Thank you to those who reviewed. Please, please review. I withheld posting this chapter because I like to have at least one more chapter prewritten before posting. The more reviews that I get, the more motivated I am to finish the chapters, and the sooner I get them to you. I write, you review, I feel proud, I write some more. Special thank you goes out to Mike, who read this chapter in its early stages and had me erase half of it and start over. It is much, much better thanks to that.
Warning: Please note the rating of this story. This chapter earns the PG-13 rating.
See Chapter 1 for Disclaimer.
"A clue to what exactly?" Harry asked, utterly confused.
"Well, that's the thing. I don't know what it's for. But it's obviously a clue." She turned the paper around, placing it in his waiting hands.
His eyes scanned the now pieced-together paper. He read it several times, each time with his eyes a bit bigger than the last. Where the sheet used to have a useless array of letters, it now had perfect English. He read it aloud.
That in which thought is hidden
Innermost secrets there kept
On leaves that hold life
Long gone but inherently close.
For there success is found
Through miraculous life, present and past.
Only in this way may it happen
Else plunge failure into darkness.
He paused and there was a moment of silence. "How did you get this?"
"The letters on your mirror were an anagram. I used the arranging spell to put the letters back in their proper order. This seems to be the order that they were intended to be in. It's a logic puzzle. And it's obviously a clue... but to what?" She took the paper again, looking over it as if staring hard enough would force the answers to come greet her.
Harry's expression suddenly changed. His face became dark, his eyes losing their luster in a matter of seconds. He looked down, to avoid incinerating the paper with a gaze. He'd had more incidences of accidental magic in the past few weeks than ever before, a fact that scared him. He shouldn't be having these uncontrollable bursts of magic. He should be able to control them all. He hadn't touched his wand in weeks. If he couldn't control his magic now... he didn't like to think of the consequences. He wasn't a scrawny ten-year old. He was a trained wizard, and a very powerful one at that. He hadn't done unintentional magic since he'd first gone to Hogwarts. Until, that is, this summer.
Unbeknownst to him, Hermione had looked up from the paper to see the smoulder in Harry's eyes. "You know," she whispered. "You know what it's a clue to." It came out quickly, and for one of the first times ever, she didn't care that it broke every grammar rule in the book.
He looked up at her, his eyes meeting hers, but not with the connectedness that they normally shared. His gaze was unfeeling and distant. "Yes," he said. It was obvious that he was not going to elaborate further.
She looked at him, her eyes narrowing. "Do you know what it means?"
"I'm not a bloody codebreaker," he said coldly. He stared straight out ahead. He'd lapsed into a time-tested facial emotion, the one that drove Hermione mad. That expression that said I've shut the world out now, and you'd better not push me.
The phone suddenly rang. Hermione jumped up to answer it, but just then remembered that, if it was the Dursleys, that would not be advisable. Throwing the portable telephone (she'd conjured a telephone also?) to hit Harry in the head, she fiddled with her Muggle alarm clock.
Harry answered the phone. "Hello," he said monotonously.
Hermione fiddled with her alarm clock for several moments, thinking through how to react to Harry. Once she'd set a radio station and corrected the time to the same as her magical watch, he'd hung up the phone. With one last glance at her watch, which now read "8:37, It's dark out, what time do YOU think it is," she looked back at Harry.
"My wonderful relatives have just won a sweepstakes. They'll be gone for three weeks. And somehow, their luggage found its way to them. They don't have to come back and get it," he said.
"That's just wonderful, Harry," she laughed.
He just eyed the paper.
Pausing a moment, she said flatly, "I'm going to take a shower. And then I'm going to bed. It might do you well to do the same. You've not been getting enough sleep."
He looked up at her, and slowly stood. "You're welcome to anything here," he said. "I know it's not home, but I hope you can be comfortable." He paused. "Good night," he began, as if it was the beginning of a sentence he never intended to finish.
"Good night," she said. He nodded his head at her, and turned and went through the door, closing it behind him.
She stepped into the shower and turned the water as hot as it would go, as if it would rinse everything away. Breathing deeply in the steam, she lingered under the comforting spray. She dried quickly and dressed for bed. Scooting down into the fluffy bed, she couldn't help but think of her real room. Her home. Her life. Her family.
She closed her eyes against the painful visions and hoped for sleep to claim her quickly.
Harry rolled over, again. For the umpteenth time. He'd had his eyes closed for a very long time, hoping he'd fall asleep. But it didn't work. It never did after he had these dreams. He looked over at the clock. He wasn't sure why he did this, because he couldn't see it anyway. The bright red numbers were unintelligible to him. Fumbling awkwardly, he found his glasses and then looked back at the digital clock. It read 1:54. He dropped his head back down on the pillow without bothering to take off his glasses. He knew he wasn't going to fall back asleep this way. He never did.
He was no stranger to insomnia. But it had been much worse the past few weeks. He looked up at the shadows on the ceiling, cast by the slats of the window shade. Taking a deep breath, he slowly sat up. Feeling slightly dizzy, he ran his hand through his sleep-mussed hair. He resigned himself to the knowledge that he was awake now, and he wasn't going to make it back to sleep anytime soon. He leaned his head back against the wall. His eyes followed the ghostly shadows all around the room, the bits of light that cast unholy visions around him.
It was then that he saw it. It was a shady figure crossing his room, obviously trying not to be detected.
With a combination of Quidditch-honed reflexes and basic instinct, he reached for his wand from under his pillow with one hand and sat bolt upright, reaching for his bedside lamp. "Show yourself!" he bellowed, staring, focused, down his wand arm and over the smooth wood of the wand. His eyes burned dangerously in the dark.
He heard the figure say "Lumos," just as he managed to flip the switch of the lamp. The room was flooded with light, both magical and electrical, and he painfully tried to keep his eyes open and see the intruder while both his eyes and those of the intruder adjusted to the light.
His eyes focused first. He recognized her immediately, taking a deep breath and lowering his wand. "Hermione," he sighed, relaxing somewhat. "Don't do that. I could have cursed you."
"I'm sorry, Harry, I really am... I thought you'd be asleep at this hour... I set a silencing charm so as not to wake you. I didn't wake you, did I?" she said sorrowfully as her eyes finally began to adjust to the light. "I'd feel terrible if I'd woken you- dear God, Harry!!!" she shrieked, interrupting herself and turning away from him, shielding her eyes with her hand.
Replacing his wand while she spoke, he was startled at her half-scream. "What?" he asked, confused.
"Harry," she embarrassedly half-laughed, "you're... you're..." she stuttered, red-faced.
"I'm what?" he said, a bit annoyed.
She gestured wildly with the hand that wasn't over her eyes and obviously tried to explain, but she wasn't finding the words. He was sitting upright in his bed. And he wasn't wearing anything. At least, nothing that she could see. He was sitting, looking up at her, confused and shirtless. The sheets were pulled up tightly around his waist. Hermione felt her cheeks burn even hotter. It wasn't like she'd never seen a boy without a shirt before. She even would bet that if she thought back well enough, she could probably think of a time that she'd seen Harry without a shirt. But right now, she couldn't think of such a time. All that she could think of was Harry sitting before her, half-naked. Hermione's ears twinged a heated red. She didn't know why it made her blush so much. He was her best friend. She'd seen him in pyjamas a few times, in the Common Room over the winter holiday. But the thoughts that she was having at the moment... they made her feel like a scarlet woman. Her face grew even hotter as an incredibly wicked little voice came into her head and wondered whether he was wearing anything under that sheet. Desperately trying to fight that thought back, she lost as it came forward and wound itself even tighter into her thoughts. She felt impossibly guilty, and yet giddily excited. It made no sense. But he, with his hand rumpling his already-messy hair, with a confused look on his face... he was... she couldn't bring herself to say it. Because she was not having those thoughts. She just wasn't. She tried to flee, to go somewhere, anywhere but here, but her legs refused to obey. She became more and more flustered. And then Harry did the absolute worst thing that he could have possibly done.
He stood up.
Hermione heard him move and she clapped her other hand firmly over her eyes. She finally mentally silenced that terrible part of her that told her to look, but not before she turned an even more vibrant red.
"Hermione," he said, thoroughly confused, "what is it?" He crossed over to where she stood, hands covering her eyes and a furious blush on her face.
She opened her eyes just enough to see his face and the tops of his shoulders. That little voice emerged again and told her that they were very nice shoulders. It wickedly bade her to open her eyes more, but she managed to override it and close them again. "Merlin, Harry, you're naked!" she blurted out, embarrassed.
"No, I'm not," he said automatically, wondering why on Earth she'd say that.
"Because you're... you... no shirt... and the sheet... and you dropped the sheet..." she stuttered, losing any of the composure that typically characterized Hermione Granger.
He blushed at her answer to his unasked question, suddenly understanding. It truly embarrassed him that she'd thought that, and at the same time it brought out a raw hormonal thought that he was glad she'd thought that, even though he really wasn't. Wonder what you'd have thought if you saw just her bare shoulders under a sheet, he thought. He blushed harder than he ever had as horrific and terrifying thoughts of exactly what he'd think came unbidden. "I'm wearing shorts," he said, his voice cracking in a way it hadn't since third year.
Steeling herself, she looked up at him to find him reaching for a robe to cover his shabby boxers. She was half relieved and half disappointed. Mentally smashing down that terrible part of her that was disappointed, she got her own voice under control. "I'm sorry that I surprised you. I didn't mean to wake you. I just meant to go downstairs and read... don't tell me that I woke you."
He sighed. "You didn't."
She looked up at him with sympathetic eyes.
"I'm sorry," he said, though he didn't tell her what he was sorry for.
"It's fine, Harry, you just surprised me. It's not like I haven't seen the male torso before. And seeing as how I'm staying here... there were bound to be a few close calls."
He gratefully smiled, but he was only smiling with his mouth and not with his eyes. There was something bothering him.
"You're not having nightmares still, are you?" she asked softly.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, leaning his elbows on his thighs and resting his head in his hands briefly. She sat down next to him gently, tucking her legs under her body and placing a small hand on his shoulder.
He looked over his shoulder at her. She was sitting, curled up as a cat might be, next to him on his bed. She was wearing loose-fitting, flowing navy blue pants, much like those that Harry had seen on the television shows where women preached the benefits of yoga. A somewhat fitted burgundy T-shirt hugged her upper body. She wore no socks or slippers, and from her position, though her legs were folded under her, he could see her bare feet peeking out. Her eyes were big and brown and open and kind. She reached up absentmindedly to tuck a single loose curl behind her ear. The rest of her hair, quite a contrast from the bushiness of earlier, was loosely plaited in a single French braid, with tendrils of individually defined curls peeking out to frame her face.
He didn't know what came over him, or what made him feel the way he did. Perhaps it was the light. She was... breathtaking. And if he'd ever imagined a girl being breathtaking, this was not the picture he'd conjured. The girls he'd thought of were dressed in gowns and primped... and here was his best friend, in no makeup and in her pyjamas. Somehow, seeing her so vulnerable and innocent was truly breathtaking. There was no other word. He could move no more now than he could have if someone had cast a Full-Body Bind on him. He slowly let out a breath that he didn't know he had been holding.
"I'm so sorry, Harry," she sighed, her hand traveling across his back to his other shoulder, as she softly lay her head on the shoulder that her hand had just vacated.
He looked down and fumbled with the hem of his shirt. There was an uncomfortable silence, before the rumbling of Harry's stomach interrupted them. He remembered then that he hadn't eaten dinner. And she hadn't either. "Do you maybe want anything to eat? We didn't have supper..."
"Actually, that sounds very good," she said quietly, sitting up. "Do you want me to make anything?"
He stood up. "Depends. What do you want?"
Looking up at him, she said, "I don't know. I'm not in the mood for anything in particular. Perhaps just some eggs and a cup of tea, if you don't mind."
He laughed. "If I don't mind? Eggs are my specialty, among a great many other things. If you'd put up the water for the tea again, seeing as you turned off the water earlier, I can make eggs. How do you like them?"
"It doesn't matter," she said. "Scrambled, perhaps. Breakfast at 2:00 in the morning... this is a new experience for me."
He was silent. She stood and walked with him toward the kitchen. "Couldn't sleep?" he asked her.
It was her turn to fall silent. "No, I couldn't."
For a rare moment in Harry's life, he sensed that another felt the same way he did. Alone, even when he was surrounded by people. "They're really going to be fine," he said softly. "They're fine."
She looked back up at him, her brown eyes meeting his green ones. "They're fine," she repeated halfheartedly.