Coming Back to You

She allowed him to sulk for four days, and it was hell. He had become so used to having her nearby that when she wasn't, he didn't really know what to do with himself. He still saw her of course – she was his apprentice after all, and she had his classes to attend – but the easy camaraderie wasn't there. She did her job as efficiently as always, but when the day was done and classes were over, she'd drift away.

The first day, he told himself it was what he wanted. He would not be made a mockery of, not by anyone and certainly not by Hermione Granger. He knew that word had gotten out to the student population about the interrupted kiss but was determined to ignore the slightly repulsed looks the obnoxious brats kept sending his way. In other words, he acted the same as he always had and by the end of the day he was pretty sure no one believed a word Bitts had said.

That night in the Great Hall for dinner, he told himself he was relieved when Hermione sat between Albus and Minerva. When the meal was finished he returned to his rooms determined to read his most recent acquisition from Flourish and Botts. He had not spent a quite evening reading in a very long time and it was something he had always enjoyed. But the book wasn't as interesting as he'd imagined it would be and he couldn't seem to focus on the words in front of him. Instead, his eyes kept drifting to Hermione's small desk and the mess of parchment lying across the top. He didn't understand how someone as brilliant as she was could be so unorganized.

He decided, after spending an hour gazing from his book to her empty desk that he was too tired to read. He retired to his room.

Her robe was lying across the foot of the bed.

Muttering under his breath, he picked it up as if it would burn him and stuck it on the hanger beside his own. The fact that he ran his fingers lightly over the fabric and smelled the collar before letting it go was completely attributable to the fact he was a very tactile man. His senses – all of them – were very keen. He loved the feel of silk between his fingers and he couldn't help but be aware of the various scents around him. He didn't miss the girl. He didn't even spare her a thought, except to wonder if she was cold without her robe and thinking if she was it served her right for being so presumptuous as to leave it here.

Mumbling a brief spell to dim the lights, he climbed into his bed and lay awake for the rest of the night, determined not to think of her.

The next day was no better. She had smiled at him and wished him good morning when she walked into the classroom prior to the first lesson. She had made some random comment about the essays she had finished marking for him before placing them neatly on his desk. She had moved to her customary seat in the back corner and sat down.

She was more distracting than ever before.

At lunch time, she sat beside him in the Great Hall but spent the entire hour conversing with Hagrid. Snape spent it sneering into his soup, wondering what was so fascinating about the Two-headed Sand Sphinx that it took sixty-minutes to discuss them.

The afternoon preceded the same as the morning had. Dinner followed the same pattern as the evening before. Snape cancelled their lab work that evening on the pretext he had other obligations to attend to and spent the rest of the evening reacquainting himself with Old Ogden.

He did manage to sleep that night, but it wasn't restful. When he woke up the next morning, he realized the side of the bed she normally slept on was completely undisturbed.

Trying to pretend he didn't miss her, he stumbled to his bathroom and was immediately distracted by the sight of her red toothbrush sitting on the sink, next to his. He wondered what she was brushing her teeth with as he started the shower and didn't even realize until it was too late that he was washing his hair with her shampoo.

He avoided breakfast in the Great Hall altogether, but couldn't avoid his classrooms. She was already there when he arrived, setting out the ingredients for the days lessons. Scowling at her when she smiled at him and wished him good morning, he barked that she was in charge of his morning classes and made a hasty exit. He ate his lunch in the back of the library, alone.

He had her instruct his afternoon classes as well, under the pretext that he was going to assess her teaching skills. As she lectured and monitored the students, he sat at his desk and glowered at her from underneath the hair hanging across his face. When classes were over, he told her to straighten up the room and swept out into the hallway, hoping he could grab dinner at the Great Hall and make his escape before she showed up.

No such luck. Either Hermione had ignored his explicit instructions, or the room hadn't needed much cleaning. She entered the Great Hall practically on his heels and was seated beside him before the meal was even served.

He ate his soup with stoic silence, steadfastly refusing to even look at her.

Finally, between the first course and the second, she said "Are you almost finished sulking yet? This is getting rather silly."

"I am not sulking," he had hissed back, "nor am I silly."

She smiled at that and he almost jumped when her hand squeezed his knee from under the table. "Do you like my shampoo?" she asked instead.

He scowled, "I used it without realizing what I was doing. I shall box your things and have them returned to you this evening. It shan't happen again."

"I'd rather you leave my things were they are, or else I'll just have to drag them all back when you stop acting like a child."

He ignored her the rest of the meal, but he didn't return her things to her.

By day four, the lack of sleep was starting to get to him. Her toothbrush seemed to mock him from its place on the sink and the unrumpled side of his bed made him sigh. He taught his own classes that day, but was so distracted he didn't even hand out one detention and he didn't make any one cry.

"Maybe Bitts was almost right," he heard a student whisper in the hallway when he was on his way to dinner. "Maybe Snape is in love with Miss Granger, but she's too smart to have anything to do with him. That's why he's been acting so strange these last few days."

"Whatever the reason, I hope it keeps up," came the hushed reply, "I like not having homework in potions."

Dinner was a mostly-silent affair again. He ate his food without tasting it and wondered if Hermione had meant what she had said, about him not returning her things. Conversations ebbed and flowed around him, but he participated in none of them. Instead, he thought about the way she had kissed him in his classroom just a few days prior. He thought about the smile on her face when they'd been caught, and how she had told him she was kissing him because she loved him. He thought about what he'd snarled at her and how it had almost made her cry.

"Hermione," he said, looking up at her suddenly and catching her slightly off guard. It was the first time he had spoken to her since that day, without her speaking to him first.

"Severus?" she replied. Her fork was halfway between her plate and her mouth, and the small piece of apple pie on the end of it smelled richly of cinnamon.

"Would you care to join me for tea in my quarters later?" he asked.

"Why wait?" she responded, placing the fork back on her plate, the apple pie forgotten. Her hand reached over to cover his own, and he brought it to his lips, kissing it gently before rising from his chair and pulling hers out for her.

"Why wait indeed?" he agreed with her, as they made their excuses and left the Great Hall.

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A/N:

This chapter was completely inspired by Leonard Cohen's beautiful and evocative song Coming Back to You

Maybe I'm still hurting

Coming back to you