Belonging

Flying Fish -Severus Snape-

-Severus Snape-

Tuesday Morning

Severus tried to run his seventh year Potions class more like a workplace than a classroom. Those who had made it this far were being prepared for careers which would have brewing elements in them. In the real world this meant a lot of working as a team. He personally did not enjoy making potions this way, and as a result would be awful in a workplace that required it. He forced his students out of their comfort zones in a way he despised himself. A true hypocrite. Forcing teamwork when he was seldom team oriented.

It required trust in others to brew as a team. It required responsibility to your peers to make sure you are being as thorough as possible in your preparation and executions. It taught communication and safety. Moreover, most of the more complicated potions are simply not done alone. It is near possible to make the timing work and have things as freshly prepared as they need to be. For this year he had divided his seventh years into three cohorts, and set them each a large cauldron brew that would require a month to make.

They were self-sufficient for the most part. Each group had chosen a leader, they were setting up their own workflow for each class period. He had chosen brews that took long periods to simmer between manipulations. This allowed him to still have lecturing days in between days where they would do group work.

On days where they worked in groups he was mainly there as a figure head to answer questions if needed. He moved through the room, as he normally would, but now there was a strangeness. One of these students was his... wife. He shook his head like he could dislodge the uncomfortable feeling of wrongness that accompanied the thought. He tried not to, but he kept looking at her. He had never paid much attention to her before now. She was competent, but not confident. Her questions were always formatted in such a way that he knew she understood the base material. He knew she was generally intelligent, but now she was also... going to be his.

When he glanced at her, he couldn't stop from searching for the things he would find attractive about her. There was nothing wrong with her, so to speak, other than she was a student and he had never and would never look at students in that light. He wondered if she would seem more grown up to him at the end of this mating bond. He knew that after it was in place he would adore her now, and he would adore her when she was eighty. Still, he could not stop judging his future self. Then again his current self was looking at the shape of her nose and trying to calculate if he found it cute or not. Perhaps he should reserve the judgments for his current self who was trying to tabulate his wife into some kind of number he could recalculate after to see what percentage more attracted to her he was after the bond. It was insane. He tried again to shake the thought.

Her team had elected Bryant, an assertive Ravenclaw to lead their project, a wise choice. She had assigned his future mate to prepare the winged flying fish which meant Madelyn was headed to the sink in the back alcove of the classroom to wash them. Severus couldn't help himself but go peer over her shoulder.

"Don't forget their air bladders." He prompted, making her jump out of her skin for she had not known he was behind her.

"You scared me." She breathed, accidentally dropping the slippery rainbow coloured fish back into the storage liquid. "But... I did forget. Thanks." She muttered.

"I'll demonstrate that for you, Watson." He announced before stepping up behind her and putting his hand into the jar on either side of hers.

"What are you doing?!" She whispered.

"Taking the opportunity to stave off the ears a little longer." He informed her quietly. He guided her finger to behind their side fins and showed her where to push to drain the small fish of all the liquid. He tried not to relish too much in the relief of where her hair touched his chin while he leaned over her to show her. "Now you do one." He instructed, keeping his hands on hers anyway, but not guiding so much as following. She reached into the jar and lifted one out, but they were small and very slimy and she lost grip on it. When she abruptly moved to try to catch it her backside thrust into his front and all of a sudden he was too aware once more that she was his student and soon he would want her, even though right now, he did not. It bothered him.

The discomfort, however momentary, had made him remember something important. He summoned it from his pocket. Madelyn finished cleaning the second fish with no help and reached into the slimey jar for another. He caught her left hand in both his. "I think it's best if you wear this." He slid her ring back on easily inside the slippery stuff. "I know it's uncomfortable but... under the circumstances I would appreciate it."

"Professor... look in the mirror..." Madelyn muttered. The tiles above the sink were mercury glass, reflective, some old safety precaution to know if someone was rushing to the sink behind you. The mirrors were old and tarnished but he saw what she did, everyone was looking. Absolutely everyone. "I'm sorry I think my wedding dress dash has created some rumours already." She looked down into the fish resignedly.

"That's what the ring is for. It doesn't matter if they know." He stopped holding her hands and washed his own so he could resume his tour around the classroom. "Excellent job, Watson, continue as before." He said before leaving the sink as every head whipped down to their work again for fear of being caught looking.

If he was guilty of looking at her, she was equally guilty of looking at him. For the rest of class they had trouble with colliding eyes. She seemed to feel very uncomfortable being caught at it. Her eyes flicked every which way as though she could pass it off as looking at something near him. For the first time Severus got a sense of her panic at everyone knowing.

While he had no wish to be the centre of attention, he was used to being the source of public ire here at school for being a fairly stern teacher. He was used to notoriety, she was not. He started to feel a kind of worry for her. Her eyes were looking all around the room, watching for people watching them. They were watching them, that was clear, but noses were mostly on their work. The surreptitious glancing though was less than subtle. He began to have anxiety about this whole thing for her sake instead of his. Great, he was caring already, he thought.

His ears and belly were content for the entire duration of class. A blessing. After the bell he watched Watson negotiating staying behind, promising her friends she would explain later. When she finally managed to shake them off she approached. "Can I have another bun and a quick handshake before I go?"

"Yes." He led her through into his chambers again. Alone together once more he said "At some point we're going to need to develop a system. For finding time to..."

"Do this?" Watson asked, grabbing his hand. She proceeded to pretend they had a secret handshake, holding up his unwilling hand like a dead fish while she made all kinds of silly motions at it and against it.

'Not that." He took his hand away and cut a bun from the tray and tucked it into a cloth napkin for her. He handed it over and they shook hands for several seconds.It felt too intimate and yet irritatingly good. Like scratching an itch or sneezing, a little relief, a palpable relaxing.

"Later, Professor." She almost seemed upbeat, which was surprising given the general anxiety on her face for the better part of class.

"Later..." He agreed with caution. He found himself looking at her nose again. He decided it was unfair to find it just neutral, so he upgraded it to agreeable. There was something cute about the configuration of her face when he really looked. He just ought not to look. When she was gone he ate a cinnamon bun in a huff, annoyed at his mind's constant churn. He would suppress this until he couldn't. This sick need to stare at her face and puzzle out why he would love her. It really wouldn't matter in the end either way. Still... the kicking and screaming felt mandatory on his way there.

If you are enjoying my story please don't forget to vote for the chapter, leave a comment, and add my story to a list so others will find it too! -Miss Measured