Disclaimer: all recognizable characters belong to Rowling. Be happy for that; if not, they'd be going through stuff like this all the time.
Enjoy!
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Happy Christmas, Professor Snape
Bloody Christmas.
Too much cheer, too many damn twinkling lights, too many people calling him Scrooge to his face and saying "bah, humbug!" at his back. As if they were so witty and original.
Plus he never got any cool gifts.
Every year it was the same: wait for the damn water to warm up for a quick shower, then breakfast with giddy people (staff and students alike) who were so jolly it made him sick, then the rest of the day in blissful silence in his office.
Every year the same.
This year, however, as he ate his bacon (thinking un-Christmasy wicked ways to get rid of that Potter kid once and for all), a great horned owl flew over the breakfast table and dropped a package on him.
He caught it in surprise and studied it suspiciously. No one else at the table paid attention.
Who could—? What could—? Well, it wasn't ticking. It couldn't hurt to open the card.
"Saw this in a catalog, couldn't help thinking of you," he read.
That certainly didn't make him any more eager to open the package.
He studied the plain wrapped parcel a minute longer, prodding it with a fork. No one would try to kill him on Christmas, would they? At the breakfast table? Of course, Potter—he shot an evil glance down the table at the boy.
Potter, along with everyone else, still wasn't paying attention to him.
With a resigned sigh, he pulled the string tying it. Better to get it over with, let everyone have a good laugh at his expense, then enjoy the rest of the day nursing bitter grudges. The thought of it perked him up a bit.
The string came off. The brown paper ripped. Involuntarily he held his breath as he pulled out . . . a black piece of cloth.
A Muggle shirt. An extra large tee shirt, to be exact. On the front was written:
I'm only wearing black until they make something darker.
A snicker escaped his lips. It was joined by a chuckle, then a full-bodied belly laugh, complete with tears in his eyes. He was only semi-aware that everyone present was staring at him, startled. He was beyond caring; at this point he couldn't explain himself. He couldn't have stopped laughing if he wanted to.
"You see!" someone was exclaiming. "I knew the house-elves spiked this eggnog!"
It made Snape howl even louder. It was shaping up to be the best bloody Christmas ever.
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whew! Thankfully that's over.
* we now return you to your regularly scheduled fiction *
