Crickets :HP:

He folks! Long time no see, yet again!

I hope you people brought crackers, because yours truly has a lovely cheese platter prepared for you. Now, if somebody could just pass out some party hats, we've got ourselfs a dorky little fluff fest!

This scene for some reason crept into my brain whilst rereading a fic by the lovely RedSioda (though completely unrelated... I think it just got me into the R/Hr state of mind). It then mercilessly demanded to be drawn AND written out. That fluff bunny was fierce. I felt a bit like the poor Autehr in "Misery". So, I drew this up at work (inbetween what I am supposed to do there...) and wrote teh accompanying ficlet last night with a pck of chocolate at hand. So, in part I blame the sugar.

btw, this scenes happens about 16 hours prior to this one:
[link]

So, here be ficlet:
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It's early in the morning and the sun is low, its beams cutting through the underbrush beyond the Burrow at an angle no higher then the closest trees.
The air is thick, promising a sweltering August day.
He can feel it enveloping him, molding his suit closer around his body.
Then again, that might just be the anxiety.
He stands in the middle of the small clearing, admiring the elder shrub, the one he used to plunder as a child, now standing almost two men tall.
He takes a few deep breaths, tries to concentrate on the chirping of crickets to block out the faint buzz of last minute preparations as a seemingly never-ending string of waiters and musicians and caterers bustles all over the Burrow's back lawn no more than two hundred metres away. Maybe three.
The swish of fabric subtlely joins the crickets' morning concert.

"Fancy meeting you here, Mr Weasley." she says quietly, with a smile equally as quiet. She walks toward him slowly, the hem of her dress racing bumblebees across the high grass, murmuring along its blades.

She notices him smirking at her bare feet and pulls her skirts back to glance down herself.

"Wedding heels" she smirks back as she looks up again, her eyes screwed up against the low sun "Do not mix well with decompressing walks in the woods."

She drops the fabric, crosses her hands loosely behind her back and steps right up to him, her feet in-between his. As she raises herself up on her toes, he lets his knees sag just a bit, leans back slightly to accommodate her presence as well as his point of gravity. They have done it a thousand times. They are hoping to make it to a million. Possibly two.

As their eyes are on level, her smirk is replaced with a smile. The sunbeams do a number on her hair that he finds, frankly, wonderful.
"Hi.", she says.
"Hi." he beams back and raises his hand towards her cheek.
She, however, rocks back on her heels and leans away, taunting.

"Ah, no touching!" she admonishes, trying to sound stern despite the mirth dancing in he eyes, despite her whisper barely loud enough to be heard above the chirping emanating from the thicket surrounding them.

He stares as she uprights herself.

"What, because it's bad luck?" he asks, smiling and stuffing his hands back into his pockets.

"Well, that, and because I say so. This is my day, you know." she breathes, back to hovering inches from his face.

"Funny." he replies, one corner of his mouth wandering up of its own volition. "Here I understood this to be OUR day."

"Oh, " she frowns in mock pity, tilts her head to the side. "Somebody got the wrong memo, it appears."

She smiles. Rather smugly.

"Alright." he says. "Silent gazing and no touching, then. Ladybug" He blows into her hair. The offending insect takes off in a huff.

"Look at me. Bloody brilliant at this, I am." he says, flashing that lopsided grin of his.

"Bloody brilliant, you are, indeed."

She shifts her gaze downwards, and sneaks the toes of each bare foot onto the top of his feet. He can feel them curling through the fabric of his shoes.

He leans down, almost but not quite brushing her cheek as he whispers.
"I thought the bride had just established that there shall be no touching."

"Doesn't count." she mumbles. "Your trainers are still in-between."

"That's wedding trainers to you, Miss Granger." he corrects her.

"Better enjoy that name while I still bear it." she whispers.

"Eh, I think it's high time you try a new one." he shrugs.

She chuckles and after a moment asks, very quietly so as not to disturb the crickets, "Aren't you nervous?"

He guffaws "Nervous?!? Terrified, I was. But then my best friend poped 'round. She made it all better."

And finally, his favorite smile makes an appearance. Number 17.

"Hm, she's fantastic like that, isn't she?" she says. Though he always finds it hard to concentrate on what she's saying when Number 17 is involved.
So he decides to just go with the flow.
"You look wonderful, Hermione."

"Thank you. So do you." she narrows her eyes. "Almost."
And she reaches up with both hands and musses the carefully coifed ginger hair.

"Oi!" he shouts, breaking the grasshopper sound barrier "Touching incident! Severe breach of protocol!"

She laughs and finishes her work with one final tousle of his fringe.

"There." She takes a step back and nods. "Much better. Goes with your wedding trainers, now."

"Mum will kill me, you realize that?" he laughs, rejoicing in the look in her eyes.

From afar, they hear the backdoor of the burrow slam open, his mother shouting her name with an undeniable tinge of outrage.

"Speak of the devil." he sighs.

Nonchalantly, Hermione gazes at her bare arm.
"Oh goodness, look at my wrist. I think I'd better go. I'll see you in a bit then."

And with that she turns around, gathers up her skirts and stalks her way back across the clearing.

"Yeah, in case you're feeling distracted: I'll be the bloke at the end of the aisle. Next to the midget in glasses." he calls after her retreating form. Snatches of his mother's ranting find their way around the tree trunks and hover onto the clearing

"… Ginevra! "A walk", indeed! In her dress, no less! What if he sees her!"

"Surely it will usher in the apocalypse, mum." Ginny sneers.

Hermione flinches, turns around and curtsies for him - parading the folds of her wedding gown to the left, then the right - and through the broadest smile he's ever seen, mouths "I love you" before backing into the shadows.

All white dress and bare feet and sparkling mischief and dimples and shining eyes and sunlight flaring up her hair.
The image will stick.
Through fights and battles and nights in hospital waiting rooms. Through his daughter's birth and his son's graduation. Through every single patronus.