Hearts are Blind (Severus Snape X OC)

Inconsistent A-Hole

It had somewhat slipped her mind about Hogsmeade. He'd asked her to go with him (told her to, really) and she'd said she would. She never told him any different.

Well, it was Saturday. It was early on Saturday. Lucinda had woken just before 5am. Her sleep was ripped violently away from her in a horrifying dream. Sitting up with a breathy gasp, she'd nearly cried out, but it was almost impossible to make much of a sound with her voice anyway. Her nightmare had taken her words completely. The more she thought of it, however, the less and less she could remember. The darkness in the room pressed in around her; she could hear the other three girls breathing in their beds and her dream was pulling back and back into her pillow. The edges of it lingered there; fuzzy and crawling a bit, but it was nothing more than a prickling at the back of her neck now and a vision of wooly arms wrapping around her head, suffocating her.

Lucinda shivered and wiped the sweat from under her chin.

There was no one in the common room. She wasn't surprised, but it still disappointed her slightly when she'd walked down there a few minutes later. She wanted someone to talk to. She needed to be pulled all of the way out of her horrible nightmare. She couldn't remember it, but it was sitting there on her shoulders, heavy and sinking its claws deeper into her flesh. She passed the fireplace, glancing at it as she went. The coals were nearly out. Maybe that's why it was so cold in there... Lucinda wrapped her arms around herself and felt with her fingers the sweater she'd put on. Should she put a coat on? No, that would be ridiculous. A jumper was enough. She just needed something hot to eat. She continued her journey out of the common room and through the portrait hole.

She hadn't been thinking clearly, that was evident. If she had, she would have remembered that she never took her sucrosulin. It wouldn't have been that big of a deal just yet, but the day before she had skipped lunch and supper. She was, in a word, starving. Not just physically, but mentally, as well. The lack of glucose in her blood was already starting to eat away at her brain cells. That was probably why it was so difficult to remember her nightmare or remember to do regular things. At least she was smart enough to head to the Great Hall for breakfast. Would it be ready yet? Was she going to have to wait? She thought she might collapse already and she was only one corridor away from Gryffindor Tower.

The halls were dark and felt colder the longer she trudged on. Some of the portraits were waking and said good morning to her, but all she could do was nod at them.

She got all of the way down to the last turn before the main staircase and was stopped in her tracks. She heard a sudden explosion to her right. She turned and looked but saw nothing except a boy's lavatory door; seconds later, water began to stream out from under it. Lucinda stumbled to the puddle, not even bothering to keep from stepping in it. She splashed ahead and then straight through the door, intent on finding out what just happened. She wasn't in her right mind; otherwise, she might've hesitated at least a little.

Upon entering the flooded bathroom, Lucinda heard a wondrous cackling. Seeing no one in there, her eyes shifted skywards. There she saw what was unmistakably the school's poltergeist she'd heard so much about: Peeves. He was swooping around the room on his back with his hands behind his head, laughing gleefully like a child. Lucinda stumbled further into the room, dragging her feet and sloshing through the water. She leaned her back against the porcelain and felt her eyes flutter closed. Peeves let out another cackle and then a fresh burst of water came flooding towards her. He'd blown up another toilet and seemed so happy about it that Lucinda also felt happy for him (crazily happy for him). She let out a soft, amused laugh and looked up at him.

Peeves spun around in the air and laid eyes upon the girl. He looked startled and then he looked evilly delighted.

"What is this?" He crooned wickedly. "Little girly want a swirly? Shouldn't be in the gents' potty room, naughty girly with hair so curly!"