothing which she is calling 'pajamas' and casts what Draco assumes is a diagnostic charm. Swotty little Granger– can't help herself, even when she's mad at the unfortunately injured party.
"Your nose is broken. I'm going to heal it."
Draco feels the tingle of Granger's magic wash over his face without waiting for a response from him.
"I can see more of your legs than of any witch I've ever dated," Draco says, his voice somewhat dazed. Draco realizes belatedly that that statement is quite telling if Granger reads too much into it. Draco hopes that she doesn't.
Granger continues to wave her wand, but rolls her eyes.
"Well, I'm sorry to offend your delicate sensibilities, but this is what I sleep in. I never got dressed today."
Granger decidedly does not sound apologetic.
Draco tries not to look, but Granger's legs are far more distracting than he might've guessed. She's wearing pink shorts. Draco has seen shorts before. He's lived in Manhattan for four years. He's seen shorts before, but Granger's shorts are shorts. They leave very little to the imagination– not that Draco is imagining anything.
It's when Draco notices that there's a triangle of freckles on Granger's right, inner thigh that he forcefully tears his gaze away from the expanse of skin before him.
Draco decides to stare directly forward until Granger has finished her forceful healing.
This turns out to be a mistake. Directly at Draco's eye-level is Granger's chest.
Draco shifts in his seat. To give Granger a better angle– not because his trousers are suddenly tighter than they had been a moment ago, of course.
Alongside Granger's obscenely short shorts, the witch is wearing what appears to be the same white long-sleeve that she wore on their outing to the library. This time, however, she isn't wearing anything underneath it. Draco knows this to be true by the way that he can see the witch's nipples through her shirt.
It's at this point, when Draco starts to–without his own explicit consent– wonder whether Granger has freckles on her breasts too that he slams his eyes shut.
This is Granger– the most insufferable witch Draco has ever met. He needs to get it together. He absolutely should not be ogling his charge. It is his job to protect her, not to objectify her.
Draco decides that once the witch has finished manhandling his face, that he will make haste for his bedroom for an extra long shower. It's just been a while. That's all. It's not Granger, specifically. It's just that Draco has been well focused on other things, rather than his own needs for the past couple of weeks. That is all.
"There," Granger states finally, stepping back and admiring her work. "You have a lot of scar tissue in your nose. It took longer to heal than it should've."
Draco can't help himself. He laughs. He laughs a real laugh for the first time in a while.
"What's so funny? You're lucky I was here to heal you," Granger huffs, crossing her arms over her chest. Her wand is sticking out from her right fist, which detracts from the defensive pose slightly.
"I know how to heal a broken nose, Granger. I would've been just fine without you," Draco responds harshly– although admittedly, Draco's nose does feel much better than it likely would've if he had healed it himself. Draco isn't sure he wants to know how she got so good at healing, though, despite absolutely having a fair guess. "And what's funny is that I have scar tissue in my nose because you broke my nose in third year."
Granger gapes for a moment before her features pinch in disdain.
"I did not break your nose," Granger argues. She's wrong, but she can try to keep arguing, Draco supposes. "I barely touched you."
Draco laughs again, tipping his head to look at the ceiling for a moment.
"You hit me so hard that I had a broken nose and a concussion. I also have a permanently deviated septum now, too."
Granger at least has the decency to look horrified for a moment before her face shifts again.
"Well, even if I did, you deserved it," Granger's voice becomes heated and Draco knows that she's remembering the events which led to the aforementioned breaking of his nose.
"I'm not disputing that. Just stating the fact that you broke my nose and caused permanent breathing difficulty."
This time, Granger looks pleased before she steps forward and takes a seat beside Draco on the sofa. She folds her– mostly bare– legs up, criss-crossing them and making herself comfortable, apparently.
"Well, how did you break your nose this time?" Granger asks, eyeing Draco pointedly, as if saying, 'It wasn't me this time.'
Draco huffs and leans back against the back of the sofa, turning his head to look back at the witch to his left.
"Centaurs."
Hello, friends! Happy Tuesday! And Merry Christmas to those who celebrated yesterday! I hope you had a wonderful day whether you celebrate or not. (:
SO. I have thoughts on this chapter. Lol. :P
This is one of my favorite chapters of this fic for a few reasons. First, that last scene- the broken nose scene- is one of the FIRST scenes I thought of when I got the idea for this fic. I didn't know how I was going to fit it into the story, but I knew that it had to be in here. :P And second, unfortunately, Theo doesn't make many appearances in this fic, which is a crying shame, but I just couldn't fit his brand of chaos into this fic very often. I did, however, have an idea for a scene with him later in the fic that I couldn't manage to get in, so if you remind me at the end of this fic, I'll post it somehow, whether in a chapter after the epilogue or in the A/N at the end of the epilogue.
Also, I know that Draco suddenly finding himself attracted to Hermione may seem out of left field, but I stand by it. First, because a physical attraction often precedes an emotional attraction, and on top of that Draco got knocked around a bit and was a little dazed, so his thoughts might've been a bit jumbled and discordant with what his thoughts might've been normally (or not. :P)
Oh! AND that line where Draco thinks of how absurd it would be for him to show up at a party with Hermione as her date was actually poking fun at myself, as in my original ideas for this fic, Draco agreed to going to Theo's party and brought Hermione with him, but it didn't feel accurate or appropriate, so you'll see what happens in place of that eventually.
ANYWAY. All of that said, thank you SO much for spending some of your time here with me. It means more to me than you could ever imagine. As of this chapter, we are officially half-way through this fic. (:
Again, thank you for reading, and let me know in the reviews what you thought of this chapter or what you noticed. (:
See you all next week. (: