*THE EVENTS IN THIS FIC ARE NOT PORTRAYED CHRONOLOGICALLY*
She was lost to him, lost in a pile of memories, and all he had left was a pounding headache when he tried to remember her goodbye. Severus/Lily.
Lost
By silver-nightstorm
Words: 1809
XX
He simply sat there, drinking himself into a stupor. She was getting married. The card lay on the desk before him atop the ripped envelope dated June 1st in her elegant cursive, the envelope he had torn in his excitement at her correspondence. The neat printed lettering was a marked contrast to her scrawl below the main message.
You are cordially invited to the wedding of
James Potter and Lily Evans
June 14th, 1978 12:00PM
St. Peter's Church
4211 Godric's Hollow
I though you deserved at least this. Don't come.
He couldn't help but remember the day where everything fell apart, his head beginning to pound as it always did when he recalled their horrible fight and his desperate attempt to apologize. He couldn't decide if he wanted to smash the bottle he held into tiny pieces or cry. He settled for both.
XX
His fisted hands trembled with suppressed anger as he stalked his way though the castle, leveling a dangerous glare at anyone who dared laugh at him. News travelled fast, everyone already knew what had happened down at the lake. Avery had found him earlier, when he had first run back into the building, red faced and thankfully with pants, but he had shoved the boy aside without listening to his plans for revenge. He had bigger problems. His anger at Potter ebbed away ever so slightly as he thought about her, she was so much more important.
He plopped himself down on the ground before the Fat Lady, who looked disapprovingly down at him before sniffing and turning the other direction.
XX
May 29th, 1978
Dear Lily,
I want to see you again. I miss you. I know you're dating James, everyone does, and I hate it but… if it means I can see you again and we can just be friends again, I don't care. I really won't care. I miss you Lily. It's been a long two years without you.
Please. I need you back in my life. You're the only good in my life. You make me good. I can't be good without you there to remind me what's right.
I am a broken man, Lily. I've never had anyone care about me, I never had anyone like me, I've never had anyone adore me, but with your friendship, Lily, I can be good. I swear it.
Your Friend (and nothing more),
Sev
XX
A voice jolted him out of his morose thoughts as he sat on the painful flagstone.
"What are you doing here?"
For a second, he almost thought it was her but when his head snapped up he met the dirty blonde hair and hard brown eyes of Mary McDonald.
"I'm waiting for Lily."
"She doesn't want to see you."
"Don't care," he replied, his face set stubbornly. The anger was mostly gone now; the only thing left within him was desperation. "I'll sleep here if I have to, I don't care. I just need to let her know that I'm sorry."
Her eyes seemed to soften for a second. "She doesn't like your friends… but frankly I don't think that's enough. I'll tell her you're here, but I won't make her come outside. You messed up, Snape."
He couldn't hide the despair in his eyes.
XX
He caught the glimpse of red hair out of the corner of his eye and he spun around to see her standing there, in the middle of Diagon Alley, the summer before their final year.
He ran towards her, calling her name, screaming apologies for that day. He stopped in the street when his head felt as though it would be ripped in two.
She looked almost guilty as she turned on her heel and ran.
XX
"I'm sorry."
"I'm not interested."
"I'm sorry!"
"Save your breath. I only came out because Mary told me you were threatening to sleep here."
"I was. I would have done."
He watched nervously as Lily sighed, wrapping her arms around her dressing gown clad form. Her eyes snapped up and down the corridor quickly, registering the emptiness, before her slim hand reached out and grabbed Severus's, pulling him down the hall and into a deserted classroom. She closed the door with a resounding slam and placed a locking charm on the door.
"Well?" she said. "What do you have to say for yourself?"
"You mean you're going to—"
"Yes, I'm going to listen, but just this once."
He wanted to fall to his knees and beg her forgiveness, but he knew that she wouldn't tolerate it. She would pity him. He didn't want her pity, he wanted her love. And if he couldn't have it, he would take her friendship as long as she never left him.
"I was humiliated," he began. "Hurt, and angry, and… humiliated. You don't know what it's like to be tormented by them day in and day out. The teachers think they're saints." She raised an eyebrow. "Well, not saints, but they think they're just pranksters. I went to Dumbledore once about their bullying, just once cause you told me to the first time when we just started Hogwarts. You know what he said? That it was harmless child's play! When Avery and Mulciber hurt Mary and the others, they got in so much trouble—"
"Sev, that's different," Lily said, her eyes growing sad. "Avery and Mulciber used Dark Magic—"
"So you're saying that just because Potter and Black use Light spells that it makes the harm that they inflict okay?"
She opened her mouth and sputtered for a few moments. "But… that… but Light Magic won't kill anyone!" She was trying to be indignant.
"Lily, you know magical theory. You know how much damage so-called Light Magic can do. Don't insult yourself. Does the type of magic make any difference if someone is getting hurt? Is that what you think?"
She seemed to crumble into herself for a moment and he started to feel bad, but he held his resolve because he knew that this was something she needed to hear. Slowly, she shook her had no.
"See? You're not!" he couldn't help the triumphant smile that grew on his face. "You're not saying that at all! Light Magic is usually used for good but it still can be very bad. The same can be said for Dark Magic, but most people don't know that because they just shy away from it. I don't, Lily. Don't you see? The only way to defend against the Dark Arts is to know the Dark Arts!"
Lily looked away, fidgeting with the ties on her robe the way he knew that she did when she was uncomfortable in having her views changed.
"But Sev," she began slowly, "not everyone is going to see it that way. They'll think you're evil and then what will they think of me—"
"You're going to leave me for your reputation?" She didn't look up at him for a moment, but when she did, her face blanched. He knew with that look that she most certainly would.
XX
Lacey Parkinson was sort of pretty but he never thought she would kiss him. But then she had pulled him in an embrace behind a suit of armor in the north wing and she was kissing him and her fingers wound though his hair and he knew Avery had put her up to it to jolt him out of his misery but it was sort of working and helping him forget her…
He vividly saw another pair on hands winding through his hair, felt another pair of much softer lips against his. His eyes were fixed on green.
He pushed Parkinson away as he held his head cradled between his fingers, trying to assuage the shooting pain at his temples.
XX
He looked down at her as she stepped closer to him and at that moment, he was very scared. She was going to leave him. She was going to leave because she cared more about her reputation than her friendship and…
Her next action startled all thought from his mind as she leaned forward and her lips – Lily's lips! – met his. His eyes widened as her hands wrapped around his neck and through a few strands of her hair and she was kissing him willingly so he just kissed her back and she pulled away after a few moments but it was so worth it…
XX
He curled up on his bed in the Slytherin Common Room, regretting the day with all his heart.
"I was. I would have done." A headache struck him as he thought. "I never meant to call you a Mudblood, it just—"
… Did he suddenly move down the hallway, mid-sentence?
… It hurt to dwell on it anymore. He must have been in front of the portrait the entire time. Anything else was impossible… Unless…
Pain struck him again and he lost all his thoughts.
XX
His head was still spinning from the surprise and happiness of the kiss when she pulled her wand out of her dressing gown and pointed it at him. Tears streamed down her face as she opened her mouth and spoke those words, her voice shaking so hard they were barely understandable.
"Obliviate."
…
She had her wand pointed at him and he couldn't remember why. He stared down the length of the swishy ten and a quarter inch willow wand, nearly crossing his eyes in an effort to see the slender tip that nearly rested on his nose.
Later, he would forget the wand completely because it hurt too much to think about it too closely.
"I never meant to call you a Mudblood," he began hesitantly, "it just—"
"Slipped out? It's too late. I've made excuses for you for years. None of my friends can understand why I even talk to you. You and your precious little Death Eater friends—you see, you don't even deny it! You can't wait to join You-Know-Who, can you?"
He opened his mouth, beginning to protest, closing it when the confused though that entered his mind that he already had made his point. There was nothing more to say.
"I can't pretend anymore. You've chosen your way, I've chosen mine."
"No—listen, I didn't mean—" She cut him off before he could tell her how despite his desperation to fit in, he would never join He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.
"—to call me Mudblood? But you call everyone of my birth Mudblood, Severus. Why should I be any different?"
Before he could utter a word to stop her, she ducked into the portrait hole and it slammed shut behind her with a resounding thwack.
He didn't know that she slid down the back of the painting, buried her head in her hands, and sobbed.
XX
The Quidditch League Competition – Round 2 – "Bring me home or leave me be, my love in the dark heart of the night, I have lost the path before me, the one behind will leave me" – Ghost Love Score by Nightwish
All Sorts of Love Competition – Canon (Severus unrequited Lily)
So this requires a bit of explanation, this fic is inspired by the movie Memento (see it!) and it's arranged so that the events in the middle occur at the end while the chronological "beginning" and "end" occur at the beginning. :D
This is my way of making Lily's actions a bit more understandable (if not more villainous) and also giving Severus a chance to explain himself.
Some of the dialogue between Severus and Lily was taken directly from The Deathly Hallows.
Please leave a review :)