A/N: Again... Thanks to muggline for translating the story and to Prof for beta reading.
Enjoy!
Hermione did not take any interest in the files that were piled high on her desk. She took notes every now and then but couldn't really be bothered with the things she wrote. Of course, she was aware of the curious glances her colleagues stole in her direction. The feeling of being watched bothered her a lot, but nevertheless, she was thankful that nobody pestered her with questions.
She had started working again three days ago, and after one look at her face, no one failed to believe that she had been ill for a few days and still did not feel very well. She needed no mirror to know how terrible she looked, but talking to Ginny had helped her to push her self-pity into the background, keep a stiff upper lip and go on with her life as well as she could manage.
As if the fleeting thought about Ginny had conjured some mysterious magic, there was a knock on the door. The young redhead stood in the office directing some excuses at Hermione's colleagues who were as astonished about Ginny's appearance as she was.
Ginny explained that she did not want to disturb them for long, made some friendly small-talk with the people around her and directed her steps towards Hermione's desk. "You look as if you've seen a ghost," she laughed, leaning on the completely overflowing desk that started swaying under the extra weight.
"Oh – I was just thinking about you, and woops, you come breezing in, so I was taken aback somewhat," Hermione explained her puzzled expression and smiled back at her friend.
"I happen to be in town all by myself and wondered whether you might spare some time for me..." Ginny put on an alarmingly innocent face, and Hermione, who had known her for quite a while and did not fall for her tricks at all, gave her a searching look.
"Of course," she finally said with suspicion in her voice and got up from her chair. For some reason, Hermione did not like the look in Ginny's eyes one bit.
"I hope you don't mind if I kidnap Hermione here for a few moments?" Ginny gave Mrs. Bossington, Hermione's superior, her brightest smile, and Mrs. Bossington immediately smiled back and shook her head.
"Okay, tell me what you're up to?" asked Hermione as soon as they had left the room and were out of earshot.
"Why do you think that I have anything in mind?" Ginny blinked innocently, but grinned when she realised that Hermione could not be fooled. "You know me too well," she admitted, shrugged and continued, "I'm going to tell you something if you promise that you won't throw a fit."
"That depends," Hermione answered distrustfully.
"Okay. But before I begin, I need to know whether there's any Pensieve here at the Ministry."
"What on earth do you need a Pensieve for?" Hermione stared at the younger woman in disbelief. A strange feeling of premonition kept invading her.
Ginny smiled and pulled a small vial with what looked like white billows of smoke out of her robes. To Hermione, it looked almost too familiar.
"Because," Ginny said softly, her voice becoming very earnest all of a sudden, "I need to show you something."
sSsSsSs
When the two young women opened the doors to the old and empty courtroom, they were greeted by a gush of musty air. They entered and locked the door. The room was filled with the typical stale smell of an enclosed space that has not been aired for a very long time. Hermione pondered doing a complicated air-cleaning spell for a moment, but when Ginny started talking, she immediately forgot about it.
"I went to see Severus," Ginny started directly and held up her hands in an appeasing gesture when Hermione opened her mouth in protest. "I know that I shouldn't have meddled," she said, "but I could not stand by idly and just watch your suffering. Something in the way you described Severus's... well, brush-off, felt quite odd. To be honest, I mainly paid him a visit because I wanted to see with my own eyes that he has indeed used you and then given you the boot as if you were some old scrubber."
"Did you come to a conclusion?" Hermione swallowed, astonished about her capability to form a coherent sentence while her head seemed to be spinning.
"That's exactly what I want to show you," Ginny whispered and headed for the Pensieve, gesturing for Hermione to follow her. She started uncorking the little vial and gave Hermione an encouraging smile.
"Whose memories are these?" Hermione asked unnecessarily.
"Mine. Are you ready?"
"No," came Hermione's truthful answer while Ginny's memories started filling the Pensieve. But she could not help herself and plunged into the wavering mist.
sSsSsSs
In the Pensieve, she found herself standing next to Ginny at Severus's front door. Instinctively, she took some stumbling steps backwards when she observed Memory Ginny who started knocking rather determinedly on said door.
"Severus, just open the bloody..."
Memory Ginny had not even finished the sentence when the door flew open, and he was there... pale and gaunt as always, with some dishevelled strands of hair sticking to his head and face in an unpleasant manner and a furious gleam in his eyes. Hermione's body became rigid, and she stared at him with wide open eyes. But in spite of the hurtful words he had thrown at her after their night together, in spite of his cold and harsh treatment of her, she felt a touch of pity for him.
"What do you want?" he barked at Ginny, who flinched almost imperceptibly at his words but would not be put off her plan.
"To talk to you," she answered very calmly.
Severus's body was like a solid wall made of refusal and inapproachability, and his voice could have cut glass when he said, "No! I do not wish to be rude, but you should go now!"
Hermione could not see Ginny because she was staring at the man in front of her. Nevertheless, she admired Ginny's courage when she heard her say coolly, "You are being rude already! Severus, you won't get rid of me! All I want to do is talk to you... you owe me that much."
His eyes narrowed and became small slits when he looked down at the young woman facing him. "I don't owe you anything!" He sneered, voluntarily using his height to intimidate her. Hermione knew that gesture all too well... she was used to it like an old sweater.
"Okay," Ginny retorted with a shrug. "Maybe you don't owe me... but you sure owe Hermione."
At these words, Hermione did actually turn around towards "Memory Ginny". Upon seeing her friend's stuck out chin that emphasised the determination that was written all over her face, her folded arms and her rigid posture, a wave of sympathy washed over her. Hermione sensed that it had cost Ginny a lot of willpower to face her son's godfather and talk about a subject that she knew would make him extremely angry.
Severus opened his mouth and closed it again, pressing his lips together in a thin line. Maybe he was astonished by Ginny's tone, which she had never directed at him before, or maybe he considered this whole conversation unworthy of an answer. In fact, he kept silent for so long that it soon felt like an eternity. When he finally spoke, his voice held a note of finality.
"I fear that you are wrong, Ginevra. What is more, I do not know why you think you should meddle in things that do not concern you at all. Except," he drawled and his gaze became disdainful, "to satisfy your silly curiosity and get to know some dirty little details."
"Indeed?" Ginny kept cool. "Well, Severus, neither am I curious nor do I intend to learn any, as you call them, 'details'. And I do agree... I don't have the right to get involved. All I ask myself is this: why did you treat Hermione as if she were dirt under your shoes?"
He said nothing, but kept staring at her from squinted eyes. The way he stood there, almost like a statue, inapproachable and bare of visible emotions, reminded Hermione too clearly of the moment when he had thrown all those hurtful words at her, and her heart constricted tightly and painfully. She did not want to watch any more and would have liked to ask Ginny to leave the memory, but yet she stood silently and dared not blink for fear of missing any reaction in his face.
"I value you and I respect you, Severus. But I guess it comes as no big surprise when I tell you that you are not a nice man. You are moody, unsociable, impolite, and to be honest, I have not the faintest idea what Hermione might have seen in you. But who am I to judge her?" She shrugged a little but continued, "All I want to know from you is why you were unable to treat her with the same respect she has always shown towards you."
"Maybe you and I have a different notion of respect, Ginevra," he said calmly. Hermione noted the different tone in his voice that sounded less sharp now.
"Do we? Please enlighten me," Ginny demanded. "Until now, I have been blissfully unaware that hurting and insulting somebody can be a form of respect."
"Did you never think, you stubborn little thing, that I might have treated her like that BECAUSE I respect her?" Swift as a predator who intends to give his prey the final blow, he had approached Ginny who took a startled step backwards. For a moment, it seemed as if he would grab her shoulders and shake her vigorously, but then he changed his mind, his shoulders slumping in a gesture that looked incredibly tired.
"You wanted to make damn sure that she would go away and never return," Ginny whispered, and the tremble in her voice was the only indication that she knew what dangerous territory she was entering now. "Why, Severus?"
"As you said before... I am moody, unsociable and impolite. I am not a nice man, Ginevra. I have never been, and I will never be. You know it, your husband knows it, and I bloody well know it, too. It was only a matter of time until Hermione would come to her senses. It was better to make her see up front what she thought she wanted to get herself into."
"Better for her... or better for you?" asked Ginny, who seemed to have thrown all caution to the wind now.
Hermione gave a small shriek when Ginny from the present grabbed her wrist and whispered in her ear, "Watch his face, Hermione..."
"That's it, right? Is it better for you that she left early enough, because you would rather bear it now than at a later point... when you would have gotten involved so much that it would have been even harder for you to see her go?"
Something in his face flinched as if he had been hit, and for a very short moment, his black eyes held a hurt, almost tortured expression. His mask dropped and revealed the man beneath it, a man who looked sad and forlorn. His self-control had only slipped for a split second, but it was enough to make Hermione's heart race.
"That's enough!" he said in an ice-cold tone and stepped back towards the door. It was the gesture of a person who could not bear the thought that somebody had seen his emotional vulnerability.
"Don't you think," Ginny said in a very calm, soothing voice, "that Hermione has seen all your human weaknesses and flaws a long time ago and decided that she could live with them nonetheless?"
He did not answer but stared at a point in the air behind her. Then he went backwards into the house and threw the door shut without another word.
For one moment, Hermione raised her hand to the spot where he had stood just seconds ago, as if she wanted to touch his pale face, but then the scene started dissolving and she found herself standing in the old courtroom with Ginny again.
sSsSsSs
"Are you okay?" Ginny asked calmly, after they had been silent for a while.
"I don't know," Hermione whispered with a trembling voice and leaned on one of the benches for the spectators.
"I... I would never have thought that I could ever talk to him like that," Ginny said. "But I think that what I said is right. He did not want you to go, but he thought that you would go anyway, sooner or later. So he imagined that it would be easier for him to frighten you off now than have to watch you disappear from his life later on." She laughed insecurely and touched Hermione's shoulder. "Are you mad because I did it?" she asked hesitatingly.
"No," Hermione said. "I'm rather mad at me because I am letting my foolish, naïve hopes raise their ugly heads again just now although I ought to know better." She swallowed hard and looked Ginny in the eyes. "I would love to talk to him, but I would never demean myself and go to him after everything he said to me."
"And you very well shouldn't," Ginny agreed. "You have enough pride not to do that. But you saw that he looked like shit, Hermione... to me, it was obvious that I hit the bull's eye. If he cares for you as much as I think, and if my last sentence got through to him somehow, he will be the one who wants to talk to you."