There are just some days that you just don’t want to get up. I had many of those days, even before the accident happened. Unfortunately, Florence Creevey had no understanding of the concept.
~
“Get up James; you have a rather busy day today”
I glared at her sleepily from underneath my mountain of blankets. For the last week, Florence had proved to be an overly optimistic creature that was a permanent thorn in my side. No matter how pessimistic I was, no matter how difficult, she never gave up. And that was very annoying.
“Kaitlin said she’d drop by today,” Florence informed me casually, while twitching my curtain so it would hang the right way. Florence liked everything neat and tidy which was why I purposely left my stuff all over the place, just to annoy her.
“Really?” I couldn’t help being enthusiastic when I heard this. Kaitlin had been my girlfriend for three years. We had met at the Quiddich World Cup, and had been together ever since. She had only been to see me twice in my three weeks in St Mungo’s. I reckoned that she didn’t like seeing me this way. They’d had to shave my head to close the injuries properly. Mum insisted I was dashing with a buzz cut, but I still couldn’t wait for my hair to go back to its former glory, if only to just cover the scar that travelled from my hairline to the nape of my neck.
“Yep, and you have gait training at eleven”
I groaned. Gait training was undoubtedly the most frustrating thing I ever had to do. When that idiot had sliced my head open, he managed to damage the part of my brain that told my legs to walk. The nerves had been permanently altered, but I had been informed that I would be able to walk again. And that is why I had to spend two hours, every day trying to get my legs to perform an action they had been doing effortlessly for twenty-odd years.
“You made brilliant progress last time!”
If she considered two steps progress.
“Look James, you can’t expect someone to just wave their wand, and for you to be back to normal,” she reminded me, for the thousandth time.
“Well, we are supposed to be wizards,” I said moodily.
“Your injury is too complicated for any magic spell to fix James,” she sighed. “Now, we’d better get going, or you’re going to be late”
~
I sat in the chair beside my bed, watching the door like a hawk. Every time I heard footsteps, I would crane my neck, but it was always just another nurse, bustling about, or another patient, slowly shuffling down the hall. I had been moved into a long-term ward, and found that Florence’s words were true. I had been lucky. The other people in my ward seemed to be in a much bigger predicament than I was. But that just made me feel like I shouldn’t be in this ward at all, I wasn’t as bad as the others, so why was I even here?
“A watched potion never brews” the elderly witch in the bed next to me said in a sing-song voice, not looking up from her knitting.
“My Nan always says that” I said back “Pity that doesn’t make me any more patient”
She smiled in that knowing way that only the elderly can pull off, and began counting the rows on what looked like one of Aunt Hermione’s crafts. To put it nicely, my aunt cannot knit. The witch saw me looking.
“I’m Muggle-born you know, I used to be a fabulous knitter, but ever since that blasted jinx backfired on me, my fingers just won’t work the way I want them too” she sighed sadly.
“I know the feeling,” I glared down at my legs, they looked awkward and disjointed.
She smiled sadly “Oh, I know you do pet.”
We were interrupted by the sound of high-heels on vinyl. I raised my hand to instinctively run my fingers through my hair, but my hand only met stubble, and the bump of the scar, which was rather unnerving. I heard her high, tinkly voice ask which room I was in. A soft voice answered her. Of course she had to ask Florence. She would now probably lecture Kaitlin for about an hour about God knows what, and if there was one thing I knew about Kaitlin, it was that she became bored very easily, and when she got bored, she became snappy and narky. Fortunately, Florence decided to hold off on the lecture, and two seconds later, Kaitlin entered the ward.
She stopped short when she saw me. That was not a good sign.
“Hi James” she said, an octave higher than usual. I saw her eyes take in the buzz-cut , and the rest of me. The idiot that attacked me didn’t just stop with my head; he decided to go whole hog, so I had sustained quite a few injuries, most of which were now faded pink scars, thanks to the Essence of Dittany.
“Hey Kaitlin” I smiled encouragingly at her.
“I’ll give you two some privacy” the elderly witch fumbled for her wand, and clumsily waved it to make the curtain swoosh across, hiding her from view.
“Muffliato” Kaitlin muttered, pointing towards the curtain “Wouldn’t want that old crone listening in”
“She’s actually quite nice Kay” I frowned slightly at her.
“Oh don’t look at me like that James” she snapped. She sat down gingerly on the bed, angled away from me. This confused me.
“So how are you?” she asked, still not meeting my eyes.
“Fine” I answered. I didn’t elaborate, and she didn’t ask. The whole conversation seemed strained, which was very odd. Usually Kaitlin and I could talk for hours about nothing.
“Look James, I’m just going to stop beating around the bush, we need to talk” she said, without meeting my eyes.
They say bad things come in three’s. For me, they come in thousands.
~
Hey again! I’m taking advantage of the short queue :)
Again, this chapter wasn’t the best, but I have an idea for Kaitlin, so I had to slot her in somewhere :P And once again, a million thank-you’s to my amazing beta apondinabluebox for putting up with my terrible grammar! :)
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