Defining Secrets // Ron Weasley

Chapter Twenty: A Timeless Happenstance and A Tale As Old As Time

TW:

Mentions and symptoms of depression, anxiety, negative thoughts and self hating. Includes mild descriptions of bone decay and death. Please proceed with care and caution.

...

Elise's POV:

Getting to sleep was agony.

I really thought I'd experienced it all by now. But never, not in my entire life, had I experienced something like this.

My stomach was in perpetual state of nausea, my eyes on a constant, teetering edge of tearing up, and my entire body was in a cycle of never ending shivers. It wasn't even that cold out. I figured maybe I was getting some kind of strange cold, even briefly wondering if I'd contracted scarlet fever – which was pretty ridiculous to me now that I knew.

That I was sick.

Not the common flu, or any kind of contagious disease, but internal. Like my body was pumping through a slow acting poison. Invisible to the outside word but no less painful. It felt stuck inside me. Etched into my skin somehow, flowing through my bloodstream, coded in my dna. With every breath I could feel it festering.

Nothing I normally did distracted me from it's presence. It took half an hour for me to get my stupid socks on!

My legs dragged behind me as I got up and went to brush my teeth. It might have taken a mule team just to get me out of bed, but brushing my teeth felt impossible. I glanced at the time and realised that by now, I would already be out the door. Although normally that would have hurried me, instead something was dragging me back to bed.

My brain was screaming at itself to get up, get dressed and be prepared. I hid under the covers and groaned as the voice got louder.

"Elise!" It rang,

"Come on, time to get up."

I shook my head, though I laughed. It wasn't as if the voice was in the room with me.

"El?"

My eyebrows furrowed.

That one sounded a bit too real.

I peaked my eyes out from under the covers and rolled my eyes at my, still, empty room.

A knock on the door followed. "El, are you in there?"

I shot up straight. Okay, that had to be real, right?

"For Merlin's sake, if you're sick then just say so!"

I sighed. Oh yeah, that voice was very real.

Behind my door was a friend with similarly curly hair, just in a different colour, with pinker cheeks and completely different eyes.

"Hermione?" I rubbed my eyes. "What are you doing here?" 

"You weren't at breakfast this morning." She shrugged.

Then, she frowned. "What are you still doing in your pyjamas? Do you realise what time it is?"

I yawned. "No?"