Chapter Text
The pub is too loud and his collar is too tight. Draco pops the top two buttons open and takes a deep breath, the first he’s taken all day, it seems. He isn’t nervous; nerves are for cowards. But to say he isn't wary of the entire situation at hand would be a lie. He turns the envelope over in his fingers, once, twice, then sets it unceremoniously on the sticky lacquer tabletop.
“I don’t want to open mine, either,” Theo says, eyes on his own unopened Ministry missive. “What if I have to marry Blaise?”
Blaise flashes a bright smile, pearly whites against his dark skin. “Wouldn’t be so bad. We’d get on just fine, wouldn’t we?”
“The entire point of this act is repopulation,” Draco mutters. “I highly doubt they’d let you two knobs tie the knot unless one of you suddenly develops a uterus.”
“I think I’d look lovely pregnant, don’t you, Blaisey?” Theo bats his lashes.
Thwap! One ringed hand smacks the back of Theo’s head. “Oi! What the hell was that for?!”
“For being,” Draco gestures broadly, “you.”
Theo grumbles, “Moody prat.”
A follow-up insult is on the tip of his tongue when the pub door swings open and in strolls Saint Potter, his Weaslette, the Weasel, and finally, the only important piece of the gaggle of Gryffindors, Hermione Granger. His heart stutters, pulse skittering and jumping as if the electrical impulses in his chest don’t know how to fire properly.
Her eyes, those massive, doe eyes, lack their usual warmth. Instead, they’re red-rimmed and sad. Dimmer, almost. She’s mostly bare-faced (she’s too pretty to even need makeup at all in his opinion) with just a slight glossy sheen on her plush lips.
Draco tugs his own lower lip between his teeth as he studies her, being less than nonchalant about it, but he assumes no one notices his fixation in such a crowded room. She’s clearly very unhappy to be there, appearing to only half-listen while the Weaslette chats her ear off. In her hand is an envelope matching those atop the table in Draco’s booth. Her coupling assignment.
He wonders, in a fleeting spell of silly desire, what if…but quickly shakes the preposterous thought away. No, Draco had never been the lucky type. There was no use in hoping. Wishing. Wanting. His fantasies were dangerous and would only lead to inevitable disappointment, so he tears his eyes from the pretty witch and locks onto the couple pushing through the doorway.
His jaw drops. Draco swears it hits the floor, but he can’t be sure. “No fucking way.”
In strolls Pansy Parkinson, flitting through The Leaky Cauldron wearing a form-fitting white dress and ridiculously high heels. Her arm is linked with another’s, a massive mountain of a man wearing a crooked smile and a mop of messy brown hair.
“Hi, losers,” Pansy says as she joins her friends. No one speaks; they all sit dumbfounded, waiting for an explanation. “This is Neville Longbottom, my husband. You might remember him from school?” Her green eyes are hard on the three men smashed into the booth, glaring as if to say ‘make a joke, I fucking dare you.’
Neville tips his head politely. “Malfoy, Zabini, Nott.”
Blaise is the first to speak, shock evident in his voice. “I’m sorry—your what?!”
“Longbottom?” Theo nearly shouts. “Like, the plant freak Gryffindor?”
With a roll of her eyes, Pansy reaches over and swats Theo’s chest with the back of her hand.
“Ouch,” he hisses. “Why is everyone abusing me today?”
“Because you’re annoying,” Draco answers, then turns to Pansy and her new…husband? “Pans…you said you had a girlfriend…”
Neville’s eyes slide from the Slytherins to Pansy, confused.
“I said no such thing,” she quickly interjects. “I said I could have a girlfriend, which I very well could. And sometimes we do. On the weekends when we’re feeling adventurous.”
“Merlin, make it stop,” Blaise cries dramatically.
Theo covers his ears and squeezes his eyes shut. “I think my ears are bleeding.”
“Oh, shut it and make room.” She slides onto the bench next to Theo and pulls her husband down with her, who is, apparently, unable to speak more than three words.
Must be why Pansy fancies him, Draco muses.
He cannot hold his tongue any longer. “No offense, Longbottom, but Pans…what the fuck? You two are married? As in husband and wife?”
“Yup,” she beams, popping the ‘p’ for emphasis like she always does. “Tied the knot before the Ministry could force our hands.”
“Guess that’s one way to do it,” Blaise shrugs, picking at his cuticles, already bored with the bizarre scene.
“So, you two have been, what, secretly dating?” Draco asks, tone tinged with the sting of betrayal. They never kept secrets from one another, and certainly not one this monumental.
“Gods, so many questions. Yes. Neville and I have been seeing each other for nearly a year and a half. And with the whole ‘marry a stranger by mandate of law’ situation, we decided to choose each other.”
“I have no words,” Theo answers.
Pansy smirks and tucks herself further into Neville’s side. “Good.”
Draco leans over the table, blue-grey eyes locked on the ridiculously large man who has one protective arm slung over Pansy’s slight shoulders. “If you hurt her in any way, I will fucking kill you." He leans back, glare so sharp it could cut glass. "That is not a threat; it is a promise.”
“Yeah, we’re not above murder,” Blaise adds as Theo nods along in agreement.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Neville answers, never breaking Draco's stare.
“Well, now that that’s out of the way, let’s get sloshed before we eligible bachelors open our fated coupling assignments.” Theo signals for the barkeep to bring a round as Draco’s gaze falls to the table on the opposite side of the pub.
Hermione sits quietly while her friends chat around her. A Patil sister and batty Luna Lovegood join her group, squeezing into the booth on either side of her. She forces a tiny smile and for the barest moment, her eyes meet Draco’s. He levels his gaze, staring back at her completely unabashedly. Seconds pass that feel like an eternity, and Hermione’s attention is pulled to the envelope on her table as it begins to move on its own accord.
All at once, the Ministry missives levitate and hover in the air, and at exactly 7 PM, the wax seals break. The sound of rustling parchment is swallowed by a clamor of gasps and shouts as the pub erupts into absolute chaos.