Breath Mints / Battle Scars

Chapter 13: XIII

October 7th, 1998

Diary,

It doesn't mean anything.

Draco

October 9th, 1998

The bruises are fading, at long last.

She catches sight of herself in the mirror next to Madam Pomfrey's office, on her way out of the Hospital Wing and back to her dormitory. Finds them nearly gone. The marks of his fingertips are yellowing, and the love bites have vanished entirely.

Now the only bruises left to heal are the ones on her lips, from the night by the Lake.

She hastens away. Tries to push back the whirlwind of memories as she ascends the first flight of stairs, only to fail. And miserably, at that.

It's so hard not to think about it. Every time she speaks or moves her lips, a soreness bites back, and she remembers the pressure that started out so unpleasant and became so exquisite. She remembers the numb ache in her feet, hypothermic - stiff. They remained a bluish purple long after she left the lake. It took her hours, in the dead of the night, to work feeling back into them in the dormitory bathroom, using a conjured tub.

Malfoy never shivered, she realizes. Not once.

By the third staircase, she's thinking about the way he breathed. A long, steadying breath, warm against her mouth - the one he let out just before stepping back. Stepping away. Without another word, he'd turned and gone, leaving her with nothing but a lingering glance and more bruises to attend to. She has not spoken to him since, and each time she sneaks a glance, she finds his eyes averted.

Stupidly, she wonders if it'll always be this way. Stupidly - because there is no always. There is no it. She has chalked these up to flukes. Murphy's Law in practice. Random, scientific phenomena. The collision of two chaotic bodies amidst more surrounding chaos. Nothing else would make her crave Malfoy's touch - and vice versa.

Malfoy is a coping mechanism.

Still, by the fifth staircase these thoughts are gone and she's once more elbow-deep in memories.

October 17th, 1998

Quidditch.

Is there any point at all?

To be fair, she's never enjoyed the sport, but now more so than ever it feels utterly meaningless. Like putting a bandaid on a knife wound - in theory, it could help, on a much smaller injury.

But Quidditch is a bandaid on the already-dead body of Hogwarts. If even Harry can't bring himself to play, she wonders why they still have matches at all.

That being said, she somehow finds herself in the stands this afternoon. Ginny's pressured her into coming along, guilting her under the guise of, "You just don't seem to have...recovered. You know - from..."

From the incident with Malfoy. If only Ginny knew how many more incidents there were.

Still, she wanted off the subject, so she relented.

And now she's in the cold, windy Gryffindor stands on the left side of the pitch, watching a rather unexciting match between mostly Fourth and Fifth Years. The majority of students older than that have opted out, following Harry's lead. It seems they can drink, laugh and be merry, but Quidditch is crossing the line.

So far, all Hermione has learned this year is that coping mechanisms make very little sense.

She sits, disinterested, amongst a large group of Seventh Years, sandwiched between Ginny and Seamus - who she has not forgiven. But she couldn't very well go hexing him into oblivion without explaining why, and there was absolutely no chance of that.