Best of You

After the encounter with Fred, Hermione had spent the rest of her day in Hogsmeade ignoring that it had happened at all. It was… a lot. She had purchased her cream (to great protest from the wizard working the register who insisted she should get it free, or at least at a discount) and did her best to enjoy the rest of her day with Harry and Draco without thinking about Fred.

It had been an utter failure. Even with committing a great deal of brain power to not thinking about it she couldn’t help but keep replaying moments of the interaction through her brain. Even an entire day teasing Harry and Draco and trying to get them to admit to a relationship wasn’t enough to distract her.

That evening, sitting in front of the fire with her dinner, she finally allowed herself to fully focus on analyzing the interaction. Fred was the only non-healer other than herself to ever touch her scar. It had honestly been a fairly brazen and out of line thing for him to do, but she really hadn’t been upset by it. It had almost soothed her every time he touched it. Made it feel… less. The joys of being carved by a cursed blade sadly didn’t end with it just looking horrible all the time. It still hurt. Constantly. At this point the constant buzzing of pain had become normal background noise for Hermione and she practically didn’t feel it at all most of the time. But the moment Fred had touched it that normal amount of buzzing had dropped. Just a fraction but enough to be a relief.

She was also mildly bothered by how ready to go kick Draco’s teeth in he had been. It was very similar to the hotheaded way that Ron responded to things really. But, he had been able to listen and calm down and move on. That was very different from Ron. There was a slight appeal to his desire to defend her, and hearing that he wanted to kill Bellatrix for hurting her… That was a nice thing to hear. Hermione briefly wondered if she should worry about being attracted to the violent edge to Fred. Maybe that was something she should discuss with her therapist.

As she stared into the flames, dinner all but forgotten in her lap, Hermione couldn’t help but keep replaying one moment in particular over and over in her head. “To spend that long with you and not spend the entire time taking every inch of you in…” The way he had said that and stared so deeply into her eyes. Hermione didn’t think she had ever felt wanted like that. Of course she didn’t know for sure that Fred meant that he did want her but.. It felt like he did.

She sighed and drained the last of her wine before standing and heading towards her kitchenette. She set her dishes in the sink and then made her way to bed. Maybe a good night's rest would help her sort some things out.

__________

A good night's rest did nothing to help her sort things out. Neither did the next night, or the night after that, or any of the nights that followed. Instead her nights were full of dreams about Fred that left her feeling frankly rather embarrassed to ever see him again.

She had spent the week focused on getting ready for her students and creating lesson plans, and shoving all thoughts of Fred back to the recesses of her mind. She had only arrived at the castle a few weeks before students were set to arrive and she had a lot to do. Of course she hadn’t been alone all week. Harry and Draco had dropped by for visits, and she had eaten almost every meal with them with guest appearances from Neville, Hagrid, and the other professors. And she had many meetings with Headmistress McGonagall to help guide her lesson plans, so the week had been very busy. It had been a good distraction.

But every time things had gone quiet and she had finished her work for the day, Hermione couldn’t help her mind drifting to a certain red-headed prankster. It was honestly getting very annoying.

Now she found herself on another Saturday evening in her living room, debating if she should go to Sunday Night Dinner at the Weasley’s. And of course she wasn’t debating alone.

“Of course you should come!” Ginny practically screamed at her, sloshing her drink about a bit too vigorously but catching it before it spilled. “Why wouldn’t you come?!”
Draco was grinning in that somehow dirty way again from his position on the couch next to Harry. The two still wouldn’t admit anything but were always somehow sitting next to each other. And currently Draco was fully leaned into Harry’s side, whose arm was around the slytherin’s shoulder. “Is it because I interrupted something in Fred’s workshop?” He wiggled his eyebrows at her.
Ginny gasped and slapped Hermione on the arm, “What happened in the workshop?!”
“Nothing!” Hermione groaned and shot Draco a withering look. Now Ginny would never let that go. “I was helping him troubleshoot a product!”
“I’m not sure what product would have him holding your arm to his chest like that.” Draco drawled out, looking up at the ceiling attempting (and failing) to be the picture of innocence.
At Ginny’s next gasp Hermione hurled a pillow in his direction. “You know I’ve punched you once before Malfoy.” She ground out at him.
Draco laughed and ducked the pillow, which hit Harry in the face. It was a strange thing to hear Draco laugh. Hermione didn’t think she had ever heard him do it during school, not genuinely anyway. It was a nice laugh.

“You know I always wondered if you two had something going on.” Neville chimed in from his armchair off to the side.
“What!?” Hermione swiveled to him in disbelief. “You too??”
Neville shrugged and grinned at her. “In fifth year I always caught you two looking at each other when the other wasn’t paying attention. Especially Fred. Seemed like his gaze was glued to you that year. And in eighth year you guys spent so much time together. I know you were with Ron but.. You just always seemed so happy around Fred.”
Hermione gaped at the herbology professor, opening and closing her mouth a few times as she searched for words. “Fred is.. A friend! He has always been my friend!”
“Hermione.” Harry finally joined in, leveling her with a serious look, “We all know that nothing would have happened while you were with Ron but… It was pretty obvious you were miserable in that relationship and not at all miserable when you hung out with Fred.”
“You weren’t even here!” She protested. “You were at Auror training!”
“I… heard things.” He shrugged.

Two sets of eyes narrowed on the raven haired wizard.
“What things did you hear?” Hermione asked.
“From who?” Ginny asked at the same time.
Harry let loose a beleaguered sigh. “Some from Ron. The way he described the times you met up and went on about certain things.. It didn’t sound like you were happy.”
“Git.” Ginny grunted.
Harry grinned. “Some from Fred. He would talk about your troubleshooting sessions at Sunday night dinners. The way he spoke about you was so different from the way Ron did.” He shrugged, then looked at Ginny with the same look she was giving him. “And a lot from Ginny in her letters.”

Ginny at least had the decency to blush a little. “Ah. Yes. Well.”
Hermione shifted her glare to Ginny who waved a hand in her direction like she was waving smoke away.
“Who wrote what doesn’t really matter.”
Harry snorted.
“The point is that you’re both bonkers for each other and have been for a long time so you should definitely come to dinner.”
“I don’t know where you’re getting this ‘both bonkers for each other’ nonsense from!” Hermione exclaimed, throwing her hands up and falling back onto the cushions behind her on the ground. “Fred is lovely and wonderful and I enjoy spending time with him but that doesn’t mean I’m some besotted teenager!”
“Of course not.” Ginny soothed. “You’re a besotted twenty-something.”

Hermione groaned and covered her face with her hands.
“Granger,” Draco chimed back in after a moment of silence, “what’s the problem here? Are you attracted to Weasley?”
“I just -”
“Answer the question Granger, do you find him attractive?”
“Yes.” Hermione ground out begrudgingly
“Okay. So he’s single, you enjoy talking with him and being around him, you’ve got the hots for him, you’re single.. What’s the problem?”

Hermione sat staring at the ceiling contemplating the question. After a few moments she let out a frustrated noise and sat up to face her friends. “I don’t know! I can’t figure out why it’s a problem, it just doesn’t feel like it shouldn’t be a problem?” She shrugged half heartedly. “He’s Ron’s brother? I don’t know…”

For whatever reason Hermione found herself staring at her hands and unable to look back up at her friends. Something in her chest felt heavy.

The room was silent for a moment as Hermione heard some shuffling before she felt someone sit in front of her and pale hands rested on hers. She looked up to find Draco sitting in front of her with a gentle look on his face. “Hermione. You are worthy of being loved by a good man. And Fred is a good man.”
“But you don’t know…” Her voice came out thick and Hermione cut herself off to try and fight back the tears suddenly pricking at the backs of her eyes.
“I know he certainly somethings you.” Draco still knew what she had been about to say. “And you deserve to explore that if it’s something you want. But you shouldn’t push that aside because you feel like you aren’t worthy of being loved for any stupid reason.” He reached one hand out and rested it gently on top of her scar, covered by cream and sleeves.
Hermione stared back at Draco for a long moment. It was difficult to reconcile the boy that tormented her throughout her years in school with this gentle and happy man sitting before her and supporting her. She reached out and rested her hand on his left forearm as well. “You know that you are too right? Worthy.”

Draco dropped his gaze for a moment and nodded. Hermione had been having fun teasing and poking at Draco and Harry for clearly trying to hide a relationship, but she hadn’t really taken the time to wonder why they were hiding. She hated to think that Draco was possibly feeling like she did right now. She glanced over Draco’s head at Harry to find him staring at them with a misty look in his eyes and a somewhat sad smile on his face. She glanced over her shoulder at Ginny and Neville to find similar, if not quite as sappy, looks on their faces. It was nice to feel the support from her friends, even if they didn’t know the whole story that Draco did. And she was going to make sure that Draco and Harry knew they had the same support.