Work Text:
“Oh Pansy, please don’t go! Please!” Hermione stood just inside the doorway and pleaded desperately. Pansy was violently pulling her drawers open and hurling items into an open bag on the bed.
“And why shouldn’t I?!” Pansy’s eyes glittered with rage as she whirled around to face Hermione. “Give me one good reason why I should stay here after what you’ve done!”
Tears began to pool in Hermione’s chocolate brown eyes. She hung her head, unable to meet Pansy’s cold, hard stare. She should have known better than to experiment with magic that she knew almost nothing about, magic that was controversial and forbidden for good reason. She should have been more willing to open her heart and trust. Why was that so hard to do? Now, she had managed to anger the person she loved most in the world.
The pair had been flatmates for some time, becoming close in the years following the wizarding war. Hermione had been there when Pansy’s relationship with her family became strained, due to their difference of opinion regarding Muggleborns. Pansy’s family still held onto the same archaic anti-Muggle beliefs that many of the Pureblood families shared. Pansy, like her ex Draco Malfoy, had experienced a profound change of heart after the fall of Voldemort and embraced her Muggle-born peers, finding they were not as different as she’d been raised to believe.
Pansy had been there when Hermione’s relationship with Ron had fallen apart. They were just too different, and it was a difficult truth to learn, but love was not always enough. Pansy had moved in not long before the relationship had entered a downward spiral, and she wasn’t sure how Hermione would have gotten along alone when everything went south. She put so much of herself into her relationships, and that was both to her credit and to her detriment.
That had been a little under three years ago, and since then, the two witches had spent much time together, simply enjoying each other’s company. There was always an unspoken understanding between them, and an easy closeness, with something more profound hovering just beneath the surface. It surprised neither of them when one drunken night, coming home from their favourite dive bar, Hermione had kissed Pansy, and Pansy had let her. One thing led to another, and they had fallen into bed together. It was like two halves of a whole had finally connected, and they’d been devoted to each other ever since.
Pansy had known that Ron was not Hermione’s only failed relationship, and she had seen firsthand the toll each heartbreak had taken on her. While she managed to pick up the pieces each time, she never seemed to be able to go on without the help of some form of magic. It had been mostly harmless charms to lift her spirits or help her push forward at work. She was a highly skilled witch, but she’d taken things too far this time by using a controversial spell.
“You had no right, Hermione. You shouldn’t have done it. You could have killed yourself in the process! And for what? Because you aren’t sure about us? Do you really trust me that little?” Ending her rant with arms crossed, Pansy glared at her with such an intensity that Hermione could practically feel the heat radiating onto her. The entire room crackled with tension and unreleased magic.
“Please, Pansy, just let me explain,” said Hermione softly. She finally lifted her eyes to meet Pansy’s. “It isn’t that I don’t trust you, I just wanted to know if your family’s feelings towards me were going to become a more significant problem.” Hermione shifted her weight uncomfortably from her left to her right foot. Pansy’s family not only disapproved of their friendship all these years, they had all but lost it when Pansy told them they were together. They weren’t the most progressive bunch, that’s for sure. While Pansy had assured her that their “unreasonable and tyrannical views,” as she put it, had no bearing upon their relationship, Hermione still felt uneasy.
“Not that you don’t trust me?” Pansy laughed bitterly. “Your distrust in my ability to handle the situation with my family is the whole reason you cast Alternis Posterum. You were looking out for you; and do not lie to me, because you’re absolutely terrible at it.”
Hermione closed her eyes and took a deep breath. It was true that she feared the influence of Pansy’s family, and she had been trying to see what efforts they might make to destroy their relationship. She also wanted to be sure that her future included Pansy, and Alternis Posterum showed her two possible scenarios. A future with Pansy, and a future without her. Even if she had gone about it the wrong way and even if she’d weakened her own magical core in the process, she regretted nothing.
Hermione exhaled defeatedly. “Pansy, I cannot tell you that I am sorry for what I did, because I am not. I had to know; I had to be prepared for the best and the worst…”
Pansy replied sadly, “It’s a shame you cannot realise when you’ve taken things too far.” She shoved the last of her items into her open bag and zipped it shut. “How can I trust you when you clearly don’t trust me?”
Tears spilt down Hermione’s cheeks as Pansy shouldered her bag and strode towards her. She lifted her free hand to touch Hermione’s face. “Hermione, you have to learn to trust me, otherwise what are we doing?” Pansy kissed her softly, sadly. “Until you can decide to open your heart to me truly, I cannot stay here. I hope this is not goodbye forever, but that is up to you.”
As she watched Pansy leave the bedroom and eventually heard the front door shut, she felt herself breaking. She buried her face in her hands, conflicted. “Oh Merlin,” she cried as she sank to her knees, “what have I done?”