Don't Tick Off Your Potions Master
Lupin dragged himself into Snape's office late that night. Literally, he was three hours and sixteen minutes late. His usual bedraggled appearance was overshadowed by the pallor of his skin, bruises under his eyes, wheezing breaths shallowly taken in and out of the werewolf's lungs, wrinkled and dirty clothes... and the red, dripping, swollen member... attached to his face. Snape took one look at Lupin and pushed him into a deeply cushioned chair next to the workroom's desk.
Snape turns to the desktop a few feet from where he had pushed Lupin, one of his most trying clients of all time.
"As usual, you have no respect for others' time. I have more important things to do than wait on you, you inconsiderate flea-bitten mongrel! I ought to allow you to take your Wolfsbane in your condition, if only to document the effects. However..." And here Snape held up a small pestle filled with white powder. He eyed the shimmer coming from the powder as he shook the mortar. He then added some yellow crystals and, with a glass stirring rod, combined the mixture. "... I have no desire to put up with you whinging on for hours."
Snape poured the mixture in water and observed the effervescing potion before handing the steaming goblet to the softly moaning man sitting in his favorite chair. "You whine enough as it is," the tall, dark man snarled quietly.
The other man looked up at his tormentor through short, matted, dirty strands. His eyes were glazed over, almost as if he didn't know why he was with Snape to begin with, or why he was being told off. But something about the goblet being shoved into his chest reached a functioning brain cell, made him grab it as if it were a broomstick in a Quidditch match.
He quickly downed the potion and then sat back with his ears slightly steaming. Slowly, the foul demon riding Lupin receded. His shoulders slumped in relief as the pressures and pains removed themselves from his body.
Just as he started to relish the diminishing symptoms, he saw the rim of his Wolfsbane shoved under his nose. Its writhing surface and putrid smell nearly caused his digestive system to upheave the broth that he had taken earlier. Once again, he looked up at the man who insisted on tormenting him every lunar month.
"Take your potion and get out of my sight." Snape pointed his wand at the door and wordlessly opened it. "And tell Pomfrey that the next time she leaves that castle this close to the full moon and doesn't check on your 'good health,' I will cease to supply her with the potions she needs for the rest of the school year!"
AN: Many thanks to the wonderful Janus. As usual, I bow to anyone willing to take my raw work, especially on Saturday night. The prompt came from astopperindeath: "Lupin is sick. With a cold or something. Not deathly sick. Someone cares for him. Humor, drama, whatever. Just go with it." And this is what I got.
Written in 2009 - am posting old stories here so I don't lose them.