From his usual place at the top table, Severus Snape scowled and kept his eyes trained firmly ahead of him as the handful of students staying in the castle tucked into their breakfast.

Thinking back to that first night of the Christmas break, he could not recall ever giving Harry Potter any indication that the visits to his personal quarters should become a nightly occurrence.

And yet somehow, over the course of the next week, they had.

The routine, it seemed, was a little less clockwork than the previous Friday evening classroom visits - yet it became a routine all the same, whether he liked it or not.  

Some evenings, Potter would bring his chess set with him, and Snape had to admit that the boy was improving. On other nights, there wasn’t much conversation, but the child seemed content to sit beside him and read.

On more than one occasion – and much to the potions master’s annoyance – the little whelp had seen it fit to fall asleep on his sofa.

This was, in fact, exactly what had happened the previous night, and he was rapidly coming to think of it as less of his sofa at all, and more as ‘Potter’s bed.’

This occurrence was the catalyst for his current source of irritation, for as he’d strode into the Great Hall for breakfast on Christmas Eve morning, with The Boy-Who-Slept-On-His-Sofa-All-The-Time trotting behind him, Severus Snape had not failed to notice the look of pure glee in the headmaster’s eyes.

With very few of the other teachers remaining at the school, it was difficult to avoid conversation with the older wizard at the breakfast table, and try as he might, his stoic glare only served him well for the first ten minutes or so before he could take it no more.

 “What is it headmaster?” he demanded, catching the man smiling at him in his peripheral vision.

Dumbledore’s smile broadened.

 “Oh, come now, Severus. I was just thinking how nice it must be for Harry to have found someone like you.”

 “’Someone like me’?” he repeated, arching a brow.

 “Somebody he can trust,” Dumbledore explained. “Look up to, perhaps.”

 “Is that so? For me, it is something more akin to finding a stray dog on the streets and having it follow you home,” Snape drawled, still refusing to look at him.

If he had hoped to shock the headmaster he was to be sorely disappointed, as his words did nothing more than elicit a soft chuckle from the other man.

 “Severus, you and I both know that isn’t true,” he said. “It is quite okay to admit that you enjoy Harry’s company, my boy.”

 “I am merely tolerating him, nothing more.”

 “If you say so,” Dumbledore shrugged. “Even so, perhaps, in the spirit of Christmas, perhaps you might humour me and tolerate him a little longer?”

 “Meaning?” Snape pressed.

 “I would hate to think of Harry spending Christmas eve or Christmas morning alone,” the headmaster said wistfully, his eyes falling up on the small boy on the table in front of them. 

Snape resisted the urge to scoff.

 “Potter has spent the best part of the last week in my quarters as it is. But then again, you already knew that, didn’t you?” he said, finally turning to face him.

 “That’s the first I’ve heard of it,” Dumbledore replied, feigning surprise.

Huffing, Snape turned away again.

There was a pause before the headmaster spoke again.

 “You know Severus, a sofa really is no place for a child to sleep.”

 “Well then perhaps you could have a word with the boy, appeal to his better nature and ask him to stay in his own bed?” he suggested.

Dumbledore nodded his head thoughtfully. “Yes, I suppose that is the first option…”

Snape sighed. “The second being?”

 “You have a guest room in your quarters, do you not? It would look lovely with–”

 “Stop right there, headmaster. Absolutely not!” Snape cried, incensed.

 “Severus–”

 “This conversation is at an end. Whatever you are trying to do, I will ask you to desist,” he said firmly. “I will see to it that the boy does not spend his Christmas alone. But beyond that, I cannot be what he – or you – wants me to be.”

 “And what is that? You mean to tell me that you can’t be an adult that the boy can trust or confide in? A mentor?” Dumbledore asked.

 “No. I mean to tell you that I cannot be a father to an orphaned child,” Snape replied.

And with that, he got up and stalked out of the Great Hall, robes billowing behind him.

Harry watched him go, before casting a curious glance in the headmaster’s direction.

Dumbledore gave him a wink.

This was going to be a lot easier than he had first imagined.

OOOOOOO

Harry spent the majority of his day in the Gryffindor common room, reading.

Hermione had set him the task of researching Nicholas Flamel over the Christmas break, and although he supposed it wasn’t the way most eleven year olds spent their Christmas Eve, it beat peeling vegetables for the Durley’s and spending the night in his cupboard listening them to them all having a nice time whilst he was miserable.

So far, he had scoured several volumes of ‘A History of Magic’ with absolutely nothing to show for it. Of course, Hermione had suggested he visit the restricted section of the library, but he wasn’t sure how to do that without getting caught. All in all, the hunt for Flamel was looking pretty bleak, and he was just about to give up and make his way to the Great Hall for dinner when he heard the voices out in the corridor.

 “–Not unless you have the password!”

 “I am a professor of this establishment, and I am ordering you to grant me access, you ridiculous scrawl –”

 “–SCRAWL!!! How dare you! I’ll have you know that I am a 19th century oil painting, and I am the guardian of this tower–”

 “– I can assure you that, should you refuse my entry, you will promptly find yourself situated on the wall of the Prefect’s Bathroom–”

 “ – Your idle threats do not scare me, Severus Snape. We’ve been here before, a long time ago, have we not? I didn’t grant you access then, and I shan’t now!”

Snorting to himself, Harry padded down the narrow hallway towards the door and swung the portrait open.

 “Sir?”

 “Ah, there you are Potter. You have just saved the good lady of Gryffindor tower a great deal of embarrassment,” Snape told him, folding his arms.

 “Are… are you here to see me, sir?” Harry asked, unable to hide the disbelief from his voice.

 “As you are the only Gryffindor remaining the castle at the present time, I struggle to imagine who else I might have been hoping to find here,” Snape told him, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Given that it is Christmas Eve, we will skip the meal in the Great Hall, and you will join me for dinner in my quarters, if you find it agreeable.”

Harry smiled. Professor Snape actually wanted to spend time with him on Christmas Eve? Nobody had ever wanted him around at this time of year before.

 “I will take the stupid grin on your face as a yes. As I have little desire to spend time in the Gryffindor common room, I will wait out here whilst you put your shoes on,” Snape told him.

Harry nodded. “Okay, sir. I won’t be long.”

He went to head back inside, but the potion’s master caught hold of the portrait before it swung shut again.

 “Oh, and Potter?”

Harry stopped,  turning to face him again. “Yes sir?”

 “As rare as it will be for you to turn up at my quarters in something other than your night clothes, please see to it that you bring them along. I do not wish to enter in to any further debate with the portrait this evening.”

Smiling again, Harry took off in the direction of the dormitory.  

OOOOOOO