Special Challenge Voting Post: Best Ficlet
Best Special Challenge Ficlet (501-1000 words)
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Best Special Challenge Ficlet:
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Special Challenge Entries:
1.
Title: Cliff Jumping
Author: Slivovitz (anitapandit)
Word count: 761
Rating: T
Warnings: sensitive theme
Notes: none
Prompt chosen: “For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love."
“It’d be quite a long fall, wouldn’t it?” mused Draco calmly, looking down into the abyss below. The indigo waves crashed against the mossy, jagged rocks what seemed like hundreds of miles down. Draco placed a cautious toe over the edge of the cliff, and a small stone loosened itself and plunged ominously into the depths beneath them.
Hermione bit her lip, refusing to meet his eyes. She focused only on the dark blue water and its unrelenting cries. Her eyes traced the glittering reflections in the water, and had this been a different circumstance, she may have even found the infinite landscape romantic. But instead, her eyes dropped downward and fell on the serrated reef below.
The ocean seemed to go on forever.
“Are you scared yet?” asked Draco conversationally.
“Of course not.”
He knew better. “Yes, you are.”
“No, I’m not,” Hermione contended, jutting out her chin defiantly. “I was in Gryffindor for a reason, Draco.”
Draco lifted her chin towards him and forced her to look at him. She flinched; his grey eyes were lit with desperate fire. His voice was a distant yet forceful whisper-
“You don’t want to die, Granger.”
Hermione nodded her head firmly and said, “Of course I do.”
“Why?”
“You know why.”
He scowled. “Is this because I said my father wouldn’t let me marry you? Merlin, Hermione, I told you I’d work around that. I want to be with you.”
She said nothing.
“Stop being dramatic,” he insisted with a raised eyebrow. “We both know you’re not going to jump.”
Hermione still remained silent, but she inched closer to the edge of the cliff. Draco’s arm suddenly shot out, and he grasped her wrist firmly, gripping so hard that she cried out in pain. He was expressionless.
“Hard-headed as usual,” he observed darkly. “I love you, Hermione, so if you die, I’m going to be really bloody pissed.”
“What’s the difference?” muttered Hermione in response. “You won’t be able to be with me either way. At least this method’s a slight bit less painful for both of us.” Squirming, she tried to ease her wrist out of his solid grasp; she could almost feel her skin bruising.
“I told you from the start that this relationship wouldn’t be easy,” said Draco harshly. His eyes looked wet, but Hermione had never seen him cry. “But I’m tired of hiding, Hermione. And no, my father won’t like the idea of us together, but I don’t care in the slightest.”
“Two years, Draco,” whispered Hermione painfully. “I’ve waited in the dark for two years, pretending I’m not in love with you.”
Draco’s grip on her loosened slightly, but he still held her fast. “If you jump,” began Draco, “I jump too.”
“What?” gasped Hermione. She stepped back a fraction of an inch. “Draco, absolutely not.”
“It’s not like you can stop me.”
She gaped at him, then turned away suddenly, swearing under her breath. Draco looked pleased with himself. He too stepped back from the cliff, and he led Hermione along with him. They stood a foot away from the edge, the sounds of the rushing water constantly humming in their ears.
“If you jump, you’re sentencing me to death, Granger. Do you really want to kill me?”
Hermione glared at him, but there was no hate in her eyes. “No.”
“Life won’t be so bad, you know. You may even get married someday.”
Hermione scoffed. “And why would I ever want to get married?” she sneered.
“Because, Granger,” Draco rolled his eyes, “I’m asking you.” And he pulled a small velvet box out of the pocket of his robes. Hermione eyes looked as though they were about to burst out of her skull.
“But…your father…”
Draco shrugged and opened the box. “I told you, I’ll work around it. I’ve been carrying this ring with me for a year, waiting for when I couldn’t hold back any longer. And if this doesn’t convince you not to jump, nothing will.”
“You…you want to marry me?” she asked in disbelief.
“Did they really refer to you as the brightest witch in our year?” asked Draco in mock amusement. “I’m holding the ring, aren’t I?”
Hesitantly, Hermione smiled. The ocean seemed a tad less limitless, controllably vast, almost comforting.
“Are you scared?” Draco smirked.
“No. Why would I be scared?” He thought her smile was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
They didn’t hold hands as together they began walking away from the cliff. He turned to look at her. “Because I’m about to kiss you, Granger.”
2.
Title: Project Anonymous
Author: lazerxangel
Word count: 951
Rating: K
Warnings: None
Notes: I put the prompt-quote at the top of the story, but I neither included that nor the title as part of my word count. Since I didn't use the quote in the actual story, I wasn't sure if I had to clarify in the story which prompt I was using, so I put it at the top. Though it doesn't put this story over the word count limit, the quote at the top does for the drabble I submitted, so if it goes against the guidelines, you could take it out? Haha, I think it makes more sense once you see the story.
Prompt chosen: "Remember there's no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end.” -- Scott Adams
“Pass it on if you have nothing to give.”
“This entire project is insane, Granger.”
“It is not!”
“You’re barking mad. I bet you even started it, you optimistic whack job.”
“I didn’t, but that doesn’t detract from its goodness!”
“What goodness? It’s a silly excuse to act charitable.”
“Because being charitable is a bad thing? Unlike you, Malfoy, civilians of our world are generally kind people.”
“What, they’re kind because they like to give knickknacks away? Just because I don’t give away things on a whim doesn’t mean I’m unkind.”
“Oh, please. You’ve got to be the unkindest person in the world, Malfoy.”
“Unkindest? Look, Granger, I just don’t believe in this inane office game. I’m surprised it even lasted this long. I gave it a week before everyone would tire of it.”
“Looks like it lived to four times your expectation, and still counting.”
“It’s too bad I’ll be the one who puts an end to it.”
“Then I hope it doesn’t get around to you,” she huffed while marching away.
A mysterious package had arrived one day upon Mr. Finkle’s bewildered intern’s desk. As the rest of the interns crowded around, curious of the odd parcel’s contents, she opened it to find a bouquet of vibrant red roses. Enclosed in the present was a piece of parchment that read, “Give a gift today and make someone smile. Don’t forget the note.”
The next day, Robert, the attractive mail boy who had been blatantly crushing on the intern, received a gift certificate for two at Madeline’s Cuisine, an expensive French restaurant along with a card that said, “Thank you for the beautiful roses. You should pass on something nice to someone else, too. Dinner tomorrow night?” He promptly went to give a proper answer to the blushing intern, but he also mentioned that he didn’t send the roses.
The day after that, Mrs. Wilcroft, Robert’s boss and well-known antique fanatic, opened her office door to find an antique lamp on her desk. Down the hall, a grumpy Mr. Adams’s frown vanished when he found a pair of Quidditch tickets to his favorite team in his mailbox. Both received friendly notes along with their gifts. Robert fervently denied having given the Quidditch tickets, but when asked about the lamp, only mysteriously smiled.
And from that day on, the tradition began.
All around the office, gifts began appearing on workers’ desks: a trendy new scarf, jewelry, coffee pots, concert tickets. Sometimes people would give items to more than one person if they were feeling generous. It was rumored that a smug Henry James claimed that one time, he gave eight different people gifts. Everyone was enthusiastic about the new office game that had popped up from nowhere. Everyone, that is, except Draco Malfoy.
Hermione, in casual conversation, had brought up the Secret Santa-like scheme that was occurring in the office, and he had grunted sullenly in response. Hermione and Draco, being Hermione and Draco, proceeded to have a debate that only further incensed the two about the topic.
He moodily voiced his thought that the entire thing was nonsense and that he refused to participate.
She tried to convince him to continue the game for the others’ sake.
He told her that her attempt to make him kinder through donations was in vain.
She replied that if anything was vain, it was him.
He responded that that was an awful comeback and didn’t make sense.
The argument continued until Hermione walked out in a huff.
Later that day, Hermione stopped by his office to drop off some paperwork, but she walked in to find it empty. Rolling her eyes and muttering about how typical it was that he would abandon his office even though he knew she was going to stop by to talk about the files she was dropping off, she tossed the file onto his desk, causing a few papers to fall off. Holding back a sigh, she bent over to pick up the loose documents until a quick glance had her doing a double take at the paper she was holding in her hand.
It was a receipt for a dozen roses, dated a month ago from Amy’s Florist Shoppe. She flipped the top of bill down to see the next sheet: an order for two tickets to a Chudley Cannon’s Quidditch match. As she shuffled through, she saw more receipts for some of the items that had appeared on some co-workers’ desks: a thirty-Galleon watch, a ten-Galleon omniocular, a fifteen-Galleon gift certificate to Zonko’s. And that was just the least of it.
Just as she was about to put back the folder, she saw a bill for a fifty-Galleon necklace that looked suspiciously like the one she had received three days ago.
After hearing a shuffling outside the door, she placed the papers surreptitiously underneath some documents and grabbed her own file. The door opened, and Draco looked momentarily surprised to see her. He then looked mistrustfully at the pink tinge on her cheeks and the wide smile plastered on her face. “Can I help you?”
“I have, er, this to give to you.” She held up the green folder.
“Oh, right. We were supposed to discuss that today. Have a seat, Granger.”
“Oh no, that’s all right. I have to run now, but how about we talk about it today over dinner?” She thrust the file into his hands and brushed past him quickly. She only stopped briefly at the door to turn around and grin at him again, saying, “I’ll meet you at Madeline’s at eight.”
As she left him standing in his office, slightly bewildered, she found that she couldn’t stop smiling.
Unkind, indeed.
3.
Title: Lies by Omission
Author: Elysium
Word count: 750
Rating: M
Warnings: Sexual References
Notes: N/A
Prompt chosen: "What a profound significance small things assume when the woman we love conceals them from us." -- Marcel Proust
He sits in his chair and thinks about untruths, the worst kind. The kind that fall from the tongues of those you love. The ones that pierce through armour.
They are the smallest ones, and the sharpest.
She goes to dinner with her friend every Thursday evening. He doesn’t want to step on too many toes so he’s never put up a fight. At first. That’s because he thought it was with him and his girlfriend. Only it’s not now. Now it’s just him on his own. And she hides the fact.
A mistake. He takes care of what is his, ensures that it is safe. He knows all her secrets.
If he mentioned this discovery, her lies by omission, she would say it’s irrelevant, because they’re only friends. But Draco knows that it’s a problem because she lied. She’s made something that is probably innocuous into a festering sore. The awareness lingers in his gut and so does that horrible realisation.
Jealousy. The familiar sentiment. Draco, for all that he has, knows the feeling acutely. He knows that no matter what he says or does, or how his name is whispered and his wealth spread, he can’t compete with Harry Potter.
He accepted this long ago, as the way things would always be. Except with her. Because she is his: body, mind and soul. Only Draco knows the way her lashes cast across her cheeks when she unravels. The breathless sounds she whispers around his name.
He wants, at times, to lock her in his room and never let her leave. Because he knows that, his or not, with the twitch of a finger, Potter will call her back to him again. Friends, she says. A likely story, he thinks.
Hermione says that jealousy is unbecoming, that it’s illogical. That’s true. It’s the ugly pit that lingers deep within. It’s not meant to be rational; it runs on pure emotion. It feasts on visions of another man’s - that particular man, with green eyes and a hero complex - roving hands upon her.
After all, he’s taken everything he can from Draco. Why stop there?
She says that he should trust her, and know that she’ll stay true. But Draco’s never been one to place his faith and belief in that elusive thing called trust. What is it, really, he thinks? A person’s word. A promise. It only lasts until one’s priorities change.
And what if that happens to her? What if she, Hermione, wakes up of a morning and decides that she doesn’t want him, doesn’t think he’s worth the struggle.
What if she decides she wants an easier life, a lover who’s not crippled by self-doubt and distrust?
Draco tries to bed down these worries. He tries to pretend that they don’t plague him at night when he feels the warm heat of her against him and the cloud of her hair tickling his skin. He thinks that she loves him; she says she does, in spite of it all. He tells himself that it won’t change, won’t fade.
He doesn’t have the sort of friendships she does. He’s never understood her reliance on Potter and Weasley and other people that aren’t him. It’s a little thing to allow her, friendship and trust, and he should grant it, he knows.
He should believe that when she goes there that she’ll come back and take him in her arms. She’ll kiss away the scars that linger, the ones he can’t admit to but that she knows are there.
But the problem is that though he tries to tell himself these things, the truth is he’s just waiting. Waiting for the day when she doesn’t come back, when she decides he’s not worth it and that Harry Potter needs her more than Draco Malfoy. And that she needs the former too.
Draco always loses out to Potter. In Quidditch. In war. In life. Why not Hermione?
He thinks it is inevitable. But he’s determined. And he’s never gone down to Harry Potter without a fight.
He sits in his chair and gazes at the fire, its crackling flames dance a rumba across the slow-burning wood. He hears her voice and his name on her tongue. And then the soft pressure of her feet on the floor, the opening of doors. And then she’s there: soft skin, and a cloud of hair that tickles him.
And he takes comfort in the fact that, whatever the end result: he’s won today at least.
4.
Title: Hero
Author: sarahyyy
Word count: 625
Rating: PG
Warnings: Profanities
Notes: The scene is taken from Deathly Hallows’ Malfoy Manor.
Prompt chosen: We can do no great things; only small things with great love.
He knew it was her as soon as the three prisoners were dragged into the room. She’d lost weight, probably hadn’t had a proper shower in ages, her face was covered with cuts and her usually vivacious hair fell limp, but he knew it was her.
And she was looking right at him, those brown eyes piercing into his, almost as if they could peer into his soul. His breath hitched slightly and he hoped that Lucius hadn’t notice.
He felt his pulse race and his throat clogged and he forced himself to look away from her eyes. He had to stop this. Greyback could sense if his blood was about to pound out of his chest. She was asking for help, he could see it. It was right there.
He swallowed when his father asked him to identify Potter. His scar was barely noticeable -stretched by what seemed to be the Stinging Jinx- and his dark hair hung low by his shoulders but the glasses belong to Potter, undoubtedly. Potter kept his gaze down, avoiding eye contact with any of them.
“Well, Draco?” Lucius asked, his excitement somewhat contained, “Is it? Is it Harry Potter?”
His tongue darted out to wet his lips and he stole a peek at Granger nervously. She was still looking, unnervingly straight, at him.
“I can’t- I can’t be sure,” was his answer.
He was vaguely aware that his father asked him to have a closer inspection at Potter, his mind bent on playing him the image of Granger’s eyes, firm and unafraid, staring right at him. He walked up to where his father was waiting and looked right up at Potter’s forehead.
It was him. Draco knew it now.
“I don’t know,” he murmured though and walked away from Potter, preferring to stand with is mother near the fireplace.
He should have told them, he should have ousted the Trio. But he couldn’t.
Not when she was looking at him like that, like he was a fucking hero who was going to save her life.
“What about the Mudblood, then?” Greyback growled and Draco felt his heart skip a beat as the light hit her face. Fuck.
“Yes- yes, she was in Madam Malkin’s with Potter! I saw her picture in the Prophet!” Narcissa suddenly exclaimed next to him, “Look, Draco, isn’t it the Granger girl?”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
His blood ran cold when everyone -Lucius, Narcissa, Greyback, Granger…- turned their focuses on him.
“I…” His throat felt dry and his tongue felt heavy. A bead of sweat ran down the side of his head.
He could save her. He could tell them that it wasn’t her. He could-
But he wasn’t a fucking hero.
He looked at Lucius who was, quite evidently, radiating exhilaration. He’d never seen his father so excited, not after his father’s fiasco at the Ministry in his fifth year and certainly not after he’d botched up his assignment to kill Dumbledore.
He could do this. He could help his father regain all the dignity he’d lost.
But all he could force out of himself was a weak “…maybe…”
He turned to look at Granger. She was still looking at him though her eyes were softer now. She looked tired and thankful and…resigned. When she gave him an almost imperceptible nod, his lips parted slightly in shock as he realized what she was trying to tell him.
She didn’t want him to lie for them anymore.
His stomach churned and he felt nauseous. Lucius was still looking expectantly at him.
“…yeah,” he answered finally, after a long pause. He couldn’t manage more than that.
There was only enough place for one hero in this story and it wasn’t him.
It wouldn’t ever be him.
5.
Title: Comes A Time
Author: mister_otter
Word count: 656
Rating: PG13
Warnings: Adultery
Notes: Many thanks to my divine beta, eilonwy!!
Prompt chosen: ”Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” --Antonio Smith
Morning sun pooled like honey across the bed. Hermione’s curls were the color of a cinnamon bun, rioting over the pillow in luscious whorls.
Food comparisons seemed logical, Draco thought, since he’d already had Hermione for breakfast. Twice.
Lazily, because that was the order of their day, he lifted one of her curls and draped it over his upper lip.
His tone deceptively casual, Draco told her, “I don’t like the way he treats you.”
“How would you know how ‘he’ treats me?” Curious, Hermione propped herself up on one elbow, turning her head quizzically toward Draco. “In the months that you and I have been seeing each other, I’ve never once criticized Ron to you.”
“There’s always gossip,” Draco shrugged, as if it mattered only a little. “I’ve heard talk…”
”You know what they say about talk, don’t you?”
“That it’s good for the soul?”
”No, Draco-confession is good for the soul. Talk happens to be ‘cheap.’”
“Now, why would you mention that word? You know I prefer ‘expensive.’”
“Is that why you married Astoria?” Hermione asked, her voice deliberately light and teasing.
“Another word I’d rather you didn’t use today.”
“You started this discussion,” she reminded him gently, gazing into his eyes with a tiny frown of dismay. “Draco, we agreed from the beginning that what you and I have is a small miracle of sorts. An oasis, for both of us. We agreed never to mention our…”
He reached up and laid two fingers across her lips. “We did, it is, and we won’t. But…I still don’t think he treats you very well.” His earlier casual tone had been replaced by something far more fierce.
Hermione sighed heavily and flopped back onto her pillow. Draco turned to gather her into his arms, hooking one long leg across her body to pull her even closer.
“I apologize, love. I won’t mention him again. It’s just that…you and I have spent the better part of our lives doing what’s expected of us. I’m convinced we could do it so much better, together.”
“Mountains would have to move, Draco. I’m not sure it’s our lot in life to have that large a miracle-yet.” She raised one hand and slid it through his hair, fingers moving across the skin of his scalp in slow, pleasurable circles.
Draco groaned and relaxed under Hermione’s ministering touch.
”Besides,” she added, slyly breaking the no-spouses rule once again. “Astoria would kill you.”
”No, she wouldn’t. Astoria isn’t bloodthirsty, merely money-hungry.”
“Too true.” Hermione chuckled. “As for miracles-they are serendipitous things, aren’t they, Draco? And one never knows…”
They lay quietly for several minutes, holding each other as the sun rose higher, the light in the room changing from the color of honey to the bittersweet, pale yellow of lemonade.
“Hermione? If there comes a time…when the mountains do indeed start moving, would you be with me?”
It was a question that neither of them had dared to voice before now. The quiet magnitude of it hung in the air like smoke, keeping them breathless and still.
Hermione linked her fingers through Draco’s and smiled into his eyes. “Let’s say-just theoretically, mind you-that a monumental upheaval does occur in both of our lives.” Her grip on his fingers tightened. “You’ll be the one I want standing at my side when the dust settles.”
With a whoosh, Draco let out the breath he hadn’t even known he was holding. Had she just said yes, without actually saying yes?
“I wish we had a magnum of champagne,” he told her. “I’d like to propose a toast.”
“To cataclysm?” Hermione arched one brow. “Or to miracles, both large and small?” she asked more softly.
Draco tightened his arms around her. “To knowing that all three may be one and the same,” he murmured as he lowered his mouth to hers. “And to recognizing when it’s time to make one happen.”
6.
Title: Aster
Author: zeec
Word Count: 720
Rating: K+
Warnings: One kiss, deep feelings, character death.
Notes: None
Prompt chosen: "Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things." - Antonio Smith
His platinum blond hair and pale skin lit up as sun light danced in his hair and upon his features. The wind whistled in Hermione's ears, caressing her face, before going in her husband's direction to attack his already-tousled hair. In that moment, Hermione felt sure she would never see anything as beautiful as the sight of him coming towards her in the golden field, a purple-petaled flower in hand. As much as she wanted to throw her hair back, close her eyes and just feel the sun light harshly burning her cheeks and the wind lightly kissing her skin in contrast, she did not. She kept her cinnamon eyes open to capture the scene in the film roll that was her memory.
Draco came towards her, smiling. He kneeled down beside his wife who was sitting in the midst of gold, looking at him with an intensity that could undo him. He touched her cheek as cerulean grey eyes met warm brown ones. "Happy birthday," he whispered to her, brushing back a stray lock of curl from her face and putting the flower in her hair gently.
"I don't think I've seen this flower before," Hermione said, her tone equally soft as she reached up to touch the said plant in her hair.
Draco's hand covered hers as he removed it and placed it in her lap so that she could have a look at it. "It's an aster," he said, looking at her closely as she examined the flower.
Hermione ran a finger along its petals, feeling its lush texture brush against her skin. Upon closer inspection, its colour was of a more lilac shade. She lifted it and placed her nose on its yellow centre. It smelt exotic like spices. Hermione felt it appropriate - it matched its wildflower beauty well. "It's beautiful," she smiled up at him then dropped her gaze to the aster once more. "It's only too bad for it shall wilt."
Draco struggled to stop the rumble that was his laughter from escaping him as he watched her disdainful expression. "Here, he plucked the flower from her fingers as he removed a journal from his pocket that would have been far too big to fit in there if not for magic. "This is my other gift," he gave her a smile. He drew his wand and tapped it upon the aster. Its petals plucked themselves, following the swish of Draco's wand, and laid themselves in every page of the journal, now flipping its own pages at an alarmingly fast rate to capture the petals. He dropped the book in her lap, "There."
Hermione opened it, her eyes lit with curiosity as her gaze lingered on her husband's smiling face. She stuck her nose in the pages and caught a whiff of the scent which was now her favourite. She smiled, threw her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to his. "I will always love you," she declared as a rush of affection washed over her.
Draco pulled back from her and looked deep into her eyes as he held her hand to his heart, "I will always love you, too."
Hermione opened the journal and caught the scent again. She inhaled deeply, feeling a fist clench around her heart as she did so.
So many years later, the scent still lingered. Like memories of that day, branded into her mind, the scent latched onto the journal like it was etched into every pore of its pages. The sun, the wind, and the god that was him… she still remembered every detail like it was yesterday.
Hermione brushed a loose greying tendril from her face and felt that fist around her heart squeeze yet again. Her tears threatened to fall as the smell of aster clung to the air she breathed into her lungs and reached into the pieces of her heart to find the ghost of him in her memories.
He will no longer brush her hair back from her face, touch her cheek or cover her small hands in his big ones. He will no longer smile at her, whisper to her or unmake her with his intense gaze.
In those little gestures he had told her he loved her… Suddenly, those little gestures did not seem so little after all.
7.
Title: Complaints
Author: elektra30
Word count: 981
Rating: PG
Warnings: Mild Profanity
Notes: Post-DH, epilogue-compliant. Dramione at its subtlest (I seem to enjoy teasing my readers :p) and maybe even the teeniest bit of Scorpius/Rose if you always extrapolate their friendship to something more.
Prompt chosen: "We can do no great things; only small things with great love." - Mother Theresa
***
The first time he came to her office, he had been a very angry man.
“I thought you had better judgment than this, Granger,” he seethed, “but clearly, I’m wrong.”
Her quill continued its incessant scratching against the parchment. He reached out to snatch the quill from her, but she was faster.
“Mr. Malfoy, I thought I was supposed to be having a civilised conversation with you.”
“Civilised, my foot. You already hung a sign of dirty, evil, arrogant, cowardly on me before I even walked in here-”
“It appears you did it to yourself. For I was sure that our topic was supposed to be your son’s behaviour, not yours.”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “You think I don’t know you’re extrapolating my past behaviour to his?”
“I don’t know what led you to that conclusion. Your son was being extremely disruptive during my class, and I don’t stand for disrespect and unruly behaviour. We need to-”
“No, not the one who champions lives of miserly little creatures who haven’t a speck of respect for their own selves, let alone needing any from-”
“As I was saying, we need to examine-”
“-figures that the very things that he was fooling about with happens to come from the Weasley joke of an empire-”
“What’s wrong with you, Malfoy?”
He sat down, hard.
It was a long while before he admitted. “Alright, Granger. I’m tired of coming to Hogwarts all the time and having no conclusion to anything. I’ve got a huge business empire to run, alimony to settle, and a single father job to handle. This is enough; it’s the last straw having to meet with you.” He paused. “I don’t know what to do with him.”
“What happens at home after you are called in every time?”
“Granger, I don’t think-”
“Does Scorpius even talk to you?”
“I don’t like where this is going.”
“Neither do I, but it seems that my daughter and your son have struck up a fairly amicable relationship. I’m not sure how that happened, but-”
“Rest assured, Granger, if this is a ploy to avoid me as an in-law-”
“-not really the point, but as Rose has told me-”
“-not at all keen at the prospect of you trying to boss my son around when-”
“Good grief, Malfoy, I said that’s not the point!” She fumed. “Rose told me that your son doesn’t want to follow in your footsteps!”
There was a long silence.
“And what would she mean by that?”
“Honestly, Malfoy, this isn’t the time to be defensive.” She drummed her fingers on the desk. “It seems to me that the way you speak to him is just like how Lucius speaks to you. A very authoritative, distant manner. I thought you’d be different, you know, but - look at you, even the hair! You look just like a copy of your-”
“I am not a copy of my-”
“There, you don’t want to be. But have you tried?”
His lips twitched. “I’m not here to listen to you preach.”
“Oh, you’ll need a good scrubbing of your ears, because I am going to preach.” She folded her arms. “You haven’t tried one bit, Malfoy. All you know is to throw a hissy fit when things go wrong, blame it on everybody else and think you’re the one everybody has to listen to at the end. That’s how Lucius was, and that’s how you are.”
“That despite Astoria’s infidelity, I’m still telling Scorpius to marry a Pureblood witch instead of messing with a half-blood like your daughter?” He narrowed his eyes at her. “Rubbing salt in the wounds, aren’t you?”
She flushed red. “Look at you, the prejudices still abound! Your son is born in a new era, and he won’t stand you telling him things like ‘you’re not to friend this girl because of her blood!’”
“I have tolerated your daughter fairly well.”
“But you don’t appreciate her for who she is inside. You’re only tolerating her because you’re tired of your son scowling bitterly when you get home.”
“And I’m only tolerating you because...?”
“Because you know I make sense, and you need sense in that brain of yours.”
“Right.” He snorted.“Scorpius doesn’t want to be either of you. He wants to be himself. A carefree soul. He doesn’t want to be bound by the stupid house rules that you all have-”
“This is getting personal again, Granger, I-”
“-so he wants to rebel against everything. He wants to let you know he won’t accept you trying to put a Malfoy mould around him. He wants to change every association there is with that name, but the children in school have heard the stories and they won’t let him. Did you even know that, Malfoy? That in this post-war world, where you are busy trying to establish your name once again, your son is on a solitary journey to find his identity?”
He blinked, then drew his attention to something sparkling on Granger’s desk. It was a tiny, shiny Snitch, with the words ‘I open at the close’ carved on it.
“War souvenir?”
She nodded. “Somehow it reminds me that the small things have greater meanings.”
He looked away.
“Draco, your son doesn’t need your grand gestures of pseudo protection. He needs you to accept him and guide him. That is the kind of love he needs, not you arguing your head off here, only to go back and punish him for rebelling.”
He stood up from his seat, ran a hand through his hair, then left.
The next time he came to her office, he was still an angry man. But this time...
“Granger, it was bad enough hearing you wax lyrical in classes about your bloody general knowledge. You didn’t have to influence my son to start asking questions incessantly!”
She arched an eyebrow. “Communication. Well done, Malfoy."
8.
Title: Cottage in a Cornfield
Author: ningloreth
Word count: 1000
Rating: R
Warnings: Crack!fluff
Notes: Inspired by John Constable’s Cottage in a Cornfield, which really is a magical painting :-) and by an old black and white film I remember seeing when I was very young. In British English, a cornfield is a field of wheat, or maybe barley, but not maize.
Prompt chosen: For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love. Carl Sagan
“Granger?”
Hermione would recognise his voice anywhere, though she hasn’t heard it since he received his pardon. “Malfoy!” The years, she notices, have been kind to him, adding an attractive self-assurance to his always-striking looks.
“I didn’t realise you worked at the Museum.”
“Only on Sundays,” she replies, “I’m a volunteer.” Anything to keep myself busy...
“I’ve come to see the new picture,” he says.
“It’s through there.” She points towards the next room, but Malfoy gestures, inviting her to go in before him and, though she knows she should be downstairs, patrolling the Mediaeval rooms, there’s something so commanding about him that, feeling a bit like Crabbe or Goyle, she escorts him through the door.
The little painting, on short-term loan from its anonymous owner, hangs in splendid isolation against a moss-green wall.
Hermione watches Malfoy lean in, and look closely.
It depicts an ancient thatched cottage in a field of waving corn. “I’m told,” she says, “that the weather changes with the seasons-and I have seen it rain...”
“It makes you feel,” he says, straightening, and stepping backwards, “as though you could just walk into it, and leave all this crap behind.”
Hermione looks up at him, curiously. But he doesn’t return her gaze and, after a moment, she leaves him to his contemplation.
...
For the next few weeks, their Sunday mornings follow the same pattern.
He arrives early, seeks her out, and herds her-somehow-towards the painting, and they stand, side-by-side, sharing pleasantries.
“You feel as though you could walk into it,” he says, for possibly the twentieth time.
“I’d never thought of you as the country type,” she says.
“I live in the country, Granger.”
“You live in a great big stately home, Malfoy.”
He laughs, and turns to her, smiling; their eyes meet, and his smile slowly fades; he leans in closer, closer, and Hermione’s eyes widen.
She’s heard rumours that his marriage is over...
Someone enters the room and, suddenly, they’re yards apart.
...
“I’ve been doing some research,” he says, the following Sunday, and-he’s so excited-his hand cups her elbow as he guides her up the staircase.
When they reach the painting, he glances round, making sure they’re alone, before he pulls out his wand and points it at the painting.
“Malfoy!” Magic’s forbidden in the Museum.
“It’s all right,” he says, “I’m a Trustee...” He takes a moment to compose himself, then, “Penetro.”
Hermione gasps. Nothing’s visibly different-the picture hasn’t obviously changed-but, suddenly, she knows it’s possible.
Malfoy grasps her hand. “Ready?”
She nods.
They take a step together, and then another, and then...
They’re standing in late summer sunlight!
...
In the weeks that follow, they return again and again to the painting’s magical world.
There, they’re just ‘Draco’ and ‘Hermione’, a young man and a young woman, unencumbered by the past. When they open the ivy-covered gate and follow the narrow track to the little cottage, they feel at home.
They work together-using magic for only the most difficult tasks-learning how to harvest the apples, and thresh the corn, and harness the horse to the cart; learning to gather the eggs, and brew the ale, and bake the pumpkin pasties in the wood-fired oven.
And the larder’s always magically stocked with hams and cheeses and jars of pickles, and the cottage is always warm and cheerful, a place of happiness.
Sometimes, Hermione goes into the sweet-smelling bedroom, and looks at the bed, with its carved bedposts and its lovingly-stitched quilt, and wishes-
“Come on,” says Draco, poking his head through the window, “I’ve got the grain on the cart. Let’s go to the mill.”
They’ve rambled along the road for miles in both directions, and found a village, with a tavern, a market, and a circulating library, found a little church and, further on, a water mill, and Hermione doesn’t know if they’ll ever find an end to this world.
But one thing she does know is that, every week, it gets harder and harder to leave it.
...
In late October, the sign reads Final Day. The painting’s going back to its owner.
Their last visit, spent tending the garden, is bitter sweet.
And perhaps that’s why, when they’re walking back to the gate, Draco suddenly catches Hermione’s hand and pulls her into his arms and why, when she responds so eagerly, he lifts her up, and carries her back to the little bedroom, and they make love there, like husband and wife.
Next morning, when-reluctantly-they decide they must return to the real world, they find the way shut.
It doesn’t take them long to work out that the painting’s been taken down from the wall and sealed in a crate.
...
Winter comes, and they stoke up the fire, and celebrate Yuletide, decking the rooms with holly, and inviting their neighbours to feast and make merry. January’s hard, but the thaw comes and, eventually, Spring brings green shoots, and fragrant blossoms, and wobbly-legged lambs.
...
Hermione packs a basket with bread and cheese and a jug of ale, and covers it with a cloth. Draco’s digging a ditch, which is back-breaking work, and he won’t use magic, and won’t let her help-she strokes her rounded belly, smiling contentedly.
“Let’s go and feed your daddy.”
Draco meets her half way across the cornfield, pulling his shirt on as he walks, and she can see immediately that something’s wrong. “What is it?”
“We’re out again-the picture’s on a wall somewhere.”
Her heart lurches. “Do you want to go home?” she asks, softly.
“Do you?” He takes the basket from her and, giving her his arm, leads her to the gate.
Together, they stare out into a cold, dull room. “I asked you first,” she says.
He sets the basket down and turns to her, drawing her into his arms and holding her close, and he murmurs into her wayward hair, “I think we’ve found our home, Hermione.”
9.
Title: Silver and Gold
Author: Beth of bethandbee
Word count: 963
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Notes: When Scorpius and Rose's wedding reception goes awry, Draco and Hermione share a dance to appease their respective children. One short dance. Five short minutes. One very important realization.
Prompt chosen: "I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble." -- Helen Keller
“Oh, honestly, Ronald!”
She truly was the spitting image of her mother. Brow furrowed, cheeks flushing red, a strand or two - or three - of hair escaping the complicated braid she had worked so hard to achieve.
“Don't you 'Ronald' me, Rose,” Ron spoke, swirling his second - or third - Chardonnay around in his glass. Rose's arms crossed her chest, shoulders heaving. And there, that famous roll of the eyes.
“Mum! Do something!”
Hermione sighed, smoothly picking up her purse, elbowing Ron, and shooting a reassuring glance at her daughter.
“You wait here, sweetheart. I'll go right over and yell at Grandpa Weasley.” Just as Hermione rose from her seat, Rose tightened her grip on her mother's hands.
“Oh no, let him rave at Lucius,” Rose raved. “Charming, isn't it? At least somebody here is acknowledging that I'm now married to that 'pureblood scum.'”
Hermione desperately tried to wriggle her fingers free. “Rose, you really ought to calm down.”
Her daughter released her hands, throwing them skyward. “For Merlin's sake, Mum! There are fifty Weasleys on this side of the ballroom and fifty Malfoys on that side, and you've all been glaring murderously at each other all night. Would it kill you to socialize? ”
“Rose, you and I both know that the second I turn my back, Ron will tear your father-in-law's head off.”
“With my bare hands, pompous git,” Ron mumbled into his wine, earning a well-placed kick in the shin from Rose.
“Then go dance with him?” she asked, turning to her mother, her voice high and pleading.
“Sure. Let's dance, Ron,” Hermione nodded briskly, tugging on her husband's elbow.
“No, I meant him,” Rose said, gesturing across the room. “Scorp's dad. You too, Dad. Dance with Astoria.”
“That wretched b-?” Ron spluttered, his fourth Chardonnay dribbling down his chin.
“My mother-in-law,” she hissed. “Come on, both of you. Up you get.”
-
“That idiot drunk you call your husband is going to sever my wife's toes if he keeps galloping 'round the dance floor. Clumsy fool.”
Hermione clenched her jaw, stiffening impulsively in Draco's arms. “Malfoy, I could clock you, right in the face, right this instant - well, I wouldn't, because I don't want to make Rose unhappy - and that's the only reason I even agreed to dance, really, because my feet are absolutely murdering me - ugh, these heels - anyway, what were we discussing?”
Draco grinned and sent Hermione for an impromptu twirl. She steadied herself, pushing her knee forward and narrowly missing his groin., glaring daggers at her partner.
“Fine. We'll leave your husband's dancing and drinking for another day. Hmm, what else? Charming decorations.”
Charming was perhaps not the best word for the decorations. Theirs was a ballroom divided, one side draped in Gryffindor gold, the other in Slytherin silver.
“The banners are utterly ridiculous, Malfoy, and if you know what's good for you, you will stop the small talk this instant and plaster a smile on that stupid face of yours.”
“Oh, but I haven't antagonized you in ages, darling.”
Their fingers intertwined and she squeezed, hard, her fingernails digging into the back of his hand.
“For Rose and Scorpius,” she whispered. “One dance. Five minutes. No fighting. It's a small thing, really, but it's so important to her that we at least try to get along. She was so frustrated, Malfoy, you should have seen her.”
“She really is beautiful tonight, regardless” Draco mused, peering over Hermione's shoulder to where the newlyweds were swaying, slowly.
“Thank you,” Hermione nodded slowly, forcing a smile. “That braid took us hours - oh, Merlin, it's coming apart. Her hair is impossible, we just can't tame it.”
“Reminds me of someone I know,” he grinned, taking in Hermione's own rather bushy curls. “She's a Weasley, all right, with that famous resilient ginger gene. You can only really tell she's your daughter when she's throwing a hysterical fit. Definitely inherited your sunny disposition.”
“You know,” Hermione interrupted loudly, “Scorpius has something more of gentleness than you ever did. I'd even say 'kind.'”
“I honestly don't know who he gets it from,” Draco muttered. “We were absolutely terrified they were going to throw him into Hufflepuff. ”
She let out an embarrassingly loud giggle. “A Malfoy in Hufflepuff?”
“Merlin, no.” Draco puffed out his chest. “We bribed the Sorting Hat. My boy's a Slytherin.”
Hermione considered Rose and Scorpius, still swaying gently, and spoke again.
“They're happy.”
“Define 'happy.'”
She shook her head. “Only you, Draco. Only you.”
“No, really. Tell me what it means.”
Draco spun her by the waist, and she squared herself against his steely grey eyes. After a moment, she looked down, chuckling.
“You and Ron, Lucius and Arthur - even I'm not faultless - we've all been fighting them every step of the way. And they're here, and they're safe, even in this bipolar ballroom. Just look at them!”
She drew in a deep breath, feeling Draco pull her closer. Across the floor, Rose sighed and leaned into her husband.
“The way she rests her head on his chest, and that dreamy look in his eye. Bliss. There's no other word for it. They just love each other.”
“I don't know who they get it from,” Draco murmured, and they stood for a moment, swaying slightly, watching their children.
“It's a mystery,” Hermione nodded in agreement. The final notes of the music lingered in the air.
Quietly, she pulled herself away, tiptoeing back to Gryffindor gold.
10.
Title: Storm
Author: eilonwy
Word count: 992
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Notes: None
Prompt chosen: "What a profound significance small things assume when the woman we love conceals them from us." --Marcel Proust
The downpour was incessant, torrential. It swept over the house in sheets, the wind whipping treetops and driving branches against the windowpanes with hard, cold lashings of rain.
Perfect, Draco thought morosely, as he gazed out the window. The house is about to crash down about my ears any minute, and they’ll find me buried under the rubble. Alone.
Hermione was gone.
The first sign had been a small scrap of parchment she’d hidden in her address book.
Fool! He cursed himself bitterly. Too bloody thick to see.
He’d really believed that it was long over. The divorce had been amicable. Weasley had actually been quite decent, all things considered. In the six years that followed, a child had been born, a beautiful, towheaded boy with his mother’s soft, brown eyes. Now four, Rowan Emrys Malfoy was his parents’ joy and his father’s special delight. Life had been unremarkable yet rich, its fabric woven of quiet, ordinary moments.
Until three months ago. Draco had needed an address for a post he’d written, his owl waiting patiently as he prepared the missive. The information had been in Hermione’s address book, stowed in her purse-a massive satchel full of all manner of odds and ends she’d always insisted were of value, even when they seemed useless.
He’d been flipping through the pages when a fragment of paper had fluttered into his lap. The writing had been smudged and barely legible, though there had been something vaguely familiar about it.
At the time, he hadn’t thought much of it, returning it to its place and locating the page he’d sought. Nothing seemed amiss. Life went on as before… except that Hermione seemed curiously remote at times.
His imagination, surely. Or at least, that’s what he told himself, after the fourth conversation during which her gaze had turned pensive, suddenly, and she’d fallen silent.
“What’s wrong, Hermione?” he’d asked, concern clouding his own eyes. He’d reached out and covered her hand with his own. “What is it, love?”
She’d shaken herself, smiling brightly. “Nothing. Really. I’m fine.” Rising from her seat at the kitchen table, she’d reached out to ruffle his hair playfully. “Time for Rowan’s bath. Want to help?”
Two days later, he’d come home from work to find the house empty. The note she’d left on the kitchen table, held in place by a dish of colourful stones she’d collected, merely said, “Back soon. Love you. H.” She’d returned a couple of hours later, carrying Rowan in her arms, both of them windblown and rosy-cheeked and all smiles.
“Where were you?” Draco had wanted to know.
“Oh, nowhere special. Just out,” Hermione had answered blithely, setting Rowan in his booster seat and unbuttoning his jacket. “Help me with this, would you? I’m all thumbs today!”
There had been another unexplained absence a week later, and then another and another, all with tossed-off explanations that told him nothing at all.
Today’s disappearance was the sixth. No note from Hermione, but he had found something else: a letter that had come by owl earlier that day, apparently. Hermione had stashed it rather hurriedly, Draco judged, beneath the blotter on her writing desk. A small corner of the parchment stuck out, inviting closer inspection.
The careless scrawl was unmistakable now. It matched both the fragment he’d found weeks earlier and writing on documents pertaining to the divorce. The message was brief: “2 pm, my office. See you then.”
Weasley. She’d been seeing Weasley. He was certain of it now. All those unexplained absences, even with Rowan in tow-she must have brought him along because she’d had no alternative. The thought turned his stomach.
She’d come to regret the divorce; that was it, surely. Weasley had been her first love, and now she’d realised her mistake in ending it with him. Images of them together pressed themselves upon Draco, unbidden and unrelenting.
Distractedly, he raked a hand through his hair, his gaze falling upon a framed photo taken the previous autumn, just after they’d moved into this house they both loved. Standing proudly in front, surrounded by foliage in glorious reds and golds, they held Rowan between them, smiling. The baby had a fistful of his father’s hair, so like his own, and he was laughing delightedly at funny faces Draco was making.
A knife-like pain lanced through him. He would lose his son too. Weasley would be the one raising him, mostly. The double loss would be unendurable.
He must have fallen asleep, his head pillowed in his arms, because it was dark when he awoke to the sound of the lock turning in the front door. A light switched on, flooding the foyer. Draco blinked several times and Hermione came into focus, silhouetted in the doorway.
“Where…?” he began muzzily.
Hermione slipped out of her travelling cloak and sat down by his side. “He’s with my parents tonight.”
“Why?”
“Special occasion.” She gave him a secretive, little smile.
Draco was confused. “What special occasion? I don’t-”
She laughed. “It’s your birthday, silly! Have you forgotten?”
He had. Completely. But questions remained, refusing to be banished by the fact of his birthday. He opened his mouth, but Hermione pressed on.
“I’ve something to tell you. See, I’ve been… well… Ron’s been helping me with something.” She took a breath, gathering herself. “You know we’ve been trying for a whole year now.”
Draco nodded, his heart banging in his chest.
“Well, I’ve been seeing a fertility specialist. Ron has connections at St Mungo’s. He got me in even though there’s a really long waiting list. I didn’t want to say anything till I was certain, but…”
She paused again, her smile tender as she placed his hand on her belly. “Happy birthday, darling.”
The earth took a crazy lurch on its axis and then settled again.
Leaning in to kiss his wife, Draco nearly laughed out loud. Fool.
Branches battered the windowpanes. No matter.
The house would stand.
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Special Challenge Entries:
1.
Title: Cliff Jumping
Author: Slivovitz (anitapandit)
Word count: 761
Rating: T
Warnings: sensitive theme
Notes: none
Prompt chosen: “For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love."
“It’d be quite a long fall, wouldn’t it?” mused Draco calmly, looking down into the abyss below. The indigo waves crashed against the mossy, jagged rocks what seemed like hundreds of miles down. Draco placed a cautious toe over the edge of the cliff, and a small stone loosened itself and plunged ominously into the depths beneath them.
Hermione bit her lip, refusing to meet his eyes. She focused only on the dark blue water and its unrelenting cries. Her eyes traced the glittering reflections in the water, and had this been a different circumstance, she may have even found the infinite landscape romantic. But instead, her eyes dropped downward and fell on the serrated reef below.
The ocean seemed to go on forever.
“Are you scared yet?” asked Draco conversationally.
“Of course not.”
He knew better. “Yes, you are.”
“No, I’m not,” Hermione contended, jutting out her chin defiantly. “I was in Gryffindor for a reason, Draco.”
Draco lifted her chin towards him and forced her to look at him. She flinched; his grey eyes were lit with desperate fire. His voice was a distant yet forceful whisper-
“You don’t want to die, Granger.”
Hermione nodded her head firmly and said, “Of course I do.”
“Why?”
“You know why.”
He scowled. “Is this because I said my father wouldn’t let me marry you? Merlin, Hermione, I told you I’d work around that. I want to be with you.”
She said nothing.
“Stop being dramatic,” he insisted with a raised eyebrow. “We both know you’re not going to jump.”
Hermione still remained silent, but she inched closer to the edge of the cliff. Draco’s arm suddenly shot out, and he grasped her wrist firmly, gripping so hard that she cried out in pain. He was expressionless.
“Hard-headed as usual,” he observed darkly. “I love you, Hermione, so if you die, I’m going to be really bloody pissed.”
“What’s the difference?” muttered Hermione in response. “You won’t be able to be with me either way. At least this method’s a slight bit less painful for both of us.” Squirming, she tried to ease her wrist out of his solid grasp; she could almost feel her skin bruising.
“I told you from the start that this relationship wouldn’t be easy,” said Draco harshly. His eyes looked wet, but Hermione had never seen him cry. “But I’m tired of hiding, Hermione. And no, my father won’t like the idea of us together, but I don’t care in the slightest.”
“Two years, Draco,” whispered Hermione painfully. “I’ve waited in the dark for two years, pretending I’m not in love with you.”
Draco’s grip on her loosened slightly, but he still held her fast. “If you jump,” began Draco, “I jump too.”
“What?” gasped Hermione. She stepped back a fraction of an inch. “Draco, absolutely not.”
“It’s not like you can stop me.”
She gaped at him, then turned away suddenly, swearing under her breath. Draco looked pleased with himself. He too stepped back from the cliff, and he led Hermione along with him. They stood a foot away from the edge, the sounds of the rushing water constantly humming in their ears.
“If you jump, you’re sentencing me to death, Granger. Do you really want to kill me?”
Hermione glared at him, but there was no hate in her eyes. “No.”
“Life won’t be so bad, you know. You may even get married someday.”
Hermione scoffed. “And why would I ever want to get married?” she sneered.
“Because, Granger,” Draco rolled his eyes, “I’m asking you.” And he pulled a small velvet box out of the pocket of his robes. Hermione eyes looked as though they were about to burst out of her skull.
“But…your father…”
Draco shrugged and opened the box. “I told you, I’ll work around it. I’ve been carrying this ring with me for a year, waiting for when I couldn’t hold back any longer. And if this doesn’t convince you not to jump, nothing will.”
“You…you want to marry me?” she asked in disbelief.
“Did they really refer to you as the brightest witch in our year?” asked Draco in mock amusement. “I’m holding the ring, aren’t I?”
Hesitantly, Hermione smiled. The ocean seemed a tad less limitless, controllably vast, almost comforting.
“Are you scared?” Draco smirked.
“No. Why would I be scared?” He thought her smile was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
They didn’t hold hands as together they began walking away from the cliff. He turned to look at her. “Because I’m about to kiss you, Granger.”
2.
Title: Project Anonymous
Author: lazerxangel
Word count: 951
Rating: K
Warnings: None
Notes: I put the prompt-quote at the top of the story, but I neither included that nor the title as part of my word count. Since I didn't use the quote in the actual story, I wasn't sure if I had to clarify in the story which prompt I was using, so I put it at the top. Though it doesn't put this story over the word count limit, the quote at the top does for the drabble I submitted, so if it goes against the guidelines, you could take it out? Haha, I think it makes more sense once you see the story.
Prompt chosen: "Remember there's no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end.” -- Scott Adams
“Pass it on if you have nothing to give.”
“This entire project is insane, Granger.”
“It is not!”
“You’re barking mad. I bet you even started it, you optimistic whack job.”
“I didn’t, but that doesn’t detract from its goodness!”
“What goodness? It’s a silly excuse to act charitable.”
“Because being charitable is a bad thing? Unlike you, Malfoy, civilians of our world are generally kind people.”
“What, they’re kind because they like to give knickknacks away? Just because I don’t give away things on a whim doesn’t mean I’m unkind.”
“Oh, please. You’ve got to be the unkindest person in the world, Malfoy.”
“Unkindest? Look, Granger, I just don’t believe in this inane office game. I’m surprised it even lasted this long. I gave it a week before everyone would tire of it.”
“Looks like it lived to four times your expectation, and still counting.”
“It’s too bad I’ll be the one who puts an end to it.”
“Then I hope it doesn’t get around to you,” she huffed while marching away.
A mysterious package had arrived one day upon Mr. Finkle’s bewildered intern’s desk. As the rest of the interns crowded around, curious of the odd parcel’s contents, she opened it to find a bouquet of vibrant red roses. Enclosed in the present was a piece of parchment that read, “Give a gift today and make someone smile. Don’t forget the note.”
The next day, Robert, the attractive mail boy who had been blatantly crushing on the intern, received a gift certificate for two at Madeline’s Cuisine, an expensive French restaurant along with a card that said, “Thank you for the beautiful roses. You should pass on something nice to someone else, too. Dinner tomorrow night?” He promptly went to give a proper answer to the blushing intern, but he also mentioned that he didn’t send the roses.
The day after that, Mrs. Wilcroft, Robert’s boss and well-known antique fanatic, opened her office door to find an antique lamp on her desk. Down the hall, a grumpy Mr. Adams’s frown vanished when he found a pair of Quidditch tickets to his favorite team in his mailbox. Both received friendly notes along with their gifts. Robert fervently denied having given the Quidditch tickets, but when asked about the lamp, only mysteriously smiled.
And from that day on, the tradition began.
All around the office, gifts began appearing on workers’ desks: a trendy new scarf, jewelry, coffee pots, concert tickets. Sometimes people would give items to more than one person if they were feeling generous. It was rumored that a smug Henry James claimed that one time, he gave eight different people gifts. Everyone was enthusiastic about the new office game that had popped up from nowhere. Everyone, that is, except Draco Malfoy.
Hermione, in casual conversation, had brought up the Secret Santa-like scheme that was occurring in the office, and he had grunted sullenly in response. Hermione and Draco, being Hermione and Draco, proceeded to have a debate that only further incensed the two about the topic.
He moodily voiced his thought that the entire thing was nonsense and that he refused to participate.
She tried to convince him to continue the game for the others’ sake.
He told her that her attempt to make him kinder through donations was in vain.
She replied that if anything was vain, it was him.
He responded that that was an awful comeback and didn’t make sense.
The argument continued until Hermione walked out in a huff.
Later that day, Hermione stopped by his office to drop off some paperwork, but she walked in to find it empty. Rolling her eyes and muttering about how typical it was that he would abandon his office even though he knew she was going to stop by to talk about the files she was dropping off, she tossed the file onto his desk, causing a few papers to fall off. Holding back a sigh, she bent over to pick up the loose documents until a quick glance had her doing a double take at the paper she was holding in her hand.
It was a receipt for a dozen roses, dated a month ago from Amy’s Florist Shoppe. She flipped the top of bill down to see the next sheet: an order for two tickets to a Chudley Cannon’s Quidditch match. As she shuffled through, she saw more receipts for some of the items that had appeared on some co-workers’ desks: a thirty-Galleon watch, a ten-Galleon omniocular, a fifteen-Galleon gift certificate to Zonko’s. And that was just the least of it.
Just as she was about to put back the folder, she saw a bill for a fifty-Galleon necklace that looked suspiciously like the one she had received three days ago.
After hearing a shuffling outside the door, she placed the papers surreptitiously underneath some documents and grabbed her own file. The door opened, and Draco looked momentarily surprised to see her. He then looked mistrustfully at the pink tinge on her cheeks and the wide smile plastered on her face. “Can I help you?”
“I have, er, this to give to you.” She held up the green folder.
“Oh, right. We were supposed to discuss that today. Have a seat, Granger.”
“Oh no, that’s all right. I have to run now, but how about we talk about it today over dinner?” She thrust the file into his hands and brushed past him quickly. She only stopped briefly at the door to turn around and grin at him again, saying, “I’ll meet you at Madeline’s at eight.”
As she left him standing in his office, slightly bewildered, she found that she couldn’t stop smiling.
Unkind, indeed.
3.
Title: Lies by Omission
Author: Elysium
Word count: 750
Rating: M
Warnings: Sexual References
Notes: N/A
Prompt chosen: "What a profound significance small things assume when the woman we love conceals them from us." -- Marcel Proust
He sits in his chair and thinks about untruths, the worst kind. The kind that fall from the tongues of those you love. The ones that pierce through armour.
They are the smallest ones, and the sharpest.
She goes to dinner with her friend every Thursday evening. He doesn’t want to step on too many toes so he’s never put up a fight. At first. That’s because he thought it was with him and his girlfriend. Only it’s not now. Now it’s just him on his own. And she hides the fact.
A mistake. He takes care of what is his, ensures that it is safe. He knows all her secrets.
If he mentioned this discovery, her lies by omission, she would say it’s irrelevant, because they’re only friends. But Draco knows that it’s a problem because she lied. She’s made something that is probably innocuous into a festering sore. The awareness lingers in his gut and so does that horrible realisation.
Jealousy. The familiar sentiment. Draco, for all that he has, knows the feeling acutely. He knows that no matter what he says or does, or how his name is whispered and his wealth spread, he can’t compete with Harry Potter.
He accepted this long ago, as the way things would always be. Except with her. Because she is his: body, mind and soul. Only Draco knows the way her lashes cast across her cheeks when she unravels. The breathless sounds she whispers around his name.
He wants, at times, to lock her in his room and never let her leave. Because he knows that, his or not, with the twitch of a finger, Potter will call her back to him again. Friends, she says. A likely story, he thinks.
Hermione says that jealousy is unbecoming, that it’s illogical. That’s true. It’s the ugly pit that lingers deep within. It’s not meant to be rational; it runs on pure emotion. It feasts on visions of another man’s - that particular man, with green eyes and a hero complex - roving hands upon her.
After all, he’s taken everything he can from Draco. Why stop there?
She says that he should trust her, and know that she’ll stay true. But Draco’s never been one to place his faith and belief in that elusive thing called trust. What is it, really, he thinks? A person’s word. A promise. It only lasts until one’s priorities change.
And what if that happens to her? What if she, Hermione, wakes up of a morning and decides that she doesn’t want him, doesn’t think he’s worth the struggle.
What if she decides she wants an easier life, a lover who’s not crippled by self-doubt and distrust?
Draco tries to bed down these worries. He tries to pretend that they don’t plague him at night when he feels the warm heat of her against him and the cloud of her hair tickling his skin. He thinks that she loves him; she says she does, in spite of it all. He tells himself that it won’t change, won’t fade.
He doesn’t have the sort of friendships she does. He’s never understood her reliance on Potter and Weasley and other people that aren’t him. It’s a little thing to allow her, friendship and trust, and he should grant it, he knows.
He should believe that when she goes there that she’ll come back and take him in her arms. She’ll kiss away the scars that linger, the ones he can’t admit to but that she knows are there.
But the problem is that though he tries to tell himself these things, the truth is he’s just waiting. Waiting for the day when she doesn’t come back, when she decides he’s not worth it and that Harry Potter needs her more than Draco Malfoy. And that she needs the former too.
Draco always loses out to Potter. In Quidditch. In war. In life. Why not Hermione?
He thinks it is inevitable. But he’s determined. And he’s never gone down to Harry Potter without a fight.
He sits in his chair and gazes at the fire, its crackling flames dance a rumba across the slow-burning wood. He hears her voice and his name on her tongue. And then the soft pressure of her feet on the floor, the opening of doors. And then she’s there: soft skin, and a cloud of hair that tickles him.
And he takes comfort in the fact that, whatever the end result: he’s won today at least.
4.
Title: Hero
Author: sarahyyy
Word count: 625
Rating: PG
Warnings: Profanities
Notes: The scene is taken from Deathly Hallows’ Malfoy Manor.
Prompt chosen: We can do no great things; only small things with great love.
He knew it was her as soon as the three prisoners were dragged into the room. She’d lost weight, probably hadn’t had a proper shower in ages, her face was covered with cuts and her usually vivacious hair fell limp, but he knew it was her.
And she was looking right at him, those brown eyes piercing into his, almost as if they could peer into his soul. His breath hitched slightly and he hoped that Lucius hadn’t notice.
He felt his pulse race and his throat clogged and he forced himself to look away from her eyes. He had to stop this. Greyback could sense if his blood was about to pound out of his chest. She was asking for help, he could see it. It was right there.
He swallowed when his father asked him to identify Potter. His scar was barely noticeable -stretched by what seemed to be the Stinging Jinx- and his dark hair hung low by his shoulders but the glasses belong to Potter, undoubtedly. Potter kept his gaze down, avoiding eye contact with any of them.
“Well, Draco?” Lucius asked, his excitement somewhat contained, “Is it? Is it Harry Potter?”
His tongue darted out to wet his lips and he stole a peek at Granger nervously. She was still looking, unnervingly straight, at him.
“I can’t- I can’t be sure,” was his answer.
He was vaguely aware that his father asked him to have a closer inspection at Potter, his mind bent on playing him the image of Granger’s eyes, firm and unafraid, staring right at him. He walked up to where his father was waiting and looked right up at Potter’s forehead.
It was him. Draco knew it now.
“I don’t know,” he murmured though and walked away from Potter, preferring to stand with is mother near the fireplace.
He should have told them, he should have ousted the Trio. But he couldn’t.
Not when she was looking at him like that, like he was a fucking hero who was going to save her life.
“What about the Mudblood, then?” Greyback growled and Draco felt his heart skip a beat as the light hit her face. Fuck.
“Yes- yes, she was in Madam Malkin’s with Potter! I saw her picture in the Prophet!” Narcissa suddenly exclaimed next to him, “Look, Draco, isn’t it the Granger girl?”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
His blood ran cold when everyone -Lucius, Narcissa, Greyback, Granger…- turned their focuses on him.
“I…” His throat felt dry and his tongue felt heavy. A bead of sweat ran down the side of his head.
He could save her. He could tell them that it wasn’t her. He could-
But he wasn’t a fucking hero.
He looked at Lucius who was, quite evidently, radiating exhilaration. He’d never seen his father so excited, not after his father’s fiasco at the Ministry in his fifth year and certainly not after he’d botched up his assignment to kill Dumbledore.
He could do this. He could help his father regain all the dignity he’d lost.
But all he could force out of himself was a weak “…maybe…”
He turned to look at Granger. She was still looking at him though her eyes were softer now. She looked tired and thankful and…resigned. When she gave him an almost imperceptible nod, his lips parted slightly in shock as he realized what she was trying to tell him.
She didn’t want him to lie for them anymore.
His stomach churned and he felt nauseous. Lucius was still looking expectantly at him.
“…yeah,” he answered finally, after a long pause. He couldn’t manage more than that.
There was only enough place for one hero in this story and it wasn’t him.
It wouldn’t ever be him.
5.
Title: Comes A Time
Author: mister_otter
Word count: 656
Rating: PG13
Warnings: Adultery
Notes: Many thanks to my divine beta, eilonwy!!
Prompt chosen: ”Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” --Antonio Smith
Morning sun pooled like honey across the bed. Hermione’s curls were the color of a cinnamon bun, rioting over the pillow in luscious whorls.
Food comparisons seemed logical, Draco thought, since he’d already had Hermione for breakfast. Twice.
Lazily, because that was the order of their day, he lifted one of her curls and draped it over his upper lip.
His tone deceptively casual, Draco told her, “I don’t like the way he treats you.”
“How would you know how ‘he’ treats me?” Curious, Hermione propped herself up on one elbow, turning her head quizzically toward Draco. “In the months that you and I have been seeing each other, I’ve never once criticized Ron to you.”
“There’s always gossip,” Draco shrugged, as if it mattered only a little. “I’ve heard talk…”
”You know what they say about talk, don’t you?”
“That it’s good for the soul?”
”No, Draco-confession is good for the soul. Talk happens to be ‘cheap.’”
“Now, why would you mention that word? You know I prefer ‘expensive.’”
“Is that why you married Astoria?” Hermione asked, her voice deliberately light and teasing.
“Another word I’d rather you didn’t use today.”
“You started this discussion,” she reminded him gently, gazing into his eyes with a tiny frown of dismay. “Draco, we agreed from the beginning that what you and I have is a small miracle of sorts. An oasis, for both of us. We agreed never to mention our…”
He reached up and laid two fingers across her lips. “We did, it is, and we won’t. But…I still don’t think he treats you very well.” His earlier casual tone had been replaced by something far more fierce.
Hermione sighed heavily and flopped back onto her pillow. Draco turned to gather her into his arms, hooking one long leg across her body to pull her even closer.
“I apologize, love. I won’t mention him again. It’s just that…you and I have spent the better part of our lives doing what’s expected of us. I’m convinced we could do it so much better, together.”
“Mountains would have to move, Draco. I’m not sure it’s our lot in life to have that large a miracle-yet.” She raised one hand and slid it through his hair, fingers moving across the skin of his scalp in slow, pleasurable circles.
Draco groaned and relaxed under Hermione’s ministering touch.
”Besides,” she added, slyly breaking the no-spouses rule once again. “Astoria would kill you.”
”No, she wouldn’t. Astoria isn’t bloodthirsty, merely money-hungry.”
“Too true.” Hermione chuckled. “As for miracles-they are serendipitous things, aren’t they, Draco? And one never knows…”
They lay quietly for several minutes, holding each other as the sun rose higher, the light in the room changing from the color of honey to the bittersweet, pale yellow of lemonade.
“Hermione? If there comes a time…when the mountains do indeed start moving, would you be with me?”
It was a question that neither of them had dared to voice before now. The quiet magnitude of it hung in the air like smoke, keeping them breathless and still.
Hermione linked her fingers through Draco’s and smiled into his eyes. “Let’s say-just theoretically, mind you-that a monumental upheaval does occur in both of our lives.” Her grip on his fingers tightened. “You’ll be the one I want standing at my side when the dust settles.”
With a whoosh, Draco let out the breath he hadn’t even known he was holding. Had she just said yes, without actually saying yes?
“I wish we had a magnum of champagne,” he told her. “I’d like to propose a toast.”
“To cataclysm?” Hermione arched one brow. “Or to miracles, both large and small?” she asked more softly.
Draco tightened his arms around her. “To knowing that all three may be one and the same,” he murmured as he lowered his mouth to hers. “And to recognizing when it’s time to make one happen.”
6.
Title: Aster
Author: zeec
Word Count: 720
Rating: K+
Warnings: One kiss, deep feelings, character death.
Notes: None
Prompt chosen: "Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things." - Antonio Smith
His platinum blond hair and pale skin lit up as sun light danced in his hair and upon his features. The wind whistled in Hermione's ears, caressing her face, before going in her husband's direction to attack his already-tousled hair. In that moment, Hermione felt sure she would never see anything as beautiful as the sight of him coming towards her in the golden field, a purple-petaled flower in hand. As much as she wanted to throw her hair back, close her eyes and just feel the sun light harshly burning her cheeks and the wind lightly kissing her skin in contrast, she did not. She kept her cinnamon eyes open to capture the scene in the film roll that was her memory.
Draco came towards her, smiling. He kneeled down beside his wife who was sitting in the midst of gold, looking at him with an intensity that could undo him. He touched her cheek as cerulean grey eyes met warm brown ones. "Happy birthday," he whispered to her, brushing back a stray lock of curl from her face and putting the flower in her hair gently.
"I don't think I've seen this flower before," Hermione said, her tone equally soft as she reached up to touch the said plant in her hair.
Draco's hand covered hers as he removed it and placed it in her lap so that she could have a look at it. "It's an aster," he said, looking at her closely as she examined the flower.
Hermione ran a finger along its petals, feeling its lush texture brush against her skin. Upon closer inspection, its colour was of a more lilac shade. She lifted it and placed her nose on its yellow centre. It smelt exotic like spices. Hermione felt it appropriate - it matched its wildflower beauty well. "It's beautiful," she smiled up at him then dropped her gaze to the aster once more. "It's only too bad for it shall wilt."
Draco struggled to stop the rumble that was his laughter from escaping him as he watched her disdainful expression. "Here, he plucked the flower from her fingers as he removed a journal from his pocket that would have been far too big to fit in there if not for magic. "This is my other gift," he gave her a smile. He drew his wand and tapped it upon the aster. Its petals plucked themselves, following the swish of Draco's wand, and laid themselves in every page of the journal, now flipping its own pages at an alarmingly fast rate to capture the petals. He dropped the book in her lap, "There."
Hermione opened it, her eyes lit with curiosity as her gaze lingered on her husband's smiling face. She stuck her nose in the pages and caught a whiff of the scent which was now her favourite. She smiled, threw her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to his. "I will always love you," she declared as a rush of affection washed over her.
Draco pulled back from her and looked deep into her eyes as he held her hand to his heart, "I will always love you, too."
Hermione opened the journal and caught the scent again. She inhaled deeply, feeling a fist clench around her heart as she did so.
So many years later, the scent still lingered. Like memories of that day, branded into her mind, the scent latched onto the journal like it was etched into every pore of its pages. The sun, the wind, and the god that was him… she still remembered every detail like it was yesterday.
Hermione brushed a loose greying tendril from her face and felt that fist around her heart squeeze yet again. Her tears threatened to fall as the smell of aster clung to the air she breathed into her lungs and reached into the pieces of her heart to find the ghost of him in her memories.
He will no longer brush her hair back from her face, touch her cheek or cover her small hands in his big ones. He will no longer smile at her, whisper to her or unmake her with his intense gaze.
In those little gestures he had told her he loved her… Suddenly, those little gestures did not seem so little after all.
7.
Title: Complaints
Author: elektra30
Word count: 981
Rating: PG
Warnings: Mild Profanity
Notes: Post-DH, epilogue-compliant. Dramione at its subtlest (I seem to enjoy teasing my readers :p) and maybe even the teeniest bit of Scorpius/Rose if you always extrapolate their friendship to something more.
Prompt chosen: "We can do no great things; only small things with great love." - Mother Theresa
***
The first time he came to her office, he had been a very angry man.
“I thought you had better judgment than this, Granger,” he seethed, “but clearly, I’m wrong.”
Her quill continued its incessant scratching against the parchment. He reached out to snatch the quill from her, but she was faster.
“Mr. Malfoy, I thought I was supposed to be having a civilised conversation with you.”
“Civilised, my foot. You already hung a sign of dirty, evil, arrogant, cowardly on me before I even walked in here-”
“It appears you did it to yourself. For I was sure that our topic was supposed to be your son’s behaviour, not yours.”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “You think I don’t know you’re extrapolating my past behaviour to his?”
“I don’t know what led you to that conclusion. Your son was being extremely disruptive during my class, and I don’t stand for disrespect and unruly behaviour. We need to-”
“No, not the one who champions lives of miserly little creatures who haven’t a speck of respect for their own selves, let alone needing any from-”
“As I was saying, we need to examine-”
“-figures that the very things that he was fooling about with happens to come from the Weasley joke of an empire-”
“What’s wrong with you, Malfoy?”
He sat down, hard.
It was a long while before he admitted. “Alright, Granger. I’m tired of coming to Hogwarts all the time and having no conclusion to anything. I’ve got a huge business empire to run, alimony to settle, and a single father job to handle. This is enough; it’s the last straw having to meet with you.” He paused. “I don’t know what to do with him.”
“What happens at home after you are called in every time?”
“Granger, I don’t think-”
“Does Scorpius even talk to you?”
“I don’t like where this is going.”
“Neither do I, but it seems that my daughter and your son have struck up a fairly amicable relationship. I’m not sure how that happened, but-”
“Rest assured, Granger, if this is a ploy to avoid me as an in-law-”
“-not really the point, but as Rose has told me-”
“-not at all keen at the prospect of you trying to boss my son around when-”
“Good grief, Malfoy, I said that’s not the point!” She fumed. “Rose told me that your son doesn’t want to follow in your footsteps!”
There was a long silence.
“And what would she mean by that?”
“Honestly, Malfoy, this isn’t the time to be defensive.” She drummed her fingers on the desk. “It seems to me that the way you speak to him is just like how Lucius speaks to you. A very authoritative, distant manner. I thought you’d be different, you know, but - look at you, even the hair! You look just like a copy of your-”
“I am not a copy of my-”
“There, you don’t want to be. But have you tried?”
His lips twitched. “I’m not here to listen to you preach.”
“Oh, you’ll need a good scrubbing of your ears, because I am going to preach.” She folded her arms. “You haven’t tried one bit, Malfoy. All you know is to throw a hissy fit when things go wrong, blame it on everybody else and think you’re the one everybody has to listen to at the end. That’s how Lucius was, and that’s how you are.”
“That despite Astoria’s infidelity, I’m still telling Scorpius to marry a Pureblood witch instead of messing with a half-blood like your daughter?” He narrowed his eyes at her. “Rubbing salt in the wounds, aren’t you?”
She flushed red. “Look at you, the prejudices still abound! Your son is born in a new era, and he won’t stand you telling him things like ‘you’re not to friend this girl because of her blood!’”
“I have tolerated your daughter fairly well.”
“But you don’t appreciate her for who she is inside. You’re only tolerating her because you’re tired of your son scowling bitterly when you get home.”
“And I’m only tolerating you because...?”
“Because you know I make sense, and you need sense in that brain of yours.”
“Right.” He snorted.“Scorpius doesn’t want to be either of you. He wants to be himself. A carefree soul. He doesn’t want to be bound by the stupid house rules that you all have-”
“This is getting personal again, Granger, I-”
“-so he wants to rebel against everything. He wants to let you know he won’t accept you trying to put a Malfoy mould around him. He wants to change every association there is with that name, but the children in school have heard the stories and they won’t let him. Did you even know that, Malfoy? That in this post-war world, where you are busy trying to establish your name once again, your son is on a solitary journey to find his identity?”
He blinked, then drew his attention to something sparkling on Granger’s desk. It was a tiny, shiny Snitch, with the words ‘I open at the close’ carved on it.
“War souvenir?”
She nodded. “Somehow it reminds me that the small things have greater meanings.”
He looked away.
“Draco, your son doesn’t need your grand gestures of pseudo protection. He needs you to accept him and guide him. That is the kind of love he needs, not you arguing your head off here, only to go back and punish him for rebelling.”
He stood up from his seat, ran a hand through his hair, then left.
The next time he came to her office, he was still an angry man. But this time...
“Granger, it was bad enough hearing you wax lyrical in classes about your bloody general knowledge. You didn’t have to influence my son to start asking questions incessantly!”
She arched an eyebrow. “Communication. Well done, Malfoy."
8.
Title: Cottage in a Cornfield
Author: ningloreth
Word count: 1000
Rating: R
Warnings: Crack!fluff
Notes: Inspired by John Constable’s Cottage in a Cornfield, which really is a magical painting :-) and by an old black and white film I remember seeing when I was very young. In British English, a cornfield is a field of wheat, or maybe barley, but not maize.
Prompt chosen: For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love. Carl Sagan
“Granger?”
Hermione would recognise his voice anywhere, though she hasn’t heard it since he received his pardon. “Malfoy!” The years, she notices, have been kind to him, adding an attractive self-assurance to his always-striking looks.
“I didn’t realise you worked at the Museum.”
“Only on Sundays,” she replies, “I’m a volunteer.” Anything to keep myself busy...
“I’ve come to see the new picture,” he says.
“It’s through there.” She points towards the next room, but Malfoy gestures, inviting her to go in before him and, though she knows she should be downstairs, patrolling the Mediaeval rooms, there’s something so commanding about him that, feeling a bit like Crabbe or Goyle, she escorts him through the door.
The little painting, on short-term loan from its anonymous owner, hangs in splendid isolation against a moss-green wall.
Hermione watches Malfoy lean in, and look closely.
It depicts an ancient thatched cottage in a field of waving corn. “I’m told,” she says, “that the weather changes with the seasons-and I have seen it rain...”
“It makes you feel,” he says, straightening, and stepping backwards, “as though you could just walk into it, and leave all this crap behind.”
Hermione looks up at him, curiously. But he doesn’t return her gaze and, after a moment, she leaves him to his contemplation.
...
For the next few weeks, their Sunday mornings follow the same pattern.
He arrives early, seeks her out, and herds her-somehow-towards the painting, and they stand, side-by-side, sharing pleasantries.
“You feel as though you could walk into it,” he says, for possibly the twentieth time.
“I’d never thought of you as the country type,” she says.
“I live in the country, Granger.”
“You live in a great big stately home, Malfoy.”
He laughs, and turns to her, smiling; their eyes meet, and his smile slowly fades; he leans in closer, closer, and Hermione’s eyes widen.
She’s heard rumours that his marriage is over...
Someone enters the room and, suddenly, they’re yards apart.
...
“I’ve been doing some research,” he says, the following Sunday, and-he’s so excited-his hand cups her elbow as he guides her up the staircase.
When they reach the painting, he glances round, making sure they’re alone, before he pulls out his wand and points it at the painting.
“Malfoy!” Magic’s forbidden in the Museum.
“It’s all right,” he says, “I’m a Trustee...” He takes a moment to compose himself, then, “Penetro.”
Hermione gasps. Nothing’s visibly different-the picture hasn’t obviously changed-but, suddenly, she knows it’s possible.
Malfoy grasps her hand. “Ready?”
She nods.
They take a step together, and then another, and then...
They’re standing in late summer sunlight!
...
In the weeks that follow, they return again and again to the painting’s magical world.
There, they’re just ‘Draco’ and ‘Hermione’, a young man and a young woman, unencumbered by the past. When they open the ivy-covered gate and follow the narrow track to the little cottage, they feel at home.
They work together-using magic for only the most difficult tasks-learning how to harvest the apples, and thresh the corn, and harness the horse to the cart; learning to gather the eggs, and brew the ale, and bake the pumpkin pasties in the wood-fired oven.
And the larder’s always magically stocked with hams and cheeses and jars of pickles, and the cottage is always warm and cheerful, a place of happiness.
Sometimes, Hermione goes into the sweet-smelling bedroom, and looks at the bed, with its carved bedposts and its lovingly-stitched quilt, and wishes-
“Come on,” says Draco, poking his head through the window, “I’ve got the grain on the cart. Let’s go to the mill.”
They’ve rambled along the road for miles in both directions, and found a village, with a tavern, a market, and a circulating library, found a little church and, further on, a water mill, and Hermione doesn’t know if they’ll ever find an end to this world.
But one thing she does know is that, every week, it gets harder and harder to leave it.
...
In late October, the sign reads Final Day. The painting’s going back to its owner.
Their last visit, spent tending the garden, is bitter sweet.
And perhaps that’s why, when they’re walking back to the gate, Draco suddenly catches Hermione’s hand and pulls her into his arms and why, when she responds so eagerly, he lifts her up, and carries her back to the little bedroom, and they make love there, like husband and wife.
Next morning, when-reluctantly-they decide they must return to the real world, they find the way shut.
It doesn’t take them long to work out that the painting’s been taken down from the wall and sealed in a crate.
...
Winter comes, and they stoke up the fire, and celebrate Yuletide, decking the rooms with holly, and inviting their neighbours to feast and make merry. January’s hard, but the thaw comes and, eventually, Spring brings green shoots, and fragrant blossoms, and wobbly-legged lambs.
...
Hermione packs a basket with bread and cheese and a jug of ale, and covers it with a cloth. Draco’s digging a ditch, which is back-breaking work, and he won’t use magic, and won’t let her help-she strokes her rounded belly, smiling contentedly.
“Let’s go and feed your daddy.”
Draco meets her half way across the cornfield, pulling his shirt on as he walks, and she can see immediately that something’s wrong. “What is it?”
“We’re out again-the picture’s on a wall somewhere.”
Her heart lurches. “Do you want to go home?” she asks, softly.
“Do you?” He takes the basket from her and, giving her his arm, leads her to the gate.
Together, they stare out into a cold, dull room. “I asked you first,” she says.
He sets the basket down and turns to her, drawing her into his arms and holding her close, and he murmurs into her wayward hair, “I think we’ve found our home, Hermione.”
9.
Title: Silver and Gold
Author: Beth of bethandbee
Word count: 963
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Notes: When Scorpius and Rose's wedding reception goes awry, Draco and Hermione share a dance to appease their respective children. One short dance. Five short minutes. One very important realization.
Prompt chosen: "I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble." -- Helen Keller
“Oh, honestly, Ronald!”
She truly was the spitting image of her mother. Brow furrowed, cheeks flushing red, a strand or two - or three - of hair escaping the complicated braid she had worked so hard to achieve.
“Don't you 'Ronald' me, Rose,” Ron spoke, swirling his second - or third - Chardonnay around in his glass. Rose's arms crossed her chest, shoulders heaving. And there, that famous roll of the eyes.
“Mum! Do something!”
Hermione sighed, smoothly picking up her purse, elbowing Ron, and shooting a reassuring glance at her daughter.
“You wait here, sweetheart. I'll go right over and yell at Grandpa Weasley.” Just as Hermione rose from her seat, Rose tightened her grip on her mother's hands.
“Oh no, let him rave at Lucius,” Rose raved. “Charming, isn't it? At least somebody here is acknowledging that I'm now married to that 'pureblood scum.'”
Hermione desperately tried to wriggle her fingers free. “Rose, you really ought to calm down.”
Her daughter released her hands, throwing them skyward. “For Merlin's sake, Mum! There are fifty Weasleys on this side of the ballroom and fifty Malfoys on that side, and you've all been glaring murderously at each other all night. Would it kill you to socialize? ”
“Rose, you and I both know that the second I turn my back, Ron will tear your father-in-law's head off.”
“With my bare hands, pompous git,” Ron mumbled into his wine, earning a well-placed kick in the shin from Rose.
“Then go dance with him?” she asked, turning to her mother, her voice high and pleading.
“Sure. Let's dance, Ron,” Hermione nodded briskly, tugging on her husband's elbow.
“No, I meant him,” Rose said, gesturing across the room. “Scorp's dad. You too, Dad. Dance with Astoria.”
“That wretched b-?” Ron spluttered, his fourth Chardonnay dribbling down his chin.
“My mother-in-law,” she hissed. “Come on, both of you. Up you get.”
-
“That idiot drunk you call your husband is going to sever my wife's toes if he keeps galloping 'round the dance floor. Clumsy fool.”
Hermione clenched her jaw, stiffening impulsively in Draco's arms. “Malfoy, I could clock you, right in the face, right this instant - well, I wouldn't, because I don't want to make Rose unhappy - and that's the only reason I even agreed to dance, really, because my feet are absolutely murdering me - ugh, these heels - anyway, what were we discussing?”
Draco grinned and sent Hermione for an impromptu twirl. She steadied herself, pushing her knee forward and narrowly missing his groin., glaring daggers at her partner.
“Fine. We'll leave your husband's dancing and drinking for another day. Hmm, what else? Charming decorations.”
Charming was perhaps not the best word for the decorations. Theirs was a ballroom divided, one side draped in Gryffindor gold, the other in Slytherin silver.
“The banners are utterly ridiculous, Malfoy, and if you know what's good for you, you will stop the small talk this instant and plaster a smile on that stupid face of yours.”
“Oh, but I haven't antagonized you in ages, darling.”
Their fingers intertwined and she squeezed, hard, her fingernails digging into the back of his hand.
“For Rose and Scorpius,” she whispered. “One dance. Five minutes. No fighting. It's a small thing, really, but it's so important to her that we at least try to get along. She was so frustrated, Malfoy, you should have seen her.”
“She really is beautiful tonight, regardless” Draco mused, peering over Hermione's shoulder to where the newlyweds were swaying, slowly.
“Thank you,” Hermione nodded slowly, forcing a smile. “That braid took us hours - oh, Merlin, it's coming apart. Her hair is impossible, we just can't tame it.”
“Reminds me of someone I know,” he grinned, taking in Hermione's own rather bushy curls. “She's a Weasley, all right, with that famous resilient ginger gene. You can only really tell she's your daughter when she's throwing a hysterical fit. Definitely inherited your sunny disposition.”
“You know,” Hermione interrupted loudly, “Scorpius has something more of gentleness than you ever did. I'd even say 'kind.'”
“I honestly don't know who he gets it from,” Draco muttered. “We were absolutely terrified they were going to throw him into Hufflepuff. ”
She let out an embarrassingly loud giggle. “A Malfoy in Hufflepuff?”
“Merlin, no.” Draco puffed out his chest. “We bribed the Sorting Hat. My boy's a Slytherin.”
Hermione considered Rose and Scorpius, still swaying gently, and spoke again.
“They're happy.”
“Define 'happy.'”
She shook her head. “Only you, Draco. Only you.”
“No, really. Tell me what it means.”
Draco spun her by the waist, and she squared herself against his steely grey eyes. After a moment, she looked down, chuckling.
“You and Ron, Lucius and Arthur - even I'm not faultless - we've all been fighting them every step of the way. And they're here, and they're safe, even in this bipolar ballroom. Just look at them!”
She drew in a deep breath, feeling Draco pull her closer. Across the floor, Rose sighed and leaned into her husband.
“The way she rests her head on his chest, and that dreamy look in his eye. Bliss. There's no other word for it. They just love each other.”
“I don't know who they get it from,” Draco murmured, and they stood for a moment, swaying slightly, watching their children.
“It's a mystery,” Hermione nodded in agreement. The final notes of the music lingered in the air.
Quietly, she pulled herself away, tiptoeing back to Gryffindor gold.
10.
Title: Storm
Author: eilonwy
Word count: 992
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Notes: None
Prompt chosen: "What a profound significance small things assume when the woman we love conceals them from us." --Marcel Proust
The downpour was incessant, torrential. It swept over the house in sheets, the wind whipping treetops and driving branches against the windowpanes with hard, cold lashings of rain.
Perfect, Draco thought morosely, as he gazed out the window. The house is about to crash down about my ears any minute, and they’ll find me buried under the rubble. Alone.
Hermione was gone.
The first sign had been a small scrap of parchment she’d hidden in her address book.
Fool! He cursed himself bitterly. Too bloody thick to see.
He’d really believed that it was long over. The divorce had been amicable. Weasley had actually been quite decent, all things considered. In the six years that followed, a child had been born, a beautiful, towheaded boy with his mother’s soft, brown eyes. Now four, Rowan Emrys Malfoy was his parents’ joy and his father’s special delight. Life had been unremarkable yet rich, its fabric woven of quiet, ordinary moments.
Until three months ago. Draco had needed an address for a post he’d written, his owl waiting patiently as he prepared the missive. The information had been in Hermione’s address book, stowed in her purse-a massive satchel full of all manner of odds and ends she’d always insisted were of value, even when they seemed useless.
He’d been flipping through the pages when a fragment of paper had fluttered into his lap. The writing had been smudged and barely legible, though there had been something vaguely familiar about it.
At the time, he hadn’t thought much of it, returning it to its place and locating the page he’d sought. Nothing seemed amiss. Life went on as before… except that Hermione seemed curiously remote at times.
His imagination, surely. Or at least, that’s what he told himself, after the fourth conversation during which her gaze had turned pensive, suddenly, and she’d fallen silent.
“What’s wrong, Hermione?” he’d asked, concern clouding his own eyes. He’d reached out and covered her hand with his own. “What is it, love?”
She’d shaken herself, smiling brightly. “Nothing. Really. I’m fine.” Rising from her seat at the kitchen table, she’d reached out to ruffle his hair playfully. “Time for Rowan’s bath. Want to help?”
Two days later, he’d come home from work to find the house empty. The note she’d left on the kitchen table, held in place by a dish of colourful stones she’d collected, merely said, “Back soon. Love you. H.” She’d returned a couple of hours later, carrying Rowan in her arms, both of them windblown and rosy-cheeked and all smiles.
“Where were you?” Draco had wanted to know.
“Oh, nowhere special. Just out,” Hermione had answered blithely, setting Rowan in his booster seat and unbuttoning his jacket. “Help me with this, would you? I’m all thumbs today!”
There had been another unexplained absence a week later, and then another and another, all with tossed-off explanations that told him nothing at all.
Today’s disappearance was the sixth. No note from Hermione, but he had found something else: a letter that had come by owl earlier that day, apparently. Hermione had stashed it rather hurriedly, Draco judged, beneath the blotter on her writing desk. A small corner of the parchment stuck out, inviting closer inspection.
The careless scrawl was unmistakable now. It matched both the fragment he’d found weeks earlier and writing on documents pertaining to the divorce. The message was brief: “2 pm, my office. See you then.”
Weasley. She’d been seeing Weasley. He was certain of it now. All those unexplained absences, even with Rowan in tow-she must have brought him along because she’d had no alternative. The thought turned his stomach.
She’d come to regret the divorce; that was it, surely. Weasley had been her first love, and now she’d realised her mistake in ending it with him. Images of them together pressed themselves upon Draco, unbidden and unrelenting.
Distractedly, he raked a hand through his hair, his gaze falling upon a framed photo taken the previous autumn, just after they’d moved into this house they both loved. Standing proudly in front, surrounded by foliage in glorious reds and golds, they held Rowan between them, smiling. The baby had a fistful of his father’s hair, so like his own, and he was laughing delightedly at funny faces Draco was making.
A knife-like pain lanced through him. He would lose his son too. Weasley would be the one raising him, mostly. The double loss would be unendurable.
He must have fallen asleep, his head pillowed in his arms, because it was dark when he awoke to the sound of the lock turning in the front door. A light switched on, flooding the foyer. Draco blinked several times and Hermione came into focus, silhouetted in the doorway.
“Where…?” he began muzzily.
Hermione slipped out of her travelling cloak and sat down by his side. “He’s with my parents tonight.”
“Why?”
“Special occasion.” She gave him a secretive, little smile.
Draco was confused. “What special occasion? I don’t-”
She laughed. “It’s your birthday, silly! Have you forgotten?”
He had. Completely. But questions remained, refusing to be banished by the fact of his birthday. He opened his mouth, but Hermione pressed on.
“I’ve something to tell you. See, I’ve been… well… Ron’s been helping me with something.” She took a breath, gathering herself. “You know we’ve been trying for a whole year now.”
Draco nodded, his heart banging in his chest.
“Well, I’ve been seeing a fertility specialist. Ron has connections at St Mungo’s. He got me in even though there’s a really long waiting list. I didn’t want to say anything till I was certain, but…”
She paused again, her smile tender as she placed his hand on her belly. “Happy birthday, darling.”
The earth took a crazy lurch on its axis and then settled again.
Leaning in to kiss his wife, Draco nearly laughed out loud. Fool.
Branches battered the windowpanes. No matter.
The house would stand.
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