Part I: Chapter 3: It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like ?

Chapter 3: It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like ...

Sunday morning dawned bright and clear; the temperature held steady, below freezing, but the sky was a perfect, unclouded blue. Hermione sang to herself in the shower as she bathed. She had thought she would be all alone on Christmas, but she was actually going to have company. In that case, they might as well celebrate. She would bring down the decorations from the attic, and procure a tree and the makings of Christmas dinner – and perhaps she would buy her usual Christmas gifts, after all. It was not Harry's fault that Ron was an idiot – nor was it Ginny's – and she knew that each of them had presents for her, because they were so transparent when asking questions and so bad at keeping secrets.

After patiently plaiting her thick, long, bushy hair into a French braid down her back, she dressed in her favourite denims, last year's Weasley sweater – which was embroidered with tiny books – and pulled on her heavy brown boots. She ran down the stairs and into the kitchen, her spirits high.

"Good morning, Professor!" she said, bustling about to pour a packet of flavoured porridge into a bowl, add milk, and put it in the microwave. "Isn't it a glorious day?"

The glower which met her from behind the newspaper might have cowed a lesser mortal. A grunt was her only response.

"I feel like a new person today! Thank you for looking after me yesterday."

The microwave beeped and she removed the bowl of porridge, carrying it to the table.

"What did you just do to that porridge?"

"I nuked it, sir. Why –"

Snape moved swiftly, his non-verbal Wingardium Leviosa floating the bowl off the table and into the sink before Hermione could complete her thought.

"That was my breakfast!"

"Do you have any idea what the ingestion of irradiated food will do to you?" he thundered.

Nonplussed, Hermione gazed into his darkened countenance. What in the world ailed the man? Unless ... unless he took her literally?

She dissolved into gales of laughter.

There were many things which Severus Snape could endure with equanimity. Being ridiculed was, unfortunately, not one of them. He rose from his place at the table and stood over her, an ugly expression upon his face.

Even one day previously, the Potions master's threatening attitude would have subdued her. After having him look after her with as much solicitude as she might have received from her own Head of House, Hermione was not afraid. She plucked a paper tissue from the box on the counter behind her and dried her cheeks. "I'm sorry, sir," she said, as her laughter subsided. "The term 'nuked' is slang. The microwave oven produces electromagnetic radiation which is exactly the correct wavelength to heat the water molecules in the food – which, in turn, heats the food itself. It's perfectly safe, I promise you!"

Snape struggled with himself. It would be so satisfying to snarl at the girl. He loathed appearing uninformed, especially to a student, but there was no way he could now pretend he knew exactly how the microwave contraption worked, after betraying such ignorance.

"Continue, by all means," he sneered. "Eat your electromagnetically radiated food. I will be outside, surveying the perimeter."

Hermione cringed slightly as the front door slammed shut. She might have handled that more diplomatically, she supposed. Why did the man have to be so prickly? She chuckled as she retrieved her bowl from the thankfully empty sink and began to eat her breakfast.

The better question was, why was she surprised? Surely there was a picture of Severus Snape beside the word "prickly" in the World Wizarding Dictionary.

The rest of the morning passed in silence, with Snape reading in the sitting room, ignoring Hermione's attempts at conversation. Finally, she decided to ignore him as well. Choosing a video from the shelf, she popped it into the player and settled down on the sofa to watch one of her favourite seasonal shows.

Before long, the movie had Snape's attention.

"That is the most obnoxious child I have ever seen," he muttered, watching Kevin McAllister's antics as he was left Home Alone by his family. Hermione's gleeful laughter as she watched the little boy outwit the burglars drew his eyes more than once, though he did not laugh himself. When the boy's mother showed up on Christmas morning, Hermione sniffled and wiped her eyes on her sleeve, but when it was over, her spirits rebounded almost immediately.

"We need Christmas biscuits!"

She stopped long enough to turn on the machine which she referred to as the stereo, putting in a flat silver disc which began to play seasonal music, then she went into the kitchen and began to make noise.

Snape stood and attended to the fire in the hearth, adding additional logs and arranging them in the grate with the flick of his wand. He had not been in a private home at Christmas in nearly twenty years, and the last time had been at the Malfoys, where the house-elves attended to one's every whim and the atmosphere was cold and formal. Since that time, he had spent the holiday at Hogwarts, which had traditions of its own.

His childhood home carried for him memories that were both good and bad. Some of the good memories were of his mother at Christmas time. She loved the season and would sing while she baked the treats that he was allowed to have only at this time of year.

The child in the kitchen opened the oven – not the microwave, but the actual oven – and removed a tray of something which filled the house with the aroma of cinnamon and nutmeg. Snape relaxed in the armchair and closed his eyes as he inhaled the scent of the homemade biscuits, underlain by the smell of the burning wood on the hearth. He dismissed the ache, which he presently felt beneath his sternum, as the undoubted product of a hastily consumed luncheon – even when the sensation intensified as the child commenced to sing along with the music, in a soft, sweet soprano.

Giving in to an urge that would normally never assail him, Snape wandered into the kitchen, ostensibly to procure a glass of water, and permitted the girl to put him to work stirring batter in a bright yellow bowl with a long wooden spoon.

Hermione startled awake when the hoarse shout from below stairs echoed in her room. Crookshanks was waiting at the door when she shoved her feet into her Winnie-the-Pooh slippers and crept out onto the landing, her way lit by the tip of her wand. She and the cat moved silently down the stairs and into the sitting room. Snape was quiet now, lying upon his back on the sofa, his bare arms stretched up and crossed behind his head; Hermione could clearly see the Dark Mark on his left forearm, which he had so bravely revealed to Cornelius Fudge after the return of the Dark Lord. The pillow she had provided for him was on the floor, as was the blanket. She could see how his thrashing had twisted the strapped vest he wore about his torso, separating it from the black trousers into which it had been tucked, revealing an expanse of his very pale stomach.

Hermione forced her eyes away from the intriguing planes of her sleeping professor's abdominal muscles and replaced the blanket over his sleeping form, being careful to cover his stocking feet, which extended over the end of the cushions. She padded out of the room and up the stairs, only to return shortly thereafter with something which she placed on the seat of the armchair, on top of the pillow she had retrieved from the floor.

When Crookshanks curled up on the arm of the couch, just above Snape's head, Hermione smiled and left him there.

Snape opened his eyes the next morning to find he had been roused by the girl's familiar, whose tail was tickling his face. He pushed himself into a sitting position, glaring at the cat.

"I thought you slept with her," he grumbled.

Crookshanks began to purr and butted his head against the professor's arm.

"Keep your fleas to yourself or you will discover the meaning of the saying that there is more than one way to skin a cat," he promised.

Crookshanks flicked his tail in answer.

Snape rubbed his hands over his stubbled cheeks and groaned. He could shave with his wand, but he much preferred his razor. And what he would give for a shower! But he had brought no personal items of that nature, nor a change of clothing, vowing to himself that cleansing charms would suffice for this sojourn, as he did not actually intend to sleep during his stay – of course, he had also not intended to eat, or to speak to the girl, and he had ended up doing all three. He found the house, in spite of its indisputable Muggle nature, to be a place of comfort, and the child behaved to him as if he were a favoured uncle, or an older brother.

It was surprisingly pleasant.

He noticed that his pillow, instead of being on the sofa, was on the armchair – and what was that on top of the pillow? He Summoned the pillow to him and it brought with it a black fleece track suit.

Obviously, the girl had brought these to him – when had she come in? Why had she been prowling about in the night?

"Well, that explains you, anyway," he muttered to the cat, as he stood and gathered his shirt and coat before going into the bathroom to perform his morning cleansing charms.

When he emerged from the bathroom and entered the kitchen, it was to find Hermione there before him, with coffee brewing and breakfast cooking.

"Good morning!" she said cheerfully. "Your owl brought your paper; it's on the table. Have some eggs and toast!"

Snape poured some coffee and accepted the plate she offered to him.

"I want to go shopping," she said, joining him at the table.

"If wishes were Thestrals, then beggars would ride," he said dismissively.

"I'm sorry, I misspoke." Hermione sipped her milk. "I am going shopping today. Would you care to come?"

Snape set his coffee mug on the table with a snap. "You are not leaving this house. It is my job to keep you safe, and I cannot do that if you go gallivanting all over creation!"

Hermione finished chewing her bite of toast and washed it down with a sip of milk before responding, "I have some shopping to do, Professor. You can come with me, if you like, but I'm not going to be held prisoner in my own home."

Though he never admitted defeat, in time it was understood that he would accompany her on her shopping expedition. Hermione levitated the dirty breakfast dishes to the sink and set them to washing, all the while examining Snape from the corner of her eye. He could look so much better if he would just wash his hair properly! How could she induce him to do so? Well, she needed no further delays this morning – at least he acknowledged that she was leaving the house to shop!

The next altercation involved transportation.

"I am not entering that vehicle." Snape stood in the Grangers' garage, his arms crossed belligerently over his chest.

Hermione looked from her mother's car to the professor and back again. "But how else are we going to get to the shops? And how are we going to bring our shopping home?" She opened the driver's side door and slid in. "Come on, it's getting late!"

"Do you imagine that you can operate this machine?" he demanded.

"Yes, I have my license – would you like to see it?"

He snorted. "We can Apparate and you can do your shopping in Diagon Alley, like the witch you are. And if we cannot carry your shopping bags, then you have bought too much!"

He strode to the open car door and leaned over, grasping her arm and compelling her to exit. "Come on – it's getting late," he reminded her.

They Disapparated from her back garden, and Hermione found that he was not a bad companion for shopping. The shops of Diagon Alley were just beginning to open when they stepped through the enchanted arch from the Leaky Cauldron, and the holly and the red ribbons adorning the shop windows, along with the snow on the ground, made it all very festive. Hermione found the gifts she wanted for Harry and Ron – yes, she would buy a gift even for Ron, for she wanted to be his friend, if not his girlfriend – in Quality Quidditch Supplies, and a lovely cashmere scarf, hat and glove set for Ginny in Gladrags. In the men's department she saw an exquisite black turtleneck cashmere jumper; a quick glance around showed her that Snape was seated near the front of the store, immersed in the book which he had produced from his cloak pocket. She paid for her selections and buried the jumper at the bottom of her shopping bag, beneath the colourful hat and scarf set she would send to Ginny.

"You cannot Apparate with a fir tree!"

She stomped her foot, sending the powdery snow from the previous night's fall up in a cloud. "I want a Christmas tree! It's not Christmas without a tree!"

But he was adamant, and they returned to her home with only her shopping bags.

After supper that evening, she pulled out the yellow mixing bowl. Snape wandered in from the sitting room.

"No moving picture tonight?"

"Maybe later; I thought I would bake now."

"Again?"

She gave him a look of fond exasperation. "Well, you keep eating the biscuits I make, don't you? If I don't bake more, then where will we be?"

Snape froze at her expression, his own impassive mask falling into place over his face, returning him to the forbidding Potions master.

"Suit yourself," he said indifferently, before going out of the house to patrol the area.

She noticed that though he paid no apparent attention to the movie du jour, which was White Christmas, he seemed to have recovered his mood enough to enjoy the homemade biscuits with the cocoa she served before going up to bed.

"Didn't you care for the movie?" she asked, dipping the spice biscuit into her cocoa as she sat with him before the fire.

"The man actually wanted bad weather," Snape said incredulously, and Hermione was still chuckling when she went up the stairs and climbed into her bed.

The muffled shouts from the sitting room scarcely startled her when she sat up in her bed at three in the morning. Her bedroom door, which she had left ajar so that Crookshanks could visit them both during the night, allowed her to hear him more clearly; she was certain that she heard him cry, "Mother!" before his words became incoherent. Picking up her wand, she padded downstairs and into the sitting room, telling herself that she simply wanted to be sure he was all right.

The first sight which met her eyes was that of Crookshanks, who was curled up on Snape's mid-section and purring. The fingers of the professor's right hand were threaded through the thick orange fur. This time he had managed to retain the pillow, though the blanket had once again drifted onto the floor.

As she moved to drape the blanket over his form again, she saw that he was wearing the black track suit she had brought for him from her father's closet; they weren't pyjamas, but they had to be more comfortable than sleeping in his clothes. She saw his coat, trousers, and shirt arranged carefully on the armchair, and for a moment she reached out and touched the black wool coat before going back upstairs to her own bed.

A/N: Beta reading thanks to Snarkywench and Brit-picking kudos to MagicAlly.