Always On My Mind

Life in the Malfoy household had not been good lately. Hermione was now eight and a half months along and crabby as a kneazle in a bath. If Draco didn’t know that polyjuice potion couldn’t be used to depict pregnancy he would swear that Lavender Brown was wearing Hermione’s skin. She wouldn’t let him near her, she broke down into tears over the slightest perceived insult or anyone mentioning anything about a baby, and she had put an all out ban on having sex with him. Draco Malfoy was fairly certain that his wife hated him. What made him most certain of this fact was that every time he saw one of her friends or anyone she worked with, they all commented on how gracefully she handled pregnancy. Hermione either bottled up all her hormones for him or she just flat out hated him.


This was a complete turn around from her second trimester when she’d been so horny that Draco had been begging her for a chance to catch his breath. He’d loved having her that randy because it made him think that maybe their relationship could be repaired. Besides, he’d slowly been finding out that he was very, VERY attracted to Hermione, but especially when she was pregnant. Nothing was more beautiful or feminine looking than a pregnant woman. Hermione, especially, was gorgeous. The only weight she’d gained had been a little in her hips and breasts and the roundness of her belly. He wished she would gain a little more, and had gotten that wish around her seventh month, but every time he tried to compliment her, she only got angry. This meant that he was left with a permanent hard-on and a very bruised ego. Always before he could coax her into having sex with him with just a few touches. Now, she reacted as if his mere presence was disgusting to her.

Blaise Zabini told him that it was just her hormones, but he didn’t think so. He’d never been around a pregnant woman before, so he couldn’t know. He knew quite a few pregnant women at the moment and Hermione was definitely carrying herself with far more grace and dignity than any of the others. She also looked better. Her mother had invited him over for tea one afternoon and showed him pictures of herself when she’d been pregnant with Hermione and Chris, Hermione’s older brother. Apparently dealing well with pregnancy ran in Hermione’s family. Jane Granger was still very svelte and probably could have had five more children, like her sister, and remained that way. Draco hoped that Hermione was more inclined to have a large family rather than stop at two. She must have been if she’d been so happy about getting pregnant by Ron.

Thinking about Ron made Draco depressed. He couldn’t be angry at him, but he was very jealous of the dead man. One afternoon, while looking for his old baby toys, Draco stumbled across a box of Hermione’s that contained two pink baby jumpers, a pair of booties and a picture album. Knowing it wasn’t his place, he still opened the album and looked through the pictures he found. He found three sonograms of a lumpy looking baby at three different stages of growth. Wizarding sonograms were much more advanced than muggle, so the pictures could be taken much earlier and with more clarity. He currently had several of his baby on display in his office. Turning the pages, he found pictures of Hermione in varying stages of pregnancy. In one she was struggling to put on a pair of muggle jeans and shoving the photographer out of the way laughing and in another she was in her old apartment knitting the baby booties he had found in the box. There were some of her and Harry and Ginny Weasley-Potter at what he supposed was the Weasley house for some kind of celebration. Harry and Ginny teasingly pointed to the round bump on her belly, to which Hermione replied by laughing and then turning to the side, proudly showing off her stomach.

There were several more pictures, but the one that made his stomach lurch was the photograph of her and Ron. They were sitting on the overstuffed sofa he’d seen when he’d flooed her and in the picture, Ron pulled her to him, planting a kiss on her temple and she grinned from ear to ear, looking up at him adoringly. Suddenly, he realized that the reason Ron wasn’t in any of the other pictures was because he had been the one behind the camera.

They’d had an entire life built together that hadn’t involved Draco one bit. They’d picked out furniture together, gone to family celebrations and discussed baby names together. Looking at her stomach, he surmised that the picture must have been taken shortly before he’d seen her on May Day last year. When he thought back to what he’d been doing around that time, it had involved meaningless, unsatisfying shags with women whose names he couldn’t even remember. He didn’t even want to remember the people he’d spent his time with last year, much less have pictures of them in an album in his attic.

This was the reason she had never sought him out during the year and a half that they were apart. She hadn’t needed or wanted him. Why would she? He was shallow and superficial and he hung around with a bunch of snobs. She had moved on with her life and if Ron hadn’t died, then he would have been forced to watch the three of them in Diagon Alley, looking like the story book family they were. Looking at the expression on Hermione’s face, he got a lump in his throat because he hadn’t seen it on her in almost two years. She had been truly happy and he couldn’t begrudge her that.

Draco was currently sitting in his study with his head in his hands. Thinking about the pictures had brought him back to the fact that Hermione currently couldn’t stand the sound of his voice. Maybe it was hormones, but he couldn’t know because she hadn’t gotten far enough in her last pregnancy to be sure. The day he saw her five months pregnant with someone else’s baby had been a pivotal moment in his life, what if the day he walked out on her had been pivotal in hers? What if that had been the only thing she needed to prove to herself that he wasn’t worth her time or tears?

He’d been incredibly cold and flippant that day. He’d been quick and to the point, hoping to avoid a scene. She had gotten tears in her eyes, but hadn’t actually wept and at the time he’d been grateful, thinking he’d gotten off the hook. Now he wondered if it was because she’d been relieved that she hadn’t had to do the dumping. He’d sent a house elf over to do the packing for him and left with a promise to owl her in a week or two. It was a promise he hadn’t kept. In roughly half an hour, he dismantled a relationship that had taken five years to build. They’d seen each other a few times while out and after the first initially awkward meeting it seemed to Draco that things had gone back to the way they were before they had made a commitment. The first few times he’d gone out with other women had been momentarily exhilarating, but he always compared them to Hermione. In his mind he saw that period as inevitable and leading up to their final union. He envisioned the two of them moving into the manor, having children and Hermione continuing to dote on him as she had in the past.

Coming back to the present, Draco smiled wryly at the way all his careful planning had gone. Oh yes, they were married and yes, they were going to have children, but Hermione resented him and rightfully so. He’d selfishly let go of a relationship to satisfy his own curiosity and then when that didn’t go as planned, he’d tricked and bullied her into marrying him. She was right when she said that what he’d had for her wasn’t love. He’d cared about her, but mainly he’d been obsessed with her. He cared more about how she made him happy than actually making sure that she was happy as well. As it was, she was happy to be pregnant and for some foolish reason, she still gave a damn about him, but she was certainly not happy. She’d adored Ron because from day one he’d been concerned about her well-being, treating her as if she were glass. Draco had made certain that she was tied to him first. He wanted to go back to his 23 year old self and not break-up with her. He wanted to make her feel as beautiful as she looked while she was pregnant. Most of all, he wanted to see her happy. He had lots of money and infinite resources, he could do it. If it meant that she left him and Malfoy Manor, then he would make it happen.

Lost in his melancholy thoughts he didn’t hear the rapid footsteps outside his door until the handle pushed down and Hermione spilled into the room. He rushed over to her side and pulled her upright.

“What’s wrong? What’s happening? Are you okay?” He was panicked. Suddenly, Hermione let out a groan of pain and his feet and hers were surrounded by a clear fluid with a slight reddish tinge. Her water had broken.

“Draco, we have to get to St. Mungo’s! Now!” Hermione doubled over again in pain and this time Draco picked her up in his strong arms.

“Is something wrong with the baby?” he asked in confusion. What if she lost this baby too? What if something happened to her or his little boy?

“Nothing is wrong with the baby, Draco! It’s ready to be born.”

“WHAT?? It can’t come now you’re not due for another two weeks!”

“Well, he’s coming now, whether we’re ready or not!” Hermione could feel her contraction subsiding, but she knew that if they didn’t get to the hospital soon, she would give birth to their first child on the floor of Draco’s study.

Not wasting anymore time, Draco carried Hermione over to his fireplace, put floo powder into the flames and shouted quite clearly, “St. Mungo’s Hospital, Maternity ward!” Once he saw the green flames he disappeared into them, hoping with all his might that he didn’t fail Hermione when she was in labor.





A/N- Thank you, thank you, thank you, THANK YOU to everyone who has left a review!