A Wonderful Fortuitous Love

60. Change

“If you died it would be like my bones had been removed. No one would know why, but I would collapse.”

- Sarah Kane, Crave

Note: I do not own the below passage about Beauty and the Beast, it's from one of my Disney books.

________________________________________

“– began to change between Belle and the Beast. They were becoming friends. Belle learned a lot about the Beast too. He didn’t know how to eat with a knife and fork, so she taught him. He didn’t know how to read, so she read to him. She taught him how to feed birds and the joys of snow. She doesn’t shudder when she touches my paw anymore, noticed the Beast. There’s something about him I didn’t see before, thought Belle. I thought he was ugly and cruel, but now he seems sweet and gentle. The Beast was actually learning how to have fun for the first time in his life. He was discovering feelings inside himself, tender feelings he didn’t know he could have. Feelings for – Hermione?”

Hermione wasn’t sure how long she had been listening to Ron, or even how long ago she had opened her eyes to a white and sea green room, and later she would blame it on all the potions coursing through her tired body.  

But now that he had addressed her, she felt herself come back to reality, her senses heightening enough to understand that she was in a hospital, and that there was a dull aching in her bones, and that she was wearing one of those embarrassing hospital gowns.

“You were reading to me,” she spoke, voice raspy and throat dry. “A Muggle book.”

Ron did not answer right away, his gaze feasting on her as though he hadn’t seen her in years, eyes dancing with such a variety of emotions she couldn’t make sense of even if she tired. Maybe she would have to rethink that ‘emotional range of a teaspoon’ comment.

He swallowed hard to gain composure, and replied with a shrug. “You always said Beauty and the Beast was your favourite as a kid.”

A pause where they both looked at each other. Then, Ron bent forward to kiss her forehead, clumsily cupping the back of her head.

“You okay?” he asked her softly, sitting back. “In any pain at all?”

She shook her head slowly, and replied in a dazed sort of tone, akin to Luna’s but without the cheerfulness. “No… no, I’m okay… but…”

“But what?” 

Hermione did not respond, incapable of shaking the feeling that something was wrong. Her eyes took in her surroundings in closer detail. The window to her left open and shining with the late afternoon sun, the white sheet resting above her waist, the soft hum of machines, the distant sound of doors being opened, the book on her bed, the flowers and get well cards and presents on her bedside table, amongst them her wand – her wand with blood on it.

Ron followed her gaze and quickly reached out with a curse he only remembered to stifle half way through. He grabbed tissues and wiped down her wand, the blood bright against the white. 

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I thought I’d gotten the last of it off…”

But Hermione was not listening. She was still staring where her wand had been, face blank, eyes a little rounder than normal. And then it all came pouring back to her in quick flashes; Theodore tossing back her wand, of Draco bruised and bloody and weak, of dodging spells, looking for Ron and Harry, seeing people she knew fall to the ground, hearing the screams and shouts, the rain, the heat, the explosions, the knife piercing her body, Theodore being thrown off his feet, Draco falling to the ground beside her, blood, blood everywhere.