Her hand was on my forearm and stroked it soothingly.
This gesture and her presence alone calmed my pulse, but it was still too high.
"What happened?", she repeated her question from earlier.
I knew roughly what had happened, only why it had happened I would not be able to explain.
I would have lied to anyone else in the world, said I was fine and never shown my weakness.
But Florentine was not just anyone.
She was the person I could be honest with without being afraid.
"Panic attack", I therefore said quietly in a trembling voice without elaborating.
She left the place next to me and crawled further onto the bed, only to hug me from behind.
Her head was now on my shoulder, her hair tickling my cheek and her arms wrapped around my chest.
I was safe. I was home.
"Will you tell me about it?", she whispered, her breathing on my neck giving me goosebumps.
Talking about feelings, something I was never good at. I'd rather eat it all up and let it all out in one big burst of anger.
But that was something Malfoy had done, maybe Draco was someone who talked about feelings.
At least he would try.
"It's all been a bit much the last few days", I tried to explain what had caused my meltdown.
She snuggled even closer to me as much as possible.
"I know that. Everything's been different since Saturday and until now there hasn't been time to process everything."
I mumbled in agreement because I didn't know what to say.
"But I think we can work it out. Together."
Together.
That word didn't make the goosebumps go away but only intensified them.
"You really think so?"
I felt her nod at the back of my neck.
"Where do we start?"
I needed order.
I had to have some point to start from and the logical solution was to start at the beginning, chronologically.
"Saturday night?"
"Are we sitting down comfortably for that?"
I nodded.
We both slid to the head of the bed and leaned against it.
She was usually the one to start conversations but I could tell she was finding it hard so I tried.
"I was sitting in bed reading when my ring got warm. I dropped everything and came to find you.
Just before I got there, I heard a scream and when I found you, you were lying on the floor surrounded by three Slytherins."
I tried to describe the events soberly but my voice kept breaking.
"I don't remember everything", Florentine admitted quietly, reaching for my hand.
"I left the party because it was so loud.
I was being chased and I triggered the emergency button because I was scared.
Then something hit me in the back.
Next thing I know I was on the floor and I was being kicked. Then everything went black."
She squeezed my hand a little tighter.
"Then what happened?", she asked shyly.
She had already been told the whole story, I had heard it myself from Madame Pomfrey but it was quite different for both of us to hear each other's story.
"I shocked Nott. The others left like the cowards they are.
I was checking your pulse when Potter came, I sent him to get Professor McGonnagal.
Then I got you to the hospital wing as fast as I could.
To this day I don't know how Madame Pomfrey could have understood what I said, I was so panicked."
Again and again I faltered in my narration and whenever I did so she stroked the back of my hand with her thumb.
It was reassuring and surprisingly it was really good to talk about all this.
"She examined you and found that...", my voice broke again, in my minds eye I saw her lying on the bed, pale and barely breathing.
"My kidney was injured", she added.
I nodded.
There was a pause in which neither of us said anything and I had to summon the courage to continue.
"You weren't strong enough to Apparate and finding a suitable donor so quickly would have been impossible."
"And then you offered yourself."
"It was the only way to save you.
And if it hadn't been for Christmas I wouldn't have known we were compatible.
I would never have considered it."
In the last few minutes I hadn't looked at her but stared out the window but now I turned my head in her direction.
"So you indirectly saved your own life."
She rolled her eyes and a slight smile crept onto her lips.
"But only indirectly. Directly, it was me. Honour to whom honour is due", I added and now she was no longer smiling but laughing.
She laughed at my feigned arrogance and just the thought that I was feigning this arrogance for the first time made me laugh too.
"You earned that honour but don't you ever bring that up as an argument, it doesn't count."
"Only as often as I have to."
After what felt like hours of laughter, which had probably only been a minute or two, she leaned against my shoulder.
"Thank you for doing that."
My reasons were more selfish because I couldn't bear to live if she didn't anymore but we weren't there yet.
That was something we would talk about another time.
"You would have done the same if you could have."
"Thanks anyway."
"I'd do it again and again but unfortunately I don't have that many kidneys."
She punched me in the side, realising too late that it was the left side, the side that no longer had a kidney.
It didn't hurt, the scar had long since healed but she didn't know that.
"Oh no, that was the wrong side.
I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking", it bubbled out of her guiltily.
"It's okay, it doesn't hurt. It's all healed."
A tear ran down her cheek which I carefully wiped away with my finger.
We were so close.
I felt her breath on my hand, smelled her shampoo and looked into deep green eyes.
I wanted to kiss her so much.
But I couldn't. I wouldn't.
If I ever kissed her, it would be perfect.
Then she would get the kiss she deserved. And if I was honest with myself, she deserved more than me, someone better.
I withdrew my fingers but kept them close to her.
"It's okay."
The same words I had said two days ago after she had confessed to me who she was.
And again it provoked the same reaction.
Actually, I had wanted to reassure her, but I hadn't thought that these words might not be the right ones.
Tears streamed down her face and she slumped against me.
"I'm so sorry," she sobbed.
"I'm sorry I wasn't quicker", I confessed to her while tears were now running down my cheeks too.
I had never cried as much as I had in the last few months with Florentine in my whole life.
But it was good, it was liberating, cleansing and exactly what I needed.
For far too long I had hidden my emotions and feelings for fear of showing weakness, but with her I could be weak, here I was allowed to be and I would be.
We lay in each other's arms, she wrapped her arms around me while I stroked her back soothingly.
It was not a happy moment, it was not beautiful but it was good.
It was necessary for both of us and it would help us heal.
It took her much longer to calm down again, but I let her take her time.
As much as I would have liked to sit here all night, the tiredness I had suppressed until now overcame me and I felt as if I hadn't slept for ages.
My collapse had probably cost me more strength than I wanted to admit.
Without wanting to, I yawned.
Florentine still in my arms pulled up her nose and mumbled into my shirt.
"We should go to sleep."
She broke away from me and when I saw her teary eyes I knew I wasn't going to spend that night in my bed.
"Do you want me to stay?", I asked quietly and she nodded in agreement.
"I have to go before someone comes though or we'll be in trouble."
Again she nodded and I set the alarm on my pocket watch.
It would wake me at 6 o'clock, which was hopefully early enough to get out of here undetected.
We slid under the covers and she pulled me close to her so that we were now cuddling in bed.
I was well aware that this would be a problem for me in the morning, but it was a problem for Future-Draco.
Present-Draco simply enjoyed the closeness.
I woke up shortly before my alarm clock and was once again grateful for my inner clock.
The first thing I noticed even before I opened my eyes was the lack of warmth and closeness with which I had fallen asleep.
She's gone, was the first thought I could grasp and opened my eyes.
The back of her head with the black curls that I had seen in front of me yesterday before falling asleep had indeed disappeared.
Instead, a small black cat lay curled up in my arm, asleep.
I rubbed my eyes, expecting to still be dreaming, but even after a pinch in my arm, the little black cat remained in the place where Florentine had lain last night.
'I am an Animagus,' her words suddenly echoed in my head.
She was an Animagus, that's what she had said. But she had never said what her form was.
And again my brain made a mental leap to a moment I hadn't thought of in a long time.
The little black cat that had hissed at me as soon as I got close to her when I had had the tantrum during the Christmas holidays.
Her manner and the green eyes had reminded me of Florentine back then and now it made sense.
Quite a lot made sense, how she could always recognise my silent answers in the dark, that she heard things that were spoken far too quietly for her to have overheard and that she could disappear within seconds without being noticed.
I didn't know how but it must have something to do with the fact that she was an animagus.
Maybe I hadn't paid enough attention in class to know if Animagi could do that, but I was sure that Professor McGonnagal couldn't, even though she was also an Animagus and even a cat.
So there had to be something special about Florentine, something different about her.
But that was a question only she could answer and even if others could, I would only want to hear it from her.
I was actually quite glad that I hadn't woken up the way I had fallen asleep yesterday, because I was sure that would have been unpleasant for me.
I had no control over my body during the night and that could be my undoing.
But I didn't have that problem and I didn't have the problem that I would wake her up when I got up.
She was no longer on my arm so I could get up unnoticed.
She should get as much sleep as possible.
I grabbed a piece of parchment from the table next to her bed and wrote her a little note.
