Once upon a time, the prospect of baring his throat to Hermione Granger like this would have rankled; would have made him feel ill-at-ease in his own skin, like he’d handed her a knife ready to stab him with. But instead, he drops that confession in her lap and she reciprocates with one of her own, and he doesn’t hate how this feels.
Because she gets it. Of course she gets it.
At her suggestion, though, he cocks his head with absolute blank-faced nonrecognition. “Eye Key what? Is that a cocktail bar or something?”
It really was truly absurd how much the purebloods could get away with not knowing, in their insular little world. You would think that, even with living between the cracks of the Muggle world, they would’ve picked up enough bits and pieces to get by, and yet. It took real, concerted effort over sheer centuries’ worth of bigoted ancestors to leave Draco looking quite so lost at the reference.
She has this moment of clarity, imagining Draco Malfoy wandering through a muggle furniture store looking absolutely shocked by everything, and almost wants to laugh. Definitely wants to make it happen, as well.
"It's a store where you can get furniture, Draco. It is, however, muggle and you'd need to exchange some money into pounds if you're going to buy anything there, but it's being advertised as very handy for young people starting fresh in their own place."
She offers him a grin, and then unhelpfully adds: "Most of my stuff is from there. I'll show you when you - " And at this, she stops, for a moment feeling very exposed. Vulnerable, which she doesn't make a habit of feeling, but which feels fitting considering that she's sitting on his living room floor naked and wearing his shirt. She was going to invite him over to her place.
She was going to invite him over to her place, so they can do this again. So they can give this a try, whatever it is. Whatever it stands to be.
"If you wanted to come over, that is," she adds, in a murmur.
It’s careful, this thing — whatever this thing is — because there are so many bricks in this teetering tumbledown tower, which feels at risk of collapsing any moment if they push on it just the wrong way. The fact that she’d bled into the flagstones in the basement of his family manor. The way he had been awful to her, and she had thus been awful in retaliation. That volleying push-and-pull of their dynamic throughout school. His complicated relationship with her best friend. His family. Hers.
But Draco Malfoy wants very little to do with his family anymore, his mother aside.
So he looks at Hermione, and he sees that dip in the road which she just tripped over; quite similar to the one he’d suffered the evening before, with that sudden pique of anxiety hammering in his throat when he’d asked about disclosure forms. So this time it’s Draco’s turn to reach out, a hand absentmindedly brushing some of her hair out of her face and behind her ear (it has gotten really voluminous and out-of-hand in its morning tangles, it’s a wonder he didn’t suffocate in the night).
“I’m not done with you,” Draco says, echoing her earlier words. “So if you’d like to show off your flat and rub it in just how much better-appointed it is than mine, then by all means.”
Wry and arch, his voice dripping with what she’s learning is his usual fond yet slightly sarcastic humour, but it’s a way of papering over that brief blip, that temporary stutter in her voice.
It camouflages the momentary stumble just right, and opens the door for an opportunity to be smug right back at him which she really appreciates him giving her. There's something wildly beautiful about this moment alone.
She's sitting on the floor of his living room, nearly naked except for his shirt, with him still crouching (very athletic of him) by her side. There are faint marks of her kisses and her nails against his skin, and she knows that her hair must be a mess from all that she was writhing last night. They've not showered since before the party that brought this whole thing on, and there's a hole in the pit of her stomach that could be identified as hunger-for-breakfast.
But in observing this moment, and in Draco brushing her hair behind her ear, it's a different kind of hunger that awakens, sudden and undeniable. She doesn't give him much warning, and doesn't ask first if it'll be welcomed. Instead, she sets the book down gently and reaches up to brush his hair behind his ear too, curling her hand over the back of his neck and tugging him towards her.
"I liked the sound of that," she says, before kissing him.
Very athletic indeed. He was a genuinely good Quidditch player for a time, good at bracing himself against that broom for long hours. So his thighs aren’t half-bad, is the thing,
except that Draco finally wobbles when she pulls him closer and kisses him, losing his balance and that careful equilibrium, and he half-topples to the floorboards with her. But he kisses Hermione back, unhesitating; doesn’t give a shit that it’s morning and they haven’t brushed their teeth and it’s not picture-perfect. It had always been a little messy from the start, her mouth tasting like wine and shoved in a closet and accidentally knocking over cleaning supplies.
When he has to surface for air, he catches himself and readjusts so he’s sitting next to Hermione on the floor instead. It’s just nice to sit here. Unpretentious. There is a sofa on the other side of the room — oh, look, his coat’s still lying there from last night — but it seems horrifically far away, when he could stay here and kiss her again instead, his fingers curling into the fabric of his own shirt.
After a moment, a contented sigh, and: “You said something about breakfast across the street?”
She ends up laughing against his lips at that half-topple, and is tempted for a moment to push him down on the floor and sit in his lap again, but what if the books will mind? Better not traumatised his poor books, before they've had a chance to sit on bookshelves.
Then the first kiss becomes a second, and he's close and he looks soft and content, and she's got a flutter in her belly that's not from nerves.
"They serve breakfast until pretty late," she murmurs back, nudging her nose to his nose, and letting that suggestion hang between them. They don't have to rush to breakfast, if they'd rather do something else first. (Each other.) "So...yeah..."
Hermione dangles that invitation right in front of him, and Draco finds himself doing some mental gymnastics and calculations and wondering exactly how uncomfortable would it be to fuck on a hardwood floor without any padding, and is there a chance they’ll both get splinters, or should they get up and move to the sofa—
“Y’know, I haven’t actually broken in this room yet,” he muses aloud.
Is that dreadful and sleazy to point out? Maybe. Or not. Maybe it’s just refreshingly honest; there’s a cheeky half-grin on his face, just visible out of the corner of her vision, as close to his face as she is. And there’s a decision teetering in the moment, before he reaches out for her again, she lets herself tip into him, and then they’re just a tangle of limbs on the floor after all.
“Ah fuck,” he laughs as she lands more on him than not, and the floor is hard which is not quite as easy as the porno mags always made it seem, but: there’s still Hermione over him, and both of them failing to bite back laughter, and Draco dragging his shirt off her, his mouth against the bared skin of her shoulder, her hand already reaching between them. It’s quick work to get their few scraps of clothing off again, eager to get their hands on each other once more even in the bright light of day.
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no subject
Because she gets it. Of course she gets it.
At her suggestion, though, he cocks his head with absolute blank-faced nonrecognition. “Eye Key what? Is that a cocktail bar or something?”
It really was truly absurd how much the purebloods could get away with not knowing, in their insular little world. You would think that, even with living between the cracks of the Muggle world, they would’ve picked up enough bits and pieces to get by, and yet. It took real, concerted effort over sheer centuries’ worth of bigoted ancestors to leave Draco looking quite so lost at the reference.
no subject
"It's a store where you can get furniture, Draco. It is, however, muggle and you'd need to exchange some money into pounds if you're going to buy anything there, but it's being advertised as very handy for young people starting fresh in their own place."
She offers him a grin, and then unhelpfully adds: "Most of my stuff is from there. I'll show you when you - " And at this, she stops, for a moment feeling very exposed. Vulnerable, which she doesn't make a habit of feeling, but which feels fitting considering that she's sitting on his living room floor naked and wearing his shirt. She was going to invite him over to her place.
She was going to invite him over to her place, so they can do this again. So they can give this a try, whatever it is. Whatever it stands to be.
"If you wanted to come over, that is," she adds, in a murmur.
no subject
But Draco Malfoy wants very little to do with his family anymore, his mother aside.
So he looks at Hermione, and he sees that dip in the road which she just tripped over; quite similar to the one he’d suffered the evening before, with that sudden pique of anxiety hammering in his throat when he’d asked about disclosure forms. So this time it’s Draco’s turn to reach out, a hand absentmindedly brushing some of her hair out of her face and behind her ear (it has gotten really voluminous and out-of-hand in its morning tangles, it’s a wonder he didn’t suffocate in the night).
“I’m not done with you,” Draco says, echoing her earlier words. “So if you’d like to show off your flat and rub it in just how much better-appointed it is than mine, then by all means.”
Wry and arch, his voice dripping with what she’s learning is his usual fond yet slightly sarcastic humour, but it’s a way of papering over that brief blip, that temporary stutter in her voice.
no subject
She's sitting on the floor of his living room, nearly naked except for his shirt, with him still crouching (very athletic of him) by her side. There are faint marks of her kisses and her nails against his skin, and she knows that her hair must be a mess from all that she was writhing last night. They've not showered since before the party that brought this whole thing on, and there's a hole in the pit of her stomach that could be identified as hunger-for-breakfast.
But in observing this moment, and in Draco brushing her hair behind her ear, it's a different kind of hunger that awakens, sudden and undeniable. She doesn't give him much warning, and doesn't ask first if it'll be welcomed. Instead, she sets the book down gently and reaches up to brush his hair behind his ear too, curling her hand over the back of his neck and tugging him towards her.
"I liked the sound of that," she says, before kissing him.
no subject
except that Draco finally wobbles when she pulls him closer and kisses him, losing his balance and that careful equilibrium, and he half-topples to the floorboards with her. But he kisses Hermione back, unhesitating; doesn’t give a shit that it’s morning and they haven’t brushed their teeth and it’s not picture-perfect. It had always been a little messy from the start, her mouth tasting like wine and shoved in a closet and accidentally knocking over cleaning supplies.
When he has to surface for air, he catches himself and readjusts so he’s sitting next to Hermione on the floor instead. It’s just nice to sit here. Unpretentious. There is a sofa on the other side of the room — oh, look, his coat’s still lying there from last night — but it seems horrifically far away, when he could stay here and kiss her again instead, his fingers curling into the fabric of his own shirt.
After a moment, a contented sigh, and: “You said something about breakfast across the street?”
no subject
Then the first kiss becomes a second, and he's close and he looks soft and content, and she's got a flutter in her belly that's not from nerves.
"They serve breakfast until pretty late," she murmurs back, nudging her nose to his nose, and letting that suggestion hang between them. They don't have to rush to breakfast, if they'd rather do something else first. (Each other.) "So...yeah..."
no subject
“Y’know, I haven’t actually broken in this room yet,” he muses aloud.
Is that dreadful and sleazy to point out? Maybe. Or not. Maybe it’s just refreshingly honest; there’s a cheeky half-grin on his face, just visible out of the corner of her vision, as close to his face as she is. And there’s a decision teetering in the moment, before he reaches out for her again, she lets herself tip into him, and then they’re just a tangle of limbs on the floor after all.
“Ah fuck,” he laughs as she lands more on him than not, and the floor is hard which is not quite as easy as the porno mags always made it seem, but: there’s still Hermione over him, and both of them failing to bite back laughter, and Draco dragging his shirt off her, his mouth against the bared skin of her shoulder, her hand already reaching between them. It’s quick work to get their few scraps of clothing off again, eager to get their hands on each other once more even in the bright light of day.
She’s right; breakfast can wait.