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It Was Supposed to be Over	By : nmos Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Snape/Hermione Views: 4437 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or anything associated with HP/i do not make money from this.

Chapter List
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Chapter 3

When Severus finally arrived at his home at Spinner’s End, Hermione was waiting for him at his front door.

“Please, after you,” was his sarcastic response to her expectant look. “Due to my current state, my wards should be down.” He may need her help, but he did not have to like it. In many ways, Snape was putting himself in the most vulnerable position he had ever been in. Granger could up and decide she was done helping him, and he had no threat or promise to keep her there.

He knew that the only hope he had to make her see this task through was to be nice, or at least cordial. But to do that, he would first have to trust her. Severus had trusted few people in his life. He supposed he had trusted Dumbledore to ensure the defeat of Voldemort and even the Order not to reveal his status as a spy. However, he had been twelve or thirteen years old the last time that he had trusted someone with something as selfish as his happiness or well being and that had not ended well at all.

Coming out of his reverie, he realized that the Granger girl was rambling apologies and explanations of how she was really only trying to be polite by waiting for him to enter his house first and, of course, she had known the wards were down immediately and how next time she would just barge in, if that was what he really wanted.

“Miss Granger, I apologize for my tone. This is a rather unique situation for me.” Hermione was slightly shocked. Professor Snape had always seemed like a man who did not excuse himself or explain his thoughts to anyone.

“Right…Well, that’s alright. It’s strange for me too,” she awkwardly replied as she finally opened the front door.

Hermione walked into his sitting room, feeling Snape’s presence behind her. Hermione looked around herself in awe; Snape certainly hadn’t made clear the size of his personal collection. She had always just assumed that he kept most of his books with him at Hogwarts. After all, his classroom and office both held sizable collections, and she was sure his private quarters also housed a small library. However, apparently Snape kept, perhaps, two thirds of his collection at his residence in Spinner’s End. Every room she could see from the sitting room had floor to ceiling bookcases that were all thoroughly filled.

Snape smiled smugly to himself as he watched her take in his collection. Perhaps he did have something to offer the bookworm: full access to his library. Granted, most of the time her studying would have to be devoted to getting him out of this insufferable situation, but maybe if she succeeded, he would leave his collection to her in his will. He wondered if he should tell her this, but decided against it. She probably wouldn’t agree to help him recover his mortality if she knew he only wanted it back so that he could die properly this time. His (hopefully) impending suicide would definitely not fit into her storybook view of how her good deed would play out.

“There will be time for getting acquainted with my personal collection and potions stores in the morning,” he said, glancing at the clock which now read eleven o’clock at night. “You’ll need your rest. If you follow me, I’ll show you where you’ll be staying.”

Hermione followed him up the stairs and into a small bedroom to the left of the staircase. The wardrobe door in the corner had been left ajar and she could see a few formal black robes inside. Otherwise, the room was bare save for a bed and a tattered copy of her old Potions textbook. She recognized it immediately; it was the copy that Harry had used in their sixth year. So…this must have been Snape’s bedroom. She looked up at him in surprise.

He looked away uncomfortably, realizing that she had figured out that this was his bedroom. This was yet another downside of this necessary arrangement; not only would he have to trust someone, he would also have to sacrifice his privacy.

“Yes, well, there is only one other bedroom, and it was my parents’. This is merely the lesser of two evils. You can sleep on the couch if you would rather not stay here,” he offered.

“No, thank you. This will be fine. I was just…surprised.”

“I’ll leave you to get settled in,” he replied as he headed back down the stairs.

Hermione looked around the barren room. She supposed it was possible that it contained more possessions than the lone book and few robes in the summer when Snape resided here, but for some reason she doubted that. She took her trunk out of her pocket, returned it to its normal size, and began to unpack. She felt odd at placing her own robes in the wardrobe next to her former professor’s forbidding black teaching robes. She also wasn’t quite sure what to do with her own books, or whether or not she would need to change the sheets on the bed.

Deciding that she’d really rather not ask Snape either of these questions, especially the latter, she left her books in her trunk and began to get ready for bed. As she slipped underneath the covers, she confirmed that he had slept in this bed without replacing it with new sheets. There was no mistaking the distinct smell of potions and cloves that she had always associated with the Potions Master. At first she felt awkward about that. But, he hadn’t offered her clean sheets and, it was a long shot, but maybe the reminder that she was in the house of this very brave man, who had helped them win the war and may have saved her own life countless times, would help keep the nightmares at bay.

Downstairs Snape was realizing that, as a ghost, nights were going to be the worst time. Left alone with his thoughts for eight hours or so would surely be enough to drive anyone mad. He vaguely wondered if ghosts could go mad and his mind instantly shot to Peeves. What had he been like before death? He looked up at the clock on the mantelpiece; it had only been half an hour since he had left Hermione in his bedroom. It was certainly strange that every night he would be waiting in anticipation for Hermione Granger to awaken so that they could work on this project, so that he would not be alone.

To pass the time he began to scan the bookcases for titles that looked promising. He had found a handfull of possibilities and had even passed four hours when he heard one of the steps squeak. He spun around quickly to see who the intruder was, only to find Hermione, in her night clothes, frozen in the middle of the staircase staring back at him. He realized that he must look a bit menacing, since he had thought she had been an intruder, perhaps a Death Eater that had managed to survive the battle.

“I did not mean to startle you, Miss Granger. I was just surprised to see you. I wasn’t expecting you to be up at half past three in the morning.”

“I’ve been having nightmares,” she admitted embarrassedly. “I was hoping to fix a cup of tea.”

“Of course. I also should have a stock of Dreamless Sleep if you’d prefer that,” he told her as he led her to the kitchen.

“I’ve thought of that. But I’m a bit afraid to develop a dependency. I think it’s probably better for me to deal with this on my own, without potions. You know, that’s partially why I decided I would help you, no matter what you asked.”

“Helping me will not erase what happened that day.”

“I know that,” she said sullenly as she filled up the kettle and placed it on the stove top. “But at least I’ll be doing something that matters. If I’m doing something for you, for someone I respect who I should have tried harder to help before, then I’m sure I’ll be able to put my full energy into it until I’m too spent to think about anything else.”

After she admitted that she respected him, he almost felt bad that the thing she thought ‘mattered’ wouldn’t turn out the way she thought it would, but said nothing. She poured herself a cup of tea and sat at his table.

“Professor?”

“Yes?”

“When you said that there was a mistake...How did that happen? What exactly happened after you…” she trailed off guiltily.

“After I died,” he finished for her with a biting tone.

“Well…yes,” she admitted. He looked away irritably, annoyed that this question had come up. He should have known that the girl’s questions would come.

“Please, sir, it might help us when we’re trying to resurrect you. Sir Nicholas said something about how if you’re afraid to die…”

“No!” he growled, cutting her off. “I was not afraid to die.” His tone made her afraid to pursue the topic any further at that time. However, she tucked away this conversation for later consideration. There was an awkward pause as Hermione nervously sipped at her tea.

After a long while Snape said, “While you were sleeping, I looked through some of the bookshelves. Maybe before you go back to bed, you could take down the relevant texts that I’ve come across.” She nodded and finished her tea before placing her empty cup in the sink and following him into the sitting room.

When she had gathered the books together in a small pile, she bid her ex-professor goodnight as she climbed the stairs to his old bedroom for the second time that night. This was certainly an interesting situation. She hoped that they could reach some sort of friendship while working on this together. Otherwise it would be difficult for her to continually deal with his irritability and obvious dislike for her. She supposed she could do her part, starting tomorrow morning, by avoiding asking him personal questions until they were on a friendlier basis, if that ever happened. Before she had brought up the subject of what had gone wrong after he died, they had been getting on alright, after all. He had offered her a potion for her nightmares without her even having to ask for it.

As Hermione tucked herself back into Snape’s old bed she promised herself that tomorrow she would start trying to stay on his good side.

A/N: again, thanks to Carolib for betaing this chapter. thanks for the reviews! they're often helpful so please continue! :)
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It Was Supposed to be Over