Whispers Through the Door

       Professor Severus Snape walked briskly down the silent, dark corridor towards his chambers. 

       He stopped, something catching his dark colored eye.  The Slytherin portrait door was open. 

       "Oh, Oh!  I want to join!" An excited voice came from just outside the portrait. 

       Weasley?  Snape raised an eyebrow, what are you doing out of bed… in the dead of night… in front of the Slytherin door?  He smiled maliciously, and walked to the now-closed portrait; he was about to say the password, and catch the young Gryffindor in the act, but a sudden outburst stopped him dead in his tracks. 

       "So, I guess, we have, a foursome, now?" Draco Malfoy's out-of-breath voice came from within. 

       "Shut it, Malfoy."

       Oh sweet Merlin.  Potter, too?  Potter, Weasley, AND Malfoy?  But, who was the fourth-

       "Watch it, Hermione, I'm slipping out!" Ron's voice came again. 

       "You have to take off your robes, Hermione." Harry said knowingly. 

       "Yah, believe me, it's a lot easier." Malfoy agreed. 

       There was a rustling of clothes; Snape's eyes went wide. 

       "Do you have to spin it so hard?" Harry asked credulously. 

       "Yah!  You've been at it all day, when's it gonna be my turn?" Ron objected. 

       A sudden mental image made Snape sick to his stomach. 

       "There was another rustling noise, and Snape assumed they were shifting positions. 

       "Oy, Weasel, that was my bum!" Malfoy exclaimed. 

       "Stop winning and spin it already!" Hermione snapped. 

       "Yah, my knees are starting to hurt from this position." Harry added. 

       From the sound of it, no one had "spun it" yet. 

       "Ron!  Quit sucking on that already and spin it!" Hermione ordered. 

       "But it tastes good!" Ron objected. 

       "Malfoy are you done back there yet?"

       Draco groaned, "I think I heard something pop."  He whined. 

       "Ron, spin it!"

       "Well, it Harry would get off me!" Ron shouted in return. 

       "If Hermione would quit moving down there!" Harry grumbled. 

       "Watch it, Potter, you'll break it!" Draco warned loudly. 

       "My back hurts now." Harry moaned. 

       Snape could see the headlines now: "Hogwarts professor found dead of heart attack after walking in on Gryffindor/Slytherin foursome." 

       "Ow! I think I just tore-" Hermione exclaimed. 

       Snape's knees buckled, and he fell to the ground with a crash. 

       "What was that?"

       "Oh, no, what if it's…"

       "I would rather die before being caught in a situation like this with three guys, let alone you three!" Hermione exclaimed, exasperated. 

       "If we get caught, my father will hear about it!" Draco sounded strained. 

       "Do you want your father to know about this?  Merlin knows I wouldn't." Ron shook his head. 

       "This is so embarrassing!" Hermione moaned. 

       "Embarrassing for you?!  Look at the position I'm in!" Harry exclaimed. 

       Snape's left eye twitched.  He gathered his courage; he had to stop this before things went any further, Merlin only knows what positions he would find them in now, let alone if he waited any longer.  He shuttered, pushing away strange, morbid, and anatomically incorrect details. 

       The portrait door swung open; "What in Merlin's name are you four doing in here?@  Do I even want to know?" Snape demanded, expecting to see three naked Gryffindors and one naked Slytherin together on the floor of the green and silver Slytherin common room. 

       Draco, Harry, Hermione, and Ron all screamed simultaneously. 

       Snape's mouth dropped open, and he stared wide-eyed at the foursome before him, "You're, you're…" He stammered. 

       No one dared to speak, frozen in their awkward positions; their limbs twisted around each other's painfully; their bodies intertwined above the plastic sheet. 

       "What in Hogwarts are you doing?  In the Slytherin common room no less?!" Snape wasn't sure if he should be relieved or horrified. 

       Ron stammered. 

       "I told you to stop sucking on that!" Hermione reached over and yanked a Honeydukes sucker from his mouth. 

       "We were… playing… a game… sir…" Draco tried to explain. 

       "That much I can see." Snape said simply, silencing them.  "Now, back to your rooms, all of you!" He ordered. 

       They gathered their discarded ties and outer robes and –in Harry's case– Invisibility Cloak, and walked back to their rooms silently, leaving their abandoned Twister game behind. 

       Snape shook his head, Kids these days… 

The End