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“It's not that big of a deal, Hermione,” Harry sighed, rubbing his damp hair into a towel, having just showered from a night of Quidditch practice.
“Stop talking.” She couldn't believe she admitted that information—in front of everyone.
Bloody hell.
It wasn't supposed to slip, but she put her stupid finger down when Neville said those seven words,
“Never have I ever…not been kissed.”
Ronald scoffed, complaining it was a waste of a turn, assuming everyone's lips had been touched by another set. Surely–they were all about eighteen, aside from Ginny. Harry chuckled, taking a swig of his beer, Ginny giggled on Lavender’s shoulder as Luna smooched Neville’s cheek.
“Some of us don't want to remember their first kiss,” Lavender protested, eyeing Ronald.
Ronald flashed his brows, sitting back. “You keep telling yourself that, babes. Let me know when you want to take another spin on these bad boys.”
“A horror, you are,” Ginny grimaced.
Hermione tried to laugh with them, hoping they would miss the small detail of her putting another finger down, only having two left. She wished she had it in her to lie, to make up some story of Krum giving her a good snog but…Those events never occurred and Ginny definitely knew Hermione’s secret.
“Far out…” Neville gasped, his eyes widening as they were fixed on Hermione’s hands. “That true, Mi?”
Everyone looked at her then, making Hermione feel small and the need to run into something metal or perhaps something hard enough to knock her out and never return to reality.
You just couldn’t lie.
She caught Harry's bright irises, his face concocting something like confusion before he clenched his jaw. “Come on guys,” he sighed at Ron and Neville who had been snickering about something, slapping each other’s chests. “I’m gonna bail if we don’t finish the game soon. I’m wiped.”
Harry laughed, throwing on a grey jumper and plopping on the couch next to her–his body weight causing Hermione to slide closer to him. “It’s really not. Everyone is on their own timeline. Besides, you were a bit busy with your nose in books…”
“It was a stupid game, I don’t know why you are still talking about it,” she bit, crossing her arms and looking towards the fire.
It was nice that they both had agreed to be Head Students this year. A bit of solitude was needed, even if she would have the constant company of the world’s golden champion. It was as peaceful as it could be, given the chaos the last five years were.
“Don’t be like that,” Harry teased, poking her hip. “It’s really nothing to be embarrassed about.”
“Who said I was embarrassed?”
“Your face, unfortunately,” Harry smirked, biting down a laugh.
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, alright.”
“Actually surprised Krum didn’t try to kiss you back then,” Harry continued—a conversation Hermione felt she very much was trying to close.
“Surprise, surprise,” she mumbled, picking at her nails.
“Well, do you want to be kissed?”
“Obviously, Harry. You’re being very invasive right now, it’s weird.” They were best friends, of course. She was nearly ready to die with the wizard—and she still would without question. But they did not, not ever, talk about bleeding snogging.
Harry shrugged. “You know about my first kiss with Cho.”
“You kissed Cho?!”
“Well, now you know, I guess,” Harry replied sheepishly.
“And Ginny.”
“Correct.”
“And–”
“Nobody else, Merlin’s tits,” Harry interrupted, laughing under his breath. “And it was just a kiss, nothing more.”
“You don’t have to justify anything to me, I’m not your mum.”
“Fuck, I hope not,” Harry cursed under his breath.
Hermione took a deep breath.“Well at least you know you can do it,” she admitted, not quite sure why she was willing to be so vulnerable about this.
“Anyone can snog, Hermione.”
“Right, of course, it’s just—” Hermione grunted, shoving away a thousand insecurities she would rather not spill all over her childhood best friend. She could look evil in the eye and not cower, and succeed in any class without question. But this? No–no. “Forget it.”
Harry sighed, looking up at the ceiling for a brief moment and letting the crackle from the fire fill the silence before he looked back over to her and pulled on her thigh, forcing her to face him on the couch. “Alright, let’s give it a go.”
Her face squirmed, leaning away from him “Are you mad?”
“That is a loaded question,” he stated, his hand resting between her leg and thigh. “You’ve never been kissed and it’s clear you would like that to change. So here I am—”
“Oh, you are mad!”
“Kind of me, I know.”
Hermione hit his chest, pushing him away from her. “Stop it!”
He caught her fingers, pulling her back towards him and causing their faces to be far too close. “No, you stop it. I’m trying to help.”
“You’ve got a gnarly hero complex,” Hermione said, furrowing her brows. “I don’t want the charity.”
“Maybe,” he agreed, a cheeky twinkle in his eye. “But I don’t see the harm in practicing."
Hermione‘s gaze felt stuck on him as he looked down at her, his eyes the perfect shade of emerald—the kind of silk you’d find at any high-end pureblood designer. “I-I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
Worse. It’s a horrible idea. The worst of its kind. Utterly, deplorable.
“Hermione,” he commanded, silencing her fuzzy thoughts. “You want to be kissed but you’re afraid you’ll mess it up so if you practice with me…You’ll be all set,” he stated, laying out a perfectly cut plan as if it had been thought of for months and not just on the spur of the moment.
Her stomach dropped ten feet into the ground, as her arms began to feel tingly—the smell of whiskey and a freshly shaved face invaded her senses.
“You have to say yes, of course. I won’t just take a kiss, if I’m not allowed,” he continued, keeping his classic Harry James smirk painted on his chiseled and sun-kissed face.
She chewed on her bottom lip, her eyes still looking for something else on his face other than sincerity. She never doubted Harry, she trusted him with everything…Suppose…It was all right to trust him with this too. “And it stays between us?”
“As you wish,” he confirmed, softly—a tenderness swirling in his expression.
“Alright,” she agreed with a shaky breath and fidgety fingers.
“Alright,” he repeated, his tone low and gruff as he leaned in closer. “Don’t move.”
Hermione nodded, feeling heat lick up against her jawline and rise to her cheeks as he gently pushed some of her curls behind her ear. She wasn’t quite sure what it would taste like—what his lips would taste like. She often thought that a kiss might feel like the sensation of rubbing your tongue against the inside of your bottom lip, or something plush—like biting into a marshmallow.
But Harry’s… Harry’s lips felt like determination, a professor straightening something out with a stubborn student and making things right.
He started slowly, his warm lips brushing against hers as his fingers rubbed the back of her neck. A slow peck before going back in and massaging his lips with hers; first softly then growing into something much firmer—possessive, forcing Hermione to fall back onto the couch, Harry’s hands catching her head and resting it on a cotton pillow. A surge of warmth bubbled up in Hermione’s lower abdomen as his body pressed up against hers, his free hand careful not to go farther than at the small of her waist.
It was intoxicating, the smell of him, his mouth–his firm grip on her body, his fingers digging into her skin like it was his to take. Her mind told her to stop, to say that was enough. But her hips thrusted up against his hard length without permission as his tongue begged for entry to play with hers.
It caused her to pant with each breath, moans slipping out of her mouth and into his as he continued to work her tongue with his, depriving her of oxygen—cutting off all her right-minded thoughts. She wanted to hide her inexperience with each new touch, pretending this wasn’t her first. That she knew what she was doing but instead felt entirely lost in all of it.
Undone. Unraveled. Starved for something she did not know she needed. And perhaps something she didn’t know she needed from him.
Something knocked on Hermione’s fragile heart then: one knock, two knocks—something was being delivered; a shoestring and some lace that spelled out something very close to mine.
Oh no.
He broke the kiss off then, his knuckles rubbing tenderly against her now exposed waist.
He was grinning like she had seen a million times—though once it was over cherry custard and now it was him on top of her, having just locked lips and stealing her first kiss.
Harry leaned in again, kissing her nose before adjusting himself off of her, pulling her shirt down. “Not bad, duck.”