Title: A Heated Correspondence
Author: Garonne
A/N: Many thanks to stgulik for beta-reading this!
.. .. ..
The first indication he got that Snape wasn't speaking to him was the curt, almost hostile note lying on his desk beside a steaming goblet of Wolfsbane. Lupin dropped his books on a chair, still clutching the note, and wondered if maybe he'd gone too far the previous night.
Snape had been lying tangled up in the bedsheets, his eyes nodding shut, when Lupin made his unfortunate remark. He'd felt Snape go suddenly tense beside him.
"Is that what you think, Lupin?" he said in an icy voice, a far cry from the tone in which he'd been moaning Lupin's name ten minutes earlier.
Lupin sat up in bed, striving to make out Snape's expression by the feeble light of the lantern. "I was joking, you know. Of course I know you wouldn't - don't be ridiculous, I don't really think you'd poison me for my job."
Snape emitted a noncommittal grunt, his eyes closed. Lupin lay down again, pulling the covers up over them. He snuggled up beside Snape, insofar as that was possible with a man who was determined to sleep on his back with his hands together and his elbows sticking out, firmly resisting any sentimentality.
After a minute Lupin added thoughtfully, "Maybe I should knock you off and take your job, though. I'd be doing your poor students a favour."
Before he'd finished speaking he knew it was the wrong thing to say.
Snape lay motionless beside him. The silence began to grow oppressive.
"Severus?" Lupin said softly.
He lay in the darkness for a while, wondering whether Snape was asleep or sulking. Finally he drifted off to sleep himself.
When he awoke, Snape was gone. He wasn't at breakfast in the Great Hall either. In fact, Lupin saw nothing of him the entire day, until the note that evening.
Lupin threw the note into the fire, downed his potion in one gulp and selected a nice heavy treatise on phonetic variations in vocalised curses to keep his mind off Snape. The other man would come round eventually. It might take him a few days, as Lupin had learnt from past experience. The record so far was two weeks, after the incident with the Marauders' Map. Three days was probably the most optimistic estimate possible, which would take them to the night of the full moon. Then add a couple more days of painful recovery and sleeping alone, meaning that it would be at least a week before they could -
Don't think about it. You can resist temptation just as well as he can. Think about something else. The palatalisation found in curses popular in the middle Ural region is not to be confused with the velarisation used in the more southern variants. The placement of the tongue - Hm, Snape's rather good at that...
Curse his treacherous mind! He pinched the bridge of his nose and bent his head over the book once more.
It wasn't as though he hadn't often criticised Snape's teaching style before. It was one of many points they disagreed on; indeed, it was those heated intellectual debates that had developed into blatant flirtation. Perhaps Snape had not appreciated the subject being carried into the bedroom, however. Perhaps -
Lupin abandoned the phonetic subtleties of Slavic curses as a lost cause and went to bed.
Next morning, he was brushing down his robes when it occurred to him that he'd left the second years' essays in Snape's dungeon classroom the previous afternoon. Distracted by other things, he thought with a grin, wondering how long Snape would take to come round.
He dismissed the idea of going down to collect the essays, since Snape clearly didn't want to see him at the moment. Instead, he decided to write the man a short note. He sat staring at the blank page for a moment, hesitating between familiarity and the cold tone Snape had used. Finally he restricted himself to a few simple, neutral lines. He popped the parchment into Snape's pigeonhole in the staffroom on the way to breakfast.
Lupin was already halfway through his bacon and eggs when the second sense he had always credited to the wolf told him he was being observed. He looked up, but Snape had already moved away and was sweeping past to take a place at the far end of the teachers' table, despite the empty seat beside Lupin.
That makes two nights and one day so far. Lupin decided to speed up the process a little.
On the pretext of wanting to speak to Professor Pomona Sprout, he slid into the empty chair beside her, knowing this would give Snape a clear view of him along the table.
Pomona was in an excellent mood that morning, having apparently managed to hatch some delicate Screeching Rhododendrons, and she and Lupin were soon deep in conversation on the dubious merits of their use in warding off vampires. Lupin grinned readily at all her jokes, knowing that Snape was fascinated by his smile - though he claimed only to be fascinated by the fact that someone could smile that often and that inanely.
Lupin moved on to the toast, risking a glance along the table as he reached for the marmalade. He caught Snape hastily averting his gaze and almost crowed in victory.
"It is quite an achievement, it's true," said Pomona, mistaking the sound for an expression of appreciation. "The stalks are almost an inch long already."
"That's very impressive, Pomona," Lupin said, his eyes on Snape.
He folded his napkin neatly and tucked it under his plate, before going to speak to Madame Pomfrey, who was sitting beside Snape.
He could feel Snape's dark gaze on him as he spun Madame Pomfrey a yarn about some medical supplies he wanted stocked in his classroom before the seventh years tackled the more dangerous creatures he had planned.
"Students can be so reckless sometimes, can't they, Severus?" he said, turning to Snape.
"There are no accidents in my classroom," Snape said with a scowl.
Madame Pomfrey clucked her tongue. "I don't believe there's a single teacher in this school who hasn't sent me a student at one time or another. Why, just the other day in Divination - "
She rambled on about a student who had dropped a crystal ball on his foot. Lupin eyed Snape, who glowered at his bowl of porridge.
Lupin was leaning down, one elbow propped on the back of Madame Pomfrey's chair and the other on the back of Snape's, so that his lips were inches from Snape's ear. He concentrated hard and was soon rewarded when Snape shivered, and not only because of Lupin's breath tickling his ear. Lupin hid a smirk, watching Snape struggle to remain composed while delicate filaments of ether stroked along his inner thighs. It was a difficult piece of wandless, non-verbal magic, and he could tell Snape was impressed in spite of himself. He turned his head to meet Lupin's gaze. Lupin stared innocently back. He felt a slight breeze ruffle the hairs on the back of his neck, a precursor to Snape's response, and decided that his purpose would best be served by a hasty departure.
" - and all kinds of tomfoolery," Madame Pomfrey was saying.
Lupin straightened up. "You certainly have your work cut out for you, Poppy," he said sympathetically. "Well, I'll come by this afternoon for those self-binding bandages, if you don't mind." He hurried away, feeling progress had been made.
That was before he received the Howler, however.
He was teaching the fourth years when it arrived. A commotion among the students nearest the classroom window drew his attention to the owl hovering outside. The window creaked open in response to a wave of his wand and the owl soared across the classroom to settle on his desk. Lupin's heart sank at the sight of the red envelope tied to its leg.
"You have ten minutes to read the introduction to Chapter Four," he said, fumbling with the strings that tied the letter on. He shot a glance around the room to make sure no one seemed to be planning any mischief in the immediate future. "There will be questions when I return."
The envelope was already beginning to heat up as he strode out of the classroom at a fairly dignified pace. As soon as the door swung shut behind him he broke into a run, diving into the first empty classroom he came to. He managed to slam the door shut just before the envelope exploded and the room was filled with Snape's sneering voice.
So that's your tactic now, Lupin? I might have known you'd want to pretend nothing has happened and everything in the garden's rosy. It's time you learnt that the world's problems won't be solved with a polite inanity and an insipid smile. If you hope to worm your way back into my -
There was a slight pause. Clearly Snape was recalling that he couldn't be sure where Lupin would be when he heard this. He continued smoothly:
- back into my good graces by sheer passivity, you may think again. I don't recall ever giving you reason to believe that I was drawn to mild-mannered idiots - on the contrary. Just don't come running to me if you choke on your own insipidity.
On that note, the letter burst into flames. Lupin let it fall to the floor, and within moments, only ashes remained. He Vanished them with a wave of his hand, torn between laughter and anger. That had surely been a direct reaction to Snape's finding the note he'd written that morning. Evidently the neutral tone he'd adopted hadn't been such a good idea.
He wasn't going to apologise to Snape for calling him out for terrorising the students, though. That was the heart of the matter, however much Snape had managed to avoid the issue in his Howler. He didn't expect to change Snape, but he didn't intend to shut up about it either. Moreover, if Snape really objected to being treated with courtesy and respect, he should stop being so bloody prickly whenever Lupin crossed him.
Lupin grinned to himself as he returned to the fourth years. He did rather like rousing Snape's passions. He was tempted to reply with a Howler of his own filled with innuendo and words such as submissive, passive, aggressive, incorrigible and shameless. Unfortunately, like Snape, he wasn't sure who else would be around when the Howler began to scream.
He decided it was time to change tactics.
.. .. ..
Lupin emerged from Greenknowles Magical Herborium with his purchase tucked under one arm. Hogsmeade Post Office was just across the street and he went in to buy brown paper and padding. It took him a while to make up the package in such a way as not to risk any injury to the Post Office staff or owl.
He was tired and aching after the full moon the previous night. He had drunk the steaming goblet that had once more been left on his desk, without a note this time. Then he had curled up by the fire, consoling himself with the thought that he would have been sleeping alone in any case, huff or no huff on Snape's part.
He had seen Snape once more, too, at the staff meeting that afternoon. He had seemed to be in a slightly lighter mood, and hadn't even glowered at Lupin once. Perhaps letting off steam at the top of his lungs had gone some way to softening him. That was when Lupin decided it was time to take the trip into Hogsmeade he'd been planning.
Now he put the finishing touches to his parcel and handed it over the counter, requesting the fastest owl possible.
His only regret was not to be able to see Snape's face when he unpacked the cactus.
.. .. ..
The students were scribbling to finish their notes while Lupin moved the grindylows back into their tank. The malicious but impotent creatures were the most he wanted to tax the second years with and he could handle them with his eyes shut. He turned back to the class, meaning to assign them some homework, and froze.
Hovering above his desk was an enchanted paper aeroplane.
There was a muffled gasp from those of the class who weren't busy writing. Lupin stood there for a moment, his eyes raking the classroom, but no guilty faces leapt out at him.
Then another idea occurred to him. Frowning, he reached out to pluck the offending article from the air. He unfolded the paper and found one word inscribed across it in a familiar spiky hand.
Prat.
He tried to suppress a smile. So Snape had received the cactus.
The class was still holding its collective breath.
"Five inches on the manipulation of grindylows for next Tuesday," Lupin said mildly. "Dismissed."
.. .. ..
The staff room was crowded when Lupin arrived. He threaded his way across the room to his pigeonhole and found it already filled with rolls of parchment. Pulling one out, he recognised the essays he'd left in Snape's dungeon the week before.
The hairs on the back of his neck rose suddenly and he spun round to find Snape standing directly behind him, eying him as though daring him to say something.
Lupin bit back the thanks that rose to his lips. No insipidities, he reminded himself. Instead he looked Snape in the eye. "You deserved every word I said the other night."
Snape blinked, not quite managing to hide his surprise. Within seconds, however, his face was once more inscrutable. "Is that so?"
Lupin suddenly realised that they thrived on the conflict.
"Next time I shan't hold back," he said, stepping forward so that less then a foot separated them.
He could have sworn that Snape was fighting to hold back a smile. "I look forward to it."
They stood there in the corner, face-to-face, Snape's gaze raking him from head to toe. The rest of the room might as well have been empty for all the attention they paid it. Lupin wished suddenly and fervently that it were.
Minerva McGonagall's voice broke the spell. "Ah, there you are, Remus..."
.. .. ..
Lupin did his usual round of the classroom before locking it, checking that none of the students had left anything dangerous or untidy. He frowned at the dubious reading material tucked under the desks of the boys who always sat at the back, and smiled over the latest addition to the carved hearts that adorned the desktops.
When he got back to the front of the classroom, a piece of parchment was lying rolled up on his desk, looking ordinary and innocent, as though it had not just mysteriously appeared out of nowhere. It was held closed with Snape's serpentine seal.
He broke open the seal and found a peculiar narrow column of writing down the middle of the parchment. His frown deepened as he read.
Lupin,
I feel compelled to write to
you concerning a problem with
your unruly students. Let me
tell you that I long for
a little peace and quiet,
impossible thanks to your students and
you. I fear I shall go out of my
way to punish them if you do
not take steps. I do not
mind if you do not come to
share my point of view, but I wish
to see the worst offenders in
my office immediately. I want to pin
a list of their names to the noticeboard.
This will simultaneously put your House and
you down and have my
students learn from others' mistakes.
It is impossible to make head-
way with you. I want to make you
see that your teaching methods
should be modelled on
mine, in every possible way. If you
find yourself, despite my
eloquence, quite unable to
agree, come to
the staffroom, where you can discuss
the matter with other staff and with
me at once.
Snape
He stared at the letter in bewilderment. What the hell had Snape in a twist now? He couldn't recall anything he'd done recently that could be construed as inciting the Gryffindors to misbehave.
After a few moments of staring blankly at the words, he realised there was something odd about the letter's phrasing. Certain word choices seemed forced and the length of the lines was suspiciously irregular.
He tapped the parchment with his wand to highlight different combinations of words, finally settling on every third line. He read it through once more, with rather different emotions this time.
I feel compelled to write to
you concerning a problem with
your unruly students. Let me
tell you that I long for
a little peace and quiet,
impossible thanks to your students and
you. I fear I shall go out of my
way to punish them if you do
not take steps. I do not
mind if you do not come to
share my point of view, but I insist
on seeing the worst offenders in
my office immediately. I want to pin
a list of their names to the noticeboard.
This will simultaneously put your House and
you down and have my
students learn from others' mistakes.
It is impossible to make head-
way with you. I want to make you
see that your teaching methods
should be modelled on
mine, in every possible way. If you
find yourself, despite my
eloquence, quite unable to
agree, come to
the staffroom, where you can discuss
the matter with other staff and with
me at once.
.. .. ..
Later, pinned to the mattress in Snape's dungeon bedroom by two strong hands, Lupin raised his head and caught sight of something in the shadows that made him smile.
"What are you smirking at?" Snape demanded.
"Never you mind." He twisted suddenly so that it was Snape pinned to the mattress and Lupin who was looming over him, nipping at his jaw. Snape relaxed under him, allowing him to bite his way up the tendons in Snape's neck and clamp down hard on his mouth. Snape moaned, and the deep, guttural sound made Lupin shiver.
He was still smiling inwardly, however, at the cactus that now sat in pride of place on Snape's chest of drawers.