"Hermione, tell me something." Severus propped himself on his elbow, his fingers caressed her soft midriff as they lay, twined around one another in their bed. Her sleepy eyes turned to him, biding he continue.
"Why did you tell me you couldn't send Weasley a Patronus, that it had changed?" She pursed her lips, her fingers coming up to caress his cheek.
"Severus, have you cast yours since the war?" He blinked, his fathomless black eyes shining back at her.
"No, I don't suppose I have." He glanced at his wand and grabbed it from the nightstand, curious what she was talking about. Conjuring a happy memory was so much easier now he was with her, it simply flowed from him as he cast. "Expecto Patronum!" He called, shocked when a lithe cat leapt from the tip of his wand, a jaguar yawned at him, sleek, beautiful.
"When I went to the shack and you were alive, I was so happy, I cast a Patronus to go retrieve Harry and Ron but it had changed." She cast hers next, another feline, sleek and cool burst into life, settled beside his own, smaller but every bit as majestic.
"I think you turned into my happy thought then, and every time after that." She blinked up at him, the Patronus expelled with the slash of her wand they vanished, each dropped their wands back to their nightstands.
"How did mine change, to change yours?" He blinked over at her, confused, it had been the doe, the reflection of Lily for as long as he could remember.
As long as he'd been able to cast it.
"I think, when you thought your debt to Lily was paid you let go." She glanced away, unsure how he would take her opinion. She could feel him tense beside her and her heart fell.
She'd hoped, hoped that had been proof of his feelings for her.
And she supposed she would always hope, and hope, and hope.
She would never have the same place in his heart as the woman.
So selfish was she, to wish she did, to wish she could eclipse her.
Lily Potter had loved someone else, had married, had a child with another man. She was here, in his bed.
Her stomach flipped and she dashed from the bed. Sounds of her getting sick drifted from the bathroom to his ears and he winced.
Damnit, why couldn't he ever react to the woman in a timely manner.
And he knew, just knew he was the reason she was ill in the bathroom, crying over a toilet.
SSHG
"Hermione." He approached her the next day, trying to ignore her puffy red eyes and pale face.
She looked like death.
His fault, it was his fault.
That acidic feeling crawled through him again.
"Not right now, Sev." She turned away from him, her feet carried her away to her own room, a room she hadn't slept in for months.
He ran his fingers through his hair as he stared at the closed door.
He'd finally done it, ruined things with the one woman who meant anything to him. The one who meant more to him than Lily ever had.
"Hermione." He leaned his head against her door, spoke through the soft sobs he could hear.
"Severus, not right now, okay?" She called through the door, he could hear her sniffle.
He couldn't ruin it like this, couldn't let her be ill over him, cry because of his once upon a time love for a dead woman.
"Hermione, just hear me out, please love?" He all but begged through the door, it slipped open a crack and he stepped back. She looked so haggard, he felt like the lowest of the low.
"I understand, I've never been enough." His stomach clenched, he'd murder every boy she'd ever dated, kill his way through them all. They'd done this to her, and he'd start with Weasley, it was easy for her to miss the dark look in his eyes as she kept her own downcast. "I'm not trying to replace her Sev, I'd just…" He cut her off with his lips pressed to hers.
She shoved against him, fought for a fraction of a second before she gave in, allowed herself to be consumed in his kiss.
It was how he'd proven himself the first time, why balk at what works?
"Hermione." He caught her hair in his hand, held her to him, tipped her head back so he could lay little kisses on her neck before he took her mouth again.
"I never so much as kissed Lily, how could she possibly overshadow you? My childhood love? Nothing, it's nothing compared to you." His voice had grown forceful as he held her hair, his lips scalding her neck as his other hand found her hip, tugged her flush with him.
She panted.
"Why then?" Her voice may as well have been pleading, she was so damaged and he hated it, wanted to take away all of that self-doubt, all of that second guessing.
"Because, it shocked me when you spoke of her." He let her head fall back forward, stared hard into her eyes but did not release his hold on her hair. She would not run away from him again, she would wait for him to speak.
"Hermione, witch, love, you are with me, mine, she was never mine, not meant to be mine. I had to accept that long ago, I paid my debt to her, absolved myself. I will spend the rest of my life proving to you that I love you more than I could ever have loved her if I must." She blinked up at him, her eyes watered.
"You love me?"
"Of course I do you foolish girl!" He growled, his face coming to her ear, the heat of his breath falling across the soft flesh.
"Hermione, she was an infatuation, a best friend I could never have, when I got her killed my debt to her was solidified in Harry. I cared for her, but I know now, I didn't understand love then, obviously I loved her, but it wasn't the same, not as with you. You hold my heart and soul in those little hands, witch. I'd pledge myself to you tomorrow and everyday thereafter if it would soothe this worry." His voice had dropped, the words danced across her skin and scorched her.
He loved her, really loved her. She'd overreacted, again. She didn't know why she'd been so sensitive since the war. She blinked up at him, her stomach coiled fresh heat at the intensity of his black eyes.
"Prove it." She clenched her jaw and he growled into her neck, his teeth nipped the sensitive flesh there and she gasped.
"As you say, Hermione." He groaned when his lips found hers and before she knew it she was pressed against her door, his mouth claiming hers with ferocity, his body flush against her.
"My perfect witch." He breathed against her mouth and she mewled beneath him.
"I love you too, Severus." She breathed between kisses, spurred his ferocity.
His searching mouth begged for more of her, to have all of her at once.
"Mm, witch, you will be the death of me." He broke away for just a second before he took her mouth again, and again, and again. "Mine, you are mine." He groaned.
"My perfect witch." A whisper.