Chapter Three
"Goodness, Mr Potter, what's happened?" asked Madam Pomfrey as soon as Harry burst through the heavy oak doors which now stood wide open and had made clattering sound which had woken up a student who was sleeping near the end of the wing. He appeared to be young, about second-year, with an arm which had been improperly enlarged and was now wrapped in bandages soaked in potion.
"Uh..." Harry couldn't think clearly. "This...she...I..."
"Is this...hypothermia?" Madam Pomfrey asked, looking at Hermione's eyes and felt the temperature of her hands. No sooner had she asked, she popped a Swift-Read thermometer into Hermione's mouth. "Yes, I was right."
"Wh-what should I do? Can I help? I tried to warm her up with the Tepidius spell, but I guess she was out in the cold too long or something. She cooled down so quickly while I was coming and—"
"Calm down, Mr. Potter. Stop panicking. I'm glad you did that spell, now she just needs a few hot water bottles to keep her extremities warm and she'll be fine. And some Anti-Sniffle All-Purpose Potion, of course," Madam Pomfrey said as she hurried around preparing everything. "As for you...you can sit down and not get in the way."
Harry obeyed and sat down in the nearest chair to where Hermione was now resting. She had hot water bottles at her feet, hands and legs and was covered by several thick woollen blankets. Still in her mouth was the Swift-Read thermometer and Harry could see that the liquid inside was beginning to make its way back to the 'Right as Rain' reading.
He silently and patiently watched Madam Pomfrey hovering around Hermione for the next half hour. He felt his eyes getting droopier and his state of alertness falling. Before long, he couldn't resist the beckoning of fatigue.
He hadn't noticed he'd fallen asleep until the next morning, when he woke up, still in his chair.
*****
Hermione lay in the hospital bed, lingering between a state of sleeping and waking. Her mind drifted and finally landed on Harry, who looked dreadful—yet, in a way, rather adorable—with his chin resting on his chest and his arms folded and seemed to be nearly falling out of the chair; he would have if the chair hadn't any arms.
It was still snowing outside and she remembered her detention. Oh no, she thought, I haven't finished. I only had a few minutes left until I was done and... How will this look on my record? Will it even be on my record if I passed out because of the cold? And what happened to Professor Whats-her-name?
Moments later, Madam Pomfrey came up to her to check her temperature again, not knowing Hermione was half-awake. She made a small 'hmm' noise as she glanced at the reading and walked off to attend to her other patient. She groaned, starting to lever herself up into a sitting position, feeling a quite stiff and finally giving up and flopping back down on the mattress. She closed her eyes tightly and tried to block out the brightness of the light outside.
*****
Harry blinked and rubbed his eyes. It was a miracle...Madam Pomfrey hadn't chucked him out. That had to be a first. He got up from the chair and paused mid-action and winced at the pain and tingling in his muscles. He wanted to have verbal outlet for his pain with something like an 'Oww', or perhaps some nice hissing, but couldn't in fear of waking Hermione up.
Ah, that's better, Harry thought as his nerves finally began to work again, nearly falling backwards into the chair as he got used to the feeling in his legs. He chanced a glance at the time and discovered that it was still fairly early. He could still make it back to the common room and do more of his essay before he had to go breakfast, if he hurried.
He looked at Hermione with an expression of concern written in every part of his body language, except for his spine, which was still stuck in the sleeping-in-a-hard-wooden-chair-all-night funk. He bent over and put his palm up to her cheek and raised his thumb up to her chapped (currently, but usually they would be about as hydrated as any other person's) lips. Taking a longing look at his friend, he brought his own hydrated lips to her warm skin and placed a gentle kiss dead-centre on her forehead.
"Wake up soon, Mione."
He left after a lingering moment of staring in hopes of seeing his friend wake up, leaving Madam Pomfrey startled at the sound of the opening and closing of the doors only moments after turning her back towards them. But no more startled than Hermione currently was.
She shot up into an upright sitting position, ignoring any and all stiffness in any part of her body as soon as she heard the doors bang closed.
"Did Harry just call me 'Mione'?" she muttered to herself. "And since when did he kiss me...*anywhere*?"
Madam Pomfrey peered around a dividing screen and frowned. "Miss Granger, what are you doing awake at this time in the morning? I trust you don't want to miss any of your lessons." Madam Pomfrey gave Hermione a knowing look.
Hermione gasped at the thought and spared no more contemplation for anything besides falling back to sleep.
That, in itself, was harder than it sounded. How could she fall asleep when one of her best friends had given her a pet name *and* had kissed her on the forehead as if he'd truly meant it? (Or had veered off-course and decided it would be safer flying north?)
She turned over and tried squeezing her eyes shut.
No use.
What am I going to do? Hermione thought desperately. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw him smiling or mouthing 'Mione' at her, as if her mental imaging skills were similar to a poorly-developed wizard photograph.
The more she thought, the less it made sense and the less it made sense, the more she thought.
She was no tomboy, but could there be other perils in befriending a much larger number of guys than girls?
Like, say, falling for one of them?
To Hermione, it was as nonsensical as the Hogwarts grading system. And according to Ron, anything she used that to describe was equivalent to the nonsensicality of starting a project due in a month when you already have 4 others due the next week. Or maybe the concept of the, "verbal non-verbal".
The strange thing was that none of these were nonsense. But wouldn't that mean that falling for Harry wasn't truly nonsense on second thoughts?
Hermione didn't get a chance to consider the Hogwarts grading system for the hundredth time—she'd finally fallen asleep.
