After their big lunch, Harry and Hermione decided to take a walk rather than sit down and work on House of Potter documents. They were both too mentally done for the day to have accomplished much.
When they found one of the aurors and let them know what they planned, he said, "One of us will meet you at the front door."
Harry just gave a nod and said, "We'll see you there."
Now, after what appeared to have been a pretty slushy day, both teens needed to rug up quite warm. Other than their short trips from the front door to the portkey/apparation point and back again, they'd not often been outside.
Then the walk, though it started out quiet, ended up being enjoyable. Hermione hesitantly began to point out different features and even pointed to a couple of homes where some of her old school-yard nemeses lived.
Pointing to one, she said, "Oh; that's where Kathy Johnson lived. She was a real cow. Used to call me the 'Buck-tooth Beaver Bookworm'."
"Well, I give her points for the alliteration, but... really?... calling someone a buck-tooth beaver is like calling a giraffe a long-necked giraffe, or a rhinoceros a heavy rhinoceros. And, 'beaver bookworm'? Now, that's all sorts of wrong. A beaver and a bookworm aren't even in the same Phylum, let alone Class. A bookworm is what is actually called a booklouse, it's an insect for Merlin's sake!"
Hermione start to, at first, giggle. Then the giggle turned into a chuckle, before it morphed into her high and clear tinkling laugh.
"Oh, Harry!" she laughed. "Don't ever change."
"Ha!" he said. "It's seems cousin Andi's potions are going to make that impossible to achieve. I'm beginning to feel all... gangly! You know, arms and legs."
"I know what you meant," she grinned. "You are, as my Mum said, currently growing like a weed. It'll stop soon, though.
"I'm also noticing you're starting to become a lot more defined across the chest and in your upper arms. It suits you."
Harry blushed, even in the cold. "It's a little embarrassing. I used to want to stand out. Then, when I got to Hogwarts, I did everything I could to hide my true self. Now, I'm going to be towering over everyone else. No more hiding, for me."
"There's no longer a need to," she firmly said. "All your enemies, bar one, have been effectively vanquished. Now you're free to be you."
Harry walked on silently for a while. 'There's two, Hermione,' he thought. 'Dumbledore and Riddle.'
With a sigh he then stopped before he turned to 'his' girl.
She stopped with him.
Pulling her slightly towards him so he could hold her about the waist, he looked at her with a serious expression and said, "Hermione Granger, I know there is that clause in our Betrothal Agreement that allows either one of us to back out of it at any time we want.
"However, I want you to know this... I don't believe there is ever going to come a time when I'm going to want to say that line. Unless you decide to say it in the not too distant future, you and I are going to marry."
She stood with her own arms around his waist; now needing to be under his, due to the reversed and still developing height difference. At first she almost panicked, thinking he was warning her he was going to say it. But, by the end of his clearly heartfelt confession, she felt herself falling in love with him even further.
She simply stepped in and kissed him. She noticed she now had to tilt her head back to do it.
When she pulled back she said, "Then, it appears we will be getting married, Lord Potter. Because, there's no chance I'm ever going to say it, either."
When they arrived back 'home' it was to see the garage door closing the last few inches.
"Mum and Daddy are home," declared Hermione. "They'll be expecting news."
She then grabbed him by the hand and dragged him the last few yards to the front gate, before then dragging him up the path.
As soon as she dragged him in through the front door she called, "Mu-um, Dad-dee, we're ho-ome!"
"Come into the parlour!" called Monica. "We're having tea in here!"
Walking in, still hand in hand, the two saw the couch was vacant and sat there. Dobby popped in with a small serving of tea for them.
Once they made their own cups each, Wendell asked, "Well? How'd it go?"
_‗_
―==(oIo)==―
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Augusta had rearranged the office, so Frank had to take a bit of time to rearrange it back to how he liked it. He was grumbling about it the whole time.
After she'd shooed Neville out to his greenhouses, Alice walked in and saw him talking to the house elves as he had two of them using elf magic to shift things back.
"Damned woman!" he grumbled to her. "It's like she didn't want me to ever come back here."
"She'd given up," said Alice. "We knew that. Why else order the Mungo's staff to stop trying to find ways to heal us?"
"She'll have an excuse for it," he muttered.
"Of course she will," she agreed. "And she's probably already had to use it a few dozen times since then, when others have made enquiries."
Once the office was reconfigured, including having the little office trinkets his mother had put up or around the place removed, he called Fluxy to inform his mother she was wanted in the 'Lord's Study'.
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