GULP AND CLENCH

Disclaimer: This is a non-profit tribute to the works of JK Rowling who created and, together with her publishers and licensees, owns the characters and settings elaborated herein.

Thanks to all my reviewers and my previewers, Bellegeste, Cecelle and Lady Memory, and my apologies for the exceedingly long wait. I hope to get back to a regular posting schedule now; the next two chapters are already written.

The story so far: After Professor Snape reveals his true feelings to a newly graduated Hermione, an unexpected friendship slowly develops, furthered by exchanges of letters and occasional meetings, most recently to the ballet. But his past keeps butting in, and Harry's and Ron's objections make a little too much sense. Sometimes honesty hurts...

When she heard his voice in the Floo, she abandoned her tea and leapt for the hearth. His mouth was grim and he looked more sallow than ever.

Oh, Severus.

"Is it true? I'm breaking your heart?" he asked.

"What? No!" She knelt down to talk.

"But you said your friends were right," he reminded her.

So much for combining honesty with tact. That had never been her strong point.

"I said they were a little bit right: no one can fix you but yourself. But the rest was all wrong. You'd never break my heart. You'd never break anyone's."

"I've broken the heart of everyone who ever cared about me." The flames cast flickering shadows on his face.

Her hands were crossed loosely in her lap. She clenched the one he couldn't see.

"From what you've told me, I think it's the other way around."

"You can't know that," he said. "You've only ever heard my side."

"And you went out of your way to blame yourself for everything, but I formed my own opinion." She couldn't ever have loved you; she married your worst enemy. But I know better than to tell you that.

He bent his head. When he lifted it again, his eyes were dull. "I should never have told you. I've known from the outset that it would only distress you."

Her hand closed tighter. "I wanted you to tell me."

"That was kind of you, but –"

"It wasn't kindness. You're not a house-elf to me, Severus. I like you."

For a moment, his eyes unshuttered, and she saw what his turned back had shielded, that day in his office. She could only look and breathe and gulp, and clench her hands to stop the trembling.

"You don't like house-elves?" he said lightly.

She grimaced. They were stupid. It wasn't their fault, but they were, and stupidity set her teeth on edge. She wasn't going to talk about house-elves now.

"I like you," she said again. "But I don't know if liking is enough, in the long run. You feel, you feel so much more than liking for me. I don't, I don't want to hurt you. And I don't know how not to."

He didn't pretend to misunderstand.

"To know that someone has cared for me is not a small pleasure. For that someone to be the one person in all the world ..." He looked away. "Perhaps I should never have offered my – my friendship. I hoped to give back some of the comfort I have found in knowing you, even from a distance. Not to burden you."

He needed a hug, but the only Hogwarts Floo you could travel through was in the headmaster's office. She wasn't going to involve the headmaster if she could help it; he'd meddled enough in Severus's life.

She settled for smiling at him. "I'm rather used to fighting my friends' demons," she said brightly. "I don't think yours will be as scary as Voldemort."