A/N: Please leave a review, comment your thoughts, and support the story with your Power Stones.
*********
"You've read that novel, haven't you?" Draco leaned closer to the girl on the sofa, studying her expression with suspicion.
"What novel?" Hermione's face remained composed, but she tried to conceal her unease by hiding the cherry stem in her palm and tucking her hand behind her back.
A bright smile broke across the boy's usually composed face.
He studied her rapidly fluttering, anxious eyelashes, a playful glint in his eyes. "Our Miss Hermione Granger seems unusually nervous around cherries..."
It was Hogsmeade Open Day, the twentieth of May, and they were in the attic at the very top of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes.
This long-dormant secret hideaway had finally come to life in the warm spring, welcoming its first visitor.
To properly receive his young master's guest, the diligent Dobby had not only scrubbed the place until it gleamed, but had also made a trip to the market near Hogsmeade to buy a batch of seasonal fruits and flowers.
Cherries — a fruit of early May — had unsurprisingly appeared on the mahogany double-tiered coffee table with its brass-framed glass in the sitting room.
"And —" Draco drawled, catching her tightly clenched hand from behind her back and slowly, deliberately sliding his fingers down her wrist toward her palm. He didn't stop until the tickling made her weak and she loosened her grip just enough to reveal a flash of green between her fingers. "I found the evidence."
He cunningly hooked the slender cherry stem from her palm. In doing so, he caught her off guard, and Hermione immediately slumped back against the sofa, looking as flustered as a rabbit caught in a snare.
"I — I was just a little curious —" Hermione said awkwardly, watching him dangle the cherry stem before her with casual amusement. His smug expression, as he looked her over, was thoroughly irritating.
"Cherry stems everywhere," Hermione lamented inwardly.
Once you noticed the phrase "cherry stem," you found that there were always a few girls chattering about it nearby.
That very morning, for instance, as she passed through the Gryffindor common room, Angelina Johnson had been perched on a sofa in the corner, speaking in a knowing tone: "The stem has to be long enough, otherwise it's nearly impossible to tie a knot. Firmness matters too..."
Her confidence suggested she had already succeeded. The girls gathered around her, listening intently and hanging on her every word.
"That makes sense." Katie Bell had even produced a quill and parchment and begun scribbling notes. "Angelina, could you elaborate a bit more...?"
"Hermione! Let's go listen!" Ginny had dashed over, eyes shining.
"No, I have to go," Hermione had said. "You go ahead."
She doubted the claim that "cherry stems can be tied in knots with the tongue" — surely that was only something out of a novel?
Who would actually do such a thing in real life?
She had shaken her head and stepped out through the portrait of the Fat Lady, trying to banish these ridiculous thoughts, when she suddenly spotted the handsome young man not far away. He was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed and his expression perfectly indifferent, using his iciest look to drive away the curious Gryffindors eyeing him.
"Draco!" She had strode forward. The boy turned, and the moment he saw her, his face relaxed into a lazy, warm smile.
At that moment, Hermione had found the idea of the cherry stem suddenly rather interesting.
Draco — his tongue was quite nimble. He might be able to do it.
Working backward from the novel's dubious logic — that people who could tie cherry stems in knots were good at kissing — he probably could, she had thought. By the standards of that book, some of his kisses went well beyond "basic" and landed somewhere between "advanced" and "exceptional."
From the entrance of the Gryffindor common room to the attic of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, she had been led along in a pleasant haze by Draco, giving half-hearted replies to his conversation while her mind wandered back to the nonsense in that novel.
Even once they were settled on the sofa, she was still distracted. Faced with the bright red cherries in the crystal goblet, instead of tasting them, she had begun unconsciously comparing the lengths of the stems — and had carelessly given him the very opening he needed.
"Curious?" the boy in front of her asked, drawing out the word, a glint of cunning in his eyes.
His voice was so distinctive that Hermione could always pick it out from a crowd. It was languid yet clear, as refreshing as a mint sweet popped into the mouth upon waking — it sharpened her mind, soothed her ears, and pulled her back from her inner world to the reality of the sofa and the attic, drawing her attention straight to his lips.
The lips of a boy his age were soft, faintly pink, and beautifully shaped.
"I — I'm approaching this from a purely academic standpoint," Hermione said, her face warm, darting a quick glance at his lips. "I'm simply curious whether it's genuinely possible. I wonder how many people at Hogwarts can manage it."
At least, the author of that novel probably could. And perhaps Angelina — radiating confidence in the common room this morning — could as well.
Could the boy currently giving her that lazy smile do it? Her thoughts kept drifting toward the possibility, and she found herself struggling to pull them back.
He was far too distracting.
Draco's expression shifted.
He said nothing. He placed the cherry stem back in her palm, then casually picked up a fresh cherry and tasted it.
Hermione watched as he leisurely put the cherry in his mouth and bit down; within moments, his tongue and teeth had neatly worked the stone free and deposited it onto the small white bone-china dish for pips and peel.
Hermione's train of thought ground to a halt.
She was quite certain the cherry had been perfectly ripe. Its juice had stained his lips a deep crimson, making his pale face appear even more striking. She couldn't decide which was more captivating — his face or his lips.
Yet the captivating young man remained entirely composed, seemingly oblivious to her stare. Draco idly examined another cherry, plucked off the stem, placed it in her palm, and said in the most ordinary of tones, "You could try it yourself — if you're that curious."
"No, I am not going to try!" Hermione said, her voice rising.
Her face wore an expression of firm refusal — accompanied by a guilty little smile and a slightly wavering tone.
At that moment, her thoughts were absolutely crystal clear. Draco smiled.
He began to tease her, plucking more cherry stems and handing them over one by one, his smile growing increasingly knowing and amused. "Isn't this academic research? Since it seems half of Hogwarts is 'studying' this, you needn't feel embarrassed."
"But it's just not my sort of thing — wouldn't it be rather silly?" she said.
"What should Hermione Granger's sort of thing look like?" he asked softly, watching her fidget with the cherry stem. "Only serious academic topics — nothing else allowed, whether amusing, trivial, or silly? Who decides what your style ought to be?"
"Everyone thinks I'm a bookworm. They say I don't know how to have fun." Hermione stared at the cherry stems. "And they aren't wrong. Over time, I think I've started to believe it myself — that I have to be different from everyone else."
She spoke tentatively, with a faint, unnoticed confusion in her voice. "Compared to books, everything else must be rather dull —"
Draco stared at her, and then something clicked.
Hermione was wound far too tightly. She wouldn't allow herself to be distracted in class, nor would she let her thoughts wander. She even dismissed entertainment that most people took for granted — not necessarily because she wasn't interested, but because she had decided it wasn't something Hermione Granger should be bothered with.
Draco knew this state of "self-denial" all too well. For four years, he had lived exactly like it — sharpened and on edge, driven forward by the looming shadow of the Dark Lord's return. No one understood better than him how gruelling that kind of existence was, and he had never enjoyed it.
But Hermione shouldn't have to live that way.
She had no reason to.
Didn't she tire of the weight she placed on herself?
"Why do you confine yourself to boxes others have built for you? Who says you can't enjoy a bit of fun alongside your studies? Does being seen as 'intelligent' and 'rational' mean you forfeit the right to be occasionally silly?" Draco pressed his lips together, leaned back against the sofa, and sighed. "Hermione Granger, I've noticed you carry quite a heavy burden. Aren't you tired? You should let your guard down sometimes and allow yourself a little fun."
"Those words carry no weight coming from a boy who's always putting on a cold, stern face," Hermione retorted. "Aren't you the same? You're cold to nearly everyone, always saying something sharp to unsettle people. Who would ever imagine you're such a reasonable and easy-going person in private?"
"Is that a compliment or an insult?" he asked, suspicious.
"A compliment, obviously. But I've recently identified a serious problem." Hermione said thoughtfully. "Given how deeply your icy reputation has been seared into people's minds — at least in Gryffindor — very few students would consider you an ideal boyfriend. They sometimes look at me with pity, assuming you'd be temperamental, sharp-tongued, and prone to storming off. Only I know what a gentle, considerate, and occasionally ridiculous boyfriend you actually are."
"Not surprising," Draco said nonchalantly. "I can't make everyone like me — I'm not Harry. I don't care what they think, as long as they don't bother me."
"I don't think that's entirely true." Hermione's gaze didn't linger on his nonchalant expression; instead, it settled on his evasive eyes. "I think you care about what others think far more than you let on."
"What gives you that impression?" he said lazily. "When did I give you such a mistaken idea — do you have any evidence?"
"Not yet. But I'll find it." Hermione considered for a moment, then pressed on. "Draco, don't you think you should try to change the misconceptions people have of you? The impressions you've left over the years have been rather terrible."
"Don't take the exceptions I make for you as the standard," the boy said quickly, a faint flush on his cheeks. "Do you think I can be this relaxed and open with just anyone?"
"I'll say the same to you," she glared at him. "Nor can I! I simply can't fully let go of my pride!"
"All right, it seems neither of us can entirely abandon our image." Draco raised his hands in surrender. "But at least you can drop the pretence in front of me, can't you? There's no shame in admitting to me that you're interested in this sort of thing."
Hermione looked at him, turning the cherry stem over in her hand, and had nothing left to say in rebuttal.
It seemed only he could see the playful, scattered energy hidden beneath her bookish exterior; and only he was willing to patiently draw out the fun-loving side of her that she kept so carefully tucked away.
Draco smiled slightly when he saw she was speechless.
He picked up a few letters from the table — from some Muggle estate agents and stockbrokers — and flipped through them idly, his tone easing. "Hermione Granger, you can do whatever you like in front of me. If you're shy —" he waved the letters in his hand with dramatic flair, "— I can look away. I do have a little work to get through. I can't keep staring at you regardless."
"I don't believe you. You'll end up spying on me anyway," she said sulkily. "You always spy on me."
"Even if I do happen to glance over, I won't laugh at you," he said with a smirk.
"But if it doesn't work, I'll be embarrassed —" Hermione stared at the slender green stem in her hand, hesitating.
"If it doesn't work, it doesn't work. Nobody's giving you an 'O' for a perfect knot, and nobody's giving you a 'T' for failing. This is play, not an exam." His warm grey eyes watched her from above the edge of the letters, his voice carrying the faintest hint of mischief. "While I admire your competitive spirit, I must remind you that this isn't a competition — it's simply an idle afternoon, and a bit of fun with your tongue."
Hermione was persuaded by the crafty boy. She was already genuinely curious about the whole business, and his lips — right there, impossibly distracting — were making it very difficult to think clearly.
She desperately needed something to occupy herself before she did anything inadvisable. She carefully selected the longest cherry stem — strictly following Angelina's advice — and put it in her mouth, wrestling with it earnestly.
This turned out to be considerably harder than she'd expected. The stem was stubborn and difficult to manoeuvre, and despite repeated attempts she couldn't make it cooperate. After much effort, she emerged defeated and slightly breathless, sitting perfectly still and somehow winded.
About five minutes later, Hermione became aware of Draco watching her with a barely suppressed smile.
Her lips, which had been working so vigorously, stilled, and she mumbled a complaint. "It's too hard... my tongue is cramping... and it tastes like plant sap — bitter and astringent all at once..."
Draco concealed the suspicious twitch at the corner of his mouth and raised an eyebrow at the dejected girl beside him. "Well — at least it proves your stamina. Five full minutes."
Hermione refused to look at him. She was glaring at the plate of cherries.
They gazed back at her with innocent, cheerful faces, entirely unaware of the ordeal their stems had caused.
In that instant, she felt thoroughly embarrassed.
She couldn't even look Draco in the eye — he was definitely mocking her. How had she been so easily talked into doing something so ridiculous in front of him?
Furious with herself, she leaned forward to spit the wretched cherry stem into the white porcelain dish — absolutely determined to never speak of it again — when he intercepted it.
"Let me try," Draco said softly. He stroked the back of her neck and kissed her surprised lips.
He didn't rush to find the cherry stem. He tilted his head and kissed her gently, tentatively, as though soothing her — coaxing the irritation out of her, dousing the flames of her frustration.
Hermione opened her eyes wide and found that his pale eyes were watching her too: a gentle, focused, crystalline grey. Her anger dissolved entirely in the shimmer of his gaze.
She realised with a flush that her sulking had been rather childish, and that he clearly hadn't been mocking her at all. She exhaled, her eyes drifting half-closed, her lips parting slightly.
He must have noticed her relax — and he began to deepen the kiss. Before long, Hermione was entirely undone by those soft lips, faintly stained with cherry. Bewitched, more than anything.
He was bewitching her, making her involuntarily taste the cherry on his lips, savouring their sweet-and-sour tang — which neutralised the unpleasant bitterness in her mouth perfectly.
"I can't blame her for taking the initiative," Hermione thought dimly, between breaths.
The taste of cherries — their soft, moist sweetness — was intoxicating enough to make any girl greedy.
Draco hadn't anticipated her bold response. He thought, with delight and surprise, that all those evenings secretly practising in his dormitory had finally paid off.
He savoured her. The faint bitterness lingering from the cherry stem told him exactly what she had been enduring, and he made up his mind to find the stem as quickly as possible and end her suffering.
For Hermione, the searching kiss swept gently through her senses. Her teeth, tongue, and the roof of her mouth were all touched with cherry, sweet and sour and tingling at once.
The combined impact of taste and sensation was dizzying — the kind that could make a heart stop, or beat more violently with every breath.
Her world spun. The tension in her mind finally let go, loosening like a bowstring going slack, swaying gently in the warm breeze he created.
The cherry stems eventually escaped her clenched palms and scattered across the sofa and the floor. Her hands had found the back of his shirt instead, gripping it and surrendering entirely, hoping only that her soul wouldn't vanish entirely with his warm breath.
As for the most troublesome cherry stem — Draco eventually found it at the back of his tongue.
He removed the culprit that had caused all the bitterness, sparing her further torment. Then, with great reluctance, he reined in his desire to keep kissing her — he needed to do one thing first.
The kiss ended just as Hermione was finally settling into it.
The boy released her, rested his elbow on the back of the sofa beside her head, and looked down at her with perfect composure.
She leaned blankly against the cushions, turned her head, and opened her eyes to find him watching her. Her expression was dazed; her eyes were bright and glassy.
How was he still so composed? She felt dizzy; his ears were only slightly pink. Hermione stared at his barely-moving lips, trying to work out what he was doing.
A moment later, he presented the cherry stem in the white porcelain dish, tied neatly into a small, perfect knot.
A cherry stem knot. So that's what it looks like.
He actually knew how to do it.
"Incredible," Hermione said softly, with a note of genuine envy.
The corners of Draco's mouth curved upward, a flicker of smugness on his face. "You deserve half the credit — you softened it first."
His explanation of the technique was so suspicious that she suddenly realised: "You — you've practised this before?"
"I told you, everyone at Hogwarts is 'studying' this — and I'm no exception," Draco said, his voice tinged with amusement.
He would never tell her that he'd been secretly practising alone in his dormitory for several days.
Draco could admit, at least to himself, that he'd had an ulterior motive from the very beginning.
Ever since he'd mentioned the novel to her, he'd been quietly hoping things would lead to exactly this.
He'd desperately wanted to show her — but he hadn't known whether she'd find it tiresome. Hermione Granger was sometimes too serious, too reserved, too easily flustered.
She occasionally appeared almost allergic to romance, sometimes growing genuinely cross at his lightest teasing. The only solution, then, was to get her curious enough to come to it herself.
For Draco Malfoy, once you found the right approach, drawing Hermione Granger in was the simplest thing in the world.
She was a curious cat. Leave a little dried fish along her usual path and she'd creep forward, nose twitching. Sometimes the dried fish was the name of a book. Sometimes it was a handful of cherry stems.
"Wait — I had no idea you'd read that sort of novel —" Hermione said, disbelieving.
A steamy romance novel seemed entirely at odds with the cool, aloof Draco Malfoy she knew. She'd assumed he had only heard of the book in passing, without knowing its contents.
"That's the book that infuriated Blaise and Pansy so thoroughly — of course I had to read it for myself. How else was I supposed to tease them properly?" Draco grinned. "The author has quite the imagination."
Hermione sighed quietly to herself.
No. Draco Malfoy's imagination is considerably richer than that author's.
Those kisses... every single one of them had been extraordinary. He seemed genuinely gifted at it. To be perfectly honest, he was almost unsettlingly skilled...
"Shall we do another cherry stem?" he said slowly, raising an eyebrow.
"No — absolutely not!" Hermione stuttered, her expression returning to one of dignified composure, even as her mind was still very much replaying recent events.
"A cherry, then?" He held up the crystal goblet, a wicked smile on his face. "For you?"
"All right." She tried to focus intently on the cherries, wondering whether her face or the fruit was redder.
"Shall I help?" he asked, watching her profile.
"How would you help?" the girl asked, puzzled.
He gave her a slow smile.
An ant crept silently beneath the sofa, navigating an attic thick with unspoken warmth. It skirted several stacked letters, made a careful circuit around the cherry stems scattered across the floor, and arrived, inevitably, at disappointment.
Its antennae informed it that these thin green stems were quite beneath its notice.
"I don't feel like you're helping me... I feel like you're tempting me..." came a shy complaint from the sofa.
"And do you think I've succeeded?" He smiled softly.
"I suppose so —" Her words trailed off.
The ant shook its head and wandered in place, utterly unbothered by the renewed sounds from the sofa — the quiet catch of breath, the warmth that seemed to seep through the wooden floor.
It turned and crawled purposefully down through the gaps in the attic floorboards, traversed three perpendicular walls, and wove through a winding seam in the planks until it reached the ceiling of the bustling Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes sales floor below, where it noted the lively difference between the silence above and the noise below.
The ant followed the pleasant smell of food, crawling along the ceiling toward the towering, crowded shelves — where Sirius Black had quietly resumed his human form and was browsing the merchandise with great interest.
On Hogsmeade Open Day, Professor Moody had no teaching duties. Sirius could at last enjoy the rare pleasure of strolling around as a perfectly ordinary wizard.
His gaze moved over labels reading "Trick Wand — 5 Galleons each" and "Canary Creams — 7 Sickles each," then found an entire row of Decoy Detonators on the next shelf — the kind that Argus Filch was always confiscating from students.
Behind him, a small boy exclaimed: "Wicked! Weasley's fireworks — whoosh — bang!"
"Mr. Black," Nigel, the young male assistant, stepped forward and greeted him politely. "He's waiting for you in the kitchen."
Sirius gave him a nod, then followed a hidden staircase down to the kitchen below, where he found Remus Lupin pouring tea. Lupin didn't turn at the sound of footsteps, but asked easily, "Tea?"
"Please. Thank you." Sirius dropped onto a bench with a lazy ease.
"You've been busy lately?" Lupin set a cup in front of him, the sound of pouring water filling the quiet kitchen.
"A bit, yes." Sirius idly traced the handle of the cup, his mind elsewhere: How was the Mandrake leaf treatment coming along? Had it been five days now?
"Who have you been meeting — anyone suitable for the cemetery task?" Lupin had apparently assumed he was thinking about Order business; a look of quiet concern crossed his face.
When the conversation turned to the matter at hand, Sirius's relaxed expression shifted to something sharper. He tapped an index finger slowly against the wooden table. "There are currently eight wizards available for the cemetery mission, yourself included... Kingsley Shacklebolt, Sturgis Podmore, Emmeline Vance, Elphias Doge, Dedalus Diggle... The Order has also recently brought in Arthur Weasley and Hestia Jones... I haven't had the chance to look into Charlie or Bill Weasley yet."
He took a sip of tea and yawned. "Alastor Moody is also desperate to go, of course, but Dumbledore and I both have concerns about his health. He's completely incapable of sitting still. He's already recommended someone to me — a wizard he calls 'very promising.' I was meaning to discuss it with you."
"With me?" A faint look of suspicion crossed Lupin's gentle face.
"By the way — does the joke shop never give you a day off?" Sirius abruptly changed the subject.
"Business has been brisk enough that we're open every day. Now that Nigel's joined us, I get two flexible days each week," Lupin said. "Weekends are out of the question — that's when it's busiest."
"Splendid." Sirius made arrangements immediately. "Keep Thursday afternoon free next week. I need you to make a trip on my behalf."
"Why?" Lupin asked, baffled.
"Before anyone joins the Order, they need to be properly vetted — at minimum, a conversation to assess where they stand and what kind of wizard they are..." Sirius could recite the process in his sleep by now. "Go and vet this 'promising' candidate Moody's been banging on about."
"Why can't you go yourself?" After a long pause, Lupin asked, eyeing his old friend with great wariness.
He had not forgotten how much Sirius used to enjoy a well-placed prank.
"As a former Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, you of all people know how it is — I have a double period on Thursday afternoons!" Sirius said, feigning helplessness. "And Moody's candidate is only available that one afternoon this entire month!"
He remembered his letter to the reserve Auror: "Couldn't you have chosen a different day?"
"Of course not — I'm still an intern, and my supervisor only has half a day free on Thursday afternoons this month. I can hardly have it known that I'm involved with an organisation like this, can I?" The reply had been unapologetically confident.
"I see," Lupin said, taking a sip of tea. He still sounded unconvinced.
"In short, I'm entrusting this entirely to you!" Sirius said happily, unloading the thorny task onto his perfectly innocent friend. "Remus, for the sake of the Order's growth, you must make this trip."
Seeing Lupin draw breath to refuse, he added with a grin, "No excuses accepted."
"You really do make my life difficult, Sirius," Lupin sighed, exasperated. "Right then — where exactly is it?"