I'm not just kidding when I say that I'm not J.K.

Thanks to my beta, Aindel S. Druida. You're much appreciated!

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Chapter 9

Two minutes later, Hermione was in her swimsuit, standing in the lavatory on the second floor. The lights in the bathroom were not as flattering as she might have liked, but Hermione knew she never would look like Audrey Hepburn, her personal fashion idol, in any universe. She stroked the two large Egyptian-cotton towels that were in her arms, and then knocked on the door adjoining her bedroom, which was currently relinquished to Snape's dressing activities.

"Are you ready to go?" she called, pressing her lips to the crack in the door.

"Rather," she heard him respond, muffled through the wood.

She opened the door carelessly, but was surprised by the fact that the room was devoid of any Snapian presence. Her eye caught a slight movement of fabric in her desk chair, and she realized a towel, wrapped in an oblong manner, was slumped against the back of it.

"Oh, you already took the potion?" she queried, unable to hide her dismay.

"Rather." The two repeated syllables were ironic, mocking her in her unhappiness. Hermione shrugged, attempting to cover her obvious discontent, or at least find a feasible excuse for it, but found none.

"Well, let's go, then."

Having heard this statement, Snape in his towel (1) voiced his agreement by standing, taking Hermione's wand from the mantelpiece, and advancing upon the girl. To the young witch's great surprise, she suddenly felt his warm, smooth hand in hers, but she had no time to think about the implications. The queer lurching of disapparation seized her instantly, and soon they showed themselves on the deck of the community swimming pool.

As they landed in silence, Hermione might have imagined it, but she thought Snape hesitated before letting her hand drop to her side.

There was never a more romantic night for such an exercise. The moon shone eloquently upon the absolutely tranquil water, which contained nary a ripple. Along one side of the pool ran an unsightly alleyway, which was screened by a wire fence covered by hardy climbing roses. These blooms reflected, in pearly blue sheen, the above heavenly sphere, and their arrogant perfume reflected the flower's valiant heritage in the annals of English history. The scent lasted only while she was within an arm's breadth in passing, however, and her olfactory sense was soon overpowered by the invigorating yet somewhat nauseating chlorine.

The concrete was lukewarm under her toes, a reminder of the day's intense heat, as Hermione chucked her plastic sandals onto one of the convenient reclining chairs. The towels followed these, and both witch and wizard unwrapped the towels that were around them, depositing them on the side of the pool.

Hermione could not see Snape after this, and with his silence, she might have been completely alone. Her eyes wandered to admire the sheer silken surface of the swimming pool, and she thought it tragic to disturb the serenity so soon.

Without her towel as a windbreaker, she realized the air was a bit chillier than she imagined it should be, particularly for a summer evening. To get used to it, she decided to wait a minute before entering the pool, sitting on the side. Barely had she done this when the scene was disturbed by a splash at the opposite end of the pool. Though not large, as such caused by the 'canonball' ever popular with prepubescent boys, the resulting ripples destroyed the ethereal image of silence. The little waves lapped at the pool's edge, and Hermione could see the occasional breaking at the water's surface, though she never saw Snape's physical self. At the end, a sort of cesspool of water formed, and she heard the immense gasp of air, accompanied by a slight spray of mist from what seemed a random location in the air. After a second of recuperation, the slapping of flesh against the walkway and the flush of water that was inevitable with it made clear that Snape was halfway out of the pool, likely propping himself up on his arms.

"What do you make of the results of my work?" he queried genially, as of one intelligent being to another.

"It certainly renders you quite invisible," Hermione nodded, not sure what else to say.

"Indeed, I daresay it works a good deal better than I expected."

"That's good." She thought she ought to probably go in, at this point. "How is the water?"

"Excellent, though a trifle nippy."

"I suppose I'll join you, then."

She made no attempt to be graceful as she jumped into the water, her dark blue swimsuit pinning a bit too tightly at the shoulder and crotch than it had last year and her hair flying after her. It being the shallow end, her the grainy floor met her feet with rapidity.

"Ooh." Her initial impulse was to leap out again as easily as she had entered, but she knew that would be impossible. She instead shivered in the waist-high water.

"Get wet all over, and it isn't so bad," Snape advised from behind her.

"No, I don't want to have to dry my hair when we get home," Hermione countered reasonably, but then two supple hands touched her shoulders with such a strong drive that she went underwater.

The first breath she took was full of faintly salty chlorinated pool water, and it made her gag. In an instant, she was out of the water again, attempting to inhale the fresh cool air, but then her knees buckled and she went under again. The terrible, nightmarish deprivation of oxygen struck her, her sight went dark, and all her mind was panic. A scarce second passed until the same invisible hands that had pushed her drew her out once more, and held her firmly under her shoulder blades.

"Merlin! Are you all right?"

She coughed and spewed water from her mouth. The world was black again, but she realized this was because she was unable to keep her eyes open.

"Well, if you're choking, you'll live," Snape said practically, gracefully drawing Hermione to the side. She felt her inferior brawn acutely, as she realized she was little more than a rag doll to him, especially in the water, but out of weakness she kept her eyes closed.

Her eyes opened again to feel the smooth pavement under her chin, as the racking coughing subsided. When she had regained her breath enough, she gasped, "That wasn't fucking nice!"

"I do apologize, Granger." His voice was genuine, though Hermione could not see his face for his potion's influence. "The force I exerted was far more than I intended. And rightfully, it was truly brutish. It was meant in jest, not malice, if that means anything to you."

She scowled. "I would have thought it uncharacteristic of you to jest, professor," she said dully, regaining a standing position on the side of the pool.

"True," the man admitted, "Now I suppose you won't be resuming your swim, will you?"

"I will if you promise to do my piano practice for me when we get back," the girl bargained sulkily.

"Certainly. I owe you doubly."

Hermione still hesitated. "One other contingency: will you let me dunk you?"

His barking laugh resounded over the water. "If you can."

It was obviously a challenge, and his abrupt splashing away free-style was proof of it.

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Hermione learned two things about Snape that evening. First, he was ridiculously athletic. There was no chance—until he obviously let her—that she would catch him. After swimming three or four circles around the perimeter of the pool, Hermione was full blown, and lazily let herself float on her back, looking at the sky. He then made a spectacle of panting obnoxiously just within her arm's reach, and then she knocked him lightly on the head. Upon this, he muttered something to the accord of 'Et tu, Brutus?' and sank underwater for half a minute before resurfacing with laughter some ten feet away from the site of his submergence.

The other thing she learned: he went swimming in the nude.

She had not noticed until once or twice she had caught too close up to him and attempted to grab the vestige of whatever swimsuit he had, to only feel clammy skin and get a kick perilously close to her face. It was this that aroused her suspicion, and then she realized that it was the only alternative that made sense. Of course he would look incredibly silly walking around invisible except for a pair of trunks or (dare she think?) a speedo, and Snape never looked silly. Also, Hermione remembered with some surprise that she had never been invited to go swimming with Ron or any of the other boys besides Harry, who was accustomed to Muggle things. She, the boy who lived, and sometimes Ginny or her dorm mates went out to the lake together sometimes, and it was an altogether pleasant experience, but never had any of the boys from wizarding families deigned to go along with them. Hermione thought she knew why, now. It could have been one of the age-old traditions; after all, men wore robes that were rather like dresses, relics of the Renaissance days, so why not wear the proper Renaissance costume for pleasure swimming?

Hermione thought it over, and wondered why Snape was not shocked at the proposition of swimming together, in that case. Well, he did grow up in a half Muggle family, if rumor is anything to go by, Hermione explained to herself. She considered her own reaction, and decided that it was a trifle more salacious than she was prepared for at this point in time, but supposed if she made no big deal of it, there would be no repercussions from her potions master. The idea that he was swimming circles around her, as brazen as Michelangelo's David, was positively exhilarating, and she wondered if it was for him, too.

But darn his invisibility potion! If only he miscalculated it!

At the point she was beginning to feel dried-out and prune-like, such as a Fox News journalist reporting in Hurricane Ike (2), Hermione emerged from the pool, wrapped herself in the towel that had absorbed the slight warmth of the concrete, and settled in one of the plastic reclining chairs compiled of smooth white plastic. There she closed her eyes and listened to the slow, tedious strokes of her previous potions master in the pool, dreaming about the idea of them continuing their exercise, only without either of them even remotely clothed and neither of them invisible.

She did drift off to sleep sooner than she intended, but was awakened by the fierce lapping of wet locks against a firm neck, and her feet received a light dew of water droplets. Her eyelids raised faintly, and she could see the faint outline of Severus Snape as he shook his head ferociously, similar to a tiger, with all the same revulsion and disgust for the clinging droplets and none of the carelessness of a dog in the same process. Apparently, his potion was wearing off, finally. She noticed with some chagrin that he already had resumed his towel, but only around his lower half. His chest was less impressive than she had hoped, rather sunken and not so broad, rather skinnier and more wiry than she imagined. As he faded into more visibility, battle scars became more plentiful and apparent. Hermione was drawn with the irresistible urge to run her hand over them and ask him for the story behind each.

To her ecstasy, he finished rubbing his hair with the second towel, shook it out one last time, and settled with it into the chair directly next to hers.

"How long did it last?"asked Hermione, bleary-eyed and very tired.

"Half an hour less than expected, but otherwise perfect," Snape gave his verdict, folding the towel with complete control and nonchalance. "Are you so tired that you're not interested in practicing piano?"

"No, no indeed!" Hermione said, sitting up with an effort, "But let's wait a few minutes. The sky is beautiful tonight."

Snape gave a brief appraising glance at the heavens and gave a snort of incredulity. "Perhaps to some aesthetic sense, but to a rational-minded man? Never do such immaterial things as stars prove to be anything more than bringers of destruction and panic among human beings."

"What do you mean?" God, he does know his Sherlock Holmes, Hermione pondered to herself, making another note to another common aspect between the stringent professor and the famed detective.

"Have you ever—by any random chance of fate, not by intention of course—read a horoscope?"

Hermione smiled at this. "So you don't like the stars because of the predictions made off of them? Or is it the constellations that give you pain?"

"Neither, except for the facts that people believe the predictions, and that people are such unimaginative fools to look at the stars and see nothing different from when a drunken Greek scholar saw thousands of years ago."

"Point valid. But what do you see, in that case?"

Snape shrugged. At this point, he was fully visible, and Hermione admired the slight reflection of the moon in his dark eyes as he gazed up at it.

"I see stars."

The conclusion was simple enough, but of course Hermione felt the need to contest it.

"No, come now! You must see something more than just that! You just criticized thousands of years of anthropologic study; you can't just say that you see stars!"

"Well, that is what I see. They may be delightful to look upon, but there is no value in walking with your nose in the air, especially if your nose is as big and cancerous as mine."

Hermione softened at the self-condemnation of his nose, but decided to not address that particular issue. "Do you say that because you want to crush your creativity, or because you don't care to use it for anything that isn't practical? I mean, you ought to indulge just a little while."

"I'm not a creative person. If you wish to have a specimen of that type, I will refer you to Miss Luna Lovegood, who has more creativity than is altogether good for her."

"But you express it in so many other ways. I know it exists in you, at least to some degree."

He slowly raised himself up and prepared to stand. "Let's not wax philosophical, Granger, it's highly annoying."

"It's annoying to you because it is the truth, and the truth one hates to accept always rankles."

He turned to look at her, and his shoulders seemed to lower just a bit more as he inhaled deeply; he seemed that he intended to reply, but thought better of it and turned to look instead at the stars.

"I see," he began carefully, obviously straining hard, "I see-" To his sudden surprise, he seemed to discover something. "I see a lil-erm, a lotus."

"Which is a kind of lily, I believe," Hermione said practically, which earned her a glare. "No, go on, keep trying. That's a start."

"I see a banana."

Hermione snorted.

"Child, you told me to try at this, but if it is purely for your amusement, I'm going back to dress."

"No, no, I didn't mean to offend you," she quickly exclaimed, joining him in sitting upright. To prove her point, she pointed, rectifying the situation with "Look, there's a beach house."

"A hat with flowers on it."

"A kitten."

"A saxa-erm-saxaphone."

"An ice-cream. Oh, and there's a bird, too!"

The pair batted new discoveries back and forth, until it seemed nothing new could be determined.

"There's a serpent, I believe."

"Granger, that's already a constellation."

Both of them were, at this time, back to reclining fully in the chairs. Finally, Snape stood up, dreary.

"Now, I must insist we go back. I am chilled."

He picked up Hermione's wand from the side table and extended his hand to help her to her feet. The girl realized exactly how tired she was, and almost resisted.

"Come on, Granger. If you still want me to play the piano for you."

This promise helped inspire her to stand straight despite her sleepiness, though it was also a thrill and comfort when Snape took her hand to disapparate, as short a time as it was.

They landed in the living room, and Hermione collapsed onto the couch-bed. Snape shook his head.

"You're going to regret not showering."

"Nah. I like the smell of chlorine. It puts me to sleep."

"You'll be disgusted in the morning."

"Let the morning bring what it may."

Snape sighed. "Granger, come now. Don't make me treat you like a child."

"Go right ahead."

"Twenty points from Gryffindor."

She giggled. "Term hasn't started yet, love."

It was this word, love, that made her jolt awake. Did I—oh God. Please no.

"Another fourty for insolence and familiarity, Granger." His voice was cool and slightly ironic as he said it, however. Hermione did not know if he was angry or not. In any case, she reluctantly rose and proceeded him to the bedroom, so she might get dressed in pyjamas and be downstairs for bed.

She was half-hoping that Snape would emerge after her in something exotic, like silk tops and bottoms, but he came downstairs wearing the dark grey flannel that Harry had described him wearing on a few instances when the boy had encountered the potions master in his most vulnerable moments. She had also noticed it on top of his valise once or twice, for the record, but she had discounted this knowledge in her anticipation.

"What do you need to practice, Granger?" queried Snape softly, not bothering to turn on any lights, but not looking at her as she fidgeted with her pillow. Not wanting to look completely like an inane little eleven-year-old, Hermione had left the blankets from the closet folded at the foot of the sofa, waiting for when Snape was done playing and she retired.

"Anything's fine, I guess, but some Tchaikovsky would be welcome. Maybe Billy Joel, if you could."

He played what she assumed was his favorite Billy Joel, Vienna. She ran through the words in her mind, but said none aloud. Her eyes drooped, but she was determined to see the end of his performance.

"You know," she said, more to keep her own attention than anything else, "I would love if you played It's a god-awful small affair. Just once. I'll never ask it again, if you do it now."

"You mean Life On Mars?" Snape stated tacitly, then began to play it.

Hermione swore up and down later she never heard a better rendition of that song than Snape created with her little upright.

However, she never really heard the end of it, as it seemed to go on and on and on . . .

Snape stopped about half an hour of playing music. He had gone from David Bowie to a few pieces by The Beatles, and then the aforementioned Tchaikovsky, as much as he could from the bits of Swan Lake he remembered. After all this, he turned to Hermione and found her sleeping.

Stupid girl didn't remember the covers he thought with a sniff of disdain. He rectified this easily by unfolding them and drawing them over the sleeping girl. Hermione clutched a pillow like a prized teddy in her arms.

Innocuous little thing. How terrible that you might even think of laying your bloody lips on hers, he scolded himself severely. His chest heaved as he inhaled deeply.

I miss Lily.

Her absence did not weigh on him heavily until night, when he was accustomed to her 'presence' in bed, arms curled around him and head against his shoulder. Even if she did not exist, she prevented him from feeling lonely, and currently, he definitely felt severely forlorn indeed.

With considerably less effort than he liked, he leaned down over Hermione and graced her forehead with a brief token of wordless affection.

Thanks for trying with my poor weary soul, my dear.

It took a tremendous amount of effort for him to ascend the stairs to his own chamber afterwards, since he suffered the intense desire to take the young girl into his arms and clasp her to him desperately.

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(1) This made me think of Larry the Cucumber so much that I had to say something about it. I can totally see Snape singing a soliloquy to the shower walls about his lack of a hairbrush.

(2) God bless those in Hurricane Ike, may they all be safe etc.

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