1.1 DO YOU STILL REMEMBER...
He was so absorbed with making notes in his edition of "Advanced potions" (sixth years addition, he was already almost a year ahead of his class) that he didn't notice her until she dropped down heavily next to him in the sofa, making him almost spill ink over his notes.
"If the Irma catches you writing in a book she'll ban you from the library you know" Lily said.
"It's my book, although she will probably throw me out, out of principle" Severus replied, not quite coming across as annoyed as he would have liked to sound. "What are you doing here?"
"I came to look for you!" Lily replied, cheer-full as always "This was the first place I looked, you know, you're quite predictable!" she buffed him on the shoulder, causing him to drip ink unto the notes he was still making "Spending Saturday afternoon in the library. Seriously, Sev!"
"I thought you'd be in Hogsmeade for the rest of the evening?" Severus said, still refusing to look up from his book, which he was basically doubled over.
"Yeah, I thought so too, but it didn't… quite work out like that"
The change of tone finally got Severus to look up at her, peering at her from underneath a curtain black hair.
"Why?" he asked.
"Oh, I got bored of the company" Lily replied casually, but now it was her turn to look away.
Severus straightened himself where he sat (he was considerably taller then her). He didn't say anything, he just looked at Lily with intense black eyes, waiting. Lily looked over at him quickly, a flash of bright green meeting his gaze, then se sighted, quietly.
"I broke up with Thomas"
A strange flood of emotions erupted within Severus, like a dam had broken, it flowed trough him. Happiness (because he'd never liked that stuck-up Ravenclaw), anger (because someone hurt Lily), happiness again, fear (because Lily looked really sad now and he wouldn't be able to handle her crying), then anger again, and so on. But he didn't reveal any of it in his expression.
And she didn't cry. Lily wasn't the type of girl to cry. But she held his gaze for a moment, and then turned away quickly, looking up out of one of the high windows, which revealed a clear-blue sky. He wasn't sure what to say next, he was good at reading people. But Lily was different. He couldn't quite tell if she wanted to talk about it or not. Thomas and Lily had been going out almost a year, and everyone (except Severus) always complimented them on being such a perfect couple, the lively Gryffindor-girl and the brilliant, well-spoken Ravenclaw. Not that Lily wasn't brilliant.
"At least he will no longer follow you and correct your grammar"
Lily laughed.
"Yeah, that was so annoying! Like, he always said I say 'like' like too much!"
"And that abnormally self-loving way in which he referred to himself and his so called intellect" Severus continued, tilting his head up and looking down his nose at Lily with an imitation of Thomas pitying smile. Lily laughed harder.
"Not like you don't do that to people, Sev!"
"The clear difference being that I am brilliant, and he just thinks he is" Severus snorted.
"And you don't smile" Lily noted.
"And" he continued, ignoring her inpass "I do not refer to you as 'my precious little flower'"
Lily made a face of pure disgust at the mentioning of Thomas nick-name for her.
"Oh by Merlin, it feels so good knowing no one will ever call me that again!" she exclaimed "Do you know he actually introduced me as that to his friends? Made me want to be named after, like, a ferret or something! Anything but a flower!"
"My precious little ferret" Severus mused.
Lily laughed so hard that Irma, the librarian peeked, her head out from several rows of bookshelves away to hush at her. Lily made an excusing gesture and suffocated her laughter into a continuing snicker. Her eyes teared up and she once again buffed Severus shoulder, and he gave her what she recognized as a slight smile, but which anyone else who didn't know him wouldn't even have noticed as anything else then a twitch in his stony exterior.
"You didn't like him very much, did you?" she said, when she finally stopped giggling.
"I do not recall making any secret of my feelings towards Mr. Brooks" he replied, pushing a black strain of hair out of his face.
"No, you clearly didn't" she smiled.
Silence settled between them as Lily once again stared out the window, and Severus spend several moments watching the sun play in her radiant hair.
"Would you like me to poison him?" he asked when Lily turned back to him. She laughed at his completely serious face.
"I can't believe you can say such things in such a casual tone" she smiled.
Severus didn't bother to point out that he wasn't completely joking.
"You don't happen to have something that would give him, like, spontaneous vomiting or anything like that?"
But before Severus had a chance of suggesting Arabella root, which might have been just as well, Lily continued; "Oh but it wouldn't be fair. After all, I broke up with him. And in front of several of his friends as well! So I guess I'm like the bad guy"
"It was hardly uncalled for, I assume?"
"No" Lily sighted "It's actually been brewing for several weeks now. Like, I don't like the way he seems to take me for granted all the time. Like I should always be there on his arm, like an ornament or something. A pretty accessory"
Severus started to mull over what other roots and extracts he could get his hands on which would have a highly unpleasant effect on Mr. Brooks metabolism.
"And in conversations, when we would like be with others from Ravenclaw, he would hush me! And then he would smile at them like 'Oh she's so pretty but boy does she say stupid things'"
He could think of several good poisons he knew, and witch wouldn't take long to make. He could in fact probably have one ready by tomorrow evening, if he could swipe some veera leaves.
"You are not stupid, Lily" he said while measuring the amount of Almund extract he would need in his head "In fact, you are brilliant"
"He sure didn't make me feel that way"
"Anyone who makes you feel anything but brilliant and beautiful is nothing more then a moron not worthy of your attention, and certainly not of your heart" Severus said, his black eyes burning. Lily actually blushed a little, he noticed, and he immediately regretted his lack of self-control.
"You should be a poet, Sev, they way you speak" she smiled, and added in a lower tone "And I like that you put brilliant before beautiful"
Severus diffidently classified this feeling as regret for his sudden outburst and bent over his book again, letting his hair fall down to cover his face.
"Well, you are better off without him" he muttered, wanting to divert the subject back to the question at hand and away form his future career in litterateur.
"Yeah, you're right" she sighted and leaned back into the soft cushions of the sofa "He's an ass"
Severus didn't bother with replying, as his agreement was obvious. Instead he picked up his quill and continued crossing out sections of his book and scribbeling new methods in the marginal. They sat in silence for a while, but it wasn't an unpleasant silence. Lily continued watching the sky, where an owl was soaring away for the castle.
Note; Chapter one was so long, I split it into two so that would be readable. Continuing in 1.2