DATE #2
She oozed into her chair with a practiced ease, "You must be Severus Snape." she said in an ominous voice, "My name is Aloevera Oilslick" she said, "My mother is Oleum Oilslick... you may have heard of her, the famous painter?" Snape shrugged, really The Dark Lord had to be out of his mind to consider this woman a fitting mate for one of his most... loyal followers. He stared in ill-disguised disgust at the thin woman sitting across from him. She had sallow skin, a large hooked nose, greasy hair, and yellow, uneven teeth. How can any man love such an uncomely creature? he wondered.
"My mother is actually painting Our Dark Lord's portrait soon." She bragged.
"She should feel honored. The Dark Lord only employs the best." If this witch is reduced to bragging about her mother's accomplishments, she can have none of her own.
"Oh, she does! Such an honor! But then again our family has been on his side from the beginning."
"Loyalty means everything to The Dark Lord." said Snape with the smallest of smiles.
The uncomely witch leaned back in her seat, a frown pulling remorselessly on the corners of her mouth. "I can see that you don't fancy me any more than I fancy you." She said in a bitter tone.
"So it would seem." He replied. Hurrah for honestly.
"But that doesn't matter to me." She said, waving away his response, "I lost my love...my best friend, many years ago and I will never stop loving him. I think you understand that..."
"I have no idea what you're referring too." He said, narrowing his eyes to glare at the impertinent woman sitting across from him.
"I'm referring to our having a child together."
Snape nearly spit his boeuf bourguignon across the table. "What exactly are you proposing?" he asked, wiping spittle from his face and boeuf from his robes.
"Calm down." She said, in a bored voice, "I'm not proposing anything… prurient. Just a simple business proposition." she said, "I want a child... you want the Dark Lord to get off your case about 'romance'… We can both come out of this unfortunate situation as winners."
"I suppose your blood is pure?" he asked, more as a stalling tactic than out of genuine curiosity.
She giggled, "As pure as yours Severus. I'm your cousin. Same situation even, mother a Prince, father a muggle, though my mother had the good sense to cut her loses and come back into the family fold before I was even born... Surely you knew that?"
"Mother never spoke of her family. I had assumed she was the last of the Princes."
"The last of the Princes?" she gaped at him, "You mean you really don't know?" Snaped shook his head, the witch positively guffawed this time, an ugly sound like a water glass bursting in a fire. "There are dozens of us! You should really visit the home county more often..."
"Why have I never heard of you?" he asked, the curiosity getting the best of him.
"Oh, we keeps ourselves to ourselves we does... in every way." she punctuated her remark with a playful wink. "If your mother hadn't run away with that frightful squib there might be a few more Princes back there."
"But surely mother couldn't marry another Prince. She was a Prince already." Snape said, "Isn't that rather a bad idea?"
"Not as far as we're concerned." she said with a sharp nod, "And don't worry about your father. None of us blame you for that and by wizarding law our grandchildren would be considered pure-blood."
"Great-grandchildren." he corrected her, "Providing our descendants marry well."
"Oh, they will!" she said, "The Princes' have learned their lessons well and they're gotten a lot more conscientious about parenting." She paused, "Basement bedrooms without windows and good stout locks do the trick nowadays. After all, if your children never meet a muggle, then they can never marry one!" she laughed again and Snape was reminded of a crude muggle word for a donkey.
"What a charming custom." said Snape as he called for the check. I wonder what is the polite way to tell someone you'd rather mate with a rabid niffler then with them? he thought.
As it turns out, the rabid niffler comment did the trick quite nicely. "Politeness isn't everything" he mused as he walked out of the restaurant.
