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So maybe organising an event for interhouse unity was not the brightest idea of the brightest witch of her age…
So what if people were literally fainting near the Black Lake and were promptly being escorted to Madam Pomfrey’s hospital wing…
So what if it was the hottest day ever recorded in Hogwarts…
Hermione was thriving.
She had her book which she received from Harry last week (the owl almost dropped it in her soup but she managed to intercept it in the air).
She had her Muggle SPF (skincare is not for the weak and her skin deserved the best treatment available, thank you very much).
And most importantly, she had her water with electrolytes and an umbrella she whipped out from her beaded bag whenever the sun became too much for her to handle (swimming in the Black Lake seemed neither responsible nor ethical with all the creatures inhabiting it).
So when she saw the sun beginning to set and absolutely no one left aside from her, she decided to take a walk around the castle (and further exhaust herself because why not?
Sleeping was a rare gift nowadays and she would exercise every day to ensure peaceful sleep at night).
When she reached the Forbidden Forest’s border, something snowy caught her eye.
“Snow? At this time of year?” she mused and came closer.
It decidedly was not snow.
It was a very burnt Draco Malfoy with an extremely erubescent hue colouring his cheeks, neck and torso lying on the grass beside a tree that evidently failed to protect his pale complexion.
“Could be worse, I suppose,” Hermione murmured, “he could be naked.”
Although she said it quietly, at the sound of her voice he started to stir anxiously but at the same time when he did that, he groaned painfully and proceeded to lie in a clearly uncomfortable position and resemble a Greek statue.
The only thing he lacked in was the colour of his skin right now – the pretty milky marble was gone and in its place was a ghastly shade of red.
He peeked at her with only one eye open and groaned again.
“Could you perhaps end my agony and Avada me already?”
Hermione chuckled.
It was not an exaggeration to claim he said it at least once a day but this one was laced with pain, so she sighed and crouched beside him.
“What’s the matter, Malfoy, have you run out of sun-blocking charms?”
Draco only grumbled something incomprehensible under his breath and immediately fell over the grass again, which caused another cry of pain.
Hermione could swear that in that moment his eyes were full of tears but he was too proud to cry in front of her.
“Do you want to see how bad it is? I know you must have a mirror somewhere in your designer bag with your initials but let’s assume you don’t – here, have a look,” she handed him a mirror and stifled a laugh from how miserable he appeared (but still managed to side-eye her at the mirror comment).
He gasped at his reflection, shut his eyes and threw the mirror dramatically.
“GRANGER I WILL KILL YOU FOR THIS!”
“Why would you kill me for your recklessness? It was you who fell asleep on the sun and didn’t think to use any sun-blocking charms or ask for my SPF, you can only blame yourself.”
“I LOOK LIKE A FUCKING WEASLEY, GRANGER!!! THE MALFOYS DO NOT HAVE ANY WARM TONES OR FRECKLES ON THEIR FACES! How am I supposed to woo her at the dance…well maybe she would like the freckles actually,” he whispered the last sentence.
“Her who?” she asked confused and he whipped his head at this.
“Her nothing. I said nothing. I am delirious and you should not take anything I say seriously,” he stated with a pointed glare.
“Maybe I will find out some dark Malfoy secrets then, you could even end up soul bonded to me if you were as delirious as you claim, you’re hopeless when you’re drunk so I only assume,” she teased him but he just stared at her with fear lurking in his big grey eyes and she deflected.
“Hey, Draco, everything alright? I was only joking, let’s get you to Madam Pomfrey and heal those sunburns,” she helped him stand up and he hissed every time she brushed or touched him.
“I would be immensely offended had I not known you no longer hold that pureblood shite,” she tried teasing again and it fell flat for the second time.
See, Hermione, the fact you were joking about possibly being bonded to me was the immensely offensive thing for me, thought Draco.
He knew she was in a -supposedly- happy relationship with the Weasel after the war had ended and he would never come close to achieving that.
The truth was that Draco was a coward.
He was a complete recreant but at least he could own up to it, unlike that tosser Weasley, who constantly made Hermione bawl her eyes out in Draco’s arms.
That made the Weasel jealous so it was a consolation prize of sorts.
Draco would never kiss those full lips coated with cherry lip-gloss.
How did he know it was cherry-scented?
He would never admit it but he actually hunted down the exact brand she used just so he could slip it into her bag whenever she lost it somewhere in the castle.
He assumed that when it would come down to her discovering his little scheme and finding two or more of those cherry things she loved, he could just lie or take it like a man and confess his undying love for her and she would do the same and…
She would never say those words to him.
Not to him specifically.
To that awful git though?
Surely.
Sometimes he’d wander into her Head Girl’s room “by accident” or claiming to be “lost” and bear witness to her saying “okay I have to go now, love you, Ron!” and ending the floo call.
It always broke his heart in half with every time she did it, so in a way he resembled Riddle with how he had halved his soul again and again.
Get it together and stop those morbid thoughts already, he thought.
“Granger, I don’t need to go to Pomfrey, just leave me here and let me die.”
She frowned at this and a stubborn expression was painted on her face.
“We could go to the Room of Requirement but I’m patching you up one way or another,” she ordered and he resigned with a deep, audible sigh.
When he picked up his shirt, she screamed, “Do not put this on!”
He ignored her of course and just when he managed to throw it onto his arms, he wailed in pain.
“You fucking moron, I told you not to do it!” he only shrugged the shirt off and looked at her like a cute little puppy.
“I didn’t know it would hurt so much with all the sunburn…” he explained sheepishly.
Hermione stared daggers at him and marched to Hogwarts.
“Room of Requirement. Now. I’d better see you there soon, I won’t be waiting forever.”
When Draco finally reached the Room of Requirement, she was already inside waiting for him with salves and potions.
She looked like a cute, angry, little kitten.
He smirked at that thought which earned him a stern glare from her.
“Fucking sit,” she announced.
“Profanities, Granger? What have I done this time?” The Malfoy smirk™ was ever-present because he knew it irritated her enormously.
“You with your…pottering about all day and…ugh!” she waved her hand in the air, pointed to the chair and he obliged her but sneered at the phrase she used, to which she only muttered a quiet “shut up” to him.
“Are my abs distracting you from healing me?” he asked, smiling.
“Don’t flatter yourself, you’re like a deeply annoying, theatrical aristocratic overheated reptile with heat damage,” she dipped her fingers in the salve and started applying it all over his body.
“I beg of you, be careful, I fear my skin is about to detach itself from me any moment now,” he replied.
“Begging now? Wish you were on your knees then.”
It was Draco’s turn to become flustered but Hermione didn’t see it because of how red he already was.
“Fabulous. Apparently I survived the war only to be finished off by a fucking moisturiser or whatever,” he grumbled.
“Poor Drakey, afraid of little stinging,” she retorted.
“If we’re going with our hated nicknames, why don’t you focus on healing me, Mione.”
She worked in silence after that.
“I look diseased,” he said with hope of starting conversation again (and fishing for some complements, obviously) and continued, “I look common, Granger.”
Apparently, she was still furious with him for she did not even make a single sound.
“I think I’d rather be cursed if I’m frank with you,” he tried again.
“That can be arranged,” she deadpanned and he mimed shutting his mouth with his hand.
Hermione worked the salve in for a while and he hissed from time to time, still sore and hurt from the sun.
“Alright, Malfoy, only your disgusting face left, brace yourself,” he nearly lunged out of the chair.
“Disgusting? It’s one of my best features!” he protested.
“Exactly, right after your incredible ability to be a vexing git,” she countered and reached for the healing salve, “Shut the fuck up or I swear you’ll swallow some of it.”
Draco had a different idea about swallowing but he wouldn’t risk confessing it to her in this situation and piped down at once.
He was surprised when she changed her approach and delicately rubbed the salve on his cheek and the rest of his face, all while he was getting lost in her eyes.
He realised everyone was wrong.
They weren’t brown.
They weren’t even caramel or the colour of butterbeer.
They were strikingly green.
Not like Potter’s (Draco wanted to vomit every time he even thought about him).
They were green the way pine needles look in winter.
Like his mother’s dark green tourmaline jewellery.
They looked like the colour of his future children’s eyes.
She brought him out of these thoughts with a careful but still painful swipe of her fingers on his nose.
“Ow!”
“For fuck’s sake, Malfoy, you act like no one has ever touched you, you’re all flinching and hissing,” she complained but he went silent at her comment.
“Malfoy?”
He shook his head.
“Well, Granger, I don’t know if you know this but girls aren’t exactly throwing themselves at my feet right now so forgive me for being twitchy and squeamish,” he said quietly.
“Oh.”
He flushed once again, jerkily turned his head knocking her hand away in the process and headed to the door silently.
“Goodbye, Hermione.”
“Draco, wait!”
She panicked and grabbed his sunburnt arm and the air left his lungs forcibly.
“Sorry,” she winced and he closed his eyes like he couldn’t face her anymore but she was determined to do something she has dreamed of since she realised her relationship with Ron was never going to work out.
So naturally, when she entered his personal space again, he reflexively took a step back, bewildered.
“And what do you think you’re doing, Granger?”
Her face fell at his words.
“I thought…I thought you liked me,” she said in a small voice, barely audible and he frowned.
“What do you mean? I do like you,” something shattered in his face when he said it.
And then, with a horrible sinking feeling, she finally understood.
“I’m not with Ron,” she stated and his jaw almost met the floor.
He still looked as if he didn’t believe her.
Like he was the second choice, a rebound to mend her broken heart after Weasley.
“I’m not seeing him. I don’t want to date Ron, I am not pining for him and I definitely do not want to hear his half-arsed apologies about how the girl he hooked up with was just a mistake.”
“He cheated on you? I’m going to fucking end him so badly his mother won’t recognise her own son,” he hurriedly rushed to the door and almost grabbed the door handle but Hermione appeared before him.
“Did you not hear anything else? I’m not with him. I’ve been single for the last two months! And for the last month I’ve tried making you notice me,” she whispered with a lump in her throat, “but if you don’t like me in that way…I’d better go now.”
She felt humiliated and her complexion almost matched Draco in this moment.
“You…aren’t with the Weasel King,” he enunciated carefully and she rolled her eyes at the nickname.
“No.”
“And this came out right now…because…?” he was so confused it would be funny for Hermione if she wasn’t embarrassed.
“Because if you were to reject me, I’d prefer it not be because of that idiot. Because you are not the second-best option for me, Draco. Because I made a mistake when I decided to try with Ron. Because I’ve actually harboured a massive, humiliating crush on you since you’ve changed last year. Because…because I was trying to tell you that I don’t want him, I want–“
He interrupted her with a steamy kiss and she immediately kissed him back.
It was slightly messy with all the salve on his face and she pulled back when she realised he’s definitely hurting but he buried his hand in her voluminous hair, the other grabbed her by the waist and pulled her back to him while he ignored his sunburns.
It would be extremely pleasant for Hermione if it weren’t for his grunts of pain here and there and puffs of air escaping him, so she decided to take the higher ground and prioritise his health.
“Draco…” she tried to say but he smothered her with his lips, “Dracooo…you need to heal, you idiot!”
“Later,” that was all he said and continued to press little kisses all over her face.
“I need to savour you, now that the fucking Weasley is gone and I finally have you all to myself,” the smirk was back, although she could detect hints of pain.
After a few minutes of proper snogging the life out of her he eventually capitulated and only held her in his arms.
“So…you don’t mind that I look like a Weasley right now? I hope I don’t remind you of him…” he tenderly murmured into her hair.
“Don’t be absurd, darling. Ron has never looked this good in red.”
And she kissed him again.