Getting the Hang of Thursdays

Chapter 12 - Who was left?

By Hayseed

Day Two Hundred Fifty-Eight

It was probably Severus’ imagination, but breakfast in the Great Hall seemed far more subdued than it used to be. He had persistent memories of loud students and clattering plates. Of laughter and shouts. But today, the hall was relatively quiet.

To be fair, he did not show up at the same time every day, if indeed he showed up at all. So it was entirely possible that the decreasing level of noise was at least partially due to that fact. Severus was unwilling to test his theory by attending breakfast daily at the same time in order to determine whether or not the students were getting quieter. It was largely irrelevant, really.

The point was that the current mood in the Great Hall rather reflected Severus’ sense of overwhelming malaise. Softly muttering students, the muted clinking of forks against plates and cups against wood, it was as if suddenly the entire population of Hogwarts knew what was going to happen today. Which was impossible, of course. Despite the general gloom, the students’ faces appeared relatively calm and unfettered, and judging by Hermione’s tenuous grip on sanity and Severus’ own internal tension, if more students knew about the time-loop, that calmness would disappear.

Thunder growled quietly, signaling the approaching storm, and Severus took a relatively unaffected sip of his coffee.

It had not stopped raining for many days -- Severus had quite lost count, and if Hermione knew the last time they’d seen the sun, he didn’t want to ask her. And they now had several storms in a day. Perhaps, before the end, it would storm continuously. Severus wondered if they would still be self-aware by that point.

He absently noticed that he was clutching at his coffee cup so tightly that his knuckles were whitened. Carefully, he unbent his fingers -- they tingled slightly as the blood rushed back into the fingertips.

Forcing himself to take another drink, he watched as Hermione, sitting fairly demurely at the Gryffindor table, speared a slice of toast neatly with her fork without waiting for it to be passed her way. Perhaps, on another today, she would have politely nudged whoever it was sitting to her left -- Severus could not see who it was -- and asked them to hand it over. But this today, she simply reached for it. He continued to watch her, piling her toast high with jam and then taking a morose bite.

With a start, he realized he was actually staring at the girl and tore his eyes away from her form. As he glanced down, he noticed that his coffee cup was empty. Severus took this as his cue to leave and stood from the table without so much as a nod at Albus, walking away from the professors’ table toward the exit.

Before he was even halfway to his goal, the door slammed open and a handful of students clad in absolutely sopping wet robes came rushing into the Great Hall. One of them actually bumped into him as they made their way to the students’ tables. “Sorry, Professor,” the creature said insolently as it passed -- Severus was not even able to discern the gender of the child before it was gone.

The entire mob stopped at the Gryffindor table, and Severus actually paused as he realized that this was the Gryffindor Quidditch team, attending breakfast after the early morning practice that Hermione had mentioned a few times. He decided that it was horribly rude of them not to bathe before descending upon the rest of the Hogwarts population -- muddy footprints littered the Great Hall in their wake and their broomsticks left trails of muck all the way to the Gryffindor table.

Severus turned around and watched the scene for a few moments. Hermione appeared to be extremely unhappy as two of the players -- ostensibly Harry Potter and Ron Weasley -- crowded onto the bench right beside her. She said something with a cross look on her face as one of the boys -- Weasley, maybe; it was hard to tell from behind, as both boys had dripping wet hair of indiscriminate color -- slung an arm around her shoulders. Deciding that this had the potential to be interesting, he slid closer to the scene, until he could actually hear what was going on.

“... damn marmalade?” a boy was exclaiming.

Hermione blew a sigh out of her nose. “Obviously, Ron, there isn’t any.”

“Ruddy house elves,” he grumbled -- it had been Weasley who’d draped his arm around Hermione. “Éclairs and things to spare, but not a drop of marmalade to be had.”

Another dripping Quidditch player, sitting across the table from Weasley, threw a triangle of toast at him, laughing as it bounced off Weasley’s forehead. “You’re such a stupid git, Ron. I bet Dumbledore does all of the orders for the kitchens, anyway. House elves just prepare the food, probably. What d’you think, Hermione? You’re the one who knows about all the little details like that.”

Making a face, Hermione just poured herself a cup of tea. “Actually, I don’t know. I’d wager that they would just tell you if you asked, though.”

Potter pushed his spectacles up against his face and reached for the teapot himself. “Nah... not if they’ve been told not to.”

“Why on Earth would they be told not to?” Hermione asked, wrinkling her nose in confusion.

“I dunno,” Potter said, dumping several teaspoonfuls of sugar into his teacup. “I was just saying maybe.”

“You didn’t say maybe,” she protested accusingly.

Potter looked up from his bacon slice. “Well... I thought it, okay?”

“Harry...”

The Quidditch player who’d first asked the question leaned over the table in an obvious effort to interrupt what Severus thought was a rather childish argument to begin with. “It doesn’t matter,” it -- she? -- said loudly.

“No,” Weasley said pointedly. “It doesn’t. We’ve got bigger manticores to tame than that.”

Shaking her head wetly, the Quidditch player made a disgusted noise. “Ron...” she nearly whined.

“Don’t you pull that obnoxious baby sister act on me,” Weasley retorted in a warning tone. “It won’t work. And don’t think that just because you’re the fastest Chaser, I’ll go easy on you, either. Your Quaffle handling is still sloppy.”

“As if you have room to talk,” the Quidditch player -- who could only have been Ginny Weasley, given Weasley’s remarks -- said viciously. “Just how many times did you fall off your broomstick trying to do that starfish maneuver thing this morning?”

Weasley’s cheeks colored, and Potter let out a loud, braying laugh. “If only we’d gotten Colin out there with his camera,” he choked out between giggles.

Severus could not see Ginny Weasley’s expression, but he imagined it was rather sly. “Not in all this rain,” she said, something like genuine sorrow in her voice. “He couldn’t have gotten a single decent shot, probably.”

“You know...” Weasley began contemplatively, looking down at the butter knife in his grubby hands. “It’s weird, really.”

“What is?” Potter interrupted.

Weasley shot him an exasperated look. “I know that it wasn’t raining yesterday,” he said slowly. “The rain must have started some time in the night, then.”

“Thanks for stating the obvious, Ron,” Ginny Weasley said as she took an apple from the nearby fruit bowl and bit into it.

“I wasn’t finished, you know,” he said with a loud sigh. “You never let me finish.”

“It’s because you talk so slow,” Potter told him, grinning like a cat. “Takes you minutes and minutes to say anything. And we always know what you’re going to say, on account of you always stating the obvious.”

“We don’t really need a Seeker for Saturday’s match, you know,” Weasley said nastily. “We’re going to slaughter Ravenclaw whether we catch the Snitch or not.”

Potter just rolled his eyes. “You were about to make some brilliant observation about the rain, I’m sure.”

“Just watch yourself in the shower, Potter, is all,” Weasley concluded, waving a warning finger in the air. “Anyway... as I was saying... somehow, even though I know it’s not possible, it feels like it’s been raining forever.”

“Actually,” Potter replied thoughtfully, taking an apple for himself, “I sort of know what you mean.”

“It’s probably got to do with all those clouds,” Ginny Weasley said. “They feel more oppressive than usual. I could believe that they go on forever.”

Unwilling to hear the rest of the conversation and especially unwilling to look at Hermione’s face as her friends continued to speak, Severus turned around and left the Great Hall as quickly as he dared. Perhaps he was a coward for doing so, and perhaps he wasn’t -- Severus found that he did not particularly care. All he knew was that it was getting worse all the time, and the lingering suspicion that there was absolutely nothing he could do about it was growing into an absolute certainty.

Day Two Hundred Sixty-Four

The only explanation Severus had for his uncharacteristic behavior was that he was bored out of his mind. Literally, as it seemed.

His only consolation was that if a student happened to walk into his office and see him sitting cross-legged on the floor with his head propped against the front of his desk, playing solitaire with the Exploding Snap deck he’d confiscated however long ago, they would have been shocked beyond a level that Severus could have induced without copious amounts of shouting.

The notion of brandy had been considered and discarded -- Severus found himself feeling that drinking alone implied a state of severe depression that he did not actually feel. And he was not about to go around Hogwarts in search of a companion to drink with.

He felt numb. Drained.

The word ‘depression’ implied an actual emotion, and Severus didn’t think he had enough energy to actually feel something.

Maybe empty was the best way to say it.

He laid a seven on top of an eight.

Severus was seriously considering spending the rest of his days in just this fashion. He didn’t have to speak to anyone, he didn’t have to... see anything, and he didn’t feel the slightest bit guilty about his liver.

A three over a four.

He was even getting better at emptying his head of difficult thoughts, as well as unnecessary emotion. The only time he saw Hermione’s bloodstained face these days was when he closed his eyes.

Discard a ten.

And he hadn’t even thought of That Day at all recently.

An ace -- Severus placed it at the top of the board without thought.

Maybe today would be the day he would forget the feel of her hand on his cheek, tracing his hateful tears. That would be a good thing to forget, really.

A two on top of the ace.

Severus paused in his game, staring at the board and using the corner of the two in his hand to scratch his chin.

“The two on the three,” a voice said suddenly.

While Severus was able to keep himself from jumping up, he couldn’t hold back the surprised intake of breath. After a moment, however, he made an attempt to regain his control. “You should knock,” he said in an icy voice.

“Perhaps I like taking you off guard,” Hermione replied, dropping to her knees beside him, her robes puddling on the floor. “What’re you doing, Professor?”

Carefully, he moved an eight onto a nine before putting the two in his hand on top of the three Hermione had indicated. “It should be obvious, Hermione,” he replied in a mild voice.

As he was trying very hard not to look at her face, he had no idea what sort of emotions her expression held. “Do you want me to leave?” she asked after a short pause.

“I have come to the realization that I have very little control over your actions, if any,” he said, still focused on his cards.

“If you’d asked me to, I would have left,” she said companionably.

Severus said nothing, choosing instead to flip over a card on the board and palm the two lying under it -- his game was not going well.

Hermione’s voice held a grin. “Do you always cheat when you play cards?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he replied in a haughty tone, taking care to hide his palmed cards in his robe sleeve.

“In general, sir, you’re encouraged to turn over only one card at a time in this game,” she said, still sounding as if she wanted to smile at him. “At least, in the version that I know.”

Feigning nonchalance, he simply folded his hands together, efficiently slipping his new cards into his discard pile. “I did only turn over one card,” he pointed out as he did so.

“Unless I saw something that you’re prepared to tell me I didn’t,” Hermione replied, “you also slipped out a card or two from under the one you turned over.”

“I am quite prepared to tell you that you didn’t see any such thing,” he said smoothly, glancing down at his cards and smiling secretively -- one of them had indeed been the card he was looking for.

Hermione shifted into a more comfortable position, mimicking his posture and resting her head on his desk as she folded her legs and arranged her robes. “How many points are you going to take away when I accuse you of lying?”

He hummed, shuffling cards about. “It all depends on what sort of mood I’m in when you do it.” Suddenly stuck, he frowned at the board -- was the game over? He idly tapped the card in his hand against his knee.

As she shifted again, Severus became aware of her body coming into contact with his and told himself that he ought to shift away. Instead, he slumped forward a bit, resting his chin in his hand and staring down at the cards moodily.

“Did you finish that exam you were working on?” Hermione asked abruptly. Out of the corner of his eye, Severus saw her smooth a wrinkle in her robes and look down at her hands.

“The second year exam? No... not yet,” he answered easily enough. “I wasn’t able to focus on it today. And besides...” Severus caught himself before it slipped out and shut his mouth with an audible snap.

The rustle of cloth made him suspect that Hermione was turning his way -- a quick glance at her confirmed it. Her expression was neutral but her eyes were slightly narrowed as she spoke. “Besides... what?”

Sighing, he returned his gaze to the cards -- what would it hurt to say it, really? “I am increasingly doubtful that it is an exam I will ever be able to give,” he said, closing his eyes and resisting the urge to cover his face with his hands.

A small, warm hand abruptly covered his, weaving thin fingers between his own. “Oh,” Hermione whispered.

Severus wanted to recoil. To scream, “Don’t touch me!” and fling her bodily across the room if he had to. His skin crawled under her hesitant touch, and he felt himself begin to tremble. Slowly, fighting every single impulse in his body, Severus allowed himself to relax under her touch and wondered why he did not shove her away.

After an eternal moment, however, Hermione retracted her touch. “Erm... Professor?” she whispered. “Severus?”

He grunted, not opening his eyes.

“I think you can put that knave in your hand on the queen over there,” she said calmly.

Day Two Hundred Sixty-Eight

“Pritchard,” Severus called as the boy stepped into the room.

Clearing his throat nervously, Graham Pritchard looked over at him. “Yes, Professor?” he asked primly. Severus wondered if he ever shouted.

“Come here, Pritchard,” he said, waving his hand at the nearest workbench.

The child walked over, carrying his potions kit under one arm. As Pritchard fidgeted with his robes, Severus was amazed to notice that his shoelace was untied and trailing by his foot -- he wouldn’t have thought that Pritchard would have even permitted something as potentially disorganized as shoelaces in his presence, much less owned a pair. He made a sniffling sort of noise as he looked up at Severus. “Yes, Professor?” he repeated in a precise little voice.

“Pritchard, I’ve recently received information that leads me to believe that your potions kit has been tampered with,” Severus said, meeting his eye forthrightly.

Frowning, the boy sat his kit on the nearby table. “I’m sorry, but that’s impossible, sir,” he replied, pulling a tissue out of his pocket and wiping his seemingly clean hand with it.

Severus briefly wondered how often this boy was beaten up in the hallways and realized that as his Head of House, it was his responsibility to know such things. “Come now, Pritchard,” he said, affecting amiability with great effort, “do you know where your kit is every second of the day?”

Pritchard swiped at his nose with the tissue. “I keep my trunk locked, Professor Snape, sir,” he responded. “And my father had it triply-warded, after what happened last semester.”

Thinking very hard about it, Severus had to reach the eventual conclusion that he had absolutely no idea what the boy was talking about. “Yes, yes, of course,” he said hastily. How had this child managed to slip through his fingers so completely? “But that does not change matters, Pritchard. I do not entirely trust the contents of your kit there. I’m afraid that I cannot allow you to so much as open it. Who knows what has happened to it?”

If Pritchard had been a few years younger, Severus would have said that he was about half a step away from tears. As it was, his face expressed extreme displeasure at the very least. “But, sir...” he protested.

With a sigh, he waved his hand at the workbench. Severus had spent at least fifteen minutes setting up every single ingredient he remembered from Pritchard’s usual table in the precise order that he could by now recite from memory. He’d even hacked the handle off one of his favorite ladles so that it looked nearly exactly like Pritchard’s battered old one. “I have everything you will need set up here, Pritchard. Unless, of course...” Trailing off thoughtfully, he allowed a grin to spread across his face. “Unless, Pritchard, you would rather skip the brewing process and fail the assignment?”

The boy looked startled. “Erm... no...” Swallowing once or twice, he took a hesitant step forward. “No, of course not, Professor Snape,” he said more calmly, twisting his tissue in his hands.

“Very well, then, Pritchard,” he said. “I’ll take your kit, if you don’t mind, and then you can get started.” Was it Severus’ imagination, or did he have to actively tug the thing out of Pritchard’s struggling grip?

Face a mask of agony, the child sat down at his workbench and began examining his ingredients. Severus noted with an inward smirk that the boy’s face lightened considerably as he surveyed the table -- he must have gotten everything in the correct position by even Pritchard’s exacting standards.

Severus put the potions kit on his desk -- he was curious to see if this was one of those things he could change or not. The vial of armadillo bile was safe within the confines of the case and Severus planned to keep it for the duration of the class. So much the better if he could keep Pritchard away from the thing.

Class progressed well. The usual questions and mistakes were made, and Severus kept one careful eye on the kit on the desk as he moved about the classroom, docking points here and there. He even assigned a detention to one of his Slytherins for setting the contents of his cauldron on fire. The kit remained unmolested.

“Er, sir?” that almost-prissy little voice that Severus could now recognize from fifty paces asked quietly. “I have a question.”

“Yes, Pritchard?” he asked, walking briskly toward his workbench.

“I can’t seem to find -- oh, no, sir!” Pritchard suddenly cried.

A troupe of highly skilled actors could have probably rehearsed for a month and still not achieved the comic timing necessary for Severus’ next move, he decided in retrospect. Glancing up at Pritchard’s shout, Severus completely failed to notice the slippery mess of shrivelfig skins that his foot was about to descend into.

But it would still have been possible to avoid the inevitable if Severus hadn’t, at that very instant, leaned forward very slightly. If he’d been questioned, which, of course, he was not, he would have said that he was attempting to look down into Pritchard’s cauldron. But he himself knew that he was merely doing his best to look intimidating.

His efforts in that direction failed utterly as his foot hit the skins and slipped.

Again, perhaps things would have turned out differently if Severus had just allowed himself to fall and worried about his dignity after the fact. But he instead chose to try and steady himself by grabbing onto the nearest table as he went down. Missing the table, Severus’ flailing arm caught the edge of Pritchard’s potions textbook and sent it spinning off the workbench.

It landed squarely on Pritchard’s left foot, Severus noted right before his forehead collided with the corner of Pritchard’s chair. He immediately clapped a hand over the injury, and dizzying black spots danced across his vision. Occupied with the seemingly daunting task of hanging onto consciousness, he did not see what happened next. He did hear Pritchard’s squall of protest, however, and a loud crash.

Once his vision cleared, and he was fairly sure that he wasn’t about to faint -- pass out, his mind supplied gravely -- Severus looked up and saw a handful of students looking back down at him with expressions of mixed fear and concern. He pressed a hand to his forehead, which was growing worryingly moist and beginning to sting unpleasantly, and summoned up his best glare. “Get back to work!” he barked, sending them scurrying.

Suppressing a small groan, Severus hauled himself to his feet in order to survey the damage. Sweat trickled into his eye and he swiped at it, realizing as his fingers came away red-tipped that it wasn’t sweat but blood. He blinked rapidly as dizziness threatened to overwhelm him once again.

“Sir, are you alright?” Pritchard’s precise voice asked unhappily.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and blew out a sigh. “Fine, Pritchard.”

“I’m very sorry, sir,” he continued, sounding worried. “I didn’t know--“

With a wave of his hand, Severus cut the boy off and opened his eyes. “Shit,” he sighed very quietly as he took in the disarray.

Pritchard had, of course, stumbled into Severus’ desk some time after the book had fallen on his foot, and his potions kit was now more or less strewn across the floor. Taking a step forward, Severus looked down at the scattered supplies. He leaned down, uncaring of the mess, and picked up the remains of a single vial. Armadillo bile ran down his fingers and Severus rolled his eyes.