"Don't be a bloody fool," Snape lightly sneered. "Of course because I was there with them."
Harry shivered a bit, the twice-repeated phrase making him a bit ill. He didn't want to talk about Samhain, he really didn't. Or at least, not yet. '"I know you're sorry," he offered, and then heard himself volunteering, "I dream about Devon too, you know."
Harry felt's Snape's breathing jerk as his teacher questioned, "You recall being at the cottage?"
"Yeah..." Biting his lip, Harry tried moving a bit. He hadn't realized at first, probably because he'd still been so recently emerged from the nightmare, but it was a little bit awkward leaning just his cheek against Snape, who seemed to be sitting on the edge of the bed. He didn't want to lose the touch, which really helped, but he was starting to think he might slide down into the sheets if he didn't get into a more stable position. Easing one hand from his teacher's grasp, Harry pushed up on it and moved his cheek up, until it was just beneath Snape's chin. That let him sling an arm around the man's ribs, and gave him something to hang onto. Of course, he held his breath the whole time, even though by then, it didn't seem too likely that the man would shove him away.
Snape didn't shove him away. In fact, he scooted more fully onto the bed, propping his back up on Harry's pillows before gathering him close against the length of his side, tucking his head into the curve of his shoulder. Ah, did that feel good. Strange that it would, though, with the childhood he'd had. Really, nobody had ever lain beside him, offering comfort and warmth. Not once, not ever, not anyone.
Not until Devon.
"I remember you holding me," Harry went on after a bit. "Just like this, for hours. I remember wishing there could be a house-elf to stoke the fire and bring my broth, because I hated it when you had to get up and leave me."
"It's odd you would remember," Snape mused, his chest rising and falling in that comforting rhythm. "You were asleep."
"No," Harry yawned, a lull washing over him. "Half-dreaming."
Snape accepted that, saying only, "You're almost half-dreaming again. You need your rest; I'll leave you to sleep, now--"
"No!" Harry cried, the word now doused with fear. "Stay. Please, Professor. Oh, please. I don't want..." Gritting his teeth, Harry broke off speaking. It was awful, what he had been going to say. Awful, but true.
His teacher hadn't moved. "You don't want what?" And then, when the boy didn't answer, in a harder tone, "What, Harry?"
Harry felt his legs clenching up just thinking about it, and a surge of anger, and something else he couldn't identify, churning inside him. "I don't want to have to blow the windows out again, just to get you up here, all right?"
Snape's voice went low and hard, as he spoke in clipped syllables, each one distinct. "What do you mean?"
Harry sat up a little bit straighter, all exhaustion burned away by the anger and the other feeling clawing up inside him. Hurt, that was it. Yeah, hurt. Because he'd needed this before, damn it! Needed to talk, to be held! And Snape had ignored him and sneered on and on about potions to Dumbledore, and walked straight past to Pomfrey's office without a word to Harry, and told Hermione to get out when Harry had sent that apology!
"Well that's what it took, didn't it?" he challenged, almost reeling with it, he was so angry. "You hate my guts again, just like before, and don't think I don't know it! You're only here now because the headmaster was afraid I'd let my magic really fly if I didn't get my way! I bet he thought I might burn down a whole wing of the castle, or something, or blow the stones apart or---!"
Snape pulled him back down and settled him close against his chest, the embrace firm and safe as Harry trembled.
"Hush, you idiot child," he whispered against his hair, tightening his arms about the boy until he stilled. "I don't hate you, Harry, of course I don't. I haven't hated you for..." his voice dropped still lower, to wryly admit, "well, for a while, we'll say."
"Oh, sure," Harry sneered.
"I should probably tell you how I, what I..." Snape muttered, his teeth clicking in an agitation Harry could feel communicated through the man's hands, as well. His teacher cleared his throat, started to say something, then abruptly stopped. Finally, after yet another abortive attempt, he managed to admit, "Harry. Listen to me. I don't hate you at all."
As declarations went, that one was absolutely, incredibly lame, Harry thought, but he liked it all the same. For one thing, he could tell it was true. But beyond that, it seemed to him that Snape was covering something he felt but couldn't say. Severus does not care to show emotion, the headmaster had said, so yeah, Harry could listen to I don't hate you at all and know that there was more to it than that.
When Snape shifted slightly, Harry clutched at him, afraid he was going to leave. He wouldn't want to sit with Harry now, would he? After he'd just unbent enough to say something like that? If he knew Snape, the man would disappear again. Either that, or hide behind some cold mask of indifference. "Don't leave yet," Harry softly cried. "I want to talk, all right?"
"All right," Snape agreed, his own voice surprisingly easy. Harry thought then that maybe he didn't know Snape as well as he had thought. The man seemed... well, okay, even after what he'd just said.
Snape shifted back, adjusting them more comfortably on the narrow bed. "We'll talk a while longer."
Harry nodded, and then thought for a while, trying to decide what they'd better talk about. It seemed like dozens of questions were crowding his mind. Even worse, the more he melted against Snape, the safer he felt, which just meant that he could dream up even more things he'd like to say. But that was good, wasn't it? It was nice to finally feel safe; it meant he could to admit one of the things that had been bothering him. "That first day when I woke up here, you said you had to work on potions... which I think is true, but I also think you were using it as an excuse to avoid me. Because you said you'd come by later, when you had time, and you never did!"
"I did, Harry," Snape insisted, still in that easy voice that Harry could center on. "You were asleep, but I sat with you, for a while. Albus can tell you that; he was there."
"Okay, fine," Harry muttered, deciding he could accept that at face value. It wasn't like he needed to check up on Snape's story. Actually, he thought it was strange that his teacher had mentioned the headmaster like that. "Why haven't you come back since, even after I apologized? And why were you so nasty at first, anyway?"
Snape sighed, a long drawn-out sound as he inhaled and exhaled, then muttered, "I truly do not know where to begin.... Harry, when you first woke up here, I felt... it's difficult to explain. I was certain you would remember Samhain; I didn't expect you to remember Devon in the least. I anticipated that speaking with you would be... well, difficult. But still, I did intend to try. A little, at least."
"Then why didn't you?"
Snape pulled him even closer, and wrapped an arm completely around his back. "Because when I came through the door, you were telling Dumbledore what had made Samhain so very horrible. You were hurt by someone you trusted."
"But that is what made it so horrible," Harry murmured, slow to understand. "Or one of the things... Oh. Oh, no... I get it. You thought I meant I'd been hurt by someone I had trusted and didn't any longer?"
"It would be a perfectly rational reaction on your part," Snape quietly admitted.
"No, it wouldn't," Harry argued, wondering how to explain. "'Cause I knew, see. I knew from my dreams that there'd be a way out, that I wasn't going to end up dead that night. You had to wait for a chance, watch for it." He gulped, his fingers knotting in Snape's shirt. "Samhain was awful because I couldn't hate you for it, Professor, not even during. It sounds stupid, I know, but it's true... hating you would have made things, I don't know. Easier." Harry paused, then plunged on. "Anyway, I thought you didn't care about trust."