Love Again

The first encounter

Severus accepted Adie's hand and shook it firmly; he noticed it to be soft and gentle to his touch.

"Severus Snape, Headmaster of Hogwarts", he replied.

Severus fought back the urge of not letting go of her hand, but he pulled back immediately, he doesn't want her to think of him as a creep if he lingers too much on shaking her hand.

"Oh yes, headmaster I know", she quickly answered and put a hand on her head, "I mean, everyone knows you, and I've done my research about the school before coming here and knows that you're the headmaster.", she said, babbling.

Severus waited for the urge to snap at the girl to come, but there was none. He just looked at her, and admired her feature, her babble. Severus cleared his throat.

"Ice cream?", Adie offered shyly.

Severus thought about leaving the woman alone in there and go to his chambers for some peace and quiet or to drown himself again with sadness and remorse, but instead Severus grabbed a spoon and went to the chair opposite to her.

Adie placed the tub in the middle, and they started eating.

When the first spoonful of ice cream met her mouth, Adie let out a moan of satisfaction while closing her eyes, but she quickly snapped her eyes open and saw black onyx eyes locked into hers.

Severus noticed her turned red, he grinned at her, and he resumed on eating some ice cream. Adie shyly chuckled and turned her attention back to eating ice cream, too. Severus paused upon hearing her chuckle and looked at her enjoying her ice cream, he was starting to feel mesmerized by her and so Severus abruptly stood up and Adie looked at him confused.

"I must go now Miss Heart, thank you for the ice cream.", he said and didn't wait for her response as he strode off the kitchens down to the dungeons.

Adie thought about Severus' behavior a while ago; she did her research about him and all she knew that he was very hard on his students and calls him the dungeon bat or the greasy git. Adie shrugged off the thought, she thought that maybe Severus isn't what they think he is, that he was just hiding behind a mask to prevent everyone in. Adie shrugged her thoughts about Severus and took her attention back to organizing her books in her shelves.

Severus got back to her office and thought about their conversation in the corridor, he sighed thinking about the words that came out of his mouth. Why did he say that to her? If she wants to flirt to him then so be it, she's not his to own and be angry about who she's talking to, but Severus knew that something inside him doesn't want Adie to flirt or be friendly with Krum, the mere thought of it made Severus' frown. He stood up and hastily went to the room where he would again make himself suffer, as he thought he deserve.

Severus is now standing in front of the mirror, his reflection looking back at him and after a while, there's Lily. Another wave of sadness, remorse and grief hit him, he kneeled and slumped on the ground where he stood, eyes still locked on the mirror in front of him as he saw Lily sat beside him Severus let out a big sigh and closed his eyes trying to feel Lily's head resting on his shoulder.

An image of Adie smiling at him and being friendly popped into his head, Severus quickly snapped his eyes open and saw Lily there smiling, still looking at him and her hand on his shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Lily. She's a new staff and she's being annoying.", Severus said and groaned. He occluded himself from thoughts of Adie. He looked at Lily with his grief and remorse again, Lily's reflection in the mirror still leaned her head onto Severus's shoulders and Severus closed his eyes to try and feel her again.

After hours of spending there, Severus grabbed his watch from his pocket and saw that it's near dinner time, Severus stood up, looking at Lily's reflection in the mirror once again, trying to feel her closeness but there is none. Severus went for the door and left.

As Severus arrived in the corridor, he saw Adie so focused on the book she's reading and was about to bump on a statue, his thoughts told him to let her be, but he quickly apparated to save her from crashing on to the statue and stopped her by grasping her arm,

"Miss Heart."