Chapter 10
“We’ve got nothing!” Hermione cried in despair, a pencil behind each ear and one in her hand.
“We haven’t got nothing,” Severus said soothingly. “We’ve got something.”
“Yes, we’ve got a methodology, hundreds of fruitless case studies and a fetid literature review. But we have no conclusion. You at least finished the abstract, didn’t you?”
“I, ah. An abstract is generally written after the conclusion.”
He at least had the decency to look shamefaced. Hermione buried her hands in her hair with such violence as if to tear it out.
“I’ve never failed an assignment in my life,” she growled.
“There’s a first time for everything.”
She caught his eye and he could tell they were both thinking about last night.
As the weeks passed they’d gotten more adventurous, experimenting with moves from ridiculous novels, avant-garde French cinema and whatever they could get their hands on. The Lebanese Fulcrum had been beyond their athletic capabilities, but the Three-Legged Pixie had been a revelation.
Hermione’s stapler had got bored and was chewing the edge of a plastic folder. She awoke from her daydream and scolded it, then wilted under a fresh wave of despair.
“Oh, but what are we going to do!”
Severus crossed the tiny office in two steps and gently cupped her face in his hands. She let him kiss her softly and she calmed somewhat.
“As I see it, we have two options,” said Severus.
“Which are?”
“Get sacked, or resign before they get the chance.”
Hermione closed her eyes and groaned. He kissed her temple.
“Best quit while we’re ahead,” he said.
“I will if you do,” she grumbled. “I’m not staying here without you.”
＊
Miss Hermione Granger and Mister Severus Snape waited with trepidation in the lobby of the Department of Mysteries, Level Nine. Hermione held a leather-bound research folio, and Severus held her hand.
The click of smart shoes on the marble floor signalled the arrival of Unspeakable Armastus, and trailing behind him, a witch and wizard in neat black robes who were eyeing each other with intense dislike.
“Who are they?” Hermione whispered. “I don’t recognise them.”
“Hands,” Severus murmured in her ear, provoking a gasp. Hermione spotted that the witch and wizard each held a familiar black envelope.
“Our replacements? But we haven’t even presented our research yet! Maybe they’ll be working in another office?”
Armastus opened a handleless door. “Mister Snape, Miss Granger? In here, please.” He then motioned to a leather sofa in the lobby. “If you’ll wait outside for a moment,” he told the unknown witch and wizard.
Armastus ushered them into the large and ever empty meeting room they had sat in on their first day, but before they could begin their presentation he took the folio from Hermione’s hands and bowed ostentatiously.
“I believe it is time for us to say goodbye. I thank you both for your diligent work, and I sincerely hope you have enjoyed your time here in the department.”
“You can’t sack us,” Severus argued. “We resign.”
Hermione pointed accusingly towards the door. “Are those two people waiting outside the new recruits? Are you telling me they’ll be replacing us?”
Armastus smiled and wiggled his moustache like a Belgian detective. “Precisely correct. As I’ve said before, we tend to hire in pairs. You two have finished your work in Romantic Love, now it’s time for some others to have their chance.”
Hermione couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “But we– we didn’t do anything! We broke no ground, made no discoveries, we didn’t invent or modify any incantations or potions, and didn’t develop any ideas at all. We don’t know anything about love.”
“Don’t you?” Armastus asked, looking between them knowingly.
Severus suspected Armastus was trying hard not to wink. He locked eyes with Hermione, who had turned an appealing shade of pink and was conveying telepathically to him that she thought Armastus was a maniac. He smiled fondly at her.
“Your work here is done,” the Unspeakable said grandly, and presented each of them with a pink slip.
“What’s this?” said Severus.
“Your notice of dismissal.”
Hermione tore it in half. “He just told you we’re resigning, you can’t–”
“Already processed, I’m afraid. Thank you again and good luck with all your future endeavours. Now, toodle-oo!”
＊
The Floo in the Department of Mysteries lobby ejected them into the red telephone box in Whitehall that served as the Ministry visitor’s entrance. They tumbled out of the booth and onto the street, blinking into the sudden, disorienting sunlight.
“It appears we’ve been the victims of some sort of governmental match-making scheme,” Hermione said fascinatedly, arrested with shock.
“Not victims,” said Severus, quickly transfiguring their conspicuous robes into Muggle clothes. “Merely unknowing participants.”
And damn lucky ones, he thought. He wouldn’t have it any other way.
The sky was flickering light and dark from fast moving clouds above them, and he could hear church bells in the distance. The towers of Westminster Abbey were visible at the end of the long road, framed by large leafy trees.
Hermione looked up at him, still in shock at the fact of her sudden unemployment, and at discovering herself to have been the subject of a research study rather than the principal investigator.
“What now?”
“I suggest we take the Bakerloo line,” he said calmly.
“Why?”
“To Daunt Books, of course.”
She laughed, recovering from her shock and falling against him, pink-cheeked and bright-eyed.
His English rose.
“Perfect,” she said, and they walked through the streets of London together, hand in hand.
fin.