Chapter 1: An Unfathomable Mistake
It was the summer of 1971, July 15th to be specific; and two eleven year old children—a boy and a girl—were sat on the banks of the Cokeworth river beneath a willow tree. Bullied by their peers, ostracized from society as a result of their natural gifts, these two eleven year olds had found solace in one another. One might even have called them, the very best of friends, not that either one of them had many. The two children were not an ordinary sort, they had unique gifts and abilities that set them apart from other children their age—they were magical, and that alone alienated them from their peers, most of society for that matter. Neither was that popular, but they'd found a friend in each other; and their hangout beneath the willow was their little sanctuary from the world where they could just be themselves and while away the days in each other's company.
The boy—Severus Snape, came from the rough side of town, from a place called Spinner's End which ran rampant with homelessness, poverty, and crime. He'd been bullied and harassed by his peers, mocked by the neighbors for being the son of a drunk, and his surname, whenever uttered, always carried a certain maliciousness—borne of the tongue which spoke it. Lily Evans came from the other side of the river—just a hop, skip and a jump away from the rundown streets that Severus called home. She lived in a nicer part of town; in a quaint, but well-decorated suburban two-story house with her mum, dad and older sister. While their living conditions varied greatly, both possessed incredible gifts that had alienated them from their peers and brought them closer together as friends.
As they laid down beneath their favorite willow tree on that hot summer's day, Lily once again was desperately trying to convince Severus to bring her to his home so the two of them could look through his mother's—Eileen Snape's old things. Eileen and Tobias Snape were out for the day, the former at the grocery store running a few errands, and the latter at the mill where he worked as a foreman. Now was as good a time as ever for the two youngsters to go back to Severus' old home now that his neglectful mother and abusive father were both out. If they sought it, their absence meant Severus and Lily would have free reign over the house for the time being at least.
"Come on Sev, you said you'd show me you mum's things today!" Lily Evans said insistently. She tugged on his hand, eagerly trying to lead the poorly-dressed Severus Snape back to his home.
"For the thousandth time, no Lily," Severus said pointedly, his brows creased in a little frown.
"Please? You promised me you would and now's the best time! Your parents are out so…we'd have the house to ourselves, right?"
Severus heaved a sigh. "Why do you want to see my house so much?" He asked resignedly.
"Because I'm curious Sev, you've seen my house, and…I want to learn more, about magic…I mean. And you've told me all about your mum's things, but you've never let me see them," Lily explained. "Besides…you said they'll be out until the evening, so it's not like they'll interrupt us. Just this once Sev, please?"
A withering look scrunched up Severus' face, but as she saw it, Lily knew she'd won. "Fine. But we won't stay long, and we can't touch any of my da's things Lily," Severus warned, his tone laced with surprising amounts of seriousness for a boy his age. "And I mean it. We'll go straight to the attic, look around a bit. And then we're leaving."
A smile grew quickly on Lily's face. "Great. Can we go now then?"
Severus sighed quietly, his eyes glancing about beyond the plentiful reeds draped around them. "I suppose so. No better time than now," he muttered, hauling himself to his feet.
Lily was not oblivious to the slight wince Severus gave as he stood to his feet, neither was she blind to his slight limp as they walked in silence towards his home. She walked by his side, passively observing the boy through green irises, as his dark eyes observed the seedy neighborhood they passed through in turn. Left, right, up the street, across it, his eyes darted all over the place, almost as if he were expecting something sinister to jump out at them from one of the many long shadows along the street. Before long, they'd made it through Spinner's End to Severus' rickety home. 17 Spinner's End had certainly seen better days, if the shingles that were falling off the roof, the rusted iron gate, and the chipped paint was anything to go by. Severus took her hand—his own palm slightly clammy and sweaty, and lead Lily into his home.
The door opened with a loud creak—borne of rusted hinges, and the two were immediately assaulted with the strong scent of mothballs, cheap liquor, and mildew. Lily gaped in shock at the state of Severus' foyer and sitting room, her jaw hanging loose as if the hinge had broken in a most un-ladylike manner. Severus wasted no time in grabbing her by the wrist and bringing the slack-jawed Lily upstairs to spare him the embarrassment of her comments on the sorry state of his home. Wordlessly, they moved through the upper hall, and found a second set of stairs that lead to the third floor, the attic, a room that played host to some of Eileen Snape's old things as well as a heap of junk. The floorboards were dusty, and that pervasive scent of mothballs seemed to intensify as they clambered up the uneven stairs that lead to the attic; on the bright side, at least that awful smell of stale liquor seemed to be leaving them.
"Sev. You never told me your home was like this," Lily whispered, clutching at his hand harshly, almost moulding herself into his side.
"Yeah? Well now you know why," the boy remarked bitterly. Lily almost winced at the scorn in his tone, it wouldn't have been much of a stretch for him to have burned a whole through the rickety floorboards beneath them—such was the strength of his glare.
Instinctively, she gripped his hand just that little bit tighter, and that alone seemed to calm him—if only just. "Come. My mum's things are just over here," he muttered.
Severus shifted aside a few dusty cardboard boxes, enough for him and Lily to squeeze by and reach the back of the attic. In the corner, sat an old, black trunk with the initials E.S.P written in faded, gold lettering printed on the side. Severus wiped a hand over the surface, clearing it of cobwebs and dust that had accumulated over the years. Gingerly, he reached for the opening mechanism and unlatched it. Eileen had never bothered to fix the lock after it'd broken, and so Severus had no trouble opening the old trunk despite lacking a key. Lily appeared at his side and peered over his shoulder into the trunk.
"Whoah…this is pretty neat Sev," Lily whispered, in awe of the collection of old things Severus' mother had.
Anything from old textbooks, to a few swiped family heirlooms, even an old…come to think of it, Lily had on idea what this little, golden object was. It looked like a necklace or a pendant of some sort, except it beneath the chain a hung a little, golden hourglass encased within a few spheres of gold. Unlike everything else, whether it be the heirlooms, or the books—that Eileen Snape's trunk contained; this little trinket seemed to be unaffected by the passage of time. Whatever this little trinket was, it looked just as it was the day it was made.
"Say…what d'you reckon this is Sev?" Lily wondered out loud, as she lifted the little, golden object into her palm.
"Dunno," Severus shrugged, eyeing the little thing curiously. "But I'd be careful with it if I were you, the Princes made all sorts of whacky stuff back in the day. So yeah…be careful with that, will you?"
Lily barely seemed to have heard him, her green eyes solely focused on the little golden spheres surrounding the hourglass. Without thinking about what she was doing, nor envisioning the possible consequences, her fingers rose to the outermost sphere, and aided by her touch—it began to spin. Sev's hand was grasped in her free hand—the one that wasn't holding the little trinket, but as the sphere between her fingers began to spin, a sudden feeling of nausea and disorientation passed over the both of them. With little time to act, or prepare themselves for the monumental rift in space-time that was to come, the world began to spin before two sets of eyes, and as quick as they felt it—that gut-wrenching force rising up from their bellies—they felt no more, saw no more, and collapsed to the ground like two sacks of potatoes.
A/N: This was based off of an interesting reddit prompt I read for Severus and Lily to travel 20 years into the future from 1971. So yeah, the idea for this isn't entirely my own, but it sounded pretty neat and I can't say I've read anything like this so I decided to give it a go.
In short, by traveling 20 years into the future from 1971 to 1991, this act will create a separate timeline. Lily and Severus are traveling to a 1991 that is exactly how it was in canon. IE, dead Potters, orphaned Harry living with the Dursleys, and everything else from the canonical Harry Potter-universe intact. Nothing is changing to the time Lily and Severus travel to.
However, by traveling forward through time, they'll create an alternate timeline entirely separate from the fic I'm writing in which Neville will be the BWL(owing to Lily's absence), and Regulus'll be Dumbledore's right hand man(due to Severus' absence). So there'll be two timelines essentially, but Lily and Severus will be going to a version of 1991 that entirely ignores the consequences of their disappearance in 1971.