What do we do now(Harry Potter/Severus Snape

Chapter 24: Confessions

Jocelyn took Severus's hand and let him pull her toward the sofa. She could feel the heat from his hand causing a strange sensation to bloom in her chest. She wasn't sure were this was leading but she knew that were ever it took her she would follow her heart.

Severus watched as Jocelyn sat down quietly next to him with a range of emotions flickering through her eyes. It surprised him that he couldn't pinpoint what emotions there were. "I won't lie to you, there are many things in my past that would make a grown man cry and I need you to understand what exactly my position is."

Jocelyn was confused, "What do you mean?"

Severus sighed, he knew that this was the make or break moment. Jocelyn would either accept him for what he was and had been or she would walk out the door and not look back. Slowly he began to roll the sleeve up on his left arm revealing a pale Dark Mark. It wasn't plain to see but the color had started to darken in the last several months cementing the fact that somehow Voldemort was coming back to strength.

Jocelyn's hand flew to her mouth to cover the gasp. "You're the spy for the Order my mother talked about!"

Severus looked back up in shock, that wasn't exactly the reaction he was expecting. "You're not disgusted with me?"

"NO!" Jocelyn replied vehemently. "My Mother saw fit to inform me of all of the Order meetings and the going on's of the first war regardless that I was several countries away. I think she did it more for her sake and to help convince me to stay as far away from Hogwarts as I could."

She sighed. "I can't imagine the horror you have had to experience but I think that you are a very brave man and I respect that."

Severus was amazed. No one outside of the Order of the Phoenix had every said anything remotely to what Jocelyn was saying and it filled him full of gratitude. "I... I don't know what to say. I never expected that you would listen to what I had to say and not run out of the room to floo the Ministry to report that a Death Eater was a professor at Hogwarts. No one outside of your mother and Albus has ever said that I was brave." He said his voice tapering off embarrassed at the level of emotion that was leaking into his voice.

Jocelyn reached out and grasped the trembling hand and held it tight. "Even if I never knew about your past, the things that you have done for that little boy in the next room would have been enough to make me fall in love with the person you are now. The past is just that Severus, the past."

Severus sat there in silence revealing in the feel of Jocelyn's hand holding onto his. It was comforting and terrifying at the same time. It had been over six years since he had been this close to another woman. Jocelyn reminded him so much of Lily that he wondered if somehow Minerva was related to his late wife. "I hope you know that I am flying blind with Daylan and most days I have no idea what to do and then I question myself a hundred times on whether I am being the best father I can be."

Jocelyn smiled. "That's what I mean Severus, you care so much for that little boy that you worry that you aren't going to be good enough for him. I don't know any other parent that doesn't do the same thing."

Severus sighed, "Things are going to get worse before they get better and I fear that Voldemort may return to try and finish what he set out to do when he killed Lily and James." his voice choked on the next words. "I can't loose him, I just can't and I don't know how to protect him from something that is invisible and can get him through his dreams." Severus could feel the tears running down his cheek but he didn't care.

Jocelyn's heart broke when she saw the tears. "So you're saying that Voldemort can get to Daylan through his dreams?"

Severus nodded his head, "Yes, as far as we know he can only interact with him when he is sleeping but Merlin knows what horrors he could subject Daylan to before we could wake him up."

Jocelyn squeezed her eyes shut at the thought of that precious little boy being tormented in his dreams by an insane murderer. Making up her mind once and for all she gathered up the courage and looked Severus in the eye. "There is something that I think that I need to tell you as well. Although I don't think that it will be as horrible as what you told me, at least I hope it isn't."

Severus smiled. "I don't think that there is anything that you could say that would make me run away in horror."

A giggle escaped from Jocelyn's throat before she had a chance to stop it. "When I was asked to come here to tutor Daylan I never thought that I would find myself in this position. Although I think that my mother may have had some hand in it as well as the Headmaster..."

"Jocelyn, you're starting to ramble. I promise you can tell me anything and I will not think of you any less." Severus said softly as a small smile formed on his mouth.

Taking a deep breath Jocelyn plunged forward, "I love you Severus and I love that precious little boy that is in the next room asleep. But if you don't feel the same way than I understand and I will help you find another tutor for Daylan."

Severus was stunned. Never in a million years did he think that this would happen again. He had been lucky to find love once but to find it a second time, he just couldn't believe it. He glanced up at the woman who so quickly made herself a part of his and Daylan's lives and he found that he couldn't picture the future without her in it. He could see that he silence was making her nervous and it looked as if she would bolt at any given second.

"I don't know how I got so lucky to find a woman that could see past everything that I am and love me as well as my son." And with that he leaned forward and captured her lips with his in a gentle but firm kiss that promised so much more than what paltry words could say.