Invisible

Invisible

Chapter 2

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I felt something brush against my throat, like a warm hand, or maybe a cold cloth…I can’t tell.

My head ached. Why did it ache so much? I’ve never had such a bad headache in my life! Sleeping Potion wasn’t supposed to make its patients get headaches….

I felt something hot, like the very insides of me were burning. An image of white, hot fire flashed in my mind. But as quick as it came, the picture and the sensation were gone. The white and red fire were no longer there.

Red, the colour of Ginny’s hair…and the colour of Ron’s.

God damnit, Mayer, snap out of it! My internal clock told me that I’d been asleep for longer then I should’ve. I worried that the burning sensation was not good.

A creak. A noise! Thank god I wasn’t dead! I can hear a door open and shut. Oh great merciful gods and goddesses from every religion ever invented I was alive! Bless Merlin’s beard!

Now, Ella, open your eyes, girl. But this was the hardest part; no matter how hard I tried my eyes wouldn’t budge. I wondered if I was sweating from the effort, hoping that someone would notice and come to help me…there again I didn’t really want them to help. My eyelids were glued shut it seemed like, so I took in my surroundings. It was black, everywhere, not a speck of light. It was frightful, but yet there was a thrill that I cannot describe, I felt warm and safe, although I felt like pounding on the floor and screaming for help at the same time.

Suddenly, a great blinding flash of white came into my vision; if I didn’t have my eyes closed I was worried that I might become blind. The light faded away quickly.

I opened an eye. Just one. But the other soon followed. Gasping I gulped in fresh air. I was starving to death and extremely thirsty.

Hearing two other gasps I smiled, although that simple task hurt my face as though I hadn’t smiled for years.

“Madam Pomfrey! Madam Pomfrey! Come quick!” it sounded like Colin. I groaned. Well, on the bright side that explains the flash of white light, it was probably his silly camera. He really should throw that thing away, it’s extremely annoying and sooner or later he’s going to make me blind.

My eyesight cleared a bit when Madam Pomfrey came over to me and started muttering charms, I suppose. I know I must have been imagining it but she looked a bit ashamed and muttered ‘sorry’ in between spells every so often.

Sorry for what?

Now that I could see properly and there was some food in my stomach (grapes provided by the Famous Sucky Transfiguration Wizard Colin Creevy…the grapes were a tad bit sour) I noticed although Ginny was smiling broadly she still had a look of worry in her eyes. And confusion.

“So what happened?” I gulped down a glass of water in a way that my older brother would frown on. Especially if he found out how much food I had devoured in the last five minutes.

“Well….” Ginny looked sheepish.

Good old Colin didn’t beat around the brush though, “As soon as you drank that potion you were out like a light!”

I rolled my eyes, “Of course, it WAS a Sleeping Potion.” I heard a groan from the next bed over.

“I’ll be right back,” said Ginny while walking off to the bed hidden behind curtains.

“Anyway,” continued Colin, drawing attention back to him, “You’ve been out cold for a week and a half!” he seemed very excited at this as though it was something important to everyone. Me? Important? No way, I’m invisible. I smiled slightly thinking of how unlikely it was that anyone would know, or even care, that I was in the hospital wing.

Then the words ‘a week and a half’ reached my ears, “WHAT?!”

“Shh!”

“Sorry,” I apologized, “But how am I supposed to catch up on all that work I missed!”

Ginny had come back, “Never you mind,” she said in a no-nonsense tone, “Colin forgot to add that the reason why you were out for so long is because the potion was way to strong. Madam Pomfrey is surprised that you woke up early, she was starting to think that you were going to die,” She looked down, she seemed to look a bit guilty to me, “The thing is, Madam Pomfrey would never mess up such a elementary magic potion….”

I gave out an unladylike snort. Never was an understatement, she’d never do that in a million years; she could probably do the potion with her eyes closed! And Snape—who made some of the other Healing Potions—would never risk his job on an insignificant student like me.

Then it dawned on me, “What’re you getting at?” when there faces stayed serious I laughed uneasily, “No way! No one’s trying to kill me!”

“Be reasonable, Ella. Have you ever heard of Pomfrey messing up a potion?” asked Colin.

Ginny nodded, “Besides, you said so yourself a million times that Madam Pomfrey was one of the best Medi-Doctors around. She could do the potion in her sleep,” Ginny pointed out. Her brown eyes shone with confusion.

I once again rolled my eye and replied, “No one would try to kill me! For Merlin’s Sake I’m not good at magic and I don’t have any enemies!”

“But lots of Slytherins hate y—”

“They hate every Gryffindor! Just as we hate all Slytherins,” sitting up slightly I looked directly into their eyes, “Not all Slytherins are bad. There are just as many evil Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws, and yes, Gryffindors.”

“Are you sure you’re all right?” Colin asked genuinely concerned.

But Ginny took my side, “It’s true. There’s been as many Ravenclaw Death Eaters as Hufflepuff ones,” she shuddered slightly, “You don’t really know who to trust these days.”

The hospital wing burst open and I slide down into my sheets ready to go back to sleep. But instead of going to sleep I decided to listen to the conversation. Especially since the two people who had rushed in were none other then Harry and Hermione. I wondered silently where Ron was.

“How’re you doing, Ginny?” Harry asked as he neared my bed. They didn’t notice me. Good.

I was very proud of Ginny as that moment, only a slightly pink flush rose to her cheeks, but she didn’t stutter or start tripping over herself, “I’m fine, I guess.”

“Just imagine, two attacks so close together. Both on Gryffindors,” Hermione shook her head sadly, “Probably both people attackers were Slytherins.”

I gritted my teeth, when would people learn that at this time we need to forget about house rivalry and band together or all will be lost? The whole school needs to stop being so arrogant and thinking that they are better then the house next to them. We need to break out of the house stereotypes.

But no one would stand up and say this; the students weren’t going to listen to Dumbledore even though they had great respect for him. And I sure as hell wasn’t, I am invisible and I like it that way, I don’t want to stand in front of everyone and make a giant speech.

“Well, I’m sorry, it must be horrible for two people so close to you to be attacked,” Potter smiled slightly, “That Leah gave us a fright,” Leah? Just goes to show I’m invisible to everyone.

“Ella,” Colin corrected Potter automatically, he smiled down at my and said with a slight sneer directed at Potter, “Do you need anything, Ella?”

Smiling gratefully I replied, “No, no thank you.”

“Hope you feel better,” Hermione Granger said. I nodded.

“We better go check on ‘The Grouch’,” Harry said, smiling as he walked away.

Ginny was smiling dreamily after him. Damn Potter! Just like always he’s fooling around with her, “Ginny?” silence, “Giiiiny? Ginny?! VIRGINIA!” she finally snapped out of her daze.

Blushing she said, “Sorry…I...er….got distracted.”

“We noticed,” muttered Colin darkly.

She turned to Colin quizzically, “Wha—”

“So, who’s ‘The Grouch’?”I Smiled, “Must be a real pain, mustn’t he or she? I guess your Potter is feeling sorry for him or something if he’s come to visit.”

The red head looked down, “That’s not funny, Ella. He almost died.”

“And whom are you talking about?”

A broad smile appeared on Colin’s face, “You’ll be happy to hear this! The guy in the next bed to yours is….”

“Yes?”

“Forgot his name.”

“COLIN!”

Laughing slightly Ginny said, “Ron, you remember my older brother, right?”

I groaned, blocking out the flutter of joy in my stomach like a butterfly on a warm spring day, “How could I Forget? He ate faster then you and Fred combined!”

“Yeah, well, some fourth year decided it would be easy to try and Avada Kedavra him,” Colin explained, “As if anyone could hurt one of Harry Potter’s friends! Luckily the curse wasn’t very strong and the girl who tried to kill him only managed to knock Ron out for a long time. We all thought he was going to die for a while.”

Ginny nodded, “It was horrible. It was in the library and I went to ask him about my Potions homework,” I severely doubted that Ginny even wanted to talk t o Ron, she was probably aiming for Potter. “This girl stepped out form behind the bookcase and—and hit him with the curse,” her voice faltered and cracked as though she was about to cry.

I gulped, “Oh, Ginny, I’m sorry.”

I truly was, she must have thought he was dead at the moment.

A hollow look appeared in her eyes, “It was the scariest thing that ever happened to me,” she sniffled slightly but was determined not to cry. Colin gripped her hand reassuringly; I patted her arm sympathetically. I was a bit surprised that Colin had been brave enough to take her hand, and that Ginny hadn’t let go.

But then she said something that stunned us both; “It was worse then the Chamber of Secrets.”

That statement alone was a lot, but to say it wasn’t worse then her brother almost dying was amazing. I had no idea what had happened there, neither did Colin, but he did know more then me since he was at this school at that time. And from what I heard it was horrible: students were being attacked, there was confusion, pandemonium.

But it seemed that day that she went down into the actual chamber was the worst for Ginny. There she found out she’d be harming the people, and Ginny with her kind nature found that horrendous. To her, she had committed a crime that could never be forgiven. It seemed most of the school thought that as well, since hardly anyone dared to get too close to her.

Colin had never really been friends with Ginny before I came along in are second year. He was shy and, truth be told, he did fear Ginny a bit. But since I hadn’t heard of the chamber I tried to become friends with Ginny, and then Colin quickly followed. We convinced her that it wasn’t her fault, but she still felt guilty.

But I think one of the things that bothered her most was that she had sent the Basilisk on Hermione Granger, one of Potter’s greatest friends. She told me once, late at night, when she had had a bad nightmare about Tom Riddle that because of that, Potter would probably never want to get to know her. All because she was practically possessed and had unintentionally hurt Hermione Granger.

“I’m all right,” she backed off and said, “Really I am. It’s just Ron scared me to death when that happened. Ella, you know what I’m talking about…what it’s like to loose someone.” I nodded, all too well did I understand.

The bed next to mine went quiet. A red head pocked out of the curtain.

“Gin? You all right?”

It was Ron. I looked at his face, he was still ghostly pale and his skin hung off his face a little as though he’d just recovered from a bad flu. His voice sounded hoarse and ruff. It reminded me of sand paper.

“I’m fine,” Ginny replied stubbornly, although we all knew that she wasn’t, “Guess who just woke up!”

He glanced at me, “Ella, right?” I nodded quietly, “Hope you don’t giggle as much as Ginny.” he said rudely, glaring at me slightly. Then his head vanished behind the curtains.

I was filled with a bit of sadness and disappointment. How dare he make me feel like that! He’s got no right to. He’s just Ginny’s older brother.

Colin smiled, “He’s been in a very bad mood lately.”

“Sorry, Ella,” Ginny apologized on her brother’s behalf.

I waved my hand, brushing off the apology, “No need to. You put up with worse in the mornings in our dorm,”

Ginny had once said that if I ever turned into a morning person, hell would freeze over.

Madam Pomfrey came, “All right, Mr. Creevy, Miss Weasley, your time is up,” and she left to go inform Potter and Hermione Granger the same thing.

“Bye then, thanks for the visit,” they both nodded.

Colin and Ginny glanced at each other and then they suddenly hugged me.

I gasped. My family had never really hugged me, my mother was the only one who had and she had left a while ago. And my Father would never do such a thing. My brothers, well, they were guys. Simple as that, they never liked hugs nor did they like giving them out. So this was a bit new to me.

“Geroff! I’m fine! I’m not going to die, although if I do it’s because you two choked me to death!”

Letting go they both smiled at me, “Don’t do that again,” I glared, someone needed to look out for them and I felt guilty that they were comforting me but yet I couldn’t look out for them.

“Bye,” Colin said.

“See you,” added Ginny.

“Later,” I called after them as they walked out of the hospital wing.

Potter and Hermione Granger had left too. Madam Pomfrey removed the curtain that had been between Ron and me.

He was looking at the door sadly. His gray eyes were somber. I knew how he was feeling.

“It’s all right,” I said to him. I don’t know what made me want to comfort him. It was weird, like I wanted to reach out and capture his sorrow and make it go away somehow. It scared me. But I wasn’t going to show fear.

“What do you mean?” he turned and glared at me.

“I know you feel like you have to go protect Pott—Harry and Hermione,” I bit my lip and then decided what the hell and threw caution to the wind, “I want to protect Ginny and Colin. It’s like my duty to them. But the best way you can accomplish that right now is to get better.”

He seemed surprised as my words. I smiled slightly, “Well, yeah…maybe…I guess,” he agreed.

It was going to be a long time before he might acknowledge my existence, longer then that to be nice to me. And maybe forever until he wanted to become my friend, or more then that.

But I knew I had just made progress.

It’s not every day Ron Weasley agrees with someone.

~