Ch. 30

Blaise listened as Draco told him everything that had happened between drinks of firewhiskey. Draco was upset with himself for losing his temper with his mate, and had already downed two glasses of firewhiskey out of guilt for yelling at her.

"Mate, you fucked up bad," Blaise stated when Draco had finished.

Draco glared at him. "Thanks, I had no idea."

Blaise shrugged and said, "At least you know she loves you."

"Yea, but she said it out of anger. She might not have even meant it," Draco said sadly as he looked into his glass. "I shouldn't have accused her of only accepting me to keep me alive."

"No, you definitely shouldn't have," Blaise agreed. "Though we all know you have a tendency to lose your temper easily and try to hurt the other person you're arguing with as quickly as possible."

"I didn't want to do it to her though," Draco said, finishing his third glass. "She deserves better than me."

"I'm not going to deny that," Blaise sighed. "But at the same time, she's obviously the person you need."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that she's helping you change into a better person," Blaise explained.

Looking at his friend, Draco raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, clearly I'm becoming a better person since I reverted back to yelling and trying to hurt her so I can win the argument."

Blaise rolled his eyes. "Yeah, but when was the last time you did that? You two hardly argue, and this argument most likely needed to happen so that you two can progress in your relationship."

"Maybe," Draco trailed off. "I hope she can forgive me."

Blaise opened his mouth to speak but then paused, turning his head towards the door. "Ginny's coming."

Draco listened then and heard footsteps, looking at his friend. "How do you know it's Ginny?"

"Because it's her scent."

Almost immediately, the door burst open to reveal an angry redhead, who stormed over to Draco. Ginny stopped in front of him and pointed at him.

"Now you listen to me, Malfoy," She started in a low, threatening voice. "You need to learn that Hermione doesn't normally operate on emotions, so she is trying to figure this out the best she can. She deals with situations logically because that's the only way she knows how, and she's not used to going based off of what she's feeling. It's terrifying her since she doesn't always know how to think a situation through emotionally, and now that she's been practically thrust into an emotional situation, she's panicking. It also doesn't help that she has no basis for a romantic relationship except for my idiotic brother. The fact that she is having her emotions run something for practically the first time in her life is extremely difficult for her, and you should not be making it any more difficult!"

Draco stared between the finger pointed in his face and Ginny's anger-filled eyes. He was too scared to say anything, but he didn't have to as Ginny pointed towards the door and continued.

"Now, my best friend is sitting on her bed, crying because she's told herself that the man she loves only thinks she's accepted him to save his life. You better go over there and convince her otherwise, or so help me Merlin, I will change you back into a ferret and use you as target practice for hexes!"

The two boys stared at her with wide eyes, too scared to move. Draco then slowly stood up, inching his way around her and practically running out of the room. Blaise sat in his spot, watching her with a frightened look on his face while she fumed silently, pouring herself a shot of firewhiskey.

"Wow," Blaise started when she finished her shot. "I've haven't seen Draco that terrified of anyone since Moody first turned him into a ferret."

Ginny took a deep breath to calm herself down, looking at him. "Yeah, well. Hermione's been through enough. I don't want to see her upset anymore because of something Draco's said."

Blaise nodded in agreement, smiling at his mate and reminding himself to never get on her bad side.

"Hermione?" Draco said quietly through the door. "Can we talk?"

There was silence. He looked down at the floor and cursed himself again for losing his temper, turning away after a few minutes of nothing. But then he heard the lock click, and he turned back around quickly, opening the door slowly.

His heart dropped when he saw her red eyes looking up at him. She was sitting on the bed and had very obviously been crying. She wiped away the last of a few tears that were remaining and looked away from him as he shut the door.

His Veela bristled at the sight of his mate being so upset because of him, but he tried his best to ignore it as he slowly crossed the room towards her. She didn't move when he stopped in front of her, only sniffing and wiping her face again.

He sighed, reaching out to gently pull her up off the bed and onto her feet, wrapping an arm around her back and resting his other hand on the back of her head. He felt her arms wrap around his torso loosely, which was a start.

He stood there holding her for a few moments, rocking them both back and forth slightly. He finally sighed and said very quietly, "I'm so sorry, Hermione. I was such a prat like you said and I hope you can forgive me."

She didn't respond, only tightening her grip on him and burying her face into his chest. He pressed her closer to him, laying his head on top of hers and then realizing that she was shaking. He pulled back slightly to see that she was crying again, but she looked like she was trying to hold it in as she quickly wiped away her tears as if to hide them from him.

He sighed and said, "Hermione, just let it all out. It's not good to hold it in. You'll get a headache."

She scoffed slightly and looked away. "I'm just so tired of crying. I cried too much over the summer, cried too much last year, cried too much today; I thought I would be done crying by now."

Draco grimaced and put his head down. "The last thing I wanted to do was to make you cry. I said things I shouldn't have out of anger, and I regret them so much. I had no idea how difficult this entire situation was for you and didn't try to understand when you tried to tell me. I'm so sorry."

She sniffed and took a deep breath to calm herself before looking up at him for a moment. "I'm sorry that I can't see the situation normally. You deserve better than that and I don't want you to think I only accepted you to save you because that's not the main reason. I'm just horrible at looking at things from an emotional standpoint and I overanalyze everything. The last thing I want to do is overanalyze us and push you away because of it."

He shook his head. "Don't ever apologize for who you are or how you think. I don't want to change a single thing about you, especially not how you think. And the last thing I'm going to do is leave; I finally have the girl I've been wanting since first year."

She smiled slightly and looked down at the floor, squeezing his hands. "I just don't want to ruin anything else by overthinking it."

"I promise you won't," He said as he put a hand on her cheek. "If overthinking a situation and analyzing it logically helps you accept it, then I am perfectly willing to help in any way to make it easier for you."

Hermione leaned into his palm and smiled at him. He smiled in return and leaned in to give her a small kiss before pulling her back into a hug. She returned the hug and sighed as she rested her head against his chest. Happiness rippled through his chest from where her head laid against him and he smiled wider as his chin rested on the top of her head.

They stood there for what felt like hours, but neither one of them minded in the slightest. Draco only pulled her in closer after a bit, smiling happily to himself. His Veela was almost purring from happiness, as if holding his mate was the best thing in the world. Which, right now, for him it was.

"So you love me, huh?" He started after a few minutes of silence, smirking.

She grinned to herself and said, "Shut up, Malfoy."

He laughed and they fell into silence. He could feel the exhaustion from their fight taking a toll on her, and he released his arms and pulled her gently to the bed. He almost expected her to fight it as she watched him lay down, but beamed with excitement when she crawled on the bed after him. Her head found the crook of his shoulder and she draped her arm across his torso as his wrapped around her again, and they settled into a comfortable position again.

"Hermione?" He started quietly.

She hummed in response, but didn't move.

"I love you too."

She  didn't  say  anything,  and  she  didn't  need  to.  He  felt  the  sudden  burst  of  happiness  and  excitement  radiate  off  of  her  and  her  arms  tightened  around  him.  He  grinned  and  tightened  his  hold  on  her,  happy  that  everything  felt  right  again.