Snapshots

A/N: Well, long time no write. Snapshots is going to be a place where I will ruthlessly slaughter all those fang bearing, glassy eyed, twelve foot, salivating pink bunnies ya’ll know as muses. Sorry if this story (if it can be considered that, more of a drabble, I think) doesn’t make sense, I’m half asleep. Review, and I’ll give you two cookies (don’t see a lot of authors flaunting around two cookies, do ya?)

Disclaimer: Sadly, I’m not smart enough to think up the HP universe on my own. I just happen to borrow the characters from time to time.

Claimer: A black and white cat. Who happens to be overweight…and plays fetch.

Summary: Pictures, like memories, eventually fade.

[it smells like you]

It was too big, that much was obvious. Its frayed hem fell a few inches above Hermione’s knees and required constant snipping of stray thread. Its sleeves stopped right at her elbows, so that they peeked out in all their knobby and ashy glory--she swore lotion made her sneeze, Harry never did get it.

He remembers the night he gave it to her. It was the end of their sixth year and Hermione was helping him pack. He was going to throw it away. He’d even set it in the ‘trash’ pile (along with candy wrappers and old potion assignments he’d prefer to forget about). Harry had noticed how she’d been looking at it out of the corner of his eyes, thin fingers tracing the fading Cannon’s logo.

“Do you think,” She had timidly begun to ask. Harry had raised an eyebrow, but nodded nonetheless.

He doesn’t know why he’s thinking about it now, in the midnight hour of Grimmauld Place. Maybe it’s the knowledge that she’s wearing it at this very moment, one floor down. Funny how a flight of stairs suddenly seems a thousand miles down.

The door creaks open an inch, enough for one large cinnamon eye to peek through. Harry motions her over. The shirt, a hideously bright orange, dances its way towards him. The bed sinks under Hermione’s weight as she crawls up beside him. She’s half asleep when he asks the question that been on his mind since term ended.

“Why?”

He sees her smile, eyes still closed.

“It smells like you.”

He leans in close, nose brushing the shirts worn fabric and inhales. He thinks it smells like her.

A/N: Hello. Thanks to everyone who reviewed (All my love and cookies to you), and here’s another slaughtered muse (I found him lurking in the freezer next to my tatter-tots). By the way, this is a late Christmas drabble (I think I’ve given up on stories), and takes place during Hogwarts’ holiday break. Review for a tot?

Disclaimer: No, no, no. I own no part of the Potterverse whatsoever.

Claimer: A converse shoebox full of nail polish.

Summary: Pictures, like memories, eventually fade.

Can I Keep You?

He was reckless. He was what she’d regret twenty years down the line, and he was currently standing before her bedroom window, one hand tucked in his pocket the other holding his broom, and breath rising in odorless white clouds. Hermione shut her eyes briefly before unlatching the lock on her window and swinging it open, barely missing Harry, who was grinning slightly

“What are you doing?” She whispers, frightened her parents may wake. Harry responds with a small shrug.

“Come with me,” He says, extending pale fingers out to her. Hermione hesitates a moment, casting a glance at her bedroom door before taking Harry’s offered hand. She wonders if any of this is real as she straddles the window frame.

They walk down the brightly lit street, neither one saying a word. She thinks the Christmas lights are the prettiest things she’s ever seen, he thinks she is. The air is cold, and bites at her skin through the pink cotton pajama bottoms she’s wearing.

It isn’t until they’ve walked around her block a couple of times that Harry finally breaks the comfortable silence they’ve been in.

“Can I keep you?” He asks as they stand in front of a house with shiny white ‘icicles’ hanging from the gutter. Hermione tilts her head, studying him.

Her breath has risen, her heart stopped, and her insides tangled into a thousand knots. She thinks she may be in love with him, she can’t be too sure though, she’s only sixteen (not nearly old enough to know what real love is).

Hermione’s hand finds his and she tugs him towards her house (where she hopes her parents are still asleep). It isn’t until they’re lying in her bed, a tangle of sheets, clothes, and limbs that she answers, cheeks flushed and half asleep.

“Always.”