A/N: This is for the 5 drabbles challenge prompt 'Great Hall'.
Emmeline hovered outside the Great Hall waiting for Severus to appear for dinner. She had been asking him when they were going to tell everyone that they were together, but each time he had brushed her off saying it wasn't the right time. It was almost as if he didn't want anyone to know about them.
"Severus, can we talk?" she asked as he walked by her.
"What do you want, Vance?" he replied, turning towards her.
Emmeline could see the irritation in his eyes and she knew that their conversation would not end well.
"Can we do this in private?"
"Looks like you have an admirer Snape," Avery chuckled.
"Perhaps," Severus said to his friend before turning back to her, "You have one minute."
She led him to an alcove a few metres away from the door whilst Avery and the rest of his friends went in.
"What was that?" he hissed at her.
If she had any doubts that he didn't want anyone to know about them, they vanished right then and there. It was time to end this before she got hurt.
"It's over, Severus. You obviously don't feel the same way about me that I do about you, and I'm not waiting around for something that's never going to happen." she said.
His eyes widened in surprise.
"Emmy, I never meant to hurt you. If I did then I'm sorry, but you know what Avery and the others are like. If they knew I liked you then they would use you to make me do horrible things," Severus said apologetically.
She scrutinised his eyes looking for any deception in them. Even though there wasn't any, her instinct was telling her that he wasn't telling the truth.
"I don't believe you. I think you're trying to convince either me or you of that, but it's not true," she said shaking her head.
"That's not-"
"It is and you know it. I mean nothing to you," Emmaline said, interrupting him.
"You're right. You don't and you never did and that's why I had no intention of ever telling anyone about us," he sneered.
The words were like a knife to the heart.
Even though she already knew it was true, hearing it come from him with such honesty and enmity was hard. She had truly thought that he cared for her.