Holding Hands
It’s amazing, really, the countless, thoughtless, ways in which they use their hands.
How, when waking up, Hermione slaps her alarm without looking, making precise contact as if following a tether to the source. The way she wrangles her curls into a thick braid, one that will fall out over the course of the next couple of hours and have to be redone, then done again. Each brush of her mascara and blush brush is delicate, when most everything in her life is not.
All of these actions she does without conscious thought about stretching open her palm, curling the fingers. Squeezing. Letting go. They’re second nature, like breathing and walking.
This, however, takes thought. Intention.
Holding Draco Malfoy’s hand when he offers it to her in broad daylight is meaningful. If she takes it, she’s as good as telling the world that there is a connection between them. Something more than colleagues who bicker over legislation, or friends of friends putting up with each others’ company at pub trivia.
She sees the flicker of uncertainty in his eyes at her prolonged consideration, but he doesn’t give up. The ripple along the jaw and slight tremble in his arm are all the further prompting she needs to take action.
Time seems to stretch as she reaches out. Her fingers tingle upon making contact, tentative, at first, then intertwining and hinging palm to palm like a door sliding shut to one future as another one rolls out beneath their feet.
The intentional step of which they’ll take together, at last.