Fleur is an excellent listener.
She tracks a conversation even through people’s blundering attempts to ask her out or garbled words as she looks at them.
She should be able to count pathetic attempts to ask her out as another language.
She always knows what Gabrielle is up to. She knows where she is, who she’s talking to, what schemes she gets up to.
She was always the top of her class. She never misses a class, she always has notes, she always knows her classmates’ opinions.
She remembers everything from war meetings.
She knows all the enemy’s habits and ticks.
It is—however—possible she misheard Gabrielle.
“How’s the truce going?” Gabrielle asks while collecting rocks and stones. Fleur does not ask why she needs a rock the size of her fist.
“What truce?” Fleur asks—confused. Mist is rolling over the lake. Fleur loves the chill in the morning.
“With Hermione?”
“I seduced her.” Fleur answers still slightly confused. Gabrielle’s suggestion was clear. Fleur followed it to the t.
She thoroughly followed the instructions.
Several times.
“What?” Gabrielle pales and stones drop from her fingers. She opens her mouth and closes it several times.
Oh. Oh, heavens.
"Wait, did you not say 'You should seduce her'?"
"No, I said 'You should make a truce with her.'"
"Merde."
“How does ‘make a truce’ become seduce? There’s extra words, Fleur!”
“I mean, considering my success I don’t believe a truce would be too difficult.” Fleur gloats.
Gabrielle puts her hands over her ears. “Ew!”
“Don’t ew at me! You were the one who recommended merging the gap between the Department of Magical Creatures and actual Magical Creatures.”
Gabrielle is honestly being disrespectful. Fleur was wildly successful. Fleur hasn’t even been back to her flat in weeks. Hermione and her practically live together.
They’re fully in love. Who needs a truce when marriage is on the horizon?
Gabrielle covers her mouth with horror. “I meant take actionable steps to repair the damage the ministry has done to magical creatures across the globe—not have sex with their poster child!”
Fleur crosses her arms. “It’s possible that something got lost in translation. However, that gap is very bridged. There have been a lot of reparations.”
Gabrielle throws a rock at Fleur and she dodges it. “This isn’t funny! This is serious.”
Fleur lets Gabrielle scream and rant and eventually stare at her with unimpressed horror. “Years you date worthless people and never actually like them. I’ve dealt with at least seven criminally boring people because at least they could string along a sentence. Then you accidentally fall in love with the girl you seduce by mistake!”
“I never said I was in love.”
“You don’t have to, Fleur! This is disheartening. You’re the smartest person I know. How?”
Fleur grins. “Hermione is smarter than me.”
Gabrielle groans. “Where’s your self respect?”
Long gone.
Taken by a bookworm with a penchant for swearing in the early mornings.
Fleur finds Hermione at her desk with her hair going twelve different ways.
“Hello, mon amour.”
Hermione closes her report and leans back. She takes off her glasses and rubs her eyes. Her nose has indents from the glasses. There’s a mug of cold tea so Fleur picks it up and kisses Hermione.
Fleur dumps out the tea and starts making her a new cup. “How was Gabrielle?”
“She screamed my head off.” Fleur laughs and Hermione smiles fondly.
“Good visit then? What was she upset about this time?”
“Very good. She yelled so much that she choked at one point and still kept trying to lecture me. I was apparently supposed to make truce with you.”
Hermione raises an eyebrow. “What does that even mean? She does know we’re dating right?”
Fleur—realizing the hornet’s nest she just put her foot through—decides to distract Hermione.
She sets the cup of tea down on the coaster and sits in Hermione’s lap. “There’s a ball coming up.”
Hermione nods. “It’s a charity ball, right?”
“For werewolf rights, I believe.”
Hermione’s eyes crinkle with her smile. “You do know that I know that you organized it, right?”
Fleur shakes her head, feigning ignorance. “I don’t know what you mean. It was a mysterious benefactor.”
“It’s anonymous, not mysterious. There’s no mystery. You’re completely unsubtle?”
“Anonymous? Mysterious? Silly English. It confuses me.”
Hermione laughs and shakes her head. “Yet you have no issue with benefactor?”
“Do you want to go to the ball with me? We can dress up. Dance. Donate money to a good cause. Make the racists uncomfortable. Maybe a pure-blood will faint.”
A look of yearning overcomes Hermione. “Do you think they’ll hit their head?”
“Oui, that can be arranged.” Fleur promises.
Hermione stands up and lifts Fleur with her. Fleur makes a delighted sound and tightens her legs around Hermione. “You will not give someone brain damage to impress me.”
Fleur pouts. “I can pretend to forget.”
Hermione looks considerate for a moment before laying Fleur on the bed. “No, they’d probably use it for their own rhetoric. ‘Veela gives a Malfoy brain damage’ just does not sound like a good headline.”
“I’d say it sounds like the best kind of headline. I hate to interrupt what is sure to be a great time for me but we have dinner plans.”
Hermione’s brows pinch. “No we don’t.”
Fleur shakes her head. “Dinner with Harry and Ron.”
Hermione groans and collapses face first onto the bed next to Fleur. She keeps groaning and mumbling but it’s smothered by the comforter. Fleur pats her back. “There, there. You’re so brave. You’re so strong.”
Hermione grabs a pillow and smacks Fleur with it. Fleur openly laughs at Hermione.
“I haven’t showered! My hair is a mess! I just wanted to make out with you and then promptly pass out.”
Fleur scrunches her nose. “I thought I smelled something.”
Hermione glares at her. “Fleur.”
Fleur grins and kisses Hermione. “I can tell them we’re busy. Or sick. Or that I simply don’t want to.”
Hermione closes her eyes—debating. “Is it bad if I say yes? I love them but I just want a calm night.”
Fleur shakes her head. “I’ll call them.”
They understand and make vague plans to try again next week. Hermione has fully curled up on the couch with a book by the time Fleur returns.
“What’d you tell them?”
“I couldn’t stand to look at their faces.”
Hermione snorts. “You did, didn’t you?”
“I think they got the message.” Fleur sits on the couch and sets Hermione’s feet on her lap.
It’s easy with Hermione.
Gabrielle wasn’t lying earlier. Fleur has…not had good luck with relationships.
She generally does not like people.
She doesn’t feel the need to pretend she does. They’re stupid and disgusting. They put hardly any effort into things that matter.
She fought and struggled for her prestige at school. She wasn’t given anything. She studied and practiced until her wand and mind were in sync. She learned curses inside and out until she could break them.
She was the one nominated for the tri-wizard tournament—her.
She cares. She has an abundance of care.
She supports the people in her life. She would do anything for them. There’s just not many of them.
People call her heartless and bitch because she will not waste her energy on someone that does not matter.
They won’t put in energy or effort so why should she? If they can’t bother picking their jaw off the floor, why should she bother treating them with any respect?
To be a better person? No.
That’s what they say when they think she’s being unfair. Those are their words—their weapon. It’s how they keep getting away with treating people terrible.
Shut up. Take it. Don’t be dragged to their level.
She will not only be dragged to their level but she will drag them to hell.
She will invent new depths of rudeness.
She is tired of having to take the high road, tired of having to swallow people blatant insults and leering gazes.
She can’t walk down a street without someone making a crass comment. People never think twice about making her uncomfortable.
Yet she still has to bat her eyes? She still has to laugh at offensive or stupid jokes?
She dealt with Molly Weasley tearing her apart for over a year before she broke up with Bill. That was her final straw.
“You broke my son’s heart, just like I always knew you would.” Molly’s face is red and her mouth is quivering with rage.
Fleur holds her door half open. She props her foot against the door so the assembled Weasleys can’t burst in. Ginny’s arms are crossed and Bill looks so physically uncomfortable. “This isn’t necessary. Please, let’s leave.” Bill tries again.
Fleur closes her eyes and counts to five. If she gets to five and she still wants to destroy this woman, she will. She gets to five and exhales. “I broke up with him because of you. Not one time went by without you insulting me. What did I do? Tell me. Or was it all just because I’m a veela. Was it because I am beautiful? Is it because I have the audacity to believe that? You were horrible. I am tired of being people’s punching bag. I am tired of dating people who won’t stand up for me.” She shuts the door in their stunned faces.
So no, she isn’t nice. Not anymore. Not ever.
She believes in effort. She believes that people need to match effort. If someone tries then she will to.
It’s not many times she is given the same consideration.
Is that what first drew her to Hermione?
Hermione who treated her like so many before. Disdain, judgement, superiority.
Then she changed.
She came up to Fleur at a cafe of all places. Hermione was nervous and blushing and stuttering over her words but for an entirely different reason than Fleur was used to.
She apologized. It was a length ramble of an apology but it made the apology better.
Fleur met her halfway. She bought Hermione a coffee to which Hermione winced and dutifully drank.
Hermione was on her mind for weeks after.
She saw her at the ministry next. She was wearing a blue scarf and Fleur couldn’t look away from. It looked soft.
Hermione was passionately arguing with a woman in pink despite her soft appearance.
Appearances are very deceiving.
She made sure to get Hermione’s phone number after
that.
Gabrielle might have mentioned the seduction-truce but Fleur was already enamored with Hermione.
She wanted to know more and get closer. She took the oppurtunity when it arose.
“You know one of things I appreciate most about you?” Fleur asks. Hermione looks up from her book. She marks the page with her finger and gives Fleur her full attention. “You make me feel more than just beautiful.”
That’s all she is to people.
Hermione can call her beautiful, can get stunned into a stupor, can pin her against a wall because she forwent a shirt—but she never makes Fleur feel like that’s all she is. She is beautiful. Hermione makes sure that’s clear every moment of every day.
She doesn’t get stuck on it. She doesn’t get mean or jealous about it. She just says it like it’s the truth and then rolls her eyes at a story about Gabrielle.
She calls Fleur a liar—as if Gabrielle isn’t capable of theft—and teases her instead of gaping.
Hermione never lets anyone talk about Fleur—not to her face or behind her back.
She can whisper devotions into Fleur’s skin whether she’s dressed up or in a three day old shirt.
She never expects anything. She doesn’t expect Fleur to put on a show or do what Hermione wants. She never makes Fleur uncomfortable.
It seems like that should be easy—a low bar—but people don’t even notice how often they make her uncomfortable.
They feel entitled to her. She’s beautiful so they have a right to stare and talk about her—they have a right to touch.
They want to see her veela features. They think they can touch her—a person—as if she’s on display at a petting zoo.
She is tired of feeling like a display item everywhere she goes.
She doesn’t even have to tell Hermione this—although she has attempted before getting too emotional—Hermione just understands.
Hermione never asks her to be nicer or smile more as previous partners have. She backs Fleur up—no matter how rude Fleur is.
Even if she doesn’t know what it’s about.
A photographer wouldn’t stop taking her picture. He kept getting too close and grew more and more aggressive so Fleur verbally eviserated him. Hermione came up and when the photographer looked to her for help, she just shrugged. “Don’t look at me, I’m not going to help you. Maybe you should try to find meaning to your life instead of a moment of someone else’s.”
Hermione sets her book down. “You know what I appreciate about you?” Fleur hums inquisitively. “You tell my friends they have a stupid face so I can read poetry without any pants on.”
Fleur feels pretty great about that. If her being rude gets Hermione the night she wants, then it’s all the more reason to be.
She can explain the whole seduction-truce thing another night.