Though I desperately wanted to stand outside of Snape's office door and eavesdrop on his and Shue's conversation, I knew I could not. Feeling slightly betrayed, I slowly walked through the corridors out of the dungeons and up to the entrance hall. I replaced the small greek statue of the goddess and was walking slowly up the staircase when I heard Shue's loud, raspy voice drift up to the hall. Once again, I stopped on the staircase and looked down. I saw Shue come out of the corridor followed by a very furious looking Snape.

"Hey, yeh don' have to follow me out, I can find me own way."

"Actually," Snape said coldly, "I do have to follow you out to be certain that you don't attempt to steal anything else."

"Now, wait a minute. I wasn't stealing that little lady over there," he said gesturing toward the statue. "I was jus' taking her for a li'l stroll."

"Get out!" Snape pushed him out of the large front doors and watched for a while to make sure he left. I gingerly stepped down the staircase. Snape closed the doors but kept his back to me.

"I never should have agreed to let him come here."

"Why did he come, Professor?"

He was silent for a moment and I wondered if he heard me. Then he turned around to face me. He looked straight ahead with an emotionless expression on his face.

"Forty years and not so much as a letter... Not once did he try to contact my mother or me. I should have been more cautious. I should have torn up that letter the moment I received it. I should have..." He was speaking very quietly, so quietly that I had to talk a few steps forward to hear him, and even then I was straining to take in his words. Finally, Snape answered my question.

"He came to ask me for money. He lost his job because he is a useless drunk. He comes to me, the son he never wanted, to ask for liquor money." Snape let out a harsh, sarcastic laugh.

"That's terrible," I whispered.

He broke his gaze at the wall and looked at me. He seemed to have forgotten I was there.

"Yes," he said, and without another word he swept down the corridor to the dungeons.


As the months passed, Snape became even more cruel and heartless as usual. Not to me, of course. Towards me his attitude was indifferent. I might go so far as to say he didn't even acknowledge my existence. But to the other students he was taking more points and jumping down their throats even more quickly. By November, even I had to admit that he was an absolute nightmare. The thing that worried me was how ill he began to look. Before he was sickly pale and sallow skinned, but everyday he looked worse. The circles under his eyes darkened and his voice grew hoarse and lost it's silkyness. I contemplated speaking with him and voicing my concern, but I was too afraid. I thought that he might snap.

Christmas break came and my Aunt Agnes insisted that I come home for the holidays. She claimed that she wanted me to be home for the holidays, but I knew that she just wanted me home because it made her image look better. She had to make it look like she and I loved each other dearly.

I made plans to meet Franco in Diagon Alley after Christmas, and those plans were my only spark of happiness during the long days in Agnes's cold, sterile house.

I walked toward Flourish and Blotts, where Franco and I had agreed to meet. The winter wind was bitterly cold and a misty rain was falling. I wrapped my scarf more tightly around my neck. Where is he? I stomped my feet to keep warm and looked at my watch. It was half past two, and Franco was fifteen minutes late. Franco is never late... I went inside and searched the entire store, but didn't find him, so I went back outside again. I was beginning to feel annoyed.

"Fine, since he's made me wait, I'll make him wait as well." I walked ahead down the narrow street, looking at the shops and glancing back every once in a while to check for Franco. I was furious by now. It was almost three-thirty, and I was trying to understand why Franco would stand me up like that when I heard a low voice behind me.

"Hello, I know you."

I turned around to see where that voice had come from and saw a greasy, dirty faced man with the same grubby brown overcoat and green hat.

"Shue."

"Tha's me name, don' wear it out," he wheezed. I could smell the alcohol on his breath.

"Why don' you come with me, l'il missy, and you can tell me all about your dear Professor Snape?"

"No, I don't think so," I said, starting to feel nervous. I took a few steps back and almost fell on a loose cobblestone.

"Watch yer step, there missy."

He kept walking toward me, closer and closer. I turned around and started walking very quickly, but he followed me. I turned down a dark, empty alleyway, practically running now. It was very gloomy and overcast, and the rain began to come down more violently. I didn't realize at the time that I had turned down Knockturn Alley.

I looked behind me and didn't see him. Thinking I had lost him, I stopped to catch my breath in front of an old abandoned shop. I was about to go back out the alley the way I had come when I felt a pair of arms grab me. I tried to scream, but a dirty hand covered my mouth.

"Thought yeh could get away that easily, did yeh missy?"