Title: Clear Colour
Author: Agent M
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: None
Disclaimer: Don't own anything that isn't mine. "Clear Colour" is by Limp
Archive: Tainted Wings (www.colourovers.net/wings) anyone else, just ask.
Notes: Song fic, Snape POV, Sympathetic!Snape and Self Pity!Harry, both quite ooc

He's staring over there again. Every day it's the same. He watches one of them intently, studying their very essence. I notice the most at meals and in my class, but you can see it in the halls. Flanked by his sidekicks, talking in their own little world, together without him, he trains his eyes on one and watches.

As much as I would love to call him on it, point out that he is looking at his enemies, I can't bring myself to do it. Maybe I'm going soft, but I feel the need to leave this alone for a while. So, while he watches them I watch him. What is he thinking? Why the critical study? I know enough to tell that it isn't him studying, searching for weaknesses or flaws. It is more like appraisal, and even at times respect. And for the life of me I cannot figure out why.

Today my class is working individually on a midterm project so I cannot help them. Instead I take the time to observe him. To try to grasp what might be going on in that head and understand what he is looking for, if anything. And despite myself I know I need to ask him about it. Not intrudingly, not critically, just as a concerned party. So, I tell him to stay after class.

His sidekicks go on without him, with only the briefest look back at him.

"You've been awfully distracted lately," I say.

He looks at me with a combination of fear and confusion on his face.

"How do you mean?" He asks.

"I have been noticing some things. Noticing who you watch." His expression is priceless, and if I didn't, for some unknown reason want to sincerely help him, I would have laughed. "Don't worry. You aren't in trouble. You have done nothing wrong."

"So, why are you…?"

"Let's just say I'm mildly concerned." Again the look is priceless. "Look, you don't have to tell me anything. I am the only one who seems to notice. I could be helpful to you, you know."

"Thank you," He says looking down as if ashamed.

I laugh. "I realize that you are most likely confused about my attitude towards you right now, but things change and certain situations merit certain actions, you understand."

"Yes, sir."

"Very well. Remember, my offer to help stands."

He turns to walk out the door.

"Thank you, Professor Snape," He says so quietly I almost don't hear him.

"Of course, Potter."

And he is gone.

Three weeks later I look up from grading papers and he is standing in the doorway to my office. It's about an hour before dinner and I would expect him to be in his common room now.

"Is there something you wanted, Potter?" I ask.

"I've come to take you up on your offer," he says rather nervously.

"Do come in," I say. "Now, what is it you wanted to talk about?"

"Well, you have apparently noticed my interest in the Slytherins," he sounds like he is gaining more confidence as he speaks.

"That I have. So what is it about?"

"Did you know that the Sorting Hat wanted to put me in Slytherin?" He asks suddenly.

"It what?" I was not expecting this. Harry Potter, the noble Gryffindor, and almost in Slytherin! That explains some things.

"And I probably would have gone there without a fight if I hadn't met Ron. But now…" He looks away as if he is embarrassed.

"You are wondering what your life would have been like if you were in Slytherin?" I ask, but it's more of a fact than a question.

"Well, yes."

Which one do you want to be like and do you want to be liked by one of them?
What's wrong with the way you are now and it is hard to be the way you are?

He suddenly gets out of his seat and beings to pace in front of my desk.

"I mean, maybe I shouldn't have argued. Maybe there was a reason that Slytherin was the Hat's first choice. What if I messed everything up? What if I was supposed to shake Malfoy's hand when he offered me friendship on the train 6 years ago? What if that would have changed things?" He is talking fast and breathing shallowly as if he is about to faint.

"Harry, sit down."

He plops into his seat no doubt surprised at the use of his first name and turns a little red when he realizes what he has just said to me.

"Look. I can see this is really troubling you. But you were also put into Gryffindor for a reason, so you need to look past that. But this does explain why you have been looking at my house so critically. Wondering what it would be like for you. I'm sure you and Draco would have been great friends." He looked a little hurt at this. "Is something wrong?"

"That has been the thing I have been regretting the most," he confessed. "The first time I met him, when we were eleven getting our robes fitted, he seemed arrogant, but not bad. Then when he offered his friendship it was more Ron that pushed him away than I did. But things could have been so much different. It's bad enough to have Voldemort after you, but to have your own personal 'arch-nemesis' at school as well? Rather tiring, it is."

"I see," I say.

"God, I must sound so stupid just pouring this out, especially to you. No offence, but we haven't ever gotten along. I just needed to talk to someone. Ron and Hermione, well, I don't think they would understand. I mean, Ron comes from a line of Gryffindors and Hermione doesn't question the wisdom of the Hat. Besides, Ron would probably think I was a traitor."

"You've grown apart?" I ask.

"You could say that."

"'Or perhaps in Slytherin, you'll make your real friends'" I quote the Hat.

I know I've been through this before and so will you go through it; you'll have your day.
Find out what you have on your mind and have a spine to stand up and chose your way.

He raises his head and looks at me as if I had stabbed him.

"You really aren't friends any more are you?" I ask him. He shakes his head slowly. "What happened?"

I don't expect him to answer and I'm surprised that he was willing to tell me anything more personal than what he had already shared.

"I never had any friends before Hogwarts. My cousin made sure of that, so naturally I clung to the first person I truly met, which was Ron. I should have known that it wouldn't have worked out. He was always a bit jealous of me I think, even besides the obvious times he showed it during the Tri-Wizard Tournament and during Quidditch. As for Hermione, I was never that close to her. He was a tag-a-long from the start then her and Ron happened and thigs went down hill from there. I became the third wheel. Outcast because of fame I didn't want, and being the way I am."

"That's why the left so quick today?" I questioned purposely ignoring his last statement about being the way he was.

"Right," He's staring at his hands. "So, I really have no other true friends. No one likes me for me. They like me because I'm the Boy-Who-Lived, or they hate me because I'm the Boy-Who-Lived. I can't win. It's not fair.

"And every time I see the Slytherins walking together they seem to have some brilliant bond to each other. Not at all the way I used to look at them thinking they were all plotting and evil. There's something else there."

"Yes there is, Harry."

"I just wish I knew something like that." He looked as if he was about to cry.

"Potter, pull yourself together." I said harsher than I meant to, but I was feeling way too uncomfortable with him like that. "You can't go around wanting to be in Slytherin, or keep up your staring act. People will begin to notice and nothing good can come of that."

He nodded.

There had to some reason this was such a big deal to him. It would take more than an argument with Ron and Hermione to make him come talk to me, to open himself up so much. But it was obvious he really had no other choice. Sirius was a die-hard Gryffindor and Dumbledore was also in Gryffindor, although I figure Harry should still talk to the latter about this.

"You are only here for two more years, Harry. You can make it." And that's when he lost it.

"Don't you understand?!" He yelled. "This is my only home and I don't feel comfortable in it anymore. Ron hardly speaks to me anymore and I am practically being ostracized for being gay! And I haven't even acted on it! I just want to be welcomed somewhere. I just want to know what its like to be happy."

He started to cry and I looked away.

"I never wanted to be the Boy-Who-Lived. I was so happy when I found out that I was going to leave the Dursley's and then I become famous for something I don't remember and find out that my life is really just one series of bad events after another. My parents are dead, my godfather has been convicted of a crime he didn't commit, my so-called best friends hardly talk to me, an evil wizard is out for my life for some unknown reason resulting in the death of one of my classmates, and all for what? So that I can be picked out where ever I go? So people can stare and whisper. And all I want, all I have ever wanted is a real friend."

Not fair. Never will be for you, not supposed to be that easy for us.
Try hard, try to keep it in line and by the time you get it won't matter then.

I didn't know how to react to this. I knew Harry disliked his fame, but when he spelled it out like that, his life was anything but filled with the pleasantries that should accompany fame. Instead Harry was just a lost boy who wanted a friend.

I could feel the walls I built up shattering against my will. There was no way I could stand there and watch this boy pour out his heart and not do anything. Almost against my will I went over to him and did the first thing that came to mind. I hugged Harry.

He stiffed at first, I would have too, then he relaxed and sobbed into my chest.

"Harry, I'm sorry." I said quietly. "It's going to be ok."

He looked up at me and wiped his eyes, "What do you have to be sorry for. It's not your fault."

"You know I haven't made your life easier in any way."

He just shrugs and says, "You keep me on my feet. Sure you treat me differently because of my fame, but it's not the same."

He's right. I do treat him different because of his fame, but also because of who he is. Or rather who is father was. And I know that is very selfish of me to hold such a grudge on a person who has nothing to do with it, but then again I am not a very nice person, normally. Or rather I try not to be.

"You should talk to Dumbledore," I say.

"What would I tell him? 'Professor Dumbledore, I respect you more than anything, and this isn't an insult to your house or anything, but I was wondering what it would be like for me to be in Slytherin'? I'm sure that would go over well."

"Dumbledore is the most understanding man in the world, Harry. I don't think you could ever disappoint him. And on top of everything else, I would wager that he already knows."

"I guess," He looks completely dejected, like he finally realized that talking to Dumbledore is his only option and it would kill him to do it.

"It'll all work out in the long run," I say and wonder where I got such a line. Oh, right. Dumbledore.

It was the very line he said to me when I came to him and asked to be a spy. He had looked at me with that twinkle in his eye and said, "It will all work out in the long run." And I hope he was right.

Harry just gives me a sad smile and stand up, "Thank you for everything."

I nod to him and he walks out of my office.

So long, hope you have a good life. Don't take advise from me or from anyone.
So long, gonna fall on your face just like I did and just like everyone.

I can only hope that he is going to talk to Dumbledore or, as much as I would hate to see it, the Dream Team gets back together. Maybe it's the fact that I can see so much of myself in him. So much of a lost soul with no true friends getting forced into something that isn't right for them. For Harry Gryffindor seemed like such a great idea at first. It took him five years to realize that he might have been wrong. For me it was the Death Eaters, but it still took me five years to realize that I was living a lie.

Dumbledore was the one person in the world who could help me. Though it hurt more than helped at first, Dumbledore is the reason I am alive today. And maybe he can do the same for Harry as well. I can only hope…

-end-

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