This is my very first Hermione/Snape fan fiction.

I should warn you - I'm not particularly a fan of the pairing, although I know a lot of people are, so I thought I'd give it a go and see how the story turns out. All in all, I'm still not convinced about the two of them. That being said - it was surprisingly fun to write! In my head I planned out a dramatic, passionate storyline, but as I typed it up I found myself laughing at every other paragraph, so if it happens to be dramatically cringe-worthy, just know that it's all part of the story. :)

Basically, the bookish, brainy Hermione has a hidden wild side - a side that has driven her to develop an infatuation, which she has secretly possessed for some time now, over her Potions teacher, Severus Snape. Unable to deal with the strength of her love, she summons the courage to let her feelings be known to hopefully ease the strain on her heart, but does not fully consider the consequences of her actions!

Hermione Granger and Severus Snape are both the property of J.K. Rowling.

Confessions of an Insufferable Know-It-All

Dear Diary,

(and, forgive me, Dear Heart,)

This is it. This is the day. This is the day I finally ask Severus Snape for 'Remedial Potions' classes. This is the day that I finally ...

Oh, no - please do not assume I am suddenly suffering a lapse in intelligence, and that I actually need extra help refining my potion-making abilities. On the contrary; I pride myself on being the most able-body and able-minded student in our class. Forgive my immodesty, but I know this to be true - I have analysed the grades list from last term and my name was enscripted in thick black ink on the top of the list. My name. Hermione Granger. Etched with firm, accute precision with a 3.1 quill I imagine, held with confidence and control by its quillman. Held, pinched and positioned, by those long, moonstone pale ...

I sigh, leaning against the embroidered drape over the stone wall, watching a gaggle of first year students racing down the corridor, presumably having been released from their lesson.

'So young, so naïve,' I think to myself, my head falling to the side as I watch them skipping and prancing along. 'So carefree.' I sigh once more.

I cling onto my leatherbound books and nod slowly, recalling my scripted conversation in my head. I must talk about his last issued essay on 'The Properties of Eckleweed Root and How They Are Effective', and discuss the difficulties I experienced whilst writing the essay. I simply must talk about how I believe my potion-making skills have taken a nose-dive since the beginning of term. Indeed I must assure Severus that he is the only Professor who can save me from my predicament.

He will assume, of course, that the predicament beholding me is my failing grades. Oh, the humanity!

Yes, these are the depths I have succomb to. I, Hermione Granger, have taken the sacrifice to hold my Hogwarts grades on the Unforgiveable line in the name of ... of ...

"Miss Granger, do you intend to clutter my doorway all day long? Or merely for the duration of the afternoon?"

That voice. A shiver runs down my spine like a spider scurrying across the flagstone floor. Heat rushes into my cheeks like the very flames he sparked and tamed to brew his magnificent potions.

"Professor, I have been meaning to talk to you," I begin, focusing upon his dark eyebrows, noting that one raises in a questioning fashion. "I should like to enquire as to whether you are still offering extra potions lessons?" I pause, now watching his eyebrow lower. I dare not look directly into his eyes. If happen to become lost in those bottomless pools of liquorice I fear I may drown and never again emerge. "I understand you have been offering them to Harry - I mean - Mister Potter."

His brows furrow, and he gazes at me intently for a moment. "Indeed," he says eventually, his voice clipped and hard. "Miss Granger, I find it inexcusably hard to believe that, out of all my students, you require further aid with your potions." He folds his arms, having not yet blinked, still staring down at me. "As much as it grieves me to admit it - you are my highest achieving student."

Against all my will power and control, a rush of fire burns in my cheeks. "If I may, Professor. I should like to discuss this. I fear I may need to relinquish that title. If you would please take the time," I swallow, now looking into his eyes. Those eyes. "I should like to discuss my last essay, if that is at all possible?"

Severus bores down upon me, before unfolding his arms and stretching the nearest one out to hold open the heavy dungeon door, not once flinching or wobbling from the weight of the thick, hinged, wooden timber.

"Come in," he gives me a final sweeping stare and signals with his other hand for me to enter the classroom.

I inhale heavily, then step inside, heading towards his desk at the front of the classroom. And then I hear the door swing closed and lock with a 'clunk'. His footsteps echo behind me. As I patter along the stone floor I am suddenly aware of his eyes upon. Those eyes, glazing me like a sharp, shining frost in the midst of mid-winter. I am fully aware we are both alone, with only the dungeon walls as witnesses. Oh, if something should happen ...

Finally we reach the desk. I take a step and lean, aiming to pull along a chair from the nearby bench.

"This will only be a short visit, Miss Granger. There will be no need to get too comfortable."

My cheeks burn once more. How thankful I am that the dungeons are so poorly lit.

"Do you have the essay?" he asks me flatly. Breathlessly I scatter my books out and flick through until three pages of parchment curl into view.

"Here," I breathe.

He accepts the essay, snatching it from the ends of the paper, as swift as the wind. "I shall review it, and we shall discuss it later tonight."

I blink at him. Tonight?

"Forgive me, Professor," I begin, "but I was under the impression you held your potion lessons with Harry on-"

"I do not intend to offer my teachings to all and sundry on a weekly basis, like some sort of trivial club, Miss Granger. May I assure you, this service is a one-off and an exclusive. Mister Potter's ... skills," he sniffs, "are, perhaps, beyond even my expert help, however Professor Dumbledore has issued his permission and approval, therefore I shall not argue and I shall do all I can." His lip curls. Those lips. "I doubt your academic performance should ever reach to Mister Potter's critical level. But, if you insist upon discussing it with me, I offer you a meeting tonight at half past nine." There is a dramatic pause. "Should I expect you ... or not?"

I stand up straight. "I'll be there," I reply in a small voice. I take this as my cue to turn around and head out of the dungeon. Once again, the feeling of being watched, being cloaked by his deep, black gaze, summons all the oxygen from my lungs. Finally, I reach the door. "Goodbye, Professor," I look around back at him. Alas, his attentions are focused upon tidying paperwork and parchment on his desk.

I close the door, careful not to bang it as it locks, and let my weight fall against the door. I cling tightly to my books, holding them against my trembling upper-torso.

"I shall see you tonight!"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxx

"Where are you going at this time? Why have you got all your books with you? Are you wearing make-up?!" I ignore Ron as his tone grows more and more incredulous. "Seriously, where are you going? Have you got a study-date or something? Batting your eyelashes amongst the books, and pouting amongst the parchment?" he snorts and laughs, revelling in his own tactless humour. Oh Ron. Plain, silly, inadequate Ronald.

"Where I choose to go in the evenings is none of your business, thank you very much," I retort, glaring at him.

"Seriously, Hermione, where are you going?" Harry turns around in his chair by the fire, leaning around to see me cross the common room, clutching my bag crammed tightly with books, books which, unbeknownst to them, had been shoved in at the last minute for appearance's sake.

I sigh, unable to conjure up a worthy story or excuse. "If it concerns you both that much," I breathe in, pulling the collar of my robes high up so that no inch of what clothed me beneath them was revealed. "I've been invited to attend extra potions lessons."

Ron does a double take and shakes his head, his matted red hair flying about across his flat forehead. "What?!"

Harry merely blinks at me. "Hermione, why on earth would you need extra potions lessons? You're the best one in the class. You did mine and Ron's essays last night, and even offered to show us how to make a Hiccuping Remedy properly after we got it wrong in the lesson."

I breathe slowly, and face the two boys. "It's merely to maintain my high academic performance and to ensure my grades do not fall."

Ron scoffs. "Hermione, if you're about to start flunking, then we've got no chance. I may as well just send an owl to Snape now and tell him I quit his stupid lessons," he holds his hands upon behind his head and sinks his head into them.

I shake my head at him. "I wouldn't expect you to understand. By then, Harry."

I do not wait for him to respond, I simply lift up my bag onto my shoulder with authority and strut out of the common room, wiggle through the portrait hole and head along the corridor. And then my nerves hit me like a rouge bludger.

This is it. This is the night. This is the moment in history when I confess my love: my undying, unyielding, unalterable love, passion and obsession with Severus Snape. Every step I take leads me closer to my heart's destination and destiny. I simply wonder whether this destiny lies in the robust yet graceful arms of my Potions Master, or rather shattered into a million pieces and cascaded carelessly across the boulevard of broken dreams.

My feet carry me as if I am as light as air, and yet my heart beats as heavily as a pounding bass drum. The dungeon door nears closer and closer, the chunky metal door handle catching the light of the grey toned flickering wall torches. Finally, I am standing outside the door.

I knock once, twice, three times against that famous wooden door. The one I have walked through countless times before. The one he held open for me earlier today, allowing me room to brush by him and feel the silken texture of those flowing ink black robes skim past my cloaked forearm. I can still feel it tingling.

"Enter."

'This is it, Hermione,' I reassure myself, curling my trembling fingers around the cold metal door handle. 'The time has come - and cannot be postponed a moment longer.'

"Good evening, Professor," I poke my head from behind the door first, before stepping along for the rest of me to follow. My free hand reaches up to hold my robes together, my other hand still gripping tightly to the door handle.

"Miss Granger," his beetle black eyes are reduced to slits, his face is cold and his tone is even colder. "Please take a seat," he spits, stabbing his hand towards the wooden stool positioned directly opposite his own plush velvet arm chair. All that is there to separate us is his hefty wooden desk. Upon it I recognise my own neatly curving handwriting on three pieces of parchment.

Without waiting to be ordered twice, I leave the door to swing shut behind me and shuffle along to the desk, where Severus stands, tall, dark and brilliantly angry.

"Sit."

I nervously perch on the edge of the stool, feeling its weak wooden legs wobble as I apply my weight. There is not one ounce of warmth in his flint face. His features are hard and cold as if they have been carved from ice. He is not amused.

"This," he snatches up my essay and thrusts it towards me, "is the worst essay I have ever had the displeasure of reading in all my years of teaching potions." He slams it back down on the desk, causing my heart to leap and my body to jump up on the stool. "It's even worse than Weasley's essay on The Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Irkstone in Modern Potion Making, and that amounted to a Dreadful back in his second year." He leans forwards across the desk to stare deeply into my wide, watering eyes. "Would you care to explain this appalling collaboration of disasterous basic potion making knowledge and severely substandard potions terminology?"

I freeze, my breath catching in my throat, as if his icy white hands have closed their grip around my air pipes.

"I - I" I gabble. I feel faint. I cannot breathe. Oh, Severus, you have stolen my breath!

"This essay is not only a disgraceful display of poor knowledge and evaluation. This essay may be received as a reflection of difficient teaching. As a student who has, across their years at Hogwarts, displayed a high standard of sense and intelligence, this pitiful essay would suggest to me," he rises from his chair, his eyes firy and alive, burning, burning into my own, "that my teaching, that my knowledge, that my classes which explore and illustrate the sublime, elegant and commanding art of potion making have been floundered, dashed, and above all flamed and insulted."

I close my eyes, my shoulders now rising and falling at a dangerous rate. Oh, stop, Severus. Stop before my heart caves in!

"Miss, Granger," he leans closer still. I feel his cold breath caress my face, resting on my skin like a blanket of winter snow masking a dewy autumn glade. "You have angered me in a way no other student in this school has - in a way I never thought I could be enraged."

I reopen my eyes. Those eyes. Oh, sweet Merlin, those devouring, enflamed onyxes, purging my soul of all it's sound sanity.

I open my mouth to draw in a final shallow breath.

"You, Miss Granger," his voice an icy hiss, yet once again resuming its natural silky tone, "are a very, very, bad student."

"Say that again?" I whisper. Not because my sense of hearing has faltered me. Simply because I need desperately to hear it one more time.

Severus blinks, his expression smoothing, his eyebrows relaxing, his voice lowering, lowering to a soft, snowy whisper.

"You," he breathed "are a very, very bad student."

Oh, holy mother of Merlin. That's it. I'm there. 'Oh, please, one more time.' My eyes shut and my head falls back. 'Once more.'

"Once more," I gasp, heaving my chest.

His head tilts to the side, his shiny curtain of black hair swooping across one side of his face. I lift my head back up and look back at him through misty eyes. At that point I know. I know he has seen it. He can see everything I have hidden up until now. He stands up straight. He is not smiling. His face is still hardened. Only it is hardened with a dark, desperate determination I have never seen etched so deeply across a human's face.

With one swooping stride he steps around the desk and stands before me, the fire alive and flaring in his eyes. Those eyes.

"You," his breath is hard, "are," his voice now shakes. Now I shake. My eyes widen. I was not expecting this. No! I was not expecting this at all! Oh sweet almighty mother of Merlin, this is further than what I had imaged or dreamed. This could be dangerous. No - this is dangerous. I should flee. I should surely flee before the very worst occurs and all my sense of sanity and morality are cast out of the arched windows outside and my inflamed ensnared senses take a hold of my throbbing heart.

"... a very ..."

He swoops before me. I stand. I abandoned my bags. I make to head for the door. His arms, his arms swooping like bats' wings, reach out. His ice white hands seize me.

" ... very ... "

I freeze, held tightly within Severus's hold, his fingers gripping into my forearms. I feel his breath once more. It is as cold, hard and commanding as the winter wind. And yet a fire commands it like never before.

" ... bad ..."

I shut my eyes tight and wince, awaiting with mingled fear and climaxing excitement the final ice stone blow.

" ... young girl, Miss Granger." I open my eyes. His voice has softened to silk. His ice breath is still. His hard eyes are soft and wandering. What is this magic?

As Severus's penetrating anger is lifted, so is my guard. Having being seized and drawn close to him, I feel my hair fan around my face, curly and ruffled, and I feel my robes slip down my shoulders. I know now that the lace, shoe-string straps of my dress will now be on display. I see his pervading eyes wander from my pale pink face down to my shoulders, scanning across where my usual shirt and tie would be, where snowy pale skin now shone out against the bleak charcoal of the dungeon classroom.

At that moment, I feel Severus's thumb lift up. While his fingers still firmly grip my forearms, planting me firmly in front of him, I feel his thumb stroke over the fabric of my creased robes. His thumb brushes over it again, and I feel my robes lower further. His thumb, now strokes across my bare forearm. My skin beneath his thumb tingles with more combined fear and anticipation. I fear his touch - yet I crave his touch. His eyes move back up and they search my own eyes once more.

Still, not one word is uttered between the two of us. The one candle that has been flickering and flowing in the damp dungeon air finally dies, leaving a spiral of smoke to swirl above it, leaving the two of us alone in the near darkness. And still, despite the lack of light, I clearly see eyes, those dark, brilliant, blindingly black eyes. They corner me; they consider me; they calculate me. Those eyes have stripped me, opened me and are now ready to penetrate me.

Our breath mingles into the dungeon air as vapour, rushing from our mouths to fan out into the open air of the dungeon. How can such heat, passion and danger erupt from such cold, hard stone?

In one instant, his hands glide smoothly up my arms, leaving my robes to slide further down to my elbows, and his ivory hands cup the sides of my face. My incessant fear and anxious need to run away is defeated by my darkening desire to strip away all evidence of the school girl Hermione, and reveal to the tall, dark man before me every essence and fibre of my being that wishes to love him and be with him without fear of judgement or rejection.

I close me eyes, breathe deeply, and cross over my arms to push down my robes and abandon them to fall to the flagstone floor. I stand a still as stone, my eyes still closed, aware that I now stood, free from any form of defence or guard, in my little black dress with the lacy straps and piping and sheer skirt, skimming mid-way across my thighs in my best evening shoes; aware that Severus's fantastic eyes are taking in every single pore of me. Each glance is fingerprint upon my flesh.

"What is this all about, Miss Granger?" Severus whispers, in a voice I do not recognise, in a tone I have never heard utter within all the walls of Hogwarts school.

Still with my innocent eyes closed, I inhale once more, with all the confidence my heart can muster. "If you want me ... you can have me. Here." I open my eyes, not widening them, but forcing them to pierce through Severus Snape's with deep, undying determination. "Now."

Possibly to combat my newly accomplished confidence, or maybe, just maybe, because the notion momentarily intrigued him or even excited him, I felt him bring me, once again, even closer. I now feel every breath he takes against my forehead. His breath is not so cold any more.

"Have me and hold me, Professor Snape." My senses have exploded. "For this one night - I am yours." I let my head loll back once more.

Slowly, Severus's fingers trace down either side of me, to rest them back upon my arms. His finger tips leave a trail of goosebumps as they slip down me. I close my eyes and bite my lips, awaiting whatever came next. Whatever comes next. I am throbbing with flaming anticipation.

His hands move with strength and swiftness to my waist. All of a sudden I am being lifted. I am lifted high, his fingers digging into my flesh to keep a hold of me as I am momentarily suspended in his arms. And then the hard wooden surface of the table bangs down beneath me. In a matter of two seconds Severus pulls me in close. Closer than before.

My chest now heaves against his own. He pulls me right in from the hips, guiding in my pelvis, then his hands race up and all over me to grasp my head to face him. He handles me without fear, pulling me in with cool control. Severus is now in complete control. I melt within his grasp, allowing myself to finally become a slave unto his crafting caressing hands. His cloaked torso rubs fiercley against my own as his hands press into me. I would fall back upon the desk. But no. He presses down into me, holding me firmly against him. Enslaved within his arms I am.

My dress is scrunched up and creased, and my legs dangle of the edge of the table, the insides of my legs feeling the same silky fabric of his robes and trousers brushing up against them. My heart is melting. Dripping.

He holds me with all the authority I dreamt of - with all the power and passion a Potions Master may possess. He forces my head upwards and brings his face towards mine. I feel him take all control of me. I am breathlessly but beautifully open, powerless and under his control.

His eyes are not closed. They are open. They are penetrating me farther than a dagger. His lips are but an inch away from my own.

I wait.

He waits.

I feel him breathing upon my lips.

Oh, Severus.

I breathe a shallow sigh against his lips. I close my eyes. I await the kiss I had envisioned in my dreams for four years. I feel the hands I watched countless times fondling tools and flicking pages of parchment now press down into my cold virgin skin. For a fleeting split second I feel the mouth - the mouth that uttered my name so many times since I first stepped inside Hogwarts - brush against mine. I can taste him.

Only for a second.

I wait. I wait for his lips to meet mine once more.

Just once more.

'Please, just one more,' I wish.

"Please," I whisper.

Then I feel him let go of me.

I open my eyes.

I watch Severus Snape take a step away from me. He stares intently at me for one more second, then he bends down to collect something from the ground.

From behind me, a drape of fabric is wrapped around my shoulders. I do not need to look behind me. I know Severus is standing there, draping my robes back over my bare shoulders, covering me up against the cold of the classroom.

"It would be wrong, Miss Granger," he said, once again adopting his smooth, professional manner. "Although in many ways you remind me of her, in other ways ..." he paused, " ... you do not."

Without moving my head, my eyes veer to my side, hoping to see a glimpse of my precious Potion Master once more before the night is over.

"But you are not her. You will never be her."

From behind, he takes hold of my shoulders, with a gentility that was never present before, and eases me off his desk.

"And if I cannot have her ... I cannot have anyone."

His voice is now broken. It is not cold any more. Yet it is empty.

From this moment I know - or rather, come to understand - that there is an emptiness within Severus Snape's soul that not even I can fill. No matter how much I long - I simply cannot.

And not another word is utter. Without casting a glance at him, I pick up the handle of my bag and drag it across the floor, not even caring to secure it on my shoulder. I pat across the floor in my heels, pull open the dungeon door and step through it.

I hear the door close behind me. I hear the lock click. I hear the hoot of a far off owl, and realise I am back in the open corridor, standing all alone, the light from the full moon filtering through the narrow glass windows at the very end of the corridor, leading up to the staircase.

In a vacant trance I walk back to the common room. Several smiling students pass me on my journey, looking at me quizzingly. Professor McGonagall spots me, eyes me wearily up and down and instructs me to make for the Griffindor common room as quickly as possible. Mrs Norris spies me heading up onto the moving staircase, heading back to greet the Fat Lady, who sits dosing in her painting.

"Hickory Hollow" I whisper. The door swings open.

Without regarding Ron snoring opposite the fire, or Harry fuming over his Divination homework, or Ginny teasing Crookshanks with ribbons trailing from her wand, I trail on in a dream-like state up to my dormitory.

I stand still, I let myself fall backwards, and feel my bed groan beneath me.

I do not care that my hair is a mess and my lipstick is smudged across my cheek, nor that I still have my strappy shoes on my icy feet, nor that I lie on my bed in my little black dress and best robes.

The realistic part of me always knew that Severus Snape could not love me. And yet I never could have dreamed or imagined the real reason why.

Oh, forgive me, heart, forgive me! This heartbreak I have imposed upon myself. And this time round time cannot be undone. I pray this night is never revealed. Forgive me, Severus. Forgive me, heart. Oh sweet Merlin, forgive me.

So - did I, from that moment, move on with my life and refine my priorities to my studies and my friends? Yes.

Did I ever forget that that night every happened? No. I knew I could not forget. And for as long as I live it shall be scarred upon my memory. Possibly not in the shape of a lightning bolt, but as an unhealed scar all the same.

Shall a defiant fragment of my heart irrationally, indefinitely and eternally love Severus Snape?

Always.

Hermione Jean Granger.