Without thinking, Snape sighs grumpily, a warm spicy breath hitting Harry in the face like a fist. The boy’s eyes snap open, startling Snape, before all hell breaks loose.

A sharp intake of breath. An ungraceful swing of a fist. Knuckles colliding with nose. A pulse of blue light sending Snape across the room to hit the wall with a thump.

It only takes seconds for Harry to realise what he’s done. His hand throbs, his breaths are quick and his energy is even lower than before. The professor was inches from his face...now he is slouched, groaning on the infirmary floor, blood trickling from his nose. Oh God.

“Professor! Professor, are you alright? I’m sorry!”

Harry grunts as he pushes himself upright, and quickly scrambles out of bed. One step towards the professor, however, and he’s on the floor again, legs giving way beneath him. He tries to push himself into sitting position, but his eyes glaze, and with an exhausted sigh, the world spins on its axis before closing around him.

Blinking to clear his vision, Snape wipes the blood from his nose on the back of his hand. Potter hit me! He hit a professor! Wait until Dumbledore hears about –

But his thoughts are interrupted as the unconscious boy on the floor swims into his sight. Damn it, he thinks, but just as he is about to move to check the boy over, a gasp from the infirmary door startles him.

“Severus Snape!  What on Earth!” Madame Pomfrey circles the bed, stopping by Harry’s limp body. She waves her wand over him and sighs. “Poor boy is exhausted. Did he do magic? I told him not to do magic.” When Snape doesn’t reply, she finally looks at him, taking in his appearance. “Severus, why are you on the floor? What happened to your nose?”

“That blasted boy happened to it!”

“The boy is unconscious, how could he possibly –” she trails off, scooping her arm under Harry’s body. “Well don’t just sit there, Severus, give me a hand!”

Using the wall as a support, Snape drags himself into a standing position and once again wipes his nose on his sleeve to stop it from dripping. Waving Poppy away, Snape puts a meaty arm under Harry’s body and lifts him far too easily back onto the bed. After taking the opportunity to apply a layer of bruise salve on the boy’s back and neck, Poppy pulls the covers over his body and adjusts his pillow. When Snape makes no move to leave the infirmary, she cannot help but shoot him a quizzical look. Snape is too busy casting a scrutinising eye over the boy to even notice.

“Poppy, could you leave us?” he asks after a long moment, barely glancing away from Harry.

“What good could that possibly do? He isn’t awake,” she says, genuinely confused.

“I would like to be here when he wakes up. We have some things to talk about,” he sneers through habit more than anything.

“Severus Snape, this is my infirmary and I will not have you harassing my patients!”

“Poppy, I assure you I will not harm the boy! I merely have a few questions for him and I do think it may be harmful to him if I do not find the answers.”

“Did he tell you something? Something about his injuries? You must tell Albus if –”

“I know nothing more than the Headmaster already knows,” he interrupts. He tells himself he isn’t even lying. He doesn’t know anything. He may have some bubbling suspicions, but...no, the brat has probably been itching to hit me since first year; he just needed an excuse. But however adept at lying Severus Snape is, he is not convincing himself.

Poppy’s face is deathly stern.

“If you so much as pluck a hair from Mr Potter’s head –”

“I will do no such thing,” Snape replies, moving to the chair at Harry’s bedside and sitting himself down.

“Okay, but you will let me know when you are finished. He is not properly healed yet and it won’t do to exert him. Today is proof of that.” Poppy sends Snape one last warning glance before exiting the infirmary.

There is a strange silence when the door clicks shut behind her. As Snape looks at the scene before him, he frowns. There are lines etched in the boy’s face that shouldn’t be there. He doesn’t even look peaceful in sleep, Snape notices, but quickly berates himself for thinking it.

For all the patience he lacks in class, Snape sits in the chair for over an hour, simply waiting. Only after that hour does he begin to feel agitated. He sighs loudly, as if hoping the boy may wake to the noise, but he has no such luck. Looking away from Harry for the first time in minutes, he looks down and notices his hands shaking. He has noticed it a lot recently. The small bouts of trembling in his extremities; the abrupt mood swings; the waves of nausea that creep up on him. Thankfully, nothing has been as bad as the night he was expecting Harry for detention.

For a moment, he is so focused on himself that the movement in the bed fails to catch his eye. It is only slight, but Harry’s face draws in on itself causing the lines in his skin to deepen. It is only at the sudden sob of pain that Snape tears his attention from his hands and realises there is something wrong. Harry’s arms jerkily release themselves from the bed sheets and tense up so hard that they begin to shake uncontrollably.

Snape’s eyes widen and he gets up, intending to call Poppy, but then he hears it. The words are only quiet, but the silence of the infirmary means he can hear everything.

“N-nnngh...no...leave m’...” Harry murmurs, as the fidgeting in the bed grows more violent.

He’s having a nightmare, Snape realises. For a moment, Snape makes no move to do anything, hoping that the nightmare will just fizzle out like most of his do. It is only when Harry begins clawing at himself, dragging his nails down the skin on his cheeks, that Snape knows he should wake the boy up.

He moves to touch Harry’s shoulder, to shake him, but the crusty dried blood feeling in his nose reminds him that, before he does anything, it wouldn’t do any harm to restrain Harry’s arms.

Grabbing the boy by the wrists, he pins them down to the bed and quickly calls out to him.

“Potter!”

A little louder this time.

“Potter!”

The boy struggles harder, his breathing suddenly loud and erratic.

He’ll have a panic attack at this rate!

Gripping Harry’s wrists tighter, Snape pulls him into an upright position, watching the boy’s head loll to the side, still lost in the dream. Holding the his wrists together with one hand, he grabs Harry’s chin and swiftly pulls it up so they are face to face. He sucks in a deep breath.

“Mr Potter!” he bellows and Harry’s eyes widen to the size of bludgers. He tries to pull away, but Snape still has his wrists in a firm grip.

“W-w-what’s going on?” Harry stutters, catching his breath and trying to take in his surroundings. “W-what are you d-doing here?!”

Snape quickly lets go of his wrists, causing the boy to fall backwards in his bed. Forcing himself back into sitting position, Harry moves as far back from Snape as he can, before pinning him with a look of pure scepticism. Snape ignores the look and huffs, settling himself back down in the chair. Harry’s eyes watch his every move.

“You were having a nightmare, Mr Potter. Would you have preferred I left you to it? It looked as though you were enjoying yourself,” Snape sneers sarcastically, but he regrets it when he sees Harry’s face twist peculiarly, and seconds later, the boy is retching over the side of the bed.  

Merlin, this boy...Snape thinks, though he is not sure of his own emotions.

Awkwardly, he stands and quickly moves to the infirmary door, “I will fetch Madame Pomfrey –”

“No!” Harry says, coughing and struggling to get his breath back. “I’m fine now. I’m fine.”

“You are not fine, Mr Potter. Madame Pomfrey will want to know.”

“What? That you can’t handle a bit of vomit?” Harry doesn’t know where it’s coming from, but he has to say it. If Madame Pomfrey came, she’d make him take a calming draught and then he’d have to relive it all over again.

Snape spins on his heel and strides back to Harry’s bedside.

“I can assure you, Mr Potter, that I would not have survived the most part of my life if I could not handle the sight of various bodily fluids.” He quickly rounds the bed, muttering a swift scourgify at the vomit-covered floor, and sets himself back down in the seat. “I believe you have some explaining to do.”

“There is nothing to talk about,” Harry says, looking at his feet.

“Do you take me for an idiot, Mr Potter?”

“No.”

“No, what?”

“No, Sir.”

“I did have some questions about what happened this afternoon, but it seems my curiosity is more interested in what happened this evening.”

“I’m sorry, Sir. I just had a bad dream.” Harry doesn’t look Snape in the eyes.

“And what exactly did you dream about?” When he gets no answer, he snaps. “Look at me when I’m talking to you, Potter!”

The flinch he witnesses from the boy in the bed would normally make him happy, but today he’s not sure how he feels about it. When Harry’s eyes meet his, he notices the fear that glitters in them. He steels his features, calming himself down before continuing.

“Was it the Dark Lord?” Snape asks, figuring that to be the only thing that could affect the boy so intensely.

A slight pause.

“Yes. Yes, Professor.” Harry’s eyes sink back into his lap, hoping that Snape doesn’t realise he’s lying. 

“You are hiding something.”

Harry turns his head completely away from the Professor.

“Mr Potter, I am trained in deception, and I can tell that you are not telling me the truth –”

“What do you care anyway?!” Harry says, whipping his head round to meet the black orbs of Professor Snape. “I had a bad dream about Voldemort!” Snape flinches. “Just leave it at that!” Harry feels like the walls are curling in around him. Like there is nowhere to run.

Shifting in his seat, Snape takes a moment to compose himself and remembers Poppy’s warning about over exerting the boy.

“Okay. If that’s the way you want to play it, Potter, I will go back to what I originally wanted to discuss with you.”

There is a moment of silence as Snape thinks about what he is going to say. Harry can hear nothing but his own breathing, and it makes him nervous.

“You performed accidental magic this afternoon. You hit me in the nose. I would like to know why.”

Harry fiddles with his hands – something that doesn’t go unnoticed.

“Today, Mr Potter.”

“I...you startled me,” he says feebly.

“Mr Potter, my presence cannot be that alarming that it warrants an attack. Not to mention that accidental magic only occurs during times of intense need. Why did your magic feel the need to attack me?”

“I thought you were someone...I thought...” as if battling with himself, Harry draws a hand over his forehead and visibly deflates in the bed with a sigh, “you just made me jump. I’m a jumpy person. I have to be...you have to be on guard when you’re The Boy Who Lived.” He laughs weakly to himself. “I’m sorry I hit you, Professor. It wasn’t deliberate.”

Though Snape does not accept the apology, Harry feels slightly better for saying it.

The air grows tense as minutes go by without either of them saying a word.

“Madame Pomfrey tended to your bruises while you were sleeping. She will be back shortly to do it again, I’ve no doubt.”

Surprised, Harry looks at Snape from the corner of his eye.

This is Snape, he doesn’t do small talk. What’s he playing at?

Not willing to join in whatever game Snape is trying to involve him in, he sits in silence hoping that the Professor will leave.

Instead, Snape sits backward in the chair, folding his arms across his chest. Having had enough of the silence, Snape exhales loudly and addresses Harry in the bluntest way possibly.

Avoidance did not work as planned, so perhaps directness might.

“Mr Potter, however much I would like to think the contrary, you are not an idiot. The Headmaster is anxious to know how your injuries came about and I am sure you have not forgotten that you are yet to divulge any information regarding the state you are in.”

“I really don’t want to talk about it –”

“Enough of this melodrama. You will have to talk about it. When you are ready, the Headmaster will be there for you, though I suggest you get ready sooner rather than later, else people’s patience with you might just run out. Merlin knows you test my patience enough.”

Harry’s face grows hot with anger. “I don’t need to talk to anyone. You can’t make me talk about it!”

“On the contrary, Potter, there are several ways to make you talk.”

“Why do you have to be such a git all the time?!” Harry blurts out, his chin quivering with rage. “I just want to forget about it! Okay?”

“Forget about what?”

“About him!” he screams. “A- about...” Harry’s face quickly drains of any colour and he finds himself hunched over the side of the bed again, painfully coughing up bile, but nothing else. He can barely feel the tears collecting in the corners of his eyes.

Snape is surprised. He didn’t think he could trick the boy.

But he is tired. His guard is down. Hardly an accomplishment, Severus, he admonishes himself. Look at him. This could never be called an accomplishment.

A strange feeling of guilt washes over him as he eyes the boy, watching him try to gain control of himself, but obviously not willing to show his weakness to his most hated Professor. Standing up, Snape walks around the bed and stands in front of Harry who has his head bowed, trying to catch a breath.

“You said him. Who is he?” Snape asks in a low whisper, schooling his expression.  

Harry says nothing, but Snape can hear the grating sound as the boy tries to suck some air into his lungs.

“Mr Potter,” he says, noticing the boy’s chest rising and falling faster than it should, “who is he?”

Seconds later, Harry’s head whips up, red-faced, his eyes full of panic. When his hands begin to grab at his chest and his throat, and a strangled sound escapes, Snape realises that the boy seriously can’t breathe. He remembers a similar scene from when he was a child. He remembers the feeling of never being able to catch a breath. He remembers wondering if he would die.

Where is Poppy when you need her? he thinks, realising that this is something he is going to have to deal with. After a deep breath, his mind instantly reverts into healer mode.

Rushing into Poppy’s storeroom, he finds the calming draught, but realises that it won’t help until the boy’s airways are opened again. He pockets the draught and remembers something his mother used to do for him. He cannot believe he is about to do it for someone else.

Climbing onto the bed, he sits behind the boy, taking him under the arms and manoeuvring them both so that Harry’s back is against his chest. To stop the boy from clawing at himself, he holds Harry’s arms to his sides and begins speaking into his ear.

“You need to calm down, Potter. Feel my chest behind you. Try to feel it rise and fall. Feel it and match it,” he says, closing his eyes, willing the boy to listen to him. “You need to breathe, slowly, calmly, like me. Feel me breathing. Now try it. Feel it and move with it.”

Hearing himself repeat his mother’s words takes him back to the times her embrace meant the world to him. It was those times that he really felt the world had a place for him. The more he thinks of her, the calmer his voice becomes.

“Feel my breathing. Breathe like me. That’s it. Breathe. Let the air in. Breathe. Breathe. That’s it.”

As he repeats himself, he feels Harry’s arms stop struggling. He feels the juddering breaths subside. He hears the air flow freely in and out of the boy’s lungs. When their breaths fall in unison, Snape opens his eyes again. For a long moment, they sit in quiet relief.

“Better?” Snape finally says.

Harry can do nothing but nod.

Moments later, though Harry barely registers it, Snape is fire-calling Madame Pomfrey.

“She will be here momentarily,” he says gruffly in Harry’s direction, “get some rest.” Snape watches as Harry wordlessly sinks down into his bed, but as he leaves the infirmary, he doesn’t miss the whisper of a thank you that reaches his ears just before the door closes behind him.