Chapter Text
“What kind of world do you want?
Think anything
Let's start at the start
Build a masterpiece
Be careful what you wish for
History starts now.”
World, Five for Fighting
August 5, 2006
9:42 A.M.
Never did Hermione think she would survive it all. It was inconceivable really.
She had thought that she would die a casualty in a war she had fought beside her friends, brave but alone. Daring to dream of another outcome was not something she allowed herself.
Hope. That fragile, fickle thing.
A lot of damage, it caused her over the years. A lot of good, too.
It took different forms these days, but Hermione had learned to recognize it anyway.
A cup of tea her mum prepared or the sound of bliss Draco made when she linked her fingers with his.
It was in the shadows that never truly left, and the anxiety that pushed down on her chest every first of March.
She saw it everywhere, that hope.
It was brilliant, her life. But it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows.
She’d told Ginny she was a beautiful bride earlier that morning. A mess of tulle and glitter, gold jewelry and painstakingly curled red hair. Hermione had never seen someone more stunning in her life.
Only Ginny stared at her open-mouthed. Then, she fucking started crying.
Alarmed, Hermione looked around. “Pansy, what the fuck! Tell her to stop!”
Just, Pansy was useless because she was crying too.
Hermione was panicked to find that her own cheeks were wet, surely staining tracks down her face, ruining her makeup.
“Look at what you’ve done!” Pansy wailed, gesturing to an equally sobbing bride.
“I didn’t do anything!”
Ginny’s eyes were bright and red, a hand covering her mouth. “Come here, Mione.”
“Ginny, we need to fix your makeup—”
“Hemione Granger, come here right now!”
Slowly, like she was wading through sand, Hermione approached the wild, scared animal that was Ginevra Molly Weasley. A loose cannon, that one was.
Ginny’s lips trembled. “Hug me.”
Hermione stuttered, “I—I’m going to ruin your—”
“Then we will do it again,” Ginny cut in, “Come here and hug me before I start crying again. And if I do,” she warned, “You’re going to have to go out there and tell my fiancé that you are the reason why I’ve descended into a puddle of tears—”
Hermione flung herself around Ginny, pushing tulle and endless fabric out of her way. Ginny rocked back a step but once she found her footing, squeezed Hermione so tightly against her that her ribs ached.
Soon enough, she felt another weight beside her— Pansy, with her teary eyes but immaculate hair and makeup. That bitch.
It felt like forever, that the three of them stood there together. Surely, they were late and the world was waiting for them to pull their shit together and get on with the wedding. But none of them moved like they were in much rush at all.
They knew that Ginny Weasley would become Ginny Zabini that day.
They knew that anything that could go wrong would be fixed.
They didn’t have to rush or worry themselves with a sense of urgency that could so easily overtake them.
It was a wedding. An emotional, godforsaken mess of flowers and feelings—
It was hope in its purest form.
December 17, 2006
1:16 P.M.
“Do you want children?” Hermione blurted to Draco that afternoon.
Both sat on the deck of their new cottage, a small, rickety thing that Hermione loved to pieces. She’d been a bit worried about Draco’s reaction to living in a space that was certainly less than the luxury he’d had before, but Draco was surprisingly in love with it too. She could tell that past the endless complaints on the sub-par craftsmanship and crazy decorations, he was comfortable there too.
It wasn’t too far from their friends, a request that Hermione had upheld with the utmost importance.
She would not miss their lives. Any part of them.
Harry and Theo had run from Grimmauld Place soon after Ginny and Zabini’s wedding, the house holding far too many memories for them to build their life there. Since Theo was set on a flat in London, not too far from the ongoing renovations at St. Mungo’s, Harry had found them a disgustingly beautiful place.
When Draco pissed her off a bit too much, she often found herself there, irritating Theo just as much as her company bargained for.
Speaking of being pissed off, Draco was really pushing it then.
Squinting at her quizzically, he didn’t respond right away.
Almost instantly, Hermione started to get antsy.
When she got antsy, she returned to the immature rambling and rumination that always revealed more than she wished to. Words fell out of her mouth like they couldn’t escape fast enough.
“Only,” Hermione gulped and rubbed the back of her neck, “Well, Pansy’s pregnant. Making a huge fuss of it doesn’t really endear me to the idea but Bill’s kid is pretty cute. Too much red hair, but I don’t think we’ll have that problem. And then Harriet’s a riot. She talks a lot, doesn’t she? Do you think—well, I mean, never mind. Silly, I know. I think I need a nap—”
She took a breath, daring a look at a stick still Draco Malfoy.
Speechless. She’d make him bloody speechless. Great.
“I think you’d have to get past the whole talking too much bit, Granger,” he drawled with an inelegant smirk on his face. “Any child that came from you would ramble until their tongue fell out.”
Hermione grumbled. “I do not talk that much—”
“You do,” he chuckled, “But I love it.”
She squirmed underneath his gaze, having half a mind to think he liked her like that. “So…”
“So?”
“Do I bloody well have to ask again!”
The flash of surprise in his eyes gave him away. “Are you serious? You— Do you want children?”
She couldn’t help the pang of hurt at his non-answer. “I asked, didn’t I?”
Whatever expression she couldn’t school from her face, he picked up on it then. “I wasn’t making fun of you, Hermione,” he said seriously, softly. “I promise. I— You just surprised me, that’s all. Children weren’t really something I thought you wanted.”
Well, that made sense. She was a dastardly prickly being. Hermione didn’t know why she ever thought she could be a good mother—
“That is absolutely untrue, Granger, so get that out of your head right now.”
She looked up from her fingernails, surprised. “Are you using Legilimency on me again?”
“I have to when you’re being especially obtuse.”
“You’re the bloody obtuse one—”
He gave her a look.
“Fine,” Hermione grumbled. “I— I just feel like an idiot now. I mean, we’re old now. And scarred. We’ve got enough trauma to fill the ocean and I don’t know why I ever thought it would be a good idea to bring a child into this world. Especially now. Especially when everything is just starting to be rebuilt.”
Draco looked at her for a long minute. His jaw was clenched, and he looked almost… angry.
Eventually, the anger faded to something like exasperation. “I want children with you, Hermione. I think that’s as plainly as I can say it, without you flying off the handle. I won’t lie, though. Everything you just said—fuck—” his words were clipped when he said, “Talk to me about this. I want to know every bit of nonsense you think about so I can dispel everything that’s wrong about it.”
He shifted closer, pulling her legs onto his lap, her torso in his side. “You’re not an idiot and we aren’t old. Our scars and trauma don’t define us, not if we don’t let it. Everything that doesn’t work has to be rebuilt eventually. Any child we bring into the world will know the new world order. They’ll know that once upon a time, the world fucking sucked, but we were a part of trying to make it better. They’ll have Hermione Granger as a mother, and no other child could be fucking luckier.”
The relief came first, crashing over her in waves. His words were a balm to her cracked skin, soothing the worries she had expressed and those he knew she couldn’t.
“How do you know?”
She had surprised herself, the first time she decided she wanted them. Shocked herself further with how much the desire to hold and cherish something she and Draco made, together, came to her.
“You care like nothing I’ve seen before— love in a way that’s almost suffocating. Everything you do, you do for those you love. Look at you and Teddy. This infinite patience you have for him, even when I know he’s being a pain in the arse, it’s something you’ll have to help me with.”
To be frank, Hermione had been a terror the past weeks, working up the gall to ask him what he thought. The barest parts of her were terrified that he would laugh her off or disagree.
He pulled her closer.
Hermione tilted her head into the crook of his neck, breathing in the soft cotton scent of his clothes, the dark, sandalwood smell of his body wash.
“We’re going to have awesome kids,” Hermione declared. “Smart as shit. Hot as shit. Cuter than whatever ball of joy Pansy pops out—"
“Hopefully somewhat athletic,” he drawled.
She jabbed his ribs. “Piss off. I’ve gotten better at flying!”
“In your dreams.”
“Oh, fuck you.”
“Maybe tonight.”
She rolled her eyes, hating when he got the last word.
“Our kids are going to have the best parts of the both of us,” Draco added after a moment of silence. “And the life that we made for them.”
Thickness filled her throat.
Time stilled as the snow fell. A light dusting had already covered the grass, a beautiful sight so close to Christmas.
Eventually, she peaked her head up from his shoulder and pouted. “How many?”
“A whole bloody Quidditch team should suffice.”
Hermione gasped, “No fucking way—"
But she couldn’t finish her protest of Draco’s insane dreams because that big blonde bastard kissed her until she couldn’t breathe, the snow and the cold be damned.
March 1, 2007
4:56 P.M.
It had been a bad day. One of her worst.
She had clung to the side of her bed like it was her only refuge. Even Draco’s presence had been no help, if only reminding her of everything she could have lost.
The thought that the war was over did nothing for her.
Nothing could penetrate the fog that kept her immobile; stuck in the dark.
She had even woken up heavy.
Boo had sensed there was something wrong almost immediately as she opened her eyes. Red fur tickled her nose as big blue eyes looked up at her questioningly, asking her why she was so sad, so weighty.
He didn’t even protest when Hermione scooped him against her side, cuddling him like a teddy bear. For a cat that often didn’t like to be held, the realization of his allowance only made her tears start to fall, a steady trickle that she didn’t even bother to move and wipe away.
She knew it was futile, to hide the evidence.
Feeling it was the only way to get through. Remembering instead of forgetting was always more painful anyways.
How much time passed, she couldn’t say. Only, the morning light faded into the afternoon sun. Eventually, night came.
The bed creaked. Arms wrapped around her, held her tight.
And she finally fell asleep.
October 17, 2008
5:16 P.M.
“I’m mad at you,” Hermione pouted.
Draco arched a brow in question. “Because I won’t let you buy red sheets?”
“Because you’re irritating.”
“Well, that’s not a new complaint, Granger. Sorry to break it to you.”
“I thought I would say it again.”
“I’m glad.”
Hermione tapped her finger against her knee.
“What is it, Hermione?”
Ugh, what a bastard. A sweet, loving, bastard—
“I think we should start trying.” Ripping off the bandage it was.
She thought he was going to play dumb, but the instant the words escaped her mouth, she had his full attention. Flashes of shock ripped through his expression, so quickly that Hermione literally recoiled back a step.
Undisguised happiness in his eyes made her exhale a rough laugh. “Really?”
She only nodded, holding close to that look on his face.
“Why now?” he asked, truly curious.
Hermione shrugged. “I want forever with you. Why not start now?”
“Merlin, you say the most outlandish things sometimes.”
She grinned. “I’ve got to keep you on your toes.”
“You do just that by breathing.”
“Imagine a mini-me.”
Draco flopped back onto the bed. “I’m going to die of a heart attack.”
January 14, 2009
12:01 A.M.
It was a new year, and Ginny Zabini was pregnant with her first child.
Conveniently, Pansy was with her second. A little girl, she’d told them jubilantly. With a blanket of the January snow falling around them, Hermione dreamed that Pansy and Ron’s second child would have the shock of red hair that little Rose was missing.
All the while, Hermione was jealous.
She hated herself for it, kicked herself in the arse to be happy for the friends that had been nothing but happy and supportive of her.
Pansy was the world’s greatest mother, showering Rose with kisses and smothering her with so many hugs that the toddler’s first word had been, “no.” Everything Pansy had confessed she thought was missing from her life had come in the form of ten small fingers and wiggling toes, red skin, and a mess of black hair.
It was a New Year and Hermione almost forgot to count her many blessings.
Her family was safe, and most importantly— happy.
Draco’s smirk still sent butterflies rippling through her stomach. His words had a penchant to spin them into the most glorious of bitch fits.
She truly loved every moment of their lives.
“Soon,” Draco promised her, awe in his eyes.
The promise etched itself into her soul.
Hermione refused to count down the days— trying patiently to sit still in the sun, just a little bit longer.
April 29, 2010
12:56 P.M.
As suspicious as it would have seemed a couple of years ago, Hermione didn’t worry too much when she saw that Minerva was in a sparkling mood as she spoke with Harry.
It had been years since the battle that secured them their futures. And amid those who actually wanted to be among the first to see the new order, Minerva McGonagall had not seen many stressless years.
Though, Hermione only knew what she was told and could see with two eyes. She had been so against becoming involved in rebuilding for reasons she knew now were incredibly valid. Guilt had been her constant companion those first months after the war’s end, reckoning that she hadn’t done nearly enough to help with rebuilding efforts.
She’d offered a sparse hand here or there, consulting on the rebuilding of Hogwarts with Minerva and Harry, then with renovations at St. Mungo’s with Theo. Physical labor, she could do. Swiping away at bricks rubble, repairing the magic within the staircases and wards— that was easy enough.
But the inner workings of their government gave her pause. There was once a trust she had given freely that now she knew was broken beyond repair. An innocent eleven-year-old witch, newly minted and magicked, had believed so fully that the Ministry would keep her safe.
It was the games of politics and the trauma of not knowing who exactly to trust that made her keep her distance. No amount of pleading or machinations by Kingsley or his acolytes would ever sway her into a government job.
And he offered her every single one.
To be a champion of the rights of magical creatures or an Unspeakable. A curse breaker or office grunt. None of it was right.
She was relieved that Draco didn’t push her to accept or even consider. Only, he stood by her side. A tall, imposing figure that even made Kingsley proceed with caution anytime they spoke together.
Hermione was content with the knowledge that she was still figuring everything out.
After the trials finally concluded last year, her friends on the other hand had done marvelously with navigating the trauma that still weighed on them, carving out the lives she knew they deserved.
Ginny was one of the first people to champion for reinstating the British and Irish Quidditch League. Before she, along with Angelina Johnson, had snagged starting spots on the Holyhead Harpies, they worked tirelessly to make the league a thing of beauty and fun once again. Ginny proved to be one of the greatest Chasers in the history of her team, but no one had much doubt, regardless.
Blaise followed his wife around the world, little Amelia Molly Zabini in tow. He was a doting father and husband, never giving Hermione any doubt about the most important things in his life. He invested in the new shops and businesses that sprung up in the years following the war, supporting their hopes and dreams like they were his own.
Pansy designed to her heart’s content, filling sketches and importing dreadfully expensive fabrics with which she covered her and Ron’s London flat in. She even spoke of opening a little shop in Diagon Alley, one she claimed she would strongarm Blaise and Draco to invest in. Of course, Hermione promised her assistance if that dream ever came to fruition, but she reckoned that Pansy wouldn’t have to work hard to earn their support.
Ron, unsurprisingly enough, went to work with the Aurors. Hermione had known that Ron found his place as a strategist, thriving where others floundered under the pressure and expectation to deliver perfection each time. He was happy, Pansy told her, hunting down the last remaining Death Eaters. And Hermione could see it.
It was expected then, that Theo found his home at the newly rebuilt St. Mungo’s. It had taken some time, but Theo had had endless help to accomplish his own dream. A privilege and an honor, he had told Hermione one day, was it to help how he could. Theo had never been a fighter in the conventional sense, but healing was his passion. It had been Hermione’s own privilege and honor to help him accomplish that.
Lastly, after five years, the rebuilding at Hogwarts had finally finished.
Standing proud amid its success was Minerva and Harry, grinning cheek to cheek as they discussed their plans for the upcoming school year. Next September, they spoke animatedly to Hermione, they would have new students and teachers.
Hermione started weeping once Harry told her his plan to begin as a Professor, teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts.
He as much as the rest of them struggled with his place in the new world, constantly questioning if he did want to be an Auror like Remus had suggested so many years ago or finding something different.
A question he had constantly put off. Instead, he, like Hermione, threw himself into renovations and rebuilding.
It took Hogwarts restored to its former glory, that he finally knew what he wanted.
To be a teacher.
Hermione sputtered her congratulations and threw her arms around her best friend. The tears from her traitorous eyes stained her face and his shirt, but she couldn’t be bothered to wipe them away. They were proof of everything they had survived, everything they had accomplished.
She began to ask a million questions.
Who would be the Headmaster? Minerva.
Would there be Sorting? Yes, because villains are made, not born.
Who else would come teach? Luna and Xenophilius. Dean or Viktor. Harry and whoever else wanted a place.
“And there will be provisions for the muggleborn witches and wizards, my dear,” Minerva told her then, “Like one of those summer camps you raved endlessly about in school. A brilliant idea, and one I should have worked tirelessly to make possible. Never, will there be another witch or wizard who felt the way so many muggleborn have before them.”
Hermione really started crying then, her hands tightening around Minerva’s with the gratitude and thanks that she could not verbalize.
All that mattered was that Minerva could see it in her face, that bone-deep relief that little boys and girls like her would never feel like they had something to prove once they got to Hogwarts. They would never wonder if they deserved their places, or if they would need to fight tooth and nail to be the best in order to prove that they belonged— unburdened by prejudice and discrimination.
They would live the lives that Hermione and her family had fought to give them.
The life that we made for them, Draco had said once upon a time.
Harry’s eyes were swimming in tears as he nodded to her. Once, twice— as many times as it took for it to really sink in.
“Fuck,” was Hermione’s only word to explain what she was feeling.
While Minerva shot her a sharp look for her language, Harry only laughed, telling her that he was right there with her.
February 8, 2011
7:48 P.M.
Hermione stared at the muggle pregnancy stick for a long time.
On the counter of her bathroom, it sat still and mocking. How an inanimate object could be mocking, Hermione didn’t know—
Pregnant.
What. The. Fuck?
The symptoms had come early, but Hermione had grown cynical in the years they had been trying for a child. Believing it would never happen, she dismissed the nausea in the morning as some form of strange anxiety. The terrible exhaustion that hit her during the day, she explained away as dehydration.
The slight roundness of her flat stomach, Hermione convinced herself was the result of too many Maltesers.
A dream was what it was.
Years of waiting. Years of tears when the tests came back negative. Years of beating herself up for the simple fact that she thought fate was punishing her once again.
She burst into tears.
Draco should have been back by then. It was close to eight in the evening and it had long grown dark. He knew she hated when they’d played Quidditch in the dark so where was he?
She found herself comatose on the couch, staring at the four walls for so long, she lost track of how much time had passed between when she sat down and when a key turned in the front door.
“Granger,” Draco called playfully from the other room, “Where are you? I’m all sweaty and am in desperate need of a shower— Granger? Hermione, what’s wrong?”
Suddenly, he was right in front of her, tugging her up from the couch with panic very real in his voice and expression. He thought something had happened to her, and it had. But she couldn’t get herself to speak.
“I—” she said, and the words got stuck in her throat.
His gaze dropped to what she held in her fist-like grip.
“What is that?” he asked. “Hermione?”
“A muggle pregnancy test,” she said, voice sounding like it was being grated out. “It’s positive.”
She thought he was going to ask what it meant or if she was sure. But he surprised her. He never stopped surprising her.
“You’re lying,” Draco gasped, immediate silver lining his eyes.
A flash of rage punched through her. “I’m going to kill you—”
“No, you can’t,” he laughed, hoarse and raspy. He swallowed past a lump in his throat, looking at her with an awe she still thought she didn’t deserve. “We’re having a baby, Granger?”
She blinked, too fast to see anything but a blur. “Y—yeah,” she sputtered out, “Are you happy, Draco? Truly?”
“Incandescently happy,” he whispered harshly. “God, Hermione, I love you. You’re fucking magic. This life with you. It’s better than anything I could have imagined in my wildest dream. It doesn’t get better than this.”
Hermione let herself imagine her then. Or him.
Platinum curls or gray eyes. Pale skin or freckled and tan. Perhaps a mix of it all, a hodgepodge of everything that made Hermione and Draco, themselves.
She let out a laugh as Draco fell to her knees before her, a hand lying protectively on her mostly flat stomach. He was sweaty and flushed and so fucking beautiful.
“You’re going to be the best mother, Hermione.”
“Oh, fuck you,” she cried into her hands.
These days, all Hermione had were tears…happy ones, but tears, nonetheless.
July 2, 2012
3:00 P.M.
“Should I call you Potions Master as I suck your cock now, love?”
Draco startled from where he was elbow-deep in what Hermione knew was surely a complicated potion. Unknown liquids splashed all over his table, earning Hermione a gleefully sexy glare.
“You find the worst times to say shit like that.”
Hermione grinned. “I just got the news from Minerva. Why didn’t you come and find me?”
The news, of course, was Draco finally finishing his Potions Mastery.
It had taken him quite some time to figure out that that was what he wanted, but once he decided, he chased that dream with everything in him. A bit of hesitation initially followed once he saw their friends happily settling down with their families and children, but Hermione was quick to wave off his concern.
Just as he told her once upon a time, she repeated his own message: they would get there, one day, made sure he knew that they weren’t on anyone’s schedule but their own.
His gaze caught on the ring on her finger. He smirked, a picture of male smugness.
Last month, she had finally succumbed to proposal number eight-seven, purely because Pansy had told her that Draco was at the end of his rope with Hermione’s stubbornness.
Of course, Hermione had valid reasons for refusing him, largely due to the fact that the ponce had only proposed the day after she told him they were pregnant. An idiot, she called him, fuming in more ways than one.
It was common knowledge that one did not propose to their long-term partner the moment they announced they were going to have a bloody baby. Common courtesy dictated that you waited at least a fucking month—
Regardless, Hermione had sent over Pansy to yell at Draco for her. Seeing him only made her want to jump his bones or cry, thanks to all the bloody hormones coursing through her body. Although, sending Pansy only made things worse. Draco was irate that she couldn’t take to him herself, him ranting about bloody communication practices and whatnot, but every time he brought up marriage again, Hermione started crying.
Carefully, they had come to an agreement that there would be no talks of marriage until Hermione was fresh out of the stage of crying about everything she saw or talked about. It had become so bad some days that even Harry couldn’t be around her without teasing how pathetic she’d become. Since the teasing usually ended with Hermione hexing Harry until he was crying himself, Theo had separated the two of them until they “learned to behave.”
Hogwash.
Hermione was pregnant, not deranged.
“I found you on the couch, snoring like a grizzly bear all but twenty minutes ago, Granger. I wasn’t going to risk my life to wake you up.”
She scowled. “It’s rude to liken a pregnant woman to a grizzly bear.”
“Well, it’s also rude to tempt a man who’s elbows deep in dangerous potions—”
Hermione sat on a stool beside his station, ignoring his glare at the chair she chose. It had to be uncomfortable, he ranted, and rickety and dirty. She’d even cast a cushioning and stabilization charm under his watchful eye, but no budging.
Some sort of protective demons rose in him, all starting the second after they found out they were expecting, so Hermione didn’t begrudge how he found control in this terrifying situation.
Artfully, she changed the subject before she got another lecture.
“How was Harry’s demonstration at school?
Sneakily enough, Harry had convinced Draco to come into his classroom during the summer term he taught and give a demonstration of protective potions and their uses during duels and other forms of battle. He was hesitant for reasons that had nothing to do with his talent with potions but admitted it to no one besides Hermione. Eventually, he gave into Harry’s incessant persistence, but had an ill look about him all week leading up to it.
Draco’s eyes flashed once he realized what she was doing. Thankfully, he read the look in her eye as the warning it was and huffed an amused laugh. “That ponce looks entirely too comfortable up there. I had half a mind to hex him in front of the class.”
“But?”
“It went well,” he bit out. “Better than I expected. They all knew my name, of course, but didn’t ask anything too revealing. I think Potter told them to behave.”
“How considerate of him,” Hermione smirked, commending her best friend.
“Whatever,” Draco huffed into his caldron, “I still want to hex him.”
Hermione rolled her eyes. She would do more to discourage their bickering, but knew it was how Harry and Draco showed their affection for each other. They could both deny it to their graves, but Hermione knew the truth.
“What’s wrong? What happened?” he asked, panicked once she had grown quiet and contemplative.
Hermione looked down at the puddle of fluid beneath her. Fuck.
“Hermione?” he asked again.
“The baby, Draco. My fucking water just broke.”
December 5, 2013
8:19 A.M.
Her house was tidy and clean. Too tidy and clean.
Hermione wanted Narcissa and Jean out of her goddamn house.
“Malfoy! Your mother is being mean!”
Narcissa gave her a look. “Just because I asked to hold your child, does not make me mean, Hermione. It’s been months. He’s practically full grown.”
“That’s a pretty textbook example of mean, lady,” Hermione snorted, “And he’s full grown when I damn well say so. Scorpius is never going to leave me. Aren’t you, beautiful? You’re going to stay with Mum forever—”
Hermione’s mother huffed, amusement in her glare. “You are impossible.”
She only snuggled Scorpius’ blonde curls closer to her nose. “I aim to please.”
And she truly did aim to please. They named Scorpius after the tradition of House Black and their strange obsession with constellations. Though Scorpius’ middle name was in honor of Hermione’s father, Henry Granger.
Her mum cried when Hermione told her, Narcissa shedding a few elegant tears as a result. It was great— Hermione only wished she snapped a photo.
“What’s all this shouting for?” Draco finally returned with a fresh bottle. He thought he was slick, slipping out of Jean and Narcissa’s way and leaving Hermione to deal with them alone. Only did he know that Hermione would get him back for all those times very soon.
“Hermione won’t let me hold Scorpius!” Narcissa whined, so unlike her that Hermione snickered. “And she thinks it’s funny.”
Hermione fussed at her baby, ignoring Draco’s look of amusement. “Grandma is being very fretful, isn’t she baby? Shall we give her a go so she leaves Mummy’s house? Yes, I think we will. Here, Lady Malfoy. Don’t drop him.”
“I’ve held more babies than you, dear,” she glared, eyes quickly softening as she took Scorpius in her arms. “Oh, he’s so perfect, Hermione.”
And he truly was. He had the platinum curls that Hermione dreamed about, a perfect mix of Draco’s white-blonde and Hermione’s messy curls. His eyes were hazel, just as her father’s had been. It made his middle name all that more fitting.
Jean leaned over and fussed with Hermione’s blankets. “How are you feeling, little monster?”
“Good,” Hermione responded, settling closer to Draco when he sat next to her. “We’re both tired. But happy, you know?”
“Yeah,” Jean breathed, “I know a thing or two about that.”
Hermione smiled.
Eventually, she grew antsy, eager to hold Scorpius once again. It was strange how easily the anxiety built when she didn’t feel him close. Draco said it was normal, that he felt it too, but Hermione literally thought she was going to die every time he left her arms.
Narcissa placed him back in her arms, Hermione melting into a puddle when Scorpius let out a content little sigh as he settled against her chest.
He was bubbly and happy, giggling at her distress and smiling at his father’s silly faces.
“Come on Scorp,” Hermione cooed. “Say Mama.”
A gurgle and then: “Daaa.”
“Draco, I fucking hate you.”
October 30, 2014
1:15 P.M.
Harry grinned when he caught sight of his elusive husband.
Theo was Head Healer at St. Mungo’s and worked too hard for his own good.
“Harry? Theo squinted as he looked up from his charts. Harry leaned against the door to his office, a bag of desperately needed sustenance in his hand. He didn’t even want to think about the last time Theo sat down and ate. That answer alone was telling.
“No, not Harry I’m afraid. Only the strange, scarred git that won’t leave you alone.”
Theo’s eyes brightened when he confirmed that it was, indeed, Harry himself.
“You are strange,” he laughed as he stood. “But I never want you to leave me alone.”
“That’s a good thing. I’ll be around forever, babe.”
A soft expression passed over Theo’s face. “Good.”
“Lunch.” Abruptly, Harry held out the food he’d brought Theo. “And I don’t want to hear that you’re too busy to eat or whatever. You need to eat, and I need a break from my class. Ergo, breaktime for the both of us.”
Theo snorted, “All right, Potter. Sit down. How was your day with Teddy?”
Harry grinned. “Fun. Malfoy and I have been giving him some pointers. He’s obsessed with the Wronski Feint. Malfoy’s having too much joy watching me try and teach him.”
Theo laughed, settling into his lunch, preparing to have Harry talk his ear off for the hour he should have taken as a break.
“And where is he now?” he asked then, apprehensively.
A smirk took over Harry’s face. “I handed him over to Hermione. Let that witch get a taste of her own medicine. Teddy always gets paint everywhere.”
November 12, 2015
7:38 P.M.
Sure enough, Hermione’s very expensive couch looked like a bloody crime scene.
“Edward,” Hermione hollered. “You’ve gotten paint all over my chaise!”
Boo pranced around Hermione’s ankles, irritating the shite out of her.
“Chill, Aunt Mione. I’ll clean it.”
“Chill?” Hermione sputtered. She looked at Andromeda’s shit-eating grin. Teddy’s grandmother did nothing these days but look at the relationship between aunt and crazy nephew with amusement and smugness.
Andromeda shrugged, continuing her embroidery. “Youths these days.”
Hermione let out a strangled sound. “Youths, my arse! Edward bloody Lupin, get your behind here right now and get this off of my furniture before I hex you seven ways to Sunday!”
“Aunt Mione,” he whined into his sketchbook, “I’m almost done.”
Seventeen and Hermione battled teenager wiles along with her terribly adorable toddler.
She thought it was cute that Teddy liked her best. Everyone knew it, barely restraining their jealousy by attempting to lure Teddy into picking a new favorite aunt or uncle. But Teddy was resolute in Hermione.
Of course, she had been endlessly flattered.
That was until Teddy grew up and decided to be a gigantic pain in her arse that got away with everything under the sun because Hermione couldn’t tell him no.
Andromeda said she did it to herself.
Remus and Tonks laughed at her under the effect of Teddy’s puppy eyes.
Hermione hated them all.
It didn’t help that Teddy was an artist, just like her. She had taught him everything he knew. Watched as he grew into his own person, his own uniqueness and ingenuity. He was dreadfully good, and most times, Hermione didn’t have the heart to hinder his creativity.
She was growing so bloody soft in her old age.
Teddy pouted, looking mournfully at his newly unfinished work. Nevertheless, he carted his arse over to Hermione’s beautiful couch and got to cleaning.
Youths.
Hermione thought she had this parenting thing down pact.
As Teddy cleaned, Hermione sat to supervise, starting to feel a little guilty.
“So, kid, how’s school?”
Teddy merely shrugged. “Good, I guess. Bloody annoying. Can’t wait until Christmas.”
“Of course,” Hermione drawled. “Why just good? Are you having trouble with something? I can help you.”
“No, nothing like that,” Teddy assured her. “It’s actually a girl at school.”
Ah, Jesus Christ. She did not have the tools in her arsenal for this conversation.
Lovely that she thought she had the parenting thing down. She was full of shite.
“A girl, is it?” Hermione ground out of her clenched jaw. “What house?”
Teddy looked alarmed with how quickly Hermione had figured out that by his reaction, he most certainly had to be in love with a Slytherin.
Surely enough, he croaked out, “A Slytherin.”
“Figures.”
Of course, Hermione didn’t give a fuck that he was in love with a Slytherin. Teddy could have confessed his crush on a centaur and Hermione would bend the world in thirds to make it socially acceptable. But something clearly about her being a Slytherin clearly bothered Teddy.
“She won’t give me a second look,” he finally confessed. “Because I’m a ‘Puff.”
“I’ll kill her!”
At last, Teddy cracked a smile. “Thanks, Aunt Mione. But please don’t.”
“There’s nothing wrong with being a Hufflepuff—”
“You made fun of me for like two weeks after you found out—”
“The color yellow is ghastly, Edward, truly—”
“Maybe she thinks so, too,” he said, clearly dejected. Fuck. Fuck fuck. Where was Harry when you needed him? Andromeda had escaped back into the kitchen once they had begun talking so Hermione was on her own.
“Then she’s an idiot,” Hermione declared, steadfast and entirely serious.
“She’s not—”
“I mean it,” she cut in. “If she can’t look past House differences, Teddy, then she’s not someone worth your time, your tears or your energy. Your parents fought in the war, fought to erase those inane prejudices that held even the kindest of people in a chokehold. You are the best kind of kid, you hear me?
He looked at her like she was speaking another language and Hermione sighed.
“Teddy good. Slytherin girl bad. Teddy must wait until girl likes him, even though he is an upsettingly mustard colored Hufflepuff. Yes?”
The chuckle that escaped Teddy was like lightning, zapping a smug grin onto Hermione’s face. Yes, she thought, she was great at this.
Moments later, Hermione asked, “What’s her name?”
Teddy hesitated a moment. “Lizzy Blackwater.”
She checked her fingernails, reminding herself to paint them. “A stupid name if I’ve ever heard one before. Worse than Draco bloody Malfoy, honestly— ”
“Aunt Hermione!”
September 19, 2016
3:14 P.M.
Ten years didn’t feel like its reality.
An hour could feel like a day, days like years. Every unit of measuring that totally abstract concept had its own rules. Depending on the day or the situation. The weather or what wizard was born that day.
In that way, time never really made much sense at all.
A long time ago, that used to bother Hermione.
Now?
Now she couldn’t give a fuck less.
That was the beauty of happiness, she realized one of these years. Indescribable and incandescent happiness.
Hermione turned thirty-seven years old today. Fuck.
She was older than she thought she would ever be, happier and more content than she ever thought possible. Fulfilled in a way that truly settled something deep in her soul, giving her the life she had fought so hard for.
Disheartened was how she felt so long, watching her friends and family settle into their lives after the war’s end. Watching as they had families and bought homes had only reminded her of things she didn’t have.
It had taken years for her to become pregnant with Scorpius, for Draco to get his Potions Mastery and open his own shop.
All the while, Hermione floundered, thinking endlessly about what she was made for beyond fighting and sarcasm.
So much time had passed before Hermione heard her calling. Months and years, seasons repeating over again until eventually, something clicked. In the beginning, the dream had started a mere whisper, amplified further by time and healing.
She thought it was strange how so much had happened, enough that she knew it would be lost to time if not written down and taken care of.
Swallowing her pride was not hard to do as she asked Kingsley about the Ministry archives. He confessed to her that he was still looking for someone to maintain them, a person quiet and unassuming about everything they would find and preserve.
He was frank in his belief that Hermione was the last person he would have thought to want to spend time amongst paper and history. Nonetheless, he was more than happy to give her all the access she wanted, a gift she promised to repay him for.
The archives she maintained were cool and quiet, just the escape she needed on the days where the past still threatened to overwhelm her. Narcissa and Jean were more than happy to watch their grandchild on the days Hermione and Draco worked, Scorpius providing them a similar peace he gave his parents.
It was a peace they deserved, one they worked every day to preserve.
Trauma like they had experienced didn’t just go away. Time was a balm, a way to process, but it wasn’t a cure-all. It couldn’t just be ignored.
Draco liked to talk, surprising for a man who had kept his emotions and feelings so tightly locked behind his Occlumency walls. But even though Hermione didn’t like to unravel her own emotions about the war as freely as he did, she was more than happy to listen, just as he did for her.
Painting the images that wouldn’t leave her mind was only one way for Hermione to process everything she had been through, a way for her story to be told. Writing it all down was another.
The world deserved to know its history. All of it.
Who better to tell the story than her, someone who had been able to transcend time and space to change that history?
The archives made it easy, her experience only adding to the authenticity of what she wrote.
Her first book, she titled, A Tale as Old as Time. It had been a dreadfully emotional thing, an account of the wars she had fought that read more like a diary than a textbook. Draco helped her, sitting beside her as she wrote. Every day, he flipped a coin and predicted if she would laugh or cry as she fervently scribbled on parchment.
But it belonged to Hermione. To them all. And it was true.
Minerva, of course, tortured her and made all of the students read it Fourth Year, making sure the new generation would know exactly how precious their peace was earned. They would never forget the blood and the loss that made it possible.
Years passed so fast that she was still shocked that today, she turned thirty-seven. Time was irrelevant in it all as she studied her future, now able to smile at the past.
“Granger!” Blaise howled across the lawn, “Stop daydreaming and sit down! It’s your bloody birthday dinner!”
She whirled towards where her family stood, watching her smile at the sky.
“This is not the time one should be having dinner,” Hermione insisted, maintaining her firm opinion about the debauchery of early dinners.
“Granger, for the sake of fudge!” Blaise Zabini cried, Amelia on his shoulders. “How long have I tried to educate you?”
She snickered at his family friendly language. Amelia had taken an early liking to parrot the naughty words that many of the adult’s favored. The first time she had said fuck, spewed from the mouth of none other than her father, Hermione really thought that Ginny was going to stab him with her broom.
“There better not be anything pickled on this table.”
Draco only shook his head, his love of pickled herring known widely. She should have been ashamed to love someone who loved something so gross, but she tried to remind herself that they all had their faults, but loving pickled herring was a pretty obscene one.
“There’s not,” her husband drawled, “As much as I championed for some. Apparently, even Zabini has standards. Nothing the birthday girl doesn’t like on her thirty-seventh birthday—”
She hushed him with a hand over his mouth. “Let’s not repeat the age, Malfoy.”
His eyes only twinkled mischievously.
They sat beside each other, just like they always did. Kicked each other under the table until whoever was across from them inevitably told them to shape up and start acting like adults. Though, Hermione enjoyed their immaturity with a grin, snuggling Scorpius so close that the kid probably had trouble breathing sometime.
And Merlin, don’t get her started on her son.
He was just as beautiful as her husband, and just as irritating. A mess of blonde curls and pale skin, he liked to scare the shit out of her when she came home from work and then hug her until she giggled and needed to pee.
Cassiopeia Narcissa came a few years after Scorpius was born, turning their world inside out and back again. If they thought Scorpius was a hoot, they were truly whacked. Cassie was loud and so resolutely herself, uncaring about anyone else’s opinion.
She was only three years old and carried herself like a queen, wrapping her father around her finger like he was her most loyal of subjects. Hermione was only her second favorite, but that was all right. Because even though her brown hair was always messy and her gray eyes always sparkling with nefarious plans, Hermione loved her anyway.
Cassie and Scorp ran circles around them both before planning world domination with the rest of their cousins. Because cousins they would all be raised as, Hermione and Draco knowing full well that they were all family in the most important of senses.
While Cassie and Phoebe Weasley gave her the frights, it was truly Scorpius, James Potter-Nott and Amelia Zabini that had to be watched around anything mildly problematic. There had to be constant supervision around them, a trusted adult that’s last name did not include Weasley. Those little terrors were the twins’ favorites, Fred and George’s antics making the rest of the adults starkly opposed to having any of them next to each other for long periods of time.
The last time Hermione had given Fred and George the benefit of the doubt to watch over Scorpius, Amelia and James, the portrait of Regulus Black had almost gone up and flames. Of course, Sirius was in his frame, laughing his arse off. Those portraits had to be separated for a month while Regulus refrained from cursing out his brother too loudly.
All the while, Harriet Lupin and Rose Weasley stayed together, surveying their icky little cousins with a face telling of little more than disgust. Teddy Lupin hung back with Hermione just as he always did, always cracking a laugh at it all.
It was truly chaos in the finest sense and Hermione counted her blessings every damn day.
Draco was in her periphery, Theo beside her snickering at the latest of gossip that surrounded their children.
Harry bounded over to where Hermione and Theo watched Draco and Scorpius. Little Cassie tried to keep up, her chubby legs in her way.
Boo tried to climb Draco like a tree. And Hermione certainly didn’t blame him.
Theo caught her looking at them, a serene expression on her face.
“You changed his life,” Theo said fondly.
“No,” Hermione smiled, “He changed mine.”
Fin