Feel
By: Lady DeathAngel
Disclaimer: not mine, not profiting, 'nuff said.
Warnings: more angst, no language really.
A/N: well, this is a different chapter. It's not in Harry's POV for one thing, but in Snape's. Strange, but it wrote itself out that way. Hope you like it, and expect more Remus soon. He's lurking in the corner right now, but I think he'll be written in within the next two chapters. Thanks for all the great feedback on the last few chapters. Oh, and because school resumes itself in two days, I may be slower with updates. Check out my livejournal for updates. Hee-hee, it's so cool that I can actually say that now. Woot! Oh, and this one will have been a quick self-beta job since I wanted to load the chapter A.S.A.P., especially in light of FFN's maintenance work. But I've got a few people willing to beta so that makes me happy! Anyway, please read, enjoy and review.
The small room was empty and quiet. Soft lamplight illuminated the yet-to-be-restored carpets and upholstery, all of it faded and tattered and yearning for better days. The small sofa that was usually the teenagers' social hub at 12 Grimmauld Place was, at the moment, occupied only by a sleeping boy. He didn't look quite as scrawny with his legs folded into a body bent at the waist to squeeze him onto the small piece of furniture. He looked almost normal when he was asymmetrical like that. Like a normal teenage boy.
Which was, of course, far from the truth. Severus Snape had known many young men and women far from normal by any standards. Werewolves and pure-bloods and all manner of Witches and Wizards with some sort of psychological mess that made them think they were above or below whatever they thought the level of normal to be. Still, it was strange to see someone growing up so far from normal. He'd grown up with plenty of people like that, but he'd never stood back and watched.
Now he was.
It seemed like it had been longer than five years since he'd known Harry Potter and watched him face evil after evil and come out relatively unscathed. It seemed like he'd been the boy's unwitting guardian for most of his life, rather than just the latter portion of it. But the fact was that he'd only known him for a short amount of time, and even then he didn't really know him.
He'd had many arguments with Black about it. The last one being just before he'd started tutoring the boy in Occulmency when the headstrong idiot had cornered him just after a meeting with the Order.
"I had so been hoping to avoid this discussion," he'd muttered under his breath.
Black had simply rolled his eyes.
"Yeah, well, you didn't honestly think I'd let you get away with avoiding it, did you?"
He conceded that he had not and made some snide comment that he barely paid any attention to. His insults just slid off the tongue like that. Black took a deep breath, not taking the bait.
"I don't feel like arguing with you," he said. "It's been a long few days and I'm not in the mood. I just wanted to tell you that you'd better treat Harry with some amount of respect when you get back to school."
"Don't tell me how to deal with my students, Black," he shot back. "I see to them how I deem fit and that includes handling our little boy-hero without kid gloves."
"From what I hear, you handle him with your standard attitude toward anyone who isn't in your House. And I'm telling you right now, if you treat him like anything less than human and I hear about it . . ."
"You'll what? Suffice it to say that your usual tactics of degradation and intimidation don't work quite like they did when we were children."
Black had sighed and raked a hand through his hair.
"Stop living in the past," he nearly pleaded. "It's not good for any of us at this point. Granted, I'll always hate you and you'll always hate me and you'll always hate James but . . . Harry isn't James. It isn't fair to him."
He'd been affronted.
"I'm quite well aware of the fact, Black. From what I hear you're the one who needs to remind himself exactly which Potter is living under this roof, not me."
He'd had no answer to that, instead growling deep in his throat before shaking his head.
"Just don't treat him like shit, Severus. You can manage that much?"
And before the potions master had a chance to reply he was gone. He hadn't thought much about that particular conversation until Potter and his friends had gallivanted off like the stupid little Gryffindors they were, dragging one of the strangest Ravenclaws he'd ever known with them. When the boy had come back and an emergency meeting of the Order had been called he'd wondered just what Lily and James' spawn had managed to muck up this time.
Seeing Lupin looking for all the world as if the universe had ceased to exist and noting the hard edge to Molly Weasley's face, he'd guessed accurately that one of their own was lost. Again. He'd immediately looked around for missing persons and for some reason he just didn't piece it all together. A part of him knew that Black was gone but he'd assumed that he was all right, possibly off with Harry consoling the idiot of a boy.
Then Dumbledore had spoken and informed anyone who hadn't been there that Sirius Black had fallen through the veil. He'd been, what was the pretty word for it? Oh, Displaced. The prophesy that Voldemort had been after was gone forever now, remnants of course remaining wherever the headmaster kept them, be it Pensieve or somewhere else. He'd been foiled and he didn't want Harry alive anymore. He'd been ready to kill him back at the Department of Mysteries. He'd told them that meant heightened security around the boy and those who surrounded him: friends and the like.
A few weeks later he informed Severus personally that he'd like for them to resume Occulmency lessons.
"I'll see about bringing in a few other specialists if it means you'll both cooperate better."
It didn't take a genius to figure out that he was still disappointed in him.
Of course, Severus had very little sympathy for the man. As much as he respected him he had agreed to few of his decisions, chief of them being to keep Potter in the dark about his true purpose. For all that he hated him by proxy, he'd felt originally that they were using him. Dumbledore was cultivating the savior of the Wizarding world with little to no real concern for his feelings. He was being to weak-handed. He was molly-coddling him and lying not just to the boy but to himself if he thought he was being benevolent and making the right decisions.
Eventually he got over it. Until he saw the boy for the first time since he'd chanced across James and his happy little family on a rare excursion to Hogsmeade. He'd looked scared, small and pale and too skinny for his age. James had never been that skinny and neither had Lily. Of course, he learned later about his being stuffed in his cupboard for most of his life and it made sense. He tried not to hate him. He honored his life-debt to James by looking after his headstrong, naive son and he thought it'd be much easier if he liked him. But he didn't.
And, of course, look what that got everyone. Black was dead and the boy and Lupin were miserable which made working with either of them nigh on impossible. He'd told himself to grow up so many times in the past, to get over it, to be the bigger man and he'd failed. Now he had no choice but it was too late and contrary to popular belief, he felt the gnawing guilt of it. It was mild and, as far guilt went, he'd felt worse. But it was there, the knowledge that the one person he'd ever seen love that scrawny, pale boy irrevocably was dead and gone and he wasn't really that sorry.
On the couch, Harry stirred. From where he stood Severus could see his brow tighten, his eyebrows meeting above his nose in an agitated 'v'. He frowned and squirmed and moaned a name. Cedric. He moved onto his back, flailing an arm, and moaned another. Sirius. Cedric, Cedric, Sirius, mum, dad, Sirius. All of them, over and over.
It felt wrong to be standing there and watching tears streak down his face and he wondered why no one had come running to their little hero's side. And then he realized he had to strain to hear the agonized groans and hissed names. Still, weren't there people that ought to be here for him? Some red-headed twit to wake him up and tell him to calm down? Some overbearing female to hold him and do what he thought overbearing females were supposed to? But there was no one.
He felt something streak past his ankles and saw Potter's cat sprinting across the floor. She leapt onto his chest and pawed gently at his cheek, mewling softly. He quieted very slightly and she licked the tracks of his tears and in a flurry of robes, Severus left the room.
He felt strangely disgusted, with himself or the others who were supposed to be there for that stupid slip of a boy he didn't know. But it wasn't his place and he wished, not for the first time, that he didn't hate Harry Potter.