Title: Someone Else
Author: luckdragon
Rating: oh… PG, most likely
Summary: All Hermione wants to do is study. (A little fluff. A little snog. A little mystery.)
Disclaimer: I don't own them. If you do, it's not worth suing anyone over – trust me, the lawyer's fees will be far more than you'll get in return.
Author's Note: For those of you who are still reading, thank you for following along. I hope you're enjoying yourselves. :) Well, this is the penultimate chapter. Since I've spelled it all out in the last A/N, I might as well point out that the point that ends the "past flashback" sections of the story is in this chapter. As you might guess, the mystery's very nearly solved, and will be within the next few days. Enjoy!
Harry catches up with her on a stairway. "Hermione!" he calls urgently, then catches her arm, which she yanks away without preamble.
"Harry! Please! Leave well enough alone for the time being!" she turns away again furiously, eyes beginning to prick and sting.
"I will if you stop and talk to me for just one minute."
Hermione slows, and finally turns. He is one of her best friends. She can't go on acting like this around him. She says nothing but her posture communicates her compliance.
"Hermione… you aren't still upset about, er, the other night, are you?" Harry questions awkwardly. "You haven't talked to your roommates…" his voice trails off into a rather helpless void.
Hermione, eyes downcast and tired, shakes her head.
"I'm sorry for that… if I had known it would be so strange…"
"It's not your fault, Harry. No need for all that. You know I wasn't upset in the first place. Would you mind terribly if I go lie down?"
"No. No. So long as you're not angry with me," Harry says in a quietly eager voice, punctuating his words with an earnest glance.
"Of course not," Hermione replies with a small smile. "I'll see you a bit later."
Hermione sank back into her seat and sighed, drained. She looked at the pages of her book, trying to figure out if the random marks therein might form actual words. Was this even the right page? Its edges were rumpled slightly, and she had to admit that this was not a startling fact, nor was it disturbing. Moreover, it should have been to one such as herself. She had been known to treat books better then people every now and again.
Naturally, her brain had settled into a rut and refused to be budged. She could see no way to haul it out – turning her thoughts and refocusing would only result the unpleasant jarring of a rattled concentration. She sighed. The classroom, cozy and contusive as recently as fifteen minutes ago, was now foreign and isolated. She flopped the cover of her Arithmancy book over and looked rather numbly at its cover. Her hands, moving in fashionable slow motion, gathered quills, scraps of parchment, books – placed them carefully in her bag.
She felt like she was in a film.
Of course she was being watched.
Hermione collapses onto her bed, covering her eyes with the backs of her crossed arms.
Once was bad enough, and twice was unsurprisingly intolerable… especially given her propensity to analyze a subject until her mind felt as though it could see all sides of a topic at once.
How could this have happened again?
She's stuck out the day, and she attributes this solely to her astonishing ability to immerse herself in knowledge and scholarship. After the… repeat performance, as it were… and after the ordeal at lunch, she had made a deal with herself. It went like this: she kept her eyes on her notes, on her books, on the teacher, on the table; she talked in as few words as possible (bonus points for entire mono-syllabic conversations); she spent all free time in the most secluded spot she could find in the company of her books only; she didn't turn her eyes or her thoughts away until she was alone at the end of this unending day – and, in return, she got through it all alive. Somehow, it has worked. For the most part anyway.
She removes her arms and presses her hands to her face, rubbing her forehead almost savagely with her fingertips. This leaves her lips resting lightly against the heels of her hands, and she whimsically thinks of little girls "practicing" kissing their hands. Practicing kissing. She wrenches her thoughts towards the concept of kissing rather than its recent reality.
Hermione is intrigued to discover that she rather likes this new practice of kissing. She hasn't really been able to consider that first shocking encounter with anything close to a rational mind. This second experience proves something to her that she was rather unable to admit earlier – that this is something to be enjoyed (and made doubly exhilarating given the circumstances). There is something about this that is satisfying in the same way that solving an Arithmancy problem correctly is gratifying. It all lay in the breaking through of barriers, in lining up the otherwise-confusing parts of the problem correctly and discovering the one right solution… or in letting go of the confusion and getting caught up in the moment. Of course it is entirely different as well, an entire world apart. Arithmancy doesn't quite rate in the same category as far as pulse-pounding excitement goes.
She finds herself thoroughly engrossed as she ponders her recent encounters. She relishes the way that Someone Else's Energy is entirely focused on her – and vice versa. She feels slightly dark, slightly corrupted, although she has not overstepped any boundaries that make her uncomfortable… well, not as far as what her activities have been. In fact, she feels somehow a bit older and a bit sillier all at once. Surprisingly, she realizes that against all odds, she feels a bit happier too. He certainly didn't seem uncomfortable either, after all. Perhaps "intolerable" was the wrong word for the situation altogether.
Hermione rolls over and hugs her pillow.
She is smiling.
She is certain that somewhere, he is too.
She looks up, and there's someone at the door.
"What are you doing here?" she asks a bit harshly. It's not who she expected at all… it's someone else entirely.
"Just doing my rounds and decided to see what all the commotion was about," he says in an aloof tone.
"What commotion?" she asks, clearly nettled.
"I heard shouting. Trouble in paradise?" These words are less detached, leaning towards malicious.
"What?"
"Is Ronniekins in the doghouse?" he questions disdainfully. "I just saw him storming down the hallway with his face all red – well, actually with his entire head all red then, really. He looked like he might just cry."
Hermione bristles. "He's not my boyfriend, Malfoy. I don't have one of those. And I was just leaving, if you don't mind."