It took no more than a day for news of Severus' altercation with his coworker to reach the ears of his employer, and no longer than a day after that for Severus to be officially sacked. When he came to pick Harry up from Gammy's house—rather earlier than was his normal practise—he had moped his way into the barn where Harry was busy at Babs' teats, finishing off her afternoon milking as the black-and-white Holstein-Freisian munched blissfully on a mix of dried alfalfa and clover.

Snape said nothing as he crunched his way through the hay that lined the floor, and Harry mistook his presence for someone else's. Really, he could have been Gammy, or Snowdrop, or even Nicky if the boy had shown up late to the residence as he sometimes did (wandering in from wherever he'd rambled during the post-school hours).

It took Harry a full five minutes to look up and notice that Snape was leaning over the stall, his chin resting on one of his arms he had supporting his weight against the wooden partition as he petted Babs' face above her soft nose.

Harry might have startled had Snape not looked so very contemplative. Instead, he watched in silence as Severus considered the animal before him with a rare air of serenity.

Of course, his kuya hadn't missed for one second that Harry had begun watching him. Snape noticed such scrutinyin the exact way which Harry didn't.

"I'm done at The Yow," he informed the boy, his voice a laconic drawl.

"They let you out early today?"

Snape snorted and frowned at Babs. "Henry let me out permanently," he corrected. "It comes as no surprise."

Although Snape seemed, on the surface, at peace with the development, Harry couldn't help but to take a shuddering breath as his hands clenched into fists on his knees. He scooted forward on the stool and began to jimmy the pail back and forth beneath Babs' girth until it was pulled free from beneath her, and away from where an errant kick would send it spilling over the floor. It occurred to him then that without his pretense for attending to the tasks on Snowdrop's grandmother's farm, he mightn't ever find himself working his newly callused hands at his gratifying chores ever again.

His eyes misted with tears of regret that he didn't allow to fall. Instead, he sniffed, hard.

"Will this... will this be my last afternoon at Gammy's?"

Snape turned his eyes from Babs, whom he'd stopped petting, to Harry, evaluating him for a silent moment. The grim set of his lips softened a touch and out came the petulant, hanging lower lip from the taut frown he'd been wearing. When Severus was upset, his mouth became a thin slash of a thing. At other times, it was asymmetrical and strangely pouty, with the way his lower lip seemed to droop slightly to the side.

"Is that your wish?"

"No," Harry answered, his voice emerging sullen and more transparently upset than he would have liked.

"Then I see no reason why, with Mrs. Hill's permission, you could not arrange to continue your afternoons here; providing, of course, that you plan to spend some of your additional time at the shop."

"Really?" Harry asked. He knew he didn't sound too hopeful, but then the provisional way in which Severus mentioned the change in his schedule didn't yet inspire too much confidence.

It was surprising, therefore, when Snape glowered down at a spot of nothing on the ground. "Pamina has agreed to have you over one day a week on a short-term basis, so long as I agree to host her grandchildren at the shop on another day of the week: those days being subject to our changing schedules."

His mouth dropping open with surprise, Harry couldn't help the grin stealing across his face, even as Snape looked surlier than ever. "I can keep coming here?"

"Yes, l'al fowt, and perhaps you missed the part where I've been made to agree to watching over Miss Hill and Mr. Henderson at least one day a week."

Harry didn't see the problem with this, and he said so plainly.

"Gammy watches me twice a week, and she has for months—"

"Yes," Severus sneered, "a helpful farmhand who puts himself to work in the stables for payment in mere foodstuffs and otherwise behaves himself is quite the same as supervising two siblings who hate one another and have a reputation for mischief or temper tantrums wherein one of the two manages to poison herself. It is certainly an equal trade-off."

"They're not always like that," Harry hesitated to say. In truth, he didn't have any desire to defend either of the siblings, but he was invested in spending an afternoon a week on the farm, and that was enough for him to put in at least half of a good word for Snowdrop and Nicky.

"How reassuring." Severus rolled his eyes and looked at Harry as though he knew precisely what the boy had been thinking, and that he'd not bought a word of Harry's excuse for the two. Harry couldn't blame him—he barely believed it himself.

Yet, to the two's credit: they hadn't engaged in a bout of fisticuffs for months, and Snowdrop had only poisoned herself the one time... and that was because of an argument with Harry, not Nicky.

Somehow he didn't imagine it would help to mention that.

Still, Snape's glare darkened as though he were privy to these mental circumlocutions himself.

"I shall have to speak to Pamina about my expectations for her grandchildren's behaviour."

Harry winced but nodded reluctantly. It might do to address that, truthfully. He wasn't sure how much good would come of it, but it probably wouldn't hurt.

"When does the shop open?" Harry asked. He stood and hefted the pail by its handle, waddling with it swinging between his legs until it stood against the wall of the milking stall. He then found a clean flannel and set about wiping down Babs' teats and udder as Gammy had shown him to do before and after each milking.

"This coming Monday."

"Really?" Harry asked, unable to mask his surprise.

"There is a great deal one can accomplish with magic when time is tight. Now that our income from The Yow can no longer be counted upon, I see no reason to delay."

"We don't even have a name for the shop—"

"We do, actually," Severus sighed rubbing at his eyes. "Da', of course, assumed responsibility for naming it, as though he ought to have the right to do so..."

"What's it called?"

"Snape & Son," Severus spat, looking disgusted. "Like that's an accurate description of what our dynamic will be, or who is really pulling the strings in this harebrained venture."

Harry hesitated. "That's kinda nice of him..."

"Nice, yes. So very kind and thoughtful of him," his kuya bemoaned, sounding anything but pleased at the prospect.

"What if no one comes, Severus?" Harry asked with a frown, voicing the question which was ever on his mind where the new shop was concerned.

"Then we shall fail."

He should have known better than to expect a comforting lie from Snape, but he still wasn't quite prepared to hear that. With a sniff, Harry turned and did his best to groom Babs' coat, using a stiff bristled brush to get the dust and dirt out of her short hairs and then turning her loose through the back of the stall into the wider open barn that she occupied throughout the winter. She left with supreme laziness—and only after eating the remainder of her alfalfa and soliciting one more scratch on the bridge of her nose from Snape's obliging hand—as was her way.

When Harry finally turned back to join Severus, it was to see that the wizard had fastened the topper onto the pail and was levitating it over the side of the stall.

"I usually take it through the door there," Harry told him. "I hafta go through the door anyway."

"I can bring it with us as far as the barn doors, but then you'll be carrying it as normal. Don't spare a worry over it; you'll be doing all the work that Mrs. Hill expects from you." Severus answered with a sardonic quirk of his lips.

In spite of that, when Harry went to heft the milk up at the entrance to the barn he almost overcompensated and sent it flying over his head. The pail was nearly as light as a feather. Clearly Snape had taken pity on him.

Severus accompanied him to the front door of the house where he waited for Harry to deliver his payload. Repeatedly, Gammy tried to coax him into her home with increasingly tempting offers of warm, fresh baked bread and fried eggs, but Severus maintained throughout that he had a great deal to do in order to have the shop finished in time.

"If it is still alright with you, Pamina, I would like to continue to pick Harry up at the same time I have been on the days he spends here. I'm afraid this afternoon is a bit of an aberration as I require his help."

Gammy, who was leaned up against the doorway, was wiping her hands on a well-used linen apron. She frowned in thought but nodded anyway.

"I don't see why not, especially seeing as how it'll now only be once a week instead of twice. Do you know what day you'd prefer?"

"I'm afraid I can't say. If it suits you, I think we could finagle that week by week, thus trading off days that fit our schedules. Having a bit more freedom in that regard is something I haven't enjoyed in a very long time, and I've found that it can be easier to set appointments when I can count on a bit of flexibility on certain days."

"Oh, certainly."

"Thus, if you have a day in mind for young Miss Hill and Mr. Henderson to join Harry and I at the shop next week, I am open to suggestions."

"I can't say whether Nicky will be there," Gammy chuckled. "Sometimes I know I'll have watch of him, and other days he shows up when and where he wants to. I'll bet if he knows that Harry and Blossom are at your shop, he likely will be too though, so don't let it surprise you."

"I am not a man who is easily taken by surprise."

Gammy nodded, businesslike. "That'll be a good trait when watching the two of them, mark my words. I do think that there was a trade show in Workington that I was interested in seeing. I didn't assume I'd get to go..."

"When is that?"

"Wednesday," She answered, wringing her hands a bit. "If you could, that might be a good day to keep Blossom for me next week. I'll be leaving here rather early, and I certainly won't be picking her up after midnight, but it may run a bit late," she admitted, looking a bit abashed.

Severus sighed lightly, as though he were already regretting the arrangement, but he did nod and agree to Wednesday, his hand landing on Harry's shoulder as he began to steer him off the porch. "I appreciate your watching Harry thus far, Mrs. Hill. It has been enormously helpful. I can only hope to repay on that debt."

"Oh it's been no trouble, Severus. Harry's been a delight," she replied, seemingly oblivious to the fact that Severus was manoeuvering for their departure. "And I think I might know of a friend whose car is in need of service. Is your shop ready to be rung quite yet, or—"

"You are in possession of our home phone number," he answered, giving Harry a soft push until the boy began to move towards the Marina parked in the gravel. Severus himself had begun to retreat and was now speaking over his shoulder. "It is kind of you to recommend us. Please have your friend call me at the house, even if we're not open yet. I'll give them the earliest appointment available."

Leaving then was as easy as calling goodbyes over their backs. Gammy observed them until they pulled away down the drive, waving all the while.

Severus looked to be in a foul temper, although not irate. Before pulling out onto the road, but while hidden by a copse of trees from the Hill's house, he finally popped the cassette out of the player and bade Harry hand him an album from Dio—"The one with the dog man on it," to which Harry had argued that three of Dio's albums featured depictions of dog-like men, and Snape had snarled that he wanted the "orange-ish" album, whatever that meant—which he lost no time in pressing play on once Harry finally located it, turning the volume as high as it was designed to go.

Speaking while the music was that loud was quite impossible, so Harry merely gripped the edges of his seat while the Marina wove hither and thither on the back roads. Even during the day, as it still was, he hated the trip through the countryside. He had hated it before the accident with the lorry, and since...? Well. It was all he could do to keep his eyes open and to prevent himself from losing his after-school snack all over the back bench seat.

As terrible as that drive was—as terrible as it habitually was—it still didn't hold a candle to the rest of the weekend. Severus was in a frantic mood half of the time and in a towering temper the rest as he rushed from Spinner's End to the newly named Snape & Son.

Toby had reluctantly made himself available, grousing all the while that he'd planned for a much further out opening, which, of course, was dishonest, as he'd not planned at all. His anticipation for an opening date any time from six months out until Judgement Day notwithstanding, Severus informed his father that his presence would be expected on the premises from eight in the morning until seven in the evening, which were the same gruelingly long hours that Severus himself anticipated he'd have to be available.

This had, of course, prompted more complaining, followed by a loud row that seemed dangerously close to erupting into violence where Severus looked ready to beat his father 'round the ears even as the older man was screaming incomprehensible abuse into his son's face.

In the end, the sense in opening so early and closing so late prevailed when Tobias couldn't deny the fact that they were brand new and had no existing body of business. It meant that they ought to keep wide open hours so long as labour was basically free (given that neither man was pulling a salary, nor an hourly wage).

Harry had stayed well away from all of this, listening through the floorboards from upstairs after he'd retreated when he'd seen the way the argument had progressed.

He dearly wished that Severus had remembered to renew the silencing spells that week.

Even Curry hadn't wanted to involve himself. He'd kept Harry company in the boy's room as Harry tried to drown out their voices with a few plucked strings on his G&L.

Severus had rung Ms. Tibbons' guitarist friend a day or so earlier, managing to secure lessons for his charge through means that Harry wasn't privy to. Snape hadn't seemed happy about the arrangement, and Harry gathered by needling the man relentlessly that he somehow had avoided paying the guitar teacher the "arm and a leg" that Severus had first, over the receiver, decried as "daylight robbery." Still, whatever Severus hadoffered in exchange must have been something he was displeased about, as he refused to elaborate further, explaining only that they'd come to an agreement and that he'd happened upon a commodity which could be reasonably tendered at a rate that made the exchange "quite the bargain," at least, for him.

Harry had reminded himself of gift horses, and had thanked his kuya for the lessons. They were set to begin the following week, providing another afternoon of activity where he wasn't obliged to sit in on Severus and his father bickering in a cement hole in the wall.

That morning—a Sunday—after Severus had dropped Harry off early at Rice Bowl so that he could ride with Lola and Mr. Padiernos (who had recovered himself remarkably quickly, with thanks to Severus' clever brewing) to Mass in Severus' stead, Harry had made sure to give special thanks to God and the poor young man who was suspended, bloodied and beaten, from the crucifix that hung in the place of honour above the altar. It seemed a trifling thing to be glad of in light of such terrible suffering, but perhaps that was all the more reason to be grateful that his own concerns were so very prosaic.

Snape and his father's arguments didn't stand to hurt Harry. He just didn't like them at all, and he was happy for a chance to be away, doing something that he was excited to do.

Remembering that thought once more, he reapplied himself to the task of plinking out individual notes on the neck of the guitar. While he had been reflecting on this, the argument raging downstairs fading into the background of his awareness. Of course, the guitar was still hopelessly out of tune, and Harry couldn't for the life of him say what it was he was meant to be doing, but he did his best to try and find notes that he recognised from songs he liked, and then when he thought he'd found one, he looked for the next note, experimenting sometimes upwards of twenty times before he found each probable next note.

By the time the door slammed and Severus had successfully coaxed his father out of the house for their final afternoon of preparations before opening the next day, Harry thought he might have gotten the first eight notes of Godzilla by Blue Öyster Cult figured out.

He had a fondness for that song. It reminded him of being with Severus that first week when the man had taken him from the Dursleys'. There were several songs that did so, in point of fact, but Godzilla reminded Harry of Cokeworth and the strange affection he'd developed for the ugly, blighted, little borough that butted up to the comparatively verdant Backbarrow.

Perhaps, with a little luck, and if Harry could only memorise where the notes he'd painstakingly found were located on the neck, he could impress the new guitar teacher he was set to take lessons from come Tuesday.

Hours after Harry had ceased his endless repetitions of Godzilla, fed and played with Wheat, and let Curry out to wee in the muddy back garden at least three times, Severus and Toby finally returned (or at least Harry assumed that this was the case, as he was already upstairs, dressed in his flannel pajamas and had readied himself for the coming school day).

They apparently had nothing to speak about, as no voices floated up through the floor, and Harry easily drifted back to sleep, even as Curry crept out the door and downstairs, presumably to whine for attention from his master.

The next morning, Harry woke after Severus and Toby had already left for the new shop, and he was alone as he prepared himself breakfast, ate, and set a course for Rowky Syke on foot.

School was a terrible drag. Without an outdoor break to enliven his afternoon, it felt torturously boring to sit and listen to Mr. Fowler go on and on about Oliver's time working in the undertaker's shop.

For all that Harry felt as though perhaps he ought to feel sympathetic to Oliver, he found he couldn't. Not because the boy had done anything to offend him, as characters go, but because the very idea that Severus might compare Harry's situation to Oliver's rankled.

Similarities aside, Harry was no leaf to be blown around by the capricious winds of fate. He felt certain that if it had been him, he would have done things differently...

He couldn't quite say how, but... he wouldn't have allowed himself to be passed over and passed along as Oliver had. He'd not end up under the care of a Fagin, nor at the mercy of the likes of Monks, nor would he have allowed himself to be coerced into participating in petty theft to begin with! And he knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that if he had ended up in the care of someone as benevolent as Mr. Brownlow, he'd not fall victim to such a ridiculous kidnapping scheme as the one that had been orchestrated by Nancy and Bill Sikes.

Oliver was simply... too much a victim and too much victimised for Harry to care for him very much. Harry was cut from a different cloth. Orphanhood be damned, Harry's story wouldn't have been useful to a writer like Dickens who, as Mr. Fowler painstakingly explained, had successfully written the story as a means of galvanising the public into caring about the plight of the poor and disenfranchised.

Harry had every intention of telling Severus off for daring to draw even a single parallel to his own life, but by the time that he arrived at Snape & Son, he'd quite forgotten.

Entering the office through the door, Harry made to drop his school bag behind the counter. The office area was curiously devoid of clutter—mostly because they'd not been open long enough to have acquired any—and he kicked a ball of dust out of the corner before he set the bag down, not wishing to pick off dead insects and dirt from his belongings when he went home for the evening.

From inside the garage, Harry could hear banging and a bit of cursing, and he carefully poked his head through the door that led into the workspace, peering at Snape's back where he was knelt before a jacked-up car.

It was surprising enough to see that they'd managed even a single customer, but Harry knew better than to voice this pessimistic opinion out loud. In any case, he wouldn't want to startle Severus from his position, where his dark, greasy head was bent low underneath the open driver-side door. If he were to jump, doubtless he'd earn a knot the size of a cricket ball on his crown, and he'd not thank Harry for that.

Instead, Harry waited with bated breath as Severus fixed a wonky curve in the car's frame and experimentally shut the door, grumbling when it failed to latch shut as it should. He opened the door again and reapplied himself to reshaping the door frame with his wand.

At least this time his head wasn't directly below something heavy and made of steel. Harry saw that as as good an opportunity as any.

His footsteps were soft, but not so soft as to avoid detection as he padded over, looking over the front wheel well where it seemed that the car must have been in some sort of front-end collision. The wheel was turned out at a bad angle, the axle seemingly mangled, and there was an accordion-like folding happening at the bonnet.

"You found a customer," Harry said as soon as he knew well enough that Snape had realised he wasn't alone in the shop.

"You'll remember that Gammy had a client ready for us. Feast your eyes, Harry: our first paycheque." Severus scoffed as he smoothed a hand over the door frame, using a finger to move a bit of the frame while he had its composition temporarily altered with magic.

"It looks like it crashed..."

"Well spotted. It's hard to believe that there are still any mysteries left unsolved in the entire town given that we apparently have our very own Hercule Poirot living in our midst."

Harry had no clue who Hercule Poirot was, but he knew enough to recognise that Severus was being insulting.

"I wasn't trying to be clever..." he answered, crossing his arms as his face settled in for a sulk. He wished he could kick something. Preferably Snape, himself.

"No. That much is clear. However, simply because one can't find anything clever to observe doesn't mean that one must fall back on inanities."

Harry harrumphed. Severus in this particular mood (which happened to be his most pedantic), was unfailingly correct, uncompromisingly eloquent, and insufferably annoying.

"Where's your dad?"

Snape cursed. His hand had jerked when his wand kicked back a bit, evidently from encountering resistance in the underlying structure he was attempting to alter. He hit the knuckle of his middle, right-hand finger on the hard metal frame and had to pull back to massage the joint. "God knows."

"He isn't here?" Harry asked. He shouldn't have been so very surprised at the news, goodness knew that this was business as usual for the Snape patriarch, but he still felt his mouth dropping open at how cavalier Severus seemed with his father's absence.

"I told him to go pick up a few litres of engine oil from the shop. That was hours ago."

"Aren't you..." Harry hesitated, remembering how these discussions had proceeded in the past and feeling chary at the prospect of prodding. In the end, he soldiered on.

"Aren't you upset?"

His head turning to peek over his shoulder at the boy, Snape's mouth bowed out into an utterly exaggerated frown, his eyebrows lifting over his eyes, rather than drawing down in a glare. With that expression, he proffered an asymmetrical shrug of his shoulders with his hands palm-up and his fingers spread wide. He didn't need to say a word, for the entire production of it was articulate enough.

No. He wasn't upset. If anything, he seemed far more at ease as the sole proprietor of the entire enterprise.

"You didn't expect him to come back, did you?"

"Now there is an observation worth making. This time, truly: well spotted, Harry."

Harry grinned and crossed his legs, sliding smoothly from standing into sitting, tailor-style, beside Snape in the sort of effortless way that children can move but adults can only marvel over.

"I think you need to move in a couple centimeters. See? There's a bump on the inside of the frame and I think that's why it won't close."

"He receives praise once and he becomes intolerable. Imagine," Severus quipped. Even so, he followed Harry's advice, seeking out and then pointing to the spot in question with his eyebrows raised askance until Harry nodded. After, he quickly moved to smooth the spot over until it was flush with the rest of the metal.

The door, upon being closed, managed to latch this time.

"I don't suppose you've any pointers for this—" Snape gestured with an open palm at the devastated front end "—utter tragedy?"

"Nah," Harry answered, shaking his head. "That's just a bit of ugly business, isn't it?" He asked, borrowing one of Nicky's favourite phrases.

"Ugly. Certainly." Snape sighed deeply through his nose, his head bowed for a moment before he moved over on his knees and began the process anew for the bonnet.

"When are you gonna fix the axel and the wheel?"

"In its due time and not a moment earlier," Severus grumbled. "I've enough of a headache without navigating that."

"Can you fix it with your wand? Like you're doing now?"

Severus sat back on his heels and heaved another enormous, put-upon sigh. "No. No, I need machined parts made to specifications that I can't emulate with magic. Compositionally I can actually enhance the strength of the car's frame by transfiguring it, but I would be a fool to think that the parts that make up the axel and wheel attachment might benefit from the same treatment, or that I could achieve the exact correct dimensions for the car to be safe to drive. The frame is mere aesthetics. That can be managed with the naked eye." He shook his head, his mouth curling into a familiar snarl. "This is where Da' might have actually proved himself useful for something."

"Couldn't we just buy new parts?"

"Generally, yes. That's what most shops would do. Our margins are quite a bit thinner, however. Even if we passed the cost for the new part off to the customer—which, incidentally, I was planning on doing anyway—we wouldn't make enough to see us through for as long as I'm comfortable with. Having Da' repair or retool the part from scratch is our cheapest, best option."

Harry winced. "That doesn't sound safe either..."

"The machines he used to design and produce for were far more complicated and involved than a wheel drive. I know you don't think much of him—I don't think much of him—but you underestimate what he's capable of. At least in this he's an actual craftsman of the first order."

In spite of the glowing praise, Snape appeared as though admitting such a thing made him feel rather morose. He returned to his task of smoothing out the folds in the bonnet.

Seeming disinclined to speak further, Severus focused his attention back to the body of the car and didn't get up except to turn up the volume on the tape deck that sat near the mouth of the garage. Harry took that as a sign that he may as well pull out his homework and get to work on it.

It was hardly the most comfortable thing, sitting stooped over on the concrete while he did his best to remember his times tables, but he quickly became so focused on the word problems that he forgot the ache in his back. Eventually, he uncurled from his seated position and laid flush on his stomach, his legs kicking in the air behind him.

He'd long since given up on attending to the particulars of his maths homework and had begun doodling little illustrations into the margins.

Sally has eight friends but only two mince pies. How much of a pie does each friend get to eat?

Well, Sally also ended up with five curly pigtails sticking up all over her head in the drawing, Harry smirked as he drew a truly ridiculous looking girl. She held in each stick-hand a small pie with a star-like crust (like Aunt Petunia had made around Christmas, and which Harry himself had never been allowed to sample).

After giving consideration to his answer, he was alarmed when it seemed as though (assuming the answer was meant to be a fourth of a pie each) that Sally likely wouldn't be able to enjoy a piece herself.

'Well, that's rubbish.'

He churlishly crossed out the 'one-fourth of a pie each' answer and penciled in: "None. Two pies is enough for one person, and if Sally gives away all her pie she won't have any."

"What are you chortling over back there?"

Harry looked up and saw Snape staring at him, one eyebrow raised in silent question.

"Nothing..."

Snape levered himself to his feet with a grunt and stalked over, snatching up Harry's homework. He frowned over the drawings until he reached the final answer and stared at it so long and hard that he might well have burnt a hole in the paper if he kept it up much longer.

Finally, he snorted, his lips curving ever so slightly, and he handed the paper back.

"I did do the work," Harry defended himself, feeling frightened at what Snape might say.

"I saw," Severus agreed with a small nod.

"Eight friends indeed," he groused. "Who can, with all honesty, claim to have eight true friends?" He turned back to his work and picked up where he'd left off.

Behind his back, Harry found himself nodding his agreement. Some friends they were too if they thought they'd gobble up all of Sally's pie.

"Of course you also could have answered something close to 0.2, and then Sally would have been entitled to her own portion, but I imagine he wanted the answer given as a fraction."

"How would I have gotten an answer like that?"

"Exactly. Which is why if that dunderheaded teacher of yours wants to phrase his questions in the haphazard way he has, he deserves the answer you've decided to give. Doubtless you were correct and the answer he truly wanted was one-fourth of a slice each. If he wasn't such a blithering ninny, he'd have said something like: 'Sally and seven of her friends want to share two mince pies. If each receives an equally portioned piece, how much of a pie will each get to eat?'

"I find the whole idea of using such scenarios pointless, as an instructor," Severus kept on, shifting so that he was knelt on one knee and with one foot planted on the ground. He tapped the frame of the car with the tip of his wand and Harry watched it ripple and change before his eyes. "What's the use in framing such a question as a situation in which anyone with half a brain could find a way to object to the core premise?"

Harry shrugged. "I think it's cause it's like something that could really happen?"

"Obviously," Snape drawled with an exasperated sigh. "But what good is there in saying: 'Griselda was out of ergot rye, and upon checking her cupboard found only nutmeg, nogtail stomach, and sea bream. In an infusion with seven shredded pig's tails, which substitution might stabilise a second-sight elixir?'"

"Er..."

"The answer is sea bream," Snape continued, clearly not expecting Harry to answer, "but properly speaking, if I'd wished my students to understand the subject, the answer is that the potion cannot be completed. The amount of sea bream necessary would be prohibitively expensive and near unattainable. The whole premise of the question is absurd, and truthfully, one ought to always lay out and check his ingredients before beginning a potion. If one is interested in mere trivia, sea bream might be an appropriate answer, if the objective is merely to argue over its potential to stabilise (notice there's no argument over whether it would even prove effective in the amounts that would be necessary—which it wouldn't!) the pig's tail infusion, but to anyone who needs to learn how to brew a second-sight elixir?

"Worse than useless," Severus spat, answering his own question. "Such methods of instruction are irresponsible."

"How would you ask it, then?"

"Well, first off: why do Griselda and her empty cupboard matter in this scenario? She's irrelevant and so is her lack of foresight. The proper question is 'Can one forgo the use of ergot rye in a second-sight elixir prepared with an infusion of seven shredded pig's tails? Which ingredient is most likely to function similarly to ergot rye in the brew while maintaining stability, and how much would one need to substitute? Given the substitution, what result could one expect from the finished potion?"

"But that's three questions!"

"Four questions, actually. One must ask as many questions as is necessary, Harry, and multiple-choice answers which don't address the particulars of any given choice—and which don't engage the student to think about the consequences of such a choice—are next to useless in encouraging students to actually learn."

"I don't think the Sally question was that serious," Harry admitted, wondering if he'd not opened a can of worms with the whole thing.

Severus never seemed to need much of an incentive to begin ripping apart Mr. Fowler's teaching style.

"For want of a nail..." he ground out, sounding irritated and pained all at once.

"You need a nail?" Harry climbed to his feet. "What size?"

Snape's fist came down on the car's side as he let out a frustrated sigh, his head dipping in resignation. "No. Forget I said anything."

"Er... okay."

"There are a few bottles in the fridge behind the counter, in the other room. I'd like a Coke, if you wouldn't mind. Help yourself to whatever looks like it might suit."

Harry grinned, his uncertainty forgotten, and he buffed off the back of his jeans with his hands until the dust fell away.

'Pulpug, pulpug,' he thought to himself as he did so, the voice in his head sounding like Lola's.

Within the fridge were the bottles of Coke that Severus had bought for himself, as well as a bottle of milk from the grocery store, and a few bottled waters. Harry would have preferred milk (and liked it even better if it had been from Gammy's), but there were no cups to pour it into, and so he instead grabbed himself a bottle of water and took Snape's Coke to him, setting it down by the man's boot.

Before Harry managed to situate himself on the ground once more, the bells over the door jangled and a rushing, clacking sound preceded a joyous bark or two as Cur Dog loudly announced his presence.

He rounded the corner and attacked Harry's face with enthusiastic dog kisses before he nosed around Snape's boot and looked ready to tip his new drink over with his snout.

Severus only just managed to grab the bottle away before it was spilled all over the concrete, his face set in a vicious scowl at the enthusiastic canine who looked up at him with innocence writ large in his big, doleful eyes.

"Da'! Come get your mongrel—" Severus barked, glaring down at the dog and fending off his enthusiastic attempts to jump up on him with an open palm on one side and the elbow of the arm he was using to hold his precious beverage on the other.

"'Ee divn't mean nothin' by't," Tobias warbled, sounding as though he were in a good mood. He sauntered in behind Curry, his arms laden with two enormous containers of engine oil each and set them down heavily by the door.

Severus glowered down at the beast, still fending him off. "Just as I'm sure he meant nothing by urinating in my only pair of boots—"

"Aye. 'Ee's a wee jewkel, Sev'rus," Tobias answered, looking annoyed with his son. "Wha' kenst thou expect?"

"Wee, yes," Snape answered, sounding more put out by the minute. "He's positively tiny," he said, glaring daggers at the enormous hound that was still enthusiastically harassing him. "I suppose I shouldn't at all worry that he'll lunge for my face and ought to instead protect my ankles."

At this even Harry had to roll his eyes. Seeing that Toby wasn't inclined to call the dog off, Harry trotted over himself and gave a little whistle, watching when Curry's ears pricked up and he tossed his horse-like neck back to look over his shoulders at the boy.

"Come on," Harry urged, clicking his tongue a bit as he did for some of the animals on Gammy's farm. "Severus and I bought some biscuits the other day while we were in town. I put half behind the counter. Do you want a biscuit?"

Cur Dog fairly sprang forward and hopped before Harry with gleeful enthusiasm, his long tail swishing loudly through the air as it whipped back and forth.

As Harry led Curry away for his snack, he listened intently to the voices in the garage, frowning when he thought he heard Toby mentioning something about a new client for later that afternoon and yet another for Wednesday.

He had to be mistaken.

When Harry had paused for too long, Curry lost no time in prompting him by licking at his fingers and whining. His wet black nose was aquiver as he sniffed at the cardboard box of dog treats that he'd picked up without remembering to give one to the hound.

"Here you go," Harry offered, pulling out no less than four. They were small. Probably suited for a dog the size of a corgi. Cur Dog was easily the size of three corgis put together, or perhaps two corgis if they both were wearing stilts of some kind.

The hound set upon the colourless biscuits with gusto, his white teeth showing as he tossed his head back and then side to side attempting to break up his snack. When he was done, he sneezed and nosed at the box again, which Harry thought to set on a shelf high above his own head rather than on the short counter.

"That's enough for now," he scolded, laughing when Curry looked downright offended.

The conversation between Snape and his father had ended by the time the biscuits were eaten, and Harry felt irritated that he'd missed part of it. He supposed it was possible to ask Severus directly, especially when the man came into the office, rubbing at his sore back and tailbone, and walked to the clipboard which held their entirely empty scheduling sheet.

He didn't though. He merely watched as Snape penciled in a name for later that evening before close, and put a few question marks around mid-day on Wednesday.

Severus glanced up and met Harry's eyes, the look he sent him conveying that he knew exactly the question that was on Harry's mind and that he had no intention of merely offering up the information unless Harry asked.

Oddly, that only resolved Harry all the more not to.

He changed tack.

"So I guess you can do the axel now, 'cause your dad's back."

"It would appear so," Snape agreed, offering nothing else.