Character: Severus Snape
Prompt: Advanced Potion Making
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG-13
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James Potter had pushed him too many times.
James lived a life that Severus would have given anything for – handsome, admired, happy, and even Lily fancied him. If Severus had been in James' place, he liked to think that he would have used his clout and popularity for good. He would have used it to elevate the status of people like himself – the downtrodden, the underdogs, people who didn't always get what they wanted.
At least, Severus liked to pretend that that was what he would do. He liked to pretend that he resented James because James was squandering the gifts that life had given him on stupid things like courting Lily Evans – and Severus did try to tell himself that the courting of Lily Evans was a stupid thing. It was stupid when James Potter did it, at any rate.
If Severus had, in reality, possessed the kind of good luck that seemed to hang on James Potter constantly, he would most likely have squandered it in exactly the same way, the small part of his mind that was entirely honest reminded him. But he ignored that part of his mind.
Oh, and there were no words for the hatred that Severus felt burning in his heart when he saw Lily and James together. He watched them, watched Lily lean over to whisper something in James' ear, watched them laugh and smile and intertwine their fingers in that sickening little motion that childish lovers like them made.
Severus watched with his copy of Advanced Potions Making lifted up to cover his face. He hid behind it so that Lily would not see the sneer of disgust and loathing on his lips if she should happen to glance over at him (not that Severus expected her to glance at him; he had long since given up the idea that she would ever look at him again). He watched James touch her hair tenderly, and he wished with everything that he had in him that James would die. There. Now.
If Severus had known a curse, something that would kill a person in agonizing slowness – if there had been a single spell in all the books of the Dark Arts that he read that would even have come close to the torture that he felt James deserved – he would have used it in an instant. He would gladly torture him, all thoughts of morality be damned. He would bleed him out until he was pale and gasping for one last breath.
Severus stared at James over the top of his book for a moment more, then stood abruptly.
Why shouldn't there be a spell that would satisfy his hatred towards James? If none existed, why should he not set about creating one? He had made spells before, working them over and perfecting every detail of them, all in the pages of his potions book. He could do another.
He could take James' fate upon himself. He – alone – could make him pay.