A/N: Written for Strictly Dramione's Summer Loving – Back to School Writing Fest 2018.

Alt universe: no Voldemort; Bill hasn't been attacked by a werewolf. No particular reason why. But surely there's more to Bill Weasley than a scar and a liking for rare meat?

Certain canon events and people's ages don't make sense. It's okay. It's just fiction.

Rated M for language and references to sex.

Thanks to coyg_81 for the scrumptious cover; LightofEvolution for suggesting the title; and La BelladoneX for supporting me through some 'fadhbanna fear.' I'm indebted, ladies.

I only own the plot of this poor tale. J K Rowling owns the Harry Potter universe; for which I humbly thank her.

At Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the school year was about to end. The vast majority of the students in Sixth Year had collapsed with exhaustion, draping themselves around their respective House Common Rooms, utterly shagged from the exhaustive toil of exams.

Except for one person.

Ron Weasley opened a bleary eye and squinted across Gryffindor's Common Room floor - upon which he was lying - at the cheerful fireplace, where Hermione Granger was talking nineteen to the dozen to his sister Ginny, who was nodding and uh-huh-ing in all the right places while trying not to fall over from sheer boredom.

'I'm so excited, I can barely wait for holidays to begin!' Hermione gushed, hopping from one leg to another.

'So I see,' Ginny murmured faintly. 'You're certainly very motivated about spending your holidays working in a bank.'

Ron closed his eye. 'She's banging on about her internship at Gringotts again,' he mumbled to Harry Potter, who was sprawled out next to him.

'Gods,' Harry muttered, lazily spelling a cushioning charm to make his sojourn on the floor a wee bit more comfy. Curse his good manners in letting the girls get all the actual furniture to sprawl on! 'How she can get so excited about working through her holidays is beyond me.'

Hermione, oblivious to the lack of interest swirling around her, hugged a special secret to herself. She'd completely lucked out on her application and scored an internship in the most exciting of the venerable bank's departments – Curse-Breaking. But that wasn't the best part!

The best part was that she'd get to work, up close and personal, with... him.

She blushed prettily.

Bill Weasley.

Oh Lord, what a honey he was! Lean, laid-back, long hair, phenomenally smart, looked a dangerous job in the eye every day and said 'What else have you got?'

He was so cool.

He was so hot!

She'd had a crush on him since forever, but he'd always treated her as kid sister number two, just as he'd always treated Harry as kid brother number... um... seven or thereabouts.

But now she was older. Her body had finally discovered the 'on' button for breasts and hips and cheekbones, and her hair – well, it was still there, just disguised beneath a realm of potions and charms. But surely he'll notice that she's a woman now, not a skinny, bushy-haired, non Quidditch-playing honorary member of the Weasley family?

Daydreaming, Hermione stopped bashing Ginny's ears with banking nonsense and drifted up to her dormitory bed.

Spelling her bed curtains shut and applying some rigorous silencing charms, she closed her eyes and sent herself a vision...

Deep in the bowels of a small manor, whose occupant had departed our shores for more ethereal ones, Bill and Hermione search for an item of rare value – a choker necklace made from precious stones, set in pristine goblin gold. It just happened to be diabolically cursed (Hermione was a little fuzzy on the details, but hey, it's her fantasy; she can skip corners if she wants to).

They've been searching for most of the day, casting detection spells hither and yon. Eventually, Bill finds the shimmering case containing the necklace behind a towering mountain of mouldy books. It feels warm and it trembles, as if with expectation, in his large, long-fingered hands.

Placing the case carefully on the manor's kitchen table, Bill methodically works his way through his significant repertoire of curse-breaking spells, Hermione taking meticulous notes along the way. But nothing works. The case still hums brightly, snug in its evil miasma.

'Shit,' Bill mutters, pinching the bridge of his nose and closing his tired eyes. 'What kind of bloody curse is this?'

Hermione peers over the top of her half-moon glasses (are half-moon glasses sexy? She'll have to look into it) and nervously shows Bill her notes. 'I think,' she bravely ventures, 'if you try this, and this; then this, you should see a positive result...' She trails off and bites her lower lip. Oh, Gryffindor's garters! How could she think that the great Bill Weasley, curse-breaker extraordinaire, could learn from her?

Bill takes her notes and scrutinises them, expressionless. Then he sets them down on the table and looks at her with wonder. 'My gods, you might have it!' he breathes. He combines a couple of curses and makes the adjustments Hermione recommends. He points his wand at the case and...

...a flash of light; and 'ping!'

The case opens.

Hermione gasps. 'You did it, Bill!'

Bill takes her hand and gently squeezes it. 'No, Hermione. We did it,' he says intently.

She blushes (to her annoyance) and Bill scans the choker for residual nasties. Deeming it safe, he takes the glittering strand of jewels out of the case and holds it up to the manor's dusty light.

'What do you think?' he asks.

She stares at it, agog. 'It's – it's stunning.'

He drapes the choker around her slim neck. Startled, her heart racing, she bundles up her hair to keep it out of the way as he leans over to fastens it.

Once complete, he ghosts his hands up to her face, angling it up to his. 'Yes,' he whispers. 'You are.'

His lips descend, hungrily, on hers.

If Hermione was the happiest Sixth Year currently domiciled at Hogwarts, one didn't have to go too far to find the whiniest. Languishing in the castle's dungeon-y bits lay Slytherin's Common Room. Inside, a group of spell-bound (not literally, we hope) group of (mostly female) fans, well-wishers and hangers-on gathered around one grey-eyed, blonde-haired grumpy pants, who'd flung himself onto a silky, forest-green settee with all the innate grace of a pre-syphilitic Byron.

'Gringotts,' he moaned. Then, upon receiving no reaction from the crowd, he raised his voice. 'Gringotts!'

Nearby, mates Blaise Zabini and Theo Nott rolled their eyes and slumped deeper into their post-exam malaise, so it was up to Pansy-of-the-pug-face Parkinson to squawk 'What about it? Has it lost all your money?'

Draco stared at her with repulsed stupefaction. 'No, you daft bint,' he snapped. 'My bloody mother has seen fit to sign away my freedom, forcing me to work over the summer holidays at the bloody bank!' He flung his gorgeous head of hair back and contemplated the Common Room's dark, high-domed ceiling.

'Oh, how awful!' gasped Daphne Greengrass, always determined to be one step ahead of Parkinson in the 'Draco Likes Me Better Than You' game. 'What a horrible thing for a mother to do!'

Draco narrowed his eyes. No-one was permitted to insult his mother except him! And even he didn't even approve of himself doing it.

'Maybe she wants you to learn about how money is made,' Millicent Bulstrode mumbled from the other side of the coffee table, where she flicked through a copy of Witch Weekly. Being square, stout and plain, she knew she didn't have a hope of attracting Draco's fleeting attention. Not that she cared. Not enough meat on his bones for her taste.

Draco snorted elegantly. 'I don't need to know how money is made. I've got tons of it already.' He sighed and slunk down on the settee. 'Gods, these holidays are going to suck.'

'Oh, Drakey, you poor thing,' Pansy cooed, putting her hand on his arm.

Draco's luscious upper lip curled. Six bloody weeks of toiling at the bank with no totty to speak of other than long-fingered goblins and mouldering old accountants. Slytherin's slacks! How the hell was he going to cope?

He looked at Pansy's hand, which was still taking up valuable real estate on his arm. His cock twitched. Her voice got on his very last nerve, and her face wasn't exactly of the variety that could launch a thousand ships. Still, she could be counted on to assume the position when he had an itch to scratch. And for all he knew, his itch may not get scratched for another six sodding weeks!

What the hell. They could always do doggy-style. Maybe he could gag her, too.

Draco nodded at Pansy, then indicated the dorms with an inclined eyebrow. 'Come on.'

He stood up. 'Give me twenty minutes, guys,' he murmured to room-mates Blaise and Theo, both of whom were three-quarters asleep in their chairs anyway.

Pansy trotted behind Draco, bestowing a satisfied smirk on the other disappointed girls. Nobody touches Drakey but me, bitches! she proudly broadcasted with her smug pug face. And don't you forget it!