"Once upon a time --"

Harry frowned. "I think I've heard this one before," he interrupted.

Snape took a deep breath, and slowly, silently, counted to ten. He'd promised Dumbledore that he would not lose his patience with the boy, no matter what, and this was a 'no matter what' situation if there ever was one. Plastering a smile on his face, and, instead of telling the boy that there is more than one story that begins with the words, "Once upon a time," and chastising Harry for the interruption, Severus decided to move on with the story.

"There was a beautiful swan and --"

"An ugly duck?" Harry asked. He was practically vibrating with excitement, leaning forward in the bed, his hands clenching the bed sheets that Dumbledore had chosen for the now de-aged boy. Severus can't help thinking that they were an unnecessary indulgence for the boy. The ridiculous sheets were covered in characters from some kind of Muggle superhero team, Avengers or something, if Severus remembered correctly.

A hulking green character scowled at Severus, and stomped its feet. Its roar was, thankfully, subdued. Doing his best to ignore it, and the other characters cavorting across Harry's bed-sheets, Severus took another deep breath, and reminded himself that he had no one else to blame, but himself, for what happened to Harry. This was merely one part of the penance that he must pay for his inattention -- how many times has he scolded his students throughout the years for this very thing?

Taking care of Harry until he returned to the sulky fourteen year old boy that he once was, was another part of it. Dumbledore, and Severus' colleagues, had insisted. The boy's relatives didn't seem to care that the boy wasn't returning home for the first month of the summer holidays.

The five year old boy gave Severus a crooked smile, and bit his lip. Severus took this as his cue to resume the bedtime story that Dumbledore had suggested he tell Harry, who, up until bedtime, had been utterly terrified for some reason. Harry, and Severus, had survived dinner (Harry had sat on the floor, rather than on the chair at the table), bath time (barely...Harry seemed to be under the impression that, not only would the water be freezing cold, but that his head would be held under the water until he almost drowned), and now it was bedtime. Severus wondered if he, and his story, would survive this experience intact, and hoped that the effects of the de-aging potion won't take the usual month to wear off.

At bedtime, Harry had been surprised that, not only did he have a room (his very own room), but that there was a nice, comfortable bed that he got to sleep in. There was a box filled with toys positioned at the end of the bed (from Lupin and Dumbledore), a plush cat that Harry had tucked to his side (McGonagall's contribution), and the room had wallpaper decorated with Quidditch players that had been charmed to fly throughout the room (Flitwick's addition to Harry's room). The small bookshelf, filled with children's books, had been donated by Granger and the Weasley family.

"No, not an ugly duckling, Pot-er-Harry," Severus said, grimacing at his near slip. For some reason, Harry cringed whenever he was called Potter, or boy; Dumbledore was currently investigating the Dursleys, because there were way too many red flags in Harry's reactions to the simplest of things, for the elder wizard's peace of mind -- Severus' as well.

Harry's forehead wrinkled and he settled back against the pillows that Dumbledore had fluffed up before taking his leave (abandoning Severus to the mercies of a five year old Harry Potter). He scratched at his nose as he puzzled at that bit of information. Severus smirked.

"The beautiful swan was accompanied by a..." Severus cast about in his mind for an appropriate companion for a beautiful swan when Harry looked up at him through the fringe of his bangs, green eyes swimming with longing that, for some reason, tugged at Severus' heart.

Blinking, heart racing, Severus said, "The beautiful swan was accompanied by a little boy with a shock of dark hair, and --"

"Green eyes?" Harry whispered. He was still giving Severus that look which was making the Potions Master's insides twist, and it slammed home to him that the boy, Potter, Harry, was very much like Lily Evans.

Severus found himself nodding, and smiling, and feeling like he'd been imperioused to do so. It was disconcerting, but, "Green eyes, and a smile that could warm even the most stone cold of hearts," Severus added, thinking, not of James, when he looked at Harry, or of the fact that he'd been saddled with Harry Potter for the first month of summer, but of Lily. Lily, whose smile had warmed his heart, turning it from stone, to something that was malleable. Her smile could, and did, move mountains, and, from what Severus could see in the younger version of the boy he'd hated, so could Harry's.

Harry bit his lip, and worried the sheets with his fingers, making the green character scowl at Severus, stomp its feet and roar in frustration. Severus merely raised an eyebrow at the fit that the miniature hulk was making, and wondered at the fact that, not once since this whole ordeal began, had Harry Potter behaved like a spoiled brat, nor had the boy pitched a fit as the green character was currently doing.

A red-haired character, clad in tight-fitting black leather knelt next to the green beast, and, breath catching in his chest, worry battling with common sense (bed-sheet characters could not be hurt, after all), Severus watched the female character, with no small amount of fear, calm the beast. He could just make out a faint, trilling sound -- singing, some kind of lullaby -- and his heart flipped. Lily used to sing. Silly, nonsensical things which could draw Severus out of a bad mood faster than anything else could.

Severus shook himself. Harry was watching him through eyes that were half-closed. The boy yawned, and Severus felt exhaustion pull at him as well, though it was not yet eight PM, and he still had work to do before he could sleep.

"The swan and the boy," Severus said, choosing his words carefully. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the green figure had transformed into that of a man; shame colored the tamed beast's cheeks, and Severus closed his eyes briefly. "Had many great adventures together."

"What did they do?" Harry asked around a yawn. "Sir?" he tacked on, eyes going wide with what Severus recognized as fear for a split second.

Severus decided that, while he'd often wanted to cause such a reaction in the teen that Harry had been (so much, to his tainted eye, like James), he had no desire to see that kind of fearful reaction in the five-year-old. He smiled, and placed a hand on one of Harry's.

"The beautiful swan had the most loveliest of voices," Severus said, his mind going back to a particularly difficult summer from his youth -- his father had just lost a job, and Severus had not been quick enough to escape the man's ire on several occasions -- when Lily's voice, soft and lilting, as she sang, had been the only thing to see him through. She'd kept him sane that summer, and had tamed the beast that roared within him every time that he thought of his father.

"She sang like an angel," Harry said in a voice that was filled with quiet reverence, as though, he, too, was remembering Lily. Dumbledore had told Severus that the boy didn't remember much about James and Lily, that the only thing Harry could recall, in any detail, about his parents, was the night that the Dark Lord had killed them. Until this moment, Severus had been unmoved by what he'd considered a sob story concocted only to make people feel sorry for the spoiled child.

Nodding, Severus squeezed Harry's hand, wondering how he'd gone from patting it to holding it. "She, and her green-eyed boy, went everywhere together. Nothing could separate them. And everywhere they went, joy would follow. No one was immune to the swan's beautiful song, or the boy's contagious smile. Happiness spread throughout the lands --"

"But then the darkness came," Harry interrupted in a harsh whisper, eyes welling with tears, chin trembling.

Severus' heart skittered to a stop, and then thundered in his chest. His mouth was dry, and the hand that was holding Harry's gripped it tightly.

"And the beautiful swan was swallowed up by it, and the little boy was lost," Harry added, breath hitching.

Flooded with uncertainty, Severus panicked for a moment before he regained his composure. He had never wanted to be a father -- he'd seen too much of his own father in himself to believe it would be a good idea -- and comforting a little boy, one who'd been fourteen years old just a few hours ago, was not in his repertoire.

"But, not for long," Severus said, quickly trying to find a way to fix the story that the little boy had hijacked, though he couldn't remember the story that he'd set out to tell the boy (there had been far too many interruptions). The last thing that he, or Harry needed, was a nightmare inspired by a bedtime story gone bad.

Harry's brow was furrowed, and the hand that Severus held in his own was squeezing Severus' so hard that Severus' fingers were tingling. The boy's breathing was off, and Severus found his other hand moving to pull the boy toward himself (imperioused, again, perhaps? Was Dumbledore lingering in the doorway?).

It was awkward at first, and Severus forced himself to relax. It wasn't like he'd never experienced a hug before, though, as he sifted through his memories, Severus realized that he'd never, not even with his godson, initiated a hug before now. He'd always -- with Lily, and, on occasion, his mother, and just the once, Dumbledore -- been on the receiving end of the hugs that he'd had. He refused to let his mind go  any further down that path, because he did not want to know how many of his ten fingers he'd have to hold up to count the number of hugs he'd received in his lifetime.

Harry stiffened in his arms, back ramrod straight, as though he was unused to being comforted with hugs, and Severus hoped that Dumbledore was giving the Dursleys what was due them. No boy Harry's age should shy away from a hug, or tremble as though afraid.

Severus' fingers found their way to Harry's hair, and the boy finally relaxed into the hug, wrapping his arms around Severus' middle, and burying his face into the man's chest. Severus started humming, a tune he remembered from his youth, something Lily had sung to him. He didn't remember the words; they weren't as important as the soothing tone she'd used.

Severus patted the boy's back, and started rocking. The movements came unnaturally natural to him, and if he was a man who believed in things like guardian angels and heaven and hell, he'd have blamed Lily's influence on him from beyond the grave for the fact that he was comforting Harry Potter. He continued to hum as Harry, probably overwhelmed with the day's events, cried, almost silently, into Severus' chest.

There were probably words that a parent would say to a child right now. Words that Severus doubted Petunia had ever used with her nephew. Words that escaped him.

Harry's tears ceased more quickly than Severus thought they should. He got the sense that Harry didn't cry nearly as often as he ought to, that, when Harry had been five the first time around, crying had not been allowed. The certainty of Severus' suspicions twisted in his gut. Severus knew, even without knowing, that Harry hadn't cried much as a child, because, he, too, had been an unwanted five-year-old boy once upon a time, and such children knew that tears were pointless. They got you nowhere, and only served to make you feel stuffy-headed, and left you unable to breathe through your nose.

Severus closed his eyes and kissed the top of Harry's head, and continued to hold Harry close until the boy started to move away. He wiped away the evidence of the boy's tears with a handkerchief, holding it up for Harry to blow his nose, and then helped the boy settle back against the pillows.

Harry twisted the sheets in his fingers, the characters' movements were subdued, as though they understood the importance of what had just happened between Harry Potter and Severus Snape. A mountain had moved, the base shifting until stone broke, and fell.

"How does the story end?" Harry asked, green eyes lifting from their contemplation of the bed sheets, to pierce Severus with a look filled with so much raw hope that Severus wanted to run away. He couldn't be what Harry wanted. Needed. He couldn't love Harry the way that Lily and James had.

Heart in his throat, Severus swallowed, and, not looking away from the little boy whose eyes practically glowed with need that terrified him, Severus said, "Happily ever after, Harry. It ends happily ever after."

"Because, when the beautiful swan was swallowed up by the darkness, a black swan came and found the little, green-eyed boy and he wasn't lost no more?" Harry's eyes held Severus', and for several, long, tense moments, neither of them seemed to breathe as they both considered what it was that Harry was really asking.

Maybe some of the fourteen year old boy remained intact within the five-year-old, though Severus doubted it. It was clear that, even at five, Harry had been a remarkable child. Wise beyond his years. Severus hadn't seen it before. Had never noticed Harry beyond the boy's fame, and parentage, but he recognized it now, as memories of Harry at eleven, twelve, thirteen, and fourteen, unclouded by prejudice, assailed him.

Regaining his composure as he mentally shook himself, Severus smiled and nodded. Brushing Harry's bangs out of his eyes, he kissed the boy's forehead, marveling at the youthful warmth, and now natural it felt to do so. "Yes, Harry, that's exactly how the story ends."

Smiling, Harry closed his eyes, his head sinking into the fluffed pillows. He clutched the stuffed cat to his chest, nearly strangling it.

Severus felt Dumbledore's eyes on him as he tucked the sheets up beneath the boy's chin and cast a silencing spell on them -- the green hulk was once again on a rampage. The charmed Quidditch players on Harry's walls were sleeping on their brooms, and Severus silenced their light snores as well, before he pressed another kiss to Harry's forehead.

"Goodnight, Harry. Pleasant dreams," he whispered.

The boy turned onto his stomach, squishing the toy cat beneath him. It meowed, and Severus inwardly groaned, wondering what had possessed his colleagues to give his...to give Harry...such noisy gifts. When Harry didn't stir at the sound, Severus decided to leave the cat be, and, after one last glance at the boy, and conjuring a nightlight in the shape of a snitch that hovered near the bed, Severus turned toward Dumbledore.

The wizard's blue eyes were twinkling, though his lips were pressed together in a tight line. Severus didn't need Dumbledore to tell him what he'd learned during his visit to the Dursleys. He knew. Just as, without Dumbledore uttering a single word, he knew that his summers would never be the same again. They'd never be Harry-free, far more worrisome, though, was the thought that Severus didn't want them to be Harry-free.

"Happily ever after, Severus?" Dumbledore asked. Clapping a hand on the younger wizard's shoulder, he drew Severus out of Harry's room. Severus left the door open a crack, just in case, and scowled at the knowing smile that his mentor gave him.

"Yes, Albus," Severus said. He refused to meet Dumbledore's twinkling gaze, choosing, instead, to pick at a piece of invisible lint on his robes. A panicked thought reminded him that he'd have to put Harry's invisibility cloak in safekeeping until the boy was old enough to have it. When he turned thirty, or maybe forty. Long after the Dark Lord was dead, again, and turning over in his grave when he realized that one of his 'loyal' followers was raising his enemy.

Nodding, Dumbledore pulled Severus into a hug, ignoring the indignant squeak that Severus made, and the younger wizard's half-hearted attempt to escape.

"I'm glad to hear that, my boy," he said. "I think both of you could use a happy ending."