After

There was a long silence following Poppy’s words. She decided she was the one who had better break it. She wiped the few tears off her cheeks and shook her head. “Molly’s looking for you, by the by,” She said to Minerva, standing up from her chair, she couldn't stand any more talk of Charity, it was still too much. “I didn’t even check for the potions I just forgot.” She excused as she started to walk back toward her office, “Apparently Harry and Hermione want to ask you something but they just weren’t sure how to write it down.”

Minerva nodded in understanding, but she wasn’t quite sure what to say. She couldn’t say when she’d leave the castle, or if, and she would never ask anyone to come there. 

“I saw Neville yesterday, he asked about you as well,” Septimia added, pushing a few things around on the table in front of them, leaving the ginger newts closest to Minerva. 

Minerva wanted to ask about them, where they were, how they were doing, and if they were hurt. She wanted to ask about the funerals that were sure to come soon, she wanted to ask after everyone they had seen in the last few days but she didn’t get the chance. 

Poppy reappeared bearing a couple of bottles, “I think you frightened them all after… after everything, you weren’t quite yourself, you know, you were almost nice to them.”

Minerva breathed a short laugh that was almost humourless. Septimia shot Poppy a dirty look when she was back in range.  “Don’t give me that look, Mia, you know the more you try and be nice to her the more she’s going to run away from us. She’s never known what do to with a genuine emotion, have you, Minnie?” 

“Don’t start with me, Pip,” Minerva said in a warning tone, though it was tempered by the slight ghost of a smile. 

“Oh, I’ve already started,” Poppy answered, holding out a vial of Skele-repair. “Drink this or I’ll really start being mean.” 

Minerva took the vial with a grimace. “I don’t see why you can’t use the regular spell,” She said sourly. “It’s so much quicker and this stuff is foul.” She finally drank some tea to try and take away the taste of the potion. 

“What did you expect? Pumpkin juice? And I don’t use the spell because it’s not advised for patients over a hundred and, my dear Minnie, despite your talents in artifice, I know for a fact that you are over a hundred,” Poppy said sternly. Minerva raised an eyebrow curiously and Poppy added, “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t know how far over, but I’ve got my bets on at least twenty-five years.” 

Minerva’s eyes went wide and her jaw dropped, offended that Poppy would estimate so wildly high a number, “I’m only a…” Minerva realised that Poppy was overestimating on purpose and snapped her mouth closed in the middle of her irate reply. “No. No, I am not going to tell you, so far as anyone is concerned, I’m seventy-two.” 

“Mhmmm, or at least you were…in the 1960s,” Septimia joined in poking fun at her. “If you were seventy-two you’d be only four years older than me and you were teaching my first-year transfiguration classes,” She widened her eyes and grimaced, shaking her head as she added, “I remember that torture distinctly.” She laughed at the old lady’s sour expression, with her spells wearing off she no longer looked seventy-two either. 

“By the by, your spells are slipping,” Poppy said snidely, “Right now you look almost 90.” Both younger witches were smirking wickedly.

“I haven’t had much time for vanities, I’ve been a bit busy,” Minerva said, gesturing vaguely around them at the repaired hospital ward. 

“Really? I hadn’t noticed…” Septimia replied sardonically, with a slight shrug and an unimpressed expression.

Minerva couldn’t stop the slight smile that crept onto her face, it was so much easier to love them when they were being mean. 

Poppy sat back down finally and was much more genuine when she said, “In all seriousness, Minnie, I can’t thank you enough for fixing up the place. It’s a lot easier to come back knowing I won’t have to start from scratch.” 

“Yes, I had hoped it would entice you to come back in September,” Minerva answered as if her efforts were only to keep the school Medi-witch from quitting. 

“Sure, I’ll be back, I might even come to prep in August,” Poppy retorted casually as if that weren’t the pattern she’d been following for the last twenty-six years. 

“I should consider myself lucky if you did,” Minerva replied, without a trace of sarcasm.

“What about me? What do I get for coming back?” Septimia asked sarcastically, before adding with a hopeful tone, “A raise?”

Minerva laughed sharply. “Hardly,” she said dispelling any hope of a raise for either of them. “But I assume that Professor Wenlock’s portrait told you that your arithmancy department is in working order when she snitched that I was here.” A slight smile crossed her face. 

“She did mention that you had been working in my office when she left you. I didn’t imagine the extent of the work you’d done though,” Septimia answered, gesturing vaguely to the castle around her. 

Minerva felt an odd urge to brag a bit. She held back from listing her accomplishments but did say, “You don’t know the half of it.” 

“I was afraid you might say that,” Poppy said, rolling her eyes and sighing deeply. She wondered if anyone was missing her from St. Mungo’s yet, and hoped that no one was looking for her. At that point, she wasn’t sure when she’d go back, and just how much of a struggle it would be to drag her elder colleague there. 

“Just what is the extent of your efforts here?” Septimia asked, nervous about the answer. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Minerva said dismissively, “I dare say you’ll find out eventually.”

“Why don’t you just tell me,” Septimia insisted, turning on her stern professorial persona. 

Minerva shook her head and sighed, but caved and said, “Most of the ground floor is structurally sound and in the early stages of superficial repair, excepting the library but including all of the ante chambers and assorted smaller rooms and broom cupboards. The courtyard is back to rights aside from a few small details best left to Pomona. The Greenhouses are repaired and only awaiting new plant life. The staircases are all repaired, up to the owlery. The Charms, Arithmancy, Herbology, and Divination departments are in working order if somewhat underfurnished. The lower levels are as they should be. And you’ve seen the rest.”

Poppy blinked slowly in disbelief. “You have got to be kidding me.” She realised again the extent of exhaustion that Minerva was holding back and realised how big of a crash she was in for.

Septimia did not have the same trouble believing Minerva’s list of accomplishments. “You and I both know she’s not kidding,” She said, shaking her head. 

Poppy started trying to think of a way to get Minerva to leave the castle. She was distracted from that train of thought when Septimia started in again.

“And your new office is all put together I’m sure,” Septimia huffed, still in a state of irritated shock. 

“I haven’t touched it, actually,” Minerva answered after a beat of silence, more gravity in her tone. She hung her head slightly when she admitted, “even my bravery has its limits.” 

Neither of them had an answer for that. Of course, she wouldn’t have done that yet, it was so obvious now that she’d said it. 

It had been Albus’s office before what Severus did. That office where she had plotted with Albus, laughed at him, laughed with him, yelled at and scolded him, fought and bickered and argued with him. Where they had traded insults and compliments in equal measure, where they had cried and comforted each other over their losses and rejoiced their victories. Where they drank and played chess and had tea and played Gin. Where they worked silently across the room from one another. Where they debated right and wrong, and struggled and compromised. The office where she sometimes stormed out, slamming the door closed behind her, and sometimes lingered in the doorway for an extra moment of conversation. 

It was no wonder her courage failed her when she would have to face that past and find all trace of it missing. Of course, she hadn’t been in there. 

It had been Severus’s office before what happened. The office she had been forcibly removed from when he rose to power with his dark henchmen. The office where she had pleaded with him to show some sign of who he had been before. Where she searched for the Severus who had been on their side only to find a cold, unfeeling, unrepentantly wicked man she hardly recognised. Where she had been humiliated by him, tortured, and forced to endure the pain of her students as they were tortured. Where she had put up a fight despite knowing it was futile, and where she had, once or twice, been beaten into temporarily giving up the fight. Where she had walked shaking out the door with an unsteady but determined step, and where she had once been half-carried out by Poppy. 

It was no wonder her bravery did not extend that far when she would have to face that past and find remnants of it scattered everywhere.

None of them spoke of it, no meaningful looks were exchanged between them in regard to it, but they understood. That horrible year had changed everything, and though there was no place in the school untouched by it, some rooms held more ghosts than others.