Chapter 11

A/N: This chapter was almost impossible to write. These two are just so stubborn!

"Very astute, Miss Granger, and actually impressive given how drunk you appear to be." She was wearing a very short, cream dress and a pair of very high, red shoes. Had she been this inappropriately dressed in the kitchen? He couldn't remember.

"You're drunk, too," she retorted. Good lord, was she pouting at him?

"And what gives you that impression?" he asked.

She was only about three feet from him now. He could smell a blend of freesia, rose and jasmine that must be her perfume.

"Well, Sir..." she paused, steadying her feet. She appeared determined to join him on the roof's edge. Given her current state of inebriation, it was a terrible idea. He stepped back from the edge until he was level with her. "Youonly threatened to take points from Padma's daughter..." He wondered if she couldn't remember the girl's name either; he sure as hell could not, and the girl was in his class. "And you didn't slam the door on your way out of the kitchen."

It was a ridiculous argument, riddled with assumptions about his behaviour, and yet somehow arriving at the correct conclusion. It irked him.

"You are a nuisance, Granger," he muttered, taking another drag from his cigarette.

"You smoke!" she exclaimed, almost knocking the damned thing from his hand when she pointed at him. She couldn't believe it! Since when did he smoke? It was only when she realised that Severus Snape was smoking, that she realised that Severus Snape was wearing jeans. It was the first time she'd seen him without robes on and it was... bizarre.

"Your powers of observation are exceptional as always."

"Does Neville know about this?" she teased, wagging her finger at him. There was something about the sight of him in Muggle clothing that made her relax around him. Her usual tongue-tied persona was gone.

Severus was perplexed. How much had she had to drink? She was slight enough, so he supposed it wouldn't take much to get her totally pissed.

"He does not."

"He wouldn't be happy, you know." Hermione was far too drunk to censor her own behaviour.

"He's not my Carer."

"He's your friend." There was something in her voice that sounded... petulant. He didn't respond, flicking his gaze back towards the door to the house, wondering if there was a quiet spot inside he could find now that she had claimed the roof. "Why is he your friend?"

What was the girl implying?

"Longbottom knows when to shut up, Miss Granger," he told her. "A talent you have yet to acquire."

She laughed then, a short, genuine laugh. He had heard her laugh before. He must have. But if he'd been asked, he would have said her laugh was one of those grating, irritating laughs. But it wasn't, not at all.

"You're very funny, did you know that?" she asked. "Of course you do. I'm sure you amuse yourself to no end."

She thought he was funny. He, of course, knew he was funny. But something about the fact that she found him funny was inappropriately pleasing. She was really starting to annoy him. First, her comment about caring about his opinion of her, and now this. Was she just trying to keep him on edge? He didn't care for it. If he wanted to be kept on edge he'd go reincarnate Voldemort. Being on edge was not something he enjoyed, and certainly not something he sought from Hermione Granger.

"Are you always like this when you're drunk?" he asked scornfully.

She paused and tilted her head to the side to think about it. He couldn't help but look at her. Her hair was all to one side, and the light of the moon caught the exposed side of her neck, the paleness of her skin appearing almost translucent. He was about to look away – this was all Longbottom's fault – when she bit her lip in concentration. She was wearing make-up, he noticed. Her lips were a dark red. Had she always had full lips?

"I don't think so," she replied and he nearly dropped his cigarette. Was she reading his mind? Had he asked the question about her lips out loud? Impossible! "Mostly I'm just sad when I'm drunk," she continued. "But not tonight." She finished with a smile. Two rows of perfect, white teeth flashed at him for a moment and then disappeared behind those dark red lips.

He didn't want to talk to her any more. She was drunk, and out of line, and what did she think she was doing, talking to him like this on a roof in the middle of the night? He finished his cigarette.

"If you'll excuse me, Miss Granger..." he made to brush past her but the damned girl reached out and grabbed his arm.

"No." Her grip on his arm was gentle but urgent. "I mean... I won't excuse you."

He just stared at her. The moon was glinting on her hair now, shades of gold and red.

"Will you just... talk to me?"

"Miss Granger, you are drunk. Unhand me." He didn't have time for this.

"Yes, I'm drunk. But so are you. And I want..." her sentence hung in the air between them, her hand still on his arm. She had wanted to say "to talk to you" but standing next to him, with the alcohol rushing through her, with his arm unexpectedly muscular underneath her hand, and with her conversation with Ginny and the girls fresh in her mind, she wasn't sure what she wanted. He was staring at her with a mixture of impatience and confusion and she needed to say something. "I want to talk to you."

He rolled his eyes. Bloody Hermione Granger and her bloody Gryffindor sentiments and her bloody hand on his arm. Her hands were small and thin. He remembered them chopping asphodel in the classroom; short, precise strokes. She had been an adequate potions student with no real aptitude for the subject beyond her exceptionally high intelligence, but he had always been impressed by the unyielding precision with which she chopped ingredients.

"You want to talk to me," he repeated, injecting the sentence with as much venom as he could muster. He wanted her to know how foolish she sounded.

"Yes. I do." She held her ground and her hand kept applying its warm, soft pressure to his arm. It was, he realised, the first time she had ever touched him.

He relented. A conversation with a drunk Hermione Granger was probably better than whatever awaited him back at the party. He nodded slightly and she finally released his arm.

Silence settled between them for a moment. Severus lit another cigarette. Hermione stood awkwardly next to him, still within reaching distance. She couldn't think of a single thing to say. When he had tried to leave her mind had filled with questions for him, all of which had disappeared the moment he had agreed to stay.

Eager to do something she conjured two chairs and sat down in one, eager to take some weight off her feet. Her shoes were murdering her. Professor Snape looked at his chair with suspicion, but sat next to her without a word. His cigarette smoke was strangely calming.

"I read an article about blood-replenishing potions last..." she began.

"Absolutely not."

"Excuse me?" she was taken aback. Was he suggesting she hadn't read the article?

"I refuse to converse with you about advances in the field of potions, Miss Granger," he told her. "You are not qualified to pontificate on the matter, and I have no inclination to speak about my work." He didn't care to be a hypocrite, anyway, after telling Longbottom off in the library for going on about plants.

Well, that was that. Lord, he could be so rude. It got under her skin.

"Well then what do you want to talk about?" she demanded, glaring at him. It wasn't like her to be so bold with him, but hell, he was wearing jeans and she was in a dress that made her feel like she was twenty-five again.

"Nothing whatsoever. I hate to cast aspersions on your memory Miss Granger, but it was you who so badly wanted to talk." She was insufferable. Utterly and completely insufferable.

"Why don't you like me?" she asked after a beat. "I'm perfectly nice to you, and I'm intelligent – don't both arguing, I am – and I'm not a child any more, far from it. What don't you like me?"

It was the kind of speech that was only made possible by alcohol. That was the funny thing about life, she knew. You walked around every day with thoughts in your head but you didn't dare say them. But then, whenever you were drunk, out they came. Some of her worst arguments with Ron had been after he'd had a few too many beers with Harry, and some of her best conversations with Ginny had been made possible by a few too many glasses of wine. And now, here she was on a roof with Severus Snape, who was only here himself because he was drunk, and she was asking him the kind of question she had promised herself she would never ask.

"I don't dislike you, Miss Granger." It was a lie, of course, but it was easier than indulging her.

"That's not what I asked. I asked why you don't like me."

She was persistent. A few years ago he would have called her insufferable. But she had grown up, even if the alcohol tonight was making her behave like a seventeen year old. But then, that was inaccurate too. At seventeen she was off hunting horcruxes, not lying on roofs in short dresses.

If he didn't like her it was because she thought she was perfect. Outstanding grades, famous friends and a not insignificant role in winning a major war while still in her teens did not perfection make. She had her flaws. She was grating and precocious and she was everywhere. She was naive and saw the best in everyone, and thought that trait made her practically a saint. She always thought she was the smartest person in the room. Her paralysing fear of failure kept her from ever really excelling, especially in more creative areas like potions. She insisted on wasting her brain as a glorified solicitor rather than entering academia or research where she could actually change things. She was self-righteous and overly protective of her children.

And then there was the fact that she had married Ron Weasley of all people, demonstrating absolutely no sense of her own worth.

"Come on, I want to know," she said. He looked at her. She was looking at the sky and her expression, for the first time, was unreadable. He fixed his gaze on the horizon again.

"Did it ever occur to you, Miss Granger, that I simply refuse to pander to your every whim like every other individual in our acquaintance? That while everyone is showering you with praise and their favour, you simply have failed to earn mine?" He was tired of her. For nineteen years, he had been free of her. Her name appeared in the Daily Prophet, and once or twice he had discovered her chocolate frog card among his student's confiscated materials (she was very popular with the shy Ravenclaw boys). But she had been wonderfully, mercifully gone from his life, her and Potter and Weasley. For seven years his whole world had revolved around keeping Potter – and by extension her – safe. And then, in an instant, it was over. She was gone. But now? She was everywhere. Neville talked about her constantly, Draco fancied himself in love with her. Her child was in his damned classroom, blinking up at him nervously in the same way she had done for all of those years. It was insufferable.

"You're wrong," she told him. "My life isn't half as easy as you make it out to be." He was about to interrupt with some sarcastic pity, when she continued, her voice unexpectedly raw. "I work so hard, every day, and my boss still calls me "Weasley". Half of my colleagues won't even speak to me since I left Ron. Eight years, Professor. And Ron's remarried, which is fine, but I'm..." she laughed mirthlessly. "I'm sorry, Sir. You don't need to hear this."

"No, Miss Granger, I don't." She was at her worst when she was sad. Her face took on that same desolate look she had worn when he had insulted her teeth all those years ago. He suddenly couldn't take any more of her. She was too much to deal with, her life wrapping itself around him as it was. She wanted him to like her, to see past the persona he had built around her. And he knew his image of her was false. He knew that she was as intelligent and gifted as Minerva insisted. He knew she was as loyal and brave as Hagrid bragged. He even knew that Draco and Neville weren't exaggerating when they said she was beautiful. But he had no interest in the Hermione Granger everyone wanted him to see. He was perfectly happy hating the fifteen year-old Hermione Granger waving her hand in his class, defending him half-heartedly to her friends and making his life miserable with every foolish decision she made.

He stood to leave. Her eyes met his. He hated her eyes.

"Goodnight Miss Granger," he said and she nodded a little, as if she understood, but the part of him that had once cared about what other people thought of him knew what she was thinking. She felt rejected by him; felt that she wasn't good enough. He tried to stop himself, tried to propel his feet onwards toward the door but he couldn't, not until he looked at her again and said – "You have very nice teeth."

And he fled.