Chapter 3

Dear Diary,

I'm starting to feel awful about whatever I may have done to make Prof. Snape so angry with me. I have resolved to apologize, and hopefully, he will not only accept, but also tell me what I did wrong. He must be extremely sensitive to be so offended at something I can't remember saying. And I know I haven't been drunk in the past few days. Or have I………

Athena was done with classes for the day, and was ready to sit herself down to a nice hot dinner and perhaps a cup of tea in the staff room to follow. But first, she knew she had to do the right thing. She was going to confront this Snape person, and she was going to make amends. So what if she couldn't figure out what was wrong? People are offended by all kinds of things these days. Perhaps it was the fact that she was wearing a cow print pyjamas. Maybe he was raised in India.

Athena wove her way through the throng of students as she moved ever so closer to the staff table. She went up the marble stairs and plopped herself down right next to Professor Snape.

"Good evening." She said quietly, but cheerfully. She found it extremely difficult to ignore the delicious looking Shepard's pie that sat next to her goblet.

Snape looked up from his plate for a moment, as if she were a nutter off the street, and he wanted to be polite. Athena was not put off.

"I just wanted to address whatever happened between us in the corridor this morning." She continued, completely missing the cold reception. The hall was completely full now, and the hustle and bustle of children talking about whatever they weren't allowed to during the day was deafening.

Snape looked up again and sneered. The yellow lighting of the hall cast a gold hue on his otherwise sallow and gaunt features. "What are you referring to, Miss Llelwyn?" he said after swallowing his mouthful of corned beef.

"I just wanted to say I was sorry." She continued, getting eye contact with him for the first time. She couldn't help but notice how dark they were. Like tunnels.

"For whatever I did." She concluded, looking away. She felt uncomfortable looking directly into his eyes like that.

Snape looked thoroughly confused. "What are you talking about?" he asked, sounding a bit annoyed.

"Well," Athena replied, "I thought you were a bit angry with me this morning because-…"

"I was not angry with you, Miss Llelwyn." Snape cut her off midsentence. "I was simply commenting on your own incompetence. I apologize that my true message was not received."

Athena didn't know how to respond to that. She felt like such a fool. Here she was, apologizing for something that never occurred to someone who was just plain mean. She opened her mouth, as if to respond, but Snape cut her off once more.

"I would prefer it if you wouldn't make such a display again, Miss Llelwyn." Snape said, rising from his seat, crumpling up his napkin and placing it on the table. "I have no time for such frivolities, and least of all for those concerning little girls."

He left the table, and then the hall.

She sat there for a moment, going over the last few moments in her head in slow motion. She was surprised. She was hurt. She had never wanted to swear at someone, but right then she could have screamed a very loud obscenity at Snape's back if she wasn't completely aware of the consequences.

"That bastard………" she whispered to herself, not realizing that she was bending her fork in half as she spoke. She couldn't imagine why someone would act so rude, so mean to someone he just meant. What was his problem? She completely forgot to eat her dinner, she just got up and rushed straight to her room, to write out as many obscenities as humanely possible before she decided to stop and actually mull this over.

Snape was not impressed by this woman's display. She was much stupider than she looked. Once again he walked the darkened halls of Hogwarts, waiting to stumble upon some unfortunate student in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was when he found himself in front of the old gargoyle statue in front of Dumbledore's office that he stopped.

The statue was only a few inches shorter than Severus, and it stood beneath a torch so it looked like a frightening illuminated silhouette against a stone backdrop. Here was one of Severus's favourite places. Late at night you could stand here and hear the whispering through the hallways of the portraits, and it was both eerie and soothing all at once.

"Acid Pop." He muttered, and the gargoyle was devoured by its platform, leaving a stairwell in its place. Severus entered and climbed until he reached Dumbledore's office. The door was ajar. Dumbledore was sitting in a chair by the fireplace, deeply engrossed in a book. Dumbledore had been spending a lot of time in that same chair, lately, and whether he really was reading, or just pretending to read while he thought was on of the endless mysteries of the Headmaster. Snape cleared his throat.

"Yes, I see you there, Severus." Dumbledore said, closing his book and getting up from his seat.

"I have something I would like to discuss with you, headmaster." Snape said, entering the room to stand before Dumbledore.

This room was by far one of the best in the castle. The domed office was full of secrets and mysteries that only Dumbledore knew now, and the portraits of former headmasters grinned knowingly from their framed homes. The moonlight spilled in from the windows, casting a faint blue glow on Dumbledore's tired face.

"I was hoping to discuss something with you as well, Severus." Albus said, his eyes twinkling behind his glasses. "I hope you will not mind if I go first?"

Severus nodded his approval.

"I had a meeting with Gilderoy Lockhart today," Albus said, crossing to the bookshelf to replace his volume. "He said that you failed him for today's lesson."

"He set fire to his potions partner." Snape replied dryly, "I saw precious little alternative."

"Yes, I see." Dumbledore replied, with a chuckle. "Gilderoy failed to mention that. He also said that Professor Llelwyn also failed him for today's expelliarmus task."

Severus couldn't help but smirk.

"It only continues to prove what I have said from the start." He replied darkly, "She is too inexperienced to even teach a child a simple hex."

"She was nervous, Severus, she will do fine when she feels at home." Dumbledore replied. A certain sharpness to his voice signalled that Athena's credibility was not to be discussed any further. "I was hoping that you could help Gilderoy with the expelliarmus spell, considering you and he worked so well with it only a few years ago."

This was what Snape had been waiting for. It proved Dumbledore was having second thoughts about Llelwyn already. By this rate, she would be out by Christmas. He relished the thought of telling Llelwyn that he would be taking over where she had failed.

"If that is your wish, Headmaster." Snape said silkily.

"So you will assist Professor Llelwyn in Gilderoy's private lessons beginning tomorrow." Dumbledore said.

Snape was not pleased. This was not what he agreed to. He opened his mouth in protest, but Dumbledore had more to say.

"If you can successfully teach Gilderoy all he needs to know," Dumbledore said, "I'm sure the recognition would be most brilliant."

That was all Snape needed to hear.

"Of course, Headmaster." He replied a bit lamely. "I will do my best."

As Snape left Albus's office, he felt angrier than he did before he entered it. He was up and alert, trying to figure out how to help Gilderoy, while Llelwyn was probably asleep in her bed, not a care in the world, dreaming vapid dreams full of unintelligence.

In all actuality, however, Athena Llelwyn was wide awake in her chamber, trying to track the code of the man with the eyes like tunnels.

Athena had spent the night sobbing into her pillow, resolving that she wasn't going to let anything get to her, and then sobbing about how she was letting things get to her. By the morning, she had half forgotten the previous night's discussions, considering she had drowned her sorrows with butterbeer and Joni Mitchell records. She was angry at herself more than she was at Snape. By being so upset about what one person thought about her, she was proving to be weak.

"Oh, bloody………" Athena moaned, the bright daggers of morning light falling on her dishevelled bed, her bloodshot eyes, and her hand clutching a bottle hanging over the bed. She had a splitting headache, had 'A Case of You' was playing in her head in an endless loop.

She stumbled out of her bed and threw on the last pair of robes in her closet.

"I could drink a case of you......... and still stay on my feet………" she mumbled, looking under her bed and pulling out her most comfortable shoes.

Today she was going to be brilliant, she had decided. Through a butterbeer induced stupor, she had vowed to herself that she was going to single handedly figure out what the hell was wrong with Severus Snape, and she was going to fix Gilderoy in the meantime. She was to be bloody brilliant.

An hour later, after sitting in the great hall for forty five minutes before realizing that she had missed breakfast and than no one was coming, Athena went to her classroom to meet Gilderoy, who she had promised to give private lessons after he begged and pleaded her, and eventually bribed her by promising his silence.

Athena took the classroom key out of her pocket and shoved it in the lock. Her surprise was apparent when the door opened at the force of her push, and her face looked even more surprised when she saw Severus Snape standing over her desk. He was bent over some parchments that she could only assume were hers, and he apparently didn't notice that she had walked in. She was regretting that she had not paid more attention to her looks this morning. She would have wanted to look slightly less idiotic. Well, kill them with kindness, her mother used to say.

"May I help you?" she asked politely, but not smiling.

Severus looked up from Athena's parchments, but did not act like he was ashamed for prying into her business.

"I have been asked to help you teach Gilderoy in his private lessons." He replied icily, coming around the desk, swooping around like a bat with his black ropes swishing this way and that. "Dumbledore is obviously unsure of your capability to do it yourself."

"Ah," Athena replied, determined not to let this faze her, "Well, don't hesitate to make yourself at home. I'm just going to quickly get some things from my office."

She brushed passed him and quickly hurled herself into her small office, shutting the door and falling into her chair all at once. She felt like she was hyperventilating.

"Must not let this ruin my chances," she said, breathing deeply and evenly. "He's only human. He's just a sad little man with no friends."

She knew that Gilderoy liked her more and was more likely to listen to her than to Snape. But then again, Gilderoy responded very well to fear. Perhaps she wasn't going about this the right way. Was the only way to get to Gilderoy's brain through his tear ducts?

Athena emerged from her office looking composed, but falling apart upstairs. This was going to be scary.