Chapter reposted! Thanks MadameMischief for your wonderful work!

oi you! Yes you! June W and Celi, don't get hiding behind your computer chair. Come forward and face my wrath. I can't send you an email cry's. Celi's just won't send and June W didn't leave an address. Thanks for reviewing! And for the birthday wish.

cough I cant breath, got to take wands from around neck, maybe 10 was too many.

Chapter 4: if I said "delroy" to you...would you find it funny?

"So…"Hermione said fingering the neck of her Butterbeer. "You have your own house…"

"I inherited it from my father." His reply was crisp and to the point. He wasn't much into conversation today, not that he was normally, unless it was to gain something. Did he really only see her as a womb with a body to go with it?

"I take it he passed away then?" Hermione inwardly slapped herself, how could she just say something like that? It was clear from the 'inherited' that he had. What if he had only passed away recently? "Sorry."

"He passed away three years ago, in his sleep. My mother not shortly before him." He didn't look at her while he spoke, he stared into the distance, watching those who walked passed the window of the quiet café he had led her to. "As an only child and last of the Snape line, I got everything that belong to my family."

"Oh, so your--"

"Rich, very rich in fact." A cocky smirk lifted the cheeks of his face into a mock smile. His eyes glinting at the look of amazement on her face. Hermione wouldn't lie that she wasn't impressed, she was. Severus looked more relaxed out of school, she noticed as she watched him, it was obvious now that Voldemort was no more he felt he could live again. Studying his pose she spoke.

"Why do you want a child?"

"Because otherwise who am I to pass all this wealth onto?" He smirked again.

"Ok then, why mine."

"Hermione," He sat forward as he spoke, elbows resting on the table between them. He had not spoken her name before. Not her first name at least. What he was about to say was going to be important, Hermione noted. "Cant you see? Any child that would be half born to you and me would have a remarkable intelligence and would be a formidable competitor to their peers."

"I don't see—"

"They would be perfect." Severus' smirk was a half smile as he thought about such a child. He had had to admit to himself while they was working together alone that he had come to respect her and even admire her beauty. Oh she was not the classic modern beauty. Several times he had watched her while brewing, her soft graceful hands and her delicate lips. He had found it impossible to refrain from thinking about what she could do with such things to his body. Then her parents had died, and it had pained him to see her in such a state. He realized shortly after their death that he was growing too attached to the girl and had pushed her away. She was never to know what he did to the people who killed her parents. She was never to know of their deaths, the people he had killed for her. Severus watched her now, her eyes had glazed over as she took in what he had said, and he had often wondered what it would take to make those eyes glaze over while she was beneath him. That was in the past, when he had fancied himself attracted to her.

"Oh." Hermione softly spoke before pulling the bottle to her mouth and taking a rather big swig from it. This was something she mulled over, he just flattered her, well sort of. She still wanted to know what was he's reason for having her out of the child's life. Gathering her Gryffindor balls she spoke. "Why cant I be part of the child's life though?"

"That is something I will not discuss here." Snape looked around him to the odd couples that were seated around them.

"But you will discuss it?" Hermione asked hopefully. He, Severus Snape, was willing to explain why! It was something she had never thought could happen. This whole thing seemed weird to her, sitting in a café with him, talking about the child they were going to have. When she was a student, she had fantasized about having a child and a husband of course. To feel her body grow with another being inside her, a being she had created, the most precious gift any woman could have. How would she be able to give away anything she had created? She found it hard parting with her parents belongings, the useless stuff that there was no reason to keep she had wanted to keep anyway. Not because it had once belonged to her parents, but because it was now hers. To describe it in one word she was somewhat clingy.

"I will talk about it when I deem it necessary." Snape's eyes caught Hermione's, he could read her feelings quite clearly, they were a mixture of nervousness, determination, pride, and even respect. Those weren't the only emotions there but they were the strongest. "Miss Granger, I hope this has been more helpful for you than it has been for me. I have more important things to attend to. There will be plenty of time in the next three years to answer all of your questions."

"Wait!" Hermione said abit too forcefully. "Could you tell me a joke?"

"A what? Miss Granger?"

"It's a-"

"I know what it is, but what good would it do if I did indeed tell you a joke?" Severus raised his eyebrow at the woman before him. He had not been asked to tell a joke in his entire life. You would have thought that she had more sense than that. Severus hoped the child would have his judgment in life rather than his mothers.

"I don't know, I want to get to know you better than as just my ex-professor." Hermione shrugged her shoulders, her face flaming. She had no idea where the idea of asking for a joke had come from. The whole idea of Snape knowing a joke was dismissible within seconds. "Humor me?"

"This whole idea was absurd, from the very beginning I should have just kept on walking." Snape shook his head searching for a answer to this notion. "If I tell you a joke will you not contact me again until the beginning of September?" At her nod of agreement Severus sighed and sat back down. "This is not going to happen ever again Miss Granger so listen close…

A student comes to a young professor's office hours. She glances down the hall, closes his door, kneels pleadingly. 'I would do anything to pass this exam.'

She leans close to him; flips back her hair, gazes meaningfully into his eyes. 'I mean…' she whispers, 'I would do…anything!'

He returns her gaze. 'Anything?'

'Yes, anything!'

His voice turns to a whisper. 'Would you study?'"

Laughing Hermione smiled at Severus. Severus felt something rise in his chest as he saw her laugh at his joke; he hadn't thought it amusing when he read it on the staff notice board. Hermione's face, he notice, was beaming with youth and a beauty that he had refused to admire throughout their meeting. It would not do to fall in love with the mother of his child; it would lead to nowhere. He waited until she had recovered before making his excuses once again and leaving her to finish her drink alone. He should of never of got her to be the surrogate mother, but as much as he would have liked to choose someone else, nobody was more perfect than Hermione.

A/N leave a email address and I shall respond to reviewers! Thanks to all those who have reviewed. And about the whole Snape telling a joke, well the only storied I've read has Snape being funny in a sarcastic sort of way, yes he is sarcastic but I bet he knows a few jokes too!