Hermione wanted to hex the person who said the first step was the hardest.
With Snape, every bloody step was harder than before.
And after four weekends, that was quite high on the measure of difficulty scale. It was like pulling teeth with this man.
He was just so stubborn! Not to mention unhealthily creative with insults. Was it a Slytherin thing? She couldn't so much as flex her hand without him commenting about it. It was downright annoying.
She lost it after he called her indexing skills rudimentary and fit for a first year's clothes closet. NO ONE called her indexing skills bad. She knew she was obsessed and therefore her skills in categorising were obsessively brilliant.
It disturbed her that she knew she was obsessed and considered it useful. She should have listened to Harry and blown off Snape for the Spa.
"Alright, I get it! I'm obviously not the right person for this, so I'll leave you alone!" She started packing her few quills and books and parchment. She'd do the master courses on her own, and he could go hang. She wasn't that desperate that she'd put up with such demeaning attitudes, even if it meant getting the best (as she thought) instruction.
Anyway, so far all he had done was ask her to start categorising the experimental charms he was designing. It was interesting to read about them, when she could sneak in a look, but Snape being the taskmaster that he was, had her on her toes.
One weekend it was indexing and categorising, the other it was cataloguing results for charms that he tweaked, performance wise, and asked that she witness the casting and change in the same.
It was actually very interesting work, and she was rather surprised that he suddenly seemed to pay more attention to charms and less to potions. Had she known before that he was alive, and not as Jonathan M. Smithe, she'd have expected him to have been toiling over illegal and/or complicated rare potions, his hair to be greasier and hands to be stained, hang on a tick now, why was she thinking about his hair and hands?
Now that she consciously noticed her mind noticing such things, she looked over at Snape, who seemed to have abandoned his writing, to watch her packing with a particularly amused and annoyed expression. How did the man manage to mix those two? True his hair was decidedly non greasy and his hands... were too far away to be observed with care.
Which meant that if she had observed them with care, he had been close enough. Hermione decided that observation of another human being was a markedly awkward topic at this point in time. She went back to sorting papers back to their files and re-arranging her desk.
Let it never be said that Hermione left a task, untidy desk in the waking.
"Is this some sort of move that carries Gryffindor-ish, and therefore futile, hope that I will beg you to stay?" His sneer was driving her mad.
"I beg your pardon?" she snapped at him, "I don't think I'd be stupid enough to expect leniency, let alone you asking me to stay."
"So you really are leaving?" Did he have to sound so gleeful at that? She didn't even know that Snape could sound gleeful. She didn't resist looking to see if his face matched his voice.
Ever the stony faced (albeit slightly sneering) professor of the Devil's nightmares stared back. Would it kill him to show something else once?
She remembered the penseive memories she had seen; his dying command. He had laughed then. He had seemed so normal. So much could change in so little time.
She sat down with a sigh, and buried her head in her hands, hair falling loose from their tie. It was pointless that she leave now. He was who he was; there was nothing to change it.
She stared at the packed bag resting by her knees. She should leave, serves him right, let him do his own bloody work. Besides, if she stayed now, she'd never hear the end of it.
She sighed, but then if she did leave, he'd hire someone eventually, and then they'd surely not have resistance as great as hers. They could go mad, or he'd murder someone. He'd go to Azkaban, or the employed poor sod would probably kill him/her self.
She could tell him she'd stayed because she wanted to do good for the society, or because she wanted to irk the magic out of him by being inept in her very special way, just so she could torture him.
Right. That's earn her scathing comments plus a free trip out on her ear. Arrgh! This was so frustrating!
He cleared his throat, "Weren't you off somewhere, never to return, Ms. Granger?"
She braced herself, "Not tonight." Hermione looked at him levelly.
"Ah, well, I could have almost sworn you were."
She didn't respond, but crossed her hands across her chest and leaned back in her chair. "Sorry to disappoint you, again."
"Quite expected," he resumed his writing. Not bad at all, considering everything; she'd just behaved grown up, in the end at least, and he hadn't ridden her for it.
"Why do you want me to leave so badly? You could have said no in the first place."
"Let it not be said that I never tried Everything once." He canted an eyebrow.
"Right. Would you mind if I called for tea? I think we could both use a cuppa."
"Indeed."
Tea service floating between their desks, at either ends of the room, Hermione was happy for the temporary silence. If it was anyone else, silence would have been odd, but with Snapping Snape around, silence was almost wished.
He sipped his tea in between reading and marking texts, and Hermione could go back to looking for changes. True, his appearance had improved quite a bit, and she supposed he actually had the time and luxury to spend on looking, well, at least not like something the mad doctor dug up.
His pallor had turned healthy, and she remembered from the times he had bared his teeth at her, or snarled at her supposed incompetence, that they were not as uneven as she remembered from the snarling and baring of teeth during school.
He looked rather normal actually, she noted in surprise, except for the enormous nose.
"Quite finished with your observations, yet?" he asked in a silky voice, and she involuntarily shivered.
"Sorry. Just thinking, is all," she looked down into her cold tea. If she believed in such things as Divination, she'd want to ask the tea leaves to tell her how to handle someone like Snape.
If she believed in such things.
She decided that she might as well push her luck and ask him for honest answers, which was stupidly futile, but she wasn't sorted into Gryffindor for an excess of subtlety.
"Why do you hate me so much, Professor? Am I really that big an inconvenience to you? You once haven't changed the files I have ordered; what makes you want to get rid of someone who would do free service for you?"
He looked up, annoyance flashing before settling into nonchalance. "This is the reason, Ms. Granger, because you always want to know everything, your incessant questions, your Gryffindor brashness for a Ravenclaw attribute. "
"Then why'd you agree?"
"Like you just said: free service."
"For the cost of your time."
"Time can be made up for."
It was true; she had done the same herself in third year.
"Would it kill you to spare something deeper than skin once in a while?" she muttered, not too softly.
"In my previous role, it would have."
That was something, wasn't it? He actually answered a question with something that referred to the times of past. Personal past. Was he just telling her that sometimes old habits are hard little buggers to kill?
Knowing Snape, which she had to admit, was a very feeble knowledge so far, he was attempting to be civil. That was a brilliant step forward.
"I... err... " she stopped, and looked at the clock, it was quarter to eight already? No wonder she was starving.
Snape must have followed her gaze to the clock. "Oh very well," he said in a put-upon tone, "Daisy!"
An elf appeared, dressed in a crisp white mini-robe. Hermione had never really seen the elf before; The tea service and snacks just appeared near them when they required.
Figures, Snape's elf was a recluse too. Hermione smiled to herself. At least the elf was dressed in better clothes than a tea towel.
"Set an extra place at the table for Ms. Granger, please," he turned to her, "will you be staying later than dinner?" He was being strangely civil and polite, and she was worried he might booby-trap her chair at the table.
"I wanted to get one file through tonight," she said uncertainly, "but I can leave if you want."
He considered this, "No need, finish the file tonight," he tapped his chin, "perhaps you'll oversleep and fail to come until late tomorrow. Peaceful longer for me."
She glared. Really? Did he have to sound that hopeful?
He turned back to the waiting elf, "an extra at the parlour too."
Parlour? Hermione frowned, and then it struck her, a drink after dinner.
With Snape.
That he had arranged for.
After dinner.
With Snape.
That she hadn't asked for.
It was bizarre. Perhaps a charm had affected him or backfired? Maybe he fell down the stairs and hit his head? Maybe he was just messing with her head?
Hermione's theories on "what could be wrong with Professor Snape?" were interrupted by his extremely irritated "Are you planning to move anytime this decade, to actually test if I poisoned your food?"
Well so much for deviation from usual, Hermione thought as she followed his long strides out of the room.