Haunted, parts 13-15
Title: Haunted
Team Name: Spy for the Order
Word Count: 3x100
Rating: G
Challenge: Haunted House challenge
Characters: Hermione, Severus
A/N: Post-DH. Previous sets can be found here (1-3), here (4-6), here (7-9) and here (10-12).
Hermione had not expected his words to affect her so deeply. For a moment, she wanted to lay her hand on his arm, to offer him support and sympathy.
She nearly reached out to him before realising that Snape might consider it pity and not take kindly to it - and that ghosts did not always appreciate contact with living, heated bodies.
‘Is this why - why you did not want to move on?’ she asked before she could stop herself. ‘Harry told us about you and Lily… Was it the thought of meeting her in the afterlife that held you back?’
* * *
She expected him to lash out again.
Instead, he looked relieved, as if he had hoped she would figure it out, nodding briefly before sagging down on the floor in a heap of translucent robes, not quite touching the boards - which, Hermione noticed, she could see through him.
She sat down next to him, careful not to touch him.
She wanted to say something - anything, but could not think of the right words. What to say to a man who spent his life protecting others and yet felt a solitary half-existence as a ghost would be preferable to moving on?
* * *
‘What have you been doing here, all these years?’
He turned slightly to face her, quirking an eyebrow at her clumsy attempt to change the topic.
‘The usual, I suppose. Float around. Haunt. Scare passing children.’
‘Rose said she had heard - well, she said she heard someone cry.’
‘Did she now.’
When an explanation did not seem forthcoming, Hermione decided to try her luck and press on. ‘It’s not like he can hex me for asking impertinent questions,’ she told herself, although she felt a little guilty about it.
‘Did she? Hear someone cry?’
‘It must have been the wind.’
---
On to parts 16-18.
Team Name: Spy for the Order
Word Count: 3x100
Rating: G
Challenge: Haunted House challenge
Characters: Hermione, Severus
A/N: Post-DH. Previous sets can be found here (1-3), here (4-6), here (7-9) and here (10-12).
Hermione had not expected his words to affect her so deeply. For a moment, she wanted to lay her hand on his arm, to offer him support and sympathy.
She nearly reached out to him before realising that Snape might consider it pity and not take kindly to it - and that ghosts did not always appreciate contact with living, heated bodies.
‘Is this why - why you did not want to move on?’ she asked before she could stop herself. ‘Harry told us about you and Lily… Was it the thought of meeting her in the afterlife that held you back?’
* * *
She expected him to lash out again.
Instead, he looked relieved, as if he had hoped she would figure it out, nodding briefly before sagging down on the floor in a heap of translucent robes, not quite touching the boards - which, Hermione noticed, she could see through him.
She sat down next to him, careful not to touch him.
She wanted to say something - anything, but could not think of the right words. What to say to a man who spent his life protecting others and yet felt a solitary half-existence as a ghost would be preferable to moving on?
* * *
‘What have you been doing here, all these years?’
He turned slightly to face her, quirking an eyebrow at her clumsy attempt to change the topic.
‘The usual, I suppose. Float around. Haunt. Scare passing children.’
‘Rose said she had heard - well, she said she heard someone cry.’
‘Did she now.’
When an explanation did not seem forthcoming, Hermione decided to try her luck and press on. ‘It’s not like he can hex me for asking impertinent questions,’ she told herself, although she felt a little guilty about it.
‘Did she? Hear someone cry?’
‘It must have been the wind.’
---
On to parts 16-18.