She liked the way he buried his nose into her shoulder while he slept; how he curled is long frame around her instead of her trying to fit against him. He always had an arm or a leg draped over her and he muttered her name in his dreams. He was comfortable having her in his space. So, during the day, she feigned headaches and laid in his bed and read books, willing the summer to assert itself properly. She'd been sending the obligatory owls to her parents since this whole ordeal begun (leaving out Snape, of course) and so they were not surprised when she sent them a letter telling them she would not return home for the entiresummer but promised them a week or two somewhere in the middle. The students would leave, boarding the train gleeful for a vacation. Some would be back in the fall. Harry and Ron, however, wouldn't be back. This made her sad but she pushed the feelings down.
Severus had gone to town for the day on Friday morning. It was the last day of exams and in the morning was graduation for the seventh years. She would walk across the stage with her classmates, it was decided. Tonight, after dinner she would have to brave the rest of the castle to go to graduation practice. She felt a little sad her parents couldn't come to the ceremony but they were just so muggle… everyone agreed it was easiest not to invite the parents of the muggle born. But the Weasleys would be there and they were like family to her. And Severus would be there, watching her from the staff seating. Then the students would leave and she'd be officially a member of the staff. She would move her things from the Head Girl room to the staff quarters – to McGonagall's quarters as soon as she was out of them and back to her family home in Aberdeen. She would watch the first years be sorted from the staff table and she would have to grin and bear Ginny Weasley calling her Professor properly.
She was musing on this when the warm orange flames in the fire place sparked green and Dumbledore's head appeared in the flames. There was no where to hide.
"Severus, there's been an accident in the Slytherin common room…" They stared at each other. Dumbledore just head and her sitting cross legged on Snape's bed in nothing but a pair of knickers and a tank top. "Miss Granger?"
"Headmaster." she said, quietly. "Professor Snape is out this morning."
"I see. Perhaps you ought to come to my office once you're decent?" he asked.
"Of course." she said, fighting the urge to pull the comforter over her. His head popped sternly from the fireplace and she didn't move. She stared at the walls and then the horrid condition her cuticles were in. She bit at them absentmindedly and had a sip of tea. She closed the book she was reading and crawled out of bed to stand in the middle of the chilled room. She burst into tears.
It was over! She would lose Severus, her degree from Hogwarts, and her teaching position. Forcing herself to calm down, she wiped her eyes and started putting on her clothes. She didn't want to keep the headmaster waiting but she found he was not in his office. She had to wait outside the Gargoyle for almost 20 minutes pacing and thinking of scenarios – each more horrid than the last. She was imagining herself at the mercy of dementors at Azkaban when he finally showed up.
"Sorry to keep you, I had to deal with the student myself since Severus was absent." he said, ushering her onto the stairs which recognized him without a password. Into the office they rose. Neither spoke while he sat behind his expansive desk and she declined to take a seat at all. "Well." he said finally. "Imagine my surprise."
"Headmaster, I know there is no excuse." she said, hanging her head. "I could try to come up with something but I'm a dreadful liar."
"I appreciate honesty, Miss Granger. Perhaps this is my fault." he offered her a dish of candy and she shook her head. She already felt as if she might vomit. "I just kept handing you privilege after privilege. You should have never had fulfill Minerva's role as educator before you'd finished an education of your own. You were just so good at it."
"I adore teaching, I do. I've never been happier." she said. "I understand if you cannot continue to… I understand if I can't…" she didn't know how to say it. "I'll pack my things."
"Was it Severus?" he asked.
"What?" She asked, surprised.
"Did he force you in any way?"
"Absolutely not." she said, suddenly angry at the accusations to his character. "I would have thought you of all people would know his true colors. I resent the accusation." she said, hotly.
"And I find it unfortunate that I had to ask," he said. "I was just checking."
"Severus is a good man." she said. "I know that it… We broke rules, we knew that going in. I expect you to take away the job but please don't punish him. He's actually happy and relaxed for the first time in… in ever, I believe." she shrugged.
"I know he is a good man. This is not the first time in the history of the world, of schools, of this school even, that this has happened Miss Granger. I just never thought I would have to watch Severus." he sighed, shaking his head. "Or you. You both are so much the same."
"You can take my job. You can take my diploma – I don't need it. I have job offers coming in daily with my scores. I also have faith that Severus will take my side in this matter but if he doesn't, if you expel me or fire me or whatever and he denies any association, I still won't regret being with him." she said, defiantly.
"No one is being expelled. I'd like to talk to Severus before I make any decisions. When you see him, tell him to come to my office, would you?" he asked, tiredly.
"That's it?" she asked.
"For now." he said. "Try to stay out of trouble on the way to your dorm if you can help it."
"Yes, sir." she said and left the office in a huff. She'd never been so forthright with the headmaster – nearly rude – but she no longer felt like a child and no one at the castle treated her as a child anymore and she didn't appreciate Dumbledore back tracking now. She was to graduate in the morning… she couldn't have kept the secret for 24 more hours? She was disgusted with herself. She climbed through her portrait who looked at her as if Hermione had abandoned her and opened grudgingly. She surveyed the room – just as she'd left it. The bed made and her clothes hung neatly in the closet. Whether she was moving rooms or moving out she'd need to pack so she started taking her clothes off the hangers and folding them. It took her a long time to realize she'd started crying again.
She went to dinner. She'd been sitting at the staff table but didn't think she belonged there at the moment and so she sat down next to Ron and Harry who looked at her, pleased.
"Decided to grace us with your presence, eh Hermy?" Ron asked, a drumstick in each hand.
"I figured it was our last meal as students together." she said. "I wanted to share it with you guys." She willed herself to eat and listen to her friends fret over their NEWT scores. She did not want to look up at the staff table and see Dumbledore's untrusting gaze or to see her empty place or to see if Snape had come back yet and if so, did he know? She would be able to tell just by looking at him, she was certain. Finally, she could not stand it and turned her head. Dumbledore was deep into conversation with Professor Sinestra and Snape was sitting at the opposite end of the table, her empty seat effectively quarantining he him from the rest of the staff. He looked stiff and discolored. He wasn't eating or drinking or looking up. He knew. She suddenly felt dizzy.
"Hermione?" Ginny asked, reaching across the table to touch her arm. "Everything okay?"
"I think I just need some air." she said, standing abruptly and fleeing the Great Hall, her fellow Gryffindors staring after her. She burst out the doors on to the front lawns, gulping air. Why was she so scared? She knew why. She had feigned indifference to Dumbledore. She had pretended that she didn't care that he knew because silly rules and age differences wouldn't matter in the longer scheme of things. Snape wanted her and perhaps – she hoped – loved her and that would be the thing that made them rise above. Part of her didn't even have to pretend because she believed. Inside, Snape didn't look as if he believed. He looked as if he'd done something awful and there was no way to extract him self from the situation without pain. She realized at once that she was a fool. Dumbledore would probably let her graduate; it seemed a silly thing to take away. But she would not get to keep her job and he would. He would not take her side. She would be quietly swept under the rug. No one had to know. Nothing would change.
She sat abruptly on the grass and was there for a while until the doors opened to let a sliver of light out. Someone was coming to fetch her. She hoped it was not the headmaster or Snape. She hoped it was Voldemort coming to kill her. She wished she had a time turner that was powerful enough to go back to the beginning of the year so she could fix this mess. The one she wore around her neck was not more than a day and it was too late to fix anything. She felt a hand on her shoulder.
"Hermione?" It was Harry and she realized that she'd missed him. She'd not spent time with him, really, since taking over transfiguration.
"Hi, Harry." she said.
"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked, carefully sitting next to her. The sun had just set and the world was that dusty grey color where everything blended – where the world lost its depth. Everything was flat if just for a moment until true darkness set it. She looked to the sky where the first few stars were peeking out. She made a fierce wish.
"I'm sorry I've been away." she said. "I thought our last year together would be fun… I thought we would actually be together." she said. "Harry I did something that may make you hate me."
"I doubt that. You could break my wand and I wouldn't hate you. You could purposefully make me lose the house cup quidditch game. You could marry professor Snape and I probably wouldn't… oh my god, Hermione, what's… your face… what did I say?" he asked.
"I'm having an affair with Snape." she gasped. "Since… since Christmas!" She buried her face in his shoulder, then. He held her and rubbed his hand along her spine.
"Well, that's unexpected but I did just say that I'd still like you and I do." he said. "And while shagging Snape would make me cry, somehow I think there's more."
"Dumbledore found out." Harry cringed.
"What did he say?"
"He's talking to Severus before he makes any decisions." she wailed.
"Hermione, you're the best witch to come to this school since… forever, I'd reckon. Dumbledore needs you too much to sack you." he said. "Let's go inside, go to the common room for the last time, play some exploding snap and just be children for a few hours more, how does that sound?"
"Oh Harry, I love you." she said, nodding. Together, they walked into the castle arm in arm, best friends until the end.
Severus, upon returning to the castle, was most perplexed to find not Hermione sitting on his couch in the sitting room, but Albus. He'd seen her at dinner but she'd not made eye contact with her once which he found strange. He'd eaten at the Three Broomsticks but came to dinner out of habit.
"Breaking and entering a new hobby of yours?" He asked, dryly, moving to pour them both a hard drink.
"Severus, you should have told me." he said, accepting the warm, amber liquid and taking a small sip. Albus only ever drank with Severus – he didn't like to lose control.
"Told you what, old man, I'm tired." he asked, sitting next to the elderly wizard and putting his highly polished boots up onto the coffee table where they reflected the fire light.
"About Hermione." he said and Snape's hand halted halfway to his mouth, the crystal glass suddenly to heavy and slipping from his grasp, spilling scotch across his lap. He swore and cleaned it up quickly, setting the glass down on the table where his feet had been with thump. In the morning, he would see the fracture through out the base of the expensive glass, so deep and minute that the glass would have to be throw away for even magic couldn't repair it wholly. "How did this happen?"
"You made it okay, don't you see?" Snape whispered, sullen like a child. "You put her on a pedestal, you made her accessible! You made her one of us. She was never like them; she was smarter and had better manners and she had the class of a Slytherin even if her blood kept her from my house."
"She was a student, your student, and technically she still is." he pointed out.
"For mere hours more." Snape argued. "She'd taken over Minerva's classes completely before we even, before I found her." he amended, thinking of that night in the tower. There was she hunched over the essays, he hair aglow from the candle light. How she hummed softly while she worked, songs he didn't know. She knew muggle music and he'd grown up on ancient wizard folk songs but she had a favorite tune to hum and to even think about the simple melody made him warm; made the smell of her leap from his memory, wherever he was.
"I don't know what to do about this. I cannot condone such blatant disregard for school policy from my head girl and a staff member but the extraordinary conditions allow for some leeway." Dumbledore shrugged. "I suppose if you answer this question, I'll be able to make a fair decision."
"Then ask." Snape said, hoping that he would keep his job and hoping she would get to start hers.
"Was it just sex or do you truly love her?" Dumbledore asked. Snape knew better then to lie and he knew better then to answer right away. He could not lie to himself – he was attracted to Hermione. She was different then any of the women he was expected to marry. She was not pureblood, not even half and half so her gene pool was much more expansive. Slytherins all tended to look more or less the same. Tall, pale skin – no matter dark or light hair. They had high cheek bones and slender noses. They were aristocrats and they intermarried to assure themselves that their status would never be taken away. Hermione, on the other hand, was so small compared to him. She barely reached his shoulders and she was not tall and lanky but all hips and breasts. She was voluptuous. Her hair was not thin and straight but thick and curly. She had big, chocolate eyes and pouting lips.
She also could hold the most stimulating conversations for hours. She could solve any problem he set before her. She could beat him in chess. She appreciated his humor and cracked jokes of her own. She was loyal to him and to her rotten friends. She was brave, even as obnoxious as bravery could be. She was gentle with him, and kind. She was a perfectionist.
"I love her very much." he said, looking at the older wizard who could see the epiphany on his face. "I think I would follow her to the ends of the earth."
"Well, then she stays." he nodded. "She will graduate. She will start teaching in the fall. People will talk but you've never cared for people."
"No."
"I'm glad you're happy, my boy." Dumbledore said. "Just be careful. Hermione has a lot of people who love her who aren't afraid to hex your face right off your head."
"I'm one of them." Snape assured her. "May I go tell her?"
"I suppose you can. Though I'd appreciate if her last night as a student was spent in her own dormitory."
"Yes, Sir." Snape said and escorted the old man out of the dungeons and made his way to Gryffindor tower. He wished fiercely for an invisibility cloak of his own and loathed Potter just a bit more. Now that Dumbledore knew he felt like the world knew and glared at anyone who dared look him in the eye. He knew it was silly, he trusted Dumbledore's confidence in this matter and he felt as though he could trust Hermione's discretion (but he had a niggling little feeling in the back of his mind that Potter probably already knew or would know soon but he batted it away). Still it was an uncommon time for him to be seen prowling the corridors and the higher he rose – the closer to Gryffindor tower he got, more and more people wondered what he was doing – where he was headed.
Finally, in a blessedly empty hallway, he came to the Head Girl portrait and snapped the password ("Alchemy" one may remember) and the portrait swung open begrudgingly. She was not inside. He did not expect that she would not be inside. He expected her to be packing, perhaps (but that task was complete) or possibly wallowing in her own tears, thrashing about on the bed but to be gone threw him for a loop. He sat uncertainly on the very edge of the bed. He'd not been in since that first night carrying her back and then it had been dark. It was a pleasant room if overly pastel but it was devoid of any character for she had packed all her things. If he listened, he could hear laughter through a wooden door which must have lead to her common room. Of course there would be celebrations tonight. He felt a little silly thinking she would waste her last night of fun moping about him and he stood to go but the door swung open rather unexpectedly and there she was, traipsing into the room up a flight of narrow stairs laughing (not giggling for Hermione had told him last Tuesday that she abhorred giggles now that she was an adult and was determined to break herself of the immature habit) at some joke and he could hear another pair of feet behind her. He turned to face her and her companion deeming himself too dignified to flee.
"Professor!" she exclaimed, glancing over her shoulder at Ginny Weasley and – lo – a third Gryffindor femme, who looked to be a rather tipsy Lavender Brown. Swell. He squared his shoulders and he could see the mirth leave her expression and her features schooled themselves into neutrality. "Did you wish to speak to me?"
"Yes, Miss Granger, I'm sorry for the intrusion, I expected you to be in." he said, just as formally, their clipped speaking manner still habit in front of others. Ginny was watching the situation with the same amount of interest as one watches a train derail and Lavender was swaying a bit and then widened her eyes and bolted for the bathroom where she could be heard retching. It was most unpleasant for all involved.
"Well, I'll just go check on her." Ginny said, the only Weasley (save her mother) who'd ever been able to read a room. Hermione gave her a grateful smile.
"I'm sorry, I wouldn't have invited them up." she said. "Let's go to the sitting room." she offered, looking at the bathroom. He nodded and they slunk out of the room. He didn't sit but began pacing while she offered to call for tea which he refused.
"I spoke with Albus." he said, in a hushed tone. They were both listening for Ginny or Lavender.
"I suspected." she said, feeling suddenly nauseous herself.
"You will graduate in the morning, receive your diploma." he assured her and she relaxed only slightly.
"And then leave." she supplied regretfully.
"Only if you wish." he said.
"I can stay on?" she asked, not at all quietly. He nodded.
"You can stay, Professor." he said. She grinned and threw herself at him. He'd gotten used to her surprise hug attacks and had already opened his arms in anticipation. He'd missed her all day and had been so scared that he'd not get to hold her again after Dumbledore had told him that he knew. But now he buried his nose in her hair and tightened the pads of his fingers against her shoulder blades while she breathed deeply with relief. She soon stepped back and looked at him still glowing.
"Thank you for telling me." she said. "There is so much I want to talk about right now but it's the last night and I'm expected back at the party." she said.
"Of course. We'll talk tomorrow. After the ceremony." he said. "Goodnight, love." he whispered and she nodded.
"Goodnight, Severus." she said. He let himself out of the portrait and she stared wistfully at the space he'd occupied for a few moments. "I know you're there." she called finally and Ginny Weasley stepped out from behind the mostly closed bedroom door sheepishly. "How much did you hear?" Hermione demanded.
"Well, Lavender passed out right around him calling you professor." she said. "I didn't mean to listen but… you're sleeping with Snape!" Ginny said. "I am shocked! I demand to know every detail right now or I will hex you, so help me Merlin, I will." Hermione rolled her eyes, already seeing it was going to be a long night.
"I don't have to tell you anything. In a few hours I will be your Professor and for every hex you fling at me I'll take away 50 house points." she said but Ginny could tell she was teasing.
"Well, am I the first to know?" Ginny asked, knowing when to back down from Hermione. She also knew Hermione would tell her eventually and she just had to be patient.
"No. Dumbledore found out this morning and I told Harry at dinner. Please, please keep it a secret." she whispered. "Please."
Ginny looked at her thoughtfully. She'd never sleep with Snape. She hated Snape. It was Weasley tradition. She found him foul and cruel and though he was less greasy now, he was still far, far from her type. And yet, she'd just seen (through a crack in the bedroom door using the extendable ears she'd had in her pocket) a side of Snape that she would have swore never existed. He'd hugged her with such gentleness; he'd called her 'love'. He'd looked happy. It'd taken a while for her to recognize the expression of happiness on his face but once she did, she knew she could never see him the same way again just as she knew now that she wouldn't betray Hermione.
"Of course." Ginny promised. "Shall we put Lavender to bed then?"
"I don't know – a night on the bathroom floor might do her some good." Hermione said, relaxing. They went back to the party, deciding to leave Lavender where she lay. The whole room greeted them cheerfully, the seventh years all roaring like lions, as was tradition. She roared back but she could not help but think about Severus for the rest of the night. Once she was an adult, a professor, they would have to hide their relationship less and less. Would it still be the same with out the passion that their secret brought out? If it wasn't clandestine, would she still love him? She could feel Harry's eyes on her all night, burning to know what had happened – why'd they'd spent so long in her room (and where'd Lavender go?) but she shook him off and when no one was looking, she crept out of the tower and made her way silently to the dungeons, intending to see him one last time while it was still forbidden.