[HP] Can you be gentle with me

"What are you thinking right now, Severus?

Snape, who was also planning to step into the fireplace, stopped because of Lucius' words, turned his head, raised his eyebrows, and asked. "What's the meaning?"

"Don't play dumb, you definitely know what I mean..." Lucius said in a deep voice. "What the hell do you mean by Tahlia?"

Snape frowned. "I do not know what you're talking about."

The corners of Lucius' mouth curved into a perfect curve. "Oh, Severus, you and I both know exactly what I'm referring to... In my mind, you hate her to the bone..."

"What makes you think that? Just because we're... what you call... old friends?" Snape replied slowly.

"You've always treated her badly," Lucius said slowly, then smirked. "Don't tell me that you suddenly discovered that Tahlia is not what you thought, or even that you finally found out that you have a crush on her...it's not like you."

"...I don't think it's any of your business, Lucius." Snape said lightly, and then he didn't speak again, and didn't intend to stay here and let Lucius ask anything, just dropped the sentence Finally, without bothering to pay attention to Lucius' reaction, he stepped straight into the flames of the fireplace.

After all, just now Lucius reminded himself more than once that he stayed there for too long, no matter what, he shouldn't stay there any longer, right?

Although today was not the way he had imagined to meet Tahlia, he managed to say a few words when they met, and it cannot be said that there was no progress at all...

In particular, I got a lot of useful information from Nigel, which is enough.

Thinking of writing a letter as soon as he got back to the house in Spinner's End.

And Tahlia's reply arrived the next day.

She personally sent it over.

Snape could hardly react, it was never one of the situations he envisioned, Tahlia might ignore his letter, or read it and ignore him, he was prepared to wait a few weeks Mentally prepared, and even thought about what action to take next.

He never imagined that Tahlia would show up at his door with that letter in person.

"If you're hesitant to let me in..." Tahlia said flatly, ignoring Snape's strange behavior of standing there with a complicated expression for a full five minutes after seeing him. "Then I can tell you first, you don't need to worry about this matter──because I don't mean to go in."

Snape snapped back to his senses, but he was only puzzled.

Since Tahlia said she didn't want to come in, why did she appear here? "You...then what are you...doing here?"

"I think you should explain to me what you mean by what you wrote in it..." Tahlia said slowly, pulling out from her pocket the letter that had just been delivered from Snape the night before. Shaking in front of him. "It's true that I'm not as healthy as a normal person right now, but I'm not at the point where I need your charity──"

"Not a handout." Snape cut Tahlia dryly. "I just think that since you stayed at Hogwarts to recuperate, then... it's time for some jobs to be returned to me."

A brief silence.

After a long time, Tahlia raised one eyebrow and spoke. "The timing is indeed just right...just when Harry is about to enter school."

"I do not understand what you mean."

Tahlia smirked. "I remember telling you that Harry is not James, put away your morbid vengeance, if you're trying to make things difficult for him in Potions...or even his Potions homework...then I have to say, You still haven't changed."

"I didn't mean that..." Snape darkened and said in a deep voice. "You should know that I—"

"No, I don't know." Tahlia cut him off coldly. "And I don't want to know what's on your mind, Snape, I'm just here to tell you that you're going to be grading the students yourself, that's fine. But don't sound like you're doing it because you care. Do it, and don't let me know that you rely on your status as a professor to bully any...student."

Another moment of silence.

And it lasted much longer this time, Snape kept taking deep breaths and exhaling repeatedly, with his lips tightly pressed together, anyone who saw it could immediately understand that he must be holding back something at this moment.

He is indeed patient.

There's no way he'll just get angry at Tahlia again, and he'll never let it happen that will make all the hard work he's put in these days go to waste...

It took him a while before he spoke, and he was satisfied to hear that his voice was steady. "I think you've misunderstood, Tahlia, I haven't changed at all." Slowly took a few steps back. "I think I'm being rude, I should have let you in the first place—"

"No!"

Snape froze as Tahlia's rejection of his words seemed unusually sharp compared to her previously calm tone.

It was only for a moment, and when Snape was about to ask his doubts, Tahlia had recovered and spoke calmly. "I mean, no, even if you say that, I don't want to go into your dilapidated and gloomy house at all." After a short pause, he added. "You can see it from the outside."

Snape frowned.

He wasn't so easily fooled by Tahlia's final addition, but why?He never had the impression that Tahlia had ever entered his house, how could she know that he only regarded it as a place to spend the night, and never bothered to take care of it, so the living room here is definitely not a place suitable for entertaining guests...

And how could Tahlia suddenly have such a violent reaction?

"I have no intention of hating you any more, Tahlia," Snape said slowly. "Of course I didn't think it would be bad for you in my room." As he spoke, he took a few steps back cautiously.

"Maybe..." Tahlia replied flatly. "But, as I said at the beginning, I'm not here to be a guest in your house."

Snape took another step back, speaking more firmly this time. "But you had a promise that didn't come true...remember?" After seeing Tahlia's doubts that she couldn't hide for a moment, she continued to explain. "You told me that you would come here to discuss some academic issues with me during the summer vacation—"

Tahlia's face darkened, and Snape snapped his mouth shut for a while.

Just when Snape thought Tahlia would probably be so angry that she turned away, she spoke.

These words really surprised him again. Of course, there was also a big reason because she actually walked into the room slowly while she was speaking, closing the door behind her.

"I'm curious, Snape... what academic problems do you have now?" Tahlia said teasingly, raising an eyebrow.

"Wait a minute." After Snape came back to his senses, he immediately turned around and drew out his wand, and this living room, which hadn't been cleaned for more than ten years, immediately changed...

"At least it's a little cleaner." He said dryly, turned around, forced a smile, and then turned around again, trying to cast a few more spells. I don't know if he is not very good at housework spells, or The dust has been accumulating here for too long, anyway, the house doesn't seem to have changed much...

"I can tell." Tahlia said flatly, but judging from the situation, there was not much sarcasm in this sentence.

There was another awkward silence.

Snape looked around, and was annoyed to realize that there was no way he could clean up his living room anytime soon, let alone entertain guests...

A few murmurs.

By the time Snape noticed it, several beams of light had already passed him and fell in front of him. Turning his head, he saw Tahlia pointing directly with his wand in his hand. Behind the curse.

It turned out that he had unconsciously been unprepared against Tahlia. Even though she cast spells to attack him more than once after returning here, he didn't regard her as an enemy anymore because of this.

If he had understood Tahlia's intention earlier, perhaps they would not have fallen into such an embarrassing situation now.

"I'm not at all surprised you're not good at these kinds of spells, Snape," Tahlia said flatly, and waved Snape slightly to look back.

Snape was surprised to find that the really dirty space became clean, at least those broken wine bottles scattered on the floor were gone, and the thick layer of dust that had accumulated on the furniture disappeared in an instant. "you……"

"And I happen to be better at using it than you are." Tahlia smirked.Then he went straight to a sofa and sat down, raising his head. "So what are you going to discuss?"

Snape thought for a moment, then spoke. "About—" Immediately shutting his mouth, he abruptly swallowed back the potion formula he had seen recently that he was about to blurt out, and changed his words temporarily. "Actually, Tahlia..." he said. "I'm not trying to lie to you...Actually, right now, I don't have anything to discuss with you──"

Tahlia frowned, but it didn't look like she was upset, but rather as if she was thinking about Snape's words.

After a while, she said lightly. "I'm surprised you finally figured out that it's not always that hard to be honest with people."

"I said I would never lie to you again."

Tahlia stared straight at Snape for a long while, and that gaze made him tense up unconsciously, feeling a little nervous. "Why?"

"Sorry?" Snape asked, frowning.

"I'm asking you—wait..." Tahlia snapped shut and shook her head. "It's okay, just pretend I didn't ask."

"Tahlia?"

"I said it's fine." Tahlia's tone became displeased. "Don't ask..." She stood up and patted the dust that didn't exist on her body. "Since you said you have nothing to discuss, why don't I stay here?" As he spoke, he raised his foot and was about to walk towards the door.

The footsteps stopped suddenly.

Snape knew exactly why.

Because at the moment when Tahlia's body froze, he also saw an unknown ugly creature that landed on the windowsill of his house. Considering that the news brought by the thing before came from the same person, he probably could predict that the next Down happened.

Tahlia turned around stiffly and forced a smile at him. "Guess, Snape... is it me, you, or both of us that our dear master is looking for this time?"