16. Nightmares
Hermione asks Fleur for wool and knitting needles.
Their days are spent figuring out an impossible plan. Her nights, knitting.
She can't sleep.
During their first week at Shell Cottage, she tried to fight the nightmares and fall asleep. But she got exhausted of pushing them away and began dreading dark.
She craves for the relief sleep once brought.
Every time she closes her eyes at night, she sees hers. And she feels the dagger digging deeply into her arm as if Bellatrix is still carving into it. She can still sense Crucios course through her body - it hasn't really stopped aching - and the fear that invaded her brain. What if she had broke and said everything. She almost did.
So she knits.
She waits for Luna to fall asleep. And as she treads the yarn under the light of a bluebell flame, she clings to the memory of a warm bed and bedtime stories ushered between the pages of a book that made the idea of falling asleep once soothing.
After two days, she's made two hats and a scarf.
At dawn she walks up to Dobby's grave to lay her work on his tombstone, so he'll stay warm. She is surprised to find Ron sitting in the sand, staring at the grave. He looks at her, eyes too bright, as she sits next to him.
"How did it got to this point?" he asks, a hint of despair in his trembling voice.
She can't answer, her throat constricts.
"What's this?" he nods toward the wool in her hands.
"Hats and a scarf."
"Did you make those?"
He seems surprised. She nods.
"When the heck did you find time to knit? I barely have time to think about anything else than Gringotts these days!"
"I-," she debates telling him, then she figures that it doesn't really matter, "I can't sleep."
His eyes grow slightly wider and she ears the question he's not asking.
"Nightmares," she shrugs as she looks away to avoid his stare.
She doesn't want to see pity in his eyes.
