Dear reader,
This story is currently on hiatus. The reason is because I am forced to participate in a work experience project and along with applying for a job and 'research' (for my stories) there won't be enough time to write. So, there won't be any updates in 1-3 months. But I am not abandoning this.
LOve and blessings,
The author
Author's note: Like OlderShouldKnowBetter said about Pride & Scorpius, if this story had been about the unpleasant wizard Livianus Stratford who fell in love with the sweet and gentle witch from unmagical parents Blossem Wilson who in turn chose for the admired, brave wizard Everett Carpenter, then it would have been 'mine'. But as you all know, the characters and storyline are made up by the creative J.K Rowling. I am merely hoping to create another 'missing moments' novel plausible with the canon for as much as my different personality and background will allow it. I am posting a disclaimer for lines that were directly copied from the books under each chapter.
Thanks a lot to Malebron, OCDdegrassi and other lovely reviewers here for pointing out grammar- and other mistakes. I used to keep my chapters short, but reading everywhere that people preferred long chapters, I decided to change it. I have rewritten this story into third perspective, seeing as most people seem to prefer that as well. To the anonymous guest reviewer: thanks for the review! I am sorry you thought the interpretation of Sev/Lily was unfair in this story. Still, different people have different interpretations of the characters and I think that is a great thing.
Chapter one: Asphodel and Wormwood
Mr. and Mrs. Evans, owners of their own small gardening company, lived in Cokeworth, English Midlands, at Church lane number 17. Cokeworth was an industrial town. Almost all the buildings in Cokeworth consisted out of the same light brown bricks as the big square cotton mill, whose great chimney spew storm colored clouds in the sky. A dark greenish grey river ran through the fringes of the town and eventually disappeared in the countryside that separated it from the nearest city, Brightford. In the west were coalfields, and barren land eventually ending in sea. On the other side was a large forest. Cokeworth had a small town center, consisting of a church located in a square building of light brown bricks, a grocery store, bakery, a clothing store, a charity shop and an apothecary. A few blocks further was a dingy pub and a fish-and-chips store. There was an elementary school, of which the stone-carved inscription above the door read: Teaching useful and dogmatic subjects since 1850. There was a sports field and there was one hotel, the Railview hotel, that looked out on a station for goods trains. Mr. and Mrs. Evans enjoyed their home, that they recently moved to because it helped them in getting more clients for their business. They had two small daughters, who greatly differed in temperament. Their oldest had cried a lot as a baby and had stayed somewhat moody ever since, but their youngest daughter had always been cheerful. On the other hand, their oldest daughter was very orderly while their youngest wasn't. There was one thing, however, that the Evans family never spoke of, that none of the other people in Cokeworth knew about. Mr. and Mrs. Evans weren't the only inhabitants who kept a secret. In the last house of the old, degenerated maze near the mucky river lived Mr. Snape with his wife and son. Mr. Snape worked in the coal mines and his wife in the cotton mill. Mrs. Foster from number ten had once found their son on the street clutching an old shoe someone had lost, crying that his parents were going to divorce, and she had been surprised to find out that his parents had made up with each other as soon as she had arrived with the boy. She had also been surprised about suddenly feeling an unexplainable urge to leave and just go home to occupy herself with her own life and that the dishes (which had been covered in partly molded food rests during the first glance she had stolen in the kitchen) had suddenly been clean after the few minutes later that she left, while she hadn't seen anyone there. Mrs. Snape and their son were different from the other people in town, so different even, that nobody of what they saw as ordinary people, such as Mrs. Foster, would believe it.
Five years had passed
Petunia Evans's light blonde hair, tied in a ponytail, sprung behind her when she walked and her pale greyish green eyes looked shortly in the direction of the river. Lily Evans was struggling to keep up with her, her thick dark red hair falling on her shoulders casually as her green eyes followed her older sister's gaze. The river houses looked depressing, and so dilapidated that Lily could hardly imagine people living in them. Lily stole a sideways glance at her sister and felt a little guilty. Petunia had said nothing else yet during their walk home together. She was accompanying Lily to and from school every day like their mother had asked, despite going to secondary school in a month, and looked longingly every day to the groups of girls that went shopping with each other instead...
"Hey diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle, the cow jumped over the moon. The little dog laughed to see such fun. And the dish ran away with the spoon!" Lily sang, hoping it would cheer her sister up. But Petunia did not laugh like the dog, so Lily went on. "Hickory dickory dock…"
"Lily, please! Act normally!" Petunia pleaded. Quickly she looked around, but after seeing that besides Mrs. Peters the streets were desolate, she sighed from relief. Lily wondered what was wrong. As they turned into Baker Street and walked past the familiar houses that were all the same, that Lily could still have pictured if she had gone blind, they arrived in the town's center with the nice shops. Mrs. Peters, the elderly wife of the police officer who worked at the second hand shop, was dusting off the few things that she had stalled out on a table outside, such as a gramophone. Usually Mrs. Peters waved, but not this time. She looked unhappy. Lily felt sorry for Mrs. Peters and waved at her. Upon seeing Lily, Mrs. Peters smiled and waved back. They walked on.
"Fortunately others haven't heard you, Lily" Petunia said at last. "That song…That song didn't make any sense!"
Lily pulled her closer. "I'm sorry! Hug!" she said.
"How was school today?" Petunia asked.
"Not very good." Lily answered honestly, not really wanting to remember how her bad grade for Maths was changed by someone else and everyone had accused her of cheating. She had been worried about taking home her assignment, because her mother was always so proud of her and Lily had been afraid of disappointing her. She didn't know who had done it and why. Often when she dreaded something, suddenly the problem got solved and she was grateful when that happened, but the solutions often created another problem. It was odd. "Please, don't tell" she added.
"It depends. Was it because you weren't paying attention in class?" inquired Petunia.
"No!" Lily said. Maybe that was partly true after all, but she had also done her best earnestly.
Petunia sighed. "Okay, fine." she promised.
Lily was very glad. "I love you, Tuney, you're the best sister I could imagine" she said, because she said it every time. Now, the corners of her sister's mouth lifted.
Not far from where the country land began, there was a road and a few blocks with houses with gardens. A skinny ten-year old boy with black, greasy hair cut in different lengths stood there wearing a coat way too large for him, looking a tad forgotten. Maybe the colonel and lieutenant of the enemy team are somewhere around here, Severus Snape hoped as his black eyes examined the strange part of town he found himself in, with new and bigger houses looking more colorful than any other neighborhood in Cokeworth, around a small deserted field made by asphalt surrounded by shrubbery that contained a metal frame with two what looked like wooden seats dangling from chains. Severus wondered what the use of it was. There was an unusual silence, the only audible sound consisted out of the buzzing of a bee. Severus liked this kind of silence. The Muggles that had made him end up here with their game were nowhere to be found. Muggles were non-magical people and they did not know Severus was a wizard. This was probably for the best, Severus thought. His mum had warned him frequently about the dangers of informing Muggles about the magical world, but at home, he had been keeping record of every day that had passed, not on a calender (too bloody expensive) but in a notebook he had received at school because as soon as he was eleven, he would start secondary education. Then his life would finally begin. On the 9th of January, he had been excited to turn ten years old, which meant that then he had been separated only one year and nine months from magical school. He had also hoped that his parents would divorce for his birthday, but like he had already expected, that wish hadn't been fulfilled. Nonetheless, it had been half a year ago, meaning that now he just needed to wait one more year and three months before he would go to Hogwarts…Suddenly, voices and footsteps disturbed the quiet. Severus automatically crouched down and searched for a gap in the branches to look through. With shame, he saw that it were just girls, but it were girls that he had never seen before, blonde and red-haired, who would answer his question because hey hurried towards the seats and hopped on them grabbing the chains. They walked backwards fast and pulled up their bare legs so that they swung forwards without touching the asphalt ground. Along with the movement of the chains, they stretched their pale legs and pushed them backwards, back and forth, so that they went higher and higher, their hair flowing and falling back on their shoulders and their skirts billowing. It had never occurred to Severus that such a thing existed, so out of curiosity he kept watching. Then it happened. When they couldn't go any higher, suddenly the red-haired girl's seat fell back empty as she had jumped forward into the air.
"LILY!" the blonde girl screeched in fear, giving Severus the impression that jumping off wasn't an usual part of the thing they were doing. He wondered what kind of girl was called Lily. It sounded a little sweet, like a diminutive, but he knew that it was also the name of a flower, he had learned that at biology. But that 'Lily' had jumped off wasn't everything. 'Lily' launched farther in the sky than she had jumped. Severus held his breath. Until that moment, even though he had been brought up with the knowledge about creatures such as dragons, threstals, pixies, veela and angels (though he had never quite believed in the latter, thinking they were reserved to the imagery of the one broken glass angel his father always insisted needed to be on the table at Christmas) he had thought of such a thing as impossible. Lily did not even have wings. Gracefully, she floated downwards all by herself and landed on her feet. Severus thought he had probably just imagined it. But his eyes had never fooled him before. Severus kept looking. He needed to know for sure what he had just seen. Then, suddenly, the door of one of the houses next to the playground opened, and a woman with thick brown shoulder-length curls wearing a flower dress came hurrying towards the two girls.
"Lily Evans! Petunia Evans! What happened?" the woman shouted breathlessly. Severus was stunned at the fact that apparently, the two girls were related. The girl apparently named Petunia was Lily's sister.
"Lily jumped off the swing!" Petunia answered without hesitation. She did not add anything else. Maybe there was something similar about their nose, or perhaps their ears, but to Severus, the similarities between Petunia and Lily ended there.
With a shocked expression, the woman that apparently was their mother examined Lily and took her to the pretty house she had appeared from. Disappointed that only the other girl remained, Severus nonetheless kept watching to see if she would do something unexpected too. Swinging higher and higher again, Lily's sister looked around. She let go of the chains like Lily had done. Then, Severus felt a blow against his temple, a dull pain went through his head and he automatically closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he saw a blurry at first, then sharp-looking sand-covered pink sandal lying next to him. The other girl now was a shaking heap on the ground wearing one piece of footwear, breathing loudly as if on the verge of tears. With trembling legs, she stood up and dusted herself off, looking darkly at the empty, shakily moving swing. Severus realized he had been right about Petunia not being like Lily. He nonetheless longed to impress someone with another letter in their surname too. Petunia's fallen sandal appeared next to her. Thoughtlessly, she put it on and walked away. Severus couldn't believe she hadn't even noticed that he had helped her with magic. Sighing in frustration, he left the playground to go look somewhere else. He needed to choose the right moment to reveal himself another day. He was still surrounded by the same houses from the same town that the warm July sun shone upon, but something about it was different.
Lily stood in the light, modern sitting room of her house, that had colorful, striped curtains and wooden furniture with blue and orange cushions, and a floor of white laminate.
"Why did you do such a dangerous thing?" Lily's mother addressed her strictly, with her hands on her hips. "You could have been hurt!"
"I'm sorry" Lily whispered, "but it was lots of fun!" She did not understand why her mother and Petunia were making such a big problem about the exciting experience she'd had. If they would just try it for themselves, they would realize that there was nothing dangerous about it at all, in fact, it had been surprisingly calming, she thought, but she didn't say that, because in the rare cases that it happened, her mother didn't tolerate any retort when she was lecturing her.
"Fun! You can have lots of fun just swinging without additional dangerous actions too. I will tell Petunia that you aren't allowed to jump from the swing anymore" her mother continued.
The excitement that Lily had felt quickly disappeared. She didn't agree, but she nodded to make her mother believe that she did. Immediately, her mother's expression softened, and Lily was glad for that. She filled a watering can and watered the new purple periwinkles on the table.
"Aren't they lovely?" Mrs. Evans asked cheerfully. "They are popular. A couple of families here and in Brightford want a complete make-over of their garden, completed before the end of summer, and they want it filled with rocks and periwinkles."
"That's nice! They are beautiful!" Lily said. She hoped they were going to the garden centre soon. She liked the garden centre. They had everything related to gardens there, from brightly colored flowers from the rainforest to lawn mowers and aviaries with birds.
"Why don't you ask Tuney if the two of you could help with dinner together?" Mrs. Evans asked. She often thought up things that Lily and Petunia could do together. Lily always enjoyed doing things together with Petunia, she enjoyed helping her mother out, and she enjoyed helping to prepare dinner, so when Petunia came back from the swings, she walked towards her and told her about the idea.
Petunia's nose wrinkled. "Alright, if mummy asked..."
Lily felt bad for Petunia, because she never liked any of the things their mother always suggested them to do together. She wished that Petunia could enjoy her life a bit more. However, Lily didn't say that out loud, because every time she had done so Petunia had assured her in a voice as if she was a baby that she was fine and that Lily didn't need to concern herself with her, thank you very much. As they silently cut the leek, carrots and onions, Mrs. Evans peeled the potatoes, humming. Lily took the butter and minced meat from the refrigerator and Mrs. Evans put on the gas and lit it up with a matchstick. After she instructed Lily to be careful, she put the meat and vegetables in the pan. Mrs. Evans boiled water for the potatoes in the stockpot. Lily was always allowed to put in the herbs because it was her favorite part. Carefully, she broke off the right amount of rosemary, thyme and laurel and shred it in the pan. Petunia poured in the tomato juice and worchester sauce and then it was done.
Mr. Evans returned from doing the business administration. "Finally, I'm done." he said. "It smells really nice in the kitchen".
"Lily and Petunia have helped me all on their own." Mrs. Evans said in a delightful tone.
"How good of you both! Getting along well!" Mr. Evans said proudly.
Then, Petunia suddenly noticed something on the kitchen table. "The leek! Lily, you forgot the leek!" she yelled.
Lily noticed, too, that the raw leek was still on the kitchen table, and that she forgot to add it. "I'm sorry" she mumbled.
"Oh, well, it will taste good without it too." Mrs. Evans said calmly.
Lily was relieved, but Petunia screamed: "I cut it! I could as well have done nothing! It adds the flavour!"
"What do you think, love? Shall we wait a few more minutes before dinner's ready?" Mrs. Evans asked Mr. Evans.
"I'm hungry right now" Mr. Evans protested, in a lighthearted tone. "But we have to, then…"
"It's all because of Lily" Petunia said. "She's just careless".
"I'm not!" Lily protested loudly. "I forgot!"
"Girls, don't argue!" Mr. Evans said, and they stayed silent as the pie went back into the oven.
When the pie was finally ready, Mrs. Evans put a piece on everyone's plates. The salt and pepper were near Lily's. Petunia looked at it.
"Could I have..." she began, looking at Lily and then at the table.
"Of course, Tuney." said Lily in her most cheerful voice and passed over the salt, and when Petunia looked back at her gratefully and replied with "Thank you", she knew their argument was fortunately over. After dinner, Petunia and Lily were allowed to watch the household commercials on television that Petunia didn't want to miss. Lily's thoughts wandered from jingles about milk to the great feeling of jumping off the swing.
Petunia poked her. "Are you even watching?" she asked.
"Yes, I am!" Lily lied.
"Which steam cleaning service is more expensive, then, Suffolk Steaming or Cleango?" Petunia asked suspiciously.
Lily's head felt heavy. "I don't know" she admitted.
"It's Topclean Pro, of course." Petunia said, sounding impatient. "Everyone in the street uses it. When I have my own house with my own family one day, that is the one I'm going to choose!"
When Lily had failed to come up with an enthusiastic reply, Petunia dropped the subject and started talking about the messed up haircut of her best friend, Yvonne. When a documentary started that their parents wanted to see, she left to do her homework, because in the last year of elementary school 'everything changed', and she needed to prepare for her secondary education at a school called St. Adelaides All Girls Boarding School, because that was necessary 'when you want to amount to something someday'. Lily didn't look forward to getting more Maths tests. Instead, she half-watched videos of nature along with her parents, before she opened her own schoolbook. After she had made some calculations that she did understand, she put it aside as inconspicuously as possible and started browsing her favorite book about herbs and their uses since the Middle Ages, that Petunia disliked because of its old smell, and a book about old legends of Britain that Petunia had thought of as a strange birthday gift compared to her own makeup set, that she wasn't allowed to use until she turned thirteen, and a set of her own elaborate dusters that she had received because of her screaming about the dead cockroach she had once found behind her bed.
It was morning and misty outside. Tobias Snape sat slumped lazily in a threadbare chair in the sitting room of the last old terraced house by the old mill. He had already started drinking to relieve his hangover from yesterday, and part of his honey-brown hair was sticking to his face. The expression in his eyes was dull and sharp at the same time.
"Severusss.. My wizard son..." he sung slurred and painfully out of sync by means of a morning greeting when his son silently appeared into the room. Tobias took another gulp of beer and belched. Severus ignored his father, and so did his mother.
"You don't give me any applause?" Tobias asked in mock indignation.
"Like you deserve it, for being shitfaced every day, while I need to do all those household chores" Eileen Snape née Prince said.
Tobias laughed mirthlessly. "With that magic of yours you don't even have to do anything, and still it's filthy as a pig shed here. You're useless." he told his wife.
"Have you heard anything from your boss lately?" Eileen asked with a sly undertone.
"None of your business" Tobias spat.
"So it's still no promotion then, hmm?" she prodded.
"I will get a promotion one day, you'll see" Tobias answered in a raised voice. "Stuck-up git just needs to realize how bloody hard I work, all the dangers I face because of that stupid prick. TOFFEE-NOSED PRATS! SHIT JOB! SHIT GOVERNMENT! SHIT LIFE!" he exploded in his usual rant.
Eileen stared in the distance with an expression that had, long ago, made Tobias compliment her with what he called her 'melancholic eyes'. "Don't worry. It will turn out alright." she hushed tonelessly.
"In the meantime, hand me another bottle." Tobias demanded.
Now, Eileen was pulled out of her trance. "Go to the pub!" she shouted back.
Tobias stood up and angrily approached her, until they were only a few inches apart. "I will." he said softly. "And I won't come back until midnight" He grabbed his coat, left and slammed the door.
"No! Wait!" Eileen shouted, but Tobias didn't look back. Severus felt relieved, although his mother's expression was far from happy. Like always, Severus went upstairs, to his mother's room with forgotten magical objects, most of them books. This time, his eye fell upon a dusty, strange-looking box that he had never seen before. He box on a rickety table and opened it. It revealed a wooden board with a circle on it, containing three inner rings, and a hole in the middle. It also contained a velvet purple sack. Severus opened it. Brightly colored, marble-like stones rolled out of it. There was also an old, magical newspaper excerpt in it, with a yellowed black-and-white photograph of his mother on it, scowling in the camera. Eileen Prince, Hogwarts Gobstones Champion, it read. Out of curiosity, he put everything back in the box and took it downstairs with him.
"Mum" he asked, "what is this?"
His mother looked at the box like it was of no importance. "Oh, that is a magical game" she said indifferently.
"So you were a Gobstones champion at Hogwarts?" Severus demanded to know. His mother nodded. "I was the captain of the team.." she said dismissively.
"Can you teach me how to play it.." Severus began hesitantly.
Eileen sighed. "Why? Can't you figure it out yourself? It's not that difficult of a game..."
"You have nothing to do! And from the look of it, it requires more than one player!" Severus protested. His mother only worked in the mill for two days a week. Sighing even more deeply, Eileen eventually handed Severus fifteen of the red-yellow marbles and took the other fifteen, which were blue-purple, herself. Excited that he was finally going to learn the game that had brought his mother fame and glory at Hogwarts, Severus examined them. Although they slightly resembled marbles they looked like nothing he had ever seen before.
"You have different sorts of Gobstone games. Let's start with the classic one." His mother took seven of his Gobstones and carefully placed them in the middle of the circle, around the hole. She did the same with her own. Then, she hovered her hand over all the stones and they suddenly jumped and floated around until all were randomly placed somewhere on the circle.
"The rules are as follows..." she begun importantly. "You have to knock out your opponent's Gobstones out of the circle with yours. Ok, I start."
Eileen hunched forward and with her pink tongue sticking out in concentration she firmly tapped against one of her Gobstones with one of her thin fingers, aiming for the Gobstone of Severus that was the closest to the edge of the ring. It immediately rolled out of it and before he knew it, he was splashed in the eye by the stone with an odd bright-green liquid that smelled like their rubbish can when the rubbish bag had not been changed for a month. It was nasty. He cursed.
"I figured you'd found out." His mother said and she started to laugh, looking as if she was trying not to but failing, not even lecturing him about proper speech. She doubled over and while laughing loudly, tears from joy formed into her eyes.
Severus got a pleasant feeling of wanting to see the same thing happening to his mother. But to his dismay, the Gobstones didn't exactly behave like marbles. Not that he had much experience with marbles; once, a boy in the street had given him three out of pity and after a few games they had been lost. Unlike an ordinary marble however, the Gobstone did not roll towards the right direction after his strong tap; it bounced on the board and eventually came to an halt on a total unplanned spot, almost knocking one of his own stones out of the circle. Again he was sprayed with a foul-smelling liquid, making him growl in frustration. His mother was surprisingly good at keeping the Gobstones move in check; in a short amount of time, only two of his Gobstones had remained on the board. Severus seethed with frustration and couldn't take it anymore. He grabbed all seven of his mum's stones and placed them out of the circle by hand. But she wasn't sprayed with liquid.
"That's cheating what you're doing!" his mother protested angrily. "And look, it doesn't work. See? See how trying to take a shortcut is never a good idea?"
Severus nodded, disappointed.
"You'll only be able to succeed at magic if you do your bleedin' best." His mother said. "Then you can become a good wizard."
"Is it true that you can kill someone with magic?" Severus asked enthusiastically.
His mother's dark eyes suddenly look different, angry. "Where d'you wish to know that for?" she said in a sharp voice.
Severus immediately regretted letting curiosity get the best of him and pretended to be examining a colorful Gobstone. "Just because" he mumbled. Muggles would have another reason to be scared of him. Or maybe he could make something heavy fall on someone when they were mean, crushing them…
"Such a morbid one, you are!" his mother said angrily. Severus did not know what that meant, but he knew it was no compliment. She went on: "But yes, you can kill someone with magic, with the Killing Curse or a potion - I would advise you against it, though."
"Thanks for the explanation" Severus said, trying to keep his eyes from sparkling and quickly changed the topic. "What happened to my grandparents? Were my grandparents magical too?"
He did not expect to get answers. But his mother sighed. Suddenly, she sat a bit straighter. "I used to be noble – I mean, I still am noble." she said with a satisfied smile. "My family used to be very influential, and rich."
Severus didn't believe it. If that was true, then why did they live now in the poorest block of a town for poor working class people?
"Then what happened to my grandparents?" he asked.
"Your grandparents went to some foreign land for business." his mother said.
"That's cool. Can we visit them?" Severus wanted to know.
"No." His mother just stared into the distance with blank eyes. "They have never told me were they went, and they have cast an Anti-tracing spell."
"But...Why?" Severus didn't understand anything of it.
"Don't know." His mother answered, which only made her answer more vague. "They didn't approve of me marrying Tobias, you know!" Suddenly, she smiled, something she rarely did. "Everything used to be great, before…" Suddenly her smile disappeared and she stopped mid-sentence.
"Before what?" Severus asked.
"Before…before…" his mother struggled for words, "before I realized how annoying Muggle life could be!" she eventually said.
Severus laughed. "How come?" he asked.
"I think…I think it was because I had the wrong idea about Muggles." his mother stated. "I had heard stories about how awful they were, and when still at Hogwarts I did not want to have anything to do with them, I assure you. But then disaster struck me. I made a horrible mistake you should never, ever make. I don't want to talk about it. Eventually, my wand was broken in two and I received the old one from great aunt Finola when she died. That one is quite useless, but don't tell your dad".
Now Severus knew why her spells went wrong so often. "I won't. Promised." he said, wondering what that mistake has been. He hated it when people kept secrets for him, especially when it was his mum who did. She continued with a sepulchral voice: "I have done all sorts of gruesome magical jobs. Collecting potion ingredients such as Imp spittle, frog eyes, Unicorn vomit and seeds of the Venomous Tentacula, identifying human remains, being a Tester for potentially dangerous healing spells and cleaning every wand and corner in Olivander's wand shop - without magic, because it might disturb the magic of the wands themselves...But the absolute worst was my job at the Muggle Department at the Ministry of Magic. I had to read hundreds of Muggle papers every day, to see if there had been any magical accidents that made it necessary to Obliviate them. The papers were so incredibly boring, and I couldn't care less about things happening to Muggles. Maybe, I would've been able to stick with it if the work pressure wasn't so high. But I didn't… They fired me."
"It was worse than your other jobs?!" Severus cried out.
"Would you please stop interrupting me?" his mother said sharply. "Well, it wasn't exactly worse than my other jobs, but more tedious. Your grandfather, who had arranged the job for me, was enraged that I had wasted even this chance. I was a failure. I managed to find a Muggle job at the mill here and then I met your dad in the pub, seeing as he lived here, and I started dating him. Even though that was collaborating with the enemy -"
"Collaborating with the enemy? Why are Muggles enemies?" Severus asked, interested.
"Not only the Muggles...Nevermind…It didn't turn out to be as easy as I expected, I assure you!" his mother finished. She looked at an old photo of his parents together. It was the only photo of them in the house, and it was made by a Muggle photographer. Sometimes Severus looked at it too, wishing his real parents were a bit more like the normal-looking, happy couple on the faded yellowing photo.
"It was fun. I go outside" he said.
Excited, he walked towards the same neighborhood as the day before and crouched behind the bushes surrounding the playground, even though this time, he wasn't participating in any game. He knew it was rather strange to be watching two girls, and in any normal situation he would have thought of himself as having lost his mind, but this wasn't any normal situation. After all, he was waiting for the red-haired girl named Lily to jump off the swing again. She went higher and higher, just like the day before. Almost…Severus thought eagerly. Now…
"Lily, don't do it!" her sister shrieked, but Lily had already let go of the chains and plunged. Laughing loudly, she ascended into the sky until she fell down again and landed on the asphalt like an aerialist. Severus watched her breathlessly. It was really true! His eyes hadn't deceived him! He had known it all along, otherwise there wouldn't have been any use in watching, but still the realization shocked him. 'Lily' was really able to fly. That meant…she had to be a witch. The realization made him excited like the moment he had first heard about Hogwarts.
"Mummy told you not to!" Petunia said angrily, stopping her own swing. She was wearing the same sandals as she had the previous day. She was putting her hands on her hips. "Mummy said you weren't allowed, Lily!"
"But I'm fine!" Lily giggled. "Tuney, look at this! Watch what I can do!"
Lily walked straight in his direction, and Severus tried to calm his nerves. But Lily hadn't seen him; she walked to a spot close to his own to pick up a fallen flower. Severus was able to see her more clearly now. She had green eyes, so green that they almost looked yellowish, eyes like Severus had never seen before because as he was sure, no-one else had eyes like that. The color that matched it the closest had been the color of the bottle of chartreuse that his dad had been angry about receiving because he preferred whiskey. It had been a remarkable green, almost like Shrinking Solution. Lily's rust red hair lit up in the sun and her face was different from his own in a way that was fascinating in a way he had never thought about before. She was a girl, after all, but that was not the point. The flower was laying on the palm of Lily's hand and when Petunia, who had been glancing around, finally drew nearer, Lily stuck it out. The flower started moving its petals fast and slow like the many shells of some living, but deformed sea creature. They opened and closed as if the flower had been tricked in perceiving that it was dawn and dusk and dawn over and over again. Severus had never seen something more entrancing.
"Stop it!" 'Tuney' immediately shrieked.
"It's not hurting you" Lily retorted, but she closed her hand over the flower and threw it back on the ground again like it had been nothing.
"It's not right" Petunia went on, but her feeble gaze followed the floating flower after all. "How do you do it?" she wanted to know, and her voice sounded different, jealous. There was a silence.
Finally! Severus thought. This was his moment! He jumped out of the bushes on the playground. "It's obvious, isn't it?" he said, his voice sounding loud and clear.
Petunia ran away screaming. Lily had stayed on the same spot and when he looked at her, Severus suddenly became aware of his own appearance. He was wearing his new second hand coat that his mum had said was too big for him and looked ridiculous, though at that time he hadn't cared about her opinion at all because the way it flapped around him when he walked had made him feel like resembling a real wizard. He hoped that this was true.
"What's obvious?" asked Lily.
Lowering his voice, because it was their little secret, Severus said: "I know what you are".
Lily said she did not understand what he meant, and asked him.
"You're…you're a witch." Severus whispered. Now Lily finally knew that she was different from everyone else too. She would probably be glad. He couldn't wait to hear her reaction!
"That's not a very nice thing to say to somebody!" Lily told him off, as if he had insulted her. Haughtily, with angry steps, she walked back to her sister, as if she wanted to prove she was as right as she was and he had been mistaken.
"No!" Severus shouted loudly. It was going all wrong. The sun had no mercy and he felt sweat dripping down his back. He felt hotter than ever, but he didn't want to take off his coat because then he'd no longer looked like a wizard. He hurried towards Lily and Petunia, who had grabbed the poles of the swings. He felt like he was it without ever having agreed to play tag again. He explained things, that there was nothing wrong with being a witch, because his mum was one too. But then suddenly, Petunia started talking instead of Lily, making the word wizard sound like a taunt.
"I know who you are! You're that Snape boy!" she told him, and to Lily she told that he lived in Spinner's End down by the river. "Why have you been spying on us?"
By using the word spying, she made it sound as if looking at other people wasn't allowed without their approval. The sun was multiplying the hidden rain of sweat drops, making Severus's unwashed hair feel clammy and stick to his face. He had been watching them alright, but it hadn't been spying. If Petunia only knew what he could show her sister...
"Wouldn't spy on you, anyway" he said to her, because she had ruined everything, "you're a Muggle." Petunia looked as if he had punched her in the face. In an even shriller voice, she said that they were leaving. Unfortunately, the worst thing that could happen happened. Lily obeyed her sister throwing Severus one last look that said she couldn't care less whether he was a wizard or a Muggle as they walked away through the playground gate. It wasn't supposed to go like this, Severus thought. He had thought Lily would be happy to know a wizard. He had carefully picked out the moment he had thought would make him seem impressive, but as usual, everything had gone wrong. He swallowed back the biggest disappointment he had felt in a long time. It had just been a misunderstanding. Next time, he would set it right.
Petunia went to her room and Lily made a photo collage of pictures from their holiday in Cornwall previous year that her mother had admired in delight when it was done. She went to her sister's room to talk to her. She knocked, but when she got no reaction and heard classical music, she opened the door to see the familiar crispy-clean room with flower curtains. Petunia was practicing ballet moves that Lily didn't knew she could. Since she heard about Rose attending ballet classes, she had been full of it. Lily thought Petunia looked really graceful, until she tripped and bumped her head against the lamp.
"Lily!" Petunia shouted angrily, while tears were filling her eyes. "That was your fault! You startled me!"
"I'm sorry!" Lily apologized. She hadn't meant to. "Sometimes I do feel like…Something is wrong with me." she confessed. "Remember the swing, the flower? Maybe I really am a witch!" she said very quickly and she felt herself blush at the thought.
"Witches aren't real!" Petunia said loudly.
"So what do you think about that flower, then?" Lily whispered.
"You need to tell me your trick!" Petunia demanded.
"There wasn't any trick" Lily answered. "It just started moving on its own".
"That's impossible" Petunia said, and her face had turned slightly paler. Lily felt disappointed that her sister didn't believe her, but she understood that for someone who did not know how she had felt, it seemed very unlikely indeed.
"Don't talk about it ever again" Petunia added shrilly, crossing her arms. "It may bring bad luck."
Lily felt disappointed.
"And by the way, I still want to call Rose and Violet about the episodes of Days of Our Lives that I missed" Petunia said, which Lily knew, was a hint that she needed to go away.
Because she still kept thinking about what the boy from the playground had said, Lily decided to look if he was still there at the playground. He wasn't, so she walked further and further, until she heard footsteps behind her.
"Some think…that when you stop using magic, it will disappear" a voice behind her stated. Immediately, Lily spun around to see the 'wizard' boy standing there, pointing at her. She had vaguely remembered what he looked like, with that hair shining from dirt and that odd black coat, but there had been details she hadn't remembered, such as his sickly-looking complexion or strange excited expression in his eyes.
"Forever?" she asked.
"Yes, forever…" the Snape boy answered. "Perhaps you will never get it back once it's gone."
Lily made a mental note not to stop doing what Petunia called 'unnatural' things, just in case. "What did you say to my sister? Were you mean to Petunia?" she wanted to know.
"Come with me, I know a place where we can talk" the Snape boy said. He grabbed her arm and Lily let herself be dragged along with him, until they eventually arrived by the dirty river. Alongside the water was a strip of nature where no-one ever came. Lily followed the boy into an overgrown thicket. The trees stood close together, looking like knobbly archways. The green foliage lit up in the watery sun. The Snape boy sat down, so Lily did as well.
"Muggle is a word for someone unlike us…Someone without magic" he whispered.
"You made Petunia upset" Lily said.
"She became upset herself! I didn't make her!" the Snape boy said.
"So…what kind of things can your mum do?" Lily asked.
That seemed to catch the Snape boy off guard, but after a while he sighed: "Arguing. Today she said that even the dementors would pass by dad." He laughed and that, too, sounded strange. Lily, who thought she should have specified magical things, did not get the joke.
"But my mum is also really good at Gobstones, she has been a school champion at Hogwarts" Snape added quickly as if trying to redeem his mum, though how, Lily had not understood.
"Why did you laugh that moment before? What are dementors? What is Gobstones? And what is Hogwarts?" Lily wondered aloud.
"Dementors are creatures that take people's happiness" the Snape boy replied, "but then there needs to be something to take away." His voice had gotten the same tone as Lily's parents or Tuney when they explained a fact, which was curious, Lily thought, because she had never heard before about creatures that took someone's happiness before. "Gobstone's a magical game. It's like marbles. And Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry is the school for us magical folk, that I'm going to when I'm eleven" he added.
"Witchcraft?" Lily asked. "Do they teach at Hogwarts how to curse and poison others, and fly on a broomstick?"
"The casting of dark spells and curses and the brewing of poisons is only taught at Durmstrang." Snape started while his voice broke briefly from enthusiasm. "A really great school in Siberia. But at Hogwarts, they only teach about the Dark Arts to defend yourself against them. Disappointing, I know. However, Hogwarts is the only magical school of the United Kingdom and is regarded as one of the best magical schools in existence. There are not many prestigious magical schools to begin with - eleven worldwide. That's because there are more Muggles than magical people. Currently, there are 1000 or 600 students at Hogwarts. It's located in the highlands of Scotland, surrounded by one of its great lochs, the Black Lake. They only teach regular, that is more friendly spells and charms at Hogwarts, arithmancy, potions, care for magical plants and creatures, transfiguration, herbology, astronomy, ancient runes… The quality of the magical education there is really great. But they do also teach Quidditch, a very popular sport. They take in everyone…as long as you're a witch or a wizard, of course."
"Really?" Lily gasped. That school had sounded…brilliant. If she had heard it correctly…could it really be true? A school without Maths? Then she felt stupid. Of course not. There she was, believing that Snape boy again…And her mother shouldn't find out where she was, or she would never be allowed to play outside again.
'I have to go" she said and stood up.
"Wait! Tomorrow, by the river again?" the Snape boy asked. Lily doubted for a few seconds, then she said: "Okay, promised". Even if it was only because she didn't like to ignore people who asked her something. It was rude. And part of her had become even more curious.
Fortunately, when she stepped in the hallway and walked in the sitting room, there was no reaction from her parents that was out of the ordinary, probably they had just assumed she had gone to the playground again. Lily sighed from relief.
Petunia told a story about some old neighbor lady whose conversation she had overheard: "And she received the card three years after her sister was back from vacation".
"That's such a pity!" Lily laughed. Then she confessed: "Tuney, I talked to that boy again and he wasn't mean to you! A Muggle just means someone without magic. He apologized. There's a school for wizards and witches, and it's called Hogwarts…He told me…"
"Then he was lying to you again! There is no Hogwash" Petunia said immediately. "If that Snape boy doesn't leave us alone, I'll ask daddy if he will phone the police and then they will put him in a mental hospital for bothering strangers with offensive words. Where did he take you, anyway? I didn't see you anymore"
Lily, who had not realized that Petunia had watched her from the window, felt caught. "Nowhere!" she said.
"It was the strangest day ever…" she told her mother that evening when her mother asked her how her day had been.
The scene of Severus revealing himself and talking to Lily and Petunia for the first time, including the lines "It's obvious, isn't it?" "What's obvious?", "No" and "Wouldn't spy on you anyway, you're a Muggle" comes from chapter 33 from the Deathly Hallows, page 663-665