[HP] Can you be gentle with me

Severus Snape was completely disoriented now.

And, he found that he didn't have any model for him to follow, and he didn't even know who to ask for advice on what he should do, so that Tahlia wouldn't always have to talk to him in front of him. Slam the door.

He thought he could figure out the answer gradually, but he was wrong.

It wasn't until one day in the teachers' lounge that he overheard Flitwick excitedly talking to McGonagall about the topic that the savior, Harry Potter, would be formally studying at the school starting next school year, and guessing which college he would be sorted into, he was surprised. , he had wasted two full years standing still, Tahlia still didn't like him very much, and of course, Nigel didn't do the same.

After the semester ended, he returned to Spider's End, and his life was very monotonous. He couldn't remember exactly what potion he made after wasting the whole morning, and he didn't even have a concept of how many days the summer vacation had passed, until It wasn't until Dumbledore showed up in his living room one afternoon, smiling but mildly complaining that he should have cleaned his fireplace, that he regained some sense of time.

Dumbledore brought a lot of news, except that Harry Potter, the savior he already knew, was about to enter school after the summer vacation, and there was another piece of information that was extremely important to him.

Harry Potter's admission letter has been mailed out today.

In other words, the letter will probably arrive at Tahlia's small apartment tomorrow morning, and she will most likely take her two children to Diagon Alley to buy supplies that day.

At the same time, it also meant that if he went there tomorrow, he would have a good chance of meeting Tahlia.

"You look at me like you're saying, you never expected to hear good news from me?" Dumbledore said helplessly. "I think I've given you too much opportunity, Severus." There was a pause. "Have to say, I'm surprised Tahlia remains unmoved."

Snape darkened and spoke in a calm voice. "I haven't thought about it either."

Maybe there was nothing left between them, but he tried not to think that way these days, always holding out a glimmer of hope that when he called Tahlia's name, he'd get a smile instead of a frown.

Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Anyway, I still want to ask you something this time."

Snape looked up at Dumbledore, not looking too surprised, because he also had a vague idea of ​​what the great Headmaster was about to say.

"Quirrell is odd, Severus."

really.

"I know." Snape said stiffly. "I'm sure he had contact with the Dark Lord." More than sure, he was even there.

He watched Quirrell turn from fear to awe after meeting the Dark Lord, and finally to fanatical admiration.

Of course, Tahlia stood by him while watching this happen.

He didn't understand why when he and Tahlia went to meet the Dark Lord, he was surprised to meet an acquaintance, and he didn't know why Quirrell, who was a professor of Muggle studies, suddenly said that he wanted to travel, and the so-called travel turned out to be wandering To the Dark Lord.

"I don't think Voldemort is content with just you and Tahlia at school." Dumbledore said slowly, rubbing his forehead unconsciously with his right hand. "Despite what Tahlia told me, he didn't suspect either of you."

"Obviously the Dark Lord cannot completely trust anyone, Headmaster." Snape squeezed his lips together and forced out a word. "I thought you should have known."

Dumbledore didn't answer, just asked Snape for another cup of tea.

"That complicates the situation, Severus," he said seriously after taking a sip of his tea. "Originally when only you and Tahlia were here, we were able to grasp and even control the information that could reach Voldemort's ears, but now with the intervention of a third person, frankly speaking, I am very worried──"

"Then why did you agree to Quirrell's transfer application?" Snape said with a dark face.

"You know why." Dumbledore sighed. "Defense Against the Dark Arts professors are still missing every year, and Tahlia still didn't agree this time—"

"You can't force her to agree, she doesn't want to be at school at all—" Snape started to interrupt Dumbledore, but he raised a hand to stop him immediately.

Dumbledore was staring straight at Snape, a gaze that always gave Snape the feeling that there was nothing to hide, despite his Occlumency skills.

"I think you're the one who forced her to stay at school." Dumbledore's eyes seemed unusually sharp in Snape's eyes at the moment, which made him say nothing for a while, just sitting stiffly , glaring at Dumbledore.

"I promised to keep an eye on her health—" Snape said a few words before abruptly changing his words when Dumbledore looked up in apparent disbelief. "...I admit it." He said dryly. "I want her to stay here, I want her to stay here—"

He sort of understood what Tahlia meant when she commented on him.

He is indeed selfish.

He couldn't just sit back and watch Tahlia get further and further away from him, he even preferred to believe that there would be a day when Tahlia would accept him again, and he was now desperately trying to make it happen.

He could only hypnotize himself with the reason that Tahlia still cared about him, and could still be persuaded by him. These days, he had been thinking like this.

"Maybe you think I'm selfish and force her to stay regardless of her wishes, but I can't bear to watch her leave without looking back." He continued, looking up at Dumbledore with firm eyes. "I can not do it."

Dumbledore opened his mouth slightly in surprise.He never expected to hear those words from Snape.

"I'm relieved to hear you say that, kid." He smiled slightly.Finally, with Snape's realization, maybe there is still a possibility for the two of them to reconcile. "But I think, these words, you have to go to Tahlia personally, not to me."

"I tried." Snape growled. "Maybe you don't understand the current situation, let me tell you—" After a pause, he laughed at himself again. "Tahlia doesn't want to say a word to me other than about the Dark Lord and her current state of health. What should I say? Grabbing her by the collar and yelling at her? No, that's counterproductive."

A moment of silence.

There was a harsh sound from one end of the room, and Snape stood up abruptly. "As soon as the school was on holiday, she even asked me to send the potions she had to take every day. She didn't want to see me at all." After finishing speaking, without waiting for Dumbledore to say anything, she walked into the small room, and after a while, carefully grasped out with a small bottle. "Maybe you should restore my memory of that night many years ago, I just want to know what the hell I did—"

"Tahlia won't agree," Dumbledore reminded calmly.

Snape had begun to give up on himself, and it seemed to him that everything he'd been trying to do had failed to impress Tahlia in the slightest.

But is it really so?

No one can be so hard-hearted, unless that person deliberately acts like this.

He was sure Tahlia was not indifferent.

"If something goes wrong in restoring your memory, you should know what will happen," Dumbledore continued.

Snape lowered his face, grabbed the parchment on the side table in annoyance, and hurriedly wrote a few words, and let an owl who was already waiting to take away the small bottle of potion before turning around irritably. turn around. "Perhaps you have other methods?"

"I'm not omnipotent, Severus, I told Tahlia the same thing." Dumbledore said calmly. "Of course, magic is not omnipotent. And Tom made the mistake of overestimating the power of magic."

"I thought we were talking about Tahlia," Snape said displeased.

"We were talking about Tahlia," Dumbledore said. "And what she cares most about now is how to eliminate Voldemort. I don't think the two conflict." After a pause, he said again seriously. "I wanted Tahlia to look at Quirrell—"

"She's done enough—"

"That's what I thought too, Severus." Dumbledore patiently reassured Snape, who was about to attack him. "I know she's done a lot, and I don't want to bother her...that's why I'm here."

"Because you know that the current me will never refuse." Snape said flatly.

"Yeah, you really don't." Dumbledore smiled. "You have changed, child."

...Yes, he is different from before.

Snape clenched his fists unconsciously, trying to restrain himself from being furious at some illiterate salesman on the street who was always trying to sell him something.

Dumbledore's words from the day before seemed to still be ringing in his ears.

He would never do anything to hurt Tahlia again.

will never.

Diagon Alley was always full of people during the holidays, and if it weren't for the high probability that Tahlia would be here on that day, Snape would never have picked this time to be here.

The whole body seemed to be exuding black air, and gradually, no salesperson dared to approach him, and a small open space gradually formed around him with him as the center, and the crowd would consciously avoid it when they saw it.

Snape just stood there, staring straight ahead at what looked like a dilapidated storefront.

Potter needs a wand, so he's sure to see them all when he waits here—

The only thing he didn't expect was that he would stand here for so long.

It wasn't until his stomach began to growl of protest and dissatisfaction that Snape realized that it was already past noon, and he still didn't see Tahlia's figure. Could it be that they were all wrong, Tahlia didn't plan to pick up Harry Potter Bring their two children here on the day of the admission letter?

Especially considering Tahlia's tragic height...it is estimated that she will be hidden in the crowd when she comes.

The premise is that there is no figure not far away pulling the two children to an abrupt stop.

Snape raised the corners of his mouth, finally waiting.

He walked forward quickly, and at this moment he felt that the crowd automatically avoided him, allowing him to move quickly in Tahlia's direction.

A woman with two small children in front of her was looking down at something, probably Potter's book list, and Snape began to imagine what he was going to say later...

"Ah, Snape, what a coincidence."

Damn.