Touch the Air Softly
by Jessa L'Rynn
Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best".
Chapter 4: The Table Is Bare
Hermione watched as Harry and Ginny slipped off toward Hogsmeade, hand in hand, and saw Ron reach for Luna's hand, then hesitate. Luna was a very, very special girl. When Hermione had first met her, she'd believed Luna completely mad. In their sixth year, she'd learned they had something in common - something besides Ron. The simple truth was, Luna was a mature and sensible woman, walking around as a child at Hogwarts. At times, it hurt Hermione's pride - Luna was, after all, calmer about this situation than she felt she would have been in her place. "You want to come with us, Hermione?" he asked, pleading.
She smiled. The only person left who was REALLY having trouble dealing with Hermione's potential reaction to Ron and Luna was Ron. "Actually, I'm going down with Colin and Dennis and some of the girls from Hufflepuff. We'll be at the Three Broomsticks at 3 to meet Harry and Ginny. You two come join us, ok? And have a good time."
Luna stood on her tip toes and hugged Hermione, who had grown rather taller than Luna had done. "Good luck," the distant, dreamy girl whispered.
Hermione laughed merrily, linked arms with the Creevy brothers, and strolled, feeling quite triumphant, into Hogsmeade.
They got separated from the boys in the book store. Hermione got separated from the girls in the Magic Wardrobe, while they were looking at rather intimate apparel she bet they would never wear, and she looked for a more sensible new nightgown.
She wandered over to the Three Broomsticks and found Hagrid having a tankard at one of the corner tables. She went over to join him, and discovered he was trying to grade the essays he'd assigned to his third years. "I didn't know you gave essays, Hagrid," she said with surprise.
"I don', norm'ly, but 'as this lot ent quite as sensible as yeh all were, I thought I'd better." He looked up at her. "Don' need no more hippogriff accidents."
No, indeed, Hermione agreed, thinking back to how Malfoy had made such an amazing stink over a few scratches. She pulled out a book she'd brought with her and started to read, enjoying the companionable few moments before the crowds of students came piling in. She got through another chapter of "Muggleborn Magic", completely lost by trying to dig her way through the convoluted soap opera plot. She'd borrowed it from Ginny, intrigued by the title, but discovered upon opening it what she should have realized - there was more innuendo, suggestion, and action in the first chapter than in the entire top three years at Hogwarts.
Madam Rosemerta brought her a butterbeer, for which Hermione thanked her. She read the top essay upside down. "Don't know much about flobberworms, do they?" she asked, amused. Hagrid looked up at her with tired, worried eyes.
"No, they don'." He sighed. "Yeh can help if yeh wan'," he said - pleaded, really.
She smiled and picked up the stack he'd already graded, just to see if he had a system that was working. "Just don't let anyone catch me," she said. "Especially not the Slytherins, or you'd never hear the end of it. It'd be just like the Slytherins to have another Malfoy in third year."
"Two or three at any given time, Miss Granger," came the smooth and silky voice from somewhere to her left.
She looked up with surprise. Snape was sitting at the other end of the table with them, a dark glass in front of him, his hair in a wind blown disarray. He was reading the Daily Prophet.
"I didn't see you there, Professor," said Hermione, faintly.
"You seemed completely taken with your enthralling quest for truth and knowledge."
She fought down the urge to blush, looking at the book still in her hand. She imagined herself saying, "You say that and still read that rag?" She gestured toward the Daily Prophet with an indignant hand, but the words that came out of her mouth were, "But that... you... I mean, they LIE, sir!" She wanted to crawl under the table - why couldn't she ever stand up to him?
He smiled his icy smile and said, "I like to keep apprised of the sentiments of the less than informed. I assume that is precisely the reason you gave Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley as to why you are still taking it?"
Now, she was blushing. Cold, conceited, arrogant... He raised a meticulous eyebrow at her, and she remembered what Harry had said about Snape reading minds.
A few moments passed in silence, angry for Hermione, desperate for Hagrid. She couldn't even guess what Snape was thinking. No one ever knew what went on in that man's mind. Hermione read the first essay. "I think you actually have a system going here, Hagrid," she said, fondly.
"Yeah," Hagrid agreed. "Seemed easier that way."
"Amazing," sneered Snape, his voice so low, Hermione was sure Hagrid hadn't heard him. Hermione glared at him again, but his returned glare frightened her back to the task at hand. She hated him, oh she hated him. 'I hate...' she thought, then stopped when she realized he was smirking at her, the Slytherin look of triumph so prevalent on his face.
"Good to see yeh out today, Professor Snape," Hagrid said in his friendly, welcoming voice. "I haven't seen you in the Great Hall fer days." He chewed thoughtfully on his pencil, then drew a careful red line over a section of text and scribbled slowly in the margin.
Snape sighed loudly. "I assure you, were it not absolutely necessary that I acquire a new copy of the so-called TEXT book that will teach these bothersome little brats how to get all sweaty and degenerate without hurting themselves or anyone else, I would be ANY where but here with these ... people."
Madam Rosemerta was just approaching their table again and Hermione saw the killing look the woman threw him. He raised his glass to her in wordless toast and inclined his head respectfully. "Present company excepted, of course," he said.
Madam Rosemerta refilled Hermione's butterbeer, Hagrid's tankard, and ignored Snape. Hermione thought that she would rather be pulled into a hole then let the topic continue unchecked, so she asked Madam Rosemerta about the shiny green shoes the woman wore.
Hermione was impressed with the No-trip charm and said she thought it was prudent that this pair had also included a Stay Clean charm. After the woman had thanked her and gone away, Snape sneered softly, "And now, I suppose you must read every book on wizarding footwear that you can find, then pronounce that you are an expert cobbler?"
Hermione wanted to yell at him, shout at him, tell him to mind his own damn business and what the hell was wrong with him, that he thought there was something WRONG with actually acquiring knowledge for its own sake. What she said was, "No, sir, I'm not really interested in shoes."
"Pity," he said. She realized then that he was baiting her, trying to get her to explode, or do something stupid, for reasons that were always Snape's own. She knew he was using magic on her, watching her reactions, carefully calculating how much more it would take. Anger didn't effect him; he knew she was too afraid of his to act on it.
'Fine,' she thought. 'Let's see what Mr. Legilimency thinks of this.' Meticulously, she conjured an image behind her eyelids. Inside her head, she rose from her chair, and sashayed over to him, her steps precise, her form graceful. She reached his seat and leaned over him, insinuating herself between him and his paper. In her mind, she met his black eyes with her own dark ones, reached out with one hand that fluttered, caressingly, toward his face. She never touched him, but stroked the air along the line of his jaw with gentle fingers, watching the darkness grow smoky in his eyes. She imagined that she felt the heat from him as her hand touched the air softly, never quite contacting skin, however he moved his head.
Hermione was startled out of her reverie by the sound of a chair scraping hard against the wood floor. "Miss Granger," Snape snapped. Was she imagining it, or was his voice a little bit funny? "You are napping Miss Granger and, I expect, disturbing everyone in the room." He picked up his drink and drained it, collected his paper, and stormed away.
She looked blankly at Hagrid, who looked back at her briefly. Then he tilted his heavy head back to his essays, "Was it summat I said?"
Hermione carefully put her book on the table. What in the world had she been thinking? She had always been attracted to his mind and his bravery, could hardly remember a time since first year that she wasn't. She believed Dumbledore when he said the Potions Master was to be trusted. She couldn't find it in her to hate him, even for that one time when he insulted her so badly he made her cry. Ok, two times. Ok, often. She knew it was stupid to think that under all that darkness and fury was a good man, but she thought there must be at least a tolerable one in need of the benefit of the doubt. She had never considered him physically attractive. Never before this.