an awfully big adventure...

“Ah, Black.” Snape said calmly as Black looked to Hermione as if she were a large bug “I’m in an unexpected bind as it is right now. We’ll have to meet another time. Perhaps next week.”

Black looked to Hermione and Snape side by side, standing beside a large cauldron. They looked like they had been working for several hours. Probably had been.

“Hello Professor Black.” Hermione said quietly, and uncertainly looking from him to Snape, who was intently gazing at the bubbling potion from below them.

Black didn’t knhethhether to cry or scream at Hermione for being some mudblood tramp. She was here STEALING his time with Snape!!! He spoke almost growling, to a quizzical Snape

“So sorry to interrupt Severus...” he said looking at Hermione smarmily, as if to say; ‘I can call him Severus…can you?’ “But, you said I was to do a Potion I knew of?”

Snape looked confused a moment, his weary face fatigued as he tried to place the words Black had just uttered, then nodded slightly.

“Ah. Yes.” Snape said stirring the mixture and stepping rather close to a now flustered Hermione. He reached around her to grab some nettles, brushing against her cloaked arm and making her blush involuntarily as she shot a strained look at Black and back to a nodding Snape.

“I was going to get you to assist me on a Potion for Lupin.” Snape said measuring the nettles and bird wings, “About his werewolf relapses.”

Black nodded, the wind out of his sails now as he looked to Hermione and Snape all cozy and making a bubbling potion together. Hermione was still wondering why Snape had invited Black to do anything with him.

Snape certainly hadn’t been that eager to help her in the first place. Forcing her to assist him, it was almost torture in itself. And now he was so sweet and nice to Black? She was almost…jealous? No. That wasn’t right.

“What’s that?” Black asked curiously, looking at the potion. Hermione looked like she was to faint, and Black assumed it was guilt from trying to steal Snape from under his nose.

“It’s to reverse a Lust Potion.” Snape answered rapidly walking around and getting various ingentsents and adding them as Hermione stirred the concoction rapidly, the sweat pouring off of her.

“Well, could I help?” Black asked gently. Hermione looked to him surprised. He decided to be tactful and looked to Snape casually.

“I mean, so Hermione could take a break. It seems the potion needs to be stirred regularly.”

“Yes…all the time it’s being prepped.” Snape said absently looking to Hermione brushing her hair from her eyes, then dragged his eyes reluctantly to meet Black’s. “Are you sure?”

Black didn’t answer, but scowled at Hermione surreptitiously and took the ladle from her, nudging her behind him as he looked back to Snape.

An hour later Snape informed them that they had to conclude for the evening, and began writing on some parchment. Hermione smoothed her robes and headed for the door.

“I’ll see you on Thursday of next week, Miss Granger. Five o’clock sharp.” Snape said absently, marking something on a piece of parchment.

Black’s eyes narrowed on a now rigid Hermione, as she nd and and ducked out the door, slamming it by accident.

“That girl will be the death of me.” Although he said the words with certainty, Black couldn’t help but notice the small smirk that had crept onto Snape’s pale lips.

“You’re seeing her, Thursday?” Black asked casually, fuming inwardly that she had caused him to almost smile. “Why are you meeting again?”

Snape looked to him with questioning in hyes,yes, and raised an eyebrow. “As her Potions teacher I am obligated to help her in a certain…predicament.” He flinched as he added, “If it’s that big a deal Black, you may help next week as well.”

“But…you hate her.” Black blurted out hastily, then stammering continued with a shaky, “Er, I mean. You always say how your time is of the essence, I suppose I’m just wondering why you’d spend your free time with a know-it-all Gryffindor.”

Snape looked up to Black exasperated and a bit confused “The Potion takes four months to create. During certain times it has to be added to, stirred and etc…it’s a large job and as I said before…I’m obligated.” He looked to Black darkly, his lips pursing in thought,

“And since when do you call Miss Granger a know-it-all Gryffindor? Your own godson is one.”

Black felt his collar tighten as Snape stood staring at him with those dark black orbs boring into him, with those powerful arms crossed over his chest. A chest that had become muscular he imagined, not at all like the skinny little git they had picked on so often.

His mind went fleetingly to their seventh year, when he and James had jumped Snape in the washroom, washing his pale hands and glaring at his own reflection in the mirror. Then James and he had come from nowhere and were suddenly beside him, as he turned suddenly with wand poised as if he’d been expecting it. Poor boy, always living in fear.

He grimaced as he recalled helping James shove Snape’s head into an empty toilet, flusflushing until the poor git started screaming and trying to hex , hi, his wand waving all over the place. They had backed away, as he kneeled sputtering and calling them every name imaginable.

They had laughed uproariously, slapping each other high fives and then muttering quick incantation as they snapped their fingers and they were at the back of their Defense against the Dark Arts class, their books still raised as if they had been behind them the whole time. No one had noticed their sudden disappearance or reappearance.

Snape had bounded in moments later with the old Headmaster. Severus’ upper body was soaked, with his dark hair all disarray, some parts sticking up with his pale face shining with water.

Lily had looked to him sorrowfully, glaring at James and Black, and going back to her books. Snape had let his gaze fall on her a moment, before his face hardened again and he started frantically screaming and pointing at James and Black.

“THEY WERE THE ONE’S!” He screamed, his face turning into a horribly angry sneer, “THEY WERE THE ONE’S WHO JUMPED ME IN THE LAVATORY!”

The old Headmaster, whose name escaped Black now, had looked at James and Black disapprovingly,

“Did you do this to Severus Mister Potter? Mister Black?” heed ped plainly, as Severus nodded emphatically beside him.

“No Headmaster. We’ve been in class the whole time.” James said innocently, “Ask anyone here.”

The class nodded save for Lily whose face was still buried behind her book. She refused to help Snape after last year’s horror.

Professor Benson, the DADA teacher at the time shrugged her narrow shoulders, “As far as I know, Headmaster. They’ve been here the whole time.”

“Yeah Snivellus, we’ve been here the whole time.” Black had said haughtily, surreptitiously smiling at James and then winking at Snape when the old Headmaster’s back was turned.

“YOU DID SO!” Snape screamed exasperatedly, looking imploringly to a shrugging headmaster. Snape’s eyes turnedfty fty as he glared scathingly at James and Black.

“Sev, pl, please-“ The professor had said with pity, for she knew that no one in their right mind’s tolerated Snape’s attitude, or superior sneers.

“Oh, just shut up.” Snape had said looking to the bewildered Professor. “Just shut up. I’ll have your job in less than a year anyway. So live it up while you can.” then his dark gaze had landed on James and a bemused Black, who were shaking their heads like they felt sorry for him.

“I hate you.”

Was all Snape had said hissing, like the snake his house emblem bore. Then turning on one wet heel he had slammed the door behind him. The Headmaster had a few words with Professor Benson who looked near tears.

Those three venom-filled words now rang in Black’s ears as he continued to relive the horror that he had caused on the poor boy.

“Well?”

Black’s head cleared as he saw the man that Severus had become. Not the scared, pale, little boy they had picked on during school. Now he was a foreboding, strong, dark man that had an air of confidence he had acquired with careful deliberation. Snape rolled those dark eyes of his, gazing back to him.

“Well, what are you looking at, Black?”

Black suddenly grew tense, and blinked rapidly as he backed away slowly. His eyes were wide seeming to know something Snape didn’t.

“I’m sorry.”

Was all he said, before running out the door, leaving Snape bewildered and confused. He regretted telling Black he could come back to help. He certainly didn’t want Black’s help, understatement of the year. He didn’t want a strange Black around him at all but decided rudeness was not the way to get Minerva off his back. Plus… he still had his plan.
________________________________________

Hermione fell onto her bed, wondering why she had been so desperate for male affection in the first place. She certainly wasn’t that eager for it, was she?

Snape certainly seemed eager to help yousaid that playful voice again, as Hermione pushed it from her head.

‘He’s an educated and miserable man.’ She thought to herself, as if trying to explain to that pesky voice that he was not in her thoughts at all.

Sure sure the voice said craftily. You don’t find him attractin tin the least?

‘Of course not!.’

Don’t find him attractive, sure. Don’t wonder what could be under those dark cloaks of his?…wonder if he’s as imaginative with those lips as hewithwith those insults.

Hermione laughed aloud at this perverse thought. Kiss Professor Snape? That was funny. Ha Ha Ha. She could see him recoiling in horror as he pushed her back, and with her luck, probably into a large rack of acids and she’d be permanently scarred for life…what a horribly dark thoug

\'Something Snape’d say\' the damned voice was getting on her nerves.

She ignored it and continued on her Potions homework, her eyes intently focused on the large parchment before her.

“Woflsbane…tarantula legs…” short mutterings like this erupted from her lips as she continued working, well into midnight, where she promptly dropped the quill, packed it in her bag and swept into some pajama\'s.

Black’s face swam into her mind as she lay under the currently cold covers. She shivered and smiled as her own cold hands trailed down her hot body as she imagined him all rugged and smiling at her.

She could almost feel his warm hands all over her, as she succumbed to her own petty wants, her hands trailed further, as her back arched and she waited for the explosion. Nothing.

Suddenly another face was blurring but coming into view, Black was rapidly gone and suddenly there was Snape.

Snape gave her a savage and rough smirk before his tongue suddenly darted out, in a very snake-like manner, tickled one already erect nipple as she moaned, as her hands went faster and further.

“No…” she murmured as the dream Snape kissed her throat now, his hands trailing down her stomach, he stopped in this fantasy, giving her an imploring look as Hermione suddenly felt no hindrance at this, and kissed his false lips with savage wanting.

“Yes…Yes…”

She cooed to the clouding figure of Snape, his hands sliding near the inside of her shaking thighs and then

…there was the explosion she had been waiting for. Her eyes shut tightly as the pleasure fed her. Her sweaty head hit the pillow roughly, her loud moans of pleasure sounding all around her, as her thighs continued bucking for several moments as the spasm of pure ecstasy invaded all of her. And she was thankful she had a room to herself.

She was panting and gasping for air as she licked her lips, still tasting Snape on them. No no no…this was all wrong. She wanted Black. A handsome, funny and sexy Sirius Black. Most definitely NOT a greasy, miserable and boring Severus Snape.

“I DON’T LIKE PROFESSOR SNAPE!.” She suddenly exclaimed out of nowhere, still panting and at this loud declaration goosebumps rose all over her body and she shivered. Suddenly the voice was back.

\'Who are you trying to convince?\'