All the Right Moves

Hermione was sitting up in bed when they walked in. She was staring at the wall as if she were trying to find something. She was staring so intensely that she didn’t hear them come in.

Draco cleared his throat and said, “Hermione, look who I brought to see you.”

The witch looked up at her husband with fear in her eyes, and said, “How could you bring anyone here. Why do they need to be here?”

Harry and Ron were feeling slightly uncomfortable, but Harry, knowing that Hermione was feeling insecure because she didn’t want them to know about what happened tried to appease her by saying, “Hey Hermione. We were just worried when we hadn’t seen you. We went to Draco and he told us that you had a bad accident in one of your classes the other day. You are looking much better.”

Hermione looked at them both with glassy eyes and said, “Yes thank you, I will be fine, but if you don’t mind, I’m feeling a bit tired. I think I will get some rest. Thank you all for stopping by, I was starting to wonder when you would hear about my carelessness in Ancient Runes.” And then she let out a forced laugh.

All three pretended to go along with it, as if everything was fine, although Harry locked eyes with Draco, and they both seemed to say what they both feared, that things were definitely bad with Hermione. Ron and Harry said their goodbyes, and Draco decided to stay with his wife.

Hermione didn’t know why Draco wanted to be around her. She was disgusted with herself for what had happened. She didn’t even know if he knew the fullest extent of what had happened, but she feared if he did, he would never be able to look at her the same way again. She pretended to fall asleep thinking that Draco would leave the room but he didn’t. He stayed in a chair beside her and held her hand. She wanted to so badly to remove her hand from his, but she didn’t want to answer any questions that may arise from it.

After sitting in silence for about an hour, Draco leaned over the bed, and whispered by her ear, “Hermione I know you are awake. I know what happened, and I love you. What happened was not your fault, and I will take care of it. I know you need time to heal, and I will give you all the time and space that you need, but know this, I love you just as much today as the day that I married you, and that will never change.”

Tears were streaming down her cheeks as she heard the comforting words of her husband. He continued, “Hermione, don’t give up now. That’s what they want from you. They know how strong you are, and they want you out of the fight. I need you to fight, fight for our child, fight for me, fight for Harry and Ron, fight for good in this world, but mostly fight for yourself. You are the strongest woman and witch that I know.”

Hermione sat back up at this. She had been sobbing freely, and she threw her arms around her husband. In between her sobs she said, “I’ll never give up. I love you so much Draco and I’m sorry.”

Draco was enraged by this. She was the victim, she was the one that was violated, and he had failed to protect her, and here she was, apologizing to him. Draco put his finger under her chin so that she could look directly at him and said, “Hermione you can be many things right now, but please, please don’t ever be sorry. Nothing and I mean nothing about this is your fault.”

Draco just held her like that until she cried herself to sleep. Draco made a vow to himself that no matter what it took, even his own life that he would make each and every one of those men pay for what they did to her. Whether they meant to or not, they had poked the eye of a sleeping dragon, and that would prove to be their undoing.