Two of the Same (A Harry Potter Student/Teacher Romance)

Chapter 8: Falling Hard (Snape's POV)

Chapter 8: Falling Hard (Snape's POV)

I had to learn to keep Marceline at arm’s length distance over the next couple of months. Sure Dumbledore still approved our extra Potions lessons, but they were strictly that; school lessons. We only talked about school, nothing else. She was a student, I was a teacher. I couldn’t let those boundaries get blurred again.

But I couldn’t help but notice things that she did that almost seemed to hint at the fact that she might like me back.

I was clearly going insane.

This whole thing was ruining my life. I was starting to get less and less sleep at night, becoming shorter and shorter tempered, and could focus less and less. This was eventually going to ruin my career as a teacher and prohibit my ability to be a spy for Dumbledore. I just wanted to shove her and all my feelings for her out of my mind!

But of course, it couldn’t be that easy. I was trapped with the feelings and the nagging pain in my chest that made me crave to see her again.  I wanted to get rid of this longing, this painful desire…

I had to keep convincing myself that she didn’t have any feelings for me. Yes, that’s what I would do. I would convince myself that she didn’t like me at all. We had a normal relationship. A perfectly normal relationship.

Who am I kidding? There was nothing normal about any of this. I, Severus Snape, who had never loved a woman other than Lily Evans in my entire life, was now in love with the least logical person I could possibly feel for. I had so many questions that began with ‘why’.

It was one particularly snowy afternoon, and I was sitting at my desk, grading a stack of tests while students worked on a particularly complex potion. Marceline was the first to finish, like usual.

“Do you need help grading tests, Professor?” she asked.

I considered for a moment, then decided that it was well worth all the time that I would be saved if I gave her the tests from my younger classes.

“Here,” I said, handing her a stack of tests from my second year class.

I cleared a spot across my desk and she pulled her chair up to it. She sat down across from me and began grading it with a red quill pen. Her hand moved quickly across the paper, trailing beautiful handwriting across the page. Her fingernails were painted black and matched the necklace she wore. An emerald ring on one of her fingers glittered like her eyes.

She looked up and noticed me staring at her. I immediately began writing again, pretending like I hadn’t been looking at her. She laughed quietly and went back to grading her stack of tests.

“How do you manage to finish every potion so quickly?” I asked.

“I don’t know, I just do. It comes naturally to me.”

She reminded me almost exactly of myself when I was her age. I had the same affinity for potions that she now had.

“How have you and Draco been?” I asked quietly, glancing up at Draco.

He was having trouble with his potion, like usual. He wasn’t very bright in this subject. I'm not sure that he’s good at anything in school…

“We haven’t been fighting as much,” she replied without looking up.

I could tell that she didn’t want to talk about it at all.

“I have to cancel our lesson tonight,” I said. “Dumbledore has requested to talk to me.”

That was a total lie. I was actually meeting Voldemort in the forest again. I couldn’t tell her that though. First of all, I don’t even think she knew I was a Death Eater, and telling her that little piece of information would most likely frighten her away. It was best if she just kept believing I was a short-tempered teacher.