The Marriage Decree

Chapter 70: Wining and Dining

Both Hermione and Draco are awoken the next morning by repeated banging on their front door. Draco reluctantly climbs out of bed with a groan, throwing on his dressing gown as he heads downstairs to answer the door. Hermione pulls their quilt up under her chin as she yawns.

"Oh, sorry, did I wake you up?" She hears Pansy loudly asks once Draco's opened the door.

She doesn't hear Draco's reply, which she assumes he muttered in his tired state.

"It's ten past nine. We were supposed to meet at nine o'clock." Pansy shouts.

"I don't mind as long as I get waffles at some point before I leave," Blaise admits as the front door slams.

"Get up those stairs, wake that wife of yours up and get dressed. You have five minutes." Pansy order Draco.

With a sigh, Hermione climbs out of bed and rummages through the wardrobe for something to wear. When Draco enters, he throws himself back on the bed.

"Whose idea was it to meet at nine o'clock?" He moans into the quilt.

"Who do you think?" She rhetorically asks, pulling a dress out. "You better get dressed before she comes up here to see what's taking so long." She warns him.

With another, overexaggerated groan, Draco rolls off the bed and searches through the wardrobe for something decent to wear. They make it downstairs with seconds to spare.

"Well, don't you both look cute." Pansy smiles, looking them up and down. "Here, an owl came for you, Draco." She hands him the envelope as she walks past them towards the front door.

Blaise gives them both thumbs up as he follows behind her. Hermione and Draco look at themselves then each other and realise they had unintentionally colour coordinated their outfit. Hermione had thrown on a dark blue flowery dress whilst Draco wore a dark blue shirt.

Draco quickly opens up the envelope to skim read the letter. He already knows what it's about, he just wants to know who it's about.

"Who's next?" Hermione asks, leaning over to read the letter.

"Jugson." He answers, replacing the letter in the envelope and throwing it down on the coffee table.

"Hey, can we go now?" Blaise sticks his head back through the door to ask.

"Yes, we're coming." Draco sighs, taking Hermione's hand and leading her out the door, which he locks behind them before they set off towards the gate.

"Are you looking forward to seeing Luna again?" Hermione asks as they sit down at a table for four inside Florean Fortescue's.

"Of course, I haven't seen her in ages." Blaise nods, shovelling waffle into his mouth.

"You remind me of my husband." Pansy scoffs, watching him in disgust.

Blaise stops in his chewing to glare at Pansy as he sits up straighter and begins to chew slower.

"It's only been a week Blaise." Draco reminds him.

"It feels like ages." Blaise shrugs, cutting up a smaller piece of waffle to place in his mouth.

"Well, I hope you have fun on this expedition." Hermione smiles, cutting up her pancake.

Pansy laughs. "Blaise. Camping. Not likely."

"Hey, I went camping for the Quidditch World Cup." Blaise defends himself.

"You slept in a bed, there was no camping involved. I saw the sleeping bag Luna was packing." Pansy points out before taking a bite of her waffle.