Chapter Text
She notices it in their first weeks together. Somewhere in between the long walks, the fireside chats in the common room when she’s supposed to be studying, and, of course, the snogging.
Harry is different.
For most of the time she’s known him— truly known him, her embarrassing crush years aside— Harry has been on edge.
She’d noticed it, because she couldn’t help but notice everything when it came to Harry.
She’d seen the visible tension in his jaw. The way his shoulders tightened and knuckles whitened when Hermione mentioned the news in the Prophet. The thin line of his lips, pressed together for hours as they sat at Ron’s bedside, obsessively trying to determine who’d want to poison her brother.
Like the spring in the old clock in her dad’s shed. Tightly wound, ready to release at the slightest trigger.
But from the moment his lips meet hers in the common room, something changes.
He’s smiling. All the time. A genuine smile, the one that reveals a dimple in his right cheek and makes his eyes shine a deep, verdant green. She hadn’t seen that smile that much since the summer at the Burrow, and even then, there were twinges of melancholy, the wound from Sirius’ death still raw and new.
There’s a lightness to him now. Joking and teasing and banter had always been easy between them, but now, it’s effortless. And she loves it—waiting as he sets up the joke, delivering the punchline, hearing Harry’s laugh, rich and genuine.
He’s affectionate. It’s hard to believe, given how she’d watched him, awkward and stiff whenever Hermione or her mother tried to give him a hug. But with her, he reaches out and takes her hand, and he doesn’t hesitate to kiss her, even when Ron’s around.
And when Ron isn’t around, well— it’s better than she imagined— and of course, she’s imagined it. A lot.
The two of them, lying together on his cloak, the late afternoon sunlight dappled through the leaves of the secluded copse of trees, just as they are now.
The sound of waves gently laps on the lake shore in the distance. Her head rests against Harry’s chest. His hand splays on her hip, painting slow patterns over her skirt that make heat pool in her belly with every pass.
She nestles into his side, one of her legs entwining with his. His chest rises and then falls with his exhale, slow and deep.
“Enjoying yourself?” she asks, breaking the silence.
He chuckles, the rumble low and deep against her ear.
She tilts her head up to look at him. His eyes are closed, and his expression is soft, his jaw slack.
“I think you know exactly how much I’m enjoying myself.”
“Hmmm.” She skims her hand across the planes of his chest. “You mean that wasn’t your wand in your pocket just now?”
He laughs. There it is , she thinks.
His eyes open, lush and green like the leaves on the trees around them. His hand moves from his hip to the ends of her hair, before coming to rest on hers.
“I am, though,” he says, his voice soft, body unspooled beside her. “Happy, I mean.” He pauses, taking a breath. “With you.”
A fierce swell of affection rises up. She might melt right there onto the forest floor, a puddle amongst the fallen leaves.
She brings his hand to her mouth and brushes her lips across his fingers. “Me too,” she murmurs.
The final coil loosens. His body relaxes underneath hers, as his hand cups her jaw.
Then his lips meet hers, and she stops thinking.