Professor Minerva McGonagall, the Transfiguration professor, was walking down to the Great Hall in Hogwarts wondering what crazy things were going to happen at the school that day, when Professor Pomona Sprout came up next to her and asked, through fits of giggles, "So, Minerva, have you heard the news about Severus?"
Minerva sighed, normally she didn't have time to listen to idle school gossip, however because it was about her arch nemesis, she was curious. "What about Severus? Has he died?"
"If only," Pomona said savagely. "No, here's a shock for everyone on staff, Severus Snape, the person without any emotions, is in love!"
"What! You must be fooling me, I've never seen Severus be as happy as he has been recently, but I thought he was just planning some malicious deed. He hasn't been in love out of all the years that I've known him, at least since he was a student. This absolutely must be a first!" Minerva spoke in a high-pitched, excited, young girl sort of voice that she hardly ever used, unless she was gossiping.
"Excuse me, ladies, may I join the conversation?" Albus Dumbledore had snuck up behind Pomona and Minerva while they were talking, and had known exactly what they were talking about, but had decided not to say anything.
Minerva in the mean time had turned a bright shade of red, as if it had suddenly gotten very warm in the Great Hall. As she sat down next to Albus at the head table she said, "If you must know we were talking about Severus. Pomona has just told me something very interesting. Severus is in love, but you interrupted before I got a chance to find out with whom."
Albus looked sheepish, but said nothing as they tucked into breakfast; of course he already knew exactly what Minerva was going to say. Pomona at the other end of the table, however, was having a grand time trying to tell her friends that there was more than one person on staff that was in love. "I swear, I've never seen Minerva McGonagall turn such a shade of red in my entire life, it was like she'd gone back to that very shy seventeen year old girl, hiding in the library of Hogwarts. She must like him a lot; she hasn't blushed like that, ever"
"Who is the lucky man that is taking her off our hands then, if I may ask, as you seem to be the authority on Minerva now, Pomona?" Filius Flitwick asked his wife, as though he really didn't care anyways, but he was actually very curious.
"Why, Albus, of course, silly man. He came up behind Minerva and me when we were talking, and she nearly went into conniptions." Pomona said laughing as if conniption fits were something to laugh about.
"Now, that rumour has been going around for fifty years. I wish one of the two of them would just admit or deny it, so we can move on. I don't see that they would, but old age and love can change people's minds." said Professor Aurora Sinistra, the astronomy professor, through a mouthful of scrambled eggs.
"They're not that old, but moving on to other school news. You will never guess who else is in love!" exclaimed Pomona excitedly to her colleagues.
"Who is it now pray tell?" asked Severus in his usual disdainful tone, as he swept into the Great Hall for breakfast.
"Oh, no one, Severus, no one." said Pomona quietly.