Breaking Down Walls

Author note: Thank you for the wonderful reviews!! The plot bunny is still sitting here with one eye open. He had to check this chapter to make sure I wasn\'t rushing things, and he did give me a look at the last line, but I told him to sit down and hush. He is still angry but he will just have to get over it! LOL! Thanks again!

“I don’t know why, professor.”

He scowled at her harder than he had ever scowled before. “What do you mean you ‘don’t know’? Is it possible the Gryffindor know-it-all has suddenly become a dunderhead like the rest of them?”

Hermione looked down into her cauldron again; wondering why her potion disintegrated in a puff of blue smoke. She looked up at Professor Snape with an almost sheepish look on her face. “I suppose so,” was all she said as she lowered herself back into her chair and placed her face in her hands. She didn’t run away. She just sat there…defeated. Her spirit seemed to have disappeared as quickly as the vapor that surrounded her workstation. Severus was worried.

“Stay after class, Miss Granger.”

He strolled back to the front of the class and dismissed them as the bell rang soon after. Hermione stood slowly and began what seemed to be a long treacherous trek to his desk.

She sat down in front of him; her eyes never lifting the level of the mahogany wood where his quill rested in its inkbottle.

“I am afraid, Miss Granger, that I have done something I am not proud of.”

Hermione looked at him with insurmountable curiosity.

“Is he…confessing to something? To me? Why?” Her thoughts ran rapid through her mind as she sat and waited for him to take a deep breath, stand slowly, and peruse the tiles on the floor while trying to find the right words.

“Miss Granger, I…” he began but his voice faltered. He cleared his throat and began to recount the many number of times that he had to ‘spill his guts’ to everyone that mattered; the ministry, Dumbledore, and even Voldemort. He had no options to stammer then, so why was it so hard for him to just tell her?

“Professor, is everything alright? Should I get Professor McGonagall?” she asked as she began to stand to fetch the Headmistress.

“NO!’

She sat back down slowly, eyeing him closely.

“Miss…” He took another deep breath. “Hermione…I am afraid that I am to blame for you loss of memory. An incident occurred that you… witnessed for lack of a better term, and it was inappropriate for you to have experienced such an incident. I felt it in your best interest to eliminate the event from you mind and Obliviated you.” He saw her eyes narrow and her fists clench, so he hurriedly added, “With your permission, mind you!”

Hermione seemed to relax, but that just started to spark even more questions. “What kind of event?”

Was he blushing?

She would have thought it funny the idea of him passing out from taking so many deep breaths, but he seemed too serious for her to smile.

“It was…a private…” He cleared his throat again. “…intimate encounter between me and someone you know.”

It was her turn to blush. “I walked in on him and someone doing…Merlin only knows what!”

She tilted her head downwards and began to entwine her fingers repeatedly. “I’m sorry, professor. I’m sure I didn’t mean to…interrupt your private moment. I should be furious over your liberty to take my memory of it away, but at the same time, I can understand why you want to. I suppose, then, that my long-term memory was affected by mistake. Or was there an accident?”

“Yes, there was an accident,” he said although he didn’t mean for her to hear.

“What kind of accident?”

“Think fast, Snape!” He sat back down and looked at her. Her eyes exuded her ferocious lust for knowledge. She was curious and asking the right questions to get the answers she so desperately wanted. She was the epitome of a teacher’s dream. She was learning with every second as was her nature, and she looked so damned beautiful in this state. So beautiful, in fact, he had to reign in his desire to reach out and touch her; to make sure she wasn’t just this teacher’s dream, fantasy, or an illusion.

“I believe the accident you and I were involved in with the automobile may have caused internal damage that was overlooked. You did not visit Madame Pompfrey when we were rescued, nor did I think to cast any diagnostic spells to detect any such damage after the wreck occurred. It is very possible that the two, the obliviate and possible damage, could have ultimately affected your memory.”

She stood and walked over to the shelves, letting this information sink in. After a moment, she turned to him. “That makes perfect sense. I could have easily hit my head in the collision and caused brain damage. The effects of the Obliviate could have been amplified with the injuries.” It was her turn to take a deep breath; a deep cleansing breath of relaxation. “I’m so glad you told me, professor. I have been pacing my room with worry ever since I was told what happened. But you made it all make sense!”

She rushed the room and dropped to her knees in front of him. Her arms were around his torso in record time, and her cheek was firmly pressed into his chest. “Thank you so much for thinking it through. Now, I can concentrate on remembering everything I’ve lost! Thank you, sir.” She squeezed her arms just a bit tighter around him. He reached around and cradled her to him. It wasn’t until she began to pull away that she realized just how firm his embrace actually was. She looked up into his eyes. She honestly didn’t know what to think of what she saw there. It was as if he was…pensieve. No. It was something else. She saw something else.

She stood up quickly and gathered her things. “I should go.”

“Perhaps you should.”

The odd feeling of déjà vu struck her and she swiftly looked his direction. At some time when her back was to him, he had moved. He was now just a few feet away from her. She saw that flash again. There was warmth in that charcoal depth of his eyes.

She excused herself from the room, and proceeded to her private chambers. She closed her eyes as she recalled the feeling of his arms wrapped around her holding her tight. She saw once more the look he had.

She sat down on the floor concentrating long and hard on that look. She has seen it somewhere before, but where? Could it have been the understanding look her teachers give her? What about the care her parents show? No. The face that appeared to her over and over again was framed by unruly black hair. It was the look Harry had given her when they were together. When they first started their relationship. Long before it ended.

It was the look of love.