More than two weeks since Christmas. More than two weeks in which the unreasonable part of her brain (a minute one) pictured him. Imagine him. Daydreamed.
It was idiotic and she knew it but on the other hand, she knew there was no harm. She knew nothing would ever come of it. She knew that her daydreams, the little scenarios she put in her head when she couldn't sleep and snuggled with her pillow, didn't hurt her and didn't hurt him. It was nothing but a little fantasy that she had put into her head and she knew that that was all. Nothing more, nothing less.
And still — it was lovely to pretend that he would be there, helping her with the revising for her Potions NEWT. To think that someone other than Harry could possibly want to hug her. Not that the real Snape would want that (or many other people) but the Severus in her head would. The Severus in her head would want to hold her through the night when the nightmares hit and he would wipe away silently shed tears, the Severus in her head would kiss it all better and would tell her that he loved her and that...
"Bollocks," she told herself on that dreary January morning. The Severus in her head did not exist. He was a phantasm. She knew it. She knew it was probably even slightly unhealthy to make out a Severus in her head. But she felt, somewhere in her stomach, that she needed the phantasm-Severus in her head to go to sleep every night.
Hermione Granger pushed her Potions notes as far away as they would go and pulled the Charms book closer to herself. Maybe she would go to Uni somewhere and major in Charms. Or maybe do something else entirely.
Hairdresser. She could always try and become a hairdresser. Maybe it would help her with her own mane. She'd look into that. Definitely. Maybe not.
On that cold, dreary January morning, sleet coming from the grey London sky, Hermione pushed her head in her hands and for the millionth time, she thought about her future. About what she wanted to do.
.
Draco Malfoy was two things: frustrated and happy. Both at the same time. Frustrated because he felt like he had been watched like a hawk since Christmas. Watched by Eleanor, was terrible. He had never more than a minute or two alone with Aideen, no matter how much they tried. And during the nights, he could get out of his room, but Aideen's was locked. No chance at seeing her alone, no chance of talking to her or even holding her hand. Nothing. Hence, he was happy that she had gone back to Uni. He only had to take the 216 bus. Then walk a bit. He had to ask his godfather for the way since he had almost the same way now. Well, had, from this morning on. Apparently, he only went three times a week and it couldn't be too difficult to catch a bus, or, once he knew where he had to go exactly, he could even apparate. And once he was there with her, he could talk to her, get to know her without her grandmother present.
As much as he liked Mrs Callaghan — and he did — those almost three weeks since Christmas had done nothing to endear her to him. Well, she had not treated him like a mongrel chasing her pedigree but she had just kept a very close eye on them, had made sure that one of them always had something to do. And that was — unnerving.
He had tried to see it from her point of view, had tried to see that she was afraid for the virtue of Aideen but who did she think he was? Someone who shagged everything in sight? Oh well — he would just have to prove to her that he was worthy of Aideen. When the time was right.
And for now, he was truly looking forward to his godfather showing him the University. And maybe beginning to work. He needed money and needed to forge his documents before he could start Uni himself.
.
Severus eyed himself critically in the mirror. Eleanor had told him to wear a tie (which had belonged to her late husband) and a jacket (which had belonged to Stephen). Aideen had said to wear jeans and a shirt or a jumper and the leather jacket. Aideen was the one attending Uni and Eleanor wasn't — and so, he had pulled out the jeans and a black jumper from his cupboard and had dressed in that. So far, he had been quite successful had shoving all thoughts about that University away. He did not want to imagine what he looked like stumbling into a classroom. As a student.
So far, he had been busy helping Eleanor keeping Draco and Aideen apart. Not that he thought it would immediately result in babies (or one baby) if they were left alone together for ten minutes (and he trusted Draco to know non-verbal contraceptive spells) but he respected Eleanor and her wish not to put her granddaughter's virtue at risk in her house. He played along — and he knew Draco was happy being with her, sensing a sort of normalcy in a family, looking out for one another when he had not talked to his father or mother once since that curse on Eleanor. There had been owls. He had seen them. And he had seen Draco ignore them. Once, he had seen Draco trying to hex an owl.
He had said — nothing. He hadn't commented on the Ministry's drugging his godson. He had thought his part. Nothing more, nothing less. Not that he hadn't been tempted to get any Muggle means of destruction and do whatever to the Ministry. Bomb it, probably. Muggles had their means and they didn't need a wand for it.
He wouldn't need one either.
But at least, he thought as he left the house and locked it up, Lucius had not shown his face again. Not that anyone knew who had put the Imperius on him, at least he didn't know. And he didn't truly care. He had a few suspicions — thinking about it when he hadn't been able to sleep — but he would do nothing. He wouldn't tell the Ministry anything. And why should he? The Ministry had never done anything for him. Tit for tat. You could — he had thought a while back — take the man out of Slytherin, but you couldn't take the Slytherin out of the man.
He walked slowly towards the bus stop, the leather bag Draco had put the money in under his arm. He knew what he had to do. Aideen and Eleanor had shown him the way. He had looked at the building two day after New Year's.
No, he was no coward — but this situation, it was so new, it was so strange. So many years of being a teacher — and then, suddenly, having to sit at the other side again? But then again, he was almost desperate to know more about Linguistics. To figure out what exactly all the books said that Stephen had said he would send — and had sent. Surprisingly. Had his bookshelf now half-filled. Books he had received from Eleanor's family for Christmas. Presents he had unwrapped with wonder greater than he had ever felt before at any Christmas. Novels. Classics. Everything. That family had given him presents.
No time to think about that now. Now it was time to get on that bus. Now it was time to prepare himself mentally for the hours to come.
Semantics with Professor Deveney. Whoever he was. She was. He'd see.
27. The Meaning of Meaning
Semantics is generally defined as the study of meaning; and this is the definition that we will provisionally adopt: what is to be understood by 'meaning' in this conext is one of our principal concerns in later chapters. Ever since Ogden and Richard (1923) published their classic treatise on this topic, and indeed since long before that, it has been customary for semanticists to emphasize the fact (and let us grant that it is a fact) that the noun 'meaning' and the verb 'to mean' themselves have many distinguishable meanings. Some idea of the range of ther meanings may be obtained from a consideration of the following sentences:
(1) What is the meaning of 'sesquipedalian'?
(2) I did not mean to hurt you.
(3) He never says what he means.
(4) She rarely means what she says.
(5) Life without faith has no meaning
(6) What do you mean by the word 'concept'?
(7) Dark clouds mean rain.
(8) It was John I meant not Harry.
It has just been said that the various meanings of the noun 'meaning' and the verb 'to mean' illustrated above are distinguishable, not that they are unrelated. Just how they are related to one another is, however, a difficult and controversial question.
(Lyons, 1977)
The chairs were uncomfortable. Other people had scribbled on the desks. Chatter surrounded him. How he wished to have his Occlumency at that moment, pushing back the terrible feeling at the pit of his stomach that came with something unknown. He wasn't afraid — he was Severus Snape after all — but he disliked that chatter, those scribbled on desks, those uncomfortable chairs.
He had been so early that the room he was supposed to go in, had been almost completely empty and he had sat down in the middle of the room, not at the front, not at the back. Inconspicuously in the middle; the students at the front were called up, and the students in the back were called upon. Those in the middle had a rather simple, rather quiet life. At least this had been the case in most of his classes. First, there had been no one next to him, then with a smile, and a 'this seat taken?', a girl had sat down. So young. Black hair, thick, black lines around her eyes, her skin almost glowingly white, a long, black frock. She wouldn't have looked out of place in the Wizarding World, he had thought, and for a moment, he had waited for her to pull her wand out and fix that one strand of hair at the back of her head that had curled itself slightly and charm it as straight as the rest. But nothing had happened.
Then, about a minute before that class was supposed to begin, a boy had sat down next to him, grinning at him. About the same age as his godson. Just as Severus had (but not the black-clad girl next to him), the young man had pulled out pens and a pad and had carefully marked the date and the course they were taking on top of the page before he leaned back and observed, just as Severus had, the rest of the class.
There were about — thirty people, he suspected. All around his godson's age, except one at the very front. A woman, older even than he was, and next to her, another man, older even than her. The woman, he judged from the one time she had looked around and the back of her head was around fifty, the man, whom he could see slightly in profile, maybe sixty-five. So, clearly, he wasn't the only adult in that room, making a fool of himself. Going to University at his age. He should have tried to find a job, a steady income, a way of paying for the newly acquired phone, the phone bill, the food, taking Eleanor to the sea for a day. Not sitting here, pretending to be a student once more.
But now, he was here. In a classroom. No dark dungeons but high up in a brick building, with scribbled on desks (that would have made a wonderful detention in his time) and uncomfortable chairs. With the pad Eleanor had bought for him and two pens she had given him. One in blue, one in black. 'You never know what you need,' she had said and Aideen had grinned.
That girl — he couldn't figure her out. He had heard her and Eleanor talk. About the pregnant cousin of hers, about Draco, about what was right and what wasn't — and Aideen had promised her grandmother to lock her door during the night. And judging by Draco's grumbling visage, she had. And yes, she was anything but a good girl. She played good-natured pranks on her grandmother and had been very close to slapping him. She had treated him with silence for three days after she had found out that it had been him who had told Draco that she had a boyfriend. And only afterwards, she had hesitantly, made contact. And she had turned out quite witty, acerbic at times. Sharp. And yet there were times when she had acted like a spoilt little girl if she didn't get what she wanted.
"Good morning," he found himself, suddenly, pulled back into the classroom by a woman. So Deveney was a woman. Shoulder-length brown hair, blue eyes, nose a tad too long. Maybe 35. Younger than him. Not by much. What utter rubbish, being taught by someone younger than himself. And a woman. He wouldn't return. Would explain that this was all a mistake and would then go and look for a job.
"Good morning," she said again and put a heavy looking stack of text books on her desk. "What does it mean?"
Everyone sat very still. Everyone but someone behind him, shuffling papers. Never a good plan. Inconspicuous. That's what you had to be. Look at the person who asks the question — but not directly in the eyes. Inconspicuously.
"You, in the back. Yeah, you, shuffling with your papers, pretending to be very busy. You are not busy at the moment with anything but this question. Good morning. What does it mean?"
"Erm," someone in the back, a girl, said and he could imagine her blush.
"No, that's incorrect. Good morning does not mean erm. Did anyone do any reading before this class? I know this is a beginner's class but is it too much to ask that you at least look up what you're studying now? Good morning," she said forcefully. "What does it mean?"
Severus knew. His hand itched to be raised. His entire arm shook. But he had an image of a select few know-it-alls in his head. Not just Hermione Granger but she was quite prominent on that list of people who always had their hands up first. He wouldn't raise his hand. He wouldn't answer this question. Even though he knew the answer.
The boy next to him coughed and he did raise his hand.
"Finally, we have a volunteer," she said in front. "Yeah, what does it mean?"
"It's a greeting," the boy said, his accent thick. Scouse. Severus could hear it.
"Excellent. A greeting. What does that mean?"
"It means a thing you say to someone you see in the morning," he continued.
"Yes. What else?" she pierced him with her eyes and for a moment, they fell on him as well. Oh, he wanted to smack the boy's head for drawing attention to him. He did not want to be seen. Not yet.
"And," the boy next to him continued, "good morning can also mean that good is an adjective describing the noun more closely. A good morning. Opposite of a bad morning."
"Yes. Well done for such an obvious question," she smiled at him briefly before she turned her back to the class and wrote her name on the whiteboard. "Now that we got that out of the way," she said neutrally, "we can deal with all the boring organisational stuff. My name is Annie Deveney but I go by Dr Deveney. Yes, I like the alliteration so deal with it. I have a reader ready for you and the itinerary for this course is in that too. Topics for papers are to be talked over with me and I want about ten to twelve pages by the second week of the holidays. Yes, I like spoiling my own holidays with grading your work. I don't grant extensions, so don't even ask. There will be essays throughout the term but they will be shorter and done on a weekly basis. If anyone wants to up their grade by doing a presentation, please feel free to contact me via email or talk to me in my office hours. Those are Thursdays from two to four or talk to me after this class. I will not accept more than one presentation per class so if you already know that writing papers is not your forte, decide quickly and on the topics. If none of those say anything to you, you should have done a bit of reading beforehand. You will do all of the reading before class. Active participation is a requirement in this course and if you don't actively participate, your grade won't be good. If you want to leave this course, which of course you can, please tell me. I will not rip your heads off. At least I have never done it before. Questions?"
