A Second Look - A Dramione Story

Chapter 9

Warning: This is not my story. It is from RiverWriter on ao3.

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A couple of hours after Hermione left Harry in his kitchen following their talk, they had collectively gotten the boys dressed and ready for the day when Andromeda Tonks and Teddy Lupin arrived to help prepare for the party. Harry had gathered some people who wouldn't feel caught in the middle between him and the Weasley family when he asked them to help him out with the party, and Andromeda and Hermione's parents were the most obvious candidates. Kingsley didn't accompany Andromeda because the two of them were still pretending they weren't in a relationship. Hermione had been rolling her eyes over their attitude for years. But she suddenly felt sympathetic to their situation in a way she never had before. Things weren't always black and white. Disclosing a relationship wasn't always that easy.

So, Hermione kept her comments to herself when Andromeda stayed with the kids while Harry and Hermione left to escort her parents to Grimmauld Place via side-along apparition. They lived within fairly easy driving distance but used magical transportation when possible as traffic and parking made taking a car rather miserable.

When the four of them arrived back at Harry's they made their way to the kitchen where Andromeda was doing prep work for the food that would be served at the party. Hermione had felt trepidation about the look on her mother's face from the moment she set eyes on her. Her fears were confirmed the second her mother opened her mouth once she was inside the heart of Grimmauld Place.

"So," Helen Granger began when they were all gathered in the kitchen, "do you have something you'd like to tell us, Hermione?" She asked with exaggerated cheer.

Hermione suddenly felt a strong foreboding and she automatically looked at Harry, who just shrugged his shoulders. Nothing else had changed in her life, but she couldn't see how her parents could possibly know about the blond- no, the blonds- who were creating such a welcome but unexpected upheaval in her world.

"I don't think so, Mum. Why do you ask?" She replied carefully, innocently.

"Well, we were at the club last night and Courtney was there. She mentioned that she saw you having lunch at Le Dauphin yesterday and that you were canoodling with a boy she described to be a- what did she call him again, Richard?"

"A pretentious prick," Richard Granger responded immediately.

They both looked at Hermione expectantly. She sighed, feeling truly aggrieved. She'd somehow forgotten about her parents' stupid country club and how they ate there almost every Friday night with the Bronsons. She wasn't surprised Courtney had tagged along to essentially tattle on her. She could see Harry shaking with silent laughter out of the corner of her eye at that description of Draco. Andromeda appeared mildly curious. Hermione wanted to groan out loud, she was quite close to the older witch, considering she was Andromeda's grandson's godmother, but Draco was Andromeda's nephew, for Merlin's sake, could this get more awkward?

"Okay, first of all Mother, I am 27 years old, he is not a boy. Second, there is no way she used the word 'canoodling.' Who says that? Third, did she bother to mention that this man is so gorgeous that she couldn't keep her eyes off of him, and I'm quite certain she wouldn't have cared how arrogant he was if he'd been giving her the kind of attention he was giving me? And finally, isn't it just convenient that she happened to come to the club the same day she ran into me?" She spat.

Both Richard and Helen looked taken aback by the ferocity of their daughter's response.

"We were just teasing you love," Helen said gently. "We know to take what Courtney says with a grain of salt when it comes to you. But there is a man?"