A/N: This is based on the song "Second Chance" by Shinedown. If you haven't heard it, it's something you should certainly listen to, and I'd recommend trying to get a listen before you read this. I've put quotes from the song all throughout, so I hope I did okay. Any quotes from the song (I've taken a few liberties with a couple of them) are in italics. Leave a review and tell me what you think!

I don't own Harry Potter, nor do I profit.

Sometimes goodbye is a second chance.

-Shinedown

The first thing he felt was a blade of grass gently caressing his cheek. Then another. And another. Then warmth across his back. Not the sticky, wet warmth of his own blood he felt moments before. Or was it hours? Oh, he didn't care. That feeling was over. A soft wind rustled his hair, and he dared to open his eyes.

He was lying in the woods where he would often sit alone as a boy. No, that can't be it. These woods were too light, too... sterile to be the woods of his childhood days. The brook babbled in almost a happy tone. The trees grew tall and green, not as dark as he remembered. No, these were not his woods. There was something too serene about them, it was almost nerve-wracking.

'So, this is what death is like,' he thought. 'It's hard to tell if it's Heaven or Hell. There's no one else here, but I've been lonely so long that maybe that's just what I deserve.'

He rolled over and sat up. Despite laying on the ground for who knows how long his black robes were still immaculate. He looked around some more, and was now sure that this was, indeed, the same woods he had spent so much time in as a young boy. There was the rock he and Lily sat on as they talked about the magical world, and Hogwarts, and friendship.

As if his thoughts had materialized, Lily was suddenly sitting on that rock. Not the young Lily of his dreams, the same woman he saw so many times in stone as he walked by the monument to visit her grave. She was smiling at him, the same warm, kind smile she had given him so many time in support at Hogwarts.

"That settles that," he muttered. "If you're here, this can't be Hell."

"It isn't," she smiled. "Though it's not quite Heaven either, I'd think."

"I'm listening," he grumbled.

"Well," she said lightly, dipping her bare feet into the small, babbling brook. "I'd think that if this were Heaven you'd be with everyone who loves you. And as far as possible from Spinner's End."

"No one ever loved me," he corrected her, trying not to sound too much like the Snape that prowled the dungeons. "And being at Spinner's End must be my penance, my little portion of Hell, for everything I've done wrong."

She looked at him curiously. "Why would you think no one ever loved you?"

"My eyes are open wide, Lily. Wider than they've ever been. I am a man incapable of love, or incapable of being loved."

"I love you," she said softly.

"Spare me your sympathy," he growled.

"I do. Just because I don't love you in the way I love James does not mean I don't have love in my heart for you."

He crossed his arms. "How can you possibly think of loving me? I killed you!"

"Really? I could have sworn that was Voldemort," she shot back.

He shuddered at the name. She sighed. "You think that the fact that he killed you as well would grant you free use of his name."

He let the comment slide. "The Dark Lord..."

"Don't call him that. It's giving him what he wants."

"Fine. Voldemort may have been the one to cast the spell, but I may as well have handed you and your family over on a silver platter."

"You made a stupid choice," she smiled and splashed some water at him. "We all do it. That doesn't mean you aren't deserving of forgiveness."

"I made a selfish choice. One that haunted my every day. For that I deserve none."

"You did what you thought was right at the time. You gave Voldemort information that he would have killed you for hiding. You did a much better job alive than you did dead. You saved my son."

He snorted.

"You did. You may not know it, but because of you he did what he had to. And he won, Severus. He's free, the world is free of Voldemort, and you're free," she stretched her arms wide as if to emphasize the point.

"I'm forever shackled by your death."

She sighed in frustration. "Haven't I told you? I forgive you."

There was a blush on his cheeks as he shot back, "How could you ever forgive someone for that?"

"Because I love you. And there's no reason to be angry."

"I'm not angry, I'm just saying that I understand if you never offer me forgiveness. I could never burden you by asking for it." The blush was not from anger, but from embarrassment. How she could ever think...

"There's no need to ask!" she was annoyed now. She stood and walked so she was standing right in front of him. "Why is it so impossible for you to think that I'd forgive you?"

A tear slid down his cheek. "Because I am completely undeserving. What I did to you was the ultimate betrayal."

Her hand was on his face, wiping his tear away. "Please don't cry one tear for me. I can't honestly say that I'm happy where my life ended up, but I don't blame you for anything Voldemort did. If it hadn't happened there's a good chance that he might never have been stopped. And if James and I had to die for that to happen, well, it's a small price to pay."

"I was a coward," he muttered.

"Why, Severus? Why must you constantly find a reason for fault with yourself? This isn't you. You have to put on this mask of anger, this voice of resentment..."

"You know me, Lily!" he shouted. "This is my one and only voice! There's no mask, this is me!"

"No, it isn't, Severus," her voice was a whisper. She took his hand and led him to the rock where they sat side by side. "I knew you as a boy, before all this," she made a grand gesture at him. "You were full of wonder, and anticipation for what lay ahead. Not contempt for the trail you left behind."

"You travel that road and have anything but contempt for yourself."

"Is that what it is? It seemed to be open contempt for everyone around you."

"If you hate yourself, it's hard to show anything less to everyone else," he pointed out.

"Particularly my son."

"That was purely genetic," he defended, and she let out a tinkling laugh. "Had it not been like having James sitting in front of me constantly..."

"Would you have preferred, perhaps, another me sitting there?"

He was silent. "It was bad enough having those eyes looking at me. Constantly reminding me of my sins."

"Why are you always running in place, Severus?" she placed a hand on his arm.

"Pardon?"

"You have convinced yourself that there is no chance for forgiveness for you, that no one could possibly love you, despite all the evidence to the contrary. Even the man in the moon disappears somewhere in the stratosphere."

"Damn you and your riddles," he hissed.

She stood and turned to face him. "You can't continue to live your life like this, Severus!"

"In case you haven't noticed, I can't continue to live my life at all," he replied coolly.

"Free yourself! Accept my love and my forgiveness and take it with you when you leave this place!"

"You can't love me and forgive me!" he snarled back. "I won't allow it!"

"You understand that this is my life, and I have control over whom I give my love and forgiveness to."

He stared back at her, this time anger in his eyes. "I've watched the world outside, the way they see me. They would never offer me the unconditional absolution you have just done. They damn me, as I should be!"

"Why do you put so much effort into figuring what those eyes are thinking?" she placed a hand on each of his arms. "Stop torturing yourself, Severus! You'll never get acceptance from everyone, no matter who you are or how hard you try. And you'll never get condolence if you don't seek it out."

He gently placed his hands on her waist and looked down into her eyes. "Why are you here, Lily? Why do you haunt me with your image and offers of exoneration?"

"Because I'm leaving out today. This is my last chance to tell you to take your second chance."

"You're leaving? Why? Why can't we stay here for my eternity?"

"You would really want to spend your eternity by this brook, in this forest?"

"If it was with you."

She studied his face. "Are you that in love with me, Severus? Or have you convinced yourself that you have to love me because of what you thought you did to me?"

The words struck him, and he stared dumbfounded into her face.

"The choice is yours, Severus," she muttered, and she took a step back. "You can come back the way you came," she indicated the path he had always come down from his house, "or you can stay here for eternity."

"Will you be here for eternity with me?"

She shook her head. "Would you have me, knowing my heart could never fully be yours?"

He felt more tears falling down his face. She closed the gap between them and kissed each tear gently away. His eyes slid closed.

"Goodbye, Severus," she muttered, and was gone.

After three months in a coma in St. Mungos, Severus Snape finally awoke.