Letters By Night

Chapter 8: He Did What?!

The atmosphere the Death Eaters had caused quickly resumed after the silliness of Valentine's Day. Professor Veiker was out of the hospital wing, and his ill, hollow look seemed to speak of the apprehension. Alanna also supposed she would have felt more indebted to Snape if he didn't rub her nose in the fact. But his screams still rang in her ears...she shuddered.

Then something happened that would change everything.

Alanna woke up one morning, and things were immediately off to a bad start. She had an enormous knot in her hair, and after trying unsuccessfully to brush it, she resorted to her wand. Unfortunately, she had never been very good at this charm - she singed several inches off her hair, and it ended up a bit frizzy at the ends.

She sat down in a furore at breakfast. Snape, looking at her hair, opened his mouth to deliver a remark, but she interrupted. "Don't test me. I'm not in a good mood today."

Though Andrew scared her, Alanna felt somewhat sorry for him - he still looked ill. She sought him out in the corridor to ask if he was okay.

"Fine, thanks," he said in a monotone, with a sort of empty smile.

Alanna patted his arm sympathetically. "I'm sorry."

"I thought I told you to stay away from her." Alanna looked over her shoulder, as Andrew hurried away nervously.

"What are you doing? He was being perfectly civil!"

"There's something wrong with that man," Snape said, staring down the empty hall with disgust.

"Did I ask you to protect me?" Her anger began to flare.

"Don't need to ask. You've shown yourself incapable of self-protection more than once."

She glared daggers at him. She had no idea why she felt like he was trying to provoke her, but, to her chagrin, it was working.

Taking advantage of her anger, he continued, "You're a mere child. You don't know what you're doing, and I'm telling you, there's something not right about him."

"I'm not a student anymore, Snape, and I'm not afraid of you."

His eyes glinted, his voice rising. "Don't be stupid! Your childishness is blinding you to the truth."

"So I'm childish, eh?" she said, the tension and the entire year of verbal abuse finally getting to her. "At least I'm not an anti-social bastard." Oh...that was rather harsh. "I...I'm sorry, I didn't mean that -"

But she'd hit the mark. Snape made a noise of anger, and raised his hand as though to push her forcefully out of the way. She grabbed his wrist reflexively to stop him, and before she knew what she was doing, wrenched it backwards with small crack. He winced slightly.
"I've had enough. I won't let you insult me anymore!" she said as she took out her wand and pointed it at him.
He glared angrily at her for a moment, moved his injured wrist experimentally, and then looked as though he was going to respond scathingly. "You are completely misled, and have paid less attention this year than you ever have in my classes."

Alanna spun around with her back to him, fuming, and began to march off. Snape took hold of her shoulder, and his voice returned to its normal chill composure as he continued.

"Since it seems beyond your comprehension that I want to protect you..."

Alanna vaguely thought her ears couldn't be working properly.

"...perhaps I ought to show you," he said, and he turned her around to face him, and with the precision and fervour with which he did everything, Snape did quite possibly the last thing Alanna expected.

All her thoughts fled, and her wand fell to the floor as she wrapped her arms around him, the world forgotten in the empty corridor. Maybe later she would wonder why, or how someone so seemingly devoid of human feeling could kiss so passionately, or perhaps whether or not she had broken his wrist; but all that mattered at that moment was that he never let her go.
The chatter of well-fed students coming from dinner rang loudly and suddenly in the corridor, then just as suddenly, all was silent. Snape and Alanna broke apart immediately, each gaping in horror at the other, and the students were staring open-mouthed and blank in shock, not moving.
"Clear off!" Snape hissed, waving his good arm at them angrily. The students quickly obeyed and hurried off to their respective common rooms. Clutching his wrist, he ploughed through the tide of children, knocking them about and nearly stepping on Dennis Creevey.
Alanna stared after him, thunderstruck. Did...did he...? Then she gathered her thoughts, picked up her wand, and headed for the Astronomy Tower. But she caught snatches of the conversation.
"Was that...Snape?"
"And the dishy Astronomy teacher?"
"Were they...they were kissing!"
"I've never seen anyone make out like that."
"But with Snape? That's just disgusting and...weird."
What the hell just happened?
She touched her lips with her fingers, still utterly take Was...was... She could hardly bear to even finish the thought. Was...was his tongue in my mouth? Alanna swayed a bit, feeling suddenly ill. Oh...oh...ugh... She hurried off up the stairs to brush her teeth.

Alanna sat down somewhat awkwardly next to him the next morning, still a bit bewildered, feeling the eyes of several staff members on the two of them. "Er..." she began, pointing at his wrist.

He simply fixed a burning glare on her, and didn't answer. He said nothing about the kiss, and indeed, acted as though it had never happened. And maybe it didn't, thought Alanna in disbelief, trying to pay no heed to the small distance between the two of them, as it was suddenly much more uncomfortable sitting next to this man than it had been all year.

Dumbledore suddenly spoke on her other side. "Oh, Professor Reid, this is so wonderful!"

Alanna looked at him. "What is?&;

"We always hoped he'd settle down with someone."

She coughed, and laughed nervously. "Oh no, Professor, we're not -"

"We thought it'd be good for his disposition, you know," he continued, not listening to her comment.

"But Professor, we're not -"

"See that you take care of him, please."

Alanna, embarrassed, said, "But we're not together."

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Now now, Professor Reid, I might be mad, but I'm certainly not stupid," he countered, and continued with his breakfast as if the conversation had never occurred.

She glanced back at Snape, who looked as though he needed to make a rebuttal comment to Dumbledore. Alanna tried to take the opportunity to speak to him...unfortunately, it didn't go over well.

"Why..." she mumbled. "Why did you kiss me?"

He took a deep breath, looking extremely reluctant to answer. "Why did I what?"

"Why did you kiss me?"

He glowered at her behind his greasy hair. "You're hallucinating. I did nothing of the sort."

Alanna looked down into her eggs, beginning to think that perhaps she had only imagined all of it. But she still felt the touch of his lips on hers, in a peculiar "now or never" sort of way, and she knew that no matter how much she wanted to believe it hadn't happened, it had.

"Sorry I hurt your wrist," she managed.

His lip curled derisively, and they remained silent for the duration of breakfast.

"Snape did what?!" Phoebe dropped the papers she was filing on the floor of the Runes classroom.

"He kissed me." Alanna sat in Phoebe's chair, her feet propped up on Phoebe's desk.

Phoebe looked horrified. "What kind of kiss?"

"Full out, open-mouth. You know, a kiss."

"And you didn't stop him?"

Alanna chewed her bottom lip. "Well...no."

"Alanna, don't tell me you..." She looked ill. "...liked it?"

Alanna glanced up sheepishly. "Er...yeah. He kisses rather well, actually. Not like in romance novels, but I don't know...in a Snape way."

"I'm going to be sick," Phoebe said, sitting in an empty desk.

"Phoebe, what am I going to do?"

"If you'll forgive me, you're past the point where I can help. But if you want my advice, I'd just forget it ever happened. Looks like he did." Gathering her papers, she glanced back at Alanna, who looked thoughtful. "Don't worry about it, Alanna. Things like that have away of working themselves out."

Easier said then done.