A/N: We're not back to Hogwarts yet, but we're close ^_^ This is another chapter I wanted to write since a long time ago because... well, because it had to happen at some point, right? I hope I did it well, I mean... I hope you like it...
Next chapter will exclusively be about the school, I promise, really... I have nothing else to write about the summer, so... the new school year will begin soon, at last!
ENJOY ^_^
MY MASTER
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36
Friends
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by Saeshmea
"Severus," Mrs. Wilson calls me before I've even made a step into the shop, "don't tell me you left that lady again, because I was really glad when I received your letter, you know."
"No, Mrs. Wilson," I reply with an almost unnoticeable smile on my lips, "I'm back with Minerva, this time," I explain, "she's visiting some friends right now."
"Oh, then you must bring her here some time so I can have a few words with her," she says, "we must make sure she knows what a good boy you are so that she doesn't let you go again."
"I will," I say and I take one of the shopping baskets and cross half the shop before she ambushes me again.
We came home first thing on the morning, after a quick breakfast that William served with the angriest face I'd ever seen on a non-human creature. He didn't like the idea of Minerva spending part of the holidays away and he made it very clear to her and me.
"I thought Mr. Snape liked it here too," he said to me yesterday night after we'd told him, "Aren't I treating you well, Sir?"
"You are, William," I replied, "but you're not the reason we're leaving. Minerva wants to visit her friends in London and I have my house there, so…"
"Tell her to stay," he said, "she does everything you tell her, right?"
"She does," I answered, "but I do everything she tells me too," I added, and the elf popped away more confused that he'd come into the bedroom.
Once back home, I unpacked my suitcase and made some space on the closet and the drawers for Minerva's dresses and things.
"You do know I have no intention of giving this space back to you, right?" she joked while using one entire drawing only for her underwear.
"Maybe I should ask for a price, then," I suggested, trapping her between me and the furniture.
"Oh, and what kind of price would that be?" she wondered, using her feline agility to turn around on that little space I was giving her, "because maybe I'm not interested, then," she grinned, and I stole a kiss from her tender lips that still tasted of her morning tea.
"I'm sorry, but no returns allowed," I concluded our verbal game before carrying her on my arms to the bed.
After a nice long shower, Minerva left to pick up Hooch before going to see Pomfrey and then I think they would also stop by Sprout's house in the city. She said she would probably have lunch with the girls, so after having a quick meal on my own I went to Mrs. Wilson's shop to fill up the fridge.
…
I'm in the small office I've made in my old bedroom, studying the school year program that Slughorn gave me as a guide for me, when I hear the front door. Minerva is back.
I don't go downstairs to greet her. I want to, but I feel like these days back in London should be about giving her some space, letting her find her place in our relationship. So I just listen to her steps going into the kitchen, the fridge opening, a drawer closing, silence – she's probably having a snack, maybe some fruit, or a yoghurt, I did buy some at Mrs. Wilson's this morning. Then I listen to her walking again, going up the stairs, standing in front of the office door and a soft knocking.
"Come in," I say.
"Hi," she walks into the room and sits down on the chair laying at the corner.
"Hi," I reply, "how did lunch go?" I ask, leaving my papers aside.
"Fine," she mutters.
"But, did you tell them, your friends, about us?" I ask.
"I did," she answers, "with a little help of Rolanda, because I really didn't know how to start. – They took it fine," she concludes, "They'd like to meet you."
"They already know me," I say, thinking she's joking.
"Yes, but not as my partner," she emphasizes that last word, "Pomona invited us for dinner at her house on Saturday, I told her we would probably be back in Scotland by then."
"Why? Do you want to go back?" I ask.
"No, but I thought…"
"Minerva," I stand up and walk around the desk to take her hand, "they are your friends, therefore, they are my friends too," I say, "tell Sprout we'll be glad to join them for dinner."
"Are you sure?" she insists.
"Didn't you say everything went fine?" I reply, "what worries you so much?"
…
What worried Minerva so much was that Sprout, who was very pregnant by now, had also invited the other two of their friends to the dinner, and none of them took an eye away from me during the entire evening.
"Here's the lovely couple," Hooch joked when we arrived to the nice country house that Sprout shares with her husband in the surroundings of London. At the front, there is the most beautiful garden I'd ever seen, which is a real contrast with the muggle houses around, and inside the house you can find the most exotic plants you can imagine in the most strange places; like inside the fridge, for instance, where I find a purple flower eating some butter when I go to pick up some more wine for the table.
"Is it dangerous?" I ask Sprout, when she comes into the kitchen after me.
"Only when it bites," she replies, and she closes the door behind her, "she doesn't know what she wants," she suddenly says, and I know I'm being ambushed.
"The flower?" I joke, trying to ease the tension in the room while I'm holding the cold bottle on my hands.
"Minerva," she says, "the war changed her, well, it changed most of us but, Minerva really became someone else," she explains, "Dumbledore put on her a lot of responsibility all of a sudden, the school, the order… it was too much."
"But she did well," I point out.
"Yes, but she sacrificed a lot of things for it," Sprout adds, "like her own feelings."
"I'm not taking advantage of her," I say.
"Of course not," she agrees, "Minerva is clever enough to know that," she adds, "Don't misunderstand me, Severus," she says, "if I didn't like this, I wouldn't be warning you, I would be talking to Minerva."
"Warning me?" I wonder, confused.
"I know Minerva seems taught, I know sometimes it looks like nothing really affects her, but she is fragile," she says, "in the insight she is, so try not to hurt her, please."
"So you don't think I'm bad for her," I try to be sure.
"Are you crazy?" she exclaims, "Have you seen her laughing with Rolanda? She's happy," she adds, "I don't know how you've done it, but I can assure you that a year ago it would have been impossible to make Minerva come for dinner, especially with a date," she adds, "you're changing her back, Severus."
While we walk back to the dining room, I wonder how Minerva was before the war. I knew her only as my professor, and the truth is that inside the classroom, she looks just the same to me.
"Here's the dessert," our host says, leaving on the table the chocolate cake she'd gone to take from the kitchen.
"And more wine," I add, and I open the bottle and refill my glass and Minerva's before sitting down with her.
"Is everything alright?" she whispers so that nobody hears, "it took you a while to come back," she says, "did Pomona say anything?"
"Everything is fine, my love," I say, and not caring at all about the rest of the table – in fact, willing them to witness, - I give Minerva a short but passionate kiss.
"Severus," she scolds me when I break it apart.
"Do not dare complaining about that," Hooch says from the other side of the table, "I am so jealous. I want a Snape of my own."
"Me too," Pomfrey mutters, "and I don't even need him to be twenty."
"Oh, enough of that, please," Minerva speaks up, "I don't need you to remind me of our age difference all the time."
"We can't help it, dear, he's half your age, it's not something you ignore…" Sprout explains while she hands each of her guests a piece of cake.
"Well, I can assure you it is something I never think about," I declare, and it is Minerva this time the one to kiss me in front of her friends.
"So, you never think of her as your former professor?" Hooch wonders.
"I do," I admit, "but I don't see the harm on that," I smirk and she blushes.
"When is the baby due?" Minerva asks, trying to change the way of the conversation, I guess.
"First week of November," Hans answers.
"Are you sure you'll be able to handle your classes, Pomona?" Minerva questions her.
"Absolutely," she says, "we've already been talking to the Headmaster about it. Hans and I will be moving together into the castle, and he will teach my classes whenever it is that our baby decides to come out," she explains, "I thought Albus would have told you already."
"Well…" Minerva mumbles, and I know it's Dumbledore what makes her nervous, "I haven't talked much to him during the summer… He doesn't, he…"
"I told you, Pom," Hooch quickly helps her friend out, "they don't want the old man to know about them in case he kicks Severus out because of their affair."
"But it's not just an affair, right?" Pomfrey asks.
"They're taking things slowly, I guess," Sprout says, "It's the only way you know you're doing it right. They must know each other well, have no secrets between them… before being sure the risk is worthy, right?" she asks looking at both of us and Minerva and I just nod.
…
Know each other well.
Have no secrets between us.
Sprout's words echo in my head all the way back to my house.
When the school year ended, when I told Minerva we were over, she gave me her diary without a doubt, she handed me all her secrets while I still keep a few from her.
"Minerva, sit down, please," I say when we're back in my living room, "we should talk."
"Talk?" she asks, "It's Pomona, isn't it? She said something to you in the kitchen when you were alone," she says, "I don't care what it was, she's wrong."
"No, Minerva, actually, she is right," I say, "but it's not about what we talked in the kitchen, it's about what she said later on the table, about having secrets."
"I have no secrets for you," she quickly says, sitting on the sofa.
"I know, I say, sitting next to her and taking her hands between mine, "it's me," I stop a moment to take a breath, "Minerva, you know I keep many things from my past to myself because you don't need to know all the atrocities I did while being a Death Eater," I say, "but there's something you ought to know, something that might change the way you see me and…"
"I don't want to know," she interrupts, "please, whatever it is, I don't need to know, Severus."
"I'm sorry, but if I keep it to myself any longer, Minerva, I'll start to feel as if I'm lying to you," I say, "and sooner or later you will find out and that will be more painful than if I tell you."
"Alright," she says, "what is it?"
"When I was a kid I met a girl, a muggle girl with magic powers that came to Hogwarts with me. I fell in love with that girl. She was beautiful and smart, and she was the first person not to judge me because of where I came from," I explain, "I never told her how I felt, and she fell in love with another boy in the school, who she married and had a child with," knowing Minerva has no clue yet of who the girl in my story is, I keep going, "later, after I became a Death Eater, I was in a mission for the Dark Lord when I overheard a conversation between Dumbledore and who was about to become the new divination professor of the school."
"Trelawney," Minerva mutters, beginning to understand where I'm heading, "You eavesdropped the prophecy!"
"I did," I say regretful, "and I told the Dark Lord about it, thinking it would help me be in a good position among the Death Eaters, and it did, because I was one of the chosen to look for the baby the prophecy talked about and, as soon as I learned the Dark Lord was looking for that girl, that beautiful and smart girl I was in love with and her family, I went to Dumbledore and begged him to protect her."
"You were in love with Lilly," Minerva mutters almost in a whisper.
"Yes," I confess with tearful eyes, "I loved Lilly Evans with all my heart and there's not a single day in my life I don't blame myself for her death," I say, allowing myself to cry.
"But you didn't kill her," Minerva says, "you tried to protect her when you learned she was in danger."
"I told Dumbledore I'd do anything if he could safe her," I sobbed, "he made me become his spy, he made me promise my loyalty to him, he made me swear I'd help him protect her baby, and I did it, I did everything he asked me to," I explain, "but Lily died, and I am still paying the price of the life he couldn't safe."
Suddenly, Minerva stand up, and I think she's going to yell, she's going to go upstairs, take her things and leave forever, but she doesn't.
"Come," it's everything she says. She takes my hand, makes me stand up and walks me outside the house, outside the magic guards, so we can disapparate together.
…
We apparated back in a peaceful street where I've never been before. I know we're still in London because I can see the shadow of the city far away, but I don't know where exactly.
"Come," she says again, and without letting go of my hand, she takes me to the house with a number four written at the front, but we don't knock the door, we sneak behind the garden and look through the window without being noticed.
Inside the house there is a family, a big man not older than thirty and a very thin woman that reminds of someone. Sitting on two different baby chairs, one completely new and the other clearly second-hand, there are two babies that don't look alike at all. The one in the new baby chair is chubby and it's getting all dirty while eating a cookie on his own; the other one looks smaller, has a strange scar on his forehead and for a moment, I believe he has smarty spotted us behind the window.
"Lilly," I say when I see his eyes, "it's Lilly's baby."
"Yes," Minerva says, still holding my hand, "that's the life you saved, Severus," she reminds me, "yes, you did terrible things, but if it had been another Death Eater who had eavesdropped the prophecy, Harry wouldn't be alive, and the war would be over."
"You shouldn't have taken me here," I tell her, suddenly feeling myself again, "Dumbledore…"
"Dumbledore told you to help him protect Harry," Minerva says resoundingly, "you can't do it if you don't know where he is."
"But…"
"I don't care if I get in trouble," she says while we walk away from the house, "all this time I thought he trusted you because he'd seen something special on you, but Albus doesn't trust you, does him? He just holds this against you, this one mistake, this one moment of weakness…"
"Minerva…"
"No. I do trust you," she says, "I did see something special on you, and I don't care how many horrible things you have done," she yells in the middle of the street, "I know you are not a horrible man, Severus Snape, so stop trying to convince me you are."
.
TO BE CONTINUED…