Hyacinth Thimbleberry sat beneath a tree on the Hogwarts castle grounds, hiding her face in a book that she wasn't really reading. In reality, she was watching another reader sitting under the tree just across from her. He was an older boy, three grades above her, and she knew that he would never notice her. Still, there was no harm in looking.
Hyacinth was a quiet, timid girl, not the type to be noticed by others. She was not ugly, simply ordinary. Her hair was short and mousy and she had a subtle facial tick, which embarrassed her to no end. That, and the fact that she was named Hyacinth Thimbleberry, had kept her low on the social ladder. Hyacinth's father was from a wealthy pureblood family but he did not own it. He was a nervous man who had never managed to live up to his parents' expectations. In many ways, Hyacinth took after her unassuming father but, recently, he felt like a stranger to her.
The boy that Hyacinth was watching was deeply absorbed in whatever he was reading. So much so, that his nose was almost touching the page. His nose was his most prominent feature. It was unusually long and noticeably hooked. His long, greasy, black hair hung over his face like curtains as his dark eyes fervently scanned the text. He was wearing the typical Slytherin robes but, unlike the other students, his were worn and disheveled.
Hyacinth thought about her father and felt a pang of guilt. It had been six months since he had been committed to the fourth floor of St. Mungo's and she had not visited him once. In truth, she didn't know if she could face him. His confinement to a ward for victims of spell damage was misleading, because his malady had nothing to do with magic. His condition had simply been diagnosed as insanity.
Hyacinth's father was rarely impassioned, but his love for Hyacinth's mother was equal to none. Her mother was a muggle-born and a brilliant witch. She was beautiful, talented, and admired by all who knew her. Her father lavished gifts upon her and exhausted himself to fulfill her every whim but, no matter how hard her tried, he could never seem to make her truly happy. In the public eye, Hyacinth's mother was always sunny but, when she was alone, a great sadness overtook her.
Her mother had been in the throes of a particularly bad spell the day she disappeared. Her father had refused to talk about it and, at first, Hyacinth believed that she had simply packed up and left. She waited for her, convinced that her mother would change her mind and return. That is, until one unsettling day, when she discovered that the upstairs bathroom was locked from the inside. When she asked her father about it, he had brushed it off, saying that door was simply stuck and to use the bathroom downstairs. Hyacinth thought this odd but attributed her father's strange behavior to his grief at her mother's abandonment. #For days, her father had wandered the house like a phantom. He barely ate or slept. Hyacinth had worried about him but she hadn't become truly concerned until the upstairs bathroom began to smell. She had tried to explain it away. She told herself it was an issue with the plumbing, but the longer she tried to ignore it, the more powerful the stench became. Soon, she couldn't stand it anymore. Her father had been sitting in her mother's chair, head in his hands, for nearly an hour. Hyacinth knew he wouldn't notice (he ignored her most of the time anyways), so she snuck into his office and stole his wand.
She knew it was against the rules but figured they could hardly send her to Azkaban. After all, she was only eleven. Hyacinth pointed the wand at the bathroom door and whispered Alohomora. The lock clicked into place and she slowly turned the knob. The door swung open and Hyacinth screamed.
She thought numbly about that day. It was all she thought about lately. Hyacinth gave up pretending to read and closed her book. Severus was too engrossed in his text to notice her ruse. She knew that Severus wasn't generally liked by their classmates and that he could be cruel and arrogant but, to her, he was perfect. He was the only thing that made her happy anymore and she clung to that happiness like a life raft in a stormy sea. #Severus lifted his head, causing Hyacinth to flinch. His eyes met hers and she fumbled with her book in an attempt to look busy. The textbook practically flew out of her sweaty hands, landing several feet away. She blushed and gave him an apologetic smile. Not knowing what else to do, Hyacinth lifted her hand and gave a little wave. He raised one eyebrow and looked back down at his book. She took a slow, shuttering breath. Suddenly, she knew, with every ounce of her being, that they were meant to be together.