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Author's Notes: Well, here's a sequel to "It's Here, It's Tingling." It's shorter, and I skipped quite a few months in between (maybe I'll go back and add in a few entries before this one at some point, who knows?), but I thought this one was pretty good. I hope you like it. And, if the people who asked me about doing a Ron entry are reading this, I'm working on it. :) My only complaint is I can't see Ron keeping a journal or anything, so I'll just have to work around that. I already have an idea how to, anyway. Back to this fic: please excuse my typos, and I hope you like it…

Tiptoe, Tiptoe…

…All I wanted was a friend

To look at me, to comprehend

All I wanted to was to fly

How could you sit and watch me die?

All I wanted was you there

Your cruelty was my despair

You just killed me

So the story goes…

--Nine Days, "Back to Me"

December 30, 1994 (9:37 p.m.)

Dear Miss Diary,

I'm feeling rather sick today. I'm not sure why either, and that's the worst part. It's a mixture of things, I suppose. Can you believe Harry and Cho finally got together? Ugh, Harry's been gushing about it for the past weeks, and I still can't get that nasty taste out of my mouth. Ugh ugh ugh…

Hmm, maybe that's why I feel sick. Or maybe it's Ron.

Ron. Ron. Ron. Oh dear, I'm beginning to hate the poor guy. Everywhere I look, there's Ron. I think I about fainted when he asked me to that Christmas ball a few days ago. Why is fate so cruel? I love him dearly, you know. But just not in that way. That deserves almost as many ughs as the whole Harry/Cho idea.

Have you ever had that feeling of your entire world collapsing? The feeling that if you move too quickly in one direction you'll fall off the earth, never to return? Of course you haven't, you're not real.

My only confidant in the world is a pretty little book I can write in. And by confidant, I mean I can tell you things I can't tell anyone else…namely Harry and Ron.

Back on my sickness, Miss Diary.

That's how I feel right now. Like one wrong move and I'm falling and falling and falling and falling… And falling some more… Then I'll stop and I'll be dead and I'll never be able to—

I'm really beginning to sound like a depressed freak on the verge of suicide, aren't I? I'm really not, I just feel that way right now.

The whole school is filled with a kind of dull electricity. I can feel the sparks pricking against my skin, smell the smoke…everything horrible is piled atop everything horrible and I feel as if I have to tiptoe about it all…tiptoe around the school.

Ugh.

Ever since I began calling him Voldemort I feel like I have to be Harry's hero. But it's beginning to dawn on me that I can't be a hero to a hero, you know? Here I am, a depressed little fifteen-year-old girl, lovesick (I said it, I said it…) to the hero, being followed around like a puppy by the hero's best friend, and moping about over the object of the hero's affection. Did that make sense?

RON, LEAVE ME ALONE.

I'm sorry, I had to get that out here, as I can't say it aloud, it'll hurt his feelings, oh dear, that sounded arrogant, didn't it?

That was one long sentence…

It's snowing. That was off-hand, wasn't it? I'm perched up in the seat of the bay window, up in my dorm, looking out into the darkness and watching those little white skeletons called snowflakes drifting to the ground… Oh my, here come the tears.

What's wrong with me? My God, I wish that pile would collapse! I wish I could stop tiptoeing! I wish Voldemort would leave us alone! I wish Ron would fall in love with Lavender! I wish Cho would lose all her hair and turn green! And most of all I wish I didn't feel so damn much! (I wrote a curse word. Miss Diary…I, Miss Perfectionist Hermione Granger, wrote a curse word… Oh my…)

I've probably cried more over this whole catastrophe than Harry himself. The story of my life: tiptoe, tiptoe, tears, tears, tiptoe, tiptoe, mope, mope, tiptoe, tiptoe, feel strong, be strong…

And it all goes down to Voldemort. VOLDEMORT. My hand doesn't even shake anymore when I write that. My heart doesn't go as nutters when Harry says that. Am I getting brave or am I getting cold? And while we're on that subject, tell me the difference between brave and cold.

I'm rambling. I'm rambling more than I have ever in my entire life.

Tiptoe, tiptoe…

I want to go home. I want to go home where there's no teetering pile of horrible things, where I don't have to tiptoe, where there's no electricity, just warmth.

It's so cold now, Miss Diary. Everyone's shaky and wary and worried. Everyone who knows is tired and has red eyes. Even through the ecstasy of Cho's acceptance, Harry's sad. Under that coat of happiness, there's a thicker layer of sadness. Sometimes I think it's only Harry and I who see the threat out of all the other students.

Harry's tiptoeing too. I'm realizing that as that anger and frustration of him and Cho goes away. He's tiptoeing, and he's crying (inside), and he's worried…

Now I feel guilty for being mad at him. The poor guy has it so much worse off than I do. How could I ever have been mad at him?

I suppose I'll tiptoe along with him, and pray along with him, so the pile won't fall. In truth, I really don't want to know what will happen when it falls. I don't think anyone does.

Oh dear, someone's coming. I can't let them see this. They'll probably think I've lost my mind. I'll end this here.

Off to tiptoe some more, Miss Diary. Hope I'll live to ramble to you once more.

--Hermione

10:04 p.m.

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