There was a reason why he hated Harry Potter.
He was a reminder of what he had lost and what he would never gain.
Every time he saw him, he remembered her gaze. Her emerald eyes that taunted him in the body of the brat.
Every time he heard him speak, he remembered her voice. How she would hum as they walked down the hills of their town. Her smile as she gossiped about her classmates as she stirred their potion. He would sometimes act as though her words annoyed him, but he couldn't help his thin mouth curl into upwards into a rare smile as she droned on and on about her day.
Every time he looked at him with his mother's eyes, he would think of life his with Lily.
Harry James Potter served as a reminder. It was like the favorite song of a passed loved one popping up on the radio. It was a pain that he deserved. A pain that would sometimes go away and he wouldn't notice, then come back and say "Oh don't you forget about me you ugly piece of greasy shit."
Severus had grown unworthy of love. Or really anything that promoted happiness. He would even go out of his way to buy the most disgusting coffee just to feel like he was being punished. He needed to be punished. Sometimes dropping a rock in his shoe or taking an ice-cold bath could do the trick for the time being.
...
"You have your mother's eyes," he whispered. Blood escaped his body like a bucket with a hole. No matter how much the boy pressed or cried, Severus kept smiling.
He was finally going to die.
About jolly good time.
The night when his soul flew up to the misty sky, Dumbledore met him above the castle. They sat in the clouds, looking down at the army from above. A few minutes later, Dumbledore waved goodbye and said a simple, "I have to go."
Severus sat alone as the other drifted towards the forest. "Want to come? Lily's down there too," the old man said hoarsely over a few meters of air.
He shook his head.
After the battle had finished, the castle mourned the fallen. The Dark Lord had fallen, his body still laying on the ground, untouched. He was still a man, after all, his eyes open and mouth hanging open like the fool he was.
Two arms gently fell on his shoulder. His neck twisted to the side to see who it was.
"Thank you," she whispered. "But fuck you still. Way too harsh on my baby," she laughed warmly, wiping her tears with her sleeve. The redhead slipped her freckled arms under his and pulled him into a tight high from behind.
"I'm so sorry," he said in a melancholic tone. He turned around and grabbed her by the waist and began to weep into her chest. It sounded like the cries of a dying animal. He shook and shivered as a mother's wailing echoed from the castle, joining his own in a song of sorrow.
"You've been too strong for too long, Sev. It was cruel. I forgive you, you know."
That was when he finally felt at peace. His required punishment had been fulfilled.
Do not pity the dead, Harry.
Pity the living, and, above all those who live without love.
Snape didn't need his pity anymore.