Disclaimer: If I owned the Harry Potter verse and its characters, would I be writing FANfiction? No, I'd be too busy diving in a swimming pool filled with hundred dollar bills—I mean (cough) giving money to charity.

Author's Note: This story starts from the perspective of an original character who had the misfortune (in her mind) to find herself in the body of one Hermione Granger, age 12. It may get much weirder, as I am toying with the idea of an awkward, Lolita-esque unrequited or unresolved romance with Professor Severus Snape. She's certainly impressed by him at first glance. You have been warned.

Sectumsempra: Cut Off, Forever

Chapter the Third:

In Which it Comes to Light that Miss Granger's Parents Are Not Dentists

As we students file out of class, I in the wake of the rather irritable Lavender and Parvati (who haven't forgiven me for not helping them with their wacky concoctions yet, I think), Snape's voice calls out, quietly but sternly,

"Miss Granger. A word, please."

Whoever "Miss Granger" is, sounds like she's in for it—maybe she got caught cheating at her concocting—but as Lavender and Parvati immediately turn around and nudge me anxiously, and Snape quietly repeats, but with more veiled menace this time,

"Miss Hermione Granger. A word now, if you don't mind,"

I realize, too late, that I am the one being called. Funny surname to have, Granger. Reminds me of cattle farms, for some reason. Reluctantly, and with a mounting feeling of dread,I turn and walk back into the dungeon to stand before Snape. I find that despite the initial appeal of his features, I have no particular desire to be alone in a room with one of the nastiest teachers I've had the displeasure to encounter, nor to be alone with the one person who seems to have seen through my involuntary disguise even for the briefest of instants. Nevertheless, the way his black eyes pierce mine is kind of sexy. Shaking off that thought (I really shouldn't be allowed to have those kinds of thoughts while I'm in this body, should I?), I square my shoulders and prepare myself to be scolded, or punished, or thrown out as an imposter.

However, he merely says, in an unreadable voice, "Tell me about your parents."

I'm so surprised at this bizarre request that for a moment all I can do is stutter out, "My, my p-parents?"

I gather my wits a little and ask, "Er…what do you want to know about them? Sir," I add as an afterthought; I am after all, his student, in a sense, and this school seems to favor formality in student-teacher relations.

"For instance, what do they do for a living?" Snape replies in the same unreadable tone, a hard, probing expression behind the blackness of his eyes.

Obviously, I don't know what Hermione's parents do for a living, and I certainly don't know why Snape's asking, but I doubt Snape knows either, especially if he's asking about them (unless, that is, he really does suspect me of being an imposter, which seems unlikely). Thus, I reckon I can get away with telling him what my actual parents do for a living. However, this plan backfires on me: as soon as I start really thinking about my parents, I realize that I'm never going to see them again if I don't get out of this stupid child's body, and that even if I did see them it would be as a stranger.

As I'm attempting to describe my father's complicated and very boring career in Public Relations for various companies, I'm holding back tears; and there's something disorienting about the way images of my parents and my previous life come rushing to the front of my mind; almost as though once Snape had gotten the thoughts flowing about my parents he had managed to open a conduit into my mind, bringing up memories of my real life, unbidden. Of course, that sort of paranoia about "mind-reading" is typical of me, and I brush it off fairly quickly. Not so easy to brush off are the powerful emotions stirred up by the memories and the knowledge that they are, henceforth, totally irrelevant.

Professor Snape stops me in mid-sentence as I'm telling him about my mother's horrible boss from a few years back, and I notice then that my voice has been pretty clearly cracked and on the verge of sobbing for about the last ten seconds.

Surprisingly, Snape puts a hand on my shoulder. I hadn't figured him for the type. At this unexpected gesture of kindness, my last resistance breaks down; I fall to my knees and start sobbing in earnest. It's incredibly embarrassing, crying copiously and, to all appearances, inexplicably, in front of an ill-tempered stranger with piercing eyes.

But perhaps he wasn't being kind after all. He pulls me to my feet by one arm and says, "Come. We're going to the Headmaster," at which point I stop crying immediately, and follow meekly behind him, only sniffling a little bit now. I wonder dimly why he's taking me to the Headmaster. Have I done something wrong? (I mean, apart from arriving to class unprepared, which hardly seems an offense to merit any Headmaster's involvement.)

Now that I think about it, Professor Snape's actions since the end of class don't really make sense at all. He keeps me after the lesson is over to ask me about my parents—why? And then, he takes me to the Headmaster after I start crying…very strange. I don't know what to make of it. As Snape purposefully leads me through the convoluted passageways and staircases of the school, my stomach feels as though it has turned to lead.