A Million Miles (Fireworks Series #4)

There was already a door. She was twenty minutes early, but there was already a door and that made her nervous. She'd wanted to get here first. What was she going to find on the other side? What would his idea of where to take someone on a date be? A candlelit boudoir with a four-poster bed and red velvet drapes? She shook her head, trying to dismiss the idea. Chances were it wouldn't even be George who was in there. Harry had always made a point of arriving early enough to open the room for the others, so there had been no need for all the members to know how to get in. She hadn't told the twins how to create a room and she didn't think Harry would have either, but possibly... probably the twins could have coerced the secret out of Ron... Even so, that would still involve George getting here even earlier than she had. Would George really be this early for anything? Maybe, if she tried the door, she'd find both twins in their own version of Frankenstein's laboratory, cooking up their latest batch of joke shop products, or making good on those fireworks orders they had been taking yesterday.

It could be a room full of broken furniture and some house-elves might be hiding away that cabinet that Fred and George had pushed Montague into. Umbridge, herself, could be in there, hunting for more evidence of the DA's guilt, so that she could expel them all, as well as getting rid of Dumbledore, or Winky might be tucked up in a elf-sized cot, sleeping off her latest excesses.

Hermione kept right on walking, only the slightest hitch in her step betraying the fact that she had even considered turning the door handle and heading on in. She kept going until she reached the next corner, ducked around it, and then gingerly stuck her head back around. She would give it five minutes. If no one came out and George didn't come sauntering along, then she'd try knocking.

She watched and she counted, interspersing each number with an 'elephant' to make sure she didn't count too fast, trying to convince herself that, when she went back to the door, she would find George waiting behind it and not Hogwarts' High Inquisitor. When she reached two hundred and seventy-five, she slowly began to walk back past the tapestry of Barnabus the Barmy and his ballet-dancing trolls. Precisely on two hundred and ninety-nine she stopped outside the Room of Requirement and when she reached three hundred, she tapped twice upon the door, trying to make it loud enough for George to hear if it was him, but quiet enough for Winky to sleep on through if she should be inside.

The door opened almost instantly, but no more than six inches, and a familiar frame prevented her from seeing into the room itself.

"Shut your eyes," George told her.

"George, we can't hang around in the corridor," Hermione protested. "Someone will see."

"Then you'd better stop arguing and shut your eyes quick." George grinned back.

Against her better judgement, Hermione gave in. Doing anything as gullible as closing your eyes when either of the twins were around would normally be a very bad move, but she supposed she was going to have to trust George at least a little if this was going to work and the last thing she wanted was for Peeves or one of the members of staff to find them in this particular corridor just because they were having a futile argument.

She heard the swish of the door opening wider and then a hand reached out and took hers, guiding her into the room, and onward in a twisting path for another ten or fifteen feet until she felt the familiar heat of a coal fire warming her left side. Her fingers reluctantly released their hold as his slipped away but then a pair of firm hands came to rest on her shoulders, turning her until the fire's warmth was on the back of her legs.

"You can look," George said, stepping to one side as he spoke so as not to impede her view.

Hermione couldn't help the little sigh that escaped her. She stood on a slightly worn hearth rug next to a blazing fire. A few feet in front of her was a similarly shabby, but comfortable looking sofa. Behind that was a largish table with four mismatched chairs that somehow wouldn't have been out of place in the kitchen at The Burrow. Sitting on it, as if just waiting for someone to come along and use them were rolls of fresh parchment, a selection of quills and a couple of bottles of ink. Against the far wall there were two bookcases full of books, some of which she recognised from the bindings as standard OWL textbooks, others new and unfamiliar. Everywhere possible there were clusters of candles, giving the room a gentle light. Both the main table and a small side table at one end of the sofa boasted lamps, though neither was currently lit. Off to the right, there were tall arched doors of wood with leaded glass which stood ajar to reveal a small balcony. The room was much smaller than the room they had used for the DA, perhaps less than a quarter of the size, but it was cosy and intimate and it was the sort of place that immediately made her feel at home.

She didn't know what to do first, whether to check out the bookshelves or see how impressive the view from the seventh floor balcony was. She compromised and threw herself at George instead.

"It's wonderful!" she exclaimed, wrapping her arms around his neck and providing the very small amount of encouragement he needed to lower his head and kiss her thoroughly.

When they finally parted, Hermione found herself with one more thing to admire. George wore a pair of faded blue jeans that clung to taut thighs in a way that his uniform trousers would never do, and he wore an open-necked, cotton shirt, the colour of pale wet sand. The subdued shade made his hair seem all the brighter and in the candlelight his skin contrasted against it with an almost pearly glow.

Suddenly Hermione felt incredibly overdressed and frumpy in the school robes she wore over her own jeans and long-sleeved T-shirt and she stepped back to shrug them off.

As she did so, George flicked his wand in the direction of one of the room's corners and a wireless that she hadn't previously noticed began to play. It appeared that wizarding society had found a third musical act in addition to The Weird Sisters and Celestina Warbeck, and Hermione decided that acoustic guitar and the female vocalist's laid-back style were exactly right for the situation. George took the robes from her hand, hanging them from the same coat hook on the back of the door where his own already hung and Hermione realised that simply watching the intimate way the two garments settled together until the folds of hers were indistinguishable from his had her almost squirming. George turned the key in the door, closing them away from the rest of the world and causing Hermione to experience simultaneous and contradictory feelings of safety tinged with the faintest hint of anxiety.

"How did you get it so perfect?" she asked him, taking his hand and leading him over to the balcony.

"Well, you said you'd probably need to study some of the time, so I guess that was in the back of my mind," he explained, "but really I left most of it up to the room and just asked for somewhere you'd feel comfortable meeting me."

Despite the coolness of the spring evening, the words made Hermione feel warm inside. She couldn't remember the last time someone other than her parents had made her feel so special. "You do realise that you're setting yourself a standard that's going to take a lot of living up to?" she asked.

"It's all part of my cunning plan to spoil you for other men forever," George answered, reaching out to cup her cheek in the palm of his hand, and Hermione thought he was only partly joking.

Even more worrying was the fact that she was pretty sure that he was already well on his way to succeeding.

His lips were dry and firm against her own, at once possessive and giving and she found herself following his lead instinctively.

Her tongue met his with hesitancy at first and then with slow savouring strokes. Their languid exploration seemed to last for minutes before his hand dropped away from her face. She felt him grip either side of her waist, lifting her up about a foot in the air and sliding her back into a sitting position on top of the wide sandstone ledge that topped the balcony wall. The new position put her face several inches above George's own and a seven storey fall at her back if she leaned out a little too far. Her legs wrapped around his hips, her heels pressing lightly against his behind, anchoring her in place. A small voice in the back of her head said that she was playing with fire, that she should stop this soon, before they went too far to turn back, but when she lifted her head to break the kiss, it was only to suck in huge mouthfuls of air.

As if he'd been waiting for just that cue, George's mouth dropped to her neck, alternating gentle sucking motions, soothing licks of his tongue and the gentle whisper of his expelled breath on her damp and sensitive skin.

Every sensation was more excruciating than the last. Hermione's back bowed, her heels pressing their lower bodies tight together, her fingers twining into his hair as she let her weight fall back, shocking herself both with her abandon and the shivers of electricity that radiated out from her abdomen at the very thought that the only reason she wasn't tumbling to the ground was the muscular male body she was wrapped around, was him. Her whole lower body seemed to clench and relax, clench and relax of its own accord. She should have been terrified, should have been trying to sit back up. Instead she leaned back further, loving the way her scalp tingled as her hair stirred in the breeze, the feeling of weightlessness, of surrender. It was almost like flying except that with George there she felt more secure than she ever had on any broom. It seemed that when it came to the important things she actually trusted George implicitly.

She moaned in protest when the head under her fingers lifted, her eyes half-opening to watch him from under her lashes, only to open wide in surprise when she met the intensity of his fever-bright gaze.

"You're amazing," he whispered, his hands sliding up her sides and then over her shoulder blades to draw her back in toward him, his eyes never leaving hers. "You know that, right?"

Hermione didn't answer. It had seemed more the other way round to her but words were still beyond her for the moment.

"But if you really want to take this slow..."

The phrase hung between them for an age while Hermione's heart rate slowly dropped back to something approaching normal and the logical portion of her brain took charge once more.

"I do..." she whispered back. "I just don't know..."

"What, honey?" he coaxed gently.

"Honey?" she asked.

"Well, it's not my fault you're name's so hard to come up with an abbreviation for. Technically, it should be Hone-ee, but... Now... what is it that that gorgeous brain of yours can't work out?"

Hermione's mouth twisted into a rueful smile. "Why I turn into a complete wanton the second you kiss me."

"I don't think so," George demurred with a slight shake of his head.

"I know so," Hermione argued.

George leaned forward and brushed his nose lightly against hers before her he claimed her lips again in an open mouthed caress that ended almost as soon as she began to respond. "Now, are you going to allow me enough manly pride to believe that you were kissing me there, not just a random male body..." he breathed against her ear, nipping lightly at her earlobe as he gave a slight shimmy of his hips that sent an answering tremor through her whole body while at the same time reminding her all too forcibly that she'd been pretty much dry humping that rather impressive bulge like a randy Chihuahua only minutes before. "...That happens to be here?"

"It's you," she gasped out, still slightly appalled at just how far she had let this go.

"You want me..." Another shimmy. "...And only me?"

Hermione's cheeks flushed even darker than they had when she had become fully cognisant of exactly what her body had been doing while her brain apparently went on holiday, but she gave an embarrassed nod just the same.

"Not really a complete wanton, then. Amazing—"

"You already used that one," Hermione pointed out.

"Sexy," George continued as if she hadn't interrupted him. "Responsive, gorgeous, sensual, radiant... Not a complete wanton." His eyes twinkled with laughter. "My own personal wanton maybe..."

Hermione made a moue of discontent. "Right now, the fact that I'm a one-man slut is not giving me a lot of comfort."

George on the other hand looked as if he found the idea quite intriguing.

"I know it's not like we're some couple who've only just met," Hermione continued. "I mean I feel like I've known you forever but this is only our second date and apart from the whole 'slut' thing it'd be really stupid if we did anything. I mean you're a Weasley for heaven's sake!"

"I'm a—?"

"George, I love your family. I really do," Hermione quickly insisted, "but do you honestly think I'm insane enough to sleep with a guy who has six siblings and trust to magic to make sure that I'm not nursing a pair of redheaded babies instead of studying for my NEWTs? Especially when the only way we'd know for sure if the spell worked or not would be if I found myself pregnant."

George couldn't restrain the chuckle. "I hadn't exactly thought about it like that... but I'm pretty certain Mum and Dad just decided to keep trying until they got a girl. Still, I can see your point. We just can't help being all virile and manly."

This time Hermione laughed, too, breaking the tension between them. "Look, if things work out when the time comes there are Muggle alternatives—"

"You don't trust magic but you want to use those balloon things?" George protested.

Hermione gave a snort of laughter. "I think I'd trust them even less than I'd trust magic, but there are... potions, but they aren't an option until I get to see a doctor. Anyway, we're getting ahead of ourselves. For now, we try to take it slow. If things don't work out that way — and I'm not stupid enough to think that, if I keep acting like I did just now, that you're always going to be the one to step back—"

"Well, you did look almost edible, but I'm older, more experienced," George interjected.

"And you're still an eighteen year old male," Hermione added. "According to Muggle pop-culture they get turned on looking at lino."

"Only if I was imagining you naked on top of the lino... but that still doesn't mean I'd push—"

Hermione pressed the fingertips of one hand against his lips. "You aren't helping. Now be quiet!" When he did, she rewarded him with a peck on the forehead before she continued. "Okay..." She took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. "Most girls my age when they worry about whether they should be having sex or not, it's only partly to do with whether they're ready or how much it'll hurt or... well, there are dozens of things that come into it... But there's only one thing that would make me look back in however many years time and think I really screwed up." She licked her lips nervously. "Do you understand what I'm saying?"

George gave her a lopsided smile of encouragement. "Maybe if you actually say it?"

"I think the only thing that would make me really regret it, other than the whole teenaged pregnancy thing, which is not going to happen," Hermione pointed out vehemently, "would be if I chose the wrong guy to trust... I don't think you're the wrong guy."

"So what you're saying is that we try to take things slow but if we get carried away it wouldn't be the end of the world," George offered. "So long as... we're careful." He reached up and took her chin in a gentle grip between thumb and forefinger, tilting her head until they looked straight into each other's eyes. "You really trust me that much?" he asked almost hesitantly. "You seemed a bit less sure about things last night."

"Well, you did spring things on me all of a sudden," she defended herself. "I've had a bit more time to think since then and I've talked to your sister."

"Are you saying my little sister talked you into..." A vivid pink flush spread up George's face as he realised that term he'd been about to use possibly wasn't the most diplomatic turn of phrase and definitely not one he wanted to think of in the same sentence as Ginny.

Hermione leaned forward and bumped her forehead against George's in a play head butt. "Let's just say that Ginny made me realise that if you want this relationship enough then you'll find a way to make it work and, even if I didn't think about you in a romantic way before, I do already care about you. That's a big head start compared with most people... I could still use more time to get used to the idea, but a few more nights like tonight and last night and I don't think I'm a million miles away from... It almost feels as if there's only one way for this to work out..."

George tilted his head back until his lips gently brushed against hers. "I'm not a million miles from being in love with you either," he said, lifting her down from the ledge and holding her around the waist until she got her feet back under her. He added another almost chaste kiss, and gave her a mischievous grin as he straightened up again, "Maybe not even a hundred."

Hermione's breath stilled in her chest as she knew with complete certainty that George's words had just brought that inevitable conclusion about a hundred thousand miles closer.