Harry slept on the couch for two hours. When he woke at nearly 9 o'clock in the evening, he didn't recall falling asleep. He'd been talking with Professor McGonagall about her first transformation into her Animagus form. The last thing he remembered her saying was "I wouldn't transform back when my instructor gave me the signal. I was really enjoying licking my leg. So she reverted me herself with a spell. I found myself on the floor in a very awkward position with my leg stretched out nearly above my head and my mouth full of fur."

Harry looked around. Though it was dark outside, the street lamps from below softly illuminated the front room of the flat. Professor McGonagall was sleeping in the wingback chair, the book Harry had been reading—To Kill a Mockingbird—propped open on her lap. She was making a gentle whistling noise with every exhale. He heard the commode flush in the hallway loo as he carefully maneuvered himself into a seated position. His legs felt much better but his arm was still sore and painfully tingly, as if he had slept heavily on it and it was trying to wake up. He tentatively flexed and stretched each leg then stood upright, grabbed his t-shirt and jeans from the desk where Snape had apparently placed them, neatly folded, and put them back on. With a relieved glance at his sleeping Head of House, he waited until he heard Snape's bedroom door close then headed off to use the loo. He found his right arm to be practically useless—he could bend it at the elbow but his fingers were stiff and it hurt to twist his wrist. He held it, as he had when he was recovering from the accident on Privet Drive, close to his chest and used his left hand for all the essentials.

Professor Snape was standing in the hallway when he came out of the loo. He was holding a potion, but instead of handing it to him, he indicated that Harry should follow him into his bedroom. He nodded to the unmade bed, and Harry sat down tentatively on its edge. Snape knelt on the floor in front of Harry, wincing as his knees hit the hardwood.

"You are obviously feeling better," said Snape as he reached out and took Harry's right arm by the elbow. "Relax it as much as possible, Mr. Potter."

"Yeah, I am," said Harry, grimacing as Snape ran his wand from the inside of his elbow down to his wrist, roughly along the length of the faint scar left by Uncle Vernon's hubcap. "Legs are working, anyway."

"Make a fist," instructed Snape. The tip of his wand was resting on the pulse point of Harry's right wrist. Harry dutifully made the fist. Snape looked up at him. "Is that as tight as you can manage?" he asked.

"Yeah," breathed Harry. "Hurts."

"I imagine it does." Snape handed the potion to Harry and Harry quickly swallowed it. Snape then reached for the post-Cruciatus cream, extracted a generous amount from the tub and began to rub it in, concentrating on Harry's hand, wrist and forearm. Harry watched him close the jar and push it back a few inches on the night stand to align perfectly with two other jars there.

"Did you keep busy today?" asked Snape as he carefully stood up, wincing slightly.

Harry nodded. "I wrote in my journal a lot. Tried to remember all the symbolic elements at the end of my sea dream. I read, too. A book I found in my bedroom—To Kill a Mockingbird."

Snape's eyes sparked, showing his interest. "A very good book to read in times like these." He didn't explain what he meant and Harry didn't ask, but he did resolve to finish the book.

"We are going to have to discuss some alternative means of treatment for your arm," continued Snape. "I'm sorry to have to bring this up, but if you want to continue your guilded career as Gryffindor Seeker, you will need more range of motion as well as greater strength and flexibility in your arm and hand."

Quidditch. Harry hadn't thought of that. Almost involuntarily, he flexed his fingers as if curving them around a golden snitch. His fist was loose at best—he could imagine the snitch sliding right through his fingers. He looked up at Snape, a question on his lips. Snape spoke before he could form his question.

"Poppy recommended a specialist. It may involve a trip to St. Mungos—and perhaps treatment there over a day or two. There is a potion, similar to Skelegrow, for nerve regeneration, but it requires careful monitoring. The Headmaster is working on suitable arrangements—there is an auror's ward there that has extremely tight security…"

Harry looked up from his study of his hand. "Harry Potter—done in by a hubcap," he said, sighing. "Can we have our second day in London before we see this specialist?"

Snape held out his hand and pulled Harry to his feet. "Of course. I believe I rashly told the Headmaster we would rest and recuperate tomorrow, so we'll reschedule our visit to the Tower of London and Greenwich for the day after. I will ask Madam Pomfrey to make the arrangements with St. Mungos for the day following that if at all possible."

An hour later, Professor McGonagall was properly thanked and dispatched. "Harry is a good candidate for study with me, Severus," she said before she flooed away. "We could begin in September and try an accelerated schedule. Consider it."

"Why are you so keen on me finding a different way to shield my mind?" Harry asked abruptly when she disappeared with a flare of flame. He had turned to face Snape, who was sitting on her vacated wingback chair. "It's because of this connection to you, isn't it? What do you expect me to do if you get called while I'm in the middle of class? Transform into my Animagus form so I don't get more nerve damage? What if my form is a buffalo? I'd probably take out both Ron and Hermione! Or what if it's something really small, like a spider? Ron would step on me before he even thought about it!"

"Mr. Potter…"

"Professor McGonagall said that her Animagus form is the same as her Patronus. It's not like I could prance around Hogwarts incognito as Prongs! I don't even know if I could get those antlers through the doorway. I'd' have to go sideways, but then the rest of my body wouldn't fit…"

"Mr. Potter, please…"

"And I didn't even get around to discussing the markings with her. Her cat's markings look like her glasses. And so did Rita Skeeters'! Is mine going to have a lightning bolt scar down the middle of its forehead? Or round glasses? That won't give me away, will it?"

"Harry, stop," said Snape, when Harry paused to breathe. "You are blowing this all well out of proportion. Sit down."

Harry flopped down onto the couch, wincing as the bounce jarred his arm. He drew his legs up on the couch in front of him, tucking his chin on his knees and stared at Snape.

"Sorry," he muttered. "I think I got carried away."

Snape rolled his eyes. "I'd say," he retorted. He looked at Harry a long moment. "I am having a hard time determining if you are anxious about studying to be an Animagus or anxious about something else—perhaps this connection to me you have developed or the prospect of having treatment at St. Mungos."

Harry shrugged his shoulders. "Not about becoming an Animagus—though it would be nice to know what animal I'd become before going through the whole thing and ending up a newt or something."

"I don't know…I could keep a newt in a ventilated jar on my shelf and not have to worry where you'd gotten off to…" said Snape. He trailed off but it was too late. Harry was no longer looking at his knees. He was, instead, looking carefully at Snape. He half expected Snape to back pedal, but to his credit, he did not.

Harry let the sentiment hang in the air between them. He didn't need to comment on it—it would make Snape more uncomfortable and frankly, he wasn't given to deep emotional conversations either. But he wanted to explain his anxiety to Snape. Unfortunately, he didn't know how or where to start. He decided to begin in the middle…with the thoughts and feelings that were closest to the surface. He'd have to muddle through this if he was going to get anywhere.

"Listen…I don't know why all this is happening. I'm not trying to read your mind or link up to you to see what's happening at Hogwarts or with Voldemort or anything…" He watched Snape's reaction—he was somewhat insecure about this new relationship with Snape and sometimes wondered if Snape thought he had ulterior motives. Snape frowned.

"You aren't doing that—try or not—are you?"

Harry shook his head. "No. No, I'm not. Wouldn't you know if I did?"

"I should hope so," answered Snape, a bit tersely, looking a bit more suspicious than before.

"Well I'm not. I just thought you might think I was. But I'm not looking at all. That's the thing. It just hits me blindly—no lead-up at all. But this last bit—this afternoon—I mean, you weren't even here, were you? You were miles away."

"Hundreds of miles away," corrected Snape dryly.

"OK, hundreds of miles away and I still felt it. I can block it—as soon as I get my barrier up. It just takes longer when…" Harry paused, swallowed. Be brave, he told himself, be honest. "When you're the one in pain." He paused. Snape was staring at him intently, but he could not read any emotion or reaction in his dark eyes. "I…I'm sure it would be the same with my other…with my friends…that it would be hard to occlude if I could feel their pain. Thing is…I don't. Feel their pain, that is." He paused again, feeling like he was both digging himself a hole and spinning in circles in place. Bravely…or very stupidly...he continued. "And I'm not even sure if I'm feeling Voldemort or if I'm feeling your pain…"

"You are feeling mine," interrupted Snape. He sounded resigned. "The Dark Lord tortures someone nearly every day. I brew post-Cruciatus by the vat for Wormtail. He twitches almost constantly now."

As much as he despised Pettigrew, Harry couldn't help but feel a pang of pity for the man.

"What did Dumbledore mean when he said that I might be an empat?"

"Empath," corrected Snape automatically. "And I do not believe you are—not in the traditional sense, anyway."

"Then why did Dumbledore…?"

Snape sighed and rubbed his forehead with one hand. "The word comes from empathy—in the Greek—passion or suffering. In English, it is a sense of feeling with a person, sensitivity to their happiness or suffering. An empath can enter into another's feelings and share them."

"Why do you think he's wrong, then?"

Snape dropped his head back so that it rested near the top of the chair, bent back so that he was looking at the ceiling. Harry found this to be a very vulnerable position for Snape and felt vaguely uncomfortable. Snape's smooth, pale neck and throat were far too exposed, as if waiting for the bite of fate.

"I do not believe you are an empath because your empathy seems uniquely directed at me and not at the world at large. Do you innately sense and understand your friend Ron's feelings? No? I thought not. As the Headmaster indicated, you seem tuned in only to me, and specifically to my suffering through the Dark Lord."

"Well, we don't know that, do we?" asked Harry. "Maybe I only feel it when Voldemort calls you or tortures you, but maybe I'd feel it if you hit your funny bone really hard or had a terrible toothache or ate something that was off and got sick to your stomach…"

Snape frowned at Harry, but it was one of those contemplative frowns that told Harry he was thinking seriously about what he said.

"And how do you know I don't feel your…what did you say went along with suffering in the Greek?"

"Passion," supplied Snape.

"Well, have you even felt passionate in the last couple weeks? Maybe I'd feel that too. It would be a heck of a lot better than the Cruciatus of feeling like my scar's burning into my brain."

Snape dropped his head forward into his hands, which were resting on his knees. Harry watched in confusion as the man's shoulders began to shake and odd noises, somewhere between sobs and snorts, escaped. Finally, Snape looked up at him. There were tear-streaks on his face but his eyes, his eyes were laughing. He shook his head.

"Mr. Potter, if you are a true empath and can feel my passion as well as my suffering, I will have to get a new job. I wouldn't last a day at Hogwarts after the first night you keep your dorm mates awake with…with…"

And now Harry was grinning too.

"But this is worth an experiment—no, Mr. Potter, not to see if you can share my "passion" as well as my suffering. I would like to see if you can feel my pain if its origin is benign. Let's try that abdominal distress you mentioned—there are potions to induce that, you know. We keep Muggle Ipecac syrup here for when Tonks goes on a binge…no..forget I said that."

"Tonks? Was that her…thingy?" asked Harry, suddenly interested.

Snape glared at Harry and stood up. A moment later, Harry heard him rummaging through the bathroom medicine cabinet. Moments after that, he heard the distinct and quite unpleasant sound of vomiting. Harry hardly had time to register the sound before he was doubled over on the floor, clutching his own stomach.

Five minutes later, Snape stumbled out into the living room, wiping his face with a wet flannel. He stopped and stared at Harry, who was on the floor clutching his stomach with his good arm and looking extremely pale.

Snape helped him to the couch and fetched him his own wet flannel. He sat down next to Harry. Neither said anything for several minutes.

"I presume you didn't get ill at the thought of me vomiting? Some people with sensitive stomachs…"

"Nope," said Harry.

Snape sighed. They sat quietly for several more minutes.

Finally, Harry spoke.

"Next time, just let me whack your funny bone."

Snape snorted.