Insomnia Has Its Perks

AN: So… I am the world's worst person.

I am so sorry! I got so busy with everything going on in my life, which I could honestly make excuses for days about but instead am just going to get to the part where I apologize profusely and remind everyone that I'm not abandoning these stories, I'm just… putting them on tiny holds.

I am bound and determined to finish these, though! And soon, hopefully… I've been working on them for way too long now and none of you deserve to not see the end.

I can't promise it'll be soon, but it will be!

This chapter is not as long as the usual, and I'm still not sure if I like the last half of it, but it's sort of an interlude which shall lead to bigger, better things.

From here on I essentially have the rest of the fic planned out, I just had to get over a few speed bumps between previously decided upon plot points. Also I'm trying to get back into the swing of writing my two favorite boys, so any criticism, however terrible and mean-spirited, shall be appreciated! :D

See you at the finish line,

Yours truly,

ForeverJynxed

Chapter 9: Detentions, Angry Redheads and Forgetfulness

"So, I know it's none of my business, but… why a Professor? You don't exactly strike me as the 'Willingly assists children' type." Harry waved his wand, guiding the broom at the back of the room as it swept away the remnants of the day's potions lesson.

"You're right, Potter. It is none of your business." Snape raised an eyebrow in challenge to Harry, daring him to take his well offered bait. Harry rose to the occasion, as per usual.

Snape was grading stacks of parchment, now covered in as much red ink as they were black. He and Harry had been nonchalantly holding a conversation for the past hour, as was the norm for Harry's detentions.

"Oh, come on, Snape. You could have done so much with your life, but you chose to go back to Hogwarts?" With a few flicks he stopped the broom and vanished the pile of dirt. "To teach?"

Snape rolled his eyes back toward his essays and released an exasperated sigh. "Potter, do you not have something better to do than pester me?"

"Nope." Harry hopped off of the desk he was sitting on and sauntered up to his usual desk, the one he always seemed to end up in by the end of his detentions. "I'm in a detention, Professor. Therefore I am to pester the Professor in charge of me. It's written in the unofficial student bylaws." Harry gave him his best, sarcastic, shit-eating grin.

Snape glanced up at Harry and did a double-take at the look on his face. He then heaved a sigh, threw his quill back into its ink pot and shoved his stack of essays aside. With hands steepled before him, he replied, eyes glaring Harry down. "You are not going to let this go, are you?"

"Correct. I'm a Gryffindor, Snape. If there's anything we're good at it's being stubbornly persistent."

"Yes, particularly when the end result is your possible hexing." He tsked and pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. "What was it you wanted to know, again? My brain is too full of students misclassifying the quills of some animal that I am now unsure as to its origin due to too many errors swimming through my mind."

"See? This is my exact point. Teaching? Why? When you became a spy, that I understand, but wanting this job is sort of what inadvertently led to the whole spy thing, so why?" Harry knew he was prying, and that by prying he was plucking rather rudely at the strenuous truce they had during his detentions. Still, he couldn't help but ask. He had been hearing nothing but speeches from his classmates and Remus over the past week about how great a teacher he would make. Honestly, they were starting to make him wonder… would it be worth letting everyone down and not being an Auror? Or perhaps what he said to Remus was true and he could use it for retirement?

His head was swimming with doubts he had not had a month previous. Something had changed. He was worried that something may be glaring at him over his hands for bringing up, even in a round about way, Harry's mother and her death.

Her murder.

Along with my father, his mind added, annoyed.

"As you know, I had initially requested to be the Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor. Well, we both know how well that turned out. Spys don't get handed cursed jobs. Albus thought it was better that I fill Horace's empty space in the staffing. I had sworn loyalty to Albus by that point, was more than proficient in Potions, and was still… I might even call it hopeful that all of my plans would be fulfilled. That I could…" the unspoken words rang between them.

That he could save Lily. That he could still live a happy life. That he would not fail as he had so many times before… and so many more times since.

"Well, at any rate, the role stuck. Also being Head of House first thing was both convenient and rather annoying. I could keep an eye out on my Slytherins, ensure they were not taking the Mark or look over them if they did. It was a win-win. As Albus reminded me. At least once a week." Snape's smile was wry as he brought up his old friend.

"When The Dark Lord fell… You know the rest of the story from here already, Potter." His face closed off then, his mask back in place so wholly Harry almost thought he had imagined everything he had just said.

"I do know the rest. But that's not what I asked. I meant before that, Snape. What I want is what led you to having the opportunity to hear that prophecy? What made you want to interview for a post as a Professor at that moment? Why Hogwarts? You could have done anything. Brewed potions, been a healer, brewed potions for the healers at St. Mungo's. Hell, even written new Potions textbooks with all of the knowledge you had that others didn't. Or, hell, inventing new spells! Anything but teaching. Why. Teaching?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"I asked you first."

"Ah. Stumbled upon a Potter problem, have I? Rethinking your life plans?"

"No. Yes. I mean- No. I am not. Just... considering other options. That's all."

"Potter. Please do me a favor. Do not get stuck here. It's far too easy to become complacent. Comfortable, even. And the Wizarding World needs its big hero out there catching dark arts masters, not teaching their children how to defend themselves from it."

Just like that the tension in the air had ebbed away. Harry pointedly refused to acknowledge that Snape's words were exactly what he needed to hear.

"Are you sure you can't read minds?"

"No comment."

Harry threw his sponge at Snape. It bounced off his desk.

Snape just stared at him, changing out a new stack of tests for the ones he had finished coating in red ink.

"You have terrible aim."

Detentions were slowly becoming Harry Potter's favorite part of his day.

Classes were dull and boring in comparison. Even Seamus accidentally setting Dean on fire in Defense couldn't top his time in detention.

Harry knew there must be something wrong with him around the time he found himself almost giddy on the way to his detention with Snape. On Thursday, Ron even asked him if he was really going to detention or just ducking out of the castle for the night, because he wasn't nearly as distraught and destroyed as he should be at the prospect of another night of cleaning cauldrons.

Harry wasn't, though. This was Harry's norm now, his little bit of peace, and he could not remember a time when he had felt as comfortable as he was in the dungeons.

It had only been a few days, but those few days seemed a month. Each night, Harry would appear at the required time, be given some task or another and set off to work. He would be cleaning cauldrons or organizing the potion supplies, Snape would be grading essays, grumbling as he flipped through sheets of parchment.

They would start working, everything going swimmingly, but eventually one of them would say something, a grumble or a comment, and off they went.

They would just… talk. They would spend the rest of the detentions talking about nothing in particular, just trivial things like Snape's students' abysmal grasp on the English language, Longbottom's rise to what Snape could begrudgingly call excellence and Harry filling Snape in on the Chudley Cannons, why he knew so much about them, and why they were obviously not winning the Quidditch World Cup that next year.

Inane topics, yet the talking worked similarly to sleeping for them. It was odd, but just being able to ramble on about nothing in particular, arguing as only they could about almost everything yet knowing it was more about their differences as humans rather than hatred of one another as humans, it helped. They used one another to vent their frustrations, but in a much healthier way than before.

Their sleep became of a better quality as well, and both seemed much less tense.

Though, nothing changed in regards to their sleeping arrangements. The moment the detention would end and they went their separate ways, it was as if whatever wall there was between them that limited their interaction and conversation would settle itself back into its normal place.

Their nights were silent. The sleep was much deeper than before, Harry having not a single nightmare, and yet there was the realization, that their talks would be over with the detentions.

Harry, not for the first time in his life, then did something rather stupid because, at the time, it sounded like the best plan. It would, however, come to bite him in the arse.

"Harry, what do you mean you have another detention? I thought those were over! How irresponsible can you be, we have Quidditch practice tonight!" Ginny was livid.

"You were there when Snape gave them to me, Gin, don't tell me you've already forgotten." Harry was already tired of the reactions from his teammates.

Slowly through the day Harry had had to inform every member of the Gryffindor Quidditch team that he was to be unable to make it to their final practice before their match against Ravenclaw that Saturday. Normally it would the be job of the Captain to give everyone bad news on the player's behalf, but since Harry was the Captain he had to take every ounce of hate and indignation.

"Yes, and I'll be there when you get out of it! Harry, do you have any idea how long it's been since Gryffindor won the Cup?"

"Yes, Ginny. Contrary to popular belief, I was partially responsible for that and am not an idiot." Harry honestly did love that he and Ginny were on speaking terms yet again. Since that day she confided in Harry about her relationship with Draco, the cinders that were there friendship had been rekindled, slowly becoming the fire they used to have.

Much like Harry's newfound (what could only be called) kinship with Snape. That day in the potions classroom, the now fabled detention to him, he realized his getting punished was the best thing to happen to him. That entire week of detentions had been pretty fantastic.

Not that he liked Snape any better, or Snape changed his way of thinking in regard to him. Not at all. Which was exactly why Harry began cherishing his punishments.

Snape. The only man to treat him like a bug under his shoe. Since the war, that had been something Harry found himself sorely missing.

Ginny sighed, trying hard to avoid another Weasley temper tantrum, "I never said you were, Harry. It's just that, why can you never have detention on a night when we don't have Quidditch?! It's like you plan them!"

For the first time, Harry could honestly say that Ginny was, in fact, correct. His first week of detentions with Snape had already ended and passed, Snape had even made it seven entire days instead of just the school days. Harry had a problem with letting them go, though, so that Tuesday morning, with the thought of no more detentions running through his brain, Harry had willfully disrupted the class, talking back and challenging Snape once more in his own classroom.

Snape had given him four days of detention, Tuesday to Friday, Harry stopping his diatribe about Snape being unfair just in time to be free the day of the Gryffindor versus Ravenclaw match. Four more days of detention, that was all he asked.

He had not thought about the fact that two of those days were supposed to be Quidditch practices. The memory of that came afterward when Ron smacked him in the back of the head, yelling about how stupid that was, "Even by your standards, mate! It's like you don't even care about Quidditch!" Ron had been begrudgingly annoyed with him since then, as well. Weasleys take their Quidditch seriously.

Harry had to admit, though, for once he found something that meant more to him than Quidditch.

He pointedly ignored, yet again, that that thing was Snape.

Harry eventually calmed Ginny down with promises of early morning practices Thursday and Friday and was allowed to go about his business as usual, with all four limbs in roughly the same condition he had started with (though his right pantleg was still smouldering just a tad and his left hand twitched intermittently for the next four hours).

That night, he waltzed into Snape's classroom, seeing the usual pile of cauldrons for him to clean sitting in the middle of the room and a Severus Snape at his desk, mumbling angrily at a pile of essays.

Since that first detention, his and Snape's relationship had almost strayed rather close to being called a… friendship.

Severus Snape was confused, frustrated and even a bit concerned.

He was in his room, laying on his back on his side of the bed, staring up at his ceiling. Trying to nap.

Not sleeping. Just staring. Why was he not sleeping? Because he was alone on his bed and the side that Snape was trying to not refer to in his mind as being Potter's was empty. The quiet warmth he was used to was nowhere to be found and he hated how much he missed it.

Sure, it was the middle of the day, but he should still have been able to take his ten minute power naps he used to use to get through the day! Just because that accursed Potter was nowhere to be seen should not have meant he could not so much as catch a few winks.

And yet, there he was, very much awake, and very much appearing to miss the being who usually occupied the space next to him.

His and Potter's relationship had been one of the caliber that Snape preferred not to look too much deeper into it, lest he find something he would not like or appreciate. Say, for instance, his somewhat giddy satisfaction at his hours spent with Potter in his classroom. Snape was not one for mild or casual conversation, yet somehow Potter had been able to pry small talk from him like it was nothing. Snape could not remember a day when he had ever had such an easy conversation with anyone, let alone the teenaged annoyance he had been engaged in conversing with.

They never talked outside of that room, however. The conversations stopped even within the room in which he was "napping." It was as if the moment his Potions classroom door was shut, or when the magical hour of "Detention is over" struck, they would devolve into a silence that was nothing short of companionable.

Snape hated it. He was already irked at his seeming dependency upon another's presence in order to sleep, with this added strange occurrence it would seem his life was just not turning out the way he had hoped. He hated being dependent on anyone, and he loathed the fact of that person being a Potter even more.

Snape had sworn to himself when he was nothing more than 15 that he would never let another person in, never allow them to be close to him. Never allow another person to affect him in any way, to never have to rely upon another for comfort or assistance. He had come dangerously close to depending upon Albus, but he had the memory of how that turned out burned eternally onto the back of his eyelids.

He knew he had to do something. Their sleeping arrangements were an entirely different entity than this new… he refused to think of it as a friendship, but that was what it almost was. He had not had that with a person since Albus died, or rather since he murdered Albus. Snape grimaced at the thought, realizing just how terrible Potter's chances were of survival if he continued to be both the accident and evil magnet Harry Potter as well as a friend of Snape's. The track record was not good for either of those things.

Then again, being a friend of Potter's also did not bode well for Snape. Yet another reason for his running away, screaming. He should be turning Potter away, not turning into a teenager because he woke up in the middle of the night or right before his alarm would go off to find that he and the adult-but-still-a-teenager had moved closer in sleep. Everything about him seemed to alter with the presence of Potter in his life.

Maybe it was the snake venom? Poppy insisted he was fine, but Snape was skeptical as far as mental damage was concerned. Perhaps it was all some elaborate hoax and he would find he'd been slipped Befuddling Potions in his pumpkin juice at dinner.

Anything was better than admitting he may, in fact, highly enjoy the company of one Harry James Potter.

Why did he care, though? Snape should be wishing some terrible tragedy would befall the dunderhead. He had certainly given him enough reason to by that point.

Potter had a habit of endlessly chatting about nothing, his comments inane and idiotic at times, but Snape would just roll his eyes and either correct him or laugh at his expense. It was not even with the same malice the laugh used to carry, either.

Then Tuesday's class had happened.

Snape was doing his usual prowling about his classroom, the Seventh Years well into their brewing of their potions, when he caught sight of Potter. He was paying attention to everything but his potion and that far seeing gaze of his being four countries away.

Potter's potion was bubbling oddly, something Snape knew the potion they were supposed to have been brewing was not supposed to do. The class should have been at the stage where the potion silently simmered until turning a light magenta, then they add the powdered newt.

Potter's potion was a deep, angry red and was bubbling like hell. Potter had added his newt before allowing the potion proper time to simmer and was about to have a meltdown. Snape had to come to the rescue, vanishing the potion before it exploded and maimed anyone, taking away 40 points from Gryffindor for Potter's idiocy and informing him he would have to recreate the potion in detention that night.

Snape figured out Potter's plan the moment Potter looked up from his potion after that, could see straight through those green eyes. They were filled with a challenge, a challenge to which Snape rose with gusto. Their arguments during detention only held a pinch of the wonder that the ones in public had, the ones with bystanders in front of whom both of them had a reputation to protect.

So he gave him detention and those green eyes lit up, not with anger, but with satisfaction. He had gotten what he wanted. But, in a way, hadn't Snape as well?

Snape had not exactly been looking forward to his evenings being quiet once more with that final detention so had risen to the occasion. Now, though, he knew it had to stop. He had to be stopped.

Perhaps Potter needed to be weaned out of Snape's life, for their own good.

"I knew you were up to something!"

Snape was distracted from his work, papers coated in red strewn about him, awaiting Potter for his usual detention, when none other than Minerva came barging through his classroom door.

"Up to something? Who, me?" Snape drawled, controlling the fear that slowly crept through him at what she said next.

"Yes, you! You and Potter, I know what you're up to, Snape, do not think you can hide it from me. You have been far too happy lately, there can only be one explanation." She glared at him over her glasses, Snape keeping her gaze, steeled.

"Well, do enlighten the class, Minerva, for contrary to popular belief I cannot, in fact, read everyone's minds." He ran a hand down his face in annoyance, resting it below his chin, leaning his elbow on his desk, his red quill pen forgotten.

"The last two weeks of detentions. You had ulterior motives, Severus." Snape kept still, had he really been found out so quickly? "Never would I have thought you would stoop so low for something so small! I mean, detentions are one thing, house points are another, but Quidditch practice? That's a new low even for you."

He mentally gaped at the woman, standing in his classroom, accusing him of giving a student detention in order to rig a Quidditch game. Any other year she probably would have been correct, was the fact that Snape had to begrudgingly accept, but this time? He only gave as many as Potter asked for, which stopped right before the game that next morning.

"I do enjoy these little visits of ours, Headmistress, but as I do have actual work to attend to-"

"Oh, you sit there all stoic and innocent but I know the truth, Severus."

"The truth? Potter openly challenged me in front of the students whom were my charges to teach. Is it your policy to allow students to run amuck within your classroom, Minerva? I did as I should have, now, you know the location of the door, pleas use it."

She balked at being referred to in such a manner, but turned to leave nevertheless. "One thing, though, Severus, if you please," Snape glanced up at her from his essays, red quill back in his possession, "next time, do run it by me first before giving Harry Potter of all people detention for two straight weeks? Sending a message is one thing, torture is another one entirely."

With a final, meaningful glance at the Potions Professor, Minerva stalked out of the room, the door shutting behind her with a sharp click.

"What on earth was that about?"

Snape had three other occurrences that day of a similar nature, from Filius offering him a second helping of everything that night at dinner to Remus sighing at him disparagingly, which was the closest Lupin ever got to being angry since the war happened.

It would seem that the entire school was under the impression he was attempting to rig the Quidditch Cup and Snape was appalled. As if he had not done that very thing before, with similarly disheartening results.

He had tried that in the past, but had always failed. Now everyone was under the impression it would work? If it did not work when Potter was twelve, he doubted it would work when he was 18 and bearing a rather highly competent team.

Still, Ravenclaws were happily waving to him in the hallway and the other Heads of House were avoiding eye contact, all but Filius, who was being too kind.

Dunderheads, the lot of them. Snape preferred to be feared, left alone, and not whispered about. In a way, it was better that they all forgot about his sudden change in demeanor and sleeping habits, but still, he was allowed to be insulted.

It was midnight on Friday and Harry didn't want his detention to end.

He and Snape were scraping the bottom of the barrel where their energy was concerned. They had the potions classroom spotless, every cauldron washed three times over, Snape had even set Harry to scrubbing the floors just to give himself something to do so they could prolong the inevitable. Snape had not a single essay left to grade, and they had no more reasons to keep Harry there for detention.

It was when Harry's sentence was cutoff by a large yawn that was then mirrored by the Potions Professor that they knew he had to leave.

"It would appear, Mr. Potter, that you have served your sentence. You may pack up your things and return to your Common Room. I am certain somewhere there is a redhead and a frazzled brunette anxiously awaiting your return." Snape was staring not at Harry, but at his desk as he fiddled with his ink and quill and seemed focused on anything and everything but the being on the other side of his desk.

Snape was right, Ron and Hermione were indeed waiting up for him to finish his detention, as they had every night that week. Still, he did not want to leave.

Harry sighed, resigned to his fate. Their tenuous grasp on what could be considered the beginnings of friendship had slipped through his fingers with the end of the detentions, or so Harry thought.

As he packed up his things, he was already planning ways to earn himself more detentions, each more likely to get him hexed by Snape than the last.

Snape was still staring at his desk when Harry finished packing up. "So, I'll just be on my way, then."

Snape did not respond, simply reorganized and moved his stack of very completed essays for the third time.

"A good thing, too. I was beginning to think I'd never be set free. My teammates may skin me alive still. Gryffindors do not enjoy it when their Potions Professor is kidnapping their Seeker, especially not when I should be practicing. Rigging the game, are we?" Harry smirked sarcastically, a friendly glint to his eyes, but Snape did not see it.

Snape's jaw visibly flexed and his breathing stilled. "Yes, well, we can't have things like detentions taking up Harry Potter's precious time, now can we? Be sure not to trip over yourself in your obvious excitement to get out of my classroom. A thing that you are free to do at any moment now."

Harry stood in the doorway, dumbfounded at Snape's acidic response. "Listen, it was just a j-"

"Has your hearing been compromised in the last two minutes? As I stated, you are excused." Snape had finally looked up from his paperwork, his face set, the sudden change in the air and tone of the conversation threw Harry off kilter. There before him was the classic Snape sneer. The old Snape was back, and Harry had no other way to respond but with reproach.

"Aw, Snape, I didn't know you cared. Merlin forbid you be a normal person for once." Harry rolled his eyes and trudged his way out of the classroom, not quite certain what just happened but certain that their unspoken truce had just been mangled.

Snape regretted the words the moment he heard that door shut. They had just had a wonderful evening, rather a useful detention and pleasant conversation. Then, Snape went and opened his big mouth.

He growled to himself as he stalked back toward his quarters, even the promise of a hot cup of tea did little to stem his anger toward himself.

Potter never showed up that night.

Snape paced around his living quarters, trying to figure out just what part of his comments had sent Potter over the edge. He was harsh, he knew, but no more than usual. Perhaps he had finally crossed a line?

Looking back, Snape realized that Potter had been meaning to joke with Snape. The sentence had just perfectly hit a sore spot with the Professor, a spot that he could not help but respond to. Minerva and the others had driven him to partial insanity earlier that day and Potter had managed to hit the nail right on the head.

Snape was upset and had taken it out on Potter, he knew that, but it was too late. He couldn't have apologized. Had he said the words, the seething tone would only have been intensified as usual. He had had rather a terrible day, and the added stress of it being his last detention with Potter and the last night of whatever it was they had going had set his teeth on edge. Then Potter went and opened his big mouth…

All Snape knew was he regretted saying what he did, and did not know how to fix it. He also did not know if he wanted to fix it.

Perhaps this was the sign he had been waiting for? The giant arrow pointing him in the direction of how his life should go. The truth behind his and Potter's tenuous "friendship" being that it really wasn't? Perhaps Potter was fed up with him? Had used him enough and was now going to kick him to the curb as so many before him had…

Snape did not sleep that night, mentally pacing until the sun had risen, cursing the name of Potter all the while.

Harry left detention, confused and a bit irritated. He had started to get so comfortable when the new way his life was working and then Snape had to go and be a prat and he no longer knew what to think.

Oh, well, I'll just ask him when I show up tonight. I am a Gryffindor, after all. Courageous and stubborn, he thought, stalking down the hallway.

"HARRY!" The man belonging to the name in question turned at the sound of Ginny running down the hallway, panting and looking like the cat who had just caught the canary.

Harry was pretty certain he was the canary.

"Whoa, where's the fire? Or did Neville turn into a canary again? Please tell me it was that."

"Shut up, Potter. I'm glad I caught you, I just got the rest of the team to agree to a late night practice!" Ginny was far too excited about the prospect of practicing in the middle of the night.

And I thought Oliver Wood was bad… "Why is it never the canary thing?"

"Oh, come on, Neville hasn't taken anything offered to him by a friend without testing it first since that Nosebleed Nougat incident two years ago, Harry, do you even pay attention?" Apparently not. "Now, come on! We have practice to get to!"

Ginny unceremoniously grabbed his arm and started dragging him at a running pace toward the Quidditch Pitch, Harry protesting the entire way.

"Hey, hey, hey! I never agreed to the practice, Gin-"

"Hush and suck it up, Harry. We have a game to win tomorrow and I shall not play with a team that's not ready."

"Ginny!" He stopped her in the Great Hall, and grabbed her by the shoulders so she wouldn't try to run again, "We had a practice this morning. And yesterday morning. And the afternoon before that. As the Captain of the team I assure you, we are ready. We will not be ready, however, if you keep me up until Merlin knows when the night before a morning match!"

The redhead glared him down until his hold on her shoulders slackened and he released her. "You may have the word Captain attached to you, Harry, but as a member of your team I say we are not prepared, and everyone else agrees with me. You have been slacking off enough as it is this year and if you're not going to listen to your friends, you at least have to listen to your teammates. Please? This Cup means more than just Quidditch, Harry! It's the first bit of normalcy we've all had since… ya know."

There it was. Her ultimate play. Bringing up the war. She truly was her mother's daughter, for they had a similar weapon they wielded with skill. Guilt. Harry sighed the long suffering sigh of a man who still couldn't say no to his ex.

"Remind me to start calling you 'Oliver.'" Ginny's eyes lit up, realizing he had given in, and returned to her assault on his arm as she dragged him toward the pitch.

Harry soon learned that the entire team did not, in fact, think they weren't ready for the game. That Ginny had dragged them all there with the same lie.

The Gryffindor Quidditch Team was two seconds from mutiny when the youngest Weasley, having been cornered with their newfound knowledge, simply shrugged and said, "Well, we're all here already, so why not just have a practice?"

The death glare and the wand in her hand were what sealed it. Genevera Weasley was an evil genius.

It was 2 in the morning before the redhead, having successfully run the team into the ground, allowed them to leave. It took Ron forgetting where he was and almost falling off of his broom, twice, before she would concede that everyone was too tired to practice and, since the match was in 8 hours, needed to go and sleep.

"See you all bright and early for breakfast!" The team groaned, limping and dragging their equipment off of the field.

"If she expects me any earlier than eight o'clock then she'll be having to find another Keeper." Ron grumbled from next to Harry as they and the rest of the team trudged back toward their Common Room.

"Hey, you're the Captain, do something about it." One of their new Beaters barked from Harry's right, as grumpy as the rest of them.

"Oi, she's also his ex and would eat him for breakfast if he even tried." Ron muttered from behind Harry, causing the third year to cringe a tad.

"You should know, she's your sister. Hell, she probably learned it from you," Harry yawned, mumbled the password to the Fat Lady and made it just about as far as a red, comfortable couch before his limbs gave out on him.

The rest of the Quidditch team were not far behind him, moaning and otherwise complaining.

Harry did not fall asleep so much as pass out on the couch, vaguely aware of his having forgotten something in his exhaustion.

"I'm gonna head up, you coming?" Ron scraped his feet on the ground as he walked toward the stairs, trying to lessen amount of physical exertion.

"Yeah, yeah. One minute, just let me regain control of my legs and eyes. That practice Snitch was being particularly ornery tonight." Ron sent him a sympathetic look before beginning his ascent of the stairs. "Just don't forget, game in the morning. Gotta rest up…"

Harry mentally swore to never let Ginny set practices ever again for as long as he lived before closing his eyes for just two seconds, his brain incapable of doing much more than that.

He awoke to few hours later, sweating and panting on the couch. Hands were shaking him awake and Harry swatted them away, not welcoming the unwanted touch.

"I see you never made it to your bed? Harry, you were thrashing around and mumbling to yourself. Are you alright, mate?" Ron was knelt down next to the couch, face in full worry mode and a crease in his brow. "I'm gonna go out on a limb and say nightmare?"

Harry sent a glare his way by way of answering his last question. "Oh, yeah, I'm peachy. Just fantastic." Harry sat up, slowly, stretching and testing his limbs. No injuries tonight, good, very good, Harry thought, arching his back to try to relieve some of the tension in his shoulders. It never worked, but the boy could hope. "Never had a better night's sleep."

"Yeah, I'll believe that when I see it. Upsie-daisy, sleepy-head, we've got jobs to do." Ron stood, arms crossed in front of him, waiting for Harry to wake up.

The sun was out and others were scattered around the Common Room, breakfast having just started from the look of how few there really were. Harry took a minute or two to remember why he was sleeping on a couch and remembered with a groan that they had a Quidditch match in a few hours.

"Ugh, Ravenclaw match… Wake me when they release the snitch."

"Oh, no you don't. No way you're leaving me to face the slave driver I call a sister alone! You have ten minutes to get your butt down to the Great Hall for pre-game breakfast. And just as a suggestion, you probably would have slept better in your own bed." Ron gave his shoulder a friendly shove before running off toward the Portrait Hole and his eventual breakfast.

"Yeah, right, I would've slept a lot much better in Sn-" Harry flew into a standing position. It was then that he remembered.

Snape. He never had a chance to tell Snape before he was stolen last night.

He never made it to his quarters.

Shit.

AN: And we're back!

Yeah, so again, that ending… Hmm.

My boys did some stupid and strange crap this chapter. Do I like it? Nope. Will I probably publish it anyway just because I'm wracked with guilt over the 297 people on story alert for this? Yep.

Till next we meet,

ForeverJynxed