For a few moments Harry allowed himself the luxury of not worrying about the potions professor’s fate, and instead he worried about the reaction of his friends to the conversation that had just happened.  A lot had been revealed – perhaps too much.  Harry liked to believe that had they not been overwhelmed by the situation, both he and Snape would have been more careful about what they said.  Neither one of them were prone to sharing their thoughts and feelings with an audience.  Even if it was just Ron and Hermione. 

Or perhaps it was even worse because it was Ron and Hermione.  He wasn’t really sure his friends would understand how his relationship with Snape had changed, or why. He wasn’t even sure of those things himself.  Sure he had dropped a few unintentional hints, and they had picked up on a few clues, but generally he had kept the fact that Snape was being so kind to him – looking after him – to himself.  It was his private treasure, and he hadn’t wanted to share it for fear it would tarnish.

He flushed at the fact that his own neediness was now so apparent, and turned to his friends, bracing himself for their reaction. 

He was surprised to find them both looking rather undisturbed. 

Ron was the first to break the silence.  “Harry!  You’re talking mate!  That’s great.” 

“Um, yeah…about Professor Snape…and what he said….”

“Harry, really,” Hermione interrupted him, “you don’t need to explain anything.  We understand.  Don’t we Ron?”  Harry didn’t miss the fact that she had elbowed their friend pretty roughly in the side, but he appreciated the nod Ron gave in agreement regardless.

More softly and sympathetically she added, “Everyone needs parents, Harry.”

“Even you?” Harry couldn’t help but tease Ron.

“Sure.  Just don’t tell them I said that!” his friend replied with a grin.

“Maybe we should go after him…” Harry said suddenly, his thoughts back to their teacher.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea Harry.  Professor Snape made it pretty clear that he wanted you to stay here.”

“I know that Hermione, but what if he can’t get past the dog? I never got the chance to tell him about music putting it to sleep.”

“He’s got a point ‘mione.” Ron stated agreeably.

“He does not!” She exclaimed.  Turning to Harry she added, “I’m sorry Harry, but if you go after him I swear I’ll go to Professor McGonagall right this minute!”

“Fine!” he muttered, with a glare to his more obedient friend.  He allowed himself to sulk for a moment, and then suggested, “Exploding Snap?”

*************

He tried to keep himself together, he really did.  He was grateful for the presence of his friends, because without them he might have given into his more childish instincts and hid in the potions supply cupboard.  Or worse, he might have given into his more Gryffindor instincts and gone after the man.

As it were, as they approached the two and a half hour mark with no return of Snape, Harry found himself retreating into silence.  Ron was trying to play chess with Hermione, who had no aptitude for the game and therefore no real interest in it, and he watched them from the big leather armchair Snape usually read in after dinner.

“Harry, I know you’re worried, but I swear if you drop that jar one more time I’m going to go ballistic!”

He stared at Ron for a moment, and then down at his hands.  He hadn’t even realized he’d been fidgeting with anything, let alone the empty jar of healing balm from when he was first attacked.  The memory made him feel both wary and safe at the same time.

“It’s been too long” he finally said.  “I have to do something.”

“It hasn’t been three hours yet.”

“I don’t care!” he yelled, and then immediately felt bad about it.  His friends were only just getting used to him speaking again, and here he was hollering at them.  “Please, can we just go to McGonagall at least?”

And so they went, with Harry leading the way at a run.

Their head of house barely looked up from her papers as they came into the room, and did so only long enough to register their presence and frown.

“This had better not be about the stone.  I told the three of you to leave that to Dumbledore.”

“It is about the stone, but Professor Snape --”

“Professor Snape’s involvement with the stone is also none of your concern.  Now return to the tower before I’m forced to take points from my own house.”

“Please, professor.  You’ve got to listen to us!” Harry exclaimed in frustration.  When she looked at him in surprise, Harry couldn’t help but feel a little pleased with himself.  He thought that might get her attention.

The woman seemed to gather herself after a moment and then slowly replied, “By all means, then, Mr. Potter.  Do continue.”

An unspoken challenge if ever he heard one.

“Well you told him we knew about the stone and he confronted us, and now he’s gone after it himself.  He told us to come get you if he wasn’t back in three hours.  It’s only been 2 and a half, but I’m worried.”

It was the most he’d said to her in months, perhaps all year, and it certainly seemed to have an impact.

“I’ll gather some of the staff and take care of it.  You’re to wait in the tower.”`

Great, just what he needed.  More waiting.

However much to Harry’s surprise, he wasn’t waiting long.  In fact merely half an hour had passed before McGonagall strode into the common room looking grave.

Taking Harry, Ron and Hermione aside she quietly told them, “We have recovered Professor Snape.  He is in the infirmary.  It seems your suspicions about theft were correct, and there was an – altercation.  You are not to breathe a word of this situation to anyone, do I make myself clear?”

Harry felt his vision tunnelling in, and leaned heavily against the wall to keep himself from falling.

He hadn’t meant for anyone to get hurt, he really hadn’t.  And now Snape was in the hospital, and what if he –

He didn’t have time to finish the thought, however.  McGonagall was clearly speaking to him, and he shook his head to try and focus.

“I’m to accompany you to the hospital wing, Mr. Potter.  The Headmaster has requested your presence.”

Harry could only nod.  Clearly his worst fears had come true.

*************

Severus heard frantic voices all around him, but couldn’t quite bring himself to open his eyes.  There was very little pain, but there was a healthy amount of exhaustion, so he could only assume that he was being treated in the infirmary.  He was about to slip back into sleep when he heard a frantic, high-pitched voice. 

Harry.

Still too far gone to open his eyes, he tried to focus on what the boy was saying.

“Wake up, please wake up!  You promised.  You said you’d take care of me.”

He had not, of course, made any such promise.  Not technically, anyway.  But he knew that there was no difference to a child.  Nor, truthfully, was there much difference to him.  The intent was the same.  Harry sounded desperate, like he was on the edge of panic.  Snape tried to open his eyes, but no one noticed in their efforts to hush Potter.

He could hear Albus talking to the boy softly, and he tried to shift towards the voices, to no avail. 

“Harry, he’ll be fine.”

“But he won’t wake up!  He should never gone down there, I should never have told him.”

“I don’t think Severus would want to hear you say that.”

Damn right.  The boy had enough emotional issues to begin with.  He didn’t need guilt as well.  Not any more guilt anyway.

“But it’s true!  If I hadn’t told him what I suspected about the stone he’d be okay right now.”

“Harry, why do you think Professor Snape went after the stone?”

“To protect it.”

“Yes.  And?”

There was a long pause here, and once again Severus almost fell back asleep.  But just as he found himself drifting Harry’s quiet response came through.

“To protect me, so I wouldn’t go after it.  He said . . . he said that’s what parents do.”

“Exactly so.”  He could almost hear the old man smiling in delight at this proof of his sentimentality.  With such a peaceful, confirming response from the Headmaster he did not expect Harry’s outburst.

“Well he LIED!  He lied!  That’s not what parents do.    Apparently what parents do is die!”  Harry’s voice broke at the end of his horrible ‘truth’.  It was motivation Severus needed to finally bring himself to full consciousness.

“I assure you, that by no means am I dead.  Unless, of course, this school actually is hell, and I am doomed to an eternity with a throbbing migraine.”

There was a hush of silence, and he spotted Harry across the room, being gently restrained by Dumbledore. 

Poppy immediately began to inundate him with questions about the state of his health, and he was so distracted that he almost missed the broken, whispered question from the boy.

“Daddy?”

Harry hadn’t meant to say it.  Not out loud, anyway.  Sure he had thought it to himself in moments of weakness and silliness, but he would never, ever have said it.  He was so scared and so relieved and so tired and so shocked, well, it had just slipped out.   He couldn’t even entertain the hope that no one had heard him, because the instant the word had passed his lips, the faces of all the adults whipped towards him, eyes wide.  Including Snape’s.

The man had heard him.  Oh how could he have been so incredibly stupid?  He’d ruined everything, just like he always knew he would.

Yanking himself free of Dumbledore, Harry fled the room.

Severus stared at the boy’s retreating back as Dumbledore quietly followed him out the door.  Snape found himself sighing into his hands.

“Sometimes I swear that boy is 11, going on 35, going on 8.”

“Well of course.” Poppy said from the other side of the room.  Her voice betrayed enough confidence that he cast a glance at her in question.

“The abuses the Dursley’s have subjected him to have both effects.  Of course he seems older than his years, and that’s what everyone expects.  However it is quite common for abused children to temporarily regress in certain behaviours once they’ve found a secure environment.  They don’t typically even realize they’re doing it, but they try to get the experiences they missed out on.  Like being carried to bed,” Poppy relayed, and gave a pointed look along with her example.

He couldn’t deny that some of that certainly applied to Harry, but the very idea seemed bathed in sentimentality and silliness.  Perhaps the mediwitch was just being fanciful.  So he asked, “And you come by this knowledge how?”

She gave him a look that made him feel like just got caught with his hand in the biscuit jar before dinner. 

“Really, Severus.  You didn’t think I’d take a nursing post at a school without being familiar with child psychology?”

He’d certainly never given the subject much thought, so he chose not to answer that particular inquiry.  He assumed it was rhetorical.  “So how am I supposed to know how to respond to him if he keeps fluctuating back and forth?”

“He’ll make it very clear where he’s at and what he needs from you.  He just did, did he not?”

If that is her definition of ‘clear’, Severus thought, Potter and I are both doomed.