Title: Red Threads
Chapter: 2/?
Author: Larissa
Feedback: MissHarville@hotmail.com
Archive: Ask first, please.
Disclaimers: The Harry Potter universe and all things officially associated with it, as well as any and all quotes and references are not mine, nor am I making money from this. Sue and you get a whole lot of nothing. For entertainment purposes only, don't read unless you're unable to handle heterosexual sex and relationships, homosexual sex and relationships, discussions of both, original characters, and children under the age of one year. Arian is my own creation and you may not use her without written permission from me (because I'm sure no one reading this has my phone number). Flames will be mocked, laughed at, graded and returned to the sender.
Notes: This is written from Snape's POV, as if he were writing in a journal. I like the idea of him keeping a journal. Therefore, this is very stream of thought and will jump around, just as if he were writing in a journal (or like I was writing in a journal, since that's the only journal-writing-style I'm familiar with ^^). Fanfiction.net readers, at one point this appears: -H-e-r-m-i-o-n-e-'-s-. The lines indicate that the word has been crossed out; ff.net doesn't support the dash the original has through it, so I had to change it. Other than that, there's no difference in the ff.net version of this chapter and the original.
I'm not sure who I sat next to at dinner, but I'm positive it wasn't Hermione Granger. She looked more like . . . Trelawny. Except less over-done. I had always figured that she'd be rather conservative as an adult, though I guess that goes to show what I know about my students. Where did she get that attitude of hers? Surely six years wasn't enough to loosen her up, was it? Look who's talking about loosening up. I'm vaguely amused at myself.
Granger + Krum – wedding = child. Somehow, that doesn't add up. It doesn't add up at all. Why she would have a child at all confuses me, and why she would have one without being married confuses me still more. I don't believe I know anyone who would enter willingly into single parenthood, especially if they had someone willing to marry them, and with as much money as Krum has. Where did this independent streak come from? Perhaps it was there all along, and just needed time to show itself.
I don't like children. I can't stand them, really. They're noisy, often smelly (especially the younger they are), have little to no manners, are unspeakably ignorant and unwilling to learn, and those few who truly wish to learn wind up bossy know-it-alls or are denser than dirt. I really can't stand children. I scare them, and it will be a wonder if I don't give Granger's brat nightmares.
It's a wonder she let me hold her.
Normally I don't like to hold children. They squirm. They don't stay put. And they're damn loud.
But she wasn't loud. The brat stared at me until I took her and then had the audacity (she gets it from her mother, I'm sure) to fall asleep while I held her. As if she were comfortable in my arms. As if she liked me.
I don't like it when people like me. It makes me wonder what they want and why they can't ask it plainly. It makes me think they're up to something.
But I liked holding the child. Arian. I wonder if Granger is pagan . . . Whatever her spirituality, if little Arian lives up to her namesake, Granger will have a hard time keeping up with her.
I can hardly imagine Granger with a child. She always seemed so ambitious, too ambitious to let a child hold her back from her career. She never did strike me as the maternal sort. And with Krum, of all people. Apparently her brains don't extend to her choice of partners. At least it wasn't Weasley, or even Potter.
She's only twenty-four. No, not even that. Twenty-three. Thought with the Time-Turner, who knows how old she is now. But she's so young to have a child; what could have possessed her to do it?
I wonder far too much about things that aren't my business.
And that business of breast-feeding at the table. (One day I'll learn to leave well enough alone and not stew over things, but apparently that day isn't today) Not that I have anything against –H-e-r-m-i-o-n-e-'-s- Granger's breasts. They're quite lovely, in fact, and her blouse showed that very well. Too well. Women shouldn't breast-feed in public. At least, Granger shouldn't. Not near me, at any rate. I don't like distractions when I'm eating.
I shouldn't think about Granger's breasts. I'm sure it's not good for my health and we're colleagues now, besides. One shouldn't think about the breasts of one's colleagues.
Even if they are nice breasts.
Writing is bad for my health. Especially journal-writing. Thoughts start flowing and eventually you're babbling everything, which I suppose is the point of a journal, but it's rather disconcerting to read over one's entries and realize that one sounds like a near-50-year-old lecher.
I'll have to owl Krum's mother, at any rate. I must find out how she got a hold of those potions Granger gave me. Or maybe I don't want to know, but as the Muggles say, curiosity killed the cat. I only hope it doesn't work the same with Potions Masters.
Muggle Life. She had to teach that class, didn't she? Out of all the other openings, she had to take the one that put her and her child the most at risk. But I suppose it was partly because it's only two classes a day and she has Arian to take care of, too, so any more would make it hard to be a mother to her child.
What was she thinking, going back to work so soon after having a baby? She'll probably be up all hours of the night feeding the child, then won't be able to function properly in the morning, and then something will go wrong in her class and someone will get hurt.
Now I sound like a fretful old man. I wonder which is worse, fretful old man or lecher? I think I'll fret.
I can't believe I'll be giving up weekends to baby-sit her. Dumbledore and the others don't see anything wrong with a first-time mother taking a newborn and at least ten students into a large city the students don't know, do they? No, only I do. Therefore, only I will be stuck going with them, making sure they don't get killed or otherwise harmed.
I hate caring about Granger and her brat's welfare. Granger's parents live in London, I believe. Perhaps I can convince her to leave Arian with them. Chances are, she'll say no just to irk me. And it will work.
That still doesn't answer, of course, the question of my sudden over-protectiveness of the two. Maybe because I know what's out there, know the kind of people who wouldn't think twice about hurting a single, pretty young woman with a small child, seeing how long it takes to break her, how much pain a newborn can be put through before she dies, while her mother watches. I know all about the monsters, and I know they live everywhere.
A fact Granger, though she came face-to-face with Voldemort, seems to have forgotten.
Which means it's up to me to protect her from herself, because everyone else seems to have forgotten it, too. Dumbledore even went so far as to tell me I'm being paranoid.
Well, I know the dangers better than any of them. I was one of the monsters for a time, after all. So I'm not being paranoid; I'm being reasonable. Though I doubt Granger or her students will see it that way.
Granger's rather pretty when she's angry. Dangerous when she wants her child back, but pretty all the same.
All right, maybe I'm a lecher. At least she's legal.
Are babies supposed to stare at people like that? None I've ever been around (and I'm sure Granger would die of shock to know that I've tended to babies before) have ever done that. Please, don't let that child be precognitive. Or telepathic. Or anything else. Just a normal three-month-old girl. Please.
Because I really don't need her ever knowing that I think about her mother's breasts.
Author's notes: What? So Snape thinks about Hermione's breasts. I think about Hermione's breasts, too. So what? I'm sure they're lovely breasts. Anyway, for any of you thinking that Snape's being a pervert, maybe he is, but if *you* liked women and had an attractive women sitting beside you, breast-feeding or otherwise messing with her chest, wouldn't you glance over? Or maybe I'm just a pervert. A title I bear with pride, mind you. ^_~ Also, I hope this clears up any confusion over his sudden protectiveness of Hermione and Arian that the last chapter may have caused.