Much to Harry’s chagrin, evening came a lot quicker than he’d anticipated. They had spent the day brewing potions and Harry had actually enjoyed it. Snape had given him a potions kit with six sets of basic ingredients that could be mixed in any combination without any ill effects. He’d told Harry that if magical primary schools were ever opened for children, this would be around a year five lesson.
Harry wasn’t sure if that was intended to be a slight to Harry’s intelligence, but he didn’t care. He found the lesson fascinating. If he’d been taught potions this way from the start, he’d probably have found it much more interesting.
The first set included six potion bases that had distinct characteristics. The second set had six color-changing ingredients, mostly flower petals, leaves, and stems. The third set contained six viscosity modifiers that could make a potion as thin as water, as thick as sludge, or anything in-between. The fourth set contained a single ingredient that could be prepared in six different ways: powdered, crumbled, crushed, diced, sliced, or strained. The fifth set was six different temperature charms. Last, but not least, the sixth set was a whiz-bang kit with ingredients that caused showy things to happen, such as having the potion send up sparks like fireworks, or producing color-changing smoke rings, or turning invisible, or dancing in the cauldron, or turning into a rubbery spherical mass and bouncing away, or belching flames.
Harry had spent hours lost in the fascination of making numerous combinations and seeing what happened. In so doing, he’d learned a fair bit about the basics of potions and lamented that, if he’d been taught this way early on, he probably would have a better grasp of the subject and be a much better student.
“Would you do it, sir?” Harry asked.
“Do what?”
“If someone asked you, would you be willing to set up Potions classes for kids before they come to Hogwarts? The Ministry’s been talking forever about having a primary school for young witches and wizards to better prepare them for Hogwarts.”
“Perhaps,” Snape allowed.
“I thought you hated kids.”
Snape scowled. “I do NOT hate children. Teenagers, on the other hand…”
Harry laughed. “So younger kids are better?”
Snape snorted. “They couldn’t be worse. Young kids are fascinated by learning. In fact, they look a lot like you. Happy to combine everything in sight and excited to see what happens.”
Harry wasn’t sure if that was a compliment or an insult.
“Because of their desire to experiment and learn, they are much easier to teach.” Snape rearranged a set of books on a shelf he’d been working near. “Teenagers, on the other hand, are more interested in dating, Quidditch, and breaking curfew.”
“So why don’t you do something like this with first years? They aren’t teenagers yet and they are presumably eager to learn.”
Snape shook his head. “If only it were that simple. There is a prescribed curriculum for each year that I must teach.”
“Maybe pre-Hogwarts summer school, then?” Harry suggested.
Snape glanced up, looking at him strangely. “That is an interesting idea. Perhaps when I retire from teaching dunderheads, I will try my hand with children of a more impressionable age.”
Snape flicked his wand to clean up the mess Harry had made. “Now that you’ve had so much fun experimenting with my test kit, I have an exam for you to take to see how much you’ve learned.”
Harry’s eyes widened. “Are you serious?”
“You yourself said it would make a good lesson. I just so happen to have been developing an alternate curriculum around this style of teaching. You have the good fortune of being my first student. How well you do on this test will tell me how well this method of teaching gets across the points I wish to instill.”
“All right,” Harry said, not sure what all was at stake. It didn’t really matter, though. He would do his best regardless.
The test was several pages long and straightforward enough. He was asked to describe each ingredient/technique in each of the six kits and what its role was in a potion. Next, he was given a series of hypothetical combinations of ingredients/techniques, one from each of the six kits, and asked to predict the outcome. Then he was given a desired potion and asked how he would create it using one item from each of the six sets.
He was also asked to report any unexpected results when combining ingredients. Here, Harry wrote: “Violet petals counteract the effectiveness of the viscosity modifiers, making it difficult to thicken a potion that contains violet.” After that, he was asked to draw as many general conclusions as he could regarding the items in the kit. To this, Harry wrote: “Cutting valerian roots in any way—so chopping, dicing, slicing, cubing, etc.—and adding them to a potion causes a volatile reaction. Valerian roots should only be pressed or strained when being used with the potions, or at least the potions in this kit.”
Last he was asked if anything critical to potion making had been left out, whether ingredient, technique, or other. To this, Harry listed everything he could think of, including the stirring direction and speed, cauldron material, and how long or short a time ingredients were left to brew.
“One hour and twenty minutes,” Snape pronounced when Harry handed him the finished exam.
“Is that good or bad?” Harry asked.
“Neither, it is merely data.” Snape wrote the length of time atop Harry’s test. “Why don’t you wash up and start dinner. I’ll clean up the lab and restock the kits. Then we can go over your examination results.”
Harry wondered if his performance here in the safe house would be reflected in his Hogwarts grades. Snape did try and teach him little things each day, even if it wasn’t specifically in a class-structured way.
Harry threw together a simple dinner of grilled cheese sandwiches, tomato soup, and asparagus spears, with melon balls for dessert. He ate as Snape pored over Harry’s answers. Snape made many notations on the parchment and Harry cringed at the thought of all he must have got wrong. Still, Snape’s expression wasn’t one of disgust as Harry would have expected. Instead, it seemed to alternate between being intrigued and stumped. Harry had finished his dinner by the time Snape set the exam aside and began eating.
“How terrible was it?” Harry asked, gesturing toward the now marked-up paper.
“See for yourself.” Snape slid the sheaf of parchment over to him.
Expecting the worst, Harry was quite surprised to see that many of the notes Snape had made on Harry’s paper were not snide corrections, but ponderous remarks on his thought process, hints on taking a thought to the next level, challenges to investigate something further, notes pointing out an error in logic and encouraging reconsideration, and even a few complimentary comments on his findings and thought process.
Harry glanced up to see Snape watching him. “If you taught this way in class, I’d learn so much more.”
Snape looked pleased but said, “I have far too many students to coach each individually to help them reach their full potential.” Snape wiped his mouth with a napkin. “You have got me thinking about an optional summer program, though. I could take the time with individual students then. It would be interesting to see how much better they performed in a standard Potions class with a foundation such as this.”
“I bet they’d perform a ton better,” Harry said enthusiastically. “Like I said, I learned more today than I ever learned in…” he trailed off, seeing no way to complete that sentence without insulting his professor. He cleared his throat. “I learned a lot today. Working with the kits. Thanks.”
Snape nodded. “Incidentally, your responses to what was not included—stirring, timing, cauldron material—that is all covered in the next lesson. There are six such lessons of variables affecting potions brewing. Lesson seven deals with combining everything learned from the first six lessons, and lesson eight is an independent project where you propose something you’d like to brew, reason out how you will do it, present your hypothesis to me, brew it, and see if your hypothesis proves correct.”
“That sounds brilliant,” Harry said. “I wouldn’t mind doing those lessons, if you want me to. I’d learn a bunch about potion basics that I haven’t managed to pick up so far, and you could see how well your lessons work.”
“That is reasonable,” Snape agreed. “And I would appreciate the feedback.” Snape, who’d finished eating by now as well, gathered up their plates and took them to the sink. Then he took down two goblets and poured them each a glass of wine before resuming his seat.
“Are you ready to return to the topic of this morning?”
Harry winced. “Er, not really. But as neither of us have forgotten, it’s likely another lesson I need.” Harry took a large swallow of wine. “Best get it over with.”
Severus clasped his hands on the table and gazed at Harry. “You asked why you seem to be getting angry lately, more frequently and over minor things. You expressed that this feels out of the norm for you. Is that correct?”
Harry ran his fingers along the smooth, cool outside of his wine glass. He nodded.
“I began to tell you that were different types of abuse, including neglect, verbal abuse, physical abuse, psychological abuse, and sexual abuse.”
Harry nodded again, staring at his fingers and not looking at Snape.
“In the course of several days, you experienced all of those forms of abuse. Is that an accurate statement?”
Harry went through the list, mentally checking each off. His captors had neglected to feed him, they taunted him and called him names, they beat him and burned him, they restrained him and messed with his food and his head. And, of course, they messed with his body, too. “Yes,” he bit out, wishing it weren’t true.
Snape took a sip of his wine. “The first four types of abuse are hard enough to deal with. In and of themselves, they are immensely traumatizing. The fifth form of abuse--sexual abuse--seems to trump all other forms when it comes to recovery, perhaps because it typically contains all of the other types of abuse as well.”
Harry swallowed. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have.
“What I mean by that is, when you are sexually abused, your wants and needs are neglected. You are often demeaned, degraded, and threatened. You may be beaten or hurt by the force of the act itself. These could be categorized as psychological abuse as well.”
Snape took another sip of his wine, and Harry thought that was a very good idea. Uncomfortable and anxious, he chugged half of his glass of wine and barely managed not to cough.
“Psychological abuse comes into play in many more ways. In an effort to stay alive, you may be forced to perform acts on others or allow acts to be done to you that are deeply abhorrent. You may traumatize yourself further with questions such as: Why didn’t I fight back? Or fight back harder? Why did I freeze? Why did I just let it happen? Did I somehow send out signals to encourage them to attack me? Am I gay?”
Harry gazed at the table, trying to hide the tremor in his hands and unable to respond.
“And that,” Snape continued, “is on top of the feelings of guilt, self-loathing, feeling dirty, taking responsibility for putting yourself in the path of danger, and more.”
Harry felt his throat swell and fought to hold back the tears.
“The reason sex is such a charged topic, and such a desired event, is because it incorporates all of our senses: touch, taste, sight, hearing, scent, and, for magical folk, magic. It is also a time when we are at our most vulnerable. Hence, sex is seen as sacred, and good sex can certainly feel sacred.”
Harry grimaced; he wouldn’t know.
“The problem with rape is that it uses sex in a way that is completely out of context. It uses sex as a weapon.” Snape took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Rape is NOT about sex, not at all. But in our minds, they become linked, which is a travesty in and of itself.”
Snape refilled their glasses of wine.
“Rape is about power. It is about complete and total control and domination. It’s about taking away your choices, your autonomy, your sense of security, even your place in the world.”
By this point, Harry was blinking wetness down his cheeks and trying to control his breathing.
“It’s about using your body against you to confuse you and make you feel helpless and powerless and as if your body has betrayed you. In other words, it messes with your head.”
Harry sniffled and wiped at his eyes, trying to remain present and truly hear Snape’s words.
Snape took another sip of wine before continuing. “So while you can work through the neglect of being starved, heal from bruises and cuts and burns, counter their words with words of your own, and slowly untangle the psychological abuse with logic and common sense, there is no easy way to overcome the soul-destroying trauma that is sexual abuse.”
“it sounds like you speak from experience,” Harry choked out.
Snape inclined his head in silent agreement but said nothing.
Harry bit his lip. After a few moments, he asked, “And this relates to my anger how?”
Snape ran his finger along the rim of his wine glass. “I am getting there.”
“Sorry,” Harry murmured.
“Over the last several weeks, we’ve been working through the abuse you’ve suffered. We’ve only begun to touch on the sexual abuse, which is, incidentally, typically the hardest to talk about. It is also a trauma that profoundly changes us and our outlook on life.”
Harry bit back a sob. He couldn’t even remember what it felt like to be the person he’d been before he’d been abducted.
“As you begin to realize what they’ve done to you, taken from you, the injustice of it all begins to burn inside of you. You become angry. Angry at the people who did this to you, angry at the world for letting it happen, angry at a world where such bad things can and do happen--to children as well as adults.”
Snape’s face twisted at his words, and Harry wondered, not for the first time, what had happened to the man.
Snape drained the rest of his wine before continuing. “Shock typically turns to numbness, disbelief, denial even. Depression follows. Then, at some point, outrage and anger sweep in, sometimes obliterating all else.”
Snape leaned forward and touched Harry’s hand gently. “The anger is you working through things, Harry. Anger isn’t all bad. Anger is a turning point.”
Harry grasped Snape’s hand and held on.
“Anger is depression transformed.”
“How so?”
“Depression is, ‘This happened to me and I was not in control and I am helpless. I am powerless. I am a victim.’” Snape squeezed Harry’s hand across the table. “Anger is, ‘I won’t take this lying down. I am going to fight back. I am going to teach them a lesson. I am going to make them pay. I am going to take back my power. I am a survivor.’”
Harry pulled back his hand to rub his eyes. “That’s great and all, sir, but that doesn’t help me much.”
Snape leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “It does, actually. We are going to take that anger and we are going to use it. It is what will drive our lessons in Defense Against the Dark Arts. It is that anger, Harry, that will motivate you to learn and to push yourself and to succeed. It may initially feel like revenge, but it’s more about taking back your power. It’s about justice.”