Left Behind 3: Curses

Love

Very important chapter, one a lot of you have been waiting for... (safe for all readers)

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A virgin.

Holy fuck.

Draco felt his heart beat slam inside his ribs as he reeled with the shock of a revelation.

You don't live in the fifteenth century Draco stop making a big deal of it.

Draco immediately was thrown back in time as he remembered HIS first time...and how he was scared shitless that he would make a complete fool of himself. He had fumbled and stumbled and made silly mistakes not knowing what he was doing and the whole time-even though he had wanted it so bad- he had felt nervous.

That's how she's probably feeling now, he told himself. Draco was at a loss of what to do and how to handle this.

At Hogwarts, one of his conquests had been a virgin. That Particular Slytherin Girl had treated her virginity like it wasn't a big deal at all, and Draco had been cool with that. His mother had hammered it into his head repeatedly that a woman's body was her own and that he didn't have any right to decide what mattered to them and what didn't.

Looking down at Hermione he knew that it mattered to her.

Fuck, what if I screw it up? He found himself wondering.

You can't be serious, he told himself. If it matters so much to her you can't let her throw it away on you, the darker part of his mind ordered.

I love her, the part that was devoted to Hermione completely said gently within his mind. If I love her is the right thing to do to tell her to wait for someone else...or is the right thing to do to let her make the decision for herself?

"Draco say something..." said Hermione softly and he saw that her eyes were filling with tears.

Shit, shit, shit.

"Hermione..." he couldn't think of anything to say. His mind was still churning over the new information as he tried to process it so he said the only thing that came into his head: "Don't cry."

"I'm not crying," she said wiping the tears away from her eyes before they could spill out.

"Okay..." Draco blinked. He didn't want to argue with her. He knew that right now the last thing she probably wanted was to argue about the moisture collecting in her eyes.

Draco took a breath "Just give me a second."

"It's not a big deal, you can forget I said it and we can just go back to..." she gestured between them. "And I'll just follow along and..."

"Nah-ah," said Draco shaking his head. "There is no world in which I am going to forget this conversation and finding out this...is...would be your first time." He swallowed as thoughts began to come together properly again. He looked down at her.

"I don't believe that you can look me in the eye and tell me honestly that this doesn't mean something to you," he touched her shoulder gently. "You may be a practical and intelligent witch Hermione but I know...you're also a giant softie inside."

"It's stupid," she said looking away.

Draco reached out with his other hand and grabbed hold of her upper arms.

"It's not stupid," he said and ducked down forcing her to look at him. "Look at me, it's not stupid. It's okay to care about it and want it to be a big deal and special."

"But I don't want it to be fake," said Hermione and he heard her voice crack with what sounded like a cross between frustration and confusion. "I don't want rose petals on a bed and all that cheesy stuff I just want to..." she bit her lip.