A/N. My other stories are on the way, was just writing this up on the laptop while on vacation, thought I'd throw the first chapter out there and see if anyone likes it. The story will start off very fluffy, romantic and all that, its one of those summer vacation type stories that turns into a more `normal' Dragonis type story.
Going on Vacation
The sun scorched the humid July 12th afternoon, sweat poured off Harry worn body as he lifted the fifty pound dumbbells with repeated grunts, his muscles burned, every nerve in his body told him to stop, but his mind relished the feeling and he kept going, painfully pushing onwards.
"Here, have some water or you'll kill yourself." Aunt Petuna said walking out to the backyard and handing Harry a large bottle of water. She liked seeing him in pain, but she didn't want the freak to go and die on her, who knew what would happen then?
Harry simply looked at her; the dumbbells fell with dull thuds onto the dead grass, wisps of thin dust billowing up and dissipating unspectacularly. "Thank you." Harry replied, gratefully taking the water. The weather had been brutal this summer, nothing but cloudless scorching hot days, and dry humid nights.
"What's gotten into you lately? You've changed you know." Petuna wasn't asking out of concern, she didn't want some crazy freak turned mental murderer to kill them all. Before he had always been rather weak, but now he was far from that, the Freak had built up a startling amount of muscle.
"Nothing, don't worry though this is the last day that you will have to see me again." He reassured her.
"Oh really?" The happiness was as masked as a herd of elephants marching down the street.
"My friend Hermione and her parents will be picking me up tomorrow at around lunch time. They're muggles so feel free to clean up the house a bit." Harry informed her.
Without another word Pentuna went back inside, a happy smile plastered on her bony face.
Finishing his water Harry took a moment to reminisce about what had happened the past year. The sixth year had gone by relatively calmly for him, there were scruffs with Voldemort, an attack here and there, but the resistance was doing really well, especially with Minister of Magic Arthur Weasley's help. They had been in a couple small fights, but surprisingly it was at a stalemate with neither side able to make any real gains one way or another. Rumors were out that Voldemort was on the hunt for something once again, it was suspected that a group of his most trusted Death Eaters had come along. This was all speculation, no one knew exactly what Voldemort was after, who was helping him or to what end, and missions to find out had proved mostly unsuccessful.
Ron and Hermione had changed during the past year, Hermione had developed, she had really developed, even through the Hogwarts uniform you could tell that she had really filled out in all the right places. She was now the fancy of practically every boy at Hogwarts, even Draco and the Slytherines looked at her differently, she tried to hide it, but it was obviously impossible to do so completely. Ron began dating Luna Lovegood to an extent that it was impossible to separate them, it wouldn't be surprising if they got married after seventh year. This left him and Hermione together alone a lot of the time, not that it was a bad thing, it was just hard to suppress some very strong feelings that were making themselves evident more and more. At first he had thought it to be just a simple crush, but then after some good analysis he realized that this crush had been going on for a rather long time and was far more then a simple crush, he was helplessly in love. He figured it was the fact that he now faced possible competition for Hermione that drew these feelings out to the forefront. He had thought about telling her, but he didn't want to jeopardize their friendship in any way, and he didn't want to seem like the countless fools who had confessed their love to her, although unlike them he would at least look her in the face and not at stare at her chest.
There was also the fact that he was experiencing some weird changes too, he had started to have dreams about fighting, destruction, explosions, and chaos, he told Dumbledore about it and now he was asking how he felt every other day. His mood had changed a bit, he was very protective of Hermione, and he spent more and more time working off his rage by doing body building and learning martial arts. He told his close friends about what he was doing, but never actually let them see him do it, it was something private that he didn't feel comfortable sharing, and went so far as to wearing baggy shirts and pants all the time to hide the transformation he was undergoing. He learned to cope with the weird dreams, thanks to his occulemency Voldemort couldn't get into his head, and when he wasn't having weird dreams he dreamt of the one thing that made him perfectly happy, Hermione.
Hermione had invited him to come with her family to a Granger reunion, all close friends invited, she had told him that there would be many families other then her own, and it was more of a very large get together then anything else. It also happened to be in Florida, but they would probably travel all around, perhaps even to the Caribbean. She explained that her grandfather was very well off and that there would be plenty of room for him and everyone else. Harry immediately agreed to come, whereupon she asked him to do one unusual thing, learn to drive. She wasn't of age yet but he was, and there was a good chance that her grandpa would give them a car so that they could go exploring by themselves. And so after some magical help from Arthur Weasley, Harry was taught how to drive, and was given a license. He had a passport created and issued, and he also received a debit card from Gringotts that automatically transferred his money from magical to muggle. Just for fun he had asked how much muggle money he actually had, the sum of thirty two million euro literally made him stagger backwards.
Right now was the hardest part of all, waiting. He had had all of his things ready for two days now, his trunk had been transfigured into a very large, yet ordinary muggle suitcase, all of the documents need were packed and ready to go, and so he waiting, passing the time by pushing his body to the outmost limit. He worked out for another hour, and then practiced some martial arts until his stomach grumbled angrily.
Walking inside the house he heard the doorbell ring.
"I got it." Duddly scrambled towards the door as fast as he could, which wasn't very fast at all. It was the girlfriend that he kept hearing about, although Harry still could not fathom what kind of girl would date something that looked more like a walrus then a human.
The answer, a very skinny thing that made Petuna look chubby.
"Duddykins!" She shrieked in a voice that made nails on a chalkboard seem pleasant.
"Hey Penny." He hugged her, or rather swallowed the poor thing up.
"Who's that?" She asked breathlessly, gesturing to the topless and very sweaty Harry, a Harry that had made many girls staring at him in secret while he worked out.
"That's just my freak cousin Harry." He smirked. "What are you looking at? Jealous?" He looked at Harry with one of those, `I have something you don't smiles.'
"Nice to meat you Penny." He ignored Duddly, giving her a quick wave before going into the kitchen to try and find something to eat.
"Not so fast boy." Vernon growled. "Wash yourself up first, we have company coming over for dinner." Vernon had obviously heard that Harry was leaving tomorrow and so was allowing him one final meal.
Shrugging it off Harry went upstairs to quickly shower and change, he smelled as bad as how good he looked at the moment, which meant. Why he hadn't used deodorant in the morning would forever be a mystery, perhaps just to piss off the Dursleys a little. He came down twenty minutes later to find a couple extra voices coming from the living room.
Vernon stopped Harry before he could make step. "Listen here boy and listen good. I want you to contemplate all possible meanings of the phrase, as silent as the grave. Understand me? No funny business, no talking, or I'll kill you myself, Penny's father is on the look out to make some very big drill purchases for his chain of stores, and that means big money for us. You got that?" Vernon ordered.
"Yes uncle Vernon." Harry quietly followed after the man.
"This is…" Vernon began to introduce Harry in the living room only to be stopped by Penny.
"Harry. Duddly's cousin." She beamed.
"Hello everyone." Harry greeted Penny's parents.
Uncomfortably Harry took the only seat left in the room, the one beside a delighted Penny who sat beside a furious red-faced Duddly. Harry spent the rest of the time under Penny's mesmerized stare, and the dinner he somehow ended up sitting opposite of her and Duddly. He couldn't decide which one he should be afraid of more, Penny who seemed like she would eat him if given the chance, or Duddly who Harry knew would kill him given the opportunity. Far too frequently the subject of conversation became Harry himself, where Harry and the Dursleys were forced to make up all sorts of lies on the spot. Thankfully Harry would be gone at lunchtime the next day, and so the lies simply had to fit logically together, however this little job proved to be more difficult then expected with Duddley's constant attempts at making Harry seem as awful as possible. By the time Penny and her parents left, Harry was made out to be some sort of criminal, a fact that enticed Penny to no end. Thankfully the evening did come to an end, at which point Harry quickly made his way upstairs to his room for the rest of the night.
That night Harry had a very different, to him, kind of dream, one that involved Hermione, very little cloths, a beautiful bubbly bath, strawberries and champagne. The next morning Harry woke up panting with a very cheeky grin. He immediately realized that this little vacation could prove to be one of the most difficult things that he had ever done. One side of his brain was telling him that he loved her, cared for her and only wanted her to be happy. The other side was telling him that she was the most beautiful thing in the world and that that little dream could very prove to be a heavenly reality, and one of the things he wanted most. Strangely the first part was agreeing with the second part.
- - - Granger's house - - -
Hermione woke up panting, she looked around room frantically…It was just a dream, oh but what a dream it was. It involved her, Harry, very little if any cloths, strawberries, champagne, and a hot bubble bath, that and a lot passionate sex that started off teasingly, gently, calmly, but which soon erupted into something much more heated. Calm yourself Granger, she told herself. Don't do anything stupid, one part or her said. But you love him, said the second part. What if he loves you too? But you just said don't do anything stupid argued the second half. Doing something stupid would be not going after that man. After both halves came to the same conclusion Hermione decided that she wouldn't be able to live with herself if she didn't at least try to start something with Harry, she would simply have to be very clever about it, although the problem was that she really didn't know how to do it. None of this deliberating involved a dual personality in any way, but there was a lot of thinking and analysis involved.
"You okay Hermione?" Hermione's cousin Emily asked. "You seem a bit flustered."
Emily, one of the many possible rival's for Harry's attention, her suspicions were soon confirmed. "No its nothing, I'm okay." Hermione answered letting out a deep breath.
"Now about Harry." Emily moved onto another subject, brushing a black strand of hair from her face.
"Yes?"
"You two aren't dating or anything right?" She asked.
"No we're not." Hermione couldn't hide all of the disappointment in her voice.
"And you haven't ever, dated or you know fooled around?"
"No." She said a little quickly.
"So then he's fair game right?" She asked.
"What?"
"Well the only thing you do is constantly talk about him, so much so that we all know pretty much everything there is to know about the guy. I figure that if he's even half as amazing as you say he is then why not have a go at him? So is he fair game right?" She asked with a knowing and oh so devilish smile. Emily knew that Hermione was head over heals for Harry, everyone knew, but she just wanted her to admit it. She had no real intention of pursuing anything with Harry, but it would be fun pretending, and she'd be able to teach the innocent Hermione things that were not written in books.
"B-H-W. Yes, he is." Hermione replied.
"Great!" Emily jumped out of bed. "Can't wait to meet him."
Great indeed, Hermione thought. She admitted that she had a better body, she would have to be mental to think otherwise, she had come to accept that most men would do anything to get in her pants and not care about who she really was. But she knew Emily, who was attractive herself, but Emily was crafty and far more experienced at the whole male manipulation game.
"Emily I need your help." Hermione finally asked after she had brushed her teeth.
"Yes, what about?"
"Its about … a boy."
Emily raised an eyebrow. "Really, which boy might that be?"
"Just a friend of mine really, a very good friend." Hermione said hesitantly. "But I want it to go past just friends, and maybe into something more."
"So just tell the bloke, if he's a good friend he'll understand."
"That's the thing, he is a good friend and I don't want to do anything drastic that could possibly, in any way rune what we have now. But I also want to try and get something started, sometimes it's as if he doesn't even notice that I'm a girl. I mean he hasn't ever even checked me out; I'd want him to at least notice me." She sat down on the bed frustrated.
"So what you want to do is entice him so that he notices you and do it in such a way that it can come off as innocent and just friends like, but at the same time drive him wild if he does fancy you. If he does fancy you'll know, and if he doesn't then you'll still know."
Hermione nodded.
"Okay then, this is what we have to do…"
And so innocent Hermione was introduced into the provocative world or male manipulation.
Hermione's aunt and family, which included Emily and Tom, were going to be flying over to Florida with them, and picking up Harry along the way that's why the Granger house was unusually busy getting their last things together when Hermione and Emily came downstairs for breakfast. They were greeted with a few rather interested looks.
"I don't want to tell you what to wear, but I also don't want to be fighting off every teenage male we see." Hermione's dad carefully commented upon Hermione and Emily's choice of enticing attire. He had come to the long and painful realization that his little girl had grown up and that boys were to be a big part of her life, but under no circumstances did this realization stop him from getting ready to fend all of them off.
"Don't worry uncle Dave, Harry can fight off dragons, guys won't be a problem." Emily replied with a voice that spoke volumes about her and Hermione's intentions. "Isn't that right Hermione?"
Hermione replied by nodding and blushing, she began drinking her coffee with uncanny interest.
"Oh, okay." Hermione's aunt Suzie gave her sister a knowing look. Everyone knew that Hermione was in love with Harry, and they had a good suspicion that he might be as well. To them Harry was already family, or would be sooner or later, the two were bound to get married.
After a quick breakfast and a last check that they had everything the Granger's and Soulier, Jacques was French, went off to pick up Harry. The drive wasn't too long, a couple of hours in easy traffic and in nice cars. Both families were dentists and owned very comfortable, very new, Land Rovers.
"Now I know you may have a biased opinion on this, but how does Harry look?" Emily asked Hermione.
"What do you mean? You've seen pictures." Hermione replied. `Ha, brilliant.' She thought.
"No…I mean, without his shirt, with very little on, you know." Emily elaborated.
"I've never actually seen him like that. He goes to the room of requirement to work out and I've never seen him with less then a shirt and pants on, especially not this year." She really hadn't, but had imagined it countless times.
Much to Hermione's parent's relief the conversation came to an abrupt end when the GPS announced that they had reached their destination.
The two Land Rovers parked at the side of the road beside the house, both families got out to go meet Harry, they were ahead of schedule by a good forty minutes and so there was no rush. Naturally the Dursley's saw the two very expensive SUV and were trying to act as casual as possible inside the house. Dudley had seen Hermione and Emily and was trying to compose himself as best he could, at this moment he was extremely jealous of Harry.
Jacques, Hermione's uncle, rang the doorbell, the door opened very quickly. "Bonjour." He greeted them slightly startled.
"Hello everyone, come on in." Vernon beckoned them inside.
Meanwhile Harry had noticed the arriving people, but hadn't recognized anyone, and as far as he knew it should have only been Hermione's family coming to pick him up, not two. Therefore he didn't even bother coming downstairs to greet the guests, thinking it was some of the Dursley's friends. The Grangers on the other hand thought that he had noticed them and was simply finishing getting ready. It was this that led them to tea with the Dursleys, who to the Grangers seemed like some of the most fake and obnoxious individuals they had met.
"Whose are those?" Tommy, Emily's little brother fourteen year old brother, pointed to the weights.
"Those are mine." Dudley replied smugly.
"Really?" Emily asked skeptically.
"I work out a few hours a day you know, does the body good." Dudley slouched back in his seat, legs apart he looked at the two very attractive ladies as if they should be honored to be in his presence.
"Well you certainly look like you really work out." Emily spurred him on, she wanted to have some fun with the fool.
"Ya you know." Dudley stood up and sat beside Emily who nearly threw up right then and there at his smell.
It was at that moment that Harry had finally decided to call the Grangers to make sure that they were coming.
"Harry!" Hermione literally jumped on Harry when she saw him come down the stairs. Staggering back slightly he caught her, a look of surprise written all over his face.
"Hermione?" He looked at her with wide eyes. "You um…you uh…you look…wow."
She blushed as he stumbled for words, very aware of his eyes roaming her body, but unlike with other men she didn't find it offensive, instead she found it very thrilling, finally she had caught him with his defenses down. "I'll take that as a compliment." She smiled at him, taking a moment to look him over. Again there was the full length light shirt and pants, but she had felt underneath drove her wild. "You look very good too." She blushed a little again.
Harry nodded, not taking his eyes off her. "Thanks." He managed to get out.
Hermione's dad coughed on purpose as all eyes were on them. The pair immediately broke off, both blushing this time.
"Yes sorry about that, I didn't realize it was you guys who had come." Harry apologized.
"Don't worry about it son." Hermione's dad answered him. "We've ahead of schedule as is."
"Hermione, care to introduce us to your friend?" Suzie asked.
"Right." Hermione snapped her eyes off Harry. "Harry these are my parents, aunt Suzie and uncle Jacques, and my two cousins Emily and Tommy." She introduced them.
"Call me Dave or Dad, and we'll be okay." Hermione's dad and Harry shook hands. It was obvious that both families had very healthy lifestyles, and to Harry they were the usual dentists, good looking, warm people that you just couldn't help but like. Hermione's mother Joanne was a strikingly beautiful woman, as with beautiful brown hair that flowed like water. Dave's on the other hand was very curly, and Hermione's had recently lost their curls and had become very soft and wavy. In turn Harry met Suzie who looked a good bit like her sister, and the tall and dark haired Jacques whose heavy French accent made him interesting to talk to.
"Hi." Emily breathed out, eyes glued onto Harry. She had seen Harry in pictures and granted he was good looking, but this was something else, he was just amazing.
"I'm Tommy." He shook hands with Harry. "You really fight dragons?"
"Well just one I guess." He answered as if it were nothing
Tommy's eye lit up "So they're real!?"
"Oh yes, very."
"Lets get going shall we? Don't want to be late." Dave said looking at his watch.
"Sure thing, just give me a sec guys." Harry said looking around. "Ah there they are." He spotted his weights and ran back up stairs with them.
Harry really did have everything ready and so they were out of the house within a few moments. Before leaving the Dursleys for the last time he looked at a very jealous Dudley and asked. "Jealous?" And then turned to Vernon and Petuna. "By the way, I have thirty two million to my name, if you would have been nice I would have given you guys a few. Bye." With that he walked out the door never to see them again.
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