He wasn't prepared for the pain.
In the end, it was the physical pain -- always present -- that proved to be the most difficult adjustment to make. Much later, Cedric would look back on that summer as the veil between an existence of ease and unthinking mobility, and a state of mind that entailed planning how he was getting from here to there -- and how much time it might take. Twinges and aches became his measure of the hours, and how soon until he'd have to take another dose from the little bottle of murtlap and yarrow in his pocket.
When they first brought him to St. Mungo's, he was placed on the Fourth Floor, Bonham Ward for Spell Damage, where he became a medical curiosity, poked and prodded by healers, including one called all the way from Germany, and another from Sweden. He wound up with a diagnostic team of four people trying to figure out what was wrong with him. When he expressed concern to his father about the cost of such consultations, his father just patted his hand. "Don't you worry about it, son. We're going to get you on your feet again. The Ministry's paying. You were a Triwizard Champion. If Ludo Bagman is a right incompetent ass, and Bertha's no better, there are decent folk in that office."
Cedric also suspected that Minister Fudge was doing his best to minimize what had happened, which meant keeping Cedric's family conciliated. It also meant controlling what appeared publicly about his injury. Cedric hadn't spoken to a single reporter since the Tournament, even the hideous Rita Skeeter. Perhaps St. Mungo's simply forbade such visitors, but he thought it might be more specific in his case. Certainly, he wasn't being told much himself, even when he asked questions. Instead, he heard, "You just concentrate on getting better," or "You've got enough on your plate, young man, without worrying about the state of the world." Even his mother wasn't telling him anything, nor was she letting him read The Daily Prophet.
To make it worse, in that first week after his arrival, he was left with a lot of free time to think. The tests they subjected him to often meant that he had to lie on his side or stomach while healers examined his spine, legs, pelvic region, and even his head. Once they actually took his blood, as in a Muggle hospital, and another time, a urine sample. Sometimes, he tried to read a book or letters from friends, but more often he was told to lie still. Despite his natural inquisitiveness, most of the healers had neither time nor inclination to tell him what they were doing, nor what each of the many curious instruments actually measured.
The German, a man named Haus, was especially rude. And they all spoke in a kind of medical code that left him frustrated, trying to decipher it. The Swede, named Sofia Ben, was nicest, and would take pity on him enough to explain what she was about. But he only understood half of it, and his reluctance to make a nuisance of himself kept him from asking her more, even while he grew increasingly irritable. After all, it was happening to his body.
The upshot was that he spent a great deal of time just reviewing what had happened with Voldemort, and wondering what the Dark Lord might do next -- neither of which topic did much for his peace of mind.
The worst of the tests involved removing the paralysis spell he'd been under since the night of the Third Task. They couldn't evaluate the extent of nerve damage if his lower body were immobilized and stripped of feeling. The first time Ben took off the spell -- even with plenty of forewarning -- the sensation of fire consuming Cedric's lower body made him scream himself raw-throated. The poor woman kept muttering, "So sorry, so sorry," under her breath for the full three minutes of the exam. If he eventually managed to stop screaming, it was only because she gave him a tongue depressor to bite. When she was done and the paralysis spell back in place, she gave him a sleeping draught and told him they were done for the day, one cool hand on his forehead. "You were very brave," she said.
"I screamed like a baby," he snarled back.
"Of course you did," she replied matter-of-factly. "That curse is killing your nerves; it's excruciating. But you were able to hold mostly still for me -- that's more than some people could manage. Sleep, Cedric."
They had to take the spell off him twice more, once for only a minute -- which he managed to bear without howling -- but the third time, it was off for almost ten minutes . . . though he wasn't told that in advance, or he probably couldn't have faced it. As it was, he was half-panting and covered in a cold sweat just from anticipation, even before Ben and Groat raised their wands. Groat was there, Cedric realized later, just to hold him still while Ben did the testing, because Cedric really hadn't been able to keep still himself (and they couldn't use a rigor charm). Afterwards, he just lay in his bed and tried not to cry (half from the pain, half from the humiliation of being unable to take it). Ben put him to sleep again. Of his healers, he definitely liked her best, and not just because she was young and rather pretty. She had gentle hands, and always called him by his first name. After a week of being St. Mungo's resident human puzzle, with half the healers dropping by "just to look in" (to look at his patient notes, truth be told), he noticed such small kindnesses.
It was exactly one week after he'd arrived that all four of his healers trooped into his ward, dressed in lime green robes and holding clipboards that they consulted while his father and mother came to stand by his bed, one on either side. Cedric didn't like the healers' expressions -- a bit too solemn to be reassuring.
The black British healer, Groat, cleared his throat, then spoke, "The good news is that we believe we can significantly slow the spreading effects of the curse."
The obvious corollary to that, Cedric realized, was that they clearly couldn't stop it, much less reverse it.
Beside him, his father made a sound as if he'd been punched in the stomach. Cedric's mother said nothing but simply stood waiting for the rest of their diagnosis, quiet like Cedric himself.
The chief healer on his case, Haus, pulled around a chair at the end of Cedric's bed and plopped down, crossing an ankle over a knee. He spoke to Cedric rather than to Cedric's parents for which consideration Cedric was grateful, although after a week he couldn't say he much liked Haus, who seemed perpetually cross about something. "My colleagues" -- he waved to indicate Healers Groat, Ben, and the other Englishman, Grant -- "think this an improperly cast Nervoccido Curse. Unfortunately, the Nervoccido Curse has no known reversal, and destroys the entire central nervous system, including the brain, within months, reducing the sufferer to a vegetative state."
Haus's compatriots shot him poisonous glares as Cedric's father's legs went out from under him and he collapsed into another chair near the head of Cedric's bed. Cedric's mother said, "I gather this won't be the case with my son? Either that, or you have a deplorable bedside manner."
"I do have a deplorable bedside manner," Haus replied, "but no, I don't think this is the Nervoccido Curse, or at least not a traditional one. If it were, by this point, your son would be showing the beginnings of deterioration to his fine motor skills above the waist, too -- and he's not." He shot a glance over his shoulder at the other three, as if to reiterate a point.
"Difference of medical opinion noted," Cedric's mother said. "Please tell us what you can do for him."
Haus hiked an eyebrow and Groat struggled not to look offended. Ben and Grant said nothing. "In young Mr. Diggory's case, damage to the nervous system seems entirely contained below the second lumbar vertibra at the base of the spine. The curse isn't spreading into the thoracic area, much less higher. Mr. Diggory may eventually lose autonomous command of his lower body, but not his upper, and he probably won't lose involuntary systems, nor actual feeling in his lower extremities. Given the alternative -- the full spell -- that's fortunate."
Ben glared at Haus, then looked from Cedric to his mother and father, and back to Cedric, meeting his eyes. "You won't be paralyzed," she said. "You won't even be confined to a wheelchair -- at least, not immediately. But you won't be able to walk without artificial assistance. I'm sorry." And she did sound genuinely apologetic. Yet their report wasn't much different from what Madam Pomfrey had warned, so it felt to Cedric like a dull blow, more confirmation of his fears than real news.
"But can't you -- isn't there something more you can do?" Cedric's father asked. "This is my son. This is England's Triwizard Champion!"
"I'm sorry," Ben said again. "I truly am." She glanced down at her notes. "The curse works to . . . crust over, if you will . . . the nerve endings, causing increasing damage. We're currently working on a variation of the Restituo Potion that will both stimulate the damaged nerves and slow down that crusting. But the recipe for the potion is very complex, and it won't be ready for another three weeks. In the meantime, we're prescribing an Abdoleo Potion, which will help Cedric begin to learn pain management. It'll have to be in a fairly high concentration, at first. Side-effects will include sleepiness and light-headedness, but he'll have feeling back in his lower body."
"In other words, it's going to make me feel drunk," Cedric said -- the first time he'd spoken.
"Well . . . yes. Abdoleo interferes somewhat with a patient's powers of mental focus, although in lower concentrations, most patients do develop a tolerance and are able to function normally. Once the Restituo Potion is finished, we'll be able to reduce the concentration of your Abdoleo."
"I don't want it," Cedric said immediately.
"Cedric, you've experienced what the pain is like without --"
"I don't want it!" he snapped, and suddenly, it was all there, balled in his guts: anger, disappointment, despair. "I'm not walking around for the rest of my life like some . . . Muggle drug addict!"
"It won't be like that," Ben said.
"What will it be like then?" he demanded, and felt his mother's hand come down on his shoulder, gripping in warning.
"You'll learn to adjust. Honestly, you will. It'll simply take time -- and it's not something you'll be able to go without, Cedric."
"I'm not in pain now," he pointed out, but it was stubborn more than reasoned.
"You're not in pain now because you can't feel anything at all below your waist," Haus snapped. "Would you rather take that option? We could make the paralysis permanent. Then you could spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair."
Cedric opened his mouth to retort -- but had nothing to say. Haus had a point. Cedric glanced up at his mother, whose face, he could see now, was stark but determined. His father just sat in the chair by the bed like a stunned bull, head in hands.
"Right now," Haus went on, "you have two options. Take the Restituo and Abdoleo, get fitted for leg braces and crutches, and learn how to use them. Or make the paralysis spell permanent and buy a wheelchair. When you decide, let me know." Rising, he stalked out. The other three followed, the Swede with a sympathetic glance back in his direction.
"So," he said finally. "That's the end of that." Meaning the end of hope.
His mother glanced down at him. "I'll go upstairs and talk to one of the healers about getting hold of those braces and crutches."
"What if I don't want them?" Again, it was more an expression of anger and hopelessness than a logical retort, and she knew as much. She just studied his face a moment before turning on her heel and heading out, her deep violet robes swirling behind her.
"This -- they must be wrong," his fathered muttered, as if confused by what he'd heard. "There's got to be something more they can do."
"Don't think so, Dad," he replied. "I'm afraid you're stuck with a cripple for a son."
Amos Diggory raised his head finally to glare at Cedric. "I don't ever want to hear you call yourself that again."
"Why not? It's true."
Cedric was being plain vicious now.
His father stood. "I'm going to help your mother." On that, he walked out.
When they were gone, Cedric sat a moment, the rage building now that his situation was certain rather than just a looming fear. Then he flung an arm out, connecting with the objects stacked on his bedside table: some books, a cup full of water, some cards. They went flying. At the table's back, tucked away under a couple letters from Cho, sat the Triwizard Cup. Just as Dumbledore had ordered, he'd brought it with him. Now, he grabbed it and flung it across the room at the wall opposite. It smashed into the stone with a satisfying crash . . . but didn't break.
"FUCK!" he yelled. It was the crudest word he could think of.
The few other patients sharing the same ward stared at him in the wake of his tantrum, and he couldn't (stuck in the bed as he was) pull his screen around for privacy. "What are you gaping at?" he snarled, then flopped over on his side, curling around himself, one hand rubbing his useless legs.
In the end, there wasn't really much of a choice. Given only the option of walking (however awkwardly) and pain medication, or spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair with no feeling at all below his waist, he'd take the crutches and drugs. He just didn't have to like it, or pretend to be grateful.
His mother returned before supper with a set of magical braces and forearm crutches, and a medi-wizard who specialized in such things came along to show him how to put them on. The braces went up past his knees, adhering to his legs and moving with the joints, but still providing support to muscles that couldn't hold him up anymore. The crutch cuffs magically molded to grip his forearms and automatically extended to match his height, keeping them from either dangling awkwardly or falling off. He wondered how he was supposed to carry anything or use his wand with the crutches. "We'll start you on physiotherapy next Monday," the medi-wizard told him. "You'll be getting around in no time."
Cedric bit his tongue to keep from saying something unfortunate. And later that evening, Haus, Groat, Ben and Grant returned, Cedric was given his prescription of Abdoleo, and the paralysis spell was formally lifted.
It marked Cedric's initiation into a lifetime of pain and hampered movement.
Hermione had spent less than a week of the summer holiday with her parents before Dumbledore showed up on their front step, requesting her participation in a 'special summer project.' Hermione's parents -- who'd always treated Dumbledore with the utmost respect -- were thrilled (if not surprised) that their daughter had been selected for such a program. Naturally, they agreed to let her go with the headmaster, although her mother hugged her extra tightly. "You're growing up so fast," she whispered. "I hardly feel I know you any more."
"I love you, Mum; I always will," was all she could think to say, because -- truth be told -- her mother didn't know her anymore. Sometimes, that bothered her. But if she told her parents half of what had happened to her at Hogwarts, they'd have withdrawn her so fast it would've made her head spin.
"Be good," her father said, "Make us proud."
"Always, Dad." Then she smiled at them both. "I'll write, of course."
"Of course."
And she was off, trotting along at Dumbledore's side, dragging her trunk, Crookshanks tucked under her arm. When they were a little distant from the house, he paused to say, "My apologies for deceiving your parents, but as you'll see, it was not entirely a lie. I do have a special summer project for you."
"And," Hermione replied, "my parents probably wouldn't have let me come if they knew about Lord . . . You-Know-Who."
He smiled gently. "I suspect not. Nor would I blame them -- although you'll be safer where we're going than you would be at home."
And that was how Hermione Granger ended up at Number 12, Grimmauld Place only a week into the summer holiday. The 'special project' of which Dumbledore had spoken was, unfortunately, a good deal less exciting than she'd hoped. Under the direction of Mrs. Weasley, she, Ron, Ginny, and the twins were set to cleaning up Sirius' family home to make it habitable. The only bright side she could see was that she got to be around Ginny -- and Ron, although her feelings about the latter were confused. One minute, she wanted to wring his neck and the next, to hug him.
"Why are boys so complicated?" she asked Ginny on her second night there. The two girls were sharing a room.
Ginny looked over at Hermione knowingly. "Ron's just a bit dim," she replied. "He'll come around eventually."
"Who said I was talking about Ron?"
Snorting, Ginny flopped back on her own bed. "So who were you talking about?"
"Well -- it might've been Harry."
"Right."
"Or Viktor Krum."
Ginny raised her head but not her body. "Have you heard from him yet, by the by?"
"Yes, once. It's my turn to write back. He's really very sweet."
"But -- if I remember right -- 'I have to do all the talking.' That's what you said."
"Well," Hermione temporized, "it's not that he's stupid or anything, just . . . quiet." Part of her was thrilled to have the attention of a famous boy who also happened to be rather nice, but another part knew -- deep down -- that it wasn't a good match.
"You prefer them chatty."
"Or at least able to hold up their end of a conversation, you know? It's nice to get a response when I ask a question."
Ginny just laughed. "And you get a response from Ron?"
"It may be 'huh,' but it's a response. With Victor, well -- even his letters are short. Terse, would be a good description."
Ginny rolled up on an elbow to eye Hermione. "I do love my brother, but I think you're going to have to wait a few years before he's ready for you. Ron's fifteen going on twelve, you know."
Hermione broke up laughing at that because, as usual, Ginny had hit the nail on the head in her assessment of someone.
So they spent the next three weeks cleaning up the house, visiting Sirius, and trying to listen in on meetings of the Order of the Phoenix. Harry's birthday was fast approaching, so Hermione and Ron made cards and searched out just the right present. It had become obvious from Harry's increasingly irritable notes that he'd grown quite impatient and frustrated with being kept in the dark, but Dumbledore had been clear to both her and Ron that they couldn't tell Harry anything about where they were, or what was going on. Although Hermione understood that the restrictions were for safety's sake, she could also understand how infuriating Harry must find it. "How much longer do you think Dumbledore's going to leave him there?" she asked Ron and Ginny one afternoon.
"No idea," Ron replied while sifting through a box full of old cuttings from various newspapers and magazines in the drawing room. "Blimey, listen to this! 'Recipe to cause the vomiting of blood.' Who'd keep something like this? Aside from Fred and George, I mean."
"My mother," Sirius said from the doorway. "She was a bit over fond of poisons and dark potions."
Hermione, Ron and Ginny turned. Sirius had brought lunch, and they all sat down to eat right there in the middle of the floor. When they'd finished, he left again and the three of them went back to work, this time on doxy-infested cupboards in the second-floor hallway. They ran out of Doxycide halfway through, and Hermione said she'd go downstairs to get more. Just beyond the kitchen doorway, however, she heard voices and paused. She wasn't entirely comfortable eavesdropping, but it was sometimes the only way to get news. This time, it was the names 'Diggory' and 'Cedric' that halted her.
"I thought I might drop in on the Diggorys on the way back to our place, in case Lucy's there," Mrs. Weasley was saying regarding her plans to return to the Burrow for supplies. "I don't know that she needs anything, but she's been spending so much time at St. Mungo's with Cedric . . . "
"How is he?" Sirius asked.
Ron's father answered. "Not well, according to Amos. Turns out that curse is irreversible, but they've got it managed for now. He's walking -- with crutches, but walking."
"Lucius had better hope he can find the end of the world, because Lucy will chase him that far," Sirius said, then added to Mrs. Weasley, "I'd tell you to give her my regards, but I think Dumbledore might not approve of letting the cat out of the bag, or Snuffles out of Grimmauld."
"I'll find a general way of relaying the sentiments. I think I can fairly say that all of us are very sorry for what's happened to Cedric. He's such a nice, polite boy."
"Then how he came out of Lucy is anyone's guess," Sirius muttered.
"Sirius!" Mr. Weasley rebuked, but it sounded as if he were grinning.
"I like Lucy!" Sirius replied. "I always did, really. But no one in his right mind would call her 'nice.' Clever, loyal, as tenacious as a dragon -- but not 'nice.'" A brief pause. "Never did understand what she saw in Amos."
"He was quite the Quidditch player, when he was younger."
"Lucy doesn't give two figs for Quidditch."
Hermione -- who didn't either -- took several steps backward, slipping into a little alcove under the stairs, and bit the back of her hand, terribly upset by what she'd just heard. That curse had turned out to be irreversible? How perfectly awful for Cedric. She remembered the last time she'd seen him before hospital -- winded but full of energy and determination to save Harry, racing about on two good legs, tall, powerful, and healthy.
Yet even when they'd visited him later, his relentless cheerfulness had made her suspect he might be hiding something about his condition. She just hadn't expected anything so . . . devastating, and wasn't used to there being nothing magic could do. Perhaps that was the ignorance of the newly initiated, but she did tend to think of magic as -- well -- magic. Intellectually, she knew magic had limits, but they were such different limits from Muggle science, she was inclined to believe magic could do anything.
But not for Cedric.
She tried to imagine what he'd look like on crutches, but couldn't. The mental image simply didn't compute (to use a Muggle expression). Cedric was an athlete, graceful and strong -- like Viktor. She couldn't imagine him any other way.
And what would Harry think, if he knew? When he knew, because -- if this were true -- it was hardly something that could be hidden. Harry would find out the first time he saw Cedric at Hogwarts in September, and she knew he'd feel terrible.
Of course, that assumed Cedric would be going back to Hogwarts. She wondered if he would.
Finally pulling herself back together, she emerged from beneath the stairs to enter the kitchen. It was just Mr. Weasley and Sirius in there now; Mrs. Weasley must have gone already. "We need more Doxycide," she said, holding out empty sprays and wondering what her face showed, because both Sirius and Mr. Weasley were looking at her oddly. Sirius got up to fetch a canister, and Hermione licked her lips before continuing, "I've been thinking. I know it's not entirely safe, but I should probably spend another week with my parents this summer. My mother said she missed me, before I left. I feel badly about being away so long, and their house isn't really that far from here."
Mr. Weasley just nodded, as if he didn't find it an odd request. "We'll look into it. It is dangerous, but if you were my daughter, I'd miss you too."
"Thank you," Hermione said, half to Mr. Weasley and half to Sirius, who'd handed her the canister.
And if St. Mungo's were only three stations down the Tube from her parent's house, well, that was a nice coincidence, wasn't it?
Not that she'd tell Mr. Weasley or Sirius that -- or even Ron and Ginny. Especially not Ron and Ginny. They'd tease her. But she needed to see Cedric's condition for herself, and before Harry arrived at the house, to decide how to soften the blow. Given Harry's dicey mood of late in letters, if he found out Cedric was crippled only when he saw him for the first time on the Hogwart's Express, Hermione feared he might go ballistic.
With a diagnosis made, Cedric's care was transferred to a different team of healers and apothecaries. He never saw Haus again, and Ben only once more. She came to wish him well before returning to Stockholm. "Don't give up hope, Cedric," she told him. "We learn more all the time, and there are magical traditions out there with their own unique spells. We might be able to heal you yet."
He just nodded and smiled, because he was expected to. He wouldn't hold his breath. If he'd been stubbornly reluctant to accept his diagnosis, he'd latched onto his planned recovery regimen with a badger's determination, because this -- finally -- gave him something to do.
His braces and crutches might be magical, but that didn't excuse him from learning to get around on them. They also gave him a wheelchair, even though he glared at it when Medi-Wizard Dyer brought it in. "Comes with a Collapsing Spell, a Hover Charm, and a full Locomotor Charm," Dyer said, turning it so Cedric could see and ignoring Cedric's sour expression -- which he usually did.
Dyer was a big, balding, phlegmatic Welshman who looked as if he should be a Muggle rugby player (right down to the broken nose), not a medi-wizard. He could pick Cedric up bodily and move him with no real effort, and he took Cedric's snappishness in his stride. Once, Cedric had overheard him tell one of the under-healers, "Kid's lost the use of his legs. There'd be something cracked about him if he weren't snappy. I'm still waiting for the really big tantrum where he throws something at my head. They all do." Which, naturally, had made Cedric determined not to throw that really big tantrum, no matter how badly he wanted to at times.
Now, Dyer said, "No wand needed to engage any of the charms. You tap here on the wheel" -- he indicated a yellow dot --"for the Hover Charm, and right here" -- he pointed to a small pad on the right side of the bottom cushion -- "for Locomotor. Use your forefinger to direct motion -- forward, turn, backward -- it's pretty straightforward. I'll show you later how to collapse it. It'll go all the way down to pocket size. We got you a sports model -- nice and light so you don't have to engage Locomotor if you'd rather handle it manually. Sometimes that's easier, if you're just moving around a room."
Eyes still on the offending piece of equipment, Cedric struggled to keep his face neutral. "I thought I didn't need a chair?"
"You don't for most things, but if you have some distance to cover, the chair'll be faster. And you'll likely get tired, now and then. You may as well learn to work it while you're here."
So Cedric learned to walk with crutches, and handle his wheelchair. In the end, and ironically, he came to favor the chair. Compact, with a low back, high maneuverability, and sloped wheels for speed, he thought it rendered him less awkward. One of the medi-witches with a talent for art charms spelled a yellow and black badger on the back to make him laugh (not something he did much these days: sometimes he thought the staff went out of their way to win a smile from him). Open-fingered cyclist's gloves, to prevent blisters, now became part of his morning dressing ritual, and he took a contrary pride in being rather good with the chair within just a week. He made little use of the Locomotor Charm, preferring the exercise of moving it himself. "Your girl'll like that," Dyer told him, pinching the swell of bicep he was showing. "It's filling out your chest, too -- you don't look so skinny these days."
"I'm not skinny!" Cedric replied, offended.
"Not skinny? Like hell you aren't, boyo! Dunno how you won that Cup." Most of the ward had seen his Triwizard Cup -- and made much of it -- even if Cedric tried to keep it buried under notes, letters, and a Tutshill Tornados pennant Cho had sent him.
Dyer was right about the muscles. And if getting about in the chair was sometimes difficult, there was a certain grace to it. By the end of his second week, he could spin a perfect circle in the hospital hallway, and would race Dyer from the ward to the lift. Sometimes he won -- though usually by cheating, weaving the chair so Dyer couldn't pass him without tripping. He took to wearing tank tops, too -- not entirely because they were cooler in the unusual July heat. Cedric had his small vanities.
Yet if he felt passably graceful in the chair, he felt like a bloody awkward idiot on the crutches. He couldn't lift his legs properly and suffered from footdrop, so his shoes dragged with each step, wearing out the sides and soles. He had little metal plates affixed to the places that dragged most, which made noise on the floor in addition to the click of the crutches. All that added up to a thump, scrape, thump, scrape that accompanied him whenever he walked. Awful. He'd once flown like a swallow as Seeker for his House team. Now, he lurched down a hallway like a troll. People stared and tried not to. He hated it.
But -- as Dyer pointed out -- if he wanted to keep his leg muscles from atrophying, he needed to walk every day, and do his exercises. The more time he spent in the chair, the sooner he'd be stuck there. As he didn't want to lose his legs entirely, he did his exercises, and he walked -- however stupid he thought he looked.
He also discovered there was a mind-boggling array of 'mobility equipment,' most of it Muggle-invented and then spelled for Wizarding use if necessary -- like his chair and crutches. There were dressing aids, lap trays, reachers, and even special bathroom equipment to enable him to get to the toilet and take a shower. Grooming presented a whole new set of challenges, and he couldn't believe how frustrating it suddenly became just to take a piss. "You're lucky you're male," Dyer told him, holding up a urinal. "Not very elegant, but in the middle of the night, it's handier. Sometimes the effort of getting to the loo just isn't worth it, you know?"
Cedric swore he'd never use the thing. That lasted exactly three nights. Necessity was a harsh mistress.
But at least he could feel down there again. He'd been a little unsure about what exactly he'd have left once the paralysis spell had come off (and he was both young and male enough to care). So at the first opportunity when he was alone in the bathroom -- supposedly learning to use the handholds -- he tried a few tentative strokes to see if there was any response. There was. Everything appeared to be in working order, although he had to wait another two days before having enough privacy to see if 'working order' included proper ejaculation. It was funny how much relief he felt when he came -- and not just for the physical release. He was still normal in that department, at least.
Rather to Cedric's embarrassment, Dyer wanted to discuss that, too. "You tried out the equipment yet?" he asked about three days after first being assigned to Cedric, and exactly a day after Cedric had, in fact, tried out the equipment. At first, though, Cedric didn't know what Dyer was talking about until the Welshman pointed at his own crotch. Then, beet red, Cedric nodded. "Any problems?" Dyer asked. "And you better tell me if there are -- being coy won't cut ice with me. It's my job, helping you adjust. That includes discussing how you keep the family jewels in working order."
"No problems," Cedric managed to cough out.
"You sure? Your girl'll be right royally pissed off with me, otherwise, especially since I can help you get that straightened out."
"No, no problems," Cedric reiterated.
"Good. Impotence sometimes happens," Dyer warned, "depending on the extent of the nerve damage, or from regular use of Abdoleo. The potion dulls everything, and can make it hard to get it up. Though that might apply more if you're thirty than seventeen."
And that brought Cedric up short. "I'm going to lose that, too, aren't I? Eventually, I mean."
Dyer turned uncharacteristically somber. "Probably. But not for a while -- with luck, a good long while. If you're thinking about kids someday, you shouldn't have any problems making them, as long as you don't put it off forever."
Cedric swallowed. "How long?"
"Hard to guess. Rather not try."
"I mean, are we talking five years here -- ten? More?"
"Likely at least ten. Probably as much as twenty. Depends on how fast the nerves go, and where."
"Bloody hell," Cedric muttered, mostly to himself. He might be impotent as early as at twenty-seven?
Dyer clapped his upper arm again. "My advice -- and your ma and da might not like me saying as much -- is to enjoy it while you got it. Pretty face like yours -- the girls'll come running."
And Cedric was strangely irritated by that. He knew he could pull the girls all right, but ironically, he'd prefer to pull someone he cared about. Given how things had been moving with Cho, though, he didn't think he'd have to wait long. If they hadn't quite gone all the way, he suspected they would, come autumn -- she'd already given him a hand job in the owlery a few times last spring and summer (which had been a bit odd, but it was private, and he'd been too worked up to care about the dry smell of feathers or owl crap under their feet).
Of course, all this assumed she'd still want to have anything to do with him when she saw him again.
She wrote to him faithfully every few days -- even if he didn't write back because he was too tired, too busy, or simply too depressed. But her letters came as regularly as clockwork, and she never complained when she didn't hear from him. He appreciated that. Yet living so far north, she hadn't been to see him in hospital. She had no idea how hideous he looked when he dragged himself down a hallway on crutches. He was freakish, ungainly, awkward -- ugly. She wouldn't want that. She'd gone to the Yule Ball with a Quidditch Captain and Hogwarts' Champion, not this . . . cripple.
He hated himself some days. Most days, really. Sometimes, he wondered if maybe he wouldn't have been better off dead. Wasn't a pretty corpse preferable to the embarrassing spectacle he was now? It made him ill-tempered, and sharp. Not very Hufflepuff.
The lack of visitors didn't help. People knew and liked him -- he'd always been popular, and he truly enjoyed company. Since the Tournament, he'd even had a fan club of sorts. But a true best mate? He didn't have one of those, and had Harry come back without him, there'd have been no Ron Weasley to strike out in a furious, protective rage. He'd never much thought about it until now as there had always been somebody around for him to talk to, plus his denmates for companionship, and for the most part, that'd been all right. Hufflepuffs stuck together; it was what Cedric liked most about his House. But he wasn't one to bare his soul, except to Esiban -- the raccoon wasn't going to tell anybody else, and wouldn't judge. For all his popularity and friendliness, Cedric Diggory was intensely private, and that had a downside. So he got letters from everybody, especially his denmates and Cho, but no one went out of his way to come and visit, and Cedric found himself envying Harry Potter, if not for the usual reasons. Then again, even if he'd had visitors, Cedric wasn't sure he was ready yet to be seen hobbling about on the crutches by anyone he really knew.
Thus, when Hermione Granger found him stumbling down the hallway on them -- hot and sweaty and headed back to his ward after a therapy session with Dyer -- he nearly died of the humiliation. Why couldn't he have been in the chair that day, at the least? But he wasn't. She gaped at him, open-mouthed, for five seconds before finding her voice at all. "Hi!" she squeaked.
"Come for the show?" he snapped, sagging against the hospital wall, still propped up by the crutches.
Her shocked face turned -- if possible -- even more horrified, which made him feel awful. "I'm sorry," he blurted out. "That was terribly rude. Please forgive me."
"It's all right," she said, almost reflexively.
"No, it isn't." But he didn't move from his spot against the wall, where he could at least look a little more dignified. "Is there somebody you came to visit?"
"You," she said, which surprised him. He'd just assumed their meeting an accident.
"Me?"
"I -- Uh -- Well, I know you don't know me. But, um, oh -- never mind." And turning, she headed back towards the stairs, her fair skin flaming under the bushy hair.
She was kind of cute, all flustered. "Granger!"
She looked back.
"You don't have to go. I just . . . wasn't expecting visitors. Give me a minute to get back to my ward? Then you can come up."
She tilted her head. "Come back? Why don't I just walk with you?"
And now it was his turn to blush terribly. Finally, he got out, "You don't have to watch."
And something in her face . . . changed -- became at once sympathetic but shrewd. "Don't be silly," she said. "I'm sure you're much better on those than I'd be. Come on." And she turned her back, headed towards his ward, just assuming he'd follow. "They told me you're on Bonham. You must be important, Diggory. You got the ward named after St. Mungo's founder."
For a moment, he just watched her walk away, reluctant to follow like a dog called to heel. But then he did, and he wasn't sure why, except maybe just her matter-of-fact assumption he would. She didn't turn to look at him once, at least not until she'd reached the door, which she held open because she'd got there first. It felt less like charity and more like logic. Then she followed him into the room and -- somehow -- he wasn't quite so self-conscious, even with her behind him, able to see exactly how graceless he was now.
He got back into his bed and took his pain medicine because he was achy all over (not just in his legs), then they talked a while. It was . . . strange. He didn't know Granger except by reputation as the cleverest girl in the school -- and for her attachment to Potter. She seemed nice enough, and had a prettier face than he remembered, or was popularly attributed to her. Then again, Krum had asked her to the Yule Ball and for all that Krum wasn't the dimwit some thought him, Cedric also didn't think he was quite so noble as to date a dog. Granger definitely wasn't that. He suspected any impression of plainness came from the wild hair and lack of makeup -- a false impression when one looked harder. She had lovely dark eyes that sparkled, a pert nose, a rosebud mouth, and the hint that she might have nice breasts one day --
And what was he doing, thinking about Granger's physical charms? He had a girlfriend. It was just that Granger was wearing a rather tight white t-shirt and he wasn't blind. Not to mention the pain potion was kicking in -- he could feel it -- which lowered his inhibitions. He'd have to keep a rein on his tongue -- didn't want to offend the girl by acting like a drunken idiot or staring at her breasts.
Even if they were perky and well-shaped.
Eyes up! he thought. Find something else to think about.
At least with Granger there -- and his mother not -- he might finally get some answers about what was happening outside St. Mungo's walls. He still hadn't been told anything even by his mother, although she was usually the frank one. That worried him. "What's going on out there?" he asked Granger as soon as they'd exchanged the necessary pleasantries about holiday, family, and friends.
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"What's the Ministry saying about Voldemort?" She started at the name and he resisted rolling his eyes. "Voldemort," he said again, half just to annoy her. "It's a word, Granger. It won't conjure him out of thin air. You're Muggle-born; you shouldn't have the same prejudices."
She shrugged, coloring slightly across nose and cheeks. "I've always read that names have power --"
"It's not his real name. We might be better off worrying about using 'Tom Riddle' than 'Voldemort.'"
She eyed him curiously for a moment, then asked, "Haven't you been reading The Daily Prophet?"
"No. No one gives it to me. It's like a conspiracy of silence around here."
He could tell she was both puzzled by that, but also reluctant to trespass. "Come on, Granger," he said. "I'm not fragile. Somebody needs to tell me what the devil's going on!" He could barely keep the frustration out of his voice.
She sighed, raising her eyes to meet his and he willed himself to hold her gaze, look responsible and sane and all that. Finally she sighed again and bent forward, elbows on knees. And Merlin's Beard, did she have to do that? He could see all the way down her cleavage -- which she actually had. It wasn't fair, but at least his lower body was now under blankets. And why did the pain potion have to make him randy? It was bloody inconvenient. Looking up, she said, "The Ministry is claiming it wasn't You-Know-Who."
"What?" He practically shouted it and she glanced over her shoulder at the door, then at the other beds. "What do you mean they're saying it's not Voldemort!" he hissed, leaning forward himself, her décolletage forgotten. "What in bloody hell are they saying happened to me? That I fell off a broom?"
"Oh, they're not denying the Death Eaters. There were Death Eaters at the World Cup, and Barty Crouch Junior was convicted as one. But that's all it was, according to them -- Crouch's plot, together with some old friends, to kill his father and Harry Potter. You were 'collateral damage.'" She made air quotes around the term.
"Dumbledore was there!" Cedric said, boggled by the Ministry claims. No wonder his mother hadn't let him know. "Dumbledore fought Voldemort! I saw it!"
Granger pulled her chair forward and leaned over to touch his hand in some effort at comfort. "I know. I know you saw it. They're saying Dumbledore is . . . well, senile."
"What? What about McGonagall or --"
"Loyal friends of Dumbledore. Either they don't want to embarrass him, or they're taking advantage of his unstable mind -- depends on who you read. You and Harry were 'too distressed' to know what you were seeing."
"That's . . . just . . . idiotic!" He felt suddenly ready to leap out of bed and stomp around -- except of course, he couldn't. "It's Dumbledore!"
"I know. Cedric, I'm sorry. Fudge just doesn't want -- Well, I don't think he's got a bloody clue what to do now, and doesn't want anyone to know it."
"And he thinks Voldemort will just disappear if he pretends he's not there? I saw him!"
"I believe you -- and Harry. And Mr. Weasley and Professor McGonagall and Professor Dumbledore. But, well, I'm not sure most people want to believe, you know?"
"So Fudge is calling me a liar?" He was furious.
"Actually, he's not called you anything. You're being presented as the victim, here -- wounded by Death Eaters who managed to spirit you and Harry away at the end of the Third Task. But that was right after -- I haven't read anything about you recently. They're kind of ignoring you." Her expression was sheepish. "The Daily Prophet prints what the Ministry dictates these days."
He rubbed his brow, trying to get his head around the massiveness of the deception -- and the fact that people would actually buy into it. "Sticking heads in the sand and pretending Voldemort isn't back won't make him go away. And I can't believe Fudge is denying it. He knows we all agreed on what happened -- we were there. He's essentially calling us all liars!" Cedric felt himself getting worked up again, tongue loosened by the drugs. "My father works for the Ministry! Why would I lie?"
"Cedric -- "
"This is insulting! Voldemort tried to kill me and Harry both! And Lucius Malfoy cursed me, and I can't ever walk again --"
"Cedric!" she said, and she was suddenly right there, bending over his bed, her hands on his shoulders. "Calm down!" She looked worried.
Subsiding, he rubbed his face, embarrassed. "It's the pain potion," he said. "It makes me say things --"
She didn't reply, but settled back in her chair. After a moment, she remarked, "Maybe that's why they didn't want to tell you. They didn't want to upset you right now."
He almost laughed. "And it would upset me less later?"
"Good point."
Looking up at her again, he managed a wry grin. She wasn't the enemy. She'd told him what no one else had. "Thank you," he managed finally.
She just nodded, then after a moment, asked, "Will you never walk again?" But as soon as she asked it, she blushed. "Sorry. That's nosey."
"It's all right." She'd leveled with him; he felt he owed her an answer, nosey question or not. "And no, I won't. Not without assistance." He told her what the doctors had said -- some years walking with crutches, then eventual confinement to a wheelchair. "This serum they've brewed is supposed to slow it all down to a crawl. Without it, I'd have been paralyzed within a few days, or something like that, assuming I didn't slit my own throat from the pain."
Her eyes looked damp. "I'm so sorry," she whispered. "This should never have happened to you."
He shrugged with one shoulder. "It did."
"All for helping Harry. He'll be devastated, you know. Do you wish you could do it over again and not go back?"
That brought him up completely short. "He'd have died! You think I'd rather someone had died?"
Now it was her turn to look brought up short. "I didn't mean that. I mean --" She tilted her head to the side as if unsure how to proceed. "I guess . . . I guess I didn't think. If it were me, I'd wish it hadn't happened."
"I do," he said, "wish that. But I wouldn't undo it, because if I hadn't gone back, Lucius Malfoy would've killed him." Abruptly, he flopped back onto his pillows and stared at the plain white ceiling. It was complicated. "I hate this -- where I am. I hate everything that's happened. I hate not being able to walk to the bloody toilet!" He raised his head again to look at her. "But if I had to make a choice between this" -- he indicated his lower body -- "and somebody dying?" He stopped. If he had known this would happen, and he'd been able to choose, would he have gone back to that graveyard to save Harry? He'd like to think he would, but wasn't sure. Could he really be that selfless, whatever Dumbledore had said? He'd learned in the last few weeks exactly what it meant to be permanently crippled. And this was just the beginning. How bitter would he feel five years down the road?
This wasn't going to go away. It was for life. "It's shitty -- to put it mildly," he said bluntly. "But I'd like to think I'd still have done it, even if I knew this would happen."
She studied his face, then said, "You really are something. And I don't mean that facetiously."
He wasn't sure whether to blush or scoff. Instead, he asked, "So why did you come today?"
"I told you -- to see you. I'm at my parents' this week; I've, um, been elsewhere, but my family doesn't live that far from St. Mungo's. Mum and Dad work all day, so I thought I'd drop in -- see how you were. Where's your little furry friend? I can't remember his name, quite. Esi-something."
"Esiban. The staff won't let him stay overnight. My mother brings him to visit sometimes, then takes him home."
"What does that name mean, anyway? I've been trying to guess what it is, but it doesn't sound Latin, or Greek or French or anything I recognize."
He laughed. "I doubt you would. It's Ojibway."
"It's -- what?"
"Ojibway -- Ashinishnaabeg. You know, American indigenous."
"You mean Native American?"
"First Nations," he corrected. "It's only 'Native American' in the States. In Canada, they're called First Nations. And esiban means 'raccoon.' Not very creative, but, well, I was twelve."
"It sounds creative to me. And how on earth did you learn Ojibway? Why did you learn Ojibway?"
"I spent a month on an Ojibway reserve. I know some people there."
"Really? Wizards?"
"Meda -- yes. I stayed with them. But I don't speak the language -- just a few words."
Chin pulled in, hands resting on knees, she sat back and just regarded him a moment. "You are full of surprises, Cedric Diggory. And say the name again, slowly, so I can learn to pronounce it."
"AE-si-BAN," he said. She repeated it and he corrected her. "More staccato. Ae'siBAN." She tried again. "Better."
They continued to talk then for three hours: about the Ojibway, magic in America -- native and colonial -- raccoons, cats, animagi, Sirius Black (although that was conducted in whispers), Harry, and one of the books Cedric had on his nightstand about Peruvian charms. He couldn't remember ever talking to anyone for that long, much less on such a wide range of topics. For the first time in weeks, he wasn't bored. But they didn't talk again about Voldemort, or the Ministry -- or crutches.
His mother returned at tea time to find Granger still there, and the girl leapt to her feet, staring down at her watch. "It's five o'clock! I didn't even notice!"
"I didn't, either," Cedric said, a little bemused because it was true.
"I've got to go -- need to be home when my parents get there."
"Don't they know you're here?" he asked, suspicious.
"Oh, yes. It's just teatime, you know. My mother doesn't like it to be late."
"Come and visit again?" he asked impulsively. "If you've time, I mean; I'm sure you're busy. But, well, since it's not so far, maybe you could?" He didn't want to sound as if he were desperate for company (even if he was).
"I will. I promise." Then she ducked out with a muttered, "Hullo, Mrs. Diggory," to his mother, who'd watched all of this with one raised eyebrow.
"Who was that?" his mother asked as she approached his bed -- a subtle rebuke for his not introducing them.
She had Esiban in his cage and set him down beside Cedric, who opened the door to invite him out. "Come on, then. Come and see me." The raccoon waddled free and climbed Cedric's chest to sniffle all around his chin and ears. "Hermione Granger," Cedric told his mother, trying not to laugh because Esiban was tickling him. "She's a friend of Harry Potter's."
"Ah," his mother said, seating herself in the chair Granger had just vacated. "I recall meeting her now, yes. A pretty girl."
His eyebrows shot up. If he thought Granger's reputation as plain undeserved, 'pretty girl' still wasn't most people's first assessment of her. "She's very clever," he said. "Probably should have been in Ravenclaw but the Sorting Hat has a mind of its own."
Sitting back, she smiled at him, although it never quite reached her eyes. "Speaking of Ravenclaw, have you heard from Cho?"
"Got a letter from her yesterday, and I'll probably get another tomorrow. Granger's visit isn't what you think, Mother. She's Potter's friend. I barely know her." Although after talking to her for over three hours, he might have to modify that assertion.
"Who says I thought anything?"
"You didn't have to."
She laughed at him. "And you, my dear suspicious son, should have been sorted into Slytherin, where you belong."
"I'm neither ambitious nor deceptive enough."
"And I am?"
"You take pride in it." But this was said fondly. He loved his mother; he just couldn't stand her House.
Now, her lips had tipped up. "I do take pride in it. There's nothing wrong with ambition, nor deception when necessary, Cedric. You needn't always be quite so terribly honest. Although you lie quite well when you want to -- mainly because no one expects you to, except your mother, of course."
"I don't lie!"
"Yes. And what happened to my African mask that was hanging in the stairway?"
"I told you, I don't know --"
"I found the pieces 'vanished' into the back shed. You really need to work on that spell, Cedric."
He turned bright red. "That was a year ago!"
"And you said you don't lie."
"You're terrible." But he was grinning.
"You like intelligent girls because all boys fall in love with their mothers." She was teasing him. Her blue eyes twinkled. "I don't suppose this Granger girl's in Slytherin?"
"Are you joking? Gryffindor."
"Ah well, it's closer than Ravenclaw; that House prizes individuality too much to get anything useful done."
"Mother, I'm dating Cho."
"Of course you are. You talk about her all the time." And rising from the chair, she said, "I'll go and call for the meal."
Cedric settled the raccoon beside him and lay back in the bed, reaching over to snatch up Cho's last letter. So he didn't talk about her all the time. That didn't mean he didn't think about her.
Endnotes: The lovely image at the top comes from the recent BBC made-for-TV movie, "The Haunted Airman" -- which, ironically, had Pattinson starring as a character confined to a wheelchair. If anyone makes a connection between Healer Haus and Dr. House, they'd be right. ; Obviously, it's not the same person, but my little quad of healers is a personal bow to my favorite medical TV show. So sue me. :-D Dyer is based on a real occupational therapist I worked with at Scottish Rite Children's Hospital, though he wasn't Welsh. He did, however, specialize in mopey teenaged boys. (G) One important observation: although Cedric has a fan following and takes Cho to the Ball -- and seems generally well-liked -- he's strangely isolated in the books. At no point is a best mate ever indicated for him, quite unlike Harry. That's no doubt because Rowling never needed to specify it, but I've decided to take it at face value. Esiban is Cedric's best friend.
While it's clear magical healing is not Muggle medicine, I presume that if wizards know the moons of Jupiter, they're familiar with human anatomy. And in many ways, doctors and hospitals are doctors and hospitals, magical or not. For the sake of common sense and my sanity, I'm going to assume some healers do specialize, just as we have GPs and specialists, and that 'healer' and "mediwitch" are generic terms given to people performing a wide variety of medical jobs, be it nursing, physio- and occupational therapy, psychiatry, surgery, orthopedics, neuroscience, and etc.