A/N: So this actually happened to me last night. I woke up at 2:30 am and randomly remembered a short story from a literature class I took over a year ago. An awful story at that, and I spent 20 minutes looking through Norton Anthologies trying to find it. I did have a final for a summer class today, and was horribly freaking out and I couldn't help but wonder how much better things would be if I had Sev to help sort me out. So this was written at 3 in the morning, as most fics are. Oh well. It was thankfully edited when I was much more awake. A slightly longer one for you guys this time. Enjoy!

SSHGSSHG

"Hermione, I don't see why you can't just stay here. Nothing will be different." They had been arguing for at least the last 5 minutes. Why couldn't she see how petty she was being over such a trivial matter?

"What do you mean nothing will be different? Everything will be completely, utterly not the same!" And so her wild gesticulating begins. She was making it one of those debates.

"Why? Because it's exams week?"

"Yes, because it's exams week!"

"Hermione, love, don't be – "

"You've never seen me during exams week, Sev. I get absolutely crazy. Psycho. Bonkers. You'll want me in the Janus Thickey Ward before the first one is even over!" As if he would ever subject her to being a cohabitant with Lockhart. Even he wasn't that cruel.

Severus walked over to her, coming in close to grab her shoulder and look into her eyes.

"Hermione, darling. First thing, you need to take a deep breath and calm down." He made sure to put the emphasis on the calm part.

"See? It's already starting." Severus couldn't help but feel a little guilty at how she could be so adorable when she was so upset. Before she could continue, he placed a finger over her lips, leaving her looking properly chastised.

"Shush." He tried to hold back a chuckle at her affronted look. "Now. Listen to me. You're forgetting the most important part in all of this."

Hermione remained quiet, waiting for him to continue, still looking like she wanted to commence her rambling.

"I love you." She gave him a confused and rather dumbfounded look, wondering how in the world that was currently relevant to their discussion. "I've told you I love you, my beautiful, wonderful light of pure perfection, countless times, and yet it appears that I still need to do it more often."

Hermione couldn't help but blush at his open praise of her. Her blush lead to his smile.

"And when I say I love you, I mean I love all of you. I loved you when you freaked out that that blasted kneazle went hunting for a few days without telling you and you thought he was dead. I loved you when you were a mucus-coated mess on my couch with the worst cold the wizarding world has ever seen. And I will continue to love you when you're a miserable bitch from being pregnant with our children and I will love you when I stay awake to make you dozens of the most amazing soothing creams for your back pain and I will love you and be more than happy to oblige you on those days when your hormones go nuts, in a good way, and make you feel the need to make me your sex slave." She couldn't help but blush at his implications of her future sex drive. "I will love you when you get random food cravings in the middle of the night and I will love you when you are crying all of the time because somehow the bloody dungeons will still end up being too hot. No matter what the case, I will still love you, my Hermione, end of the term exams be damned."

She looked shocked at him for a moment, seeming to take a brief second to think over what he finished saying before starting in on her side again.

"But it'll be so much worse than that, Sev! There will be screaming and crying and ranting and pacing and incessant questions and yelling and cursing and I'll be up at 3 o'clock in the morning making pancakes and I'll have too much caffeine and be either completely manic or passed out somewhere and I won't sleep and you really don't need to deal with all of that going on down here. It's exams week for you, too, you know."

Everything seemed to come out in one breath. Severus was surprised that Hermione wasn't panting. Despite her hurried tirade, her eyes still had a touch of fear to them.

"I suppose it wouldn't help if I said you make pancakes at 3 o'clock in the morning now, anyway, would it?" Severus half smirked and half smiled, knowing that he was starting to win the battle.

Hermione let out an exasperated cry as he leaned in to hug her. She buried her face in Severus's shirt, holding back panicked breaths and hurried tears the best she could. By the time her breaths matched evenly with his, she pulled back, eyebrows slightly furrowed, looking uncertain.

"Will you really rub my feet for me when I'm pregnant?"

He chuckled and pulled her back in for an even tighter hug. "Every day."

He felt her smile as she mumbled into his chest. "Okay."

~ 2 weeks later ~

Severus woke up to the sound of a large thump and an empty side of the bed next to him. Casting a quick tempus charm, he groaned as it read 2:33 am.

Getting out of bed, he made his way into the sitting room, following the sound of continued thumps. Opening the door, he was more clearly able to hear the frustrated muttering and was graced with seeing one of the most adorable sights he'd had the pleasure to lay eyes on in days.

"Hermione. Darling. What are you doing?"

His girlfriend was sitting on the rug in front of the fireplace, wearing one of his ratty old t-shirts that he really only kept around so she could steal them to sleep in. Pout planted firmly on her face, Hermione was surrounded by what had to be at least 50 books strewn across the room. Thankfully, none of them were too close to the flames. At least she still had some sense of sanity left with her brilliant mind. With a humph and another distinct thump, Hermione threw another book into the ever increasing mess. She looked up at him, eyes a whirlwind of anger, frustration, and panic.

"I can't find it." Her voice was so distressed; you would've thought Crookshanks was missing again. Severus moved over to sit on the couch, perhaps one of the only surfaces that was relatively book-free.

"Find what?" He was doing his best to keep from laughing. She looked so offended at his question, clearly wondering where his sudden stupidity was coming from.

"It! The name of a story I read about a year ago. I remember everything that happened in it, but I can't remember what it's called or who wrote it. I know it's early 20th century American and that there's an obnoxious little boy with only 7 teeth because he eats too many sweets—honestly, who eats sugar cubes whole, what, does he think he's a horse—and he carries a walking stick that he stole and likes to hit people with and his older sister is a complete bitch to the main character who has no backbone, Merlin help him, and she, the bitchy sister, goes off and starts dating some stupid, daft, arrogant French guy. Or maybe he was Italian, I'm not really sure, but he had a weird accent and was a terrible singer and I can remember all of that but not the bloody name!"

Oh, she was really testing his strength of will. Severus could feel his stomach muscles start to hurt from not letting out his laughter and his face turning a particular shade of red from reigning in his smiles. It would be pointless at this point, and quite possibly hazardous to his health, for him to point out that this in no way, shape, or form would be on her exams tomorrow, or ever, for that matter. One thousand years and Hogwarts had never had a literature course, let alone an American one, and he'd bet his left kidney that it never would. Doing his best to keep a sympathetic look on his face, he did the only thing he could think to do.

"Come here." Severus knew that that particular phrase, especially from him, was a weakness for her, knew that he was playing a cheat card, but he also knew that it would work like a charm.

"What?" Hermione was so surprised by his cool reaction and, more importantly, already trying to figure out how she was supposed to get around all of the books.

Seeing her dilemma, with a wave of his hand, Severus sent all of the books back to their proper places on the shelves, a few getting in a tangled mess due to size and location before resting comfortably.

"Just come here, love." Seeing as she was free, and that there was no alternative considering he just set her search back to square one, Hermione got up from the floor and went into his waiting arms on the couch. An annoyed, questioning look from her was all Severus needed to start explaining.

"I'm offended, Hermione, truly." He said it with a smirk on his lips. "I wonder, did you doubt my abilities or simply forget that I have them?

Her face full of confusion, her eyebrow raised in an unintentional impression of him, her head tilted slightly to her left. "What?"

Severus brought his hands up to her temples, leaning his forehead against hers and looking into her eyes.

"Think of everything you just told me about the book, and try to remember as much of your reading experience of it as you can."

Hermione's eyes widened, realization suddenly dawning on what he was going to do.

"Sev! You're a genius." The smile that lit up her face more than made up for the fact that he was woken from a wonderful sleep, even if he was exhausted. Grading second year essays mentally took a lot out of a man, no matter how practiced at it he was.

Seeing as they were already so close, he gave her a barely there peck on the lips, responding with "I know, darling, that's why you keep me." He couldn't help but smile. "Now, focus. We both need to get back to sleep."

Severus could feel her focusing in and he entered her mind. Hermione's mind had become a comforting sort of place for him. It brought him closer to her, metaphorically speaking of course, and he relished the feeling of trust she offered so willingly to him. Moving past long ago memories of her early childhood and the few locked doors she still wasn't quite yet ready to open for him, he saw the images of the story she spoke of. Hermione was curled up into a seat near a window in the library, and Severus could see his girl reading a massive book. Damn that brain and its need for excessively large anthologies. He moved deeper in, trying to see if he could find the author or the name of the story in the top corners of the pages. Severus couldn't help but mentally roll his eyes when he finally saw what she was reading.

Back on the couch, Hermione looked up at him, more anticipation and excitement on her face than a child at Christmas.

"Well? What was it?" She was practically shaking with her need to know, to remember, even if it was with some help.

Giving her the greatest look of boredom he could possibly muster under the circumstances, he told her the name.

"Daisy Miller: A Study." The look on her face was priceless. "By Henry James, if you're interested." He smirked as she let out a giant sigh of relief.

"Feeling better?" Severus brought a hand up to caress her bare shoulder, his t-shirt having slid down to one side and leaving a lovely selection of skin exposed.

"Much." Hermione leaned forward and gave him a kiss, brief, but meaningful. "My hero." She fluttered her eyelashes exaggeratedly, thinking that he had to at least get some amusement out of this, followed by a truly sincere "Thank you."

Severus drew back, a look of mock shock and offense on his face.

"Severus Snape? A hero? Never! I have a reputation to uphold." He leaned forward, eyes glowing playfully and blistering into hers. "I must remain the villain!" With that unexpected war cry, he grabbed Hermione around her waist, throwing her over his shoulder and heading back to his, eventually their, bedroom. She needed sleep, and Merlin help him if she didn't fall right back into a deep, deep slumber.

Her shrieks died down as he tossed her on the bed. Hermione pulled the blankets back and Severus crawled in next to her. As the lights in his dungeons finally extinguished for the night, she snuggled back into him, his arms tightening around her. Her breathing evened out, and, as she drifted back to sleep, Severus couldn't help but think on one last, horrifying thought before he, too, fell asleep.

It was only day 2 of her exams.

SSHGSSHG

A/N: I kept it ramble-y for the real life effect. Because do we honestly ever make complete sense when we're that tired and over caffeinated during finals week?

Also, if you're interested in a film adaptation that is so horrible it's laughable, then watch the old Daisy Miller film. I have notes from viewing it in class that never fail to bring me to tears, some from laughing, and others from its horrendousness. It's awful. No offense to Mr. Henry James. Or to you, if you personally really liked it.