TW: dissociation, derealisation, suicidal thoughts, blood ++.

Hermione had a passion for rain. She loved the noise it made, loved wearing knee-high rubber boots with which she could walk through mud and puddles. She loved feeling the water drip from her skull to her face and running home to warm up. She loved watching the drops fall from inside her house, wrapped up under blankets by the fireplace.

Albert was running beside her, amused at having to escape the downpour that had started just as they took a step outside. Hermione had had to rush to the back of her bookshop to get her boots, before facing the torrents of rain alongside her best friend.

She laughed. For the first time in a week, Hermione was laughing about the situation. She was soaked to the skin and her teeth were chattering from the cold. But she was laughing. Maybe it was nerves, a sort of build-up after this awful week. Maybe it was an ounce of happiness in the midst of all her recent misfortunes. She didn't care. She was laughing and Albert was barking.

And then she laughed because she suddenly realised the absurdity of her existence, of the situation, of her days, of her routine. She could do nothing but laugh, laugh until her throat hurt, laugh when she wanted to cry. She laughed because she was sad, because she was lost and because nothing seemed more ridiculous than these emotions.

Hermione stopped, but Albert kept running. Her laughter died down and her best friend's barking sounded like a distant echo. The raindrops on her face mixed with tears and her throat tightened with these emotions that no longer expressed any joy. She cried, it was so rare.

It had been days, weeks, maybe even months, since she had felt so much. She felt like she had been wrapped in cotton wool, that all her emotions had been silenced for so long. Crying, laughing, it was all very similar, really. She was incapable of it, or at least it was too rare for it to be normal. She wanted to scream, to sob, to live laughing, but she couldn't do it. Everything was so insignificant and illusory. It was all ephemeral.

She was out of breath. She put her hands on her thighs and leaned forward, inhaling deeply to steady herself. She closed her eyes as dozens of drops of water ran down her face.

She was cracking. She recognised those moments of madness when her body and mind held nothing back. Those moments when everything seemed ridiculous and simple, even though her brain was screaming at her that nothing was right any more. Those minutes when nothing seemed worthwhile, when nothing mattered. It was quick, it never lasted long, just enough for her to be affected by it, marked by it.

She felt like she was entering another reality, a dimension that wasn't her own. She felt light, no longer carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. She let go of everything she held back for so long. Her worries were gone and she was ready, for a few minutes, a few hours, to do anything.

She was mad. Mad.

Hermione looked up and saw her house in the distance. The downpour made the horizon hard to make out. Albert must have arrived. She imagined him waiting outside the door.

Her chest was still heaving and her eyes burned from crying. She resumed her run. Nothing mattered any more, only her laughter enlivened the valley. She felt herself going insane, hysterical. Her movements were regular, her eyes agitated and a painful smile on her face. A moment of bliss, of lightness.

She reached the door, exhausted. Her breathing was ragged and her legs threatened to give way under her weight at any moment. She wanted to sleep, she wanted to leave this state of madness that was so painful for her. She ached all over, it was too difficult. The lightness was gone, there was only suffering, heaviness and overwhelm.

Once inside, she immediately forgot about Albert and his barking. She needed peace and quiet and sleep. She paid no attention to the delicious smells wafting from the kitchen. It would be too hard to think about. She threw off her soaking wet clothes and rushed upstairs, determined to dive under the covers to get some sleep.

Her body was shaking, whether from cold or panic, she wasn't sure. She almost tumbled down the stairs after slipping on one of the steps. She barely caught herself, without reacting to her scratched hand or sore knee.

On the way to her bedroom, she tied her hair into a loose bun and fastened it with the elastic band she always wore around her wrist. She brushed a few wild, soaking wet strands from her forehead and ran a hand over her face. She needed to sleep. It would solve all her worries. No more madness, no more thoughts, no more aching, heavy body.

She rushed to her bedside table and opened the first drawer to grab a vial of dreamless sleep potion. She turned white. Her breath caught in her chest. She realised that it had been a while since she had cleaned her nightstand of the empty vials she kept there every night. She rummaged through them in search of the potion that had become vital to her, without success.

Her hands began to tremble. Panic soared. Every vial she reached for was empty. She uncorked them one by one with frantic movements.

She opened them all once. Empty.

Then twice more. Empty.

Thrice. Empty.

Her breathing was ragged, her heartbeat was pounding in her ears and her hands were tingling. They were all empty. Empty.

With a jerk, Hermione pulled the drawer out of the nightstand and flipped it onto the floor. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She was terrified, almost paralysed by the situation. One by one, the vials crashed to the ground and shattered under the impact. She crouched down and searched through the debris for a filled vial or any remnants of potions, but there was nothing left.

She scraped her fingers with glass, but kept crying. She sobbed in terror, her back ached, her knees ached, her head ached. She was confused. Panic invaded her chest, which heaved at a high rate. She continued to search, but hope had left her. She felt lost, desperate. How could she manage without a potion? How would she survive a night without sleep? She could already see herself panicking and tossing and turning in her bed. She imagined seeing their faces again, hearing their voices and their screams. They were going to haunt her. She was doomed.

She had waited all day to be able to go home and finally sleep. All the way home, she had dreamt of the moment when the taste of her potion would touch her tongue and sleep would finally come.

The blood dripping from her fingers only increased her panic. It suddenly reminded her of so many things. She could no longer feel the pain, it was simply the anguish of the moment and of all those that had gone before.

She ran her hands through her hair and pulled at her wild locks until they ached. She needed to feel something else, something other than this fear, this destructive unease. She pulled out several strands before the pain became unbearable. Her whole body ached, her conscience, mind and soul were heavy, reducing her to a lump of agony.

That was all she was. Pain, screams, anguish and tears.

oOo

The smell of the gratin dauphinois that Draco had prepared wafted through the air. The nutmeg, the cream, the potatoes—he'd never believed that these scents, blended together, could be so pleasant. Exquisite.

He was sitting at the kitchen island, busy embroidering some designs on tea towels he had found in the basement. His embroidery book was open in front of him and he was trying to reproduce a frog and some mushrooms with his coloured threads. He had pricked his thumb several times trying to make the frog's legs, which he was struggling to get right. This had caused him to make ridiculous moans of pain, which could almost have made him laugh if he hadn't been so focused.

As he was finally finishing the outline of the legs, which, if he was honest, didn't look like much, he heard the front door slam soundly behind him. He tensed immediately. He waited. He counted the seconds in his head. Ten, twenty, thirty. Sixty.

The kitchen door remained closed and he resigned himself. Today wouldn't be the day.

He heard Hermione's footsteps on the wooden floor upstairs and then the door to her bedroom slamming shut. He released the air he had been holding in his lungs all this time.

His chest was compressed. His heart ached. Tears welled up in his eyes. How could things have changed so drastically? And why? These questions crossed his mind every day, until he forced himself to forget.

He was on his own. That was fine. It was what he deserved, what was best.

He put down the tea towel he was embroidering and took his face in his hands. He sighed. The truth was, Draco couldn't take it any more. He couldn't stand the tension, the silence, the absence. He felt empty without Hermione, as if he were taking hundreds of steps back towards the day he'd first arrived. He didn't recognise her any more–she had become a stranger.

As though everything they had experienced had been erased in a jiffy. He had counted so much on her, on her presence, on her looks, on her voice, and now he could no longer live properly without them. He had unconsciously developed an attachment that he couldn't shake off. It was too hard.

And as guilty as he felt, as worthless as he felt, he didn't want all this. He wanted her back, smiling and laughing and telling him about her days when she came home from work. Just like before.

After several long minutes, he got up and turned towards the oven, which still contained his gratin dish, ready to be eaten. He bent down to take it out, but a crash echoed through the house. It was loud, sharp.

Draco was startled and immediately stood up, alarmed. He had recognised the source of the noise straight away. It was coming from upstairs. Hermione.

No. No, no, no, no. No.

He imagined the worst. She was dead, she no longer existed, he was alone, even more alone. He imagined her lying there, lifeless. He saw himself going upstairs in slow motion, finding her on the floor, running to her and crying against her lifeless chest. It had to be that. He imagined finding her lifeless body, hanged or drained of blood. He imagined having to carry her, clean her up, tell her relatives.

In just a few seconds, he had planned Hermione's death, he had imagined all the steps of this dreadful event that made his fingertips tremble. Because of a simple noise. That had to be it, didn't it? It was so easy, so logical. She was angry and lonely, she couldn't go on like this. It had to be that. She couldn't take it any more, she was tired, he knew it. She was suffering. It had to be.

He heard a second crash and flinched. He had been standing still in his thoughts, doing nothing. He dropped the tea towel he'd grabbed to take the hot dish out of the oven and rushed out of the room. Hermione.

He ran past Albert without even seeing him and climbed the stairs as fast as he could. Hermione.

The run to the bedroom felt like an eternity. It was as if the walls and the floor were stretching out indefinitely so that he would never reach the door. He heard sobs and his heart missed a beat. Hermione.

He quickened his pace and stormed into the room. Hermione.

He froze. There was blood. Everywhere. On her, on the floor, on the furniture. Everywhere.

All he could hear was his heart beating in his ears, in his head, in his body. There was nothing left but that loud pounding and that vision of horror in front of him. His hands were clutching at nothing and his jaw was clenched so tightly it was beginning to hurt.

There was blood everywhere. Everywhere.

Everywhere.

The glass shone in the light and it reflected back at Draco. He was frozen, stunned.

He was transported, suddenly. Far away from the room he was seeing for the first time. Far away from these walls with their old-fashioned wallpaper and wooden furniture. Even further from her, from Hermione, from that metallic smell, from her crazy hair and trembling body.

He was there again, in that bathroom, between those too-white walls, that faulty shower, that smell of filth and blood. He was there again. Maybe he'd never really left.

But the sobs were still there. In his ears. They replaced the beating of his heart, disturbing his dark memories and awakening his subconscious. He was in a strange in-between place, on a bridge between his past and reality. He couldn't reach either of them. He was suspended, frozen. Stunned.

The movement she made to pull on her hair shook him out of his lethargy. He blinked several times, as if suddenly woken from a long nap. She continued to cry, suffering openly in front of him, and he just stood there, motionless.

He shook his head and sprang into action. He couldn't stay like that. He couldn't run away when faced with so much distress. Not any more. Forgotten were his memories, his dark past and all that blood. All he could see was Hermione's suffering, her face contorted by crying and screaming. There was only her pain and Draco's desire to help her, to save her, to get her out of all this.

He rushed to her side and fell to his knees beside her, careful to avoid the shards of glass.

"Hermione." He said it for the first time in far too long. "Hermione, I'm here."

He hesitated for a few seconds before leaning towards her and grabbing her hands to remove them from her hair. She let go of everything the second their skins touched. She gasped and looked up sharply at him. She was seeing him for the first time.

He saw so much distress in her eyes that he felt his heart beat a little harder in his chest. His stomach clenched as he realised how destroyed she was from the inside. It was powerful, transcendent.

Despite everything, Draco managed to maintain his composure. He managed to keep a cool head, to focus on the most important thing: Hermione. Hermione. She was all that mattered at the moment, the troubles were gone. He didn't want to lose her, he had to help her.

He smiled, that reassuring, calm smile that he gave only to her. He took her hands in his and stroked the inside of her wrists with his thumbs.

"I'm here," he repeated. "You're not alone with all this."

She nodded, tears falling silently from her eyelids. He smiled again. She was no longer sobbing, her chest wasn't heaving in a frantic rhythm. She was staring at him and that was all he needed to know to help her now. She was calm.

He helped her slowly to her feet, careful not to let either of them step on the glass still on the floor. As he did so, he realised that they were broken potion bottles. This made his heart sink a little more, but he remained composed.

He sat Hermione down on the edge of her mattress and placed their linked hands on her thighs, crouching down facing her. He was still smiling at her.

"Can you stay here alone for a few minutes?" he asked without taking his eyes off her. "I'll be right back, I'm going to get something to treat your hands."

He spoke to her earnestly, without belittling her nor as if she were a child in distress. She was still the same Hermione he knew and she deserved to be treated that way. He was telling her the truth. She was strong. He knew that. She impressed him, sometimes, often, she was so brave.

She nodded again and breathed in feverishly. Draco stroked the inside of her wrists one last time and straightened up. He felt the urge to hold her close but restrained. He didn't want to rush her. He couldn't spoil everything.

He left the room without wasting any time and headed to the bathroom. He remembered that the cupboard above the sink contained a red kit with everything he needed to treat minor injuries. He had read all the instructions one day, when he was still bored with his days, which were too long to be fully spent. He also grabbed several of his own potion vials and returned to the bedroom as quickly as he had left it.

Hermione hadn't moved, she was staring at the wall in front of her as if she couldn't see it. She was lost in her thoughts, her tears had dried and she seemed to be somewhere else, far away. Draco entered slowly, so as not to startle her, and knelt down in front of her to try and catch her gaze.

As tall as he was, he faced her face as she sat there. It wasn't long before she saw him and lowered her eyes to meet his. He smiled at her.

"How are you feeling?" he asked in a low voice as he took some compresses and tweezers out of the kit.

She shrugged without answering and her eyes filled with tears again. He nodded understandingly and looked down at her hands. A few pieces of glass were still stuck in her fingers and he applied himself to removing them as slowly as possible with the tweezers. His hands weren't shaking, he was focused.

"I'm tired," she whispered after a long silence.

He looked up at her and met her gaze. It inspired such sadness that he had to take a deep breath to stop himself from panicking. He smiled again and put down the tweezers, having removed all the shards of glass.

She was tired, exhausted. He knew it, he could see it. There was more than she could express. He knew it, he could see it.

"I've brought some potions," he informed her without letting go of her hands. "I'll finish healing you and give them to you."

She nodded, without saying a word. A solitary tear rolled down her cheek and Draco quickly wiped it away.

"I'm here, I'm not leaving," he added before grabbing a compress to clean the wounds.

He applied himself to each of the scratches on her hands, then on her knees. He reread the instructions for the disinfectant to make sure he was doing it right, before spraying it on the wounds.

She hissed in pain the first time and Draco immediately looked up to check that she was alright.

"Sorry," he said, stopping what he was doing.

She shook her head to let him know it was nothing and he nodded. He bit his lower lip before continuing his cautious movements. He was afraid of hurting her now. Afraid of ruining everything, of embarrassing her. What if she panicked again?

However, she showed no sign of pain, her eyes were fixed on him and she was silent. It felt right. She wasn't moving, so much so that he might have been worried.

However, as he began to bandage her hands to cover the multiple wounds, she began to react. She was slowly becoming aware of her surroundings. She clenched her right fist as he moved on to the second.

"Just this one more and you'll be able to sleep," he promised her.

She nodded. He finished applying the white band around her palm and closed the kit once he'd finished.

"Do you need help getting up?" he asked her quietly.

She shook her head and got up on her own. She climbed into bed on the opposite side from where the debris still lay and wedged herself under the covers in no time. Draco could see from her face that she was exhausted. He joined her by the bed and handed her a vial of the midnight blue potion.

"Do you want something to eat first?" he suggested before giving it to her. "I've made a gratin."

"No," she whispered, grabbing the potion.

He nodded and stood up, ready to leave the bedroom. He would clean the glass later, the next day, when she had slept. He was exhausted too, it had all been too emotional. He needed to sort things out, to calm down. He was still struggling to come to terms with what had just happened. She was fine. So was he.

"Draco," she called as he picked up the kit from the floor.

He turned to her, his face contorted with worry. Was she hurting somewhere? Perhaps he should give her something for the pain? Perhaps she needed to eat or drink even if she didn't want to?

"Stay," she implored him in a sleepy voice.

His heart skipped a beat. He hesitated. He wasn't sure he understood. He couldn't believe his ears. She couldn't have said that, not to him, not after all this. Did she really want him to stay? Until she fell asleep? Did she want him to stay all night? He had no idea.

What if he couldn't sleep? He hadn't slept with anyone in so many years that it seemed inconceivable. He clenched his fists quietly as he blinked, trying to understand.

What if she changed her mind? What if she was angry with him later? She wasn't in her right mind, he was going to take advantage of her again! What if–

"Please."

He met her gaze and that was enough for him. She was silently begging him.

His feet led him to her and he lay down beside her on the other pillow. She turned to face him and looked at him for a few seconds. It seemed like an eternity. In the darkness of the room, only her eyes shone. He wasn't sure if it was tears or gratitude. Her eyes were caramel, or whisky, or a mixture of the two.

She closed her eyelids, in front of him, and he did the same. Soon, their regular breathing was the only sound in the room.