Chapter 6: Why?

After being discovered in what he thought was a very compromising situation in the infirmary by Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall, Severus was absolutely phobic about being seen in public with Alex.  She tolerated his behavior because she wanted him to be comfortable with their relationship.  She couldn’t resist teasing him at dinner one night by giving him a sultry look just to stir things up.  For the most part, though, she tried to act as if nothing had happened between them, at least while they were with his colleagues. 

When they were alone, Alexandra also tried to curb her natural inclination to be affectionate.  She tried to make every conversation low-key and casual.  She talked to him about his day and asked questions about his work.  She helped him prepare for class.  He wanted to know all about her life since she left school and asked her questions about her work for the FBM.  The tension between them was very pronounced, but she found it very exciting.

She confided in Professors McGonagall and Sprout one morning in the staff lounge.  “Poor Severus,” she said, “He’s still so embarrassed about what happened in the infirmary, he can hardly look at me.”

“Alexandra, it’s understandable.  He’s not used to having attention from a woman and to have been seen by Professor Dumbledore . . .,“ said Professor Sprout. 

“That’s silly.  It was just a kiss.  Besides, Professor Dumbledore is probably the best friend he has.  You would think that would make it better.”

“Don’t forget,” said Professor McGonagall, “I was there too, along with Potter and his friends.  Surely you must realize that being seen by Potter is the last thing he would possibly want.”

“I guess you’re right, Minerva.  I’ll try to be patient.”  Yes, that’s right, I have heard he has less than noble feelings toward Harry.

“Well,” said Professor McGonagall with something approaching a grin on her face,  “We can’t all be women of the world, Alexandra.  After all, you did have the distinct pleasure of being Gilderoy Lockhart’s bodyguard when he was in the United States, didn’t you?”

“That’s right,” said Professor Sprout.  “We saw pictures of you in the Daily Prophet escorting him around New York.  Severus simply doesn’t have Gilderoy’s tolerance for public displays of worship.”

“Oh, come on,”  said Alex,  “You can’t possibly think I had a thing for that brainless twit.  You must know that my brother stuck me with that duty because he knew I could keep Lockhart out of trouble.” 

“It did seem that you took your duty rather seriously,” said Professor McGonagall with a straight face.  Whoa!  So Minerva does have a sense of humor!, Alex thought.

“Minerva!  I get the impression you think I’m a wanton woman.  I’ve only had one other serious boyfriend.”

Minerva looked very serious for a moment, but then relaxed her face into a smile.  Alexandra was relieved.  The last thing she wanted was for anyone to think she liked Gilderoy Lockhart.  Only a flobberworm has a smaller brain than his, Alex thought.

*  *  *

For a whole day after they saw Professor Snape kiss Alex, Harry, Ron, and Hermione didn’t say a word to each other about it.  Then, as they sat in the common room that night, working on an assignment that Snape had given them the week before, Ron could no longer contain himself.

“As long as I live, I will never understand women.  She must be completely mental.  He practically tried to kill her and she . . . “

“Oh, Ron,” said Hermione, in a somewhat impatient tone of voice, “It was an accident.  She said so herself.”

“She shouldn’t have trusted him.  He’s too evil!  He’s too vile!”

Harry, who had kept quiet, looked up and said, “I’d just like to know why him and not Sirius.”

“Harry,” said Hermione hesitantly, “Why don’t you go and ask her?  She seems like a very honest person.  I’m sure she wouldn’t mind talking to you.”

“All right,” said Harry.  “I’ll go and talk to her right now.”  They watched him walk out through the portrait hole. 

Ron shook his head.  “If an ugly git like that can get a pretty woman like her to kiss him, what is this world coming to?  Next, they’ll be getting married and having a load of little greasy-haired Snapes.”

“Ron!  It’s not just about how he looks,” said Hermione.

“Well then, is it about the charming way he acts?” exclaimed Ron.

“I don’t know why, Ron, but I don’t think she would have kissed him unless she really cared for him.  She’s not a scarlet woman, after all.”  Hermione shot Ron a sideways glance.

“I’ll have to wait and see,” muttered Ron, his ears going slightly pink.

*  *  *

Harry decided to take a walk before going to Alex’s room.  He was mulling over the letter he’d received from Sirius that day.  Harry had written to him right after Alex introduced herself.  Sirius had told him that Alex was a very high-spirited girl when he knew her.  He also said that from what he’d heard from Remus Lupin, Alex had been involved in some of the biggest arrests of bad wizards by the American law enforcement division in the last eight years. 

Harry had stopped short of asking Sirius how he felt about Alex.  He reckoned Sirius understood what he wanted to know because he had answered the question anyway. 

“Harry, I’m sure you’re curious about my friendship with her.  When we were in school, she befriended your mother.  We spent time together naturally, because we were friends with Lily and James, and because she was in Gryffindor.  Actually, Snape was one of her best friends, if you can believe that.  Alex had a way of falling in with the most unlikely people and she never cared which house they were in either.  Even Filch liked her.  She got us out of a few jams with him.” 

“I was never her boyfriend at school or after.  No doubt her brother, Michael, would have killed me if I’d tried.  Alex was quite a girl, Harry, and when you were born, she seemed to love you every bit as much as her own nieces.  Give her my regards, will you?”

It wasn’t what I wanted to hear, but at least I found out that she and Snape had a past.  Maybe he wasn’t always horrible, Harry thought.

He started walking back toward Gryffindor tower, where her room was located.  He saw Snape coming out of her room and hid around the corner.  Harry peeked around and winced when he heard them talk.

“Good night, Alexandra.  You need to rest now.”

“Severus, quit fussing over me like an old lady.  I’m fine.  Good night.”  He saw Snape look down the corridor and bend down to give her a small kiss.  Harry felt his stomach churn. 

As soon as he saw that Snape was gone, Harry went up to her door and knocked.  She opened the door.  Alex was dressed in a red sweater and pants.  He wasn’t used to seeing the adults in the castle in Muggle clothes, but he thought she looked nice. 

“Hi, Harry.  Please come in,” she said to him with a big smile.

“I hope it’s not too late,” said Harry.

“Not at all.  My door’s always open to you, no matter what time it is,” she said and led him to the sofa.  “Harry, how about some hot chocolate?”

“All right, thanks.”

Alex pulled a cord near the window and a tray with two mugs of chocolate and some biscuits appeared on the table.  “Here we are.  This place is so cold all the time, we really need this, don't we?”  She handed him a mug and he took a sip.

“Alex,” Harry said a little nervously, “I  . . . well . . . “

“You want to know about Professor Snape, don’t you?”

“Yes,” he said and looked down.

“Harry,” she began, looking a little anxious, “I hope you don’t hate me now.”

“Oh no, of course not,” he said, a little too quickly.  “I just don’t understand why you like Professor Snape so much.  He’s . . . well. . .he’s always been so awful to me.”

“I know,” she said in a quiet tone.  “He was just in here telling me.  I think he was worried that you and I might have problems because of him.”

Harry was astonished.  Can it be that Snape actually cares about someone else’s feelings?  he thought.

“Harry, let me start at the beginning.  I have to admit, I have a real blind spot when it comes to Severus.  I don’t expect you to understand, but I’ll do my best to tell you why.  Severus and I were friends as children.  At least, he tolerated me after a while.  No one knows this, but he was the first boy I ever kissed.”  Harry saw Alex smile at the look of horror on his face. 

“I think the fact that we were friends is the key to our relationship now.  We really don’t have much to hide from each other.  We learned to trust one another years ago.  I know most of his flaws and he knows most of mine.  I’ve been around him when he was doing bad things and I know he’s done very good and brave things as well.  He may have a problem acknowledging and expressing his feelings, but he’s not going to play games with me and I won’t do that to him either.”

Alex took Harry’s hand and looked him in the eyes.  She went on, “The fact that he has treated you very badly is a big problem for me, Harry, and I can’t change the past.  Believe me, it really disappointed me to hear about it.  I do think I understand why he has hated you so much, though, and I don’t think he hates you now.”

Harry just stared at her.  Surely she knows I don’t believe that.  He might say anything to her to make her like him.  Alex went on. “I won’t make excuses for Severus.  He’s very rigid about rule-breaking and he demands to be treated a certain way by students.  I don’t agree with his methods, but I understand why he needs rules so much.”

“Why?” asked Harry.

“What do you mean?  Why did he hate you or why does he need rules?”

“Both, Alex.”

“OK, Harry, let me show you something.”  Alex went to her wardrobe and pulled out a photo album.  She found the page she was looking for and showed it to Harry.  There was a picture of a young Snape in his Hogwarts robes sitting next to a very pretty girl with green eyes and dark red hair.  It was his mother.

“I took this picture and I’m willing to bet my next month’s salary that Severus still has his copy.  The girl is, of course, your mother when she was a student here.  He loved her then-”

Harry cut her off, almost yelling at her,  “He can’t have loved her.  He wasn’t good enough for her and he’s not good enough for you, either!”

“Everyone deserves a chance to be loved, Harry.  Some people, of course, aren’t very lovable.  Worst of all, none of us can control who we fall for.  Severus may have cared for your mother, but she didn’t return his feelings the same way.  Thanks to my prodding and her generous heart, she spoke to him and liked him well enough, but she was always in love with your father.”  Alex smiled down at the picture of Lily, who waived at them.  Snape just scowled.

“You know, Harry, Severus was a really bright student and he played Quidditch pretty well, but James always overshadowed him.  Everyone liked James better because he was friendlier, more open, better looking, and he wasn’t a Slytherin.  Like I said, I won’t make excuses for Severus, but even back then, I felt sorry for him.  I wanted to protect him, so much so that I told James about the joke Sirius was planning to play on him when Remus was in the Shrieking Shack.”

Alex shook her head, as if the mere memory of that incident troubled her.  Then, she went on.  “As we Americans say about cowboys, Severus never wore the white hat, and no matter what he did, your dad’s group wouldn’t accept him.  I think he secretly wanted to be one of them, but he couldn’t help that he was Sorted into Slytherin.”

“What do you mean?”  I managed to stay out of Slytherin.  Maybe he just didn’t make the right choice, thought Harry.

“Harry, if you spent seven years of your life being told that you were bad, overly ambitious, cunning, and untrustworthy, what would you think of yourself?”  Harry stared at her.  “What’s more, if you spent seven years of your life being told that the Gryffindors were your enemies and rivals, and if the other students always sided with Gryffindor against your group, how do you think you would behave?”

“Badly.  They do behave badly and they are bad.  Just look at Malfoy and his friends.”

“Oh, no doubt.  Everyone is responsible for the choices they make, but I do understand what influences them in a certain direction.  And remember, almost no one is all good or all bad.  I think Severus felt very powerless in the face of the competition from James and his group.  And the Sorting Hat is right about Slytherins.  The need for power and control is a driving force in their personalities.  On the one hand, James and Sirius, and to a lesser extent, Remus, got all the glory at this school.  It was handed to them on a silver platter.  Believe me, they could be pretty arrogant at times.  Severus, on the other hand, wasn’t recognized by anyone outside of Slytherin.  Once he really started relying on that Slytherin gang, that was it.  The past influence of his family and his peer group, along with his own character flaws and insecurities, led him down the path straight to Lord Voldemort.”

“Alex, do you really think he’s turned around?”

“Yes, Harry.  Dumbledore wouldn’t trust him otherwise.  My brother knows a lot about what Severus did and is doing now for our side too.  I think his need for rules and structure are a way for him to be secure that he won’t ever go back to that side.”

“What do you think changed him?”

“I remember Severus telling me once that all of Voldemort’s followers truly believed that there was no good and no evil, just power, which the strong should always seek.  Well, I don’t think he admitted to himself how bad it was until he saw that so many were dying and that Voldemort was after Lily and James.  I know that he contacted Dumbledore at one point and started working with him before Voldemort was incapacitated.  I also happen to know that it was Severus who told Dumbledore that Lord Voldemort was after your parents.  Love is a very powerful force.  He had loved your mother and he wanted to save her, even if it meant that he had to place himself in danger.  I saw him right after James and Lily were killed and he was devastated.  He hated James when we were in school, but he never wished for him to die.” 

“That leads me, Harry, to the reason he hated you.  I say that in the past tense because I’ve spoken to Severus about you and he has admitted to me that he respects you, although he’s still hung up on that rule-breaking thing.  He also told me that you went through a terrible ordeal the night Voldemort rose again.  I think Severus is coming around and trying to understand you a little more, because the truth is, you aren’t all that different.”

Now she’s really gone too far, thought Harry.  What he was thinking must have shown on his face, because she smiled and said, “I didn’t say you were the same.  I said you aren’t that different.  You’re both very smart, very brave, and you both are independent thinkers.  You just react differently to situations.  I have to tell you, Harry, just how proud I am of you.  You’ve turned out to be a great young man, in spite of the way you were treated by your awful relatives.  I think Severus should take a page from your book.”  Alex squeezed Harry’s hand. 

She continued,  “Now Severus didn’t say anything about this to me, and maybe I shouldn’t presume to speak for him.  But, hey, I’m going to do it anyway.  My guess is he will continue to treat you badly in class because he has to.  Otherwise, it would seem suspicious to some of the members of his house, who are just a hop, skip, and a jump away from being Death Eaters like their parents.”

Harry looked at her.  It makes some sense, but I don’t know. . .  “He’s doing a good job of ‘acting’ like he hates me already this year,” said Harry angrily.

“Oh, Harry, don’t you see?  It would have been much easier for you if you hadn’t looked so much like James.  Seeing you every day, he’s reminded that the person he once loved did not love him.  She loved another man, the man whose shadow he lived in for seven years.  The man, who thanks to me, saved his life once.  But the worst blow was that he tried so hard to save all three of you, and he failed.  Every day, when he sees your scar, he sees her death and his failure written on your face.  Who among us likes to fail and then have to live with the symbol of his failure every day?”

“It’s not my fault he sees me as this symbol of his failure, is it?” Harry said even more angrily.

“No, it’s not.” she said with tears in her eyes.  She looked absolutely miserable.  Harry suddenly felt sorry for her.  She gave a little sob and he put his arm around her. 

“Alex, don’t cry.”

“Harry, it makes me so sad that I can’t just wave a wand and fix everything.  I didn’t come here planning to have a relationship with Severus.  All these years I tried to forget him.  That night I heard that your parents had been killed, I came back here looking for some connection to the past and to Lily and James.  Severus was here too.  He was so broken, so crushed.  I knew that he had tried to help.  I think I fell in love with him that night, even though I knew he still had a long road to redemption.  It seems, though, that instead of getting better, he turned all of his anger and guilt in on himself.  He cut himself off from everything and everyone.  He never wrote me.  I tried to stay in touch, but he refused.  I had to move on with my life.  At least I had one comfort.  I had you to look in on whenever I could.  Seeing you made me feel like your parents were still here and that our whole group hadn’t been decimated by the evil of Lord Voldemort.”

Alex looked at him.  Her eyes were so full of sadness and pain that it almost hurt Harry physically.  In a whisper, she said, “I still miss her, Harry.  I miss her so much.  I miss James too.”  He must have given her a pained look, because she said,  “Maybe I shouldn’t tell you that, but I want you to know how much I loved them; how much we all loved them.” 

Alex got up and went to the bathroom.  Harry could hear the water running and he thought maybe she was washing her face.  He didn’t know what to say to her.  He wished Professor Dumbledore had told him about Professor Snape and what he had done when Harry had seen Snape’s face in the Pensive last term.  Could it be that Snape was really someone different underneath all the hatred and venom?  It’s just so hard to believe.  

“Harry, I’m sorry I got so emotional.  I tend to hang it all out there, don’t I?” 

I have to say something nice to her, no matter what I think, he thought.  “Alex, if Professor Snape loves you, then won’t all his past disappointments seem pointless?  I mean, he did seem to care about you when you had the reaction in his class that day.”

“Oh, Harry.  You are your mother’s son,” she said and gave him a hug.  Please, don’t start to cry again, he thought.  “I hope so.  It all comes down to love, doesn’t it?  Love saved your life.  Maybe it will save the rest of us.”  She looked at him and smiled.  “Listen, Harry, I’m afraid I’ve kept you up too late.  I know I’ve given you a lot of information to digest.  I want you to try and get some sleep now.  Let me walk you back to Gryffindor Tower.”

She took Harry’s arm and led him to the portrait of the Fat Lady.  “Good night, Harry.”

“Good night, Alex.”

Somehow Harry felt better knowing that someone who loved his parents was nearby, even if she did like Snape.  It’s better than hearing the Dursleys talk about them.  He dug out his pictures of his parents and looked at them all before going to sleep.