Asylum

A special thanks to my beta, Saeadame.

Asylum

Chapter 11

Severus woke up the next morning, eyes half closed as he walked towards the bathroom. Luckily, he had a door connected to it from his bedroom. Despite what everyone thought, Severus Snape was not a morning person. He needed a nice cup of black coffee and a hot shower to really get going in the mornings. Or on mornings like this, a cold shower. A very cold shower.

Honestly though, he was pushing 40, you'd think that his body would stop this nonsense. It had been such a long time, and he'd officially thought that it had stopped. Apparently, his body disagreed, and all it took was the idea of the beautiful youth in his quarters to cause the morning wood to start up again. He was too old for this, or so he thought.

Severus groggily pushed open the door to his bathroom, only to stop confused as a wave of steam pushed passed him, escaping the room in which it was confined. He looked around only to stare dumbfounded at the sight only a few feet in front of him.

There Harry stood next to the sink; toothbrush moving against his teeth, but that wasn't the problem. The problem Severus was having was with his lack of clothing. His hair was dripping wet, causing a slight puddle on the floor. He had obviously not bothered to towel his hair before stepping out of the shower and to the sink. His wet hair clung to his shoulders causing tiny rivulets on water to run down the exposed chest and back of the smaller man, stopping only when it hit either the floor or the small towel that was wrapped around the youth's waist, hiding his manly parts from view.

At this point Harry spit out his toothpaste into the sink and noticed Severus in the bathroom.

"Severus?" He looked around a moment before comprehension dawned on his face. "Oops, sorry. I must have forgotten to lock your door too."

Severus looked around to notice an extra door to the bathroom, obviously connecting to Harry's room. Albus probably thought that this would be helpful, and not cause awkward moments if someone forgot to lock one of the doors.

Severus nodded and cleared his throat. "Don't let it happen again. I have no wish to see you when you are not-" he searched for the words, "appropriately attired."

"Yes, Severus. Sorry. But there should still be some hot water left if you want a shower." With that Harry packed up his toiletries and left the bathroom, unaware that the plumbing was magical and that the hot water didn't just run out. Not like Severus actually needed hot water this morning as he had a small problem to take care of. Well, not quite so small anymore after that little display. Apparently, a shower and coffee wasn't the only thing that could wake him up in the mornings. Just show him a mostly naked male and he is ready for the day.

"This is going to be a long day." He mumbled before he locked ALL the doors to the bathroom.

Harry and Severus sat next to each other at the staff table. Harry was fixing his plate happily with pancakes, syrup, and chopping up strawberries. Severus, on the other hand, was not in so nice a mood, this mornings events causing his sour mood to worsen. Oh how he hated Mondays, nonetheless when it the first day of class.

That means he would have to put up moronic first years who claimed to get lost in the hallways, when they were really just late because they were talking to friends. The older years were always trying to make up excuses of how they 'misplaced' their summer homework, like he would buy their excuses. Severus Snape was not a pushover; he'd simply fail the brats.

It's amazing that after all of these years, the idiots still didn't get the fact that he simply didn't take excuses. He didn't care if your family took an extended vacation to Majorca and you didn't bring your books with you. He didn't care if the cruise ship you were on crashed and you were stranded alone on a deserted island without any of your books with you (they had all sunk with the ship).

Why should he care if Voldemort himself attacked your grandmother's house and he were so distraught over her untimely death, (really if the woman was over 150 how could it be untimely?) that you couldn't stand to do your homework? Severus Snape didn't accept excuses. The day he took one, the entire school would walk all over him. How could you take a teacher seriously if they let you get away with something like late homework? He refused to be that type of teacher.

He took a sip of his black coffee and looked over at his new 'apprentice,' nearly spitting out his coffee. Harry sat there slicing up strawberries to place on top of his pancakes, now this was perfectly fine. It was just a little…frustrating to watch him take the occasional sliced strawberry with his fingers and eat the red morsel, then suck the juice off every finger it touched. He would then proceed to lick his lips the get the remaining taste of the strawberry off of them.

Severus looked away. Yes, it would definitely be a bad day.

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Severus watched as Harry set up a cauldron and started the flame underneath it from the corner of his eye. He was having Harry make a few batches of dreamless sleep for the hospital wing. He wasn't worried about him making any mistakes, as Harry was somewhat of a perfectionist.

He often compared potion making to cooking, "Just follow the recipe and the cake will turn out fine." Was what he would say. The same concept applied to potions. The only reason why the students in his class didn't do so was because most were raised by magic. They relied on it to do everything for them. Chop vegetables, measure flour and such. For the purebloods, the idea of lifting a perfectly manicured finger to do a house-elfs work was ridiculous, never learning the concept of following a recipe.

For the muggleborns it was different. Although they grew up without the use of magic in their home, they were shipped off to Hogwarts at the mere age of 11, most not being allowed near a stove before then. Their parents always cooking and doing the chopping of ingredients as the children were too young to do so.

However, Harry was different. His relatives pawned off any housework onto the boy. Harry had told him that he couldn't even remember being taught to cook, he just always had. His relatives had most likely handed him a recipe and pushed him towards the stove at a young age, expecting a perfect meal from a boy who wasn't even tall enough to reach the stove. Therefore, Harry obviously knew how to follow a recipe, because if he didn't, well, things wouldn't go well for him. Harry hadn't made any major mistakes yet with a potion, so Severus wasn't too worried about making him brew one while his students were working.

Speaking of students, Dumbledore never failed to make his life difficult. It was time for his 9AM Slytherin and Gryffindor seventh years. Soon students filed in, sitting automatically, knowing that their teacher would take points if they stood around and talked until the bell rang. Soon the clock struck 9 and the bell rang to signal the start of class.

"Wands away. This year you will be studying for your NEWTs. You will work hard, be precise, and not dally when getting your ingredients. Some of the potions required for your NEWTs are highly volatile, which means Longbottom." He looked down his long nose at the nervous looking seventh year. "That you WILL be careful of what ingredients you add to your potion, as well as how much. I would hate to send you back to your grandmother a few limbs less then what you came into my class with."

A few Slytherins sniggered at this.

"Today you will be making the Drought of Distraction." He looked around for a target. "Thomas, what does the Drought of Distraction do?"

The boy opened and shut his mouth a few times. "I don't know."

The teacher gave him a pointed look.

Dean gulped. "Sir. I don't know, Sir."

Snape rolled his eyes. "Why the Ministry forced me to lower my standards to Acceptable instead of Outstanding I will never know. I suspect they wished to rid the world of stupidity, but that is just an assumption. 10 points from Gryffindor for not reading ahead Thomas. Now who can tell me what the Drought of Distraction does?"

Only one hand was in the air. Sever sighed. It was Granger of course.

"Yes, Miss Granger."

Hermione cleared her throat. "The Drought of Distraction was created in 1492 by Benjamin DeLusia. The drought was then banned by the Ministry from 1647 to 1824 after being used at the International Conference of Wizarding Affairs. The most diluted form is often used as pranking devices, because when slipped into a candy or a drink it causes a person to have temporary ADHD making it hard for someone to concentrate. Zonkos sell it in a form of candy. The Drought of Distraction when mildly diluted causes more serious problems to occur. A person when slipped this form is so distracted that they have can't concentrate on a single thing. They tend to want to look everywhere at once not being able to eat or sleep."

She took a deep breath. "The most potent form, which is undiluted, can be fatal to the drinker. The drinker is so distracted that they forget to both blink and breathe causing the drinker to die within minutes." She finished.

Snape nodded. "Correct. Now," he tapped his wand against the blackboard, the ingredients needed listed on the board. "Get your ingredients and follow the instructions in your books."

Snape sat down and murmured a few comments about how Harry chopped ingredients. "Be careful, they're delicate. If the roots are crushed in anyway the potion will not be useable. Slow down and slice them less harshly."

Harry nodded his head and slowed down; now careful of how he sliced the fragile ingredients.

"Better." Snape said in approval, getting up to monitor the students.

He stopped in front of Neville Longbottom; his potion was a murky green. It should have been a light purple at this stage. "Granger, watch Longbottom. I don't want to be the one to inform the Headmaster that he somehow managed to blow himself up."

He was at the back of the room peering into Finnigan's cauldron when he heard slight snickering from the middle of the room, the Slytherin's side of the room to be exact.

He silently walked towards the source of the laughter.

"Filthy little mudblood thinks he's better than us. He claims to be pureblood. I don't know any purebloods by the last name Augustine. If one had moved to England father would know. He's lying. He's just a filthy mudblood." Said none other than Draco Malfoy, the Prince of Slytherin to his cronies that actually passed their OWLs with an Acceptable.

"Mr. Malfoy, is there a problem with your hearing?" Snape asked in a cold voice.

Draco looked confused at the question. "No, sir."

"Then tell me why you decided to go against Headmaster Dumbledore's orders? Mr. Augustine is supposed to be treated like a teacher. Not only are you insulting Mr. Augustine, but myself as well. I was the one who chose him as my apprentice, so by insulting his character you are insulting my taste. 25 points from Slytherin and a detention with Filch Friday evening at 8."

The class gasped and stared. Points taken—from Slytherin? By Snape? The world was coming to an end.

The Bell rang. "Clean up your areas and bottle your samples. I want 12 inches on the Drought of Distraction and why it was banned form the Ministry in 1647. Class dismissed."

He watched the class file out.

"Thank you."

He turned around to look at the owner of the voice.

"What?"

"Thank you, for standing up for me. I haven't had anyone make fun of me in long time, being at the hospital and all. I didn't know what to do in this situation, being in the middle of class I didn't want to disturb anyone. So thank you." Harry said.

Severus looked at him with indifference. "You heard me. I didn't do it for you. He was insulting me by insulting you, and no one insults me in my own classroom."

Harry just gave him a knowing grin, obviously not buying Severus's excuse.

One class down, 3 more to go.

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A/N: Haha…you know, I didn’t even think about the portrait resembling Louis Pointe du Lac. I didn’t make that connection until a few reviewers mentioned it. It has been forever since I saw that movie. I guess it could be him. Didn’t mean to do that though. Hehe…kinda funny.

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