Elly churned through five minutes of mind-crossing blah-blah-bhal-bahl taken somewhere randomly from the middle of the book in complete silence before working up enough politeness to try speaking again.

Her fellow teacher was sitting stiffly at the opposite end of the compartment, as far away from her and her friend as possible.  He was staring at the door, because staring out the window was already taken and he didn't seem to like sharing.

"This - is this your first year teaching at Hogwarts?" she asked.

He turned to look at her, with a spider-fly kind of disgust.  "No," he said decidedly.

"Oh, so you've got lots of experience then," she said, "Teaching.  This is my first year.  I haven't been to Hogwarts in years - not since I graduated.  It's a strange feeling to be going back, isn't it?  By the way, what's your name?"

"Snape," said the wizard somewhat uncomfortably, and shifted in his seat.

Something about the hair, the voice, the uncomfortable shifting, it all triggered ancient memories to start stirring themselves.  "Oh, I remember you!" exclaimed Elly in a sudden outburst.  "My first year at Hogwarts - you were -"  Him.  The creepy Slytherin who was always running around in the dirty black polyester robes never washing his hair.  And there were whispers that he was working for The-One-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.  All now-dead Dark Lords aside, Snape had always thoroughly terrified her.  "You were in your seventh year," she finished, feeling extremely stupid and wondering if there was a spell for melting through floors.

"I don't recall," said Snape.

"I had glasses," said Elly helpfully.  "I ran into you once, by accident, on the second-floor corridor, and dropped my books onto your foot and you -"

"Adalbert, isn't it?" interrupted Snape suddenly.  "Hufflepuff, I believe."

Elly nodded, but didn't look him in the eye.

The train finally had the decency to start moving.

With that, Alfie's head banged loudly against the windowpane as the carriage jolted forward and she woke up with a start.  Her tall, handsome Norwegian had been unexpectedly replaced by an irritated, aging professor with a face that had just swallowed earwax.  "Hello there," she said cheerfully, "You must be the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher.  Dumbledore told me you'd be coming.  Nice to meet you at last!

Snape looked even more irritated than ever.  "You must be mistaken," he said shortly.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," Alfie apologized generously, "I thought that we were the only teachers who hadn't already arrived.  But you're a teacher too?  What do you teach?"

"Potions," snapped Snape.  Elly closed her eyes behind her book and tried not to moan.  Alfie, several years younger than Elly, had never once seen Snape before - Elly couldn't ever remember hearing him called by his first name, whatever it was - and he had never come up in any of their conversations, either.  There really was no hope.

"Oh," said Alfie, "That must be interesting.

"Indeed," said Snape.

"I'm teaching Ancient Runes," Alfie told him, "I studied them two years in Iceland under Galdra-Jón.

"And your name is?" asked Snape at last.

"Aelfgyva," said Alfie, thankfully without asking him to call her anything else.

"It's not a common name," said Snape.  It was the nicest thing he had said all day.  The effort seemed to tire him and he turned back to staring the door.

Silence fell.