Dawn

We Don't Need No Education

Harry had insisted, only moments after he blew out the candles on his birthday cake, that as a five-year-old he was old enough to go to school just like all the other kids. Dumbledore snickered, before handing Harry a present and the boy, in a flash, forgot his previous request and went straight to ripping up wrapping paper.

Severus thought on this for quite some time. The fact that there were things to be learned from Muggles that unfortunately so many pureblood families decided weren't worth their time was troubling. Severus didn't want to make the same mistake in raising the boy.

Unfortunately, as much as he would like to, Severus didn't have enough time during the school year to teach Harry everything he needed to learn while also teaching his normal classes. To make up for it, during the summer, Severus spent everyday teaching Harry maths and reading, along with other important things. The first few weeks had been hard. The attention span and memory retention of a five-year-old left a lot to be desired. While Severus had learned patience he would never have otherwise, he was still finding himself a little short-tempered at times.

Often when teaching Harry, Severus would be forced to take a break, forced to sit down and collect himself, especially during moments when they would review what they had learned and Harry would blink back up at him in confusion. Teaching a child, let alone his own, wasn't like teaching any other student. He couldn't yell or call him names even though it was almost his second nature.

As usual, there were many times during the following school year where Severus caught himself yelling at students. While he normally never gave it a second thought, now, after teaching Harry, after the struggles of raising a child, he found himself becoming deeply unsettled by his own behavior. He would catch himself starting to demean a student and unexpectedly stop. Something about the pathetic look of hurt on their faces always reminded him of Harry - all wide-eyed and snotty, but most of all confused and innocent.

Because of Harry, Severus found himself easing up on his students a little bit at a time. When his students started getting better grades, well he just decided to attribute that to his superb teaching skills.

What surprised Severus the most though was how much Harry seemed to enjoy learning from Professor Burbage, who amazed the boy with pens and glitter when the beauty of maths had been lost on him. It took some adjustment, but Severus eventually decided to let things slide - Harry was only five years old after all. Seeing as some of his first years seemed to have worse maths skills, he was willing to admit that there was still plenty of time for him to learn. However, what he couldn't get used to was how sticky Harry always was when he came back - covered in glue, glitter (which was the bane of the earth to which no cleaning spell affected) and all other unmentionable horrors. Unfortunately, the boy seemed to revel in his mess. And while he was loathe to admit it, he was a bit jealous of the fact that Harry seemed to have more fun with someone who wasn't Severus.

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"No," Severus said again, a vein above his eyebrow twitching and his anger getting harder and harder to control.

Harry was lying face down on their living room rug, little fists pounding on the ground and legs flailing. He was screaming at the top of his lungs that he would not go to bed if he couldn't have a bedtime story.

Severus sighed. Today had been bad. They woke up late, throwing their whole schedule off, which unfortunately caused them to miss naptime. Worst thing yet, Harry had been grumpy and irritable all day, even going so far as to refuse to eat his greens which he was normally so good about. Severus knew the child was extremely tired so when it came bedtime he had tried to get bathing done as fast as possible and hurry Harry to bed. He had seemed okay with this until Severus informed him that there would be no bedtime story tonight. That was when Harry had become extremely distraught, his tired brain unable to cope with this perceived injustice.