by Harry Potter
~*~
Over the next week, Harry kept busy by staying away from Draco. Whenever Harry passed Draco, the brave Gryffindor would duck behind something (a statue or tapestry) or someone (usually Hermione) in order to hide his courageous self. Thankfully, Malfoy had not joined the other seventh years in class yet; he was busy trying to catch up on the lessons he had missed. If he had shared lessons with his peers, Harry had a plan in order to avoid any unnecessary or uncomfortable contact. Our hero planned to bravely arrive five minutes late to each lesson that he shared with the Slytherin so that he wouldn’t bump shoulders with Malfoy as they entered. Harry would also leave class early, sneaking out under his Cloak, for the same reason.
At first Hermione had criticized Harry for his irrational fear of Draco. “Just because he’s come out of the closet doesn’t mean he’s going to violate you,” she had argued. Then she saw the love letters that Draco had been slipping under the door of the Head Students quarters. She had gotten as far as “... I want you to pull back my foreskin and...” before she realized that Harry’s irrational fear was actually quite rational.
One day, as Draco pranced down the corridor and Harry hid behind Hermione, the brunette witch asked, “Draco’s a marked Death Eater, how’d you suppose he was able to overcome the pain of the Morgy Ritual? I mean, we sent over a hundred running for help. Why didn’t he end up at St Mungo’s like the others?”
“Don’t know,” Harry whispered, dreading that Draco might hear him.
“Oh hell,” cursed Hermione. “I just remembered. Snape’s on our side.”
“And?”
“And he’s a marked Death Eater. That means he suffered from the Morgy Ritual as well.”
“Good.”
“Harry, we should have warned him,” protested Hermione.
“Why?”
“Because he’s working for us,” she explained. “He’s helping us hunt Horcruxes. We should have warned him that we were planning an attack against all of the Death Eaters.”
“And just how were we supposed to do that?” asked Harry. “I can’t just send him a post now can I?
“‘Dear Snape,
We’re planning on hurting the lot of you. Hope you don’t mind.
Yours truly,
Harry and Hermione.’” mocked Harry.
“We could have tried,” she persisted.
“No, we couldn’t,” Harry countered. “If someone had intercepted our note, Snape would be revealed and most likely killed.”
“Oh,” Hermione breathed.
“Is that Harry Potter?” an effeminate voice called out.
Harry and Hermione looked in horror as Draco skipped toward them, waving his arms about frantically.
“Run,” Harry ordered, dragging Hermione behind him as they bolted around the corner.
~*~
After Hermione placed a simple Glamour Charm on her eyes to change them back to their previous brown (Harry was still paranoid that Hermione’s parents would be furious over the “Sorry I shagged your eyes green” incident), the young couple began packing for their stay at her parents’ house.
“Do I have to go?” whimpered Harry. The thought of how upset her parents were when they had found out that Harry and Hermione were having a physical relationship made the young wizard second guess his decision to visit the Grangers.
“You can stay here,” she offered as she folded up several pairs of his socks. “Of course then you’d be risking your virtue with Draco milling about.”
“Let me help you with that,” offered Harry, and placed several of his pullovers into the suitcase.
~*~
The train ride to King’s Cross was uneventful; uneventful to everyone except for Ginny that is.
“Why is the damn train jostling so much,” the red haired witch said peevishly while her complexion turned a nasty green.
Ginny vomited four times in total. Three of those times, she had made it to the loo. Her fourth wasn’t so lucky. Neither was Ron, who was the proud owner of the lap that his sister got sick on.
“What’s your problem?” Ron demanded while he tried to clean the sick from his robes and trousers.
“It’s not me,” Ginny said, wiping her mouth with the back of her sleeve. “The bloody train’s bouncing too much.”
“Well, it’s not bouncing more than it normally does,” Ron pointed out.
One shared looked with Hermione told Harry that his girlfriend was thinking the same thing as he was; “Ginny’s baby doesn’t like to travel.”
~*~
If Harry was hoping that Hermione’s parents had grown more accepting of their relationship, his hopes were dashed when Richard, Hermione’s father, greeted the young wizard by asking “Have you enjoyed molesting my princess?”
The car ride to Hermione’s began politely, despite Richard’s greeting. For fifteen minutes, Hermione and her parents talked and talked. Harry, sagely, decided not to tempt the elder Grangers’ ire by attempting to join in on the conversation. Then without warning, Fiona asked her daughter flatly, “Hermione, are you using protection?”
“Of course I am, mother,” Hermione replied, clearly offended that her mother thought such a thing.
“Don’t give me attitude, young lady,” her mother snapped. “I don’t know what types of precautions you have in the magical world and how effective they are.”
“They’re very effective,” informed Hermione.
“Oh really? Tell me, does that red head girl you got off the train with use protection?” demanded Fiona.
“What do you mean?” asked Hermione.
“I can tell she’s pregnant,” Fiona said hotly. “Do you use the same protection she used?”
“How can you tell Ginny’s pregnant?” Hermione inquired. “She isn’t showing, is she?”
“I’m a mum, I don’t need to see a bump to tell when someone’s with child.”
“It’s that particular shade of green she had about her,” Richard grumbled, obviously angry that he was forced to be in close proximity to the person responsible for deflowering his princess. “Your mother got that way whenever we would travel back when she had you.”
Harry felt very sorry for Ginny. If Fiona, who only had one child, could tell from a distance with one look that Ginny was pregnant, certainly Mrs. Weasley, who had seven children, would find out. Harry suspected that he would be able to hear Mrs. Weasley screaming at her daughter halfway across the country.
“So, answer the question, young lady. Do you and that girl use the same type of protection?” Fiona asked again.
“No, I use a better one. More reliable,” Hermione lied. Clearly she didn’t want to admit to her mother that she did use the same charm Ginny had used but the fact that Neville was so overly-endowed that he was able to physically bypass the seaman repellent charm by pushing through Ginny’s cervix. There are some things one cannot discus with one’s parents. That definitely includes “My friend’s boyfriend makes Hippogriffs feel inadequate.”
When they got to the house, Richard sweetly said to his daughter “Your room’s just the way you left it, princess.” He then turned to Harry and pointed to the couch. “You’ll be sleeping there,” he ordered with a considerable decline in the sweetness factor.
“Dad, we share the same bed at school,” protested Hermione.
Richard turned white then flashed red in less than two seconds.
“Not in my house you don’t,” he said angrily.
“Hermione, dear, it would be irresponsible for us as your parents to allow you to fornicate under our roof. Especially while you two are just dating,” her mother explained. On the surface, her voice was calm and cool, but there was an angry and venomous edge hidden just bellow the calm. “Perhaps when, or if, you marry, we might allow it.”
“Over my dead body,” grumbled Richard while staring daggers at Harry.
“Until then, we will not allow you to do such things,” concluded Fiona.
~*~
The
day before Christmas, Harry had to get out of the Granger house. He and Hermione had been there for three days and they hadn’t been left alone for even a second. Her mum and dad were watching the young couple like hungry vultures. If Harry attempted to kiss his girlfriend, one or both of her parents would make a noise (like a cough or a threat of bodily harm) and glower at them.
On the second night, Hermione tried to protest to her mother after the matriarch forced her daughter from giving Harry an innocent kiss.
“Mum, I’ve done a whole lot more than just kiss him,” the brunette witch had dared to say.
“Well, you shouldn’t have, and now you’re paying the price,” her mother said firmly.
“Mum,” Hermione started to argue.
“What you did was rash and foolish,” Fiona chastised. “You should’ve waited before you moved your relationship ahead like that.”
“But mum, you were involved in a three-”
“Don’t give me that! It was the seventies, things like that happened,” Fiona said, using the same excuse that Hermione had used when she had told Harry about the infamous “Tumbleweed Dance” incident.
Because of all the tension in the air and the fact that he hadn’t shopped for Hermione yet, Harry apparated to the Leaky Cauldron so that he could pick up some gifts at Diagon Alley.
As he walked through the dimly lit pub, Harry took notice of a group of wizards sitting at a nearby table. Most of them had their heads hanging low, but one wizard was beaming happily.
“Why so glum, fellows?” the happy wizard asked his peers.
“Why so chipper?” one asked bitterly in response.
Curious as to what these wizards were talking about and why most of them were so down, Harry slowed his pace so that he could overhear the conversation.
“Obviously, you didn’t catch the Prophet the other day and the great news it reported,” the happy wizard stated.
“Yeah, we did,” a sour looking wizard countered. “What’s to be happy about?”
“One hundred and ten Death Eaters captured, my boys,” the nearly euphoric wizard declared. “This war is about to end.”
“One hundred and ten out of how many? Two hundred? Four hundred? A thousand?” a wizard asked with a frighten frown. “No one knows how many followers You Know Who has. He may have so many that a hundred Death Eaters might mean nothing to him.”
“And don’t forget about the giants or werewolves,” another pale faced wizard added. “You Know Who’s still got loads of them following him.”
The formerly happy wizard suddenly turned pale with fright.
“It’s gotten so bad, I can’t concentrate on my work,” one wizard added.
“Work? Hell, I can’t concentrate on my life,” a wizard whose hands trembled stated. “Last night, while in bed with the missus, I couldn’t even sleep much less anything else but worry about Death Eaters or giants busting through my door to kill everyone.”
“You’re over exaggerating a bit aren’t you?” the formerly cheerful wizard asked. The tone of his voice told Harry that the wizard was hoping that his peers would say at any moment that they were joking and that the situation wasn’t so dire.
“My second-cousin, his wife, and two kids were slaughtered last week,” someone offered. “Ever since then, I haven’t slept a wink. I’m always looking out the window for some attacking force.”
As the conversation continued down into despair, Harry made his way to the entrance to Diagon Alley. As the bricks stretched out of the way, a bothersome thought entered his mind; by all rights, everyone should be happy if not elated that scores of Death Eaters were now in custody. Harry and Hermione had done a great service to wizarding kind by performing the Morgy Ritual... and a great service to themselves because the sex was great, too. But for some reason, people were still frightened.
As Harry made his way to Gringott’s to pick up some money, he noticed that Diagon Alley wasn’t particularly full; only a handful of wizards and witches could be seen. He had expected that it would be jammed with people rushing to buy last minute gifts like he was doing. Sadly, Harry now knew why there weren’t many people about. Just like the wizards in the pub, people were still dreadfully afraid of the war. The fear of Voldemort and his Death Eaters and what they might do had seeped into and affected every aspect of their lives. This was so unlike his fellow students at Hogwarts; they were bright and chipper. The war had not affected them, not to the extent of the adults outside of the school.
The first place Harry stopped after fetching some gold was Flourish and Blotts to pick up a few books for Hermione (in that aspect, his girlfriend was very easy to shop for - any book would be a cherished gift). Then he paid a visit to a little curio shop to buy something for the Grangers. He looked at statues, but stayed away from anything “Princess” related (he didn’t want to give Hermione’s father a chance to say something like; “Oh this statue of a beautiful princess hasn’t been violated by some hooligan.”). After buying a magical statue of a rose that would blossom every morning, Harry decided he’d buy something special for Hermione, something very personal that he’d give to her in private.
“Oh, hello Harry,” Alicia Spinnet greeted him as he entered the shop. “Welcome back to Franklin’s of Cardiff.”
“Hi, Alicia,” Harry said with a smile.
“Did Hermione like the lingerie you bought her?” she asked. “I always suspected that she had a ‘Hello Kitty’ fetish.”
Recalling that he had not been brave enough to give his girlfriend the bra and knickers that had the cartoon cat stitched in strategic places, Harry muttered, “I forgot about those.”
“So, you’re Christmas shopping for your witch today?” Alicia asked. “We have some very nice holiday themed knickers. They’re called ‘gift-wrapped boxes.’”
“Actually, I was thinking about... uh... toys,” Harry said with a touch of embarrassment.
“It’s always the brainy ones,” Alicia said and her smile broadened.
“Tell me about it,” he said and felt his face heat up even more.
“Did you need some help or did you want to browse around a bit?”
“Um, browse,” he replied.
As Harry shuffled to the back of the shop to where the toys were kept, Alicia said “Just give me a shout if you need any help.”
After thirty minutes of shopping; placing several items back on the shelf only to pick them up again, Harry walked up to the counter and placed the dozen or so toys in front of Alicia.
“Wow, she really is kinky?” Alicia said, clearly impressed at the number of products Harry had selected.
“Yeah,” Harry said, unable to make eye contact.
Alicia rang the first three items up. Then she pointed to the fourth and asked “Have you used anything like that yet?”
“No, not yet,” Harry said while looking around the shop, hoping that no one could see what he was purchasing. Even though the shop was devoid of other customers, he was still nervous.
“You must tell me if it’s fun,” she said and placed the cardboard tube that contained the fourth item into a paper bag.
“Um, sure,” he said as politely as he could without blushing.
As Alicia continued to tally up the many toys, Harry took notice of a number of books behind the counter. Knowing that books were always welcomed for Hermione, Harry looked them over. Many of them had to do with beauty, make-up and hair, a few dealt with celebrities, but oddly, only three books covered sex and intimacy. Harry had assumed that a shop like this would be overflowing with books on such things.
“I see that you’re checking out our sex-book collection,” Alicia said following his gaze. “Don’t waste your time. One deals exclusively with ‘the joys of the missionary position.’ It’s the most prudish sex-book I’ve ever heard about. The other two are more than fifty years-old and only cover a few simple positions, nothing fun.”
“I’m surprised,” Harry said and finally made eye-contact with the witch. “I woul
d’ve reckoned a place like this would have loads of books.”
“No one’s written one in a while,” she said. “Not worth reading anyway.”
Harry pondered over the idea of copying his ‘special book’ and passing it out. It was old, like two of the books the shop had, but it was dead helpful - not just with sex either, the book had some useful spells and whatnot.
“Well, that’ll be thirty-five galleons, eight sickles, and twenty-seven knuts, please,” Alicia said and pushed the bag to Harry.
“Shouldn’t it be more?”
“I gave you the employee discount. You’re the first sale I’ve had in weeks let alone the only customer in days. No one’s even bothering to come in anymore. Everyone is so preoccupied that sex is the last thing on their mind,” Alicia said with a touch of disappointment. “Preoccupied isn’t the right way to describe it. Scared is more like it.”
“If I’m the only customer you’ve had in a while, you guys must be hurting financially,” Harry said, trying to steer the conversation away from the war. “I don’t want to take any money away from you, especially if nothing is coming in. Besides, I don’t like taking things I don’t think I’ve earned. And getting a discount just because I’m the only one here doesn’t feel right.”
“Okay then, let’s make a deal; you keep the discount but you have to do something in return, that way you will have earned it,” Alicia smiled sweetly at Harry and reached in the bag to pull out the mystery toy hidden in the tube. “But you must tell me how this works out, okay? I’ve been eyeing this for weeks but I’m a little curious to find out if it’s any good or not.”
If this had happened a few months previously, Harry would’ve been floored in embarrassment. The idea of someone asking him such a personal question would have left him flabbergasted. But now, after nearly every student and at least some of the teachers at Hogwarts had seen him and Hermione have sex (a lot), Harry was quite surprised to find that he wasn’t embarrassed. In fact, his previous shame over buying sex-toys disappeared as well.