Hearts are Blind (Severus Snape X OC)

He's A Smooth Talker

Severus Snape waited in his sleeping quarters. They were conveniently just off the side of his office, tucked beneath a Slytherin drapery that hung on the west wall. He sat on the couch with his legs propped up and a torch light shining over his shoulder. There was a book in his hands and a glass of scotch on the floor beside him. The raven-haired man read through the page he was currently on and then took a sip from the glass. Setting it back down with a clink, he then proceeded to read the page over again... and again.

Perhaps he was just mercilessly trying to get the full effect of... He turned the book over and glanced at the cover: Nautical Natures of the Ninth Kind. Snape gave a sigh and tossed the leather-bound to the floor. What good was reading it when his eyes only saw and his brain didn't render? He picked the glass up and emptied it down his throat.

It's no use... he thought dejectedly, staring at the vacant glass in his hand. The girl kept floating back up into his mind.

Severus stood and stretched, then walked through a small doorway in the darkest corner of the room, where an even smaller bathroom was. He stepped to the sink and rinsed out the whiskey glass, placing it on the shelf to the right once he was done. Then he put both hands on each side of the sink and leaned in toward the mirror, hunching his shoulders. He looked into his own eyes and sighed loudly.

"This just won't do..." he said observably and then whipped around, his black cloak swirling about his feet. "It's decided then. I'll go."

And so he did.

A few short minutes later, although it was very late (nearly two o'clock in the morning, to be exact), the Potions Master had made his way up from the dungeons, through the castle and into the Hospital Wing.

x-x-x

"I don't... remember..." the girl beneath him mumbled out. She was looking at him like he was going to ravage her or something else ridiculously inappropriate.

Snape reached his hand toward Lucinda's neck and then picked up the damp cloth that was there beside her. He pulled back and held it in front of her face.

Lucinda looked down at what he was holding and a somewhat embarrassed expression molded into her face. "Oh..." she said simply.

"What did you think it was?" he barked and then smacked her chin with the cold cloth. "I was trying to lower your fever."

"But what did you say to me—"

"I hardly said anything to you," he sneered, straightening up and absentmindedly rubbing his lower back. "If you heard talking, then it was hallucinated, due to the severity of the fever."

The girl didn't speak at first. Then she sighed and said, "Thank you, Professor."

Ugh.

His heart sickeningly warmed at her words and he sat back into the chair at her bedside. They were silent for several minutes and Snape rubbed his temple with the heel of his hand. It was almost three-thirty in the morning. He really needed to get some sleep and now that her fever was down, he felt comfortable leaving. As he leaned forward to get out of the chair again her voice stopped him.

"Professor Snape?" she inquired quietly.

The man relaxed back into his seat and looked at her. "What is it?"

Lucinda looked down at the blanket over her lap. "You came here tonight for a reason, right?" She asked, glancing over at him through the curly tendrils of her chocolate hair. "You tried to lower my fever..." Snape blew the air out of his nose annoyingly. "So," she continued, "You must not dislike me that much."