Breathless (Alan Rickman Fanfic) COMPLETED

Chapter 19 Doom & Gloom

Alan adjusted the diploma on his office wall for the first time in weeks. Oddly enough, it had actually tilted a little to the right though that wasn't why it had garnered his attention. Unable to sleep, he had finally given up his attempt at four in the morning, and he'd been pacing ever since. It was either adjust the diploma or wear a hole in the rug. Should he go upstairs and beg for forgiveness? He'd been in good terms with Jasmine ever since he met her and had been thankful for her stimulating company but, thanks to his stupid impulsiveness, everything had changed.

Never would he forget the look on her face when he'd kissed her. She had been so surprised. Of all the unbelievable, improbable events to happen at a fund-raising event, kissing Jasmine was never in the top list. Like a drunken buffoon, he'd plastered one on her. Only he hadn't been drunk at all.

He stopped pacing - unaware until that moment he'd been doing it again - and looked at the clock. A quarter to nine and Jasmine hadn't come down for breakfast. Maybe she'd decided she couldn't work for him anymore. He couldn't blame her. He'd been a cad, and an innocent girl like Jasmine deserved better.

Damn he was tired.

There will be a point in life where you'll do the inevitable and in Alan's case it is to go straight into Jasmine's room and see why she still hadn't come down for breakfast.

"Blimey what happened?" Alan exclaimed when he opened the door. Jasmine stood before him wearing nothing but a worn-our t-shirt and a very short shorts displaying her slender legs, her right knee profusely bleeding.

"I uhh well..."

His heart dropped and without further thought, he scooped her into his arms and put her on bed, he stood and walked to a washstand to get some water then crossing the room to retrieve bandages and anti-bacterial (wound) spray in the first-aid cabinet, ignoring how Jasmine's room was decorated with posters of himself in different roles he played on-screen or how he found Severus Snape's altar adorned by slytherin crest, his wand, portrait and a standard size cauldron for potion making. Dragging a footstool over in front of her, he sat and began washing the blood from her knee. "Where else are you hurt?" Forcing her fingers to relax, Alan saw her bloody palm. He took a deep breath and faced her. "Tell me what happened."

Jasmine on the other hand couldn't actually answer him truthfully, when it's all his fault or should she say Harry's fault, his character in the movie Love Actually, which is in fact still playing on her android phone. She gasped remembering that the very actor was in her room. Alan immediately apologizes if the anti-bacterial spray stings.

"Jassy, won't you tell me what happened?"

Jasmine will definitely not admit that it was 'fangirling' that caused her little accident. Who wouldn't have tantrums if you were on the scene where Harry dances with Mia. He is mine!!! She had been screaming in her head when all of a sudden she fell off her bed with her knee and palm getting scrapped by a pocket cutter she left on the floor after finishing her DIY Alan Rickman scrapbook.

"I cut myself with a cutter and clumsily stumbled onto it."

he raked his hand down her calf, telling himself he was only checking for injury. "I'm afraid you'll have to buy a new stocking to cover the gash on your knee."

"There's no need, I am always wearing jeans anyways." She covered her leg with her blanket and for a second he felt like a lecherous animal. She was injured and he was thinking how smooth her calf felt in his palm. He hoped in her shaken state, she hadn't been aware.

"Let me see your hands."

Rolling her palms upward, he took her hands in his, so small, so delicate. The scrapes weren't as bad as the knee, but they still needed to be tended. A careful washing and some antiseptic cream left him with the last of his tasks. Placing his finger under her chin, he lifted it so he could examine her face. A tiny red mark can be spotted on her forehead.

"Is my face hurt too?"

"A little. Can you feel it?"

She shook her head, a wan smile lifting her lips.

"Your knee took quite a hit you're going to have to apply antiseptic on it so it won't get infected."

She nodded slightly, raising her eyes to look at him while he laid his hand against her forehead feeling if there are any bumps. His hand moved to feel her cheek. The silky softness was like touching a porcelain doll and before he could stop the impulse, his thumb stroked across her face, painfully close to her lips, which parted, drawing him toward them. Jasmine remembered the kiss they shared in King's College London Chapel. The thoughts of it coming back snapped her back from daydreaming.

"Do you intend to work here after you graduate?" Alan asked, disposing the discarded bandages into the trash bin.

Jasmine hadn't thought of that for now. "I don't know."

"Do you mind if I ask what you want?". Alan asked.

"From what?"

"Life."

What did she want from life? "I want what everyone wants, I suppose."

The answer seemed too obvious to state. "I want to be happy."

He sit with her and mulled over her answer for several moments before he asked, "And what would make you happy?"

"A family of my own, a warm home, and food on the table."

There was a deafening silence that followed after that. But he'd opened the discussion, and it seemed, only right he participated. "What would make you happy, Mr. Rickman?"

"What makes you think I'm not?"

The reluctant smiles, the distant stares... "Nothing."

Her tone must have said more than her response because he replied, "I'm not being fair, am I?"

"Not too."

"Happiness would be simple for me, Jassy. All I need to be happy is to forget."

She turned to face him. He kept his eyes forward, though she knew he had to be aware she was looking at him. Dare she ask? "What do you need to forget?"

"How to be sad."

He'd intended his answer to be a joke, but it hit too close to the mark for any real humor to seep in. It came out, instead, ambiguous, perhaps cryptic, and even though part of him wanted to tell her everything, a bigger part didn't want her to know. He's teaching career in KCL is for him to start a new life. If she knew his failure, the past would always be his present. And the respect in Jasmine's eyes would fade.

"Why are you sad?" she asked.

Now he'd done it he couldn't blame her for asking, having all but teased her with his answer. "I'm a widower. My daughter has no mother, and sometimes it gets very lonely." With a shrug he added, "but then, I'm no different than many others, and this conversation has gotten a bit sappy don't you think?"

Instead of immediately grabbing the segue, as he'd hoped, Jasmine remained silent for a minute before she finally had the courage to speak.

"Thank you," she said to Alan.

"No need to thank me." And as he went to the door he looked at her, sitting on her bed, the sun shining through the window behind her illuminating her like the angel she is and added smiling, "Reid is a pretty cool name." Then slowly exited her room.

Jasmine glanced at her open journal with her name adorning Alan's surname, little hearts decorated the entire page and the name Severus Reid Rickman if ever they were blessed to have a son.

HE SAW IT!

HE SAW IT!

HE SAW IT!

Capital letters D-O-O-M-E-D was sure to hit Jasmine's way.