Chapter 12

The Happy Ending

Harry

Harry went to his apartment. He figured he'd find him there, seeing as that was where he lived.

He kicked at the soft, wet snow on the street and glanced up at his window. It was dark and cold outside, and the light was on in Snape's flat and Harry knew it would be warm and nice there, still he considered staying outside. He wondered what Snape would say if he found him lying frozen to death on his front steps, but couldn't come up with the answer.

Harry allowed himself a cigarette as he waited for that Gryffindor courage to appear in his gut. It didn't. He sucked on his cigarette till it was just filter, and he still didn't want to go up there. He sighed and flicked the cigarette into the snow and watched as the glow went out.

He couldn't do this. He couldn't walk up there like nothing had happened, like they were going to spend an afternoon in bed like before. He couldn't.

It started to snow. Harry reached his hand out and caught a snowflake, and it melted on his palm. He shook his head and his entire body seemed to slump together. He couldn't. He...

"Harry?"

Harry turned around and there he was. Just as bad boy and irresistible as before. His stomach twisted up in a knot just looking at him.

"Yeah?" Harry said, like it was a coincidence they'd bumped into each other just outside Snape's apartment.

"Come upstairs", he said, and Harry realised how much he'd missed his voice. He wanted to touch him so bad, and at the same time, he wanted to scream at him and hit him.

"All right", he settled with and left the snow and the cold outside to the warmth of Snape's flat. The place smelled just like he'd remembered it, like a mixture of that soap Snape used and the dark, dusty smell of a potions lab. Harry remembered a time he'd showered at Snape's house and gone around smelling like him for days.

"You can sit, if you like", Snape said, and Harry did. He settled in the couch and managed to take up all of it, to make sure Snape understood to sit in one of the armchairs instead. He got the hint and sat awkwardly opposite from Harry.

"I'm so sorry", he started, but Harry's expression must have stopped him from saying anything else.

"Yeah", Harry mumbled. His anger was starting to come back, so he decided to talk about something else. "Where were you going just now?"

Snape was still wearing his thick, winter cloak. "I was, um, going to your flat."

"Oh. I had good timing, then."

Or bad. Depending on how you looked at it and how this conversation went.

"Yes", he said, and started to slide his cloak off. When he was done, he looked at Harry with those black - no, dark brown - eyes. "Did you get my letter?"

"Yeah, I got it."

Snape looked down at the table. "I don't suppose you read it?"

"No", Harry just said.

"Will you let me explain now?"

Harry's stomach was hurting so bad that he was seriously wondering if there was something wrong with him. Would he? Why would he have come here otherwise?

"Go ahead", he said and Snape swallowed. He seemed as nervous as when they'd first kissed.

And he told him all about how screwed up he was when he was younger, how he had seen Voldemort as a way away from his family and his bullies and everyone else who looked down on him. And then when he'd seen what Voldemort could do with his own eyes, he'd hated it. He'd hated himself. Snape told him how he'd worked for the light side almost the entire year before Voldemort's fall, and that he'd then taken the opportunity to get away from everything.

"I never hurt anyone", he said. "I want you to know that. I never killed anyone, or... or anything else."

"Well, that makes it okay, then", he grumbled, that little monster inside him wanting to rip him to pieces.

"No, it doesn't. I know that."

"You know, lots of people have messed up childhoods, but they don't go off to join Voldemort", Harry bit out, feeling only a little unfair. He felt bad when he saw Snape flinch at the name.

"I know. But I did", he said, and he sounded weak, and extremely sorry. "I don't know what kind of a person that makes me, but... I've bettered myself. I'm not that person anymore."

So he'd changed. What a fucking cliché.

"And you couldn't have told me this?" Harry asked. "I had to find out from my dad?"

"I'm sorry about that. I should have told you, I just... I didn't think about it. And you... When I realised I hadn't told you about that part of my past, it was, well... It was too late. You would have been just as angry with me if it had been me who had told you."

"Not if you had explained it like this", Harry said and fiddled with the hem of his shirt. "But now I got a pissed of father yelling that you were like the devil himself."

Snape smiled cautiously, and Harry returned it.

"Am I forgiven?" he asked and Harry looked down at his hands.

"Do you understand how hard this is for me? How much of a hypocrite it will make me to forgive you?" he asked and Snape just looked at him. "I'm practically the poster boy for the light side."

But in reality, Harry didn't care if it made him the biggest hypocrite in the world. He loved him. Even if he was angry at him for not telling him sooner, at the same time he was happier now than he'd been in months.

"I understand that", Snape said, and he moved from his seat to a sort of half standing, half kneeling position on the floor by the couch. His hand came up to Harry's and Harry kept his eyes on their intwined fingers instead of his pleading eyes.

Harry realised he could just let it go. He could just let his stomach relax and untwine that uncomfortable knot and kiss him. So he did.

/

The fire was coming along nicely. His dad always insisted that they barbecued the muggle way (it made it taste better, somehow) and that usually took ages. But it was right in time. Harry suspected that after an hour had passed with nothing but smoke, Snape had used his wand behind his dad's back. And dad would never know.

It was early for a barbecue, only March, but they'd gone ahead anyway. The weather was perfect, even if it got a little chilly in the afternoon.

Everyone was there, in the back yard. His parents, Alice, Hermione, Ron, Sirius, Remus. And of course, Snape.

"How's it going?" Harry asked his dad, who of course was on cooking service.

"Great. Although Harry, you might wanna stay between your little boyfriend and Sirius, because they look like they're gonna tear each other to shreds", he said, and squinted over to the table, where Sirius and Snape were glaring at each other.

"Oh, they're fine", Harry said dismissively and poked a beef with a fork. Some juice seeped out and crackled against the coal.

His dad shrugged. "Don't come running to me when they start losing ears and toes."

Harry laughed and left to go get the vegetables and side dishes. The house was dark compared to outside, and Harry had to take a while to get his eyes used to it.

Hermione and Ron were in the kitchen, kissing. Harry made a big deal of stomping his feet and they stopped and looked up at him with red cheeks.

"Hey, we're not paying you to snog. Start chopping tomatoes, house-elves", Harry said and Hermione rolled her eyes.

"You don't pay house-elves, Harry. That's the whole deal", she said and then added, "And that's a really offensive thing to say."

Ron nodded when Hermione looked at him sharply. "Yeah, Harry. Not funny. And besides, aren't I too handsome to be a house-elf?"

Hermione hit his chest with a serious face and Harry suspected he'd gotten Ron in trouble.

He snuck out the door again and returned to the table without any vegetables.

"What are we talking about?" Harry asked and slumped in his chair between Snape and Uncle Remus.

"School", Sirius said, and sounded gleeful.

"Sirius is just being an idiot", Remus said, and glared at his friend.

"What?" Sirius said with a small, nasty laugh. "I was just saying it's incredible how little things have changed since then."

"Hm", Harry said, thoughtfully. "Were you a dick then as well?"

Sirius' smile faded, but Snape started chuckling.

"He was", he mumbled and Harry smiled and leaned over and kissed him slowly, just to make Sirius go red and start to blubber things about food and unhygienic activities.

"Shut up, Padfoot", Remus said and then they started to bicker. Harry didn't mind. They'd eventually settled down, and serve the food (which would in fact be ridiculously good) and people would try to be nice to each other, which was really all Harry could ask for. And afterwards they could all go home, and Harry could go to his flat, and Snape could come with him.

"What are you grinning at?" Snape mumbled next to Harry's ear, and Harry turned to him, his grin not diminishing the slightest.

"Oh, nothing", he said and kissed him, again making Sirius burst out in halfhearted protests that everyone ignored.

A/N: There, finished. I thought it would be fitting to upload it on the day I saw the last movie. I'm in a sort of numbed shock, I think. (I won't spoil it for those of you who haven't seen it.)

Comments and reviews are always appreciated!