Why Keep It Mum

A/N - Thank you all so much for your wonderful reviews! I can't tell you how much they mean to me. This little ditty started out to be just a thing I did for fun, but it is rapidly becoming one of my favorite things to work on. I really hope you've enjoyed the ride as much as I have. And though I do hate feeling like a pimp, it IS what I've written this piece for, so here I go: Vote for me! I'm not 100% sure I remember when voting begins, but please keep this lovely little piece in your mind when you vote for the Anything Goes challenge awards. Thanks and enjoy!

>>> a late add-in by me, now that voting is over:

Thank you ALL! You made this piece number one!

Chapter Four – Why Keep It Mum

Severus sat at the large mahogany desk that occupied the vast amount of the sitting room in his personal chambers. He stared down at the two items clutched in either one of his long-fingered hands, just above the smooth, uncluttered desktop. In one hand, he held a signed contract. In the other, a single brown hair threaded itself between the pads of his index finger and thumb. Both things could be either his salvation or his utter damnation. Gingerly laying the thread of hair on his desk, he turned his attention to the contract. Radames, the barn owl he frequently borrowed from the school owlery to run interference between his box in Hogsmeade post office and himself, had brought it this morning. He seemed to sense Severus's anxiety, hopping around the tray of owl treats nervously, shifting from foot to foot as Severus attempted to loosen the red ribbon bearing the seal of St. Mungo's that had been used to attach the thick envelope to Radames's leg. Much as he expected, the envelope contained an official copy of the contract between himself and Joy, with Healer Levy's signature between them like a chain link. He knew that the original was kept under the security of confidential record archives at St. Mungo's and that Joy could no more see his real signature than he could hers. Instead of her legal name, he simply saw the smooth, loopy "Joy" that she usually used to close their letters. He supposed that she merely saw his own nom de plume in his spiky scrawl. Severus grimaced down at the signature. In a moment of sheer impatience and curiosity earlier, he had tried every revealing charm he knew, trying to force the name into existence. It resisted him completely, but he hadn't expected otherwise. Part of him cursed himself for not attempting it before Healer Levy had signed it to make it official, but Severus had a hunch that Joy's spell-work would have had no more holes than St. Mungo's. He sighed again.

This was getting very dangerous.

Severus had started to get to a point where he just had to know who she was. However, aside from the five-minute lapse this afternoon, he had staunchly refused to betray her trust. Joy had been nothing but thorough this entire process. Aside from the betrayal of her age and the small fact that she worked at the Ministry, she'd given him no identifying information. True, he could make a few guesses from these facts, but they were mostly inconclusive. Hundreds of people worked in the Ministry, and as he hadn't the foggiest idea what she did (her interests were so varied, it could be anything from clerical work to being an Unspeakable), he couldn't really narrow it down. And as to her age, knowing the year she graduated didn't help much more. Having turned thirty-two just this past September, she would have graduated in 1997, the year of the last war. True, that class was more pertinent to him than any other, but could he really guess at her identity? Nearly two-hundred students graduated from Hogwarts every year and only twenty or thirty of them took Potions that entire time... her knowledge of Rondat's theories suggested that she was one of them, but it could simply be a hobby. And she had made a hint that she was a Gryffindor – more than a hint, if he was honest – but was this a clue, or simply a detail she'd used to throw him off? Or was she simply a Ravenclaw who'd longed to be something that sounded more impressive? It was the baby's sorting that she'd been talking about, not her own, so could he really be sure?

Aside from those tiny details which he found riddled with holes, she'd given no other crumb of obvious identification. Which was odd to think about because surely he knew her far better than he'd ever known anyone in his life. Even Lily. His eyebrows pinched together at that thought, but it was true. He'd known Lily, watched her obsessively, hungered for her for as long as he'd known her, but she'd only opened the doors to her heart so far. Once Severus had been sorted into Slytherin and she into Gryffindor, things between them had changed forever. Sweet as she was, good as she was, she couldn't help tar him with the same brush as all the other Slytherins and, as they had offered him the only whole-hearted acceptance he'd ever known, he'd blindly run towards it, which had taken him away from Lily. But now, forty years later, Joy's letters, sweetness, and almost childlike enthusiasm and good will had given him the chance to be the man that his youth had never afforded him. He could be Severus, unencumbered by doubt and prejudice and obsessive love and, most of all, insecurity. She didn't know him so she wouldn't judge him. There on those pages was the Severus Snape he never thought he'd have the chance to be. And here on this contract, he'd signed away his chance to continue to be that man. In a few weeks (at best), she would need him no longer, and the unshackled Severus Snape would curl back into the shadows again. His chest ached; he wanted – no, needed – a way to hold onto her. It was like losing Lily all over again, and Severus wasn't sure he could stand that. He needed to know who she was; it seemed terribly important now, as if his own identity would slip away with her if he didn't find out. Which brought him back, with a crashing thud, to the other item on his desk.

The single hair was all he had of her, and it shone up from the surface of the desk, golden against the dark wood. One hair, but it was all he really needed. She had been so careful over the course of the last several weeks. He recognized the telltale signs of someone who'd done thorough banishing charms – the lack of any smell to the parchment but that of the paper itself; thorough erasing charms – no errant finger prints from holding the paper as she wrote; and pinpoint accurate summoning charms ... with only one failure. When he had first received her afghan, which now draped invitingly over the back of his couch, he'd buried his nose in it, hoping to pick up some faint whiff of her scent. He'd been disappointed, but after her letters, this was unsurprising. What did surprise him, though, was the glint of a single hair caught in the weave of the wool. The one brown hair he'd found was the only thing on the blanket that could identify her, and somehow he knew that despite the fact that it would have been excruciatingly difficult to remove every single hair among a blanket made up of yarn woven from hair (granted, it was animal hair, but hair nonetheless) that Joy would be annoyed that she had missed that one. Severus fingers touched the hair. It was really all he needed to find out who she was. A dozen or so potion tests popped into his mind, let alone the fifty-seven different charms he could recall that could be done on this one strand. All of them would tell him who she was. But here he was, six hours after the arrival of the contract and two weeks after he had found the hair on the blanket, and he just couldn't bring himself to perform any one of those tests. Not one charm would leave his lips. Anything more than thirteen years ago and the Severus Snape that had died on the floor of the Shrieking Shack would have performed those tests the first instant the hair had hit his hand. The Severus Snape that had woken up on that same dusty floor, covered in venom and blood and loomed over by none other than Apprentice Healer Euterpe Levy who was spooning potion after potion between his lips and murmuring words of comfort between spells, couldn't bring himself to do it. Joy had entrusted him with her anonymity; he couldn't bring himself to willfully steal it from her.

As Severus sat staring at the single golden strand, he couldn't decide if this made him honorable or weak.

*****

Now that the contract has been taken care of, we are set to get off and running with the process itself. I've Flooed Healer Levy, and she has confirmed that she is open for appointments for much of the rest of the week and the entirety of next week for your physical. She has assured me that she is willing to work around your schedule if you are not able to make it to St. Mungo's during typical business hours. Once she has completed a formal Bill of Health (as per the contract), she will inform you of where and when to report to donate the semen. Again, as per our contract, Healer Levy will provide you with documentation that I am not currently taking any contraceptives of any kind. Once the insemination has taken place, I will keep you abreast of the results of the efforts.

Hermione scowled down at the letter she'd just written. It all seemed so stilted and formal, not like her at all, and certainly nothing bearing any resembled to the correspondence she usually enjoyed with Tobias. The wording of the whole letter made it seem as if it were just ... a business transaction. With a lurch of her stomach, Hermione realized that for the first time since they started corresponding, that this was what the letters were supposed to be like. Her lunch threatened to repeat on her, but she took a deep breath and tried to continue writing as normally as possible.

*****

"If that isn't a 'goodbye forever'," Severus said bitterly as he read, "I'm a Crumple-Horned Snorkack."

When he read her last lines, though, the furrows in his brow smoothed as his scowl turned to a moue of surprise.

Severus felt certain as he read this last paragraph that his heart ached so much that it truly must be trying to exit his chest. This tiny connection, this marginal admittance that she would be amendable to admitting his existence to their child, taught him to hope for the future. She not only wanted to remember him, to keep him as a presence in her future, she wanted the child to know of his or her father. A strange urge compelled him to clap his left hand over his heart and rub at his chest, as if the clutching of his long fingers in his shirt could steady his heart beat as he hastily scribbled a response to her letter.

*****

More than one person of my acquaintance has told me that I have a very angular face; one lady even went so far as to call it "hawk-like."

Severus smiled as he penned that line. What he hadn't said was that the phrase, taken out of context here to be used as a compliment, had actually been extracted from a conversation that he had overhead while patrolling the halls some years ago. Potter and some of his brain-dead cronies had made several colorful remarks about his nose, and the Granger girl had actually had the temerity to defend him, likening his features to the bird of prey. The gesture had turned into a fool's errand, as it only spurred the boys to make jokes about his 'beak,' but the strangely kind description had stayed with him. It sounded like something Joy would say, if she actually knew his appearance.

This is a bare description for an entire human being, I know, but it is accurate enough.

Lifting his quill from the page, Severus gulped heavily and wondered if he had the courage to ask for reciprocation. Watching how his hand shook, he growled at himself and forced it back to the page. "Brave enough to defy Voldemort, you can certainly ask for this," Severus spat to himself.

And your appearance? I shall not be raising a child with a stranger's face, true, but turnabout is fair play ....

Tobias

*****

Severus restrained himself from tapping his foot edgily, but it was a near thing. He sat in the small room obviously set aside for health physicals, his long legs just touching the floor as they dangled from the high table. Both his pride and his temper were smarting from the earlier encounter with the receptionist. She had done an obvious, visible double-take as he'd strode into the antechamber of Healer Levy's office, gawking at him and cowering as if Satan himself had popped up and demanded her soul. The twit had actually stammered twice on the "p" before she'd gotten his title out and stumbled over the "s" nearly as much.

"Professor Snape," she said with horrified awe. She'd eventually managed to string those two words together at the same time. "What are you doing here?"

He raised an eyebrow at her and used his best leer. "As much tact and grasp of the obvious as your school days, Watkins," he snapped. "My business here is no concern of yours. Where is Healer Levy?"

"Ah," she said for a moment and then seemed to recover herself. "Oh. Healer Levy, of course."

Glancing down at her desk, the young woman shuffled a few pages of the appointment book that very quietly said, "One o'clock appointment in progress. Estimated time of arrival: fourteen and one-half minutes."

Delilah Watkins looked up at him nervously then back down at the appointment book, as if he were going to scold one or the both of them for Healer Levy's preoccupation. "She's currently in with a patient, Professor," Delilah managed.

"So I heard." His scowl deepened.

"You can, erm," Delilah looked around helplessly then, upon spotting an open door behind her, collected herself a bit. "You can either take a seat here in the waiting room or I could set you up in one of the exam rooms."

Only a split-second's consideration went into his decision. "An exam room will be sufficient," he bit off. He could only imagine what calamity would befall him, were someone he was acquainted with to see him here. He hadn't taken the time to think up an alibi, and he hadn't the energy to do so in the next fourteen minutes.

Nodding eagerly, the young woman had bolted up from behind her desk and showed him to the only one of four doors behind her that stood open. After a quick blurb about dressing down to his underthings – which had caused her to blush herself nearly purple under his stare – she had dashed away, obviously in a rush to be as far away from Snape and his underthings as possible. This suited Severus just fine. She had closed the door behind him, and he had perched himself on the edge of the exam table, still fully clothed. Not even Albus Dumbledore and a stack of Galleons the size of Hogwarts could have convinced him to sit unclothed to await someone else.

After what felt like hours, the door opened again, and a petite woman with a pointed, elfin face and a wealth of sleek brown hair pinned in a knot at the crown of her head entered and smiled at him. She closed the door behind her promptly, but not as if she was in a rush. When she turned back to him, he rose from the table and returned her cheery smile with a bland nod of acknowledgement.

"Professor Snape," she said in a warm, low-pitched voice in direct contrast with her tiny frame.

She extended a small hand for him to shake, which he accepted briefly, before settling himself back onto the exam table. Without further ado, Euterpe Levy settled herself behind the small rolling table, in an office chair that rolled a bit as she sat, after which she tapped an applewood wand on the table, producing a small file folder containing the words "Fertility Treatments – Bundle/Reynard." A tiny sigh of relief escaped him as he realized that all records would be conducted under his alias, not just converted or spelled to reveal only his fake name. If Healer Levy noticed the exhalation, she made no sign of such, simply opened the file, extracted an empty rubric of some kind and withdrew a Muggle pencil from somewhere in the knot of hair at the back of her head. She quickly stowed her wand in that same location, giving her the look of a lopsided Geisha. He couldn't help a tiny smile.

"I know," she said with a laugh. "Extremely dangerous, that, pointing a wand down the back of my neck, but it's a terrible habit to break, and it IS a rather handy usage for all this hair. I never have to carry a purse or holster for it! Now, Professor," she said, holding the pencil over the rubric, "I'm going to have to ask you a few questions before we get started with the physical exam."

Severus grimaced at the mention of the physical, but nodded shortly, crossing his arms over his chest. "Proceed," he said.

She smiled again, a cheery sparkle in her bright violet eyes. "First of all, are you currently taking any potions or Muggle medications?"

"No."

"Any treatments for any ongoing health problems?"

"No."

"Any lingering effects of previous curses, hexes, spell work, or injuries suffered during the war?"

Severus's face went stony before he uttered a decidedly clipped, "No."

While she dropped her eyes to scribble a few symbols that must be some sort of shorthand, Healer Levy said, "I ask everyone that question, sir. Just so you know." He hmmphed but said nothing, so she continued in a warm voice, "It's more common than you'd think for people to still be suffering from lingering problems from all those years ago. Did you know they've recently linked the uncharacteristic rise in arthritis among both triptagenarians and pentagenarians to an overexposure to Cruciatus during the Final Battle? Seems that those age groups were the most likely to be involved in the battle, as they were either students then or parents of students, so they suffered the most backlash."

Severus took a deep breath and tried not to censure the woman's happy chatter. He knew she was simply trying to make the process friendlier, but he wanted nothing more than to just have it over with. "You don't say," Severus responded.

He knew that she caught the frosty tone to his voice, but her expression didn't falter. After a few more innocuous questions about his health, she stood up and withdrew her wand.

"All right, Professor," she said and gestured for him to stand. "Now comes the fun part..."

He scowled at her and a mischievous glint lit her eyes.

"Well, it's fun for me, anyhow," she said, laughing as his expression darkened. Holding her wand over each hand, one at a time, Healer Levy said, "Ablutium."

Severus recognized the sanitizing charm and although he was grateful for her attention to detail, it reminded him more forcefully of their purpose here.

"If you would please remove your robes and any garments beneath; I need you in nothing but your skin."

Severus's teeth clenched, and he favored the pint-sized little demon with a particularly scathing glare before she pointed her wand at the wall and extended a privacy screen. She hummed the entire time he was divesting himself of clothing, and he could nearly hear the smirk in her tuneless warbling. Just as he turned to face the screen, fighting a flush of embarrassment for being naked as an infant, her shadow flicked its wand towards the wall across from him.

"There's a paper gown for you to put on," she said lightly. "You can wear that for the beginning of the exam. Have a seat on the table once you've got it on."

A beat of silence went by as he donned the gown. After a moment, he said, "Did you purposely wait that long just to make me sweat over it?"

He had just placed his scantly-concealed bum on the paper lined table when she flicked her wand, whisking away the screen.

"Of course," she said gaily. She smiled again in the face of his scowl since it had much less venom this time. "Was it a Slytherin-worthy effort, sir?"

"For a Hufflepuff," he said, smirking.

He stayed silent for a while as Healer Levy lit her wand and peered into his ears, eyes, and throat, and then said, "You needn't call me sir, Healer Levy. You must be thirty-five by now; I haven't been your professor for quite some time and you're not that much younger than I."

"I'm actually forty-two, Professor, but you're kind to forget that." She cast a few charms to amplify his heart beat and listen to his lungs. "Besides, I wouldn't know what to say if I didn't call you sir or Professor."

"You could try my name."

"Shall I call you Severus, then, or Tobias?"

Severus froze in the act of standing. Not only was it the first direct reference to the situation at hand, it felt unspeakably cruel for some reason. Because he could think of nothing else to do, he simply finished standing and stared at a fixed point on the wall without answering.

"Severus it is," Healer Levy said quietly. One small hand went to his arm in a very gentle touch that Severus might have almost considered sympathetic, had she not followed it by saying, "Well, since we're on a first name basis, I suppose it's time for me to ask you to get naked so I can handle your bits."

He glared at her, but she just smiled, so he sniffed imperiously and folded his arms across his chest.

"I was just trying to loosen you up, Severus. You looked so uncomfortable. It won't hurt, I promise."

"This whole process is highly undignified," he said loftily, but deigned to uncross his arms and stand still while she Banished his paper gown.

"Perhaps," she said, suddenly serious, "but it's extremely important. Not just for her health, but the baby's too. And yours as well. I noticed on my records that you haven't had a formal physical since the last time you came here to be treated with antivenin twelve years ago. With everything you've been through, sir, I'd hate to think of some sort of silent disease taking you out. You deserve better than that."

Stunned, Severus could only mumble, "Thank you. That is ... kind of you to say."

Discomfited by the sudden look of shining admiration and pride in her eyes, Severus resumed his rapt examination of the wall above her head. He gasped a bit as he felt one of her small hands press down on his lower abdomen, the other pushing a firm, supportive pressure against his lower back.

"A deep breath, please," she said, her eyes intent on his stomach, and when he complied, "Good. Another. Good." Healer Levy dropped to her knees in front of him, and with another cheeky smile as she gazed up at him, she gave a low whistle. "My goodness."

A quick glance down at her and he couldn't help but ask, "What is it?"

"Well, sir, it's just a shame you aren't doing this the usual way. If she had the view I have, maybe she'd change her mind about..."

"Miss Stanhope!" Severus shouted without thinking.

The small woman burst into a peal of musical laughter and said, "I haven't been a Stanhope for nearly twenty years now, Severus. And I've been a Healer for twenty-three, which I'm sure you'll remember."

"You weren't this forward when you were a Stanhope."

"Not to you," she said cheekily. "I was terrified beyond my wits in your class."

"And a damn sight more respectful as a result!"

"Shall I go back to calling you sir, then?"

He narrowed his eyes at her, but let it go without comment just to get the damn thing over faster. She ran the usual battery of tests on his lower half that he remembered despising at Hogwarts, but was thoroughly grateful that, despite her cheek, Healer Levy was both gentler and more relaxing to his nerves than Poppy Pomfrey. Especially as he didn't have to eat breakfast across the table from her every morning, knowing that she'd traversed the less scenic vistas on his body, unlike he suffered with Poppy Pomfrey. Eventually, Healer Levy moved to the small sink in the corner to wash her hands. As she did so, she turned her head to talk to him.

"Now that we've got that done, there's just one last thing I need to get before I can Floo Joy with a clean bill of health. I'm going to need a semen sample, so we can run a diagnostic to get sperm count. Men of your age," she ignored his indignant grumble as he replaced his clothing, "run the risk of having lower sperm counts, especially if they've had repeated spell injuries and use of Unforgivables in their past, which I'm sure you have. We can get a sample for the BoH, I can run the diagnostic, and you can schedule an appointment with Delilah to come back for your donation."

A heavy sigh escaped him as he withdrew his wand from an inner pocket and wordlessly used it to rebutton his robes. "Can't I get this out of the way all at once?" He shuddered to think of wording his follow-up appointment with the idiot at the front desk.

Healer Levy looked genuinely surprised. "I wasn't aware you were in such a hurry to get on with it," she answered. Before he could reply, she said, "Of course, if you have the time, you can provide the full amount necessary and I'll just run the diagnostic on the whole sample. You can wait for the results and then you won't have to come back again."

He nodded shortly and fought the rising blush that he knew was on his cheeks.

"Well," Healer Levy said, and for a moment, Severus could see a strange sadness in her face. She twirled her wand in the air, and a small rack of test tubes about as thick around as his wand deposited itself on the rolling table. "When you're ready to begin, just tap it with your wand and say, 'Expletum.' It'll fill each test tube in turn, at the appropriate time. Please see if you can manage to fill all four; it'll decrease the likelihood of having to come back to make more donations. You may transfigure the furniture or room however you see fit."

"Thank you," he said, acutely uncomfortable.

The instant Healer Levy opened the door, a sleek black owl swooped into the room, dropped a small envelope in Severus's lap, then circled for a moment and winged its way out again. He barely had to look at it before recognizing Joy's writing addressing the missive to Tobias. Healer Levy's eyes held on the handwriting for just a moment before rising to Severus's face. She looked at him silently.

"I tried to stop her, Terri," Delilah's voice called from the other room, "but she was fairly insistent."

Healer Levy watched Severus stow the letter in his pocket, calling "That's fine, Lil," to her secretary and nodding to him as she moved to the door. "Call me whenever you're ready, Professor. Take your time."

She had closed the door nearly all the way before Severus said, "Euterpe?"

The door opened again, showing her small face bearing a raised eyebrow and a curious expression. "Yes, Severus?"

His face pinched a tad in discomfort, but he couldn't control his curiosity. "Were you surprised when you saw who Tobias was?"

A full-throated laugh left her. "Could have knocked me over with a Jobberknoll feather. Funny how fate works these things out, isn't it?"

"Yes, funny. And do you," he started, but had to stop and clear his throat. "Now knowing who the father of this child is, do you ... that is, do you believe ... do you think..."

"She'll be a wonderful parent, Professor," Healer Levy said quietly. Just before she shut the door, she peered around it to give him a thoughtful look. Then, she said, "So will you."

Too stunned to respond, Severus watched the door long after it closed, his hand clasped over the pocket holding Joy's most recent letter.

A/N – Well, I hope you enjoyed this installment. I thoroughly enjoyed Severus's little trip to the hospital. Oh, just for reference:

Expletum: to fill up; to satisfy: to quench; to appease.

Also, a word of warning: the next chapter will have some adult content, so the rating will jump. If you're squicked by adult content, you might want to either skim the next chapter or skip it completely. Though why you'd want to skip the fun part, I'll never know. ^_^ The next few chapters are already written so, aside from the hiatus for the voting process, the rest of this fic should barrel right along.

By the way... vote for me, vote for me, vote for me!!!!

Thanks for all the lovely reviews and encouragement!