After a quarter of an hour spent eating the finest that Hogwarts had to offer, Severus could feel himself becoming used to James and Sirius, and did his best to bite back his resentment. What they had done to him didn't exist anywhere except in memory, and it would only do him harm to act on it. He did his best to appear only cautious with them, perhaps slightly afraid of breaking their fragile friendship, and the three Gryffindors around him seemed to accept this. Lily had kept quiet for most of the meal, watching the awkward conversation between the Marauders and their newest edition. James looked to be the most at ease of all of them; if anything, he was enjoying the way that Sirius was struggling to keep his disbelief and frustration locked away.
"Will you be trying out for Quidditch next year, Severus?" asked James, shoving a spoonful of mashed potatoes and gravy into his large mouth. Sirius muttered something under his breath that sounded unpleasant, and James elbowed him sharply in the ribs. Severus tried his best to mask his amusement at the low groan of pain that escaped Sirius, but if the grinning features of Potter were anything to judge by, he had not succeed.
"No," he answered cautiously, taking another bite of shepherd's pie as he paused, "I don't think I will be. I've never been an exceptional flyer." James nodded at his answer – if Severus had been asked, he would have said that James was pleased with this. After all, it only meant that he had less competition for a place on the house team.
"And what about you, Lily?" James grinned at her as he asked, and for the first time since getting over the shock of returning to life, Severus felt curious. He and Lily had never talked about Quidditch before. There had never been a reason to. They attended games together, of course, Lily often joining him in the Slytherin stands because he refused to sit with the Gryffindors, but neither of them had ever expressed an interest in playing. Or, perhaps Lily had wanted to, but he had unknowingly quashed the desire out of her.
Thinking back to his previous life, Severus knew that this not only possible, but likely. Lily had been extremely adventurous when it came to the wizarding world; if there was an option, she was likely to explore it.
"I might. I've never flown on a broom before, and I don't know if I'm any good." She looked at James a bit sheepishly – he had been talking mostly of Quidditch the entire evening. Of course, that could have been an attempt to break the ice, but as far as Severus knew, Potter had always been an avid fan.
"What do you mean, you haven't flown before?" he asked, sounding entirely appalled. "What sort of parent doesn't teach their child to fly before coming to Hogwarts?" Lily's face became red with embarrassment. Severus thought of something she had asked her before coming to Hogwarts, and he had answered truly: Non-magical blood did not affect the experience that one would have at Hogwarts. Even if he had not believed this entirely at the time, he did now.
"Potter," he said coolly, finding a balance between remaining on friendly terms with James and defending Lily, "Someone could only be taught to fly if their parents have the means to procure a broomstick for them."
"But even the poorest wizarding families can find a way to get a broomstick! Borrow it from a friend, or something!"
"There is the possibility that her parents did not know that flying broomsticks exist, and even if they were to find one, I'm sure that they wouldn't put Lily on it." Severus glanced back at his plate, waiting for the information to sink in. Surely, Potter wasn't so thickheaded that he wouldn't realize what he meant.
"How do you live in the wizarding world and not know what a broomstick is?" James sounded earnestly shocked and confused. Severus admitted, he had always thought James to be thick, but he had never had such solid proof as this. If he was to survive the next seven years on friendly terms with Potter, he could only hope that he grew out of imbecility, and quickly.
"Mate," said Sirius, finally speaking up for the first time since agreeing to give Severus a chance, "You didn't get it. She's muggleborn." As realization stuck James, and he looked at Lily with his face full of chagrin, Sirius smiled ever so slightly. Severus knew that Sirius had always supported blood equality – it was extremely unlikely that he was taking amusement in Lily's heritage. It was more likely that James' lack of observational skills was what he was smiling at.
Severus glanced at Lily, and he saw that her face had only become redder. James was quick to stammer his way into an apology.
"Lily, I had no idea. But – it's not like I have anything against Muggleborns – I just didn't know." Sirius chuckled darkly, as if he felt that this was a form of payback for being forced into a friendship with Severus.
"It's fine," Lily said quickly, as if she wanted to move on from the subject as quickly as possible. It was clear to Severus that even though he had told her that blood purity – or the lack of it – meant nothing at Hogwarts that she was still self-conscious of the fact that she had been born into a Muggle family. She smiled at James quickly, making it clear that she didn't want him to feel badly about the situation. Severus wondered momentarily if he deserved it, but said nothing else.
"Well," James said awkwardly, "I'm sure that once you try flying that you'll like it. It's loads of fun – I've been flying for as long as I can remember, but first years get official lessons in the first weeks of school. If we're lucky, they'll borrow the time from Potions."
"I certainly hope so!" cried Sirius dramatically, "Even though Bellatrix is a complete nut, I'm sure she wasn't kidding when she said Slughorn was a bit off." Horace Slughorn was an eccentric person, but not in a terrible way. Thinking back to his previous years at Hogwarts, Severus recalled that he had an indifferent opinion of the Head of Slytherin. The Slug Club was the only thing that marked him for a Slytherin – if he had not shown his ambition through that, Severus would have been sure that the squat man had been a Hufflepuff. Or, more likely, a Ravenclaw: he could not deny that the man was brilliant when it came to potions.
"I've never liked the idea of potions in general," James paused shortly to stuff more food into his mouth. "There's no point in throwing stuff into a cauldron, waving your wand, and hoping that it comes out right." That was very typical of a Potter – Severus supposed that Harry's opinions on potions had been hereditary.
"Who's Bellatrix?" asked Lily, and Severus opened his mouth to respond when he remembered that he wasn't supposed to have any clue who she was. As of now, she would have already left Hogwarts, but she had been insane from the very beginning. Severus had a feeling that it was not all due to inbreeding; Andromeda and Narcissa had turned out fine. Although her mind had been twisted from the beginning, it had taken several years for her appearance to catch up. Bellatrix had been rather attractive before Askaban, never pretty, but her dark features had been rather handsome. She hadn't gained the features of an insane woman until she had spent thirteen years locked away.
Sirius looked at Severus oddly – he had seen that he had nearly answered for him. "She's my cousin," he said offhandedly to Lily, keeping his brown eyes on Severus. "Do you know her, Snape?"
This could end very badly. He knew of the dangers that a Time Turner could produce; there was no telling what could go wrong if he gave the wrong answer. Now that the shock of his arrival was finally beginning to wear off, the consequences of his actions seemed to be a hundred times heavier. It was true; the choices he made now could have a very large impact on the future. But Severus was not naïve enough to believe that it all could be good. Nothing ever worked as planned, and even with a lifetime's worth of mistakes and memories stored away in his head, there was no guarantee that this would end the way he wanted it to. He had already changed so much with the simple decision of switching houses – perhaps the mistakes he had made earlier and the lessons he had learned had been rendered useless.
"No, I don't." he spluttered, trying to work his way through the situation with too little time to discover the best solution, "I just thought that I recognized the name."
"Maybe you do," Sirius pressed, sensing Severus' anxiety, "I have other cousins. Have you met any of them?"
It was going to take far longer to create a friendship with Sirius, he knew that. Sirius had always held grudges longer, and he was the only member of the Marauders who had outright tried to kill him. James had had the decency to warn Severus before he had gotten harmed by the werewolf, but Sirius' true character had been revealed. Getting caught in a lie wasn't going to make Sirius more amiable.
"I don't think so," he said cautiously, "I don't recognize the surname Black, and I've never met anyone who's told me they're related to a Black."
"Right." Said Sirius flatly – it sounded as if he didn't believe him. Involuntarily, he raised barriers around his mind; using Occlumency as a defense was now second nature. Of course, it was impossible that eleven year-old Sirius Black knew Legilimency. In all likelihood, Sirius just didn't want to believe anything that came from Severus' mouth.
"Until I met you, I'd only heard of Blacks because my family's always getting invitations to their fancy parties. My mum's told me that your family is fond of overdoing things. And I've never heard of a Snape – I doubt he's heard of you." James, managing to pause long enough between eating and drinking to say something, found it necessary to jump in and rescue Severus. Initially, the once Slytherin recoiled: he didn't need anyone to step in and save him. He could handle himself. But, as soon as the words had left James' mouth, Sirius seemed to relax a bit. He still looked incredibly agitated, but he changed his gaze from Severus' face towards his plate. And, a small part of him felt a rare emotion: gratitude.
Although his assistance had been unnecessary, it had ended the conversation before Severus had slipped. No doubt, it had placed his already strained relationship with Sirius under more tension, but it had stopped things from escalating. But he wasn't about to let James know he was thankful – that would only enlarge his already enormous head, and it would only put Sirius in a darker mood.
And now, the group sat in silence. The four of them ate quietly, James scraping his plate clean then repilling it with food. It was disgusting to eat that much food in one sitting, and Severus had no wish of duplicating the act. As he finished of his last piece of pheasant, he laid his fork and knife down. He was still a little hungry, but it was never healthy for one to eat until they were full.
Lily had already stopped eating, but instead of trying to continue the conversation, she was looking around the Great Hall. No doubt, her eyes were filled with curiosity and wonder – she had been excited about Hogwarts years before she had received her acceptance letter. Severus watched her for a moment, noting the way her thin hair fell loosely over her shoulders. It hadn't thickened up until third year, but he found it attractive nonetheless. It was that familiar shade of red-brown that he had adored since he had first laid eyes on her. His eyes lingered on her for a few seconds longer than they should have: the last thing he wanted to do was reveal his weakness to Sirius.
Severus finally tore his eyes from Lily, and in her absence, began scanning up and down the table for familiar faces. Although most people only tugged at his memory namelessly, there were a few that he did recognize. There was Frank Longbottom – and sitting only a few places from him was the future Mrs. Longbottom. Alice's dark hair tumbled in curls down to her shoulders: perhaps that was why she had chosen to chop most of it off in the future.
He saw the Prewett twins; Fabian and Gideon were currently roaring with laughter hardly ten feet away from him. Out of all of the deaths he had been responsible for as a Death Eater, those were the two that he regretted the most - aside from Lily's, of course. It had taken a total of five Death Eaters to bring them both down, and they had both fought like true Gryffindors through to the end. They were seventh years now, at the highly annoying age of seventeen. That was the age that most teenagers believed that they owned the world, and acted , who was five years their senior, would not be here. Neither would her husband, Arthur Weasley. By now, they were caring for their first child.
"Sirius!" a bright, high voice called over the din of the Great Hall, and the four of them turned towards the source of the sound. There was another girl Severus thought he recognized; but he couldn't quite recall her name. She was walking towards them at a fast pace, and he noticed that her robes were a bit too big for her. The nameless girl was grinning widely, presumably at Black, and Severus decided that she was a first year. She didn't look like she had the confidence that a second year would, and the glee was too fresh on her face to have been here before. Trailing behind her was the mousey Mary McDonald, and she looked to be painfully shy. That was right – Mary had not suited her house until her seventh year.
"Arabella," said Sirius with a warm tone, and for the first time all evening, he seemed to rise above his brooding. "Why didn't I see you on the train?" Arabella. And suddenly, the name clicked in his mind. Yes, she had been in his year; but she had died rather suddenly. At the time, it had been quite a scandal among the rest of the school – no one had spoken of anything but Arabella Prewett for several weeks. He also recalled that it had taken the death of their cousin to quiet Gideon and Fabian, but they had only restrained themselves for two months before they continued as they had before.
But try as he might, Severus could not recall what had caused her death. No doubt, this was due to the fact that he had marked it as insignificant at the time, and he hadn't bothered to remember. But it didn't matter now. If she was going to die, she was going to die. He didn't dare interfere with something as monumental as death; the consequences of changing that would be unimaginable.
"You didn't see me because you ran off before I could find you!" she said hotly, sounding indignant that he dare to try and pin her disappearance on her. "So I sat with Mary instead." She gestured back towards Miss McDonald, who nodded timidly before returning to stare at her shoes.
"Well, I only ran off because James dragged me." Sirius said innocently, shrugging his shoulders, playing at the victim.
"If I remember correctly," said James, his voice containing a bit of a jesting edge, "I only dragged you off because you begged me to, before your 'annoying little cousin' could find you."
"I don't believe you, Sirius!" cried Arabella in indignation, "I should have known better than to count on you." James chuckled without restraint, and Sirius looked as if he were struggling not to join him. They were cousins? That was right; the Black and Prewett families were related. A majority of the Prewetts had been marked as blood traitors, and seeing Arabella's house, Severus was almost certain that she and Sirius shared similar ideologies.
"You should have been in Slytherin," Arabella snarled, clearly upset by the way he had reacted to her statement. Sirius choked on his own breath, and James roared with laughter. Severus smirked: the fire in her voice was so tangible that it should have burned the very air they breathed. He glanced sideways at Lily, and he saw that even she was smiling. To his right, Arabella was only becoming angrier at the sight of her cousin's friend openly mocking her, and Mary looked extremely uncomfortable.
"Sev- Severus," James gasped, laughing so hard he looked as if he were struggling to breathe, "He nearly was!"
"Me?" asked Sirius, entirely ignoring James' remark, "In Slytherin? Hell will freeze over before I'd even think of it!" Arabella, seemingly cured by her cousin's injured remark, laughed at him freely. She smiled smugly, and replied smoothly, looking entirely unruffled by the anger she had experienced earlier.
"Well, Sirius, that's what you say.How do we know you aren't just a snake in hiding, waiting to drag all of us down with you?" Sirius looked absolutely enraged. Pride had always had so much control over Black, and Severus had to admit, it was good to see Sirius come entirely undone.
"How dare you even suggest it?" he yelled, not noticing that he was now attracting the interest of several of their peers. "That bloody hat put me in the right house, and you can shove your bloody opinions up your damn –"
"Students," called Dumbledore, his voice drowning out the end of Sirius' self-defense. Severus noted that he was now standing back at the podium, "I fear that like all things, our feast must come to an end. First years, please follow your house prefects to your common room, and there you will be shown your dormitories. Class schedules will be passed out tomorrow at breakfast. Sleep well, students!" By the time Dumbledore had finished, Black had fallen silent, his face crimson with anger. Arabella, however, was smiling sweetly at him.
Severus decided that he liked the girl immediately.
The chatter picked up again once people began standing from their seats, and Severus slid out of his seat as quickly as he could. He waited beside Lily patently, and as soon as she stood, she was speaking more quickly than he had ever heard her before.
"Sev! You never told me that it was so big! Or that we had to row across a lake! Or that there were floating candles! And you never said a word about the Sorting Hat." He laughed as she paused, waiting impatiently for an answer.
"I've never been here before, either," he reminded her teasingly, and he smiled wryly at her. It had been so many years since he had smiled genuinely: Lily had been the only person who had ever inspired true happiness in him. Even if she had never been his, he had always been hers. She paused for a moment before continuing, and he could only guess that she was trying to come up with more wonderful things about Hogwarts.
"I'm so glad that we're both in the same house, Sev. We would have been so lonely, if not." He was slightly shaken by her statement; she had no idea how lonely he had been in Slytherin. The only people that he could associate himself with were all future Death Eaters, and that had eventually lead to the break in their friendship and her death.
"I am too, Lily." He said softly, keeping his eyes on her as they moved along with their fellow Gryffindors. Severus could hardly believe that he was one of them now, or that he had an actual chance at having Lily Evans. He had spent his entire life praying for this, and after a lifetime of pain, the chance was finally here.
Just then, a fellow first year rammed into her, knocking her into Severus. He grabbed her shoulders reflexively as they slammed into his chest, and set her standing again as quickly as he could. He dared not allow his mind to linger on the thought of touching her. He couldn't risk driving her away, not now that things were set on a different course. Doing his best to not dwell on the sensation of her weight against him, he instead focused on the student that had run into her, and was unable to keep a dark scowl from his face.
"I'm so sorry," said the offender quietly, looking at his shoes. That was probably the reason that he had run into her in the first place.
"It's quite alright," said Lily warmly, ignoring the crowd of Gryffindors that were walking around the trio. "It was only an accident. What's your name?"
"Peter," the boy mumbled at the floor, "Peter Pettigrew."
I hope you enjoyed it!