Not much happening in here, I'm afraid, but has to be done, brick-laying, you know?!:-)
****************************
The next morning found Severus only slightly better. His condition didn't improve when an owl with a ridiculous pink ribbon around its neck dropped a piece of paper on his plate. In his porridge, to say the truth. He picked the paper – lilac, a colour that wasn't exactly his favourite, only a little better than lavender – out of what had been his food with his fingernails. And opened it. His eyes nearly popped out of their sockets, a fact that was made known to him by the innocent question of his fellow teacher, the werewolf, what to hell was the matter with him. Snape gurgled. "The cheek of the people". With that and his robe billowing he got up and left. He wouldn't eat food soiled by that particular piece of rubbish.
The evening found him well-hooded in Hogsmeade. On the premises of that dratted Playhouse. Snape's mouth curled. The cheek was admirable, if nothing else. Playhouse had once been a perfectly innocent word for something where actors acted, and not something which induced the feverish dreams of hormone–crazed teenagers. And their elders who should know better. He pressed his teeth together and knocked on the door.
He did not have to wait long. A person clad in those abominable colours, but otherwise looking quite unspectacular, opened. Nothing like a Veela, Snape thought, perusing the man. Well, Severus you idiot, he told himself, it said Veela-trained, not Veelas. And what difference does it make how the employees look when they will act someone else most of the time?
He closed his mouth as far as possible to be still able to talk. Which was quite far. "I'd like to talk to the manager", he said to that person. "About this – invitation". He waved with the piece of paper that horrible owl had ruined his breakfast with. The eyes of the doorkeeper lit up as he perused the sheet of paper in Severus' hands. "Oh, so you are Severus Snape. Madam Aphrodisia will be so pleased to meet you. Come in, Sir, come in".
Snape was a little surprised. So this creature wasn't from here. Surely everybody in Hogsmeade knew him by sight. He was not to be mistaken for someone else, he was ridiculed for his outfit and looks often enough to know that. And yet, the owneress of the house, his lip curled in disgust, a certain Aphrodisia, seemed to wait for him. Strange. With his luck it was a former student of his, one of the many too dense to make a decent living, who had come up with this desperate means.
No, he didn't know this woman. Had never seen her in his life. Wouldn't have forgotten her either. Quite a sight. And in possession of a decent brain. And manners. Nothing at all like his students. She let him rant and rave on that abomination of a proposal she sent him, served him tea and talked him into it. Must be the room. It was dark, black and green and very much like his dungeon. The woman was wearing black too. He would never have given in had she been wearing those abominations others had the cheek to call colours.
And he was out of the room and out of the house and on his way back before he came to think again. And found himself with a new job. He shook his head. How she had done this, was beyond him. Must be the Veela training, he thought. More to it than met the eye. Well, he could make Polyjuice Potion in his sleep. And he could use the money she would pay him to go on a nice long holiday somewhere in the south. Of course he never would use the extra benefit she had offered him. That was really out of the question. Severus Snape felt himself blushing for the first time in years. This meeting had really left an impression on him, one that had actually taken him by surprise. He couldn't recall being that impressed by a woman in years. In his life. Ever. Sod it. It was not so much the looks of her, which he couldn't really remember vividly. It was more how he had felt in her presence. Alive. Young. And foolish. Well, foolish was of course his impression afterwards. After the deed was done. Where ever that witch had been schooled, it had been a good one. Well, could be that she had been in Hogwarts when he hadn't been a teacher yet, even if that seemed to be impossible. He nearly had forgotten about life before being a teacher. But there must have been one. Well, he wouldn't find out. Of course, Aphrodisia was not her real name. Quite ridiculous, as far as names went. But somehow extremely fitting. It was this thought that brought the potions master to an abrupt stop in his thinking. Muttering under his breath he set a swift pace and wouldn't think of it again. He spent the night making Polyjuice potion, though.