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"What is your problem?"
Snape looked up from where he was eating his breakfast, alone at the very end of the Slytherin table. "Hello, Evans. I am unaware that I have a problem."
"Why do you act like this? Do you really want the entire school to hate you?"
"Better than wanting the entire school to love me."
"You don't have to be like them."
Snape followed Evans's glance up the Slytherin table, where Narcissa and Bellatrix were giggling. "And you don't have to be like them," he replied, nodding toward where James Potter and his sycophants sat at the Gryffindor table, no doubt scheming new ridiculous stunts.
"I'm not like them!" Evans protested.
"Aren't you? Tell me, how much of what you think you know about Narcissa and Bellatrix came from a source other than their disgruntled cousin?"
Evans had the good manners to flush and stammer. "Er, I—"
"Precisely," Snape interrupted. "When you show yourself capable of a thought that hasn't been clouded by that lot, perhaps we'll have something to talk about. Until that time, just leave me alone." He turned back to his meal, and heard Evans sigh melodramatically and storm off.
It was disappointing how easily even a clever girl like Evans could be taken in by charm and nonsense, Snape thought. He pushed his eggs around his plate for a bit before deciding he wasn't hungry anyway. He gathered up his things and left the Great Hall; if he hurried he had time to check on last night's potions experiment before his first class.