About Harry

Hermione

A few moments later the light is off, but my eyes are still wide open, and so they will stay, impossible to close them as I've always done before this moment. How could I be so stupid as not to realise this before?? Now, with my eyes open in the darkness, I see all what I purposely decided not to see up to now.

While I'm reflecting about the seriousness of a situation for which I haven't got the flimsiest of tools to handle it, a whisper come to me.

'Hermione?'

'Yes, Harry?'

I hear a rustling as he turns toward me.

'There is something I forgot, isn't it?'

I bite my lips unsure. I don't know how to behave nor what to tell.

'Yes, Harry' I admit cautiously.

A long pause ensued 'More than one thing, perhaps...'

I sigh, it's not a question addressed to me, but a sentence addressed to himself.

'And it's something important...' he continues.

I spun toward him, and I look for his hand under the duvet, I squeeze it tightly.

'Hermione?'

'Yes?' I answer try not to let him perceive from my tone of voice the tears that are clouding my eyes.

'How old am I?'

I need to get a big breath and push them back before to be able to reply composedly without choking on my words.

'Thirty-eight'

A long silence follows this affirmation and when I think no answer will come, it arrives in a fearful whisper 'Am I going insane?'

I leave his hand and I encircle his limp body, that let itself be hold helplessly, with my arms.

'No, you are not. I believe you are only protecting yourself'

'From what?'

Better not to let him find it out for the moment, let's him live peacefully and serenely in his denial a bit longer because when it will break... My god... I feel sick already.

'Sleep now. Don't think about it anymore' I say soothingly caressing his head and I keep him in a tight reassuring hug until I feel his breathing getting heavier. Only then I slip carefully out of the bed.

I need to call Ted.