Just Desserts
Severus quickly ducked under the windowsill as a shadow neared. A face that could have been, yes, was definitely female, slid back the elegant drapes, peering into the inky night beyond. The former spy held his breath, cape pulled close around him, as if holding his breath would hide him just a little bit more from her sight. His dragon hide boots were muddy, soiled in the firm cold earth beneath their soles. Pivoting lightly, he resumed position when the curtain fell shut once more. A thin sliver of light permeated his fathomless orbs. Only the minute twitch of fingertips over a three day beard betrayed any hint of man blending into the backdrop of night.
He could see clearly down the long hallway to the tree beyond, lit with faerie lights and bits of tinsel. The happy, excited chatter of young children drifted through the cracked window and a woman's soft lilt intermingled with a deeper timbre.
Snape's broken heart shattered all over again when the man and woman embraced suddenly within view, arms and lips and clothing as one in a heated embrace broken only by tiny fists clutching hems of trousers and skirt proclaiming, "Mummy, Daddy, look what Father Christmas has brought me!"
Her laughter was warmth, a balm that filled the jagged and lonely cracks littering the mouldy, deserted landscape that was now his soul's reality.
Severus didn't feel the pain shooting through his jaw from teeth clenched so tightly together the brittle enamel threatened to crack from the pressure.
She was supposed to me mine! We were betrothed!
Pats on the head and bum brought the object of his intense desire to the fore when two cherubic faces were scooped up, drawn past the window and out of sight up the stairs in the arms of their mum.
That hated, handsome face he'd known for so long looked on adoringly, openly, as his wife disappeared with their two children.
I hate him. I hate him! I should kill him! He took her from me!
It wasn't supposed to be this way! How did this happen?
Muscles turned aching and frozen in the chill New Year's air. Even though Christmas had been over half a fortnight their wretched children were still opening gifts. How fucking spoiled rotten!
They should have been mine! Mine, not his! I'll kill him!
Still, he clutched the narrow edge of the outer sill. They were so arrogant, not placing wards so near to their home. As if no one in the world would harm their precious, imbecilic little idyll.
Snape held his breath once more, ignoring the sharp daggers of sleet encasing his outer woolens in a blanket of ice that threatened to turn the withering body into a living sculpture.
Numb fingertips clutched for his wand when she reappeared and shrieked, snatched by her husband and pulled to the floor in a very intimate, erotic embrace.
Every dark curse known to the washed up Death Eater forced its way through his battered conscious, revenge and a bloodbath of epic proportions sloshing over the visions of increasing heat just beyond the glass.
Avada Kadavra! his mind screamed, and a flash of green light shot forth from the end of his wand, ending the life of the betraying cunt as he stared down in abject horror at the ebony instrument of death slipping numbly, in slow motion, to the frozen ground.
Her eyes were lifeless, then, and all will to live drained out of his own being.
Severus didn't feel the pain of passing when her husband shrieked in sudden grief, throwing himself in abject rage towards the man in black who'd murdered his wife, for no apparent reason other than perverse jealousy, in cold blood.
They could be together in death as they could not in life.
He'd always love her. From beyond the grave she was finally his and no other man's. Severus felt no remorse in removing her from a loving family and friends, children who'd grow up with no mother. A husband who'd once been his best friend turned hated enemy for stealing away his lady love.
The intense vision faded from behind his eyes as icicles hung like miniature tree decorations, freezing the tears tracking unchecked down angular and frostbit cheekbones. Turning away from the moans and lovemaking of the couple on the plush Persian rug just beyond his grasp, Snape slunk away back to his meager, drunken and self-loathing existence at the hovel of Spinner's End.
He'd be back tomorrow to torture himself from just beyond reach of the woman he'd driven away by allowing the demons of his past drown her along with him in revulsion, pettiness and hatred.
Just like Lily, Hermione would never be his.
Just desserts for a man who'd led the sort of life he'd allowed to transpire.
Too cowardly to win her back or end his life, he would continue on as the Dark engulfed him in a half-life of self-imposed pity and hell of his own making until the end of his days.
