Chapter 14
"Do we have to discuss this again?"
Harry was alarmed. "When did we discuss it in the first place? Kill me for wanting to revisit the subject while your cock isn't inside me and I can string two full sentences together." Saying that candidly when they were neither naked nor close together in bed made Harry blush and made him a little horny too. But Snape didn't object anymore to the conversation.
"Fine." He was sitting by the fire in Harry's room, waiting for him to finish packing a rucksack for Robin Hood's Bay. They were due to meet Hawthorne and Savage at the castle's entrance in half an hour.
Harry went into his wardrobe to grab pants but he stared inside of the drawer for a while and couldn't think of what to say to Snape. He was filled with anxiety again that he was pushing Snape too far, asking him for too much and that Snape would respond soon by ending everything.
"We don't have to go on about it forever. I just want to know that you believed me."
"Can you be more specific?"
Harry grabbed some pants, more pairs of socks and closed the drawer. He packed them in his rucksack and walked over to where Snape was seated. Snape's ankles were crossed and he was picking at something on his hand.
Harry sat on the floor beside him. "Did you believe me when I said nothing happened that night I went out with Hermione?"
"Do you think I can't tell when someone's lying to me?"
"I wasn't lying!"
"I know you weren't- that's what I meant."
Harry had many questions at once. "Then what didn't you believe?"
Suddenly Ron's voice filled the room. "Harry? Oh, er, sorry- hello professor."
Ron's head was in the fire. His face was becoming so red that Harry was sure he'd have a hard time telling the difference between him and the flames.
"Sorry," Ron said again.
"It's okay," Harry said, noticing out of the corner of his eye that Snape's hand clenched the armrest tightly. "What's up? I was just packing, we're due to leave soon."
"Yeah, I wanted to go over the plan to make sure we're all on the same page."
"Right. We're walking to Hogsmeade, the five of us- me, Snape, Hawthorne, and Savage with Hagrid in back. Hawthorne and Savage will Apparate to London first and use the two-way mirror to let me and Snape know it's okay to follow. We'll be there for a couple of days for some training?" No one had told Harry exactly what they'd be doing so he stopped to confirm this with Ron.
"Yeah," Ron said, not elaborating.
"And then Apparting to Manchester first- it's safest in case anyone's got trip tracers for magic anywhere near Robin Hood. From Manchester, we drive."
"Okay, good. See you soon."
"Bye," Harry said and sighed when Ron disappeared. "Sorry," he told Snape, not sure why he was apologizing. When Snape didn't say anything, he asked again, "What didn't you believe?"
Snape scratched his cheek. "You said you couldn't. You kept saying that."
"You think I could have if I had the opportunity?" Harry asked, eager for this piece of the puzzle.
Snape just looked at him, not answering.
"Well that's just a fact. Someone did try to have a go with me-"
Snape cut in forcefully. "It's not my business. Who am I to-," he looked into the fire before carrying on,"stop you from living your life? I meant it, when I told you to explore." He paused. "I tried to mean it."
"Is that what you think I'm doing with you? Not living my life?"
"I think you're in a bad way. Maybe we both are."
"What do you mean?" Harry started worrying his bottom lip.
Snape shook his head. "I'm trying not to say anything that will hurt you."
"You're not doing so well."
"You're the one that asked to have this conversation."
"Yes, so I could tell you I want it to be your business if I'm with other people. To tell you the thought of either of us sleeping with someone else makes me sick. Not so I could hear you tell me you think you're in a bad way and that's why you're doing this."
"That's not," Snape shook his head again, "that's not what I meant."
Something about the way Snape wouldn't look at him gave Harry a peculiar feeling. "Are you lying to me to make me feel better?"
"I don't know," Snape whispered, still not meeting his eye. "I don't want to talk about this anymore."
"Grand," Harry said and got up from the floor to finish packing. He expected Snape to leave, almost wished he would, but Snape just stayed there, looking into the fire until Harry was done.
Harry'd gotten progressively angrier as he packed and by the time he needed to shrink his bag, he was so unfocused that he couldn't manage to make it small enough. Snape finally got up from the chair to shrink it for him. Harry stuffed it into his pocket and left quickly without waiting for him.
As they walked to the entrance, Snape hung behind him at a distance. The halls were dark- it was midnight. Hawthorne and Savage were waiting for them at the bottom of the main staircase and when Harry came into the moonlight that flooded that part of the castle through the windows, Savage gave him a look. "You alright?" Her eyes then found Snape behind him.
"Yeah," Harry said. "Shall we?" Harry tried to walk past her, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm.
"Hawthorne and I will lead, you walk in time with Professor Snape, Hagrid will take the back. Wands out."
Harry made no comment and obeyed.
It was freezing outside and just starting to snow. Hagrid met them and ruffled Harry's hair, as if he were still thirteen. As they walked to the edge of town, Harry kept walking ahead of Snape so Snape had to work to keep close to him.
"Stop walking away from me." Snape said it loud enough for all of them to hear.
Harry felt his face get hot, even as the cold was making his cheeks numb. "No," he said.
"You're acting like a child."
"Seems appropriate, you all seem to be treating me like one."
Savage and Hawthorne both turned their heads to look at them without stopping. "Did something happen between you two?" Savage asked, her breath visible in the air.
Harry had a ridiculous urge to say yes. To tell her something had happened, that Snape was stupid and mean and had broken his heart.
"We need to stop talking," Snape said.
Hawthorne, as usual, rushed to support Snape. "Exactly- this would be a great time to attack."
Harry rolled his eyes but didn't say anything and paused to let Snape move closer to him. Snape's hand brushed against his own on accident and he shivered involuntarily.
They made it to Hogsmeade without incident. Savage and Hawthorne left immediately and Snape, Harry, and Hagrid stood in an awkward silence after the crack of their Apparition was gone.
Snape took the two-way mirror out of his pocket, waiting for Hawthorne to signal. Harry'd given it to him earlier because he'd been feeling particularly in love and wanted Snape to carry something with him that was his, like it was a piece of himself instead of a bit of glass. Now it seemed like such a childish thing to do and he hated himself for it.
He looked at Hagrid. The lamp light at the gate illuminated his face and his eyes shone with unshed tears.
"Oh Hagrid," Harry said, reaching out to pull on Hagrid's sleeve. "Don't. It's going to be okay. I'll be back before you know it."
"Right, course, just bein' silly," Hagrid said.
"It's not silly- he could very well die," Snape said, his gaze still on the mirror.
"Jesus," Harry said, wanting to hit Snape. Hagrid let out a deep sob and rubbed the wetness from his eyes.
"After me," Snape said, looking up from the mirror and putting it back in his pocket before Apparating.
Harry's heart dropped. He hoped Hawthorne and Savage were outside the Leaky Cauldron waiting for Snape instead of leaving him out in the dark, alone.
He took Hagrid's big hand and squeezed it. "Bye."
When they were safely inside the doors of the Leaky Cauldron, Harry held his hand out to Hawthorne. "Mirror," he said. Hawthorne gave it to him. He turned to Snape with his hand out as well, trying not to openly glare.
"It might be wiser, if one of us held on to the other half," Snape said but Harry insisted. As Snape handed over the mirror, they were hounded on by many Aurors at once.
Savage and Hawthorne were being led off by Dawlish and Kingsley Shacklebolt was shaking hands with Snape, leading him to the bar. Ron took him by the arm and pulled him into an embrace.
"I'll show you to your room," Ron said. It dawned on Harry that he'd wanted to discuss this with Snape, what to do about the fact that they'd be separated, but he'd never gotten around to it.
They went up the stairs to the second floor, a feeling of unexplainable dread in Harry's stomach. His room was at the end of the hallway. Ron unlocked the door and handed him the key. The room faced the main street, which he could see down to from the window.
"That view is just a spell. We blocked the actual window."
Harry took his pack out of his pocket and reversed the shrinking charm. He started changing into his sleep clothes because he was uncomfortable with Ron there, just sitting at the edge of his bed and saying nothing.
"Did you just come in to watch me undress or something?" he said finally, unable to take the quiet.
Ron did Harry the favor of laughing. "I'm sorry if I'm being weird. I'm trying to apologize."
"Did Hermione tell you to?" It came out more bitter than Harry'd meant it to.
"Well yeah, obviously. But she didn't really need to, to be fair. I've been feeling pretty shite about the whole thing on my own."
Harry finished pulling pajama bottoms on and sat beside him, so neither of them would have to look at each other. He said nothing and waited for Ron to find his words again.
"I just, um. I shouldn't have left you and Hermione like that, that day. I guess I've just been trying to adjust to this new version of your life, without Ginny in it. And she's doing okay but I know she was really hurt by the whole thing, and you know, I'm her big brother."
"I know," Harry said.
"And you were together so long that I guess I just always kind of thought you'd get married. I always imagined that."
Harry didn't know what to say.
"Did you think- did you ever think that would happen between you two?"
"Yeah, honestly. I definitely imagined settling down with her and having kids. The whole thing."
"Yeah, so it's hard for me to understand what happened there and it's just taken me some time to get used to the idea that it won't be like that."
"It's hard to explain. I just thought for a long time what I had with Ginny was normal. I didn't understand what you should feel until I felt it."
Ron turned to look at him, his eyebrows slightly raised. "With Snape?"
Harry nodded.
"That was obviously hard to swallow too. I know I told you before I thought it was ridiculous because of how he used to be with us and he's so much older, but that's not even the hardest part for me anymore."
Harry laughed. "Yeah, okay."
"No, seriously. I know you think, especially after last week, I'm a homophobic prick, but I'm realizing it really isn't that. It's just hard for me to imagine him, of all people, making you happy. Fitting in with us," Ron made a circular gesture with his hand.
"He won't fit in if you make him feel different," Harry said, defensive. "And why are you assuming he wouldn't? He's got much more in common with you and Hermione and your whole family then the rest of the wizarding world."
Ron didn't say anything, as if he was thinking about this. "So, it's kind of serious between you two, is it?"
"I would use that word, yeah, but I don't really know we mean the same thing by it."
"Do you spend a lot of time alone together?"
"Yeah- every night."
"And- you're like, sleeping with him?"
Harry laughed and nodded.
Ron blushed. "Let me guess- every night?"
Harry patted Ron consolingly on the leg. "Ten points to Gryffindor."
"Is it like, do you-," Ron rubbed the back of his neck, "does it make you happy? Spending time with him, is he nice to you?"
"He is and he isn't."
"See that's what I mean, why would you deal with that?"
"Because I get it- why he's like that. No one who's been what he's been through could be expected to be any different."
"Suit yourself," Ron said, but Harry felt like this wouldn't be the last he heard of that. "So he does make you happy?"
The question made him remember a study hall he'd supervised with Snape the week before. They both used the time to grade papers or read but Harry liked to sit among the students and Snape always preferred the teacher's desk at the back of the classroom. Sometimes the students forgot he was there and they would whisper things to each other. They were all second-year Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws.
"Do you think Professor Snape ever just writes D's on all our papers without reading them?" said a girl with thick glasses.
"Shut it before he hears you," someone else said.
"He really is reading them," Harry said. "He just has very high standards." He thought "high standards" was a generous way to put it but he said it anyway.
"Exactly," said another Ravenclaw. "He's quite prickly and he favors the Slytherins but besides that, I've learned a lot in his class."
"Quiet," Snape said loudly, his quill scratching parchment.
Harry and the students chortled.
"And did you know he can do wandless magic?" Harry said, making sure his voice was above a whisper.
The students all looked at him wide-eyed, not wanting to make a sound.
"It's true, look." Harry crumpled up a bit of spare parchment and tossed it at Snape. It would have hit Snape over the head but the moment it entered Snape's orbit, it burnt softly into cinders and disappeared without him looking up from his parchment.
The students clapped silently and whispered excitedly.
"Detention, Potter," Snape said. Everyone laughed properly without holding back, including Harry.
"Yeah," Harry said. "He makes me happy."
"Are you guys going to be sneaking into each other's rooms?"
"Not tonight," Harry said. He felt tired, then, and wanted to be alone.
Thankfully, Ron got up and moved toward the door. "So can I tell Hermione you forgave me?"
"Not just yet."
"Fair enough. See you in the morning." Ron left.
Harry laid back in his bed, feeling like a rag doll. In the crackle painted ceiling, he listed all his options. He could go downstairs to the bar and drink a lot and annoy Snape. He could figure out what room Snape was staying in and come up with a plan on how to get in there, maybe even before Snape was upstairs. He could give Snape back a piece of the two-way mirror.
In the end, he was too proud to find Snape to make up. Resigned to a terrible night's sleep, he ordered wine to his room and drank half the bottle. He tossed and turned in bed for a few miserable hours, dizzy with drink, wishing Snape had said different things before they'd left Hogwarts, wondering what would have happened if he was better at not forgetting how to say what he meant when he looked into Snape's dark eyes.
Getting out of bed was difficult not because he managed to sleep at the last minute but because his body didn't want to move. When the time above the wardrobe read seven o'clock, he knew if he didn't get up soon, someone would come knocking.
His back hurt as if he'd been lifting heavy things from the floor all night. His knees felt brittle and ached with a hollowness that meant rain was coming.
And he was freezing. He'd tried to light a fire in the grate the night before but it didn't work, leaving him to think they'd blocked it so no one could possibly Floo in. He couldn't stomach the idea of a shower and just slipped on his largest, heaviest jumper and a pair of loose wool trousers. He liked to feel like he was swimming in his clothes sometimes, as if the size of them could hide how his body felt, its weaknesses, all the ways he couldn't rise to the occasion. It helped him feel okay when he could comfortably cross his arms and his legs and close into himself, unobserved. He figured even if his chances of going unnoticed were nonexistent in a place or time like this, it was a sort of rebellion in itself to spend the little energy he did have trying to disappear.
Him and Hawthorne walked out of their rooms at the same time, closing their doors and meeting each other's eyes. "Shit," Hawthorne said. "You do not look good, mate."
"Thanks," Harry said, moving past him toward the stairs.
There were already several men and women standing around the long tables with cups of coffee and tea in their hands, their half eaten breakfasts being cleaned up after them by Tom, the barkeep. Harry tried not to be conscious of the hush that settled over the room for a moment when he climbed down the stairs and poured himself coffee. He resisted the urge to try to flatten his hair self-consciously. He also resisted the urge to scan the room for Snape.
He sat at a long, almost empty table, far away from the one person sitting at the end, Jamsen. The moment Harry sat down, Jamsen said, while shoveling porridge into his mouth conscientiously, "You look like shit, Potter."
"Fuck off, Jamsen."
He supposed he should seek Kingsley or Dawlish out, anyone in charge, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He stared at the staircase to the rooms on the second floor and drank his coffee.
Snape came down the stairs and made a beeline for him. Harry tried to school his face into indifference.
It felt like he'd blinked and Snape was there, seated across from him. "I have to tell you something." He then looked pointedly down the table at Jamsen.
"Jamsen?" Harry called.
"What?"
"Fuck off."
Jamsen glared at him but took his bowl and his Daily Prophet and got up.
"That was rather rude," Snape said, an eyebrow raised.
"It's the only way to talk to that nutter," Ron said, setting a plate of food down on the table and sitting a chair away from Snape.
"You look like shit," Ron said to Harry.
"Of course," Harry said, and nothing else, fuming at this private joke, a higher power seemed to be making him the butt of. In front of Snape, no less, who looked annoyed at Ron for interrupting. Thankfully Ron was quite occupied with his plate and didn't notice.
"Didn't sleep last night?"
"Not a wink," Harry said, looking pointedly at Snape.
Snape glared back and Harry noticed his chest moved a bit, as if he were taking a deep breath. "As I was saying-" he tried to continue.
"In front of Ron?" Harry was surprised and let it slip before he could stop himself.
Ron chewed his eggs and looked between them. He made no move to leave, much to Harry's disappointment.
"He knows, doesn't he?" Snape said dismissively.
Harry didn't have to ask what he meant. "Yes."
"Alright then. I've been putting a sleeping spell on you for almost two months now."
Ron choked on his food and started coughing.
"What? What sleeping spell? But you- you categorically refused to give me a sleeping potion."
"Yes, because a potion would have lingering, physical addictive properties that a spell could bypass."
Ron was still recovering from swallowing his food wrong and was too busy coughing and downing water to say anything and Harry was grateful because he knew once Ron found his voice, it would be over.
"But with the cheering charm, that was a spell but still, there were problems," Harry said, shaking off the feeling at the back of his neck that he always got when he remembered that time in his life.
"Because the source of that spell is phantom, artificial energy. The source of my spell is real, grounded in energy that has to already exist in the person being casted upon."
"Your spell?" Ron had recovered. "You- you invented some experimental dark spell and cast it on Harry without his permission like he's a lab rat?"
"It's not dark magic," Snape said, as if Ron was incredibly stupid. "But yes, it was experimental." He looked at Harry. "And I cast it against your will. The first time was when I told you the password to my room. Beatitudo- that's the incantation."
Harry couldn't speak. He had so many pressing questions, not the least of which was why on Earth Snape was deciding to share this with him in front of Ron.
"Oh, this is just bang out of order," Ron said, his voice raising slightly.
Harry's hand shot out across the table and he grabbed Ron's wrist. "Ron, please. Please don't make a scene. Just be quiet for a minute."
Harry let him go when Ron's ears turned red but he shut his mouth, and took a deep breath. He put his fork down, clearly and suddenly disinterested in his breakfast.
Harry turned to Snape. "Why didn't you just ask? I wouldn't have said no." He ignored the pointed look he felt Ron boring into the side of his face.
"Many reasons."
"Like?"
Snape glanced at Ron and Harry got the sense that he was finally starting to feel rationally about Ron being there. "It was experimental. I had to control for a placebo effect without having anyone else to test it on."
"Here's a wild idea," Ron broke in, but in a deliberately hushed tone for Harry's benefit, "Give two shits more about telling him the truth than controlling for a placebo effect, whatever the fuck that means"
Snape didn't look twice at Ron. He was still looking at Harry, who said nothing. He wanted to hear Snape's answer.
"I'm not going to defend myself," Snape said finally.
Harry hesitated. "How's it safer than other things, like potions?"
"I told you, potions are more physical. They stay and build up in your system in a different way then spells can. They become part of your biology, change your physical makeup. Spells deal more in energy. This spell, in particular, isn't even really a sleeping spell. In order to work, you need to have a basis of feeling, a blissful feeling, however vague. The spell uses that and produces on it, magnifying it, relaxing you until you're asleep."
This was a feeling Harry remembered having, almost every night he'd slept in Snape's company. "Did you cast it every night?" Harry asked quietly, afraid of the answer.
"No. That's another reason it's better than a sleeping drought. Since it uses an energy that you should already produce yourself, it's not supposed to encourage a dependency. Just a healthier association."
"Shouldn't I be able to sleep on my own, then, if that's true? I couldn't sleep last night," Harry said. "Or the night I spent at Ron and Hermione's."
Snape shifted in his seat, looking down at his legs. "I didn't foresee you developing other dependencies."
Harry looked at Ron. He was staring at the wall opposite him, shaking his head in disbelief.
Snape continued. "I'm telling you now, so you understand. You can cast it on yourself, train yourself to sleep until you don't need it anymore. You certainly don't need me."
It felt like a pair of hands fisting his heart. Harry cleared his throat to get the last looming thought out of his mouth. "Quite a thing to tell me in front of Ron."
"He has more ammunition now, for when he undoubtedly will tell you to stay away from me." It was almost as if Snape knew of Ron and Harry's conversation the night before.
"I certainly do," Ron said, looking squarely at Snape as if he wanted to hex him. "I'll tell him everyday if I have to."
Snape still looked straight ahead into Harry's eyes. "I'm depending on it."
Harry was very close to telling them both to fuck off when Dawlish interrupted them. "Ready? Ministry cars are waiting outside."
"Where are we going?" Harry asked.
Dawlish nudged Ron in the shoulder. Ron was eating again, finishing whatever he could of his breakfast. "You didn't tell him?"
Ron swallowed. "Didn't have time. I'll tell him in the car, come on."
They left the tavern and the entire Auror department plus Harry and Snape piled into the black cars that lined the street. Harry sat between Ron and Snape in the back seat of their car, eager to separate them. Savage drove and Hawthorne took the front.
Ron played with the window down button and then quickly shut it when a gust of wind chilled the car. "We've tried to make sure we'll have magic for at least part of the time while we're there. Snape's helped us develop a potion but we're not even sure it will work and even if it does, it might only be for minutes at a time." Ron looked smug.
"I need more time," Snape said stiffly.
"We have ingredients for you to work with at the Leaky Cauldron, to keep on with it. Anyway, the other thing we'll bring with us are these Deactivators." Ron lifted his bum off the car seat to dig in his front pocket. He took out what looked like a white and blue ball, no bigger than a marble. He handed it to Harry, who looked at it in the light. Inside was a swirling liquid.
"The Department of Mysteries gave them to us, they're not fully developed either. They're supposed to deactivate offensive or defensive magic, but we're not sure they'll work well with the scale of the spell that's in place at Robin Hood.
"So we need to make sure we're prepared to not be able to do magic at all. We're going to a shooting range. Specials muggle police officers are going to teach us how to use guns!"
Ron looked extremely excited by this prospect.
Harry was less so. "Guns are deadly," Harry said, reminding himself of Hermione for a moment. "All it would take is Jamsen thinking he's funny- aiming at one of us for a laugh and pulling the trigger by accident. You could bleed out in seconds." An intrusive image of Snape doing just that burst in his mind.
"Well they have to have a way to teach people who've never done it before, haven't they? Besides, we'll have a Healer there in case."
That didn't do anything to ease Harry's concern but he forced himself to relax back into the leather of the car.
The drive was longer than Harry was expected, about an hour. Ron explained that coming by car was meant to make a show of their officialness to the muggles, make them feel more at ease. Apparently the ministry had enough of a time working with the muggle government in getting them to agree to train strangers from an unknown organization.
They drove out of central London, and just past the outskirts of town. The buildings and residences stopped and winter greenery began to surround the horizon.
As the minutes passed, he couldn't stop his mind from wandering to the conversation over breakfast, wondering what Snape meant by telling him he could cast the spell on himself, he didn't need him anymore. It was awful to be sitting in prolonged silence nearly pressed against the very person whose thoughts he desperately wanted access to. For a fleeting moment, when Savage made a sharp and fast turn, their thighs were flush. Warmth scooped at Harry's stomach so deeply that he was worried it would be visible in his lap. And then he thought about sitting in Snape's lap and he rested his hands in front of him.
"Sorry," Savage said sheepishly from the driver's seat and everyone readjusted themselves in their seats, leaving respectable distances in between.
They arrived at a place called Camp David. The small sea of ministry cars that rolled up to the site's parking lot all together seemed bigger than the site itself. Harry thought it was sort of a grand name for a place that seemed so insignificant. It was three sheds equally set apart from each other on a wet, muddy field. In the distance, Harry saw a long stone ledge that seemed out of nowhere and utterly useless- he thought there might have been various items perched on top but he couldn't tell what they were exactly from the distance.
The muggles who greeted them looked quite militant and reminded Harry of Dudley's post-boxing phase. A short man wearing a black jumpsuit told them to leave anything they were carrying with them in the cars. They all first had to go through a security screening, which agitated the wizards from the Secrecy department they had brought with them in case anyone needed memory modification. Harry heard one of them mumbling something behind him about how they were going to explain their wands.
Ron turned to them and whispered something Harry couldn't hear because everyone was being ushered into one of the cabins. They went through what Harry recognized as metal detectors- he volunteered to go through first to show the rest that there was no way the thing would be set off by anything on them. He took off his belt and put it in the broken plastic bin he was offered and walked through the detector with his wand in his pocket. When nothing happened, the rest of the lot started forming a queue.
Snape was just after him and taking off his own belt when the short man supervising the line and who'd ushered Harry through the detector said "You, take off your shoes."
Snape didn't very visibly bristle as Harry expected him to, but Harry saw his wand hand twitch. "And why didn't he have to take his shoes off?" Snape asked, nodding to Harry.
"I don't like the look of you," the man said, eyeing the scars on Snape's neck. Harry tensed, ready to bodily block Snape from killing this man if he had to. He didn't seem to be the only one; several of the people in the queue shifted on their feet, clearly resisting urges to pull out their wands.
But Snape just smiled and let out a short, quiet laugh. He took off his shoes obediently and even raised his hands in submissive surrender when the man in the jump suit ordered another officer to pat Snape down after he cleared the detector.
Snape and Harry met eyes are the officer ran his hands down Snape's sides and paused questioningly over the right trouser pocket. He put his hand inside and Snape didn't move or flinch as the officer presented the shorter man in charge with Snape's wand.
"What is this?" he barked.
"I'm in forensics. It's a tool we use in our lab work. I was there this morning, it must have slipped my mind that I had it." Snape lied quickly and easily, his face expressionless.
"I didn't know lab geeks needed to learn how to use firearms," the man said, tossing Snape's wand to him. Harry almost felt everyone in the room release a breath, but he knew the trouble wasn't over as the other men laughed and he watched Snape's eyes fill with loathing.
"That doesn't surprise me, seeing as you're a fucking idiot," Snape said.
Things happened very fast after that, like a confusing dream. The man Snape insulted lunged for him, slamming him into the nearest wall and fisting his shirt so it rode up and revealed his stomach, flat and pale. The sound that Snape's head made as it connected with the wall resounded in Harry's ears and he almost couldn't make his voice work as he threw his arm around the man's neck and the other officers grabbed at him, pulling him back as Harry dug his nails into the man's flesh as they put more space between them.
"Get off of him!" It was Ron yelling that and there were flashes of red light as the Aurors descended on them and the muggles around them fell to the floor, Stunned.
"Well," Ron said, as they were riding back to London in the car in heavy silence, "I'm honestly not sure why we thought that would go off without a hitch."
Harry looked at Snape for the upteenth time to make sure he wasn't passing out. He couldn't unhear the awful thud of Snape's head hitting the wall. Snape was looking out of the car window and Harry took the opportunity to inspect the back of his head.
He reached his hand to touch Snape's hair, which looked matted where he'd been hit. Snape flinched away from him and Harry's fingers were red.
"You're bleeding," Ron said.
Hawthorne turned in his seat to look at Ron. "Who?"
"Snape."
"Do you want me to send a message to the Healer?" They'd left the memory modifiers at the site to deal with the aftermath and in the rush but the Healer was in one of the cars behind them.
"Stop the car." It was the first thing Snape said since Camp David.
"You want me to pull over?" Savage said over her shoulder, her eyes still on the road.
Harry noticed Snape was rubbing his palms on his trousers, as if wiping sweat from them. "I'm going to vomit," Snape said matter of factly.
Savage indicated to the left and stopped. Snape opened the door and stepped out, walking around the car as if he'd merely decided to take a brisk walk and waited until he was near a tree that be braced himself against. He bent over and vomited. Harry got out of the car and watched him, even though Snape's back was turned and he must have hated to be seen this way. The cars rushed past on the motorway, drowning out any sounds he was making.
Another ministry car stopped in front of theirs and Dawlish was getting out of the back seat, jogging over to them.
Snape spit and said something Harry couldn't hear.
"What?"
"Don't call the Healer."
"Don't be an idiot."
"I'm serious. Don't call the Healer." Snape spit at the ground again and wiped his mouth. He turned and said "The Leaky Cauldron's not far," as he brushed past Harry got back in the car.
Ron headed Dawlish off and once they were all back in the car, Savage set off again. When they got to the inn, Snape still refused to see a Healer and locked himself in his room.
After lunch, they gathered closely at a few tables in the bar and Dawlish told them they would try again the next day. "We're trying to get a different site so we don't have to work with those idiots again, even after their memories have been wiped, but it might not happen. In any case, we'll all need to use concealment charms on our pockets."
Harry wished they'd thought of that before that fiasco could happen and for a moment he felt a rush of anger toward them all as he blamed them. He waited almost hopefully for someone to say something he could fight against, something about how they should all do their best to mind their tempers, but Dawlish said nothing else and dismissed them.
Harry caught Ron's arm before he got up from his seat. "Which room is Snape in?"
Ron looked at him for a moment, then nodded. "I'll ask Tom."
Harry knocked on 214, which was on the opposite side of the hall from him.
There was no answer.
He knocked again. "It's me, let me in."
Still nothing.
Harry put his hand on the knob and rested his body against the door, speaking closely into the crevice. "We don't have to talk if you don't want to. I just want to be in the same room as you. Alone," he added, exasperated.
The door opened and he almost fell in. When he steadied himself, he scanned the room for Snape, closing the door behind him. Snape was standing at the sink in the bathroom.
There was a hand mirror levitating behind his head where his injury was and he was looking ahead of him. Harry walked into the bathroom and hosted himself on the counter next, trying not to wince as he looked at the gash in Snape's scalp that he attempted to heal with his wand.
"Do you want me to try?"
"You said you wouldn't talk."
Harry made a show of keeping his mouth shut. After a minute or two, Snape finally managed to get the angle right with his wand and heal the wound. Harry was inching closer and closer until he was very close to falling in the sink.
"Don't fuss," Snape said as he vanished the blood with another wave of his wand. He put his hand down and opened a small container of yellow paste that was on the counter and started applying it to the now closed skin of his wound.
He washed his hands when he was done, wiping them dry on a towel and looking at his reflection. He came to stand between Harry's hanging legs, his hands on Harry's knees.
Harry put his hand on Snape's chest. He noticed a button missing on his shirt that should have been just under his thumb, second down from the collar.
"Button's gone," Harry said. He was inordinately sad for the lost button. It reminded him of the way a sliver of Snape's stomach was revealed to a watching crowd, and how for Snape, who was so private and so particular, maybe that was the worst part. His hand balled into a fist, gathering some of Snape's shirt with it.
"I hate him for hurting you." Saying it out loud felt like unburdening a secret. He could feel Snape's breath on his face. It smelt like toothpaste and an empty stomach.
"It's nothing," Snape said.
"Why didn't you do anything?"
"You mean fight back?"
"Yeah."
"Didn't I ruin things enough?"
"Well at that point- I just don't know how you resisted. You're not exactly the type to take things lying down."
"I wanted to." Loathing rose, fresh, in his face. "I suppose I thought you wouldn't want me to."
Harry's mouth hung open in surprise for a moment and Snape kissed him. His hands didn't move from Harry's knees, as if he was trying to control himself, to color in the lines. It felt like Snape was treasing him and when Snape teased, it was very hard for Harry to breath and he opened his mouth for Snape's tongue readily, but it was never wide enough, he could never give enough. He thought about letting Snape do whatever he wanted to him and he made a sound, trying to catch Snape between his legs, but Snape just made him dizzer, moved his hands higher up on Harry's thighs, tighter, holding him back, keeping him still.
Snape pulled away quickly, taking his hands off Harry and balling them into fists around him on the counter. "I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"For touching you."
"When did we agree to stop touching?" Harry remembered the conversation in front of Ron in the morning with new pain. "You think I'd dump you the moment Ron told me to?"
Snape's head was hanging between his shoulders and Harry leaned back to try to see his face but his hair was hiding it.
"Friends," Snape said, his voice tense like unsprung coils.
Harry resisted the urge to pull Snape's curtain of hair back. "What about them?"
"He wants what's best for you. He understands boundaries the way we can't."
"I can decide that for myself."
"No, you can't. Certainly not now. You're blind."
Harry let his head and shoulders rest back, the nape of his neck touching the cold mirror.
"The light's hurting my head." Snape straightened and waved his head over his head to darken the room. He stepped back from the counter and leaned back behind him. Harry could still make out his face in the light spilling in from the bedroom.
"I think you should see the Healer."
"Seems we both have different ideas of what's good for us."
"I'll keep after you," Harry said, low.
"It's like a dog chasing a moving target. You think you want it when you're running, but the moment you catch it, you won't know what to do with it."
"I'm not a dog. I'm just a person who wants another person. Sometimes things are simple like that. It's you who keeps twisting it."
"I told you I'd cast an experimental spell on you many times without your permission in front of another person because between us, I don't think it would have occurred to you as strange, as strange as it actually is."
"If you thought it was strange, then why did you do it?"
Snape laughed. "Isn't it obvious?"
"Clearly not."
"I'd been developing it ever since you asked me for a sleeping draught. The first time I'd used it on you was right after the Veil and it didn't seem so terrible that I didn't ask you, obviously you just wanted to sleep. I told myself I'd tell you when you woke up. But then we fought. Even now, I'm making excuses for myself."
Harry waited for him to go on.
"Don't make me say it," Snape said, looking at a spot near Harry's ankles.
"Say what?" Harry asked, genuinely lost.
"I liked that you needed me," Snape blurted. His eyes were screwed shut, the same way they were nights ago in bed with Harry after their Legilimency.
Harry crossed his legs on the counter. He felt a terrible pity for Snape that he didn't want to feel.
"I'm not a good person. I do things for power, power over magic, power over people," Snape went on.
"I don't believe that," Harry said firmly. "I don't believe that in all these years you lived for love and that hasn't taught you anything about what matters."
"Your mother thought better of me as well, for a time."
"Oh yeah, and what, she saw right in the end?"
Snape leaned forward. "Didn't she?"
"She obviously judged you too soon."
"Don't fault her."
"I'm not- I don't blame her for breaking off from you. But -" Harry struggled to find the words for what he meant. He panicked in his hesitation, not wanting Snape to take advantage and overwhelm him with his quicker tongue. "Like, what were you supposed to do? You were young and you thought being in Slytherin was great and you loved magic, all kinds of magic, because it got you out of that shit hole. And then you came to Hogwarts and you and her- your only friend- got sorted differently. What were you supposed to do in Slytherin? Not make any friends? Just be miserably alone your whole time at Hogwarts?"
"That is not-"
"Shut up," Harry said. "Just shut up for a minute, okay? I'm not saying she was wrong for judging your friends and stuff. She wasn't. My mum, from what I can gather, was an amazing, talented, exceptional person. But it's not fair for you to compare yourself to her all the time and use her as this measure for what's good. She wasn't a saint either. She- I mean how else do you explain her attraction to my dad in his asshole years?"
"That's rich, you talking about strange taste," Snape said.
"Listen," Harry said, the thought he'd been trying to wrap his words around finally seeming to be at the tip of his tongue, "I'm not saying she was wrong or she didn't know what she was doing when she broke things off with you. It happened, and she had good reason. But you think of it like she'd branded you of being unworthy or something and that's just the truth about you, but it's not.
"You're just- you're not still the dark oddball kid who called her a mudblood once. You've lived, you-"
"I killed your parents," Snape said, his voice so loud in the small space that Harry winced. "I killed them. I'm the reason you've lived this life that's broken you. One day, you'll turn your head to look at me and that's all you'll see."
"You didn't kill my parents," Harry said, pushing down what he really wanted to say so forcefully that his eyes filled with tears of frustration. "Voldemort did. And I'm not broken."
"Is that why you can't sleep at night?"
Harry didn't answer.
"Why are you crying?" Snape sounded guilty.
"I'm not crying," Harry said, his voice hoarse as he tilted his head up. He was anxious to prevent the tears from falling, anxious to make sure Snape couldn't make his thoughts out. He hid his desperate wish to say to Snape plainly, I love you, and to know for certain that Snape would say it back.
Part of him wanted to go now, to leave and never return until Snape said all the things Harry needed him to say. But he was powerless, glued to the spot and understanding with defeat this clamor inside him would never turn down anything Snape was willing to give.
He breathed in, deeply. "Can we just lie next to each other tonight? I just want you to hold me until I fall asleep and then I want to wake up tomorrow morning with your hard-on pressed against me." Harry brought his gaze down to look at him.
Snape nodded. "Alright. But I might vomit on you at some point. I think I'm concussed."
They went about the rest of the day quite separately, Harry satisfied with Snape's consent to spend the night together. The Aurors drew up more detailed plans for the next day, ditching the idea to revisit a training site and instead bring one trainer with them to Manchester. Snape used his illness to retire early after dinner and Harry followed not long after. When they were in bed together, Harry told Snape not to cast the sleeping spell and Snape asked for it to be cast on him.
At first, Harry wasn't sure he'd moved his wand in the right sweeping way Snape showed him. But a minute after he'd said the incantation, the arms around him went heavy and Harry's ear tickled from the long, puffy breaths of Snape's deep sleep.