Can I just say that I am extremely flattered to have gotten so many reviews from you readers! I am having so much fun writing this story and knowing people are reading it and enjoying it makes me feel so happy words cannot describe!

*cyber hugs*

Chapter 10:

Ice Cream

Compared to the unpredictable excitement of Hogwarts, the Muggle village where Snape and Lily lived was a little less than painstakingly dull. They were underage and could not use magic over the summer holidays, so with a heavy heart they locked their schoolbooks, cauldrons, parchment and quills away. Though neither Snape's mother nor Lily's parents minded the schoolbooks, cauldrons, parchment and quills, having them sitting out where Snape and Lily could see them made them both depressed.

Of course, this didn't stop them from talking about Hogwarts every second they were together. Snape often spent time at the Evans house where they would discuss everything from the teachers they had, the interesting spells they had learned, and the upcoming year ahead of them. Petunia got so fed up with hearing all of it that she left the room whenever she overheard words like 'Muggle' and 'broomstick.'

Alone, Snape spent a great deal of his summer outside, as far away from his house on Spinner's End as possible. During the days he would spend the long, hot hours under the shade of the park trees, scribbling on a piece of paper or fingering the wand he could not use. During the nights to escape his family, he would travel the darkened streets, prowling among the grid of houses in his neighborhood until it was well past time for bed. But the days he would most look forward to were the ones he spent with Lily, walking long distances to the outskirts of town, stopping every now and then to purchase a coke from a convenience store to quench their thirst.

One blazing afternoon, two weeks before the Hogwarts Express would be carting them off to school, Snape and Lily were taking an alternate route to a bowling alley through a suburban street. They had decided to splurge that day and bought themselves ice cream cones, which dribbled over their hands as they melted in the sun. Lily was wearing a thin dress with printed sunflowers to battle the heat; Snape was wearing an old soccer jersey he found in his attic with jeans that were much too small for him.

"Sev," said Lily, flipping her long ponytail over her shoulder. "Will our second year be any different from the first?"

"Not really," he said, licking his cone. "But we won't have to take boats to the castle this year. We'll be going in carriages."

"What about classes? Will they be difficult?"

"Not to us."

"Ha ha!" She leapt lightly onto a low brick wall that surrounded the front yard of a house. "I wonder if my parents will let me get an owl this year. It would be nice to have one to send letters. I hate having to use the school's owls. They always peck at me."

"Speaking of owls," said Snape, squinting into the sun. Lily followed his gaze and saw what he was looking at: two tiny figures were coming towards them from the sky. They grew steadily until they could clearly define two large barn owls swooping overhead. The owls dropped two thick envelopes into their hands. Snape and Lily tossed their empty cones to the ground, the owls pecking at them hopefully, before tearing open the envelopes.

"It's our Hogwarts letters!" said Lily. "Wow, look at all our new books..."

The book list was slightly longer than it had been their first year. It included such staples as The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 2, and Snape knew he would be inheriting his mother's old copy. But there were newer editions of books that were required that he was sure his mother hadn't owned.

"Hey, what's this?" Lily asked, running her finger down the parchment. "'One set of dress robes.' What are dress robes?"

"Robes worn to parties and such. Look, there's something written at the bottom," said Snape, scrunching his eyes to read the small paragraph added in under the book list:

Hogwarts is pleased to announce that there will be a formal ball this year sometime in the month of January. Those wishing to attend will need a set of dress robes for the occasion.

"A formal ball?" said Lily. "Sounds fancy!"

"They expect this to excite us?" said Snape disdainfully. "Just an excuse for hormonal teenagers to snog in public. I wouldn't be caught dead there."

Lily bit back a smile, silently wondering what color dress she would be buying.

"School is in two weeks," she said, changing the subject. "Do you want to come to Diagon Alley with me in the last week of this month?"

Snape paused and stuffed his letter in his pocket, which was slightly difficult given that his pants were two sizes too small. "I'll... have to see if it's okay with my parents," he mumbled.

"Oh, right..."

They stopped talking and watched the two barn owls, now finished with the ice cream cones, take off into the sun once more. Lily peeked at Snape from the corner of her eye. "You know you always have a room at my house," she said. "If you ever need a place to stay..."

"I know," said Snape quietly.

-

The last two weeks of August seemed to pass considerably slower for Snape and Lily, as they grew more and more anxious at the thought of returning to Hogwarts. Lily informed Snape that she and her family would be shopping at Diagon Alley on the 27th, and that her parents would be delighted if he could join them (Petunia was mum on the subject). Unfortunately, he would have to let his father know when he came home from work, and he would need to ask him for money to buy his school things.

And so the night before the trip, Snape stepped carefully down the stairs to the bottom floor of his row house, where he could clearly hear the sound of a television from below. At the bottom of the stairs was a room to the right, which seemed to have the lights off and television turned on, bathing the room in a bluish glow. In the middle of the room was placed a single armchair, ugly and plaid and patched. From the light of the television, Snape could see the silhouette of a man sitting in the chair, his hooked nose protruding from a lined face; a beer bottle was clutched in his hand.

Tobias Snape had been a hard-working man for most of his life. Raised as only one of many boys, his father was a firm believer in discipline and little play, and taught his sons the life lessons that came with being a poor working man. Tobias had therefore grown to be an almost exact version of his father, though the modern world was becoming increasingly less accommodated to his proletarian type. Perhaps it was the fact that his hard labor had earned him very little in life, or maybe it was a deep-seeded resentment of being deprived of something that could have made his life vastly easier, that made Tobias Snape detest the magic of his wife and son. Snape as a child had hated his father's temper and close-mindedness. Now, as an adult in mind and memory alone, Snape couldn't help but hate him even more.

He cleared his throat and walked into the room.

"May I talk to you, Father?" he said, addressing the side of the armchair. Tobias did not acknowledge his son, but grimaced at the television screen and drank from his bottle. Snape rolled his eyes and continued. "Lily Evans invited me to Diagon Alley for school shopping tomorrow," he said curtly. Snape had already proven to be more of a man than his father could ever be, and this gave him a confidence he had never known as a child. It was only the fact that Snape was still only twelve and wandless that he bothered to show any respect for his father at all.

"S'pose you want money," his father said in an icy tone. "What am I going to have to pay for this time? Toad spit?"

"Just some books," said Snape. "I need them for school or else I can't attend."

Tobias seemed to weigh this in his mind. "Why don't you get a job then, eh? Earn your own damn money."

"There are no jobs for twelve-year-olds," said Snape.

Tobias turned his hard face to look at him, and the expression Snape could make out in the blue glow was similar to one a farmer would give the runt of the litter. "I had my first job when I was five," he growled. "Woke up at the lick of dawn and nearly broke my back every day to haul crates of King Prawn at the docks. And I could do it hunky-dory without waving a fucking piece of wood around. More 'n I can say for your lot."

Snape felt his face redden with anger, not that it was noticeable in the dim light, and had to dig his fingernails into his clenched fists to keep from saying anything he would later regret. "I'll get the money from Mum," he said. "May I go then?"

"You mean the money I give her?" Tobias scrutinized his son for another moment before turning back to the television and taking a swig of drink. "If she wants to split her allowance with you then it's no skin off my nose."

Snape gave a quick nod before leaving the room and retreating back upstairs, confident that his mother would give him the money. She knew what it was like at Hogwarts, at least. But it would only be enough to buy secondhand books at best, Snape thought as he entered his bedroom, for Tobias did not give his wife much allowance to begin with.

-

"What do you think of this one?" Lily inquired, pointing to the inside of a metal cage.

"Looks a little big, don't you think?" said Snape. "Remember you have to lug the thing around when you get on the train."

Lily bit her lip. "Hmm... that's right..." They were standing in front of a wall of cages inside Eeylops Owl Emporium in Diagon Alley. The place was cramped, smelly, and filled with the sound of hooting owls in all types of cages. Lily's attention was strictly kept to the owls, which would be useful for letters, though her eyes occasionally wandered to the ceiling, where some songbirds chirped Mozart and Chopin.

They were alone in the noisy shop apart from an extremely old woman with enormous round spectacles, who kept the shopkeeper busy as she seemed to be part blind and needed help in choosing a bird.

"This skinny one, then," she croaked, and the shopkeeper looked to where she was pointing. "He looks perfect."

"Ma'am, that's a coat rack..."

It took them a quarter of an hour to finally get to the shopkeeper long enough to make their purchase, and Lily exited the shop with Snape, holding the cage of a severe-looking brown spotted Great Horned Owl. "What's next on the list?" asked Lily. "We've got our Potions ingredients refilled, parchment and quills-"

"We need our books next," said Snape. He sighed as he looked up the street. Lily would get her books at Flourish and Blotts, while Snape would have to journey farther down the street to the secondhand book shop. "There's less of a crowd where I'm going," he said, and indeed Flourish and Blotts looked as if it were jam-packed with people. "I'll carry your owl and meet you here when we're finished."

"Thanks, Sev. See you in a bit," she said as she handed him the bird cage and disappeared into the crowd. Snape lugged the owl up a block and entered a very shabby-looking building. It was dimly lit and very dusty with the distinct smell of cabbage coming from somewhere in the back. The shelves were filled with chipped wands and cauldrons with the remains of brewed potions crusted on the inside. There was even a half-painted portrait hanging in the corner of the shop; its inhabitant, half of a very dignified-looking witch, glared at Snape as he entered. He strode straight to very back where there were several bookcases containing used school books, which had been bought from previous Hogwarts students in need of money. He perused the sections, grabbing what he needed here and there, before going to the front desk and ringing the service bell.

"Coming!" said a voice. From around the corner came a middle-aged wizard in dark blue robes and a pointed silver hat. He must have been in his early forties, as indicated by his peppered brown hair, but his skin was unusually tan and he was tall and fit. "Will this be all for you, sir?"

"Yes," said Snape. "Um... didn't an older man used to run this shop?"

"That would be my father," said the wizard. "I'm back from traveling the Americas and I needed a place to stay for a short while. Are you a Hogwarts student?"

Snape nodded, handing him a handful of Sickles.

"My name is Arnold Hastings," said the man. "Went to Hogwarts years ago as a lad. Wonderful place... still miss it sometimes." His eyes filled with misty reflections. "And you are?"

"Severus Snape," said Snape. "Thanks," he added, as Hastings handed him his change. "What were you doing in the Americas, if you don't mind my asking?"

"Oh, traveling mostly. Was there on assignment to deal with some vampires up in Washington. You won't believe the vampire problem there." Hastings was putting Snape's books one by one in a shopping bag. "Second year, are you? That's a turning point, you know. Next year you'll get to choose your own classes. Tell me, Severus, what's your favorite subject?"

The man was talking quite a lot, but in a polite and friendly way. Snape thought for a moment. "Defense Against the Dark Arts," he said, though would have loved to drop the 'Defense Against' part.

Hastings paused and smiled at Snape fondly. "Me too," he said and suddenly disappeared behind the counter. He arose a moment later, holding a small black book. "Consider this a gift," he said, and popped it into the bag. Snape looked surprised by this sudden act of kindness.

"No, I couldn't-"

"Don't worry about it," said Hastings, motioning around the shop. "One man's trash is another man's treasure- this shop is proof of that. Think of it as a hand-me-down from a former Hogwarts student to a current one."

"Th-thank you," said Snape uncertainly. Was the fact that he was buying secondhand books from a junk shop a sign of his financial status? Was this man pitying him?

As if reading the look on Snape's face, Hastings quickly said, "I just thought you could use it, you know. I myself wasn't as- er- well-off as most people. A lot of the junk here is from my parent's house. I wasn't implying anything."

"Mm," said Snape, still wary. The Great Horned Owl hooted from inside the cage.

"That's a handsome owl you have there," said the man. "What's his name?"

"He doesn't have a name yet. But he isn't mine, he's a friend's."

"Tell your friend to give him a Greek name," said Hastings as he handed Snape the large bag containing his books. "It's lucky. Well, I'll see you soon, Severus. Got to get back to my cabbage." And before Snape could ask where he would be seeing him, the man had gone.

Snape had to wait a good ten minutes until Lily finally emerged from Flourish and Blotts, looking exhausted. "It's like a madhouse in there," she gasped. "We must have picked the day every student would be here to do their school shopping. Have you got all your books?"

"And more," said Snape, pulling from his bag the small black book. He read the cover: From Transylvania to Timbuktu- The History of Sinister Arts Around the World.

"Oh no," said Lily, looking horrified at the book. "That wasn't on our list, was it?" She turned and cast a fearful glance back at Flourish and Blotts, apparently terrified at the thought of having to go back into the chaos.

"No, the shopkeeper just gave it to me," assured Snape, flipping through the pages before looking down at the bags Lily carried. "How many books did you buy, anyway? You look like you have two of everything."

"Oh, well, you know," she laughed nervously. "I picked up a few extra things myself." And she waited until Snape's back was turned to stuff a silken, emerald dress farther down into her shopping bag.

Sorry for the wait!