Soft As It Began

24. Twenty-Four

TWENTY-FOUR

 

In a matter of two days, three very important things had happened.

First, they had found Harry.

Second, Macnair Junior had been captured and delivered to Azkaban.

Third, Harry had destroyed the Deathly Hallows.

They’d each agreed to take one more day—Harry at his house in Finland, where he would pack up his things and prepare himself for the onslaught of media and reunions, the upheaval that his return would inevitably cause; Draco and Hermione to return to Headquarters and do essentially the same.

Except, she and Draco had both agreed that they’d use their day to write. To sit down at the desks that had been left pushed together in the study and finish the article as a team; compare notes and add new ones. With a bit of focus and determination, they’d be able to finish a rough outline of the story before they would pack up and leave the next morning.

Hermione had been slightly reluctant to leave Harry, but he’d insisted—with a roll of his eyes— that he would stay put, and that the wards she’d put up around the house before she left were plenty enough to keep out anything unwanted.

When they had arrived back at Headquarters in the early morning, the day after the reversal spell had been performed, Hermione had been overcome with emotion. She could hardly believe that they’d done it—that their time here was at an end, and they’d accomplished everything they had set out to do. She has hardly had a moment to process any of it, to sit and take a breath after half a lifetime of holding it.

She’d been thankful that Draco sensed she had needed a bit of time alone before beginning to write. He probably needed it too, maybe even more than she did. He’d made her a cup of tea and they’d parted ways, holing up in their respective rooms for some much-needed introspection and rest.

Hermione, of course, didn’t have it in her to rest. She processes things much better when she is keeping herself busy, so she’d begun to pack up all of her things.

Fold her clothes, shrink her books, tidy her trunk, all while meditating on the events of the last few months.

Tomorrow, she’d been home in her own bed. She’d see Crookshanks again, give the old boy snuggles and as many treats as he wanted. She’d go back to The Howler Herald office and see her co-workers. She’d see Ginny and Ron, Luna and Blaise and Dean. Her parents. London, Diagon Alley. She’d most definitely have to go to the ministry to file paperwork, to discuss everything that had happened with Kingsley and the Aurors.

And what then?

Funny, how the first thing that comes to mind when she asks herself this is Draco. She can’t visualize the two of them sitting across the office from one another without picturing Draco’s sneer; without thinking about all of the times they’d shared petty arguments over unsigned documents, or passed cold, dirty looks between cubicles.

She didn’t know what was going to happen with them when they returned. Funnily enough, she sort of doesn’t need to.

She likes that everything they need to figure out together, they seem to figure out step-by-step, as they come. It was how they’d worked since the beginning of the summer; never any expectations or assumptions.