Title: Harry Potter and the Summer From Hell

Author: Ladye Black

Warnings:

Disclaimer: The day I own these guys is the day it is written that they :beep: each other. So, in other words, I don't own them.

Notes: Thanks to all my wonderful reviewers, you'd all get prizes and your names mentioned if I wasn't so lazy, but believe me, I love it when you review and I remember who you are.

Chapter 16

Shopping. Oh, how he loathed shopping. Well, grocery shopping, at least. Poking around for potions could actually be, dare he say it, fun. There was just something about looking for necessary ingredients to dangerous potions that made his day…or maybe that was because he imagined the various ways he could kill his pupils by having them drink unknown potions made from the ingredients he was buying. Yes, they'd never realize that sugar mixed with toad clippings was poisonous…well, Granger might. Damn.

At any rate, he was absolutely sure he hated shopping for groceries. Especially when it was in a Muggle store with Harry Potter leading the way. Why did Merlin have to torture him so?

Well, there's no hope for it, I'll just have to bare it. And so, after putting on his game face (known to some as Glare #2: You are beneath me and I barely tolerate you, but so-help-me-Merlin, I will kill you if you piss me off too much.), he followed Harry into the store. Okay, he took it back, Harry leading could be a good thing…especially in those nice Muggle leg-wear.

"Okay, so, what do we need?" Harry's voice interrupted Snape's concentration. It was probably a good thing, too, Snape reflected.

"Well, I don't think the Headmaster expects anything like what Hogwarts serves-" Snape was cut off when Harry snorted.

"Are you kidding me? If you cook, it won't matter. You make food even better than Hogwarts fair."

Snape almost blinked at the statement. "I suppose I should thank you."

Harry smiled over his shoulder at him, "Your welcome."

They continued wandering the aisles searching for something fit for a powerful Headmaster of a prestigious school.

Almost an hour later, Snape was thoroughly annoyed and ready to hex something. He'd been run into by about thirty small children, a few of which he was sure were repeats, several people hadn't been watching where they were going and run into him with their cart, and there was the one case where an incompetent employee had broken a bottle of olive oil and hadn't put up a warning sign yet and Snape had slipped on the resulting messand fell on his ass.

The only reason he hadn't hexed that last one was because he didn't have his wand with him. He'd left it at the house; Snape was sorely disappointed with himself that he'd forgotten to bring it. Of course, when he'd tried to strangle the employee with his bare hands, Harry had caught by the back of his black Muggle jeans and refused to let go. Snape decided Harry got to be out back on his list of "People That Needed To Stay Away From Him Or He Would Kill Them And Enjoy It". Number one was the High Dark Squib of Bad Breath. Really, being mostly dead didn't reallydo much for a sub-person.

At any rate, Snape really wanted to get out of the store. Unfortunately, they were not yet done and Snape had taken to grinding his teeth in silent frustration.

"Right, I think we've got most of the stuff," Harry said, squinting down at the list. "Only a few more things left and then we can go."

"Oh, thank Merlin," Snape mumbled as another child ran into his leg. Thirty-one, Snape was fairly certain he hadn't seen that one yet. After scaring the child off with a well-glared glare, he followed Harry through the last few aisles and then into the checkout line.

That in itself was a torture.

First, it seemed everyone had to pay for their food at the same time. All the lines were long, and excruciatingly slow. They picked the most likely looking line, behind a group of young people with little or no children, and waited their turn.

Once they got to the front, Snape was slowly driven insane by the constant…beeping. In fact, he developed a twitch to accompany it after several minutes. Beep..twitch…beep..twitch…beep..twitch, and so it went.

After several more minutes of beeping and twitching, the beeping finally stopped, though Severus had seemed to have developed a minor tick in his left eye. Harry was concerned.

"Are you alright?"

"I'm fine…" Twitch. Severus hoped it would stop soon.

And then came his favorite part, riding in the automobile.(feel the sarcasm) The ride to the store had been bad, and he had a feeling that the ride back wouldn't be different.

He was right.

Cars passed too close to him, and really, were those things under control? It looked like they'd come right at you in a moment's notice, not like a good horse-drawn carriage, or eve better, simply Apparating.

When another car again passed too closely for comfort, Severus tightened his grip on the door handle and resolved not to move a muscle until they made it safely back to the house.

Which they somehow did.

TBC…

Uh, don't ask why Harry is driving. I figured, out of the two of them, he probably had the most experience even if he can't legally drive. So, yes, he's driving without any form of documentation. Good thing that car was charmed to be unnoticeable…uh-huh, yeaaahhh…