Time is Depressing

Chapter 3: Time Is Depressing

Ron hurried back to the hospital wing after his strange meeting with Dumbledore. He wasn't quite sure what to make of what the Headmaster thought of the shattering Time Turner, but it seemed that even the Headmaster wasn't sure what he thought. A faint feeling of unease settled in Ron's gut as he made his way back down the corridor to where Hermione was waiting.

When he turned the corner, Ron saw a figure hovering around the hospital wing doors. The figure paced a few steps back and forth, almost as if it couldn't figure out whether to stay or go. Ron reached into his pocket for his wand and held it at the ready. It didn't matter if they were in the same castle as a seventeen year old James Potter. Ron knew for a fact that there were Death Eaters in the castle... or at least Death Eaters in waiting.

He was only a few steps behind the figure when it whirled around, robes billowing in a fashion that made Ron start with recognition. Staring back at him was the same pair of bottomless eyes that had terrified him during his first years at Hogwarts. The face wasn't as lined from scowling or hissing at dunderheads, but he recognized the large nose.

"Snape!" Ron shouted. It was the first thing he could think of even if it wasn't the brightest thing to say.

An angry scowl twisted Snape's face, making him look as if he'd eaten something sour. "Who are you? How do you know my name?"

Ron's mouth opened and closed so quickly it made him look like a landed fish. His eyes nearly bulged out of his head. Unsteady fingers held his wand, not sure if he should use it or not. Even though the Snape standing in front of him was just seventeen, he was pretty sure he had a few good hexes up his sleeves already.

The trembling in his hands drew Snape's attention to Ron's wand. A lightning strike of fear rushed over his face before he puffed out his chest and closed in on Ron.

"You're one of Potter's friends, aren't you?"

"Well, yeah, H..."

Snape's eyes narrowed, flicking back and forth from Ron's face to his wand and back again. "Of course you are. He and that idiot Black sent you, didn't they?"

"What?" Ron stammered, too flabbergasted to figure out what was going on. "No, of course they didn't!"

Ron felt himself being pushed back against the stone wall as Snape stalked toward him. Those menacing black eyes were very familiar, almost as if they had reached back across the years to make sure Ron knew he was in quite a lot of trouble. With a snarl, Snape stepped into Ron's space and practically pressed the end of his wand to the other boy's throat.

"Do not. Lie. To me."

Gaping, afraid to say the wrong thing, Ron just stared back at Snape, his eyes bugging out of his skull. He was certain that his future professor was going to hex him within to an inch of his life. Whatever had landed them at Hogwarts in this time, it was going to get him killed. There would be no getting things straightened out and back home to their own time. Not if Snape was going to put him six feet under.

The door behind them opened with a faint creaking. Madam Pomfrey had cleaned her up, but Hermione still looked haggard and worn. Her bound arm rested tight against her ribs as she peeked out from around the doorframe. There were dark circles under her eyes already, but there was something about the glow in her eyes that made Ron uncomfortable. She'd looked at him that way... once.

"What's going on, Ron?" Hermione's voice was soft, her brow furrowed when she looked between the two of them. She tried to keep her eyes on him, but she couldn't help the way she was drawn to the seventeen-year-old Severus just feet away from her. "What have you done?"

Clearing his throat guiltily, Ron shifted from one foot to the other. He kept his eyes on Snape's wand... just in case. "Nothing! I was just coming back from talking to Professor Dumbledore and saw him lurk...outside the hospital wing."

Hermione stepped fully out into the corridor. She had changed into a clean pair of pajamas from the hospital supply, her hair tied up in a loose ponytail. It was almost comical to see Snape's expression change so quickly. His eyes lost some of their menace, and Ron would have sworn he blushed.

"Hello," she said quietly. There was an easy smile on her face as she let her gaze roam over Severus' features. She fought back the urge to reach out and touch him.

For a long moment, he stared at her. That feeling, that tightness and pulling beneath his ribs, stretching along his diaphragm, it was back. The strength and suddenness of it made frustration and anger roll inside him. He didn't know this... this girl. And it unnerved him that she made him feel something that he only ever believed he could feel for Lily.

"Where did you come from?" he spat, trying to rein in his anger. He fought the urge to crowd her back into the hospital wing just to get her out of his way... out of his mind.

Hermione and Ron looked at one another. Ron tried not to look as if he wanted to say that this whole thing was a bad idea. It would have been just fine with him if they just went down to Hogsmeade, took a room at the Three Broomsticks, and waited this whole mess out until Dumbledore could figure out what to do. But he knew Hermione well enough to know that once she set her mind on something, there was little that he could do to change her mind. And so he just sighed, looking back at her in a way that let her know that she was in charge.

"It's complicated," Hermione said helplessly. If she could have, she would have been wringing her hands in worry. "We... where we're from... I don't think..."

A sneer raced across Snape's face so quickly that Hermione felt she had been slapped. "That much is obvious." He turned his nose up at her, trying to be angry with this troublesome girl who had made him feel so out of sorts. "The both of you look as dumb as Potter and his other friends."

As Ron watched, Hermione's brown eyes filled with tears. Her face went pale white as she did her best to turn back to the hospital wing. Ron felt a wave of pity rush through him as he watched his friend's shoulders shake with her quiet sobs. Snape backed away, looking as if he was confused at her reaction.

Ron took a quick step between Hermione and Snape, letting her take a few steps into the cooling darkness of the hospital wing before he spoke. His voice was laced with venom on her behalf. "You're a ruddy git. And you'll always be a ruddy git."

Then he slammed the hospital wing doors in Snape's face.

For a moment, Snape stood there, his chest heaving and his heart racing as if he'd just run a long marathon. He couldn't quite explain why he felt the way he did, but there was something about that girl... Well, there was nothing that could be done about it. She was one of Potter's friends, just as Lily was. Wherever she and the ginger had come from, the glory that was James Potter reached there too.

Am I to never have anything that isn't tainted by Potter? With that final thought, Snape turned on his heel and made his way down to the dungeons and the Slytherin common room.

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Hermione tucked herself beneath the blankets on her bed in the hospital wing. She wished she could stop the tears from slipping down her cheeks in hot trails. As she pressed her head against the pillows, she closed her eyes and tried to remember the last time she'd seen Severus...her Severus. It seemed so long ago... a lifetime ago.

A flash of memory fought its way to the surface of her mind. It seemed the disaster with the Time Turner had left her memories of the future a little addled, almost as if they were already changing. It was like looking through a puddle of clear water. The edges of her memory were fuzzy and rippling, trembling like the gossamer strands of a spider's web in the wind. Hermione fought hard to hold on to the memory, to see just a few seconds of it.

There was darkness, the smell of pine and wet leaves. A ripple of wind and the snap of snow and ice. Something silver flickered through the trees ahead of her, followed by a silent black shadow. Her heart lifted, pounding against her ribs. She caught the scent of what Amortentia smelled like to her... freshly mown grass, new parchment, spearmint toothpaste, and the potions classroom. The scent wafted off a deep black cloak.

The memory wavered and disappeared. Hermione let out a wail and tried to reach for the retreating thoughts. Ron, sitting on the bed across from her, felt his heart twist with sadness for Hermione. She had buried herself in the bed, hiding her face in the pillows and sobbing with silent cries. Something had happened in those months while Harry and Hermione had gone through the Forest of Dean without him. Something that had changed Hermione in a way that he could never understand or explain. And Severus Snape was right in the thick of it in some way that Ron could never quite pin down.

"We don't have to stay," Ron whispered quietly. "I'm sure Dumbledore will help. We can find some rooms in Hogsmeade. Figure out how to get back home."

That was obviously the wrong thing to say for Hermione's sobs only got stronger. She pulled the blanket up over her head with her good hand and rolled away from him. Ron gave a little huff and lay back on his own bed. He barely heard when Madam Pomfrey came through and told him off for having his shoes on the sheets.

Ron stared at the ceiling and listened until Hermione's sobs stopped and she drifted off to sleep.

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Snape burst through the door of the Slytherin common room and would have continued storming if he hadn't been stopped by a marble white hand on his elbow. He looked up to see the cool eyes of Lucius Malfoy staring down at him, one brow cocked in question.

"Oh dear," Malfoy said smoothly. "It seems you got into a bit of trouble again."

The vast bubble of fear and frustration that had ballooned in Snape's chest burst with a painful violence against his ribs. He lurched forward, feeling for a moment as if he would strike his friend... his only friend these days. In a moment, Snape's body went from burning with anger to feeling as if his life's blood had drained onto the stone floors.

In an easy move, Malfoy slipped his arm around Snape's shoulders and drew him over to a pair of high backed chairs by the fireplace. Malfoy picked the book and bag from Snape's hands with practiced grace, barely having to apply pressure to the other boy's clenched fingers. With a practiced eye, he caught sight of the flecks of blood on Snape's robes and the way his obsidian eyes appeared dull.

"Potter?"

"Black."

"Ah." It was all that needed to be said. Malfoy knew how much Snape loathed the two of them. For his own part, Malfoy could have cared less...even if Sirius Black was a traitor to wizardkind. One of the oldest pure-blood families in their world, and there he was running about with those Mudbloods and half-breeds. Malfoy let out a breath through his nose and sat back.

For what felt like hours, Malfoy and Snape sat in silence, alternately looking at the fire burning in the grate and at each other. It was nearly more than he could manage for Malfoy to stay silent in those long moments. Yet he had been friends with Snape long enough to know that when he didn't want to speak, there was no pushing him to words.

At long last, the space between them filled with Snape's warm timbered voice. But it wasn't exactly what Malfoy expected to hear.

"Something strange is happening, Lucius."

Malfoy quirked a silver eyebrow and crossed his legs, propping his ankle on his knee. He waved his long fingers in a gesture for Snape to continue.

"There's a girl in the hospital wing."

A muscle in Malfoy's jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. He had listened enough of Snape pining after that Mudblood Lily Evans. Malfoy was nothing if not a good friend, but he was quite sick of listening to Snape's broken hearted tales over witches who weren't good enough for him.

"Who is she?" Malfoy kept his frustration on a tight leash. The last time he and Snape had gotten into a row about some girl Snape hadn't spoken to him for weeks.

Snape rubbed his fingers over the bridge of his beak-like nose. He pressed at the spot between his eyes. "No idea. She's our age at least. Magical without a doubt. She feels like a powerful witch. But I've never seen her inside Hogwarts before. She isn't a student."

A bit of the pressure in Malfoy's chest released. If this mysterious girl wasn't a student that meant it would be much easier for Snape to forget about her once she was gone. "Perhaps she's visiting? Related to one of the professors."

"Maybe, but she had a boy with her. Never seen him here either."

Malfoy closed his eyes to fight the urge to roll them. "A problem that will go away by the morning, I'm sure."

Snape stood up with a sound that was remarkably like a grunt. He gathered his book and bag into his arms before he made his way to the doorway that lead to the dormitories. Snape barely looked back at his one remaining friend, his mind all those floors above with the brown eyed girl in the hospital wing.

Malfoy watched Snape disappear into the darkness of the dormitory hall. His alabaster fingers flexed and contorted as he fought the urge to throw something into the fire. It seemed nothing had changed over the summer. He had nearly single-handedly removed Snape from under the thumb of his pustule of a Muggle father and his slightly simpering good-for-nothing witch of a mother.

And yet, this appeared to be starting off as every other year since they had become friends. Another year listening to Snape moaning about some useless girl who could never match him for wit or talent. Another year watching Snape make a fool of himself trying to screw up the courage to get their attention. Another year seeing him disappear further into himself.

Another year where he tried to keep his hands and his feelings to himself. "Good gods, this is going to be depressing."

Notes From The Mistress: Sorry for the delay in this chapter. It's been a long week. And for those of you following along... the plot thickens!