“You know this is embarrassing as all hell Snape,” Harry said, flushing slightly as the Potions Master picked him up and carried him to the bathroom.

“Well if you would have waited five minutes while I went to grab my sharper knife, I would have helped you add the ingredients and the potion wouldn’t have exploded,” Severus replied, taking no notice of the boy’s furious blush as he spelled away his clothes, sitting the teenager in the bathtub, already filled with water.

“Hm, some Master you are; aren’t you supposed to care if your apprentice nearly gets blown sky high?” Harry asked indignantly. Sometimes he still couldn’t believe that he was apprenticed to Severus Snape. There were times he still couldn’t believe they both survived the Final Battle.

“Of course I care,” Severus replied, fighting the smirk that was threatening to ruin his serious act, “Do you know how badly I’d be mocked if it was found out that an apprentice of mine killed himself making a simple hangover remedy, a potion he’d made and imbibed many times previously?”

“Git,” Harry muttered, trying and failing not to smile. “How long until I can actually move again?”

“A few hours,” Severus said, removing his black jacket and rolling up the sleeves of his white shirt. “The effects will wear off more rapidly after all traces of the potion have been washed off of you. You really should be more careful Harry,” Severus lectured, kneeling beside the tub and reaching for the soap, exposing the scars on his neck as his shirt pulled slightly away from his neck.

“You’re one to talk,” Harry muttered, his eyes traveling over the scarred arms and the newest scars that decorated the man’s neck. He had more scars than Remus Lupin, a legacy of abuse and the ill effects of spying.

“Hm, well none of my activities have caught up with me yet and have no chance to do so in the future. You however,” he continued, ignoring Harry’s spluttered protests as he wet the unmanageable mop that Harry calls hair, “Can still die because you don’t listen to me. I’m no longer giving you rules just to be a snarky bastard Harry, or had you forgotten?”

“I’m of age,” Harry grumbled.

“Yes, but you are still my apprentice,” Severus said after he finished washing Harry, “And as such I will not let you kill yourself because of your stupidity.”

“How is it you can make an insult sound like an endearment?” Harry asked as he was removed from the bathtub.

“It’s a skill,” Severus remarked dryly, spelling fresh clothes on Harry and carrying him into his room. When Harry had decided to become Severus’s apprentice, he added an extra room to his quarters for Harry, in case the boy needed to get away from the other Gryffindor’s (who didn’t take too kindly to their hero apprenticing himself to a Death Eater), or if he had an accident (like this one).

“What am I going to do now?” Harry asked as he was deposited in his bed and covered with a thick quilt. It was cold in the dungeons in January. Suddenly Harry remembered something important. “Oh hell,” he groaned, closing his eyes in defeat.

“What’s wrong Harry?” Severus asked, confusion and worry in his tone.

“I mucked up the most basic potion I know how to make, on your birthday, and you had to help me instead of whatever you normally do to celebrate your birthday.”

“I don’t celebrate,” Severus said shortly.

“Neither do I anymore. At the Dursley’s, they really didn’t care whether I lived or died, and after having a party at the Weasleys’, I realized that it wasn’t my style. I didn’t like being the center of attention.”

“Of course you didn’t.” And the tone wasn’t mocking, but accepting. Harry had learned in the beginning how similar he and the snarky Potions Master were.

“Um, Severus…can I ask…I mean, I really can’t do anything…if you don’t want to its ok….” Harry was babbling, and Severus let him attempt to make his point before interrupting.

“I won’t know whether or not I will or will not want to do whatever it is you want until you ask.”

“Could you read to me? Or tell me a story or something?”

He looked so much younger than 17 when he babbled like that. Damn those muggles to hell. “Very well Mr. Potter, however be warned the book will be on potions. You need to finish your day’s lesson, mishap or no.”

Harry simply smiled as Severus summoned the book he wanted and sat in Harry’s desk chair. Opening it to the page he wanted, Severus began to read. All because of a ruined potion, he thought, seeing the happiness that was so rare to find on his boy’s face sometimes. This once, he wasn’t upset about the exploded cauldron. Much. After all, there were worse ways to spend his birthday.