Twenty Seconds

Harry stood in the queue with everyone else, as Professor Snape had ordered, wondering what on earth was going on. Snape taught Defence fairly well [he would never admit that allowed, though] but they rarely did a whole class practical.

Usually, he either told them what to do, and ordered everyone to find a partner, or he picked on one unlucky individual, and used them to demonstrate a spell or technique.

The man paced along the line, glaring sternly. It had lost the scary effect it had once had on the class, which were now seventh years, and could glare back perfectly well.

"Today you will not be defending an opponent." He stated, and Harry noticed that the Slytherin did not have his wand out.

"Then what are we doing?" Ron muttered. "Considering this is defence, and all." Harry winced the second he heard his friend talking.

He may have been whispering, but Severus had been a spy, and his hearing was excellent.

"Five points from Gryffindor, Mr Weasley, for stupidity as well as disrespect." He walked the length of the line and back again, and Harry watched the strangely graceful movement, smiling a little.

For some reason, he found Severus's short temper to be quite amusing. He wasn't sure when it had ceased to irritate him, but guessed it was probably close the time where he had noticed that the man's hair was slicked away from his face, not greasy, and his form, which had been a part of the intimidating image when he was younger, seemed to be lean and elegant under his robes.

"This is defence, and sometimes, the battle part of your defence will fail, and you will face death. Today's test is to be much different from all of the others I and likely any of your previous, useless, teachers have given you."

He withdrew his wand, and pointed it at the board. The chalk wrote incredibly rapidly in Severus's usual neat script.

Twenty Seconds to live.

"You will show me what you would do if you had been successfully cursed, and had twenty seconds before you found yourself immobile and dying. Got that?"

Everyone nodded a bit absently, other than Hermione, who said 'Yes sir' quite chirpily. Apparently, she had already found what had to be the correct answer.

"You have to actively show whatever your answer would be. You may use props." He looked at Seamus, who was pointing his wand at Dean.

"Please use decoy forms if you plan on injuring anyone in any way, Mr Finnigan. You cannot kill Mr Thomas, even for the sake of this class."

Harry and Several others sniggered, and Seamus smirked, shrugging it off the way he did with most things Snape said to him.

The first person in the queue was Lavender. Who dropped to her knees, and began praying. To Merlin, God and SpongeBob. Harry wasn't sure when she had seen the Muggle cartoon, but found it fairly amusing. Severus rolled his eyes, and then raised one eyebrow as he wrote on a piece of parchment; most likely her grade.

The next person followed, but Harry did not watch, instead thinking of exactly what he would do, if he had twenty seconds left in the defence classroom.

"…Oh, for Merlin's sake, Parkinson! Honestly! What would you actually do?" Pansy had started combing through her hair with her fingers, which, somehow, Snape considered to be even worse than Lavenders.

Probably because he thought her silly enough to actually do that.

Well, if it was what he would actually want to do with his last moments, Harry only had one response.

And that was likely to get him detention for a month.

It got to Dean, who was standing in front of Harry. Who hadn't noticed just how close it was to his turn, until he realised that there was no-one between him and Dean.

Well, that was what he got for not paying attention. Dean, took two steps forward, so he was between Severus and his class, and turned sideways.

This was confusing, until Dean slipped one hand down his trousers, about to do something highly inappropriate.

"Dean Thomas! That is not acceptable! Detention with Filch for a month!"

"But sir! That's honestly what I would do!" He said seriously, though when he stepped back, Harry could have sworn he saw the flash of light hitting a galleon as Seamus high-fived him.

Their betting and dares were getting out of hand. Harry shook his head at Dean, then realised that Snape was looking right at him, expecting him to do something ridiculous, no doubt.

Harry quickly reasoned that it was no worse than Dean, and actually honest, before he stepped forward, past the partway point in line with where Dean had stopped, right up until he was standing directly in front of Snape.

He took a deep breath, then moved fast, resting one hand on Severus's jaw as he leaned in and kissed him.

He lightly brushed his lips against the older man's, soft and slow. Severus appeared to be frozen, and Harry dared to add more pressure, kissing him more firmly, even going so far as to catch the man's bottom lip in between both of his own, and suck lightly.

As he drew back, he heard several whistles and cheers coming from behind him, and he blushed. Deeply. He hadn't thought of his peers reactions.

Severus blinked several times before he seemed to come back down to earth. It had been nice, and Potter was clearly a good kisser.

He's also handsome, smart though a bit of a ditz and a little sarcastic, but you normally don't dwell on it too much he told himself.

He then realised where he was, and was about to shout at the boy for trying to be deliberately aggravating, until he properly looked at the Gryffindor.

He had blushed a deep pink, and looked a little embarrassed.

Severus cleared his throat. "You will explain yourself after class, Mr Potter." He told the boy, in his most threatening voice.

Harry nodded in a resigned fashion. "Yes, Sir." The Gryffindor muttered.

-When everyone had cleared out, he turned to Harry, who seemed to be trying to think of some sort of explanation.

Severus simply reached out, gently took the boy's chin in hand, and tilted his face up slightly, before leaning down a little to kiss him.

Harry wrapped his arms around him as he kissed back, and Severus moved his own to tangle his hands in Harry's messy black hair.

He barely knew the boy, as a person, and not a student, but it felt like he was home.

The End.