A/N: So here I am with the next chap! I'm hoping to keep this story unpredictable…but I really do enjoy your guesses!
Thanks for all of your awesome reviews and I hope you enjoy this new chapter!
Chapter 7 - The Hospital…of Love?
"Harry! LOOK OUT!" Hermione slapped a hand over her mouth and turned red when she realized the she was the one who yelled that. Aurora turned her head at Hermione and raised an eyebrow.
What happened next seemed to take forever when in actuality it all took less than two seconds.
Harry took a quick glance at both bludgers streaking towards him, each on opposite sides. He seemed to tense up-he realized he wasn't going to make it. But then he did something unexpected. He grinned at Hermione and winked at her, then jumped off of his broom in the direction of the snitch. Harry flew through the air, his face determined.
His fist closed around the snitch and he looked triumphant for only a millisecond before it turned to alarm as the stands rapidly approached him. He smashed into them only a few feet from Hermione, letting out a cry of pain before he blacked out. The stands erupted in a myriad of sounds. Slytherin booed and made sounds of disgust as Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff cheered for the capture. The Gryffindor stands were going wild and screaming. Most of the screaming came from the immediate vicinity of where Harry had crashed into the stands. Blood was leaking out of a pretty big gash on his forehead and his left foot was pointing backwards, painting a gruesome picture.
Hermione was scared out of her mind and so was Aurora, who was clinging onto Hermione's arm and crying into her shoulder. Even though Hermione wasn't a big fan of Harry and his arrogant personality, it didn't mean she wanted him dead. The Gryffindor team was hovering on their brooms near where Harry had crashed, and Madam Pomfrey had already conjured a medical stretcher and was moving Harry onto it while seemingly shouting something at Hermione. Hermione shook her head and told herself to get a grip, she wasn't of any use to anybody if she was in shock.
"Ms. Granger! Please accompany me to the Medical Wing!" Madam Pomfrey was shouting over the crowd.
Hermione nodded and pushed her way through the crowd. She had wanted to be a healer since her third year and had been Madam Pomfrey's aide since the beginning of sixth year. She was actually the best healer in Hogwarts behind Dumbledore and Madam Pomfrey herself.
Hermione knew from looking at the wound that unless an ambulance was literally less than a minute away, the head wound would've been fatal for a muggle. Fortunately for Harry, he wasn't a muggle.
Madam Pomfrey first had Hermione levitate Harry's stretcher while she worked on closing the head wound. Wizards were imbibed with magic, which also naturally repelled foreign magic to a certain (and small) extent. While this means very little in terms of offensive magic, half a second lost in healing could be fatal. So Hermione and Madam Pomfrey were walking as fast as they could toward the medical wing as they could while keeping Harry relatively stable so Madam Pomfrey could properly close the wound while simultaneously cleaning it.
By the time they had made it up to the Hospital, the wound had closed and Harry was breathing a little easier. Madam Pomfrey quickly mended all of Harry's visible wounds (such as his broken legs) and muttered an incantation that scanned for internal injuries.
It turned out that four of Harry's ribs had broken and one had punctured his left lung, another wound that had to be healed immediately. Luckily, immediately was no problem when magic was at hand and in no time at all Harry looked back to his healthy self, just a seventeen-year-old boy who was sleeping.
After levitating Harry onto his bed, Hermione wiped the sweat off her forehead and plopped down on the chair next to his bed and conjured a glass of water. She regained her breath and willed her legs to stop trembling. That was the worst injury she had ever participated in healing (even though she only levitated him). It left her shaking from exhaustion after the adrenalin rush had faded and she hated to admit that she had felt so scared. If she had been on her own or in charge, she didn't know if she would've been able to save his life.
"Yes you would have, Ms. Granger," said Madam Pomfrey, who was carefully pouring a potion into Harry's mouth.
Hermione blushed scarlet and muttered, "Did I speak out loud?"
"No," said Madam Pomfrey with a small smile as she put the empty goblet on Harry's bedside table. "I recognize that look. The same look I had when I was part of healing an injury not even as bad as this one." Hermione looked back down at her shoes, which had a small drop of blood on them. "The same look Lily Evans had when she was sitting in that very seat, James Potter lying in that bed."
"Lily Evans?" Hermione inquired. The name Lily rang a bell, but no Evans.
"Well, for eighteen years now it's been Lily Potter," said Madam Pomfrey.
"Lily Potter," said Hermione almost reverently, her eyes sparkling as she looked at her mentor. "The youngest Head of the Emergency Wing in St. Mungo's in over two hundred years." Then Hermione cast her eyes down at the floor in shame. "But she had a reason to be scared," she said morosely.
"Whatever do you mean by that?" asked Madam Pomfrey.
"Well, she married James Potter, didn't she?" asked Hermione, raising an eyebrow at Hogwarts's Healer. "She was probably in love with him by then and they had probably been friends for a while before that. She liked who was dying, I hold only disdain for Harry."
Madam Pomfrey let out a very rare loud laugh and quickly used her hand to cover her mouth and stifle the others. "My dear girl," she said between chuckles. "That is the funniest thing I've heard in years!" Hermione looked at her quizzically and she continued. "Lily disliked James just as much as you dislike Harry!"
Hermione's eyebrows furrowed and she looked up at Madam Pomfrey, trying to use her vast intellect to figure out what her mentor meant. "Wait...they got married when they were eighteen, though. That doesn't make any sense."
Madam Pomfrey smiled at her young pupil as a faraway look crossed her face, like she was reminiscing. "Ahh…Lily and James," she said. "You two remind me so much of Lily and James. One smart, the other putting up a tough and arrogant act to hide the vulnerability on the inside. Lily loathed James. She was a strong, intelligent, beautiful, independent girl…very much like you, I'll say. James, well…let's just say the apple didn't fall far from the tree with this one here," she said, patting Harry's bed. "Naturally, Lily didn't like James because of the way he treated his fellow students, females, and most of all…himself."
Hermione nodded in understanding. "But then how did they end up married only one year later?"
Madam Pomfrey shrugged. "It was just one of those things. James toned down his arrogance and began trying to impress Lily by showing her how good of a person he could be and how he had changed…" Madam Pomfrey smiled as a dreamy look came on her face, "…all for her."
Hermione knew she had the same dreamy look on her face as Madam Pomfrey. It was all so romantic. But then a thought hit Hermione and she snorted. "Fat chance of that happening with this one here, though," she said in a humorous voice.
Madam Pomfrey arched an eyebrow at the student but said nothing before turning around and heading back to her office. But before she shut the doors, Madam Pomfrey turned back around, a very serious look on her face, and said, "Oh, and…" her serious look suddenly turned into a smile and she said, "Please try not to draw attention to yourself at future Gryffindor Quidditch matches. Harry's in here far too much already even when he's not trying to impress you. Please tell him when he wakes up that he has to stay the night to make sure the concussion is completely gone."
Madam Pomfrey shut her doors, leaving Hermione thoroughly confused. She knew that Madam Pomfrey was going to say something else right then before smiling-she was going to give Hermione the answer. The answer to her questions. The answer that couldn't be found in books but through life experience only. Why couldn't adults ever give her those types of answers-it was so infuriating! They always left her to find those answers on her own, like they were doing her some great service by doing so.
Because no matter what Hermione told her friends or herself, a deep corner of her was attracted to Harry and cared for him, and she knew that Madam Pomfrey was about to comment on that.
Hermione sighed and took a quick glance at Harry's face and her eyebrows furrowed.
A part of you is attracted to him because when you see him like this, you see what's hidden when he's aware of your presence.
When Hermione looked at Harry sleeping, or if she opened her door a crack to peek at him as he did his homework, or when he was talking to his younger brother, she saw what he could be. He could be a kind, modest boy. He just turned into a prat when he was around her because he was afraid of rejection and didn't want it to show. When he was in his arrogant mode, he could pretend that every time she blew him off or made a cruel remark, it didn't affect him because he was the great bloody Harry Potter, the coolest person at school who could get any other girl he wanted.
He was afraid that if he asked her sincerely and didn't make a fool of himself as he did it, then the rejection was more real. If only he could realize that if he didn't act like an arrogant prat and was nice to people and her, then he wouldn't be rejected.
But Hermione reminded herself that in the end, none of this mattered all too much. Because Harry was an arrogant prat who thought the Earth revolved around him. He may have had that tiny speck of kindness and humbleness in him, but 99 percent of the time, he was a complete git.
"See something you like?" Harry's voice said as a grin made its way onto his face and his eyes opened a bit.
"No," said Hermione, more annoyed than usual at Harry's conceitedness. "I was just amazed that you somehow got even uglier than you had been."
Hermione did have enough sense of mind to inspect Harry's eyes closely as he gave her his usual 'that-didn't-affect-me-at-all' smirk. Hurt and pain shone through them. "Aw, is someone upset because they revealed that they truly care for my wellbeing?" he asked teasingly, making no allusion to his true feelings.
"Truly care for your wellbeing?" Hermione asked incredulously, now getting angry that Harry couldn't admit to himself what she now saw. "Like I give a damn," she said harshly, making Harry flinch back. "I could care less about your stupid, arrogant, conceited, selfish, pitiful existence." For some reason the words tasted foul in her mouth. She had never said anything this mean to anybody and was ashamed and embarrassed to the point that tears were forming in her eyes. But she couldn't find it in herself at the moment to apologize. Instead, she practically spat, "You're staying here tonight," before she angrily strode to the doors, which were blasted open by the magic she had lost control of in her fit of anger.
As soon as she made it to her dormitory, she cried.
She didn't know exactly why she was crying. Maybe because she had made a fool of herself by getting that angry for no obvious reason. Maybe it was because her heart hurt because she wasn't the type to intentionally hurt someone else physically or emotionally.
Or maybe the real reason was something Hermione wouldn't admit to herself.
Maybe it was because of the look on his face when I said those words to him.
A/N: I bet you were expecting something completely different when you saw the chapter title. I bet you think that Hermione is beginning to change her thoughts about Harry and the story is going to be over within a few chapters. I bet you're wrong.
Because when have I ever made things that easy between the two?
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