Imprisoned

"Say something," Black rasps from his side of the cramped cell, and I wonder if he's going to shout at me again. It's been two cycles of alternating light and dark, two days, since the last time we've said anything to each other. I was beginning to feel like I had something to be thankful for again. No such luck. Such is life.

Perhaps if I close my eyes and pretend I've fallen asleep--

"Oh bloody hell, Snape! You get about as much sleep as I do, so just shove it!"

I feel the beginnings of anger prickling along my skin and it's a welcome sensation. "I do get about as much sleep as you do. I would ask your forgiveness for attempting to remedy that annoying problem if I thought for one moment it's any of your business. As it is, I don't." My eyes remain closed. For a moment there is a blessed silence, and I can feel myself sigh with relief. I don't want to hear any more incriminations from Black. Silence is preferable.

It only lasts for a moment. He starts to giggle to himself in bursts that increase in volume--exponentially.

"May I ask what you find so amusing, Black?" I say in a tone that makes it immensely clear just how stupid I think he really is. It takes about a minute or so more before Black can control his mirth enough to answer my inquiry.

"I was just thinking how sodding rich it is that I'm sitting here on a dirty floor practically begging Snape of all people to give me a bloody conversation. Snape! You! Snape!" He starts to giggle again.

I stare at him. "This really just proves you're just as crazy as I always thought you were, Black." He laughs harder, and I watch him: this man who was my enemy in our school days, this man who hates me, who I hated. Hated... I look at him, his hair ragged and tangled, his skin gray from from weeks of built up grime, his eyes haunted with the death of his loved ones. Has it really only been four years since we were both at Hogwarts? He was arrogant, rash and careless then, and I hated him. He's still arrogant, rash and careless now. Do I hate him?

"I didn't mean to kill you," he says suddenly, halting the giggles.

"What?"

His gray eyes light on me, and they glitter with emotion: guilt, frustration, and hate. "Remus. The Shrieking Shack. I didn't mean it, Severus." I try to call up the appropriate anger at that incident so long ago (or was it not so long ago?); it doesn't come. That lump of hatred inside me had dissolved somehow during the nights of stretching silence as he we cried in the black of our own regrets.

He's never called me Severus before, not outside of his mockery.

"I should hate you." An echo of my own thoughts, and yet he is the one that utters the words. I should hate you, but I can't anymore. I don't have my hate anymore; I have nothing; I am bereft. He continues. "You don't believe I'm innocent and I should hate you because I'm beginning to not believe. But I'm starting to think we're alike and damn it, Snape, I'm starting not to care whether you're a Death Eater or not."

"I am," I lie, though I guess it might be the truth. Something in my chest clamps tightly as a deathly cold grabs me and I bite my tongue bloody to keep from shivering. The dementors are here again. "We're nothing alike, Black." He feels it too; I glance at him and see him shiver, eyes screwing shut, face distorted. No, we're nothing alike. I sigh inwardly.

"Talk to me, Black." The dementor presses against us, silent and dark and cold and choking.

"I didn't kill them! I didn't kill them! I didn't kill them, I didn't kill them, I DIDN'T KILL THEM!!" The dementor presses closer, drawn to us--to him-- to his panic and distress.

"Merlin, Black," I say, struggling to keep my voice level. "I heard you the first time. Shut up."

"Believe me, damn it! Believe me! You're a Death Eater! You'd know if I was one of yours. BELIEVE ME!" The dementor is stroking his cheek softly, as if comforting him. I don't even want to think about what it's putting into his mind. It doesn't matter whether I believe you or not, I want to say. It doesn't matter, because we'll never see another human being again.

"I believe you, Black. Now shut up." He does shut up, and the dementor drifts away after a while.

-------
"Snape."

"What?"

"Does it feel better? To be an actual murderer rather than a framed one?" I open my eyes and he's staring at me again. He's been staring since the dementor left how many hours ago. His beard is getting long; he was always so clean-shaven in school.

"I don't know, Black." It's no use fighting him in here. He'll just start screaming until I answer him, no doubt. Insufferable sod. "I've never actually been framed." All my crimes are real.

"It really doesn't make a different does it?" he asks in his raspy voice.

"No, not really."
-------
"What if I told you I was going to kill myself?"

I snort, ignoring the twinge of...something in my chest. "What if I told you I was spying on the Dark Lord for Dumbledore?"

"I'd tell you to go fuck yourself."

"After I was so willing to believe your lies about Potter's death, Black?" I retort. I clench my hands into fists for no apparent reason.

"I won't kill myself. I still have Harry to look after."

"Potter's son. Already being called The Boy Who Lived," I drawl, and then he does something he's never done before. He smiles.

"My godson. He knew I couldn't have children the way I am, and so he gave Harry to me. I promised to protect him with my life."

The way you are? "Musn't die then."

He's still staring, and I'm suddenly afraid he can somehow see through my cool mask. What lies underneath even I don't know. I don't want to know. He crawls over to me, and I force myself to stay still, not move away. "You don't want me to die," he whispers when he's just inches away from me, crowding into the corner that is supposed to be mine alone. His eyes gray eyes are intense, and I watch as they gradually deepen with something akin to understanding. I feel my stomach knot, and my hands are wet with sweat.

"Say it," he commands in his raspy voice, and his hand grips my arm. I don't tell him to let go, even as it burns. The first human touch I've had in weeks.

"No," I say, whether it's a refusal to answer or the answer itself I don't know. He seems content with it, though, and settles against my wall, his body warm beside me, his grip gone, but our sides brushing against each other as we breathe.