Somnium Insidiae

Somnium Insidiae

#1

He couldn't see her, but he knew she was behind him, because he felt her arms wrapped around his waist and her hiding her face in his back. She was scared. Trying to calm her down, he looked back and murmured something to her. She nodded. She still seemed a little off, but she took a deep breath and held onto him again. In the end, he grabbed on tightly and they started to rise, with jerky movements...

"Harry? Harry, wake up..."

The boy opened his eyes, focusing on his surroundings. With some relief, he remembered everything that had happened that night. He'd fallen asleep on the grass, and he'd had that dream again. Breathing clean air, he forced himself to separate the real world from the dream world. Mostly because that warm body that was resting against his felt very real.

He looked to the side and found his gaze locked with that face that he loved so much. He smiled, whispering "Hey..." and as he moved behind her ear a few rebellious strands of her hair, he asked: "Have you been awake for long?"

She didn't answer immediately, instead giving him a light kiss on the lips first, and then, levering her weight on her elbows on the grass, she continued looking at him with a smile on her face. "Not much. I was really comfortable. I'd say you make a very good pillow, Mr. Potter," she concluded.

Harry put his arms behind his head, looking up. "It's in the job description, miss." When he looked to the sky, he noticed it was darker than usual. "Seems like it's late... what time is it?"

The girl immediately looked to her wristwatch. "Oh, it's past eleven! We have to go back..."

Harry put on a mock-sad expression. "Awww, can't we just stay here a bit more?"

She laughed, amused, but she still looked a little worried. "Really, Harry, it's very late..."

Then he stood up, stretching his waking muscles, and gave her a hand. "You're right," he replied, helping her get up. "I don't want to get the Head Girl in trouble..."

"I absolutely agree," she replied, blushing when he kissed her hand.

While they walked down the corridors of Hogwarts, Harry thought of how wonderful his life was. If someone had told him that morning that he'd have a girlfriend by the afternoon, he wouldn't have believed it. And much less would he have believed that said girlfriend would be the best-looking, smartest girl in the school. Somebody up there must really like him to give him such good luck.

Personally, he had never thought he was attractive enough for a girl as special as she was to take an interest on him. He wasn't tall, or strong, or intelligent... he wasn't even that good with the opposite sex. After all, she was the one who took the initiative in the first place. Of course, there was the whole "Boy-who-lived" thing, but he was completely sure that she wasn't with him because of that. It wasn't his talent for quidditch either, and much less the fact that he was the captain of his team. Really, Harry couldn't see what was so interesting about him.

But even then, he felt like the king of the world.

When they reached the private dormitories of the Head Boy and Girl, she said goodbye and kissed him, reminding him that they'd see each other in the morning, at breakfast. When she finally walked in, and the statue came back to its original position behind her, Harry knew that he was standing there with the goofiest smile on his lips. Anyway, he couldn't help it. With a sigh, he turned around and started walking to the Gryffindor Common Room, praying he wouldn't find Filch or Mrs. Norris on the way back. Why, oh why had he not thought of bringing his invisibility cloak with him?

But he found someone entirely different.

"You're out after curfew, Mr. Potter."

Harry stopped as if a bucket of freezing water had been thrown on him. He slowly turned around. Of all the people who could catch him breaking the rules, it had to be his Defense against the Dark Arts teacher? It would've been better if it had been Snape! At least with him, he'd know what to expect. "I know, sir."

The professor walked around him, serious, with a critical eye. Harry felt as if, instead of being in a School of Wizardry, he were in a Military Academy. "Let's see," the professor began, "to be fair, I think I should ask you the reason you had to break this rule, before I take any points from Gryffindor."

Harry gulped. He wasn't going to tell on his girlfriend on the first day of their relationship, but he couldn't lie. So he was just going to try and not cause much damage. "I was in the gardens with my... girlfriend." The professor's eyebrows rose, but he let him continue. "We fell asleep outside... we didn't realize it was so late. It was my fault, she wanted to come back..."

"Very well, Potter," the professor interrupted him. "Ten points from Gryffindor. Now go back to your Common Room."

Harry nodded and kept on the way he originally planned on taking.

"Harry."

Once again he stopped. The voice was the same, but the tone was different. He turned around again to look at that man standing in the middle of the hallway.

"I was waiting for this moment to come one of these days..." the man continued, blue eyes shining behind his glasses. "I'm proud of you, Son."

Harry smiled. The line between family and profession was rarely walked through on weekdays, much less at that time of the night. "Thanks, Dad."

James Potter also smiled, that gesture so similar to his son's. "She's a good girl, I hope," he threw back, putting his hands inside his pockets.

"Of course," the boy replied. "Cho is a wonderful girl."

And with that, both men continued on their respective ways.

When Harry walked into the Common Room, ready to go up to his room and fall on his bed, he was surprised to see that someone was still awake.

"WHERE have you been?"

Harry rolled his eyes and decided to ignore her, sneaking quickly towards the stairs to the right, but he couldn't make it far because she, swift as an eagle, hung onto his left arm and threatened not to let go of him until he explained.

He had no choice but to stop on the first step. Over his shoulder he looked at her, irritated.

"Gwynn, you're a pest, you know?"

The little girl let go of him as if burnt. Crossing her arms with an annoyed expression, she made a face to let him know that she did not appreciate that comment at all. Harry laughed. In that position, with her blood-red hair straight and disheveled, her baby blue pajamas and her bright blue eyes, she looked as cute as a puppy. The boy knew he wouldn’t be able to resist.

"Ok... what is it?"

The girl's shoulders sagged as if her anger had escaped in a whiff. "Mom noticed you didn't come down to dinner... she sent me to look for you since then! I spent the whole night walking around the castle. I even got lost! Where were you, huh?"

Harry grimaced. He had never imagined that when his little sister came to Hogwarts, her mother would have the perfect spy to find out about anything that happened in his life. And Gwynn had no problem with it, of course!

He sighed. "Don't you have friends to be with, like normal people?" he asked, and the girl again looked at him with one of those killer looks. That didn't stop him, anyways. "I don't have to tell you. Dad already found me, and he took away 10 points. Why should you find out?"

"Harryyyyyyyyy..." she whined, hugging him around his waist (because she couldn't reach his neck). "Teeeellllll meeeeeee..."

The older brother asked himself if he'd ever had that much energy. How could she be so active, if it was past midnight? Prying her little hands off his waist, he continued riling her up. "Listen, Red, I'm not going to tell you. And well, you wouldn't understand anyway. You're just a little girl, you can't know about these things."

In less than two seconds, the girl was four feet away from him, with her hands on her hips and openmouthed, obviously offended. "How dare you?!" she exclaimed, and she couldn't have looked more like Lily Potter if she'd wanted to. "I'm not a little girl. For your information, Professor McGonagall told me this morning that I'm very mature for my age."

Harry laughed even more. "Ok, ok, I'll tell you. But you have to promise me that you won't tell Mum."

Gwynn bit her lower lip. "Well, I could promise, but... you know how Mum is. She always finds out." She shook her head with a tragic expression, as if he were announcing to her brother that he was going to die the next day.

"I know. I'll tell him myself, but not yet." And he hadn't even finished saying that phrase, when Gwynn was already giving him the puppy eyes.

"So?"

Harry had to admit that those eyes were powerful. With a resigned air, he let his little secret come out. "I was with Cho."

Again the girl opened her mouth, but this time in surprise. The suprise quickly became joy, and the exuberant little girl couldn't help jumping around the whole Common Room singing: "I've got a new sister, I've got a new sister!" Harry followed her through the whole room, trying to shut her up, at the same time thinking that he didn't know what he'd done to have such a fun sister... even though he wouldn't admit it out loud.

It was close to half past one in the morning when Harry finally made it to his room. Noticing that his roommates had left the light on, he let his eyes wonder about the
room.

He had always liked that room. The environment was much nicer than that of his room at Godric's Hollow. It was more home-like. Little details here and there... made it... more real, maybe.

The first bed to his left was Dean Thomas'. It was covered in notebooks and drawing parchment, posters of the Manchester United team, and his Prefect's badge was on his night table. Dean, like every night, was asleep on his bed, on his back, and with his arms extended to the sides of his body. The boys always joked about that, telling him he looked more like he was sleeping inside a coffin than on his bed, but Dean couldn't help it, really.

Seamus Finnigan's area was distinguishable from the others because of the green color that covered it. Seamus had a big Irish flag hanging from the bedposts, and there was also the clover glass he had on his night table. Seamus normally slept in weird positions, and this night he was face down, with his pillow over his head. Though when one thought about it, maybe it wasn't that weird. At least the pillow muffled the snoring.

Neville Longbottom's bed, to the back of the room, near the window, was the most normal out of the five. The covers were Hogwarts standard. Over his night table he had a picture of his grandmother and one of his parents on their wedding day. Neville was comfortably asleep on his right side, with one arm beneath his pillow and another one holding his bed sheets.

Then, back towards him, was his own bed. Nothing weird about it, one or two posters of some quidditch team (the national team was really good that year, a lot of people were saying they had great possibilities of winning the World Cup the next year), "Quidditch through the Ages" had fallen to the floor along with his red quidditch robes. Yeah, it was rather messy but Harry jut didn't have enough space, and he had to read all those books... he was the captain, and he had to guide his team to victory.

The last bed, just to his right, was Ron Weasley's, Harry's best friend since his first day at Hogwarts. The bed was even more bright than Seamus', what with his orange covers and his orange flags and his orange posters... Ron was a fan of the Chudley Cannons, and that became pretty obvious when you looked at his stuff. Had anyone ever told him that that color clashed horribly with his hair? Harry half expected to find Ron falling off his bed, like every night, but instead he found him sitting on it, looking straight at him with curious blue eyes.

"So?"

Harry sighed and rushed to lie on his bed. "What, is it 'interrogate Harry' day?"

Ron smiled. "What happened? Teacher trouble?"

"I wish," Harry shot back, remembering to lower his voice so as not to wake the others. "After leaving Cho in her room, Dad found me."

"Ouch," the redhead quipped, cringing like he shared his friend's 'pain.' "Did he give you detention?"

"Nah, he took ten points but he let me go," he explained. "And when I came into the Common Room, Gwynn was there."

"Ugh, don't even tell me," Ron groaned. "That girl is not normal. What, doesn't she sleep?"

It was Harry's turn to laugh. "You're right. I'd never say that a girl who's in love with you is normal, Ron."

Ron threw an orange pillow at his head. "Don't remind me of that!" he exclaimed between his teeth.

"Ok, I won't mention it anymore..." Harry conceded. "I wonder if Mum will tell me anything tomorrow?"

"She probably will," his friend replied, laying back on his bed. "You know how she is."

"I'm kind of scared that she won't like Cho," the boy confessed. "You know how she is with Gwynn and me... I know she doesn't do it on purpose, but I don't want her to get jealous or something."

"Ah," Ron closed his eyes, fixing his pillow to his neck. "Well, you can't do anything about it. Consequence of having your mother in Hogwarts, isn't it? Thank God mine is FAR away... if she were here, I'd already be married to your sister or something like that!"

Now Harry threw the orange pillow back at him. "Don't you dare, Weasley!"

"Nah, don't worry... So, tell me, Potter. You have a girlfriend. How do you feel?"

Harry sighed and Ron rolled his eyes, muttering something about drooling idiots and romance novels. "I'm very happy, Ron," he answered. "You don't know how it feels. It's just that Co is... so wonderful... I don't know. She's almost... perfect."

Ron laughed. "Yeah, I can tell from your face, mate. And well, you take good care of your perfect girl because, who knows? One of these days I might take her away from you..." he added, suggestively.

"Sure, Weasley," he replied. "In your dreams!"

They were going to continue their chat, when Neville interrupted them. "Harry, Ron, could you please go to sleep?" he asked, with a sleepy voice, still laying down.

Both boys rolled their eyes, but, muttering their respective "'nights", they laid down, letting the rest of the room sleep in peace.

Harry stayed awake for a while, thinking about Cho and about everything that had happened that day. What he'd told Ron was true: he felt really happy, maybe happier than ever. He knew that he was very lucky that a girl as beautiful as Cho had taken an interest in him, she wasn't only pretty in that simple form, but she was the smartest (well, she wasn't Head Girl for nothing) and most understanding girl Harry had ever met. And well, maybe she wasn't exactly the perfect girl, but she came very close.

And with that last thought, he fell asleep.

And there she was again. He was holding his broom and getting ready to fly, and she, with her bushy hair floating behind her shoulders, and her brown eyes shining with determination, came between him and his objective. She was saying something, but he wasn't focused but on her face...