Chapter 2
After what could be merely seconds or days, Hermione regains consciousness to the sting of nails biting into the flesh of her upper arm, and the sensation of being violently shaken awake.
Thanks to her extended time on the run, she instinctively throws herself to the side before her eyes have even properly blinked open. Adrenaline floods her system as her body, seemingly with a mind of its own, twists out of the stranger’s grasp and scrambles away across the library floor.
It’s darker now then when she first fell asleep. From a few yards away, she’s unable to make out a single useful detail about her attacker’s face or stature. Moonbeams no longer filter through the library skylights and while everything was peacefully quiet when she fell asleep, it is now deafeningly silent.
Suddenly wide awake, her heart hammering in her rib cage, Hermione clamors to her feet. She doesn’t remember where she put her wand, and has no recollection of drawing it, but suddenly she’s got it out and pointed at the darkened figure. This realization gives her a small dreg of relief and her knuckles whitten around the thin piece of wood as she takes a step forward.
“Who’s there?!”
There’s something strange, almost distorted about her voice. She shakes her head and files that thought away to consider later. She needs to focus, the figure hasn’t moved, hasn’t answered.
It’s only remembering that the war has been won - has been over for hours now - that compels her to ask one more time. It could be a PTSD-stricken student. An escaped Death Eater surely would have killed her by now.
“Show yourself!” She calls again, and squints against the odd, garbled resonance that echoes through her head when she talks.
Although she still doesn’t receive an answer, the figure casts a silent lumos and she nearly falls over from relief at the sight of a familiar lanky red-head.
But then his mouth is moving, and her newfound relief curdles as realizes he’s talking - and she can’t hear him.
Fred’s face is pale, his brown eyes alight with a desperate sort of intensity that unnerves her even more. He gestures to himself with large, sweeping hand motions, most likely assuming she isn’t responding because somethings wrong-wrong with her - not because she’s gone deaf.
She’s almost too stunned to move - succumbing to the mental whiplash from trying to escape her supposed attacker, to realizing she was safe and it was Fred of all people, to confirming that there is something seriously wrong with her ears…
Meanwhile Fred is growing more and more agitated. As she continues to fail at acknowledging what he’s saying, the twin’s panic appears to reach a fever pitch. She watches numbly as he stops trying to communicate and abruptly drops his wand on the floor. He barely looks at it as he kicks it away.
Hermione blinks.
She had thought she felt relieved, safe even, the second she discovered the figure was just Fred - and she’s suddenly surprised at just how much tension seeps from her body at the sight of the wizard disarming himself.
She finally brings herself to meet his eyes,
and realizes they are wet.
Something in Hermione breaks
“Oh, Fred.”
She crosses the room in just a few strides and crashes into his arms just as her legs give out.
What was she thinking? She should have gone to find him right away. Thank Merlin he’s not dead. Thank Merlin thank Merlin…
Her fingers knot in the fabric of his torn robes and she presses her forehead into his chest and just breathes. She’s barely aware that he’s lowered them to the floor, and completely unaware of how long she stays, unmoving in his arms.
Finally, an arm unwinds from her and a gentle hand cradles her face. Fred’s thumb swipes at the wetness rolling down her cheeks, and gently angles her face back and up so he can see her.
Roused from her stupor, Hermione realizes with a jolt that he’s trying to talk to her, and her face heats in embarrassment. Not only has she run away after it all ended, neglecting to check on her friends, she’s also just turned herself into a burden, a problem. Ear drums. Her fucking ear drums during the wall explosion. Of course they got fucked up, and instead of dealing with it she took way too long to realize what had happened and decided to take a nap instead of healing herself and checking on the others.
Hermione gave herself a shake. That was embarrassing. That level of obliviousness and negligence would have gotten them all killed if they’d still been on the run. She was better than that dammit. Ear drums were hardly a big deal. No use freaking out anyone more than she already had, she’d deal with her hearing once she could snag a few minutes alone. For now, she needs to get it together.
Fred’s still trying to speak to her, his brow furrowing more and more as she continues to be unresponsive.
Hermione swallows, blinking her eyes hard and centering herself. It’s fine. If she watches his lips closely, she can make sense of the muted, disjointed sounds coming out of his mouth.
She barely makes out what she assumes is: Are you okay? Where were you? And pulls away from him, sitting up properly with a groan.
It’s almost laughable, that question. She’s very much not okay - physically or otherwise - so she elects to ignore that part.
“Um... the courtyard. For a while. I think I kicked Voldemort in the teeth a few times?” The last bit comes out like a question and Fred noticeably pales.
“Oh don’t look at me like that.” She huffs, slouching forward and quickly rubbing the heels of her hands into her eyes. It’s finally hitting her how absolutely shitty her body feels, but she’s relieved that her brain is starting to wake back up. “You’ve hit him in the face with a snowball before, so no judging.”
I’m not judging. Fred’s lips read. She grows suddenly annoyed that he doesn’t seem to find the situation funny at all. Because it is dammit, and he finds everything funny -
Are you alright?
Blimey, he needs to stop asking her that. Hermione grits her teeth.
“I’m fine.”
She angles her face toward the skylight, trying to calm herself and breathe, when he says something again. She hadn’t been watching his lips.
“Sorry what?”
Fred’s eyes narrow, and after a pause he says something but barely moves his mouth.
Hermione clenches her jaw, and after a beat of silence where it’s painfully obvious she still doesn’t know what he’s said, Fred wordlessly summons his wand and casts a diagnostic on her.
She doesn’t look up, wanting to avoid seeing his reaction, but that doesn’t stop her from getting the gist of the diagnostic. A splattering of glowing reds and oranges reflect in the wood floor polish.
“I was getting to it.” Hermione grits out. “It’s fine, just give me a sec.”
He says something back and this time she purposely looks away. “One sec.” she repeats. Bugger, she just wants to go back to sleep, repairing eardrums hurts like a bitch. She had wanted to wait a bit.
Okay, she settles herself. Ear injuries. What do you treat first?
Fred must notice that she's avoiding looking at him, essentially cutting off communication. There’s a pause, and then careful fingers tilt her chin up so she meets his gaze.
Can I do it?
She shoves him off.
“No. Stop. I’m fine.”
He lets her push him away, but doesn’t go far. He sits behind her and places a hand on her shoulder.
After a few seconds she realizes he has no intention of moving it.
“This isn’t going to be pretty and I’m going to scream.” She says in a stilted voice. “Go back downstairs - I’ll come find you when I’m done.” His hand just squeezes her gently in response and doesn’t move.
Wanker. Bloody stupid considerate wanker. She blinks away a sudden spring of tears and tries to focus.
The spell work is hard. Much harder since she’s casting silently so she doesn’t unknowingly fuck up the pronunciations of the spells. Also hard in the sense she’s pretty sure she’s been awake for more than thirty six hours and can’t remember the last time she’s eaten.
Finally, she gets the spellwork right (or passably right for the time being) and with a crescendo of pressure and a painful popping sensation, sound rushes in.
Fred’s deep breathing behind her. The patter of rain against the skylights. Screaming? - wait, she’s screaming?
Hermione abruptly snaps her mouth shut and heaves a ragged breath through her nose. Behind her, Fred wastes no time in pulling her backward between his legs. Her back hits his chest, strong arms come around her again, and his chin drops onto her shoulder. He smells like gunpowder and pine needles. His red hair has grown longer since she’s last seen him and is soft against her cheek. She wishes she was feeling better enough to enjoy it. Pre-war Hermione, who was clumsy navigating the very start of relationship with the jokester, would be swooning.
Now she just feels tired.
And kind of mortified.
The diagnostic flickers a few more times over her head before blotting out of existence. Although she’s relatively confident she’s mended at least the important bits of her ears, she notices the diagnostic is still flickering red. Her right shoulder and abdomen have begun to throb, so she’s not really surprised, but she is thankful Fred doesn’t say anything. She isn’t sure she could handle casting another healing incantation at the moment.
“Sorry, I’m sorry.” She says after a minute, breaking their careful, companionable silence. Her voice is alarmingly ragged.
Hermione gingerly pulls away from him, rocking herself up into a sitting position, and avoiding his gaze. “What’s going on? Where is everyone?”
“Everyone’s mostly alright now. Ready to go home.” Fred answers after an extended pause. His voice is oddly flat. “The lot of them are splitting between the Burrow and Shell Cottage - doesn’t look like anyone wants to be alone.”
Ha. Whoops.
“Right. Of course.” She feels like she’s swallowing glass. “Sorry about...”
“It’s fine, Granger. “ He says, cutting her off. “We were all just wondering where you went.” For someone who was just hugging her against his chest, Fred suddenly sounds oddly detached. Almost casual.
She wonders briefly if he’s learned occlumency in the past year she’s been away.
She certainly wishes she had.
“Right, well -” She’s just about to push herself to her feet when the library door slams open. The sound is nauseatingly abrasive on her barely-repaired eardrums, and she flinches back, hands thrown up over her ears. The yelling that follows certainly doesn’t help matters.
“Oh thank Merlin you’re not dead! Thank Fucking Merlin, holy shit! We nearly had to stun Harry and Ron, nobody had seen you since the wall fell, thank -“
Even though he’s behind her, she can tell Fred is shaking his head violently at his twin. George’s mouth abruptly snaps shut, and his posture seizes with tension.
“How can I help? What does she need?” He asks roughly. He leaves the library doors blown wide behind him and moves into the room slowly, like she’s an animal he’s trying not to frighten.
“First aid potion kit. The most intensive one we made.” Fred responds immediately in the same emotionless voice from before. “Mine got lost during the battle.”
“Mine too. Is she stable enough to apparate back to the shop with us?”
“Barely. I’ll have to stun her.”
Hermione’s annoyance at being talked about like she isn’t in the room reaches a boiling point at Fred’s nonchalant plan to stun her.
“OI!” She bristles, relishing the spike of angry adrenaline that further serves to make her more alert and numb the residual pain in her body. “I’m fine.” She punctuates this declaration by dragging herself to her feet and trying for her most swotty prefect voice.
“Didn’t mean to give everyone a scare, but I’m all good, alright? And both of you lighten up - it’s incredibly odd to see you so serious.” George is gaping at her. Fred cocks his head to the side, considering her like he would a misfiring product at his joke shop.
Hermione whirls away from them, quickly locating a fireplace against the far wall of the library and stomping over to it. She decides it’s safe to assume the floos and apparition wards have been lifted in the post-battle mass exodus. The twins follow silently behind her and watch wearily as she grabs a fistful of floo powder.
“Now, I’d rather not go to Shell for obvious reasons, so let’s head to the Burrow, yeah?” She all but demands. She turns back to the fire. “I’m exhausted.” And with that, she casts the floo into the fire, bellows for the Burrow, and disappears into the emerald flames.