Severus Snape dots his "i" and blows out the candle in his lantern. He sits in the dimly lit Potions classroom, writing a letter. He re-reads the last bit over and silently folds it into thirds. "Sincerely, me…" he murmurs, repeating the last two words of the letter. He stands up and quietly looks at the watch on his left wrist. 12:05. He has been 18 for five whole minutes and not even known it. "Happy Birthday, Severus," he whispers to himself, slipping the letter in his bag and carefully opening the classroom door, looking around first to check for prefects. Seeing none, he walks down the candle-lit dungeon hallway, and quietly whispers the password to the wall guarding the entrance to the Slytherin common room. He walks down a stone staircase, and into the 7th year's bedroom, slipping into his bed and falling asleep almost instantly.

His alarm clock wakes him up around 8 and, realizing it's Saturday, he grabs his bag and heads outside to study in his usual spot by the lake. The soft spring breeze blows in the grass and trees. He walks across the grounds, and starts to pull the folded-up letter out of his bag. He walks around the corner of the castle.

There he sees Lilly.

Kissing James.

Not exactly what he expected.

James sees him looking at them.

"Hey, Snivellus! Look at what I got me! Don't get to jealous!" He says, breaking away from Lilly for only a moment. Lilly whispers something to him and they both laugh.

"Ha, jealous. I feel sorry for you, dating a mudblood like that thing," he quickly retorts, hurrying past them and rounding the next corner. Once he's out of sight, he lets the tears he tries to hold back fall. They stream down his face and he tries to wipe them away, not wanting to look pathetic. He clutches his Potions book to his chest and angrily pulls the letter the rest of the way out of his bag. He rips it in half, throws it to the ground, and walks off, still trying to stop the flow of tears. Lilly follows him. "Snape?" she sees half of the letter on the ground, and grabs the other half out of the air, where it is caught in an eddy of wind. She unfolds the pieces, and puts them together, reading them.

Dear Lilly,

I love you. I can't seem to stop thinking about you. I don't know if you love me back. If you don't, I'm really sorry to bother you, but if you do, please tell me. I write this moments before midnight, the day before my 18th birthday, and all I really want for my birthday is for you to tell me that you love me back.

Sincerely,

Me.

She thinks for a second, and then realizes what she's done. She tries to run after him, but he is too fast.

"Snape?" she yells after him. "Severus? Wait up!"

But he doesn't stop, and her efforts are for nothing. She pulls out her wand and charms the two pieces of paper to combine along the rip, and slips it into her pocket, swearing to herself that she'll find him later and tell him that she really does love him. That James was just to make him jealous, to see if he liked her back.

But she never gets to tell him.