Downside of Aging Potions - Chapter Twenty-One

"Well this is incredible starving insatiable
yes this is love for the first time
and you'd like to think that you were invincible
yeah well weren't we all once."
-Dashboard Confessional, This Brilliant Dance

"I'm tired of it, Severus. Tired of it." She raged.

He stood, hoping to keep his courage by being taller than her. She walked around his room, pacing, mad, and cheeks red.

"You don't remember a thing that happened, do you? Either time you were drunk. Do you?" She pressed, turning and walking right up to him, centimeters from his body.

"I don't know what you're-"

"I'm talking about this-" and she grabbed his face and pressed her lips to his in a desperately dangerous kiss.

He couldn't sink into the brutal kiss before she pulled away, still holding his jaw with quite a grip.

She was breathing heavily and her chest heaved to show it, in case he couldn't hear her, because none of his body seemed to functioning anyway.

"Miss Granger-"

She let go, throwing her arms into the air and paced as she ranted, "I'm the only who remembers anything. And apparently I'm the only one who feels anything in this room, too-"

"You don't know what I feel." He cut in immediately.

"I know I don't. Because you won't tell me. Jesus Christ, Severus, do you think I'm some dog? Because that's what it fucking feels like. You just let me follow you around the castle and then you think it looks bad around everyone-"

"That is not true!" He shouted, fuming at the thought that she would think that. He may be a bastard, but nobody could be that heartless. Except perhaps Voldemort.

"Then tell me! Tell me what you think because I'm fucking lost!"

"I..." He'd started to say it, but changed his mind, "I like being around, you, okay? Your company has softened me, despite my attempts to push you away towards the beginning of the year, and now it's fucking December and... and we're in deep shit." He sighed.

"I told you already, I don't want to separate, but there are still some people around here who went to school with me and will recognize my face. And if anyone sees us... I don't want you to get in trouble, I'm not worried about me, so don't try and turn it around on me and say I don't care about you!"

He finished and then realized what he'd finished with.

"Does that mean..." The flush was gone from her cheeks, but she stood as close as before.

Not waiting for her to finish her sentence, he pulled her into his own kiss, less brutal and with more passion than she'd tried, or cared, to put in.

Now Hermione was so stunned she didn't quite ease into the kiss... at first. Soon, she was forgetting everything and she wrapped her arms around his neck and he hastily put his arms around her waist, glad that this was actually what she wanted.

Her head was dizzy with... the feeling of it all. The feeling, the longing she was suddenly start to feel and her stomach was churning and her knees were having trouble supporting her weight.

All too soon, he broke apart, and he stepped back from her, and she nearly cried. But before she could leap back onto him, he said, "It does."

Hermione clasped her hands uncertainly behind her back and looked up at him, "Oh..."

He laughed, "Oh? That's it?"

"Well, I didn't expect... that..."

He laughed richly, making Hermione smile in return. Putting her hair behind her ears, he said, "So... did I really kiss you when I was drunk?"

But she didn't get to answer because his fireplace erupted in green flames and Dumbledore stepped into the room with a very odd look on his face.

'Thank God he's always late.' Snape thought to himself and walking away from Hermione to greet the Headmaster.