Chapter Five

Wednesday Night

I had the whole day to assess what I heard last night. As great as talking to Ginny was, no problems were solved; they were still lingering there in the back of my mind.

Thankfully, this night, I didn't have to resort to sitting with Pavarti or Lavender. Now that Ginny was no longer missing, I was able to sit with her.

However, I caught myself glancing wistfully at my regular spot between Harry and Ron. In spite of myself, I missed them. All of them. I missed Harry, and the way he would engage me in conversation. Ron, who would talk and joke with me with his mouth half full. And Draco, who would put his arm around me while teasing and flirting with me.

Ginny, on the other hand, was aiming her gaze at a different direction. I followed her eyes, leading to the Slytherin table. Leading to Blaise.

Any person could spot his air of mystery and charm, not to mention his physical appearance. He and Ginny truly did make a great couple. With his jet black tousled- like- I- just- got- laid hair, fit body structure, and deep, slightly haunted hazel eyes, he was easily one of the most attractive in Slytherin. And if you think about it, when you see couples together, they're usually on the same level of attractiveness.

Then why on earth would Harry or Draco want me! They must be vision- impaired. It was the only explanation.

Conversation was very vague and forced. I could tell that both of us only had half a mind interested in what the other was saying.

I pulled my eyes down to my plate and sighed. I had no appetite tonight.

Then, for some reason, my goblet of pumpkin juice caught my eye. I looked closer and realized why.

The table wasn't shaking, but there in my cup, my barely- drank juice had tiny but constant ripples going through it. Then another. Another. Another.

Pretty soon, the barely noticeable ripples became bigger. More people began to notice. I looked up at the kidney soup in front of me. It too had ripples crossing its contents.

People ceased their loud chatting, and started talking in confused mumbles.

Then, the rumbling started.

At first, it was quiet, subtle. But it got louder and louder. Dumbledore stood up. "Prefects, please take the first through fifth years to the dungeons. Everyone else, if you will, summon your wands. And be prepared for anything."

He said this quite fast. The prefects and younger students obeyed, apparently confused by his instructions, but obliged nonetheless.

I was confused as well. And a bit panicked. One thing you don't want to hear your headmaster to say in a nervous voice was "summon your wands and be prepared for anything", while ushering away young and incapable students. Nope, this was definitely not good. The students who didn't have their wands with them quickly spoke the spell, "Accio." A dozen or so wands came soaring toward the tables.

The rumbling was still going on, and getting louder. It had gradually increased to the sound of a stampede. Everyone was standing up now, glancing around nervously.

Then, as strangely as it started, it stopped.

All of a sudden, the south wall of the Great Hall, where no one was sitting, crashed in, earning many screams of surprise.

Debris came flying at the tables. I breathed in dust, coughing until tears formed.

Once the air cleared, I gasped in horror as I saw who the intruders were.

In front of us were hundreds of masked wizards and witches in billowing black robes.

Deatheaters.

My heart clenched in fear. I couldn't believethat this was happening. For a moment, I felt that this had to be some sort of bad joke pranked on us by the faculty, or someone. Anyone. It was too sudden, too unexpected to be real.

But it was real. The looks on everyone's faces told me it was. The faces of Dumbledore, McGonagall, Snape, everyone.

And to think that I was just pondering my little boy problems.

In the midst of my thoughts, the deatheaters had already charged forward and started throwing spells. Everyone sprang into action. Except for a select few who were shaking uncontrollably or hiding on the ground, everyone was fighting. I shook myself off. This was what we had been training for in all our seven years of learning. This was what we were here for.

I didn't show my fear, but inside, I was terrified. What the hell was wrong with these people!

"Allentora!" I screamed at a deatheater coming on to Neville. I took down as many deatheaters as I could, trying to do my part, while looking frantically around for any of my friends.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Draco and Harry fighting back to back, looking out for each other. They seemed to be surrounded. Before I could compute this, a blow knocked me on to the ground from behind. I turned over on the floor and saw a deatheater standing over me.

"Hello, mudblood." He cackled evilly. The voice was familiar.

"You!" I pointed at him angrily. I could feel him smiling through his mask at my recognition of him. The bastard.

"How nice of you to remember. Crucio!" I knew this was coming. Searing hot pain coursed through my body. It was like nothing I ever felt before. It was like a million burning knives were stabbing me everywhere unceasingly. Tears sprang to my eyes, but I could barely feel them dribbling down.

Finally, it stopped. But the echo of the pain left me weak and crying. I must have been screaming as well, for my throat was hurting and dry. Although my eyes were dropping, I forced them to open a crack to see what had made the fucker stop.

I saw Draco. Drenched in blood and sweat, he was standing over Lucius Malfoy's body, pointing his wand at him.

Before my hazy world blacked out, I heard him whisper in a distant voice, filled with absolute hatred, "Fuck you, Lucius."

I vaguely felt myself being lifted up from the ground in gentle hands before falling into blissful unconsciousness.

Friday

Ow. Ow. Oooh...ouch.

I opened my eyes. My body was aching all over. And when I say all over, I mean pretty much from my head to my toes. Not an exaggeration.

Seriously. My head was slightly throbbing and my toes were sort of sore as well.

Anyways, light flooded into my pupils, which only worsened my headache.

After I adjusted to the new setting, I realized that I was in the hospital wing. It was fuller then I ever remembered it being. All the beds were occupied by someone, and I noticed that there were even some added.

The events of the night came to me. I shuddered at the remembrance of pain. It definitely disproved the paper cut pain theory.

I opened my eyes even wider when I realized that right next to the bed I was in, Draco was snoozing in a chair.

A kind of warmth flooded over me like no chocolate could ever produce. Not only did he save me, but he stayed with me overnight as well.

A boyfriend can't get any sweeter then that.

With another jolt, I noticed that even though we weren't speaking for such a long time, we never officially broke up either.

My head stayed on the pillow, watching him. His robes were extremely wrinkled, and his usually orderly hair was messy and tousled.

Hmm. Kind of sexy.

Nice timing for naughty thoughts, I chided myself. I turned my body around. Ow. Ow. Ow.

In the bed next to me was a clump of red. I peeked closer and saw that it was Ginny.

I gasped and tried to sit up, but to no avail.

Someone just entered the room. Someone by the name of Blaise Zabini.

He was looking around at first, probably to make sure that he wasn't going to be caught where he was. I closed my eyes immediately, but leaving a peek open just enough to see what was to happen. He reached Ginny's bed.

The way he was looking at her; it was like she was the most precious thing on Earth, like she was the answer to all questions. I felt my lips start to curve upward into a smile, but I forced them down again.

He looked around once more in a paranoid manner. Finally satisfied, he leaned down toward Ginny and gave her a tender, lingering kiss on the lips, and then swiftly turned around to exit the wing.

I turned my head around once more, again facing Draco. Ow. Ow.

He was slipping down in his chair. Lower and lower, he was falling. It was only a matter of time before he…

"Ow!" was his startled response when he bumped his head on the wooden armrest. He propped himself up right away and rubbed his sore head.

I couldn't help it. I began to giggle.

He looked at me, surprised. Then, breaking into a relieved and good- natured grin, he said, "Oh be quiet, woman."

This only made me giggle harder. It was sort of hurting my head to laugh, but I couldn't really stop.

He patiently waited for me to stop, watching me, amused.

When I finally became silent, he said in a mock hurt voice, "So this is my greeting, after watching over you for thirty- some hours lying in that hospital bed, worried sick?"

My eyes boggled. "How long have I been sleeping? What time is it? What day is it?"

I tried to get up, again to no avail. He helped me up. "Well, it's-" he glanced at the clock, "- four a.m., and it's officially Friday."

"Shit. And you've been here all this time?" I had another sudden urge to laugh. "Aw, poor baby," I cooed, stroking his hair. Even though my arm hurt. Ow.

He took my hand from his head and held it gently on the bed. "Oh, so you're talking to me now?"

"I guess so."

He smiled happily. "Good. I missed you."

I realized that I had missed him too. I told him so.

"Wait," I said. Something was sort of weird. "Where's Harry and Ron?"

His smile dropped instantly. I took it as a bad sign. He sighed and nodded his head at the opposite beds from me.

There, in two beds next to each other, were Harry and Ron. I inhaled sharply as I felt tears form, out of pure fear.

I got out of bed. Or rather, I fell out of bed. Draco quickly got down on his knees and helped me up, which was rather sweet of him. It was good that he didn't suggest for me to get back into bed, for I wouldn't have even considered listening to him.

I limped over to their beds, leaning most of my weight onto Draco. I looked down at their faces. They both were wearing bandages in various parts of their bodies and were bruised some places, but otherwise looked alright.

"They're okay, right?" I asked quietly.

"They already woke up yesterday. But they have to stay a couple of days. It was you we were all worried about. And…"

I looked at him curiously. "And…" I motioned for him to continue.

He looked away for a second and looked back at me. "We're sort of worried about Ginny as well."

I looked back at him. After a split second of hesitation, I wobbled over to her bed, this time without his support.

I gasped at the sight before me.

Ginny's usually flowing red hair was limp and frazzled. Her complexion was pale, and she oddly looked like a very peaceful and limp petrified person. She had no bandages, but for some reason, she looked much worse then Harry or Ron. All in all, it was clear why they were worried about her as well.

"W- what happened to her?" I asked in a shaky voice.

"She got hit by the Cruciatus Curse. Only unlike you, she hasn't woken up yet. Right after it was released, she got hit with it again by another deatheater."

I felt tears leaking from the corner of my eyes. He wrapped his arms around me cautiously, as if I would pull away. I didn't. I needed it.

"Is she gonna be alright?" I asked him helplessly, still crying.

"She is. Don't worry about it."

But I was worried. Who wouldn't be? It wasn't like he could say that and I would all of a sudden be saying, Oh, okay. Now I'm not worried anymore, just because you said that!

Of course, I didn't say that to him. I was too busy relishing the feeling of warmth in his arms, and wallowing in silence, watching my unconscious red- haired friend.

A Few Hours Later

For the next couple of hours, Draco and I put up a silencing charm around my bed and talked. I confessed. I told him that I did sort of like Harry back, and that I was truly sorry for it. I also told him about the date- I mean, test run.

Aw, fuck it. It was a date. I knew it. Harry knew it. Draco knew it.

Anyways, he listened to me through it all. When I was done, he kept silent. As much as I wanted to find out his reaction, I bit my lip and kept my mouth shut.

The thing is, I wasn't planning on telling him the truth anytime soon. But considering the events that currently happened, I felt that it was pretty much necessary. It just wasn't fair to him or Harry for me to keep the truth all to myself. It just seemed like the right time to tell him.

He paced around my bed for a minute, thinking. I tried not to cry.

We were going to break up. I knew it. And if he did dump me, I would let him. It would break my heart, but I would let him. And I couldn't bear to be the one to break up with him.

However, it turned out that I didn't have to face that prospect just yet. Because it turned out, he couldn't bear to break up with me, either. All he said to me as he plopped down on the bed was, "But you like me more, right?"

I smiled and kissed him. I nodded whole- heartedly. He sighed and wrapped his arms around me again. I was content to stay like that until…

"Hermione! You're awake!" I swiveled my head to greet the familiar voices.

I took away the silencing charm and cried in delight, "Harry! Ron!" They slid off their beds, making them groan in pain, and came over to my bed to give me a hug. Draco had kindly stepped off to the side to let them. I thought that that was very decent of him, considering what I had just told him.

We talked for another hour. By then, everyone had already started to wake up, so there was no need for the silencing charm.

Once in a while, Harry would catch my eye and very slightly raise an eyebrow, making me know that he would want to talk alone later.

Gee, I'm just so looking forward to that.