-1The Half Blood Prince

Vs

The Know-All Queen

The Morning After the Night Before

I wake up and discover that I'm naked in a bed that isn't mine and for some reason, my left ear is wet. I shimmy away a little; the left arm draped around my waist tries to stop me but I manage to escape. As I turn around, I look at the sleeping Severus Snape whose nose is apparently itchy, and who is drooling in his sleep. That would explain why my ear was wet and an itch would be the reason his nose keeps twitching. I lean over and lightly flick his nose with my index finger; this causes it to twitch even more. A quiet snort of laughter escapes my lips and I decide it's time to get out of bed. I pull on my underwear and, more out of ownership than anything else, I put on his shirt. Normally a woman is supposed to look kind of sexy in a man's shirt, however this is Severus Snape's shirt. This shirt has frills on the cuffs, and a wide collar. To be frank, I look like a half dressed Jane Eyre.

I check each room in turn and eventually stumble across (or in my blurry eyed state, into) the kitchen. I would make tea but all I can find is Earl Grey, and I don't like coffee. Actually it's not hard to find anything in his kitchen cupboards; everything is organised in labelled bottles displayed in alpha-alpha. It's a little disturbing. I settle on pumpkin juice, which I find in his fridge, (its contents are also labelled, which I'm wishing wasn't the case as this includes the goat's stomach.) I take two tumblers in to the bedroom on a tray. I climb back into bed and shake him lightly to wake him up.

"Severus?" I murmur. "Severus, wake up."

"Piss off," is his reply.

Well, I'm a little offended and a little amused by his reaction. Clearly he is not a morning person. I kiss him on the shoulder.

"Severus, I'm half dressed, holding a drink, and would actually consider repeating the previous night's events on a regular basis, so I suggest you wake up." I try to purr and end up sounding like I have a sore throat, but I think he gets the drift. I see one dark eye taking a sneak peek of me to see if I'm telling the truth, then snaps back shut.

"I might wake up if you were a little more undressed." A smirk spreads across his face.

"If I were a little more undressed you would need to be awake to tell the difference." I laugh. "Just get up, you lazy arsed git."

He props himself up on the pillow next to mine. I hand him his drink.

"Grateful as I am, why not coffee?" he takes a sip and make and 'mmm' noise to reassure me that he is indeed grateful.

"It smells funny," I reply with a slight frown. It just doesn't have the same magic as a cup of tea. I take after my mum that way I suppose. Mum was always a great believer in tea, 'You're not well? Here have a nice cup of tea…' or 'He'll be back, love, don't worry. Have some tea…' If aliens invaded and declared war on earth, Mum would probably try to resolve it with 'Milk and sugar?'.

"How about some tea then?" he says, then realising what he said, takes another large swig followed by an equally large 'mmm'.

"Earl Grey is not tea, it's perfume." I abhor Earl Grey tea; it tastes horrible, it's like sucking flowers. "Next time you can just do it yourself," I huff.

"Next time? That is a very good idea indeed." He places his drink down on his mahogany bedside table, and begins to snuggle in to me.

"Yes, next time is a good idea." I prise one arm off me. "Next time," I repeat, "not this time." I get out of the bed and find his bathroom. "I'm going for a shower. I won't be long," I declare.

I actually spend longer in the shower than I intend to. However, eventually I step out of his shower and begin looking for a towel. On a towel rail next to the sink I find three different sized, royal blue towels hanging over the rail in size order. This man is just far too organised! I pick up the largest one and wrap it around my body giving me the effect that I'm wearing a dress. I then get the middle sized towel so I can wrap it around my hair. 'Come on Hermione, today's the day!' I have been awful at wrapping my hair up in to towel ever since I came to Hogwarts as a student, and it is the one thing I have yet to improve on. I CAN do this, just wrap, (I draw the towel over my head and around my hair) twist, (I twist it tightly around my hair and hold it at the bottom) and flick! I jerk my head up so fast I let go of the towel, (which has already reversed stage two) and it flies off my head and hits the small shelf in between the sink and the shower, and sends various labelled bottles plummeting to the floor. I then hear the sound I've been dreading. SMASH! Severus bursts into the room.

"What the bloody hell is- Hermione, your foot is bleeding!"

I look down. "So it is!" I agree. 'So would yours if it had a ruddy big chunk of glass in it!' I think to myself. Although as I begin to study the true depth of my injuries I notice I am bleeding rather profusely. Severus then wraps a towel around the protruding glass and as he dashes off I hear him say something about "Murtlap essence" and "lavender oil". I'm beginning to feel rather faint. Looking at my foot doesn't seem to help, so I try the only thing I know to keep my mind of my bleeding foot.

"Eye spy, with my little eye…" 'Not Severus' my slightly panicking inner thought says. Oh to hell with it; I decide that surely it can't be that bad. I gingerly unwrap the towel from around the glass and take a look. Right then, I do seem to be bleeding quite a bit. Then I notice the glass has residual fluids on it, from whatever was previously in it before gravity and I intervened. This could be bad, depending on what was in that bottle; potentially dangerous fluids could be poisoning me. Armed with a towel in one hand and nerves of steel, (steel that has been pulled and heated and contorted, until it has the same consistency as treacle that is) with my other hand I pull the piece of glass out of my foot. This is then added to my still growing list of 'things never to be done ever again, even if you life depends on it it's such a bad idea', as blood is now flowing so freely from my foot, I find myself sitting in an increasing pool of my own blood. The towel is soaked in blood and the floor isn't in a much better state, Severus is still not back and I'm beginning to feel more light headed than before. My eyes begin to slip shut and just before my head hits the floor I see a blurry, black robed figure moving towards me with an out stretched hand. Apparently death has come to claim my soul, so with my last ounce of strength I speak my last conscious thought, "No! Not yet, it's not…it's not that…bad…" I manage just before I'm engulfed my a warm fuzzy blackness that smells like clean.

Right, I know it's been a long time coming but I have been so busy over the christmas period, that I simply didn't have the time to work on it properly. Anyways it's here now and I hope you like it, loves and hugs to all x x x x