A/N: Hello everyone. I would like to present you my story about Severus and Harry. Because my English is not very well, I have a translate from amazing Aliveas (thank you so much, darling!). 

I hope, that you will enjoy this story.

A young black-haired man was walking slowly through the afternoon crowd hurrying who knows where. He assumed many of them to be rushing from work to manage to buy some groceries before they jump into the whirl of making dinner, taking care of children and other necessary needs before they will be able to sit on a couch in the living room and watch their favourite soap opera. Some of them will also walk their dogs, put children to bed and make love with their partners before falling asleep.

He knew that his idea of a cosy evening was a naive and kind of a fairytale one, he knew that it didn't work that way everywhere. He did also realise, that somewhere people would be fighting, somewhere else would someone be drowning their sorrow in a bottle of wine, someone would be worrying about person dear to them. But it was his own idea of a perfect evening. To come home from work, go for a walk with his lover and their dog, eat dinner together and then talk or watch a movie. Then later make the evening complete with cuddling, feeling each other's heartbeat and entwine fingers together in a gesture of belonging. However, nothing of that was any more than a nice fantasy. There was no dog waiting for him to come home, let alone a lover. Just a small quiet house he managed to get when the war ended and he finished school.

A cough somewhere at his feet preoccupied him and interrupted his flow of not so happy thoughts. Confused, he looked around and tightened his black scarf closer to the neck. He didn't remember any intention of making for the waterfront of river Thames, so standing under one of the many street lamps that illuminated the paved walkway and flowing water under him. Winter was coming, the air was cold and filled with damp that was forever bonded with London tales. The wind was playing with little leaves that fell down from trees where they fought for life until the very last second. Few of them touched a hunkered down person sitting on the ground with a clearly insufficiently warm blanket under him, who coughed again when he tilted his sight down to him. Without thinking, he threw a few coins he had in the pocket into a little plastic cup. The jingling sound was almost encouraging.

"I'm sorry, that's all I have," he mumbled and turned to continue walking.

"Thank you, sir," the man said hoarsely with a hint of gratefulness. It was apparent that he had a cold, his voice shaking from the freezing weather.

Something in him moved suddenly, he took two steps back. "Can I join you for a moment?" he asked, lead by some impulse of solitude. He had no idea if he wants to talk or just stay in silence, it just seemed nice to stop for a while and share the moment with someone else, someone new.

Not that he wouldn't meet enough of them every day — after graduating from Hogwarts he at last decided for a different career than he intended to. The defeat of Voldemort which he was obliged to without ever asking for it, broke something in him. Almost a year spent alongside Hermione and Ron, looking for Horcruxes disgusted him everything that has something to do with war and any crime. He gave up his dream to become an Auror. He put effort into studying, improved his potions and with Neville's help discovered secrets of Herbology. Instead of Auror's training, he applied for Mediwizardry studies. Instead of catching criminals, he decided to save lives the other way, he became the Mediwizard Potter.

And with a certain satisfaction, he realized that the job actually fulfils him, even though the shifts on the third floor known as the Poisoning department were sometimes very difficult and exhausting. He enjoyed meeting new people and being able to help them. It was refreshing and every smile on the face of a healed patient filled him with a warm feeling throughout his body. Maybe that's why a simple cough caught his attention so easily, whereas everyone else would simply overlook such thing.

"It's a public place," said the man with a shrug and straightened up, "you can do anything you want."

His voice was deep and unexpectedly pleasant, despite the fact that it was husky from his illness. It reminded him of something, something lost far away in his memories but he wasn't thinking about that for now. What surprised Harry so much he slightly jerked, was a dirty band around the man's eyes that got lost on each side of his face in his dark tangled greasy black hair that fell under his shoulders. A hooky nose dominated his face. The man was overall very dirty. His light clothes, completely unsuitable for the freezing cold, tore up and one of his shoes had a large hole in its sole. He had his hands in fingerless gloves entwined — if anxiously or simply trying to warm up, Harry had no clue. The man's face with overgrown beard tilted, trying to catch a hint of his breath to figure out if he still stood there.

"The question is," he spoke again, "why would you do that." Harry heard a wish for him to leave in his voice, and saw a silent prayer in his face that he stayed.

"You're ill," he replied instead and squatted next to him. He looked around, no one paid any attention to him, the waterfront was almost empty by now, the sky in the cooler of deep blue. He carefully took out his wand from his sleeve, created a mild warming spell with unspoken magic and sat down.

The man coughed again. "Obviously."

"Do you have any family?" Harry asked when he crossed his legs beneath him and dragged sleeves of his jacket over his fingers. He couldn't understand how the man next to him could bear such cold.

He tensed. "That's none of your business," he whispered.

"I thought that I could help you contact them. I'm sure they'd-" he started to explain to him but the man interrupted him.

"I don't have anyone," he retorted and tilted his head down, his fingers in his lap tightly clasped.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to inquire," he replied with honesty. He wasn't entirely sure why he was so interested in that shabby man. Maybe he just wished to fill his need for any social interaction that took hold of him every time on his way back home. And something in his voice seemed so familiar, it fluttered on the edge of his subconsciousness, he just couldn't grasp it. He felt the need to know more, to remind himself of the long lost memory. "Do you have any other health problems, apart from a cough?"

"Why do you care? I can tell from your voice that you're young. Go home, cheer your wife, don't waste your time with me." An emotion that Harry couldn't identify glimpsed in the man's voice. He was missing eye contact, that would help him figure it out.

"I'm a doctor," he replied carelessly and ignored the pain somewhere near his heart. He had no one he could cheer. "I don't even have to examine you to see that you have a cold, soon there'll be a fever if you don't have one yet. The cough will get from bronchi to lungs. If you're not somewhere warm and dry, you'll get pneumonia." He remained silent for a while, he didn't mean to scare him but he needed to let him know how serious it could get. He continued with urge: "You could die of it."

The man didn't raise his head up. "Great," he sighed resignedly and shook himself.

"I will help you," he offered and reached out to encouragingly touch his shoulder but then he withdrew his hand. The man didn't see him. He could interpret his touch completely different from what he intended to.

"I don't need help," the man said but the sureness he meant to put in his reply got lost somewhere in the cough attack. "I don't want help," he continued when he calmed down. "I don't want to talk. Go home."

"Sure." He got on his feet. "Will you be here tomorrow? I'll get you something for the cough."

"I won't," the man replied with an obvious lie.

"Okay. I'll still come, around the same time." He frowned. "It's getting dark. Do you have somewhere to go?"

"It doesn't matter if it's day or night. I'm blind. There's only dark in my life." He finally lifted up his head to him and told him another lie: "And you don't need to worry. I have no idea why you care so much but I have a place to go."

Harry sighed but on the other hand, he understood the man. It was hard to keep any pride when he had to live on the street. And it apparently mattered to him. "I'll come tomorrow," he repeated and set off. In the middle of the first step, he stopped, took off his scarf and got on one knee right in front of the man. "I'll leave you something here. I hope it warms you up a little. No need to thank me." He let it fall in the man's lap and could almost imagine the look of surprise on his face. Then he took a few steps away from him until he was sure the homeless man convinced of him leaving. He looked at him one more time and couldn't resist a smile before he finally took off home.

The blind man under the street lamp sat there still, holding the scarf in his hands and inhaling its smell. He couldn't get enough of it. It was soft and still held a little bit of warmth from the man who left it there and that was leaving quickly but that perfect smell remained. He recognized some expensive perfume, similar to the one he himself once used to use. He could also smell the distinctive scent of the man that sat next to him just a while ago. He couldn't understand. He had to be young, surely had a family or at least a girlfriend that he could rush to but instead, he gave attention to him.

He couldn't resist and buried his whole face in the piece of cloth. He perceived all the tones of different smells meeting in one in his nose and felt a strange pain around his heart. How long had it been since someone talked to him for the last time without showing how strongly disgusted they were? He couldn't even remember. He tried to forget about the past. About the time everyone hated him, but then he at least had some pride, he was himself, at least in some aspects. He had somewhere to live, to eat, he had some respect. And he lost all of it in one single day. He'd just been waiting for death ever since, but it wasn't coming.

With a certain sarcasm, he said to himself, that not much has changed, actually. He still was hated by everyone. But then he could at least be clean. He sighed when he realized the scarf would get just as dirty as he was during the next few hours and its scent would get lost in the unpleasant smell he had around himself. But while he could, he just wanted to keep inhaling it, to snuggle with it, with the only source of light in his dark life.

Severus Snape desperately wished the man didn't come again. At the same time, he hoped that he kept his word. If he had any tears left, he would cry.