Erin did not tell her parents that she was dating Hermione. And she was sure Hermione did not tell her parents either. But not because of the reason you may think.

Erin knew very well her mum nor father would judge her for who she was because since she was young, they had been telling her that they will love her no matter what. She didn't know if Hermione's parents were the same, but the Gryffindor never mentioned anything about homophobic parents.

The reason Erin didn't tell her parents was because they surely would want to keep Erin's bedroom door open all the time. Not that the girls had been planning to have sex anytime soon. But them watching the girls snogging was not something that would appeal to Erin.

It was two weeks since the summer holidays started. Erin hadn't been doing much. She visited her grandma and some of her Muggle friends that she befriended before she went to Hogwarts. Even Daphne, Astoria, and Luna visited. The four girls had a sleepover and took a trip to London and wandered around there, celebrating the Greengrass sisters' birthdays that were just a week apart.

Currently, Erin was cleaning her room just like her mum told her to. Erin always thought that she was keeping her room rather tidy, it was her chaos and she liked it that way.

Gwendolyn was going insane. That's what Erin said about her. The woman was cleaning the whole house at least two times, fixing the pillows on the sofa so everything was perfect. She was behaving as if the Queen of England herself was going to visit.

She panicked as the knock on their house door echoed through the house.

"Mum, you need to calm down."

"Hermione is your new friend, I need to make the best first impression!" Gwendolyn argued.

Erin rolled her eyes but didn't say anything else. She aproached the door and opened them, revealing smiling Hermione.

Erin's eyes lit up. It felt like an eternity since she last saw her. She pulled her girlfriend into a tight embrace.

"Hi," she whispered.

"Hi," Hermione said in the same volume.

"Why are we whispering?"

"I haven't got a clue. . . "

Erin grabbed Hermions's hand and lead her into the living room, where both Gwendolyn and Elias were waiting for interduction.

"Hello, Hermione," the woman and the girl shook their hands. "I'm Gwendolyn and this is my husband Elias —" Hermione and the man shook their hands too "— we are so happy to finally meet you. Erin has talked about you a lots!"

That sentence made both of the girls blush and Erin groan.

"Mum!"

Gwendolyn ignored her daughter, her attention was fully on Hermione. "Erin was not able to tell me what your favourite food is, so I made spaghetti, I hope you don't mind!"

Hermione shook her head. "Oh, no, not at all. I'll eat whatever, I'm not a picky eater."

Gwendolyn signed happily and put her hand on her chest, both Erin and Elias rolled their eyes at that.

"How happy I am to not have another picky eater in my house," the woman said, her eyes landing on her daughter.

"Alright, that is enough," said Erin, grabbing Hermione's hand and lead her far away from her parents into her bedroom.

Just as Erin was about to close the door, her name was called by her mum.

"Ah, it's not even a noon and I'm already in trouble," sighed Erin, making her girlfriend giggle.

When Erin came into the living room, Gwendolyn was there alone. Elias went probably upstairs to prepare for his work at a hospital.

"Yes?"

Gwendolyn eyes her up and down and then asked, "You two won't do any funny business in there, will you?"

It took Erin a moment before realizing what her mother meant. She gaped at her, "How do you—"

"Oh, please!" The woman laughed. "You think I was born yesterday? I used to do this too when I was your age."

"I thought you said that you never sneaked boys into your room."

"Who's talking about boys here— Erin! Answer the question!"

"We won't shag." Gwendolyn scrunched her nose at the word 'shag'. "It's not like either of us can get pregnant, can we?"

"Just. . . If you do. . . do it when me and your dad are not in the house, okay?"

"Yeah, I promise," Erin paused. "Just an innocent question. . . when will you and dad be out of the house?"

Gwendolyn playfully glared at her but said nothing as she walked away, up the stairs.

While Erin was gone, Hermione looked around her room. It wasn't special, but the Gryffindor liked it anyway. It was Erin's Chamber of Secrets as she once said.

The walls were covered in flowery tapestry. It looked similar to the pillow and duvet cover that lied neatly on her wooden bed that was to Hermione's left as she stood at the doorway. Right above the bed, on the wall there was a poster of Agnetha Fältskog. Hermione remembered Erin talking about it once.

"Spending two weeks with them, I learned a thing. And that is that Harry looks at Ginny like I look at my Agnetha Fältskog poster."

There was one window right in front of her, from which you could see on the street the house was standing on. A canvas and some other painting equipment stood in the right corner across the room. It seemed it was Erin's little art corner.

There was a bookshelf on the same side of the room as the canvas filled with books, perfumes, make-up things and even vinyls. It was just then when Hermione noticed that Erin had a gramophone.

Speaking of Erin, she just came back when Hermione was looking at her wooden brown closet.

"Your room is so pretty and cozy," said Hermione, smiling.

Instead of replying "thank you", Erin said, "My mum knows."

The Gryffindor's eyebrows furrowed, frowning. "Your mum knows that your room is cozy?"

Erin let out a laugh as she shook her head. "No, my mum knows about us and she asked me to shag you when she and dad aren't home."

Hermione's mouth opened, her face turning bright red.

"Not that we will. I—" Erin suddenly stopped herself. "Anyway, What do you wanna do?"

She smiled, looked at her feet, bouncing on them before glancing back at Erin.

Erin bit her lip and took a step closer to Hermione, taking her girlfriend's hand in hers. She pushed her backwards so Hermione was sitting or Erin's bed.

Erin could feel Hermione's hands tangling in her blonde hair, but she could not see it when she pressed her lips against Hermione's. From the kiss, Erin could taste the lip balm on Hermione's lips and coffee on her tongue.

Erin placed her knees on both sides of Hermione, stradling her, wrapping her arms around Hermione's neck, deepening the kiss.

This, with a couple of breaks to catch their breaths, continued for a while. Erin placed her hand on the back of Hermione's neck so she wouldn't bump into the wall as she was lying down on her back.

Erin couldn't help but smile into the kiss as warmth blossomed in her chest, butterflies in her belly. Hermione sneaked her hands under Erin's t-shirt, her palms touching Erin's bare sides.

Even though the Gryffindor was under the Slytherin, Hermione seemed to take control over the situation. She sat up and started kissing Erin's neck, her hands still wandering across her naked torso.

No matter how good it felt, Erin knew she wasn't ready.

"Wait," she whispered, pulling away as Hermione lied back down. "I don't think I'm ready for . . . You know. . ."

"Oh, of course!" said Hermione. "I don't think I'm ready, either. I'm sorry, Erin, making you uncomfortable was not my intention."

"I know, it wasn't." Erin pecked Hermione's lips before getting off the bed. "Do you wanna listen to some music?"

Hermione sat up. "Yeah, sure! What have you got?"

"Uh, well, let's see. . . " Erin pulled out the box full of vinyls and put it next to Hermione. "ABBA, Queen, David Bowie, Kate Bush, Dolly Parton, Mazzy Star—"

"Mazzy Star?" Hermione's eyes lit up. "I love them!"

"Me too! Which album should we play? She Hangs Brightly or So Tonight That I Might See?"

"So Tonight That I Might See!"

"Side one or two?"

"Whatever is Fade Into You on. I've been obsessed with that song lately," replied Hermione.

"Hermione Granger," breathed Erin out. "You truly are my person."

After everything was set, Erin got onto her bed, pulling Hermione down onto the pillow.

Fade Into You was the first song to play. Erin put her arm around Hermione, her hand under Hermione's chin, cuddling up to her girlfriend's chest.

Hermione started humming to the intro of the song and then singing softly;

"I wanna hold the hand inside you

I wanna take the breath that's true

I look to you and I see nothing

I look to you to see the truth

You live your life, You go in shadows

You'll come apart and you'll go blind

Some kind of night into your darkness

Colors your eyes with what's not there

Fade into you. . ."

***

As soon as Erin opened her eyes the next day, she knew it was fifteenth of July. The main day why she visited the graveyard in her town every year.

It was fourteen years since the death of Marlene Mckinnon and Dorcas Meadowes.

Erin always had this sad mood on that day and she was feeling bad for Hermione to see her like that. Their relationship was not on that stage yet.

"You okay?" Hermione asked in her morning voice, startling Erin as she did know her girlfriend was awake. "You've been staring at the ceiling for the past five minutes, didn't even notice I was watching you."

Erin turned her head to her and smirked. "Were you admiring me, Granger?"

Hermione slightly slapped Erin's arm, blushing. Her face grew serious again as she asked, "So what's going on?"

"It's fourteen years anniversary of auntie Dorcas and auntie Marlene's death," Erin whispered. "I always go to the graveyard where they're buried. I'm gonna go there today. Do you wanna go, too? You don't have to, of course. . . "

"Of course, I'll go," assured Hermione, smiling sadly. "I wanna be there to support you."

Erin planted a quick kiss on Hermione's lips. "Thank you."

***

Hand in hand, Erin and Hermione walked to the graveyard that was about a half an hour from the Mckinnon's house.

Unsurprisingly, they had been given some looks of disgust from other people but none of them said anything because they simple did not care what people thought about them. Those people didn't even know who the girls are.

Erin was wearing white long-sleeved shirt, black skirt, stockings and black Doc Martens shoes. Hermione decided for a dark academia inspired outfit; white shirt, brown cardigan over it and dark brown trousers with black also black Doc Martens shoes.

It started to rain in the morning. Because Hermione was slightly taller than Erin, she was holding the grey umbrella.

The only person who was at the graveyard was an old lady who lived on the same street as Erin. The girl knew the woman had a son who also on fifteenth of July, but ten years ago, died.

But in a car accident.

It took a few moments before the graves that Erin and Hermione were looking for came into their sights.

The girls put pink Hydrangea for Marlene and a yellow one for Dorcas.

Erin took a deep breath as her eyes started to water. She sniffed and wiped it away.

Hermione was watching her girlfriend in concern. She wrapped her arm around Erin and placed a kiss on the side of her head.

"I'm sure they would be so proud of you, you know?"

Erin could only nod because she was sure her voice would break if she talked.