And Broken is Broken
(Draco/Hermione)
Written for rjade829, my fellow closet Draco/Hermione shipper

She didn’t – hadn’t– loved him.

She was never meant to be his. He was never meant to be hers. Of course, these petty technicalities matter little for ultimately they presented but the smallest of hurdles, easily overcome in the durm and strang of war. It doesn’t matter how it came to be – only that it was a war and lines were crossed and Hermione Granger, for all her sensibilities, found herself swept along.

Perhaps it was that infamous Gryffindor nerve spurring her onwards, even when she knew there could be no happy ending. Even in their darkest, most desperate hours, he would not go so far as to say that he loved her, would make an honest woman of her. The most striking indication that something deeper festered beneath the surface was when Malfoy’s firm stance shifted from “I don’t love you, Granger,” to “I can’t love you,” which was – coming from the mouth of a Malfoy – practically on par with a proposal of marriage, as close to a diamond ring on her finger as could be.

Not that she was daft enough to think he’d marry her. Not then. Not ever. As it was, he married respectably, married well enough for the Daily Prophet to work itself into a right state covering the event and the many very public spats between the newly minted Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy that followed. As for Malfoy and Hermione, their circles never crossed again. Had there been any need for supervision, his luckless bride would have to seen to it that their paths be kept separate, but both parties had long accepted the fact that they were never going to grow old together. And, after his tenth proposal, she accepted Ronald Weasley’s hand in marriage, because he was steady, predictable… because she’d run out of reasons to turn him down. It was better this way, she’d told herself as she’d shuffled her wedding bouquet in her moist palms. This way – Ron’s way – her recollections of the two might never be entwined.  

And now both are gone and all she has are the memories. If Ron was cozy dayrooms, muggy jaunts on the Quidditch Pitch, all banter and bickering to cover up for what wasn’t there, and the give and take of day-to-day living, Draco Malfoy was dark stairwells, snuffed out candelabras, bitter winter winds raising the hairs on the back of one’s neck, strong words and stronger desires, a sprint to the finish line.

She is an old woman now. It does not do to dwell on the “what ifs” and “could have beens.” Were she to divulge her recollections now, her children and grandchildren would only smile and laugh, humoring the harebrained antics of a batty old woman. How could they ever believe that she loved someone other than their father – their grandfather – the man with the ginger hair and the notoriously short fuse? Ronald Weasley, the man who teased her for her lackluster cooking skills and danced her around the parlor with a child perched atop his feet. Ronald Weasley, the good father – the good husband -- was not to be supplanted in their eyes. She is too old to set the record straight. Her bones ache and her eyes are weary but she still remembers the rush of youth, of being young and reckless and in love. But all this happened so long ago and now she can only bear to remember it as it was for that briefest of moments. She no longer has the energy to piece everything back together, for fear that the cracks will shine through.