Chapter Text
I don’t wanna get over you
I guess I could take a sleeping pill
And sleep at will
And not have to go through what I go through
I guess I should take Prozac, right
And just smile all night
At somebody new
Somebody not too bright but sweet and kind
Who’ll try to get you off my mind
I could leave this agony behind
Which is what what I’d do
If I wanted to
But I don’t wanna get over you
-The Magnetic Fields
Nobody should be knocking on his door, and yet there it was - a sharp, menacing tapping. His adrenaline response had already kicked in, his veins buzzing unpleasantly as he walked toward the door. He pulled his formal robes from their hook beside the door and flung them over the black woolen trousers and white button-down shirt he was wearing. He removed most of the wards, leaving the one that would hex anyone other than him fully crossing the threshold. Minerva’s yearly visit for tea had been last month, so he had no idea who this could be. He opened it a crack, wand low but pointing straight at his unexpected visitor.
She was a few years older than the last time he'd laid eyes on her, but he knew the face well - big cheeks, big hair, big brown eyes. Another shot of adrenaline went through him and he slammed the door shut, throwing the dead bolt and warding it again.
Granger. The immediate danger was handled, but this could not possibly mean anything good. He hadn’t seen her for years. What did they want from him now? And why would they send her to get it? Hadn't he given them enough?
Another sharp tap came from the door. Of course she wouldn't take the hint. Or the blaring siren and big, waving sign that said "GO AWAY." Metaphorically.
He unbolted the door and opened it widely enough to stick his head through. "Granger," he said. "Go away."
"Sir, please, I just need one little--"
He closed the door firmly again.
Before he could even step away, the sharp tap came once more.
His adrenaline was decreasing and his overriding state was settling into irritation, rather than panic. And he was feeling very, very irritated.
He cracked the door open again and said, "Granger, if you do not leave I will hex you."
"Sir, it's a simple thing, a tiny favor, a quick bit of karma."
He cracked the door a bit wider and said, "You know my karma. Do I look so deluded as to think I could ever work it off?"
She wasn't fast enough. "Er- I-"
He closed the door again, locking it and warding it. He went and sat on the couch.
The infernal woman knocked again.
He was back at the door in three long, angry strides and opened the it only wide enough to hiss, "If you touch this door one more time, I am calling the Aurors and reporting harassment."
"What if I trade you something?" she said quickly.
Snape's eyes narrowed as the crack in the door widened. "Like what?" he said in spite of himself.
"I have... some rare books. An original Pine, a Salem grimoire, lots of transfiguration stuff..."
"I am not in need of books," he sneered. His next attempt to close the door was stymied by her toe of her boot, which she jammed in between the door and the frame.
"Sir, might I just come in while we haggle?"
"I would much prefer you leave," Snape said, making sure his body was blocking the doorway so that she couldn't see into his house. His dusty, cramped, run-down, morbidly depressing house. Everything he owned had somehow become the same shade of washed-out brownish gray. He only noticed this now, when someone else could possibly see it. He didn't want anyone to see it.
"There has to be something, Sir, that you want that I could provide."
He looked skeptical. "Do you have phoenix tears?"
"No," she said quietly.
"A ghost orchid?"
"No."
"Acromantula venom." This was a bit of a gamble, as he knew she was friends with Hagrid, or at least used to be, but he was friends with Hagrid too and rarely got his hands on the stuff.
"I could make you dinner," she said hopefully.
He scoffed. "I do not need dinner," he said.
"There's nothing in the world you might need from me," she said, sounding impossibly skeptical.
The thought of the possible inclusion in this proposition of something outlandish and sexual in nature did of course occur to him, if only to give him the opportunity to forcefully reject the idea. He didn't think for a moment she was actually offering such a thing, or indeed that it had even occurred to her that anyone might think in that direction. Of course, with a leer and the right set of offensive words, he might get her off his damn porch. That was a pleasant thought.
"Of course not," he answered coldly instead. "I don't need anything from you. That is why I was sitting in my own house minding my own business."
"Sir, I need you to sign a paper saying that you taught me potions for five years and that I didn't blow anything up or maim or poison anyone. It will take you less than a minute."
His moment’s hesitation made her face all the more hopeful, and he strengthened his scowl. "What do you need that for?" he asked.
"I'm matriculating at a new program and want to skip the first year of Introductory Potions class, which I can do with the approval of my previous instructors. If you don't sign it, I'll have to essentially repeat a year, and it's a long story but that will set back my ultimate goal."
"They can't hinge the whole thing on one measly signature. What if I were dead?"
"If you were dead, the requirement would be waived. But you're not."
Hm. Was there an 'unfortunately' implied? His frown deepened even further. "What about Slughorn?"
"He's already signed that he taught me potions for a year. It took me a month to track him down, I had to eat about a pound of crystallized pineapple and he spent forty minutes interrogating me about who I'm still in touch with from the war, including the Great Harry Potter."
Snape caught his smirk just in time. He would absolutely not let the girl know that she had amused him. But he did have to admit that a signature on an educational formality was not a lot. He had been expecting some sort of quagmire of a project he'd be expected to consult on for free, or some favor that might involve the Great Harry Potter in any way.
She continued. "So there's nothing in the world you might ever need from me in the future," she said.
His eyes narrowed slightly. "Well, Granger, I would say that is a different proposition altogether."
"A signature in exchange for a favor to be named later, then?"
One of his eyebrows rose slightly.
She frowned. "Within reason."
"Have you ever found me reasonable, Granger?"
He didn't know what answer to expect to that, and he didn't get one. She just looked at him.
"I will be right back. Stay here. Unless you lose interest, in which case leave, I don't care."
He closed the door in her face again. He summoned a fresh piece of parchment and a biro from his writing desk, hunching at the kitchen table to write up a quick agreement.
She was still standing on the step when he opened the door back up, and he handed the parchment to her.
She frowned as she read aloud. "I, Hermione Granger, hereby pledge to render to Severus Snape one favor to be named at the time of his choosing. Such favor will be mutually agreed-upon and will fall, according to Hermione Granger's good-faith assessment, no higher than a seven on a scale of onerousness measured one (lowest) to ten (highest). The favor will not include any behaviors or situations that the parties mutually agree would be likely to maim, kill, humiliate, or emotionally scar either party."
Snape had already signed and dated the agreement.
She stared at it, apparently deep in thought, then held her hand out for the biro. He handed it to her and she signed, bending down to use her thigh as a hard surface for her signature. It glowed blue slightly and then dimmed again. She silently handed him her parchment, already containing the statement about her non-disastrous performance in his Potions class, and he cast a quick curse-detection spell over it and then signed it against the wall of his front room.
She traded him the parchment he had just signed for the parchment with the favor agreement. He tapped it with his wand once, twice, and then handed her the copy that had appeared. "I have charmed it so that when I wish to redeem the favor, it will chime and display a message about how I would like to redeem it. Can we agree that I can expect a response within 24 hours of that notification?"
Hermione nodded. She rolled up the parchments together, tied them with a length of conjured ribbon, and stowed the bundle in her handbag.
"Thank you, Sir," she said.
"I believe someday I shall have occasion to thank you," Snape said, smiling for the first time. He closed the door in her face again.
Humming to himself, he walked into the kitchen at the back of the house. After dawning as bleak and dreary as all the others, this day had taken quite the interesting turn. He pulled one of his stronger magnets off of the fridge (this one advertising an ironmonger's that ceased trading sometime in the late 1980s) and stuck the parchment to it with a pleased little smile.