Disclaimer: The disclaimer on the first chapter applies pretty much to everything else in the rest of the fic.

Rating: Still PG-13

Pairing: Still yet to come in the later parts

Notes: My take on Severitus' challenge, and I thank her (or him?) for giving me a reason to write once again.

The Diary

By: Astral Fou-lu

Part Two: In Which Severus Deals With the Forgotten Truth or Severus Snape's Anguish

Professor Severus Snape had every noise in the classroom quieted as soon as he closed the dungeons door behind him. He regarded the whole classroom with a languid but alert eye: everything was in place, no one absent, and Harry—

His expression darkened. There he was, The Boy Who Lived, frantically writing on his parchment. Forgotten his homework, no doubt. His lip curled slightly as he spied another chance to rub the Potter boy's fur the wrong way.

"May I take a look at what you are too occupied with to take notice of my arrival Mr. Potter?" Snape breathed down on Harry's neck, pleased that he could very well divine the small amount of fear in those green eyes.

Gingerly picking Harry's parchment, Snape tsk-ed as he examined it. "My, my. My appointed essay on vervain, express-style. What is my class, Potter? Some kind of a Muggle fast-food parallel?"

The Slytherins snickered.

"No, sir," the quiet voice said. Harry.

"Oh, no doubt about it, no doubt," Severus sneered with a tone that gave away a grudge that had been brewing for so long. He promptly rolled the parchment, not handing it back to Harry. "I will give you a fast grade for this as well, Potter. An F."

Howling laughter from the Slytherin table.

Snape shushed them with a wave of his hand and took up his chalk and wrote down the ingredients for the day's work. He could somehow hear Hermione Granger's scathing remarks to Harry that he should have done his homework earlier.

The class was well immersed in their potions when a loud clang, a sound of a fallen cauldron, no doubt, snapped the Potions master from his relaxed scribbling on the blackboard enough to make him snap his chalk.

"What is it now?" he said tersely, not even bothering to look behind him as he reached for a longer piece of chalk, assuming that it was Longbottom again.

No answer.

With an exasperated sigh Snape turned around to see Longbottom's cauldron intact, and it was the Potter boy's cauldron that was on the floor, rolling on its side and its contents spilled all over.

"Explain, Potter," was all Snape said. Inside, he was extremely incensed that six years of teaching him potions had not instilled in him one ounce of a sense of precaution.

But then, that should the same for Longbottom too.

Green eyes held his gaze steadily as Potter answered, "Malfoy had intentionally pushed it while I wasn't looking, Professor,"

Those infuriatingly green eyes. It made Snape slightly sick, seeing those eyes take on a hard gaze totally unlike Lily Evan's gentle and naïve disposition.

The mindless and overly-gentle kindness that promptly made him want to belch. Lily had no backbone, and to see her green eyes had somehow warped his absurd vision of Lily Evans-Potter being able to hold herself.

"As always, putting the blame on others. You could do better, Potter," he said, the words rolling from his tongue effortlessly. Merlin, the way the students act predictably that my responses are just as quick, he thought bitterly. He knew that Potter was saying the truth (he disliked Draco Malfoy but his current position had not given him the liberties to grill the spoiled prat), but he wanted…

Wanted to see the anguish from those green eyes. Lily-green eyes.

"Five points from Gryffindor for creating such a ruckus, Potter. And another two for blaming others. You could have just guarded your work so that nobody could tamper with it," Snape drawled, but he looked pointedly at Draco and his voice hardened as he said the last phrase.

He dared not deduct points from Slytherin, so as not to give a reason for his loyalty to be questioned.

"You will serve detention this weekend, Potter. At night."

In Snape's Dungeon Quarters

Grading papers was enough to lull anyone to sleep, and Professor Severus Snape could attest to that. He never needed a dreamless sleep potion ever since he took on the profession.

Finally writing down his last F for the day with a flourish, Severus rubbed his eyes and started to fix his things on his table, when a particularly large tawny owl tried to squeeze in the overhead opening, which served as a window in his dungeon quarters.

A letter? At night? Severus wondered as he stepped on a nearby table and reaching up, helped the owl pull herself down into the dungeon quarters. Grateful, the owl gave an affectionate peck on Severus' nose (which made him grimace) as he descended from the table.

After giving the owl a treat grudgingly, he settled down on his table and took the letter tied to her wrist.

Severus, I know something about your past which has great importance to both you and Harry Potter. I've already met with Albus Dumbledore about this, but he decided that I best talk to you instead of him.

Send a response regarding when you are available and where you are going to meet with me. The owl will deliver your response.

Remus Lupin

It took approximately a whole minute for Severus to fully absorb the implications in the short letter.

So short, and yet it said so much.

Severus' head snapped to the nearby table, where the owl was indeed waiting for his response. But no, that was not what was agitating him. Something made him freeze in fearful anticipation, and fear wasn't even the right word for it. Horrified was more like it.

What could it be that Remus Lupin knew? About the Order of the Phoenix? But no—it had been clearly stated in the letter that it was about the past.

Impossible.

"Impossible!" Severus Snape spat out, causing the owl to ruffle, holding his urge to break things and instead taking it out by running a hand savagely through his hair. "It's already buried! The only other person who knew about it is DEAD!"

No, no, Severus. He could be meaning something else. Something else. Anything but that, anything…Gritting his teeth and grinning in a deranged manner, he buried his face in his hands and laughed softly (still in a deranged manner), trying to convince himself that.

The owl sensed his agitation and flew over to his side and cooed, reminding Severus that he had yet to write his response to the letter. Collecting about his wits and posture, he opened his drawer and took out a quill and blank parchment.

Severus knew he cannot sleep with a threat much more terrible than Cruciatus Curse looming over him.

Meet me tonight at the Shrieking Shack.

Severus Snape

The Shrieking Shack. Just in case there would be some shrieking to be dealt with.

Midnight, In The Shrieking Shack

"Good evening, Severus," Remus greeted him as he arrived, voice grave. Severus had waited for an hour, sitting on the chewed-out bed with its torn canopy and some occasional bared springs. Remus' voice, Severus noted, was devoid of its usual friendly lilt.

"What do you know, Lupin?"

As a response Remus Lupin whipped out from the depths of his robes a small but thick leather-bound book.

"I know everything that is written in here."

"You did not answer my question, Lupin." Severus' tone gave no indication of the disturbed and tensed state he was in.

"To be frank, Severus, I just happened on the fact that you are Harry's father."

Silence.

Snape broke it. "And I expect you to tell me that I am an evil bastard, a maniac to have ever sullied Lily's innocence. And much more."

"Well, what do expect me to say?" Remus spat out, throwing Lily's diary to Snape, hitting the latter squarely on the chest that it made Severus flinch in pain. "What do you expect me to say to an—an asshole who deserted a woman whom he had impregnated, a woman who had loved him so much?"

Snape laughed at that, his eyes showing no mirth but hardness at the irony of it all.

"You don't even know the half of it, Lupin," was all he could say for the moment.

"Correction: I bloody well know the otherhalf of the situation, Snape. Lily's half. In her diary."

"Then you do not know much."

"The hell I don't know much!" Remus grabbed a handful of Snape's black cloak. "Lily married James so that Sirius would not suspect anything and save your hide!"

Snape met Remus' eyes and stared back, his gaze cold enough to lower the temperature by two or three notches. "Really."

It got him a punch on the face which sent Severus to the other end of the bed.

"Damn you Severus. Lily saved you, James didn't even know he saved you for the second time, and from Sirius again no doubt, and all you can say is REALLY?!"

Severus calmly rubbed his aching jaw, silence screaming out the tension in the darkend and grotesquely tattered and torn room.

"Ask me whom I loved then, Lupin."

The absurdity of the command confused the werewolf for the moment.

"Ask me whom I loved then, Lupin," Snape asked again, impatience coloring his tone

The werewolf growled, getting annoyed by so strange a request. "Okay then. Who?"

Severus Snape sighed audibly. "James Potter."

A/N: Bet you didn't see that coming, huh? Well, sorry if there wasn't much of Harry in this chapter, I just made it a point to focus on one character per chapter, to make it more solid. Next chapter would be Harry's turn, though I have a feeling that most of you people have a hankering for more Snape ^_^. Read and review, guys!