Chapter 1 - I'm Sure
Disclaimer: I don't own anything that relates to the Harry Potter series or franchise. Anything you might recognize is borrowed. Everything else is, well, mine.
Also - a big thank you to my beta Daerwyn, for helping me make my stories the best they can be.
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A fire was crackling merrily in the fireplace in the small living room. Outside, snow was falling. It was December, and two weeks until Christmas. Two cups of glühwein—the content still warm and steaming—stood on a wooden coffee table next to a tray of biscuits.
In a sofa facing the fire grate sat two figures, one deeply absorbed in a large tome. His long, black hair creating a curtain around his face. His nose, much too large for his face, almost touched the pages as he read.
The other figure, a woman with brown, bushy hair, sat completely still. She appeared to be watching the man beside her.
Suddenly she spoke.
"Severus."
A small grunt escaped the man's lips.
"Look at me", the woman said. "Please."
The man looked up, a crease appearing between his eyebrows.
"I'm looking at you", he said. "What is it?"
"I'm …" the woman suddenly choked. "I can't do this anymore."
And with those words, Severus Snape's world fell apart.
Again.
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"Did you hear me?" Hermione inquired quietly.
Severus mouth was so dry. His tongue felt thick and numb. He looked down on his hands. Laced his fingers together. He'd thought they were fine this time. That they had worked through their problems. That they had come out stronger.
Hermione sighed irritably. "It's always like this with you, what do I have to do to—"
"Are you sure this time?" Severus interrupted.
"Sorry?" Hermione looked like she had been slapped in the face. "I'm telling you that I'm … that I'm leaving you and … and all you can think of asking me is if I'm sure?" Hermione's voice cracked at the end.
Snape couldn't remember how to breathe properly. "I just need ... I need you to be absolutely sure," he said.
Hermione looked at him, just looked at him for a while. He could feel it, but he didn't meet her eyes. He couldn't. It was impossible. He was about to do something that was completely against every instinct he had ever developed and it required every strength he had.
For a moment memories of their seven years together flooded his brain, invading every nook and cranny, overtaking his senses.
Their first real date, the time she had kissed him in the middle of the street in Hogsmeade, their wedding, their annual trips to southern France, her warm brown eyes locking with his when—
He looked up, and met those brown eyes, now brimming with tears, and he knew. He knew the answer long before she opened her mouth.
"I'm sure," Hermione whispered.
He nodded once, closed the book quietly and then rose from the sofa. He stopped by the coffee table and slowly took off his wedding ring, placing it carefully beside the tray of biscuits.
"I don't know what you're looking for, Hermione", he said as he put on his overcoat, clasping the buckle a little more forcefully then intended. "But I certainly hope, for your own sake, that you find it."
He paused for a fraction of a second to look at the woman he had loved and adored for such a long time.
And then he Disapparated.
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