Present Tense

I have never felt particularly safe.

I know what lurks in the shadows, and why flesh must inevitably fail. Truthfully, I don’t believe anybody in their right mind should ever feel secure. The world is too full to possibly have empty spaces of safety.

My father moulded my fear, because fear is awareness and awareness is pivotal in any endeavour requiring stealth. Therefore, invariably, I have always felt alone. The sole custodian of my own affairs, however varied and many there are.

Snape understands this concept. He too has led a life dedicated to secrets, lies, and silence. He has had to decide what to tell whom, and when. I suppose we must all carry on in such a manner, though a wrong word is seldom fatal to the general public.

It is in these moments of spent intimacy that I feel truly insecure. The fire has died down somewhere in the room, and the chill came with the last of my guest’s departure. Snape lies asleep beside me on the rug and I notice how he frets in his sleep. Like a terrible gloom haunts his inner-most moments.

I wouldn’t know what to say to him when he wakes up, and I fear that moment draws near. So I gather my remains, nick one of his cigarettes, and I venture upstairs. Upstairs it is desolate and I know I will be able to think clearly in the dark that is wont to gather. It is rude of me to leave him alone and exposed in such an open place, but to have him close is too terrible for me to bear on the verge of sober and blotto.

I pick an empty room that has been in disuse for decades. There is a balcony that opens to the dark and cloudy sky. It is cold, but I am comfortable with it. I take out the stolen cigarette and light it, inhaling as if it were a last breath. I resign myself to lie on the grey stone floor, wanting to be lost in the great expanse of sky above me.

I smoke and listen to the world around me, as if I haven’t been in this exact position every day, trying to figure it all out.

The sky lightens as I lie here, hours pass and day is firmly set before I hear footsteps in the room beyond. Snape is beside me and sitting down carefully, staring off onto the lawns.

A long moment passes in silence before he speaks.

“I didn’t come here to rut like an animal,” he tells me, his voice apologetic. I turn to look at his pale face that has been made ashen by the covered sunlight.

“Nobody goes anywhere to do anything, do they? Doesn’t stop it from happening.” I know it sounds childish, but I completely believe it. It’s always the excuse when unexpected things happen.

I sigh and I can see my breath, “All right, what did you come here for then?”

Snape tugs absently at the hem of his trouser leg, “I had nowhere left to go.”

I look back to the clouds and I smile. It is the ultimate irony that after all we’ve been through separately, we only have each other left. It is this realisation that warms me.

Knowing that we two are alone despite our proximity, despite the layers of paranoia and solitude, causes me to lay down my chains. In all the world, he chose to rest here.

“Me neither,” I say needlessly as I sit up and put my hands over his. I think of the sky and it is no longer so immense to me. The great deep places of the earth lie within Snape’s eyes, and in them I have found a harbour.

We both know, and in that knowledge we have both discovered safety.