TW: Emotional manipulation.
A new chapter, and a very important one at that! Make sure you read the end note before you leave, it's particularly important :)

The shelves within her bookshop were probably the only objects Hermione took the time to organise. Every section was sorted by genre and author. She also made sure that each book was neatly displayed without a trace of dust.

Upon receiving the new inventory of books, she spent several hours meticulously arranging each one into its proper space, but only after writing it down in her handwritten register. She knew where each book, magazine, and comic book was placed, down to the row. She was even able to tell any inquisitive customer where on the shelf they could find what they were looking for.

Having spent much of her spare time buried in books while waiting for the rare customer, she had read most of the books she sold. Sometimes she wondered whether the location of her bookshop was the most appropriate. Did such a small village really need one? Or would she have been better off setting up in the nearest town? Then she remembered all of the smiles that the villagers would give her when she suggested to order them something to read, or the stars in their eyes when they told her they'd liked the book she'd ordered for them.

Those were the kinds of moments that warmed Hermione's heart and reminded her why she opened in the small village in the first place. It was what she chose to focus on when negative thoughts got the best of her. She liked this bookshop and she took care of it. She liked to advise her customers and it was just a bonus that she was able to spend most of her days reading.

It was good, it felt right.

"Trois jours chez ma mère, vous dites?" Hermione questioned as she leafed through the register of books from the previous year.

"C'est bien ça," Madame Muller, the florist in the next village, confirmed.

"Je crois que j'ai vendu le dernier exemplaire la semaine dernière… Mais je peux vous le commander, il devrait arriver avant la fin du mois."

"Faisons ça," her customer agreed with a smile. "J'ai de quoi faire passer le temps en attendant."

Hermione smiled as she lifted the small pile of books she had recommended. Her favourites for this new year.

Madame Muller paid for her purchases and kindly bid Hermione farewell. She was one of her monthly customers, and came in often enough that Hermione was able to get to know her a bit better. She made the trip every three weeks to stock the small library in her flower shop. Similar to Hermione, Madame Muller didn't have many customers herself and read in her spare time.

Sometimes they bonded over entrepreneurship. Hermione felt she could be less guarded around Madame Muller, so sometimes she would let herself talk about the few problems that might arise within the bookshop. At one point Hermione even asked for assistance after receiving a bill that made no sense. A scam, according to Madame Muller.

Hermione trusted her enough to talk to her, which was rare. She wouldn't call her a friend though, they weren't close like that, but they knew each other well enough for her to elaborate on certain details of her life. About ten years older, her client was experienced, mature, and impressively stoic. An example, a role model. She seemed to live out her days in peace, without anxiety or fear. Hermione dreamed of being in her place, of being as capable as she was.

Hermione exhaled deeply once Madame Muller left, only after realising that she had been holding her breath for a few seconds. She wanted to make a good impression, to show her that she was doing just fine on her own and that she was just as perfect as Madame Muller. All she needed was a flowery hat, a perfectly fitting dress, and some lipstick and Hermione would look exactly like her. Those were the only differences. She was as confident as Madame Muller, wasn't she?

Albert's absence that day didn't make things any easier on Hermione. He had remained at the foot of her bed, still asleep by the time she was ready for the shop. He had seemed rather tired and unwell. Draco also took notice of Albert's shift, and encouraged her to let him rest at home. She hesitated for a long time, but the reassuring look in her friend's eyes was enough to convince her it was a good idea. Her dog would be safe, Draco was there.

She realised the trust she'd managed to place in him, a blind, almost perfect trust. It creeped its way into her mind and heart without her truly taking much notice. Afterall, it was just a few weeks prior that she had been unable to even accept him petting her dog for too long, or giving Albert orders when he begged. Now Draco was an integral part of both of their lives and Hermione couldn't be happier. It felt right.

In reality, she was the one who was most disturbed, not Draco. She was no longer used to working alone in her shop, she had lost her bearings without him. With each passing hour she kept telling herself that the day would soon be over.

The bell above the front door rang as she made a note on the order form for Madame Muller's request. She quickly applied a professional smile across her face, ready to face the next customer.

Was it a regular? Or was it someone she'd never seen before?

The second option was the most frightening. She hated meeting new people, it was particularly stressful and she always felt like a stammering idiot. When did her social skills become so impaired?

She finally looked up and froze when she saw Harry's face in front of her. Her body instantly flushed with heat. Her sweaty hands clamped down on the order form. Perhaps the radiator was suddenly broken and spewing out too hot air? She needed to air out the bookshop, to open the windows wide enough that she might catch a cold. It was too hot.

He was standing in front of her, chin up and hands in the pockets of his long coat. She instantly recognised the influence Theodore had on Harry's mannerisms.

His hair was more dishevelled than usual, if that were possible, and his eyes were worried. His whole body seemed tense, as if he was expecting her to shout at him. Perhaps that was going to happen.

Hermione dropped her pen and sat up, her shoulders and neck tense. She felt anger building as she recalled the impressive number of letters Harry had sent her since Christmas.

She should have expected him to come eventually, she should have prepared for it.

"Hi," he merely said as he took a step towards her.

Perhaps he had interpreted her silence as an invitation. She sniffed.

"What are you doing here?" she questioned, already weary.

"You didn't answer my letters, so I thought–"

"Didn't it occur to you that maybe I wasn't in the mood to answer them? That I needed time?" she asked, tiredly.

Suddenly, all of the discussions she had with Draco about their friends came floating back to her mind. He had warned her, and opened her eyes to the situation and had made her turn the tide. She wouldn't be fooled this time, she wouldn't forgive so easily. She'd had enough.

She had built up so much anger, so much fatigue, that she could no longer contain it. Talking to Draco had turned the tide–and she was no longer going to hold back and stop her thoughts from escaping between her lips. She wasn't thinking about Harry or the others, she was thinking about herself, about her rage, about her exhaustion.

Harry sighed and ran a hand through his hair.

"Don't make things complicated, Hermione, I just want to talk."

"I'm making things complicated?" she exclaimed, outraged.

She couldn't believe he was implying that. It was almost ironic. Almost.

The anger was building and Hermione didn't want it to stop.

"Yes! You could have answered my letters, at least let me know how you were! I was worried!"

"You were worried? About what, Harry? About what?"

He took a step back, his face contorted by what looked like grief, then suddenly anger.

"I worry about you constantly, Hermione! I've been doing everything for you for years! I've done everything to make you better, to get back to what we had before! Do you think I don't see how badly you're feeling, how stranded you are here? You're not the same person, Hermione! You're not well!"

Tears welled up in her eyes. He had no right. Behind her, a book fell from a shelf but neither of them paid any mind to it.

"You were selfish," he said, shaking his head. "You ran away, alone, and you left us."

He too seemed to lose control, no longer holding anything back. The rage had risen so quickly, after being contained for so long. It had always been like that between them, they struck sparks and quickly let their emotions engulf them.

"You know that I had no other choice!" she cried, angrily wiping away the tears that were now freely streaming down her cheeks.

It was too much at once, too fast, too strong.

"You think you were the only one who wanted to run away?" he retorted, his face red. "I'm sick of pretending, making it look like I'm fine and doing everything for everyone else! Do you think I was alright when Theo was locked up, when Ron went completely mad and then when you left? I was alone!"

Hermione shuddered. She felt like throwing up. The wooden shutters slammed against the windows of the bookstore.

"What would have happened if I'd run away, like you did? What would have happened if I'd sunk too, Hermione?"

He laughed coldly and sniffled in turn. She could see that he was on the verge of tears too. The shelves shook around them.

"I haven't been present enough, I know that, believe me it's been made clear to me. But I couldn't split myself in pieces in order to help Ron! I did what I could to free Theo, to support you, but I couldn't do everything!" He breathed in while closing his eyes.

It was as if static electricity crackled around her body, causing the strands of hair sticking out of her plaits to lift.

"So yes, I haven't been there for you, I've even stepped away, but I needed to, for Merlin's sake! I was going to explode, Hermione! Theo came back and I... I just enjoyed being with him, those little positive moments with him."

"I did what I could," she contracted in a weaker voice.

She tried to defend herself, but was far too touched by his words. She wanted him to understand that she was just as alone and lost as he was. That she hadn't been able to do more than she had already done, and that she was angry with him for judging her for it. But she couldn't. Her heart was pounding in her chest, in her ears, between her eyebrows, on her fingertips. Her entire body was thrumming to the pounding of her emotions.

The arguments, her arguments, the ones she knew so well and had rehearsed so many times with Draco, were disappearing from her mind one by one. Before she knew it, her head was empty. She'd forgotten everything.

"It wasn't enough," he replied, tears welling up in his eyes.

She stifled a sob, her hands shaking. Her whole body was shaking. She stared at him, betrayed, as her body shook, as if in a trance.

She saw him frown, but closed her eyes abruptly when a violent migraine hit her temples. She put a hand to her forehead, feeling feverish.

In a fog, she could make out her name being called, but the pounding of her head was too strong for her to react. She was exhausted, she didn't want any of this. She wanted to run away, far away. She wanted him to leave, she wanted these last few minutes of arguing to disappear. He'd ruined everything. She tried to breathe slowly to calm herself, but it only made her breaths come faster. Then she felt the magic pulsing through her veins.

That was it. Her magic. It was making its presence known, awakening inside her and shaking every part of her trying to break free after a long slumber. It was rebelling, refusing to let things be. It was like the continuity of her mind, of her body. Hermione felt as if she was trapped in a bubble filled with powerful, suffocating magic.

"Hermione!"

She felt her navel being pulled back before she could open her eyes. Her body was tossed and shaken for what felt like an eternity. She began to panic in earnest. Her breathing was stuck in her chest as she continued to be tossed about, as if being transported inside a tunnel that was too narrow.

These were strange, unfamiliar sensations. She had no recollection of ever having felt such things, while at the same time having such a painful migraine and such disturbing nausea. Her ears were ringing and she couldn't even hear Harry's voice anymore. It seemed like her surroundings had disappeared, that she was alone in this endless tunnel that was crushing her ribs.

Suddenly, just as she was imagining her life coming to an end while suffocating like this, she felt the ground beneath her feet and her body immediately dropped. She put her hands by her knees and lowered her head, her breathing coming hard and her lips trembling. She was in shock.

She wanted to vomit, to scream out in pain. Yet she felt nothing, she was calm again, only her thoughts stirring.

The ground was hard under her knees, but it was cool and smooth. She clung to it in order to regain some awareness of her surroundings. The pounding of her heart was deafening, thumping in her ears like the door-to-door salesmen who used to go round the neighbourhoods when she was a child. She didn't know why she was suddenly thinking of them.

She remembered how it infuriated her father to have to tell them every Saturday that he wasn't interested in their cleaning or gardening services. Hermione felt more tears rolling down her cheeks as her emotions mingled with these unwanted memories. Why were they bothering her now? She needed to focus on literally anything else that would distract her!

Yet every time she tried to focus her thoughts on the flowers in her garden or the vegetable patch that would soon be home to new plants, her brain refused to help. It kept coming back to the argument that had just broken out, to the strong, painful words Harry had spoken. To unpleasant memories, the ones that crushed her heart and smiled viciously at her. She was lost, drowning in his screams and accusations.

She didn't even know where she was, what she was doing, what was going on around her. Maybe she was at Harry's feet, maybe she was begging him for forgiveness without even realising it. Her mind was going crazy, she could feel it. Maybe it was the potions. She still hadn't managed to change the composition.

"Hermione!"

Someone was calling her. She had heard it, her ears weren't ringing anymore. But she was unable to answer, unable to move. She had to concentrate on the floor. The floor. The floorboards, the wood, the cold.

Her parents were scolding her now. They were shouting at her for opening the door to a stranger. One of those stupid door-to-door salesmen.

"Hermione!"

She felt hands on top of hers. They were also touching the wooden floor. Her breathing was rapid, too rapid. Her head was spinning and she felt nauseous.

Her mother would have advised her to put drops of peppermint oil on her temples.

Did Harry know? Could he see she was feeling ill?

"Hermione! Hermione, breathe, it's all right."

It was all right. Yes. It was all right. The floorboards were there, everything was fine.

Her father had rocked her to sleep the week before she started at Hogwarts. It was all right, that's what he always told her.

The hands above hers were now caressing the top of her wrists. It was pleasant, soft. Hermione concentrated on this new sensation, on the voice that kept telling her that it was all right. Because it was.

"You're safe."

Why was she in such a state? Her body was so tense that it ached all over. The thumbs caressing her skin guided her and she relaxed her muscles one by one.

She could hear herself hiccupping and sobbing over the voice that was helping her to calm down. She was exhausted. Her chest ached, her hands ached, her knees ached and now she realised she had fallen on them. As the seconds passed, her panic increased.

Something was wrong, but she was too confused to know what.

"Let it go, Hermione, let it go."

And so she did. She let herself fall forward with a small, stifled sob. Then she gave in.

oOo

Hermione felt like she was in cotton wool. Extremely soft cotton that isolated her completely from her world. It was pleasant. She could think of nothing but this cotton. It was soothing.

It didn't last long. Suddenly it was as if a bucket of ice cold water had been thrown over her face and the cotton had hardened around her. She was jolted out of her tranquillity when a hand landed on her cheek.

"Hermione?"

She immediately recognised Draco's whispered voice and blinked. She was lying on one of the sofas in her living room, her head propped up on a pillow and a blanket draped over her legs.

As a headache hit her temples, she remembered her argument with Harry. She grabbed Draco's wrist, his hand still on her forehead, and looked into his eyes. Her eyes filled with tears and she saw a worried frown stretch across his face.

"What happened?" she asked in panic.

Her memory was blurred, confused. She was lost.

Draco took her hand in his and placed it between them. He was kneeling by the sofa, right next to where Albert was laying. He watched them silently, almost worriedly.

"You apparated here," he explained, stroking the back of her hand with his thumb. "You were–you were completely panicked, I couldn't even talk to you without you shaking. You kept crying and saying that–"

He cleared his throat and looked away for a few seconds before continuing.

"You kept saying it was all your fault."

Hermione swallowed hard and closed her eyes. She sighed as the memories flooded back.

"What happened?" Draco asked in return. "I thought you'd been attacked, or that– I don't know, that something bad happened."

Hermione felt awful. She'd worried him for nothing.

"It's Harry," she whispered without opening her eyes.

Her eyelids were pressed together and she had tangled her fist in the blanket over her legs. Draco's grip tightened around her hand when he heard her best friend's name. His caresses didn't stop.

"He came to see me, he... he wanted to 'talk'."

"Talk?" he repeated suspiciously.

Hermione nodded as she tried to control her breathing. She didn't want to sob in front of him like that. She was ashamed, suddenly, to put herself in such a state in front of Draco.

"I was angry," she said, opening her eyes and staring at the wall in front of her. "I tried to... I tried to tell him how I thought, what we talked about and make him understand how I felt, but–but–"

She sniffed. Draco reached up and wiped her right cheek with his thumb. She froze. He wiped the second.

"But?"

"But I didn't," she resumed with a sigh."Our voices raised and–and he got angry."

She closed her eyelids to let a few tears fall. She was using all her concentration not to burst into tears. But she knew it was futile. She knew she couldn't stop.

"The rest is a blur, the angrier he got, the worse I got. I felt bad and–"

"And you ended up apparating here," Draco finished for her.

She nodded again and wiped her tears with the edge of her sleeve. She felt miserable. How could things have gotten out of hand so quickly?

Draco put his other hand on Hermione's and sighed. She felt a certain warmth there, a fragility. She eventually turned her head towards him and met his gaze.

His grey eyes were just as full of tears as hers, except that none had spilled.

"I was so scared," he breathed, looking away.

His cheeks were red, as if he was ashamed to admit it.

"I thought you were splinched, you were shaking so much and–and you looked–"

He cleared his throat.

"You ended up falling asleep against me," he continued, lowering his gaze to their clasped hands. "And I brought you here, I thought– I thought it would be more comfortable."

He looked up at her, uncertain. She nodded silently and squeezed his hand in hers to thank him.

She was still lost and confused. She could hardly comprehend what had just happened. Harry's words were vague, she could barely remember them, and yet her heart was still compressed in her chest.

She blinked to chase away her tears, but did not pull her eyes away from Draco's. He was staring at her with such concern and worry that she shivered.

"I–"

She fell silent. She didn't know what she was about to say, but the words died on her tongue. She blinked again.

Draco's irises were so clear. How could she have missed them? How could she have missed such splendour? She turned her attention to his face, breaking away from his hypnotic gaze. The expression lines around his eyes showed obvious concern. His pale eyelashes fluttered with regular frequency. His cheekbones were still coloured and so was his sharp nose.

Then she noticed that he had a mole on his lower lip. She stared at the spot for long seconds, unable to tear herself away from it.

And suddenly, without understanding what was happening to her, without understanding the impulse that took her by storm, Hermione leaned towards him.

She leaned forward until their lips met and, without waiting, pressed them against Draco's.

Her heart exploded in her chest.

That's it for today, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and that this (FINALLY) slow-burn ending was satisfying ahah! It's a chapter I loved writing and one I've been waiting to publish for a long, long time! Let me know what you thought ;)

On a slightly less 'cool' note, I'd like to announce that the regular rhythm of publication is coming to an end. I realise that I've been putting a lot of pressure on myself for months now, and to avoid long breaks because I'm tired or overwhelmed, I'd rather leave myself the time to post when I can and not put any more pressure on myself for the translation and the rest of the story. I've got less than 10 chapters left to write, but I've still got about twenty to re-read and rework, and that's no mean feat ahah!
Anyway, I won't be posting chapters every ten days any more, this resolution didn't last long (I'm sorry for all these fluctuations in publication), but I think it's for the best, if I don't want to end up stopping writing this story :)
I'll do my best to post news of forthcoming publications on my social media accounts, especially my discord server, where the dates of the next chapters will be referenced (if I know in advance!).

I'll see you next time, and I'd like to thank Knd, Jojo, BadEmpress AccioBraincells and Autumnfoxwrites for their support. See you soon!
Nova