fic, lupercalia love fest gift for pointblankdarcy
Title: Between Two Points
Summary: When Snape is faced with a persistent admirer, Hermione steps in to 'help'. Snape disapproves.
Characters/Pairings: teensy traces of SSHG; short appearances by Ron, Ginny, Luna, Lavender, Minerva, OC.
Genre: crack humor
Rating/Warnings: PG
Word Count: 3013
Author's Note: Oh, bb, my humblest apologies for failing so hard! I make no excuses, I am just really, really sorry. >_< This is actually the second fic I’ve started, after the first one became way overambitious and I realized I had no hope of wrapping it up in any satisfactory way, and well, I’m not even sure how this one turned out, since it fought with me til the end, but at least I have something to show for myself, at long and much belated last. *shameface*
Between Two Points
A funny thing happened after the war. It became fashionable to champion Severus Snape. This was due in no small part to Hermione Granger’s unrelenting campaign to pressure the Ministry into freeing him from their custody. When he had been found barely clinging to life after the Final Battle, he had received treatment for his wounds before promptly being imprisoned with the other remaining Death Eaters.
Thus was born Hermione’s new cause, Assist Severus Snape, or A. S. S.
(“Ass?” sniggered Ron. “That suits the git all right.” Then with a thwack to the head and a death glare from the founder of A.S.S., he subsided and returned to trailing around in Hurricane Hermione’s wake as she worked on Snape’s defense)
The support of the Golden Trio and the aid of a heroic back-story- the notion of spending years as a triple agent was enough to prompt countless articles in various witch magazines on the brooding anti-hero- spurred on the majority of the Wizarding world to rally to Hermione’s cause. It wasn’t long before the Ministry bowed to the inevitable and Snape was released to become a free man and recipient of an Order of Merlin.
But he never did forgive Hermione for the unfortunate acronym attributed to the campaign. When she greeted him with the party assigned to release him with all due pomp and circumstance, he snidely informed her that if she was hoping for him to drop to his knees with gratitude, she needn’t hold her breath.
“It’s lucky I didn’t do this in the hopes of receiving thanks, otherwise I’d be sadly disappointed,” she sniffed, though secretly, Hermione had been hoping for at least a smidgen of respect or appreciation from the man whose praise she’d never managed to earn as a student.
Years later, when she wound up on the staff at Hogwarts working alongside the man, there still existed that prickly tension between the two of them, despite Hermione’s efforts to incite him to bury the hatchet- in spite of having no idea what the hatchet was. Personally, she thought some small part of him was grateful to her and his standoffish behavior was overcompensating for that because he thought it was beneath him to owe anything to a former student, a Gryffindor, no less. She imagined that he had resigned himself to being permanently mired in ill-fortune and that when something good happened to him for a change, it completely threw off his world-view and being confounded in such a way drove him to take it out on her.
“Or it’s possible I’m over-thinking it and he’s simply hated me ever since my first day just because I knew the answer when Harry didn’t and I interfered with his mission to humiliate him,” she rambled during a drinking session with Luna and Ginny to celebrate the latter’s engagement.
“Hermione, you really need to get over it,” Ginny told her briskly. “If you let him get to you, he wins. Just forget about him!”
“But I work with him,” Hermione wailed. “I see him every day for breakfast and dinner! And I tell myself I’m not going to react, but then this stupid irrepressible part of me surfaces occasionally that thinks that maybe today is the day I can change the dynamic between us and I open my mouth and then he completely shuts me down.”
“Nargles used to meet under pine trees to mate,” Luna noted. “Only that would attract the attention of their natural enemy, the squirrel. After nearly dying out, they finally altered their mating location to that of the mistletoe, which has the advantage of proximity to humans to-”
“Is this going somewhere, Luna?”
“If one form of behavior isn’t working for you,” she explained patiently, “perhaps you need to change it and try another. People could stand to learn a lot from observing Nargles.”
“She’s right,” Ginny chimed in. At Hermione’s incredulous stare, she shrugged, “Well, I don’t know about Nargles, but about changing your behavior if it’s a liability. Remember when I could never open my mouth around Harry because I was such a fangirl? You were the one that told me that I just had to behave like myself, that he’d never notice me if I was just another person awestruck by his celebrity. And it worked, when I relaxed and just was myself and treated him like any other person, that was when he started to become attracted to me.”
Hermione’s jaw dropped. “I’m not trying to attract Snape!”
“Mm-hmm.” Ginny coughed into her hand, a cough that suspiciously sounded like a muffled, “Liar.”
“Really! He just…he’s a challenge! It’s nothing more than that!”
Luna tilted her head and stared at Hermione with her peculiar piercing eyes.
“I need another drink,” Hermione groaned. “Bartender!”
Lavender shoved another Firewhiskey down the counter toward her, then leaned in to murmur confidentially, “In my experience, if a man is driving you to drink, it’s not nothing, Hermione.”
“I’m paying you for the drinks, Lavender, not the advice.”
“It’s on the house,” she said with a smile. “You really look like you need it, too.”
“Oh, shut it.” Hermione raised her glass. “Girls, why are we talking about my love-life? It’s meant to be Ginny’s night.”
“So you admit the dark and mysterious Severus Snape is a part of your love-life?” Ginny said slyly.
“No! That’s not- it isn’t- let’s get back to you, Gin!”
“Do you really want to hear about my love-life? All the intimate details about me and Harry? Because if you like, I can go into all the sinful, toe-curling-”
Hermione gagged. “He’s like my brother, you cow, stop right there.”
When she woke up the next morning and blearily fumbled her way to the Hangover Potion, the main thing she remembered from the previous night was that she had to stop giving a damn what Snape thought about her and behave like he was any other person, not the man whom she’d freed from prison after weeks of hard work with not a word of thanks in return. She then fell back into bed, brooding over Snape and how much she did not care about his opinion and how she was going to make sure he saw how little he affected her and she was going to get the better of him if it was the last thing she did.
XIXIXIXIXIXIXIX
Her opportunity came about in the most unexpected of ways.
A Ministry liaison had been assigned to Hogwarts in order to assess how well the school was operating and what additional funds might be necessary to restore it to its former glory. Several years after the Final Battle, there were still portions of the school that had not been rebuilt and besides, schools always had areas that required extra funding in order to turn out highly skilled and intelligent graduates.
Hogwarts was looking to expand its staff so as to ease the burden on the existing faculty, who juggled numerous roles which demanded a lot of time and effort, but this would only be possible if the report worked to the school's advantage. So Snape had good reason not to antagonize the liaison- as Potions master, Slytherin Head of House and Deputy Headmaster, he stood to gain if their budget allowed for additional staff.
The only problem was that Celia Blakely had developed an all-too obvious crush on him.
He blamed Hermione Granger- if she hadn’t fashioned him as a romantic anti-hero, valiantly working against the Dark Lord for his lost love, Lily Evans, he would never have been forced to deal with all the unwanted female attention whenever he went out in public. Even hidden away here in Hogwarts, he still had to regularly Incendio fanmail that arrived for him.
And now he was faced with an admirer that he could not afford to antagonize, one who was regularly at Hogwarts and managing to cross paths with him much too frequently. It taxed all his reserves of patience and cunning to find ways to avoid agreeing to any of her overtures without offending the woman. He was counting the days til she left and he could billow down the corridors in peace once more.
At last, her period of observation at Hogwarts drew to a close. The staff was called together for one final meeting to submit various reports and confer with her as to what they were seeking, if anything, and then she would be out of his hair!
However, he had reckoned without Minerva’s hidden capacity for cruelty.
“It has been such a pleasure having you here,” she told Celia. “I know that you must return to the Ministry, but as you are aware, we are holding a ball for Valentine’s Day and we would be happy to welcome you there, if you have no other commitments.”
As Celia murmured her acceptance, Snape agonizingly awaited yet another overture from her, no doubt galvanized by the romantic holiday celebration in the offing.
Sure enough… “Shall I see you there, Severus?” Celia asked him coyly. “It would be lovely to have a partner for the evening.”
He flinched. She had never been so blunt in her intentions before, perhaps out of a sense of professionalism, but it was clear with the conclusion of her duties here, that no longer provided any protection.
“I do not participate in such frivolous celebrations. I will be patrolling the grounds to ensure that the students are behaving appropriately, instead of engaging in youthful follies amongst the rose-bushes.”
“I’m sure that two heads will be better than one,” she offered eagerly. “If we were to walk the grounds together, it would be an even more efficient way of making certain the students aren’t getting up to mischief.”
“Ms Blakely has an excellent point, Severus,” said Minerva from the opposite of the table, smirking unrepentantly as he directed a scowl her way. “The two of you could team up on any trouble-makers and play Good Auror, Bad Auror.”
“I…” he paused, gaze travelling across the table as he attempted to compose a suitably mild and tactful (ie. non-budget-reducing) rejection.
Hermione shifted uncomfortably as his eyes landed on her at the corner of the table, from where she was watching the little sideshow with amusement. There was a minute twitch of his facial muscles, as though he pondered something distasteful, then his jaw set and he spoke.
“Regrettably, Ms Blakely, I have already made arrangements with another individual that must take precedence.”
Hermione’s eyes widened. He can’t be- he’s not about to…
Celia pouted. “Is that so? With whom, may I ask? Otherwise you’ll have me thinking you simply made up this person to avoid my company.”
Snape cleared his throat. “Not at all. In fact, it is Professor Granger who has graciously volunteered her time to patrolling the school.”
He did! Hermione was torn between cackling at the Potions master’s desperate attempt to thwart his admirer by calling upon her (and he must be at his wits’ end if he was throwing to her!) and wickedly wondering whether to play along or to put a spoke in his wheel by denying all knowledge of these supposed plans.
She raised her eyebrows at the foreboding gaze he was currently sporting, as though to intimidate her into going along with his claim. “Really,” she said in an even tone that neither confirmed nor denied anything. Really, Snape? I’m not a first year, you won’t get your way by bullying me into agreeing.
At his grimace, she guessed her message had sunk in, and his features shifted to a more neutral expression, which was as close as she was going to get to pleasant from Severus Snape. It was probably for the best, she decided. After all these years of hostility from him as a teacher and then (comparatively milder) disapproval from him as a colleague, she might actually faint if he were to smile at her.
“I could always relinquish my claim to you, if you preferred to accept Celia’s invitation,” she offered sweetly. “Now that you have other options, I’ll understand if you no longer want my company.”
"Of course I want you. Very much," he ground out through gritted teeth.
As the other teachers surreptitiously traded curious glances, Hermione thought that he might come to regret his choice of wording just a bit, especially given how she was about to twist them- for his own good, of course, not as a minor form of payback. Really, she reflected sanctimoniously, he should thank her because she was going to do him a huge favour and put an end to Celia’s advances toward him once and for all. (And if her methods made him squirm, that was no less than what he had coming to him)
“Is that so?” she said, warming up to her role in this charade. “It doesn’t feel that way. Sneaking around gets tiring after a time, you know. When the excitement of a clandestine affair wears off, a girl does begin to feel awfully unappreciated.”
This bombshell was met with varying reactions from those present. Minerva snorted. Sybill Trelawney dropped her crystal ball in shock. Aurora Sinistra discreetly elbowed Rolanda Hooch to keep her from giving into the giggles she was clearly trying to contain. And nonsensical scribbles accumulated on Flitwick’s parchment as he moved his quill about haphazardly to try and look preoccupied with his work while keeping his ears open to the drama unravelling before him.
“Professor Granger,” Snape said dangerously.
“Oh, no need to be so formal, Severus, we may as well lay all our cards out on the table.”
“So, the two of you…are…?” Celia asked tremulously.
“Oh, yes,” Hermione confirmed with a brilliant smile.
“I confess myself curious as to how long you and Hermione have managed to keep us all in the dark,” Minerva said in her usual no-nonsense tone, but a tiny quiver of her stiff upper lip told Hermione she was concealing just how much this farce at Snape’s expense was amusing her.
The man in question stared daggers at the two banes of his life, but bowed to the practicality of following Hermione’s lead in order to put off Celia. “Our…association has been very recently formed,” he said begrudgingly.
“Association,” Hermione repeated tragically. “It’s very hard to feel wanted with such a tepid word to describe our relationship. And even on Valentine’s Day, the most romantic day of the year, we’re merely going to be on duty to keep students from succumbing to teenage hormones.”
She heaved a sigh, and then channeled Ginny’s air of intimate satisfaction, “It’s just as well that in private-” Snape rose from his chair in a flurry and strode to her side. Certain that he was about to physically drag her from the room when she had not even begun to fully exploit the situation, Hermione quickly continued, “He’s very good in- mmph!”
In those few steps, Snape had conjured up a gaudily wrapped box of chocolate (from where, she didn’t know, perhaps confiscated from a student? Because she was certain that Severus Snape would not have a box of chocolates in gauzy Valentine packaging ready to summon up at a moment’s notice) and then rapidly removed one to shove into her mouth.
Hermione promptly choked.
“If you’ll excuse us, Hermione appears to have been overcome by my unexpected display of Valentine spirit. Come along, my dear.” He grasped her arm and propelled her out into the corridor.
She frowned up at him as her jaw worked furiously and finally began to break down the giant slab of chocolate. If it had a liqueur center, which she utterly despised, she would make it her mission in life to match-make him with any and all eligible females that came within reach.
Fortunately for him, it had a lovely caramel center that she quite liked. But she was still annoyed, and that was not going to make up for his rude treatment of her. (Although she did plan to abscond with that box, because the chocolate was divine)
“Wha- wer- ou- inking?” she mumbled around her mouthful.
“I might ask you the same thing, Professor Granger. There was no need to create such a spectacle! Of course, one would expect nothing less from a Gryffindor.”
Hermione swallowed at last. “Well, that was your fault for picking me as your alibi, wasn’t it? There’s no shortage of female staff you could’ve chosen from, but you went with me.”
He sniffed disdainfully.
“I bet you were thinking that as your former student, I was more likely to meekly follow your lead?”
“I certainly know better now. You can be sure I will not call on you in the future.”
“Oh, don’t be like that, it worked out for the best! Celia’s going to be too embarrassed over propositioning a taken man to come anywhere near you.”
He looked mildly appeased at that.
“You can’t be too annoyed with me right now, or at least, you can’t afford to be. I’m your alibi for tomorrow after all. If I turn up at the ball in full view of the public, she may suspect she was played. As a Slytherin, I do believe you’re required to make nice with me right now.”
Hermione eyed the box of chocolates he still held, then looked back up at him meaningfully.
“Quite appalling,” he muttered as he handed it over. “Not even a shred of subtlety.”
“But I got what I wanted,” she said gleefully. “Now, where shall we meet tomorrow? Your quarters or mine?”
“The entrance to the school should suffice.”
“Such a romantic. Well, Severus, I look forward to being your Valentine.”
As she strolled sedately back into the staffroom, she imagined he probably wished he’d simply taken Celia up on her invitation after all. Hermione smirked. Finally, she had one-upped him! It was a delicious feeling. And she had him at her mercy the following evening as well…
Hermione popped another chocolate into her mouth in celebration. Life was good.
3013/30 = 100 points for Slytherin
Summary: When Snape is faced with a persistent admirer, Hermione steps in to 'help'. Snape disapproves.
Characters/Pairings: teensy traces of SSHG; short appearances by Ron, Ginny, Luna, Lavender, Minerva, OC.
Genre: crack humor
Rating/Warnings: PG
Word Count: 3013
Author's Note: Oh, bb, my humblest apologies for failing so hard! I make no excuses, I am just really, really sorry. >_< This is actually the second fic I’ve started, after the first one became way overambitious and I realized I had no hope of wrapping it up in any satisfactory way, and well, I’m not even sure how this one turned out, since it fought with me til the end, but at least I have something to show for myself, at long and much belated last. *shameface*
Between Two Points
A funny thing happened after the war. It became fashionable to champion Severus Snape. This was due in no small part to Hermione Granger’s unrelenting campaign to pressure the Ministry into freeing him from their custody. When he had been found barely clinging to life after the Final Battle, he had received treatment for his wounds before promptly being imprisoned with the other remaining Death Eaters.
Thus was born Hermione’s new cause, Assist Severus Snape, or A. S. S.
(“Ass?” sniggered Ron. “That suits the git all right.” Then with a thwack to the head and a death glare from the founder of A.S.S., he subsided and returned to trailing around in Hurricane Hermione’s wake as she worked on Snape’s defense)
The support of the Golden Trio and the aid of a heroic back-story- the notion of spending years as a triple agent was enough to prompt countless articles in various witch magazines on the brooding anti-hero- spurred on the majority of the Wizarding world to rally to Hermione’s cause. It wasn’t long before the Ministry bowed to the inevitable and Snape was released to become a free man and recipient of an Order of Merlin.
But he never did forgive Hermione for the unfortunate acronym attributed to the campaign. When she greeted him with the party assigned to release him with all due pomp and circumstance, he snidely informed her that if she was hoping for him to drop to his knees with gratitude, she needn’t hold her breath.
“It’s lucky I didn’t do this in the hopes of receiving thanks, otherwise I’d be sadly disappointed,” she sniffed, though secretly, Hermione had been hoping for at least a smidgen of respect or appreciation from the man whose praise she’d never managed to earn as a student.
Years later, when she wound up on the staff at Hogwarts working alongside the man, there still existed that prickly tension between the two of them, despite Hermione’s efforts to incite him to bury the hatchet- in spite of having no idea what the hatchet was. Personally, she thought some small part of him was grateful to her and his standoffish behavior was overcompensating for that because he thought it was beneath him to owe anything to a former student, a Gryffindor, no less. She imagined that he had resigned himself to being permanently mired in ill-fortune and that when something good happened to him for a change, it completely threw off his world-view and being confounded in such a way drove him to take it out on her.
“Or it’s possible I’m over-thinking it and he’s simply hated me ever since my first day just because I knew the answer when Harry didn’t and I interfered with his mission to humiliate him,” she rambled during a drinking session with Luna and Ginny to celebrate the latter’s engagement.
“Hermione, you really need to get over it,” Ginny told her briskly. “If you let him get to you, he wins. Just forget about him!”
“But I work with him,” Hermione wailed. “I see him every day for breakfast and dinner! And I tell myself I’m not going to react, but then this stupid irrepressible part of me surfaces occasionally that thinks that maybe today is the day I can change the dynamic between us and I open my mouth and then he completely shuts me down.”
“Nargles used to meet under pine trees to mate,” Luna noted. “Only that would attract the attention of their natural enemy, the squirrel. After nearly dying out, they finally altered their mating location to that of the mistletoe, which has the advantage of proximity to humans to-”
“Is this going somewhere, Luna?”
“If one form of behavior isn’t working for you,” she explained patiently, “perhaps you need to change it and try another. People could stand to learn a lot from observing Nargles.”
“She’s right,” Ginny chimed in. At Hermione’s incredulous stare, she shrugged, “Well, I don’t know about Nargles, but about changing your behavior if it’s a liability. Remember when I could never open my mouth around Harry because I was such a fangirl? You were the one that told me that I just had to behave like myself, that he’d never notice me if I was just another person awestruck by his celebrity. And it worked, when I relaxed and just was myself and treated him like any other person, that was when he started to become attracted to me.”
Hermione’s jaw dropped. “I’m not trying to attract Snape!”
“Mm-hmm.” Ginny coughed into her hand, a cough that suspiciously sounded like a muffled, “Liar.”
“Really! He just…he’s a challenge! It’s nothing more than that!”
Luna tilted her head and stared at Hermione with her peculiar piercing eyes.
“I need another drink,” Hermione groaned. “Bartender!”
Lavender shoved another Firewhiskey down the counter toward her, then leaned in to murmur confidentially, “In my experience, if a man is driving you to drink, it’s not nothing, Hermione.”
“I’m paying you for the drinks, Lavender, not the advice.”
“It’s on the house,” she said with a smile. “You really look like you need it, too.”
“Oh, shut it.” Hermione raised her glass. “Girls, why are we talking about my love-life? It’s meant to be Ginny’s night.”
“So you admit the dark and mysterious Severus Snape is a part of your love-life?” Ginny said slyly.
“No! That’s not- it isn’t- let’s get back to you, Gin!”
“Do you really want to hear about my love-life? All the intimate details about me and Harry? Because if you like, I can go into all the sinful, toe-curling-”
Hermione gagged. “He’s like my brother, you cow, stop right there.”
When she woke up the next morning and blearily fumbled her way to the Hangover Potion, the main thing she remembered from the previous night was that she had to stop giving a damn what Snape thought about her and behave like he was any other person, not the man whom she’d freed from prison after weeks of hard work with not a word of thanks in return. She then fell back into bed, brooding over Snape and how much she did not care about his opinion and how she was going to make sure he saw how little he affected her and she was going to get the better of him if it was the last thing she did.
XIXIXIXIXIXIXIX
Her opportunity came about in the most unexpected of ways.
A Ministry liaison had been assigned to Hogwarts in order to assess how well the school was operating and what additional funds might be necessary to restore it to its former glory. Several years after the Final Battle, there were still portions of the school that had not been rebuilt and besides, schools always had areas that required extra funding in order to turn out highly skilled and intelligent graduates.
Hogwarts was looking to expand its staff so as to ease the burden on the existing faculty, who juggled numerous roles which demanded a lot of time and effort, but this would only be possible if the report worked to the school's advantage. So Snape had good reason not to antagonize the liaison- as Potions master, Slytherin Head of House and Deputy Headmaster, he stood to gain if their budget allowed for additional staff.
The only problem was that Celia Blakely had developed an all-too obvious crush on him.
He blamed Hermione Granger- if she hadn’t fashioned him as a romantic anti-hero, valiantly working against the Dark Lord for his lost love, Lily Evans, he would never have been forced to deal with all the unwanted female attention whenever he went out in public. Even hidden away here in Hogwarts, he still had to regularly Incendio fanmail that arrived for him.
And now he was faced with an admirer that he could not afford to antagonize, one who was regularly at Hogwarts and managing to cross paths with him much too frequently. It taxed all his reserves of patience and cunning to find ways to avoid agreeing to any of her overtures without offending the woman. He was counting the days til she left and he could billow down the corridors in peace once more.
At last, her period of observation at Hogwarts drew to a close. The staff was called together for one final meeting to submit various reports and confer with her as to what they were seeking, if anything, and then she would be out of his hair!
However, he had reckoned without Minerva’s hidden capacity for cruelty.
“It has been such a pleasure having you here,” she told Celia. “I know that you must return to the Ministry, but as you are aware, we are holding a ball for Valentine’s Day and we would be happy to welcome you there, if you have no other commitments.”
As Celia murmured her acceptance, Snape agonizingly awaited yet another overture from her, no doubt galvanized by the romantic holiday celebration in the offing.
Sure enough… “Shall I see you there, Severus?” Celia asked him coyly. “It would be lovely to have a partner for the evening.”
He flinched. She had never been so blunt in her intentions before, perhaps out of a sense of professionalism, but it was clear with the conclusion of her duties here, that no longer provided any protection.
“I do not participate in such frivolous celebrations. I will be patrolling the grounds to ensure that the students are behaving appropriately, instead of engaging in youthful follies amongst the rose-bushes.”
“I’m sure that two heads will be better than one,” she offered eagerly. “If we were to walk the grounds together, it would be an even more efficient way of making certain the students aren’t getting up to mischief.”
“Ms Blakely has an excellent point, Severus,” said Minerva from the opposite of the table, smirking unrepentantly as he directed a scowl her way. “The two of you could team up on any trouble-makers and play Good Auror, Bad Auror.”
“I…” he paused, gaze travelling across the table as he attempted to compose a suitably mild and tactful (ie. non-budget-reducing) rejection.
Hermione shifted uncomfortably as his eyes landed on her at the corner of the table, from where she was watching the little sideshow with amusement. There was a minute twitch of his facial muscles, as though he pondered something distasteful, then his jaw set and he spoke.
“Regrettably, Ms Blakely, I have already made arrangements with another individual that must take precedence.”
Hermione’s eyes widened. He can’t be- he’s not about to…
Celia pouted. “Is that so? With whom, may I ask? Otherwise you’ll have me thinking you simply made up this person to avoid my company.”
Snape cleared his throat. “Not at all. In fact, it is Professor Granger who has graciously volunteered her time to patrolling the school.”
He did! Hermione was torn between cackling at the Potions master’s desperate attempt to thwart his admirer by calling upon her (and he must be at his wits’ end if he was throwing to her!) and wickedly wondering whether to play along or to put a spoke in his wheel by denying all knowledge of these supposed plans.
She raised her eyebrows at the foreboding gaze he was currently sporting, as though to intimidate her into going along with his claim. “Really,” she said in an even tone that neither confirmed nor denied anything. Really, Snape? I’m not a first year, you won’t get your way by bullying me into agreeing.
At his grimace, she guessed her message had sunk in, and his features shifted to a more neutral expression, which was as close as she was going to get to pleasant from Severus Snape. It was probably for the best, she decided. After all these years of hostility from him as a teacher and then (comparatively milder) disapproval from him as a colleague, she might actually faint if he were to smile at her.
“I could always relinquish my claim to you, if you preferred to accept Celia’s invitation,” she offered sweetly. “Now that you have other options, I’ll understand if you no longer want my company.”
"Of course I want you. Very much," he ground out through gritted teeth.
As the other teachers surreptitiously traded curious glances, Hermione thought that he might come to regret his choice of wording just a bit, especially given how she was about to twist them- for his own good, of course, not as a minor form of payback. Really, she reflected sanctimoniously, he should thank her because she was going to do him a huge favour and put an end to Celia’s advances toward him once and for all. (And if her methods made him squirm, that was no less than what he had coming to him)
“Is that so?” she said, warming up to her role in this charade. “It doesn’t feel that way. Sneaking around gets tiring after a time, you know. When the excitement of a clandestine affair wears off, a girl does begin to feel awfully unappreciated.”
This bombshell was met with varying reactions from those present. Minerva snorted. Sybill Trelawney dropped her crystal ball in shock. Aurora Sinistra discreetly elbowed Rolanda Hooch to keep her from giving into the giggles she was clearly trying to contain. And nonsensical scribbles accumulated on Flitwick’s parchment as he moved his quill about haphazardly to try and look preoccupied with his work while keeping his ears open to the drama unravelling before him.
“Professor Granger,” Snape said dangerously.
“Oh, no need to be so formal, Severus, we may as well lay all our cards out on the table.”
“So, the two of you…are…?” Celia asked tremulously.
“Oh, yes,” Hermione confirmed with a brilliant smile.
“I confess myself curious as to how long you and Hermione have managed to keep us all in the dark,” Minerva said in her usual no-nonsense tone, but a tiny quiver of her stiff upper lip told Hermione she was concealing just how much this farce at Snape’s expense was amusing her.
The man in question stared daggers at the two banes of his life, but bowed to the practicality of following Hermione’s lead in order to put off Celia. “Our…association has been very recently formed,” he said begrudgingly.
“Association,” Hermione repeated tragically. “It’s very hard to feel wanted with such a tepid word to describe our relationship. And even on Valentine’s Day, the most romantic day of the year, we’re merely going to be on duty to keep students from succumbing to teenage hormones.”
She heaved a sigh, and then channeled Ginny’s air of intimate satisfaction, “It’s just as well that in private-” Snape rose from his chair in a flurry and strode to her side. Certain that he was about to physically drag her from the room when she had not even begun to fully exploit the situation, Hermione quickly continued, “He’s very good in- mmph!”
In those few steps, Snape had conjured up a gaudily wrapped box of chocolate (from where, she didn’t know, perhaps confiscated from a student? Because she was certain that Severus Snape would not have a box of chocolates in gauzy Valentine packaging ready to summon up at a moment’s notice) and then rapidly removed one to shove into her mouth.
Hermione promptly choked.
“If you’ll excuse us, Hermione appears to have been overcome by my unexpected display of Valentine spirit. Come along, my dear.” He grasped her arm and propelled her out into the corridor.
She frowned up at him as her jaw worked furiously and finally began to break down the giant slab of chocolate. If it had a liqueur center, which she utterly despised, she would make it her mission in life to match-make him with any and all eligible females that came within reach.
Fortunately for him, it had a lovely caramel center that she quite liked. But she was still annoyed, and that was not going to make up for his rude treatment of her. (Although she did plan to abscond with that box, because the chocolate was divine)
“Wha- wer- ou- inking?” she mumbled around her mouthful.
“I might ask you the same thing, Professor Granger. There was no need to create such a spectacle! Of course, one would expect nothing less from a Gryffindor.”
Hermione swallowed at last. “Well, that was your fault for picking me as your alibi, wasn’t it? There’s no shortage of female staff you could’ve chosen from, but you went with me.”
He sniffed disdainfully.
“I bet you were thinking that as your former student, I was more likely to meekly follow your lead?”
“I certainly know better now. You can be sure I will not call on you in the future.”
“Oh, don’t be like that, it worked out for the best! Celia’s going to be too embarrassed over propositioning a taken man to come anywhere near you.”
He looked mildly appeased at that.
“You can’t be too annoyed with me right now, or at least, you can’t afford to be. I’m your alibi for tomorrow after all. If I turn up at the ball in full view of the public, she may suspect she was played. As a Slytherin, I do believe you’re required to make nice with me right now.”
Hermione eyed the box of chocolates he still held, then looked back up at him meaningfully.
“Quite appalling,” he muttered as he handed it over. “Not even a shred of subtlety.”
“But I got what I wanted,” she said gleefully. “Now, where shall we meet tomorrow? Your quarters or mine?”
“The entrance to the school should suffice.”
“Such a romantic. Well, Severus, I look forward to being your Valentine.”
As she strolled sedately back into the staffroom, she imagined he probably wished he’d simply taken Celia up on her invitation after all. Hermione smirked. Finally, she had one-upped him! It was a delicious feeling. And she had him at her mercy the following evening as well…
Hermione popped another chocolate into her mouth in celebration. Life was good.
3013/30 = 100 points for Slytherin