Fan Fiction ❯ True Confessions Of a *forced to edit by mediaminer* ❯ Chapter 1

True Confessions

of a Bastard

By: Irish

 

Disclaimer: In case you weren't sure, I'm not JK Rowlings. I know, its shocking, but I'm not. So these aren't my characters and I'm (obviously) not making any money off this (I forgot the disclaimer and got a warning from mediaminer :O )

 

Warnings: The word `Bastard' is in the title. This is apparently inappropriate language. Oh, there is of age adults smoking. And I think the word arse. Does that cover it?

 

~*~*~*~*~

 

“Potter.” It comes out a hiss, and inwardly I flinch, because my tone has already set the boy's jaw and hardened his eyes. There is no point in trying to teach him anything now. He is disgustingly like his father, but lacks the deceased Potter's easygoing nature. No, this Potter is more tightly wound. If possible, he drives me to even greater depths of madness than his father.

 

“Snape?”

 

The insolent little bastard… I can feel my eyes narrow, and I leave the stool I had been sitting on, rounding my desk, baring down on him.

 

“You will have enough respect to address me as `Professor' or `Sir'. Lupin may allow you to call him as such, but I am not he. Some of us have actually earned the title.” Whatever minor correction I had had for him has now become yet another power struggle. Lupin tells me to ignore him, says that in order for it to be a power struggle there has to be someone to struggle with, and if I would not condescend myself… Oooh but he does not know this little brat that sits before me, no no, he sees the polite, well mannered, poor, orphaned, afflicted Harry Potter.

 

“Yes Sir.”

 

He meets my gaze with out flinching, those nearly feminine green eyes

staring at me, daring me to take this further. He knows I won't give him detention if I can help it. Two hours a day with him is more than enough.

 

“Potter, what are you using to mince your hen's teeth? A dull spoon?” I growl, it's all I can do to not actually bare my teeth at him, nose to nose like this.

 

“I didn't know a dull spoon was required for third year potions. I was using a razor as per your instruction.” He blinks. Even that annoys me.

 

“Well Potter, be that as it may, I think you may have done a better job if you had used a hammer. Finely chopped, Potter, finely chopped. Are you literate? Hearing?”

 

“Yes, both, I appreciate your concern.”

 

He won't let me ruffle his feathers today. It took him two years, but he has finally figured out that if he holds his temper, it only looses mine more. By now I am as disgusted with myself as I am with him. He is thirteen. Thirteen. How can he get under my skin like this? What about him grates on me so?

 

“Well, now that we have established you are applying the correct implement, and are sound enough of mind and body to register and execute directions, I suggest you do so… A poor attempt at a potion will do far more than singe off your eyebrows, Seamus.” I include him in this little foray, seeing he is about to add his powdered moonstone before his snakevine. Seamus jumps, his forehead wrinkling, suggesting his eyebrows, had he had any, would have about hit his hair line.

 

Unfortunately in his startlement he sways his hand, and the entire vial of moonstone drops into the cauldron. Why must Gryffindors be so bloody incompetent? I have enough time and sense to turn my face away, and hope everyone has on their safety glasses today, before the cauldron explodes.

 

Girls shriek, so do the boys for that matter, most of their voices yet unchanged. I hiss again as I feel places of burning the size of knutes on the back of my neck and over my hands and wrists, which are still splayed on Harry's desk. There is a second wave of shrieks as my students also get splattered in the boiling liquid. Merlin, I hope Seamus didn't get a face full of the stuff…

 

“Put out your fires, lids on your cauldrons!” I bark as I straighten, hastily wiping my hands on my robes, seeing blisters already rising. “Stop crying. I don't care how hurt and scared you are.” I squint around my classroom, now thick with smoke reeking of the botched potion. “Seamus?”

 

“Professor?”

 

I try to follow the squeak of a voice, where was the little Irish rat? “Is anyone hurt? No, Betty, that doesn't count.” A deep breath slides from my lungs. Betty's injury is raising blisters on her arm. Looking around again I finally find Seamus as he crawls out from under the desk, his hair several inches shorter and still smoldering, but he seems no worse for wear.

 

“Seamus, Can you explain to me why everything you touch explodes? Clean up, everyone. We're done. Leave your cauldrons, I will dispense of the potions. Just get out of here.” Before I kill you all. I catch Malfoy quickly untucking his shirt and zipping up his robe… trying to hide the dark wet crotch of his trousers. The Malfoy's have never been known for their mettle. Harry is getting up, wincing. He's ten feet from his desk chair, and I see Hermione sitting up, rubbing the back of her head. As always, Potter the hero saves the girl… though that bushy haired twig is not half as pretty as Lily had been.

 

Even more quickly than usual, the Gryffindors pile out of the room, today, my Slytherines are tight on their heels. They know when not to press their luck. I move up to my desk, dropping down on my stool again, leaning back against the cold stone of the wall, banging my head back against it a few times.

 

“Why… why me…” Really, I think its some cosmic entities final joke, that I should spend the rest of my life here, the same way I started, disliked, unattractive, and frustrated. At least that's what I think on days like this.

Surveying the damage before me, I am tempted to walk out, lock the door behind me, and cancel class for the rest of the day. Even two floors away, I can hear a bottle of brandy calling me. Ah, but that is too easy. The only pride I've had is in my diligence. Again I find my feet, this time moving to the row of sinks in the back of the room, turning on the could tap, holding both hands under it a moment, taking out my kerchief and soaking it, placing it on the burns on the back of my neck.

 

“Is everything quite alright Severus?” Lupin's lilting voice dances through the war zone that was once a classroom. Inappropriate as always.

 

“Indeed. It's a new floor treatment I am trying.” I turn to him, literally grinding my teeth. “What is it with you Micks?”

 

“Seamus, eh?” He laughs, despite my derogatory comment. Always has a smile, that one. But I know better, I have lived and walked the same path he has. I know. And that smile does not reach his eyes, not really. That is his own wall, his cheerfulness. “At least it wasn't Neville.”

 

“Would that it had been… I expect this from him.” In fact, I had worked all summer on a new enchantment, one that would turn his cauldron cold, and deaden his fire the minute he missed or added and ingredient erroneously. So far, it had worked. I was tired of scraping his latest misstep off the ceiling of my classroom.

 

“He is terrified of you.”

 

“Good.” I snarl… I know Neville is terrified of me. I know that I give him every reason in the world to be… but still…

 

“Yes, yes, I know, how can you be lonely if you're always alone. For breakfast every morning you eat two students that set you off the day before, you chew ball bearings instead of bubble gum…” Lupin's eyes rolled in his head so exaggeratedly that the irises almost disappeared into his skull. “You're a big hard dick, Severus, I know.”

 

“Good. Then I won't have to eat you in addition to the two students who have set me off tomorrow for breakfast. I don't have that kind of time.”

He laughs, like I knew he would. He likes to play with words as much as I. It would probably startle my students to know I had a sense of humor… one that wasn't based on sadism.

 

“I think some bad entendres are flying around.” He saunters further into the room, seeming to avoid the puddles of vomit-orange potion on the flagstone. “But I doubt your mind works that way.” He knows it does.

 

“Pure as the driven snow.” It's my turn to roll my eyes. Oh yeah, years in service of the Dark Lord, of course I am oblivious to a few sex puns. But he is joking too.

 

“Mmmhmmm… why, of course you are. St. Severus the Pure. Patron Saint of sexually repressed old bastards and virgins. Intercessor for the asexual, the eunuch, spade and neutered animals. Guiding light for the-“

 

“Sterile?” I suggest, quirking an eyebrow. It's a jab at him and he knows it. All werewolves are sterilized if their lucky, made eunuch if their not.

 

“Alright, alright, I can take a hint.” But he is still laughing. He didn't laugh like this when we were boys. He did not try to hide his quietness, his shyness, but then, he had defenders. Now, he is alone, like me.

 

“So you claim, yet you are still here.” I say dryly, slipping my wand from my sleeve and setting the room to cleaning itself, under my careful eye.

 

“Oh, I can take a hint, that doesn't mean I plan to act on it. Fancy a fag?”

I tense a moment, turning my eyes back to him slowly. Word play? A proposition? “Pardon?” I aim for the same droll, bored voice with which I

say nearly all… save Potter's name, which always comes out feral growl.

 

“A fag, a smoke, a light…” He pantomimes the action in question, his eyes dancing, he likes that he tipped me off balance. I don't even know what about it I found startling, he knows my preference, and I his. Contrary to what common sentiment may have you believe, not all homosexuals fall in bed together, based simply on that one shared trait. Lupin and I a prime example. I for one would rather show up to class in naught but my knickers, than let him in them. Or at least that is what I am telling myself.

 

“You find your self lacking in your vice.” I have no doubt that is why he is asking me to join him for a smoke, because he has none.

 

“Not true. I simple lack anything to light it with. Besides, some of us enjoy the company of others, even you. Sneak off to Moaning Myrtle's loo?” He waggles his eyebrows, barely visible under the shaggy fall of his hair. He has produced a pack of cigarettes from somewhere in his many pocketed robes, a muggle brand, they are much cheaper, and waggles them at me as well.

 

“All right, all right.” I sigh, glancing around my classroom. It will still need tending but I have time before my next class. First year Hufflepuffs, I shudder at the thought. I stand again and step around my desk, following him out of my classroom.

 

We walk a good space apart, neither of wishing to be caught in the presence of the other. We both have reputations to maintain after all, mine the Bastard, his the Allie. He pushes into the girls' loo with out hesitation, I have no doubt he walked into many a girls' toilet, trotting after Lily like a dog on a leash. They were best friends. I on the other hand still have some decorum; though I know this particular toilet would never be used, save for Moaning Myrtle and rule-breaking escapades. I still wait to make sure there are no girlish shrieks when Lupin enters, more than willing to turn and let him take all fault, but there are none, and I step after him.

 

“Ooooooh… Professors… you should not be smoking on school grounds!” Myrtle wails. “Besides, it makes it all smokey in here.”

 

“Yes, but I know how good you are at-“ Lupin starts to placate, a smile on his lips, his face benign, innocent. Such lies.

 

“You don't breath, Myrtle, smoke or no it has no effect on you.” I snap, glaring at her. I can hear Lupin let out an annoyed sigh. I know it will set her off crying, but it will also set her off. She is a shameless flirt, and while she has always hated me, and been more than willing to insult my countenance, I suspect likewise, she has always found Lupin attractive, and indulgent. She would likely be all too happy to linger and flatter the werewolf with out shame.

 

“Oooooh!'' Her wails are worse than nails on a chalkboard. “How insensitive of you, Snape, to remind me that I don't breath, you are so meeeeaaaaan.” As I had hoped, she dives off down one of the toilets. The first smile of the day turns up the corners of my mouth.

 

“That was a bit unnecessary. Just because you can make someone cry, doesn't mean you should.” But even Lupin, defender of… well everyone, can't even manage to sound much like he cares.

 

“She cries like most people breath.” I say dryly, patting at my own pockets for the pack of Draconos secreted in one of my own pockets. Dumbledor doesn't allow smoking anywhere in the castle. Until Lupin's arrival, I was the only one horribly inconvenienced. Its nice to know someone else is suffering. “I refuse to light that, you would do better to smoke a dirty sock. Here.” I offer him my pack after taking one of my own. I know how those cheap muggle cigarettes smell.

 

“You are too kind, Severus.” He grins and takes one, placing it with practiced ease between his lips and waits. That's right, he has no lighter or match. Muggle devices, but in our day it had been considered horribly uncouth to light your cigarette with your wand. I find my engraved Zippo and roll the flint with my thumb, lighting the wick. I hold it out to Lupin, a bit awkward as he is rather shorter than myself, but I know not to hand it to him. The lighter is plated with pure silver. Pure enough that I suspect it would melt away his fingers before he could drop it. My jaw tightens with this thought, he is cupping his hands around mine, as though it were windy, his flesh far too close to both my hand, and my lighter, for comfort.

 

“Careful.” I murmur. Lupin losing a finger or two is not a sight I would like to witness, though they would probably grow back. He leans back again, cigarette lit.

 

“Thank you Severus, much obliged.”

 

I light my own smoke before flipping shut the Zippo and returning to the pocket I found it. I shift a bit, uncomfortable, trying to find a way to stand

casually, while in a girls' loo. Lupin of course does not appear in the least uncomfortable as he hops up to sit on the edge of one of the sinks. He is short enough that his feet dangle. It takes me a moment to hear that he is laughing; I am concentrating so hard on trying to be… relaxed.

 

“Severus, you look constipated, just sit.”

 

“On what, pray tell?” I chose to ignore his toilet humor, though it was well timed.

 

“A sink, the radiator, that window ledge looks rather comfortable.” He rocks a bit, feet swinging, carefully balanced so he falls neither forward onto his face, nor slides back to get his arse stuck in the sink. I look at the window ledge, unable to believe I am considering sitting on it, but I am starting to feel self conscious, standing. I watch him another moment suspiciously, before I cross the room and lever myself onto the rather wide ledge, turning and cocking a knee, resting a foot on the sill as I lean back against the frame. I'm almost comfortable. It feels good to dangle my right leg, taking some pressure of my knee, and old war injury. Lupin has shifted position while I was settling, moving two sinks down, closer to where I sit, his feet resting on the radiator, he is leaning forward a little, arms wrapped around his knees.

 

“Right. Now that we are all comfortable and cordial…”

 

“You know you almost look good sitting there, Severus, its humanizing to see you so casual.” His smile is different this time, gentler. He isn't being suggestive; this is the Remus Lupin I remember from our schoolboy years. Softer, quieter, no protective bravado.

 

“Precisely. Which is why you do not generally see me in such a position.” I tap my ash onto the floor, where it blends with the dust, seeing my companion do the same.

 

“Yes… gods forbid, relating to people on a human level. I know you Severus, you're not the bastard you want to be, I bet you cry at weddings.” He smiles again, still soft, he is teasing me, but I have long learned, that is just his way and unlike his once compatriots, he means no insult by it.

 

“I wouldn't know, I can not say I've ever been to one.” I shrug, my eyes casting up and to the left as I riffle back through my memories, trying to remember if I ever had been.

 

“You haven't? No wonder you think the worst of everyone.” He shakes his head, eyes crossing as he looks down his nose as he exhales smoke through it, which forms two linked rings and floats off, I wonder if its subconscious, or intentional, two linked rings. “Listen-“ He pauses, interrupted by the heavy dong of the bell in the courtyard, indicating a period change. “Oops, that's me. Hmm… how nostalgic, late for class because I'm sneaking a drag. Anyhow, I'm on duty tonight. Come by.”

I watch him slip off the sink, dust puffing up around his heels as he lands on the tile. He squints an eye as he tosses the butt like a dart, into one of the stalls, and assumably into the toilet.

 

“Have a good day, Severus.” He drops me a wink before turning. I can see some of the saunter he had in his teens, a certain arrogance, self-assurance, something… sassy. I suspect all of that saunter would still be there, but judging by the way he has moved since arriving at Hogwarts, the arthritis that swells the knuckles of his bony hands, has settled in his hips as well.

 

I finish my own smoke, some how feeling almost cool. I don't know if its rub off from Lupin, or if it's the rebellion of smoking in the toilet, or sitting in the window, or all three. I have this period free, and take my time with the rest of my smoke, holding each breath in my lungs until it burns, exhaling slowly. When I am done, I drop my butt into the same toilet Lupin had, hitting the flush with my foot. I wash my hands before I walk out, hating the smell of tobacco on them. When I look up from my hands in the sink, I catch my reflection in the mirror, and wonder for a moment whom I am seeing. Nothing has changed since I walked away from my mirror this morning. My hair is limp and stringy, my face pale in an uneven curdled sort of way. My nose is still the most prominent feature of my face. So what is it, that caught me off guard for that brief moment?

 

It takes me a minute to meet my own gaze; I hate seeing my own disgust with myself. When I look though, I understand. I'm not scowling, I'm not glaring, my eyes aren't seething. I am not smiling, either, nor is my expression a pleased one… but it is calm. Damn Lupin anyway. That's why I hate him. He is contagious.

 

Author's Note: I really want this to be a multi chapter deal, but I don't know how that's going to fly. So right now, I'm posting it as a one shot, with the intention of writing more, but making no promises. Hope you all enjoyed my Snape-Paradigm.