Fire Starter ~(Completed)

Chapter 4

Sleep is lovely, death is better still, not to have been born is the real miracle~ Heinrich Heine

I laid in bed that night, looking at the small bump opposite me that was Severus Snape. I had had no idea about his home situation, and was kind of grossed out by what James and I had done to him over the past few years. I had made up my mind that it was time to stop- I couldn't bullying him anymore. It was as though it was the first time I was seeing him as a human, and not just a punch bag to practise spells on.

There was also the fact that I was itching to self harm. And smoke. But letting me anywhere near a lighter was a deffinate no from all of my teachers, so I was stumped. My skin crawled indignantly, and I screwed my eyes, trying to stay calm, because I knew that if I didn't, I would go mad. Well, madder. In the end I had to swing my legs out of bed, and started pacing up and down the walkway, my eyes darting all over the room. I had never felt more paranoid.

My random midnight pacing woke up Severus, and he sat up on his elbows when he saw who I was.

"Sirius, you daft berk, go to bed." I twitched at the sound of his voice, then shook my head.

"I can't" I whispered, continuing to walk. "My mind is crashing, I can't sleep and I need my lighter. I can't sleep, and I won't, not until I'm out of this hell hole."

"Yes you will. Go to bed."

"You of all people know what it's like" I shot back, and the boy across from us stirred. Severus paled, then to my amazement he too got out of bed, his pale feet, long skinny arms and milky white face being the ony things visable in the darkness. "You'll come with me to get a lighter?" I asked, shocked.

"No, of course not, that won't help anyone. I'm taking you to Madame Pomferey's- you need a sleep potion." I rolled my eyes- I hated taking unnecessary medications, but I knew he had the more sensible idea, so I dumbly followed him down the corridor and to the office on the right. It seemed as though this wasn't just an office, there was a wardrobe next to the door, and a bookcase filled with fantasy books, not the dreary non-fiction books that occupied the shelves in the library. In the corner there was a small, hospital-regulated bed, in which laid the matron, the top of her long, white nightdress viable above the quilted duvet. 

Severus knocked on the door, and whispered into the dim room, "Madame Pomferey?"

She shot up immediately, clearly used to nightly interruptions. "Boys? What is it? Is someone ill?"

"No, Sirius just wondered if it would be possible if he could have a sleeping draught? He's pacing up and down the ward and sending us all crazy." She sank back into her pillows, looking faintly unimpressed.

"Well, I trust the two of you to go and get one out the medical cupboard" she yawned crossly, and she was asleep again within seconds. I looked at Severus in bewilderment, and I quietly closed the door, setting off to find this medical cupboard.

It was easy enough to find, a thumping great cabinet in the middle of the hallway that separated girl's and boy's wards. It was unsettiling easy to open, and we rifled through the various bottles of crap, aided by the bright lights on the end of our wands. "Make sure you get the right one" I said half seriously. "I don't want any essence of insanity, thanks."

He snorted in an almost humerous way, and looked at him in shock. "Yeah, not like you need any more of that" he replied sarcasitcally, moving a small, stopped bottle of thick, red liquid out of the way."Yuck, this looks like blood."

"Don't tell my family, they'll be after it. As long as it's pure though." Severus laughed again, and I had to smile to myself- there was something strangely rewarding about making the one person who never smiled laugh.