an overwhelming desire to win...

\"MUM!\" she cried, bursting out of her room and into the living room of her house. She realized it hadn\'t been cookies she was smelling, it was just the scent of her mother\'s perfume and father\'s cologne. She smiled, looking to her familiar room and feeling that familiar safe feeling envelop her.

She was home.

Strange, her mother wasn\'t answering her straight away. Perhaps she and her father were outside on the patio. She ran to the said landing on the side of the house.

No one.

Her stomach sank as she realized that all the lights in the house were off, and the doors were all locked. Perhaps they had just gone out for a while, that was all. They\'d be home soon.

She dropped her wand and cloak in her room and took a long, hot shower, washing her hair at a long, luxurious rate she never felt comfortable with at school. After a drying spell on her hair she stepped out of the bathroom in her small light blue nightdress, and walked slowly to the kitchen.

Her parents still weren\'t home. How she wished she could speak to her mum about all of this. About how it felt to finally be in love and then having ones heart dashed against the proverbial rocks.

She made herself a small sandwich and poured a glass of milk, making her way into the family room of her house and turning on the telly. A strange Muggle show popped on and she lay back, feeling her crafty mind going slack as she succumbed to the inanity that was television.

Not even a half hour later she had flicked off the telly, washed her dishes and brushed her teeth, and was now sitting in her library of the house and sipping some tea.

She trudged back upstairs to put the milk away when she saw a blinking light on her answering machine. She\'d always hated them. She may be brilliant, but setting a v.c.r. and figuring out how to use on of these telephone machines had always been the bane of her existence.

She imaged Snape would hate technology as well.

Hermione shook her head, Fuck Snape, she thought, clearing thoughts of the said prick and moved her way over to the answering machine, pressing the sleek, black button and waiting.

Nothing.

She had turned her back, cursing the moron who invented such a thing when a loud BEEP sent her tripping over her slippers and onto the linoleum.

\"Hey Pam, Greg. I know you\'re on vacation, but Carl and I just wanted to thank you for you advice about Kenneth\'s braces. He was a little worried about looking stupid at college but-\"

Hermione rolled her eyes, unplugging the daft machine with a determined tug. Well, two mysteries figured out right there in that machine:

One: Her parents were on vacation.

Two: She wasn\'t going to let them ever set her up with Kenneth.

She sighed lazily in the library of her house, looking at the various spines of the books. Finally deciding on a small collection of Edgar Allan Poe poems she retired to bed, determined to spend a few nights here at home and retire back to Hogwarts before winter break was over.

Well, at least she’d catch up on her reading.

She turned off all the lights, locked all the doors and made her way into her room, pulling back the covers, flicking on a nearby lamp and reading a while.

An hour or so later Hermione\'s eyes were growing heavy, and she placed the bookmark into the book and set it next to her beside her wand, turning off the light.

She lay on her side then in the darkness, feeling so stupid for ever caring for the man in the first place. What was so bloody great about him in the first place? He had a hooked nose, greasy hair, a horrible temper, obviously a weakness for tramps...the list went on, finally lulling Hermione into an angry slumber.

* * *

It was the feeling that something was brushing her cheek which broke her from her sleeping. She stirred, hearing as the figure backed up and into the darkness.

She shot up in the bed, someone had broken into her house! Where was her wand?
\"GET OUT! OR I SWEAR TO GOD I\'LL KILL YOU!\" Hermione screamed shooting up in her bed dizzily, groggy from sleep and throwing pillows at the intruder, while looking for her wand. Where the bloody fuck had she put it?

\"Stop it you silly little girl!\"

Hermione faltered, a pillow still in her hand as she blinked into the inky darkness, knowing who it was in her room, standing by her wall with that irrepressibly silky voice of his, beckoning her.

\"Miss Granger?\"

He couldn’t be here.

Hermione sat up in bed, scarcely believing that Snape, Professor Severus Snape was in her room, standing over and gazing at her, his hair rumpled from the pillows that had been thrown at him. He moved out of the darkness, his face closer to her.

\"What...what are you doing here?\" Hermione asked in shock as she turned on her lamp, her eyes widening with every step closer to her. \"How did you ever find me?\"

\"It wasn\'t hard,\" he said moving closer to her, his hand gently falling on the bed, as she shivered, looking to him uneasy. He was so dark in her room, he looked so out of place in his robes and standing in her muggle room.

\"Get out.\" she suddenly blurted out as he shot her a look of confusion. Snape obviously couldn\'t accept the fact that she of all people was kicking him out of her room.

\"Excuse me?\"

\"I said,\" Hermione replied venomously, images of he and Pansy shooting through her head, \"GET OUT.\"

Her voice was so loud in the empty room, and Snape shot a precarious look to the door of her bedroom.

\"You needn\'t worry.\" she said trying to be aloof, \"My parent\'s aren\'t here.\"

Dumb thing to say Hermione. a voice chided in her head, and she felt so very vulnerable and nervous all of a sudden. Sure, Snape had never tried anything before but...she was starting to discover many things about the elusive Professor that she hadn\'t known before.

\"You\'re here, alone?\" he asked roughly, his voice with an undertone of something foreign to Hermione. She nodded, not liking the way his eyes were trailing over her.

\"Yes. Now leave.\"

\"Miss Granger,\" he said trying to be dignified under the circumstances. He was standing in the rather...pink room of Hermione\'s looking to the new room of hers that he had intruded upon. Finally his dark eyes fell upon her, and she pulled the blanket up to her chin.

\"I have to explain.\"

Hermione shook her head, \"No, you don’t.” she said shortly, rolling on her side as he frowned deeply, his pride obviously hurt.

\"Just listen.\" he said growing agitated. Hermione sighed irritably, sitting up on her knees on the bed, her blanket still wrapped around her.

\"No. You listen.\" she sneered, taking Snape by surprise. \"I have done nothing but throw my emotions on the table. I wanted to kiss you and I did. And what did you to with my
advances?\" she shrugged as if asking him, \"YOU THREW IT IN MY FACE! You ignored me and then..then you go and...\" she trailed off, angry tears streaming down her face.

\"I know,\" he said tersely \"And I wanted to tell you I am interested. Very interested.\"

\"Bollocks.\" Hermione said dryly, looking to him with angry eyes, \"I don\'t know whether this is a joke between you and Pansy, or you just like to be a prick. But I know it must pain you to be consorting with a Mudblood Gryffindor like me.\"

\"Pardon?\"

Hermione rolled her eyes, \"Pansy told me everything.\"

\"Miss Parkinson?\"

\"Ohhhhh,\" Hermione drawled sarcastically, \"How informal for a woman you were shoving your tongue down the throat of. She told me you\'d never consort with a Mublood...especially not a Gryffindor one.\"

She decided to leave out the part where Pansy bragged about their superb shag, as Snape winced, rubbing his temples and then looking to Hermione with complete and utter earnest diplomacy.

\"Miss Granger. Miss Parkinson gave me a drink, laced with potent firewhiskey.\"

Hermione nearly laughed aloud, \"You\'re a Potions master, and you couldn\'t figure that out before hand?\"

Snape flushed, Gads this was humiliating. He was going to have to tell her everything. He shifted from foot to foot once more, licking his lips as he prepared to speak.

\"I was in a quite...vulnerable position at the time.\"

\"Vulnerable?\"

Why did she have to talk? \"Yes. Vulnerable.\"

\"Please, do elaborate.\"

He saw the merry torment dancing in her eyes and resignedly he spoke. \"I was sulking, because I had just seen you and that Seamus boy gallivanting about. She offered me tea and I accepted. I didn\'t even realize the effects of the mixture until I sobered up a few hours ago.\" his eyes grew dim, \"And then I came here.\"

\"Why were you mad at Seamus?\" Hermione suddenly wondered aloud, why was he here anyway? She didn\'t trust it. He shifted from foot to foot, looking embarassed.

\"I thought my motivations would have been rather obvious, Miss Granger.\"

Hermione blushed, was he saying...what she had been hoping he\'d say? No...
Hermione suddenly felt the anger that had been bottled up for too long. Even though he had been sloshed and mad at her, all common decency should have stopped him from sleeping with a student...of all students Pansy.

\"Enough of this pity party.\" she said darkly, giving him a look of disgust. \"Sleeping with a student, of all people Pansy Parkinson. I don\'t care if you were sad and jealous, its downrig-\"
\"I never slept with Pansy Parkinson.\" he interrupted through clenched teeth. Obvious aghast that she could say such a thing. He was a Professor after all. Seeing her like this all angry and callous was disturbing...and he admitted, arousing.

\"That\'s not what she said.\" Hermione said lamely, Gods…how stupid. Had she even backed up her argument? SHE BELIEVED PANSY? What the bloody hell had she been thinking? A Slytherin?

\"You took the word of a Slytherin?\"

Hermione blushed at his rather accurate point, feeling quite stupid now and thoroughly embarassed. Him and his damn smug, superiority. It was irritating as hell. Especially when he was right.

\"Hermione.\" he said, his voice hitching on her name as he tentatively stepped closer, her features unreadable. \"Evidently my...my feelings towards you are-\"

Hermione shot a look to him of utter confusion and anger, she didn\'t know if she was angry at herself or at him, but all she could see was fury and she did the only thing a defensive girl like herself could do. She retaliated.

\"Get out.\" Hermione said shallowly, and swallowing deeply she added \"I want nothing to do with a greasy git like you.\"

Snape stopped mid sentence, in obvious shock at her outburst. Hermione stopped facing him, rolling over onto her side and turning off the light.

\"You can leave the way you came.\"

Why was she angry? He had told her everything.

He saw her breathing shakily, perhaps even crying. He knew she was confused, and he was selfish to have even bothered her about this at all. But he wanted her. He\'d never wanted anyone as much as he wanted Hermione Granger.

And he\'d have her.

This wasn\'t a simple idea, it was a full blown obsession. He had to accept it would take time. Perhaps she would be better in a few days time.

\"Of course.\" he said stonily, moving towards the door. \"Good evening Miss Granger.\"

With a wave of his arm he had disappeared and the room was silence once more, although Hermione had the feeling that wasn\'t the last she would see of Professor Snape during her visit home.