Heartbroken Christmas

Author: Leta McGotor

My thanks to Slim Shady, Lady Henrietta, Jade 1982 and Deathbeforglory for reviewing and yes, she'll be okay, because this is the last chapter and it has indeed a happy end.

Underground: I didn't plan to write about those dreams but they include a nice place and Severus and… :-) Anyway, there is not so much that will happen in this chapter, it is the last one. But I hope you review nevertheless. Thank you for your thoughts.

Chapter 7: Incidents in the Hospital Wing

Severus awoke with a start when a beam of the sunlight hit him. In fact he was that shocked and confused by the light, that he slid from his chair to the floor. Slowly he opened his eyes again. A large window met his eyes, showing him the Hogwarts grounds. On his left and right were several beds, all of them unoccupied. Swaying slightly Severus came to his feet again and looked around properly. He had been wrong. One of the beds was indeed occupied.

Severus hurried to the bed and stopped only a few feets away, realising that the person in it might be asleep. Carefully he crept nearer and nearer, watching the woman's breathing and thanking all he could think of that she was alive. She looked peaceful in her sleep, her hair and face were freed from the ice and snow and her lips had neglected the shade of blue and had turned red again.

Cautious Severus sat down on the edge of Minerva's bed, still watching her. After a few moments he lifted his hand and touched her cheek. Her skin felt soft and warm instead of cold when he had found her. Slowly his hand wandered to her lips and to her other cheek until it reached her hair.

"What are you doing there?" said a voice from the other end of the ward. Severus turned around and saw Poppy Pomfrey standing at the door with a furious and confused expression.

"I…" Severus began, not knowing at all what to say.

"Yes? She needs to rest, can't you see that? And you need rest, too. I wanted to transferre you from the chair into a bed immideately after I had finished with Minerva, but you couldn't wait, could you?" She stormed, coming nearer with every word she said.

"I need no rest and I only wanted to see how she is, because you didn't care to wake me up and tell me." He answered furiously himself, feeling helpless like a baby and very useless for Minerva.

"She'll make it and now go to bed."

"'She'll make it' means?"

"What do you think it means? She is asleep now. That's a better cure than anything else in the moment. We'll see how she feels when she awakes, but she will be okay, right? So don't ask any other silly questions and go to bed. I have been awake the whole night and I don't need someone else to worry about beside Minerva. So GO TO BED!"

"But she'll definitely make it, yeah?"

"I told you so."

"Good, but I'll stay here."

"No, you won't"

"I will."

"No…"

"I will and you can't stop me. So go to bed and let me alone with her." Whatever Madame Pompfrey answered Severus didn't understand it. He didn't care, either. Minerva would be all right and that was all that mattered right at the moment. Severus looked back into her face and nearly jumped when two green eyes looked back at him.

"Has someone already told you, that it looks funny when you are embarrassed?"

"I've never been embarrassed."

"No? Then I have seen it wrong or it has been the first time." She smiled slightly, closing her eyelids and relaxing.

"Maybe I… I… Alright I was embarrassed, but you would be, too, sliding from the chair and been watched by someone like her."

"I don't think sliding from a chair is why you looked that way." Severus looked to the floor. So she had felt it when he had touched her?

"Thank you, Severus."

"What for?" He looked up and saw that she was watching him.

"For saving my life."

"I… It's all right. I was near the train by chance and so I could help. Easy." He answered not looking her in the eyes. He couldn' tell her the truth. If he did, he would have to explain his feelings, too, and that was something he couldn't stand to do – not at the moment, anyway.

"Near the train, were you? What have you done there without magic at all. I remember a broom on our way back."

"Yes, I… I… Alright, I followed you after Albus had told me the train had got stuck up. Had you preferred I hadn't done it?"

"No, I said that I was very grateful. … I heard the others around me. Most of them started going out. They wanted to go out of the valley on their own. That was something like committing suicide, wasn't it? But there was another woman a few compartments from mine. She didn't go with them, either, and stayed with her daughter. What happened to them?"

"I found them dead, already. I couldn't help them, even if I had had the time." He looked into her face and saw a single tear making its way down her cheek.

"She wanted to go to her parents and then back to London. Her husband is in hospital and she couldn't visit him and care for her daughter at the same time. So she wanted her parents to stay with her…"

"I'm sorry." Severus said and felt it, too, although he hadn't known the woman with her daughter or the husband at all.

"Why?"

"I don't know." He shrugged and felt incredible stupid.

"Severus?" He turned to her.

"Don't blame yourself. That's not you. Think what the students would tell." She smiled. "Severus, I feel weak, very weak and tired. I don't want to send you away, but…"

"It's alright, Minerva. I'll come back. Sleep now or Poppy'll have our heads, you know her." Before he had even finished, Minerva had fallen asleep. Severus sighed and watched her for a while, before he made his way down into the dungeons.

The next morning Severus awoke early. It was dark outside and neither the moon nor the stars were visible. But to Severus this all didn't matter. He didn't care for the stars and their meaning and he had hated to watch them even as a student.

After he had showered and washed his hair (yes, he washed indeed his hair) he made slowly his way up to the hospital wing. He knew that he was early, but he also knew that Minerva liked it to stand up very early and he hoped that she might be awake yet. Carefully he opened the door and peered inside. Of course there was no light in the room. Madame Pomfrey was still asleep and the sun hadn't risen yet.

Quietly Severus went to Minerva's bed. When he was only two steps away a female voice said: "You are early. Poppy'll kill you – or us – for that."

"I bid you a Good Morning as well, Minerva." Severus answered.

"Yes, Good Morning."

"How are you feeling?"

"Better."

"Better?"

"Yes, better. I'm warm again and I have slept the whole night and I hope that Poppy is really still asleep, so I can try to stand up."

"No, you don't. You aren't strong enough yet."

"And you can judge about that? I feel perfectly cured, Severus, and you can help me if I fall, right?" She swung her feet out of the bed and stood up.

"Be careful."

"I am careful." Slowly she made a few steps. "See, there is nothing to worry about." But in this moment her feet gave way. Severus cought her fall in a hurried movement.

"I told you so." He said while pulling her upwards.

"I know, but I don't want to stay in bed for the rest of my life." She looked into his eyes and saw the worry there he tried to keep to himself. They were so close and suddenly Minerva remembered the moments when they had stood under that mitletoe.

"Severus?", she whispered not knowing exactly why.

"Yes?"

"Why… why have you run away?" This question had nagged on her since that evening.

"What do you mean?" he asked still holding her in his arms.

"When… when we stood there under the mistletoe?"

"I… I…" Severus closed his eyes and prayed for an answer. What should he tell her? How should he explain his feelings. He didn't understand it, either. But then an idea came into his mind and when he opened his eyes and looked into Minerva's sad, questioning and hopeful ones, he was determined to do it. So he simply leaned down and kissed her passionately.

Minerva responded immediately and pulled herself even closer to him. She had wished for quite a time now to be kissed from someone she loved dearly in that way, but never did she imagine that this someone was Severus Snape. If she had realised it before this kiss then only mere seconds ago. Severus pulled her closer, too. He never wanted to let her ago again, never. But then…

"What do you think you are doing there?" asked a harsh voice from the other end of the ward. Minerva and Severus parted immediately and turned around. There was a furious Poppy Pomfrey in her light blue dressing-gown striding towards them. "You are my patient, Minerva, and you need to rest and don't dare say something. Go to bed or I'll forget myself! And you…" She was standing directly in front of Severus now. "How dare you use her weakness to… to…"

"Poppy, he didn't…"

"Be quiet, Minerva and go to bed!"

"I'll go then, too." Severus said retreating defensively.

"Yes…" Poppy turned around to watch Minerva go to bed again, so she couldn't see Severus wink at Minerva before he vanished around the next corner.

"I'll never forget Poppy."

"I'll never, either. I wished I could have helped you there, but…"

"It was probably better for you to go. I've never seen her in such a state."

"Yes, frightening."

Minerva and Severus lay outside next to the sea on the Hogwarts grounds and enjoyed the sun. It was summer now and the events of Christmas were nearly forgotten – nearly.

"I believe she'll never forgive us."

"No, probably not, although she has been barely cruel to me the last time I was in the Hospital Wing."

"Yes, I explained her that we are going to be married coming December. You had to have seen her. She was so excited about it all, that you would think she is the bride and not somebody else."

"What do you mean with "Somebody else"? You are the bride."

"Yes, I know, but what if I change my opinion?"

"You wouldn't… would you?" Minerva smiled and kissed Severus on his forehead.

"No, never." They shared another passionate kiss.

The End Okay, that's all for this time. I hope you enjoyed reading as I have enjoyed writing it. It would be great if you were leaving me a review, although it is the last chapter. Thanks!