5
August 2, 1999
Hermione stepped out of the shower, towel wrapped tightly around her body, and reached for another to dry her hair. The steam was thick, coating the bathroom with a hazy cloud and fogging the mirror. As she wiped the condensation from it, she took a minute to actually look at her reflection, something she felt she hadn't truly done in months.
She had never been the type of girl to care that much about her appearance truthfully, and spending years sharing a dormitory with Lavender and Parvati had made her truly loathe any form of vanity. Fourth year, spending time with Viktor, was the only instance in her life when she even gave her looks any real consideration. But then, during the war any sliver of self-care seemed completely frivolous and idiotic, so her thoughts of how anyone else perceived her appearance were few and far between.
Taking in her reflection now was no less than shocking. If only her fourteen-year-old self could see her now. There was no trace of the girl from the Yule Ball who seemed to put the entire room at a stand-still. Her eyes then had been so full of light and prospects of the future, and now they seemed hollow and empty. Her hair, pulled up beautifully that night in an up-do that she would never admit had taken her hours to pull off, typically had a mind of its own, standing on end and taking up more space in the room than she ever could have on her own, but now it lay flat against her head, looking as lifeless as she felt. Her skin had always been one of her features that she was somewhat proud of. Parvati and Lavender had always complained about their complexion or blemishes, covering themselves in thick, pasty masks at night, but Hermione had never suffered any of that. But now, what once was blemish-free and radiant, was pallid and withdrawn.
She untucked the corner of the towel that had been folded beneath itself, allowing it to fall to the floor around her. She sucked a breath in deeply through her teeth, taking in the image in front of her. All those missed lunches were starkly evident. She could count every rib protruding throughout her abdomen, and the bones in her chest jutted harshly against her almost colorless skin.
Wow. I look like a skeleton. It's really no wonder everyone looks at me the way that they do.
With fucking pity.
It was always pity she saw in their face.
A large, pale scar covered her entire right hip, wrapping from her navel to the top of her thigh in a sharp starburst, jagged tendrils emanating from it like solar flares. The jinx Dolohov hit her with in the Department of Mysteries may have not been fatal due to the silencing charm on him at the time, but the dark magic had still prevented any healer from removing the mark it left behind.
Another scar, this one faintly purplish and resembling four slashes across her chest, was from a stray hex during the Battle of Hogwarts. She still didn't know who the caster was, she could never tell through the smoke and falling debris, and at this point, did it even matter?
She tried to hide them, to see if she could find herself in this stranger looking back at her. She covered each of these scars with one of her hands, but even then, there were still more to show. Small pockmarks dotted the backs of her hands from the bubotuber pus she had received by owl shortly after the Yule Ball and faint splotches covered the back of her right arm from the burns she suffered in the LeStrange vault.
Removing her hands from the scars covering her midsection, she caught a faint glimpse of the one Bellatrix gave her at Malfoy Manor. She twisted her arm toward the mirror, bringing the scar fully into view. She tried to never look at it, even wore long sleeves to bed to prevent ever having to see the permanent reminder that Bellatrix gave her, her magnum opus of battle scars.
Prior to that moment, she had always been somewhat proud of her muggle-born heritage, despite the negative connotations that came with it in the wizarding world. She had bested them all, dirty blood or not. Now, she felt mocked every time she caught sight of it. All over again, she heard Malfoy jeering it at her between classes, as if he were still standing just a few feet away. She felt eyes on her from the entire Slytherin table during meals. She could feel it, a constant heat, almost breathing, beneath her shirt sleeve.
MUDBLOOD, still perfectly visible despite the time that had passed since having it carved into her skin. The healers tried to remove it after the war but found that nothing could be done to get rid of it. When trial after trial ended in failure, their final attempt involved flaying the skin from her arm and regrowing it entirely. It was useless. The moment they removed the bandages from her arm, the letters recarved themselves, just as painfully as if Bellatrix was there herself engraving the word all over again. They determined that outside of amputation, she was stuck with it.
Dropping her arms back to her sides, she gave herself one final look, taking it all in.
Even though she had never considered herself pretty or even bothered to care all that much about how she looked, it still took her breath every time she saw her own battle scars. There was nothing left of the hopeful young girl clutching Viktor Krum's arm back in 1994. The war had taken that from her, along with her reflection.
She lived through the war, but she didn't feel like she truly survived it. The girl looked back at her with sunken eyes and protruding ribs covered in scars. This wasn't Hermione Granger. She died alongside Lavender, Fred, Sirius, Remus… the list goes on. Her name wasn't up on any walls in memoriam, but she felt like a casualty, nonetheless.
She lifted her towel off the floor, sighing deeply, and rewound it back around herself before leaving the bathroom.
After owling into the office to take a personal day and speaking to Susan's secretary, she now had a couple hours to kill before her appointment. Ginny and Harry had already left, so it was only her and Crookshanks in the house. She sat down at the kitchen table with her coffee cup and a copy of the Daily Prophet. As she typically did when she was home alone, she added two fingers of Muggle whisky to her coffee and relished the burn she felt as it hit her stomach.
She had never been much of a drinker, but after the war ended, she found herself frequenting the Muggle bar down the street. Obviously, she tried drinking at Hogwarts on multiple occasions when someone snuck it in, typically Fred and George or Seamus, but the burn of firewhisky had never been satisfying. Just the smell of it anymore was enough to make her gag.
She had Ron to thank for that lovely reaction.
After seeing Ron's disgusting display in the common room with Lavender 6th year, she left the room with all intentions of wallowing in her own misery in peace. Her attempt was cut short as Lavender and "Won Won" burst into the room she was wallowing in and started attacking one another's face again. It was almost comical, both their attempt at proper snogging and the fact that they'd end up in the same room she was in yet again. It really was no fault of her own. She had taken the high road and left the room to begin with, and yet, here they were again, shoving it in her face. So, really who was to blame for the hex she threw at them?
She stormed back into the dorm, smiling maliciously at the sound of Ron and Lavender fighting off the small birds she had conjured to attack them, and furiously snatched the drink out of Seamus's hand, downing it in one gulp. Shaking her head to relieve the burning in her ears, she heard Seamus say, "Blimey, Hermione. You alright?"
"Fine. Can I have another one?"
"Umm, I'm not sure-"
"Is this a celebration or not?"
"Well, yeah, but you don't –"
"Then I would like another," she said matter-of-factly. He exchanged a furtive glance with Dean who only shrugged and then refilled her glass. She lost count of the number of shots she had, but she definitely remembered singing "The Rattlin' Bog." Seamus had taught it to everyone back in first year, and as they sloshed drinks all over one another, the entire common room erupted in "Ho, ro, the rattlin' bog, the bog down in the valley o." Somewhere between the nest and the bird, it got a little fuzzy. The rest of the night was tinged in shadow and vague memories of throwing up all over her trainers. She woke up in her pyjamas hugging the toilet in the girls' dormitory with no recollection of how she got there. Since then, she stuck solely to Muggle whisky.
She finished her coffee and checked the clock on the wall behind her and found that only an hour had passed.
She wasn't used to having time to spare, and she found that she didn't at all like the feeling of uselessness.
She spent the rest of the morning walking from room to room attempting to find something to do. She had left all of her case files at her office, so she didn't have any work to catch up on, and she was too on edge to focus on reading. She sat down at her desk to reorganize the paper and notes that were strewn across it and soon found herself sobbing into yet another whisky-laden coffee with photos of her and her parents now scattered where her loose notes had been.
One was from the trip to France when she first learned to ski. It showed her and her mother, both of their cheeks pink from the wind and their matching curls blowing beneath their wooly hats. She had both hands raised in the air triumphantly, and her mother was smiling like it was the greatest moment of her life. She remembered having fallen dozens of times before finally making it down the bunny slopes, her mother catching her at the bottom. Her father had snapped the photo just as they let go of one another.
Another photo was from the Christmas before she Obliviated them. She had returned home sullen and frustrated after a horrid date with Cormac McClaggen for the sole purpose of upsetting Ron. A huge cock up, that was; definitely not one of her better decisions. But after only a day, her father managed to cheer her up with his obnoxious and completely unfunny dad jokes. And she spent all of Christmas morning cooking their favorite dishes with her mother. Ron and Cormac were the very last things from her mind, along with Voldemort and the approaching war. It was probably one of the last moments of happiness that she remembered, actually. The photo showed her and her parents sitting in front of the Christmas tree opening gifts. The camera had been set up to magically take photos every few moments to try and catch a good one, and this one had been her absolute favorite. It wasn't the huge smiles on all of their faces, though, of course, she loved that part as well. But it was the way her mother had casually placed a hand on her knee and her father's eyes were squinting just so as he laughed at some silly remark or another. She couldn't even remember what exactly had caused them all to laugh, but it looked like such a typical moment from her life. It wasn't an unusual occasion at all for her father to be laughing uproariously and her mother to be smiling, rolling her eyes in feigned irritation at her father's silliness. It was such a real example of how her life used to be. She was certain she hadn't felt so happy and unfettered since that holiday.
Her father teaching her to ride a bike.
One of her grimacing in a silly dress she had been forced her to wear for some event or another while her mother laughed behind her, hands covering her mouth.
Her mother and father's wedding dance.
One where her parents were standing in front of her childhood home. In one hand a SOLD sign was held haphazardly above her father's head while the other was wrapped around her mother's waist. Her mother had one hand lovingly resting on her swollen belly, and they looked at one another as if nothing else in the world mattered.
Another of her and her father sharing a sundae.
Hermione knew she should stop looking at them. She typically didn't allow herself to even think about her parents anymore. It could've been the whisky or the approaching meeting with Susan where she would have to come face-to-face with the demons she'd been running from, but she couldn't seem to stop.
Her wand vibrated, and as if she were being doused in cold water, she was pulled from her memories. She put all the photos back into the bottom drawer and all the memories into the corner of her mind where she liked to keep them, where they couldn't hurt her.
She stood and immediately regretted how pissed she had gotten in the past two hours. Swaying on her feet, she stumbled into the bathroom and pulled the Sober-Up Potion from her cabinet. Downing it in one gulp, she looked at her reflection in the mirror and watched as her eyelids slowly lifted and the flush from her cheeks dissipated.
Blinking away the last of the haziness in her vision, she thought, well that was a shitty decision. She wiped her face and tried to prepare for what was surely to be an uncomfortable conversation.
She stepped through the floo only a minute after their appointment time and strode to the secretary's desk. Just as she opened her mouth to tell the pretty brunette sitting behind the desk about her appointment, Susan's voice to her left caught her attention.
"Hermione, I'm so glad you're here." Stepping out of the doorway, Susan motioned for Hermione to join her inside her office. "Come on in. Have a seat."
As Hermione followed Susan into the room, another woman with long black braids rose from the lush armchair she had been seated in and gave Hermione a warm smile.
"This is Alys Morgan, my partner-in-crime so to speak," Susan said, as Alys reached across the table in the center of the room and took Hermione's outstretched hand.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Granger."
"Just Hermione is fine. I've met your sister a few times."
"Ah yes, you're friends with Ginny Weasley."
"Yes, I am. We're roommates now, actually." When Susan took one of the chairs in front of her, she gestured toward the seat in front of her, which Hermione took as permission to sit as well. She sat, her right foot nervously tapping, and immediately had to remind herself not to start picking at her nails. Sober-Up Potion always gave her the jitters.
Susan crossed her ankles, calmly placed her hands in her lap, and said, "I assume that you looked over the pamphlet I left for you last night."
"Umm, yes. I did."
"And how do you feel about participating?"
This is a mistake.
"I'm not at all comfortable with the magic policy."
Susan responded, "I understand completely. I should probably tell you now then that it is more involved than simply relinquishing your wand. There's also a daily dose of a magic-suppressing potion as well."
What?!
"A magic suppression potion? That's insane. No one will agree to that." Her mind was reeling and her chest was already beginning to tighten at the mere thought of surrendering her magic.
Alys spoke this time. "Rest assured, Hermione, we take our job very seriously, along with the safety of our patients. I completely understand the hesitation with not using magic, and for those who have gone through tremendous psychological trauma, like-yourself, relinquishing your magic or even simply your wand can definitely bring on feelings of anxiety and trepidation. Every single person we've spoken to has expressed similar sentiments." She gave Hermione a kind smile, as if all Hermione's worries were cleared in those few simple sentences.
"With all due respect, knowing everyone is anxious about it doesn't make me any less anxious."
Susan chuckled, drawing Hermione's attention toward her. "Of course not. What Alys means is that you aren't alone in feeling concerned about surrendering your magic for twelve weeks. The reason we have this policy at all is because one of the main foundations of our program is trust. Any individual suffering severe psychological trauma would have a hard time not only trusting others but also with trusting that they're safe even when in a completely safe environment. For Muggles, they must rely on their bodies and minds to fight feelings of danger or discomfort. For us, we have a tendency to rely solely on our magic, forgetting that our minds and bodies are capable of such amazing feats of resiliency."
"In other words," Alys added, "your magic can theoretically be a hindrance in overcoming psychosomatic disorders. And that isn't even taking into consideration what a magical person could do when they perceive a threat when one doesn't actually exist. I think you've already experienced what can happen during an accidental burst of magic."
Her mind instantly thought of the previous night, Harry's face covered in blood and the shattered china littering the dining room floor. She nodded, guiltily.
Then, returning to the conversation, she said, "Theoretically? What do you mean by 'theoretically'?"
Alys looked at Susan, indicating she could answer. "Yes," Susan began, "theoretically. The Willows Retreat program is in the trial phase, as I'm sure Ginny mentioned to you." When Hermione nodded, Susan continued. "Alys and I, along with Dr. Whitby, our program director, believe that Muggles are so much more advanced when it comes to mental healing than we are here in the wizarding world simply because of our reliance on magic. As I'm sure you've noticed, there isn't much emotional healing done within wizarding society, particularly in a clinical setting. Individuals who've faced trauma are simply left to figure it out on their own. However, in the Muggle world, the mental health field is constantly growing and developing to encompass a myriad of mental illnesses. What sets us apart, biologically, from Muggles, Hermione?"
"We have a specific magical gene. That's the only difference."
"Exactly," Alys said. "Biologically, we are the same, excluding that solitary gene, which contributes to our longer lifespan and our heightened immune systems. However, if a witch or a wizard were to get, say, cancer, it would be treated in a typical Muggle fashion, yes?"
Hermione felt stumped. "Umm, I really have no idea."
"It would. We could potentially go into a person's body using wizarding methods, but the eradication of the cancer itself would have to be done using typical radiation or chemotherapy, just like for Muggles. We don't get cancer as a general rule, so there hasn't been significant research done on how to combat it using magic. So, we would resort to treating it in any way that has shown significant results. The same can be said for anything involving the brain. We, meaning humans, magic or otherwise, have barely traversed the tip of the iceberg on what the human brain can do. Outside of drowning psychological problems in a sea of Pepper-Up Potions and Calming Draught, healers have no idea how to fight depression, anxiety, or stress disorders, let alone dissociative or personality disorders. So, we should be reverting to treatments that are working, which is exactly what we're trying to do at the Willows."
Hermione had to admit the entire notion of Muggle mind healing was intriguing, and more than anything, Alys's excitement was unmistakable. She could remember herself becoming excited at the prospect of something amazing as well, though it had been awhile. The idea in and of itself was catching.
Susan continued, "These treatments are shown to work for Muggles. Mental health in their world is becoming something that isn't at all taboo to talk about. People talk to their friends about medications and treatment options, as if they were exchanging recipes. It isn't hidden or shameful; yet, here we are in the wizarding world, more advanced in almost every way with our healing abilities, and we're living under a proverbial rock, allowing people to suffer in silence – "
"Forcing them to really," Alys interjected.
"We don't just want to help people who are dealing with trauma-related issues," Susan said. "We want to remove the stigma associated with them altogether. Imagine for a second, a world where someone like Tom Riddle could have received advanced healing for the clear mental illness he was suffering from as a child. Maybe nothing would've happened or maybe we could've prevented two major wizarding wars."
The silence in the air was palpable. Hermione had never thought about how someone could've helped Voldemort before he ever became Voldemort, though she remembered Ron suggesting using time-turners to go back and kill him once.
"Tell me you aren't saying –" Hermione began before being cut off by Alys.
"Neither of us are making excuses for Voldemort. What we're saying is that at one time, Tom Riddle himself was a victim of circumstance. Perhaps without the stigma surrounding mental health in the wizarding world, another child could be prevented from becoming who he was."
Hermione allowed herself a moment to contemplate this. Had Dumbledore sought medical treatment for Tom Riddle upon learning of his sadistic behaviors rather than simply bringing him into the wizarding world without restraint, perhaps he could have been controlled to some degree. Had he learned to trust someone, could he also have learned to love? To be loved?
Susan spoke, pulling Hermione from her thoughts. "But that's not really our focus here. We're dedicating our work at the Willows to trauma suffered from the war, because that's what so many are struggling with currently. It's really opportunistic in that one, we truly want to help these people, and two, hopefully it can serve to benefit the greater wizarding community in both promoting Muggle treatment methods and eradicating the shame involved with seeking help for mental illness."
Hermione spoke for the first time since they began giving their program's vision. She wanted to give them the opportunity to fully explain, but truthfully, it was encouraging and almost cathartic in seeing someone so passionate about what they were trying to accomplish. "You said this was a trial program. What do you hope to accomplish if the trial is seen as successful?"
For the first time, Alys and Susan seemed a bit apprehensive to continue. They glanced at one another before looking back at Hermione and Alys said, "Obviously, the Willows Retreat will remain open and functioning regardless, but if it's viewed as a success, we'll be fully funded as an annex of St Mungo's. And, well, this isn't something we're really promoting throughout the program because it isn't taken well by many of St Mungo's directors, but we're pushing for a new wing of the hospital to be built and dedicated solely to non-wizarding medical treatment, specifically Muggle treatment for mental health related illness, albeit on a smaller scale than what will be treated at the Willows. In addition, the annex would serve as a treatment center for other Muggle illnesses and provide coverage for Muggles who are harmed in magical catastrophes or war. And we hope to eventually encompass magical beings as well, werewolves, vampires, veela."
"I can see how many on the board are against that," Hermione grumbled.
Susan gave her a knowing look and added, "Yes, it's been a struggle. But luckily, there are some who are fully on board and we've had a few large contributions from wealthy wizarding families as well. It may take a while and quite a lot of people willing to push for it, but I think the wizarding world is at an opportune moment for changing the tide in the way so many people think. If we can secure St Mungo's, I'm certain it would make the Ministry a much easier nut to crack."
This, more than anything either of them had said so far, spoke volumes to Hermione. The wizarding world as a whole had come a long way since the war ended, yes, but there were still so many who were persecuted and infringed upon simply for being what they were. Regardless of the amount of discomfort she knew it would cause her in participating in their program, Hermione knew at that moment that she would do it, if for no other reason than to further their cause.
Hermione grinned, "Well, you've sold me. What do you need from me?"
Alys pumped her fist in victory while Susan smiled exuberantly. "I'm very excited to hear that, Hermione. Our first step would be to have a counseling session with you just to really get to know you and your unique situation. Every patient is different, regardless of similar experiences, as I mentioned to you at your house last night. As of now, it's only myself and Alys who are doing initial intake assessments, as Dr. Whitby is away. She and I have talked, and given that you and I already know each other, I've asked that Alys be the one to do your assessment, if that's alright with you."
Hermione hadn't really considered how it could affect her ability to open up if she was talking to someone whom she already knew though didn't really consider a close friend. It already seemed overwhelming just to say some of her thoughts out loud, but with someone who already knew her, it may make it seem that much more difficult.
Alys interjected, "Sometimes, if the therapist and the client already have a personal relationship, the healing process can be threatened. Perhaps the client doesn't want to talk about something they think could make the therapist judge them or occasionally the therapist may have a hard time remaining objective."
"That makes sense," Hermione added.
Alys continued, "There are actually a few individuals whom you've been acquainted with at Hogwarts who we believe would be better suited with having me as their predominant therapist as well."
"Wait, so there will be people I know there?" Her mind began to race at the possibilities. The idea of having to pour her heart out in front of people who have known her since she was eleven immediately caused her pulse to quicken. "Who?"
Susan said, "I can't tell you that. Healer/patient confidentiality and all that. But there is a meeting of sorts, for all those who will be attending to do a walk-through of the facility and to meet the staff. You'll have an opportunity to see the other patients, and we'll be going over all the details of the program there as well."
Hermione was still concerned with who else could be attending? She began to work through ideas of who seemed "damaged" enough to require this sort of help, though, obviously she wasn't a good judge of that, given that she wasn't even aware of Neville or George's issues.
Seamus and Dean seemed to have gone through quite an ordeal at Hogwarts while she, Harry, and Ron were on the horcrux hunt. But she'd seen them both recently and, despite being completely smashed, they seemed entirely fine, normal even.
Harry would've been an ideal candidate, of course, given what all he had told her about seeing Susan himself, but he would've mentioned if he were signing up.
She heard that Pansy Parkinson had suffered quite a bit of estrangement following the Battle of Hogwarts. She tried to hand Harry over to Voldemort, so, clearly, she hadn't been welcomed into society with open arms following graduation. Hermione visibly cringed. Having to share her innermost secrets with Pansy Parkinson made her want to stick her head in an oven.
"Will I be able to back out? After this meeting, I mean. After I see who else is there?"
Hermione expected them to share another glance at this, but the smiles they both shared were completely genuine. "Of course, you can," Alys said. "We want you to be entirely comfortable. Despite all that we just shared with you about our plans for the program, our number one priority is the mental well-being of every person who comes through our clinic. Even if you decide that you don't want to participate, I hope you'd still be willing to speak with me on a one-on-one basis. Simply based on what Ginny shared with Susan, I believe you'd benefit from it greatly."
Hermione sighed in relief and nodded.
"Okay, then." Susan stood and walked toward a desk in one corner of the room. Picking up her wand and a notebook, she strolled toward the door. Turning back toward them, she said, "I'll just leave you two to it then. I'm so excited to have you on board, Hermione." She gave Hermione a final nod, then left the room.
As she left the room, Hermione turned back toward Alys, and realizing what Susan meant, nervously asked, "Wait, so we're starting now?"
Alys summoned her notebook from her desk across the room and said, "Is that alright with you?"
Why did I say yes to this?
"Umm…" She tried to think of an excuse and couldn't seem to think of one while Alys was staring at her. "Yes. Sure. I mean, I'm available now."
She immediately became aware of how useless her hands appeared just sitting in her lap, so she started wringing them. Thinking she didn't want to appear nervous, she forced herself to stop, dropping them to her sides.
You look like an idiot. She lifted her hands and folded them in her lap.
Stop fidgeting! Obviously, this made her fidget even more.
Realizing that Susan had been speaking during her internal breakdown, she shook her head and said, "I'm sorry, what did you say?"
"I said it's okay if you'd like to take a moment before we begin." Placing her quill down, she folded her hands in her lap and said, "It's also completely normal to feel a little anxious about beginning therapy."
Hermione wasn't sure if it made her feel better or worse to see that Alys understood what she was thinking already.
"No, I'm okay. We can start now. I'm not really sure what I'm supposed to do though."
"Well, nothing is necessarily expected. I'll ask you some questions just to get a better understanding of your personal situation and we'll just go from there, yeah?"
Hermione nodded, and Alys asked, "First, have you ever seen a mind healer before? Or a counselor? Really, the two are interchangeable, but I've found that most in the magical world prefer mind healer."
"No, I haven't. I honestly never really considered it."
"Why not?"
Because it wouldn't help. Because I'm broken. Because I think this is all stupid.
"I just never thought of it as an option really. Just like you said before, the magical world is pretty antiquated when it comes to mental illness, and frankly, I don't think it'll help."
She really hadn't meant to say that last part. She thought Alys would be upset then, but she simply nodded. She didn't say anything, but her furrowed brow indicated to Hermione that she should go on.
"For one, I haven't talked to my friends about what I've been going through, I don't think I'll be able to just walk into a room and spill my guts to a stranger, no offense."
Alys gave her a gentle smile. "Many people have this exact fear when beginning therapy, though most find that it's actually easier to share their secrets with a stranger, someone they have no real ties to, someone who can be entirely objective and nonjudgmental."
"And I don't think simply talking about an issue will make it go away. I don't see how anything will go away by just 'talking about my feelings'."
While she was speaking, Alys continued to look at her, not unkindly, but in a way that Hermione felt she hadn't been looked at in a while, as if she was actually being heard and seen. Most of the time, even when talking to her friends, she felt bothersome and irritating, like underneath their "Are you okay?" they truly meant, "Are you over this yet?" Instead, Alys made her want to keep talking. What the hell do I have to lose?
"That's why I haven't ever talked about it with my friends even. They're all completely fine, at least on the surface, and I feel like I can hardly breathe most days." Just saying that out loud felt simultaneously like a relief and more of a burden, as if the clouds had suddenly parted to reveal another storm rather than a rainbow.
"Can you elaborate on that feeling?"
Shit.
"I'm constantly reminded of everything we lost during the war. I feel like everyone else just sees all that we accomplished, but every waking moment, all I can think of is everything that was taken away, the lives that were lost, the fact that nothing at all is the same… I'm not the same. And… it's just… it's hard to reconcile that, especially when everyone else is so keen on just pretending like it never happened."
"And what makes you believe that you know what everyone else is thinking?"
Hermione only blinked, dumbfounded.
"Is it possible that others believe that is exactly what you want, to just pretend that it never happened? If you've never spoken about it with anyone, couldn't it be that they think you simply don't want to?"
Just like when Susan asked her a similar question the night before, she felt flummoxed. She truly had never considered that.
"I guess that is possible, yes." If Harry had been to therapy as well, and Neville was unable to spend a night by himself, and George couldn't seem to cope without a bottle in hand, perhaps more people wanted to talk about it than she ever considered before.
"I'd like to go back to something you said a moment ago," Alys said, pulling her from her thoughts. "You said that you're no longer the same. Could you tell me more about that?"
"I just don't feel like me anymore…too much has happened, too much has changed."
She began fiddling with a stray string on her shirt sleeve. "I don't really know how to describe it, other than that. I mean, everything about me has changed. I used to be so dedicated, so driven. Most days, I have to force myself out of bed and into work."
Hermione found that once she started, the words just fell out of her mouth like she had been dying to say them for a year.
"I used to care about so much, and now, I just don't give a shit about much of anything anymore. I was the girl who knew all the answers." She snorted disgustedly. "I don't know a damn thing. I can't even control my own thoughts anymore. I just… I can't get used to this – this – normalcy. The vast majority of my life has been formed around the basis of war. Preparing for a war, proving there actually was a war, running from a war, fighting in a war. Danger, threat, survival… I just, I don't know how to be normal. Every part of me is constantly wound tight, ready for the next curse, the next battle, the next death. I don't know who I am without that. I've lost too much, seen too much, changed too much to ever be that girl I used to be." She wiped tears from her face not realizing until then that she had even been crying.
Alys was still looking at her thoughtfully. She looked sympathetic, but thankfully, Hermione saw no pity in her eyes at all. If she had, she thought she would've just walked out then and there.
"What makes you think you have to?"
"Everyone seemed to like her." Laughing sarcastically, she said, "Well, the people who mattered liked her."
"I think people still like you just the same. Ginny cares about you so much that she was willing to upset you by coming and speaking to Susan on your behalf. Based on what Susan told me about last night, Harry considers you more family than friend." She stopped and looked at Hermione expectantly.
"I liked pre-war Hermione much better than the new one," Hermione said, surprising herself by looking into Alys's eyes rather than her trainers. It seems Alys was right. She was able to share herself much easier with a stranger than a friend.
"I think that's much more truthful."
"I can't stand the fact that I'm covered in scars or that I can't stop my mind from taking me back to some horrible event or another. Or that I can't even read a book because I can't shut my mind off. I hate that I don't laugh anymore. I feel like I should be happy. We won, right? I'm alive. My best friends are alive. Voldemort is dead. That should be enough, but it isn't and that makes me feel just vile." Her voice was rising now and couldn't seem to make herself stop. "All these people lost so much more than I did, and I can't even climb out of this hole to make all those deaths mean something!" She dropped her head into her hands almost involuntarily. Breathing in and exhaling deeply, she lifted her head. "I should be happy, but I'm not."
Alys said, "There are no rules here, Hermione, no guidelines on how to handle what you've been through. Perhaps, instead of punishing yourself, you should just allow yourself to feel what you feel."
Feel what I feel? "I feel like that's what I've been doing. I am feeling. All day every day. I want to stop feeling, actually."
"No, I don't think you have. You don't allow yourself to talk about the things that have happened, beyond just that you were in a war and you got out of it alive. You go on every day, pretending to be okay, but, by your own admission, you are not. You say you're feeling, but you aren't giving yourself the opportunity to grieve or express that emotion in any way before you just push it all away. I think that you feel the onset of emotions, and you lock them away so that nobody else can see them, but also, so that you yourself cannot see them."
Hermione felt like she had just been slapped. Is that really what she had been doing all along?
"You said earlier when we first started that simply 'talking about your feelings' wouldn't be enough to help you, but truthfully, I think that's exactly what you need. I think emotionally and subconsciously, you've been needing to share your story with not only someone else but also with yourself. I think once you've done that, you'll be able to work past this. You may never be that girl that you were before the war began or even before you befriended the 'Boy Who Lived,' but you are the woman you are now because of all that you've been through, the good and the bad. And if you allow yourself to fully embrace our program, giving it your all and sacrificing your pride here and there, you'll be a much stronger woman on the other side of it, and I think you'll find that you like her much more than you thought you would."
I hope so, Hermione thought.