Chapter 4
Hermione sat up on the sofa, a scream rupturing from her throat as the night terror crashed over her. She clutched her chest, trying to steady her panicked breathing, trying to remind herself it was just a flashback, it wasn’t happening, she was safe. But waking up in a dark, unfamiliar room had not helped the situation, and it was taking her brain too long to catch up and remember where she was.
“What’s wrong?” Snape asked, striding into the room.
Hermione hung her head in her hands, her skin slick with sweat. She shook her head silently, still trying to regain her bearings.
“Miss Granger, what’s happened? Why did you scream?”
“It’s nothing,” she rasped, her voice scratchy and raw.
“Your wailing would suggest otherwise.”
“It’s stupid. I’m sorry I woke you. I’ll cast a silencing charm.”
She heard Snape make a growling sound and then suddenly he was kneeling on the floor before her, prying her hands away from her face. He grabbed her chin in his hand and she felt him slam into her mind like a semi truck. She only had Harry’s accounts of his occlumency lessons with Snape to go off of, she had never experienced it herself. Now, coupled with her night terror it felt like her very brain was on fire.
“Stop!” she gasped, trying to shove Snape away, but he held tight to her, rifling through her mind until he found what he was looking for.
The memory.
That night at Malfoy Manor.
The Cruciatus Curse.
The cursed blade.
The unadulterated fear.
Snape released her mind and Hermione crumpled back onto the sofa, fighting off tears.
“That doesn’t look like nothing to me,” Snape said, his voice only slightly less aggravated.
“Please leave me alone,” she whispered. “I’m sorry I woke you.”
“I do not expect you to apologize for having a nightmare, Miss Granger.”
Hermione remained perfectly still, eyes squeezed shut to try and keep in the tears. She said nothing and the silence felt like knives against her skin.
“Would you like a calming drought?”
She shook her head. “I don’t respond well to them. They make me feel ill.”
“Very well. Get up.”
Hermione opened her eyes to see him standing up again and holding his hand out to her. She also noticed that he was not wearing a shirt. His broad, scarred, pale chest was on full view, the only article of clothing being loose black pajama bottoms hanging off his hips.
“Why do I have to get up?”
“I do not think sleeping out here in the drafty, windowless dark on an old, stiff couch is helping the situation. And seeing as I would actually like to get some sleep myself I suggest we relocate you.”
“To where?”
“Don’t be dense, Miss Granger. My bed is big enough to accommodate two. Now, get up.”
Hermione stared up at him, dumbstruck in the darkness. Surely she had heard him wrong. Noticing her clearly flabbergasted look Snape sighed in typical frustration.
“I am not propositioning you, Miss Granger.”
“I didn’t think you were, Professor.”
“Good, then. Get. Up.”
Hermione relented to his command, taking his hand and letting him help her up. His palm was cold against her burning skin and she couldn’t deny how soothing it felt. She wobbled a bit on her legs, her breathing still not evened out and Snape’s hands moved to her forearms to keep her from completely toppling over.
“Can you make it to the room?”
Hermione nodded. “Yes.”
“Very well.”
Snape released her and headed back to his bedroom, Hermione followed nervously behind him. He waited for her, holding the door open. She avoided his eyes as she entered his room. When she heard him close the door she flinched slightly.
“Do relax, Miss Granger. I’m not going to attack you.”
“I know that.”
“Then stop acting like a skittish animal.”
Hermione rolled her eyes. Leave it to Snape to be abysmal at comforting someone after a night terror.
“Which side of the bed is yours?”
“The entire bed is mine. I do not care where you lay, just hurry up and do it so we can attempt to salvage a few hours of sleep from this night.”
Hermione huffed and walked over to climb in the bed. She looked up to see Snape clearly trying to fight back a look of immense annoyance. She sighed dramatically.
“This is the side you sleep on, isn’t it?”
Snape said nothing.
Hermione huffed again. “Honestly, you’re acting like a child. You could have just said so.”
“Lay down, Miss Granger. And please be quiet.”
Hermione glared at him but followed his orders, moving to the other side of the large bed and settling in, her back facing him. She remained perfectly still as she heard Snape approach the bed and then felt the mattress shift under his weight. She held her breath to try and wait and see if his breathing would even out into the tell-tale sign of sleep, but it was obvious he was as wide awake as her.
Neither one of them spoke.
Hermione wanted to disappear.
“Professor?”
“I told you to go to sleep, Miss Granger.”
“You are also still awake.” Snape sighed loudly. Hermione fought the urge to groan in annoyance.
“What is it, Miss Granger? What is so pressing that you cannot simply be quiet and try to sleep?”
“I just…”
“Spit it out already,” Snape practically growled.
“Why are you being nice to me?”
There was a brief silence and then Snape made a scoffing sound. “You consider this behavior to be nice?”
“You’re letting me sleep in your bed so I don’t have another nightmare. You bought me dinner. You’ve offered to make me a healing salve, teach me occlumency, and have agreed to let me stay here for three months while we prepare a complicated ritual, all solely to help me. So, yes, I would consider such behavior to be nice.”
Her response was met with nothing but quiet and for a moment Hermione wondered if her former professor had fallen asleep. She rolled over to find Snape was already looking at her. The sight of his inky eyes staring at her across the darkness was staggering. The two laid there like that for a few moments, just looking at one another. Hermione felt like she was burning beneath his gaze.
“Professor?” she whispered.
“To answer your question, Miss Granger,” Snape spoke slowly, saying each word with purpose, “I have seen far too many people suffer in my life. I have no desire to see any more.”
“Okay,” Hermione said, her voice soft against the night. “Well…thank you.”
“You’re welcome, Miss Granger. Now, go to sleep.”
***
Hermione was on the floor of Malfoy Manor, sobbing, screaming. No one would help her. No one would do anything but watch her suffer.
Then Severus Snape burst into the room. He knelt down beside her and took her face in his hands.
“Miss Granger, you’re dreaming. This is just a dream. You’re not here. You’re at Hogwarts. You’re safe. This is the past. It’s just in your head. Wake up. You can wake up and come back. Wake up, Miss Granger.”
Slowly the Malfoys and Bellatrix began to melt away and Hermione was alone on the floor with Snape still looking down at her, speaking to her in words she didn’t understand.
“You need to wake up. It’s okay. You’re here with me, I’m not going to hurt you. Your mind doesn’t rule you, wake up now.”
Hermione opened her eyes with a gasp, tears streaming down her face as she dragged herself from the nightmare’s clutches. She sat up in bed, breathing ragged. She looked around the dark bedroom, trying to understand what had just happened. Her eyes found Severus Snape’s stare through the darkness. He was sitting up next to her, a look of actual concern on his face.
Without saying a word between them, Hermione collapsed into his arms, sobbing. He did not hesitate to hold her, his arms were a bit stiff in their embrace, but he did not push her off. He remained perfectly still as she clung to him, needing anything to anchor herself to the waking world and not the terrors of her subconscious.
“I’m so sorry,” she gasped through her sobs. “I keep waking you and I’m sorry—”
“You do not need to apologize.”
Hermione continued to sob, shaking in his embrace.
“You were there,” she whispered as her bone-shaking sobs began to die down. “In my mind. I didn’t dream you, you…walked in.”
“Yes. I did. You wouldn’t awaken. You were…screaming again. It seemed a faster way to bring you back.”
“I don’t like people seeing that memory.” Her fingers dug into his forearm that was braced around her. She was expecting for him to push her off any second now, but such admonishment never came.
“I can understand that,” he said, his voice soft and unaccusing. “I needed to wake you up.”
“Thank you.” Hermione couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Apparently neither could Snape because he remained silent with her for several more minutes.
“Would you like to lay down?” he finally asked.
“I’m afraid to go back to sleep,” she admitted, feeling pathetic.
“I know. You don’t have to. Just lay down.”
Hermione was afraid to let go of Snape, worried that without having something to hold onto she would somehow fall back into the nightmare. Luckily she didn’t have to, Snape slowly guided her back to the bed until they were laying beside one another, with Hermione tucked against Snape’s side. She briefly marveled at how absurd the entire situation was, to be huddled in the arms of her former professor who should really not even be alive as she was trapped in an alternate timeline, suffering from flashbacks. But the anxiety and fear brewing inside her was too strong to harp too long on it. She desperately wanted to feel calm and she wanted to feel it now. So she allowed herself this moment of absurdity and exhaled deeper into Snape’s stiff embrace.
“Do you usually have nightmares this bad?”
Hermione shook her head slightly, her curls falling over his bare chest as she did.
“They only happen when I’m very stressed.”
“Well I can’t possibly imagine what recent event could have prompted you to feel any measure of stress.”
There was a moment of silence and then Hermione laughed. “Is that your attempt at a joke?”
“I suppose it is.”
“It was funny.”
“Thank you for the glowing endorsement, Miss Granger,” Snape drolled, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “What do you normally do when you have them?”
“Well, I live here at Hogwarts. So, I just…get up and walk around, or sit up and read a book.”
“You are sure you don’t want to take something to aid your sleep?”
“Sleep potions make me feel sick.”
“Do these extreme night terrors not also do the same?”
“I’ll be better tomorrow night. We have a plan on how I will get home. It’s fine. I’m sorry to impose all of this on you.”
Snape instinctively tightened his hold on her. Hermione gasped in surprise.
“Stop apologizing, Miss Granger. It’s rather annoying. I do not blame people for having bad dreams. I am, in fact, aware that you do not have any control over it.”
“I can go back to the couch.”
“And then I will have to get up again when you have your next one.”
“I told you I could cast a silencing charm.”
“Stop arguing with me, Miss Granger and focus on calming your mind.”
Hermione huffed in frustration.
“Miss Granger,” Snape said in a warning tone.
Not wanting to argue, Hermione did her best to focus on taking slow, deep breaths until her muscles began to relax and her heart rate stopped racing.
“Good,” Snape said, his voice still brusk but not nearly as vexed. “Keep breathing like that. Let your mind go somewhere else.”
“Where?” Hermione whispered.
“Replace the bad memory with a happy one, focus on it until you drift off.”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to fall asleep again tonight, Professor. I’m sorry. I can go read on the couch so you can sleep.”
“No, Miss Granger. Just be quiet and stay here. Focus your mind.”
“Professor—”
“I would prefer, Miss Granger, if you would abstain from continuing arguing with me whilst in my bed and in my arms.”
Hermione stilled at his words. It was as if she was just now fully processing that she was being held by Severus Snape of all people. She knew that logically she should pull away and curl up on the far side of the bed, even insist that she go back to sleeping on the couch. But the fact of the matter was that her night terrors had left her shaken, and accidentally getting stuck in an alternate timeline had her feeling completely frazzled, even if they did have a plan on how to return her to the proper time.
Being held at all was calming, and Snape’s arms did not feel restrictive like she might’ve imagined they would. She felt safe here, the way he had promised she would in her dream.
I’m not going to hurt you.
She exhaled slowly, fully giving herself over to the feeling of his arms around her; choosing to believe his words.
“Better?” he asked, his voice barely more than a whisper.
“Yes. Thank you.”
“Have you replaced the bad memory?” Hermione nodded, her chin grazing his chest as she did. She heard him inhale sharply and she wondered if it was because of her. “Focus on that memory.”
“Will this really work? Is it like casting a Patronus Charm?”
“Yes.”
“Professor?”
“Yes, Miss Granger?”
“Is your Patronus a doe? I was just…wondering if it’s the same here as it was back in—”
“Yes, Miss Granger,” he cut her off, his voice becoming prickly again.
“So you think of Lily when you cast it.”
Snape didn’t respond.
“I think of Harry,” Hermione whispered.
“Are you and Mr. Potter romantically involved?”
Hermione shook her head again, her chin ghosting across his skin once more. “No. He’s just my best friend. My favorite person. The person who sees me and understands me and believes in me more than anyone else. Everything in my life felt overwhelming and confusing until coming to Hogwarts and becoming Harry’s friend. And even in the midst of all the terrible things that happened, when Harry was there it was always better. He must be so worried right now, wondering where I am. We talk almost every day, and my absence has surely been reported so he’ll have heard.”
“What does Mr. Potter do for work?”
“He’s an Auror. Is he one here too?”
“Yes,” Snape said. “He is.”
Another uncomfortable silence settled over them for a few more minutes.
“I think Mr. Potter would be glad to know that you think of him when casting your Patronus Charm.”
Hermione was quiet, mulling over his words. She knew Harry thought of his parents and Sirius when casting his charm, but she had never shared what she thought of. Knowing that in this timeline she was dead and would never cast a Patronus again filled her with an overwhelming sense of melancholy.
“I’ll tell him when I get back.”
Snape said nothing in response. Hermione wished he would do more to uphold his side of this strange conversation, but she wasn’t surprised. Severus Snape had never been a man of many words when he was alive in her timeline.
“Professor?”
“Yes, Miss Granger?”
Hermione moved her hand from where it was still gripping his forearm to gently rest it on his bare chest, just below his heart. She heard him inhale sharply again and this time she was certain it was because of her.
“I’m afraid I won’t be able to get home.”
“I know,” he said, his voice bordering on apathetic, but then she felt him pull her in a bit closer. “You’ll get home. I will make sure of it.”