A/N: ok I'm writing this with Jisatsu Keikou and Yoru Kurai

On January 30, 1840 I was born the illegitimate child of an unmarried woman working as a seamstress in a small Virginian town. Her husband had died two years before, leaving her with an infant daughter and 60 pounds of debt. In that time she was taken advantage of and left alone and with child, struggling to support Petunia while managing her pregnancy.

It was nine months later that I was born, the illegitimate bastard child of the town

I was late so I ran as fast as I could, my feet slapping against the dry earth of the dessert as I clutched my skirts in my sweaty hands, holding them up and out of the way of my pounding feet. If I was late my mother was going to kill me, there was absolutely no excuse for this. I was supposed to be leaving for the East that afternoon, not wasting my time exploring the parts of the mountain I had never seen before. At least that's what my mother thought. But she never did understand. When the proposal had arrived she had taken it as a sign from God and had jumped at the chance to have me out of her way for good.

The man I was marrying was nothing more to me than a childhood friend, a flicker in the distant memories of my past, but I was still had to try. Anything to make my mother happy, anything to make her hate me a little less, and if marrying Severus meant that, then I was going to give it a shot.

You see, my father was nothing more to my mother than Severus was to me, just a flicker, something that happened so fast she could barely remember, but was burned so deep into her mind she could never forget. He was nobody, a traveler passing through our small town, searching for a woman to be with. Who he found was my mother, what he did was unforgivable.

He first saw her in my grandmother's store as she sewed clothes for the wealthy, working with slender fingers on intricate designs. When it grew dark he watched her close up the store, make her way down the steps and head off in the direction of her home. She never made it back. We lived by the woods on the outskirts of the town far from the eyes of others. Nobody heard her screams.

My father ran out of town soon as he was done, left her bruised and alone in the dirt; she never saw him again. Until I was born, and then she saw his eyes in my face, his nose, his lips, and she hated me. I was the shame the followed her wherever she went.

In my life, there has been only person whose eyes I've seen that do not reflect my mother's shame. They are dark and warm and I have not seen for nine years, since I was eight. They belong to the man I am to marry, they belong to my best friend, they belong to Severus Snape.

When I first met him it was at the bottom of the same hill I was standing at now. My mother had yelled at me again, had called me worthless, and I had run, hiding my tears as I had done so many times before. And then I ran into him and he fell and I couldn't help it, I laughed. And once I started I couldn't stop, it was like something inside me just broke. The boy tried to stood up with grace, but with his posture you would never have know.

"I command you to stop laughing by order of the mayor," he hissed, but I just laughed harder. "I am Severus Snape," he almost yelled, "son of the mayor and I command you to stop laughing!" I stopped but I found it hard to believe this boy was the mayor's son, what with his long greasy hair, pale skin, long hooked nose and dark his eyes… eyes that looked different from anyone else I'd seen. Eyes that didn't hate me for something I'd never done.

We had always been together since then, had never separated unless absolutely necessary. It had taken awhile at first, for us to earn each other's trust, but when we had, there was nothing that we couldn't do.

But then I had left. My mother had finally had enough of the condescending stares of the town and had decided to move west with the gold rush in an attempt to start a new life. We had never seen each other again. Petunia had been thrilled. She had hated the town almost as much as my mother had and had hated me even more.

But now I was going back, back to the ridicule, back to the distain, and now, hopefully, back to warm embrace of a dear friend.

"Have you heard the news?" Sirius asked, leaning up against the side of a large oak tree, "Old Severus is getting married. And to a beautiful Westerner at that."

I looked up from where I lay sprawled across the grass and yawned, "When's the wedding?"

"Two weeks time," he grinned, "And her caravan's going to be passing through here tomorrow mourning. You've always wanted a way at getting him back," he said, "What better way than stealing his bride?"