Author's Notes: Heaven help me, this is turning into something more than just a quick romp.

Also, please forgive any jarring non-UK representations. I did my best research but the fact remains that I am a Yank (having been born in NYC, I think that actually makes me a damn Yankee, even though I do like grits and know better than to order "just one"). Certain aspects of the story may be completely at odds with real life across the pond - especially when it comes to grocery stores. I beg and thank you for your tolerance!

Chapter 6 - Supermarket Sweep

Breakfast turned out to be just as satisfying as Hermione had promised. Despite having had eggs and potatoes the night before, Snape was more than happy to indulge again, adding sausage, tomatoes and beans to round out his meal. The tea wasn't quite as overpowering as he'd have liked but having already had a cup at Hermione's, the lack wasn't as critical as it might otherwise have been.

Conversation revolved around the classes Hermione had been taking at university. She was reading in Arithmancy, Potions, Physics and - to Snape's eye-rolling scorn - a course called "The Psychology of Learning."

"You're not turning into a jelly-spined, soft-headed, platitude-spouting psychic therapist, are you?" His contempt was only marginally outweighed by his brilliance with a sarcastic phrase; frankly, it was hard to separate the two.

"It's 'psychotherapist,' and no, I have no intention of going into counseling as a career. Nor am I particularly interested in acting as some kind of emotional hot water bottle to anyone. I just thought it sounded interesting." Hermione paused and leveled a glare at her former professor. "You would probably do well to read some of the texts, especially if you're serious about changing - I mean, finding a less offensive middle ground in your teaching methods."

He snorted: "What could Muggle textbooks possibly have to say about teaching a dangerous craft to aggressively mediocre dunderheads?"

Hermione managed to maintain her faux shocked expression just long enough to see him register surprise and then defensiveness before she dissolved into laughter. "Severus Snape, you can not mean to tell me that the Head of Slytherin House needs to be reminded that if he is to vanquish his enemy, he must study them first?"

Good Lord, the woman was right.

Rose had put their bill on the table and while he was still dealing with the shock of having been out-Slytherined - by a Gryffindor, no less - Hermione had picked up the piece of paper and made it to the cash register. By the time he realized that they were leaving, it was too late to feel any embarrassment at allowing a woman to pay for his meal. Hermione was already out the door and halfway down the block.

Thankful for his long legs, he caught up to her quickly.

He could smell the market before he could see it; somewhere in the building that Hermione pointed to was a crate full of cantaloupe melons about to turn. If the temperature had been just a few degrees warmer, the odor would be overpowering.

Walking into the structure, the first reaction Severus had was full-on sensory overload. In addition to the aforementioned smell of overripe melons were the scents of virtually every kind of produce known to man, combined with various notes of fish, cured meats, and the sweetness of baked goods. Gaudy colors, signs, posters and painfully blue-bright fluorescent lighting caused his pupils to dilate to mere pin-pricks.

The noise was at a migraine-inducing volume. The combination of unidentifiable yet inane music that droned at a mind-numbingly consistent tempo and was far too heavy on violins was frequently but unpredictably interrupted by the crackle and nasal whine of voices requesting prices. Adding the sudden, nerve-wracking metallic crash of wheeled pushcarts made the former Death Eater wonder if this were some hidden cache of Voldemort- created torture.

"A bit overwhelming, isn't it?" Hermione asked softly. Her calm presence provided a welcome counterpart to the chaos that surrounded him. Realizing that he had probably been standing with his mouth agape and even less color to his complexion than usual, he gave himself a mental shake and followed Hermione as she disentangled a trolley from a long line of conjoined metal.

He watched as she gave the contraption an experimental push or two; his eyebrow arched and she answered his silent question: "Sometimes one of the wheels is misaligned or broken and the trolley either wobbles or makes an awful noise."

Thinking that nothing could make the cacophony of this place any worse, he nonetheless nodded and followed her as she headed off toward the produce section just to the right of the entry.

Catching up to her as she breezed past all the loose vegetables, Snape grabbed the trolley handle and asked, "What exactly are you planning to eat today?"

A look of surprise crossed her face. "Erm, I guess I don't really know. What would you like?"

"Nothing that comes in a box, certainly," he said pointedly. "Do they have a butcher here? Or a fishmonger?"

"Yes," she answered, obviously perplexed, "but those departments are at the back of the store. We can get to that later."

"Hermione, how do you prioritize your homework? Do you complete your assignments based on those references located most conveniently in the library?" He asked, his patience an obvious façade.

She shook her head. "Of course not, I work on the assignments that are either due first or those that look to take the longest to complete."

"Precisely. So why would you allow the floor plan of your grocer to determine your menu?"

Hermione was completely lost by his argument and it showed.

He sighed and said, "What would you prefer for supper this evening: beef, pork, poultry, or fish?"

She thought a moment. "Chicken."

"How would you prepare it?" He asked, putting her hands back on the metal cart's handle.

"How would I prepare it?" Her eyes widened in fear until she saw his amused expression. "Oh, how would I like it prepared. Well, I've always loved roasted chicken. My mum used to make it on Sundays with gravy and potatoes."

"Roast chicken it is, then, and you shall prepare it, my dear Miss Granger. Under close supervision, of course. Now, lead me to the butcher if you please. As with any potion, we begin by determining if the available ingredients suit our purpose." With that, he gave her a gentle push.

At the back of the store were the usual coolers, filled with meat and poultry. Snape looked from one end of the lane to the other. "Is there a butcher at work here or is this the exclusive domain of the plastic- encased?"

"The chickens are here, Severus." She pointed to a plethora of cellophane straight-jacketed birds at his knees.

"I can see that, Hermione, but none of these birds appear to have been breathing any time recently." He picked one up and hit it against the cooler's edge. It was as hard as one of Hagrid's rock cakes. "If I'm going to go to the trouble of cooking and eating something, I would prefer to know that it wasn't older than the incoming first year students." Hermione was beginning to truly enjoy his dry wit. When it wasn't directed at her, that is.

She hailed a burly man in a blood-stained apron and white paper hat. "Excuse me, do you have any." she paused and looked at Severus who nodded his encouragement "fresh chickens?"

"Free range, organic, or pastured?" He asked. Hermione was so relieved that the man hadn't been insulted at the question that it took a moment for her to realize that he'd given her options she didn't understand.

After a quick education on the various types of fresh chicken, they selected a small bird, and to Hermione's surprise, a rasher of bacon. There was a moment of confusion when Severus tried to pay the butcher for the meat; Hermione subtly stepped in between the men, obscuring the neatly folded but alarmingly large number of pound notes Snape had pulled from his pocket.

His expression remained neutral but his eyes flashed a variety of emotions at her action: surprise, confusion, annoyance, and panic - in that order and in rapid succession.

"We pay for everything all at once, when we're done," Hermione said under her breath as she pushed both Severus and the cart back toward the produce. As she turned and saw the orderly layout of the store into departments, she was suddenly struck by the likely reason for at least part of his confusion.

"The store is arranged into separate areas, just like at a farmer's market, but everything is still owned by the store, not by the individuals who work in that area. The butcher doesn't have to pay for the meat he sells; the company buys it. The butcher earns a wage that the store pays him. It's the same for the baker, the dairy, the green grocer - everyone who works here.

"What, then, is the incentive for the butcher - or any of the other workers - to provide the best quality?" His question surprised Hermione; for some reason, she'd never thought that Snape would be a capitalist.

"I guess there are a few reasons. First, there's always pride in one's job and knowledge." He snorted at that.

"If the man is so knowledgeable, wouldn't that be an enticement for him to swindle unsuspecting customers into buying bad merchandise?" He looked askance at the paper-wrapped bird they'd just agreed to buy.

"I suppose it's possible," Hermione said thoughtfully, "but it would only take one or two instances of that happening before people would stop coming here. And you know how people are, they talk. I've read that customers will tell twice as many people about a bad experience they've had somewhere as they tell about a good experience. In a neighborhood like this, bad word-of-mouth advertising can shutter a business, leaving that unscrupulous butcher - or whomever - out of a job."

Snape looked skeptical.

Hermione continued: "From a more pragmatic standpoint, the better the supermarket does - the more customers it has, the better quality food it's able to bring in and sell - theoretically, anyway, the more it can afford to pay its workers."

"Thank you," he mumbled.

"Sorry?" Hermione had heard him; she just couldn't resist making him say it again.

"I said 'Thank you,' and I know you heard me the first time." He repeated in a distinctly grumpy tone.

"You're welcome. What are you thanking me for?" This question, unlike her last one, was genuine.

"Thank you for preventing me from making what might have been an embarrassing faux pas and for choosing not to belittle my ignorance. And yes, I am perfectly aware of the irony of my statement, so I am also thanking you in advance for not belaboring the point."

Hermione grinned as they headed back to pick up lemons, potatoes, and onions. Severus also threw a few limes, some strawberries, red-leafed lettuce and tomatoes into the trolley.

They wound through the store, Severus telling Hermione what he wanted and Hermione leading him to the appropriate location.

In less than half an hour, they'd assembled everything they needed for the salade niçoise they planned for lunch and for the roast chicken supper. A few other items intended to round out a well-stocked kitchen went into the basket and Severus deemed their shopping finished.

Hermione's head was swimming. Severus was nearly as knowledgeable about food as he was about potions and there was no way she could absorb everything he said in such a short period of time. She did know, however, that she would never again consider a frozen dinner the height of an in- home dining experience.

Putting two last-minute items in the trolley (a pint each of chocolate chip ice cream and lemon sorbet), she wheeled over to the checkout lanes. Severus stood back, watching the entire process with interest as he reached into his pocket to extract the money needed to pay for their purchases.

Hermione took all the groceries from the trolley and placed them on a conveyer belt. She glanced up at Severus and borrowing an expression from him, arched a sardonic eyebrow at him. He moved to the trolley and began to unload it. A bored looking cashier picked up each and every item, passed it over a small window set into the counter, and set the items aside in a separate area.

Once Hermione had set Severus to unloading the cart, she moved to the end of the line and began placing the items into plastic bags. Before she could finish, the cashier drawled a number to her and Hermione took a small plastic card out of her wallet. Slipping the card through a machine, she pressed a number of buttons, put the card away and finished putting the groceries into bags.

Snape suddenly realized that she must have just paid. Again. Albus had given him a rather substantial sum of Muggle cash to defray Hermione's costs during his stay but the girl simply wasn't giving him an opportunity to pay.

Telling himself that his embarrassment was somehow Hermione's fault (he'd figure out exactly how that worked later), Snape grabbed four of the six bags from the counter and stood back to allow her to lead the way out of the store.

"What was that about?" he huffed.

"What was what about?" she answered, completely nonplussed.

"You paid for the food. You did pay, didn't you?" For a moment, the fearsome Potions Master was reduced to a frightened child as he fought back panic at the vision of hordes of Muggles chasing him for having stolen all the food they had selected at the market.

Hermione laughed out loud. "Yes, Severus, I paid with my debit card." His expression lost its terrified edge but he didn't look at all comforted; she elaborated. "It's an electronic way for the store to draw funds from my bank account automatically. It's faster and easier than writing a check and I don't have to carry cash with me. And before you go all noble on me, Albus deposited a rather generous sum to my account to cover these things. You needn't worry that you're bankrupting me."

There you go, it was her fault. She'd had the money all along thanks to Albus and had never told him. His chagrin was her responsibility, just as he'd suspected. He smirked at her back as the walked home, then caught up with her to ask for more details about how the payment system had worked.

For an approximation of my family's favorite roast chicken recipe, try the recipe posted at Food Network's website, thanks to "Tyler's Ultimate" show. ml