Disclaimer: All publicly recognisable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author.

Morning light filtered through a gap in the curtains, sending a panel of bright light across the bed, waking up it's occupant.

Not for the first time in her life, Hermione Granger dragged herself out of bed and shuffled gracelessly into her bathroom, staring at the mirror balefully. The night before had been another one to add to the growing pile of bad choices she had made in her life. She'd gone out drinking after work, and while it was something of a weekly ritual, it was one that was becoming harder for her to recover from the older she got. Her drinking partner, on the other hand, was far older than she, and seemed to always come out looking no worse for wear - almost as though he hadn't drank in the first place.

But Hermione knew better. The sneaky bastard was a potions master, and always had a little hangover potion readily available to him.

After a shower to try and pull herself together, she dressed in her most comfortable sweats, shoved her feet into a pair of slippers, and walked downstairs to her kitchen, yawning and rubbing her eyes. Every Saturday morning, she hated the number of stairs she had to face on her journey down, and she clung to the railing to prevent herself from slipping over and bouncing the rest of her way down.

As Hermione entered the kitchen, she noticed a cloud of ginger fur trail in after her silently.

'Morning Crooks,' she mumbled as he jumped up onto the nearest chair at the table.

He stared at her silently, leaning into her touch as she went to give the top of his head and under his chin a scratch. That was when she caught sight of it - a vial on the kitchen bench near the window where her owl post was delivered. As she approached, she saw the vial had a light aqua fluid within, and a label written in familiar, spikey scrawl was attached that read 'Drink me'. On reflection, her next decision was perhaps a reckless one, but she was so desperate to feel less wretched that she uncorked it immediately and tossed the potion back in one swallow.

It was minty fresh, and the nausea and throbbing headache that had been threatening disappeared. Bless that snarky bastard for taking pity on her this week.

Crookshanks crooned across the kitchen at her, reminding her of her responsibilities that morning, and she hurried over to place some wet food into a bowl for him, placing it down on a small mat. He happily began to gorge himself on the offering, making Hermione curl her lip in disgust. She set about preparing herself coffee and toast, and then took it all out on her back porch so that she could enjoy the flowers blooming in her small garden.

Once the breakfast portion of her morning was over, she spent some time pottering around her house tidying and cleaning as she went. She often neglected it through the week when she was busy, and would catch up on the weekend. Crookshanks, despite his advanced age, would often jump around in her clean laundry basket as she tried to fold it. It was both annoying and endearing.

She'd spend the rest of the weekend completing various errands around the house, or eating dinner with her friends. She spent a fair amount of time reading and catching up on the academic journals for the month. But really, it was all a distraction so that she didn't have time to spend thinking about Severus.

She'd wonder things like what did he get up to on his weekends? Perhaps he was more social than she had come to know from him. Did he read a lot as well? Of course he did - he was possibly the only man in Britain who had an affinity for the written word that might have surpassed her own. And she liked him - more than liked him. And it was a problem, because there was no way with their history, and their current friendship, that Severus would ever be interested in her the way she was in him.

That thought carried her through the rest of her weekend, though she spent much of it wishing it would go by faster, so that she was closer to seeing him again.

Making a beeline straight upstairs to the staff lounge off the visitor's centre on the fifth floor of St. Mungo's, Severus acquired two mugs of fresh coffee.

He wasn't exactly fond of the coffee brewed in the staff lounge, but it was a fair sight better than having none at all, or having to brave the crowded streets of Muggle London. If he was being honest with himself, it was less about the coffee, and more about seeing the delighted expression on the face of his friend and colleague; the curly haired Hermione Granger.

Severus made his way down to the floor below, bypassing the nurses station, and went to the far recesses of the floor where Hermione's office was located. Her office door was open - something about a ridiculous open-door policy which she applied in the literal sense. Sometimes her charming eccentricities alluded him. Severus stood in the doorway and took a moment to briefly admire her.

She had her head down as she was reading over a patient chart, a pair of glasses perched at the end of her nose. Her wild mane of curls had been tempered by a long, ropey braid that day, though there were still some frizzy tendrils that refused to be captured framing her face. She had her plump bottom lip pulled between her teeth, as she did whenever she was focussed on something. She was beautiful and he was a daft fool for subjecting himself to her presence every day with the knowledge she would be forever out of his grasp.

'Coffee,' he drawled, startling her.

She flushed pink when she realised she had been off in her own world. 'Thank you, Severus,' she said with a smile that made his stomach tighten.

His fingers brushed hers as she accepted the mug from him. Severus commits the feeling of her soft skin to his memory. He is ridiculous, of course, filing away the memories of her gentle touch to ruminate on later. When would he ever learn? When would he cease to fall in love with unavailable Gryffindors?

'Yes, well. I felt responsible for the people on your floor - you are a harridan without coffee in your system, Granger,' he quipped, hiding his foolish feelings behind a smokescreen of sarcasm. It was easier than dealing with it.

Hermione snorted, but blew on the coffee before taking a sip of the still steaming brew. She hummed happily, her eyes closing, and he felt his breath catch in his throat. She was beautiful. He shuffled from one foot to put his weight on the other, and decided it was time for him to take his leave - no need to torture himself any longer.

'I've got brewing to check,' he lied.

'Well don't let me keep you from it,' she said with a smile. 'Thanks.'

He pushed away from the doorframe and made his way back down to the ground floor, where his own office and lab was located. He'd had it moved down there when he accepted the position at the hospital - brewing volatile potions was risky, and having that risk elevated above other important wards in the hospital was not one he had been willing to take.

Once in his office, he sat down at his desk, sighing heavily and staring into the rich swirling liquid in the mug.

He had taken this position reluctantly, after years of nagging from Kingsley Shacklebolt. At first, he had been miffed to find out that he'd be working so closely with Hermione. She was one of the brightest students Hogwarts had seen. But she had also been an enormous pain in his backside, from the interruptions in class spouting textbooks verbatim, to her incessant hand-waving. But the Hermione Granger he had met three years beforehand, when he had taken the position at the hospital, was not that same student.

Several years out in the world working after a gruelling war that stole her childhood, had hardened and matured her. She was hard-working, compassionate, and had a way with her patients. She was beloved at the hospital. He hadn't stood a chance. Oh, he tried to ignore her in the beginning; being short with her when she had questions, ignoring her at every turn, and refusing all requests to engage socially both inside and outside of the hospital.

But Hermione was undeterred, and had steamrolled over him, forcing herself into his life and browbeating him into friendship. It was one of her more endearing qualities.

'Master Snape?' a quiet voice said from his doorway.

He gazed up and saw one of the interns. Had he forgotten to close the door behind him? Or was he just so distracted by thoughts of Hermione, he hadn't even noticed they'd opened it.

'What is it?' he snapped.

'I had a few potions related questions for you, if you have time,' the young man said, the slight quaver in his voice giving away his state of nervousness.

Severus raised an eyebrow. Part of his role there was to educate, and while he hated teaching, he was relieved that he no longer had to try and force important information into the minds of uninterested dunderheads. Not that the interns were much better.

'Come in and show me what you are having trouble with,' he said gruffly.

The young intern scurried in and sat in the chair across the desk from him, holding out a few sheets of parchment. Severus smirked. He loved scaring the interns.

Friday had taken so long to come around again, that Hermione had ended up counting the minutes as they went by the entire day. She was tired. It had been a long week, and despite what it would do to her heart, she was looking forward to her weekly drinks to Severus.

She had barely seen him that week, save for the odd coffee he stopped by with every other day. She had become so used to seeing him multiple times a day, that the week had seemed to crawl by because he hadn't been there. At one point, the day before, she'd even wandered down during a break to see him in his office, but he had been working, and Hermione had been reluctant to interrupt.

She missed him.

It was strange, because she still saw him all of the time - far more than any of her other friends. But, she supposed, it wasn't as thought she had gone and fallen in love with any of them. In fact, most of them were all happily married with children or some on the way. She liked them well enough, and supposed one day she might have one, but she wasn't focussed on becoming a parent in the way many of her peers had. She found a lot more satisfaction from her academic and career pursuits. She was too busy taking care of everyone at the hospital - she didn't have time for it at home as well.

At exactly five, she removed her Healer's robe and hung it on the hook on the back of her office door. She traded it for a casual black robe she always had on hand for her after work drinks, and covered up the pencil skirt and blouse she was wearing beneath. She checked her appearance in the mirror to ensure everything was as it should be, scrunching her nose a little when she saw her hair - a lot of her wild curls had escaped her braid that day, so she quickly cast a charm that saw it all up in a loose bun a the top of her head.

There. She looked almost respectable.

She made her way down to the ground floor where Severus' office was located, and when she didn't see him in the lobby, she walked to find him, and caught him as he was locking up his office for the weekend.

'Ready to go?' she asked a little breathlessly, placing a hand on his forearm. She felt his arm stiffen beneath her touch, but she persisted. He was warm.

'Yes,' he said, his voice sounding a little tight.

Hermione kept her hand on his arm. 'Are you well? We don't have to go out drinking if you aren't up to it,' she said with a smile.

He sighed and shook his head. 'I am fine,' he replied. 'Let's go.'

They went to the lobby and Apparated to Diagon Alley, heading to the Leaky Cauldron. They located a booth and Hermione watched as Severus went to the bar to order drinks. He returned with two pints of what looked like lager, and she gratefully accepted it and took a healthy swig. She closed her eyes and smiled. When she reopened them, Severus was staring at her silently as he nursed his own pint.

'You're awfully quiet,' she pointed out.

'It has been a very long week,' he answered.

'Do you want to talk about it?' she pressed.

He shook his head and fell silent again. She busied herself with drinking her beer, and took a moment to examine the man across from her.

He barely looked a day older than when he had been her teacher - not having a raving lunatic for a master had done wonders for him. But there was something behind his eyes that troubled her - he was distant, shuttered. He hadn't been this way in the past couple of years - not since they had become friends. An ache began in her chest, and a chilly feeling slid down her throat and settled into the pit of her stomach. Hermione wished that she could reach out and smooth the crease between his brows.

'I apologise, Hermione,' he said, breaking the silence. 'I am terrible company tonight. Forgive me.'

'Not at all.'

'How was your week?' he asked, diverting the subject.

She shrugged. 'The same old, really,' she answered. 'You know as well as I that I don't get a lot of new patients, and those I do oversee, have been around for quite some time. My interns are useless.'

Severus snorted. 'All of the interns are useless. They're all dunderheads.'

'You think that about everyone,' she remarked.

'Not everyone,' he said quietly, gazing right at her.

She felt her breath catch in her throat, and hurriedly took a sip of her drink to cover it. 'I'll take that as a compliment,' she said, a hint of teasing creeping into her tone.

'As it was meant.'

The next two hours passed in a blur of beer, fish and chips, and talk about the latest potion periodicals. Hermione subscribed to all of them. She was still a swot, she was just better at tempering her exuberance for knowledge. She didn't have to hide that side of her when she was with Severus - he was a know-it-all himself.

Severus walked her home from the pub. Her house wasn't too far away from Diagon Alley - she lived just on the cusp of what was a very respectable Muggle neighbourhood, and the Wizarding World. He was a little distant and Hermione could see the tension in his shoulders. Even after their pleasant dinner and drinks, there was still something weighing on him that he clearly didn't want to talk to her about. She decided to leave it be for now - very unlike her.

If she was completely honest with herself, she was worried about what it could be. He didn't seem all that close to anyone other than Kingsley and Minerva, and even they did not see him as often as she did. When they arrived at her front door, he bid her goodnight and she stood there, house keys in hand, as she watched the tall, slender man disappear around the corner as out of sight.

Letting out the breath she'd been holding, Hermione unlocked the door and was immediately treated to Crookshanks twining himself around her legs and rubbing against her.

'Hello, Crooks,' she greeted. 'Are you hungry? Come on, let's get you some food.'

She walked through to the kitchen and served up his favourite, crouching down beside him and scratching behind his ears as he greedily wolfed down his food.

'What am I going to do boy?' she asked him.

He turned his head and butted his squashed face against her hand, licking her thumb briefly before turning back to his meal. Hermione smiled and stood up, removing her black robe and walking upstairs, completing her nightly ablutions in a daze as her mind was elsewhere.

She fell into a fitful sleep that night, her mind turning to the shuttered black pools of his eyes.

The following week found Severus staring at a sheet of parchment before him, but it was offering up no answers to the quandary he now found himself in.

He couldn't turn off his feelings for Hermione, no matter how hard he tried, and how much he drank himself blind at home on the weekend. In fact, the only thing he knew for certain, was that he needed to stop doing that or his liver was going to pack it in sooner rather than later. He'd tried avoiding seeing her every day for a month. It didn't help. She'd seek him out and bring him the wretched coffee instead. They'd still have drinks and dinner on Friday night - he could not think of a single convincing lie to get out of it. She was clever, this witch.

It left him with very few options; he would either need to find a way to live with it, or do something horrible to make her push him away. Neither option appealed. The first, he could at least attempt. The second, he wasn't so sure he could bring himself to do anything that would hurt her now.

Throwing down the quill in his hand, he pushed his chair back from his desk and stood up. He needed to clear his head. Severus made his way up to the fifth floor and to the staff lounge, intent on finding some coffee so he could at least try to get some work done that day. And while it wasn't much better than instant coffee granules, he'd gotten used to it. He had not, however, accounted for the fact that Hermione might also be fetching coffee, and was holding a mug in each hand. She was coming to see him.

'Severus!' she said cheerfully. 'I was just on my way down to see you. I was fading..'

'Thank you,' he replied.

'We really should coordinate our coffee trips better - maybe we need some sort of rotating roster…'

He couldn't help but smirk as the witch disappeared into her own world at the idea of putting together a daily coffee schedule for them. 'Woman, you will do no such thing,' he told her plainly, interrupting her train of thought. 'I do not require a strict coffee schedule to adhere to. I am neither Potter nor Weasley studying for exams.'

She had the grace to blush then. 'Of course not.'

'Let's not hang about here,' he said with a sigh, pointing at the doorway.

Hermione smiled and strode past him, leading the way back down to her office where they found her assistant organising her file cabinet. Severus narrowed his eyes at the younger woman and was pleased that she seemed to be a little jumpy around him too. He smirked, satisfied by her reaction as she apologised and hurried out of the room. Like shooting fish in a barrel.

'I saw that,' Hermione said, grinning.

'The young ones here are far too skittish,' he drawled. 'So easy to toy with them.'

'You're evil.'

'Severus Snape, at your service.'

'You really are the limit sometimes,' Hermione said with a chuckle.

Severus smiled at her. No, he could not hurt her. He would simply have to find a way to be satisfied with their friendship. Better than he figured that out now than wait for her to find a new beau and have to work it out then. They sat on opposite sides of her desk, and he observed her as she pulled a stack of paperwork out of the in-tray on her desk.

'I cleared my in-tray this morning,' she grumbled good-naturedly.

'I don't doubt it,' he replied. 'Mine is probably filling up as we speak.'

'You can always borrow Ana for the afternoon and she can help you sort through it faster,' Hermione offered slyly.

Severus scoffed. 'You assistant is going nowhere near my paperwork, thank you very much.'

'Suit yourself,' she said, not bothering to look up from her work as she scribbled her signature on some papers. 'Just remember I made the offer, when you are swamped in paperwork later in the week.'

'Hmph,' he murmured with a huff. 'I should probably get back to my office.'

'Don't rush off on my account.'

He was tempted to stay. Hermione's office was nice and well-lit. She had an excellent view of this part of the city from her window, and everything about the room screamed her. She had a wall of bookshelves that was packed to bursting with textbooks and periodicals. Her filing system was a charmed tall chest of drawers, and her desk was built with the very same rich brown wood. Hell, the room even smelled like her - like bergamot, jasmine and vetiver. All of it wrapped around him with the warmth that she exuded from every pore. He liked being there with her.

So, with some effort, he dragged himself up from the chair and walked over to the doorway, pausing to look at her over his shoulder on the way out.

'No coffee schedule.'

She smiled. 'Fine.'

He walked back down to his own office with a heavy weight on his shoulders.

The clock seemed to have slowed, as if sensing that she was tired and just about at her limit for the work week.

Hermione looked at her watch again as she stood at the nurse's station and gave it a jiggle, as though such an action would make time go faster. It didn't help. Huffing impatiently, she handed over the patient charts to the nurse behind the desk with a grateful smile, and walked back towards her office after her morning rounds were over. Dropping into her chair, she eyed the paperwork with narrowed eyes. The pile had grown while she had been out of her office.

Exhausted from her patient interactions, Hermione decided she would need something to help get her through the rest of the day - at least until the afternoon, when she would undoubtedly help herself to another mug. Just as she had made her decision to head upstairs, the tall, dark and sinful form of her tormentor appeared in the door. She smiled, using her foot to push the chair across from her out from under the desk in invitation. He smirked. Gods he was handsome when he did that.

'You are far too predictable, Granger,' he told her, placing one of the mugs on the table between them.

She hastily reached for it before taking a sip, headless of the heat now scorching her tongue. She didn't mind. It distracted her from being able to gawk at him like an imbecile. 'Thank you!'

'Impatient as ever.'

'It's been a long morning, and I've just come back from rounds to a mountain of paperwork! I've never going to have it done to leave on time if I don't spend the rest of the day holed up in here. I may have to skip lunch,' she pouted.

'I could help…'

'You most certainly will not,' she told him, slapping at the hand that reached out to grab some of the pile.

'Violent woman.'

'I know you,' she said primly. 'If you help me now, I'll owe you a favour and then you'll have me cleaning cauldrons with potions caked to the bottom without magic like I'm in detention.'

'I would never.'

She sat smiling. This teasing banter between them had gone stale over the past month, and she had been missing it. His biting wit was something incredible to behold, and she especially loved his sarcasm and ire, now that it was no longer directed at her. He was funny, in a droll way. But despite the friendship they had fostered, she knew that he would likely never be able to look past their history as student and teacher. Although, every now and again, she wondered if perhaps his dark eyes lingered on her in the way she knew hers did on him.

'I need to get started on my work,' she said finally, pulling out her quill and ink. 'Stay or go - it wont bother me what you choose.'

'If I didn't know any better, Granger, I'd say you like it when I hang about and bother you at work,' he murmured with a smirk flirting at the corners of his mouth. 'It certainly can't be the coffee - it's swill.'

'Maybe I do like it,' she said without thinking, a blush immediately staining her cheeks.

There was a pregnant pause before Severus swallowed hard, and she could see the outline of the Adam's apple in his throat bob from the effort. 'The coffee?'

'No.'

'How interesting,' Severus drawled.

Her abused bottom lip was pulled between her teeth then. 'Yes.'

'It's Friday,' he observed.

Hermione looked at him quizzically then. 'It is indeed.'

'Are we still on for drinks after work, as usual?'

'Oh,' she breathed. 'Yes, of course we are.'

'Then I shall see you later, Hermione,' he said, voice filled with an unspoken promise.

She could barely bring herself to look away as he stood from his chair and strode out of the room. Her heart was pounding in her chest so hard she could feel the flutter all the way up at the pulse point in her throat. Her palms felt incredibly clammy all of the sudden, and she quickly wiped them on her robes. What the hell had just happened? He'd never looked at her quite so intensely before, at least not to her knowledge. She felt flustered, and when she brought her cold hands up to her cheeks she could feel they were warm, and were likely flushed pink.

What on earth had driven her to say that?

She must have been mad to flirt with him so overtly that way. But, she thought for a moment, recalling their interaction, had he not just flirted back? She felt giddy. He had flirted with her, right there, in her office. She thought hard back to moments before. He had firmly reminded her of their standing drinks commitment. She pinched her arm. Definitely awake.

Hermione spent the remainder of her work day trying to concentrate. She might have even snapped at Ana a few times as she rushed to get all of her work done in time, eager to see Severus so she could work out what was going on between them. At five, she filed away and sent off the last of the paperwork and hung her work robes, deciding to leave off wearing her black ones that day. She looked down at her outfit, wishing she had thought to wear something a little nicer.

Why would she have thought to? It wasn't as though they were on a date. It was just after work drinks with her friend.

Sighing, Hermione squared her shoulders and left her office. She didn't have time to worry about how she looked. After all, he'd already seen her that day. He was waiting for her in the entryway on the ground floor, his back to her. She'd always known he towered over her, but for some reason, without his thick black work robes on, he looked impossibly tall. It didn't help that she stood barely past his shoulders.

'Ready to go?' she said as she came to stand beside him.

He just barely looked down his long nose at her. 'Yes.'

He held out his arm and they Apparated in tandem, but she was surprised to see he had taken them to Hogsmeade instead of Diagon Alley that evening. She looked up at him in surprise.

'Rosmerta has better roast,' he offered in explanation.

Hermione decided not to question it, and followed his lead towards the Three Broomsticks. Hogsmeade on a friday night was certainly a lot more quiet than Diagon Alley and the Leaky Cauldron. They were seated and had their orders taken at their table. Hermione wondered why he had chosen there specifically. There was actually a much higher risk of them running into someone they knew there - Neville was the Herbology professor now, and Luna had taken over Charms when Filius Flitwick and Pomona Sprout had retired and eloped.

'I can practically see the cogs turning, Hermione,' Severus murmured.

She turned her attention back to her companion. 'My apologies,' she said hastily. 'I was lost in thought.'

'I live just outside of Hogsmeade,' he said.

Her brows raised. He knew where she lived, and often walked her home. But in the three years they'd worked together, he'd never once mentioned where he lived. She didn't want to assume he still lived at his childhood home in Cokeworth. It simply felt too personal to ask, and so she hadn't.

'You do?' Hermione wanted to hit herself. Brightest witch of her age, indeed.

Severus smirked at her. 'I do.'

She flushed. Why was she so awkward around him now? It wasn't as though anything had changed - she was still head over heels, just as she had been before he stopped by with coffee that day, and he was still very… Severus.

Their drinks and dinner arrived at the same time. Hermione was grateful for the temporary distraction, and dug into her meal with gusto. She hadn't realised how hungry she would be. She was terrible at feeding herself during the workday, and through the week, often only had breakfast and dinner. She observed the man across from her covertly through her lashes, watching him eat quietly. He was so tall and thin, she wondered if he even ate at all. But she knew he did. She'd felt his forearm muscles over his robes, and his clothing didn't do them justice.

Hermione could feel her hands becoming clammy again. This nervousness she was feeling was unfamiliar to her. She looked back down at her plate and tried to concentrate on not embarrassing herself while eating.

'Hermione?' he said, his tone almost gentle.

She forced herself to look up at him. 'I'm sorry,' she said immediately. 'I'm being ridiculous.'

He sat back and closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose for a moment before looking at her once more. 'I think it might be time for us to address the elephant in the room.'

Hermione felt her heart stall for a moment before she blinked and it started anew. 'Severus,' she began, surprised at how clear her voice sounded despite her anxiety. 'I don't expect anything -'

Severus held a hand up to stop her. 'Perhaps I should begin,' he said, the tightness in his jaw belying his confident delivery.

'Go ahead.'

'Forgive me if I misinterpreted our earlier exchange in your office,' he started, shooting her a quelling look as she opened her mouth to protest. 'Let me finish or I might never be able to get through this again, witch.'

She snapped her mouth shut and nodded. 'Alright.'

'I value our friendship a great deal,' he told her with a small smile. 'I know I fought you tooth and nail at the start, but it has come to mean a lot to me - too much. You are a force to be reckoned with, Hermione.'

She smiled and nodded at him to continue, the butterflies that had started in her stomach were making their journey upwards.

'I have been reluctant to make any move to change our relationship because until today, I did not think it was possible that you would return my regard,' Severus said finally, averting his eyes, his pale cheeks stained with colour. Hermione found it endearing.

Taking a fortifying breath, she reached over to where his hand rested on the table and placed her own over it, giving it a gentle squeeze. 'I feel the same way.'

He looked back at her in surprise before chuckling and shaking his head. 'We are idiots.'

Hermione grinned. 'We're both socially inept,' she agreed. 'Anyone else would have just said something. But that's not us.'

'So do we agree there is an "us" to consider?' he asked almost shyly.

'There is, definitely.'

The two of them finished their dinner with some haste after that, downing the rest of their drinks before mutually agreeing to leave the pub. Unlike every other time Severus had walked her home on a Friday night, this time he held an arm out to her hesitantly. She looped her hand around it, flushing with pleasure at being pressed close to him. He smelled ridiculously good - a herbal note mixed with spearmint and something else. They walked in silence, but at some point she realised they weren't heading to the Apparation point near the pub, and were heading to the outskirts of town.

They came to a stop in front of a house that took Hermione by surprise. It had a white picket fence and looked very normal, with a garden in the front, and was surrounded by trees.

'This is your house?' she stammered, surprised.

He nodded.

'It's lovely.'

He smirked. There, that was more like him. 'I'm glad you approve,' he drawled.

'Are you going to invite me in?'

Severus swallowed and pushed open the gate, and they walked up to the front doorstep. He touched the tip of his wand to the front door and it unlocked and opened. She walked in, her anxiety was back and was like a storm in her belly. The front door shut behind him, and the two of them were just standing awkwardly in his front entryway. Hermione gave herself a mental kick. Are you a Gryffindor, or aren't you?

She turned to him, and before she lost her nerve, Hermione placed her hands on his chest and leaned up to press her lips to his. He stilled for a moment beneath her, before his arms drew her tight to him, crushing her to his body as he returned the kiss with more ferocity than she had expected. She was delighted to discover the man knew how to kiss, and when she parted her lips and gently eased her tongue between them, he did the same, greedily feasting on her mouth. When their mouths parted for breath, Hermione could see a fire blazing behind his dark eyes. Nothing else needed to be said as they wordlessly walked up the stairs, his warm hand engulfing hers.

Later, as she lay back on the cotton sheets, still a little sweaty and struggling to catch her breath, Hermione smiled. Severus' head was pillowed on her breasts as he panted from the exertion. She gently ran her fingers through the silky strands of his hair as he pressed a kiss to her sternum, rolling off to her side, one of his long index fingers coming up to trace that scar that dissected her chest.

'We should have done that years ago,' he murmured with a smile.

Her breath caught in her throat at the pleased look on his face. 'We've already established that we are idiots.'

'We have a lot of lost time to make up for,' Severus said, his dark eyes flashing with something that made Hermione's stomach tighten with fresh desire.

'We'd better get started then,' she teased, pushing him over onto his back and straddling his hips before dipping down to kiss him.

As his hands slid up her thighs to grip her hips, she smiled into their kiss. Bliss, she thought to herself as their bodies came together as one again.

Fin.

A/N - Written as a birthday gift for the lovely Morbidmuch! Many thanks to my fic wife LunaP999 for editing this tale! x

Fika is a concept, a state of mind, an attitude and an important part of Swedish culture. Many Swedes consider that it is almost essential to make time for fika every day. It means making time for friends and colleagues to share a cup of coffee (or tea) and a little something to eat.