Like Father, Like Son

Twenty-second Chapter

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Make-Ups and Make-Outs

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"Are you sure about this?" asked Dumbledore, watching them over his half-moon shaped spectacles. "As this is your idea, I will require you both to attend, you know." Despite his stern words, however, there was a slight smile playing on his lips.

"Of course we are sure," snapped Severus. "Our son's been walking around like a kicked puppy ever since his girlfriend broke up with him. I don't care whether he gets her back or finds another girl, as long as he gets over it. And I know for certain that he will not do anything unless given the proper push to a direction or another."

"It is really annoying," Sirius admitted as well. "And if Severus is willing to put his precious reputation in line by attending an event such as this just to get Remy set right, you can only imagine how bad he is. Take my advice, Albus, and just do it."

"Very well," the Headmaster said, now chuckling slightly. "I will inform the whole school tomorrow. Of course, I will not reveal where the suggestion came from." At this, he glanced at Severus, his eyes twinkling madly.

"I should hope not," murmured Severus. "Otherwise, I would be forced to kill you, and as I really do not cherish the thought of being in Azkaban, no matter how appealing the act of murdering you in itself is, just keep quiet."

Now, Albus blinked. Then, he chuckled. "Well, even if your son has changed, you certainly haven't, I see," he said, his blue eyes twinkling.

Severus merely huffed. "Well, will you do it or not?" he asked irritably.

"Of course I will, my boy. Just wait and see."

*

On breakfast the following morning, Dumbledore stood up to make an announcement. Once everybody had their eyes locked at him, he started, "As you all know, St. Valentine's Day is getting nearer. This year, we have decided to have a Valentine's Day Ball." This brought on excited squeals from the girls and whines from the boys. Raising a hand to get silence, the Headmaster then went on, "None of the students are required to have a partner for the Ball. However, all Prefects are expected to set an example for the others. Therefore, they are all required to participate in the Ball, and if some of them don't have partners, I'm sure we'll find teachers who'd be willing to dance with them for a while."

At this, the previous boredom on Remy's face turned into one of utter horror. In an instant, every girl nearby got a predatory look and started to talk to him. Only Hermione just rolled her eyes as Remy put all his Snape nastiness in use to turn down as many girls at a time as possible. Samantha, however, merely ignored the whole ordeal, not showing a sign of even having heard about the Ball.

Of course, this did not do any good for Remy's mood. Getting finally enough of the girls asking him to accompany him for the Ball -- Cho Chang was one of the most eager ones -- he simply stood up and left the table, grumbling quietly to himself. Hermione considered for a while going after him, but then thought better of it. Noticing how tensed Samantha on her side was, she turned to smile at her friend.

"Don't worry," she said reassuringly. "I'm sure Remy will come back to his senses soon." But, as Samantha just nodded miserably, she couldn't help but doubt.

*

The following morning, however, Remy was certainly not showing any signs of "coming back to his senses." Hermione simply couldn't believe his behaviour. Just the night before he'd been most enthusiastically telling her how he would go with Samantha, or with nobody. And yet there he was, talking cheerfully with all the hopeful girls, flirting with everybody who even looked at his direction. It was really annoying -- and really upsetting to Samantha, too.

Just then, however, she noticed something odd. There was a dove flying towards the Ravenclaw table -- and it was pink. Not a screaming bubblegum pink, though, but a light, romantic pink. Even more surprising than this odd bird, however, was the load this dove was carrying. To be exact, a heart-shaped chocolate box, and a pink envelope sealed with a small, red rose.

As she watched the dove flying nearer, other people, too, noticed it. Soon most people in the Hall -- well, most girls, at least -- were watching attentively to see where it went. They were all shocked to see it slowing down over the place where Hermione was sitting with her friends, then diving down, and landing right in front of Samantha. The small girl, too, watched the bird in shock.

"Take a look at it," Hermione urged, curious. While doing this, she glanced at Remy to see the boy's reaction. The young wizard, however, showed no signs of even noticing that anything had happened. Hermione couldn't tell whether he'd been the sender or not. Like a perfect Snape by blood, he showed neither anticipation nor jealousy, which was rare -- usually anything connected to Samantha shattered his mask of calmness. Or maybe he was finally starting to get over her?

Then, however, she looked at Samantha again. Her friend had taken the pink envelope from the dove, and was now looking at it suspiciously. She obviously thought that this was a prank. At last, however, urged on by the surrounding girls' half curious, half envious words, she opened the envelope.

And then, they all found out just what was the magic of the letter. "Samantha," they all heard Remy's voice from the envelope, magically strengthened to carry over the whole Great Hall, "I admit that I've been an utter prat. Could you still perhaps find it in yourself to forgive me and be my partner for the Valentine's Day Ball?"

Now, the envelope fell silent, and everybody stared at it in shock. Then, slowly, everybody turned to look at Remy. Sure, he wasn't half as cold and aloof as his father was in public, but he could never, under any circumstances, be called romantic. This was surely some kind of a prank -- but from whom, everybody wondered. Had it been the boy himself, or somebody else?

Remy, however, did not look at any of these wonderers. Instead, he was now looking right at Samantha, having wholly forgotten about his breakfast. "Well, could you?" he asked, seemingly still just as calm. However, Hermione, who was used to read him, noticed a bit of nervousness in his voice, and she knew that Samantha had noticed it as well. They just knew him too well.

For a moment, Samantha just watched him. Hermione could not know exactly what was going around in her friend's head, but she could already guess her answer. A Snape would not apologize, but Remy had just gone drastically against his usual character just to ask Samantha for the Ball. Not only that, but he had even admitted that he had been wrong, something Hermione could have never thought he would do. And more: he'd also given Samantha the perfect weapon to use against him if she so wanted. A negative answer, and Remy would be publicly humiliated, the only thing a Snape could consider worse than death, like Samantha knew just as well as Hermione. Really, if she still cared for him any -- like Hermione knew she did -- there was only one possible answer she could give.

So, Hermione wasn't any surprised as Samantha soon melted into a warm smile. "Yes, I do think so," she said, looking him right in the eye.

"Good." After saying this, Remy stood up and slowly walked towards Samantha. By now, everybody in the Hall was looking at them. Therefore, they all saw perfectly well as Remy leant forward and kissed Samantha right on the mouth.

At this, Dumbledore started to clap his hands, a beaming smile on his face. Soon the whole Hall followed suit. And in the Head Table, Severus gave his husband a small smirk. Then he whispered so quietly that nobody but Sirius and Remus could hear, "Ten points to Ravenclaw for a good question... and another ten points for the correct answer." The other two Marauders on his sides just nodded in agreement.

*

Hermione glanced at her friends and smiled. If she hadn't known better, she could've thought they had never been apart. Remy was sitting on a couch in the living room of the Snapes' quarters, looking almost too happy with himself, and Samantha was sitting next to him. The small girl was playing with a lock of her boyfriend's raven hair, and Remy had an arm around her shoulders. Hermione was delighted to see the old sparkle again in her friend's ice-blue eyes and a slight smile on his lips. His free hand was fiddling with the bracelet on Samantha's wrist as the girl's other hand was resting in her lap.

Suddenly Remy seemed to remember something important. "Oh!" he said. "I fear I have managed to miss your birthday during this ordeal, Samantha."

The girl gave him a small, sad smile. "It doesn't matter, really," she said quietly. "It's quite enough that I have you with me now." She pecked him on the cheek.

"Well, it's not enough for me," Remy said at that. "I can't really turn time backwards, but I still can give you your birthday present." At this, he raised his wand and pointed it at some undefined depths of his parents' quarters. "Accio present!" In an instant, a small parcel flew to his hands, and he handed it to Samantha. "Happy belated birthday, my dear," he said, smirking a bit.

Samantha rolled her eyes and then took the present from him, carefully opening it. Her eyes widened as she saw what was inside the parcel. It was a small glass bottle -- and something was moving inside it. There were a couple of tiny holes on the bottle, allowing air in. Like Hermione didn't notice until now, there were also holes on the wrappings of the present.

"Her name is Sarlass," Remy said helpfully. "Don't worry, she knows not to do anything to you. Only if somebody or something is threatening you, she will attack. There'll be no more monsters eating you up."

"She's beautiful," whispered Samantha as she opened the bottle and saw the snake. The little creature was deep blue in colour, and she wrapped herself around the small girl's wrist as soon as she got out of the bottle. Giving Samantha an affectionate hiss, the snake then rubbed its cheek against her arm. "What does she eat?" asked Samantha then with a curious tone.

"Don't worry about that," Remy said dismissively. "I'll take care of her feeding."

"Thank you," Samantha said, her eyes shining. "Thank you for everything, and especially for Sarlass. She is really an amazing gift." And then, she flung herself at Remy's neck, planting a kiss on his lips.

Hermione shook her head and took her eyes off what seemed to be becoming a rather good make-out session. It wasn't that she wasn't happy for her friends, no; she was excited about the fact that they were back together again. However, seeing them together reminded her of the fact that she was all alone.

So, she stood up and walked to another armchair, this time to one by the fireplace, leaving the young couple behind her back. Sighing a bit, she sank into the armchair, watching the crackling fire with little interest. Oh, how she hoped that she had had somebody to go to the Ball with. Maybe just the particular someone...

Suddenly, however, she was startled from her thoughts as a face appeared to the flames. "Harry!" she exclaimed. "What's wrong?"

"Oh, nothing is wrong," the young wizard said, flashing her a grin. Hermione couldn't help but wonder how much he actually looked like Remus. Sure, his eyes were hazel instead of amber, and his features were a bit softer, but still, at times he managed to be a spitting image of his carrier. "Actually, it's you I was looking for."

"What?" Now, Hermione was really surprised. What did the boy mean?

"You see," Harry said, "I heard of the oncoming Ball, and thought that it would be a perfect opportunity to drop by and check up on Father. You know, to make sure he's not doing anything stupid," he then added gravely, but cheered up immediately. "Anyway, Dumbledore's made this stupid rule that any outsider wanting to attend the Ball has to have an inhabitant of the school as a partner for it. So, as I'm already graduated, I just thought I could ask you to go with me."

Now, Hermione was stunned. At the same time, she wondered whether there truly were fairies that fulfilled people's wishes. This, at least, did look like such an event.

"I will make it worth your while, honestly," Harry said hastily, misreading her stunned expression as hesitation. "Not just the show-up-and-leave trick. I'll bring flowers, carry your things, anything. I promise you'll enjoy it just as much, if not more, as if you went with one of your schoolmates." He gave her puppy eyes. "Please?" he whined.

"Of course," Hermione finally managed to say. "Yes, I would be glad to go to the Ball as your date." 'Even if it's only for the sake of appearance,' she thought a bit sadly.

"Excellent!" Harry beamed at her from the flames. Then, a moan from behind Hermione reached his ears, and he grinned. "Go break those two up now," he said, "before they get any further. In the meantime, I'll go check my dress robes." And with these words and nothing more, he disappeared from sight.

Hermione sighed and rolled her eyes. However, her expression wasn't half as lonely as before as she went to remind Remy and Samantha of the fact that they were not in private, instead being in the living room of Remy's parents, who might walk in on any moment. Of course, Remy's expression as Severus and Sirius then indeed walked in to see their son with a girlfriend draped over him was priceless.

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