Severus Snape - A Magical Muggle (BOOK ONE)

Chapter 10

Severus arrived at 12 Grimmauld Place. 

The Order had a gathering scheduled for that evening, but he decided to show up earlier just to update himself about how Ana's lone training was going. He gave her a little more freedom to practice while he was away considering he had a lot of work to do in Hogwarts for the past couple of weeks.

He didn't even need to ask Molly where his pupil was, she indicated to him her bedroom without saying a word and he slowly went upstairs, observing the darkness hovering in those halls. He was used to such darkness, though. His house at Spinner's End was just like it, depressing, lonely, and sullen. He lived there his whole life but even though he had almost no good memory from his childhood there, he couldn't get rid of the house. He didn't know why.

As he went upstairs and reached for the bedroom door, he was hesitant to knock. Yet, somehow, Ana was aware of a presence at her door and spoke aloud to allow whoever it was to enter. Severus sighed and opened the door, furrowing his brows when he saw her lying on her stomach on the carpet, with colored pencils spread in front of her - she was drawing.

"What are you doing?" He couldn't fight the urge to ask as he approached her and sat on edge of the bed.

Ana smiled at him and confessed.

"I kinda... like to draw. And I know Albus's birthday is in two months, so I'm making him a draw. It's no big deal. We took a picture at King Cross before I even met you and I'm making a drawing of it." Severus nodded his head, but his eyes locked on the sketchbook And had worked on before. Ana noticed the curiosity in his stern mask and bit her lower lip. "Do you want to see it?"

Severus just nodded and when he opened the sketchbook and only saw a couple of pages, Ana witnessed the surprise on his face - a good surprise expression. He was actually taken aback by how good those drawing were.

For a moment, the raven-haired man wanted to express the thoughts going through his mind. If he hadn't stopped himself, he'd say that Ana was a truly astonishing girl - She was studious, loved books, play the piano and, now he discovered she can even draw. It is hard to find a woman with interests like hers, he believed. 

"Do you think he'll like it?" Ana interrupted his thoughts. 

Severus swallowed hard before forcing himself to make an audible sound.

"Yes."

She nibbled her lower lip once again, hesitating before opening again her sketchbook.

"You can see the other drawings if you like." 

Without speaking another word, he scanned page by page, every drawing she had been making through the years. He could discern the drawings had improved a lot on each page, so it was a continuous learning process. And as he proceeded through the book his amazed face grew.

"What do you think?"

"They are... good."

The brunette beamed, feeling her cheeks flush. That was the best compliment she could receive from Severus' mouth, she believed.

"I -- never show my drawings to anyone," She confessed in a low whisper which made him stop looking at her drawings and look at her instead.

"Why?"

"Well, I never trusted anyone enough to know they wouldn't point a finger and criticize just because, so..." She shrugged, too embarrassed to continued talking.

Severus noted some abnormal tension in the air and redirected his attention back to her sketchbook, freezing when he saw one particular drawing. Reasonably his favorite: it was a charcoal drawing of a unicorn under the moonlight. Simplistic, yet sublime. And he just stared at it.