She Lost Her Mind, They Say

No one can help you now.

The dark, crackled voice startled Hope awake. Casting weary glances up down the length of the hospital wing, she frowned, seeing no one the disembodied voice would belong to. Such a strange thing, hearing voices. Hope had always been considered a sane-minded person, but now?

Now, she wasn't so sure.

Aside from the moon casting distorted light through the glass, it was dark, and what dying embers in the fireplace remained. At least she wasn't alone; just next to her sat Newt. He'd pulled up a little table to lay his ink bottle and parchment on. His quill scratched quickly against the surface.

Newt glanced over, probably as he'd done the past hour, and his quill stilled over the parchment.

"Hey," he smiled softly, setting his quill down to flex his fingers. "You're awake."

Hope nodded, closing her eyes as he reached his hand forward and stroked her cheek lightly with the back of his fingers. 

"Hm." She murmured, the cool sensation a relief to her flushed skin.

"How are you feeling?" Newt asked gently.

Hope answered with a nod. It had been like this for the past two days. She would sleep for some time, be awoken by something, and be asked how she felt. Newt, Albus, and Madam Florence had been taking turns sitting by her bedside. Albus had mentioned keeping her company once, but Hope knew the truth. They were making sure she didn't wander off while in another episode. 

So far, nothing of a notifiable incident had happened yet, but Hope was still so tired. Every day, no matter how much sleep she got, she was plagued with fatigue and bluish-gray circles under her eyes. Her babysitters, apparently, said her rest was often restless, but she never recalled having any dreams or nightmares after waking.

Albus was starting to toss around the idea of trying to enter her dream world, or at least attempt to, possibly by using a Pensieve. It wasn't something they'd tried yet, but they were starting to get desperate.

"Hope is a strong-minded individual," Albus had said to Madam Florence last night, "and for her to lose such control of her thoughts makes very little sense to me."

Hope knew who was behind it, though. She'd always known. The man in the cloak who had been tormenting her from the beginning.

The night she'd lost her vision (and her hair) was the same night she'd felt a wand glide across her back, and it hadn't been Sylvia in her room that night. He's been screwing with her since the beginning over a year ago, and now it seemed Hope was unraveling.

Little by little, he tugged at each thread in her mind, and it seemed no one had the proper tool to stitch her back together.

It had been such a slow, gradual process; now that people took notice, it might even be too late. She was practically Humpty Fucking Dumptey. Now she saw it, though. Now she could see how her patience had been waning, how her thoughts had been becoming more distracted. The old Hope never would have ventured through the castle at night without a plan. The old Hope would never have run off into the forest without a thought to the consequences.

Sometimes you just never see yourself falling apart until it's pointed out in an obscure and obvious way, but she needed that. She needed that clarity, even if her mind felt too foggy at present.

"Hope?" Newt murmured.

Glancing up, she met a pair of familiar blue eyes. She hadn't been aware Albus had walked in.

Meeting Newt's concerned eyes, she pursed her lips. 

"I zoned out again, didn't I." It wasn't a question.

Newt nodded with a small, tight smile that he must have been forcing from somewhere deep. "It's okay," he murmured, squeezing her hand, "are you hungry?"

Looking down at her stomach, she had to think about it. Was she losing weight again?

Oh, right, hungry. Was she hungry? 

When was the last time she had eaten? She really did miss gumbo, mainly for the spice and the feelings of nostalgia it gave her. 

New Orleans.

Hope missed New Orleans. The jazz and the heat- the music of the cicadas in the trees. The splash of the water when an alligator suddenly dives under the calm, murky water.

"Hope?" Albus asked now. He sat down on the edge of the bed and took her hand in his.

"I miss the alligators," Hope nodded, settling into her pillows, "they would hide everything but their eyes," she moved under the covers so that only her eyes could be seen, "like this."

Albus smiled softly and nodded. "Ah, I see. Were they well-behaved alligators?"

Hope didn't miss the glitter of sadness in his eyes.

"Why are you sad?" Hope asked, confused, moving forward a little. "Did I do something wrong?"

Albus shook his head with a small smile, though a stray tear streaked down his scruffy cheek. "No, of course not. I'm delighted to see you right now."

Nodding with relief, Hope settled back into her pillow, suddenly terribly tired again. Sleep threatened her, but she couldn't take her eyes off Newt's face, which had become red and puffy almost instantly.

Her eyes closed, as keeping them open took too much effort.

Newt murmured in a thick voice; it sounded as though he were on the verge of tears, "This is not our Hope, Albus…"

"I know."