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"I just don't understand what she can possibly see in him!" Harry said grumpily as he studied Lockhart's stupid smiling face in the Daily Prophet. He gulped down his beer and asked the bartender for another. "How could she leave me for that idiot?"
Harry and Hermione had been in a relationship for years, the nature of their love for one another having changed irrevocably when they'd been camping alone all those nights in the Forest of Dean. They'd shifted, softly and slowly, from friends to a little bit more. When Ron had finally returned to them, he hadn't stayed long. Their love had cost them his friendship and, by extension, the rest of the Weasleys, but they'd made it work. For better or worse, it had been just the two of them against the world. Their love was soft and comfortable, like a well-worn and much loved blanket; they'd kept each other warm. At least, they had until Harry had caught her wanking to a press photo of their old DADA teacher and it had all fallen apart.
"You've been saying that for months, Potter," Severus Snape said, sliding him another glass. "Had you tried to understand your studies this much, we may have gotten along better."
"I doubt it," Harry scoffed. "You didn't get along with Hermione either and she tried harder than anyone."
Snape waved him off. "She tried to memorize, never to understand. I have no patience for know-it-alls."
"You have no patience for anyone," Harry said. He shoved the newspaper aside and ran a finger through the condensation on his glass.
"If that were true, I would not allow you in my pub," he said dryly.
"I'm the only one miserable enough to come into your pub," Harry shot back, beginning to enjoy himself for once. "If you didn't let me in, you'd just be in here by yourself."
Snape snorted. "Perhaps I'd prefer it that way." He studied Harry for a long moment, his dark eyes unreadable. "You must overcome this, Potter," he said seriously, dropping the banter. "You are the saviour of the world. You could have any Witch you want. You do not need one who simpers for Gilderoy Lockhart, of all people."
"I don't want any other witch," Harry said, sinking back into his misery.
"Any wizard then," Snape said. "Any wix at all."
"I'm not–" But Harry cut himself off. He had been going to say that he wasn't interested in wizards, but the words felt false on his tongue. He thought back to Cedric Diggory and Draco Malfoy, hell, even the way he'd once looked at pictures of young Sirius, and decided that he wasn't exactly uninterested in wizards. Idly, he wondered if their trio would still have broken apart if Hermione had been the one to leave him and Ron in the Forest all those years ago.
He looked up at Snape and found him gazing smugly back at him. Harry shot him a glare. "I need to think about that," he said carefully, then dropped some money on the bar and left Snape to be smug and judgmental by himself.
~~~~~
The following day, Harry sauntered into the pub with something other than Hermione on his mind for once. Taking his usual seat, he waited as Snape slid him his usual drink then met the man's eyes. "Have you ever slept with a man?" he asked, his tone casual.
Snape raised an eyebrow at him, then pulled out a cigarette and lit it with the tip of his wand. "Yes," he said dryly, with neither shame nor enthusiasm.
Harry grinned. "Did you like it?" he asked, slightly worried that Snape was going to hex him but unwilling to stop.
"Yes," Snape repeated, breathing out a ring of smoke. He looked utterly bored and Harry wondered if that was some sort of Slytherin mask.
"Would you like to go out with me?" he asked hopefully. "To dinner or something," he quickly added. He didn't want Snape to think he was just asking for sex and thought, a moment too late, that his initial line of questioning was probably a bit misguided.
Taking another drag from his cigarette, Snape said, "I don't even like you Potter," then tapped his ashes into a nearby ashtray. His fingers were long and thin, his nails painted black.
"But you tolerate me," Harry said with a grin. "And you said I could have any wix I want." Boom. Mic drop. Snape couldn't possibly argue with his own previous statement.
Snape blew smoke out of his nose, gazing blankly at Harry, then ran his thumb over his bottom lip. "Will this get you to shut up about Gilderoy Lockhart and your bloody ex?"
"Absolutely," Harry said with a certainty he didn't feel. He hoped that it would though. Who wanted to pine after someone who wanked to press photos?
Snape gave him another long appraising look before stubbing out his cigarette. "Very well, Potter. I will go out with you," he said.
Harry studied his face for any hint of sarcasm but he found none, just a knowing smirk on his thin face. He decided it was best not to question it so he drank his beer in satisfied silence once they'd made their plans. He didn't even check the paper for new mentions of Lockhart.
~~~~~
Much to Harry's surprise, he and Snape – Severus as he now referred to him – had hit it off incredibly well. They'd gone dancing in a muggle club and been out to see a punk band in Knockturn Alley and Severus had been comfortable and confident in both settings. And more than that, he'd been a great match for Harry. Funny, snarky, and intelligent, a surprisingly good conversationalist… Harry was finding that the date he had only asked for as a way to get over Hermione was rapidly becoming something more and he couldn't be happier about it.
Their third date, his birthday date, was the first time that they were actually having dinner together and Harry was looking forward to having time to sit down and just talk with his new love interest, no distractions or interruptions. Anxiously jiggling his leg as he waited, Harry ordered a bottle of wine for their table and began sipping a glass. All movement ceased, though, when Severus came through the door and took his seat.
Severus Snape was not a conventionally attractive man. His face was a touch too thin, his nose a touch too big, his expressions always full of sarcasm and snark. But Severus Snape in a suit, sitting down across from him and pouring himself a glass of wine with quick nimble fingers was nothing short of striking. Conventional attractiveness was massively overrated, Harry decided, when contrasted with someone who matched him so perfectly, who held his own in every situation. When contrasted with someone he was attracted to. Convention be damned.
"Happy birthday, Potter. You clean up well." Severus swirled his wine around in his glass. "And you apparently know your wine," he said with reluctant admiration.
"I just picked what the server suggested," Harry said sheepishly. "And you can call me Harry, you know."
Severus shrugged minutely. "Knowing when to trust the expertise of others is to your benefit," he said, ignoring Harry's suggestion and studying the menu.
The food turned out incredible. It was everything Harry could have hoped for and he knew he'd be frequenting this restaurant in the future. Ideally, with Severus, because the conversation was even better than the meal. The two openly flirted, their conversation full of laughter and teasing and innuendo. Harry was just about to invite Severus to come back to his flat for a drink when Severus' face darkened.
"What's wrong?" Harry asked, his own face falling. He couldn't imagine what he'd done to mess up their evening.
"Your ex," Severus said through clenched teeth, "is over there." He gestured subtly with a nod of his head.
Harry felt his eyes widen, then he followed Severus' gaze. He expected to feel hurt, to feel angry, to feel sad. He did not expect to begin laughing.
Hermione Granger sat on the other side of the room and, at first glance, Harry thought she was there with Lockhart himself. He stared openly, not caring if they saw him, and when he looked closer he saw that the man's smile was a bit crooked, his gestures not quite practiced enough.
"She's with a fake Lockhart!" Harry exclaimed loudly through his laughter. The sound of his voice attracted Hermione's attention and she shot them a startled glance, which only made Harry laugh harder.
After a beat, Severus began laughing with him, the tension sliding effortlessly off of his thin face. The sound of his deep laughter at his ex's expense only served to make Harry like him more.
Slipping his hand across the table, he tangled his fingers with Severus' and gave them a squeeze. "I promise, you have nothing to worry about, Severus," he said, giving him a more private kind of smile. "I'm completely over her and I'm exactly where I want to be."