Continuing Tales

Cliché

A Harry Potter Story
by Alexis.Danaan

Part 3 of 26

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Cliche

20 weeks:

"Hermione!"

Her mother pulled her in for a hug and it was only her purse, held in front of her, that stopped her mother from feeling the swelling in her abdomen. She leaned in to the embrace, relishing the touch and the familiar scent of her perfume.

"You said it was important to talk to me, but you never specified. I have to admit, I've been a bit worried all day," Mrs. Granger confessed, holding out her hand for Hermione's light jacket. "Are you all right, darling?"

"I'm okay, mum," she said, turning around and shrugging out of the jacket. Her jumper was sufficient to cover her belly as long as it wasn't pulled taut but she wasn't going to take any chances until her mother was seated. "I just have some stuff to tell you about."

Her mother took her coat and hung it up, turning for the kitchen as Hermione toed out of her boots.

"I have a feeling I'm going to need to be sitting for this one," she called over her shoulder.

Hermione silently agreed and padded into the familiar kitchen of her childhood home. Very little had changed over the course of her life living under this roof; the changes only came after she received her Hogwarts letter. It was then that magical items began dotting the house; pictures, mostly, but the occasional joke toy from Zonkos that Ron or Harry had given her. Her room became a shrine to a life lived in two worlds. Her Muggle book collection had to make room for magical textbooks, her pens had been joined by quills and ink pots, and her posters replaced by moving pictures of friends and the scenery around the castle.

When the war had broken out in earnest, Hermione had sent her parents away to Australia without any memory of their former lives or their daughter. After Harry had put Voldemort six feet under—which was really just a figure of speech seeing as the Ministry ordered his body to be destroyed—she had retrieved them and reversed the spell. They hadn't been happy, of course, but they understood in the end. Her mother had been a bit wary of magic for a while after that but she had come around eventually—just in time for Hermione's infamous break up with Ron, actually.

But this room was her mother's sanctuary and it had not changed, not even after her father had passed away suddenly from a heart condition none of them had even known he had had.

"So, what's going on this time?" her mother asked, placing a cup of tea before her daughter and settling in a chair adjacent to her.

Hermione grabbed the mug and wrapped her hands around it. Despite the fact that this was the third time she'd told this story—and really, shouldn't her mother have been the first?—it was not getting any easier.

"I'm pregnant, mum," she whispered, staring at the milky tea. There was a heartbeat of silence and then her mother put down her cup.

"Are you really?" she whispered, causing Hermione to look up.

The expression on her mother's face was not one that she had expected. Wonder and happiness lit her eyes as she reached out to touch her daughter's hand softly, tenderly.

"Yeah," Hermione said, uncurling a hand to grip her mother's fingers. "And I'm terrified."

"Of course you are, baby," her mother said, leaning over the table awkwardly to press a kiss to her curls. "I'd be worried if you weren't. Who is the father?"

Here she ducked her head, unable to watch her mother's face.

"An ex-professor?" her inflection left it coming out more as a question than a statement of fact.

"Oh, Hermione," her mother's hand dropped to the table. "What have you gotten yourself into?"

"That's why I'm here, mom," she said, staring at the polished wood table. She remembered a summer when her father had taken it out back, sanded it down and varnished it. "I had a reckless one night stand and now I've got a baby coming and I'm not ready for it, at all."

"You better start from the beginning," Mrs. Granger said, leaning back in her chair and pinning her daughter with one of those looks that seem to come from being a mother.

And so she did. She told her of how she had run into Snape at, of all places, a Muggle bar. It had shocked her to no end at the time but she had already been a few drinks in and had boldly approached him. For the first time he had not simply brushed her off as "Miss Granger", though he did still call her that at first, and she had practically dragged him to a booth so she could monopolize his attention. She had started the conversation by confessing that she only came to Muggle bars to escape ending up on the front page of the Prophet, crying into her pint. When he asked her if she actually cried into her booze she had laughed and told him that it only happened when she was particularly stressed out with something from work. That had launched them into a discussion about their respective professions. He had left Hogwarts after the war and used his skills with Potions to earn himself more than a teacher's stipend. Most apothecaries carried some pre-made potions, particularly ones with a long shelf life, along with their raw ingredients. Snape, however, had opened up a shop that specialized in making all the potions you could possibly want or need—for a price. Everything from potions that only a Master would be able to brew to those that most First Years could manage was made to order for those Longbottom-like sods who couldn't manage to not blow their house apart with a cauldron. Hermione had been surprised by just how willing magical folk were to shell out money to have their potions made for them, and he had some very regular patrons, but then she remembered just how disastrous their old Potions classroom had sometimes been and retracted the thought.

They had talked until last call at 2am and she remembered being surprised by the fact that they had been there, willingly conversing, for several hours. When they had finally dragged themselves out of the bar, she had looped her arm through his and, in a daring mood that could have only been inspired by alcohol, had asked him back to hers. He had stared at her for a minute, as if assessing the seriousness of her request, before he finally asked,

"Are you asking me to bed, Miss Granger?"

"I am," she had told him, too drunk to care if he said no but sober enough to want him to say yes. "You clearly don't have to say yes, but I really want you to."

"And you didn't think to use some safety measures?" her mother asked once Hermione was finished talking. "Or did they just fail?"

"No," Hermione groaned, dropping her forehead into her palm. "They didn't fail because I was too stupid and drunk to think about it until we were already having sex and by that point I didn't want to stop. In my defence, he didn't ask either."

"Hermione, it's your body. It's your responsibility!"

"I know, mom, I know!" she snapped. "Trust me, I've already berated myself more than you possibly could over this so can we just skip this part where you make me feel even worse than I already do?"

Mrs. Granger sighed heavily and Hermione looked up at her from under fallen curls.

"I'm sorry," she said finally. "I just...I'm not used to watching you make these kinds of mistakes. I suppose I became accustomed to the idea that my child was never really a child, at least not the kind that was prone to thinking and acting like one."

"Sometimes I think that had there not been a war to fight for the majority of my adolescence I might have managed a few more blunders," Hermione said, a trace of amusement in her voice. "As it were, my mistakes were far more costly," thinking back to the fiasco that was the death of Sirius Black. She had blamed herself for a long time for not stopping Harry that night.

"You grew up far before your time," Mrs. Granger murmured. "Something I've never forgiven the Wizarding world for if I'm honest, but you are only human, my dear. Everyone makes mistakes, no matter what their age. You did what you had to."

"Yes," Hermione agreed. "But what am I going to do now?" she laid a hand against her belly and her mother followed the movement with her eyes.

"Do you want to keep the baby?" she asked.

"Part of me does," Hermione said, her hand slipping under the material of her jumper to rest against the warmth of her own skin. "But how do I know if I'm going to be a good mother? How do I know that giving the baby up isn't the best thing for it?"

"You'll never just know, darling. Every woman, every man too, is terrified at the idea of becoming a parent at first. There is no handbook and you never get to a point where you think to yourself 'right, I've learned all there is to know'," she grinned unexpectedly. "Trust me, your child will never stop surprising you and there will be days when you'll be quite positive that you're simply not cut out for it."

"I'm beginning to wonder how the hell any woman manages," Hermione said wryly, though her face was thoughtful.

Her mother chuckled. "The lucky ones have their mums around to offer sage advice and point out how they're doing it all wrong from the comfort of an armchair."

Hermione let out a short laugh that quickly turned into a cry. Her mother leaned forward and silently placed a hand on her arm as Hermione covered her face with her other hand. "Thank you," she whispered hoarsely. "Thank you for not yelling at me."

"Why would I yell at you?" her mother asked.

"Because I disappointed you?" she asked, sniffing.

"Oh, honey," her mother murmured, squeezing her arm. "You haven't disappointed me. You're not a teenager without an education or a job. I'd have liked to have seen you married before you had a child but sometimes life just...happens."

Hermione nodded but found that her throat was too tight for speech as she tried to swallow back the lump in her throat.

"It'll be okay, darling."

"I really hope so."

xXx

24 weeks:

Hermione had found a handy charm that hid the curve of her ever expanding belly from those who did not already know about it. It was very similar to the Notice Me Not charm and since the spell was actually cast and woven into her clothes, not her skin, it was safe to use for prolonged periods of time—as in Monday to Friday, from 7:30am to 4:30pm.

Still, she knew it was only a matter of time before someone found out, before someone realized. Plenty of her co-workers had children of their own—whether they were male or female—and she expected that they would eventually recognize the signs, especially the women. She was continually shocked and simultaneously relieved each day that she left the Ministry without someone blowing the lid on her secret. She wanted to work for as long as she could before withdrawing from society until her baby was born—it was fine if there ended up being rumours about her being pregnant, as long as no one knew how far along she was, Snape probably wouldn't figure it out.

She hoped.

As it turned out, the first person to accidentally discover it was the best person Hermione could hope for.

She had been working at her desk, steadily going through a pile of old tomes on Blood magic and Wizarding Wills to help a couple of Aurors working on a case related to inheritance when she happened to glance down and realized that her breasts were wet.

"Shit!" she muttered, casting a discreet drying charm at her chest and getting up to go to the bathroom. It had only happened once before and it hadn't occurred to her to line her bra with padding to help stop it from being noticed. One of her pregnancy books had a handy charm that could be cast on gauze to enable it to absorb far more than it would normally be capable of but she had, of course, left that book at home.

She was hurrying down the hall towards the department loos when she passed the lift just as the bell dinged to announce its arrival on her floor. Without warning, someone stepped out and slammed right into her shoulder, knocking her off balance. Her arms pin wheeled as she tried to regain her footing and she felt a jolt of pure terror race through her as she realized she could fall and crush the baby. Her heart seemed to stop seconds before an arm shot out and grabbed on to her and stopped her free fall.

Hermione came face to face with Lavender as the other woman yanked her instinctively close. Under normal circumstances their bodies wouldn't have touched but there was nothing normal about Hermione's circumstances anymore and she saw the exact moment when the other witch felt the hard, round bump of her belly.

The charm did not, unfortunately, stop someone from feeling the swell.

Lavender's eyebrows contracted in confusion for a heartbeat of time before the charm evaporated for her and she was able to see what she already knew was poking her in her own stomach. She gasped and her eyes going comically wide before they shot up to meet Hermione's gaze.

"Come with me," Hermione growled, furious to be outed in such a way. With a quick look around, no one was really paying them much attention since the two were often together, she grabbed Lavender's hand and dragged her along. Lavender, for probably the first time in her life, followed quietly.

Hermione shoved her way into the bathrooms and, upon spotting Alisha Welkins at the sinks, she dragged Lavender into a stall and cast all the silencing charms she knew. With a final flourish of her wand, she looked up to find Lavender staring at her, mouth open.

"Yes," she sighed. "I'm pregnant. No, I won't tell you who the father is but I'm about 5 months along and you can not tell anyone that."

Lavender continued to gape for a second before she breathed a soft, "Holy shit" and sat down hard on the toilet.

Hermione snorted and ran a hand over her hair. It was tied back into a tail and relatively tame these days—she had finally learned how to appreciate a good hair product—but the occasional curl always escaped and dangled in her face.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you, I just wanted to keep it quiet for as long as I could, only three other people know," Hermione confessed, a bit worried about Lavender's reaction.

The blonde looked up from where she had been staring at Hermione's belly and frowned. "Why are you keeping it a secret, beyond the obvious unwed part?"

"That's a huge factor," she confessed, leaning against the stall door. "It's weak but I really just don't want to deal with all the crap that will come from The Prophet about the Golden Girl finally fucking up."

Lavender winced. "Yeah, you'll get a lot of that. You know it's inevitable, right?"

"Oh, definitely," she said, placing a hand on her stomach. "I'm just avoiding it for as long as I possibly can."

"So what's the other reason?"

"The father doesn't know and if he finds out he will not be pleased," Hermione sighed.

"I...wow," Lavender stammered, completely flummoxed. "I wasn't expecting that."

"Yeah well, I wasn't expecting to get pregnant either," Hermione groused. Lavender raised her eyebrows and she instantly felt bad. "Sorry, I'm just a bit of a bitch these days."

The other witch grinned and waved it off. "My cousin had a baby not too long ago, you remember I told you? I'm kind of used to it."

"Yeah, I'm not used to it at all," Hermione retorted. "I don't even feel like myself anymore."

"I don't think any woman does, at least not the first time," the blonde shrugged. "I can't speak from experience but I imagine this is similar to when you got your first period. Remember how weird it was, all the new sensations and emotions, and how long it took for you to get used to it? I'd guess this is the same just...well, okay, maybe not," she snorted quietly and Hermione giggled, rolling her eyes.

"I see what you mean," Hermione admitted, "but I don't think it's quite the sa—"

Her words cut off in a gasp and her eyes widened in surprise before they shot down to the hand that was resting gently against her bump.

"Hermione?" Lavender stood up, reaching out. "Are you okay?"

"I felt it," Hermione whispered, not taking her eyes off of her stomach.

"You what? It moved?" Lavender repeated, placing a gentle hand against Hermione's belly. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure," she said, her voice soft with awe. "I felt it. Just a little nudge, but it was right against my hand...almost as if it knew I was there."

"Of course it knows you're there!" Lavender said and Hermione could hear the shit eating grin in her voice as her friend's hand slowly caressed the swell. "You're everything to h—it."

"I am, aren't I?" Hermione asked, reaching up with her other hand in the hope of feeling another nudge.

"Yeah, you are."

Hermione looked up then, wonder in her eyes.

"Yeah, I am."

xXx

28 weeks:

She stumbled slightly, the heel of her pump catching on the entryway to her flat, but it hardly mattered because his arms were already around her, pulling her into his chest the moment they crossed the threshold.

"Last chance," he murmured, his breath hot on her neck.

It sent shivers down her spine, her flesh breaking out in goose bumps as liquid heat blossomed in her abdomen.

"Don't need it," she retorted, reaching up to pull him by the back of the neck down to her level.

She claimed his mouth roughly but he didn't seem to mind as he met her bite for bite, pull for pull. Her hands wound into his hair, pulling fistfuls of it so that he might get closer, closer, closer. His own hands were tangled in her clothes, one up her skirt and the other pulling at her blouse.

"More," she moaned, reaching for his shirt. The buttons were her undoing and she had no patience for them, not to mention any coordination for them. Her frustration mounted as he succeeded where she had not and without conscious thought her magic surged up and out of her fingertips. She crowed victoriously as all his buttons fell to the floor in a clatter.

"What have you done, witch?" he chuckled, looking down at himself.

"Fucking buttons," she mumbled, reaching forward to run her hands down pale flesh. He groaned appreciatively as her fingers danced through sparse black hair and played with dark nipples.

Her own open shirt lay forgotten for the moment as his head lolled back and he soaked in her attentions. She dipped her head to suck at the junction where his shoulder met his neck and the hand still under her skirt twitched, clenching at the soft flesh of her thigh. She grinned victoriously and attacked the weak spot with a vengeance as one hand slipped lower, caressing the bulge in his trousers.

The feeling of her hand on his length seemed to snap him out of his lust clouded haze and he sprang to attention, his eyes opening and his hands seeking. Deftly, he hooked his fingers under her knickers and pulled them down her thighs, letting gravity take them to her ankles. She shimmied out of them, kicking them aside to be dealt with later and he murmured his approval as his fingers skimmed the curve of her arse.

"More," she moaned again, pushing his shirt off of his shoulders with one hand and fighting with his zip with the other.

"You still have no patience," he chuckled as she yanked at his trousers.

"Are you seriously complaining right now?" she growled. "Because I can stop," she glared at him, her hands full of his ruined zip. He laughed outright then, a soft, deep sound of complete amusement. Swiftly, he palmed her thighs and pulled her up.

"But then there would be repercussions, Miss Granger," he murmured, wrapping her legs around his waist and pinning her to the wall with his hips.

"Don't you dare, Severus," she retorted, stressing his first name as she dug her heels into his arse. She was still wearing her pumps but something told her that he didn't mind.

"I wouldn't dream of it," he said, managing to sound contrite as he thrust against her, his half opened trousers rubbing deliciously against her overheated flesh.

"Good fucking lord," she moaned, reaching between them to pull his clothes out of the way.

Together, they worked him out of his trousers. He pulled at them with one hand while she tried to use her calves to shimmy them off his hips. They made an awkward sight but neither of them could bring themselves to care.

Severus growled lightly as his pants finally fell to his knees and he wasted no time in thrusting against Hermione's slick skin, teasing her with short thrusts against her clit. She gasped, her back arching into the sensation as her hands scrabbled for purchase against his shoulders.

"Bastard," she growled. "Fucking tease."

"It's only teasing if you don't plan to follow through," he responded, his voice rough and unfamiliar to her. It made her thighs clench as a jolt of heat unfurled in her stomach.

"And do you?" she demanded.

"Most definitely," he grinned, reaching between them and deftly guiding himself into her body. With one hard thrust, he seated himself fully within her warmth.

"Oh fuck," she moaned, watching through a half lidded gaze as his mouth fell open and his eyes closed. Leaning forward, she claimed that mouth with her own, biting down on his lip. He responded by pulling back to thrust into her, hard.

"Severus," she murmured, one hand flying out to find purchase against the wall, or a piece of furniture, anything. Her elbow connected with a picture frame and it fell from the wall with a crash but she couldn't have cared because he had a firm grip on her hips, allowing him to fall into her over and over and ov—

A real crash startled Hermione out of her dream and into reality, causing her to sit up quickly and send pillows flying.

With a wild look in her eyes, heart racing and hair askew, she looked around to find the source of the noise. Crookshanks meowed at her pleasantly from her chest of drawers across the room, a real picture frame lay face down beside him as he flicked his tail at her.

"Seriously?" she demanded of him, her heart rate slowly falling. He 'mrow''d at her again, seconds before she grabbed one of the many pillows on her bed and threw it at his head. He dodged it, growling and grumbling his discontent.

Hermione had fallen asleep with a weird and precarious balance of pillows and a hot water bottle. Her body aches had steadily gotten worse as she gained weight but her back was positively the worst; even her breasts had been forced to take up second place next to the lower back pain that she experienced daily. The sweet relief of her complicated pillow system to spare her pressure in key areas and a hot water bottle on her back was almost as good as an orgasm.

Almost.

It had been a long, long time since she had experienced that kind of release, in fact, the last time had been in his arms. She hadn't dared relieve the tension herself after she had discovered her pregnancy; something about it just struck her as wrong and she felt guilty for seeking the same release that had landed her in her current predicament.

She sighed and shifted uncomfortably, moving a few pillows around and trying to ease the ache between her legs. The result of her denial had been increasingly sensual dreams; sometimes they were memories of her last wild tryst, others were complete fabrications of her mind or, like tonight, they were somewhere in the middle between memory and fantasy. Either way, they always featured him.

With a groan, she slipped her hand under the less than sexy maternity knickers that she hated and gave in to the temptation of that damn man.

Cliché

A Harry Potter Story
by Alexis.Danaan

Part 3 of 26

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