Chapter 23: Candid Confessions

Severus did not even make it 24 hours before his guilty conscience completely ate him up and brought him to his breaking point.

Filled with regret and remorse, he made sure to avoid running into anyone as he sluggishly made his way up from the depths of the dungeons in the early hours of the morning. Not having been able to sleep for obvious reasons, he had been drinking away his sorrows all night, and after half a bottle of Ogden's Old Firewhisky, he had ultimately decided that the best possible thing he could do right now was to come clean. There was no excuse for his behaviour, of course, but he figured that it would still be better if the old man at least heard it from him first. In his mind, there was no doubt that Hermione was already sitting in Minerva's office at this very moment, her beautiful face all tear-streaked as she recounted her traumatic experience of being attacked by one of her teachers. He felt so truly awful when he thought about her – the poor girl had run away from him in such horror that he was certain she hated his guts now. And who could blame her? He knew that there was nothing he could do to ever make this up to her. Even on the off chance that he was not going to lose his job over this, there was no way that Hermione would not be pulled from his class and transferred to another tutor. And without her, Severus did not see any reason to remain at Hogwarts. So he would simply confess to everything, resign from his position and leave the castle immediately, and not a single soul would know – that was until Slytherin's new Head of House was going to make his or her inevitable debut at the Quidditch game against Ravenclaw the following morning. But by then, he would already be long gone.

All too fast, the Potions Master arrived in front of the ugly gargoyle guarding the entrance to Dumbledore's office. His heart felt heavy as he quietly muttered the password – flibbertigibbet – before watching the large stone figure move aside. Stepping on the spiral staircase, he had a thousand thoughts racing through his mind while he was slowly being brought up to the top. He felt so ashamed of what he was about to confess to – while Albus and his antics were nothing but an annoyance to him on most days, Snape was nevertheless always secretly desperate for his mentor's approval; he shuddered at the thought of how disappointed and disgusted the older wizard would be. As a servant of the Dark Lord, he had committed countless unspeakable acts – pillage, torture, arson and even murder – but yet somehow, kissing one of his own pupils felt like the most immoral thing he had ever done. Even hours later, he was still mortified by his actions. How could he have let himself lose control like that?! He was just such an idiot when it came to women and love, he had read all of the signs completely wrong! He was so embarrassed that he even briefly considered asking that the reason for his sudden resignation would not be disclosed to the student body and his colleagues, but he quickly determined that that should be up to Hermione to decide – she was the victim here, after all. If she wanted to publicly shame him, then so be it. He deserved it.

The moving stairs finally came to a gentle halt, and Severus felt scared out of his wits. He knew the big, heavy door in front of him all too well; he must have walked through it hundreds of times, sometimes for nothing more than a simple staff meeting, other times to give personal account of Voldemort's newest deranged move. But never before had he been this nervous of entering the circular room which lay behind it. For what felt like an eternity, all he could do was stand there unmoving, staring right at that damn door as his legs just would not move. He did not want to do it – did not want to walk into that office, admit to his biggest failure and lose the respect of the only person who had always believed in him. But did he really have any other choice? No. No, he did not.

Filled with dread, he took a cautious step forward and was just about to lift up one of his hands to knock when he suddenly heard a joyous "Come in, come in!" resonate from the other side of the door. Snape did not even flinch – of course the flamboyant geezer would have already known that he was coming. He always did.

Taking one last deep breath, he stepped into the office. Ignoring all the funny little noises coming from the wide array of weird instruments distributed all across the room, he was grateful to see that the residents of the dozens of portraits hanging on the high walls were still sound asleep. Fawkes was nowhere to be found, and even the Sorting Hat seemed to be snoozing peacefully on its shelf. Good – this conversation was already guaranteed to be bad enough without any witnesses.

"Severus! But what a pleasant surprise so early in the morning!" exclaimed Dumbledore loudly from his usual spot behind the desk. He had a big grin on his sunken face and was wearing another one of his outlandish robes; this time, it was a fashion nightmare made of icy-blue silk embroidered with shiny blood-red beads. "To what do I owe the honour of this visit?"

Severus had to forcefully suppress the urge to vomit as he reluctantly staggered towards his employer. He did not want to do this, no, he really did not.

"Albus." His voice sounded terribly hoarse. "There is something I need to tell you."

"Is that so? Well, then go ahead. Spit it out!"

"I, I –" He tried to swallow, but his throat was suddenly feeling excruciatingly tight. "I am so, so sorry, but …"

He faltered. All night, he had thought about how he should bring up such an awkward and sensitive subject and had even mentally prepared a whole speech ahead of time. However, in this exact moment, his mind went completely blank. And so out of necessity, he decided to simply make it short and to the point. Slamming his fists on the table separating them with a loud bang, he let out a barely audible whisper saying, "I kissed Miss Granger."

"FINALLY!"

That was definitely not the reaction which Severus had expected.

"Wh-what?" he stammered perplexed, his dark eyes filled to the brim with tears.

"Oh son …" Dumbledore shook his head empathetically which made his long, white beard dance like a serpent performing for a snake charmer. With a quick movement of his wrinkly hand, a simple wooden chair appeared next to his claw-footed desk. "You are completely shaken up. Have a seat, please!"

He waited until the younger man had done so while still trembling from head to toe before he continued.

"I do apologise for my little outburst just now, but I must confess that this does not really come as a surprise to me." Severus' jaw dropped, but the headmaster simply lifted one of his long fingers to keep him from interrupting. "Let me explain: you see, I did not bring back Hogwarts' apprenticeship programme for the sole purpose of giving the extracurriculars a slight brush-up. When making the decision, I specifically had you and Miss Granger in mind."

"I don't … think I understand."

The wizard with the half-moon spectacles sighed. "My boy, the Order enlisted your services as a double agent for two very long decades. Again and again, you bravely put your life on the line for the greater good, and now that the war is over, nobody deserves to have a shot at a normal, happy and carefree life more than you.

"But I know you, Severus. You are quite possibly the smartest man I've ever met, but at the same time, you can sometimes be so dense when it comes to the more emotional part of life that I feared you would not be able to recognise that the key to your happiness had been in front of your eyes all along. And even if you had, you also unfortunately have such a low opinion of yourself – which is, might I add, completely unwarranted – that you probably still wouldn't have taken a chance at it as you would mistakenly deem yourself unworthy. So I knew that I had to give you a push in the right direction for your own good, so to speak; that I had force you into a situation where you couldn't possibly escape your own luck no matter how hard you tried."

Severus had confusion written all over his face – Albus' words did not make any sense. What was he talking about? Why hadn't he banned him from school grounds yet or at least scolded him for assaulting his apprentice? "What?"

Dumbledore offered him a sympathetic smile. "Come on, be honest with yourself. Didn't you realise a long time ago that Miss Granger is probably the only person in the entire universe who could ever match your brains? She shares the same thirst for knowledge and the same passion for academics as you do, Severus; it's really a miracle that she should exist. I didn't have any other choice but to revive this tradition – it was the only way to get the two of you to spend more time together alone and to finally recognise that you were practically made for each other!"

It took Severus a few seconds to register what had just been said, but then his eyes instantly grew big in shock. He could not believe his ears. "WHAT?! But she's a student! It's forbidden! It's wrong!"

Albus let out a silent chuckle; he was seemingly oblivious to his staffer's despair. "I believe that we can both agree that Miss Granger is not an ordinary student. So why should ordinary rules apply to her? She's a war hero, just like you. You both had to go through more than most people could ever even imagine, and those sorts of things force one to grow up fast. The regulations dictating that teachers and pupils cannot have a romantic or intimate relationship are in place to protect our students from being taken advantage of by someone in a position of power as most of them are still too immature and impressionable to consent to something like that.

"What differentiates Miss Granger from her fellow classmates is that she has spent her teenage years eye to eye with the world's most evil and ruthless men, fighting against them with her bare hands as they tried to bring victory to the dark side. I'm confident that she could defend herself perfectly well in the unlikely circumstance that you should try anything with bad intentions in mind. Dare I say that she could probably beat you in a duel if she wanted to! Therefore, I see no reason why I shouldn't allow such a union."

Severus was completely dumbfounded. He had always known that the silver-haired man liked to play puppet theatre with other people's lives, but he could not believe that that shrewd bastard had also been meddling in his private life all along! Suddenly, all those knowing gazes he had given him while he had been dancing with Hermione made so much more sense. He now also understood why Albus had been so insistent on him teaching for just one more year, even though he had originally wanted to resign following the war.

"I had to act fast, of course. Now that we have won the war and the Order has again disbanded, you would have no reason to see Miss Granger after her graduation. I simply could not let you miss out on the opportunity of falling for her – don't you understand?"

"So that … that ball was just another excuse? Another part of your grand plan?" Severus whispered.

"Yes and no – I also just wanted to see all the funny pairings dance with each other. I mean, did you see Sybill and Miss Brown? Hilarious!" His laughter was unpleasantly shrill.

"I cannot believe this! Why did you do all of this instead of just telling me?!" Severus was getting increasingly irritated. He had thought that after retiring from being a double agent, he would finally be a free man. But that son of a bitch just kept interfering with his life – and he had not even noticed!

The headmaster's small eyes were filled with that strange twinkle again. "If I had told you that I thought you and one of your students were soulmates, would you just have accepted it and thanked me or would you have cursed me out?"

Silence. Severus did not know how to answer. He knew that the other man was right.

"I do apologise for going behind your back, but it had to happen like this. I knew that even if you had realised it yourself, you would have never followed your heart, because you would much rather follow the rules. But some rules are meant to be broken, Severus. Especially when it comes to matters of the heart." There was another short pause. "Even a lone wolf like you deserves to have somebody by their side. She makes you happy – and that's okay."

"But Albus … I can't! It's not right! She is 20 years younger than me, for Merlin's sake!"

"You need to remember that she's most definitely not a helpless, little girl anymore and of age in both the wizarding and the Muggle world. I believe the correct term is that she's legal."

"HEADMASTER!"

Dumbledore let out an almost eerie giggle. "I'm just joking, of course! However, you should really stop worrying all the time; it's not good for you. Just accept things as they come, and stop fighting against your own fate! It is quite all right if you don't want to admit it, but I know how close the both of you have got over the past couple of months."

He looked at him completely baffled. "You've noticed?"

"Of course! The castle has eyes everywhere, my friend, and it can quite chatty at times."

Severus felt drained, both mentally and physically; this whole revelation was just too much. A lone tear escaped the corner of his eye and rolled down his cheek. All he wanted to do right now was to crawl into his bed and sleep for a week or two, but there was just one more thing that he had to ask. "But how could you have even known that she would choose me as her tutor to begin with? Hermione is so talented at everything she does; she could have gone with anyone!"

"The answer is simple: I didn't. I just had a feeling she would."

The Potions professor buried his face in his hands. He did not know if he should feel relieved that he was not in trouble or rather repulsed by the fact that his boss had played such a trick on him. All of a sudden, he was longing to finish off that half-full bottle of alcohol waiting for him in his quarters.

"Anyway," Albus spoke up. "You and Miss Granger may or may not decide to enter into a relationship, and either way it is really none of my business. But I must of course still ask you to not go public with it should you choose the former, at least not yet. While I have complete trust in the two of you and would support such a union wholeheartedly, others might not be so understanding and could try to ostracise you. We wouldn't want anyone questioning Miss Granger's well-deserved stellar grades, now would we?"

"I do not think you'll have to fret about that," replied Severus grimly, his eyes still glued to the floor. "Hermione ran away from me in disgust. She obviously wants nothing to do with me anymore."

"Oh Severus, I wouldn't place my bets on that! I believe that this is all just a big misunderstanding that will be resolved soon." He winked at him. "Now, would you like a piece of sherbet lemon?