Severus woke up bright and early, quickly readying for the day. He tiptoed down the hallway until he came to Harry's bedroom door. It was cracked open just enough for Severus to peer in and see that the boy was sound asleep, his right arm hanging off the side of the bed. Satisfied, the Slytherin continued his quiet trek down the hallway and into the kitchen to prepare breakfast with Flurry trailing behind him.

The talk with Minerva must've worked because the little fur ball had followed Severus to bed last night, reclaiming the extra pillow he kept on his bed just for her. Severus cracked open a can of cat food and dished it out into a small bowl before placing it on the floor next to the water bowl that was charmed to refill itself at the end of the counter, preventing Flurry from starting her morning protest.

With the cat taken care of, Severus turned the magical coffee maker on before opening up the cabinets, one after another in search of what he wished to cook for breakfast. He had sent out a house-elf for the basics, but hadn't wished to fully replenish his stocks without Harry's input.

Each day that passed with the boy in his quarters served to show just how much Severus didn't know about the boy that he thought he had. It frustrated him because Harry was turning into an unpredictable puzzle that changed every time Severus thought he was making progress. He didn't even know something as simple as what the boy liked to eat. Everything the Slytherin gave Harry to eat, he ate a few bites of before pushing it away.

Sighing, Severus pulled out the carton of eggs to make scrambled eggs. They were simple and easy to eat in terms of digestion, a plus for Harry. He cast a scourgify over the stove, pan, and egg carton as an extra precaution before washing his hands and starting to prepare breakfast. As he was tending to the eggs to cook, Severus shuffled through his mind for ideas of what to serve with eggs besides the usual boring toast, something that might appeal to Harry. He had bananas, strawberries, and yogurt, but the child hadn't seemed to favor either food or any food for that matter. Yet, the boy continued to drain his glasses of juice. Perhaps that was something Severus could work with.

A fruit smoothie!

Severus, himself, hated the texture of smoothies and milkshakes no matter how many times his mother tried to get him to like them, but it might be just the thing to combine Harry's apparent like of fruit juices with something that held a considerable amount of calories.

He flicked his wand towards the eggs to ensure they didn't burn. They weren't his number one priority anymore since Harry wouldn't likely eat them anyway, and he was never a breakfast eater.

The Potions Master was never happier his mother insisted he have a blender for her rare visits, and forced him to learn how to make the smoothies she adored so much as he pulled out the magical blender. With another flick, the eggs were done, and Severus was able to turn his attention to making Harry a smoothie.

Taking out the bananas and strawberries, Severus washed the strawberries before casting another scourgify, a spell he was learning he'd be using numerous times a day, aimed at the island and the blender and fruit lying on top of it. The chopping and slicing of fruit soothed Severus. It was the same motions that went into making potions, and he'd gone too long without brewing. He refused to hole up in his lab and leave Harry alone. The child was too unstable, too hurt by others shoving too much onto his shoulders over the years.

The Potions Master turned smoothie maker poured the bananas and strawberries into the blender before casting a silencing charm. With the press of a button, the blender roared to life blending the fruit until it was smooth. Then, Severus added yogurt, ice, and milk to the mix and turned the blender on again until he achieved the perfect thickness. He poured the completed smoothie into a glass charmed to stay cold before placing the pitcher into the charmed cold cabinet for later. After levitating breakfast to the table and canceling his silencing charm, Severus' task was finished, and it was time to wake Harry. 

Opening the door, Severus found Harry curled up facing the wall with the covers thrown halfway off. He strode over to the bed, perching on the edge. He placed the back of his hand against Harry's forehead to check for fever. The boy pressed his head against his hand, but his forehead didn't give any indication of an increased fever. A flick of his wand confirmed Harry's slightly elevated temperature caused by his leukemia that Severus hoped would be taken care of by the chemo later that day.

"Harry," Severus gently shook the boy's shoulder.

"Tired...go away," Harry mumbled as he pulled his pillow on top of his head.

"Time to get up, breakfast is ready," he tried to tempt the boy while taking his pillow away.

"Not hungry. Wake me up after Potions."

Severus smirked. Harry must think he was Mr. Weasley, and he was in his dorm on a school day. "Harry, it's Severus, and you can sleep later."

"In Potions?" the child mumbled, clearly more asleep than awake if he was assuming Severus just gave him permission to sleep during Potions.

"Yes, you can sleep during Potions," Severus answered not being able to resist.

"Okay," Harry smiled, his eyes cracking open as he stretched. "Professor?" the boy's eyes went wide and he froze. "I thought-"

"I know," Severus mused, handing Harry his glasses. "Wash your hands, and come to the table. Breakfast is ready."

At Harry's nod, the Slytherin left Harry's room and washed his own hands in the kitchen sink before sitting down at the table. He poured himself a cup of coffee, and savored the warm caffeine-filled liquid as it slid down his throat. Severus had acquired the taste for coffee during the summer he spent learning Muggle medical techniques and had never tried to break the addiction.

"Good morning," he greeted Harry properly as the child took his place at the table.

"Good morning," Harry yawned. So maybe the boy wasn't as up as Severus thought him to be. "What's this?" the Gryffindor motioned towards his glass.

"A smoothie," Severus answered.

"A what?" he asked as he scrutinized the drink as if he'd never seen a smoothie before though with the clues Harry kept leaving, it was quite possible that even though he was Muggle raised, he'd never seen or drank a smoothie before.

"It's strawberries, bananas, yogurt, and milk blended together. A smoothie is similar to a milkshake. Try it."

Harry took a small experimental sip before taking a much larger drink. "This is delicious," he smiled. "Thank you."

Severus nodded, a small, satisfied grin crossing his face for a split second. "If you drink a few of those a day, it'll help supplement the calories you're missing by not eating proper meals. Smoothies can be made using any kind of fruit, so you'll just have to let me know what fruits you'd like to try."

"This is fine," Harry insisted, fidgeting in his seat.

"Harry," Severus forced himself not to sigh. "I've been meaning to ask you what foods you like, so I can make a list to send a house-elf to the market with. While you're here, it's my job to ensure you eat properly, and I wish to do that by preparing foods you like."

"I'll eat anything," the child protested, uncomfortable with the idea.

Severus reached over to squeeze Harry's hand that he had resting on the table. "I'm sure you'll eat anything, but I want to cook things you like, Harry. Can you let me do that?"

"It won't be any trouble?" Harry asked, his eyes downcast.

"No, I'll make sure our meals are nutritious, but within that frame I'll incorporate what you like and don't like," Severus explained. It was important for Harry to get all the nutrients he needed, but there were many ways for that to happen, and the last thing he wished to do was have Harry attempting to eat food he didn't like to begin with, never mind how the chemo might affect his taste buds.

"Okay," the boy agreed.

"Good, we'll discuss it later." Severus poured Harry a glass of water before fetching his morning pills. "Take these, and then try to eat some eggs and finish your smoothie. Miss Adamson should be here in an hour and a half, and I think you'd like to shower before then."

"Oh, right," Harry sighed as he reached for the cup filled with pills.

"It'll be okay," Severus reassured the boy, hating how quick the child went from smiling over being given a smoothie to showing symptoms that could very well develop into depression.

------

After showering, Harry felt refreshed even if he wasn't allowed to have the water as hot as he liked, and Snape had to help him use a Ziploc bag to ensure his Hickman didn't get wet. The warm water pouring down onto him had felt great as he washed away the grime from his skin. He dressed in a pair of blue and green flannel pajama pants, a black tank, and a navy hoodie. Severus had reminded him to dress comfortably, which furthered his anxiety.

Harry was scared about the coming week. Every test and procedure he'd endured so far lasted an hour or so, but this round of chemo lasted the whole week, and he'd be hooked up to the infusion pump for twenty-three hours each day. He shivered at the thought, wrapping his open hoodie around him.

Stepping up to the mirror, Harry ran a comb through his hair, not that it helped any. He sighed and ran his fingers through his unruly mop of hair instead. A few pieces of raven hair latched onto his fingers, not anymore than normal, but Harry wondered when his hair would start to fall out, and if it would just fall out overnight or slowly over a period of time. As much as he cursed his hair for not staying neat, he'd miss having hair to help hide his scar.

With a sigh, Harry tried to flatten his hair over his scar before picking up his toothbrush to brush his teeth. Voldemort hadn't sent him a vision since the Ministry incident, and Harry knew it was bound to happen again soon. Voldemort wouldn't leave him alone for too long, especially if he got wind of how sick he was. Harry hoped Voldemort never found out because he couldn't deal with the madman while battling cancer.

"Harry, are you almost finished?" Snape asked from the other side of his bathroom door, breaking up his thoughts.

"I'll be right out," he called after spitting out the toothpaste into the sink. Harry quickly finished up in the bathroom before retreating into his bedroom where Severus was smoothing down his bedcovers, his clean bedcovers.

There was a new pale green silk blanket, or as Hermione would correct him duvet, with pale blue sheets spread across his bed. Was that what Snape picked out for him when they were in the store? His bed looked so inviting, and Harry never imagined anyone providing such luxurious items for him. At the Dursleys Harry was happy to receive Dudley's old comforter so he had something warmer than a thread-barren blanket to cover up with.

"You didn't have to change my bed for me," Harry commented, feeling uncomfortable with the quality of the linens and having someone else change his bed for him. He had been changing his own bed since he was old enough to lift the thin mattress' corners in his cupboard. In his dorm, Harry knew the house-elves changed the beds, but the linens were always the same, so he never thought about it.

"Flurry was up on your bed yesterday. Remember?" Severus asked as he situated the numerous pillows on the bed. Harry blinked. There had been two pillows there when he woke up, but now he counted six.

"I could've done it," Harry said, hoping Snape wasn't mad at him for not changing the bed himself.

"Miss Adamson should be here any minute," the Potions Master reminded him, narrowing his eyes in scrutiny.

Harry shifted from side to side before walking over to his professor and taking the last pillow from his hands to place on the bed. "I can do it."

Severus placed a hand on his shoulder, nudging him to turn around. He gulped as he spun around, his professor a foot in front of him towering over his small frame.

"Harry, I never intended for you to change your bed this morning. You're not in trouble," Snape said squeezing his shoulder.

"I'm not?" Harry asked, surprised. He never expected Snape of all people to clean for him, especially when he could do it himself.

"No. Why don't you go grab your book and smoothie? You may want something to read later," Severus suggested, turning the conversation back to something Harry was comfortable with.

Harry nodded, slipping away from Snape with relief. He was still trying to figure out the man's expectations of him and his duties so the Potions Master didn't throw him out. Even though Snape said he wouldn't, Harry didn't believe the man. Adults never stood by their word. Sirius promised Harry could live with him, but that never got further than words. Every year he was forced to return to the Dursleys, until Sirius died, making the possibility of living with his godfather forever impossible.

Tears threatened to form at the thought of Sirius, but Harry held them back. He refused to cry three days in a row. He wasn't weak.

Instead, Harry turned his attention to his smoothie sitting on the table. It was still chilled, and Severus must've refilled it for him because it was filled to the top again. Cracking a small smile, Harry took a sip of his smoothie while he went into the sitting room to pick up his borrowed book before returning to his room.

"Thank you, Professor," Harry said as he set down his smoothie and book on the nightstand.

"It's Severus," Severus reminded him again.

It felt strange and unnatural to refer to his professor by his first name after the man insisted Harry call him sir or professor during Occlumency lessons. Harry knew it would take time before Snape had to stop correcting him and for calling him Severus to become natural.

"Thank you, Severus," he corrected, jumping up onto his bed.

He was right about the bedcovers. The duvet was smooth, and the cotton sheets were softer than normal cotton. They smelled wonderful, too, like fresh picked lilies. There was also a light blue chenille blanket folded at the foot of his bed that he hadn't noticed before.

A warm feeling filled him. Severus had picked out the luxurious linens and made the bed, complete with freshening charm for him, Harry, the boy who only had hand-me down worn out linens for his whole life. Harry brought the duvet up to his nose, smelling the lingering scent of fresh lilies. It felt wonderful to have someone care enough to purchase brand new linens just for him. He never wanted that feeling to go away, but the arrival of the Specialist sent his nerves into overdrive, overshadowing the warm feeling he had found contentment in.

"Good morning," Miss Adamson greeted them with a knock on his doorframe, a large hard-sided case slung over her shoulder and a stack of envelopes in her hand.

"Good morning," Harry said. It was really going to happen; he was going to get chemo dripped into his cancer-stricken body. He hugged his knees to his chest as he eyed the large case. Was the chemo in there? Is that why the case was hard-sided?

"Here's the post, Severus. It was sitting outside the floo," Miss Adamson handed Severus the stack of envelopes.

"Thank you," the Potions Master said, sending the stack out of the room with a flick of his wand.

"Ready to get started, sweetie?" Miss Adamson asked him, setting the case down on the floor.

Harry gulped. How was he supposed to answer that question? Of course, he didn't want that poison flowing into his body, but he had to if he wanted to live.

"How are you feeling this morning?" she moved on, flicking her wand over his body in a motion that Harry recognized as denoting a general scan.

"Okay," he shrugged.

"No more throwing up or feeling nauseous?" the Specialist withdrew a quill and wrote down a few things on his chart.

Harry shook his head.

"Good. Lie back and take off your top for me," she requested. "I'll change the dressing and make sure the area around your Hickman is healing, and then you can put your tank top back on before I hook you up, okay?"

He looked towards Severus, his hands starting to tremble, as the Specialist left to wash her hands, and the Potions Master walked around to the other side of the bed where he sat down and pulled Harry into a side hug. "It'll be okay," Snape reassured him. "Miss Adamson will have to draw some blood, and give you a Benadryl and anti-nausea drip before hooking up the chemo. Try to relax."

Harry nodded though he didn't know how it was possible to relax. If anything he was growing more anxious with each second that ticked by. He pulled off his hoodie and tank top before Severus helped him settle back into the pillows.

Returning with gloved hands, Miss Adamson made quick work of checking his Hickman and changing the dressing. "A day or two more and the dressing can be changed every three days instead of every day," she noted. "Is it a little sore still?"

"A little," Harry agreed. He hardly acknowledged the slight ache in his chest, but reaching for things in the shower had hurt a bit.

"Good, and your back and hip?"

Harry shook his head. Either the pain in his lower back was too dull to feel with his high pain tolerance built up from Voldemort's mental attacks or there wasn't any pain to feel.

"How's your appetite?" she asked as she dictated to the quill set to write for her on her clipboard as Harry felt a tingling from the disk on his bracelet, a sign Harry figured out meant that the medical records stored in the disk on his bracelet were being updated as well.

"We discovered smoothies this morning," Severus answered for him.

"Wonderful," Miss Adamson smiled. "I'll bring a few samples of protein powder for you to add into the smoothies to help with Harry's protein intake."

Harry saw Severus nod as Miss Adamson waved her wand over the large case to open it. She levitated a few empty vials out of it along with a weird plastic thing wrapped up in some kind of protective wrapping. "I need to collect a few vials of blood to start with, so just relax. This won't hurt a bit."

Nodding, Harry watched as the Specialist rubbed one of the Hickman endings with an alcohol wipe before attaching the weird plastic thing to the end. She released the small clamp from the tube, and a moment later blood started flowing into the vial set into the weird plastic thing. She replaced the vial when it was filled with another one until all her vials were full, and she flushed the line before levitating two bags up to his infusion pump and connecting him up to them.

Harry was surprised how smooth the blood draw was. Miss Adamson had been right. He hadn't felt a thing, which was so much better than having his arm poked.

"I hooked you up to a Benadryl and anti-emetic drips. The first is in case your body reacts with the chemo, and it might make you sleepy. The anti-emetic drip is what I gave you yesterday. The hope is that by giving it to you before your chemo you won't feel nauseous during it," the Specialist explained. "While those drip into your system, I need to floo back to St. Mungo's, so a few tests can be run on your blood and the chemo can be mixed. I'll be back in about an hour." With a nod from Harry, Miss Adamson departed.

"Are you okay?" Severus asked. "That was quick."

"Yeah," Harry yawned, sliding down into bed. "I just want the chemo to start and get it over with."

"That's understandable," he said with a lazy wave of his hand.

Harry felt his tank top press against his skin, and he smiled up at his professor. He had forgotten about his tank top along with Miss Adamson. "Thanks, Severus."

"You're welcome," Severus helped Harry lay down without getting the tubes twisted around him.

He clapped five times to turn on his mural. The rolling waves soothed him as he stared at the wall while the medications dripped into his system, and he waited for the chemo to start.

Harry drifted in and out not quite asleep, but not fully awake until Miss Adamson returned. Trying to force his eyes to stay open only made him more tired as he tried to watch the Specialist hang the chemo bag through half-lidded eyes.

"Don't fight it," Severus whispered running a hand through his hair. "It's okay to sleep."

Taking Severus' words as permission, Harry drifted off to sleep just as the first drops of intravenous chemo trickled into his body.