fic: in need (hp, draco + hermione)
in need | hp | draco + hermione | multi-genfic bingo card #2, square "focus on object". Don't know how well this fits the prompt, tbh. Also for xx-pinkstar who I think is the person I talked to, a billion years ago, about our mutual need for a draco + hermione being BFFs during HBP. this is it, sort of. enjoy, everyone.
The books are identical. Same size, same leather binding, and Hermione's first part is to make them look like the History of Magic textbooks to anyone else. That way, the chances of someone noticing them or taking them into their hands were slim.
The second part, well, it's a simple spell to do, really, in that way that things become simple when one knows them in their sleep and when one's worked to know to do them in their sleep like she has, because one of the reccurring nightmares of hers during her first year, even after the mountain troll and the beginning of her and Harry and Ron, the so called Golden Trio, was being expelled out of Hogwarts. So she worked, and she studied, and now she can, and she does.
She has different sorts of nightmares, though, these days.
When she tells Draco this, he doesn't laugh at her, but she doubts that has a lot to do with her. He doesn't laugh these days, no matter what happens around him.
So she buys the notebooks and then there is a sleepless night, and then the notebooks aren't mundane anymore.
"Here", she extends her hand shily to him. "You can write in here. No one will be able to read it but me, if you want me to."
His eyes are red, and he nods slightly and his skin is white and she thinks she can almost see how tired his body is through this thin skin of his. She's careful not to touch him, though - touching is for other people. She ponders for a moment if perhaps he is making her more cruel just by sharing air with her, and she wonders if he thinks the same of her, and whether she is making him dirtier by the simple act of sharing his air.
Well, it doesn't matter anyhow.
He doesn't write in the notebook that night, or the day that follows. But soon, his thin handwriting starts appearing in her duplicate of the notebook. She opens the notebook when it becomes warmer to touch, the signal of new writing, and she is pleased with this as she watches the letters form on the page in front of her. The spell seems to be functioning. At least she still has that.
"i don't sleep anymore. don't know how to."
"try a potion? or talking to someone?"
"no. and i talk to you."
"then talk."
Time passes. Hermione stares at her notebook. No new words appear. The notebook gradually becomes cold again. Oh, well. Happens.
She dreams of a battle that night. Ron stepping in front of Harry and her to stop the curse from hitting them. His body falls to the ground in slow motion. Harry's body follows in a matter of minutes, and she stands there, frozen. Her hands shake as she writes out the nightmare in the notebook, on the same page, after "then talk".
At least no one will ever be able to say Hermione Granger didn't take her own advice.
He writes back almost immediately. "at least you didn't die", he writes. "in all my dreams, He kills me", Draco continues.
She snorts.
"I know, how predictable", more letters appear, and this might be the first light-hearted thing she's heard him say in a month, it's almost a joke even.
She draws a smiley face, and closes the book.
Talking to a sort-of-friend, even if mostly through a book, well, it's better than not talking.
It feels like progress.
The books are identical. Same size, same leather binding, and Hermione's first part is to make them look like the History of Magic textbooks to anyone else. That way, the chances of someone noticing them or taking them into their hands were slim.
The second part, well, it's a simple spell to do, really, in that way that things become simple when one knows them in their sleep and when one's worked to know to do them in their sleep like she has, because one of the reccurring nightmares of hers during her first year, even after the mountain troll and the beginning of her and Harry and Ron, the so called Golden Trio, was being expelled out of Hogwarts. So she worked, and she studied, and now she can, and she does.
She has different sorts of nightmares, though, these days.
When she tells Draco this, he doesn't laugh at her, but she doubts that has a lot to do with her. He doesn't laugh these days, no matter what happens around him.
So she buys the notebooks and then there is a sleepless night, and then the notebooks aren't mundane anymore.
"Here", she extends her hand shily to him. "You can write in here. No one will be able to read it but me, if you want me to."
His eyes are red, and he nods slightly and his skin is white and she thinks she can almost see how tired his body is through this thin skin of his. She's careful not to touch him, though - touching is for other people. She ponders for a moment if perhaps he is making her more cruel just by sharing air with her, and she wonders if he thinks the same of her, and whether she is making him dirtier by the simple act of sharing his air.
Well, it doesn't matter anyhow.
He doesn't write in the notebook that night, or the day that follows. But soon, his thin handwriting starts appearing in her duplicate of the notebook. She opens the notebook when it becomes warmer to touch, the signal of new writing, and she is pleased with this as she watches the letters form on the page in front of her. The spell seems to be functioning. At least she still has that.
"i don't sleep anymore. don't know how to."
"try a potion? or talking to someone?"
"no. and i talk to you."
"then talk."
Time passes. Hermione stares at her notebook. No new words appear. The notebook gradually becomes cold again. Oh, well. Happens.
She dreams of a battle that night. Ron stepping in front of Harry and her to stop the curse from hitting them. His body falls to the ground in slow motion. Harry's body follows in a matter of minutes, and she stands there, frozen. Her hands shake as she writes out the nightmare in the notebook, on the same page, after "then talk".
At least no one will ever be able to say Hermione Granger didn't take her own advice.
He writes back almost immediately. "at least you didn't die", he writes. "in all my dreams, He kills me", Draco continues.
She snorts.
"I know, how predictable", more letters appear, and this might be the first light-hearted thing she's heard him say in a month, it's almost a joke even.
She draws a smiley face, and closes the book.
Talking to a sort-of-friend, even if mostly through a book, well, it's better than not talking.
It feels like progress.