I sighed and tried bending. After multiple tries, I got it but as I stood again, there was a gush of liquid down my legs.
My water had broke.
*****
Hermione pov
I straightened up and immediately felt dizzy. I held onto the sink to steady myself. The amniotic fluid continued dripping out and Anne turned to see.
"Ew Beaver! Did you wet yourself?!"
I was about to answer when a contraction, the worst pain I had ever felt, wracked my stomach. I screamed, my voice loud and shrill. Then I fell to the floor, gasping for air. The three girls were by my side in a few seconds and I managed to stammer out a weak "Draco." Renee, the fastest, ran out the door while the other two stayed by me. Every thing started turning black and the pain seemed to disappear so I closed my eyes and welcomed the darkness.
*****
Draco pov
After Hermione went to the loo, I talked to her family for a bit. Mostly her dad and Jacob, but also her good aunt, as Hermione called her.
"So Draco, tell me: how exactly did you propose to her?"
I opened my mouth to answer, smiling at the memory, when a scream pierced the air. It was loud and gut wrenching. I had only heard it once in my life before, but it had been once too many. That sound was ingrained into my memory forever. It was Hermione's scream. She was in pain, lots of pain.
I jumped up, ignoring the many glasses that fell because of my actions and started to run down the stairs and to the women's restroom. Halfway down the stairs, I bumped into Renee and she started falling. I, not thinking much, whipped out my wand and waved it, levitating her to the top, and continued running. Hermione was laying on the ground, unmoving, and her cousins were over her, staring in shock.
They looked up when they saw me and Anne said, "Why are you holding a stick?"
I looked down and realized my wand was still in my hand, but I couldn't care less right now. My wife, the mother of my child, my one true love, was laying on the floor and her first question was why I was holding a stick! I exploded, "YOUR COUSIN IS LAYING ON THE FLOOR AND YOUR FIRST QUESTION FOR ME IS WHY I'M HOLDING A STICK?! FORGET ABOUT THE DAMN STICK! WHAT IN THE BLOODY HELL HAPPENED?!"
"She went to the loo, came out, her earring fell, she tried to pick it up, she peed or something, she screamed, she fell, she asked for you, Renee went to get you, she closed her eyes, you came."
I nodded, processing everything. She was in labor. Her water had broke. She needed to wake up. I leaned over Hermione and started kissing her face, saying "Hemrione! Wake up! I love you! Please Mione!"
Then, just minutes later, her body tensed and started shaking. She was making whimpering sounds but was still unconscious. It was a contraction and she still wasn't waking.
"Get her parents here. And get some napkins. Now!" I said to the girls, who jumped up and Anne ran for the parents while Emily went to get the napkins. She was still close enough to see the wand but it didn't matter anymore. I couldn't lose her. I took out my wand and said, "Reneverate." Her eyes opened and she tried sitting up.
"I'm going to pick you up Hemrione. Shhh, it's okay. The baby's coming Mione. You'll be fine." I said as she started crying.
"It-it h-hurts Dra-Draco. It hur-hurts." She sobbed as I slid my arms underneath her and picked her up slowly.
"I know baby. I know. I'm sorry." I said quietly, kissing her forehead as I walked toward the deck.
A contraction came and she tensed, screaming in my ear, "YOU DID THIS TO ME! I HATE YOU MALFOY!! WHERE THE HELL IS MY WAND?! GIVE IT TO ME NOW!" She somehow managed to take it out of her purse, she held it up to curse me and I said, "Hermione, no. Don't do that, I don't mind but you want your son to have a dad, don't you?"
"THIS BLOODY HURTS DRACO!!! AND YOU DID THIS TO ME! I DONT CARE IF HE HAS A DAD OR NOT! AVAD-"
I cut her off with a kiss. She didn't actually want to kill me. It was just the pain talking. Right?
I let her lips go when she stopped struggling. When I pulled away, her contraction had stopped and she was tired and breathing heavily, but at least she didn't want to kill me anymore.
"M'sorry Draco. I don't want to kill you. I don't know what came over me, take my wand before I do anything dangerous." She panted, shoving her wand into my pocket.
I kissed her as we reached the parents. We would have reached much faster, but I stopped walking when she got a contraction, and I had been walking very slow to not hurt her or the baby. I laid her down on the deck chair which was covered with blankets, and her parents came to us.
"What happened?!"
"She's in labor, we have to turn the ship around."
"Okay, Andrew! John! Adam! Can you tell the captain? She's in labor!" Her dad said to his three brother-in-laws. The men nodded and left immediately.
Hermione was panting, sobbing, and trying to talk at the same time. I knew that if she didn't calm down soon, she would start hyperventilating, stopping the flow of oxygen, which could be dangerous for the baby, especially when in labor.
"Hermione, calm down. Please, for the baby. Slow deep breathes. In...and out...in...and out... good job." I said as she followed my directions.
All her cousins were running all over, getting things to help her. Her mum, dad, and Olivia were sitting by us while her other two aunts were helping the cousins.
I saw her breathing change and go uneven again and I told her to calm down.
"I SWEAR, IF YOU TELL ME TO BLOODY CALM DOWN ONE MORE TIME! GIVE ME THE WAND! I SAID, GIVE ME THE DAMN WAND!!!!" She screamed, squeezing my hand till it was numb, right in front of a muggle. "I WILL AVADA YOU! NO! I'LL CRUCIO YOU SO MAYBE YOU CAN FEEL A FRACTION OF THE PAIN! I DONT CARE ABOUT THIS KID HAVING A DAD OR NOT! THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!!! WHY THE HELL DID YOU MAKE ME COME ON THE CRUISE?! WE COULD HAVE GONE TO ST MUNGOS BY NOW BUT NOOOO... WITTLE DWACO WANTS TO GO SEE THE RIVER! NOW GUESS WHAT?! MY KID IS GOING TO BE BORN OVER WATER! IN FRANCE! I HATE YOU!"
I had forced her to come on the cruise? I had wanted to see the river? I wanted to argue but I knew she would just scream and cry.
She stopped screaming as the contraction stopped and she saw her aunt. I could practically see her thoughts, not even using legilimency, she was realizing everything she had said, in front of a muggle.
"Draco, I...I broke the statute of secrecy! I'm going to Azkaban! The dementors! I can't! The war! Bellatrix! I can't!" She cried, hugging me as if she hadn't just been threatening me with death and torture a minute ago.
And still, I had to be nice. She was, as she had said earlier, overly sensitive and emotional and hormonal, and me being mad wouldn't help. So I hugged her, "Shhhh. You're not going to Azkaban sweetie. They can't blame you. I'm sorry, I should have done something."
She sobbed quietly as the rest of her family came up.
"The captain's taking us back to the port."
As the ship started turning around, she covered her mouth with her hands. Seeing this, I conjured a bucket and she threw up into it. "I dont normally get sea sick...weird."
"Hermione, I think it's probably morning sickness more than anything."
"Not even bloody morning...hate this shit, hate you, hate everyone and everything." She grumbled before puking again, "Draco, can we go to st Mungo's? Have this ship take us there? Can't Floo back there anyway. And it takes around five hours, right? By then the baby should be born, hopefully."
"Hermione, you're already 8 cm dilated. The labor must have started this morning or even earlier. The baby should be crowning in an hour or two and then you can push." Her mom said after checking everything.
"Two more hours of this?! I bloody hate you Draco! Go tell the captain to go to London." She said, fake paling considerably.
I nodded and asked her uncles to go ask the captain that.
Now it was all her aunts, cousins, and her parents, plus the two of us, up here on the deck.
I checked the time and saw that it had already been two and a half hours since dinner. Apparently Jean realized this too because she suggested that Olivia and Henry, Hermione's dad, take a break and Renee and Camille could help her. They grudgingly agreed and were replaced. Camille and Jean were at Hermione's feet, checking everything, and Renee came to one side of Hermione and sat down, talking to her.
"Do you know the gender?"
Hermione was panting heavily so I started to reply but she held up a hand, out of Hermione's sight, to make me quiet. She was trying to distract Hermione from the pain.
"Boy" she growled, tensing as yet another contraction grasped her. She blindly grabbed for my hand which I handed to her, flinching at the pressure.
This time, she said a series of bad words, all directed at me, that made everyone go red. If anyone thought she was innocent and kind before, they were proven wrong. This woman knew more curse words than a sailor, which was ironic since we were on a boat. The words were bad, bad enough to be censored on a muggle film.
"Do you two have any names?"
"NO! LEAVE ME ALONE HARRIS! YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THIS FEELS LIKE! NEVER AGAIN MALFOY!!!! I HATED BEING AN ONLY CHILD BUT I COMPLETELY SEE WHY!! THIS HURTS LIKE HELL MALFOY! HOW IN THE WORLD DID MOLLY DO THIS SEVEN TIMES?! OUR CHILD WILL BE AN ONLY CHILD, I GUARANTEE YOU THAT!"
I hated seeing her in pain. Once had already been too much. She had been tortured in my house, by my aunt, and now had a reminder of it carved into her arm. And now she was in even more pain, according to her. I hated it, especially because I couldn't do anything to help. But this pain was better, even if it hurt more, this pain was giving us a family, a little baby boy to take care of forever.
"Draco?" She whimpered, looking at me with big, round, red-rimmed eyes, tears pouring out of them. Those eyes. Everything about them made me melt. The chocolatey color, the long lashes. Not just the eyes, all of her made me feel happy. Her hair, a dark caramel brown color and not nearly as bushy as it used to be. The usually soft pink lips, still beautiful even if they were chapped and bleeding slightly right now. Her skin, soft and smooth, covered in sweat and tears at the moment. It was pale and flushed at the same time. Her protruding stomach, covered with the Slytherin green material, made her look even more beautiful. No matter what she thought, she was always going to look amazing. She was amazing.
I was brought out of my thoughts by a very annoyed Hermione, "Draco?...Draco? Draco?!"
"Huh? Yes darling?"
"I'm going to faint, it's spinning around. I'm not joking Draco, I'm going to faint!"
I looked over at Jean, who looked scared too, and it hit me: we were doing this on our own. If something went wrong, there was a huge chance that we could lose Hermione or the baby—I could lose them.
"Draco...It's blurry, I can't see anything. Can I take a nap?" Her voice sounded so weak and when I looked back at her, I noticed how she was slumped back on the chair, eyes closed. One hand was clinging onto mine and the other was on the forehead.
"I don't know, Jean? Can she sleep?"
"Hermione, sweetie, you can try but with the contractions coming just two minutes apart, it won't be long before you're crowning."
"Okay, the sooner this thing is out, the better." She grumbled, tears streaming out and her body shaking as a contraction began. She managed to say, clawing her nails into my hand, "Use the thing and silence me! We can't risk anything else!"
I hesitated but saw her biting her lips to not scream, drawing blood. Her face was scrunched up in pain and her eyes were filled with tears. I took my wand out and waved it, silently casting a spell to silence her. The second I did it, her mouth opened and moved, but no sound came out. She clenched my hand even tighter and it started to turn gray.
"Hermione, you can push now!"
I saw her mouth moving and her face scrunched up with concentration. It continued for about a half hour and my hand definitely broke in the process, but it didn't matter, and then the silencing charms broke and we could hear her again.
"—URTS DRACO! HOW THE HELL IS THERE NO WAY TO STOP THIS PAIN?!"
"I'm sorry Hermione. But the contractions are right on top of each other now. This baby will be born soon and we'll be parents. It'll be fun!"
"Fun? Fun?! FUN?! It'll be FUN?! IS THAT THE ONLY REASON YOU WANTED A CHILD?! BECAUSE ITS FUN?! I can't do this anymore, it hurts too much Draco. I did it for this long, YOUR TURN NOW!"
"Sorry Hermione, but you have to do this, and you can do it. You're stro—"
"SHUT UP! I DON'T WANT TO HEAR YOUR IDIOTIC EXCU—Oh!"
"Wha—" I cut off as someone started crying. I looked around and saw that Hermione was crying, but it wasn't her. She was also smiling.
"What happened? Why are you smiling?"
"The baby, he's here." She whispered, leaning over to hug me. I held her tightly and looked over at Jean.
"Draco? Do you two have any baby clothes? Or a nappy?" She asked, holding a small, blood-covered, pink, wrinkled thing in her hands. I stared at her, unable to speak.
That was my baby. My son. My own flesh and blood. I was a dad. Hermione was a mum. We were parents. I had a son!
"We have some in the bag, Draco?"
I handed Jean the bag but I couldn't respond as Jean cleaned him up, put a diaper on, and handed me the baby. I stared at him. He had a very large amount of hair for a baby, but it was the same color as mine so it looked nearly invisible. His eyes were closed and his face was scrunched up, a loud wail coming out of his mouth. He was smaller than Blaise and Luna's kid had been, having been born at 35 weeks pregnant, but he was healthy. Plus magical babies could be born earlier and would survive, most of the time.
I handed him to Hermione. She took one look at him and started crying, "This is our baby Draco! O-our b-b-baby!"
I smiled and let my own tears flow, kissing them both. She nursed our son and I laid next to her, looking at the sky. Now that we were further from the city, you could see the stars. As he finished drinking, she gave him to me and turned around to sleep. I held him, gently rocking him to sleep.
"That, baby, is a star. That one right there is Orion. That one is the Big Dipper. That one's Draco, that's the one I'm named after. That one is Scorpius, and that one's Leo." I said, pointing with one hand. Hermione turned around and half asleep, mumbled, "You know he can't see yet... but that's his name."
"What is?" I asked and she whispered, smiling softly, "Scorpius."
"Scorpius." I tried it out for effect and it rolled off my tongue. I nodded and looked down at my lap. Scorpius. Scorpius was now asleep. I was officially a dad!
A/n: sorry this chapter took so long!! But it's done now, hope you liked it. I think there will be one more chapter and then it's done.
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