Chapter 19

The weekend passed in a haze of tangled limbs. By Monday morning, Severus had apparated to the gates of Hogwarts just before dawn. Throughout the day, the memory of the weekend was persistent. The images flashed unbidden in Severus's mind. He could still feel the ghost of Harry's hands on him, and a faint, entirely involuntary blush crept up his neck.

The post-gala atmosphere in the castle was... peculiar all day, to say the least. The blatant stares had diminished but were replaced by a subtler, more curious scrutiny. The Prophet's coverage had been surprisingly restrained and focused instead mostly on the charitable donations announced at the event rather than the guest list.

Severus spent the day in a state of detached but professional focus. His seventh-year NEWT class brewed the Draught of Living Death, and his sarcastic mental commentary was particularly sharp during that time. 'Mr. Nott, your attempt at a stirring counter-clockwise spiral resembles a drunk kneazle chasing its own tail.' he had thought.

The final bell of the day had echoed through the stone corridors hours ago, and his students were more than happy to flee his presence. Now the potions classroom was silent, and Severus sat at his desk grading third-year essays on the Swelling Solution. 'Ten points from Gryffindor, Miss Lancaster, for producing a concoction that appears to have the viscosity and intellectual ambition of troll bogies.' He scrawled the comment with a flourish of red ink, and his lips twitched as he imagined Harry's smirk if the other could read this.

There was a knock at the door. Severus didn't look up as he muttered. "Enter."

The door creaked open to reveal Filch. "Visitor for you, Professor," he wheezed. Before Severus could demand a name, the visitor stepped around Filch, and the air in the dungeon classroom seemed to grow heavy.

"Lily?"

For a moment, Severus's brain refused to reconcile the image. She looked nothing like the girl he'd known. Gone was the girl with the fiery hair and challenging eyes. This woman looked like she'd stepped from the pages of a High Society ledger. She wore a tailored charcoal wool coat over a cream silk blouse, with a strand of pearls around her throat. Her trousers were pleated and her shoes, while looking simple, screamed handmade Italian leather. Her hair was still a vibrant red, but it was swept into an elegant chignon. The years and wealth seemed to have sculpted her into something else entirely. Someone Severus did not recognize.

"Severus," she said, "Can we talk?"

He stared at her for a few seconds before nodding, though his face was a careful blank mask. "Filch, you may go," Severus dismissed the caretaker, who gladly shuffled off while muttering about sludge in the moving staircases.

Lily finally stepped fully into the classroom, and Severus caught her glance around with a slight, disdainful curl of her lip, as if the dungeon was lacking. She stopped before the Potion master's desk but did not take the offered seat.

"I'll get straight to the point, Severus," she began. "I want you to leave my son."

Severus leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers. "I was unaware he was in your custody, or that you had any say in his associations."

There was a flicker of anger in Lily's eyes. "Don't be obtuse, Severus. We both know what this is. It's... grotesque and unnatural. You are the same age as his father."

"On the contrary," Severus replied, "He has never seemed more... content. And if you are condemning me for the age card, Lily, then aren't you condemning your favourite Professor as well? Minerva's first husband had a 25-year age gap with her after all. You were her maid of honor in 1982."

"Severus, please." The 'please' was strained, as if she wasn't used to saying it anymore. "This isn't easy for me."

"And you imagine it is for me?" The Potion master countered. "Being scrutinized by the woman who once called me 'Snivellus' and now judges the man sharing her son's bed?" She flinched at that.

Then she reached into her handbag and withdrew a Gringotts draft. She slid it across the desk towards Severus. Severus's brows drew up as the number of zeroes was obscene. "This is for you. To walk away. You can have your independence, and you'll never have to worry about anything again." Lily stated.

Severus looked at the draft. He didn't touch it. "You are attempting to buy me off," he stated flatly.

"I'm offering you a good deal," she insisted. "I know what you really want. It's not him. It's the security." Then she leaned closer. "I am even willing to include a private, fully equipped potions laboratory in a villa in Tuscany. All you have to do is walk away from my son."

Severus stared at her, his black eyes unblinking. The offer was staggering. He let the silence stretch while watching the calculating gleam in Lily's eyes. Then, slowly, he pushed the Gringotts draft back towards her with the tip of one finger.

"No."

Lily blinked, as if now unsure what to do.

Finally, Severus spoke, "Are you quite finished?"

"I see. Perhaps your... interests are not purely financial." She uttered. She took a step around the side of the desk, and her voice dropped to a husky tone.

"I understand, you know," she murmured. "This... thing with Harry. It's... convenient. He's young, flexible. He looks... a bit like me, doesn't he?" She then gave a small, knowing smile. "I should have known. He's a substitute, isn't he? I know what you really wanted. What you've always wanted, Severus."

She was close enough now that he could see the fine lines around her mouth. "It doesn't have to be him, Severus. It never did."

She leaned closer and then uttered the most absurd thing Severus had heard this entire year, and considering he'd seen Tom Riddle sugar-high asking Fillius to polka, said a lot. "It's not too late. We could... we could have something real." She looked eager. "You don't have to settle for my son when you can have the original."

Severus stared at her, and at the hand she had placed on his arm during her speech. His mind held both disbelief and revulsion. The sheer, staggering narcissism of it. How dare she reduce his and Harry's relationship to a case of transference.

He removed her hand from his arm, as if brushing off a contaminant, and said in a cold voice laced with contempt while taking a step back, "Mrs. Potter. You are laboring under a profound and frankly insulting misapprehension."

Lily flinched at the use of her married name. "Harry Potter," he continued, "is not a substitute. He is his own man. Brash, yes, infuriating, yes, stubborn, like you wouldn't believe, and brilliant. What exists between us is nothing but a shadow of some adolescent fantasy."

"I stopped having romantic feelings for you when you latched onto that brute, James Potter. You threw away a Charms Mastery scholarship, secured by Professor Flitwick's own recommendation, for what? The fleeting prestige of a name? Making me jealous? Your... indiscretion in a broom cupboard with James Potter gave me, against all odds and reason, the man I love. And for that single, twisted mercy of fate, I am perversely grateful."

"You offer me money," he continued, "As if my loyalty, my... affections... are a commodity to be traded on your husband's Gringotts ledger. You offer me a laboratory, as if my life's work can be bought like a bauble. And now," he said with disdain, "you offer me yourself. As if your used, marital... attentions... could hold a candle to what I have."

He then leaned forward slightly. "Your son, for all the complications of his existence, possesses more integrity in his little finger than you have demonstrated in this entire pathetic display. He is a better man than the one who sired him, and light-years beyond the woman who bore him."

"Our conversation is concluded," Severus said while straightening up. "You will leave my classroom. You will not approach me again, and you will cease these infantile attempts to manipulate a relationship you do not understand and have no right to interfere with. The door is behind you. Do not force me to make your exit... memorable. And we both know I do not make threats. I make promises."

Lily stood frozen. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. With a final, venomous glare, she snatched the Gringotts draft from the desk, turned on her heel, and stalked from the room. The heavy oak door slammed shut with an echoing sound. It was only then that Severus sank back into his chair. The adrenaline drained away, leaving only a cold, hollow feeling in its wake.