Restricted

1

She'd shy away from her friends, silently complete schoolwork and then hide away in the library and research when the time came to socialise. Hermione would go back to her dorm with a melancholic look on her face and normally cry or just be left so emotionless she wouldn't sleep a wink.

She'd been sat in the library half an hour since she'd arrived and hadn't opened a single book. The silence in the library at this time was so calming that she could just simply sink into her chair for hours and enjoy it.

Hermione longed to feel something again.
Something other than just emptiness.

She resisted and closed her eyes gently against her lids, resting her head on the table and letting her hair cascade over her face. Her normally bright eyes were now encrypted with dark circles that surrounded them, but a constant lack of sleep is bound to do that to a person.

Hermione knew she wasn't going to get any potions homework done, nor was she going to be able to complete any useful research or findings for Harry and Ron.
And although last year she would've largely flustered over this, she found herself simply past the point of caring. The constant research into dark magic and the history of hatred against muggleborns was certainly not something that would help lift her spirits this evening. Though she was beginning to think that nothing ever would.

She opened a book timidly and began to read, attempting to focus on the delicate words of the author and consequently ignore the life that seemed to be crumbling around her.

Hermione huffed and looked around, any last lingering students had left and the library was now completely empty. She was the only one sane enough to risk staying after hours. Hermione didn't care about anything.
She tried to stop Harry and Ron's disappointed glances from reappearing in her head and continued to read.

When she finally looked up from her book, the clock on the wall read 11:00pm. She was four hours past curfew. Hermione yawned at a dull expense and then collected her things to make her way back to her dorm. With any luck the girls would be asleep and she could sneak in as she usually did. Ginny was certainly the worse for asking questions, she'd never let her off easy.

The corridors were silent as she passed through them, her steps only lit by the lumos from her wand.
"Alohomora."
She whispered as another yawn escaped her mouth, yet somehow she knew she wasn't going to be able to sleep. Hermione creeped gingerly into the dorm and let out a sigh of relief as she noticed the girls were sleeping. She placed her bag down beside her bed and drew her deep red curtains around it as she always did, fond of her privacy.

Slipping into a set of lilac pyjamas, she curled up into her bed and stared up at the ceiling, her eyes slowly adjusting to the darkness that surrounded her. Hermione felt tired always, and yet was never able to sleep. Especially with Ginny and Parvati's early morning wake up call, estimated 5am, to practice quidditch. She rolled her eyes at the thought of it, they didn't even try to be bloody quiet.

~

As she awoke to sounds of the girls nattering, hardly an hour's sleep, she felt a cold tear run down to her jaw. She hadn't even noticed she was crying and yet it was minutes after she'd awoke and her cheeks were wet.

How could all her friends go on acting so normal as if muggleborns weren't getting murdered every other day?

As if a war wasn't brewing?

She must've been the only one that felt like this because they all seemed overly cheery for a Tuesday morning. Hermione lay in bed until the last one left the room so that she could get herself ready in peace.

Clambering out slowly, she got up and released a long sigh as she looked at herself in the mirror. Her hair was wild and her face hollow and tired, plump lips a little cracked.
Moving to the bathroom, she stood under the hot stream of water and cried again. Hermione turned up the heat, the water scolding at her skin, burning and fizzing at her fingertips.