Harry had come to look forward to the comfortable daily routine he and Snape had created together. Breakfast (with pastries Harry had gone to town to buy), work in the mines followed by lunch, work and study of the minerals they had mined, and one or two trips a week to other parts of the country to deliver the goods they'd mined and cleaned up.

While Snape still acted irritated with Harry frequently, Harry had grown used to it and wondered often if it wasn't that the man was irritated with Harry, but that it was just the way he spoke. The more Harry began to suspect that this was the case, the less he felt like he had to tiptoe around the Potion's Master for fear of reprisal.

Harry knew things would never be as he'd told Draco. He knew Snape would never take him fishing or hiking, or play board games with him, but Harry had never spent as much time with an adult before as he was spending with Snape, and he enjoyed mining the gems and working with the minerals alongside the professor. For all that he had lied to Draco about his relationship with Snape, he felt like the man who had accidentally adopted him was like a father anyway. Snape had even laughed with Harry in the mines the other day when Harry had finally managed to correctly mine a piece of Luminous Rock, when he'd been struggling with it for over a week before that. It felt good to laugh with him and to know he'd pleased him.

That shift in Harry's attitude about Snape led him to relax in a way he shouldn't have. While his mind should have been screaming at him that he was still on his own, that he was still an orphan, it was silent.

* * *

Harry sat on his bed and held his old shoes in his hands, turning them this way and that as he examined the new hole in the side and the broken laces. He really needed some new shoes to wear. He couldn't wear the nice boots into the mines, because those were only for going into town. Snape had just reminded him the night before to polish them and keep them clean and had given him shoe polish and a brush to clean the boots up.

Snape had already bought Harry a lot of clothes, for which Harry was grateful. The only thing he really needed was another pair of shoes. He was confident that the man would buy him a pair or give him some money to go into town to get a pair himself. Harry pulled the shoes on and went down the stairs for breakfast. It was his day off today so he'd have time to go get new shoes in town.

In the kitchen Harry pulled down the fresh bag of donuts and sat down to have one as Snape came in to make himself a cup of coffee. After Snape had seated himself and reached for the bag, Harry asked, "Sir, I was wondering if I could have a new pair of shoes."

Snape didn't look up from The Prophet as he took a drink of coffee. "You have not overshined the new pair of boots and worn a hole in them I hope?"

"No sir, they're fine. I meant for working in... or for when I'm not going into town."

Snape looked over the paper at him and then back at the Prophet again. "I was under the impression you were earning money to buy your own clothing."

Harry froze. He barely had ten pounds left because he'd been bringing home pastries for breakfast for the past several weeks. Snape had liked them so much, he'd just kept buying them. Snape didn't say anything for several more minutes as he finished his coffee. When he rose from the table a few minutes later he said, "Keep yourself out of trouble today. Do not stay up late. We must rise early to deliver minerals to London tomorrow."

Harry barely heard him as he stared at his half eaten pastry on the table in front of him. He'd been wrong. Snape still expected him to buy his own clothes. Why had he bought him clothes before? At first it was just so Harry could look presentable, and later probably because he'd already planned on getting clothes for that other boy. Harry had practically forgotten about the other boy because he'd grown too comfortable here. Now that he thought about it, the orphanage had promised to check back after a few months to be sure the placement was ‘working out'. They'd check to see if Snape had bought him any clothes. Now the man had and that was the end of it. His duty was done.

This bitter realization felt like a heavy weight was crushing his chest. This was Harry's fault. He hadn't been paying attention and had moved beyond hope of getting to stay to want. He wanted to stay. He wanted Snape not to find a different boy to adopt. Though his attitude had changed towards the man and towards the situation, reality had not. He was still Harry Potter. Snape still hated him... was disgusted by him like the Dursleys. In that moment Harry felt like he was living at the Dursleys, where the bare minimum was done to keep him alive. If nothing had changed, he might as well still be living with them. His mind flickered to the cupboard under the stairs again... the one under Snape's stairs. He wasn't safe here, and as he realized it, the weight on his chest only felt heavier.

Harry rose from the table to throw his pastry away, and went out the front door and out to the lane. He'd need to earn some more money so he could get shoes. He'd have to stop buying pastries too. All of his money should be saved if he was going to have to take care of himself.

That afternoon Harry mowed the Mayer's lawn followed by Mrs. Allan's. He watered both lawns and pulled weeds at both houses. He also dusted Mrs. Allan's house and helped her clean out several kitchen cupboards. Harry offered to wash the windows for Millie, but she told him he looked tired and sent him back to Snape's house. It was after six in the evening when he returned, though he didn't go inside. Instead he went to the creek behind the house and sat under the tree he could see from the bedroom window upstairs. He counted his money, and with the ten pounds he had and the money he'd made today, he had twenty four pounds. Not enough for shoes yet.

Harry didn't come in until dark, at which point he made himself leftovers from the fridge and went upstairs. It wasn't fair, he told himself, but then maybe life wasn't supposed to be. Why were other kids allowed to have what he couldn't? What the other boys in the orphanage couldn't have?

* * *

Harry spent every spare minute over the next week working for the neighbors. Mrs. Allan had recommended him to another neighbor half a mile down the lane towards Bainbridge, and Harry had gone down there to clean up an old garden that was overgrown with vines and weeds, and to repair a fence at a little cottage in Bainbridge. Snape didn't question that Harry was gone so often, so long as Harry was there for mining and cleaning up minerals afterwards. What had felt like quality time spent with the man a week and a half ago, felt like a chore now. Harry flinched when the man's voice grew irritated with him, and he kept quiet as much as possible. Not a father, just a boss. That is what Harry had wanted for the summer anyway, wasn't it? A job? He wished he could talk himself into feeling happy about the prospect again like he had at the start of the summer.