Drabble the third
I bring you more fluff!
The next of the fanfict00bs V-Day drabbles.
For my very dear avidbeader.
Prompt: H/Hr: Post-Hogwarts; Harry goes out on a limb to get Hermione an original gift (prompted by a well-meaning but clueless Ron, +5) and she isn't quite fast enough at hiding her puzzlement or slight disappointment.
The Best Gift
“Say, Harry, have you got Hermione her birthday present yet?”
Harry looked up at Ron. “Yeah, why?”
“What’d you get her?”
“A book and a quill set.”
Ron rolled his eyes slightly. “Again? You always get her a book.”
Harry shrugged. “It’s what she likes.”
“Maybe it is but I’d think she’d get a bit bored with it after all these years. I know that Ginny was brassed off once when I got her the same thing three years in a row.”
Harry stared at Ron with the beginnings of dismay. Was Ron right? Would Hermione be bored with getting essentially the same gift every year? She never seemed to mind but maybe she was hiding her feelings and trying to be nice… And now, especially, he didn’t want to bore Hermione with his gifts-or make her think he didn’t care enough to put thought into his gifts for her.
That thought was more convincing than anything else. He couldn’t have her think that he didn’t care enough-not when-not when he had slowly come to realize in the past few months that, if anything, he cared too much. When he had come to realize that the way he cared for Hermione was much more than the simple friendship he’d always thought he felt-and he knew that the way he reacted to her smile sometimes or to her occasional, fleeting, friendly touches was not at all friendly. When he knew that one smile from her meant more to him than… well, than a lot of other things.
So now the question became-what should he get for Hermione on her birthday?
He dismissed the idea of clothing immediately. The thought of a perfume or something like that occurred to him while wandering through one store but then he had a sudden memory of their 5th year, when Ron had gotten her perfume and her comment on it had been that it was “interesting”.
He grimaced. No, ‘Interesting’ was not exactly the sort of reaction he was hoping for.
But then what?
He dithered for a few days but then he and Ron were over at Hermione’s flat for a butterbeer and he noticed something that gave him an idea.
~~
“Happy birthday, Hermione!”
Hermione beamed at Harry and Ron in turn, as they handed over her gifts.
Harry studied her in the dim lighting of the restaurant as she smiled at them, her smile bright and her eyes even brighter, and experienced one of his fleeting moments of feeling something like awe. God, she was beautiful… She was always pretty in his eyes but every once in a while-and he could never predict when it would happen-he would look at her and his breath would catch and he could only stare and think that she wasn’t only pretty, she was beautiful.
This was one of those moments.
She was beautiful and he-he wanted her. Wanted her with a sort of visceral desire that made both his body and his heart clench.
She opened Ron’s gift first to find a bracelet in the style that had lately become the fashion, with its promoters claiming the design and the combination of metals used in the making of it were somehow alchemically meant to bring good fortune to the wearer. Hermione had expressed some doubts about it but then Hermione never had been one to follow the fashions very closely. (And, Harry knew very well, that Hermione disliked bracelets because she said they got in her way when she was working.)
She looked up at Ron with a quick smile. “Oh Ron, thank you. I’ve been rather wondering if I should get one of these myself lately but you just saved me the trouble,” she said half-laughingly.
Ron returned her smile. “Oh good. Ginny got one a couple weeks ago so I thought you’d like one too.” His smile turned teasing as he added, “My other option was to get you a Chudley Cannons t-shirt and hat for you to wear to the next Chudley Cannons game.”
Hermione laughed softly. “Ah, well, I think I prefer this better, thanks.”
She turned to Harry’s gift and Harry tensed a little.
This was, he thought, exactly what bothered him most about these new feelings for Hermione, this new awareness of her; it tended to make him tense around her as suddenly, everything to do with her acquired a new layer of significance. When every smile from her meant more to him than almost anything else he could think of, everything to do with her mattered so much more than it had before.
For a fleeting second, Hermione blinked before she hastily smiled brightly at Harry. “Oh, Harry, this is great. I have been thinking it’s about time I replaced my old summer cloak.”
He knew a moment of dismay, wondering if it was his imagination-that had become hyper-sensitive to every look and every tone-or if there was just a shade too much enthusiasm in her voice, if her smile seemed just a shade too bright and too quick… Was he imagining it?
Whatever it was, he hastened to explain. “It’s made from a special fabric and has all sort of charms put on it so you can wear it basically year-round and it’ll keep you as warm as you want to be. And it’s been charmed to repel rain and snow, too, so it'll never get wet. I thought you could use it.”
“Oh, I can definitely use it!” she smiled, her hand passing over the soft fabric in an appreciative movement that was almost a caress-and Harry forgot his worry over her reaction in a fleeting stab of envy for the bloody cloak.
She was caressing it-and he suddenly (irrationally) decided he wished he could be that damn cloak.
“It’s lovely, Harry,” she said in a softer voice. “Thank you.”
He met her eyes, seeing the sincere gratitude in them, and returned her smile honestly. “I’m glad you like it,” he said simply.
She smiled and for a while, he forgot any worries he’d ever had about his choice of gift.
But, insidiously, inexorably, as worries tend to do, they came creeping back later.
After he and Ron had seen Hermione to her flat and then returned to their own (much-messier) flat, after Ron was absorbed in watching a Remote Apparition of the Quidditch game that had been played earlier that evening, he couldn’t help but wonder and worry.
That moment-the fleeting second-of her reaction-had he been imagining it? Again and again, he replayed the moment in his mind, her expression, her tone, her smile, analyzing it with a concentration he’d certainly never given to his studies (much to Hermione’s chiding dismay). He didn’t doubt that her gratitude was sincere but he wondered-had that been the faintest hint of disappointment in her eyes?
And as he wondered, all the doubts about the wisdom of getting her something new and different resurfaced. Maybe he’d been foolish to listen to Ron-after all, when it came to understanding Hermione, Ron did not have the best record.
And wasn’t it possible that giving her a cloak, nice as it was, could be seen as a rather impersonal sort of gift? He flinched inwardly-God, he hoped she hadn’t thought that!
Finally, he simply couldn’t stand it anymore and abruptly stood up, grabbing his original gift for Hermione and his cloak and heading out with a brief word to Ron.
Hermione opened her door with a curious look. “Harry, what are you doing here?”
“I came to give you the rest of your birthday gift.”
She smiled. “The rest of it? Why didn’t you give it to me earlier?”
Why, indeed. He hadn’t stopped to think of what reason he would give but thought quickly, deciding to edit out his own idiocy and Ron’s part in the story. “I was sworn to secrecy, to only show you,” he blurted out, exaggerating the truth.
“Well, now you have to show me what it is.”
She settled back onto the couch and held out both hands teasingly. “So, give me my gift.”
He smiled. He loved the glint of mischief in her eyes, loved the playfulness in her manner that she didn’t show too often. He pretended to hesitate. “Mm, I don’t know; maybe I should just let you wait until Christmas or something.”
“Harry!”
She tossed a cushion at him, which he ducked with a laugh.
“Okay, okay, here it is.”
He handed her the gift and watched as she opened it, wondering-for what seemed like the millionth time-how it was he’d known her for so many years and never noticed just how pretty she was when she smiled like this. At this moment, with her eyes bright, her cheeks flushed, smiling as she was, she was positively glowing…
“Oh, Harry!” She looked up at him, her eyes and her smile brighter than he’d ever seen it. This was the reaction he’d wanted, he thought vaguely, this spontaneous and utterly sincere enthusiasm that made her the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen… She stole his breath and his heart. “I thought this wasn’t supposed to be released until next month!”
She returned her gaze to the book, the first printing of the first volume of the research of the leading medical Herbologist, Amaury de Montfort, which had been widely anticipated for the last few years, before looking back up at him.
He shrugged, schooling his expression to be nonchalant, even as he made a mental note to never listen to Ron again when it came to Hermione. “It hasn’t been released yet, hence the secrecy.”
“But, Harry, how--”
“I happened to mention to the publisher and the publisher happened to mention to mention what I’d said to de Montfort, that I was very much looking forward to this book. And Amaury de Montfort sent me, as a bit of a favor, one of the advance author’s copies.”
“Harry!”
He pretended innocence. “Apparently, I’m quite an important person so even a scholar like de Montfort will do favors for me.”
He was rewarded by the sound of her laughter.
“And I suppose he just happened to autograph it and write an inscription to me, as well?”
Oh, right, that. Well, he hadn’t thought she’d believe his story. It had taken more use of his name and his fame than he’d ever really used before, certainly more than he was comfortable with-but all he had to do was look at her face and know that it was worth every bit of it.
In the next moment, she stood up and threw her arms around him in a hug. “Oh, Harry! I can’t believe you did this for me. Thank you!”
He wrapped his arms around her, breathing in the familiar scent of her and savoring the feeling of her in his arms.
He drew back just enough to meet her eyes, intending to say something light and teasing, but the words vanished from his mind when he saw the flicker of uncertainty in her eyes. He didn’t see it often-she was too confident for that-but he knew her well enough by now to know that her confidence also served as a carefully-preserved façade to hide a streak of vulnerability. And he suddenly realized that somehow-amazingly, it almost seemed-she really didn’t know just how important she was to him. Even before he’d realized he loved her, she’d been so important…
“Don’t you know there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you?” he asked softly and then, on a sudden, mad impulse, he did something he’d never done before and brushed his lips against hers. It was a tease of a kiss, so light and fleeting and quite platonic.
She stared up at him, her eyes wide, and he hastily retreated onto more familiar ground, safer ground. “Happy birthday, Hermione,” he said with an attempt at his usual manner and made as if to step back, letting his arms drop from around her.
But she didn’t let him. Instead she rose up on her toes and pressed her lips to his.
She kissed him.
For one split second, he was too surprised to react, but then his brain caught up to his body-Hermione was kissing him!
He tightened his arms around her, deepening the kiss as her lips parted, and finally, finally, he kissed her the way he’d wanted to for months now. Finally, she was in his arms and he was kissing her and tasting her and feeling the softness of her lips and her fingers tangling in his hair and-and…
And he stopped trying to catalogue all he was feeling.
How long the kiss lasted, he had no idea-he knew he could have gone on kissing her forever-but all too soon, the need for air became imperative and he reluctantly ended the kiss, brushing his lips against her cheek and then her nose and then her eyebrows before he drew back, just enough to look at her.
She was flushed and starry-eyed, her lips swollen-and so beautiful it almost hurt to look at her.
For a moment, neither of them said anything, only stared at each other, as he sought-and found-all he’d hoped and wanted to see in her eyes.
“Hermione…” he breathed-just her name, not quite a question, not quite an affirmation, not quite an endearment, but somehow a combination of all three.
A slight smile tugged at the corners of her lips, a half-teasing light entering her eyes. “I think,” she said softly, “this is the best gift.”
He smiled, feeling a bubble of laughter well up inside him. “I’ll keep that in mind; it’ll save me some money in the future.”
“Oh, Harry…” Her laugh was soft and low-and utterly irresistible.
When he kissed her again, they were both smiling.
And his last coherent thought before he abandoned thought in favor of exulting in the rush of pure physical sensation was that this entire evening was turning out to be an even better gift for himself, giving him what he’d wanted most: her…
The next of the fanfict00bs V-Day drabbles.
For my very dear avidbeader.
Prompt: H/Hr: Post-Hogwarts; Harry goes out on a limb to get Hermione an original gift (prompted by a well-meaning but clueless Ron, +5) and she isn't quite fast enough at hiding her puzzlement or slight disappointment.
The Best Gift
“Say, Harry, have you got Hermione her birthday present yet?”
Harry looked up at Ron. “Yeah, why?”
“What’d you get her?”
“A book and a quill set.”
Ron rolled his eyes slightly. “Again? You always get her a book.”
Harry shrugged. “It’s what she likes.”
“Maybe it is but I’d think she’d get a bit bored with it after all these years. I know that Ginny was brassed off once when I got her the same thing three years in a row.”
Harry stared at Ron with the beginnings of dismay. Was Ron right? Would Hermione be bored with getting essentially the same gift every year? She never seemed to mind but maybe she was hiding her feelings and trying to be nice… And now, especially, he didn’t want to bore Hermione with his gifts-or make her think he didn’t care enough to put thought into his gifts for her.
That thought was more convincing than anything else. He couldn’t have her think that he didn’t care enough-not when-not when he had slowly come to realize in the past few months that, if anything, he cared too much. When he had come to realize that the way he cared for Hermione was much more than the simple friendship he’d always thought he felt-and he knew that the way he reacted to her smile sometimes or to her occasional, fleeting, friendly touches was not at all friendly. When he knew that one smile from her meant more to him than… well, than a lot of other things.
So now the question became-what should he get for Hermione on her birthday?
He dismissed the idea of clothing immediately. The thought of a perfume or something like that occurred to him while wandering through one store but then he had a sudden memory of their 5th year, when Ron had gotten her perfume and her comment on it had been that it was “interesting”.
He grimaced. No, ‘Interesting’ was not exactly the sort of reaction he was hoping for.
But then what?
He dithered for a few days but then he and Ron were over at Hermione’s flat for a butterbeer and he noticed something that gave him an idea.
~~
“Happy birthday, Hermione!”
Hermione beamed at Harry and Ron in turn, as they handed over her gifts.
Harry studied her in the dim lighting of the restaurant as she smiled at them, her smile bright and her eyes even brighter, and experienced one of his fleeting moments of feeling something like awe. God, she was beautiful… She was always pretty in his eyes but every once in a while-and he could never predict when it would happen-he would look at her and his breath would catch and he could only stare and think that she wasn’t only pretty, she was beautiful.
This was one of those moments.
She was beautiful and he-he wanted her. Wanted her with a sort of visceral desire that made both his body and his heart clench.
She opened Ron’s gift first to find a bracelet in the style that had lately become the fashion, with its promoters claiming the design and the combination of metals used in the making of it were somehow alchemically meant to bring good fortune to the wearer. Hermione had expressed some doubts about it but then Hermione never had been one to follow the fashions very closely. (And, Harry knew very well, that Hermione disliked bracelets because she said they got in her way when she was working.)
She looked up at Ron with a quick smile. “Oh Ron, thank you. I’ve been rather wondering if I should get one of these myself lately but you just saved me the trouble,” she said half-laughingly.
Ron returned her smile. “Oh good. Ginny got one a couple weeks ago so I thought you’d like one too.” His smile turned teasing as he added, “My other option was to get you a Chudley Cannons t-shirt and hat for you to wear to the next Chudley Cannons game.”
Hermione laughed softly. “Ah, well, I think I prefer this better, thanks.”
She turned to Harry’s gift and Harry tensed a little.
This was, he thought, exactly what bothered him most about these new feelings for Hermione, this new awareness of her; it tended to make him tense around her as suddenly, everything to do with her acquired a new layer of significance. When every smile from her meant more to him than almost anything else he could think of, everything to do with her mattered so much more than it had before.
For a fleeting second, Hermione blinked before she hastily smiled brightly at Harry. “Oh, Harry, this is great. I have been thinking it’s about time I replaced my old summer cloak.”
He knew a moment of dismay, wondering if it was his imagination-that had become hyper-sensitive to every look and every tone-or if there was just a shade too much enthusiasm in her voice, if her smile seemed just a shade too bright and too quick… Was he imagining it?
Whatever it was, he hastened to explain. “It’s made from a special fabric and has all sort of charms put on it so you can wear it basically year-round and it’ll keep you as warm as you want to be. And it’s been charmed to repel rain and snow, too, so it'll never get wet. I thought you could use it.”
“Oh, I can definitely use it!” she smiled, her hand passing over the soft fabric in an appreciative movement that was almost a caress-and Harry forgot his worry over her reaction in a fleeting stab of envy for the bloody cloak.
She was caressing it-and he suddenly (irrationally) decided he wished he could be that damn cloak.
“It’s lovely, Harry,” she said in a softer voice. “Thank you.”
He met her eyes, seeing the sincere gratitude in them, and returned her smile honestly. “I’m glad you like it,” he said simply.
She smiled and for a while, he forgot any worries he’d ever had about his choice of gift.
But, insidiously, inexorably, as worries tend to do, they came creeping back later.
After he and Ron had seen Hermione to her flat and then returned to their own (much-messier) flat, after Ron was absorbed in watching a Remote Apparition of the Quidditch game that had been played earlier that evening, he couldn’t help but wonder and worry.
That moment-the fleeting second-of her reaction-had he been imagining it? Again and again, he replayed the moment in his mind, her expression, her tone, her smile, analyzing it with a concentration he’d certainly never given to his studies (much to Hermione’s chiding dismay). He didn’t doubt that her gratitude was sincere but he wondered-had that been the faintest hint of disappointment in her eyes?
And as he wondered, all the doubts about the wisdom of getting her something new and different resurfaced. Maybe he’d been foolish to listen to Ron-after all, when it came to understanding Hermione, Ron did not have the best record.
And wasn’t it possible that giving her a cloak, nice as it was, could be seen as a rather impersonal sort of gift? He flinched inwardly-God, he hoped she hadn’t thought that!
Finally, he simply couldn’t stand it anymore and abruptly stood up, grabbing his original gift for Hermione and his cloak and heading out with a brief word to Ron.
Hermione opened her door with a curious look. “Harry, what are you doing here?”
“I came to give you the rest of your birthday gift.”
She smiled. “The rest of it? Why didn’t you give it to me earlier?”
Why, indeed. He hadn’t stopped to think of what reason he would give but thought quickly, deciding to edit out his own idiocy and Ron’s part in the story. “I was sworn to secrecy, to only show you,” he blurted out, exaggerating the truth.
“Well, now you have to show me what it is.”
She settled back onto the couch and held out both hands teasingly. “So, give me my gift.”
He smiled. He loved the glint of mischief in her eyes, loved the playfulness in her manner that she didn’t show too often. He pretended to hesitate. “Mm, I don’t know; maybe I should just let you wait until Christmas or something.”
“Harry!”
She tossed a cushion at him, which he ducked with a laugh.
“Okay, okay, here it is.”
He handed her the gift and watched as she opened it, wondering-for what seemed like the millionth time-how it was he’d known her for so many years and never noticed just how pretty she was when she smiled like this. At this moment, with her eyes bright, her cheeks flushed, smiling as she was, she was positively glowing…
“Oh, Harry!” She looked up at him, her eyes and her smile brighter than he’d ever seen it. This was the reaction he’d wanted, he thought vaguely, this spontaneous and utterly sincere enthusiasm that made her the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen… She stole his breath and his heart. “I thought this wasn’t supposed to be released until next month!”
She returned her gaze to the book, the first printing of the first volume of the research of the leading medical Herbologist, Amaury de Montfort, which had been widely anticipated for the last few years, before looking back up at him.
He shrugged, schooling his expression to be nonchalant, even as he made a mental note to never listen to Ron again when it came to Hermione. “It hasn’t been released yet, hence the secrecy.”
“But, Harry, how--”
“I happened to mention to the publisher and the publisher happened to mention to mention what I’d said to de Montfort, that I was very much looking forward to this book. And Amaury de Montfort sent me, as a bit of a favor, one of the advance author’s copies.”
“Harry!”
He pretended innocence. “Apparently, I’m quite an important person so even a scholar like de Montfort will do favors for me.”
He was rewarded by the sound of her laughter.
“And I suppose he just happened to autograph it and write an inscription to me, as well?”
Oh, right, that. Well, he hadn’t thought she’d believe his story. It had taken more use of his name and his fame than he’d ever really used before, certainly more than he was comfortable with-but all he had to do was look at her face and know that it was worth every bit of it.
In the next moment, she stood up and threw her arms around him in a hug. “Oh, Harry! I can’t believe you did this for me. Thank you!”
He wrapped his arms around her, breathing in the familiar scent of her and savoring the feeling of her in his arms.
He drew back just enough to meet her eyes, intending to say something light and teasing, but the words vanished from his mind when he saw the flicker of uncertainty in her eyes. He didn’t see it often-she was too confident for that-but he knew her well enough by now to know that her confidence also served as a carefully-preserved façade to hide a streak of vulnerability. And he suddenly realized that somehow-amazingly, it almost seemed-she really didn’t know just how important she was to him. Even before he’d realized he loved her, she’d been so important…
“Don’t you know there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you?” he asked softly and then, on a sudden, mad impulse, he did something he’d never done before and brushed his lips against hers. It was a tease of a kiss, so light and fleeting and quite platonic.
She stared up at him, her eyes wide, and he hastily retreated onto more familiar ground, safer ground. “Happy birthday, Hermione,” he said with an attempt at his usual manner and made as if to step back, letting his arms drop from around her.
But she didn’t let him. Instead she rose up on her toes and pressed her lips to his.
She kissed him.
For one split second, he was too surprised to react, but then his brain caught up to his body-Hermione was kissing him!
He tightened his arms around her, deepening the kiss as her lips parted, and finally, finally, he kissed her the way he’d wanted to for months now. Finally, she was in his arms and he was kissing her and tasting her and feeling the softness of her lips and her fingers tangling in his hair and-and…
And he stopped trying to catalogue all he was feeling.
How long the kiss lasted, he had no idea-he knew he could have gone on kissing her forever-but all too soon, the need for air became imperative and he reluctantly ended the kiss, brushing his lips against her cheek and then her nose and then her eyebrows before he drew back, just enough to look at her.
She was flushed and starry-eyed, her lips swollen-and so beautiful it almost hurt to look at her.
For a moment, neither of them said anything, only stared at each other, as he sought-and found-all he’d hoped and wanted to see in her eyes.
“Hermione…” he breathed-just her name, not quite a question, not quite an affirmation, not quite an endearment, but somehow a combination of all three.
A slight smile tugged at the corners of her lips, a half-teasing light entering her eyes. “I think,” she said softly, “this is the best gift.”
He smiled, feeling a bubble of laughter well up inside him. “I’ll keep that in mind; it’ll save me some money in the future.”
“Oh, Harry…” Her laugh was soft and low-and utterly irresistible.
When he kissed her again, they were both smiling.
And his last coherent thought before he abandoned thought in favor of exulting in the rush of pure physical sensation was that this entire evening was turning out to be an even better gift for himself, giving him what he’d wanted most: her…