Chapter Text
The owl pecked at the thick glass window of Spinner's end, a dark, almost chocolate brown owl with a neat white scroll of parchment on it's leg. "Hoo ... hoo hooo."
The window opened up automatically into what had once been the living room, now empty except for the stained outlines against the wall, of white, and not so white, where bookshelves and furniture had once been pushed up against. Now all that remained was a large, free standing mirror, hazed over in something like a white cloud. When the presence of something living was sensed, the glass trembled slightly, State your purpose.
The owl fluttered in and rested on the floor beside the mirror, hooting again at the sound of the voice and looking at the glassy surface.
State your purpose. The mirror repeated.
The bird tapped at the glass and waved it's leg bearing the letter again, tilting it's head at it's milky reflection.
There was a pause in the automatic message, and the glass cleared slightly, a solid hand reached out, gently stroking the bird before retrieving the message that was tied to its leg.
The bird blinked, but stayed calm until the hand had finished stroking it's head and flew off rather quickly, spooked by the disembodied limb.
In a room, many miles away, a former spy withdrew his hand from a mirror, taking up a note and turned it over in his hand as he walked back to his morning breakfast which he had left on his kitchen table to answer the Sentinel Mirror.
Dear Professor Snape, The note began in a familiar scrawl, I hope this letter finds you well. It's been a month since everything happened, and I never had the chance to talk to you as we were both carried off to the hospital so quickly. The frenzy seems to have died down enough that I can send a letter, finally (no, I don't enjoy the attention in case you're wondering). Anyway, I was wondering if there was a time I could speak to you about something I don't think anyone else can help me with. I don't want to talk about it like this in case anyone else reads it.
I hope your neck is healing well.
- Harry Potter
Severus sighed, It never ends. placing the note down on the table before him, picking up his fork and eating from his bowl of mixed fruit and berries. His eyes examined Harry’s handwriting carefully, he determined that it was in fact Harry who had written it because of how he wrote his S’s and O’s. But then the question became, did he write it on his own accord, or to lure him in? For what?
It took until the end of a rather slow paced breakfast for Severus to decide to write back, walking into his home office that looked much like the one he had kept while a professor at Hogwarts. He wrote:
Dear Mr Potter,
You have asked, and I shall serve. Make yourself available by ten this evening in Greenwich Park, by the Old Royal Observatory. If you are not there, I shall not wait, and the offer shall not be extended to you again.
SS
This, Severus folded in half and presented to a large, black bird sitting on a perch, hunched over and squinting, looking out of the window, "If you please" the bird straightened, snapping up at the letter before taking flight out the window just as Severus opened it for him.
* * *
Around ten 'o clock that evening, a young, dark haired man sat on a bench, slouching casually, watching green leaves blown over the trail beneath his feet as they tumbled from point to point. He looked ordinary, maybe a little handsome, but somber, almost joyless as he looked around expectantly, tense.
"Mr Potter." A voice came from Harry’s side, slowly walking towards him from along a path that ran perpendicular to the Greenwich Meridian.
Harry blinked and looked up through his shaggy, dark hair that these days resembled his late godfather's so much with his bright green eyes and stood, respectfully. "Professor," he said, smiling shallowly and rubbing his right forearm through his casual brown muggle shirt.
"You have questions for me?" Severus prompted, curious by what seemed like Harry’s sudden change in behavior with him.
Harry nodded and looked around, "Do you want to go somewhere a little more private and talk about this? I don't want a muggle ... or anyone else overhearing ..."
Severus glanced to his side as well, trying to see what threat Harry saw that he had perhaps missed. He had considered the public park, at this hour to be a decent enough location. "As you wish, Mr Potter." Severus answered, his voice softer then normal, slightly scratchy.
Harry nodded towards a side path for them to exit the park through. He looked even paler than he usually was, and more exhausted than one would expect a war hero to seem, "Thanks. So ... you look well."
Severus did not respond to this, he looked the same. He wore a muggle sweater that curled up just under his chin, concealing his neck, similar to that of his high collared robes he wore at school. Except in public, he traded out his robes for a trench coat that fell just below his knees. Still the effect was the same, he concealed the true nature of his frame and body under layers of clothing. "What is it you wish to discuss, Mr Potter."
Harry looked away and pushed his dark hair out of his pale, thin face, "My wand arm ... it won't stop shaking no matter what I do. I've been to a healer about it, they can't find anything physically wrong with it." Harry's right hand was shoved into his jeans pocket to keep the trembling down, almost not noticeable as long as the pocket was holding his limb still.
"I assume, you have not performed magic since our last encounter."
"Not ... not the sort of magic I did when last we met." The truth was Harry hadn't performed very much magic at all since his defeat of Voldemort, and when he had, he made himself use his left hand to do so.
Severus stopped suddenly and turned to Harry, "Look at me."
Harry stopped, not looking up at first, but looked up slowly, swallowing, unsure what to expect.
The older man raised his chin slightly, waiting for Harry, his gaze however fell into something he saw swimming around in Harry’s eyes. "You don’t understand what has happened, do you."
Harry's face went blank with horror and he could only whisper, "No ... no ... I ... my entire right arm, whenever I handle my wand all I can think about is ..."
"You are still being torn apart. Your soul, Harry," he used the young man’s given name smoothly, what your mother worked so hard to protect, "is still being torn apart."
Harry frowned, shaking his head, "But ... he's gone, he's gone ... why- how can he still do this to me!?"
"He’s not. You are."
"I'm doing this?" Harry stumbled a little, light-headed, but righted himself against a tree. "I'm tearing my soul apart? Why? What did I do wrong?" It made sense, now that Harry thought of it, the bone-chilling cold, the pain, his lack of sleep.
"What did you do wrong?" Severus raised an eyebrow, "You killed a man."
"I-" it felt like an icepick through Harry's chest to hear that and he snapped, "I STOPPED the DARK LORD! It wasn't MURDER!"
"He was still a man. You’re soul, Harry, does not recognize between killing for good or killing for evil. You still killed a man. And it is tearing at you."
"He was a murderer, a monster who ... it was self-defense!" Harry spat out every excuse that he repeated over and over in his head this past month, "He tried to kill you, he killed Sirius, he killed SO many people through his little army and he had to be stopped! He killed my MOM!"
"And no matter how many times he justified it," Severus remained calm, "it still tore at his soul too, because he too, was just a man."
Harry's wide green eyes went dull as he looked at Snape, "Do you think I deserve it?"
"No, Mr Potter. I do not. I truly thought it could have ended another way."
"So did I-" he replied in a small voice, his eyes falling as he turned and began to stride towards the muggle world again. He looked back, making sure that Snape was following and waited for him to catch up. I should have done it another way, I should have used another spell, I should have let him somehow kill himself ...
"You will find, that you will start to feel better, when you can admit to yourself, that you killed a man, not just the monster he had become."
Harry was silent as the walk light changed on the corner, silent as they crossed the street to the quaint, almost empty cafe on the corner with one waiter moving from table to table, polishing the formica. "Two please-" he mumbled as the waiter greeted them with a nod and menus, sitting them in a small, comfortable booth near a jukebox.
"Can I bring you anything to drink?"
"Hot water and a slice of lemon, thank you." Severus said sitting across from Harry, finding his silence most peculiar.
Harry swallowed, raking a hand through his hair, "Um coffee, black. Thanks."
"Sure," the waiter smiled, and moved back to the kitchen, leaving the men alone.
"I did what I had to do. I did what I was raised to do! No one told me about this ..."
"Do you truly believe that, Mr Potter? Fate, then? You had no choice?"
Harry glared a little, "I didn't say I was born to do it, I said I was raised to do it ... from the time I was eleven. You don't think this is what Dumbledore really intended for me to do in the end?" He looked sad as the waiter brought their drinks and tactfully disappeared again. Harry took his cup with his right hand, or tried to, sloshing coffee all over the too-white saucer before he gave up. "I don't have any illusions about that anymore. I was a weapon, I know that. The problem is, what do I do now that I've done my job?"
Severus found this curious, "You feel used? And yet, do not accept the outcome of your use."
"No one prepared me for the outcome of my use!" Harry closed his eyes, taking slow, deep breaths as he hid his shaking arm under the table again, "Sorry ... sorry."
"Harry-" Severus sighed, squeezing the contents of the lemon wedge into his cup of hot water, "This is your struggle. It cannot be cured by the words of any mentor. Until you, yourself come to terms with it, in it’s entirety … it will continued to tear at your soul. It is an internal struggle, a battle that cannot be helped with the aid of friends or an outline of direction from someone like myself."
Harry turned his face away, almost choking on the sudden lump in his throat as he bit down on his own lip. "Sorry-" he took a deep breath, "this happens a lot lately." Harry looked over with teary green eyes, shivering hard, "I know I'm a mess, but I know you can help me, I know you won't treat me like some bloody hero for what I did ... you already don't. I need your help though, I really do because gods, it's not just me dealing with this ... Teddy is only three months ..."
Severus’s lip parted, as if something had just struck him in the stomach under the table, a child without parents, raising a child, without parents. "What do you believe I can do for you, Harry?" Severus turned his gaze down to his mug of hot water, letting it cool as he sat in silence.
Harry swallowed, truly at the end of his rope, "I ... please just ... I don't talk to anyone anymore. I can't, I can't stand it because everyone else expects me to be some sort of overjoyed war hero and I'm not any of those things! Maybe I just need someone to talk to, a real person not just Teddy who only cries and cries and oh GODS I haven't slept in so long ... I need any sort of help, Professor."
"Then firstly, stop drinking coffee."
"I need it to stay up with Teddy, I can't just leave him alone and screaming in his crib. He's used to two parents ... and it's just me."
"I thought you wanted my help Mr Potter."
Harry nodded, "Okay, stop drinking coffee and just let Teddy cry ... got it." He wasn't making fun of Severus, he was just exhausted and grieving, shaken by what he'd done and trying hard to give someone else's child the comforts he never had.
"The boy will not cry, I will get him to sleep."
Harry paused, looking up, having to blink for a moment to register what Severus had just uttered, "I'm sorry, I just thought you said ... what?"
"You are confused, Mr Potter, so I remain patient. I am helping you, am I not?"
"You ... are coming to my house? Really?"
"Unless you object to having me near the boy."
Harry took a deep breath, "No ... no of course not, no, but ... he's noisy and messy ... you've been around babies before?"
Severus smirked, "Yes Mr Potter, I have."
Harry paused, tilting his head, "Were you ever around me- when I was a baby?"
"Yes, I was." Severus looked to his tea, not sure he wanted to know Harry’s reaction to his confession.
Harry just blinked, his expression softening, "When?"
"Shortly after you were born, while your father was still away." Harry would never know, but it took a great deal of effort on Severus’s part to say ‘your father’, rather then ‘Potter’ or to imply that perhaps it should have been someone else altogether.
Harry blinked, moving a little closer, "My mother invited you?"
"Yes. I am not in the habit of imposing my company upon others."
"How was she?" he asked, concerned.
Again, it was exceptionally difficult for Severus, as he saw Lily in his mind, holding her newborn son, "Happy."
"Was she ... scared? Tired?"
"Happy, Harry. She loved you very much."
Harry was about to ask more when he noticed the clock, "Sorry, I have to get back ... he only has a sitter until eleven." He laid down a few muggle bills on the counter and looked at Severus before standing, "I understand if you have to go home ..."
Severus stood slowly, "Once more Harry, do you wish my assistance, or not."
"Yes-" he breathed out, unable to stop trembling finely all over from his soul splitting or just exhaustion and hope, he didn't know.
"Does Lupin’s son have any medical conditions I should be aware of?" Severus began to walk with Harry, opening the door for him to leave the café.
"No ... no," Harry shook his head, "no, he's a metamophagus like his mother but no actual problems." Harry walked out, waiting for Severus to follow, still a little dazed. Snape's coming home with me?
"Are you quite sure?"
"He's already been tested for lycanthropy if that's what you mean ..."
Severus inclined his head, not bringing up that there can be various intensities of the disease that could have possibly been passed on to the boy. He would be careful, and see for himself just the same.
"Trust me, Remus demanded every single test there was ... but as far as we all know, he's fine." Harry led Snape to a small, dark red car with a baby seat strapped in the back and unlocked the driver side door. Harry climbed in and reached over, unlocking the passenger door.
Merlin, Severus opened the door slowly, looking in at Harry getting comfortable behind the wheel of the car, unknown body found in the wreckage of automobile this morning … and thus ends Severus Snape, Severus imagined easily. He got into the car, glancing to Harry out of the corner of his eye.
Harry started the car after two tries, "I told you, I haven't been able to stand a lot of magic-" and shifted the transmission with a grind of the gears and backed out of the parking space, nearly into two cars. "Sorry! Sorry! ..." he shifted again and lurched down the street. "It's not far."
"Good." Severus said quietly, wide-eyed, his hand gripping at his own knee.
Harry just sighed and turned a corner sharply, squealing the tires and almost hitting a fire hydrant, swearing under his breath as the car stalled and he had to start it again. "I'm ... trying, really, it's hard to learn ..."
"Yes. Fine." Severus whispered, with his other hand near the side of the door, as if ready to jump out at any time.
A couple of white-knuckled stops and starts later, Harry stalled the car just in front of a newer looking muggle house. It was small, but charming and neat looking, obviously just bought. Potter parked the car, pulled the key out and sighed, relieved, "Thankmerlin ..." he muttered before he climbed out, moving to the passenger side to open Severus's door for him. "This is it." There was nothing extravagant about the house or the yard, it looked rather average, even unassuming for the wealthy hero of the wizarding world.
Severus nodded once, getting out of the car, glancing at it as if the machine were pure evil he had just tainted himself by sitting in it. He looked to the front of the house, the mid-height privacy hedges, and the closed curtains within, "And you trust me?"
Harry blinked and his eyes suddenly looked very clear, sure of himself, "Of course I do ... my mother trusted you with me." Harry opened the little gate, pulling out a set of keys and walked up the small stairs, unlocking the door as quietly as he could.
A baby could be heard crying within and Hermione's face came into view, "Harry, there you are ... I'm sorry, I can't get him to stop, you're right, he's just ... maybe he's colicy?" She stopped, "Oh ... professor ..."
"Miss Granger." Severus said quietly, not hiding behind Potter, but defiantly letting the young man stand between them, just in case the young witch did not approve.
Harry took the baby, who quieted a little and clung to Harry's shoulder, chewing at his hoodie as his tuft of hair went from red to blue, "Thanks Hermione, sorry, I know you have to get back to Mungo's ..."
Hermione nodded, getting her bag, "I ... couldn't get him to eat, I tried everything, I'm sorry ..."
"It's fine, trust me there's an art to it. Thanks Hermione, have a good night at school, say hi to Ron."
Hermione nodded, "Sure, Harry" she stared at Snape for a moment, "Goodnight, professor." She left, closing the door softly, leaving Harry standing in a heap of baby toys and blankets, laundry, parts of a crib, and bags of diapers yet to be opened.
Severus let his eyes drift across the room briefly, getting a sense of the place before he addressed Harry, "Does he have his own room?"
"Yes, but I don't use it ..." Harry bounced Teddy a little and the boy whimpered, still breathing as though he were crying even though his tears had stopped. "Want to meet Uncle Severus, Teddy? Want to say hi?" Harry raised his eyebrows and turned the boy very, very slowly in his arms, walking him over, "Teddy Lupin, this is your Uncle Severus ... Professor, this is Teddy." Teddy had huge, huge blue eyes at the moment that matched his strange, wispy hair.
Severus let the boy look at him, engaging him with his eyes as he pulled his jacket off, laying it over the top of a nearby couch, "Hello Teddy."
Teddy blinked at Severus, his blue eyes going green, then purple, then brown, and then black like Severus's, his hair going ebony too in mimicry. The baby gurgled a little and opened his hand at Snape.
Severus in turn mirrored the boy, opening his hand, then closing and opening once more, "Yes? Hello."
There was something thoughtful about the baby's gaze and he leaned back against his godfather, then hid his face, shy. Harry turned him around again and bounced him, "That's actually the best reception anyone's had since ..."
"It’s alright." Severus cut Harry off so that he didn’t have to say it.
Harry nodded, "He needs a bath, I think, then a bottle ... do you want some tea or something to eat? I think I have bread and peanut butter, I can make toast." Harry walked into the kitchen with Teddy and started running warm water in a surreptitiously clean sink.
"No, Harry. I am here to help you. I am not your guest."
It was almost something a parent would say, and Harry set up teddy's bath mat and a few clean towels beside the sink, a bottle of baby shampoo and lotion. "Okay ... " his shoulders were still tense, squared as he carefully undressed his godson and after testing the water again, set him in the warm bath.
As something new to focus on, Severus stood not far from Harry. Being around someone the boy trusted allowed Teddy to see him as unthreatening.
Teddy was content, his small feet kicking back and forth a little as Harry washed him carefully. The baby's eyes kept switching from green to black, green to black as he looked between his godfather and the calm, dark man next to him.
"When was the last time you slept for more then three hours?"
"He likes baths, he's quiet, then." Harry yawned widely and Teddy yawned with him, smiling a little. "Hmm? Um ... dunno, I might have a couple days ago." Teddy yawned again and watched his godfather gleefully, almost clapping when Harry yawned again uncontrollably.
"After he is fed, I suggest you sleep Mr Potter."
"Okay ..." he nodded, blinking slowly and smiling at Teddy, "Uncle Sev is going to play with you for a little while, Ted, okay? Are you going to be a good boy?" Harry rubbed the tiny soles of Teddy's feet with the washcloth and yawned again as he rinsed him off for the final time and lifted him into a soft, clean towel, wrapping him up and carrying him to the fridge. "Do you like pizza?"
"You – are – not – feeding that boy pizza."
The chosen one opened his fridge, shaking his head as he pulled out one of almost twenty pre-filled bottles and dropped it in a pot of water that he set to simmer before walking Teddy back to the livingroom, starting to diaper him with expert hands. "Course not, I'm trying to feed you ... I'll eat anything."
"I am capable of attending to myself, Mr Potter. Recall, I am not your guest."
"Well I like pizza and I'm ordering some ... so- just tell me what sort of flavor you like." Harry powdered Teddy's bottom and his glasses went white. "Almost done ..." he soothed the baby as the water heated the bottle.
Severus gave no answer, but retrieved the bottle from the kitchen, pulling up the hem of his sweater, just a little, he tested the milk on his wrist before walking towards Harry.
"Stop ... squirming or I might stick it to you again-" Harry mumbled, trying to close the sticky tab of the diaper so that it was tight enough. He looked up, trying to see through the talcum powder, "his bottle should be almost ... oh, you ... have it."
Severus offered it to Harry, "Stick it to him?"
"His ... diaper sticker, tab ... thing-" Harry fastened the diaper and took the bottle, lifting the diapered baby into his arms and testing the temperature on his wrist before he offered the bottle to the baby. "Thanks ..."
Watching the two, Severus remained out of the way, but in direct line of sight. "Where is your room in relationship to his?"
"It's ... there-" he nodded down the hall and then just walked there as he fed the baby, pushing the door open to the messy, cave like room with his foot. A bassinette sat on a stand just beside the only part of the bed that seemed slept in.
"Ah, I see … there is no separation between the two."
"He's too young, it's easier if he sleeps with me." Harry walked into his room, kicking muggle clothes out of his way and sitting down with Teddy in his arms who was almost done the bottle.
Severus waited in the doorway, making no comment upon the condition of their home environment, or any other remark for that matter.
Teddy finished his bottle and fussed, crying a little until Harry put him over his shoulder, patting his back. "He has to be burped or the gas builds up and then we're really in for a bad night."
Still, Severus waited, "When you are done, will you try giving him to me?"
Harry nodded, rocking back and forth with Teddy and then standing, pacing with the infant whose hair looked blonde-white, the color of Harry's sheets. "Come on buddy, come on ..." Teddy started to fuss, "burp ... you can burp ...."
"Harry … please." Severus insisted.
"You know how to burp a baby?" Harry asked cautiously, still pacing.
"He doesn’t need to be burped. He needs to be positioned differently in order to comfortably digest his food."
Harry paused, blinking, "What? How do you know ..."
"Harry, please." Severus held a arm out, palm up.
Harry nodded and handed Teddy over, then sat on the bed, watching him. "So how was I supposed to hold him?" God, I'm the worst godfather ever. I didn't even feed him right.
Severus held Teddy, what was traditionally considered ‘backwards’. He held the infant as if he were a bouquet of flowers, or a rugby ball, whichever allusion first comes to mind. Teddy laid on his stomach against Severus arm, his head resting against the crook of Snape’s elbow while the palm of the man’s hand was gently pressed against the underside of Teddy’s stomach, leg dangling on either side of his hand. Severus kept the child close to his own stomach as he slowly walked, his second hand rubbing over the child’s back. "There is no supposed to, Harry … everything is learned. Some things will work, others will not."
Sure enough, Teddy cooed immediately, happily, humming and playing with Severus's dark sleeve. "So where ... where did you learn this?"
Again, Severus seemed to forget to answer Harry’s question, "Just needed time to digest-" he spoke to the boy, trying to engage him, then glanced up to Harry, "Go to sleep."
Harry sighed, head in his hands, "Gods ... what else have I been doing wrong for an entire month to him?"
"Stop." Severus said firmly, clearly not tolerating such talk. "… I apologize." He looked down to the boy again in his arm, "You sounded like Lily just then."
Harry straightened, having never been told that before as he took his powdery glasses off, looking at Severus with exhausted, red-rimmed green eyes, "Really? She was bad at this too?"
"She wasn’t bad at it Harry, and neither are you. She was worried that everything she was doing was wrong, that a single act was going to traumatize you for life … but the truth is, you were learning about the world, and she was learning about you."
Harry laughed, "And I ended up traumatized anyway-" he smiled to himself, cheeks pinkening for the first time in well over a month, "sorry, bad joke. I'm beyond exhausted and I should just shut up and go to sleep, right."
"Yes." Severus smirked, taking Teddy with him out of the room. "As you say ... shut up and sleep. I don't want to see you for at least ten hours. Good night."
Harry grunted and tried muttering instructions through the gap in the door but fell asleep with his mouth open, drooling on the sheets.
* * *
Sitting on the floor with his legs crossed and his back up against the couch, Severus sat with Teddy in his lap who watched Severus’s efforts to build him something interesting. This was the third time Severus attempted to build a building, a rough replica of Hogwarts castle with the supplied wooden and plastic blocks. Though purposefully, each time Severus had given Teddy a block to hold on to in his fist, and after some time, would end up being tossed at the model, so that Severus could start over again.
Teddy giggled quietly against Severus's arm, the cantankerous baby had turned docile and patted his own toes as he watched Severus's hands turn the bright block.
Severus Snape, man of few words and not prone to talking to himself, however, was carrying on a somewhat one-sided conversation with the young boy, "And after we put the yellow rectangle up like this, then the blue triangle can go on top, like this, yes?"
Teddy looked up with dark, dark eyes, fascinated with Severus, reaching up to him instead of the block. "Abbaababa" he babbled.
"Abba?" Severus smiled a little, "Up? Up?" Severus wrapped his arm around Teddy, turning him in his lap so that the boy was facing him now, "Yes? Hello."
"ABBAABABABA!" Teddy grinned, kicking his feet gently, then going shy again, hiding behind his own hands and peeking between his palms at Snape, "baababa."
"Yes? Hello. Oh! Where did you go? Where? Oh?" Severus smiled assumingly whenever Teddy rediscovered that he was in fact still there.
Teddy turned pink and hid his face again before peeking, "AI!"
"Yes? Oh! Hello. Hello. Teddy."
Teddy Lupin gasped and hid again, but stuck out his tongue and grinned, curling his tiny, pale toes.
"Yes, I see you too." Severus placed his second hand gently on the boy’s side, holding him carefully so that he didn’t tip backwards.
Teddy reached out with one hand and touched the tip of Snape's nose, gently.
Severus blinked, then raised his eyebrows, "Yes? Hello to you too."
Teddy smiled a little and patted Snape's lips, laughing a little.
"Yes. Lips. Mouth. Ahhh ... see? M o u t h."
"Awwb." The baby yawned and his hair went lavender before he opened his eyes again, blinking just as his godfather had. It was three in the morning, and the baby had finally been pleasantly tired out.
"Tired?" Severus lifted the boy up into his arms as he stood, walking slowly around the living room until he found what he was looking for. Picking up a blanket which was bunched up behind a pillow on the couch, Severus sat with the boy, wrapping him in the blanket, resting him in the crook of his arm.
Teddy blinked slower and slower every time, his eyes going warm and dark as he looked up at Snape, stretching. The baby fell asleep like that, mid-stretch, arms up in the air behind his head, small fingers curling as his breath deepened and evened.
Severus watched the boy sleep in his arms, more then a little fascinated by the young life that was placed in his hands. As he watched the boy, he couldn’t help but wonder, would Lupin object? Would Tonks? And yet, already he thought of the boy as Harry’s child, as the boy would likely identify Harry as his father, not godfather.
Teddy fell fast asleep, dreaming whatever it was that babies dreamt of, mostly soft colors and the sounds of voices, some from today, some from long ago as the new person who smelled a little like his father's jackets held him. "Mmmmbbbbbbb ..." he gurgled a little, humming happily as Harry made similar noises in the cave of his bedroom.
It only now seemed to sink in for Severus that he was sitting on a couch, holding Harry’s godson while he slept in the other room. He did not know how it happened, but Harry was different. Though he was having difficultly sorting out exactly what it was. His own thoughts drifted as his head bowed forward, holding the child in his arms, falling into a light sleep.
* * *
A voice spoke, close to Severus as Teddy was lifted carefully from his arms, "I'm sorry ... you should have a bed ..." Harry was awake, sun poured in the tall windows through the half closed drapes that came with the house when the chosen one bought it a month ago. Teddy was awake again, clapping happily at his godfather as Harry held him.
Severus slowly lifted his head, cracking his neck as he focused on Harry, "Has it been ten hours yet?"
"Six hours," Harry smiled with a little yawn, "feels like ten though ... do you want to take my bed?"
"I recall telling you, that I didn’t want to see you for ten hours." Severus stood slowly with a sigh.
"Keep your eyes closed and you won't," Harry grinned, "Really, you just spent all night sitting on my couch, go to bed and I'll feed him."
Severus smirked, just staring at Harry a moment. You just told me to go to your bed. "Thank you, no. I have some things to retrieve from my home if you still wish me to stay."
Harry nodded, kissing the top of Teddy's head as he took him to the changing table, "You just let me have the first real sleep I've had in months, stay as long as you want."
"Then perhaps, I shall return again, around ten? A simple enough routine, I come here when it is time for you to sleep, and Teddy and I keep one another company into the late hours of the night. It is a start, but I must remind you, you did not risk contact with me because you wanted a baby sitter."
"No, of course not-" Harry swallowed, turning to look at Severus. "In fact, I was wondering if you'd just like to stay here ... that way I can at least keep you up to date with-" he looked down at his right hand, where Teddy chewed on his fingers. "Everything else" he looked back, "There are lots of spare rooms, if by lots I mean two, and I do ... but they can both be yours if you want to ..."
It was strange, until Severus cleared his head, all he had herd was, keep you. "I shall consider it. However, if that becomes the case, I must insist that no one know of our arrangement."
Harry nodded, smiling a little over his shoulder until he yelped and groaned, "TEDDY!" The baby giggled and Harry covered his automatic sprinkler with a clean diaper, looking at the wet spot on his shirt. "Nice, Ted, nice" he looked back at Snape, blushing, "um ... I can be in charge of diapers."
"Good idea" Severus said with a raised brow, "I'll leave you to it then."
"Sure ..." he smiled, "see you later."
"Good day, Mr Potter." Severus let himself out, disappearing once he passed Harry’s property line.