antebellum [t. riddle]

xiv.

november 1944
(tw: brief mention of self-harm)

whatever was wrong with sicaria was worse the next morning. 

she woke up sweating and halfway delirious. her vision was slightly blurred, her mind was racing, and she felt incredibly irritable. she could barely stand to open her eyes without another searing pain in the back of her head. it was dim in her room, but even the minimal light peering through the windows burned her corneas. 

and she was nauseous. very nauseous. 

it took all of her willpower to force herself out of bed and down a strengthening potion. she needed to be in her right mind today, and this was the worst time to have come down with some sort of mystery illness. 

could i have been poiso-

she shook the thought out of her head. no one was that interested in a school duel right?

right?

her mind was still racing, and it was hard for her to form a coherent thought. 

she went quickly to her potion stash and downed a calming draught to soothe her muscles and an energy potion to clear her mind. 

once she felt like her consciousness was back in her body, she casted a series of glamour charms to hid the dark circles under her eyes and the paleness in her usually olive skin. she looked like a corpse, and now she looked like a well-disguised corpse. she also cast a cooling charm in hopes that she would stop sweating.

breakfast was long and treacherous. her bad mood could not be concealed by the potions she downed, but she hoped that they'd at least hide the physical effects until after dinner. maybe tomorrow she'd go to the hospital wing. 

"why do you get the prophet, the new york journal, and le parisien tribune?" lestrange asked as the striped black and grey owl dropped the three papers in front of her. 

"i like to know what's happening in the world." she said between small bites of food. she knew she needed to eat, but the nausea kept her appetite at bay. 

rosier's eyes lit up. "you speak french?" obviously.

"yeah and latin, russian, and spanish." and greek. and german. maybe i shouldn't have admitted that. 

"why on earth-" 

"parents." she responded simply. venus scoffed slightly at the mention of her parents but sicaria pretended not to hear. she gritted her teeth harshly to stop herself from going off on the girl. lestrange looked questioningly between the two but she pretended not to see his gaze. venus had made several sly, snide comments, trying to paint the picture that sicaria was using her parents deaths for sympathy. sicaria let the attacks on her character slide, but she was starting to get fed up with venus' jealousy. 

there was not much time to be irritated with her though; the universe seemed hell-bent on testing her patience today. 

only a few minutes after she sat down, a ravenclaw boy from her potions class came up beside her.

it seemed that sugiyama's actions yesterday seemed to set of a chain of events. the boys who had been after her had stuck to flirting with her in class and when they caught her in the hallway, but once sugiyama had made a public attempt, he opened the floodgates. apparently, it had emboldened everyone to make some sort of move on her. 

"hi, miss edwards," dear god.

these three words were enough to set off the whole table, regardless of his faux friendly tone. the attention of her friends was now on her. she took a deep breath and turned to her side.