A new professor at Hogwarts: a Severus Snape story

Reconciliation

Twelve years later...

'Guess who I run into today?' Eileen smirked, taking a sip of her glass.

It was July, and the four of us were together at Jake's celebrating his twenty-fifth birthday. We had just had dinner and were now opening – and drinking – the bottles of liquor we had gifted him with.

'Who?' Jaz asked.

'Dante Woods' she replied with a snigger.

'You're kidding!' I laughed.

Jaz and Dante had broken up shortly after he graduated from Hogwarts, and we hadn't heard much from him since then.

Jake, who was slouching on the sofa, sat upright. 'How is he?' he questioned.

'He's fine, he's working for your mom now too' Eileen replied. She had a job at the Department of International Magical Cooperation, which was headed by Mrs. Adams.

'No way!' Jake gasped.

'Yes... and he also introduced me to his very cute new boyfriend' she glanced at Jaz.

Jake and I almost spilled wine all over the carpet.

Everybody turned their eyes at Jaz. She didn't look surprised at all.

'You knew about this?' I asked.

'Oh, no, I didn't, or I would have told you. But, I mean... I had this feeling... there were... signs' she giggled 'I noticed after dating him for a while that he seemed very keen to show everyone he was snogging the teachers' daughter, but he was never so interested in me when we were alone' she shrugged. 'Besides...' she looked at me 'I don't know if you will remember that... but one of the first things he asked me at the Yule Ball was the question.'

I burst out laughing. 'Yes, I remember you told me about that. But I didn't think it was odd, I mean, everybody wants to know that.'

Eileen was glancing from Jaz to me, puzzled, blinking her eyes that same way her mother did when confused.

'What question?' Jake asked.

Jaz chuckled.

'The question everyone wants to ask male metamorphmagus' I grinned.

Jake stared at me bewildered for a few seconds, and then howled 'Oh... he wanted to know if you can metamorph that' he guffawed.

'Exactly' I leered.

Eileen went red but laughed too.

'I just don't remember what you told him' I turned back to Jaz 'because we used to lie about that all the time, back then, to have fun with people's reactions.'

She chortled. 'No, I told him the truth.'

Eileen and Jake gaped at her.

'So you know it?' Jake asked in shock.

Jaz and I laughed even harder.

'Of course I do! You can't find anything about Ted that I don't know.'

I nodded to them, agreeing.

'You two are so awkward together' Jake shook his head.

'Yeah, sometimes I think Teddy is your twin instead of me' Eileen added.

I chuckled, but Jaz's smile faded away.

'We're not brother and sister, we're friends' she retorted.

'So' Jake cut in, turning to me again 'are you going to tell us if you can do it?'

'Well' I began, flushing 'in theory, yes. But metamorphing requires concentration. No one can do it in the heat of the moment.'