A Room With a View

A Date and Dinner

Merlin's jagged left toenail, what the FUCK was that? A very panicked and slightly queasy Severus Snape marched toward the Hogwarts gates from the apparition point, hands dragging at the ends of his hair and breath snorting out in frustration. She gave you a peck on the lips, Severus. A peck! As a thank you! And you tried to bloody leap down her throat like some spotty teenager! It wasn't a date, and you went and arsed it up anyway! A simple lunch with a friend, and you act like a complete imbecile. She's going to sodding kill you, drop you on your damned pointed head like the moron that you-

"SEVERUS SNAPE, YOU STOP WALKING THIS INSTANT!" An enraged shout from behind him made Severus stop in his tracks a short distance from the Hogwarts gates. 

Not that he had much choice. Half body bind curses do have a tendency to halt one's forward momentum. Severus hunched his shoulders - since he couldn't really move any of his other appendages - and waited for the inevitable.

The very red, very enraged face that he had so recently been mashed against appeared in front of Severus' lowered head. Hermione stood in front of him, wand drawn and hands on hips in a picture so reminiscent of Molly Weasley that Severus would have laughed but for the sneaking suspicion that she was about to hex his bollocks off.

The angry witch in front of him spoke in a dangerously low tone of voice. "You're beginning to make a habit of rabbiting after first dates, Severus. Would you mind explaining what the hell all that was about before I turn you into a toad and fling you into the bloody Forbidden Forest for the centaurs to trample?"

Severus drew himself up as formally as the rigid body bind would allow before speaking. "I'm terribly sorry, Professor Granger. I did not intend to accost you. I don't know what came over me and I can only express my abject-" He paused and raised an eyebrow at her. "First date?"

The color in Hermione's cheeks heightened slightly, making her look like a blushing tomato with corkscrews coming out the top. "Yes," she hissed, "first date. What did you think that was?"

"Ah... an outing? Between friends? I - I wasn't clear on the purpose of - that is, we never specifically said that - Pants. I'm shit at this." He would have buried his face in his hands had he been able to move. Severus settled for rolling his eyes and focusing them over her shoulder.

A burble of laughter escaped from the (slightly less angry) woman holding a (very lethal) wand on him. "You really are, aren't you?" She continued to look at him with an expression of exasperated amusement on her face. "If I unbind you, will you stop running and talk to me for a moment?"

He nodded and she wordlessly finited the spell, stowing her wand. His shoulders sagged as the binds released, but before he could as much as move she grabbed his elbow and half pulled, half flung him toward the low rock she'd perched on before they left for Edinburgh. He took the hint and sat, hands folded in his lap. She stood in front of him with her arms crossed, and expectant look on her face.

"So you didn't think this was a date."

"I didn't want to presume. We've barely re-established a friendship."

She rolled her eyes. "Severus, you know we've been on a date before. Why wouldn't you presume?"

"Uhm... because that date was six year ago? And I don't remember it? And because, by your own statements, it was no an unqualified success?"

She considered him a moment. "You have a point," she conceded. She sat next to him on the rock and huffed a sigh. "Well this is awkward."

"Indeed." The silence between them grew.

Hermione drew a breath as if to speak, then released it in a plosive gust. Severus shifted on the rock. She fidgeted with her nails a moment. Finally he spoke.