As I look over to the man I love, a sense of surrealness washes over me. He's out there in the back yard of the Burrow with the men of the Weasley clan, Harry and Remus while the ladies are here, inside the kitchen catching up on the latest gossip before Sunday lunch. All the kids are for once, sitting as still as kids can, spellbound by the twins' newest invention. Only little Dominique seems to have no interest as she trundles her way to my fiancée who is in deep conversation with Remus, yanking on his coat to get his attention. Severus looks down his nose at her with a look that would easily scare many students but seems to have absolutely no effect on this 4 year old as she merely holds out her hand, waiting for him to take the daisy that she had picked from it. I smile at his look of wonderment, his face softening its sharp look as he carefully takes it from her with a murmured 'thank you'. She breaks out into a toothy smile before running back into her father's awaiting arms.

If someone had ever told me that I would be marrying Severus Snape in 6 days, I would have requested they be committed to the Janus Thickey ward at St Mungos. Right now though that thought leaves me as nervous as Buckbeak in front of strangers, but so happy I could cry, and have done so frequently since he asked me 5 months ago.

*flashback*

I'm lying against him in his arms watching our fingers intertwine after a really intense bout of lovemaking. "Hermione?" he says softly. "Mmm?" "I…er…." He fades off. I turn slightly to look at him. "What is it Sev?" "I wanted to ask you something." "Yes?" "Will you erm..?" He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Opening them with a determined look on his face he brings our hands together, briefly kissing my fingers before saying, "I love you more than anything else in this world and I know that this relationship has not been easy, I have not been easy, but my life would mean absolutely nothing without you in it." He reached with his free hand for a small box on his bedside table that I could swear wasn't there before...,opening it to a simple yet beautiful silver sapphire ring with tiny diamonds on either side. "This isn't the way I planned to do this but I think my heart would burst if I kept it in any longer." I move off him to face him fully. "I'm old and cranky and being married to me will not be a walk in the park but, I simply cannot live without you. Will you marry me?" The tears that formed in my eyes in the few seconds of his declaration start to blur my vision. "Yes Severus, nothing in this world would make me happier." The relief on his face as he slowly slips the ring onto my finger is palpable. "By the way, I don't think you are that old, more like fine wine, you just get better with age" I giggled. "Cheeky minx" he laughed and grabbed me, pulling me in for a sweet chaste kiss.

The path to get here though was…strange. After the final battle, when the dust had finally settled, we were surprised to learn that Severus was recovering in the hospital ward. Guilt had welled up in me then, realising that we could have probably saved him, but didn't. We had honestly thought that he was already gone when we left the Shrieking Shack. It turns out that Draco had followed us in a misguided attempt to help Harry in return for saving his life in the Room of Requirement. He found Severus after we left, at first also presuming he was dead, before hearing low but definite breathing coming from him. He was supposed to have died, he told me once, he should have but he just didn't. He forgave us of course, said he never expected anyone to stay or come back for him. I could not forgive myself so easily.

I came back to finish my seventh year after all the restorations on the castle were done. Harry and Ron opting for the honorary pass that the Ministry was so eager to give, a.k.a the easy way out. Ha, why was I not surprised! It took years of my admitted nagging to even get them to do their homework, don't even get me started on studying for exams…. Harry joined the Ministry as an Auror and Ron, the Chudley Canons, a lifelong dream coming true for him.

At this time Severus was…hiding. Yes, that's the appropriate word for it. He was under the assumption that the entire wizarding world either hated him and wished for his death or wanted to save him and marry him. He couldn't decide which was worse. He sequestered himself off at his home in Spinner's End and adamantly refused Professor McGonagall's guilt ridden offer for him to return as Headmaster; also forgiving her for running him out of the castle. It wasn't her fault after all, he had had a part to play and he had played it well. The only person he had spoken more than a few words to was Draco and Harry and that too only because of the Boy-Who-Lived-Twice's persistence.

I was allowed to take my NEWT's just 3 months into the school year, courtesy of Headmistress McGonagall. School was still important, just not as important as it used to be to me. So much had happened and we had all changed. There were more important things in life than just studying and being the person with all the answers. As for Ron and I, we tried. Dating. Making life long plans. And it worked for a while. But I always felt like something was missing. Where was the excitement to see him again? Where was the feeling of contentment when we simply sat and held hands? I tried treating him more like a boyfriend than the friend I had to push forward in life. He tried to treat me more like the girlfriend he had after the Final battle than one of the guys he spent years thinking I was before that. Eventually we just sort of fizzled out but we made sure that we could remain friends.

I had just started my career at the Ministry and even though I hadn't found my parents yet, things were good, really good. However after a year and many unsuccessful attempts to revolutionise the Department of Magical Law Enforcement (actually maybe only revolutionising my broom closet sized office), I began to realise that I was nothing more than a glorified paper pusher, a famous face they would use whose ideas were never even acknowledged, of course I should have known, I was 'too young' to understand the way that things worked. When work became little more than a soul sucking task I had to drag myself to every day, I decided to call it quits. It's not something I would normally do, Hermione Granger was never one to give up. But I just felt lost. Of course Harry, Ron and the rest of the Weasleys were supportive of my decision if not maybe slightly confused.

By this time Severus had gone back to Hogwarts as the Potions Master as a favour to the Headmistress, or rather due to her guilting him into it. It had taken him a while to go back and not everything was just forgiven – on both sides, but time heals as they say. I spent more than 6 months scouring Australia for my parents only to find them, but be unable to reverse the damage I caused by Obliviating them. I mourned them but I will always hope that somewhere in the back of their minds, the people that I love are still there.

When I returned, Headmistress McGonagall owled me, having heard from the boys that I had left the Ministry. She was looking for a replacement Transfiguration teacher and new Head of Gryffindor, as all her duties were starting to overlap. So I agreed, on the conditional title of Assistant, after all I had been in school with most of the students just a few years before. I settled in quite well, the staff seemed happy to have me back but in a new role and the students excited as they thought I would go easy on them…hardly. It was like coming back home. But 2 years weren't enough to ease the guilt I still felt after the first time I saw Severus. It was there in my morning greeting to him, in the polite conversation I made when asking after him, in my eyes every time he accidentally caught me looking at him.

So when he mentioned that he needed some help brewing at a staff meeting a few months later, I gladly offered my services. He looked at me suspiciously then, a force of habit I think before giving his thanks. The first day he showed me into his lab he said "I know why you are doing this Miss Granger and while I thank you for your assistance you need not feel guilty anymore" "What?! What do you mean Professor?" He turned around and looked me straight in the eye. "You. Potter. Weasley, leaving me after…after I gave him my memories. You don't need to feel guilty. I… I should have died…I don't know how I didn't…" he stared off into space. "Anyway just stop, please. I…I forgive you…all. Bloody Gryffindor tendencies!" "Thank you Professor" He looked at me again. "Severus. We have been colleagues for a while now, I would prefer that you call me Severus" "Okay, I take it that you will call me Hermione?" He blinked. "As you wish…Hermione."

At first we worked together in relative awkwardness. Working with Severus Snape was different to say Professor Flitwick. There was none of the ease that would be there were it any other teacher. I admired him though, for no matter how prickly of a man he still was, he was also an intelligent human being and a brilliant potions master. I think that's when I really noticed him. He always exuded so much grace, his deft hands measuring, stirring and chopping always with precise movements, never a wasted motion. His appearance had changed too, oh he still wore his billowing robes over his long frock coat and cravat, no doubt hiding the ugly consequence of that encounter with that damn snake. But he looked healthier, less tense and more at ease. At that time I'd liked to think that he respected my work more than he did when I was a student but if he did he never said so.

After a while the awkwardness lessened until we were comfortable enough to really talk to each other like colleagues and dare I say it a semblance like friends. His wit was refreshing and I learnt of his biting sense of humour. We also had great debates which sometimes turned into great arguments when we wouldn't talk to each other for days… I muse over one of our bigger arguments, a new way to brew wolfsbane. Now I knew he was one of the only people, if not the only one still alive that knew how to brew the potion (a fact that he never failed to remind me of, quite smugly I might add) but I had read in the newest edition of Potioneers' Quarterly that using a gold cauldron might increase the efficacy of the potion. When I told him, he would hear none of it. "… can you even read such utter rubbish from that dimwit of a potioneer Rimbus Tumbleweed!" "You're not even giving it a chance, what if it did work!" "I know it wouldn't work because I have brewed this potion more times than even you could count Miss Granger!" (He always reverted to using my student title when he was particularly annoyed) "I think I would know whether it would work or not!" We were standing face to face, breathing heavily, our hands twisted into fists at our sides. "Oh you're just a great bloody bat!" "And you are just an insufferable know-it-all!"

The next thing I knew we were all hands on each other, lips to lips. His kisses were heaven, drugging me, I couldn't get enough. Somewhere I registered just whose lips were on mine, whose hands were in my hair, whose neck my arms were wound around but I just couldn't bring myself to care. And I would have stayed that way if it wasn't for him gently stopping and pushing me away. We stood staring at each other, still breathing heavily, neither knowing what to say. When he did break the silence, he said something I wish he never said. "I'm so sorry Hermione, it will never happen again, I promise" I looked at him, from his lips, swollen from my kisses to his distraught eyes. "I mean I'm too old for you and anyway Lily was …" In that instance it all came crashing down. Lily. It always came back to Lily. I needed to cry but first I just had to get out of there. I ran out, ignoring him calling out my name in apology, my heart breaking in every step, realising how very much in love with Severus Snape I was.

I went back the next day, having pushed my feelings as far behind a solid wall as I could. I pretended that everything was fine and that he was right. I couldn't show him how deeply he had hurt me, how pathetic I felt so I just didn't. He seemed strangely relieved that I was back and that everything seemed to be fine again. He didn't press me for any explanation and I was relieved. I knew if I started I would just be pouring my heart out to a man that couldn't care. We went about our routine as normally as possible, aside from the banter we used to have. But as much as we tried to ignore what happened, it would just never go away. It was never far from my thoughts and from the look in his eyes every time I caught him staring at me, it was never far from his either. The school year was coming to an end and so was the need for an extra set of hands for brewing. In an effort to distance myself from my broken heart and its cause, I made more plans with Harry, Ron and the rest of the Weasleys. They were happy to see more of me; I had become strangely scarce once I started brewing with Severus. The twins were up to their usual silliness, flirting with me every chance they got. They were harmless I know but I was starting to suspect that Fred was actually serious as compared to George. When he started to get shy every time I spoke to him I knew I was right. Not that it would ever work, not only was he Ron's brother, but my heart was still traitorously attached to one prickly potions master, he who I had started to avoid as much as possible. Those kisses would just not go away. That couldn't stop Fred from coming to the castle with flowers whenever he was 'around'. And whenever he did, Severus's jaw would begin to twitch and he would cast his murder glare at him, ignoring me as much as possible. When he did speak to me the iciness in his tone was sub-zero. And I was back to being 'Miss Granger'.

Eventually I had to let Fred down as gently as possible, telling him that I wanted someone else; he seemed to understand, surreptitiously pointing in Severus' direction. Was I that obvious? Severus was trying hard not to openly stare from his chair at the Head table. To make matters worse as only Fred can, he kissed my cheek just before he could leave, winking at me. At this display of such open affection, Severus stormed out of the Great Hall, robes billowing. Sighing I left the Great Hall as well, heading for my rooms. He was waiting for me there and startled me. His scowl softened at my surprise. "Can I have a word with you please Miss ….Hermione?" My eyes snapped to his at the sound of him saying my name. He looked tired. I nodded and invited him in after me. We stood for a few minutes before he broke the silence. "So… you and Mr Weasley…" I narrowed my eyes at him. "I'm sorry Hermione, I have no right to even ask that, not after my own behaviour. I just wanted to apologise properly and wish you well. I hope he makes you happy." He started to walk away before I mentally kicked myself for keeping this charade going. "He's not my boyfriend" He stopped and turned around. "That is, we are not, never were and never will be together. It shouldn't mean much because you don't … that is you still… love …Lily, but I...well, lying is stupid" I stared at the floor, gasping when I felt his hands hold mine up to him clasping them. I looked into his eyes, his beautiful black eyes and I felt myself being pulled under again. I needed to move away, I couldn't drown again. I tried to pull my hands away but he wouldn't let go. "Hermione, wait. Please listen to me" I stopped struggling. "Look at me…please" I looked into his eyes again. "I've been a fool, a right fool. That day we kissed, I never wanted to stop. I wanted to take you into my arms and make love to you at that moment, believe me. But I've carried her in my heart for so long, it confused me that I could feel more for you than her, after such a short time. It took me a while and I wanted to tell you but I couldn't face you after pushing you away like that unless I was certain. By the time I realised what I fool I was, ready to beg your forgiveness, I saw Mr Weasley give you flowers and assumed I had already lost you. I love you Hermione Granger" My eyes widened in disbelief, afraid to believe him. "Are you sure Severus because I cannot compete with a dead woman?" At that he cupped my face and kissed me, slowly, showing me exactly how he felt. "I'm sure" he murmured against my lips. "I've never been surer of anything in my life."