Remus was a fool.

He had never held a very high opinion of himself, but if there was anything he'd ever prided himself on, it would be his strong common sense. James had never entirely grasped it, though not for lack of trying in the years before his death, and Sirius had never even attempted at it. Remus had settled into the role of "level-headed one" the moment they'd welcomed into the fold.

This was not common sense. This was ridiculous, and ludicrous, and…stupid.

He'd removed the entirety of his wardrobe and draped it over every available surface in his room at Grimmauld Place; if anyone were to come in, he would be hard-pressed to explain what he was doing. "Decorating" wouldn't appease Molly, let alone Sirius. God forbid one of the children come in to speak with him. That would begin a line of questioning he wasn't sure he would ever be prepared to answer.

And if they discovered he was making an attempt at dressing up in anticipation of seeing Severus…

He was a goddamn fool.

Heaving a sigh, Remus lifted his least threadbare jumper and scrutinized it for holes and stains. Severus's clothing was in no better shape than his own, but…

There came a knock on the door, and Remus threw himself at his wand, twisting around on his bed to send everything shooting back into the wardrobe. "Yes?" he called as he straightened up and attempted to look innocent.

The door creaked open to reveal Sirius. Neither of them spoke, but the stony expression on Sirius's face said more than enough. For what felt like an eternity, he scanned the room as if searching for something—and whatever he found seemed to steel his resolve, for he said grimly, "Moony, we need to talk."

—

Severus told Albus what the boy had confessed.

He regretted it the moment he attached the letter to Potter's owl alongside the litany of others and sent it off into the open sky. Closing the window with a snap, he briefly contemplated using accio to bring the owl straight back and send the damning letter into the hearth, or tear it to shreds; perhaps even to Banish the remains into nothingness—anything to rid himself of the swell of dread starting in the pit of his stomach. Instead he stepped back and watched the owl grow smaller in the distance, until she faded from sight and he was left to watch a storm roll in.

Potter had only five days left in Spinner's End. Five days until Albus came to ship him off to Grimmauld Place, where instead of strengthening his mind, disorganizing Severus's bookshelves, and cooking painfully elaborate meals, he would spend his days rubbing shoulders with Sirius Black and the Weasleys. And then they would both be off to Hogwarts—and everything would go back to how it had been.

Severus didn't want it to end.

He was a selfish fucking prick. Potter belonged with his friends and godfather. Cokeworth was not a home to the boy. This town was a prison, a dead-end for those who'd ended up here, and a graveyard for those who were unfortunate enough to be born in it. Potter would amount to more than this. He would amount to more than Severus ever had, and even more than his long-dead mother, who'd never been given the chance to reach the vast potential she'd had in life.

Pressing his palms to his eyes until stars burst like fireworks, Severus leaned against the sink and tried in vain to stave off the headache threatening to overtake him. It wasn't even noon and yet he was already acting like a maudlin fool.

His mother had always despised that about him. He was too much like his father; too Muggle, too angry, and with a tendency towards wallowing in self-pity. He'd been a nervous and pessimistic child—the kind any parent would hate—and had grown up to become an anxious and hateful adult. Whatever social life she'd had before conceiving him had flown out the window the moment he'd been capable of expressing wishes to remain tucked away indoors; invitations to the sorry excuses for parties at the neighbors' houses had dwindled, day trips to the museum across town became far and few between until they ceased entirely, and by the time he'd grown old enough to tramp about Cokeworth by himself, Eileen had grown bitter and reclusive, content to hide herself away in their rotting two-up two-down while her husband drowned himself in whiskey at the pub.

It was just as well that she'd never accepted his invitations out to lunch over the years; she would have hated him more now, more than she ever had before. It had been over a year since they'd so much as written. The last time they'd spoken, it had been in the form of three words scrawled on the back of his unopened letter: Don't waste parchment.

He'd stopped trying after that, and she'd never made much of an effort with him either way.

"I finished the book," Potter announced from the doorway, where he'd been hovering for some time, half-shrouded in shadow like it would turn him invisible.

Severus peeled his hands away from his eyes and squinted at him. "Snow Crash?"

"Yeah. I stayed up late to finish it, because everything started happening at once and I couldn't just stop reading. S'pose I won't need to take it to school with me, after all." He shuffled from foot to foot. "Thanks for letting me borrow it."

"There's another book," he said, remembering very suddenly. "I'd not bothered to buy it. The Steel Age, or something similar."

"I'll have to find a bookstore the next time I go to Diagon Alley. They'll have plenty of them in London."

Keep the book, Severus nearly said, and covered his eyes again so that he wouldn't have to look at the boy and devolve into overly sentimental mush. I've gone fucking mad.

After a moment, he straightened his spine and pushed himself away from the sink to begin rummaging through the boxes he'd dragged out of the storage room, pulling out old scrolls and ratty composition notebooks. Here was one he'd spilled tea on, years ago; and that scroll there had fallen in the sink while he'd brushed his teeth. It was crusted over with toothpaste. Severus aimed it towards the rubbish bin and then stopped, looked it back over, and shoved it back inside its box. Perhaps he'd need it one day…

The boy still hadn't left the kitchen, but Severus couldn't bring himself to muster up any anger over his disobedience. "What is it?" he said dully, flipping through layers of unfinished potions experiments in an effort to find one that piqued his interest.

"What?" Potter said, startled.

"You're still here. What are you wanting?"

There was no response, and for a moment Severus felt a swell of ever-present rage—until Potter said, "What's going to happen after all this?" and the irritation vanished like somebody had blown out a candle and left him cold.

He tossed aside another scroll. "Explain yourself," he said, even though he knew exactly what the boy meant.

"What'll happen after I leave?"

He took a deep breath. "You will be escorted to headquarters, where you will remain with your friends and godfather until you return to school."

"And after that?"

"After that, I would presume lessons will resume as normal and you will, I would hope, study and work hard." Severus moved to throw aside another scroll, and then paused, pulling it back open to skim through the contents. On the margins were half-finished sketches and abandoned scribbles, useless, but the experiment itself…He let it roll closed with a snap and shoved it off to the side. Stuffing the rest of the scrolls back inside their box, he reached up to put them away at the top of the cupboard over the sink. He began to pull ingredients out, opening tupperware and plastic bags, and set his cauldron up on the stove next to a roll of mostly-empty parchment and a quill. When he unrolled the scroll and pressed it flat, he took care to cover a smudged drawing of an intricately shaded bluebell, lest Potter see it and make up embarrassing theories. The stove hissed when he turned it on high. And all the while, the boy did not move an inch. "You're still here."

"What about us?"

"Us?" he sighed.

"Us. This—er…"

"If you dare call us friends, I will not hesitate to sick up, Potter," he said scathingly, picking up his quill and finishing one of the drawings he'd done near the top of the scroll, this one of a frog. "Say your piece or leave. I'm tired of you dithering about like a fool."

Potter shifted from foot to foot, worrying his lip between his teeth. "Well, I just meant…us. You can't—you can't deny that things have changed. A lot. Sir."

Severus didn't respond. Instead, he dropped his quill and began chopping salamanders, shoulders hunched and hair swinging low to hide his face.

He wasn't an idiot. He'd noticed the change between them. It would have taken someone truly thick to have let it go unnoticed. But to have it brought out in the open…

"You've seen, haven't you? The change?" Potter pressed. "We couldn't even have a conversation until recently."

He would hardly call any of this a conversation. Unskilled though he was at anything social, Severus was fairly certain a conversation was two-sided. "What do you want?" he said eventually, running a hand through his hair. "What are you expecting to accomplish here?"

"I dunno. I'd expected you to start yelling by now, actually," the boy said to the floor.

"Nothing has changed between us." Severus didn't have to look at him to know Potter was now watching him raptly. "When we return to Hogwarts, we will proceed as usual, unchanged."

"But…I thought…"

"Did you expect otherwise?" Setting down his knife, he turned round and braced a hand against the counter, eyes boring into the boy's. "You are not a fool, but you are certainly acting like one. Things have not changed. We cannot exchange social niceties in the halls. We cannot discuss books in the classroom, or sit down to eat together. We cannot go shopping or visit the library. We cannot have conversations, Potter, unless you would like Draco Malfoy to write to his father and get us all killed. This, whatever you believe this is, will end. There is nothing for you here. There has never been, and will never be, anything for you here. You are Harry Potter. You cannot be seen with somebody like me."

Every word came out of him as easily as drawing water from a rock; but even as Potter's face fell and shoulders slumped, even as his chest tightened and his hands tried to draw into fists, Severus knew it had to be done. This could not last.

"But I don't want it to end," Potter said.

"It has to. This cannot continue."

"But—"

"It has to stop!" The sentence ended on a yell. "This will end! None of this has meant anything, and you're a—bigger idiot than I thought if you've convinced yourself that is does!"

The boy didn't speak. He'd made himself very small against the wall, gripping the ends of his over-long sleeves like they were a shield. The kitchen was silent. Next door, the Richardsons were having a row; muffled crashes rattled the window. The sound of it put him on edge. Severus held his breath, hoping to slow his pounding heart.

"It's meant something to me," Potter said angrily, "even if you don't care about any of it. I care."

This has to end, Severus told himself, but even his head he sounded more desperate than anything. He tightened his grip on the edge of the counter, scratching at it with his nails. It has to end.

"I don't want this to end. Even if we can't talk in person, we could—exchange notes, or…or send owls, or—"

"Or have our letters intercepted by the Ministry?" he said breathlessly, shaking his head. "Or receive gossip rags about Harry Potter's secret lover because you have begun sending a ridiculous amount of letters detailing each and every last plot device used in a book? If Ms. Granger's support during the Tournament was enough to send Rita Skeeter crawling out from her gutter, I dread to imagine the shit she'd dream up once she received word of mysterious letters. The entire Wizarding London would be scrambling for answers, and no doubt Fudge would begin raving about a conspiracy. We can't go on like this. It will end."

Potter looked dreadfully unhappy, with his brows drawn close and lips pursed, but Severus decided he didn't care. "You think the Ministry is intercepting owls?" he asked.

"I would be hard-pressed to believe they aren't."

"Isn't that illegal?"

"Fudge has allowed power to go to his head. He is no longer concerned with rules and laws—he wants power, and he wants control. Intercepted mail is hardly a trivial matter, but compared to anything else he will soon find himself capable of, it is the least of your worries now." He ran a hand through his hair again and tried not to think about how oily it had already gotten. Before he could stop to think about what he was saying, Severus muttered, "We need to discuss Wednesday's visit."

This triggered an instantaneous reaction. "What's there to talk about?" Potter demanded, wringing the hem of his jumper in his hands. "We already did that. We talked about everything."

"Not all of it," Severus shot back. "There's more."

"More? I told you everything!"

"Do not lie! The others may be content to believe you've given every last detail, but I know better. There is more. There is always more."

Potter was breathing hard, edging backward until Severus held up a hand in a silent order to stop. "What would you know?" the boy snapped. "How would you know I haven't told everything? Why would you care? You just said we can't be—friends, or whatever. So why should you care?"

I don't care, he wanted to say, but somehow couldn't bring himself to lie. He'd done too much already by entangling himself in this mess—especially when he'd insisted, on multiple occasions, that he wanted no part in it. Riling the boy up would only serve to make matters worse. "I'm a professor. I've seen cases like you."

Potter laughed without humor. "So I'm a 'case' now? D'you mean a mystery, or a head case, like the Prophet says? Wait, no, this is you we're talking about—you mean both."

"You're behaving like a toddler," Severus said flatly. And like your godfather. "Where in that sentence did I suggest I so much as read the Daily Prophet? And—you're sidetracking, but it won't work. There is more to the story and you will tell me."

"No," the boy said, "I won't."

"Then you would prefer to stay with them?" Severus ground out. "You prefer the belt and the cane, and being withheld meals? Do you enjoy being locked in your bedroom? In a cupboard under the stairs? Does it make you feel special?"

"No! I want to be normal! I don't want to be treated like a freak, or have everyone hate me for a month before changing their minds because the Ministry's decided I'm evil again. I don't want Voldemort trying to kill me, or Uncle Vernon treating me like furniture, or…anything!" He flung himself down at the table, burying his face in his hands. "I hate being famous for my parents dying. I hate this scar."

Uncertain of what to do over such a sudden outpour of emotion, Severus weighed empathetic sentences and pitying words in his mind before eventually deciding on, "Don't say the Dark Lord's name."

Potter made a sound behind his hands, but it was too muffled to tell whether it was a laugh or something along the lines of fuck off. "There isn't anything more," he mumbled. "Dunno why you think there is, but there isn't. I've told everything."

"There's always more," he insisted. There was always more that went on behind closed doors. Beatings were one thing, but in houses like…Potter's, there were always secrets. There was always more, even if, or especially if one parent was left in the dark.

"D'you want an essay on the way my family's brains work?" The boy snorted. "I don't know much about psychology. Sorry, Professor."

At a loss for words, and more than a little nauseated, Severus moved back until his hips met the counter again. "No secrets?" he asked again, one last time. "Something your aunt doesn't know about? Or your uncle?"

Looking at him strangely now, in a way that made his stomach twist and his palms sweat, Potter shook his head and said, "Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon tell each other everything. They don't have secrets. Aunt Petunia even told him about magic before my mum died. They're happy together for a reason, I s'pose. They don't keep secrets."

(Was it not normal, then? Was it unnatural to keep secrets with one parent and leave the other in the dark, even if it made you feel slimy and wrong inside? The boy was wrong. There were secrets. There were always secrets. Always more to the story.)

"I see," Severus said, letting his shields slam into place and take away whatever tormented thoughts had stirred up within him. His voice sounded distant. "That was all there was to discuss. Do you feel up to an Occlumency lesson? Or would you rather eat lunch first?"

And the moment passed as though it had never been.

They ate lunch in silence. Neither looked up from their food, intent on ignoring the tension in the air. When the boy stood to clean his plate, Severus made no move to get up from where he'd been merely pushing his own food about, knowing he'd only trigger his dyspepsia if he tried choking anything down.

"D'you want to do it now?" Potter asked quietly, without turning away from the sink. "Occlumency, I mean."

He wasn't about to eat anymore of his lunch. "If you're prepared."

"Yeah. I'm ready."

Severus retrieved the Pensieve and began his usual removal of incriminating memories, taking care to remove the ones that had been building too close to the surface of his mind; there would be no use in the boy seeing anything from his childhood, let alone anything involving his mother.

They took their usual positions by the table once he'd finished, breathing deeply in tandem. "One…two…three…Legilimens."

The now-familiar rush of memories overtook him, blurring out all hints of the kitchen around them. Severus fixated immediately on the boy's family, digging their faces out of the stream, and his mind exploded with sound. Not allowing himself to become lost in the sensory overload, he pulled out whatever hint of abuse he could find. Potter gasped as if from a long way away.

Before he could look too closely, he was assaulted with a burst of anger, overriding anything in front of him—and he was ejected forcefully from the boy's head.

They both staggered back, panting and sweaty. "Why do you keep doing that?" Potter hissed, rubbing his eyes.

"What?" Severus said coldly.

"Looking for my uncle! You've been doing it for weeks!"

"You are deluding yourself," he said. "Up, Potter. Again."

And he was back in the stream. Focusing instead on the boy's aunt, he dredged up her voice, and the familiar-unfamiliar face. Hair has darkened face longer, he thought before cutting himself off, and Petunia's face slipped away, back into the flow of memories. Cousin.

Images of a large blond boy burst into view; running from him, getting punched in the face by him; "The toilet might get sick—" and pig on hind-legs and—pig's tail, Hagrid, a birthday cake—and a surge of affection rose at the sound of Hagrid's voice, blinding him against all else.

Severus stumbled back and nearly fell, gripping his head with a groan. The kitchen swam back into focus. Shooting an arm out to grab at the counter, he hauled himself upright and turned to look at the boy, who hadn't even been knocked back. "Good," he panted, squinting through the grey light coming through the window. "That was…good."

"It's getting easier," Potter said breathlessly. He had his hands on his knees.

"Yes. Again." He cleared his throat and gathered himself. "One, two—"

From the next room over, the Floo roared to life. Severus spun round in alarm. Narcissa—?

"Severus?" came Albus's fire-crackly voice. "Are you there?"

He released the breath he'd been holding and took a step towards the doorway. "I'm coming!" he called, and then stopped, turning to look at the boy. "Stay here. This should not take long. I'll return momentarily."

"Yes, sir," Potter said, taking a seat at the table.

Severus left him there and hurried to the fireplace, dropping to his knees in the scattered ash. "Albus," he said to the head floating in the hearth, "I trust you've received my letter. May I come through so we can discuss the contents?"

—

"Something's going on between you and Snape," Sirius said.

They'd secluded themselves in the drawing room with the Black family tapestry, far away from the Weasleys and the rest of the Order, so that no one would listen in on a potentially sensitive conversation. Though Remus found the room unsavory at the best of times, it now gave him a feeling of decided unease. "'Going on'?" he said dryly, running his fingertips along the mantle over the hearth, polishing away the dust and leaving streaks. "What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean, Moony. This—fucking weird infatuation you have for him, whatever it is—that's what I mean. Listen," he sighed, turning around so that they were face-to-face, "I know you like him. You always have, even back at Hogwarts. Why you like the greasy creep—"

"Sirius," he said, exasperated, but was cut off before he could continue.

"Let me finish. Why you like the—don't give me that look…fine—why you like him, is that better? It's mad, is what I'm trying to say. Snape isn't someone you want to be around. He never has been. He's not the sort of bloke you take home to meet your parents." There was no hint of a smile on Sirius's gaunt face, nor any sign of an incoming joke; and suddenly Remus couldn't decide whether or not he'd prefer one. Pranks and jokes were easy. Do it now, without thinking deeply about your actions, and regret later. Simple.

This was not simple.

"If you would only try to get to know him," Remus said, even as he knew the words would fall on deaf ears, "I'm sure you would change your mind. He's not the demon we've always made him out to be."

"Not the demon we've made him out to be? Remus, he's a Death Eater. For Voldemort. This isn't a fucking Ministry official who's taken bribes or made Fudge sympathizing statements to the Daily Prophet. Snape has killed people, and he'll do it again the second Voldemort—his master—tells him to. He treats Harry like utter shit—"

"From what I've witnessed, he's on his way to treating Harry much more kindly than he has before."

"He terrorizes the students and, according to Hermione, has tormented one boy enough to make him their Boggart!"

"What Neville is afraid of is figures of authority, more than any one person. Severus had just left the room and was fresh in the mind. He'd mentioned himself that it could have been his grandmother."

Sirius shook his head wordlessly, lips parted and eyes wide. "Are you even listening to yourself?" he hissed. "This is mad! Are you Confunded? Under the Imperius? Snape is an oily little slimeball who tortures children for a living and kills Muggles on the side. Moony, we've known this since we were kids. Nothing has changed. I know you like to see the good in people, but this? James would've thought you'd gone off your rocker. Fuck, I think you've gone off your rocker."

"Don't bring James into this," Remus snapped, turning back to the hearth. Sirius grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him back around.

"And you don't try to push me out. Moony, I'm serious about this. Don't get involved with Snape. I know you like blokes—I like blokes, I could hardly give a fuck if you do too—but Snape? You could have…anyone else. Anyone. I could set you up with somebody, or Tonks could…anyone but Snape."

"You said the same thing to James about Lily, and we all saw how that turned out," he said, voice heavy with irony.

"Lily wasn't a genocidal maniac!"

"And neither is Severus!"

"Are you shagging him?" Sirius demanded.

"I don't see how it's any of your business—"

"You're my best mate, of course it's my—"

"But no! No, I am not," he said firmly. "I'm not shagging him. I don't know that he would even want that, honestly. I don't know what he wants at all."

"So you admit he could be playing the long game, waiting for your guard to drop, and then—"

"I'm not admitting to anything, Padfoot, but—"

They both jolted back from each other when a flash of light burst in the room, illuminating the burns on the family tapestry and the streaks Remus had made across the mantle. "That's a doe," he said dumbly, staring at the Patronus standing silently by the door. Sirius gaped at it, the dark of his eyes leached of all color in the ghostly light. "Lily—?"

"The meeting tonight is cancelled," came Snape's voice, drifting out of the Patronus as distantly as if it were coming from the end of a long tunnel. "Do not come. You will be turned away. The boy is safe."

The Patronus faded away; Remus had to force his arm back to his side before he could reach for it, and he studiously ignored the way Sirius's hand rose to touch the light before it could vanish entirely.

The drawing room seemed very cold and very dark, all of a sudden.

Sirius sucked in air like he'd been drowning, stepping back and blinking hard. "Meeting?" he breathed.

Just as softly, Remus said, "I was supposed to check on Harry tonight."

"Something's happened." Sirius wet his lips and his eyes, which had been so lost, steeled. "Remus, something's wrong. We need to call Dumbledore."