Title: One Last Goodbye
Author: pristineungift
Beta: serendipity513
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Harry Potter
Character/Pairing: Severus Snape, implied Snape/Lily and Snape/Hermione sort of maybe if you squint.
Summary: A free verse halfway poem/halfway drabble. Takes place in the Shrieking Shack in the final chapters of Deathly Hallows. The confused thoughts of a dying man.
One Last Goodbye
Sometimes one is not enough. The world demands two.
Two faces. Two lives. Two deaths.
Twice as many hopes. Twice as many fears. Twice as many enemies.
Twice as much pain.
A remembered glance from green eyes, fading into a concerned brown gaze and a warm hand on his shoulder.
Twice as many friends.
How could he warn them? How could he let them know? Twice as many tales to tell, twice as little time to tell them.
Two lives flashed before his eyes, spinning memories in a fading dawn. A sinkhole of the mind, a writhing morass of moments.
One man made in darkness, the other forged in blood.
Both marked with death.
Silver thoughts and darker things spilling from a shattered skull. Strange thoughts, stranger deeds.
Two minds to lose.
Both to spy. Two to lie.
Two to die.
Two masters to serve.
Two parts to play. One death to give. Two promises to keep. Both hearts to break.
One man to kill in a flash of green atop a cold, stone tower.
One last goodbye.
Twice as many enemies, twice as few friends. Time moves twice as fast, he moves twice as slow.
Sometimes one is not enough.
One to save the children. One to lead the boy. One doe to light the way.
One to stop the Carrows. One to miss Minerva. One set of memories to leave. One story to tell.
One to answer summons. One to serve the Dark Lord. One to wear the mask.
Both to bear the Mark.
One to fight the Order. One less than the other. One more set of memories to leave.
One story to tell.
One.
One more breath to take.
One last look.
One last goodbye.