Work Text:
Hermione's gaze was distant as she idly chewed her lip. Tendrils of a dream were stitching together in her mind, and she knew beyond a doubt that she'd had the dream before. But the pieces were hazy, each one slipping through her fingers before she could analyze it fully.
The pieces she could remember were so odd. They all seemed to circle around this one very impossible theme: stolen moments with Draco Malfoy. The thing was, they didn't feel like dreams. She often could feel his lingering touch or smell a waft of cologne... She could taste spearmint on her lips long after they'd kissed.
But they had to be dreams. They had to be because not only had Hermione Granger never kissed Draco Malfoy, but she couldn't even remember a kind word spoken between them. They worked adjacently in the Department of Mysteries, but he worked in Memory and she in Death. Their paths rarely crossed, and even if she had attempted to broach a civil conversation in the break room a time or two, it was a lost cause.
The man was still the insufferable git he'd been back in Hogwarts, no matter that it'd been nearly three years since the war.
Hermione shook her head, scattering the thoughts clouding her mind and returned to the work piled on her desk. Wasting time thinking about Draco Malfoy was exactly that. Time wasted.
xXx
"Are you alright, Hermione?" Luna's sing-song voice lilted through the air. "Your aura is cloudy."
Hermione's lip twitched in an amused smirk. "I'm fine," she lied. "Just a little tired. I haven't been able to sleep much lately."
Luna was also in the Department of Mysteries, and they often scheduled their lunches together, if only to get away from the monotony of the department. She worked in Unseen Room, an entire department dedicated to studying things that couldn't be seen by the naked eye. And she was absolutely brilliant at it.
"Bad dreams?" Luna asked pleasantly as she took a bite of ketchup covered chip.
Laughing mirthlessly, Hermione shook her head. Across the canteen, a shock of blond hair caught her attention and instinctually she followed his movements. It was odd, she found, dreaming of him so much. It felt like she knew him, even when she decidedly did not.
"No, not bad dreams," she said. "I don't know what's wrong with me, honestly."
"Do you have plans for Valentine's Day? Maybe that'll cheer you up; I could set you up with someone!"
Hermione's nose wrinkled. The last time Luna had set her up on a date the man had smelled like pickled slugs and talked to invisible creatures on his shoulder.
"I think I'll just have a quiet night." Hermione's eyes ticked up again, but this time when she looked at Malfoy, he was looking back at her, a curious wrinkle to his brow. "But say, Luna... maybe you can help me something?"
Luna smiled and set her fork down. "Anything!"
xXx
"I want you to relax," Luna said calmly.
Brilliant. How could she not relax lying on a hard cot in the coldest corner of the Department with Luna's wand tip pointed at her ear? It was a breeding ground of anxiety.
"I'm going to put you to sleep now but if you resist, it'll be harder. That's why I need you to try and clear your mind and relax. Got it?"
Slowly, she allowed her shoulders to fall away from her ears and filled her lungs with slow, steady breaths. "Got it."
As her eyes drifted closed, she could feel Luna's magic prodding at the forefront of her mind, begging entry. Her instinct was to push her back out again, but she listened and allowed her defenses to fall. Sleep came quickly then, lulling her into a deep darkness that felt calming and comfortable. After a few moments, flickers of a dream began to materialize.
She was on the Quidditch pitch, far past curfew. The night was warm and the sky clear. Ahead was an inky black sky filled with countless glittering stars and beside her was a warm body. She didn't look at him; she knew who it was.
"I don't want to leave," she heard herself say quietly. "I can feel something bad coming."
Next to her, Malfoy rolled onto his elbow and gently guided her face toward him. He was younger, too skinny and shadows under his eyes. He looked how he had sixth year. Still, his touch felt like home, and she nestled closer into his side.
"We don't ever have to leave. We can stay here all night."
Dream Hermione shook her head. "No, I mean I don't want to leave school. Things are happening too quickly and—”
Malfoy silenced her with a kiss, his lips pillowing hers as he rolled on top of her. His leg settled between her thighs and whatever worry had been gnawing at this version of her quickly dissipated. He stole away every thought as deepened their kiss, and when his hand moved to grip her backside then traveled upward toward her breast, she gasped, back arching into him.
Too soon, she felt pulled. Like someone had grabbed her around the waist and was dragging her backward. The scene on the Quidditch pitch flickered back to black and her eyes shot open.
She was back on the cot with Luna hovering overhead. Her breaths came in hard pants and she shot up, trying in vain to gather her senses. "Sorry you had to see that Luna..." Hermione breathed. "I don't know why my mind keeps imagining—”
"You aren't imagining, Hermione." Luna sat on the cot near her legs, her mouth twisted in a sad grimace. "Those aren't dreams."
"What do you mean they aren't dreams? You just saw—”
"If it were a dream, the edges of it would have been more transparent. Furthermore, the point of view was all wrong, you were in your body."
Hermione snorted and swung her legs off the table. "I dream from my own point of view all the time."
"That's not how it works. When I say you were in your body... I mean, you were in that body. That was you and not a dream distortion. Dreams behave differently than memory, they're more erratic, jumpier. In a real dream, it's incredibly hard to see an entire scene like that play out in order. You see only the important parts and you stitch together the in-between. This was a memory."
A moment passed. Then another. Hermione could only blink at her friend. "Luna, I don't even know Draco Malfoy outside of him being a pretentious prick at school. Those can't be memories."
Luna's hand covered Hermione's and her lips folded in a smile. "I think you may want to visit the Memory Department, Hermione. Trust me, that's not a dream."
xXx
For two days Hermione ignored Luna's advice. The dreams continued—Hermione refused to call them memories—and she tried to convince herself that eventually, they'd stop. What other choice did she have?
That evening, Luna had invited her over for a girl’s night. It was the night before Valentine's Day and while Hermione ignored the existence of the day altogether, she knew that Luna had put this together with the best of intentions. She was about to leave for the day when she spied Malfoy sipping a cup of tea and staring at the department bulletin.
Before she even knew was she was doing, she marched over to him. He startled when he realized how close she was, his eyes rounding for a splinter of a second before steeling into his familiar, unimpressed, expression. He was more handsome than he'd been when they were at school, and even though Hermione had loathed his very existence, even she knew he was handsome back then.
"Do I know you?" she asked with an arched brow, her arms crossing tersely over her chest.
Malfoy's gaze flickered around the room in confusion. "Have you hit your head?"
"I mean," she paused, letting out an exaggerated breath. "Obviously I know who you are but... do we know each other?"
Something passed over his features that she couldn't read. "I don't know what you're talking about, Granger. If you'll excuse—”
"Malfoy! Listen, something is... something is happening. I thought they were dreams..."
He smirked. "Dreaming about me, Granger? I'm flattered."
"That's the thing," she said, stepping into him. "Luna says they aren't dreams; they're memories. Is there a reason I would be recalling memories about the two of us?"
The blood drained from his face. "What?"
"I said—”
"I know what you said." He waved his hands in the air dismissively. "It's just not possible."
The look on his face paired made her heart twist. "What's not possible?"
"I have to go." He turned to march back into his department.
"Malfoy! You can't just--"
But he was already gone. Hermione left for the day feeling more confused than ever, unable to forget the look on his face.
xXx
Galentine's was... a lot. Hermione had hoped for maybe a few glasses of wine and girl talk but Luna filled the evening with ice breakers and horrifying games that asked invasive questions about their love and sex life. As a result, Hermione was swimming in white wine and hiding in the corner. She'd chosen her black off the shoulder blouse and let her curls mostly hang free around her shoulders, a few strands pulled back to keep it away from her face.
She also wore her heart-shaped earrings; they were rose gold and completely ridiculous for work but she loved them anyway. She couldn't exactly remember when she'd gotten them but every year for the last five years she'd worn them on Valentine's. She played idly with them as she watched the other girls engage in various forms of debauchery and finally when the clock hit midnight, Hermione excused herself.
She decided to walk the few blocks home, the chill of London in February nipping at her cheeks and sobering her slightly. Rubbing her hands together, she breathed warm air into them and her mind continued to drift back to Draco Malfoy. He'd acted so strangely that afternoon and while she hated not knowing the answer to what was happening to her, part of her thought maybe it was best. After all, it wasn't like it could be possible that she and Malfoy would... No, definitely not.
As she approached her building, a familiar silhouette stood leaning near the door. Her mouth ran dry as she paused midstep. "Malfoy? Is that--"
"Evening Granger."
She huffed in surprise as she climbed the few steps. "How long have you been out here?"
"A few hours."
Her eyes widened. "You've been standing outside my flat for a few hours ?"
"I figured you were at Luna's ridiculous little party, and I thought I'd just wait until you arrived."
"That's mental," she said, shaking her head. "Why are you here anyway? Just wanted to leave me with some more cryptic messages without an answer?"
Then, his eyes caught on her ears and he smiled, reaching forward to touch one. It was odd how familiar he felt, when he was for all intents and purposes, a stranger. But she didn't stop him when he rubbed his thumb over the smooth material and then looked back at her fondly. "You wear these every year."
Hermione shrugged. "So?"
"I always look for them at Valentine's Day. It's a funny thing to do, but even if I couldn't have been with you... it felt like you still carried me with you."
Disbelief coursed through her and she stepped back, reaching up to touch the small hearts dangling from her earlobes. "Why do you know anything about my earrings?"
"I gave them to you sixth year, even though you made me swear not to get you anything. I saw them in a shop on Diagon over Christmas holiday and couldn't help myself. You wore them for a week."
"Malfoy, I don't--"
"It's a long story, Granger. Maybe we could talk about it upstairs?"
She probably shouldn't invite the acquitted Death Eater up to her flat at midnight, but her curiosity was piqued. There was something about the look in his eyes and despite the years of torment, she somehow felt she could trust him.
"Sure," she said, swallowing thickly. Together, they climbed the stairs towards her flat and as she twisted her wand at the locked door, she could feel her heart hammering against her ribcage.
She wasn't sure she'd ever said more than two kind words to the bloke and now he was coming into her flat in the early morning hours of Valentine's Day. She shrugged from her coat and set her bag down before turning back to him. "So, what is it you want to tell me? Please tell me you didn't nefariously plant false memories. Please tell me it was something for your work gone awry."
With a small chuckle, he shook his head and reached into his cloak. He produced a tiny red box and with a tap of his wand, it expanded. "Neither of those."
"What's that?"
His eyes were dark as he set the box down on the counter and then turned to her. "I entered the Department of Mysteries and chose the Memory Room because when we were in sixth year I fell in love with a girl who broke my heart."
Her heart stopped beating as she stared back at him. "Draco Malfoy, speak plainly."
"We started seeing each other around Halloween. At first, I think we were just hate-shagging each other—”
Hermione choked, clutching at her throat. "We did not shag each other!"
Tucking his chin, Malfoy grinned privately. "I assure you, we did. Then we stopped hate-shagging and started shagging just because we liked it—liked each other. I fell in love with you and as far as you told me, you fell in love with me too."
It was impossible. Absolutely bloody impossible. But there was something so sure in the way he spoke. "If this is true," she managed, "why don't I remember any of it? I'm not likely to forget someone I dated for months... not to mention the first person I supposedly slept with. Did you obliviate me?"
Malfoy sneered and dragged a hand through his hair. "Don't be ridiculous. I was pissed when you took your own memories. It was you who forgot me."
"What? Why on earth--"
"You knew you weren’t coming back seventh year; you said Harry needed you. Impossibly, you were so bloody stubborn, that all you cared about was my safety. You were terrified you'd be caught and they would find out about the two of us and it would get me killed. It was fucking stupid."
Hermione's lip curled. "It's not stupid. If I loved you like you claim I did, of course I'd want to keep you safe."
"Well, I wanted to keep you safe. I wanted us to run and start over and you wouldn't leave Potter. So, instead of coming with me, you left me. I was furious. After school, I started in Memory just to try and figure out how to get us back. The problem was two-fold: I couldn't tell you what happened between us. Mostly because you'd never believe me even if I tried. Secondly, you performed the spell on yourself. That gave me some semblance of hope because that's intense magic, you could have made a mistake."
"That doesn't sound like a problem."
Smirking, he rubbed at the back of his neck, looking at her like he knew her. "Well, maybe that'd be right but you're pretty fucking good at magic. I couldn't ask you to come in and test you or ask you to work with me. I thought about trying to just start over, to beg you to love me twice somehow but it felt like it was so impossible that you loved me the first time... I wasn't sure I could get us back if you didn't know everything that happened sixth year."
"So I kept working," Malfoy continued. "I worked with memory loss patients all over the world. I'm not there yet... but I'm close."
Her heart thudded erratically. "So what's in the box, then? The cure for my lost memory."
He shook his head. "No, not quite. I'm hoping you'll be able to help me with that if you don't hex me from oblivion."
Malfoy approached her, turning her towards the box and gently closing his fingers around her eyes. His touch set her skin on fire and her breath quickened.
"What are you--"
His breath fanned over the shell of her ear, gooseflesh erupting along her skin. "Trust me."
And she did, to her own surprise. Gently he guided her forward and when he lifted his fingers, the inside of the box was glowing in hazy pink. Inside was a small pensieve and dozens of vials.
"This is us, Granger. All of us that I could extract. I know it's not the same as having your memory back, but I'm not done trying. Until then, I thought maybe if you could see... maybe then you'd understand."
Hermione reached into the box, plucking a single vial and studying the tendril of ethereal magic dancing inside. "What is it you want?" she asked, turning to look back at him. "I watch these and we pick up where we left off? I don't know you..."
"I know," he rushed, hurt twinging his eyes. "But I know you. I know you better than anyone and if you just see what we had... you might want to fight as hard as I have to get it back." His hand curled around her cheek. "I never stopped loving you. Wouldn't know how even if I wanted to... you're apart of me."
If she'd been less shocked, she would have swooned. Who was this version of Draco Malfoy and why did she like him so much?
"I'll leave you with those," he said, stepping back and letting his arm fall away. "Here's my Floo number if you need anything."
He offered her a small roll of parchment which she took. "I still can't believe this is all real."
"You wouldn't be you if you did," he said with a laugh and then turned for the door. "Happy Valentine's Day, Granger."
xXx
Hermione spent hours pouring through the vials Malfoy had left for her. He'd been right. At first, they didn't seem to care for each other all that much but slowly and surely, she saw the way he looked at her change. What's more, she saw how often he looked at her when she wasn't paying attention. How he'd watch her as she dozed half-naked in his arms. How he'd stopped in his tracks when he saw those little heart earrings in Diagon.
They'd loved each other once—and according to Malfoy, he loved her still. It was unsettling, to have someone love you so deeply when you didn't remember them at all. They still weren't her memories, after all.
When she'd exhausted the vials, she fell into bed, unable to sleep even as the sun crept into view.
The following morning at work, Hermione again wore her signature heart-shaped earrings. When she entered the DoM she didn't go for her desk, she went to Memory.
Inside, Malfoy was hunched over a table, his eyes red-rimmed as though he hadn't seen a pillow in his life.
"Malfoy," she said sharply, causing him to jump.
"G-Granger. What are you doing here?"
"I need to try something if that's okay."
He straightened to full height and looked around the otherwise empty room. "Okay."
With as much gumption as she could muster, Hermione crossed the space between them. Her nerves wanted her to back out but if she didn't just try , she wasn't sure she'd ever know. Perhaps with too much force, she grabbed the sides of his face and pulled his mouth down to hers. He was frozen, his lips unmoving, and Hermione wasn't sure how to kiss him either. She wasn't sure she'd ever kissed a stranger.
But then, as quickly as a heartbeat, he melted into her. One arm banded around her waist and the other buried in her curls as he kissed her. He kissed her like he was desperate. His mouth moved effortlessly over hers, coaxing her lips to part so he their tongues could brush together. She felt his kiss everywhere, as though fire were licking at her skin. Still, she craved more.
Finally, their lips parted as they shared in a broken gasp, their foreheads pressing together as he continued to hold her close.
"Do you remember?" he asked, breathlessly.
Sadly, she shook her head. "Not... not really. But I remember this feeling." It was like her body had remembered what her mind forgot. "I didn't know if it would maybe spark something but while it was very good," she laughed, pulling back to look up at him properly, "no memories."
Malfoy's lips folded in lamentation and he released his hold on her. "Well, there are still things to be done. Now that you're aware of the lost memories, there are certain trials which have proved helpful in certain cases of shoddy wandwork."
"I know you are not implying that my wandwork is shoddy."
At that, he cracked. For perhaps the first time she could remember, he smiled— really smiled . "I would never imply that, merely that casting complex memory obliviation on oneself leaves room for error. Maybe you could even look over the research I've found... You might find something I didn't."
"Yes, of course, but there is one more thing."
His brow arched in a silent question.
"I don't think it's unreasonable to say that I wouldn't fall for you again. I saw those memories and if you're half as charming as you were back then, well, I think we might still have a chance— memories or not."
Malfoy's body seemed to sag in relief. "Are you saying you'll give me a chance?"
Laughing, Hermione pressed up against him and lifted onto her toes. "Well, it is Valentine's Day, so I suppose I could let you take me for dinner, especially if there will be snogging like that."
His lips slanted over hers and she moaned at the way he knew her body; it wasn't foreign to him, it was like he was finally back where he belonged. "Yes to both," he said against her lips and then pressed her against the research table. "Yes to whatever you want."