Chapter 9:

It was an unusually hot morning in july when I woke up with a groan.

I was still in Snapes body.

It had been two weeks since the day I collapsed on my parents' floor and it hadn't rained a single drop since. England was apparently on its way into a dry period which meant there would be no rain in the nearest future. I feared I would have to spend my time in Snapes body for the rest of the summer, a thought that always made me groan in frustration. The time I had left in my own body was limited and I wanted to make the most of it. But I couldn't do that if the weather refused to cooperate.

I wasn't usually one to sit around hoping for something to happen. I wanted action, I wanted to do something; instead I had to wait until Dumbledore and Amaryllis found some results in their research. If they ever would . . .

Of course, I hadn't been completely inactive. When I told Moody that I would stay at Grimmauld place for a 'research project' for Dumbledore, I had given myself the idea to look for useful information in the Black library. The least Snape and I could do while we stowed away in that grimy old house was to try and help Albus and Amaryllis with the cure. So that was what we did. We usually spent our days in the library with our noses in dusty old tomes. But alas, none of them revealed anything about the Well of Lives, or about our condition so far.

This was very frustrating. It meant we were of little use for anyone at the moment. I felt like a child who was waiting for her parents to come home. Restless and bored. I knew we wouldn't be able to find anything in the Black repertoire. We needed a larger selection of reading material and I longed for the Hogwarts library. But Dumbledore didn't want us to go outside of Grimmuld place. I suppose it was because it would look suspicious if Nymphadora Tonks (who was now being portrayed by Snape) suddenly started hanging out at Hogwarts all the time, but I didn't understand why he forbid me to go. After all, Snape was a teacher at Hogwarts. It should be completely normal to observe him at school even during the summer. However, instead of letting us go to Hogwarts ourselves, Dumbledore gathered a mountain of books from the Hogwarts library and brought them to Grimmauld place for us.

Believe it or not, we still didn't find anything useful . . .

That was only the tip of my problems.

If there is one thing I hate more than anything in the world, it is to sit still over a long period of time. If I didn't move around I would get restless, a problem that hadn't changed with my new body. I couldn't stay in my seat for more than a few hours before I had to get up and do something else. Have some tea in the kitchen, study the stuffed house-elf heads in the hallway or simply sprawl out on my bed and stare at the ceiling. Snape on the other hand refused to move. While I couldn't manage to sit still, he stubbornly stayed in the library. Sometimes even until long after midnight. Believe me, I tried to make him do something else from time to time, but he was very hard to convince.

I understood why he was so stubborn. Of course, I wanted a cure as fast as he did, but there was nothing else we could do. And exhausting ourselves by reading useless books for too long wasn't going to help.

I think Molly Weasley thought the same. Sometimes she would come down and pull us both out of the library for what she called 'a break'. In reality she needed us to help out with the cleaning of the house. If she and her children found some dark creature in a corner for example, she would ask us to help banish it. Usually she could do it herself, but I think she wanted an excuse to pull us out of the library so we wouldn't grow permanently stuck to our chairs. She was the only one who could force Snape to come out of the library, other than to sleep and eat, and I admired her for that.

If I had been able to help more with the cleaning I would have done so. But it was so painful to be around the other order members I chose to stay alone. People tended to send me looks of suspicion or hatred whenever I tried to dine with them, and they could be downright rude if I tried to join with the cleaning.

Not surprising, I quickly started to understand how Snape felt around other people. Of course he would be angry and rude when it didn't feel like anyone wanted him. That was one of the reasons why he acted so horrible all the time. He was most likely depressed. Heck, even I started to feel depressed by my situation. That still didn't justify his actions, but at least it explained some of them.

This was the reason why I usually dined with Snape in the library. He was certainly not the best company in the world but at least he didn't look like he expected me to grow bat wings and eat him whenever I was in the same room (like the Weasley children did). No, Snape was simply angry. In his frustrated attempt to find something helpful in all the dusty tomes, he had an annoying tendency to skip his meals which made him even more frustrated and snappish than usual (and that was saying something). He wasn't particularly agressive, but his air was clearly hostile, and he would often give a snarl here and there for good measure. I would sometimes bring him his stupid dinner and force him to eat it just to save the poor library books from being tossed at the wall. But I didn't make it a habit. I wasn't his mother after all. If he was hungry he could always go downstairs and have a meal with the others. Nobody hated him anymore after all. But instead I could swear he wanted to be angry as if that could help him feel more like himself. Had I been able to choose I would not have spent my time with him.

At least Snape didn't focus his anger on me. In fact, he talked very little and when he did he always used short and angry monosyllables. He usually stayed eerily quiet and broody, with the occasional glare. But I had to experience a few flying books and growls before I realized they were never directed at me. He would never try to hurt me (at least physically . . . ). When I finally realized this, I relaxed a lot more around him. By the end of the first week I started to find him more annoying than intimidating.

And yet, despite his snappish comments and idiotic behaviour, I felt a strange sort of affinity towards him. I couldn't explain it. I knew that he felt guilty for our situation. I knew he would never take advantage of me. I even knew, although I couldn't explain how, that I could trust him. I could feel it. It was almost like we had a sort of mental connection. I couldn't explain how, but a few seconds before and after we switched I could swear I could pick up an entire range of emotions that didn't belong to me. Who else could they belong to than Snape? He was occupying my body after all. I didn't know if Snape could pick up some of my emotions. If he could, he didn't mention it.

I rose from my bed and padded my way to the bathroom in my flat in London.

After a week of living in Grimmauld place with Snape, I moved out. Much to Dumbledores protests. But I had a simple reason to do so; there was no room for me. The youngest Weasley boy, Ron, had to share a room with his brothers Fred and George so that Snape and I could have separate rooms. It had been fine for a few days, but when Ron started to fight with his brothers, Mrs Weasley decided to move him to another room. The options were either to share a room with me (which Ron had blankly refused) or with Buckbeak in Sirius' parents room (which Sirius had argued would be too creepy for anyone to bare), or, the option which Molly had preferred, Snape could share a room with the girls, Hermione and Ginny, and Ron could take over his. That would have been a good idea if Snape had actually been a woman. But alas, that was not the case. So; I decided to move out.

I could have moved to one of Snapes residencies. For example, to his rooms at Hogwarts. However, Dumbledore insisted I stay as close to Snape as possible (for reasons I didn't understand) which meant Hogwarts was too far away. Snapes own house was closer, but he refused to give me the address. Mostly because the house was swarmed with deatheaters, which I could understand. Also, I didn't want to go there anyways. I was already prying enough in his privacy as it was.

Therefore I moved to my own flat. Dumbledore agreed grudglingly only because my flat was in the same city as Grimmauld place, but only just.

I still came to grimmauld place every day to do reasearch with Snape, but in the evenings I would stay in my flat, wander around in muggle streets or visit my parents for a meal or to simply listen to my dad play on his guitar while my mum made me another vitamin potion. Nobody knew I went to my parents house. I didn't even tell snape. For all he knew, I followed Albuses rules to the dot. Too bad I didn't take rules too seriously.

I brushed my teeth (with snapes toothbrush mind you) and had a shower before I ended up standing in front of the mirror for the hundredth time since our incident.

I tried to ignore the little voice in my head that said 'better get used to it now since it is going to be permanent' while I stared like I had done so many times before. No, Snape was not a handsome man but would that even matter when the biggest problem was that he had been a death eater? How would I cope if people hated me by default? And even if I told the Order who I really was, people in the streets would still fear me. I would still be regarded legally as Severus Snape, until I fixed it at least, and it would still be me who had the dark mark on my arm.

Speaking of the dark mark, I lived in constant fear that it would start burning and summon me to a deatheather meeting. None of us were sure what to do if that ever happened. If I decided not to go, then Snapes position as a spy would be threatened. He might be able to convince Voldemort he was preoccupied at the time but he would also risk his life by going back to Voldemort later. Missing a deatheater meeting was simply not an option.

But . . . could I go? Would that even work? Despite what Snape had told Albus, I actually did know some occlumency, but I was sure that in a battle of minds against Voldemort I would definitely loose. Luckily Voldemort didn't seem to crave Snapes company just yet.

My thoughts wandered to Remus. And again I wondered if he could possibly regard me as anything but a friend if I was in a male body? I didn't feel anything differently towards him now. I was still attracted to him no matter which body I was in. But would he be able to feel the same for me? The thought of Remus made my eyes sting and I shook my head to get rid of all the depressing thoughts. No point in crying over something I had never had.

And besides, I was not alone, I reminded myself for the umpteenth time. Snape was in this too. And he wasn't okay with this eighter.

I know what you may be thinking, 'But why didn't you try to help him in his misery and try to make him feel better Tonks?'

Well guys, in my defence, it's Snape were talking about. Even if I did try to talk to him he would immediately shut himself off, leave, or tell me to fuck off. Albus had tried to talk to him too, but he had about as much luck as I did. This was very disconcerting, because I knew Snape was having a hard time about our situation. But there was nothing I could do. Snape would simply have to deal with it on his own.

'I wonder if he'd kill me if I cut his hair.' I thought and held my hair up from my face. But again, it wasn't my decision to make. It wasn't my hair. Just because I didn't like his hairstyle didn't mean he didn't like it. Although I doubted the man actually cared about his looks at all. At least I managed to make it look better by trailing my hand through it so it looked slightly windblown. Then the trick was to add a tiny-tiny bit of Oscars-hairmagic to make it stay out of my eyes.

Shaving was an entirely new experience for me. After only one day in Snapes body I realised that males had this inconvenient thing called facial hair. Can you blame me for forgetting? It had never been a problem for me before. But that meant I had to learn how to shave. Snape of course, along with all his other strange, old-fashioned trinket choices, used a straight razorblade like the ones you see in Sweeny Todd. I soon found out that I, with my clumsiness and all, should be nowhere near a razorblade like that. Not only did the thought of putting an open knife against my throat sound terrifying, I also had no idea how to use it. I cut myself twice before I decided to give up the old-fashioned blade and go to muggle London for a safety-razor. I didn't tell Snape. I figured he would only tease me for my inadequateness in razor-use.

I shaved before I quickly dressed in a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt before I moved to the kitchen to make myself some breakfast. I had snuck into muggle London one day to buy myself some muggle clothes so I didn't have to borrow my dads' clothes from the seventies anymore. Nobody in the magical world would have noticed how silly my dad's clothes were, but if I decided to walk down a muggle street I would have been completely out of fashion, so I bought something new. I used my own money so Snape wouldn't kill me. He didn't even know I'd bought them yet because I always put his black robes on top when I went to Grimmaulds place. But whenever I was at home, I dressed more casually. It was a hot summer after all and it also helped me feel more at home in my muggle flat.

I looked out of the window while I fried myself a load of sausages on the stove (I might have decided a while ago to try to put on some weight while I had the chance). I had to admit, my flat was very nice. My favourite place was the kitchen where I had a nice view over a little park were several children would play around on the swings. On a sunny day like this the park was crawling with children. It was a sight that made my spirit calm. I loved children, and their laughter allways made me feel happy.

But the calm feeling didn't last for long when I remembered what I needed to do today. I needed to go to Grimmauld place like usual. I wasn't sure if I wanted to do that. We had been searching for information for two weeks without a trace of result. I was sick and tired of it, and yet there was nothing else we could do. But I was too bored to stay at my flat all day, my parents were at work and I had no intention of wandering alone in the muggle world. Perhaps I could help with some of the cleaning if any of the order members could stand my presence?

Grimmauld place was dark and silent. I had to be very careful not to trip over the troll-foot umbrella-stand as usual. I had done that enough times as it was, and I would probably reveal myself if I did the same in Snapes body. The only person in the kitchen was Snape himself who sat alone by the end of the table with a cup of tea.

His hair was my favourite shade of pink and he was wearing exactly what I had told him to wear yesterday; a pair of jeans and a green t-shirt.

"Wotcher Severus, is there any tea left?"

"Tonks" He greeted me. His tone wasn't friendly but at least he had stopped glaring at me by now.

"Anything interesting happen'ere? I'm bored." I said and went to the kitchen counter to pour myself some tea.

"No" he said briskly.

"Nothing?"

"No"

"You don't know do you" I teased. (yes, I know what you're thinking 'You shouldn't tease Snape, Tonks' but as I told you, I was bored). "You avoid talking to people don't you?" I sat down across from him.

"I certainly do not-"

"Liar"

"Fine, they are about to start the cleaning and Molly Weasley insist I join, but I have no intention of doing so because I'm avoiding Black. And now that Lupin is back as well-" he said with distaste.

"Really? Lupin is back?" I asked innocently. I tried to ignore the little skip in my chest by the mention of his name.

Snape frowned. "Please do not do that again"

"Do what?"

"That. Your face brightened up by the mention of his name. I do not want to see than on my face every time someone mentions that werewolf" he said with distaste.

"Haven't I told you to stop that?" I said annoyed (really, I was used to Snape by now I didn't bother to get angry) "I swear if you call him 'the werewolf' one more time I'll glue your tongue to the roof of your mouth."

Snape glared at me for a while (what do you know, I take back what I said earlier about him not glaring at me anymore) before he stood up to make himself some more tea. I sighed. I would never get an apology from the man. He never admitted his mistakes but when he broke eye-contact it usually meant he knew he had said (or done) something wrong.

"But seriously, what are people cleaning now?" I tried again.

But before Snape could answer Sirius came down the stairs "Hey Tonks, it's time if you want to join the cleaning. Molly and Remus are upstairs and-" but he stopped abruptly when he noticed me.

"Snape" he said as if the name had a bitter aftertaste. "Why are you here? Don't you have someone else to bother than my relatives?" His tone was unusually aggressive and he stormed over to Snape and put a protecting hand on his shoulder. Snape looked about to murder him, or perhaps toss the content of the teapot in his face but Sirius didn't notice. He was too busy glaring at me. Oh, the irony of this situation.

"I came to ask Moody to marry me" I deadpanned and sipped my tea calmly.

Sirius looked like he was lost for words while Snape stared for a second before he suddenly burst out laughing. Okay, that was not something one witnessed every day. But it was a nice change.

"Did you just crack a joke?" asked Sirius in disbelief.

"I may have my moments" I answered just as calmly and continued to sip my tea.

But then, in true Weasley fasion, Molly burst through the door "There you are" she said "Sirius, Remus is looking for the towels we used last evening but he can't find them. Would you mind showing him? "Nymphadora, did you want to join with the cleaning today? You can come with me and we can fetch the buckets we placed in the living room yesterday. Oh, hello Severus have you come to help us with the cleaning?" she said while Sirius left the kitchen to find Remus.

"Yes Molly" I said with a charming and exceptionally un-Snapeish smile "In fact I have."

"Oh, how wonderful. Then you can come with me too" said Molly distractedly while she waved her wand and a large amount of cleaning products flew from the kitchen cupboard and into a bucket she carried. Snape glared at me again, probably to make me change my mind and leave. I ignored him until he gave up and followed me reluctantly. He seemed to decide to join with the cleaning after all, despite his wish to avoid Sirius. I had a feeling it was because he wanted to make sure I didn't do anything stupid.

Molly ushered me and Snape out of the kitchen and up the stairs to the first floor and into the second salon behind the library to pick up more buckets. We carried them up to the third floor where Remus, Fred, George, Ron, Hermione and Ginny waited for them. They all stared in disbelief when they spotted me. As expected, some of them gave me very unpleasant looks. Ron was gaping and Remus frowned. But Molly began to blabber away about what they were supposed to do and when she finished they all gathered around the buckets to get the cleaning gear they needed.

I stayed away from the crowd a bit and decided to observe for a while. No one seemed to want to talk to me. This was not surprising. It was the usual welcome from this crowd. But it still hurt.

This was how Snape was usually treated even when he was fairly nice to people. No wonder he continued to be so unpleasant when nobody even gave him a chance. But then again he was the one who chose to live like that. He was after all the one who started the hostility and acted like an idiot. The problem was; he expected people to dislike him, so he acted as if people had already made up their minds about him no matter how little they knew him. I should have gotten used to it by now, but I hadn't.

I started a conversation with Molly when she moved to stand in the outskirt of the crowd and asked her about the progress with the house. She answered me enthusiastically.

For some reason, Molly seemed to have nothing against Snape.

"I am really glad we started with the kitchen. Merlin it looked awful down there when we first came here. There lived a nasty ghoul in the pantry and the cauldron we found in the corner . . ." she shivered. I remembered the ghoul as I had been the one to find it after all, but Snape was not supposed to know that so I pretended to be surprised.

"But anyway" continued Molly "we recently found a new storage room in the basement. There appears to be nothing else there than a wardrobe with a boggart in the middle of the floor."

"Really?" I asked curiously. I had heard nothing about this storage room. They must have found it when I was absent.

"Oh yes, we examined it for dark curses before we entered it, but we found nothing. Alastor wasn't here at the time, so we could not check if it really was a boggart, so we let the wardrobe stay as it is for the moment."

The first thing that came to my mind was 'cool, a new and hidden room'. "Would it be possible for me to go down there and check it out?" I heard myself ask. I had no idea where that came from and I had a feeling it was a very bad idea, but my curiosity got the better of me. Molly looked at me curiously and warned me to go there alone but I barely listened. Anything to get away from these people who looked like they all wanted to murder me. I left the noisy lot and headed downstairs.

There really was a secret door behind a pile of junk in the basement across from the kitchen. I approached it carefully while I muttered a string of diagnostic charms under my breath to discover dark magic and curses. Nothing. I took a deep breath and opened the door carefully. The room inside looked completely normal which was unusual considering how abnormal the rest of the house was. In the middle of the floor stood a big wardrobe that rattled slightly in the dark. I lit my wand and snuck inside.

It looked like a completely normal wardrobe. Large and carved from dark oak wood. It looked rather boring where it stood. However, the moment I stood in front of it I felt an irresistible urge to open it and see what was inside. If it really was a boggart I could take care of it easily. As if I hadn't done that a hundred times before. Of course, there could be something else entirely, but the urge to peek was so strong that I acted recklessly. I did something completely unwise in a situation where I was alone in a dark room two floors underneath anyone that could hear me scream. I lifted my wand and waved it once. "Alohomora." The door gave a little click before it opened slightly.

Nothing happened.

It was unnaturally quiet. The wardrobe didn't rattle anymore either. That was strange. There should be something in there. But then I noticed the light that streamed out from the crack in the door. There was a light inside the wardrobe. I lifted my hand carefully and pushed the door open.

What I saw made me gasp loudly. Inside the wardrobe was a flower field and beyond; a landscape with trees and mountains. When I opened the door completely a fresh summer breeze hit my face and blew up some of the dust on the floor. What was this? A vanishing cabinet? But no, vanishing cabinets didn't work this way. They looked like normal cabinets until you went inside and closed the door. Only then could you be transported to the twin cabinet. I had never seen anything like this before.

Without thinking I went through the door and stood in the field. It smelled wonderful. The field lay in the middle of a clearing in a forest at the foot of a small mountain and on the other side ran a shallow valley with a river cutting through it that slithered its way towards the sea in the distance. 'Wow' was all I could think at the beautiful view. From this side the wardrobe was only a door that hovered slightly above ground on its own. One could walk around the door and look through the same opening, only then it showed the field on the other side. I was fascinated by the sight and studied the beautiful mountains for a while before I suddenly heard a click behind me.

The door had closed on its own.

"NO!" I stared in horror at the door as it faded and disappeared in front of my eyes.

"No, no, no!" I cried. How could this happen? The door was right there and I hadn't closed it on purpose. How could it close by itself and just disappear? I fumbled around in hopes that the door had only become invisible. But it wasn't there. I felt the panic gnaw at me as I found my wand and cast every revealing charm I could think of to find out where the door had gone. But to no avail. According to what I could find, there had never been a door there at all. I fell to my knees as I failed to hold back a sob.

I was stuck here.