Who's Wedding Is It Anyway?

♡ N E

It wasn't much. Ginny had asked for a small wedding, just a few family and friends. She and Blaise didn't even want bridesmaids or groomsmen, just the Best Man and Maid of Honor. Of course Hermione was Ginny's first choice and Blaise would be dead if he hadn't asked Draco.

When asked, Hermione and Draco both jumped at the opportunity. Neither had ever been to a wedding, let alone been able to stand at the altar. Now they both had that chance. Little did they know it would be harder then it looked.

Ginny and Blaise fell madly in love shortly after the war when she and Harry broke up. Blaise gave her plenty of time to get over him before asking her out. Just a year later he proposed. From that moment the two were lost. So lost they forgot about everything around them.

Hermione ended up planning the wedding on her own. Draco would help her occasionally, but there was never really anything he could do besides fitting. He tried though. He knew it was least he could do to try and get along with her. There were a few mishaps, but she had been his greatest friend when they were younger, before his father poisoned his mind. She was the first Muggleborn he had ever met, and he was the first wizard she ever knew. Over the summer following third year, they got extremely close, but then his father found out. He turned cold and made it a point to make her feel awful, as if this was her fault. He never forgave himself. In return he would stay up just as late as she would, keep her company when she was alone in her flat, which she almost always was. He'd make coffee runs and brew her tea when she was too stressed to stand. He didn't realize it, but, in Hermione's eyes, he was a huge help.

Hermione tried to meet Draco in the middle too. She knew her opinions would be close to the same as Ginny's, and his would be like Blaise's, so the arguments actually ended up being helpful. It was too easy to slip from being acquaintances to friends when they spent so much alone time together. It was almost like the old days. They spent sleepless nights at the kitchen table leaning over fabric swatches, trying to find the difference in cream and oyster or fawn and toasted almond, losing their minds together. When she was drunk on coffee, he was drunk on coffee too. When her eyes burned and her fingers went numb from all the page turning, he was there with her favorite movie so she could break. When she got a migraine from staring at different types of bouquets, he would have painkillers and a cup of hot tea ready. They went to Hell and back together for that wedding and it wasn't even their own. It seemed like it though.

By the time everything was set up for the big day, the two seemed to forget the wedding was for someone else. They had done everything. They even bought the rings of their own liking. Hermione bought the dress Ginny had briefly told her see wanted, then spent the whole day with Molly and her mum trying on Maid of Honor dressed. Same for Draco. He purchased Blaise's tux, then suffered through Pansy forcing him into suits of his own. They got so used to doing all of the wedding things, it was hard for them to realize that they weren't the ones getting married.

And though they would never in a million years admit it, they kind of wished they were. Slowly, piece by piece, they had started to fall for one another. When Hermione came back to her flat, well, their flat - Draco had begun to stay nights there after one time they had fallen asleep together on her couch - the night after dress shopping, she put on her dress to show him, and it all fell into place. She was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen, and seeing her in that little white lace dress made him realize it. It brought it all back. And when she saw the lengths he went to keep her sane throughout the planning, she grew respect for him, then admiration, them something more.

Now that all meant nothing. They stood on the steps of the altar, on the sidelines at their perfect wedding while Ginny, wearing the only things she had chosen for herself, walked down the aisle grasping Arthur's arm. It made Hermione cry. Not because she was happy for her best friend, and she was, but because she honestly wanted this. She wanted the moment to be hers. But she knew that was selfish. She knew she could manage a fake smile.

The music stopped the second Ginny was facing Blaise. Arthur scurried to his seat next to Molly and then it began. Draco and Hermione turned towards the couple and pretended to listen to the words being said, but in reality, they were staring at each other. They let their guards down at that moment. Hermione let herself cry and Draco didn't wipe away the tears that trailed down his cheeks. Everyone else would think, 'tears of joy,' but they knew how they really felt.

They didn't blink when the rings were handed to them. They just stepped up to their friends and handed the shiny loops over. They handed their rings over. But they didn't blink.

"You may kiss the bride!"

Smattering applause filled the room but Hermione didn't join in. Draco's hands were clasped white knuckled behind his back, his tears long dried. Hermione quickly took Ginny's bouquet as an excuse, swiping away the last of the drops on her cheeks.

When the Newly Weds began to make their way down the aisle again, Draco and Hermione quickly followed. No one noticed that he took her hand and gave it a squeeze, just for a second. She looked at him through the frenzy of cheers and claps and tried to smile for him, but her lips just would curve up.

Draco would only admit and let himself believe they were just friends, but he still couldn't help but get choked up at the sight of her so sad. He knew, well, hoped, it wasn't him, so instead he blamed it on the two people who had been causing all her stress lately. The blond's face scrunched up as if he were about to cry again, but instead he cleared his throat and rubbed his thumb over the back of her hand, then turned back to the couple.

Hermione knew him well enough to know something was really bothering him. It broke her heart to see her friend in that state. She blamed Blaise and Ginny, the only others that really got to him.

He would get back at them for this, and so would she.