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It was late in the afternoon on Monday before Christmas. With a cheerful hum on her lips, Hermione was rearranging the ink section of Flourish & Blott’s after the glow-in-the-dark ink had gone scarce — an all-time favourite around Christmas time, alongside the Self-spelling quill, and the magical artefacts calendar for next year.
The endlessly expandable storage room in the basement had run out, too. She had made a mental note to order more ink as soon as she returned to the front desk — knowing very well that the new supplies wouldn’t arrive in time for the last-minute Christmas shoppers. Having been up and down the stairs multiple times, searching in vain, her calves ached with the strain, and she huffed, reminding herself that she ought to exercise more. Feeling like an old lady at twenty-four seemed a little premature and on the brink of embarrassment.
The rows of available ink pots were straightened out to a comfortable, maybe slightly exaggerated degree, but who could argue with order? Everybody loved order — well, especially Hermione — but unfortunately, not everybody left it that way.
It tugged a smile on Hermione’s lips every time another pot of ink lined up precisely with the other. Just like that. Order was beauty. Plain and simple.
Of course, she could have fixed it with magic, but there was something quite soothing in the manual process — as if pieces of a puzzle settled in place every time books, quills, or gadgets found their place again. Sometimes, it felt as if things fell into place in her head as well, leaving nothing but tranquil order. Working in the bookshop after the war had been therapeutic, and even though she had a fairly successful career in research at St. Mungo’s, she thoroughly enjoyed the few afternoons per month she got to spend time between books, office supplies, and delicate dust.
It was no secret that books represented everything that mattered to her: knowledge, time spent in peace and quiet, and the possibility to live a thousand lives inside wondrous worlds. It was the greatest love of her life.
Despite the time of year, the shop wasn’t very busy. Perhaps because the weather had turned especially cold this afternoon, the year’s first snowstorm brewing on the darkening horizon. The last customers had left ten minutes ago, leaving her with nothing overly important to do — hence the conscientious organising of bits and bobs. The slow, meticulous work just smoothed her mind, almost like meditation.
Helping people discover new books or older forgotten ones was another favourite. The chance to pass on recommendations and the happiness it brought to people’s faces when just the right thing materialised was all the payment Hermione could want. The small salary the job provided was insignificant, bordering on ridiculous, but the time spent here absolutely rivalled her time in the lab. Research was rewarding in the long haul, but the gruelling hours spent over test samples and botched experiments often outweighed the few breakthroughs Hermione had achieved over the last few years. Still, she wouldn’t trade the process of conquering a new cause — whether it was breaking a medical curse or implementing a new cure for magical diseases — for anything. The notion of helping people seemed to thread through her life like a credo. Maybe in part because it drowned out the need to care for herself.
Every time Ginny told her to take some time off for herself and cater a little more to her own wishes and needs, she scoffed and reminded the redhead that reading in the bath was all she could fantasise about when she thought of holidays and free time. Maybe a cup of tea to top the whole thing, and fulfilment would be complete.
Books. Hot water. Nothing complicated. Just bliss.
Who needed a man for that?
Despite her arguments, Ginny had been relentless for the past six months, nudging at Hermione every chance she got. “About time you found someone to take care of you, love. Someone who sees you. Someone to take you out of that cramped apartment and show you the real world.”
Hermione couldn’t say which she disliked the most, the idea of leaving her cosy home to meet “the real world” — having seen quite enough of it during the war — or the fact that Ginny might be right. Though Hermione would be hard-pressed to admit that out loud.
There were very few men who were true contenders for that particular spot in her heart. Maybe really just one. And that idea was as bad as catching pneumonia and the Dragon Pox all at once. An idea that needed to be squashed and certainly not rooted for by Ginevra Weasley-Potter. Hermione blessed herself for not having disclosed anything about her secret fancies to her best friend, knowing how easily that could have turned into a public manhunt with Ginny as the cunning but hellbent lead matchmaker.
The quiet of the old shop was calming, almost meditative. As the cherry on top, it had finally started to snow. Large, downy flakes of snow floated down from the dark sky, veiling the pavement and Victorian houses of Diagon Alley in white shimmering wonder. It looked like something plucked out of a fairytale.
Hermione had been staring out the window for at least five minutes straight — lost in thought and memories from a Muggle childhood with scarves and snow suits, sledges and snowball fights with the neighbour kids. Despite her efforts to stay composed, damp pooled in the waterline of her eyes — a warm but heavy sensation pressing at her ribs. There were still things that needed guarding and careful handling — things that could easily throw Hermione off in a tailspin of longing and sadness. A bittersweet notion that not all things could be mended, good intentions or not.
A faint clink sounded from the bell at the door. She turned and saw a tall figure shutting the door with a soft snick, using his shoulder as leverage. His dark wool coat was sprinkled with white — the snow capturing the dim light of the shop like a shroud of small diamonds.
Her eyes travelled up and caught on the shock of familiar blond hair that perched over the black collar. Pale blond like no one else. She would recognise that hair anywhere.
Draco Malfoy.
Reformed Death Eater. Known as a brooding recluse, his merits included expansive philanthropic efforts which had graced St. Mungo’s with several large grants — all thanks to his large potions company that thrived internationally. She had read all about his business accomplishments in the Witch Weekly articles that dug into celebrity lives with the zeal of a virus and the dignity of a badger. She herself had been a regular victim of spying and prying in her personal life in the first years after the war. Fortunately, her life was too dull to really gather interest, and the attention had eventually dried out.
Thank gods.
Breaking up with Ron a year after the war had been the single most devastating event in terms of both media coverage and emotional damage. It had been a whirlwind of hurt and public humiliation when Ron had officially started dating Lavender Brown — almost before he’d told Hermione he was leaving her.
But fortunately, it was long gone. Water under the bridge and so forth. Having avoided dating in public — and at all after that, she had long since escaped the worst snooping around in her small, mediocre life. The most recent coverage had been about her advances in research for a cure for lycanthropy.
And that she didn’t mind.
The tall man at the door had experienced a similar fate with a public media storm following his failed engagement with Astoria Greengrass. Apparently, old pureblood families weren’t big on revealing secrets like blood curses, and the way Greengrass had been gallivanting around the wizarding world after the break-up spoke volumes about the young generation of the Sacred Twenty-eight not agreeing with old customs.
In the wake of the scandal, Malfoy had struggled to stay out of the public eye, hiding behind official statements about channelling funds into various charitable causes. From the outside, it certainly looked like an attempt to drain the family vault and redeem the Malfoy name. From Hermione’s limited point of view, it seemed to work.
At the present moment, she couldn’t take her eyes from him, even if she wanted to. He was poised and unsettlingly handsome, having grown into his sharp features over the years. Someone very far from the lanky, sneering bully from Hogwarts. Now, he exuded an odd maturity that stemmed equally from his pureblood manners and something that read like sadness. He seemed withdrawn and sombre. Something about it called for her sympathy and definitely piqued her curiosity when it really shouldn’t have.
His hands were shoved deep down into his pockets as he turned towards her. Some of his blond hair fell into his eyes in heavy, snow-filled locks. His gaze immediately locked on hers across the shop. It hit something that should have been more heavily protected, and Hermione steeled herself unwittingly. Something else inside her tried to remind her that she should be careful with the man, but there was something soft and open in his gaze that threw her off track as he slowly crossed the floor.
“Granger,” he nodded in a low voice, awfully polite.
“Malfoy,” she replied, carefully guarded.
For a second, she hesitated, wondering if she should turn away and just let him roam around the shop on his own. But sensing a strange tension in his body, she decided against it.
“Can I help you?” she asked softly, tilting her head questioningly.
He didn’t answer right away, just stared at her with wide, grey eyes as if he were collecting evidence of something she wasn’t sure she understood.
“I think you can,” he finally said, a ghost of a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “I’m looking for a present — a book, preferably.”
The last part came out on a slightly amused lilt. She narrowed her eyes, not sure what to expect from the blond wizard who carried so much history with him.
“You’ve come to the right place, then,” she quipped with a non-committal wave of her hand.
He leaned in over her with mildly assessing eyes. “Apparently so.”
For a moment, she couldn’t focus, couldn’t decide whether to hold his gaze or avert it. The snow on his shoulders was already melting into tiny droplets of water caught on the wool fibres. They almost seemed suspended, light playing in them with tiny rainbows. They felt safe to look at. Pretty, even.
He shifted to the side — pulling her out of her stupor.
“Could you help me pick one? My hands are injured.”
A tired smirk glided across his face as he withdrew his hands from his pockets, showing them all wrapped up in bandages, for a second looking like a tragic Victorian invalid.
She looked at him, baffled. “What happened?”
With a snap of his head, he tossed the sodden hair out of his eyes. A long breath escaped him, a half-annoyed expression flashing over his face. “Theo happened.”
She cocked an eyebrow, all too curious. “Theo? Care to elaborate?”
Malfoy sighed, his face twisting into a grimace as if he had tasted something sour.
“Alright, he released a — band? A flock? — What do you call it when it’s crabs?” he started, huffing before continuing. “He set a bunch of fire crabs loose in my bedroom. I got burned trying to get rid of them.”
She had to bite her lip to avoid bursting out laughing. Theodore Nott — the big prankster at Hogwarts, adulthood had apparently not weeded that out of him. The image of Malfoy fighting fire crabs off his Egyptian cotton sheets with unsavoury thread counts nearly made her cackle.
“Why didn’t you use magic?” she managed between hiccups of suppressed laughter.
“Well, apparently, the burns of fire crabs don’t react to traditional healing. I have to resort to the Muggle way — and wait.”
“No, I meant magic to get rid of the crabs.”
Malfoy’s beautiful grey eyes crinkled with exasperated mirth. “Ah, that would be Theo again.”
She cracked a laugh despite herself, her hand flying up to cover her mouth. A feeble smile graced his face, and it stirred something soft inside her — something close to sympathy.
“He’s still a menace?”
“Oh, an absolute menace. Ought to be disinherited and neutered — in any order.”
“What did he do?”
“He hid my wand and went on a binge. He came back twenty-four hours later so high he torched one of my recliners in an attempt to light the hearth. I couldn’t help him.” Malfoy lifted his shoulders in a non-apologetic shrug, waving his bandaged hands as an excuse. “At least not until he’d seared off half his precious curls while trying to put out the fire.”
She howled a laugh at his expression. “You’re evil.”
“Some things never change,” he rolled his eyes with a chuckle.
For a quivering second, she wanted to take it back, take his arm and apologise.
“Once a Death Eater, always a Death Eater, right?” he mused, undeterred.
“Don’t say that,” she muttered. “That’s not who you are anymore.”
He leaned in just a little, a conspiratorial glint in his eyes, his voice a pleasant rumble. “How do you know that?”
She couldn’t laugh. “The war is over, Malfoy. Stop fighting.”
He exhaled deeply. “I stopped fighting long ago. But for some, it’ll never end, and the Malfoy name will never be redeemed.”
“I know, and I’m sorry,” she said with a low tremble in her voice. She stared at his bandages, realising how much hurt hid beneath them and all the other — invisible — band aids they both carried. “I’m sorry I said that. I don’t think you’re evil.”
“You’re just saying what everybody thinks.” His lips curled in a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I don’t blame you. You have every reason to feel that way.”
The air between them heavied, settling around them with the terrible weight of the past. So many unspoken words, truths and secrets threatened to split the moment and unearth the ugly bones everybody was still trying to bury or pretend not to know about.
He spoke before she could. “I’m sorry for what I did to you, for what I caused, and for my family’s part. I’m deeply ashamed of it, and I wish there was some way I could remedy all the hurt I caused you.”
It was probably the longest sentence she had heard from him since the war, but the meaning was even larger, graver. It sent a blinding shockwave through her mind to hear his apology. His eyes flickered to her arm, and when her hand closed over the sleeve that covered her old scar, he nodded — a mournful, severe look on his face as if he had just received and accepted a harsh sentence. And maybe he had — the accused, the judge and the executioner all wrapped up in the same person.
It tore at her heart to see so much grief and guilt embodied in the young man who towered over her with his pale grey eyes. Without much thinking, she reached for his arm — the one with the Dark Mark. The black wool felt soft against her fingertips, but the moisture from the melting snow tinged it with something nameless.
She squeezed his arm reassuringly. “I forgave you a long time ago, Malfoy.”
A breath shuddered out of him as if he had held it back. Something fragile and tender hung in the air between them. It clawed at her, begging her to let up, to undo the tethers and dare something new. Just a brief moment of reconciliation — open and unarmed, yet it felt so defining.
Then Malfoy schooled himself by clearing his throat, turning to glance around the shop, the suave gentleman stepping back in to smooth everything over.
“So, a Christmas gift, Granger? Think you can help me?”
“I can try,” she said, recovering from the moment of vulnerability with polite dedication. “Looking for anything particular?”
For a second, she thought about asking who the lucky recipient might be, but she disliked both the prying and the knowing.
“A book.”
She narrowed her eyes at his teasing expression. “You’re not helping. Any particular genre or subject, Malfoy?”
He clicked his tongue and let out a loud exhale. His eyes looked genuine, though.
“I thought I had come to the expert.”
A tirade about buying the right book for the right person rose to her tongue, and she bit it back with a huff. He was just goading her, and she refused to let it mean anything. Instead, she turned towards the nearest display and grabbed one of her favourite novels.
“How about Mathilda Baggins: These Fated Vows?” she asked, choking back a miffed sigh, expecting the ordeal to drag on miserably if he was this unwilling to participate.
He dug his hands back into his pockets and shrugged.
“I don’t like the main character. I found him predictable and dull to the point of agony.”
“Oh, really?” She stared at him through narrowed eyes, taking the bait instantly. “You read it?”
He made a face, the tiniest of smirks gliding in — both smug and infuriating in all his handsomeness.
“Of course, I did. You’ve read it too, I assume?”
“I did. I actually liked the male character very much. I thought he was honest and intelligent. And brave.”
“Like St. Potter?” he huffed with a chuckle.
“Still hung up on Harry, are you?” she quipped back.
The corner of his mouth quirked in a lopsided smile. “There were other Gryffindors who caught my interest long before the boy wonder became a nuisance.” His voice had taken on a low purring quality she couldn’t place or process.
Malfoy’s eyes darkened slightly as he leaned in, and something snagged in her chest as if she had caught him flirting. Without warning or reason, her cheeks warmed. He looked so keen — like he was daring her.
It was hard to ignore it — he was breathtaking. Tall and blond. Pointed features, matured into sharp, elegant angles, cheekbones, and jawline cut exquisitely from hundreds of years of meticulous breeding. His grey eyes shone with liquid silver. Eyes that had been haunting her for years — for all the wrong reasons, and now, because they were just raw beauty.
They exuded intelligence. Mystery. And today — an unexpected warmth.
To be honest, he looked like a man worth exploring — worth knowing.
She shook herself free from the self-imposed spell, refusing to ask what he meant, what he was playing at. The imminent suspicion was that he was trying to throw her off, taunt her because he was picking up on her weakness for him.
“So, not These Fated Vows. Maybe something less complex,” she snipped, trying to regain control with a not-so-subtle dig.
He cocked his head with an amused look.
“I’m just trying to find the right present. No need to get irritated.”
“Is it for someone special?” It flew out of her before she could stop it.
She could have slapped herself. Instead, she bit her cheek, hard. Focus on the main thing — customer service. Even Malfoy deserved fair treatment, even if his mere presence rattled her.
“Someone very special,” he murmured.
Without explanation, a tight knot grew in her stomach, cold and confusing. His eyes hovered above her, unreadable, still keen in a quiet but disturbing way. The dim light of the shop seemed to catch and flicker in his irises, and she had to tear her gaze away to not give away something risky and absolutely mortifying.
As if displeased with her retreat, he cleared his throat with a rasp that sounded almost like a protest.
“How about that one?” With his elbow, he pointed to a book piled on a table nearby.
“Seven ways to make her notice? Needing dating advice, Malfoy?” she teased, happy to divert the attention from herself. “I thought you were looking for a Christmas present.”
“You read it?” he drawled, smoothly ignoring her question.
“I skimmed it,” she admitted, quietly annoyed with herself for having wasted time on that particular book.
“Any good?”
She looked at him with an exhausted expression. “I loathe those kinds of books. I don’t fall for that run-of-the-mill, generic understanding of human interactions as transactions, no matter how pretentiously it is presented. It’s demeaning to women to assume that one size — or seven — fits all. And the notion that charity, gift giving, poetry or whatever could sway a woman is preposterous.”
“Just skimmed it?” he quirked a smile.
She huffed, blushing.
“I just don’t fall for that kind of drivel. That’s not how I’d want to be wooed, anyway.”
She could hear how bad it sounded. How it could be taken as a thinly veiled plea. She was embarrassing herself for no good reason.
“Of course not,” he laughed. “You wouldn’t date anyone unless there was a three-page written application.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Four pages.”
The way his face split again made it bloody difficult to hold back a grin of her own.
Merlin, he looked so tender when he laughed. She couldn’t recall ever seeing him laugh that way. Not in a long time, and certainly not with her.
She glanced around the shop to grasp onto something that wasn’t him, afraid that her gaze would disclose too much. A well-known book came into view, and she seized the opportunity. Rolling up on her toes to reach for it, she wobbled, her fingers nudging the book loose from the high shelf.
“Need some help, pixie?”
She swivelled around, lips pursed. “Rich, smart guy. And how would you help me with your hands?”
“Give you a leg up? You could stand on my knee?” he nodded towards his leg with a smirk.
Just the thought of balancing above him made her uneasy and giggly all at once. What was it about him that turned everything warm and weak, easy even? He just stood there, perfectly charming. Boyish and pleasant. Surprisingly so. She shook her head — mostly at herself — as she presented the book she had retrieved.
“How about this one then? Alchemy in the Stars?”
It was a classic, one of the most revered books in the wizarding world.
“Maybe something newer?” he mused, then paused to look around the shop. “What would you choose if you could pick one for yourself?”
“Me?”
“Yes, you,” his brow arched with maddening humour. “You do read books, don’t you? Those with letters and sentences, right? Not just pictures.”
She halted half a second before blowing him a raspberry, trying so hard not to let him get under her skin. She suspected it was too late, though — judging by the way her neck heated under his gaze.
“You know I have a mile-long list, right?” she groaned. “My to-be-read list grows every time I come here. I’ll have to live till 200 to finish it.”
“I hope you get to be 201 then.” The sweetness of his words hit somewhere between her ribs — striking something fragile and shivering. “What’s at the top of that list, Granger?”
She mulled it over, carefully choosing the right answer. “It’s a tie between Sands of Oblivion and The Mortal and the Moon.”
“Not Hogwarts — A history?”
“How…? How do you know that?”
“Because the one at Hogwarts’ library was always checked out. Everybody knew you were hogging it.”
He let the accusation hang in the air with a tight-lipped expression. A few seconds later, he cracked another smile.
“Sands of Oblivion — is that the one by Henri Auclair?”
For a moment, she just stared at him and nodded. “You know it?”
“Yes, I’ve been meaning to read it. I just haven’t found time for it yet.”
He was surprisingly well-informed, perhaps even well-read. Evidently, it shouldn’t come as a surprise. He had always been a diligent student at Hogwarts, fighting her for top marks in every class, so annoyingly committed. And today, he seemed cultured and refined in a way that rose above pureblood manners.
A rare example of a man.
Regrettably so. And currently, he was buying presents for someone special. A childish part of her pictured herself dumping the books in his arms and storming off. Leave the man to fend for himself. Surely, there were ink pots that needed attending to.
But his hands.
As if sensing her mood, he leaned in. “How do you find time and patience for this? Catering for difficult customers.”
And just like — with a sardonic roll of his eyes — he blew away her reservations. She flashed him a skewed smile.
“It’s not that bad. I like being here. It’s something that doesn’t require my mind to work overtime. It’s quite peaceful, even when the customers are being difficult — which I rarely think they are.”
She gave him that, following it with a pointed look — teasing to the point of flirting. She rolled her eyes inwardly.
“I thought you were too busy at St. Mungo’s. Are you making any progress in your research? Advances with that cure for lycanthropy?”
“I am, thank you. I’ve been struggling with some magical signatures in the condition’s genetic profile, but I’m rather confident about the outcome of my recent tests. Thank you for the last grant, by the way. It made a huge difference. I got to…”
Without blinking, she embarked on a lecture about her latest endeavours in the lab. She went on and on until she caught herself, red-cheeked, slightly out of breath from the stream of words that had escaped her. He had said nothing, just listened like it was the most captivating thing he’d heard of. Like she wasn’t really boring him with all her blathering.
She wanted a man like that, she realised with a pang to her heart. Someone who would just listen and value her words because they mattered to her and therefore mattered to him.
He stood so tall above her with his gentle grey eyes — still, he felt close, as if space was shrinking between them — growing warm and intimate.
“Your eyes shine when you talk about your work,” he said, his voice a low, delicious rumble. “Must be nice to have something that fills your life like that.”
For a second, she was about to blurt out the truth about the great incompleteness of her life. Her failure to find someone special to care for — someone only for her. Not just werewolves or customers seeking books. Someone to spend Christmas with. Someone to buy presents for and share books with. Someone to cuddle up with, staring out the window at the snowfall together.
She huffed at herself for being naïve. Where would she find time, and more importantly, where would she find the man? The excellent candidate in front of her was obviously not a real contender for the spot — no matter how tempting he was.
Ah, so many missed opportunities. She bit her lip to press herself back into reality, the small sting of her teeth nothing compared to the one on the inside.
And then he just had to say it. As if he read her thoughts, he asked with a sincere expression:
“So much care for others. But who takes care of you, Granger?”
With a faint shudder in her chest, she straightened her back, steeled the molten parts before she answered. “I take care of myself, thank you very much. No need for the pity party, Malfoy.”
It sounded more reassured than it was, and the way his eyes lingered showed he saw right through her. He could have stuck it to her, landing a sophisticated barb about her sad life because it was the easiest thing to do.
But he didn’t.
“I’ll take both.” He tipped his head towards the bookcases.
“The books?” The question was dumb.
He leaned in with a smirk. “Anything else I should take with me?”
She could have sworn it sounded like anyone. But that would have made no sense. She tossed her curls to free her mind of rogue ideas. She squashed the question Anything else I can tempt you with? and resorted to the more neutral, “Anything else I can help you with, Malfoy?”
For a moment, they stalled while she picked up the two titles. Time snagged, stopped and started again in small jerks. Both looked around the shop, as if searching for something to hold onto, to keep the moment afloat and prolong the unexpected warm glow.
In a hardly recognised effort to soak up and retain every little detail, she let her gaze drift over the dark wool of his coat. It framed his broad shoulders so neatly, making him look like a model who had just stepped out of a fashion magazine. The fabric looked expensive, and its softness made her fingers tingle with the need to touch, to reach out and curl into it in a vain attempt to keep him there with her. Around his neck was a woollen scarf, cream with a single line of black. Everything about him just screamed quality and softness. Perhaps the biggest surprise of all was the unimagined warmth radiating from the stunning, grown-up Malfoy.
Above it all, his blond hair had dried somewhat, a few pale locks falling to his forehead in a diminutive disruption of his meticulous elegance. It made him feel human. The swell inside her chest was a strange mix of melancholy and astonishment. No matter how she told herself differently, she wasn’t quite ready to let go of him yet, and she nearly grabbed a new book to strike another conversation with him — just to hear him speak again.
“I believe that’ll be all for now,” he mumbled, his eyes suddenly glued to the books in her hands.
“Want me to wrap the present?” she asked, forcing a fresh tone, masking her thoughts with joviality.
“Yes, please,” he said with a low grin, waving his bandaged hands before her. “I won’t have it ready by New Year’s Eve if I have to do it myself.”
She smiled at the bookcases as they weaved through the shop towards the till. It was a second home to her, cosy and vibrating with all those unread words — books waiting for her at every turn. Still, something else vibrated along with the hum of undiscovered book worlds. Something that had to do with the man strolling leisurely behind her.
Back at the desk, she wrapped the books with the finest gift paper she could find — a decadent dark green with accents of gold. She figured it would please the Slytherin wizard. His eyes seemed to trail her fingers with quiet interest as she worked to sharpen the creases. Once more, she could have used magic for the process, but there was something diligent and caring about doing it by hand. And even if she refused to acknowledge the fact, it took longer — a minor detail, obviously.
“Do you want a card to go along with the gift?” She lifted her eyes to his.
Something unreadable hitched in his gaze as if she had caught him stealing or leering, but it was tender — a flicker, and then it was gone. Her cheeks reacted with a predictable blush — it was getting noticeable and, to be honest, a little embarrassing. To be melting like that in front of a customer. Ridiculous.
“Sure,” he murmured vaguely before he snapped back from somewhere distant. “No, of course. I’d love a card.”
She tilted her head towards the stand with greeting cards in all sizes and shapes.
“Which card do you want?”
His gaze roamed over the cards with a cagey expression. He seemed at a loss, reluctant to move the transaction forward, suddenly withdrawn as if he were speculating, thoughts spinning somewhere far away.
“I don’t know,” he said, his voice snagged by a hoarse rasp. “Which one would you pick?”
In truth, she didn’t need much time to choose but turned the stand a few times to make the choice seem deliberate. She picked the one with a snowy path through a white dusted pine forest. It fit in so many ways. Green, snow, open paths — if only… All that was lacking from the image was pairs of footprints winding down the trail, side by side.
Malfoy shifted against the counter as he cleared his throat.
“Could you write it for me? I’d like to give the present today.”
Time halted unbearably when she met his eyes again.
“Want me to write it for you?” she stared at him in disbelief, her stomach churning with something cold and unforgiving.
He waved his hands at her with a lopsided smile. She really — really — didn’t want to, but it was the benign thing to do. She pressed her tongue against her teeth and picked a quill, silently cursing herself for being too kind. Such a pushover for him. Stupid.
“How many lines? Approximately?”
He seemed to think it over. “Let’s see.” He paused. “Make room. I’m feeling verbose,” he winked.
With a conspiratorial expression, he started citing, stretching the words and making pauses between sentences to let her keep up with the transcription.
“Merry Christmas.
I wish I could say these words to you in person — but for now, this will have to do. I want you to know that I think of you.”
His baritone voice cut into her with agonising precision. Still, she couldn’t help but love the soft rumble, curling around her like dark caramel and winter spices, the quality of something old and refined.
“That you fill my life with something other than pain and regret. The knowledge of you being somewhere near makes me breathe a little deeper, try a little harder. You make the world feel a little less cold.”
She stared at him for a second. Just the words made her heart flutter. How could he be this? Malfoy? Soft and poetic? His grey eyes flowed with something intangible and unreadable. He looked away briefly as if she had peered into something she wasn’t supposed to see. Strangely, she was the one to feel guilty when he was the one spilling his heart to some unnamed person. Like she had no business hearing this side of him. The knot in her stomach tightened.
He cleared his voice and continued when she had finished writing the last line — her lettering not half as neat as she would have liked.
“I love the way your eyes shine when you’re passionate about something, when you stare out of the window with those wide, dreamy eyes — it makes me want to be someone for you, the one you see. Someone worthy of you. Someone who will take care of you because you’re important. Maybe one day you’ll grant me the possibility to show you. I hope that someday I can say these words while I look you in the eyes.”
He paused again, graciously waiting for her to complete the line. She felt the weight of the words hit her like an avalanche, icy and suffocating. So much longing for someone — mirroring her own ache, and it felt as if she was missing out on something monumental. As if she really wanted him to say the words to her — not just at her.
Deep down, that was the truth. To have someone like Malfoy whisper kind words to her, tender and devoted — that was perhaps her one Christmas wish. Damn Ginny for having planted that seed again.
The blond wizard shifted abruptly from one foot to the other as if hit by the same unease as her. As if he finally realised the unsuitability of spilling his words of love meant for someone else. His eyes darted between the lines on the card and her face, an uncharacteristic, unsure expression gracing his gorgeous face as he read out the last words for her. She thought she heard a slight tremble in his voice as he wrapped up the greeting with a half-apologetic shrug.
“Some gifts are chosen carefully — others simply feel right. I hope this one is right for you. D.M.”
It curdled inside her to write it, a vicious clench to her gut, ugly and primitive like jealousy — knowing the beautiful words were aimed at someone else. Such sweet promises she would never hear or read from him. She bit her lip to stop herself from tearing up. Her eyes felt hot, and the quill groaned from the strain as she placed the last period with a hard press.
“Thanks for helping me,” he muttered, his voice suddenly downcast and flat.
She made a non-committal sound and shrugged. With practised movements, she closed the card over the barely dry ink and shoved it into the envelope. She slid it under the ribbon of the package, completing the present for the pale man. It sat there on the desk, all Christmassy and luring, as Malfoy reached into the pocket of his coat. She couldn’t bear to look at him. Instead, she stared at the present, barely registering the soft ring of the Galleons on the counter.
She scooped up the payment and worked the stubborn old till to erase the evidence of the precarious trade — words and feelings hiding behind gift wraps and coveted books. A treacherous hitch walloped through her chest.
Her eyes snapped up to his, more intent than she wanted them to be. “Thanks for shopping at Flourish & Blott’s,” she said with a deceptively singsong tone. “Merry Christmas, Malfoy.”
The air seemed to have left him as he nodded instead of replying. She saw his jaw clench tight as if he was holding something back. Then he turned on his heel and strode for the door, suddenly in a hurry. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a flash of white crumpled against the desk. Something scrunched — a bandage.
“Malfoy, you forgot your present,” she called after him, waving the package with the pleasant weight of books at him.
He turned towards her, head cocked with a teasing air.
“No, I didn’t. Merry Christmas, Hermione.”
His lips curled into a smile before he wrenched the doorknob — his hand perfectly whole — and vanished into the swirling flurry of snow.