Tastes Like Christmas
"Potter!" the reprimand was sharp. Harry Potter, who at that very second had been hoping that it would be the last voice he heard, turned slowly, facing the ever calm potions master. Speak of the devil.... "Don't you have anything better to do during your holidays than sneak around and get yourself in trouble?"
Harry was not deterred, instead snapping back with a scathing question of his own. "What about you? Don't you have anything better to do than follow me around and catch me doing something wrong?"
Snape rolled his eyes with a sarcastic mutter of 'lovely' before sneering. "No, I don't. I'm so lonely that I must spend all my valuable quiet time stalking a pig headed boy. And 30 points from Gryffindor."
Harry stared quietly at Snape, rather than gripe about his loss of house points. "No one should be alone on Christmas." was all he said quietly. "Would you like to come back to the dorm? I can make us some hot chocolate."
Snape raised a single eyebrow. "Granger and Weasley have gone home, I take it?" Harry suddenly thought that the tile a few feet away had a very interesting crack in it and needed his attention. "Besides, I doubt you know how to make real hot chocolate." Snape turned on his heels with a swish of his robes. He walked but a few steps before throwing over his shoulder "well, Potter, are you coming or not?"
Snape's personal rooms were well lit and warm. The place smelled of Ginger bread cookies and perfectly aged scotch. Snape disappeared into another room, mumbling something about "Sit wherever you like." Harry fell into a soft arm chair, staring at the rows of things on the shelves, leather bound books and odd things in jars. A clock ticked on the far wall, 15 minutes to midnight, and to Christmas morning.
Snape came back in with cookies and hot chocolate. They sat in arms chairs facing each other, staring at everything but each other as they drank creamy hot chocolate, Snape reading a book. Harry felt surprisingly comfortable. With his most hated teacher, of all people. He sunk further into the arm chair, sipping his Hot Chocolate that tasted just like Christmas.
5 minutes to midnight.
Harry was rolling around an idea in his head. He didn't care to think about why it popped in his head, and he wasn't about to question it. Besides. If anything went wrong he could laugh it all off as a joke.
1 minute to midnight.
Harry got up, crossed the distance of the rug to Snape's armchair. The potions master payed him no mind, until he knocked the book from his hand. The firelight flickered on Snape's pale face and made his black eyes that had widened just a little in shock glow. Harry leaned down and kissed the teacher's slack mouth just as the bells signaling midnight, and Christmas day, rang.
"Merry Christmas, Professor." Harry said with the slightest of smiles. "And your hot chocolate is really good."
Owari
