By Chance to Intention

Chapter 24: Bad Timing

"Beginnings are sudden, but also insidious. They creep up on you sideways, they keep to the shadows, they lurk unrecognized. Then, later, they spring."

― Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin

September 22nd, 2011

Severus awoke before dawn, seething. Before he processed where his anger derived from, he jerked himself out of his bed, threw on a robe haphazardly and stepped out into the hall. About twenty feet down, he yanked the door to his daughter's room open and sighed deeply upon seeing her dark hair splayed across the satin pillowcase.

"Severus?" Hermione Granger's voice came quizzically from the far corner of Katherine's room. He would have been jumpier had he not immediately recognised the honeyed voice he had become all too familiar with. He ran his fingers through his hair, walking into the room for better sight. She sat in an armchair, and a lantern sat atop a stool beside her. The dancing flames created an illusion of moving energy across the woman's body. Her pyjamas consisted of a t-shirt with a muggle band displayed and a pair of shorts. In typical Hermione fashion, she clasped a book in her hands that she had sat in her lap upon seeing him. His face tinged pink as he jerked his vision from her appearance to her eyes.

"I apologise; I did not mean to startle you. I just needed to check..." His words carried and fell with an air of decided pressure.

"It's fine, Severus. I would have done the same if it were Henry." He watched as she tucked the book to her side and pulled herself up from the chair.

He appraised her silently as she approached him. She was short - nearly a foot below himself, but her free hair added to her height. The bushy tendrils gave her the appearance of a lioness; she did not need to be large in size to protect what was hers. Her face was a pale brown, with freckles strewn across her nose. It contrasted heavily with his pale pallor, he knew. His skin had always been sickly white, as though the sun would never deign to touch him. He noticed all her small details in the dim light, and his half-conscious self couldn't keep the thoughts from forming. He found her astonishing. He found her beautiful.

"Why don't you lay back down? Or take a bath?" she paused before him, reaching out to offer a touch of support to his arm. The touch sent a rush down his spine, and he shivered slightly, silently hoping she hadn't felt it.

When he didn't respond, she went on. "It's been a long night for you... I reached out to Harry about what we could do, and Luna already touched base with me about posting an interview with Harry to oppose the one Skeeter wrote. We have it handled. You need to take care of yourself. I'll keep an eye on Katherine until you return. Krema has agreed to stay with the kids while we teach. She will have constant supervision, whether she wants it or not."

Severus felt himself nodding, but his half-conscious self was more focused on the touch of Hermione's hand that had dropped from his arm to his hand. She was just offering him comfort. He knew this. But his brain was not functioning properly, and his eyes widened slightly as he felt his lower body react out of his control.

Surreptitiously, he turned away from her to leave the room, speaking as he did.

"Yes, thank you for watching over her. I'll–I'll go and get ready for the day."

His mind was whirring well more than it should have been before the crack of dawn.

As he shut his bedroom door behind him, he became all too aware that the robe he had thrown on had hardly covered his shirtless self, clad in only his pants. She had seen him practically naked, and he'd become aroused by the sight of her in pyjamas. He felt ill at the thought she had noticed, but that didn't matter much now.