Breath Mints / Battle Scars

Chapter 11: XI

October...6th? 7th? Maybe? It's likely still October, 1998

Scratchy sheets. That's what wakes her up. Scratchy sheets and the queasy sensation in her gut - the kind that comes with sleeping too long.

Her eyelids are sticky. Hard to open. But when she can gather the muscular force to peel them apart, the clinical white of the ceiling is all too familiar. So is the herbal scent hanging in the air. The Hospital Wing.

It's not like waking up had been with the hangover. This time she remembers everything. Quite clearly.

Swallowing is hard with such a dry throat. Her lips stick together, too. It takes her a second, but she manages to tilt her head to the side so she can see the rest of the Wing. The three beds next to her are empty and tightly fixed, but the fourth bed down has a body in it.

Her queasiness intensifies at the sight of blond hair. She wonders if that'll always be the first thing she recognizes about him.

For a moment, she thinks he's there because he hasn't woken up from the stunning jinx yet. But then her eyes refocus, and the color red grows more and more vibrant.

He's covered in blood.

Why is he covered in blood?

She can only see half of him, but on that half she sees a black eye and a split lip and a still bleeding gash at his temple. His white shirt is scarlet. And he's out cold.

The memory of his icy hand clasped around her throat comes flying back, and she knows she shouldn't care. She should be furious. Happy, too, that he's somehow this badly injured.

But she's none of those things.

She's sitting up.

It takes about five seconds for a pair of hands to try and force her back down, but she fights the pressure, letting out an unexpected yip of disapproval. The hands release her, and Harry's glasses move into her line of sight.

"'Mione, you shouldn't sit up so fast," he says.

"I want to - I want to sit up. I want to sit," she replies, voice a croak, words jumbled.

Harry sits back cautiously. He's cross-legged at the foot of her cot, face a map of concern not so unlike the way he usually looks at her.

"What happened?" she asks, massaging the suddenly throbbing expanse beneath her chin.

Harry bites his lip, adjusting his glasses where they're perched on his nose. "Well, erm - Malfoy attacked y-"

"No, no," she waves him off, "I know that part. After. What happened after?"

He seems a little surprised at her reaction. Clears his throat and messes up his already messy hair a little more. "Oh, erm..."

That's when she notices Ron over his shoulder.

Ron, who's sitting on the end of another cot, getting his hands wrapped by Madam Pomfrey. Madam Pomfrey's shaking her head and muttering to herself, but Ron is looking at Hermione. A boyish grin spreads across his face, and he pulls one half-wrapped hand away to wave at her.

His knuckles are split. Bruised and bloody.

She puts it together before Harry says another word.

"Tell me he didn't," she breathes.

Harry sort of grimaces.

"You absolute arse, Ronald Weasley!" She's lobbed a pillow at him before she even considers that it could hit Madam Pomfrey. Poppy, however, has adept reflexes as it turns out, and she dodges casually, allowing it to pummel Ron directly in the face.