Note: The fact that this story is over just breaks my heart. As much as I'm convinced that Louisa and I would not get along in real life, I've enjoyed writing her and Severus' story, and I hope you all have enjoyed reading it.

As a final disclaimer, only Louisa belongs to me, the rest is the property of J.K. Rowling.

As a final credit, all of the story titles are taken from the lyrics to songs by the group Rilo Kiley, with the exception of this chapter, which is titled after an Amy Winehouse song (cover?) that reminds me of where the story ends.

I have also taken an absurd amount of inspiration from John R. Parsons' photographs of the stunning Jane Morris sitting in a wicker chair. Anyone who is interested in knowing what Louisa would have looked like need only Google these photos.

Most importantly, thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed this story over the years, and who inspired me to finish it.

Our day will come
If we just wait a while
No tears for us
Make love and wear a smile

Late Summer/Early Autumn, 1998

Twenty-four hours later, Severus was acquitted. It was an outcome he had never dreamed of, never dared to hope for. The Daily Prophet would later credit Louisa's testimony with his salvation, while simultaneously lamenting that she could not have been prosecuted in Severus' stead.

With his freedom, however, Severus was struck by the revelation that he had nowhere to go - no home to return to. It was Minerva McGonagall who met him as he exited his Ministry cell, clutching a meager knapsack of his belongings, and it was Minerva who brought him back to Hogwarts.

As headmistress, she would, she told him, reinstate him as Potions Master eventually. Horace Slughorn was eager to re-enter his retirement, but the transition would have to be gradual to avoid alarming oversensitive parents. For the time being, Severus would serve as adjunct faculty.

He was surprised at how easy it was to re-adjust to life at Hogwarts but, though it seemed like a lifetime ago, it had only been a few months since he had left.

In the weeks before the term started and before the school was inundated with students, Severus settled into an easy pattern - walking the Hogwarts grounds in the early mornings, before the late summer heat set in, and spending his afternoons in the school's cool, underground potions laboratory. He even resumed research he had begun years ago, before life became irreversibly complicated.

Despite his acquittal, his colleagues ignored him with a fierce determination. Even Minerva remained hesitant to be seen speaking to him publicly. Though he had been shunned before, Severus found himself confronted for the first, real time with infinite loneliness and determined to prepare himself for a lifetime of solitude.

Severus was at the school for three weeks before he saw her again. He had spent the morning buried in the empty, silent stacks of the Hogwarts library. Finally selecting three heavy, hundred-year-old tomes with long passages on the history of the Draught of the Living Death, Severus made his way to the library's front desk, anticipating nothing more than a brief exchange with the officious, unpleasant Madam Pince. Instead, his wife was seated in her place, taking his books with a small smile of recognition and filling in his name and the date on their book cards.

The exchange happened so quickly and unceremoniously that Severus nearly gathered his books and left, as planned. But then, at the last moment, he stalled.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded in a harsher tone than he had intended.

"Madam Pince retired," she stated simply. On his confused stare, she continued, "You remember I helped her when we were here. When she left, McGonagall asked me to come back. Not like anyone else would have me, anyway." She flashed a wry smile.

"How long have you been here?"

She shrugged, "A few weeks."

"Did you know I was here?"

She hesitated for a moment, then nodded, looking away.

His face fell, "I see."

It felt terrible. Like they were two strangers meeting. Like she had never been Evan's sister, never been his wife, never been the woman he loved.

Unable to look at her, he nodded a goodbye, gathered his books and turned to the door.

She stood suddenly, her hands perched on the desk before her.

"Severus," he turned back, and her mouth hung open wordlessly for a moment. "I'm sorry. I should have said something earlier."

A pause settled between them, their eyes were locked together, each trying desperately to read the other.

"H-How have you been?," Louisa finally asked in a barely audible voice.

"Well. And you?"

"Fine, thank you."

Another silence threatened them, but instead Severus nodded in recognition, turned and left quickly, black robes billowing behind him.

Two days later, Severus began his morning walk as usual. Thoughts of Louisa, of what he had lost, of what little he had to look forward to, had plagued him day and night since he saw her in the library, but he had insisted on keeping his new schedule in hopes of bringing order to his disordered life.

On this morning, though, he decided to change his usual course, walking east around the lake, on a path that would, if followed to its end, lead to Hogsmeade and the Shrieking Shack.

The lake shone silver in the early morning light. The air was still crisp, but golden light filtered through the trees above, foretelling a warm afternoon.

Severus was nearly a quarter of the way around the lake when he saw Louisa. She sat near the water's edge on a grass-covered embankment, her violet-colored robes drawn around her. Though the sight of her made his gut twist in apprehension, he couldn't help smiling. While the students of Hogwarts, and even some of its staff had taken to wearing Muggle clothes outside of school hours, Louisa would never.

She heard him approach and looked up.

"May I join you?" he asked, surprising himself.

Her lips curved into a shy smile. She nodded.

He sat down beside her.

Severus cleared his throat, "Why aren't you at breakfast?"

She looked at him, one eyebrow raised. "Why aren't you?"

"Fair enough," he smiled in spite of himself.

She sighed, staring straight ahead. "They hate us."

"Always have."

"I really am sorry about before," she said, her eyes never leaving the water in front of them. "I've been thinking about...everything, and-" She stopped and looked at him and he met her gaze. "I don't see why we can't be friends, don't you think?"

The proposal made his heart soar and his head spin. It would be enough, he thought, just to be near her again, and to know that she wanted him there. He couldn't trust himself to speak, so he simply nodded. They spent the morning together there, by the lake, and walked back to the castle side by side.

Summer finally faded into autumn. Leaves changed colors and hoards of students, new and old, filled the school.

While the weather held out, Severus and Louisa met every morning by the lake before classes started. In talking to her, Severus found himself truly listening for the first time. For the first time, he wasn't burdened by thoughts of Lily or distracted by his own insistence on distancing himself from her.

He learned that she was writing a history of the Hogwarts library. He read her drafts and discovered that she was a skilled writer. She reviewed his potions research and he found that she understood it easily, and better than he expected.

Together, without the looming specter of Lily, Louisa and Severus were relaxed, familiar, peaceful. Yet Severus felt an acute sense of loss, without knowing that Louisa felt it too. While they reveled in their newfound companionship, they both grieved in silence for the loss of years when they could have been happy together.

When the weather worsened, he visited her in the library. The older students, the students who had been at Hogwarts during the last two, awful years and followed the Death Eater trials, watched them interact carefully. Every time Severus leaned a little too casually against her desk or elicited a genuine smile or a barely-stifled laugh from Louisa, a new spate of rumors spread through the student body and around the faculty lounge.

On one such visit, when the library was empty except for a sixth-year couple who had disappeared and who Louisa and Severus strongly suspected were feeling each other up in the stacks, Severus picked up her nameplate. It was an item he noticed on each visit, but had never had the courage to mention.

"Still 'Madam Snape'?" he asked, running his fingers across the engraved name.

"That's what it says. Do you object?" She was looking up at him from the desk with a teasing half-smile, but her eyes were wary.

When Louisa was hired, McGonagall had known that her testimony at Severus' trial was false and told her so. She had seen Louisa forgo food and rest to keep a constant vigil by Severus' hospital bed. Nonetheless, she had asked her if she wanted to return to using her maiden name. Louisa had refused, saying that she was simply accustomed to her married name, but privately she believed it was all she had left of him. All she had to prove it had all been real.

Severus' expression grew serious and the smile faded from Louisa's face.

"Not at all," he said quietly, setting the nameplate down and straightening it so that it sat parallel to the edge of her desk.

Together, they found that they cared less and less about the opinions of others, appearing together and sitting next to each other at the few meals they attended and whispering conspiratorially to each other in the back row of faculty meetings. They became each others' refuge against a castle full of detractors.

That Christmas, Horace Slughorn invited the entirety of the faculty to his annual party, and Severus and Louisa were invited by default. They arrived together. Each tried, independently and valiantly, to engage their colleagues and students in honest, natural conversation, and each failed miserably. Members from both groups abruptly excused themselves for invented reasons or outright turned their backs.

The couple eventually found themselves alone together in an abandoned corner of the room, spiking their pumpkin juice with pours from a flask of firewhiskey, mocking everyone who had rejected them. Their only visitor was Minerva, who spent seven minutes talking to them about the weather.

Severus' head swam as they made their way back to the dungeons under the lake. He couldn't quite remember leaving the party, but now Louisa was leaning against him as they walked, and he could feel her warm body under his arm. She was laughing and the sound echoed in the empty, stone hallways and then he was laughing too.

She shushed him loudly and stage whispered, "Here's where I live." She unlocked the door to her chamber and pulled him in behind her. "Come on, quick!"

She closed the door behind him. "I can't be in here." He could hear that his voice was slow and slurred.

"Don't worry, I'm allowing you," she said as she started up the fireplace and poured two glasses of elf-made wine.

The firelight made her skin glow. She had never looked more beautiful to him, all dark, heavy-lidded eyes and full, curving lips. She had been his and now she wasn't. His heart grew heavy, his balance faltered, and he sank to his knees.

Louisa saw him fall and cried out in exaggerated concern. Hurrying to his side, she stumbled onto him, sitting astride his lap with acres of fabric between them. Her arms were around his neck and her face was above his. "Are you alright?" His hands went to her waist to steady her.

She was so close, warm, and alive, and he had wanted her like this, in his arms, for months. By the way she grew suddenly quiet and dipped her head ever so slightly towards his, his dulled mind began to suspect that his feelings were reciprocated. Despite the bunched robes between them, he felt her hips move against his, and any resolve he might have had was destroyed.

They moved toward each other simultaneously, their mouths meeting in the middle. Her tongue stroked his and he began clawing at her skirts until they were gone and only the fabric of her underwear and his pants separated them. His hands gripping her hips, he thrust up against her, suddenly feeling himself barely contained. She moaned into his mouth. Her fingers gripped his shoulders, then moved to undo his cravat and the cloth-covered buttons leading down his jacket.

It took a full minute of frantic unbuttoning, unclasping, and unlacing until Severus was bare-chested beneath her. Her fingers and lips traced the familiar lines of scars and explored for the first time the mottled, poisoned flesh of his throat and left shoulder.

Severus had undone the back of her dress and pulled it down over her shoulders and off her arms. The corset beneath it was plain and white, with blue embroidered vines along the bustline. He recognized it. He had seen it countless times and had thought he would never see it again. Severus was overcome; he felt as though his heart might burst. With trembling fingers, he tore at the corset's laces and tossed it to the floor, pressing his bare chest against hers.

For Louisa, it was like being dunked in a tank of cold water. The fog in her mind cleared; she gasped and pushed against him, standing up and stumbling backward. Her robes were around her waist, her arms covered her breasts, her face buried in her palms.

What am I doing What am I doingshe sobbed.

Severus leapt to his feet, crossing the room in what felt like a single step. His hands wrapped around her upper arms.

"What? What is it?"

She looked up at him, her face flushed and tear-stained, her voice weak and uneven. "We can't do this again. Not ever."

"Louisa-"

Her breathing was growing strained and ragged.

"You can't hurt me again. I can't let you."

Her stared at her, horrified, for a moment, then pulled her against him. She went limp, sobbing against his shoulder.

When her breathing slowed again and her shoulders stopped shaking, she murmured "Please, go" and he did.

Severus spent a sleepless night in his own chambers and was summoned to the Headmistress' office early the next morning.

Minerva told him that she was assigning him as a tutor to a group of advanced sixth and seventh years who had the potential to advance far beyond the confines of Slughorn's class. He agreed, still feeling dazed and distracted from the events of the night before.

"Are you alright, Severus?" Minerva asked him, her green eyes wide and sympathetic.

"I'm fine," came his reply, though the dark circles under his eyes told a different story.

Minerva examined him carefully, then cast a surreptitious glance at Dumbledore's portrait. She swallowed. "And Louisa? How has she been settling in?"

Severus rose from his seat, realizing that she had no more business to discuss.

"You'll have to ask her," he snarled, as he strode towards the door.

That afternoon he met with the advanced potions group. The group was composed of six students he recognized as the most talented he had taught at Hogwarts: three Ravenclaws, two Slytherins, and a Gryffindor.

As he took his place at the head of the otherwise-empty classroom, he addressed them, "As you may know, Headmistress McGonagall has requested that I tutor you in potions. I'm sure none of you are happy about it, but I assure you it was not my decision."

He turned to begin writing formulas on the chalkboard.

Behind him, the students exchanged glances. A seventh-year Slytherin boy finally spoke up.

"We requested you, Professor."

Severus turned, glaring at him in confusion.

He continued, "The only time we ever learned anything about potions was from you. Slughorn's rubbish."

A sixth-year Ravenclaw girl with blonde hair and a northern accent chimed in, "And we don't care what everyone says, we think you did right in the war."

Severus felt his chest constrict. He knew that the old Severus, master-of-espionage Severus, who hid who he was at all times, would sling back a sarcastic retort. But he wasn't that person anymore.

"Thank you," he said quietly, looking at the ground.

The class' single Gryffindor, a seventh-year boy who had even been in Dumbledore's Army, spoke next.

"Are you still with herthough? People say they see you together, but -"

"That," Severus cut him off, "is no one's business." He looked at their faces and knew that they had fallen for Louisa and Narcissa's ruse. He decided to start a rumor of his own. He smiled mysteriously. "You can't always believe what you read in the papers. Or in court transcripts."

Neither Severus nor Louisa appeared at dinner that night. Severus spent the evening pacing his room, his mind a jumble of thoughts. Finally, at nearly midnight, Severus found himself at Louisa's door.

She was clad in a nightgown and robe, her feet were bare. He hadn't bothered to realize that it was nearly midnight. She stepped aside, and he entered, turned to face her and launched into the apology he had rehearsed for the past half-hour.

"Please allow me to apologize for last night. You know I never drink and I don't know what came over me. It was unforgivable." He raced through it, his nerves getting the better of him. When Louisa remained silent, he prepared to continue his mea culpa. Her hand on his arm stopped him.

"It's alright." She smiled the sad, understanding smile he had grown accustomed to seeing, "You weren't exactly alone."

She was so close, and even though he shouldn't have, he couldn't help bringing a hand to cup her jaw, his thumb brushing her cheek. "I made a promise to Evan, and to you," her heart stopped, as it always did when he mentioned her brother, "that I would always keep you safe and happy, and I've done such a miserable job. God, think of what he'd do to me if he had any idea of what I've put you through."

Despite his attempt at levity, Louisa could see that his eyes were starting to glisten in the dim light and she brought her hands up to touch his, pressing her cheek into his warm palm.

She said nothing, so he continued. "I swear to you now, though," he was on a roll, bending his head closer to her, filling the gap between them, bringing his other hand to the other side of her face, "I swear to you, Louisa, I won't hurt you again. I won't." By the end of his oath, she had wrapped her arms around his neck and his arms were around her waist, his face buried in the crook of her neck. "Things are different now. I'mdifferent. You changed me."

Her hand stroked the back of his neck. "I know."

They held each other for a long while. Then, she pulled back slightly. "It's late," she murmured.

He moved away, his hands still on her waist. His eyes were dry, but spots on his cheeks glinted in the candlelight.

His heart dropped and he struggled to keep his expression neutral. "I'll let you sleep, then."

"Stay."

Her bedroom was smaller than his, but neat. She hung her robe on a hook and slid under the covers. Stripped to his boxers, Severus followed her.

Moments later, in the dark and quiet, she led him to wrap his arms around her, his front meeting her back.

She had just fallen asleep when he felt his arms, almost of their own volition, tighten around her. She pressed against him without opening her eyes, still striving for rest after the long, sleepless night before.

She was only vaguely aware of his presence as he burrowed through her unruly, sleep-mangled hair to rest his chin on the curve between her neck and shoulder.

She heard him sigh, a sound made louder by his proximity to her ear. In that moment, Severus felt somehow lighter, almost giddy, feeling freer than he had in years, even decades. Louisa's skin was soft under his fingers, her hair touched his face lightly, her legs shifted, brushing his, and he could wait no longer.

"Louisa?"

A sleepy grunt answered him.

He felt the words bubbling up in his chest. He could have shouted them in his sudden exhilaration, but he knew that it was too sacred for that.

"I love you."

Her eyelids lifted and she turned to face him in the dark.

"What?" her voice was soft and groggily slurred.

Under her gaze, he felt strangely nervous. Where a moment ago he had been filled with courage and inspiration, he was suddenly awkward, hesitant, exposed.

"You…you heard me before," he stammered, punctuating his assertion with a huff for emphasis.

By the tone of his voice, she almost could have believed that she had imagined it, but his fingers were tracing her collarbone and she could practically feel his rapid heart beat where their chests met.

"Maybe I didn't," she countered. But she had, and it made her expression split into an impossibly wide grin.

He sighed again, a sound loaded with resignation and insuppressible devotion.

"I'm in love with you," he caught his breath, "Louisa."

The only thing she could do to stop herself from crying was to take his face in her hands and raise her lips to his.

After a few breathless minutes, Severus pulled himself away from her, gently at first, then more assertively.

She looked at him silently, terrified at the thought that something had gone wrong.

He swallowed, not meeting her eyes.

"Aren't you—I thought—Shouldn't you…say it back?"

A jolt of insecurity flashed through him. Since she left the hospital so many months ago, since he had first been sure of his feelings for her, he had grown steadily more unsure of her feelings for him.

She said it back instantaneously, pulling him back against her.

By the time they finally allowed each other to sleep, they had made seven such declarations and reciprocations. Severus had counted them all.