She wakes up more abruptly than she's accustomed to, the sheets sticking to her in that familiarly unpleasant way, and her cheeks colour scarlet. Not again. It can't be happening again.

It hasn't happened since that first night at Hogwarts, where she cried herself to sleep because she was Sorted into Ravenclaw and not Gryffindor like her older brother, Thom, the one her parents cherish, while she's ignored. She was humiliated, though not surprised, to wake up with a damp night-dress and soggy sheets.

Now, though...why now? She doesn't know, and she tiptoes from her bed with a rapidly fluttering heart, her braids thumping against her shoulder-blades (she always braids her hair when she goes to sleep). In the next bed, Mandy turns over, snuffling an indefinable something into her pillow, and Morag bites her bottom lip hard to keep from crying out.

She knows that all she needs is a quick shower and a clean nightgown (easily procured from the top of her trunk), but she can't bear to go back to sleep yet, not so soon, and instead, she sits on the tiled floor under the hot spray, feeling it plaster her hair and needle into her shoulders. If the water's a bit saltier than it should be, there is no one to notice.

"I suck," she whispers into the sound of the pounding water, and fresh tears prickle her eyes. It is long, long minutes before she feels sufficiently recovered to step out and dry herself off, and even longer to whisper-call a house elf into cleaning up her sheets for her. The one that comes to help, a girl with the largest ears she's ever seen on a house elf, says her name is Tinky, and that it will be her pleasure to help Miss MacDougal, yes, it will. At least this way, she won't wake up all her Housemates with the noisy struggle of getting damp sheets off her bed and putting on new ones.

With a sigh, Morag tiptoes back to her bed. Mandy is now on her back, faint snores escaping her mouth. The bed is warm and faintly lavender-scented, and Morag pulls the blankets up almost to her nose.

Maybe by the time she wakes up tomorrow, she can forget this ever happened.