The Redemption of Severus Snape

Part 29

Lindsay's first Potions lesson after the summer break was quiet, but still laced with tension–a different sort of tension than before. She chose to politely ignore it. Snape's staring had changed a little now that Remus was gone. He still looked at her intensely, but there was less visible aggression. Maybe he was jealous of Remus? thought Lindsay. How silly, it's obvious that we're no more than friends. But people feel what they feel. It's how people deal with their feelings that makes the difference. Lindsay's mother used to tell her to "shower them with kindness and they'll melt." Her mother could melt an iceberg with just a smile. Lindsay had to work a little harder, but she liked a challenge. The structure of Snape's lessons changed too. This time he chose to join her rather than stalk her, and stood on the opposite side of the table she was working at.

Snape silently watched Lindsay select and prepare ingredients. He had to stop himself from smiling when she first entered the classroom. He'd missed her over the summer break and wasn't prepared to handle such a feeling. She reminded him so much of Lily, yet she was so different from her. Lindsay's hair was nearly the same shade of dark red, perhaps a shade or two darker than Lily's. She was pretty, outgoing, charismatic, and confident. Lily was all of those things too. Yet the way Lindsay projected her character was so different from Lily. Lindsay was more subtle with a softer manner. Lily was frank and assertive. Snape frowned to himself as he looked down at the potion that he should've been making Lindsay brew on her own. He felt as confused as he appeared. His behavior around Lindsay was ever-changing. He wasn't able to sort out his feelings regarding Lindsay, and it made him feel disorganized and nervous. The uneasy combination presented itself outwardly as dislike.

Lindsay's easy relaxed manner lulled Severus into a false sense of familiarity. Her silence allowed his mind to wander without interruption, and he found himself seeing Lily's face locked in concentration. Instead of Lindsay's long, thin, artistically adept fingers, he saw Lily's small feminine hands reaching for Potions ingredients. The light scent of gardenia that wafted from Lindsay's body shifted to his memory of the soft English rose perfume that he'd made for Lily when he was a boy. And then Severus did something he hadn't done in many, many years.

"Do you hear that?" said Lindsay as she looked up from chopping Potions ingredients

Snape was standing on the opposite side of the work table slowly stirring a bubbling pink potion. "Hear what?"

"There's a vague sort of humming noise." She looked around the room, trying to discern where it could possibly be coming from. "Hmm, it's gone now. That was weird." She went back to chopping. "Ugh, there it is again! You don't hear that?"

"No," said Snape, his eyes still fixed on the potion.

Lindsay looked at him for second and started to laugh. "You're doing it, aren't you?"

"Yes," replied Snape, a tiny smile creeping into his features.

"Will you teach it to me?"

"No."

Lindsay laughed harder. "Alright, Professor, you got me. That was really annoying." She went back to chopping ingredients. Snape lifted his eyes and watched her through his curtain of lank hair. She was still smiling mischievously. He was unsure if she was genuinely amused, or if she thought him foolish.

"Professor, will you tell me about the Dark Arts?"

"Ask Lupin," replied Snape brusquely.

"I did and he, like everyone else, skirted the subject. Besides, I'm not asking about Defense Against the Dark Arts. I'm asking what the Dark Arts really are."

Snape's eyes glittered ominously. He studied her for some time before answering. "You are not capable of performing Dark Magic."

"I don't want to perform it; I want to understand it. Let me put it another way. There's an old saying that goes, 'Know thyself; know thy enemy'--"

"--'A thousand battles, a thousand victories,'" finished Snape. "Sun Tsu, 'The Art of War'. I am familiar." He stopped stirring his potion and put out the flames underneath the cauldron with a wave of his hand. Lindsay thought the conversation was over and was about to bring up another topic when Snape spoke again. "Come with me."

He led her to his quarters. Snape's sitting room was dark and essentially unfurnished except for a few fully stocked bookcases and a single armchair with a small side table, upon which sat a single unlit candle. There was no fireplace in the room, but there was an old potbelly stove in the far corner of it. The only light in the room was coming from its front grill, which cast an eerie, flickering, orange glow. It was blatantly obvious that he rarely, if ever, entertained guests. Lindsay immediately understood the profoundness of being invited into his inner sanctum, no matter how odd the invitation had been. She weighed her words carefully so as not to offend him. "So these are your rooms. Uncluttered and practical, they say that's a sign of an organized mind."

Snape stood in front of a long stone wall, which was clearly not bare as Lindsay could see portrait frames hanging upon it. The darkness of the room, however, obscured the portraits' subject matter. Snape waved her over. She stood next to him, her warm smile still firmly planted on her face. "Oooo, pictures, I like pictures."

Snape removed his wand from its pocket and held it in front of the portraits. "Lumos," he said softly. Light burst forth from the wand's tip, illuminating the entire wall. He studied her face, never looking at the portraits.

Her eyes widened and her smile vanished. "Oh...God...these are gruesome."

"These are the Dark Arts," said Snape without taking his eyes off her.

"How can you look at them?" Snape studied her expressions as her eyes moved over the images. The first was horror, and it swiftly traveled through her features. He next saw a mingling of curiosity and disdain. He waited for her to look at him so he could see the inevitable rejection in her eyes.

"I get it," she said as she turned to him, her eyes warm and welcoming. "It's a narrow and dangerous line to walk. To defeat an opponent, you must understand it. True understanding requires some kind of an attachment like respect or fascination, but not love so much, because a certain amount of objectivity is crucial. They teach us that in medical school as a form of self-preservation. It can be emotionally damaging to get too involved with patients. Objectivity is a physician's shield. I couldn't learn it, that's why I chose not to practice." She nodded, more to herself than to him. The pleasant smile returned to her features. "I understand. Thank you, Professor." She turned her back on the portraits and patted his shoulder. "They still creep me out, though."

His confidence in her disapproval of him was unexpectedly shattered, and he was left feeling naked and ugly in the light. His curtain of hair wasn't substantial enough to shelter him. "Nox," he said and quickly moved away from her. Lindsay followed him back to the potions lab.

"That was an eye-opener, Professor. What's that old saying...a picture speaks a thousand words?" He resumed his place on the opposite side of the work table and said nothing. His only response was to raise an eyebrow. "Yeah, that was a stupid thing to say considering the portraits around here actually talk." She began cutting and chopping and crushing ingredients, which she handed to him for inclusion in the now simmering potion. "My friends who weren't studying medicine were horrified by some of the pictures in my textbooks, but the ones who were medical students thought the inside of the human body was the most beautiful and fascinating thing they'd ever seen. It's all about perspective, isn't it? It's absolutely terrifying the first time you cut into a living person, at least it was for me, but sometimes we have to hurt people to help them. Logically speaking, that makes perfect sense to me, but emotionally...not so much...."

Her tone was familiar yet respectful, her posture relaxed. She seemed totally unaware that he had no idea what to say back to her. Beautiful women didn't speak to him unless they had to, and then they spoke at him and not to him. Had she been condescending toward him or frightened of him, he would have had an endless supply of snarky remarks to put her in her place, but her congenial manner left him at a loss for words.

"...Everything turned out alright in the end. I earn a good living as a painter and a freelance medical writer. And best of all, I'm not tied to an office. I like a change of scenery now and again, don't you?"