'Ello!
This is it. Well, no, not it, as in the end. There's definitely more coming. But this is it as in the chapter that I wrote the story for. (Tee hee.) This was the basic idea of the fan fiction-inspired dream I had that resulted in this story. I wish I could've made this chappie better though, in the dream it was awesome... but yeah, lol. Am I the only one who has fan fiction in their dreams?
Some notes about this chapter:
-HOW AM I WRITING THESE SO DANG FAST? (Wish I could be doing Trapped in My
Mind this fast... lol.)
-I'm in a love/hate relationship with this chapter. I love the idea of this
happening (yes, I am a crazed fangirl... problem?), but I don't exactly like
their 'date'. Bit hard to write.
-This particular section is mainly plotless, and if you were to skip it (you
may not like the idea of HPSS romance, for example... which would be rather
baffling if you're here, but yeah) it probably wouldn't matter that much.
-Even though the majority of you who were here while I was posting the beginning
chapters felt I was being too slow with the HPSS stuff, I still feel like I'm
taking this way too fast. No, Harry's not seriously 'in love' yet - Sevvie
is right, he just thinks he is. But it still feels awful fast to me.
-I'm still torn between a happy ending for this story or an angsty ending. I
dunno, I'm not writing two versions though. Probably a happy ending though,
I love happy endings, they're so... happy!
-Wheeeeeeeeeee seven days 'til me birthday! ^^
-I don't know yet if this story will be spanning the entire school year or not
- what I have planned for Voldemort is minimal at this point, but he's so careful
when planning that his actions should take all year. (Even though how
they line up exactly with the school year is a little suspicious on JKR's part....
¬_¬) I don't know, I'll have to leap bigger spaces in time than three
days to a week, like I have been. It's not even Halloween yet. (What do you
think?)
-Did you see Switched: Reflection yet? If not, I suggest you read that
before this chapter. It's one of the aforementioned "mini fics". I
wrote it, just click my name up there somewhere. *Points up*
-Someone reviewed and reminded me about the fact that they can't apparate in
Hogwarts... GAH I can't believe I missed that... but unfortunately their
review was eaten by FFN and shall never see the light of day. *Pout* Thank you,
whoever that was! @_@
-Snape has commitment problems. o.O
-The next chapter may or may not take a while. You see - I have concerts and
practices and crap galore in May. I also have a MAJOR problem at the moment
with copyright theft from my interactive Hogwarts site - someone was lazy and
took all my ideas, my system, my images, all the things I've kept running by
hand since November of 2001 and turned it into a little pagebuilder site. I've
had problems with people taking my ideas before (but I'm smart enough to know
that that's because their jealous that they're not so creative... bah), as well
as bandwidth, layouts, and actual text from the actual pages before,
but never all at once. (Gah I'm so POd, ugh.) But yes. My venting is over, lol.
I've already killed this person... *thinks* ...twelve times now? Ah well. I'll
just get through it by thinking very wonderful, egotistical thoughts. ;)
The characters we know of are (body - person IN body):
Blaise Zabini - Harry Potter
Crabbe - Padma Patil
Goyle - Dumbledore
Neville - McGonagall
Ron Weasley - Blaise Zabini
Draco - Lavender
Padma - Ron
Harry - Draco
Pansy - Snape
McGonagall - Hermione
Snape - Neville
Thank you to my wonderful reviewers!....
Necromant - Thanks! Yes, RWSS is a rather unusual pairing... that's
why I want to try it! Oh, and you'll be seeing Sevvie's reaction this chapter...
^^
LeeLeePotter - :S Sorry about that confusion. In a way, I intentionally
jump around that way, though I'm not entirely sure why... just to drag some
things out a bit longer sometimes, I guess. Or check if my readers are awake.
XD
Ruth - He'll find out this chapter. Oh, and Voldie knows that killing
everyone didn't work - hence the 'reminder' - he just doesn't know to what extent
it didn't work. (Dang, I seem to be explaining an awful lot in these replies.
I should be putting the answers into the story. --")
Fuzzy-Bumpkins - Okay. :)
SlytherinRomantic - Alrighty, thanks.
Sky - Thanks, even though I have absolutely no clue what makes a main
plot and background plot differ... O.o Lol.
Lady Darkness13 - Hehe. Well, you'll see his reaction this chapter....
Doneril - He never really does work up the courage, you know? Poor Harry,
never getting all the time he needs for anything.
Katie Lupin Black - You'll see! ^^
silver-sunn101 - You will!
Saavik13 - Yep, the hormones are wearing down on our poor professor....
Ronda-Silverpaw - Okay. :)
ataraxis - Whaaaat? Severus is way too prejudiced to understand *that*
fast... but he might eventually, lol.
penny - Thanks for the review. ^^
Ah yes, this is slash, male/male romance... between both Blaise-in-Ron/Draco-in-Harry and Harry-in-Blaise/Snape-in-Pansy (whew confusing)... just to enlighten the unenlightened. Potter belongs to JK Rowling. I'm not JK Rowling. I'm just a girl who lives in the United States who happens to enjoy terrorizing JKR's creations.
.~*~.
Chapter Thirteen
"Idiots! Stop blasting curses at random! Aim!"
The group of Death Eaters looked up, collectively giving Pansy looks of loathing
that she chose to ignore. "Your aim is important. If you fire off in any
direction, you may not have time to send another one when it misses. Learn to
keep your hands steady." She glanced at the clock, sighed, and told them
to go. She couldn't keep them from their vastly more important social
lives, after all.
She sighed. Zabini had been avoiding her for two days in a row now... since
their fight. Pansy was wondering why it was bothering her so much.
So, he thought he loved her. Thought he could love her. He would snap
to his senses at some point before revealing himself, and she'd never
know who had toyed with her emotions so much in the past weeks.
"What'm I going to do?" Harry paced in Padma's dorm.
He was getting tired of his friend's constant teasing–as if falling
for Snape and then thinking he was in love with the man was something funny.
Hell, maybe it was. He wasn't exactly in the most jest of moods.
"Well, I quite admire your way of going about things," she told
him, snorting. "Seeking a little intimacy, hmm?"
"Sod off. I need advice, not taunting."
"Right." Padma peered into the mirror as she spoke, trying to untangle
the comb he hadn't quite mastered using out of her thick hair. It wasn't
budging. "What about taking her on a date?"
"What?" Harry stared at Padma as though she'd gone mad. "You
know as well as I do that all the Hogsmeade weekends are cancelled until further
notice...."
"You don't have to go there to have a date, mate, just pack a picnic
and go for the lake. Girls love it when you set up something like that for them."
Harry coughed.
"Well, er, at least girls who are girls do," Padma ended, on an
awkward note. "Go on! Think of how romantic it would be–just you
two, the moon, and the giant squid–"
He whacked her. "Prat."
"I'm serious though, you should ask her on a date. You might get
to know each other a little better."
"Yeah, alright. How do I go about asking her?"
"You don't know how to ask a girl on a date?" Padma asked,
incredulous. "Where've you been, the past year that Cho was chasing
after you? Didn't you pick up on anything?"
"Er... not really."
"Just ask her if she'd like to have dinner with you out on the lake
sometime, Harry." She shrugged. "Not that big a deal."
"So I was wondering if, er, you wanted to have dinner with me out by
the lake sometime."
Pansy blinked. Zabini had stopped her on her way to her dorm to... ask her on
a date?
"When?"
"Er, maybe Friday? Yeah. Friday."
"...When?"
"Six maybe?"
"Well... I have to teach the dunderheads at seven."
"Oh. Can you call it off? It's only one day," he said with
a shrug.
"That could be the evening before they are called to a meeting."
"Well then." Harry nervously glanced around to give himself some
time. "Maybe... you could teach them at six-thirty, and meet me at eight
for dinner?"
"I suppose that could be arranged."
They stared at one another for a minute. "Well. Thanks, Severus."
She nodded curtly, and continued up to her dorm in a daze.
Sitting in Defense Against the Dark Arts, the last period of the day Friday,
Harry was continually fidgeting in his seat. His... date... was tonight.
I'm dating Snape, he noted. I'm dating Snape and Ron and
Hermione think it's all laughable and I don't like to think that
I'm falling into love with him.
And pigs fly, he added, for good measure. Everything else that he thought
impossible was happening.
Pansy could see Harry squirming with the corner of her eye. It made her feel
that she at least still had a little control.
Her Death Eater class dragged on at a tantalizingly slow rate. The students
were still learning simple curses, and were blocking an easy way, with a simple
shield charm.
Pansy had wanted them to master this charm so she could move onto more, but
had never considered their reaction time. To put it kindly, they needed practice.
Lots of it, too.
One of the students' hair was standing up from the static buzz of an incorrectly-sent
curse. Another was having trouble getting his wand to work, period. Yet another
continually aimed six feet above her target. Out of all of them, Crabbe appeared
to be the only one with half a brain for the particular stuff that was being
taught; he lazily cast a shield charm, and with one flick of his wand had Millicent
body-bound.
Elsewhere, students were not so handy. A desk started burning with a green
flame, and the entire class paused to look at it, reducing the previous racket
to silence, which then became panic.
"Stop!"
Pansy put out the fire and repaired the poor desk, an innocent bystander of
a battle of the idiots.
"That is all for today. Out! For tomorrow's meeting, I expect
you to know your defensive magic."
The class filed out in a great lump, no one wanting to be the one left with
an angry Pansy. Alone in the room, she leaned back against a desk, closed her
eyes, and massaged her forehead. These dunderheads need to study more or
they'll kill themselves off before Voldemort gets the chance.
Somewhere a clock chimed eight times, and she realized just how long she was
drilling and teaching them each day. It was a wonder how they ever got their
homework done.
Well, no it wasn't, since three-quarters of their classes were like free
periods anyway.
Sigh.
Eight. Weren't you supposed to do something at eight?
Silence....
ACK!
She changed directions and sprinted back down the hallway, only slowing when
the doors were in sight and she realized how it would look if Minerva or Albus
were to see her running.
Ha.
She raised an eyebrow when she saw Harry, who was sitting next to a rather
large picnic basket, looking out at the lake. He'd spread a tablecloth
that the house elves must've given him. He didn't notice her coming.
She cleared her throat from a few meters away. He glanced over and jumped, sitting
up straighter and mouth breaking into a shy grin.
"Trying rather hard, aren't you, Zabini?"
"Nah," he said, shrugging. "Just figured it would be nice."
"You do realize that the outdoor curfew was half an hour ago?"
"It was?" he asked vaguely. "Oh well, no one's going
to catch us out here." As he spoke, he fumbled with something that Pansy
couldn't see in the darkness, and seconds later, a small candle floated
above them, giving them light. "It's invisible to anyone but you
and me. Learned the spell last summer while doing homework."
"Interesting," she said mildly, not really sure what was expected
of her next. It wasn't as though she'd ever been on many dates as
Severus Snape.
"Er... you want to start eating then?"
"Sure," she replied, sitting cross-legged and taking the napkin
offered to her. Out of the picnic basket came salads, pork chops, and cheesecake.
"I hope you don't mind the odd combination," he said, looking
up to give her a grin. "I wasn't sure what you would like that I
could bring in here," he said, poking the basket with his toe.
Pansy shook her head, still somewhat amazed that this student, knowing who she
was, had still brought her out here and wasn't just pranking her.
Picking up their salads, they started eating in a somewhat awkward silence,
until Harry was brave enough to begin a conversation.
"How's training? Are they still dunderheads?"
She caught herself smiling and began to feel nervous; small talk never was her
strong point.
"Unfortunately, yes, they're still the idiots they were the past
few days. They caught a desk on fire. Started panicking. I can't believe
how small their charming skills are."
"Well, you have to give them credit for trying, don't you? Some
could be first or second years, and just after the start of school they were
forced into this sticky situation."
"True," she admitted, shrugging. "They aren't studying
on their own time, though. They need to be, or they don't improve from
class to class at all."
"Maybe they don't think of it as a class," Harry said, through
a mouth full of salad. "Maybe that's why they don't feel they
should study."
She made a thoughtful face. "I would think that the importance of the
situation would get through to them...."
"You obviously aren't familiar with students' habits then,
Severus. A little surprising."
"Doesn't it bother you just a tiny bit that you're on a date
with me?" she asked, changing the mood dramatically.
"Dangit, you're so insecure. Yes, it's a bit of a surprise,
but I don't really mind. I'm really not that close-minded."
"Even for a Gryffindor?"
He stuck his tongue out. He was almost done with his salad, and Pansy only then
realized that she had stopped eating hers. She hurriedly brought a forkfull
to her mouth.
By the time they finished their slices of cheesecake, they'd been discussing
such light matters as the weather, particular classes that had absolutely no
structure, and half-hearted bickerings of the differences of their houses. The
conversation had made both a little more comfortable with one another as the
night progressed.
Harry leaned slightly against Pansy, sighing. These little things, like putting
his arms around Pansy, or leaning against her–they were completely new
to him, but they just seemed to come naturally. He wasn't as worried about
how he appeared or sounded to Pansy. He figured that most of that was because
Pansy had no idea who he was, but they were still pleasant thoughts, even if
this was Snape. He was personally amazed at how easily he was taking the discovery.
One would think that the idea of dating the Potions master was a crazy, even
laughable thing, but here he was, leaning on the man's shoulder....
His stomach gave the now somewhat familiar 'squick'.
Pansy seemed a little tired; she was leaning back a bit now. Harry slung an
arm around her shoulder, absently matching his breathing to hers.
She turned her head to look at him and he looked out towards the lake, only
remembering her presence when she slung her arm over his own shoulder.
Some time later, after a few minutes in a comfortable silence, they stood up
together, then stared at one another for a few seconds, before Harry grinned
at the sudden notion to sweep her off her feet. Holding in a laugh, he did just
that, teetering for a moment where he thought he'd drop her. She laughed,
stopping short when he brought her closer to the water.
He'd had the fun idea of throwing her into the water, but froze when he
saw something she hadn't yet noticed.
Pansy, helpless to Blaise picking her up, could only laugh as he stumbled.
He was probably used to a body that wasn't so string-bean thin as Zabini's.
Then she realized he was going to throw her into the water.
It probably wasn't that cold, but she didn't particularly care to
find out.
And then he stopped, and she took a second to glance up at his face before looking
out at the lake.
Oh.
In the water before them, mostly because of the moonlight and the candle behind
them, was their reflection.
Harry had never really considered that lake water could be one of the substances
Dumbledore mentioned–the ones like the mirrors and the Great Hall's
ceiling, both of which reflected their true selves rather than their bodies,
until broken.
But the evidence was right before them. It obviously was.
Harry saw himself, Harry, standing in Zabini's clothing, but still himself.
But in his arms wasn't Pansy Parkinson's body. It was Severus Snape's,
with his arms holding onto his neck, and mouth open in the rare look of astonishment
that one saw on his face. Harry's 'squick' feeling intensified.
For what seemed like a minute, but was probably only half of that, neither moved.
Their expressions of shock stayed the same, and the slight breeze was lost to
them, as to Harry was the dampness of the water seeping in through Zabini's
boots.
And then Pansy pulled herself from Harry's arms and started to back away,
watching him with mistrust.
"I guess now you know who I am," Harry said lamely, making no
attempt to move towards Pansy, who had stopped at a safe distance a meter or
two beyond the picnic blanket. He sighed as he put his hands in his pockets,
feeling faintly sick to his stomach. After a few moments of nothing, he spoke
again, more quietly. "Please don't just walk away. We could still
make this work–"
"Make what work?" she spat. "You're–you're
Potter. There was never anything between Potter and myself and there
never will be."
"I asked you to be accepting," he said, taking a few tripping
steps forward, so he was at the other edge of the blanket. "Aren't
you even going to try?"
"I won't be–"
"You seemed fine enough when you didn't know I was me," he
said, walking forward again, stopping right in front of her. "You have
to admit, you had something going. You came to this date. You put your arm around
me. You laughed when I picked you up. Please, don't go back on old grudges
against–"
She opened her mouth to say something else in her rage, but Harry cut her
off.
"What am I saying? No one ever tries to get to know you. Except Dumbledore.
You know why you've been on your own for so long? Because you want
to be, that's why. And even though you know you want something with someone,
you get in your own way because you expect such high standards that–"
"You wouldn't even make low standards, Potter."
He punched her arm, inwardly screaming at himself because he couldn't
decide if it counted as hitting a girl or not, then pulled her close enough
to kiss her for a brief second.
"You see? I don't mind. Why do you?"
And with a flick of his wand that made the candle, picnic basket, and tablecloth-slash-blanket
vanish, he walked off, not listening for any more words from Pansy.
She didn't say anything anyway. She was too busy trying to sort out her
very jumbled, conflicting thoughts.
