(no subject)
Hermione definitely made her potion right. It was strong and it lasted. She woke up the next morning to the strangest feeling she'd ever experienced before. She felt like laying in bed for hours, she felt her hair around her neck and face and the material against her breasts and... MERLIN.
"I'm horny." Hermione said to herself and into her pillow. "I can't believe this. Bugging, bloody... I am going to kill Snape." Hermione never swore and on this occasion it seemed appropriate. So who was horny that was around her? She decided not to think about it. Hermione felt very ill when she tried sitting up and sat very still for a few moments once she finally managed it, feeling like death.
After a near-traumatising experience at the owlery the night before (hoo hoo will take the letter hoo hoo wind air hoo flap flap flutter soaring freedom boredom crunch crunch mice mmmmm crunch fluff feathers hoo sit hoo post hoo mice mmm chilly hoo (from a hundred different directions at once)), Hermione had fallen into bed, only to have the strangest and most creative dreams she'd ever had and couldn't ever imagine up again if even only for entertainment. She was tired and hot and bothered and she shoved her covers aside and marched to she girls showers with her towel and toiletries-bag clutched in her shaky hand.
Hermione selected the last shower at the end of the row of stone stalls and prayed no one came near her for the duration of her shower. She wasn't about to feel other girls' showers with them. Not today, not ever.
Towel wrapped around her body, Hermione applied her lipgloss as she was invaded with Parvati-hyperness and Lavender-groggyness from both sides at once. Parvati was talking and talking and applying some horribly shiny gloop to her eyelids and Hermione nearly passed out as she left the mirror.
She needed to eat. On went her stockings and on went the socks, the shirt, the skirt, the tie, the shoes. She buttoned up her robes and fastened on her cloak and grabbed her bookbag.
The Great Hall was going to be hell, she just knew.
* * *
Hermione walked very, very slowly to her table. She sat down delicately and set her bag on the floor. The Earth was spinning, the faces blurry, her mind a fog. She covered her face with her hands and tried to remember what Snape had reminded them... it was there, on the tip of her tongue.
Then she had it. "It will take a few conscious hours of existence with the potion in your system for you to adjust to your new reality." She'd been awake... what time was it? She guessed it had been about two hours. When would she feel normal? Where was the tea?
Where the bloody hell is the BLOODY STRAWBERRY JAM?!?!??!!!! Hermione felt the roaring emotion inside of her. WHERE THE BLOODY FUCK is it!??!!!! It's too early for this! I like mornings, Hermione thought, and I don't even like jam! It took her fifty seconds to realise that Ron had sat down beside her and was pushing jars and cups and silverware all over, hunting the jam down. She found the jam next to Neville (who was emitting only sleepiness and contentment with his coffee) and handed it to Ron silently, burying her face in her hands once again.
Ron's presence relaxed and she sat next to him for a long while before slouching against him and groaning. Ron looked at her, outwardly alarmed.
"Hermione? You all right?" He placed his toast back on his plate, fearing he might drop it in her hair if he didn't take the right precautions to avoid such a disaster.
She groaned again and let her hands drop to her lap. She shoved her face into his shoulder.
"Hermione. Ill, then?" She mumbled something he didn't hear.
Ron was pulsing through her now, he felt jumpy and startled and what's more... gentle and... content. Hermione felt anything but content and tried to suck up all of Ron's contentment to no avail.
"What's that, 'Mione?" Ron pushed her up straight and held her there with one hand while he pushed hair out of her face with the other. Being able to see her now (and Hermione feeling more and more of Ginny behind her who was fretting about her OWLs and fuming about something Goyle had said to her and causing Hermione great upset), Ron looked at her straight.
"Can you pour me some tea?" She hardly got the words out. She stared at his chest.
"Yeah. Um, sure. What's going on with you?"
Hermione whispered something.
Ron decided that this was entirely out of character and just... bloody WEIRD.
"WHAT?" He was losing his patience, and fast.
"I took the potion last night. Your anger doesn't feel good. Please stop." She felt it. He did.
"Oh. How is it?"
"Awful. Please, just give me tea and think about happy things so I can ignore how hungover Seamus is feeling." Hermione closed her eyes and sat very still.
Ron did a good job of doing as he was told. She felt thoughts of quiddich and flying and teasing Ginny and... thoughts of herself. What? Hermione was lost in all the emotions flying around her. Harry was asleep at the table, or nearly. Neville was feeling caffeine. Ginny was still fuming and now really fretting about her next class. Dean and Seamus and some other fifth-years Hermione didn't know were all hungover and Hermione felt that emotion stronger than all the others. She needed more powerful ones around her and she needed them now.
So she was slightly more content when Ron set tea in front of her with just the right amount of sugar and some lemon and ordered her to drink and let her lean against him with his arm around her shoulder as she sipped her tea and he talked mindlessly to Neville about the Cannons, eating his toast and thinking about sleep.
* * *
It had taken about five more minutes before the organisation came to her and she was suddenly struck with understanding and clarity. She had sat up straight and smiled at Ron, thanking him and finding herself some fruit salad. She had talked with Ginny about Goyle and calmed her nerves some, thank Merlin, and she felt Neville feeling chipper and Ron missing her warmth and Harry wishing it were Saturday and time for the next quiddich match.
* * *
Classes were the most stressful thing Hermione had ever had the displeasure of enduring. By the end of the day she had decided that all of the students in all of her classes (or at least those that sat around her) all had the attention spans of monkeys. Her notes were disastrous and she found herself thinking more about girls she didn't care for in compromising positions than she did on the content being taught to her. She silently cursed all sixteen-year-old males in the world and headed to the common room when it was over, deciding that if she was going to feel other people's emotions she should at least do it in a comfortable chair.
* * *
At six o'clock Hermione decided that the only good thing about finally getting her head under control was that she seemed to have developed more tracks to her brain. She was able to interpret over twenty emotional dialogues at a time without losing her mind. What was more, she could finally pour over her notes and begin her homework while still being aware of emotions.
Ron was sitting on the couch to Hermione's left and Katie Bell was to her right. Katie was scribbling an essay for History of Magic, feeling relaxed and focused and Ron was staring at the ceiling, feeling tired and sad.
"What's so sad?" Hermione looked at Ron and poked him with the end of her quill.
"I'm not sad." Ron replied, pushing her quill away but smiling.
"Yes you are." Hermione pointed out and set her quill down in her lap.
"Oh. Well."
Hermione smiled and noted the slight panic and excitement rise in him. What was this about? Is he panicking about something he doesn't want to tell me? Is is about why he was in his dorm all day on Valentines Day? Hermione had been wondering about this for days.
"Nothing." He decided.
"Okay. What about Valentines Day, then? Where were you?" She asked him distractedly, adding a few more neat lines to her Charms assignment. He felt offended, upset, sad, warm, then angry again. She said nothing.
"I felt like being alone." He was nervous now and Hermione had had enough with being mean.
"That's nice. I hope you at least got your homework done."
"Yeah." She felt him relax as he dropped his head back against the sofa.
Hermione was mentally exhausted after another hour and decided to go to bed early, foregoing supper and pudding and anything else she could have done in the evening. Homework completed, Hermione pulled her blankets up around her neck and lay in her dark room. She wouldn't be able to sleep but that was beside the point. All that mattered to Hermione was the fact that there weren't any other people in her dormitory and there wouldn't be for hours.
She lay in bed for a long time, waiting for sleep to come, for an owl from Tonks, for a response from Blaise.
She wondered about why Ron acted the way he did and who else might have taken the potion today too. Then she panicked.
Anastasia,
I strongly, strongly dislike Professor Snape.
After getting over the feeling that I had DIED (which took a few hours), I had a day that drove me to near insanity.
I am so glad I am a female. Reading Ron's feelings alone was like being shoved around a crowded market for hours and then hurled off a building.
What is with him, anyway? He's really taken to solitude, which isn't like him.
Again, I will repeat that I despise Profesor Snape.
A lot.
Hermione