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Viktor stopped by the flower stall at the north end of Diagon Alley, greeting the rosy-cheeked witch there with a quick smile of familiarity. "Good morning, Miss Caroline."
"Hello there, Mr. Krum." The sturdy young florist was one of the few who recognized him that didn't go all weird or make a god-awful fuss over him, so Viktor didn't mind that she acknowledged who he was. "What will it be for your young lady this week? We have long-stemmed red roses, with a gorgeous scent--"
He considered them, and then shook his head with a sigh. "They are beautiful," he conceded. "But ven I buy her roses, she puts them in her finest vase on dining-room table and they get hidden by stacks of books and she forgets them." He gave a helpless shrug, looked at the perfect roses. "And then they just ... vilt."
"Hm... yes, that is a shame." She looked amused by his rueful tone, dimples deepening in her cheeks. "So the dining table is more of a reading table, is it?"
"You could say that her whole flat is more of a library, actually," said Viktor with a fond smirk.
"All right, here we have blue irises from Cornwall -- the bookish ladies all seem to love irises. And aren't they a lovely deep shade?" She gave him a speculative look. "The colour of her eyes, maybe?"
"No, her eyes are brown," said Viktor softly, seeing a pair of tawny, clear eyes in his mind. "Deep brown, like ... vild honey, or spicy Bulgarian tea. Are very beautiful eyes."
"Mmm, I can tell that they are," Caroline said shrewdly. She glanced around, quickly getting an overview of her colourful display of flowers in baskets, goblets and zinc buckets. "Aha, look at these orchids, cream and the softest russet brown..." She held them up for his perusal, cocking an eyebrow in mischief. "In the language of flowers, orchids mean uninhibited desire. I'm not implying anything, mind, just ... thought you'd like to know."
He raised his eyebrows right back, clamping down on a smile as he studied the exotic, delicate flower heads. The colours really were exquisite, and the shape ... well, it wasn't hard to figure out why orchids had acquired that meaning, thought Viktor, his eyebrows climbing another notch, before heat suffused his face as he realized exactly what he stood here thinking of.
But finally he shook his head. "No, for same reason as roses. They are too ... grand, too ... flamboyant, is that vord? I think she just doesn't care about that sort of thing. Do you haff something a little less ... I mean, a little more..." He searched for words. Something sweet that she'll put in a plain glass on the kitchen table and smile every time she sees it, thinking of me. "Something fresh, simple--?" he said.
She bit her lip, cast about with sharp eyes. "Oh, I know! Tulips? They're in season and I have them in several colours. They're my favourite," she sighed. "These pink ones are delightful."
The tulips weren't bad at all, both cheerful and sweet. "Vot do tulips mean in flower language?" he asked curiously.
"Fame." She winked at him as he cringed. "Oh, come on, Mr. Krum, could it be any more appropriate?"
"Too appropriate," said Viktor. He frowned. "I gave her tulips a few veeks ago. Did not know they meant that."
"Ah, she probably didn't know the meaning anyway."
"Vell, maybe not -- but she is sort of person who knows all sorts of things you don't expect people to know."
Caroline looked around her again with a huff that implied playful exasperation. "Really now, how difficult can it be? I have dozens of different ... ahh, wait a minute!" She dove down behind her counter, arranging something. "I do believe I've got just the thing for your tomboy-bookworm-know-it-all sweetheart."
Viktor waited patiently, and when she rose up again he lit up as he saw what she held in her hands.
She beamed back. "These are pretty, yes? I picked them myself up in the Borders this morning, in the woody meadows around our farm." She held forth the small posy of wild pansies and wood violets, blue and white and green with little nodding heads that still cradled dewdrops from the night, and Viktor reached out and touched a pale-blue violet reverently.
"She vill adore them," he murmured. A memory danced at the edge of his mind, and he reached at it, smiling as he remembered--
"I always bring some wildflowers when they are in season, because all the young lads who can't afford the posh flowers like to buy them for their little sweethearts," Caroline confided. She gave him a bemused smile. "I never thought of suggesting them to you, Mr. Krum."
***
"For me?" said Hermione after she had given him his welcome hug, with that shy, slightly distracted grin that she always gave at his gifts of flowers. "Oh, Viktor, thank you, you really shouldn't--" She tucked the quill she was holding behind her ear, and took the bouquet that Caroline had lovingly wrapped, first in light green crepe paper and then in blue gift-wrapping paper, finished off with a curled white band.
"Open it," said Viktor, biting down on his lip to keep back his own smile. "I vant to see--"
"What?" She got her scissors from the top desk drawer and carefully cut the paper open. "Oh," she said, suddenly, her expression gentle. "Oh, how--" She pushed the blue paper to the side, then folded back the thin green crepe paper to reveal the soft haze of blue inside.
"Remember?" He couldn't hide his excitement.
"You picked them for me, at the edge of the Forbidden Forest," she whispered, her gaze lost in the flowers. She dipped her nose to them, inhaling the delicate scent. "That last evening we ... Wood violets. You put them in my hair--"
"And for my efforts, you called me 'a very silly Viktor'." He chuckled.
"I only said that because I ... loved it," she said quietly, looking back up at him. "Did you know?"
"Oh, I knew. You had tears in your eyes." He leaned forwards and brushed his lips over her cheek, surprised that he still could taste the memory of warm, wet salt there.
Hermione rose from her desk and walked into the kitchen, reaching into the cupboard above the sink and taking down one of the blue glass tumblers she used for milk or orange juice.
"You vill not put them in crystal vase in dining-room?" he asked, all innocence, as she filled the glass with water from the faucet, and she looked quickly up at him over her shoulder.
"Oh ... no, I thought I'd just ... put them in this glass and keep them here on my kitchen table, and every time I see them I will think of--" She faltered, searched his expression. "You don't mind?"
Viktor shook his head, laughing for joy.
"No," he said. "That vill be perfect."
-end-