sugar & spice

chapter twenty eight

Easter holiday had been as exhausting as it had been rejuvenating, leaving her feeling as if she needed a vacation from her vacation. A vacation she was unlikely to get with N.E.W.Ts right around the corner.

Her exhaustion wasn't helped by the fact that for a week she'd been spoiled rotten, sharing a bed with Theo and Draco. Now she was back in Gryffindor tower and they were all the way down in the dungeons, several floors separating them.

Tired as she was, she couldn't sleep. She couldn't even get comfortable. Her sheets were too scratchy and the air didn't smell a thing like cloves and Merlin help her, somehow those two insufferable Slytherins she'd fallen for had gotten her hooked on sleeping with a veritable mountain of pillows. Her single sad lumpy pillow wouldn't do.

Not to mention there was a throbbing in her chest. It didn't hurt, but it was terribly annoying, like she was strangely cognizant of some part of herself she usually never consciously thought about. Like when she clasped a bracelet or a watch around her wrist and how all she could think of for several moments was the band against her skin. It was like that, but buried inside her and no amount of time passing acclimated her to feeling.

Rolling over for the umpteenth time, she burrowed her head into said sad lumpy pillow and scrunched her eyes shut. Maybe counting backward would lull her to sleep.

One hundred. Ninety-nine. Ninety-eight. Ninety-seven. Ninety-six. Ninety-five...

Seventy-six. Seven-five. Seventy-four. Seventy-three. Seventy-two...

Thirty-three. Thirty-two. Thirty-one. Thirty...

Ten. Nine. Eight...

Three. Two...

Bugger.

She sighed and flopped back over, staring up the dark sanctuary of her canopy. Across the room, Ginny was snoring worse than Fluffy the three-headed dog, each inhalation loud enough to penetrate the drawn curtains of Hermione's bed. Even if she could get comfortable, how in Merlin's name was she supposed to sleep with that noise? Gods, had no one taught Ginny how to silence her bed?

She wrinkled her nose. No, she was not going to consider those implications. That was Harry's problem.

Fingers catching on the wand beneath her pillow, she cast a quick tempus. Two-nineteen. She had Potions first block and the last thing she needed was to face-plant into her cauldron.

This wasn't going to do.

Tossing off the covers, she slipped out of bed, wincing when her feet landed on the cold, stone floor as opposed to her fuzzy slippers. Shuffling slightly to slide them on, she snagged her bag and, as quietly as she could manage, she folded her uniform and tucked it in beside her books. Her robes were draped across the trunk at the foot of her bed and she quickly slipped them on, concealing her pajamas.

Wand in her pocket, bag over her arm, and shoes in hand, Hermione slunk out of the dormitory and down the stairs. The common room was mercifully empty as it should've been at such an hour. Even rounds would've been long concluded, but still, she passed through the portrait and into the corridor as quietly as she could lest any of the ghosts spot her and give her grief.

She'd just made it to the bottom floor of the castle, was in the homestretch, so close to the dungeons and consequently the entrance to the Slytherin common room when a soft meow sounded behind her.

Bloody Mrs. Norris.

Biting her lip, she ducked around a tapestry. Hiding wouldn't do much in that she couldn't conceal her scent, but maybe if she stayed perfectly still and didn't make another sound, Mrs. Norris wouldn't pursue the hunt.