rejitxt.cc 
Harry barged without knocking into Snape’s office. Nothing. He barged into the back office. Nothing. He kept barging, right into the lab.
“Drunken trolls have more grace than you’ve just displayed.” Snape was at Harry’s table, his back to the door. “However do you stay on your broom during Quidditch matches?”
Harry stopped, caught his breath. “You called?”
When Snape turned back around, he was holding a beaker of clear liquid. That in itself would have told Harry nothing, but Snape’s expression of suppressed triumph eliminated that problem.
“Is that me?” he asked.
Snape rolled his eyes. “To answer the question you’d have asked had you a functioning brain in your head, yes.”
Harry felt a grin stretch his face. “I’m cured?”
One side of Snape’s mouth twitched. “You are cured.”
“Yes!” Harry pumped his fists. “Thank you, sir.”
“I thought you would want to know immediately,” Snape said then, oddly. “I hope I didn’t interrupt anything important.”
“Hm? No,” Harry said, puzzled. “No, not at all.”
“Fuligo found you in Hogsmeade.”
Harry was additionally puzzled until he realized Fuligo must be the tiny black owl Severus had used.
“Oh. I was shopping with Aidan.” He smiled. “Like a couple of teenaged girls.”
“I hope you found what you needed,” Snape said quietly.
Harry grinned. “Yeah, I did.” Then he realized what Snape’s question might have meant, and how his response might have sounded. His stomach sank – then recovered as he thought: Snape actually cared. As more than a friend.
Unless he’d read it wrong. Which he probably had. Or not. But …
God almighty. I’ve lost my mind. “Severus.”
The man looked up, wary, scowling thunderously.
“Not like that,” Harry said.
“Not like what?” Snape said precisely, almost distastefully.
“You know what I mean,” Harry said, exasperated. “Aidan.”
The storm in Snape’s face lifted. “Ah.”
Harry’s hands danced over one another. He wanted to hug him; he thought he should at least shake his hand, but Snape had made it clear he didn’t want Harry touching him.
“Thank you,” Harry said instead, feeling how worthless it sounded. “Thank you for saving my life again.”
Snape’s mouth thinned. “Thank me by taking better care of your own defenses.”
To hell with it. Harry flung his arms around the man and gave him a brief, hard hug, kissing his cheek, breaking contact before anything irrevocable could occur.
“Thank you,” he said again. Snape, flushed, flustered, actually allowed himself to smile before turning back to his laboratory counter.
“You are welcome, Mr. P–”
Harry held up a warning hand.
“Harry,” Snape altered course smoothly. The clock on the wall chimed and he said, staring at the table top, “It’s … it’s nearly time for dinner.”
Harry glanced at the clock, watched the little goblins saunter across its face for a moment. “Good,” he said, thinking that would be the perfect time to sneak in here and deposit his little surprise. “I’m starved.”
“You’ll be returning to London tonight?” Snape asked as he moved bottles and knives tiny, pointless distances.
“Tomorrow, I think,” Harry said, watching Snape fidget and wishing that the only two reasons he could come up with for the man to be nervous were not polar opposites. “I’m not expected back ’til then, and I’m enjoying the break here. It’s almost like being back in school, only without any responsibilities.”
Snape laughed softly. “Your work ethic won’t bear much strain after all, will it?”
Harry smiled. “Maybe I’m just enjoying your company.”
Snape stopped fidgeting. Froze. Harry backed up, hands upraised in apology.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to do that. It just comes out.”
Snape’s fingers curled into fists. “I wish that you would stop acting as though you expect me to curse you every time you …”
“The word is flirt,” Harry said mildly. “I’ll try to stop it.”
“I wouldn’t worry about it if I were you,” Snape said. “After tonight, it won’t matter.”
Harry backed toward the door. “Will I see you at dinner?”
Snape nodded and Harry left, berating himself silently. He accepted and respected Snape’s rejection – why did he keep saying and doing things that seemed to show the opposite?
* * *
Dark. Quiet. Harry moved slowly, as silently as he knew how – and despite Snape’s taunts, he did know how. Through the corridors, through locked doors that came unlocked at Harry’s will and whispered words, through rooms striped with light and shadow, to his goal. He dipped one hand into the pocket of his robe and drew it out with its precious cargo.
“Harry?”
Harry froze. The irrelevant thought – I’m leaving and he’s finally learned to call me by my name – flitted across his mind before he turned away from Snape’s desk to look at the man standing shadowed in the doorway of his private office. So much for sneakiness.
“What are you doing in here?” Snape asked. Puzzled, not angry. That alone spoke painfully to Harry about how far they had come. “Why aren’t you at dinner?”
Harry sighed. “Why aren’t you?”
Snape ignored the question, scowling as his gaze ran from Harry’s face down to his fingers.
