Harry was playing happily in the bathtub when a house elf appeared by Snape's side with a pop. It bowed deeply.

"I am Pickle, sir," it said in its high voice. "I have the honour of overseeing the cleaning of your rooms and the preparation of your meals."

Snape nodded, taking in the spotless tea towel and the grizzled tufts of greying hair behind the batwing ears. It appeared they had an old and experienced elf taking care of them.

The elf bowed again, and cleared his throat apologetically. "If sir has a moment," he said delicately. "Pickle has run into a slight problem..."

Snape flicked a gaze into the bathroom where Harry was floating his block boat around accompanied by various hooting and whistling sounds. He nodded curtly.

"Right this way, sir," the elf said, leaping to Harry's door and bowing his way inside. "In the little master's bottom drawer, sir." He slid the drawer open and lifted out a handful of small sausages and a boiled egg.

"What the-?" Snape bit off. "Why is there food in there?"

"This was from last nights supper, sir," Pickle said, indicating the sausages. He held up the egg. "And this from breakfast."

Snape nodded and dismissed the elf with a promise to take care of it. The elf bowed and disappeared again and Snape sat on the edge of Harry's bed, gazing down at the pitiful little store in dismay. This was getting serious. It wasn't hard to figure out why the boy might prefer a smaller space after years of living in a cupboard, but this was harder to understand.

Surely Harry knew he was never going to be locked away without food again?

"Daddy! I need my towel!" Harry called and Snape hastily dropped the food back into the drawer and slid it closed. He needed to think about this before deciding what to say to the child.

Harry was waiting patiently in the water, having been forbidden to climb out of the slippery over large bath on his own. Snape warmed a towel with a quick spell and helped the boy out of the sunken tub, engulfing him in the toasty folds and gently pushing him towards his bedroom with a tap on his behind.

Harry scurried across the sitting room, leaving tiny wet footprints on the pale green rug. Eyes on the small marks Snape sank back down into his chair. Not for the first time he was doubting his own ability to raise a child. This child. Harry had been raised by Muggles and was in danger from Death Eaters. Add to that the damage his childhood had caused and he was more than a handful, he was a bloody vocation.

"Can you comb my hair?"

His life's work appeared at his right arm, and Snape spread his legs and let the child stand between them, leaning trustingly against his thigh.

He summoned a comb from his own dressing table. "The night shirt fits then?" he said inconsequentially. It was fairly obvious it did, along with the dark green plaid dressing gown belted around his waist and the soft little slippers on his feet. The house elves had excelled themselves.

Harry nodded. "But I haven't got a brush or a comb." He closed his eyes blissfully as his father ran the old tortoise shell comb through his damp locks. "Can I grow my hair long like yours?"

Don't aspire to be like me, child, Snape thought achingly. Don't wish to emulate your bad father, or your foolish adopted father, or your blind Muggle mother. Be your own self, Harry. Grow up to be a good man.

Grow up.

"When you're as old as me," Snape managed, his throat tight.

Harry opened trusting green eyes and smiled easily. "I'm glad you're my dad," he confided.

Mountains of problems diminished before his eyes like snow in the sunshine.

"So am I," Snape said, honest in his own way as always.