dig

Thanks to Oreph for beta. Spark Notes for the Harry/Snape epic I will never write. For Christina.

Snap Shot
by Hetre Z

1. Before Snape could say anything, before class started and he could say something about brewing truth/love/sleep/glory, about stupidity or scars, Harry reached up and ran a hand through his hair, mussing it a little. He saw a reflection of himself in the glass ingredients case, and it looked like he'd been flying.

2. Detention, Mr Potter.

3. The ants in the Dursleys front yard are shiny-black, round like berries or sausage links, and they tickle a bit when they crawl over his hands. He's been lying on his stomach all summer. Harry can't use his wand, so he reaches out and crushes them with his fingers, thinking crucio, crucio.

4. Sometimes Potter would be on his knees and he would be James, his mouth a strange red color, sneering, and oh, you've got what's coming to you did it to yourself deserve it go down, and, I get to see this I made this please start crying. Snape would be just that close to saying it out loud, and then Potter would stand up with his eyes still closed and be Harry, with hair covering his scar.

5. After another summer on Dudley's diet he's found he likes Sweet'n Low in his tea. The house-elves don't know what that is when he asks them.

6. And ten points from Gryffindor.

7. The penseive looks like milk that's gone off, or as if Aunt Petunia's mercury thermometer got broken into a bowl. Harry wonders what would happen if he drank it. All his memories would get sponged up, or it would get into his veins and poison him; he'd be infected with it and go like Snape on the inside. He knows that when he looks down, he'll see his father.

8. He dreams that Potter has wings, fuzzy black ones with the pinfeathers still in. Potter tries to groom them with his teeth but his neck isn't long enough, and he ends up turning in circles until Snape comes over and smoothes them down.

9. For N.E.W.T.s this year they practice brewing truth, and love, and sleep, and glory. Snape glares, and Harry tries to pay attention. He wants to bring a Snitch to class.

10. Detention, Longbottom. Detention, Weasley. Detention, Potter.

11. Snape is still ugly. Harry's knees hurt and Snape doesn't get prettier with time.

12. Snape thinks he should have put more in his penseive, if this is what happens. After Quidditch practice, Lucius smelled of water and cinnamon, until he walked mud to the locker and the showers and the smell was pulled away. Snape himself smelled of unripe apples, Evans of warm bread, and of dirt. With these memories, Potter could bake a pie.

13. Heh. Broomsticks. Harry has trouble keeping a straight face.

14. The first potion Snape ever tried to make was Cornwall potion. Three parts corn, one part ground wall. To make countries, his cousins had told him. He found out later why it hadn't worked.

15. Snape was breathing a little funny, and Harry knew he was going to get detention or expelled or banished to the Forbidden Forest, and the other students were whispering and staring at him like always. His hair shoved against his fingers and Snape's eyes were wide, and he could see Snape's chest rising and falling, quickly, under his robes. Harry smiled a little, and narrowed his eyes the way he'd seen Sirius do.

16. Detention, Potter. Detention, detention. The words dilute themselves.

17. Skin tastes salty, no matter whose it is. Snape tastes like the chips from the little shop off Privet Drive that opened last summer. A handful soaked oil into his napkin, and left smears on his fingers and the flavor on his tongue. Snape would sneer at being compared to a chippie. Harry thinks he wouldn't mind.

18. He has recently acquired a small Muggle portrait, a rendering of the Periodic Table which he displays prominently in his rooms. There are numbers and letters instead of diagrams, so that it looks like an Arithmantic equation hung on his wall. It doesn't move.

19. One day, Harry will make a deal.