Vacivitas

Chapter Twenty-Three

"I've broken bones too many times since I got to your house," she says after a while.

To her surprise, he laughs. It's quiet. It's barely there.

But it's a laugh.

Hermione rolls onto her back, his arm moving so she's still cradled between it and his side. She rests her head against the front of his shoulder and edge of his chest, gazing up at the canopy of the four poster.

"I don't remember the last time I could see the sunlight," she says, her voice a murmur. "It's always felt so dreary."

"The manor is dreary."

"Of course it is, but that's besides the point."

"You were in a dark pit for months before it."

"Yes, but that's not what I'm talking about. I mean, I remember on the day of the battle, the sky was grey. The sun never came out from behind the clouds. It stayed that way for days. I haven't noticed it since."

As she speaks, she raises her hand a little above them. Somehow, he knows to do the same. They spread their fingers and press their fingertips together, absentmindedly watching themselves do so.

"I never liked the sun," he replies. "Too bright and I don't like the heat."

"Malfoy, there's never a day where I thought you liked the sun. You are white as Hell."

Another laugh from him, and the hand of the arm she's laying on slides down to her lower back.

"There is that, yes. But I mean, there's just something about being out in the sun, trapped with no escape that always made my skin crawl. Like being a bug caught in a...A jar, or something."

"I once kept a bug in a jar," Hernione says.

"How interesting. What did you do, stare at it?"

"Sometimes. Mostly I just watched it running around in circles, feeling smug."

"...Is this where I'm meant to ask why the smugness?"

"Sure."

"Why the smugness?"

"It was Rita Skeeter."

Malfoy bursts out a laugh, and she feels it shake his entire body. "You trapped Rita Skeeter in a jar?! How the Hell did you manage that?"

Hermione lets her hand fall to his stomach. "She's an Animagus. I just waited for the opportunity and trapped her. She was a nightmare. I hated her so much during the Triwizard Tournament."

"You did that in Fourth Year?"

"Yes."

"Ruthless. You definitely should have been in Slytherin."

She doesn't laugh but a small smirk plays across her lips. "If I had been, would you have hated me any less?"

"I don't know, to be honest. I was such a prat back then. My mind was so poisoned by my parents' opinions and ideals that I think it's safe to say that things would have turned out the same between us."

"Then or now?"

She feels his fingertips begin stroking her forearm, back and forth, wrist to elbow.

"Are you insulting me?" he asks.

"Yes. You're still a prat."

"No, I'm not." She can hear the smile in his voice, and she's tempted again to look. The last time she saw him smile was the night he was drunk, and she's not sure that counts. "I'm worse."