AN:-Hope you enjoy.

And thanks to CrouchingCrookshanks for being the brave first reviewer! lol thanks it was lovely.

Chapter 4

When professor Slughorn had said that they were starting with a potion, she hadn't expected this. She looked down at the slip of parchment lying between her and Snape on Monday morning. All it said was, "Felix Felicis". That was all it said, nothing of its ingredients nothing of its directions. She paled.

"What does that mean?" she turned to Snape whose features were neutral and in the least worried.

"It is a luck potion, Cromwell." He looked disgusted, "Honestly, have you never heard of it?"

"Shut up, Snape." She scowled, "But doesn't it take six months to brew?"

Professor Slughorn spoke as Snape was about to answer, "Each pair has a different potion in front of them, some will take longer to prepare then others while some have ingredients that are harder to acquire then others. All potions are of an equal advanced difficulty level."

"Professor, there doesn't seem to be an ingredient list or brewing directions on this parchment." Sirius pointed out. Snape snorted.

"Have something to say, Snape?" Sirius demanded as he swirled around to face Snape. He gave Samantha a sympathetic look which she ignored.

"Children…" Professor Slughorn dragged out as he gave Sirius a pitiful smile, "I know, Black. How well you prepare these potions together as a team will be a major part of your final grades. Now, as soon as you have chosen the correct apparatus I need you to bring them to me because I need to put a divided spell on them to make sure that both partners do an equal amount of work." He walked back to his desk at the front of the room and sat behind it. "All potions books within the school have been hexed not show any of these potions, and please don't waste yours and my own time trying to bring in books to help you, for the Headmaster has agreed to filter the mail."

Samantha felt sick.

"Oh and these potions will be done in your own time, we have much to cover this year and I cannot allow your projects to interfere with my teaching." The Professor added.

She felt even sicker. Samantha tried to get Lily's and Annabel's attention, wondering if they were as horrified as she was. She heard Snape clear his throat next to her and turned to look at him.

"It isn't time to gossip with friends, Cromwell. How do you consider we do this?" His face was blank and bored looking.

"So let me get this straight, we have to prepare a potion that takes six months to complete, in our own time, without resources and in our own time?" she said it slowly, making sure he heard everything.

Snape glowered, "It would seem so. The sooner we get started the sooner we finish."

The week passed slowly, painful slow. Professor Slughorn had told them that this first week was to be dedicated to gathering notes and deciding on the specific apparatus that would be needed. Monday of next week they were all to begin with the brewing, she had talked to several other classmates and it seemed that everyone's potion would take between five and seven months. She was secretly pleased to find out that Sirius and Remus' potion would take the longest – about seven months two days.

"How am I supposed to concentrate on one thing for seven months and everything else that will come up?" Sirius had whined at dinner after that class.

"Could do him some good to actually commit to something." Alexis whispered to herself. No one had heard her except Samantha.

"But I shouldn't be the one complaining. Sam, you have to spend time with Snivellus outside of class for six months." he looked horrified as if it were happening to him.

"I know." She said in a neutral tone.

"Public." Potter said as he caught up with what had transpired.

"What?" Samantha asked, starting to become irritated.

"Only meet with him in public. Lord knows what he would do if he got you alone somewhere." He said.

Remus, Peter, Sirius, Alexis, Annabel and even Lily grimaced.

"Your right." said Alexis. "You know how he hates Gryffindors."

Samantha just stared at them.

"Would he really try to hurt Samantha?" Annabel asked, starting to look anxious.

Samantha frowned.

"And he is a soon to be Death Eater, the greasy git." Peter piped in.

"If he doesn't try to harm her he might try to convert her to the Slytherin way of thinking." Potter smashed a fist into his palm.

Remus hadn't said anything but one could tell from his face that he agreed with them, they all turned to Lily who looked from one to the other.

"Well I no longer know who he is; he could be capable of any of those things." She said but Sam saw that deep down it hurt her to realize that she actually meant it. Poor Lily.

"You are all mad." She finally said and they stared back at her, "What next, are going to try to convince me that he might actually try to kill me?"

They didn't say anything, but they didn't deny the thought.

On the Wednesday of that week Samantha walked into Potions class to find Snape scribbling away on a rather long piece of parchment.

She sat down beside him and stared at his hand as it floated over the parchment. "Are you doing homework?" That stopped him.

Slowly he removed his hand from the parchment, laid the quill neatly beside the parchment and turned to look at her. His face as always held no real expression it was just a bored face, a little shy looking but she would never tell him that.

"Cromwell, may I ask you something?" he asked in that calm, monotone of his.

This didn't sound good. She didn't say anything but he continued.

"In Monday's class you extensively reminded me that our potion will take six months to prepare." He reminded her, "For us to actually finish by the third week in March we need to begin straight away on Monday of next week, which is our starting day." He gave her time to respond to this. She had nothing to say so he continued, "Do you know how we will start this potion on Monday?" he asked.

Samantha blinked at him.

"I didn't think so. And from the idiotic expression on your face I can tell that you have not even read up on potions similar to the one we are to make. To busy I presume or has the thought never crossed your mind? Therefore it is left to me to read up and take notes on possible remedies. Is it not?"

He was right, she hadn't even thought about it. But she didn't like the way he was talking to her. "You don't have to make it sound so awful that you have to work with me."

"But, it is." He said simply as he turned back to his parchment. "I will be finished with my ideas around Friday afternoon, and then I will give it to you so that you can," he looked over at her in scrutiny and continued sarcastically, "add your own thoughts." He picked back up his quill and added. "I will leave it to you to decide on a meeting place; however it won't be anywhere near Gryffindors, particularly your friends, or in the library. We need somewhere where we can leave our items undisturbed for a six month period."

Great, he was already bossing her around.

For the next two days she asked around to find out where the others were meeting, so that she wouldn't end up working in the same place as others. Sirius and Remus, and Lily and Annabel were working within their dormitories and a couple of others had asked teachers about using their vacant classrooms. She wanted somewhere that no one will use so that the potion wouldn't be tampered with. She didn't know all of the rooms of Hogwarts but she did know someone who did.

That Friday after lunch she found herself staring through Nearly Headless Nick, the ghost of Gryffindor, at the wall opposite her. "The Room of Requirement?" she asked.

"Well, yes dear. Now, what you have to do is walk back and forwards in front of it imagining the perfect room to perform this little experiment." He said as he stepped aside.

She did as he said, but didn't know what to think about. When she was done nothing happened.

Sir Nicholas frowned, "What are you envisioning, my dear?"

"Nothing really, I'm just saying potion over and over in my head." She gave him a sheepish smile.

She tried again but nothing happened. After two more tries she thanked Sir Nicholas and told him that he should go on, that she was going to stay a little while longer to try a bit more. He gave her a salute and headed down the corridor.

About half an hour later, Samantha was sprawled on the cold stone floor in front of the wall. What was she doing wrong? She glared at the wall as she heard voices and footsteps coming up the corridor. She didn't bother look their way as she moved out of the middle of the corridor and leaned against the wall.

"What have we here?" she heard a snide girl's voice say. "A lone Gryffindor? But don't they travel in packs?"

Bellatrix Black, Rodolphus Lestrange and Mulciber…something…stopped in front of her. She sighed inwardly.

"What's the pretty little lion cub doing sitting on the ground alone?" Rodolphus asked a wicked smile on his lips. Samantha watched as something shifted in Bellatrix's eyes at the word 'pretty' leaving Rodolphus' tongue.

Bellatrix turned her cold black eyes on Samantha. "No mirror here to admire yourself in, Gryffindor." She snapped.

Samantha sat up straighter and stared up at her, "It's the serpent that holds vain images of itself and sees nothing but lies."

"Says the lion at the serpent's feet." hissed Bellatrix, as she made to move forward.

"No." Rodolphus' one word stopped her. She stepped back to his side.

Samantha was getting annoyed, "Well, it was a lovely chat, but you are blocking my view." She gave them a dazzling smile.

"Of a wall?" Rodolphus laughed evilly, "We are blocking her view of the wall." Mulciber snorted.

"Did you hear that, Severus? She was staring at a wall, I'm afraid that you have been paired up with an imbecile." Bellatrix laughed.

Samantha watched as Snape came forward from behind the trio. His black hair covered his face and his robes hung lose over his thin frame. Where all his robes to big for him? she wondered.

"I have already realized that, Bella." He said in his monotone voice and looked down his nose at her. Stupid big nosed snake. "She's not much different in class you know." He mused, in a pitiful voice.

The three laughed and Snape looked distastefully away. Samantha narrowed her eyes at him. She regretted that she had stopped Sirius and Potter that day they were teasing him. She should have let them bring her into the feud.

Bellatrix watched her closely, like any snake would its prey. "Look, the lion kitten is getting angry." She looked excited about the prospect. "I believe it is going to pounce."

"And he calls me childish." Samantha said as she met Bellatrix's gaze.

Bellatrix gave her a death stare. Rodulphus wrapped a restraining arm around her waist and said, "I'm bored with this." He waved his hand nonchalantly over Samantha, how someone would acknowledge an uninteresting animal and they all turned to leave. She watched them go, her burning eyes following Snape's billowing robes.

That afternoon she walked to Herbology her mind in turmoil. She hadn't gotten into that room and she had tried for about another ten minutes after the Slytherins had left. She tried to think of different things about potions to think about.

In Herbology she didn't tell Alexis about the exchange. There was no point for her friends would just get riled up for no reason and become a nuisance. She, Alexis and Remus Lupin were in a group today extracting liquids from a poisonous rooted plant that looked suspiciously like a large carrot.

As she held down the withering poisonous carrot thing she caught sight of Snape from across the room. In his group were Rodolphus and a Slytherin girl whose name she didn't recall. Of course Snape was the one with the needle. Figures.

After extracting liquids out of the veins of about twenty of these plants and labeling the tubes with the plant's weight, length, sex and shade of orange, they were told to place them into coolers to be kept fresh for next week's class.

While clearing their working place a piece of parchment appeared in Samantha's hand. She unfolded it and saw Snape's scrawl.

'Wait for me after class.'

She thought about ignoring it and leaving with her friends but it was Friday and he had said that he was going to give her his notes of how they would begin their project.

After telling Remus and Alexis to go ahead without her she waited outside of the Green House. She watched the sun hang just above the tops of the trees of the Forbidden Forest and told herself that she was getting into the Room of Requirement tomorrow. She heard someone clear their throat behind her.

Severus handed her a rolled up parchment. "If you have something to add, do it in another color." He turned to leave and she just stared after him, not surprised but annoyed at his rudeness.

She caught up to him. "Don't think that you can just boss me around, Snape." She blurted out.

He turned and gave her a disinterested look. "Was I bossing you around back there?" he asked with not a care in the world.

Samantha didn't know why she was even going to try to talk to him about this. "I don't even know why I was going to ask you if it is possible for you to not be rude."

"I don't know why you would ask such a thing either." He agreed.

"Stop mocking me." She demanded.

"Am I mocking you?"

"Just shut up, then."

"How about you walk away?"

And she did.

Early the next day, which was a Saturday, she was sitting across from the wall that should be the entrance to the Room of Requirement. Twenty five minutes of walking and thinking of things used to make a potion. She wasn't a useless whining girl but what she really wanted to do right now was cry. Just sit there and cry because she couldn't think of the right thoughts to get in this stupid wall. All I needed is a simple room with all the apparatus possibly needed to make a damn potion. Was that so much to ask?

Angry she got to her feet and was about to storm off when she glanced back at the wall. There was a door in it. She felt hysterical as she laughed through a sob and she walked closer to the door. She glanced inside and saw a medium sized room with a couch to the far side and a large table in the middle with a large cauldron. On the back walls were a large assortment of potion utensils and potion books. Feeling a wave of accomplishment she closed the door walked down the corridor and came back to find the wall back in place.

She walked back and forwards three times and thought of a simple room to conduct their experiment in and turned to see the door there again. She peeked inside and found the same room.

Walking down to breakfast she felt foolish at how simple it had turned out to be.

AN:- Six months with Severus Snape - Can you imagine? *Heart Flutters* lol

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