"You didn't tell you father at once?"
It was all going to come out now, so Harry decided to get it over with. "I didn't tell him at all."
"Oh, my dear boy," crooned the headmaster, folding his hands across his lap. "I am so very sorry. You and Severus aren't getting on, then?"
"No, we get on great--"
"But you don't feel you can trust him with this."
"Of course I can--"
Draco's cup and saucer clattered as he set them down. "Can you stop leading him around by the nose and just say what you want to say, Headmaster?"
Dumbledore glanced at Draco, his old eyes a little bit bemused. When he turned back to Harry, though, his expression was perfectly serious. "I'm sure you can tell me any number of reasons why you didn't take this to your father, Harry. You're sixteen, which is old enough, surely, to handle the matter on your own. Though I will say you haven't acted your age, today. And you don't care for special treatment, not even on account of having a father on staff. And so on and so forth."
"Oh great, I have to ratchet up my Occlumency again!"
"No, no, certainly not with me, my boy. I haven't pried into your thoughts. I merely flatter myself that I know you, in some small measure at least. As I should hope I would, after all these years." Dumbledore smiled, looking every bit like a loving grandfather. His eyes weren't twinkling, though. They were still profoundly sad. "And because I know you, Harry, I know you had another reason for neglecting to mention your problems in Defence to Severus."
"No, I didn't."
"To Professor Snape, I should perhaps say?"
Harry stiffened. "I don't think of him that way anymore."
The headmaster's voice softened still further, his tone gentleness itself. "Do you not?"
"No!"
Dumbledore slowly shook his head. "Oh, Harry. If you were being unfairly treated in a class of little importance to your future, your justifications might be believable. But not when it comes to Defence against the Dark Arts. Of all your courses, that is the one most key to your very survival. And you expect me to accept that you let petty concerns about seeming childish or privileged keep you from asking your father for help?" Pausing, Dumbledore drew in a breath. "Harry, you are simply not that silly."
Shifting in his chair, not liking this conversation at all, Harry raised defiant eyes. "I told McG-- I mean, Professor McGonagall."
"Yes, when you needed someone to mark your practical. Don't you suppose that your father would have been the more qualified choice? And yet you didn't go to him."
Harry flinched slightly. "You knew how Aran was treating me, then! You knew I needed help, and you didn't offer any!"
Dumbledore smiled. "I knew that you had a father more than willing to help you through any difficulty. And Harry, you are the one who made it clear to me, earlier this year, that you preferred his counsel to mine. So why did you never once seek it? Hmmm?"
"I go to him about plenty of other stuff!"
"But not this." Dumbledore sighed. "Harry, do try to be honest with yourself. Why would you be so very reluctant to bring this particular problem to Professor Snape?"
Again with the man's school title. Harry couldn't help but feel he was being given a large hint, there. It wasn't one he could exactly miss, either, considering the way the headmaster had stressed the word particular. "I... uh, well... look, I wasn't thinking about it that way at the time, honest."
"I'm sure you weren't," agreed Dumbledore, nodding amiably. "At least, not that you were aware of."
"Subconscious motivations, that's what Marsha calls them," said Draco, his silver eyes searching Harry's expression. "But I don't follow. What were yours?"
The knot in his stomach suddenly grew a lot worse, so much so that Harry began wishing he hadn't eaten anything at all. Strange how he hadn't realised earlier just why he didn't want to bring his problem with another teacher to Snape.
Turning to Draco, he tried to explain, but the words got stuck in his throat. Dumbledore conjured him a cup of tea and pushed it over. Harry sipped at it for a moment, then tried again.
"I guess I didn't want to bring Aran up to Snape because... um, you know. Apart from Umbridge, Snape is the teacher I would have been complaining about every other year here! I mean, if I'd had a family to complain to."
"So?"
Harry sighed. "So, when he adopted me we sort of agreed that it was all over, but we never really talked very much about how he used to treat me. And I didn't want to talk about it. It's better just to push it behind and move on."
Draco's eyes narrowed. "Oh, please. You can't compare Severus to Aran!"
"Can't I?" Harry's lips twisted. "At least Aran has a semi-coherent reason to resent me. He's afraid of Parselmouths. Stupid as that is, it's something, at least. What reason did Snape have to single me out that first day of class and humiliate me, and keep it up for five straight years? He knew I was Muggle-raised and wouldn't have the first idea about monkshood and Wolfsbane or whatever! And everybody expected me just to deal with that all on my own, so why would I go to Snape with this? For him to go to Aran complaining about somebody mistreating me... ha, talk about the pot calling the kettle black--"
"All right, all right!" interrupted Draco, holding up his hands. His silver eyes looked a little bit panicked. "I understand! There's obviously still some... er, resentment there."
"I don't want there to be," sighed Harry. "So, I try not to think about it... ever. I guess maybe that's why I thought I'd just handle Aran myself."
Draco grabbed a sweet from the dish still on the table. "Marsha calls that avoidance."
"Yeah, well it was working out fine until you decided I ought to--" Harry abruptly stopped talking. "Never mind."
"So Professor Aran is mistaken about who was influencing whom. Well, no matter. Harry, what do you intend to do now?"
Harry blinked. "What, you mean I get a choice? I pretty much figured you were going to show that," he pointed at the assignment he'd dropped on the small table, "to Snape and let him decide how to punish me."
"Oh, no. No indeed." Dumbledore whispered a spell and the parchment dissolved into ash. "I don't think we need to go to quite those lengths, not now you've realised about your... what was that clever word? Ah yes, avoidance."
"Last time, when I was having seer dreams, you blackmailed me into talking to him."
"Yes, but I don't think that will be necessary this time. Now that you've thought it through, I think you know what you need to do, Harry."
Harry hung his head in his hands and spoke through his fingers. "Yeah, yeah. Talk to Snape. Ugh."
"Will you stop calling him Snape?" asked Draco. "You said you didn't think of him like that any longer!"
"Yeah, well I can't help it now, can I? This is why I didn't want to talk to him about any of this!"
"Harry." Dumbledore waited until the boy had raised his head and looked at him. "You love Severus. That was made very clear to me earlier this year. I'm certain you don't want the past to interfere with your relationship as it stands now. But don't you see? By denying him the chance to act as your father in this matter, you are letting the past influence the present."
"Yeah, I get it," said Harry, grumbling. "I'll talk to him, fine. I just... well, how am I supposed to bring it up now? He's not going to be so pleased that I didn't come to him sooner."
"Today's Wednesday," said Draco, a remark which seemed a little out of place until the boy went on. "How about this? We'll go down later to have dinner at home, right? Severus'll like that. And while we're there, you er... break the news. If you don't mind me being there, I mean. But see, this way, if things don't go well, I'll say that you should come along to Marsha's and you and Severus can have my therapy session."