Title: Even if…
Pairing: Harry/Snape
Disclaimer: Harry and Snape are sadly, not mine.
Warning: In case the warning in the summary failed to inform you this is SLASH! Go away if you have problems with this. Although if you feel the urge to flame, go ahead. I've never been flamed before.
A/N: Well it's my first Harry/Snape story. As such, I'm not sure how IC Snape is. It's so hard to write him correctly! *sticks tongue out at Snape* Anyway, it's not very original but I like it anyway.
Severus Snape wrenched his eyes from the door to check on the clock ticking morosely away on his classroom wall. Harry Potter was late. Seventeen minutes late, to be precise. He couldn't remember the last time someone had been late to one of his detentions. It was insulting. You worked years honing a reputation of severity and viciousness and people were so unaffected by it that they forgot detention with you. And here he was wasting his time waiting around for that arrogant brat to show up.
With a snarl he leapt from his seat and strode to the door, his robes billowing about him in a comforting manner. He opened the door only to have a panting form run straight into him. With an undignified "Uff" he stumbled back, arms pinwheeling in a truly degrading manner. Once he managed to grind to a halt he shoved the breathless body off of him, nearly sending it back out the classroom door.
"Potter." He snapped, hands smoothing his robes efficiently, trying to recover his precious dignity. "Not only have you displayed a lack of coordination worthy of Mr. Longbottom, but you are late."
Harry's face lost some of his flushed coloring as Snape's voice cracked over him. How was he going to explain this?
"Well, I was…er," Harry gave up trying to speak coherently and settled for gazing at the dungeon floor.
"You were what?" Snape's eyes although still angry, now glinted faintly in amusement.
"I was-" He suddenly found his face jerked up by one of Snape's hands. He could feel Snape's fingernails resting against his skin. He forced himself to keep perfectly still, not to lean into Snape's tapered fingers.
"At least have the balls to look at me while you lie about your whereabouts Mr. Potter." Snape sneered slightly as he watched Harry blush. The brat HAD been about to lie, then. He wondered fleetingly how someone whose face was as easy to read as a children's book could possibly be the savior of the wizarding world. After glaring into Harry's eyes for an interminable amount of time, he released Harry's face.
'Almost like a caress' Harry thought as he felt Snape's hand slide back across his cheek. He closed his eyes briefly, the sensation of actual contact with the Professor combined with Snape's penetrating gaze too much to handle at once.
"Now, what exactly made you late for your detention?" He crossed his arms over his chest and watched as Harry struggled to force another lie from his lips.
Finally the boy sighed and looking almost defiantly into Snape's eyes said, "I was in the Astronomy Tower with…someone, and I lost track of time."
Snape's gaze flicked over Harry's neck, which looked faintly bruised to his robes, which were only half buttoned. His thin lips pursed. How dare this arrogant whelp blow off his detention to make out with one of his numerous groupies! To be passed over for some giggling vacuum-headed girl was…insufferable. He felt the intense urge to slap Potter but allowed only a sneer to express his disgust.
"One of your fangirls decided to get her 2 minutes with fame, I suppose." His voice dripped vitriol.
"Well, not fan*girls*," Harry blurted out, before his brain had time to stop him.
Snape's eyebrows shot up his pale face. So Potter was…Well, Well. His sneer turned into something more gleeful as he watched Potter turn an amusing shade of puce. It was quite fetching on him, actually…
'Oh God' Harry thought, utterly appalled at his stupidity. 'I just came out to Professor Snape! I haven't even told Ron yet.' Harry gazed fearfully up at Snape, waiting for the verbal axe to fall, but it didn't. The black eyes bore into him in a way that made him long to shift uncomfortably, but not one snarky comment passed his pursed lips.
Finally Snape blinked and seemed to come back to himself. "It makes no difference to me who you were groping up there. The fact remains, you were late. You will serve an extra half hour to make up for the time you missed. Start by scrubbing this entire floor, using this." He flicked his wand gracefully, muttering under his breath. To Harry's horror a toothbrush appeared in Snape's hand along with a bucket of soapy water that looked dirtier than the floor. Handing the toothbrush over to Harry with a flourish, Snape smirked once before floating to his desk.
Harry gazed after him, confounded. Didn't he care? Harry had known since his crush on Snape began that it was useless but to have his sexuality brushed off like crumbs from Snape's immaculate black robes was painful. He wasn't even worthy of the Professor's disgust. Harry snorted. Actually wanting that intolerable ass's revulsion. He wondered about himself sometimes, he really did.
Over the course of the next hour Snape found his gaze drawn to the figure scrubbing the floor before him. It was just because he was so surprised at Potter's impromptu confession, he told himself. Of all the students he would have ever expected to see in a meeting of the 43rd chapter of the Gay and Lesbian Wizard Alliance (Draco Malfoy, for instance) Potter would have been one of the last. After all, it went against the Hero image that Potter fit so perfectly. He was supposed to marry that youngest Weasley girl and become a famous Auror or something. Not get hickeys from random boys in the Astronomy Tower.
'I wonder if he would ever-' Snape chocked that thought off viciously. Even if Potter did swing that way he would never think of doing anything with him. Not that he wanted him to! Even if he was getting an excellent view of Potter's backside.
He forced his eyes back on the mediocre third year essays he was marking. Potter was sixteen for Christ's sake! It was not only illegal but also repulsive. He was James Potter's son. The man who had made his teens a nightmare and then had the nerve to save his life. And then had had the absolute cheek to die before he could repay the favor. He should not be having lascivious thoughts about his son. And he should certainly not be doodling dirty pictures of said son on some Ravenclaw's archaic essay. Even if Potter's scrubbing motions were rather evocative. Sighing, he murmured an erasing charm over the parchment, removing all traces of his artwork from it.
He scratched a giant F across the paper, and began reading the next. 'I wonder how he would look-' Dear God! Where had all these thoughts come from? Yesterday Potter had been one slightly more annoying than average student and now he was having sexual fantasies about him.
He wondered about himself sometimes, he really did.
Groaning at the aching pain running up and down his tired legs, Harry stood up at last. Snape's head snapped up from his papers and watched with avid interest as Harry stretched. He was done for. He had officially turned into a randy old git. His face flushed slightly but couldn't stop from staring as Harry contorted his body into some thought provoking positions. Finally the youth turned around and fixed his green eyes upon Snape's black ones.
"I'm finished, may I go?" 'Please say no. Just please say anything.' Harry prayed.
Snape's eyes shifted quickly to the clock and then back to Harry's. Even if he did still have 15 more minutes left it was probably a good idea to get him out of the classroom now. He desperately needed to deal with his body's reaction to the flood of inappropriate thoughts that had been building up over the past two hours. "You may."
'Ooh,' thought Harry. 'His voice is more gravelly than usual.' He found himself asking Snape something just so he could hear more of the calloused voice.
"Pardon me Potter, did you just ask me if I would be teaching tomorrow?" Snape mobile eyebrows had once again crept up his face in disbelief.
"Well…I guess so." Harry felt all the blood that could be diverted from his voice-induced erection flood his cheeks. He was such a dolt sometimes.
"When have I ever been known to be absent from school, Potter?" Malice threaded through Snape's voice, making Harry shiver. "Dare I hope that you were actually concerned with my welfare? Or perhaps you were planning on skipping to have another fuck with one of your fan*boys*?" Snape couldn't prevent the snarl that wrapped around the last word.
Harry's brain shrieked to a halt. Snape had just said 'fuck'. Harry didn't know whether to be horrified or horribly aroused. He settled for a combination of the two, gaping at the Potions master as a furious blush rose on his cheeks. Just then what exactly Snape had said registered and he forgot to be horrified and was enraged.
'He looks absolutely edible' Snape was grateful for his large desk, which blocked all hint of what the sight of the flustered boy was doing to him. He rather thought that it was exactly as Potter would look when he came. Snape filed the image away for later use in his fantasies, which he would indulge in as soon as Potter left. Which had better be soon, or the admittedly large portion of his brain devoted to witty repartee would short circuit, leaving him as dumbfounded as Potter.
"You bastard!" Harry blurted out, his hands clenching in an effort to stop themselves from wrapping around Snape's throat. Even if the Potions master did have the sexiest voice the entire school it didn't stop him from being an unmitigated prick sometimes.
"What did you call me?" Snape snarled, rising from his desk in a flourish of black robes. Potter might have looked like desire personified with his cheeks flushed and his lips pursed in a suggestive manner and his-STOP! But it didn't give him the right to question his Professor's parentage, even if he was absolutely correct.
"I said you were a bastard!" Harry yelled, forcing his hands to remain at his side. They desperately wanted to touch Snape's face. Whether to punch it or merely enjoy the sensation of his skin, he could not say.
Snape tore around the desk, his voice low and menacing. "I may be born on the wrong side of the blanket, Potter, but at least I am in possession of parents." He knew it was low but something in him had never been able to stop baiting the boy, to see rage flash in mesmerizing-
Harry's hand connected with Snape's face with a sickening crack. Snape stumbled back to the desk holding his cheek, utterly shocked. Harry Potter had struck him.
If this had happened yesterday he would have dragged Potter immediately to the Headmaster's office and watched gleefully as he got expelled but today he used it an excuse to grab Harry's shoulders and pull him towards him. Harry's shaky breath trembled over his face and his eyes, startlingly beautiful up close, gazed wide-eyed at him a few blissful inches away. He allowed himself to enjoy Harry's presence for a mere second before snarling down at him.
"You know, of course, that striking a member of the Hogwarts faculty is resultant in expulsion?"
Of course Harry knew. He had known the minute that his hand connected with Snape's cheek that it was probably one of the stupidest things he'd ever done. With one slap he had not only gotten himself thrown out of his only real home, but he had put an end to any contact with the man he had been lusting over for nearly a year. A man who was now pressed up against him in all the right places and glaring at him with a stimulating intensity. He closed his eyes, trying to steer his mind back to more important matters, like his future. "I'm sorry!" Harry exclaimed, even though he wasn't, really.
Snape apparently didn't think he was either. "Your attempts at falsehood are truly pathetic, Potter."
Harry stared up at the mix of malice and pity on Snape's face waiting once again for more of the verbal venom to be poured in his ears but Snape didn't growl a word. Just gripped his arms with his long fingers and glared at him in a truly unsettling manner and pressed into…Harry looked reflexively down and then back up at the Professor. Was it his imagination or did Snape have a hard-on? He shifted experimentally and watched Snape's eyes unfocus slightly. It wasn't his imagination, then. Oh God.
A/N: Kind of ends abruptly, doesn't it? I love cliffhangers, don't you? *evil grin*
