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...After Happily Ever After	By : Lissa & snowblind12 Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Snape/Hermione Views: 25739 -:- Recommendations : 4 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I am in no way affiliated with Harry Potter or J.K. Rowling. I make no money off of these stories. This is just fun for me.

Chapter List
- 27
- 28
- 29
Author's Note: I fear I was gone too long. I'm hoping people have just been too busy this week and haven't had time to pop on and see the updates. This chapter and chapter 28 are done. I'm planning on posting 28 tomorrow unless I get a lot of freaking love tonight and I'll get it up before bed. The reason 28 is done, too, is because I had trouble with the bar scene in this chapter. I hope it turned out okay. Love you guys! xLissa
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Mid-Late February 1999
The stares were awful, and they came at all hours of the day. She couldn’t walk down any hall, up any flight of stairs, or sneak through any passageway without people actually turning so their eyes could follow where she was going. The whispers were just as bad. She would approach a group of students to ask a question or give a directive and all conversation would cease. No one would look at her face – Circe forbid anyone look her in the eye.
She wasn’t sure what part of their knowledge was worse. The fact that she was engaged to the formidable Potions professor (not because she was ashamed or embarrassed, simply because it was private, and both she and Severus relished their privacy) or the part where she had been abducted and raped by every Death Eater who had escaped ministry persecution and then some. By mid-June, she was sure it would be the fact she would be almost seven months pregnant and didn’t know who the father was.
Breakfast had been an unmitigated disaster. She literally could have heard a pin drop when she walked through the doors of the Great Hall. Severus had left her at the top of the dungeon steps and made his way to the staff entrance at the back of the Hall. She agreed that was for the best. It was perhaps kinder to staff and students for them not to be seen together at all hours of the day.
She wasn’t sure what she was doing with him at the moment. Half of her wanted him next to her every second of the day, the other half didn’t even want to be able to look at him. She was an awful mix of desperate for him and disgusted with him. It felt like her mind wasn’t her own.
Harry, Ginny, Ron, Susan, Seamus, Dean, Luna, Neville, Lavender, Paravati, and Lizzie had swooped down on her the moment she entered and started chattering quickly about everything and nothing. This did not stop anyone from noticing she had entered. The sudden ceasing of meal time din reached her ears anyway. It didn’t stop her from seeing the wide eyes, some people even standing to get a better look at her. Severus was already at the head table, watching her protectively over the newspaper he was reading. Ginny slung her arm around her waist and Lizzie took her hand on the other side and they simultaneously guided and pulled her to the end of the Gryffindor table. Her friends surrounded her on all sides. Malfoy, Nott, and Zabini gave her encouraging nods from across the room. The noise did not resume when they were seated, her friends piling food on her plate that she would never eat. It wasn’t until Professor McGonagall stood and told everyone to get back at it or they would be late to their first classes did the normal chatter pick up. She swore her name was being hissed from every corner of the room.
Her face was blazing and she was struggling to keep tears at bay. Her friends were being lovely, pretending everything was normal, but she wanted nothing to do with them. They were making plans for a game of fanged frisbee in the snow between end of classes and start of dinner and were trying to encourage her to come. She made an excuse about being tired and having so much work to catch up on. “Next time,” she promised. They let it go.
The days blended together. She answered questions only if she was called out. Twice in as many days she had actually told a professor, “I’m sorry, I don’t know.” This happened to wild whispers from her peers and overly concerned glances from her professors.
At night she studied, trying to catch up, striving for the perfection she knew she was capable of, but she was so bloody exhausted she could barely keep her eyes open by the time dinner hit. She was struggling with staying on task with her revising schedule for N.E.W.T.s and by Thursday evening Severus had woken her at her desk and put her to bed three of four nights.
Friday morning dawned earlier than usual for her, she woke feeling out of sorts. Thinking she had to pee – she always had to pee these days, having to stop between almost every class – she jumped out of bed only to have a wave of vertigo sweep over her so hard she almost hit the floor. Cursing she stumbled to the bathroom, waking Severus.
“What’s the matter?” His voice was thick with sleep.
“Sorry, hafta pee,” she muttered, softly clicking the door behind herself. Then her stomach rolled and she was on her knees throwing up outstandingly into the toilet. She vomited so hard, petechiae* (pe – tee – kee – I) bloomed across her cheeks. She had barely anything left in her stomach from supper the night before and tasted mostly bile. Her body started to tremor violently as she heaved dryly. She didn’t even notice when the door creaked open or that Severus had entered until he was pulling her hair back with one hand, rubbing her back gently with the other. She continued to dry heave about a dozen more times, tears and snot streaming down her face with the effort. She sputtered and spit and groaned as wave after wave of nausea hit, but she had nothing left. When her stomach finally calmed, she collapsed, her muscles trembling with the exertion.
Grim faced and aching for her, Severus pulled her into his arms, trying to warm her cool limbs and sooth away her shaking. He handed her a wad of tissues which she used to clean her face and she pulled in slow, controlled breaths. He was glad he had brought his wand with and conjured her a glass of water. She rinsed and spit into the toilet before taking a few tentative sips, then, much to their dismay, she was back on her knees, losing the little water she had taken in and dry heaving again.
He stood and started the tub, making the water hot before tapping the floor with his wand. The cold tile bloomed deliciously warm under her knees as she braced herself at the toilet, continuing to sputter. He helped her stand once her body calmed again and she had cleared her face a second time. He grasped her around the elbows, supporting her when her knees buckled, before stripping her out of her pajamas. She was too weak to protest, but he said nothing when she attempted to cover her nakedness with her arms. His dismay at her decimated frame was barely kept at bay. He could count ribs and her hip bones jutted out painfully. When he helped her into the tub, he could see each knot of her back bone, he had to choke back tears. She bloody had to start eating more, but now with morning sickness starting, he feared her nutritional health would only continue to deteriorate.
She sank into the tub with a deep, guttural moan of pleasure, turning to her side to hide against the edge and resting her face on the lip. “Thank you,” she whispered, then gagged horrifically. He grabbed a garbage can for her to spit into as a sob broke through the gagging. “What’s happening?” Her voice was desperate.
“Oh, love.” He sighed and sat down next to the bath, resting his back against the white porcelain. “I think you can welcome the joys of morning sickness.”
“The pregnancy –” She gagged again before swallowing audibly and taking a deep breath. She tried to open her mouth to talk and all that she could manage was another gag. “Oh my God,” she moaned miserably after a few more large, calming breaths. He smoothed a damp curl from her cheek and wiped a tear from under her eye.
“I’m sorry, love. I’ll talk to Poppy and find an anti-nausea potion that’s safe for pregnancy.”
“Crackers,” she whispered in a pleading voice. “Saltines. And juice. Orange juice, please. Not pumpkin.” She was taking shallow breaths, punctuated by hard swallows trying to control the roil of her stomach.
“On it.” His answer was blunt and he stood, exiting the bathroom. “Pepper!” he called for a house elf he liked in particular. Hermione heard him give her specific orders and actually felt a small smile tug one corner of her mouth before another roll of her stomach had her dry heaving into the garbage can, saliva flooding her mouth, which she spit.
The crackers did help, but the orange juice tasted awful to her palate even though her mind still craved it. Severus dumped the cup down the drain, rinsed it, and filled it with cold water from the tap. “Will you chill it, please?” she whispered when he made to hand it to her. He tapped it with his wand and held it to her lips, letting her sip carefully. “Oh, thank you,” she breathed, grateful for the coolness to wash away the aftertaste of dry, salty crackers and bile.
“Sit up, love,” he urged her, kneeling at the side of the tub. He transfigured a flannel into a small, plastic water pitcher and set about washing her hair. Her little throat noises of pleasure were doing things to him he was trying hard not to contemplate and he focused on the task at hand.
When he finished, she thanked him again. At this point, the gratitude was making him quite uncomfortable. “I’ll get your robe,” he told her, leaving her to dry off in privacy. When he came back she had her hair wrapped in a towel with another secured toga style around her body. She didn’t meet his eyes as he handed her the garment.
“I’ll let you have the bathroom,” she told him, not unkindly.
“You’re feeling better?” He knew he sounded worried. The flash in her eyes made him uncomfortable. Why didn’t she want his concern?
“I am. Hopefully that’s it for today.”
But as the days passed, the hope proved to be fruitless. The morning sickness, or all freaking day sickness, as it were, only continued to get worse. She was pretty sure she vomited more in the last seven days than she had in her collective lifespan. All in all, she felt like death warmed over, looked like it, too.
It was the make-out session of his life. Not that Ron hadn’t ever had any great make-out sessions, but none of them had felt quite like this. Lavender…well. He shuddered mentally as Susan’s fingers dug into his shoulders, her body adjusting under his. He stifled a groan as her thigh ghosted over his hard on. Lavender was something he tried not to think about. He’ll never know what he was thinking while he had been with her. He shouldn’t think ill of the dead, though. Hermione had been a great kisser, but never into it enough for his taste. It had been like she was fulfilling a job description. Lizzie…well, even though he had wanted Lizzie to be more, he imagined kissing Lizzie was what kissing Ginny would be like. He grimaced.
“What’s wrong?” Susan breathed, planting a few chaste kisses at the corner of his mouth before returning to seal her lips soundly over his, tracing the seam of his maw with her pert, little tongue.
“Just thought of something stupid,” he muttered, pulling away after another intense, tongue-filled smooch. He nudged her chin with his nose so he could nip at her neck. She gave a satisfied little hmm in the back of her throat that increased the excitement, her nails ran down his back over his jumper.
They were in Hermione’s Head Girl room (a place he, Harry, and Lizzie took turns using for their make out sessions and romps with Hermione being absent and or hardly ever utilizing the room herself.
Which is why, when the girl in question bolted into her room fifteen minutes later, making a beeline for the bathroom without noticing her friends on the bed, he and Susan almost toppled to the floor. They quickly started to right their clothing before they realized what was happening.
“I think she’s throwing up!” Susan whispered, horrified. Sure enough, the unmistakable sounds of sick echoed around the room, the door to the loo wide open.
“Oi! Hermione!” Ron exclaimed, dashing in to check on his friend. He watched in dismay as the poor girl was sick two more times before spitting, wiping her face with toilet tissue, flushing, and flopping onto her hip in exhaustion. She looked up at him, dazedly realizing he and Susan were staring at her in a mix of confusion and concern.
“Do you need to go to the hospital wing?” Susan asked, eyes wide.
“Blimey, I’ve never seen anyone throw up that hard in my life.” Ron was awed. “I have four brothers who got bloody trashed over the hols, too.”
This made Hermione give a little squeak of hysterical laughter that had boyfriend and girlfriend exchanging worried looks.
“Hey!” Ginny’s voice came from the doorway. “’Mione in here? I thought I saw her running through the hall.”
“I got her here!” Ron called out. “She’s sick.”
“Should I get Professor Snape?”
He watched Hermione shake her head violently before she gagged and drove herself back up on her knees to dry heave over the loo. “She says no, but I think that’s a good idea.”
Susan was wetting a flannel and kindly pressed it to Hermione’s forehead after the heaving stopped. She watched the girl take steady, calming breaths, swallowing loudly between each. She didn’t miss the protective hand the curly-haired brunette had curled to her lower abdomen. Ron left the loo to give the girls some privacy when Susan told him she would help Hermione until Snape arrived.
“Hermione?” The lovely redhead asked softly. “Are you pregnant?”
Wide, startled, and terrified brown and amber eyes met blue. “Oh, honey.” Susan plopped down next to the girl she had known of for eight years, but was just starting to really get to know. She threw an arm around her shoulders and pulled her in. “When are you due?”
Hermione stiffened and pulled away from the girl, effectively ending the attempted connection. “September. Listen. Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Does anyone know?”
“Yes. Severus, Madam Pomfrey, and Professor McGonagall.”
“You haven’t told Ron or Harry?”
“NO!” Susan jumped at her vehemence. “I’m…I’m not ready. It’s too early yet.” Susan nodded hesitantly.
“I won’t tell anyone. I swear.”
“Hermione!” It was Harry. He skidded to a stop at the bathroom door and watched as Hermione pulled herself to her feet and brushed her teeth. “You all right? Ginny said you’re sick.”
“I’m fine,” she assured him quietly. She wasn’t looking anyone in the eye. “I’m going to head back to the dungeons, guys. I’m tired. Maybe I have a little stomach bug.”
“I’ll escort you.” Severus’s deep, thundering baritone came from the doorway and she looked up. Her friends were watching the interaction closely and she attempted to smile at him, but it looked more like a grimace of pain.
“’Mione,” Ginny said, sounding artificially bright. “We’re going to Hogsmeade this weekend. Lizzie has a date with Draco and his friends, but you should come with us, Luna, and Neville. We’ll go to Honeydukes and pick up some of that caramel nougat you like so much.”
Hermione’s stomach twisted violently at the thought and she covered her mouth with her hand, trying to stave off another gagging episode. She looked wildly at Severus, imploring him to get her out of there quickly. He wasn’t any help at the moment. He was watching her interact with her friends.
“Thanks Ginny, but I’m going to stay in this weekend. I’m so behind in Runes and Arithmancy. I haven’t been feeling well.”
“Oh, come off it, Hermione,” Ron teased, trying to lighten the mood as he slung an arm over her shoulder. “You being behind still means you’re at least a week ahead.” His comment was met by chuckles, which abruptly cut off when she lifted her chin and glared at him, ducking out from under his arm. Harry reached for her, but she side stepped him to avoid the familiar touch.
“I’m actually behind,” she snapped. “Truly behind. Life hasn’t exactly been easy for me at the moment, Ronald!” Her words were sharp and Ron and Harry flinched, being forcibly reminded of the Hermione wearing Slytherin’s locket on a day with no food. She caught their jerky movements and instantly felt bad. Severus raised an eyebrow at her. Anger was good. Anger was better than no emotions. He was disappointed when it fizzled as quickly as it had come. “I’m sorry.” Her voice dropped into a monotone and her eyes fell to the floor, her arms wrapping around herself as she avoided a hug from Ginny. “I can’t come – I really don’t want to. I’m…I’m just not there yet.”
The boys nodded at her, and Ginny looked hurt. She crossed the room and brushed past Severus. He let her go a few paces ahead, turning back the small group of her closest friends. “Please keep trying.” He all but begged them. The quartet stared after their teacher in silent shock. They were pretty sure they’d never heard the man say please. However, the desperation in his voice said so much more.
“I made an appointment for you with Dr. Jenkins.” He lifted one eyebrow when her head whipped around so she could glare daggers at him. “That’s the most reaction I’ve gotten out of you in days,” he told her stoically, brushing off her ire flippantly.
“I’m not going.”
“You are. Monday. Six o’clock. I will escort you myself and stay in the waiting room during your session. You will continue with him until you have returned to some semblance of yourself.”
“Whatever.” Hermione turned back to her Arithmancy texts and notes, no infliction or tone in her voice. Severus felt his shoulders drop.
“Have you tried the lozenges Poppy sent for you?” He attempted again to engage her in conversation.
“They smell terrible.” She muttered. He closed his eyes briefly, praying for strength. He would not be angry with her, he would not. She was being so God-damned exasperating, but he could not upset her worse. She was just too fragile.
“I’m still researching anti-nausea potions. There are two that should be okay, I’m just looking up correlations with pregnancies.”
“Okay.” The answer was brief, uncaring.
“I’ll leave you at it, then.” He turned to leave her room, where she did all her studying. She had put herself to bed the night before – in her own bed. She had never even come in to say goodnight to him, he had just found her passed out under the covers around midnight when he had come to bring her to bed. He paused in the doorway. “You’re sleeping in here again?”
“I don’t know.” She didn’t look up, but he saw her shoulders tense.
“Come say goodnight at least?” he requested, softening his voice. He didn’t keep out the longing, her attempts to break away from him were starting to scare him. He missed her; he missed her mind, her laughter, and the way she felt in his arms.
“Sure.” The answer was laced with noncommittal.
He sighed and walked back to her, settling his hands on her shoulders gently. She jerked at his touch and he pulled away as if she had burned him. They didn’t say anything. He stared at the back of her head, not seeing her stare blankly at the wall, tears forming in the corners of her eyes. “Goodnight, Severus,” she finally said in a tight voice.
He left without a word, the door closing with a soft click behind him. She was angry with herself. She wasn’t sure what was making her do it. If she kept pushing like this, he would break. She wasn’t a stupid girl. He wouldn’t put up with her being like this much longer. She had to figure out how to pull herself together, or he would leave. Was that what she wanted?
She just felt so…at war with herself. The logical part of her mind knew she was depressed, that she needed help to get through this. She was fighting a losing battle; she couldn’t continue to fight her demons alone. She was pushing away everyone she loved and didn’t know how to stop.
She wanted her mother, more than anything. Jean Granger had a way of being able to wrap her arms protectively around her daughter and make everything okay again, no matter how bad it had gotten. She would never have that again. Her hand dropped to her still-flat stomach. There was a little hard ball, now, if she lay on her belly. Outside of the fatigued and overwhelming nausea and vomiting, there were no real signs she was carrying a life inside of her. She wished she had someone she could talk to about pregnancy. The longing for her mother pinged again and she gave up studying as a bad job.
She stripped to her knickers and crawled into the lonely, cold four-poster bed. She knew it was hurting Severus that she couldn’t be by him, but she just couldn’t stand it. She felt filthy, soiled, tainted. Used by disgusting men and hung out dry, left for dead on the stoop of hospital. Muddy – dirty. A dirty Mudblood. A sob forced its way out of her chest. She didn’t want him to touch her, to soil himself. He was too good for her.
She didn’t know he was standing on the other side of the door, listening to her sob with tears pooled in his own eyes.
Lizzie wasn’t sure if she had ever laughed so hard in her entire life. Theodore Nott was a bloody riot and a half and was only egged on by Blaise and Draco. The three had been exchanging childhood horror stories all evening. Some were downright appalling, and she wasn’t always sure if she should be laughing or crying – such as the time Theo’s father told him his dog ran away after having killed it himself for chewing up a pair of his favorite slippers. The way he told the stories, though, made her feel like he just wanted everyone to laugh. Almost as if it would take away the tension that was his life growing up as the son of a Death Eater.
Draco’s angry parent stories were nowhere near as bad as Theo’s (as apparently his parents did love each other and their son), and Blaise had grown up without a father. All three were only children and were fascinated with her explanation of having to go to bed early because of sharing a room with a younger sibling or fighting over who got the biggest piece of meat because there was only one for each person at every meal. She had a hard time coming to terms with what must’ve been a lonely upbringing.
“But we weren’t alone,” Theo insisted after taking a swig off his third tankard of butterbeer. They had finished lunch an hour before. “We had each other. We were tutored together,” he explained when Lizzie raised a questioning eyebrow.
“Yeah,” Draco said. “Blaise and Theo would floo to the Manor every day during the week to study. Blimey, we got up to such shenanigans. That poor tutor. What was her name?” All three boys were laughing and Lizzie couldn’t help but grin as they reminisced.
“I don’t remember,” Blaise said. “Do you remember when we were six, though? And Theo hadn’t had any accidental magic yet?”
Draco guffawed and choked a bit on a sip of butterbeer while Theo gave a look of mock indignation. “Now…guys. I don’t think Lizzie needs to hear this one…”
“Oh, Lizzie most certainly does,” Lizzie quipped, her grin turning to chuckles as the other two boys laughed harder.
“We convinced him to climb up on top of the Garden shed off the East orchard. We had snuck away from that blasted tutor…what the hell was her name, you guys?” Draco could barely breathe between the words and the laughter, they were starting to get stares from other tables at The Three Broomsticks and Madam Rosmerta shot them a warning look, although even she was smiling.
Both the other boys shrugged still chortling merrily.
“Anyway, anyway,” Blaise continued. “We convinced him to climb up the garden shed and then insisted he could fly. We stood underneath him telling him to jump.”
“I was bloody scared out of my mind!” Theo recalled as tears started streaming down his cheeks. “But, they were my mates, yeah? So I freaking jumped!”
“Just as the tutor – guys…gonna drive me barmy, what is her bloody name?! – comes running up waving her arms like a crazy person screaming ‘Don’t do it, Theo! You’re gonna die!’ but Theo had already jumped.”
“I freaking heard her, too. So, here I’m already jumping and now I’m one hundred percent sure I’m going to die. I screamed all the way down.” All three boys were hysterical and Lizzie was laughing just because of their reactions to each other.
“What happened?” She insisted when no one continued. “Obviously you didn’t die!” More laughter before Theo was able to choke out an answer.
“I bounced!”
“Like one of those Muggle rubber balls…boing, boing, boing,” Draco used his finger in the air to demonstrate the leap frog pattern his young friend had taken once hitting the ground from the top of the garden shed and they all dissolved into a riot of giggles again. Lizzie was swiping tears from her eyes at their antics.
It took many more minutes for them all to calm and if any of them said “boing, boing, boing” they were off again in a riot. Finally, after a smiling, but frustrated Madam Rosmerta told them to stuff it or get out, they calmed enough to wipe their eyes and clear their throats.
“I gotta use the loo,” Draco said once they were sipping their beers and giving each other smirks behind their mugs. “I’ll be right back.” He leaned in and kissed Lizzie on the forehead then shot a warning look at his friends. “Be. Nice. Do not scare her away or I’ll kill you.” He said pointedly.
The other two boys shared an innocent glance as if to say “Who? Us?” Before nodding.
The moment Draco was gone, they pounced on her. “Dear sweet Circe, what have you done to him?” Blaise asked, grinning. “He’s never been this happy, ever. It’s refreshing to see.”
“I think he’s in lo-oo-ove with you, Miss America,” Theo teased, stretching the ‘o’ in love out to three syllables.
Lizzie felt her face go bright red, but her eyes sparkled. All those brothers meant she was quite used to being teased relentlessly. “I sure hope so. I feel the same way.”
Both boys started making smoochy noises at each other. “Draco’s in lo-ove, Draco’s in lo-ove.” They chanted before she waved at them to stop, grinning.
“Well, Miss America, welcome to the club, then.” Theo raised his drink and motioned for the other two at the table to do the same.
“What club?” Lizzie laughed, raising her glass. She was confused.
“The People Who Love Draco Club, of course,” Blaise said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Now that you’re a member, you’re probably stuck for life. He’s hard to get over, that one. No matter how upset he makes you.”
Lizzie silently agreed from her personal experience back in October. “I can see that,” she conceded. “I take it if you’re initiating me to this club, you approve?”
“You bet your beautiful eyes we do,” Blaise winked at her flirtatiously and she felt color rise in her cheeks again.
“And as one of us,” Theo continued. “Know that you can always come to us if you need help. Us Slytherins stick by our own, and you, Miss America, are now an honorary Slytherin…being you’re dating the Prince and all.”
They clinked their glasses with smiles and laughter and more banter. She would toast to that. She couldn’t be more grateful that Draco had these friends in his corner, they seemed like really great guys.
*With this chapter I officially broke 100,000 words and 200 typed Word Document page! I’ve never written anything this long before! O.O
*Petechia – plural petechiae – small red or purple spots on the skin caused by a minor bleed from broken capillary blood vessels. (This happened to me with my third pregnancy – it is a very real thing.)

AN: Just in case I have some people out there not liking or thinking the morning sickness scenes are unbelievable I will raise my hand. Me. Every. Single. Pregnancy. And I was dumb enough to do it four times in eight years. My third pregnancy was by far the worst, I was diagnoses with hyperemesis gravidarum and had to be hospitalized twice with IV's for fluids and lost 35 pounds my first trimester. Being this sick is a real thing, peeps.
Mistress: So thrilled to see you still with me! SOOO glad you liked the chapter and that things met your expectation. Damn it was hard to get over that block. I'll promise you here and now that this is a HEA. ;o)
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...After Happily Ever After