mea culpa

mea culpa

A sigh as Hermione lifted herself onto the couch beside him. "Well, you're good at giving the impression that you don't give a damn; I'll say that much." She rubbed an ache in her neck; old scars were a bitch as she got older. "I'm sorry that you felt you had to worry; I'm all right, really, just a bit overworked. Mea culpa entirely."

Probably better to explain herself rather than try to probe further; he'd simply hedgehog if she pried. It was incredible that he'd said so much already. Besides, she knew he'd keep her private details to himself.

"What the boys are worried about… well, it's only related in a diagonal sort of way. I get… overinvolved in my work, always have. But normally, like now, I know how far I can push myself. I may look ghastly right now, but I'll be fine after a bit of vacation. Some food and sleep and job well done.

"But…" Hermione leaned back to stare at the ceiling. How much to say, how much not…? "After the war…" she trailed off again.

"Minerva explained your 'volunteering,'" Snape said quietly.

She flashed him a startled look. "Oh. Well," she added lamely.

Far more difficult to begin than she'd thought. But then, everybody who ought to know already did; she'd never had to say it out, even if she'd come to terms with it.

"I… had nightmares," she said abruptly. "Dark, terrifying nightmares. I'd guess you know the kind." She kept her eyes on the ceiling. "I felt alone in a crowd. I hated seeing the graves, but I continued to go see them. I felt it was my fault. Often, I felt that I really was a worthless Mudblood.

"I knew it wasn't true. But that didn't change how I felt."

She didn't look at him. He watched her carefully.

"I knew what it was," she continued. "PTSD, the psychologists call it. But wizards don't have psychologists, do they? So I put myself to work; it was the one way I could chuck the whole mess at the door. I went from hospital to Hogwarts to library to wherever. Wrapped up in a project, I was complete again, useful, worthy.

"I used work to avoid thinking, feeling, dreaming. Sleeping was too difficult, might as well work. Eating gave me time to think again, better to avoid it as much as possible."

"You stopped eating," Snape repeated flatly. How could anyone have missed it? Hermione Granger was surrounded by friends, admirers… hell, even enemies.

"More or less," she agreed. "I hurt so much already, what were a few hunger pangs in addition? I told myself I'd eat later, when I had time.

"Later rarely came. I lost… oh, a few stone, at least; I wasn't paying attention. And neither was anyone else, wrapped up in their own grief and guilt and relief. They never noticed when I 'disappeared'; I was always 'somewhere about,' 'making myself useful.'

"I kept you company quite often."

"I never knew." He felt obscurely guilty, as though, even unconscious, he should have sensed her presence, known something was wrong.

Hermione shrugged. "Not really any reason for you to. You're no more obliged to me than anyone else who looked after you. If anything, I was obliged to you." She finally turned her eyes to him.

He stared at her in consternation, wondering just exactly what she meant.

"You reminded me," she said quietly, answering the unspoken question. "Reminded me of… many things, I suppose, but really that… now that it was over… the truth was what was important."

Severus couldn't reply, his mind trying to make sense of what she was telling him. His thumbs unconsciously worked the grey fabric still in his hands. Her own hand reached over, stilled the movement.

"You did so much for us, so much that was hidden, that none of us might ever know, but that you deserved to be honoured for. I had no right to tell your story, but I could tell mine, how much—how little—I actually did, and let people make their opinion from fact, not… not lionizing yellow journalism.

"I began my book because of you."

The rest of her story was easier to tell. Hermione told Severus of the hours she spent—many in his hospital room—writing furiously everything she remembered from her first visit from Hagrid. Even more hours revising what she had written under the influence of his undeniably critical presence—conscious or otherwise.

The boys had emerged, finally, from their grief and shock to realize the state their friend was in. They hadn't been able to do much more than force her to eat decently, but that was enough.

Enough to see her through the book and its intertwined, healing catharsis.