Anyone But Me

Chapter Fifty-Nine

It was stuffy under her new cloak... Being made from a thicker material than Harry's- was not something that she had accounted for when getting ready that night and she was paying the price. Sweat pooled above her brow and to distract herself from how uncomfortable she was she went over the last couple days in her head. Trying to work out how it could have been less than a week since she had gone from asking for help in the Headmaster's office to standing around impatiently waiting the night before the start of Easter Holiday.

Her life seemed to have been split into two speeds since December. One was filled with long agonizing purgatories where she was left in limbo, feeling like she was dangling over a pit waiting... Always waiting for whatever was next. And then there were the moments that flashed by so quickly she was afraid if she blinked too long she would miss them entirely. Not all of them centered around who she was waiting for but enough of them did that it was alarming.

According to her parents it was supposed to be the other way around. They were always complaining about how fast time slipped by. That one second her mother had just found out they were expecting her and in the next she was a fully formed adult, a year away from graduating. Or how it felt like only yesterday that they had met, reciting every other cliched remembrance parental figures liked to use when looking back on their lives.

According to the whispered giggles in the girl's bathroom it was a normal reaction when waiting for the next ardent meet up. A natural phenomenon that happened when raging hormones came into play. They all counted down to times when their carnal desires could be fulfilled...

According to her... She had to be batshit and desperate to be letting them get caught up in Dumbledore's plans the way she was...

Unfortunately, it was the only path available that allowed her to sedate her worry on if he was okay. Not just in the coming days but in the times ahead when he felt like cracking under what Voldemort asked of him. She couldn't stand the thought of him going through the torment from the other night alone and deliberately tried to ignore the evidence that it was a scene he had already replayed. Multiple times.

The last three days had been exceptionally hellish as she attempted to wade through fact and fiction when it came to what had happened during the hours following his provoking stunt. Everything from McGonagall finding out from a scared student and tracking him down in a fit of hexing rage to Draco walking into her office and cockily confessing had reached her ears. Both were equally improbable.

No matter how it had come about, by dinner Slytherin was missing seventy-five points and he hadn't made an appearance in public since. Of course, this generated the perfect storm for the more outlandish of rumors to gain traction (there was no universe in which the Head of Gryffindor House would transfigure a student into a warthog) leaving her number of facts to one...

He hadn't been expelled considering late that night, just before she had been about to fall asleep, the locket had heated against her breast.

Sunday Midnight

It was a small relief that he had been allowed to stay on until the start of break, even if it was spent in some kind of exile, but not enough to end her anxiety. Any objection that was voiced on the severity of the punishment by his fellow Slytherins was quickly stifled when McGonagall held to her promise and reinstated life as usual. So, Hermione wasn't able to glean information from dissenting rumblings when he straight out refused to answer the questions she sent through the necklace. Payback for her taunting reply to his inquiry earlier in the week, no doubt.

A bead of sweat finally broke free and rolled down into her eyelashes causing her to blink rapidly to avoid the sting of it making it into her eye. She had not stood there, silently baking, to out herself by moving. Only the Gods knew who was in the hallway with her.... Even the map didn't list house-elves.