The Sunrise of My Heart

I slept until about 1:30 in the afternoon, which gave me five hours of sleep. It wasn't a lot, but it was acceptable. The first thing I did after pulling myself out of bed was to eat. I was starving. After eating a huge lunch, I showered, sat outside reading for awhile, and then finally decided to actually get to work.
I had an essay in DADA, Potions, Transfiguration, and Charms, and I had been instructed by Professor Sprout to identify all magical herbs in my aunt's garden and state their uses. Joy. Still lounging outside, I got to work on the Potions essay. I was pretty sure Slughorn was taking it easy on me. There wasn't really any way for me to brew a potion, so I had to write a paper on the uses of moonstone. Are you kidding me? That was super easy. I spent the next fifteen minutes writing a bunch of fluff about moonstones, throwing in the fact that they were used in the Draught of Peace and in many love potions.
The DADA essay was harder, as was to be expected. I had to write a detailed essay on the dangers and benefits of self-made spells, with particular emphasis on figuring out how to defend ouyrself against them. Snape was so funny. He knew Salazar Slytherin's curse was one he had created himself. Way to rub my curse in my face when I was already being tortured by it. I considered having a few words with him when I got back.
For Transfiguration, I had to write an essay on animagi. I'm pretty sure McGonagall didn't know I could do it, but no matter. At least that made writing it that much easier. I wrote the essay in under half an hour, being sure to add that all witches and wizards who wanted to become animagi should register with the Ministry. Because doing it illegally was bad...
My Charms essay was easy. Write about seven different useful charms, their ranges in power, and the dangers of using them carelessly. Okay, so maybe most of my teachers were going easy on me since I had just been through a tragedy. Worked for me. It gave me more time to sit around and mope about the injustices of my life.
Before I could do that, though, I had to finish the rest of my homework. I got up and went inside, looking for Aunt Iris. As I had expected, she was in the library reading a book. I was starting to think she spent every waking moment in there. She had this huge house, but she never seemed to go into any of the rooms.
"Aunt Iris?" I said, walking into the library.
"Yes, dear?" she looked up from her book, her full attention on me. That was one of the things I liked about her so much. She would devote her whole attention to you, not just humor you with a glance while thinking about something else.
"What are all of the magical herbs in your garden, and what are their uses?"
She frowned at me, and for a minute I thought she wasn't going to answer. But then she rolled her eyes lightly and slowly listed them off while I wrote down everything she said. She had a fair amount of herbs, most of them useful for healing, but didn't seem to use them. It was completely insane.
When I had finished writing down all of the herbs, I started to leave so she could go back to reading, but I hesitated in the doorway.
"Is there something else?" she asked, looking at me curiously.
"How exactly did magic kill your son?"
"The greed and prejudices of magical people tore apart the entire wizarding community. Of course, you know this. You were alive when Voldemort rose to power and began destroying everything. My son William, like so many other witches and wizards of that time, decided to fight against Voldemort and his followers. He was betrayed by one of his friends, who had changed sides because he thought they had more power. For the chance of a little extra magic, my son's friend murdered him. That is how magic killed my son. Because if there had been no magic, Voldemort wouldn't have had a cause in the first place. And I would still have a son."
"How old was he?" I asked.
"He was twenty-six. He had a fiance, a future, a life. And it was all torn away from him because magic makes people do stupid things."
I gave her a sad smile. "At least you got twenty-six years to spend with him. Only once have I had a child, and I died when he was just an infant."
"You were Olivia Quill," she said.
"Yup. I am my own descendent. How messed up is that? And you know what? My curse happened because of magic. But that doesn't mean I'm going to give up on magic. That's like hating all dogs just because some of them bite people. Magic is a part of who we are. It runs through our veins and beats in our hearts. I know magic has brought you pain, but has it not also brought you great joys before? And how did you meet William's father?"
"We met at Hogwarts."
"See without magic, you never would have met your husband. And you never would have given birth to William. Like all things, magic can be very good or very bad. But at least you had twenty-six years of the very good before the very bad happened." I shrugged. "Just something to think about."
The next two weeks went by surprisingly quickly. I had homework to do every couple days, but nothing too unmanageable. Besides, the homework gave me something to do. It still got boring, though, and I needed a hobby to clear my head. So I started -wait for it- jogging. That's right. I, Riley Carson, open hater of all things jog-related, had started jogging. It had worked for Roxanne. So it should work for me. It did help me keep my mind clear a bit, and I got into better shape. My leg muscles were becoming very toned. I was going to have to keep this whole jogging thing up.
When it was finally time for me to return to Hogwarts, I packed all my clothes back into my trunk, said a sad farewell to my beautiful bedroom, and went to meet Aunt Iris in the library. We were apparating to Hogsmeade, where a teacher would meet me and take me back to the castle. I wondered which teacher it would be. I hoped it wasn't Slughorn. That guy was just so annoying, and he talked too much.
When Aunt Iris apparated us to Hogsmeade, she turned and gave me a tight hug, which I quickly returned. "Be good," she said to me. "And strong. Yes?" She looked me in the eyes, waiting for me to nod. When I did, she nodded as well. "Good girl."
Professor Snape (thank Merlin) showed up then, motioning for me to go over to him. Aunt Iris gave me one more brief hug before letting me go. With a sigh, I picked up my trunk again and dragged it over to Snape. He didn't speak to me, but he did pull out his wand a flick it at my trunk so it was now floating along behind us. Magic is so useful.
"Miss Carson," he finally said in greeting.
"Snape," I said back. He gave me a cold look. "Hey, at least I stopped calling you Sevy. And at least no one's around to call you Snivellus."
His eyes narrowed and his lip curled at the reminder of that nickname.
"See? Snape's sounding a lot better isn't it?"
"Fine, you may call me Snape since we're alone. But in class, I am still your professor, and you will address me as such."
"Deal," I answered. We clomped through the frozen grounds, getting closer to Hogwarts with each step. Still, I was freezing my ass off. I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye, trying to assess the kind of mood he was in. It didn't seem to be too negative... For the sake of my frozen body, I wrapped my hands around his arm and leaned up against him, using his body heat for extra warmth.
He looked at me like I was a parasite sucking the life out of him, but I didn't let go.
"I'm cold," I said. "For the sake of the close friendship you had with Roxanne, don't make me move away. I'll freeze to death." He sighed in annoyance but didn't say anything, causing me to smile. "Thank you."
"You are insufferable," he told me.
"You know, I seem to hear that a lot. Still doesn't phase me."
When we finally made it back to the castle, I let go of Snape and grabbed my trunk, heading down to the dungeons. I waved to him in farewell as I walked. It was a Friday evening, and I was pretty sure there were only one or two more classes left before everyone went to dinner. I didn't really feel like going to eat, and I was happy for the opportunity to be alone before being assaulted by a sea of students. Once I made it to the Slytherin common room, I dropped my trunk and sat down on it.
"I am so not dragging this into the girl's dorm. That's way too much work."
"Glad to see you're just as lazy as ever," a voice said from the common room. I stood up to find the source and saw Draco laying down on the couch. He looked up at me when I walked around to him, not moving from his comfortable position.
"Well, wouldn't want to freak people out by suddenly becoming physically active."
He chuckled softly at me and shook his head. "That certainly would be strange."
I hugged him suddenly, causing him to make a funny noise. It was a combination between an oof and a horrified yelp. "I missed your dark attitude and bitter comments," I said.
"Get off me," he said, trying to push me away.
"No," I answered.
He sighed in annoyance but hugged me back all the same. "There, I hugged you. Now will you let go?"
I rolled my eyes and released him, standing up straight. "You do realize that human contact isn't a bad thing, right?"
"Well it's not a good thing either."
I frowned at him for a moment before lying down on top of him.
"Riley, what are you doing??" he asked me in horror.
"Ssh," I said. "Just let it happen. It's good for you."
"How is this remotely good for me?" he asked skeptically.
"Human contact warms the soul. Let your soul be warmed."
"Can you warm my soul without laying down on me?"
"No."
He sighed. "I should've seen that coming."
"Quit fighting it," I ordered.
He muttered under his breath for a few moments, but he eventually wrapped his arms around me and stopped fighting my soul warming.
"Good," I said, snuggling closer to him. "You're comfy. Just so you know."
"Don't you dare fall asleep," he warned.
"Fine, fine," I said.
After awhile of us laying like that, I could hear a difference in the way he was breathing. I lifted my head slightly to look at his face. Just as I thought. He had fallen asleep. Hypocrite. I laid my head back down, smiling a bit, and closed my eyes. I drifted off into a light slumber, my fingers curled into Draco's shirt.
After an indeterminate amount of time, I woke up, blinking sleepily. At first I was confused, because I was on the couch, and Draco was on me. Then I realized we must have carefully rolled over while we were sleeping. I looked at Draco's peaceful face for a minute before gently shaking him awake.
"Draco?" I said softly. "Draco wake up."
He groaned and opened his eyes, blinking down at me sleepily. "I fell asleep?" he asked in surprise.
"So it would seem. But dinner will probably be over soon, and I didn't think you'd want people to walk in and see you sleeping on top of me."
"Don't care," he mumbled, putting his head back down and closing his eyes.
"Um... Hey, Draco?"
"What?" he asked in annoyance, clearly very tired.
"Your head is squishing my boobs. Also, I have to pee."
He sighed loudly before dropping his legs off the couch and standing up. "Better?" he asked.
"Yup," I answered, getting up and going to use the bathroom. Turns out, having 100+ pounds of Malfoy pressing onto your stomach will make you really have to pee. When I got back to the common room, Draco was reclining languidly in one of the arm chairs.
"Hey," I said suddenly. "Why aren't you in class? Or at dinner?"
"I took a sick day," he answered.
"But you're not sick."
"How would you know?"
"Because sick people look sick. You look... well, stressed. Okay, yeah, a little sick, but no worse than usual. Besides, your skin isn't flushed and you're not running a fever."
"You can tell my body temperature simply by looking at me?" he challenged.
"No, I can tell by having your forehead pressed into my cleavage, smart ass."
He sighed in a mock wistful way. "That was such a nice pillow..." He shot me the signature Malfoy smirk.
I shook my head at him and walked off, grabbing my trunk and dragging it up to my dorm. "Pervert," I called out to him as I walked away. Once I put my trunk back at the foot of my bed, I flopped down on the bed and closed my eyes, but I was now too awake to go to sleep. Damn that Malfoy for being a comfy bed.
I got back up and walked out into the common room, sitting down on the couch that was still warm from us sleeping on it. "You know," I said, "that was actually a really refreshing nap. So, did it warm your soul?" I asked him.
He scoffed and rolled his eyes. "Of course not."
"You're so damn negative! Why can't you ever just be happy? It's just the two of us here, I promise I won't tell anyone that you showed a sign of weakness by smiling. Why is it so hard for you to show when you're happy?"
"Why is it so hard for you to face your darker emotions?" he countered. "Your mom just died, and you're acting like it's no big deal. Sure, for the first day or two you were upset. But it's only been a month. You should still be broken."
I stared at him for a moment. "Touche," I finally said.
"How are you okay right now?" he asked.
"I'm not okay, I promise."
"Then why are you pretending to be?"
"Because I'm so far from being okay, that if I don't pretend to be okay, I don't know how I'll ever recover. I'm afraid I'll fall into a void of pain and darkness, and never be able to get back out. Do you have any idea how close I was to my mom? She was my best friend! And she's gone! And it's all my fault!" Now that I had voiced all of those dark thoughts, I suddenly couldn't stop from crying. I covered my face with my hands and cried into them.
"Oh, shit," Draco said. After a few moments, I felt him sit down beside me and wrap his arms around me, pulling me close to him while I cried. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to open the flood gates and make you breakdown."
I chuckled softly through my tears. "It's okay," I said, my voice muffled. "I think I needed to cry again."
He rested his cheek on my head and continued to hold me close while I cried.