Rain

The rain had finally begun a steady, depressing fall as he emerged from the castle proper and set out across the field towards Hooch's cottage. He glowered some more at the clouds, faintly annoyed that they didn't respond to his glare as students did, and muttered the ever useful Umbrellus Charm to keep the steady rain from drenching him to the skin. His long legs carried him quickly across ground that was well on its way to becoming muddy.

It wasn't a storm, not yet; but if the ominous piling of dark thunderheads was any indication, the next day or two was likely to get there. For a moment he spared a thought to wonder if Albus had done some weather-working to arrange a 'proper' memorial climate for the dead Ravenclaw boy, then dismissed the speculation. The Headmaster was more than capable of actions that seemed to defy reason, but even he wasn't mad enough to tamper with weather magicks just for the sake of 'honoring the dead.'

He slipped on patch of slimy soil and barely managed to keep his balance, cursing fluently. The Umbrellus wavered with his concentration, and cold rainwater instantly attacked the back of his neck. He cursed again and recast the charm.

Finally he was at the door of her hut. He stared at the small building, set apart from the rest of the castle because Hooch valued the closeness to the Quidditch arena, team lockers, and equipment storehouses. He'd never been to visit her before, and glared at the tightly shuttered windows and rather spartan exterior of the house. Severus raised a hand and rapped sharply on the door.

There was no answer. He grimaced, feeling water start to seep into his boots and the bottom edges of his robes. He liked rain well enough. He liked lightning and thunder and wind. He liked watching storms crash and rage, his own dissatisfaction with the world easing somewhat in the face of Nature's wrath.

But inclement weather was much better experienced when inside. Inside, dry and warm and drinking a cup of coffee with a little something extra in it. Not standing in mud and a steady drizzle, watching water sluice off the 'oh-so-cute' gargoyle water spouts on one's fellow teacher's roof, when one is only there because one had a temporary descent into insanity-- or as fools might call it, sympathy.

He knocked again, harder. "Dammit, Hooch, I know you're in there," he grumbled under his breath. A wind was starting to pick up, chilling wet skin.

Finally he heard something inside. A muffled voice said, "Albus, I'm fine. Just getting some rest. Please don't trouble yourself."

He swore again. "Not Albus. Open the door before I blast it in."

A pause, then the sound of latches being undone and the rough oak door swung open. "Snape?!"

"No, I'm really Merlin's ghost done up in drag," he snapped, then said in a somewhat more neutral tone, "Evening, Hooch."

He studied the figure who had opened the door. Peregrin was a good head shorter than him and now stared up at him with her distinctive, piercing yellow eyes, except they were currently bloodshot and a little swollen. She was not wearing the formal teacher's robes (unlike Snape himself), or even the more practical garb she wore while showing idiot children how to stay on top of floating pieces of wood. Instead, she was in a pair of Muggle blue jeans and one of her white dress shirts, though the shirt was untucked and a bit wrinkled. One hand hung at her side, clutching the neck of a bottle whose contents were not hard to guess; the other still rested on the doorknob.

She blinked at him, then seemed to try to pull herself together. "If you're here, it must be bad. What? Are we under attack? Let me get my wand..."

"Don't be ridiculous. Are you going to invite me in or aren't you?"

She blinked again, then stepped back and made a vague gesture that could be considered an invitation. He stepped in without hesitation, ducking his head to avoid hitting it on the door frame.

Inside was blessed dryness and warmth. A fire crackled merrily on the hearth, the only light in the room, and Severus mentally berated himself for not thinking to just use the Floo. Behind him, the door slammed shut, and quiet filled the room.

He couldn't help looking around. An intensely private man, he was always intrigued by the living spaces of others. Hooch's was no less fascinating than anyone else's, and probably more so than some.

Severus stood in a long, low-ceilinged room that reminded him for some reason of pictures of houses he'd seen in the southwestern United States. The walls were a warm sandy color and plain, their only decoration an occasional hanging or woven blanket in bright colors. No photographs, even on the tables and shelves that dotted the room here and there.

The furniture was simple and attractive. The same maple wood had been used in all the pieces, lending a nice air of uniformity to the chairs, low coffee table, bookshelves...

It was a plain and functional space, yet not without an understated beauty, Severus mused. He felt faintly chagrined-- for all he had imagined that he understood her better than the other members on staff, he had never imagined such a... pleasing dwelling place. If he'd thought of Hooch's quarters at all, it had been to visualize trophies and broomsticks hanging on the walls, and hundreds of photos taken during Peregrin Hooch's time as a Chaser for the Falmouth Falcons. But this was free of such ornamentation.

He turned to look at her, perhaps open his mouth to say something, but she beat him to speaking. One eyebrow arched in an amused, sardonic expression that was nearly the equal of his own, she commented, "Well. Albus is sending Severus Snape to check on me now. He must be really worried."

He couldn't help a little snort at that. He didn't bother trying to deny Albus had sent him; they both knew the truth of her words.

"I'll leave soon," he said with a smirk; "just long enough for me to tell him I honestly tried."

She chuckled as she walked past him, back to the chair by the fire she'd been occupying before his knock. The hand not clutching the alcohol waved in the general direction of one of the other seats. "Well, make yourself comfortable then. Just don't expect my usual scintillating conversation."

He found himself moving to take up the offer before he even realized it. Ah well. He could at least warm up before heading back into the water outside.

Severus sat and observed Peregrin's movements with the practised eye he had developed during his years as a teacher. Her speech had been unslurred and her movements were steady, even if her hands trembled slightly. He drew the conclusion that, bottle or not, she was cold sober. Despite her best efforts otherwise.

He watched her watch the flames. She was a small and compact woman, wiry and athletic. Her red-rimmed eyes and shaky hands were at odds with the confident, spunky image she usually presented. Even as he stared, she took a shuddering breath and closed her eyes wearily.

"You look like shit," he heard his own voice say bluntly. Her eyes snapped open, and she laughed harshly.

"Then I'm improving. Minerva said I looked like Death warmed over. Shit's a step up, right?"

"Indeed. By tomorrow, you'll no doubt only look like hell."

She laughed again, then reached down to something at the side of her chair. Her hand came back with a bottle, twin to the one she held in her hand. She tossed it to him.

"Where are my manners. Have a drink, Severus."

He examined the unmarked, plain bottle for a second before prying the lid off. The strong smell of liquor assaulted his trained nostrils. He glanced at her from under a raised eyebrow. "Home brewed?"

"Not by me. Hagrid's idea of a consolation gift."

"Oh."

"'Oh' is right. It's potent shit."

Severus shrugged slightly, and took a swallow. And gasped. And choked. He was vaguely aware of Hooch's smirk, and told himself he'd curse her when he could breathe again.

Finally his vision cleared, and he sat up straight, staring at the bottle the way men stare at a poisonous viper. "What the hell is he getting his directions from? A recipe for paint stripper?"

Hooch chuckled and took a cautious swallow from her own bottle. "It... *gasp*... g-grows on you after a while."

"I'll have to take your word on that," he said with a shudder. After a moment's pause he said, "Does Hagrid have any extra, do you think?"

She arched a questioning brow. "You're joking, right?"

"Not in the slightest. I've been looking for a good cleaning agent for the student cauldrons. I think this could eat through anything, even three-week-old dried shrivelfig."

She laughed outright at that. "You can take some bottles when you go. He gave me at least ten gallons worth."

"Dear Merlin."

"Um."

A tentative silence settled over the room, broken only by the sounds of the rain on the roof and the fire as it burned, popped, and hissed. After some moments of the quiet, he leaned forward, resting his hands on his knees, and sighed. "So. Tell me what happened."

Hooch glared at him. "Don't play the fool, Snape. Whole damn school knows 'what happened.'"

"I'd like to hear the actual events if you please, not Variated Rumour Number 378."

She sighed and looked up at the ceiling, stretching out in her chair. Another swig of the poison Rubeus Hagrid dared call liquor, and she started talking.

"He... T-Terry had asked for some extra practice time, what with the big match coming up next month. Our best Chaser, dammit. Worked himself so- bloody- hard..."

...

"Professor Snape?"

"Mm. Yes, Ms. Delaney?"

"I was wondering if I could use this evening to get some work done on my extra credit project? I think I'm really close to getting it..."

"I don't believe that would be a problem. I'll leave the classroom open for you-- I don't suppose I need to tell you not to get in the ingredients for the other classes?"

"Of course not, sir! What do you think I am, a Gryffindor...?"

...

"... He'd been having some problems with his Nimbus lately, and I told him he could use the school brooms if he liked. He said, 'thanks, Madam Hooch, but I've got it under control.' I...

"I should have insisted..."

"He was off and up, chasing the Quaffles like nobody's business. Smart kid. Good reflexes. Always polite.

"Anyways, one of them got pretty high up, he zips right on after it. I was checking the charms on some of the Bludgers-- they'd seemed awful lazy lately-- and I wasn't keeping my eye on him," she ground out, her lips pressing in a thin line. "I-- wasn't-- watching..."

She closed her eyes for a moment, her brows drawn in pain. "I heard him shouting for help. Looked up just in time to see him crash dead into Gryffindor Tower. Going so damn fast..."

"I got over there quick as I could, of course... hollered for Poppy on the way... for all the good it did. She said his neck broke on impact, at the speed he was going and the angle he hit. Said, 'at least it was quick and painless,' as if that makes any gods-damned difference..."

Hooch let out a bitter snort. "Anyways. We examined his broom later, of course-- the parts that survived the crash. It had a little bug in the spells, something a lot of the Nimbuses have had lately. They think some witch or wizard got lazy at the factory... there's an official inquiry going on, or some such rubbish. Little late for Terrence Boot."

She let out a low oath and took another swallow of the poison. Snape felt obliged to join her, and amazingly only coughed once or twice the second time around. She glanced over at him and lifted an eyebrow. "I'm impressed. Took me an hour with the stuff to stop seeing stars at every gulp."

"Y-yes... well... 's what happens when you spend a l-lifetime drinking down nasty mixtures."

She smiled a bit, turning her bottle around in her hands slowly. "Anyways, that's what happened. You asked."

"So I did."

For a moment, there was silence again, Hooch's eyes returning to the flames. Without warning, she swore viciously and hurled her bottle into the fireplace, the resulting crash and burn something quite spectacular to watch, and buried her face in her hands. He caught snatches of her sobbed words:

"Damn fool boy... flying on some broomstick you know's being twitchy.... Circe and Hecate damn me, I should have made you use the school broom. I should have been watching, I could have... just a little charm and you'd be alive, you damn fool boy.... why the hell wasn't I quicker, wasn't I watching..."

Severus closed his eyes. Opened them-- he didn't need to see images of dead students repeating themselves on his eyelids. He exhaled a slow breath, then dragged his free hand across his face.

"Hooch."

She didn't respond, other than to turn in her chair so that he couldn't see her face at all.

"Hooch."

A shudder ran through her form, and he thought he heard her mumble something that sounded like a cross between 'I'm sorry' and 'fuck off'.

"... Peregrin," he said quietly, then reached a hesitant hand across the space between them and touched her shoulder. She whirled at the touch, golden eyes blazing and bright with the firelight, her anger, and her tears. He felt himself pinned by that fierce and sulphuric gaze.

"Peregrin," he began softly, using the tone of voice one employed with a dangerous animal, and distantly recognizing it for the tone Albus sometimes used with him, "I'm not very good at this sort of thing. All I can say is that... with time... it will get better."

"Don't you fucking give me that!" she snarled. "'Time heals all wounds,' and such shit! Bollocks to that--"

"I didn't say it would heal," he snapped. "I said it would get better. There's a difference."

She glared at him mutely, and he took a breath and continued. "Right now... all you can see is your student's face. Every time you close your eyes, every time you see some child with the same coloring and form, every time you... All you do is go over and over and over what happened. You try and figure out what you did wrong, knowing that if you just can understand, it will be fixed, you can fix it, and your student-- your child, dammit-- will still be alive.

"You don't want to go out into the world that child occupied, because seeing that place without him or her in it will just make it real, and it means you can't go back and fix it..."

Severus heard his own voice trail off into nothing. Hooch was still staring at him, her eyes now wide and anguished, instead of the narrowed, furious gaze she had turned on him before.

"Who was it for you?" she said in a tight whisper. He winced. He should have known she'd figure it out the instant he started speaking. Snape took a deep breath, feeling her eyes searching his face hungrily. He wanted to bolt from the room. He'd never told anyone about it voluntarily, and Albus was the only one who had dared try and talk to him on the matter. But-- she stared at him as if held some sort of gods-damned answer, and he couldn't bring himself not to try.

Severus took a swallow of the liquid courage-- make that liquid insanity-- under the logic that if he couldn't taste the words in his mouth, maybe he couldn't hear them either.

"I had a student. My second year teaching, her second year of school," he said dully. "She was a smart girl. Bright. Gifted. Good with potions. Better than most of the sixth and seventh years. A Slytherin.

"I felt... responsible for her. She was alone, like bright children often are. I tried to help her. It seemed to be working.

"She... I had her doing an extra credit project. She was working on it unsupervised. Shouldn't have been a problem. The ingredients were harmless. Even Neville Longbottom couldn't have caused any chaos with them.

"Some idiot fifth year had put his ingredients away in the wrong cabinet. Two powders, very similar in appearance. She used the wrong one. Simple mistake.

"Tested the potion on herself. Died. I found her an hour afterwards, when I came in to check on her progress."

Severus stared into the flames. He couldn't seem to let go of the bottle in his hand, and instead raised it for another swallow. Peregrin watched him mutely, curled up in her chair, her eyes glittering in the fire's light.

"I didn't know. What was her name?" she said quietly. He shook himself and murmured, "It was before you started here. There would have been no reason for you to know. And it was Delaney. Fern Delaney."

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her pull another of the bottles from beside the chair and pop the lid off. "To Fern Delaney and Terrence Boot," she said roughly, then took a healthy swallow. He mechanically followed her example.

"So," she murmured after a moment, "it gets better?"

Severus shifted in his chair, bringing his eyes back to her. He felt tired and drained. "Yes. Yes, after a while. It... you won't see their face when you sleep. You won't dream of them. You'll stop feeling like everyone else on staff is silently pointing their fingers at you. You'll eventually be able to teach your students that particular potion-- or show them how to do that dive, or that feint-- without problems, without nightmares.

"You'll still hurt like hell whenever you hear their name. You'll still feel like you betrayed a sacred trust. But it will ease. With time.

"After all. Life goes on," he said bitterly.

"Even if the children don't," she whispered.

He nodded. "Even if the children don't."

Peregrin took another drink and stared up at the ceiling. "It isn't fair, is it, Severus? We... we try so damned hard, trying to do the right thing, with our bloody lesson plans and syllabuses and what-not, and some stupid accident comes along and screws up all our careful planning. It's not fair."

"Life's not fair."

"Ha. I'll drink to that," she said, idly holding out her alcohol to be toasted. He reached out and tapped her bottle with his own, the faint clink of glass loud in the silence. They both took healthy swallows, then engaged in the requisite gasping and choking.

"Potent shit."

"Yeh..."

Snape leaned back in his chair and followed her example of staring at the ceiling. The rain sounded like it was really going now, pounding violently on the roof.

"Tell me," Peregrin said in a conversational tone after a bit, "do I, with time, end up like you?"

"What?" he managed, startled by the question out of the blue.

"Well, I mean, you're a bastard, Snape. Is that reaction to this girl's death, or just the way you are?"

"Oh. No, that's pretty much natural inclination. Personal preference," he sighed, lifting the bottle again. He was starting to feel a warmth in his veins and slight buzzing in his ears. This stuff wasn't that bad after all.

"Oh. That's a shame," she said distantly.

"It is not. It gets results in class," he muttered indignantly. She chuckled. "Ends justify the means, eh?"

Severus decided he wasn't going to dignify that with a response. He closed his eyes and slid down in the chair, listening to the rain drumming on the roof. It was surprisingly peaceful here, as if the hundred or so yards that separated the hut from the rest of the school acted as a barrier to the stress as well.

"By God. I should get a camera in here."

"What?" he managed, wondering what the crazy witch was talking about now.

"You're smiling. I don't think I've ever seen you smile before, Severus."

"I am not."

"You are so. You've got this happy little comfortable smile on your face. Merlin's ass, that's... surreal. Weird. You're freaking me out."

He opened his eyes and glared at her. She grinned impudently back, then raised her bottle to him in mock salute before downing another mouthful. Snape rolled his eyes, then closed them again.

"Fine. I'm smiling. Is it a bloody crime?"

"On you, yeah. Like I said, I've never seen you smile. You've always got this expression like you stepped in something the house elves forgot to clean up."

"I do not."

"The hell you don't. You go around like some bloody bat, all dour and glowering and monstrous. The whole 'everyone-else-is-scum' look."

"I do not."

"You do so. Ask Minerva or Albus if you don't believe me."

He muttered curses under his breath, then finished off the rest of the bottle in one gulp.

"Gasp... *choke* =coff coff kaff= h-hell..."

"Merlin's balls, you trying to kill yourself or something?"

"N-no.... just.... Fuck. Hand me another bottle."

Peregrin snorted and tossed him one from her seemingly endless cache.

"What do you suppose Hagrid calls this stuff?" Severus grunted, as he wrestled with the tight lid of the new bottle. It seemed to be stuck.

"Er... when he brought it, he said, 's a wee li'l pick-me-up, or something like that."

Severus snorted. "Yes. Pick-me-up-- and put me down in St. Mungo's. This stuff can't possibly be healthy."

"No shit, Snape, you come to that conclusion by the smell or taste?"

"By the protests of my offended and endangered liver and kidneys... oh come on, you wretched thing, open... They want to know why I hate them so, that I'd subject them to this punishment."

"Oh, you talk to your bodily organs, do you?"

"Indeed. Held a wonderful literary discussion-- damn this lid-- with my right lung just last week," he snarled, still trying to get the lid off. "Damn, it's on tight."

Hooch smirked over the open mouth of her 'wee li'l pick-me-up.' "Need some help with that, Severus?"

He fixed a patented glare on her. "Sod off. The day I-- mmf-- can't get a bloody bottle open-- ng-- is the day I retire-- dammit-- as Hogwarts Potions Master. Damn!"

The last oath came as the lid abruptly and violently came off, and the bottle's contents, long under pressure, saw fit to escape at great velocity.

Severus Snape blinked and blinked again, the corners of his mouth twitching as if he was about to erupt in a litany of obscenities and couldn't quite make up his mind which one to start with. Strong alcohol dripped from his hair, which was hardly improved by its impromptu bath; his aquiline nose, and his chin. His whole face had been sprayed, and the liquor was also seeping into the fabric on his neck and upper chest. A line of the dark golden-brown liquid trickled slowly off one hand.

Snape's lips compressed into a thin flat line and he said quietly, "One word, Hooch. You so much as say one bloody word, and so help me Circe..."

Peregrin Hooch looked as though she was going to burst. She bit down fiercely on her lower lip and when that didn't work, brought up her non-alcohol occupied hand to clamp over her mouth. When even that began to fail her, she turned and buried her face in the arm of her chair and laughed hysterically.

Severus glared, conscious of how futile it was with Hagrid's poison dripping from the end of his nose. After a good minute during which Hooch laughed herself silly into the armrest, she finally sat up and wiped her streaming eyes.

"'m sorry... I really am... oh gods... it's just..."

Her yellow eyes looked at him again-- and off she went once more. This time she just threw her head back and howled. Severus Snape pursed his lips, nodded very slightly in the manner of a man who has come to terms with the fact that the Universe hates him, and philosophically took a swallow from what still remained in the bottle.

****

"Rain is grace; rain is the sky condescending to the earth; without rain, there would be no life."

--John Updike