Break This Spell626, thank you dearie =)

HarryCriesForDumbledore, you dear sweet child you, thank you very much. I appreciate that. =)

: Draco:

Monday morning came fiercely, with cracks of lightning and non-stop booms of thunder.

'How fitting,' he thought to himself.

He had slept poorly, unable to rid his thoughts of the girl in the other room. Her behavior baffled him. He just couldn't wrap his head around the drastic change she had undergone over the summer. What could possibly have happened to her to take her from spitting fire to cowering in shower stalls, in just three months time.

They were supposed to be free, and at peace. The war was over. The light had won. People were STILL celebrating. Stores were giving "light" discounts, pun intended, restaurants had free desserts, everyone had a smile ready for their fellow witch or wizard. The whole wizarding world was caught in the grasp of *untamable* good spirits. So why not her? How had she gone to the complete opposite end of the carefree spectrum?

Draco got his clothes ready and headed to the shower, distracted, still pondering this strange situation. He opened the door to the washroom, turned on the light, and jumped a foot in the air when he caught sight of Hermione, who had been standing at the sink, in the dark, in a towel, slowly brushing her teeth.

:Hermione:

To say that she was nervous about starting her classes was a gross understatement. She was utterly terrified. Petrified. Well not literally, cuz she had been there, did that already, didn't bother wearing the t-shirt.

Her fear was like a physical being standing next to her, it's icy fingers pressing into her heart, and threatening to stop it from beating. Her breathing was shallow and quick, and her palms were dripping with sweat. But her education needed to be finished. Not finishing wasn't something that had ever crossed her mind. And no one could do it for her, not that she could ever let that happen anyways. So she summoned up what little courage she could muster, and got out of bed.

Hermione walked into the bathroom and flicked the light on with her wand, feeling another thrum of joy as her magic coursed through her, from her heart, to her brain, and finally out the tips of her fingers into her wand. Despite spending the past week in her room practicing every spell she could remember and every new one she could find in the huge library in her bedroom, she still relished the way it felt flowing around inside. She glanced around at the room, then decided to turn the lights back off. She walked blindly with arms outstretched in the direction of the shower, stopping when she felt cool, smooth glass beneath her searching hands.

She stood in the hot hot water for what felt like an hour. This was her first shower all week, and it honestly felt nice to get clean and let the water relax her muscles. She used her time in the shower to root around in her brain, trying to find more courage. She knew there had to be some hidden deep within herself, but it had felt like so long since any courage was required of her, that she wasn't even sure which brain drawer she kept it in anymore. She scoffed a little, picturing a brain with random open drawers pulled out, before reaching in the dark for a razor. She stopped dead as soon as her fingers closed around it, thinking about what would happen to her if she DIDN'T shave. She started laughing when she realized that she could skip it if she wanted to, then started crying when she remembered why it was funny in the first place. No more showers under watchful eyes, no more beatings if she didn't shave herself all over. No more skimpy clothes that she would never have been able to look at in a store without blushing in embarrassment, shaking her head at thoughts of the girls that felt that they needed clothes like that. She cried about everything she had lost, mixed with hysterical laughter at the sense of freedom creeping upon her. Then she cried some more thinking about how difficult this day was going to be, and all the ones that would follow. Some time later, after she had had a decent cry, she turned off the water and stepped out. She toweled off briefly, not giving her brain time to think about the last time she had been dried off after a shower. Wrapping the towel around herself, she set about brushing her teeth to a hundred, like her parents had taught her when she was a child. She counted very slowly, to keep her mind from wandering into closets it shouldn't be in, like dreading the schools reaction, how skinny she had felt to her own hands when she wrapped up her towel, how her parents would never teach her anything again...