Disclaimer's Note : All characters are property of the lovely JK.
Severus hated Halloween above any other time of the year.
Even more then Christmas and Easter when called home to his family, and there was nothing but fights and stress. His brothers flaunted what they have gained, and his mother refused to look at him.
He hated Halloween because it took place in fall. The time of the year when everything died. People took joy in what a beautiful display it was, but all Severus thought about was what a lying whore nature was; all the death he had seen had been painful, heart-wrenching, soul-numbing...
Yet, every Halloween there was the dutiful arrival at the Hogwarts feast. The garish colors blinded him at first, the noises deafened, smells sickened, but after awhile it all fell away to the prison of his mind. He forgot where he was, who he was and all he remembered was what is to come that night.
The same questions and routine came from the Headmaster every year. Was he okay? He didn't look well. Should Poppy prepare something?
And Severus just dimly wondered if anyone had pieced it together. Even so, he knew the answer was no. Perhaps if Bella was still there... but he had turned away from her and everything that involved her. So she didn't know, and she wouldn't be here for him when he needed her.
He retired to his dungeons, half to escape the Headmaster's inquires, and half because he knew he couldn't escape what will happen tonight.
Mainly Severus hated Halloween because it reminded him of his greatest loss; Regulus had been killed just days before Halloween. Severus had been sick and confused with grief and Lucius had taken him in, partially out of fear, though the Malfoy would never admit it. That was where Severus was that first Halloween.
Curled up in bed, unclean and unwell, trying to claim any moment of peaceful sleep that he could. It was believable that that particular night he could have hallucinated the entire thing. The gentle touches that had brushed over his skin ever so slightly. The way the room had filled up with Regulus' musky scent and the smoky smell of his cigarettes. He could have imagined the tiny kisses and the shape that had curled up against his back that was both warm and freezing in the same instant.
Bella, in fact, had come the next day, and seen the look in his eyes. She had shaken her head at him.
"He can't return." was all she said.
Severus left Lucius' manor the next day, without saying another word to either Lucius or Bella and went in search of the Order.
Somehow though, all these years later in his dungeon at Hogwarts, the events of Halloween never changed. There was the persistent hinting at the fact that something wasn't quite normal.
He hated that feeling.
Most of all though, he hated the fact that the feeling brought around the awareness that things should have been different. That night where he had returned home to the house to find the Dark Mark splashed across the inky black sky should have never existed. The blood painted inside the house and the echoes of screams...
He should have been able to see and feel Regulus every night. He should have been able to twine his fingers into his lover's and watch him smile.
Instead he was stuck with this teasing hint of touching once a year when the veil between the living and the dead was thin and transparent.
He sank down heavily into the cold sheets of the awaiting bed, trying to forget.
Suddenly he felt the casual touch of a hand, but he didn't turn, because he already knew that there would be nothing to see. Unable to resist temptation though, he reached his own shaky hand up to try and cover whatever has touched him.
He only touched his own shoulder.
Another Halloween was spent crying to the shadows.