A/N: I do not own Harry Potter. I wonder if I should use my deviantart or my livejournal to post fanfiction and my writing self-projects.
The Art of Lying
He shivered and he coughed, stumbling along the hallway to his living room. Blood was all over him, he was sore and tired. Severus Snape was a tortured man, he had displeased the man who everyone knew as He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and was punished with the pain of the Cruciatus curse. It was normal, it happened almost all the time, he was used to it. There was nothing that could be done. Not until the war was over, he would serve as a double agent and place himself in harm's way.
The evenings had started to get colder and he was often sick. There was a fire and it was helping his aching muscles, he sat on his favorite chair in front of the fireplace. He ignored his wounds and bruises since he can all treat them later. What he needed now was sleep, he was longing for it, to be able to close his eyes and dwell in a mindless, dreamless, quiet state. Albus Dumbledore can talk to him in the morning, the aged wizard need not see him in his current state; it would be harder to tell him that he was alright, that he felt okay because he wasn't but he was going to keep telling himself that he was fine, for in order to lie to others, one must learn how to lie to one's self.
We are never deceived; we deceive ourselves. Goethe