Loving the Lonely

Chapter 6

There is nothing at first, just murky blackness. Then wisps of color appear, reds and blues, and the others slowly filter in. Hermione can't see herself, but a scene is appearing before her. Two shapes are forming, growing taller and wider, limbs sprouting out of the blobs, spreading into fingers and toes. It takes a while before faces appear, but when they do, Hermione feels herself stepping back from them.

"You hurt us," the woman hisses, and for a moment, her teeth are long fangs and her eyes flash redder than blood.

"You used your magic on us," the man adds, his hands reaching out and suddenly his nails aren't short and rounded like a humans, but long and razor-sharp. He makes to swipe at her and Hermione doesn't know how, but she knows that if he rips her open, she'll keep bleeding and won't ever stop. But he stops and withdraws, nose turned up and lips puckered in disgust.

"No, no, I didn't mean to hurt you," Hermione whispers, stumbling backwards. She meets a solid force, a wall, but she can't see it, not without taking her eyes off the half-human-half-monsters in front of her. She has no where left to go.

"Who's to say you won't do it again," the woman, her mother, spits. "What if we don't recover this time. Maybe we'll be hurt worse than this time, or killed, by your hands!"

Her father picks up where his wife had left off. "Our own child, unable to stop herself and control her magic. Using it against her own parents." He sneers down at her as Hermione hunches her shoulders and takes the verbal beating. "We always knew you were a freak, what with being able to perform those nasty spells. You're so different from us, too different."

Hermione flinches, cowering against the invisible wall, wishing it would swallow her up and whisk her far away from this moment, this life. The pair in front of her don't stop though, and the wall doesn't give away, unheeding of her pleading.

"We hated when that vile letter came and you were sent off to that school for beasts like you. Impure, inhuman creatures, the whole lot of you. To think, the perfect little girl I raised had been a monster all along." Her mother shakes her head, hair a wild shock all around, and she stalks forward, her eyes bright with rage.

"Please, stop!" Hermione pleads. "I didn't mean it. I never meant for you to think I'd hurt you!"

Her father's voice booms, "but you did, didn't you? You're full of darkness and power, so what would a creature like you care when hurting us? You're a monster for it!"

Hermione's knees buckle and she hits the floor hard, unable to stand under the weight of his accusation. "Don't say that," she whispers. "Please, don't call me that. I'm your daughter, I love you, so much. Please, please don't call me that." Her head drops to hang between her shoulders and her fingers curl into the dirt under her hands, searching for something. Anything to take her away from this place, this memory, this dream, whatever it may be.

"You're not any daughter of mine," her mother barks. "You're vile!"

"Filth! A dirty creature who deserves the worst," says her father, caring not for her pleading, nor for the tears Hermione can feel rolling down her cheeks. She looks up at him, but can't meet the pure, unadulterated revulsion that shines in his eyes. "Nobody could love a monster like you. Not your friends, not your family. No one at all."

"You'll be alone, just like you deserve," her mother warns. "No one will be left to care about you, and you'll abandoned until every part of you is lost to your own darkness."

Unable to take another word, Hermione howls, "stop it!" She covers her ears, pulls at her own hair, begs the figures to disappear. "Stop it! Stop it! STOP IT!"