A/N: This is complete silliness to use up my 'Sharing a bed' trope prompt. I've quite possibly used some other tropes in writing what my brain decided to come up with. List of prompts at the bottom, as usual. Not had a proper beta – apologies.
Summary: Hermione can't sleep and Sirius has nightmares. Some bad decisions are made between the two friends in trying to get some sleep. Hermione/Sirius (Warnings: Cross-gen(ish))
Writing for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry (challenges & assignments). Assignment 7 - Potions - Task #1: Mandrake Root: Write a fic with the theme "misery loves company."
Unspoken Issues
A loud shout echoed through the dark rooms of Grimmauld Place. Hermione, already awake and had been staring at the ceiling for the last ten minutes, bolted out of her bedroom, wand in hand. Harry and Ron were working nights as Aurors, so it was just her and Sirius in the house.
She half-expected to have bumped into him in the dark corridor of the floor they shared, but she made it all the way to his room to find him sat up in his bed. There was a single light coming from his wand, clenched tightly in his fist, making him look demonic with his ragged breathing moving him awkwardly, and his dark hair hanging partially over his face.
'Sirius?' she called.
He lifted his head, groaning when he saw Hermione at his open door. 'Sorry, love.'
'Nightmare again?' she asked. Taking a step into his room, Hermione flicked her wand so the lights dotted around came on.
Sirius put a hand over his eyes, squinting at the brightness. 'Bit of a warning next time, Hermione.'
'Sorry,' she muttered, coming to sit on the edge of his bed. 'Want to talk about it?'
Sirius dropped his wand on the bed, the light from it going out, and rubbed at his face with both hands. 'No,' he snapped, his voice muffled under his tattooed hands. 'Do you?' He dropped his hands and gave her a pointed look.
She practically growled at him when she said, 'No.'
Both of them hadn't been sleeping very well for weeks now and neither seemed to want to talk about it. To anyone.
Hermione picked up Sirius' wand and placed it on the bedside table with her own. Lifting the blanket, she said, 'Shove over.'
'I'm fine,' he said, already moving over for her.
Once he'd settled back down, leaving the lights on, Hermione shuffled over to him, wrapping an arm around his waist so she was spooning him. He held onto her hand tightly, settling in. 'Better?' she asked.
'A little,' he admitted.
She lay there, looking at Sirius' hair, the melon scent of his shampoo coming off the strands in waves. It was so silky and shiny. Not even a grey hair had appeared yet. 'Sirius?'
'Yes, Hermione.'
'How is your hair so good without you even trying?' she asked. 'You don't even brush it and … look at it!'
'It is great hair, isn't it?' Sirius' smirk could be heard in his voice. 'I leave the conditioner in for five minutes.' There was a moment of silence before Sirius said, 'Hermione?'
'Yes, Sirius.'
'Get your feet off me, please,' he said, pushing them away with his own.
'Sorry, are they cold?' She lifted her feet to tuck the bottom of the blanket under them.
'Oddly, yes. I can feel ice,' he said.
'Oh very funny.'
'I need a drink.' Sirius got out of the bed, practically dragging Hermione out with him.
He roughly shoved her back onto the pillows, smirking at how disheveled she looked as she tried to straighten herself out. 'Bring the bottle, please!' she demanded, throwing one of the pillows at his retreating back.
With her cold feet still making her feel like she couldn't get warm, Hermione went searching for one of Sirius' well-worn jumpers in his chest of drawers, ignoring his griping when he caught her in the act. 'It's this or I put my feet on your back …' She trailed off, a jumper in hand, staring at Sirius' feet. 'Er, what are those?'
Sirius proudly moved his right foot side-to-side in front of his left, which were adorned by soft pink fluffy slippers that covered the entire foot. 'Ginny's slippers. Reckon she's got a charm on them because my feet are never cold when I've got these on.'
Hermione snorted, shoving the jumper on. 'She'll kill you when she knows you've been stealing her slippers.'
'Only if she finds out.' Sirius kicked them off, handing Hermione an empty glass tumbler before getting back into bed. 'I won't tell about the mighty Hermione Granger needing to share my bed in order to sleep if you don't tell about the slippers. Deal?'
She narrowed her eyes at him for a moment before getting under the blanket. 'This works both ways, Sirius.'
Sirius shrugged, pouring Firewhisky into his tumbler. 'They know I have nightmares. I don't hide my demons.'
'I never said I had demons,' she muttered, holding her tumbler out to him. He filled it more than was sensible before putting the bottle on his bedside table.
'No, just secret insomnia brought on by unspoken issues,' he said with a smug grin, his grey eyes twinkling in amusement.
'What happened in your childhood?' she asked with a wide smile and a raised eyebrow. 'Shall we talk about your mother?'
Sirius' narrowed his eyes. 'Fine. You can put one foot on my calf.'
Hermione wasted no time in pushing her foot into the lower of his leg with a smug smile. Her toes started to tingle with the heat that always came off Sirius' body. 'Thank you.'
They clinked their tumblers. 'We are two of a kind, you and I,' Sirius said. He flinched a little as the Firewhisky he'd swallowed travelled through his body.
'In that we're both miserable, and misery loves company?' She took a large gulp of her drink, joining Sirius in the flinch. 'This is not a healthy friendship, you know?'
'Meh.' Sirius shrugged, some of his drink splashing drops onto the blanket. 'You make it sound like we're having some forbidden relationship.'
They silently continued to drink, Sirius staring at his drink between sips, Hermione looking around at the different items in Sirius' room, like the posters he'd put up as a teenager and still hadn't taken down.
It wasn't until they were finishing their third tumbler of Firewhisky that one of them finally spoke.
'When I close my eyes all I can see is Bellatrix's face and I'm back in that room,' she said quietly. She swirled the small amount of amber liquid left in her glass. 'All these years, and it still comes back.'
'I can still see Lily and James … their unseeing eyes.' Sirius' words slurred slightly towards the end.
Hermione finished her drink and stared at the empty tumbler. 'In retrospect, this might have been a terrible idea.'
'No, a terrible idea would be if we slept together,' he said, laughing.
Hermione laughed, holding her tumbler out to him. 'We've not drank anywhere enough to even joke about that.'
Six Hours Later
Hermione groaned, her head thumping violently, as consciousness worked its way into her brain. There was a mass of soft hair covering her face, and just by the texture and scent, she knew it wasn't hers. Also, there was the weight of Sirius' head on her chest.
'Sirius,' she croaked, her throat struggling against the dryness. She slapped at his bare shoulder. 'Get off!'
'There's Hangover Potions in the cabinet,' he mumbled into her bare chest, his breath tickling her and his stubble scratching her at the same time. He waved a hand blindly towards the bedside cabinet on her side of the bed without getting off her.
'We were idiots,' she muttered. She rolled, forcing him to move off her.
'I don't know. It wasn't unpleasant.'
'Well, that's exactly how a woman likes to be spoken about – not unpleasant,' she mimicked his words. She groaned again as her headache intensified with each movement, trying to find the potions in the cabinet without getting out of the bed.
Sirius merely laughed, kissing her naked back as she continued to search through the cabinet. 'Best sleep I've had in weeks, though.'
Hermione elbowed him away, two potion phials now in her hand as she flopped back, breathing heavily like she'd run a marathon. 'We really shouldn't have done that,' she said, handing him a phial. She sat up to drink hers, really fighting not to vomit as the movements made her headache violently pulse through her brain.
'I've no regrets,' Sirius said nonchalantly after drinking his own potion.
'Good decisions are never made when drunk, Sirius. What if we've ruined our friendship?' She sighed heavily looking at his bemused look, trying not to let her eyes linger on the tattoo he had on his chest; a small outline of a Grim.
'I don't think the drink is completely to blame for what happened,' he said, tugging at one of her messy curls.
She slapped his hand away. 'It's not funny.'
'Do you regret it that much?' he asked.
Her gaze snapped to his at his tone. 'No,' she said quickly, grabbing his closest hand. 'You are not something I'll ever regret.' She gripped his hand tightly, trying desperately to convey in it that she wasn't rejecting him. 'But neither of us are in a stable place to give the other what we need right now. I can't lose you as a friend, Sirius.'
'No,' Sirius said with a sigh. He lifted her hand to kiss her palm. 'You're probably right.'
She smiled sweetly at him before frowning. 'Seriously, Sirius. Why is your hair so fabulous?'
Spring Funfair
- Milkshake Bar - Chocolate 3. Sharing a bed
- Cherry Blossoms - 17. (task) Include the following phrase somewhere in your fic: 'two of a kind'
- Urban Safari - 16. (word) Mighty
- Levi-Kart - Amortentia Goblet - 4. With a character from a different era/year than your 'kart' (Sirius Black)
- Paint a Rainbow - Red 7. 'In retrospect, this might have been a terrible idea.'
- Tree Planting - Dogwood 4. (character) Sirius Black
- Teddy Bears Picnic - Banana Sandwich - (object) Blanket
- Birdhouse Building - Step 2. (object) Fluffy slippers
- Spring Petting Zoo - Sheep - (action) Cuddling
- Bunny Races (Hermione) - 1,543 words
- Egg & Spoon Race - Sirius Black with Hermione Granger
- Egg Hunt - Spotty Egg - (trope) Sharing a bed
Spring Seasonal
- Days of the Year & Religious Events - March 26th - Write about a character with great hair
- Aquarium Month - The Heater - 6. Write about someone cold being warmed up
- Crayon Day - 37. Melon
- Space Day - Neptune - (trope) Sharing a bed
- Spring Colours - 5. Soft pink
- Crystals & Gemstones - 3. (trope) Sharing a bed
April Writing Club
- Book Club - Nick - (word) Forbidden, (action) Smirking, (trope) Sharing a bed
- Lizzy's Loft - 17. 'Oddly, yes. I can feel ice.'
- Elizabeth's Empire - 28. (action) apologising
- Liza's Loves - Ron 18. (item) Jumper
- EnTitled - 7. (feature) Tattoo
Yearly
- 365 - 355. (trope) Sharing a bed
- Scavenger Hunt - 86. (trope) Sharing a bed
- Fantastic Beasts - 20. Baku - Scenario: Write about comforting someone after a nightmare
Spring Quarterly
4. London - (trope) Sharing a bed
Piñata
- Hard - (trope) Sharing a bed - 1,543 words
Would You Rather...
- Write a Rare Pair OR a Common Pair?
Word Count: 1,543