Three - Interlude

Disclaimer: Anything you recognize belongs to JKR. I do not profit from writing this story.

Author's Notes: I thought it important to note that unlike my other monster of a fic that I am updating here, this one is not a WIP. It's a short tale completed at just under 15,000 words.

Two Weeks Previously:

"Still kicking, then?" Lucius called in an upbeat cheer. The pleasure in his voice surprised even him.

He had entered the dingy pub in Knockturn Alley for a much needed drink before heading back to his job at the Ministry. His name might have been cleared after the war, but his previous status would never be reinstated. So, sometimes he needed a little...incentive...during his lunch break to calm his nerves enough to tolerate the actual workload he had never experienced before.

It hadn't taken him very long to recognize the body of his long lost... friend... hidden underneath an ominous black cloak. He couldn't believe his eyes when he had first run into Snape a few days ago. His pleasure at the chance encounter had been genuine, even if it was one-sided.

Not expecting an invitation, Lucius settled himself in the unoccupied seat across from Severus Snape.

"For the last bloody time, Lucius, I am NOT suicidal," Snape snarled, eyeing his uninvited company with disdain.

Lucius calmly took a sip of his wine before drawling, "Your mouth may be saying one thing... but you still haven't joined the land of the living."

"I haven't been invited."

Lucius flipped his hand with an air of exasperation. "For fucks sake, not this again. If you didn't want everyone to assume you were dead, then you shouldn't have disappeared for so long."

"Don't presume to think I pity myself, Lucius. I actually prefer things this way." Snape slowly lowered his hood over his brow before glancing around the bar suspiciously. Foolish wizards and witches were so willfully blind to everything around them that Snape's 'Do Not Notice' glamour was practically unnecessary. "My account at Gringotts has been endowed with a very satisfying legacy for my troubles, and I do enjoy living in complete obscurity. Things could be much worse. My face could be on the cover of that rag, for instance."

Lucius glanced down at the rolled up trashy magazine sticking out of his cloak pocket. "Nope, not yours. Just the usual nonsense." Snatching it from his robes, Lucius threw the magazine onto the table with a turn of his wrist. It spun in a swirl of color before pausing directly under Severus' nose.

Snape's facial muscles tensed at the familiar figures looking up at him in the photograph.

"War Heroes to Wed!" the caption read.

Snape had only been back in London for a few weeks but wasn't wholly prepared as he had hoped to have been in seeing their faces. Snape knew in time, it would be inevitable. But he had expected a more...personal...confrontation. The last time he had laid eyes on those two, he had been lying flat on his back, the severed artery in his neck squirting blood with the rhythm of his failing heartbeat. Their faces had been appropriately masked in the horror demanded for such a sight.

Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, the latter pressing his lips to her cheek as she faced the camera with a very convincing expression of surprise.

The wizarding world had indeed changed so much...so quickly, and Snape wanted to believe he had been prepared for it.

"Don't look so surprised," Lucius sumptuously droned.

"She has always been an irritating little swot," Snape agreed dismissively, "but he's a blubbering idiot."

"He's a pureblood. I would say she couldn't do any..."

"Oh, let go of that shit, Lucius. No one cares anymore."

Lucius appeared unsettled for a moment at Snape's words. He glanced around the bar thoughtfully, spotting a few individuals who would never have entered such an establishment in his day. He wouldn't have been surprised if the two Gryffindors in question had popped in for a drink, either. "Indeed."

Snape slowly closed his eyes, leaning further back into the booth. He seemed to concentrate very hard on his breathing before he made an effort to speak. "This has all been very enjoyable, but I've had my fill. Go away."

Lucius chuckled darkly. "Whenever you finally decide on 'coming out,' do let me know. I would be very disappointed if I missed it and was forced to read about the revelation in here." Extending an elegant finger, he rhythmically tapped the magazine on the table.

Snape's lip curled. It wasn't difficult for him to refrain from wishing Lucius good day.

He hadn't been surprised that Lucius was able to recognize him again. Only those who wanted to see him, it seemed, could. Snape hadn't changed his appearance at all. He might be a bit skinnier, and decidedly more sallow, but he only wore that one glamour. It was easier for him to go unnoticed in the wizarding world if everyone had already made up their minds against acknowledging his existence.

Denial was more potent than any glamour.

Little did Snape know that he had done himself a disservice by vanishing to North America for so long. If he had remained in society, he could have adjusted with the changes. He knew he would never have accepted the ridiculousness of this forcefully blind Utopia, but at least it wouldn't have been such a shock.

Except for the word 'war' in the caption of the magazine, one would have thought it had never happened.

Snape wasn't so morbid as to believe that all who had experienced the war should be perpetually depressed. Nor did he think life should exist without the enjoyments of simplicities such as marriage...

... but them.

They didn't deserve it.

There were many reasons why Snape had stayed away these past six years.

One of which was the necessity to recuperate from his physical injuries. His nerves had been permanently damaged from the poisoning of Nagini's venom. His body had been so loaded up on various potions that last week at Hogwarts that now he understood why the venom had failed to absorb properly in his bloodstream. Snape's body had certainly improved compared with when his wounds were still fresh, but some damage appeared to be permanent.

Whenever Snape allowed his emotions to get the best of him, his muscles tended to lock up. There had even been a few instances of seizures, but Snape felt confident that the range of potions he was ingesting daily would adequately control them.

'Come Out,' my arse, Snape thought darkly. Lucius would certainly enjoy that.

Snape had returned with the intention of finally making his presence known, but he'd been researching the state of the wizarding world for the past couple of weeks continuously hidden behind his glamour.

What he had learned was that some assumed he was dead while many didn't think of him at all. Surprisingly, he preferred it this way. Snape truly wanted to be left alone.

At the very least, Snape was... satisfied... that Potter had cleared his name soon after the boy had both feet in a high position at the Ministry. The number of black-listed Death Eaters was staggering. The trials had taken place the same week as Voldemort's fall with all potential threats swept neatly under the rug. Azkaban's rug, to be more exact.

Out of sight, out of mind...in its very lowest form.

Snape had also learned that some people couldn't say his name. In those rare, hushed conversations, he was only referred to as 'Dumbledore's killer.'

That discovery hadn't been surprising, at all. To be frank, Snape couldn't blame them.

But them. Even the act of clearing his name wasn't enough to remove Potter from his list of enemies.

They were some of the handful he despised with fervor...Minerva and her golden Gryffindors.

Snape's bitterness hadn't been fueled by the knowledge that the wizarding world still loathed him. He had never dreamed of surviving the war, never mind becoming a hero. And he certainly didn't expect the four of them to spend their lives recounting his many sacrifices to all who would listen. Snape really couldn't care less if the four of them liked him or not. He would have enjoyed mocking them if they'd claimed affection.

Yet, there was one thing, one measly little thing, he had expected of Minerva, Potter, Weasley, and Granger.

One final act that had been his only expectation for as long as he had been a professor at Hogwarts, and which certainly was his due after the war.

Respect. More importantly, respect in death.

When Snape had given his memories to Potter with what should have been his last, dying breath, he had expected them to bestow the final honor that was his due for the twenty long years of service to Dumbledore and to the Order.

And not in the way Potter had attempted at the Ministry.

Snape had never anticipated that he would survive the war. That potentially fatal bite in the neck wasn't terribly surprising the moment Snape realized he was alone with Voldemort in the Shrieking Shack. He had even unquestionably prayed for his end to arrive swiftly.

Snape had lain on that disgusting floor for hours, immobile, bleeding in his own piss... but he hadn't died.

The only explanation Snape could come up with was an odd reaction between Nagini's venom and the multitude of potions he took daily to keep his mind sharp and awake.

His bleeding had eventually stopped; his heart rate had steadied... but the pain. The pain kept Snape from feeling any measure of gratitude for his life. He had ultimately lost consciousness from the extent of it.

To his own disbelief, Snape had awoken hours later to the sounds of birds chirping.

As his strength slowly built to the point where he had been able to roll off his back, his resentment against the four of them had solidified.

They knew. Potter, Weasley, Granger... and probably Minerva. They all knew where he was and had never come back. He would never have survived if it hadn't rained on the second day when much needed water had dripped through the dilapidated Shrieking Shack.

Snape wasn't resentful that they hadn't attempted to save him. They probably and rightfully assumed he was dead. But the one thing they could have done, the only 'reward' he had ever wanted, was to be honored in death.

They should have come back to claim his body.

It would have been swollen with three full days of rot.

So Snape left, without any intentions of returning. Snape hadn't been tempted to come back until rumors of Potter's success in rebuilding the economy and society had reached his unwilling ears in Alaska.

Such hatred as he hadn't felt in a very long time flared anew at the sight of their picture on the cover of this magazine.

Thank you, Lucius.

Snape curled the paper into a wad, tucking it into his cloak pocket. He fled from Knockturn Alley only to walk the short distance to the flat he knew was located nearby.

Ten years ago, reporters would have been very careful about leaking personal information like the address of Hermione Granger for fear of madmen abusing such knowledge.

Snape smirked evilly, wrapping his robes tighter around his shoulders. He appeared to be the only madman loose at the moment.

Snape proceeded to spend the next two weeks standing vigil outside Hermione's building.

He watched her, memorizing her daily routine. More importantly, he listened. He listened to Hermione's fears and worries, and he heard much more than her fiancé was willing to absorb.

Whenever he spied Weasley coming and going, Snape was sorely tempted to confront the gangly young man in a dark alley. He wouldn't physically harm the little bugger, but how Snape yearned to see the arrogant git scared out of his senses once he was finally confronted with a sight from the past.

That had been when Snape had made up his mind to actually do something instead of just watching.

Perhaps others deserved contentment after the war but not them.

It was all so disgustingly normal with Snape himself having helped make it all possible. And none of them gave two seconds out of their day to remember it.

Snape had given up a life of normalcy since Potter had been one-year-old. He had wasted his existence protecting him and his friends with nothing to show for it.

If they wanted to remember Snape as the bastard of Hogwarts, he would really show them just how much of a bastard he could be.

Every night, Snape had waited until it was dark before flying silently to her window... and watching. The size of her flat, the quality of her furniture, even the way she sighed when she combed her hair, it all grated on Snape's nerves, serving as crucial fuel to his escalating rage.

He hated everything they had now and yet couldn't stop watching.

Snape especially couldn't stop watching her.

Vengeance burned a hole in chest so hot, he thrilled at the prospect of finally achieving his chance to settle scores.

Starting with Hermione.

Author's Notes: Story bet'ed by the brilliant melusin.