Chapter Ten - Celebrity Status?
All eyes were on him. For the first time in his life, all eyes were on him. Making his way down the corridor by the wheelchair, Severus could literally feel the stares of dozens of students bore into him, and he began to feel a little self-conscious. Why were they all staring at him like that? Not that they were glaring, or staring at him condescendingly. In fact, they seemed to wear looks of awe, as if they were seeing someone they'd always known and belittled all of a sudden in a completely new light. Like an ugly caterpillar emerging from a cocoon as a magnificent butterfly, with no trace of its old, despised, former self. Except this wasn't a physical transformation for Severus - he looked exactly the same with his near shoulder length sheet of ink blank hair, and intense dark eyes set in a very serious looking face. No, this transformation was an atmospheric one, and he was the atmosphere's foci. Whereas before, no one had ever bothered to throw a glance in his direction, now those very eyes which had dismissed him were now fixated on his presence in a wheelchair, their pupils eagerly soaking up the sight of a recently declared Quidditch legend.
"Snape, you were wicked!" Severus heard someone yell, and he turned his head backwards to see the Slytherin Quidditch Captain, Mitchell Clearwater, grinning and giving him a big thumbs up. "That clockwise backward twist you made in the air right after you caught the Snitch - that was fucking amazing!"
A large, resounding cheer accompanied Mitchell's words, demonstrating that the surrounding crowd happily agreed with him. That clockwise backward twist - although it had landed Severus in the hospital ward with two broken legs - had been spectacular. It was a move that had never been seen before on the Hogwarts Quidditch Grounds, let alone executed with half a broom handle! Even the most ardent of Gryffindors had to admit that Severus's broom moves were nothing short of incredible.
"I see you've already attained celebrity status, eh?" Mitchell joked, looking around at the myriad of students who pretended to go about their daily business walking to lessons but in actual fact were busy ogling this new totally unforeseen and unexpected Quidditch star.
Murmurs and whispers could be heard at each stage of the long corridor, and Severus could hardly believe what he was experiencing. He, Severus Snape, the awkward, irrelevant, despised Slytherin know-it-all-loner, the arch nemesis of the ultra-popular cool boy Gryffindor James Potter, was no being treated as some sort of Quidditch Hero? It seemed so ludicrous to Severus that he found it almost risible. What on earth was going on?
And then, Severus heard a voice that seemed to be asking the same question.
"What the hell is going on?" James Potter yelled agitatedly, apparently not too thrilled at the positive reception of his most despised enemy. He had walked into the corridor looking for his three best mates, Sirius, Remus and Peter, only to find a huge swarm of students blocking the hallway for no apparent reason. And when he had discovered the reason, it being Snivellus Snape, he could barely believe his eyes, and quickly pushed his way past the front of the large group of students who surrounded Severus in his wheelchair.
Perceiving the looks of admiration on the faces of the students around him, James Potter glared at Severus and then proceeded to produce the most condescending laugh he could muster. "What the hell are you guys staring at him for?"
No one responded to Potter's question, which he naturally took as a cue to continue speaking, this time aiming his words directly at Severus. "I can't believe people are thinking that because you won this match, that means you're actually any good at Quidditch! I mean, you were up against Hufflepuff for Merlin's sake! Not exactly a notoriously difficult team to beat! The Seeker on their team was a pathetic little girl for crying out loud! And even if you did manage to catch the Snitch – which really shouldn't be classed as that big of an achievement – doesn't that show in itself that people think nothing of you? I mean, the entire school is literally shocked that you caught the damn Snitch – literally the only job a seeker has to do – and they're impressed by that!" He laughed again bitterly. "You're only regarded as a 'Quidditch Hero' now because you've been penned as the 'Quidditch Loser' since the beginning!"
There was a silence in the corridor for a few seconds, and Severus could spot the faces of Remus, Sirius and Peter in the back of the crowd, apparently unwilling to join their best friend in talking Severus down. In fact, no one seemed willing to join James Potter in his mocking tirade against Severus, and it was only just before Potter opened his mouth again to continue talking that someone shoved past the large congregation of students in the now extremely cramped corridor to face James Potter directly.
"Well, I guess now we can all see what a pathetic little jealous bastard you really are." Sophie Evergreen declared calmly, with a triumphant look on her face. Although she was a good deal shorter in height than James, for some reason her confident and assured appearance made her physical presence appear the much larger of the two. "Your poor precious little ego is so fragile that you can't even stand not having all of the attention for five damn minutes! And I hope your unabashed sexism won't go unnoticed by your group of adoring fans. Your "Quidditch Hero", ladies and gentlemen," she mocked, motioning towards James in one large sweep of her outstretched palm.
"And it's not even about the Snitch, you idiot." Mitchell Clearwater added, eager to join in any opportunity to bash his most hated Quidditch enemy. "He's got wicked broom skills, and now the whole school knows that the match against Gryffindor wasn't just a one-off. Severus has real talent, Potter, so you might want to get over your hissy fit and prepare your team, eh? Wouldn't want to be shown for what a talentless Quidditch player you really are, hm?"
James Potter replied with a hysteric laugh that was intended to ridicule Clearwater, but in fact only betrayed his discomfort and unease. The sound that came out of his mouth resembled more a mangled groan than a condescending laugh.
"Me, talentless? Look at him." James Potter pointed to Severus, who was sitting in a wheelchair with his legs looking like a pair of elephant trunks, three times their normal size, and wrapped up in sheets of off-white bandages. "He's in a wheelchair right now because he's busted his legs. And he's busted his legs because he can't even operate a bloody broom properly! And you're trying to tell me that I'm the talentless one? You've lost your fucking mind Clearwater!"
But no one seem convinced by James Potter's rambling, least of all Clearwater who only smirked in response at his success in pissing Potter off, meanwhile Sophie could not stop herself from pointing out the obvious. She stepped forward so that she was face-to-face with James, mere inches separating his seething eyes from her own, though she was several inches shorter than he was.
"If you had been using the shitty, splintered two-hundred-year-old broom that he was forced to use, it's not just your legs that would be busted. You'd be fucking dead, Potter." She told him in a quiet but powerful tone.
Everyone in the corridor seemed to come to a standstill, pondering the fact that a Slytherin girl, yes a Slytherin girl, was lecturing a Gryffindor on the unfairness of playing Quidditch when faced with extremely wealthy opponents who could afford the most expensive, state-of-the-art, latest model brooms. Even though Slytherin was the House renowned for its members being supremely wealthy, here she was accusing a Gryffindor of being a spoilt, privileged, daddy-buys-me-everything loser. But, strange as though this was, no one could fault Sophie – she had a point. James Potter was indeed a privileged, arrogant teenage boy, whose broom alone probably cost an exorbitant fifteen thousand Galleons. The Hogwarts students, as they watched the scene before them, could not help but to wonder: would James Potter really have become a Quidditch Hero if not for his fifteen-thousand galleon broom? Would he even have been a remarkable Quidditch player at all without it?
These kinds of questions, however, were not ones which James Potter desired his Hogwarts peers to be asking, whether out loud or in their minds. Another tense silence followed as Potter looked around the crowd, despising them for not giving him the support he expected. Surely they were not agreeing with that stupid, presumptuous blonde Slytherin girl? What was the matter with all of them, sympathising with a bunch of Slytherin idiots, who couldn't even beat a group of Hufflepuffs at a game of Quidditch without almost ripping off the legs of their Seeker.
"What's wrong with all of you?" He barked. "It's bloody Severus Snape! Pathetic little Snivellus Snape from Slytherin, the house of absolute gits!"
Still trying to get the attention off himself, James then approached Severus in his wheelchair and leaned forwards to look him dead in the eye. "When the match between Slytherin and Gryffindor arrives in a couple of months' time, I'll show you who's really the Quidditch Hero."
He then stormed off, meekly followed by his groups of friends and a couple adoring second-year fangirls. The rest of the crowd rapidly dispersed, and the morning bell rang signalling the start of the next lesson. The corridor soon became deserted, save for Severus in his wheelchair and Sophie Evergreen and Mitchell Clearwater standing next to him.
"Did you see how riled up he got?" Clearwater laughed, with satisfaction coming off his voice in waves. "It's obvious he's feeling threatened. That's a good sign. It means he's realised we're not bluffing, and the Quidditch Cup's spot in the Gryffindor common room's glass cabinet isn't a given. He's scared shitless, the bastard!"
Mitchell then gave Severus a good-natured thump on the shoulder before turning around to head for his Arithmancy lesson, a class he preferred arriving late for. As he walked away, Sophie gave a reassuring smile to Severus, echoing the same sentiment that Clearwater had just expressed - Potter was scared out of his mind, and that was a good thing.
"I'm sorry, Sev, but I've got to run to my Herbology lesson now. But just ignore Potter – he's just done more damage to his reputation in the last five minutes, and he knows it. He'll cool off. I'll come and visit you in the ward later!"
Severus quietly nodded at Sophie, and she turned around and sped down the corridor, hoping she wouldn't arrive too late to her lesson and open the door to an angry-looking Miss Sprout. Sophie, as opposed to Mitchell, generally tried to avoid arriving late to lessons.
Severus, on the other hand, had been excused from lessons owing to his injury, leaving him to enjoy the rest of the day by himself. He slowly started making his way back to the Hospital Ward, trying to come to terms with what had happened in the last few hours. Understanding how he'd gone from loser to a celebrity, wrapping his head around the fact that he was now considered 'cool'. Severus almost shuddered at hearing the word 'cool' in his head. It was not going to be an easy task.