These characters and their setting are the property of J. Rowling and her associates and affiliates.
AN: Thanks go out to Sian for explaining to me about A-levels and other facts about British schools. Hopefully this chapter will not seem totally unrealistic to those of the British persuasion. There will most likely be elements of American life entwined willy nilly with anything British I manage to incorporate. But I'm a Yank. I think it's an occupational hazard.
Chapter 12: An Unexpected Coincidence
"I've brought your book back," Emma said brightly, entering the office with a sprightly step.
"Indeed. Thank you." Snape was busy with papers at his desk and didn't look up. "You may borrow another, I suppose."
"Thanks."
Emma glanced at the science teacher with a touch of concern. She was glad that he was well enough to return to the classroom, but he still looked awful-- bad enough to have stayed out another day. He seemed exhausted. There were deep bags under his eyes as if he hadn't been able to sleep, and his sallow skin looked waxy as if he hadn't eaten or drunk properly either. He also appeared to have lost weight, which was slightly alarming considering how thin he already was. To call Snape "lean" on a normal day was an act of charity. The poor man could stand to put on weight, not lose it.
Watching him covertly as she moved over to his library, Emma couldn't help but wonder if his condition didn't stem from more than just a simple cold or flu. Snape's whole countenance drooped. He looked careworn. The poor man almost appeared as if in mourning. Could he be suffering from a sudden emotional shock? Had he had lost someone close to him? Or had a doctor, perhaps, just given him a deadly diagnosis? Emma really hoped it wasn't anything truly dire. She liked Mr. Snape. He was the only person in her narrow life for whom she felt any affinity and she couldn't help being a little worried. Selfishly worried. She didn't want to lose him before they even had a chance to be friends.
"How was your biology class today?" She pulled out Darwin and Twentieth Century Controversy, frowned, and carefully put it back. "Did they give you any trouble? I hope the students weren't too rambunctious after all that Skull Ball I played with them."
Snape made a huffing sound. "No problem I couldn't handle. They were a bit unsettled of course, but no worries. I still managed to put the fear of Snape into them before the end of class."
"Umm, don't you mean 'fear of God'?" Emma paused as she eyed a book on genetics.
"No. In this case fear of Snape is sufficient." He scribbled something with a flourish. "Not all of my students believe in God. But they do believe in me, and I cultivate a keen respect every time I verbally reduce them to the state of mushy peas. At least it's good to know I haven't lost my touch."
Emma giggled slightly as she considered a volume on super-conductive ceramics. "I'll say you haven't. And that's good actually. Your students learn. They might complain about it, but they do learn, and that's saying something at this school."
Papers crinkled in irritated hands. "Too bad my efforts here seem to be wasted. Almost none of my students will make use of what I teach them. I might as well just stand there and recite them poetry..."
His tone sounded defeated and it made her sigh. Mr. Alan Snape was the best teacher this school presently had. It was criminal that he wasn't better appreciated. The students here had low expectations for just about everything, and their parents really weren't much better. If only there was something that could be done to change that, to wake them up a little. If only there was some way to help them set their sights higher, or even just to teach them that learning could be fun. Suddenly, Emma had a brainstorm of an idea.
"You know, it's true that very few students here seem to think about going on to college, but there's no reason why that can't change. Why don't we do something to fire up their imagination-- get them to think outside the box, or maybe just think outside of this piskey little town. Hey! Why don't you start an after school science club or something? That might help."
Snape scrawled a large red "D" on the top margin of a student's test. "Odd how you seem particularly eager to volunteer my time." He sounded darkly sardonic.
"Oh, but it wouldn't have to be just you, sir. I could help!" she countered earnestly. "And I'd be really glad to do it. Since I'm almost done with Mrs. Osbourne's math tests, I don't have anything else to work on. Oh, this could be great! And fun too! It would be a wonderful way to get students interested in science outside of the classroom. And then we could encourage them to try for college. Just think, we could have experiments, all sorts of quiz games, and maybe even field trips..."
"Curb your enthusiasm," Snape pronounced quellingly. "Hanscomb would never give it funding."
"No?" Emma felt like a popped balloon.
"Not on your life. He's parsimonious to the point of penury when it comes to doling out money-- particularly when it involves the science department. I have to fight down and dirty, tooth and nail for every ounce of supplies I get." He scribbled another red-inked comment in a manner that was almost vindictive. "Something that sounded like a field trip would never pass his muster."
"Darn. Oh that's really too bad. I was hoping we could get up a career exploration workshop and then take a bus load of students over to the closest Uni to sort of whet their appetites. I mean, maybe if they saw how fun campus life was maybe they'd try a little harder for it." She sighed before getting another sudden bright idea. "But say, I don't think the Head would object if you had after-school help sessions! That would work. I mean, those wouldn't take any funding at all!"
"No, just my time and effort," he snarked. "Which, believe it or not, are actually important to me! But aside from that, your promising idea would never work here. Student hate me. No one would come."
Emma thought of the slouchy boy with the greasy yellow hair, and remembered the closed, defensive look on his face as he had tried to hide the hungry spark in his eyes. "Oh, I don't know about that, Mr. Snape. I think lots of kids would-- John Tupper, for one-- if they were approached the right way.
Snape paused for a moment before flipping over a paper and Emma carefully hid her smile. She had obviously scored a point. "Hmm," he mused, if unwillingly. "Perhaps I will consider it."
The title, Mysteries of Human Memoryshone down at her from the third shelf and Emma grabbed it joyfully. "By the way," she asked, "How did Tupper do on that homework assignment-- the one with the parsecs in it?"
"He finished it." The man sounded weary. "He even got a few of them right. That boy has potential. Too bad he doesn't see it."
"Oh, I know! I think he's smarter than anyone realizes. That's why it would be great if we could get him to come in for extra help, get him to join a science club, or..."
"I said, Miss Smith, that I would consider it!" The glare momentarily flashed at her was peeved
With effort, Emma reined herself in, though inside she was bouncing. The science club was a good idea. She just knew it! And with a little persuasion, the math teacher might even go for it too-- well... providing Emma did all the work, but that was really no problem. She wanted to! Emma felt like dancing as ideas for outings and experiments bubbled up in her mind. But she restrained herself from actually dancing as it would probably put off Mr. Snape. At this point she hoped she hadn't already alienated him. It was glaringly obvious to her now that Snape couldn't be pushed. She doubted she could even "manage" him the way she did Mrs. Osbourn. Handling Snape was going to be tricky and if Emma wanted her science club she would have to be tactful. Possibly even devious...
Oddly, though, despite the fact that it would make getting what she wanted more difficult, Emma was glad that Snape wasn't a pushover. This was a man she could respect, someone that would make a truly valuable friend. A friendship with him would take time but it would be worth it, and she would just have to proceed with caution. A silently raised eyebrow greeted her as she placing her choice of book on his desk. "Say, why do you have so many books on memory Mr. Snape?" she ventured. So far she had counted seven.
Snape paused slightly in his work. "It is an interest of mine. Though it seems odd that it should be one of yours as well. This is the fourth book on memory you've sought to borrow, Miss Smith. Why?"
"Er... you don't know?" Emma was confused.
"Now does it really look like I'm in the mood for guessing games?" He huffed, shooting her a quick, irritated glance. "Obviously, if I already knew I wouldn't ask."
Emma decided to ignore his rudeness since it was typical Snape behavior and she had been pressing him. At this point, she was surprised he was still talking to her! Besides, she knew he wasn't feeling well. It was only fair to make allowances. "I'm sorry if it sounded like that Mr. Snape, but I really wasn't playing any games. It's just that I thought everybody around here knew about me-- especially considering how people talk."
"I don't listen to gossip," he grumbled, eyes back on his work. "And people don't come to me with it. Forgive me for being so uninformed," he continued sarcastically, raising his pen toward another paper, "but just what is it about you that everyone knows but me?"
"Only that I've lost my memory."
The pen in Snape's hand fell. For the first time he actually looked at her with full attention. "What?"
"It's true. I don't have any memory. That's the reason I'm here working at this school. I don't have the credentials to get a job anyplace else, no proof of schooling or skill training at all. No one could find out anything about me. So when I couldn't stay at the nursing home any longer, the social workers found me this position here."
There was a moment of silence wherein coal black eyes studied her the way a chess player might study his board. For some reason Snape suddenly seemed very interested and Emma tried not to hold her breath. Having so intense a stare leveled at her from that harsh face was a little hard to handle-- even though his attention was what she'd originally wanted. She had the disconcerting feeling of being a mouse stared at by an owl.
"Perhaps," he began, his eyebrow quirked and his voice very soft, "you would start from the beginning to make your story understandable to me. Why, for instance, were you at a nursing home?"
Emma trembled slightly, but that was only from eagerness and relief. This was the first time anyone here had asked to hear her story even though she knew most of her co-workers knew about it and often talked about her behind her back. She had even come upon people in the very act of discussing her situation, yet no one had ever sought to hear it from her personally. Perhaps they were only waiting for her to bring it up out of a form of polite consideration, but Emma had always got the feeling that no one really cared. Emma was an outsider. Her oddities were only good for gossip. Now Mr. Snape was actually asking to hear it. She took a deep breath and plunged carefully ahead.
"I don't know exactly what happened to me," she began. "They told me I was found by the side of the road unconscious-- possibly from a hit and run accident. All I really know is that I was in a vegetative state for two years and that nobody thought I would ever wake up. They were even thinking of pulling the plug on me. No one still knows why I recovered, but when I did wake up I couldn't remember anything. I couldn't tell them what had happened to me or even who I was."
Snape frowned. "Didn't you have any identification on you?"
"No. Nothing. I didn't have a purse or a cell phone, or maybe I did but they had been stolen. According to the police report all I had on me was odd looking clothes."
"Odd looking clothes? Well that's rather cryptic, I dare say."
"Yes. They said I looked like I was going to a Renaissance Fair or something. I was wearing a long gown and a big hooded cloak. I still have them. For some reason they were kept for me, though I don't know why." She shrugged. "Perhaps it was because it was all I had for them to save."
"Hmm," Snape paused, one long finger absently rubbing his lower lip. "Very interesting. And when did they find you?"
"A little over three years ago. I spent two years in the coma and another year learning to walk again. After that I came here."
"Three years..." Snape suddenly stilled and his brow furrowed. His eyes narrowed sharply and he seemed to be looking inward at some disconcerting train of private thought.
"Umm. Is that significant?" she asked puzzled by his strange reaction.
His attention flicked back to her and his expression again became masked. "No, probably not. Though I'm sure it's significant to you. You say you have no memory at all?"
"No-o... not really..."
"Not really? Maybe?" His tone was sharp. "Well, which is it?"
"It's just that what I have isn't actually memories. It's I know is... things."
"Explain that to me."
"Well, facts aren't really memories, are they? You just know them and take them for granted. I mean you don't go walking down the street and suddenly start remembering that William the Conqueror defeated Harold of Essex in 1066, or that Henry VIII had six wives-- three of them named Katherine, two Ann, and one of them Jane. I don't remember these things, I just know them, and I seem to know quite a lot. I don't even know how much I know. But it's all just facts, random information. I don't have any real memories at all."
Again that steady, obsidian gaze. "So what you are saying to me is that you remember nothing... personal."
"Yes! That's it exactly! I can't remember anything about ME. But ask me a question about Quantum Theory, Guy Fawkes, the food chain, or metamorphic rock and I could probably give you an answer. I seem to know a lot about history and science."
"You have no personal memories AT ALL?"
"None. I wish that I did."
Snape considered for a moment, fingers tapping absently on the desk.
"Do you have shadowy ideas, hazy outlines that you can't fill in the blanks to?"
"No. It's as if I woke up a year ago and my life started from that point."
"Hmm." Strangely, he sounded a little disappointed. "Do you have any weird impressions or feelings? Any odd experiences of displacement?"
"Well, it feels awful not knowing who I am."
"That's not what I mean. Do you find that some things are oddly familiar that shouldn't be? Do you find that things that should be familiar aren't? Do you get the 'feeling' that you should know something or that some innocuous occurrence is somehow significant? Do you get little teasing impressions that you actually know people when you don't?"
Emma shook her head puzzled. "No. I don't have anything like that. I just feel... empty. Nothing at all feels familiar, at least not personally."
"What about your dreams," he went on. "Do you have repeating nightmares, or dreams with faces that appear to you over and over, scenes that recur?"
"Not... not really. I don't see the same things over and over in my dreams, but there are ideas that keep repeating in them. I seem to dream a lot about being lost."
"Lost."
"Yes. Oh, it's awful. I have dreams like that at least once a week-- sometimes more. I'm aways lost somewhere, and every time I get the feeling that what I need is right there, close by, but I can't get to it. And it's not the same dream all the time either, just the same idea. Sometimes I'll be in a little life boat lost in the fog, or I'll be wandering in a desert, or an empty plain. I'll dream that I'm in this huge neighborhood where all the houses look the same and I'll know that my people are shut up in one of the houses, but none of the doors will open. That one's the worst. All the doors will be locked, and I'll hear people talking and laughing behind them, but they never let me in."
Snape just stared at her, his odd, down-slanting eyes unreadable. Emma focused on her hands.
"I hate feeling so lost, but that's what I am. I'm lost here. Oh, I probably belong somewhere. Most people do. But I don't know where that is. And who knows? Maybe it's already too late for me. Maybe my people are all dead or moved on without me and I'll never ever know. I wish I just KNEW!"
Emma swallowed hard. "I seem to have so much knowledge and I can't even do anything with it. I should probably be a teacher myself, or perhaps have a job in research. But instead I'll be stuck as a secretary in this awful school for maybe the rest of my life. Oh, I suppose I could take night courses and sign up to eventually sit the A-levels, but that would take years even if I could afford it! And I would still have a hard time getting somewhere because you have to have a PAST. You have to have an identity. No matter how hard I try, I may never be able to get the sort of job I'm really suited for. It's like I'm trapped in a prison! I know it's really not so bad of a prison, but I'm still trapped."
She sighed and gave him a rueful, apologetic smile. "Sorry for whinging at you like that. I just got a little carried away. I feel so helpless and frustrated. It's probably not something you'd relate to."
There was a long pause where dark eyes measured her ironically.
"Don't be so sure that I can't or don't, Miss Smith. Certainly my being here's no picnic either."
"Yes, but at least you can leave. You can always get a job somewhere else."
Again there was a long ironic stare, and Emma found herself wondering why Mr. Snape was here in the first place. Had there been some trouble in his past? Had there been a scandal or some sort of misunderstanding at his last job? Could he simply leave or were there complications she could only guess at? Emma wondered how badly she had trespassed, even as she wondered what sad secrets lay in the man's past. Snape, however, merely seemed pensive.
"I suppose it's true that I could leave, and someday I might actually do that, but at present I find myself employed here-- for better or for worse as the case might be. And... it appears at present that our situations might contain some... similarities. I also think it is possible we could be of help to each other. Tell me, Miss Smith, would you be interested in assisting me with some... research?"
Emma perked up instantly. "Research? Sure! What kind of research are you doing?" Restored to buoyancy by even the thought of a challenge, Emma felt her buoyancy returning. And she almost couldn't believe it. This was the sort of opportunity she had been hoping for. Here was a chance to do something far more rewarding than just typing quizzes and student work sheets. This was one of the original reasons she had wanted to get to know this brilliant, enigmatic man. Diverted a little from her from her own private troubles, Emma turned bright, expectant eyes on Mr. Snape. She really hoped her eager ears weren't pricking forward like a dog's.
Snape steepled his hands and and considered, the tips of his long fingers pursing his lips for an extended few moments, his black eyes glittering slightly. "As you have already guessed," he said softly, "I have an interest in the subject of memory. Though I have studied it extensively, as yet I have had no proper test subject. Providing you are willing, I would like to examine your 'non personal' memories. I certainly can't promise it would help you significantly, but it is possible that it might."
"Oh. Umm, sure. I suppose." Emma felt a little nonplussed. She hadn't expected this would be about her.
"Good," he said decisively, "First of all, I want to know what sort of memory therapy they used with you. Did they try anything at all?"
"Yes, of course. But it didn't work."
The science teacher rolled his eyes. "Obviously, Miss Smith," he said snarkily. "Just tell me what they did."
"Well, they had me look at pictures to see if anything seemed familiar. They did hypnosis. They tried scent therapy and music therapy to see if smells or sounds would jog something. But mostly they just had me talk to them. I guess getting patients to talk about feelings usually brings up memories eventually. It didn't work at all with me though."
"And what about all this knowledge that you appear to have. Did they do anything with that?"
"Oh, yes. They had me take a lot of tests-- math, history, language, and so on. They were very impressed by my academic knowledge. They thought that perhaps they could pinpoint what sort of school I had gone to and find my identity through that."
"And that was another obvious dead end as well."
"Yes. They sent my picture to a lot of schools but none of them had ever heard of me."
"Hmm... I wonder..." There was a long pause as he considered before turning back to her. "I will, of course, have to think about this carefully, but what I propose is to examine your wealth of knowledge from a viewpoint other than the academic. There may be things we can learn of your past from the odd facts you do remember, and there may be ways of gleaning information concerning your personal life from these facts."
"How? What do you mean?"
"What I'm saying is that you have learned many things, and not all of them in school. There may be bits of knowledge that would have a geographical or cultural significance and in these cases, what you don't know would have just as much significance as what you do know."
"Hmm. I suppose." Emma couldn't help a bit of a skeptical note in her voice.
"Yes. For instance, Miss Smith, do you know how to..." he considered for a moment, "change a nappie?"
"Huh? How could that have anything to do with--"
"Just answer the question. Think about it carefully, then give me an answer."
Emma thought. She knew what nappies were, of course. Babies wore them. They came in plastic packages and were made of paper these days, not cloth. Try as she might, though, she couldn't actually picture what one looked like outside its package. She also couldn't envision herself putting one on a child's backside either.
"No."
"Well, then," Snape smirked slightly. "From that we can surmise that you have never taken care of an infant. You most probably have never borne one, nor have you grown up in a family with siblings much younger than yourself. You probably have not earned money as a babysitter either, unless it was with older children. Do you understand what I am getting at?"
Suddenly she did.
"Oh!" she exclaimed. "Yes. I see! And I've been learning things like that already! I mean, I can tell you that I've never played Rugby or lived with someone who knew a lot about it. When they talk sports at the lunch table, I can't follow along at all. And when they are discussing childbirth..."
"Yes. Quite," he answered dryly. "Now what I want you to do is to think about the types of things that you've learned, any revelations you've had, and write them down. Then we can take it from there."
"Sure. I can do that. I'll start right on it tonight!" She tried not to sound too excited. She really did try, but Emma couldn't help a little rush of hope such as she hadn't felt in months. Maybe her life wasn't as quite so dire as she had been coming to believe it was. Maybe it wasn't a total loss after all. Maybe Mr. Snape really would find something those experts who had given up on her hadn't. Perhaps all it would take would be someone "outside" the prevailing method, someone with a fresh eye and new perspective.
Emma couldn't help gazing at Mr. Snape with grateful eyes. How nice it was that he was offering to help her! Of course it was, all things considered, only an academic exercise. The man was probably writing a paper on the results, but that didn't make Emma any the least bit less grateful. Besides, it was only fitting that as his secretary, she be in on all of his research oriented exploits.
"In the mean time," he said rising, "I propose we start with an experiment." From a side cabinet Snape took out what looked like a small black bottle. He also retrieved a long, thin box. Opening the box, he held out its contents to her.
"Do you know what this is, Miss Smith?"
"Why, that's a quill pen, isn't it?"
"Yes. Do you know how to write with one?"
"Oh, I don't know. I can't remember ever doing so."
He put the quill box and the ink on the desk before her and provided her with paper. "Well, give it a go, Miss Smith. I want to see how well you do."
