Disclaimer: If I were JK Rowling, I would not be in Wisconsin right now. I would be in Sweden, getting a geniune Swedish-massage, with several very cute men waiting on me hand and foot and feeding me Swedish-fish. In other words, this is her stuff, not mine, I just like to mess with it, and wish it was so that I could be in Sweden... and no, I don't know what's up with Sweden. But it rocks!

A/N: Since the pre-romance--but-we-know-their-lusting-after-each-other-anyway-tension in SS/Hr has always fascinated me. I decided to try my hand at it. This is the first little bit of Harry Potter fanfiction I have written in a very, very, very long time, so please be gentle with me. I did my very best to keep Severus and Hermione in character, but feel free to thwack me if I messed up.

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Hermione Granger stepped out of the underground station and into the surprisingly bright midmorning sun. Blinking, she adjusted her shoulder bag and made her way slowly towards Charing Cross Road. The past few days had been unbelievably rainy, and she hadn’t felt much like venturing out of her flat. But, she did need some supplies, and the master that she was studying under, Sara Starkey, had insisted that Hermione get out and do something or she would personally hex the young witch.

Most of the Muggles Hermione passed on the street, hurried by her with out saying anything. Although a group of tourists gawking at an old building greeted her with ‘Hellos!’ that were much more enthusiastic than necessary.

Spotting the Leaky Cauldron up ahead between the second hand book store and the record shop, Hermione quickened her pace and marched forward faster. Reaching the door she glanced fugitively up and down the Muggle street to ensure that no one was looking, before she pushed the door open and stepped inside.

Tom, as bald and toothless as ever, nodded to Hermione as she entered. A few hags in the corner eyed her warily, and a frumpy little wizard wrinkled his nose at her clearly muggle dress. Hermione glared at the wizard and walked up to the bar and pushed three knuts across the oily counter.

‘A butterbeer, please,’ she said as she settled herself onto a stool and let her bag drop to the floor.

Tom nodded to her, and reached below the counter and pulled up a bottle and a glass. Expertly he popped the top off of the bottle and poured the creamy liquid into the glass. Without another word he scooped up the knuts, and turned his attention to a strange dark stain on the counter top.

Feeling the frumpy wizards eyes on her, Hermione said; ‘Poneme Ropa,’ with a jab of her wand directed at her clothes. The dark blue t-shirt and blue jeans melded into one, and gently flowed into floor length, three quarter sleeve, robes. The robes separated from her neck down so that the front was open revealing a navy blue skirt, sash, and white blouse. Her mother had made her buy them after looking at a Gladrags catelouge. Hermione had handed her mother her Gringotts card and turned another page in her new Airthmancy text.

She heard the wizard snort in disgust, but choose to ignore him, instead focusing on her drink. After finishing her drink, she walked swiftly to the back of the pub and stepped outside. Reaching up, and standing on her tip toes, (as she had stopped getting any taller in her fifth year and now stood at a proud 160 centimeters) she tapped the third brick up, and then two across. Stepping back, she watched as the bricks rearranged themselves into an archway revealing Diagon Alley before her. Adjusting her shoulder bag, she stepped out onto the cobble stone street and was soon swept along with the crowd.

Spotting the Apothecary, Slug & Jiggers, Hermione made her way over to the small shop. Pushing the door open she was greeted with the jingle of the bell above the door. The smell of bad eggs and rotten cabbage assailed her nostrils, but she ignored it, the flat that she and Sara worked in smelled just as bad what with all of those ingredients crammed into one small hall closet.

Smiling slightly, Hermione began to inspect the goods for sale in the shop. Barrels of slimy substances such as bubotuber pus, and flesh eating slug mucus were lined up on the floor. From the ceiling hung bundles of fangs, claws and feathers. Hermione was particularly interested in what appeared to be rather fresh jobber knoll feathers. A quick accio and she was happily holding the fine black feathers.

Turning her attention to the jars of powders and herbs along the wall, Hermione began to fill her arms with jars of powdered bicorn horn, dried daisy roots and a withering mass of gillyweed. Laying out her purchases on the counter, she instructed, Jigger to fill up a small paper cone with beetle eyes.

‘Miss Granger,’ he said in conversational tones as he pried the lid off of the large glass jar filled with shiny black beetle eyes. ‘It’s been some time since I’ve seen you in here. Ms Starkey usually stops in to buy more supplies–is she well?’

Hermione replied, ‘She’s fine, but she said that I needed to get more sun, and sent me off.’

‘Ah,’ said Jigger knowingly. ‘The curse of the Potions Master, too many potions to tinker with, not enough sun.’

Hermione grinned in response and handed Jigger her twelve galleons, seven sickles and two knuts and carefully slipped her purchases into her magically expanded shoulder bag.

‘You might want to stop at the cauldron shop, Miss Granger, they’ve just gotten some new silver cauldrons that you might like to see.’

Hermione thanked Jigger, and headed over to the cauldron shop. As he had promised, stacks of shiny new silver cauldrons where piled up in the window. Hermione had to dodge a few people as she hurried across the street, and stepped into the shop.

‘Hullo,’ a young witch with too much make-up on, greeted her from where she sat behind the counter with out looking up from her issue of Witch Weekly.

Hermione nodded to the girl and made her way over to the cauldrons and picked one up off the pile and began to inspect it.

The silver was of fine quality, but not pure, she noticed. Most likely it had been mixed with a little pewter to encourage stability in potions. The bottom was a little too thick for her liking, any potions made in this cauldron would have to simmer for a little longer, but that would only add to the fun of the brewing.

Running her fingers along the wide lip, Hermione could feel the slight hum of anti-crack charms that had been infused into the metal itself. Waving her wand over the cauldron, she smiled a little seeing that the cauldron had the capability to become a self-stirring if the right enchantment was bought. Self-stirring cauldron’s came in handy if one wanted to go over their notes but the potion needed to be stirred anticlockwise thirty-nine and a half times.

Jigger had been right, the cauldrons were very nice, and she did after all have a few more galleons to spend. . . .

Setting the cauldron back down, Hermione dug in her shoulder bag looking for her money-purse. Pulling it out, she counted out her galleon, she had fifteen left. Looking up at the price sign she noted to her disappointment that the price of the cauldron was nineteen galleons. Sadly patting the cauldron, she turned to leave.

And promptly walked into Professor Snape.

He promptly was knocked backwards, tripped over a table of cauldrons and fell to the floor knocking Hermione down with him.

‘Pro-professor!’ Hermione squeaked in surprise as she quickly pulled herself to her knees.

‘You silly girl,’ sneered her old Professor. ‘Two years out of Hogwarts and you still need to be babysat to ensure that you don’t do something utterly stupid.’ He sat up and glowered at her.

‘S-sorry Professor,’ Hermione stammered and quickly stood up, feeling her face flush.

Professor Snape too stood, and with a few flicks of his wand righted the table and replaced the cauldrons. Several of the other customers in the shop looked curiously over to the pair, but a glare from Snape sent them in the opposite direction.

'I'm so sorry!' Hermione said as she scrambled to her feet and tried to brush her thick hair out of her face. It fell back into her eyes at once and she scowled at it. Snape sniffed loudly and looked at the cauldrons she had been inspecting.

'It's a waste of galleons, Miss Granger. You would be better off investing in one of those pure pewter cauldrons.' He jabed one long pale finger at a haphazard stack of cauldrons in the corner of the shop. 'Although I doubt you have learned much from that foolish Sara Starkey. You could have done better in choosing someone. But then, you were a Gryffindor after all, perhaps I had too much hope for you.'

'Severus Snape went out of his way to have hope for a Gryffindor?" Hermione scoffed as she once more stubbornly shoved her hair behind her ear. It wouldn't lie flat.

'Surprising is it not, Miss Hermione Granger? I had thought that you would be able to see past the petty prejudices that the school house inflict on you miserable children. But I see that I was wrong." With a long suffering sigh, he reached into the pocket of his cloak and pulled out four shining gold galleons. For a moment he weighed them in his hand. Then, without a word, he picked up Hermione's hand and pressed the coins into it, curling her fingers around them. His hands were cool and dry.
'Professor?'

‘Good day, Miss Granger,’ he said with finality as he swept out of the shop leaving Hermione feeling dumbfounded and exceedingly embarrassed in his wake.