Okay, so there is absolutely no explanation for me taking this long to update, and I am so super sorry _ Can you forgive me? Anyway, I swear it won't be anywhere near as long to update again, because I already have the next chapter mostly written. Thanks for hanging in there!
Allie
That night Hermione dreamed.
She dreamed every night now, since the war. Nightmares, horrific, gory nightmares.
Of course she had studied up on it, what the muggles called Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Most of the treatments were drugs, and were therefore out of the question.
So Hermione buried her life under a mountain of work and tucked away the dreams and mood swings. It worked, for the most part. But the hardest parts were the nights.
At night, when she was asleep, her defenses were down. She couldn't recite tables or spells to keep the images of the dead away. And there were so many dead. They haunted her, their faces and unfinished stories. Everyone had left someone behind, but some were closer than others.
Tonks and Lupin were frequent visitors in her nightmares. Sometimes they fought together, and sometimes they were fighting to get to the other, but they never made it.
That, unfortunately, was tonight's theme, Tonks and Lupin were on the Hogwarts grounds where they both fell, fighting against shapeless blobs of black shadow. Hermione saw them both fall, taken by different curses. She saw them hit the ground, broken, and she saw them being taken to the repurposed Great Hall.
She was unable to do anything; of course that's what made it a nightmare. She didn't have her wand; she didn't have a muggle weapon. She was useless, powerless against the dark forces that claimed her friends.
She would wake up screaming, thrashing around in the blankets like a patient at St. Mungo's. Even with the silencing charm she placed on her room every night, people somehow found out, she could see it in the sympathetic looks in the halls, and Madame Pomfrey had approached her one day after Ancient Runes, offering her a sleeping draught that Hermione had politely declined.
This night, predictably, was no different than all the others. She woke up in the early morning, her throat raw, her hand reaching for her wand, and her pillow wet from tears. Crookshanks had since refused to sleep anywhere near her anymore, so she hugged her pillow tight to her chest and sobbed.
She was sitting at the Gryffindor table when Harry and Ron stumbled in and sat down heavily. Neither of them had gotten much sleep either, by the looks of it. Ginny wasn't far behind, by she looked significantly more well-rested.
Harry mumbled something that resembled "Morning," while pouring some pumpkin juice.
Ron ignored her and started stuffing his face with eggs and toast.
Ginny flashed a quick smile at Hermione in way of greeting and kissed Harry's cheek. "Whatcha got there, Hermione? Anything worth reading?" She said, nodding at the Prophet spread in front of Hermione's meager breakfast of fruit and dry toast.
"Nothing at all, I'm afraid." She said truthfully. The Prophet was even more rubbish now than it had been a few years ago. She folded it resolutely and started in on her Arithmancy book.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, until finally Harry joined the waking world and said, "I got a letter from Kingsley the other day, said he might have a new lead on Macnair, somewhere in Russia."
Hermione sighed, why can it never be somewhere warm?
"Excellent! When do we leave?" Ron had decided to join the conversation. He avoided Hermione's eyes, which was a common habit now.
Ginny snorted in disgust, "Honestly, Ron. We don't even know where he's at. In Russia. Stop going around half-cocked ready to fight anyone who looks at you funny!"
Hermione sighed again; it seemed to be that kind of morning.
"Sod off, Gin. Don't tell me what to do." His ears were turning an unpleasant shade of red.
This had to be difficult for Harry, his best mate and his girlfriend were brother and sister and were biologically programmed to fight, but everyone handled the war differently, and it had put a lot of strain on a lot of relationships.
The Weasley's were as close as ever, if not closer, but there was always something fragile in the air when they attended Sunday dinner. The Burrow had been rebuilt, thanks to a generous benefactor that everyone assumed was Harry, but there was something about the family that was damaged beyond repair.
Hermione was brought back to earth abruptly when Ginny said hotly, "Right, Hermione?"
Hermione, startled, looked over her book at Harry for help but he just sat there looking miserable."Um, well…" She had no idea what they had been arguing about now.
Ron snorted, "Just go back to your book, Hermione. Like you always do. Run away to the library because obviously that's where all the worlds' problems are solved."
Harry tried to intervene, "Ron, mate, c'mon that's a lit-"
Hermione shook her head, cutting him off. "It's alright." She gathered up her things and exited the Great Hall, heading not, in fact towards the library, where Ronald had so kindly suggested she run to, but instead to the Room of Requirement.
Across the hall, a pair of raging gray eyes followed the event and her exit with some hostility.
The Room of Requirement had survived the fire, but only just. It was injured, but slowly improving. In time it would be just as great as it once was, helping students break the rules as it always has. Hermione has been helping it along, fixing things that can be, and clearing out the things that were ruined beyond repair. It was a tiring job, and often dirty. Ash seemed to get into every crevice possible, and she was constantly washing it out of her hair.
The room seemed to be glad to see her; it conjured one of Hermione's favorite squishy chairs. And while this was about the limit of what it could do, it was an improvement.
She sat her heavy bag down on it and began to sort through some of the books that had been in the room with the fire. Some of them we nothing but bound ash, fragile to every a breath, but others were barely singed.
Mind numbing work is exactly what I need. No Ron, no blonde stupid ferrets, no nothing.
And so it began, she worked and cleared out some of the ashes, conjuring shelves and cabinets for the rest.
Time, being fickle as it is, flew by without her notice. By the time she stopped, it was time for dinner, and she had missed all of her classes. Normally, this would have bothered her, her being Hermione Granger. But today, she couldn't muster enough feelings to care.
She left the Room of Requirement, murmuring promises to be back soon, and headed back to the Head's dorm.
There had been no contest for who would be Head Boy and Girl. Both of them were infinitely qualified with academics and their participation in the war.
Harry and Ron had predictably fought against McGonagall when she had announced that Hermione and Malfoy would be living together. While the three of them argued, Hermione had stood there awkwardly, looking everywhere but at him. He stood there looking like he had better things to do, but then he had turned to her and smiled that small smile and her world had tilted.
That was it, though. The only bit of humanity she had ever really seen from him. Since then, he had been withdrawn, distant. Occasionally cold. He had never once called her a Mudblood, or voiced any such opinions from their school days before the war. So that was progress, she guessed.
But for some reason, she could not get that brief moment out of her mind. She must be imagining things.
"Alea iacta est" The tapestry shimmered into the door that she pushed open.
Luckily, the one person she wanted to avoid wasn't there. She smiled in relief and curled up in the armchair by the fire, and started on her Potions essay. Skipping class wasn't exactly acceptable, but forsaking homework was unthinkable.
She got about four inches down the page before her eyelids started drooping, and about another half an inch before the quill slipped from her hand to flutter to the floor.
