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One Night and One Morning by Bingblot
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One Night and One Morning

Bingblot

Disclaimer: All things HP belong to JKR; I'm only borrowing her characters for some (smutty) fun.

Author's Note: This is what I write at 2 am. I decided to write my own contribution to the large number of 'H/Hr get drunk and shag' fics out there.

One Night and One Morning

Hermione Granger was drunk.

Drunker than she'd ever been before.

She was sloshed. Tipsy. Three sheets to the wind. Absolutely bosky. However you wanted to phrase it, she was it.

She couldn't remember exactly how or why they'd started drinking but at the moment, she didn't much care. All she knew was that she was drunk and it felt bloody marvelous.

"You're funny," she informed her best friend, once her hysterical laughter at Harry's spot-on imitation of Headmistress McGonagall had calmed somewhat.

"And you're drunk," Harry retorted, grinning, and then nodded his head slowly as if this were a most profound observation. "I never thought I'd ever see you get so drunk."

"It feels good. And if I'm drunk, so are you."

"Never said I wasn't," Harry said in a tone of offended dignity, as if denying his inebriated state was beneath him.

She laughed again at his tone this time.

"You have a pretty smile, you know that," he blurted out suddenly.

"And you have a nice arse," she responded thoughtlessly and then continued on with the slow, exaggerated deliberation of someone who'd been drinking, "You're very sexy. I suppose it's no wonder I fell in love with you." And it was proof of just how much she'd drunk that this, her most closely-held secret, spilled out of her and she didn't realize it.

"What?" Harry stared at Hermione, surprise fighting its way through the alcoholic muzziness of his brain.

"I fell in love with you. Realized it in 7th year for sure, but never thought you'd care, so I never told you." She smiled rather blearily at him. "It's okay. I don't mind that you don't love--"

He cut her words off with his mouth, kissing her hard.

He wasn't thinking clearly but he somehow retained enough coherence to understand exactly what Hermione had so blithely confessed and though he couldn't quite put words to the reason in his alcohol-sodden mind, he knew they were words he'd wanted to hear. And he knew, too, exactly what he wanted. Her. He'd wanted her for months now, he thought fuzzily.

So he kissed her, closing the distance between them on the couch they'd both been lolling on.

And once she got over her surprise, she kissed him back, her arms going around his neck and keeping him against her.

His hands slid under her shirt to touch her bare skin and she gasped, arching even closer to him.

Encouraged, he pushed her shirt up so he could cup her breast, first through her bra and then in another minute, he'd gotten rid of even that flimsy barrier and could touch bare skin, cup her, caress her.

Her head fell back on a breathless moan, as his lips left hers to fasten on her hardened nipple, laving and lightly nipping first one and then the other.

Hermione's entire body was on fire, what little remained of her mind reduced to a mindless puddle of pleasure and arousal, wanting more, more, more, always more…

She clutched him tighter, her own hands making remarkably quick work of his shirt, unmindful of the faint pings as buttons tore off it and then she was touching him, running her hands over the bare skin of his taut back and then exploring the ridges of his chest, all the lovely skin and hair and muscle which she'd seen but never before touched.

He shuddered at her touch, leaving off his heated caresses of her body for the moment to lift her up against him. Her breasts were flattened against his chest and the feel of it was almost more erotic than anything that had gone before. He scrambled to his feet (miraculously managing to find his feet and keep his balance), pulling her up with him, his lips fastened on hers with an urgency as if he'd go mad or die if they stopped touching-and indeed, he rather felt that way.

He was insane with lust, more intoxicated from the feel of her smooth, soft skin and the touch of her hands on his body than from all the alcohol he'd drunk.

Ever afterwards, Harry had no idea how he and Hermione managed to stumble into her bedroom (the closer one) without killing themselves but somehow, they did, falling onto her bed almost as one. He landed half beside her and half on top of her, so his arousal was pressed against her thigh and he groaned.

They made quick work of removing their clothes, scattering them and his glasses haphazardly on the floor.

And then they came together again, both completely naked, hands reaching, stroking, discovering, with increasing fervor, kissing in a tangle of lips and tongues, until his breath was hers and her breath was his.

One hand slid down her body to touch, explore, the wet, hot mystery of her body, while his other hand cupped, caressed, squeezed her beautiful, perfect breasts until she cried out, arching against him.

He slid one finger inside her and she cried out again and that was enough.

He needed to be inside her now, so he moved up and in one swift surge, buried himself inside her.

She shrieked, stiffening in shock and pain, the pain doing more to clear the effects of the alcohol from her head than almost anything else could have.

He stopped, holding himself still in an agony of lust and arousal and guilt and uncertainty and finally did the only thing he could think of and kissed her, with a gentleness, a slow, languorous thoroughness which he hadn't given her before. Until now, it had been too hot, too intense, too feverish, for any of the caresses or kisses to be gentle. Now, he was gentle, and slowly, her body adjusted.

She tightened around him experimentally and he groaned, losing the battle, and began to move.

And where before it had felt as if she were being split open, now she felt full, stretched, the friction caused by his at-first slow, cautious movements making her gasp. And the fire returned, burning inside her, brighter and stronger than ever at every thrust.

His lips and hands were busy licking and sucking and shaping her breasts, waves of molten heat moving downwards to pool between her legs. She lifted her legs to wrap around his, her hands moving over his shoulders and down his back in frantic, seeking caresses, causing him to shudder and increase the pace of his movements. And she gave herself up to the mind-numbing rhythm and the heat and the pure pleasure of it.

And the world shattered around them both in shards of ecstasy, their cries mingling much as their bodies were.

The world was slow to right itself and before it had, she succumbed to the sudden wave of exhaustion, only vaguely aware of him slipping out of her and his arm curling around her, in a gesture that was half-possessive and wholly tender.

And they both slept.

~*~

Hermione returned to consciousness slowly, in stages.

Her first thought (if thought it could be called, being more like an instinct) was that she was dying. Her head was pounding as if a group of trolls were trapped inside and battering her skull with their clubs to get out, while her mouth felt rather like some small, furry thing had crawled inside and died.

Then she realized she was naked, an odd soreness between her legs, and she was curled up against another warm body. A warm, equally naked body. A warm, equally naked, male body.

And finally, in drips and dribbles, everything (or at least, mostly everything-the highlights) came back to her and she remembered.

Being bored after a long week at work, Ron being away for the Cannons spring training, leaving her and Harry alone in their flat. Drinking with Harry. Telling Harry-oh my God, had she really blurted out all that? But her horror at her drunken confession was entirely eclipsed by her dismay at what had happened afterwards. Good God, she'd had sex with Harry. Hot, passionate (wonderful, some imp in her mind inserted) sex with Harry.

This was a disaster. An absolute nightmare. It could not be happening. Any second now, she'd wake up for real and it would just be a regular morning.

She opened her eyes and then promptly closed them again as the light attacked her pupils, before she tentatively squinted until, gradually, her eyes adjusted to the morning light streaming in through her curtains.

And her mind and body accepted that this was really happening.

This wasn't a regular morning; it was the morning after.

She was never, ever going to drink anything stronger than butterbeer again. And she was never going to be able to look Harry in the eye again. For a fleeting moment, she wished she could avoid even seeing Harry ever again but then, not even this searing embarrassment and dismay could make her wish that.

But oh God, oh God, oh God, what had she done?

Harry, thankfully, was still sleeping, his arm heavy as it was draped over her. How was she ever going to face him again?

On that thought, she slowly, gingerly, eased herself off the bed, sliding out from under Harry's arm and, grabbing her bathrobe, retreated to the bathroom.

She didn't know how she was going to face Harry but she knew she didn't want to do it lying naked in the same bed with him.

She felt more human once she'd brushed her teeth and washed her face, the routine actions beginning to calm her down. She stepped into the shower, hoping it would complete the process of making her feel herself again and it did-until she began to soap herself.

Her body didn't feel entirely hers anymore; everywhere she touched, she was assailed with memories, sharp, vividly-remembered sensations of Harry touching her, exploring her body, urging her on to that peak of splendor, making her his in some strange, unseen and yet tangible way. She looked down at herself, half expecting to see some visible evidence of Harry's touch (she felt as if his mouth and hands had almost branded her as his) but there was nothing. It was just her, because she felt different. He had left his mark on her mind and heart and she was suddenly very afraid that she would be tormented with these flashes of memory of what it had felt like to have him touch her, be inside her, for the rest of her life.

She wrapped herself in her robe again, sliding down until she was sitting on the floor, irrationally wishing she could stay in hiding forever.

God, how could she have been so reckless, so colossally stupid as to get so drunk and shag Harry?

In all her idle wonderings about her first time, she'd never imagined this, that it would happen when she was drunk. She hadn't imagined the regret or the fear either, that one night might ruin the friendship of the past eight years. The only aspect which was the same as her secret dreams was that her first time had, after all, been with Harry.

She let out a half laugh that contained no amusement and a wealth of irony. Well, she'd gotten her secret wish with a vengeance.

Now she just had to somehow put the pieces of her relationship with Harry back together again. Rearrange her life so Harry wasn't the center of it, or even a large part of it? Could she even do that?

~

Harry awoke with a pounding headache and a feeling that something that had been missing in his life was finally set in its right place.

He also awoke alone.

He opened his eyes cautiously, wincing at the harshness of the light, realizing where he was (and in what state) and remembering everything that had happened last night in one rush of consciousness.

He was naked in Hermione's bed. He had shagged Hermione. But the thought that returned to his mind most strongly and made him smile in spite of his headache, was the one that Hermione had said she was in love with him.

Hermione loved him. She loved him.

He didn't doubt the truth of her words, although he knew she'd consumed much more alcohol than she normally did. In vino veritas, wasn't that the old saying? But more than that, he knew it from the way she'd returned his kiss, from the way she'd touched him, from the way she'd held him…

He had shagged Hermione-and it had been the best experience of his life. Their platonic friendship had been well and truly ended. And for the first time, the thought of such a major change in his life didn't provoke any distress. So he wasn't quite sure how they would go on from here, exactly how their relationship would change-but he knew he wanted it, knew he wanted her.

He heard the shower running and then stop, and he waited, wanting to see her again, wanting to tell her what he hadn't told her last night, that he loved her.

He waited but she didn't emerge.

And for the first time, he knew a flicker of uncertainty. Was Hermione so unwilling to face him now? What was she thinking?

He got up, hunting around on the floor for a minute before he located his glasses (they were underneath his trousers) and pulled on his boxers and then slipped into his shirt in the sitting room, noting with a flare of heat in his body, the buttons that had been torn off in their haste last night.

He swallowed down some of the hangover potion which they kept on supply (although, until today, Ron had been the only one who'd ever used it), grimacing at its taste and then rinsed his mouth to get the taste out.

Feeling infinitely more himself, he approached the still-closed bathroom door.

She knew he was standing outside the door before he knocked. Sensed his presence, his hesitation.

He knocked quietly. "Hermione, are you going to come out so we can talk, or have you decided to live in there?"

There was a moment's silence and then Harry heard her response. "At this moment, I think I'm leaning towards the second option." He smiled to himself. He could almost hear her blush in her voice and knew just how much she must be fighting to infuse her tone with humor.

He avoided the more important, tense subjects opting for a side issue. "It's not like you to hide."

"What's going to happen now?"

His heart pinched at the uncertainty and vulnerability he could hear in her voice and answered carefully, "Well, the first step might be for you to come out of the bathroom."

"Can we skip that part?"

"Hermione," he said, the one word filled with a wealth of amused frustration. His tone softened as he continued, "I don't know what you're thinking right now. Are you-are you that sorry about what happened?"

"Yes… No… I don't know." He had to strain to hear her half-mumbled words through the door, and then he just managed to hear, "How am I ever going to face you again?" although from the softness of her voice, he knew she was talking to herself rather than to him.

Harry suppressed a sigh. He supposed he should have been expecting this; of course Hermione would be dismayed at her drunken confession and more so by the fact that they'd shagged afterwards, without any preliminary conversation or thinking about it.

Now was when he needed to tell her the truth, that though the sex had definitely been precipitated by the alcohol, it had also been something he'd wanted for a long time. He knew what he had to tell her but somehow, now, facing the barrier of the closed door between them and unhappily aware that his future relationship with Hermione rested on what he was going to say, he couldn't think of any words. Finally, he just blurted out the first thing he could think of, a rather blunt statement. "I kissed you first." He had kissed her first-and all the ramifications of that. He'd made the first real move; he'd taken initiative.

"You were drunk."

"Well, yes," he admitted, his lips quirking slightly. "But not so much that I didn't know what I was doing."

There was a pause during which Harry hardly breathed and then he heard the door unlock. And he just had time to step back before the door opened and he saw Hermione, her bathrobe wrapped protectively around her, one hand clutching the two sides together at her throat. (Not that it made that much of a difference to him; the sight of her still took his breath away.)

She had opened the door but she still didn't quite meet his eyes. Her eyes focused instead somewhere around his chin before her gaze lowered to the bare skin of his chest and stomach revealed by his shirt which he hadn't bothered to button. And she proceeded to blush even hotter than she had been before.

"Don't you want to know exactly why I kissed you?" he asked softly.

Now she looked up at him, her gaze more uncertain than he could ever remember seeing it before and he felt a wave of tenderness. His Hermione, who was rather a know-it-all and always confident, felt entirely out of her depth here.

He allowed himself to smile. "I've wanted to kiss you for months now. I just never dared because I figured you only saw me as your best friend. So when you said that…" his voice trailed off, and then he finished in something of a rush of words, "Of course I love you. How could I not?"

The brilliance of her eyes and her smile could have lit up the entire room-and he could have sworn that it did light up his heart.

"Oh, Harry!" She catapulted herself into his arms, flinging her arms around his neck as she buried her glowing face in his shoulder. "I love you too. I've always loved you and I was so afraid that this might ruin our friendship and I didn't know what to do and--"

He loved it when Hermione babbled; she did it so rarely in moments of extreme emotion or excitement. But in this case…

He drew back just enough to cut off her words with his lips, his hands coming up to cup her face in a gesture of infinite tenderness, as he gave her a kiss that stole her breath, her heart, her very soul-as well as every coherent thought she had.

They kissed for a few minutes, exploring each other's mouths with their tongues, slowly, leisurely, but then the mood shifted abruptly, their embrace turning into a lush, heated thing of open mouths and open hands.

She slipped her hands underneath his shirt, parting the two sides to touch his shoulders, his chest.

He slid his hands down her back to cup her bottom and bring her flush up against his jutting erection, gasping at the contact, his lips leaving hers only to wander across her cheek to her ear and then down the line of her chin. "I want you," he groaned, his voice low and husky with need and lust.

"Yes," she breathed. "God, yes."

They stumbled blindly back towards her bedroom, shedding his shirt and then her robe and then his boxers on the way, until they tumbled onto her bed.

Some of the urgency that had built up abated slightly as they both stilled, by silent, mutual accord, their eyes opening, their gazes meeting in wordless communication that was as clear as telepathy. I love you. I know, me too. This is it. I know. I want you. Touch me.

Last night had happened almost too quickly, the white-hot intensity of the passion that had flared up between them surprising them both and neither of them had really paused to thoroughly explore the other.

Now, the urgency of the night over, they did.

Harry paused to stare down at Hermione's body as she lay on her bed, watching as her blush spread down her cheeks, staining her throat as well. He hadn't stopped to really look at her last night; that sort of leisurely admiration had been quite beyond his capability in his fog of mindless lust. Now he looked his fill, seeing her small, perfect breasts, the indentation of her waist, the flare of her hips, the long, endless length of her legs-and the sight of her made his breath stall in his chest. "God, you're beautiful," he breathed, and then proceeded to prove just how very sincere his words had been with his lips and tongue and hands, exploring with kisses, licks, the occasional nip, learning every inch of her body with his hands, stroking, caressing. His wonderful hands-she'd always loved Harry's hands with their lean fingers that were capable of strength and yet so much gentleness as well, hands that were working another sort of magic on her skin now…

He shaped her breasts with his hands, palming her nipples as they hardened against his hand, and then he lowered his head, drawing her nipples into his mouth with his tongue, as she arched her back, her fingers tangling in his hair.

He aroused her with his words as well, not with eloquence (that was quite beyond him) but more with their very simplicity, soft, breathy phrases spilling from his lips into her skin, words of praise and words of admiration and words of arousal ("your skin's so soft", "so beautiful", "love touching you", "Love you", "It's you", "Hermione…")- and finally, his words were reduced to murmurs and whispers of sound as he lost track of any coherent thoughts.

Hermione gasped and moaned, her breathless sounds of arousal providing an erotic accompaniment to his actions and his words. She was burning, she was melting, she was drowning in a flood of sensations. Every inch of her body had somehow turned into an erogenous zone, bizarre, random places which she would never have associated with arousal-her collar bone, the skin just under her ear lobes, the inside of her elbow, the back of her knees, her ankles-but when Harry touched them, her entire body lit up like paper when a match is held to it.

Harry paused after tracing a damp path back up the length of her leg with his lips, dropping a quick kiss on the inside of her thigh, his eyes wandering up her body spread out before him like the world's most delectable feast, waiting, wondering-did he dare? He never had, of course, and he knew she hadn't…

Hermione was beyond either approval or denial, beyond any questions or answers, her mind adrift in a sea of arousal, her entire universe narrowing down to Harry and what he was doing to her.

Tentatively, he touched his tongue to the most secret part of her body, smelling the musky scent of her passion, and tasting the juices of her arousal. Her entire body jerked as she cried out. "Harry!"

Encouraged and emboldened, he repeated the action, licking her as she shuddered, and then his tongue swirled against one spot and she screamed.

The world fell apart around her, bolts of pure, unadulterated pleasure shooting through her body, sizzling down every nerve in her hyper-sensitized body.

It was the single most erotic sight and sound of Harry's entire life.

She was trembling and gasping as the world slowly righted itself around her and she returned to this plane of existence, tugging Harry up so she could kiss him, deeply, tasting herself on his tongue (an oddly erotic thing), thanking him the only way she could think of. She kissed him until she felt some semblance of coherence returning to her brain, and then she drew back, managing a smile at the dazed, cloudy expression in his eyes when she did so.

"My turn," was all she said, breathlessly-and so it was.

Now she was the explorer, his body the new terrain she explored.

Her hands drifted over the smooth, nearly hairless expanse of his chest and then down to the ridges of his stomach, his muscles clenching in automatic response. She touched her tongue to his flat nipples, smiling a smile of pure, feminine pleasure at the strangled groan that escaped him.

She scattered kisses and caresses from his shoulders on down, following the path of her hands. One hand closed over his hardness-he shuddered-she stroked-he moaned-her lips lowered to his body, at first just dropping a light kiss on him, and then enclosing him in liquid heat-the breath left him in a rush. She moved her mouth just a little, her tongue stroking him and that one small movement pushed him to the edge. His hips jerked convulsively and his hands, which had been twisting in the sheets, pushed her away. "You-I can't!" he managed to gasp out with what little breath remained in him.

He was too close to the edge and he didn't want it to be over; when he came, he wanted to be inside her, feel her wet warmth surrounding him…

He tugged her upwards, his mouth fastening over hers, as he gently pushed her onto her back and slid inside her with one twist of his hips.

She broke the kiss to gasp at the intrusion; there was just a twinge of pain, more from residual soreness than anything else, but it wasn't comfortable.

Harry stilled. "Are you okay?" he gritted out, his jaw locked, face tense with the strain of keeping himself from moving.

He looked as if he might die if she said she wasn't-and oddly, she thought she'd never loved him more than at that moment. She laid her palm gently against his cheek and lifted her head to kiss him, offering him her lips and her body with that one gesture. He wanted no other answer.

He kissed her deeply, his tongue thrusting in and out of her mouth a moment before his hips began to move, imitating the action and the rhythm, slowly at first and then with increasing intensity.

And any thoughts of tenderness or love were wiped out and replaced by raw, sexual desire.

She matched his movements, her hands clutching at his shoulders, his back, and down to his bottom, while her legs twined around his, as they moved together in a dance as old as time, that somehow felt unique only to them. As perhaps, in some strange, indefinable way, it was-their own, special dance, an affirmation of years of friendship that had built up to this one moment, this one passion.

The world, the entire universe, everything else dissolved into insignificance; her entire existence focusing on him filling her, stretching her, possessing her, his hands caressing her, his lips on hers-and then it exploded in a burst of searing rapture, that ripped a cry from her throat, as she convulsed around him, and she was peripherally aware, too, of screaming his name…

He joined her in another moment, spilling himself inside her with a shudder and a groan, before he collapsed on top of her in a boneless, breathless heap.

She had no idea how long it was before he finally shifted, and was aware of a pang of loss as he slipped out of her body and rolled over onto his side, but it was okay, because he drew her close, keeping her body curled against his.

His lips brushed her shoulder in fleeting, idle caresses, before she turned her head and captured his lips with hers, turning in his arms so she was facing him as they kissed slowly, gently, each simply savoring the other, the passion from earlier sated. Just kissing, with no intensity, no expectation of anything more, simply enjoying the freedom of it, the gentle pleasure of it.

And then they simply lay there, curled up side by side, her body fitting into the curve of his as if it had been made to fit.

He was the first one to break the silence, a smile curving his lips as he said, "I didn't know you could sound like that," his voice both teasing and tender.

She nudged him lightly, feeling her cheeks blush hotly. "I didn't know I could feel like that," she admitted rather shyly.

He brushed his lips against her forehead, his hand tracing idle patterns on her skin, but made no other response.

"Harry, weren't you… upset when you woke up?" she ventured.

"No."

She met his eyes. "Why not? I mean, this-" she waved one hand in a rather awkward gesture to encompass the two of them lying in her bed with their limbs entwined, "is so new and it'll change things. Aren't you at all uncertain?"

"No," he said again, deliberately, and then softened his tone as he continued on slowly, thoughtfully. "I can't imagine a world where we wouldn't last. It just doesn't seem possible to me that we could go through so much and then have this not last. And really, I don't know how to live without you as the most important person of my life."

And, she realized, neither could she.

"Oh, Harry…" she breathed, letting those two simple words express everything she felt. And as she offered him her lips in a kiss that promised him her heart and her soul for the rest of their lives, she felt the last of her uncertainties disappear.

Maybe it wouldn't be easy all the time; life never was. But it would be good, perfect even-or as perfect as life could ever be- and it would last, for both their lifetimes and maybe even beyond that.

She had, she thought, found forever in his arms.

~The End~