Severus only waited until we got to our rooms before he gave me my gift. Gifts. There were two of them. He Accio'd it from his room and they floated over, unwrapped. Not even a bow. Which was probably for the better for they were the worst gifts I had ever received, promptly taking first place on that particular list. At least I hadn't wasted any excitement on it by unwrapping them.
I'm not a fan of emotions. Oh, I can do the crying thing to release a plethora of stuff from sadness to irritation, and I can shout as good as anyone, but using words to convey my feelings was a definite no. So when Snape sat down with me on the sofa and offered me a choice between the antidote and adoption papers, telling me he had come to care for me and saw me as his son—he even used the L-word—my first thought was to run. Worst birthday gift ever. I scrambled to get off the chair but he popped me right back and on the third escape attempt did a sticking charm on my butt. My second thought was to make a joke.
"What if I take both? Will you be able to handle a hundred and thirteen year old son?"
"What have I been doing this last year?"
I hopped in my spot. "I'm not really a hundred—"
He sighed.
I scowled.
I contemplated the transparent vial that he had placed on the coffee table in front of us and the silvery liquid it contained. It worked, he had said. Tested on three rats. "So I can be old again and take over Albus's life? Everyone will be fine with it? Even though I can't do magic and don't know anything about the ministry and what about the school?"
"Minerva and Aberforth have been thinking about it. The plan was for Albus to step down this year and retire, whether you chose to be older again or not. He has a secluded beachfront cottage where I am sure you will be comfortable if you wanted to—"
"I don't." Alone on a beach with creaking knees and time ticking away—"I don't!"
"You don't want to go live in the cottage or you don't want to be an adult," he asked patiently.
"Both." For a year I've been running around Hogwarts and Magical Britain, doing everything possible not to think about the fact that I should actually be an adult. True, a very old one here but even back home I was definitely not a kid anymore either. I knew he was still working on an antidote but never thought he would be able to pull it off. I scowled at the Bat. What a stupid birthday present. He could have given it on any other day.
"We will support you in whatever you decide to do. This is why I am giving you a choice, Albus."
Stupid. Some days it took me an hour to decide between the last liquorice and bubblegum. I changed my scowl into a glare just to mix things up. "What if I don't want to be adopted by you?"
"Do you have any other ideas?" he asked, his face neutral.
"No." Gah! Spy Bat! Couldn't he just be like normal people for once and let me see what he thought about that?!
They had apparently been searching for my parents, through muggle and magical means, up until the moment I admitted to being from another world. Which was the day before yesterday. Quite a long time to persist with something so fruitless, wasn't it? That meant they didn't want me here, did they? This adoption was just an option to be kind or something… Well, he did use the L-word…
"You are not stuck with me as your only option," he said in a careful tone. "If you do not want to live with me then you just have to say, Albus. Molly adores you. Charlotte might like to have a little brother—"
"No!" The spoiled fake cousin that crowed over the fact that she was a year older than me every chance she got would just love to have me under her thumb. "I'd rather live in the forest with the Acromantulas!"
"There's no Acromantulas in the forest."
Oops.
He narrowed his eyes. "Is there?"
"I didn't put them there!"
"I didn't say you—This is something you know from your books?"
I nodded.
"I will have Hagrid look into it," he said.
Fat lot of good that will help. Just what did he think Hagrid was up to in that forest. "Fine, can I go now?"
"We haven't finished discussing the adoption."
"I don't want to be adopted. So, there. Done. Can I go now?" I was willing to crawl out of my pants if it would get me unstuck and away from this conversation.
He sat unmoving, his face an indecipherable sallow mask.
Oh.
I might have hurt his feelings.
"I meant by anyone. Next time you want to give me a birthday gift, make it a book! Can you unstick me? Can I go?"
"If that is what you want. Go, Albus." He did a silent finite. "Your party is in an hour, don't leave the rooms."
Released, I ran for my bedroom and the safe haven of my bed where I found solace under the covers. What I wanted did not matter! I was an adult, you can't adopt an adult just because they look fou—five! He'll just have to get over it!
"I don't want to go," I told him when he fetched me for my long-awaited party, plucking the covers off me.
"Nonsense. You've been looking forward to this day for months now. Will you walk or shall I carry you?"
"You can go without me."
"We won't possibly be able to eat all that cake without you," he said.
What? I scowled at him. Was I supposed to laugh? I wasn't in the mood for his jokes, he hadn't even blinked when I said I didn't want to be adopted, hadn't even tried to convince me—
"Carry it is," he declared and did so.
My party was held at The Burrow. Over the last year we had both been embraced by the Weasleys.
Ginny wrote me a ton of letters after our aborted adventure. In the beginning it was more questions about Harry than anything else, until he actually came to live with them. Then she quickly realised that he was not the hero she had been learning about since she was knee high, but an annoying eleven year old, not much different than Ron.
Molly and Arthur took us under their wing after I exposed Pettigrew. I got a large tin of fudge for Christmas and we received a jumper each in Slytherin green. It was soft and not lumpy at all. They also invited us over the summer for Harry's birthday and Snape dropped me off there whenever Poppy started talking about fresh air, leaving me in Percy's well paid care while he went off to do who knows what. Sleep he said. Percy was making a mint out of us.
Molly declared that the school was no place for a children's birthday party, especially since most of Severus's family was going to come, and insisted we use their garden.
We stepped out of their hearth and into their sitting room, and everyone that I knew in this world shouted: "Happy birthday!"
Even expecting it, I nearly strangled Severus in shock.
It was overwhelming. Usually I would make him put me down the second we stepped out of a Floo but this time I clutched myself to him and refused to let go despite our current contention. How did we know so many people! If the Malfoys were here I was going to bite someone.
For a few hours I managed to forget all about the impossible choices that had been set in front of me.
There was cake. They had charmed the confection into the shape of a very realistic looking dragon. I had to touch a scale before I believed it was icing. It seemed the gig was up about Norberta—can you blame me? I wasn't going to let the trio have all the fun and miss a dragon!—but Snape only said Happy Birthday with the rest and held me up to blow the candles on its spines. I was not yet blasé about magic and when the cake roared into life and started flying around the rafters in Molly's kitchen, singing the walls, I squealed and clapped my hands with everyone else. It took the combined effort of Severus, Arthur and two of Severus's uncles to get it down. Molly tsked and went off in search of Fred and George who suddenly was nowhere near the scene of the crime.
There were gifts and sweets and the Weasleys wasted no time in organising a Quidditch game, half of which was spent quibbling over which team got to have Harry. A barbeque was set up, the fire manned Disney-style by the utensils, plates stacked high with hotdogs flying around the air to whoever looked hungry.
There was also cousin Charlotte. Little blond pigtailed and blue eyed girl, all decked out in the most nauseating candy coloured ruffles, trying to best me at each and every one of the party games Poppy had set up. The girl was beyond irritating, objecting every time I won, informing me that they let me win because I was a baby of all things. The worst of it was that I couldn't hit her, bite her or kick her, for the simple reason that she was a six year old girl, and as such so very-very much younger than me. I'm sure she cheated too.
I ended up going to sulk on Snape's lap. I might not be too happy with him yet but he certainly was the lesser of the two evils.
Molly and Arthur had put a huge pavilion tent up in their backyard and most of the adults were enjoying the shade there, far enough from the children's noise. I skirted the women's hugging arms and cheek pinching fingers to where Severus sat arguing mildly with Arthur on the merits of improving Muggle studies. He made space for me on his lap without interrupting his tête-à-tête and passed his tea over to me for a sip.
"I wanted to hit her," I told him after making sure her parents were not in earshot. No need to explain to him who I meant.
"I'm glad you didn't."
"I'll just sit here for the rest of the party."
"You may sit here until you've cooled down. Find a non-violent way to resolve it, I am sure you can."
"This is my non-violent way, I call it hiding." I took over his half-eaten cake and stuck a heaped forkful in my mouth. The man was not a fan of sweet food which usually meant there was more for me.
I sat with Severus until I had scarfed another slice of cake and then went back into the fray. Unwillingly. In actual fact I was pushed unceremoniously off Severus's lap and told to go play. Behind me Molly said something about a haircut to Minerva.
The day was long and tiring but all that I had wished for. I was exhausted by the time we said our goodbyes, the sun having long since set. Severus carried me from the lantern lit garden to the Burrow, through the Headmaster's office and out of our Floo. The contents of our coffee table caught both our eyes. He set me on my feet.
"Brush your teeth and prepare for bed, I will tidy up here," Severus said and walked over to study his horrible gifts, "and put these away."
He picked up the vial and reached for the parchment but I got there before him. Grabbing it I stuck it behind my back.
"Don't throw it away!" I shouted.
"It was not my intention to discard them, Albus. Calm down. Have you changed your mind?"
"No." I had been thinking though. I did enjoy the day in the end, but whenever I had a breather from playing my mind went right back to worry away on this. Did I have the right to be adopted at my age? Was I play-acting and all this just a farce? It had all started with me having to pretend to be four years old but how much of that was still pretense? I liked being taken care of and—"You can throw the antidote, I don't want to be old."—surely there was something wrong with me… "You don't have to adopt me just because you feel responsible for me, I know I can't take care of myself… economically… but I can be fine in an orphanage or somewhere where I am not a bother."
"Feel responsible? Did you miss the part where I said I had come to care for you as my own son, Albus? I lo—"
"But I'm an adult!"
"What was your solution to Charlotte's bullying."
What? What did that have to do with anything? "She wasn't really bullying me."
"She was. I had a word with her parents today so you can be sure it will stop. What was your solution?"
"I don't want to say."
"Do it anyway. I saw she left you alone so I know you had done something."
Fine. "I promised to give her a Galleon if she would stop talking to me."
"Child. Keep the adoption papers, and take your time to think about it. With it or without it you are my son. Go brush your teeth and go to bed."
"I don't have to be told these things you know."
"Which things? That I lo—"
"Aah! To brush my teeth! I'm going!"
He followed me to my bathroom and leaned against the open doorway. Eyeing him warily I set the papers next to the basin, well out of his reach, and took up my toothbrush. Minerva had been the organiser of our new rooms and had made sure my amenities were built child sized, supposed to grow along with me, so I had no problem reaching everything to brush my teeth. Which I did with fervor. Why was he looking at me like that?
I spat the minty foam out. "You don't have to watch me."
"Wash your face."
"I don't need telling!" I washed my face.
I had long since lost all body horror, and being small and overtired made your limbs lethargic so I let him change my robe to pajamas, saving me from the struggle. I stood next to my bed while he sat on the edge. All the while I clutched the parchment, not letting it go, only switching it from hand to hand to free my arm for the sleeves.
Was it so wrong to want it?
"If I did let you adopt me, can I change my name?"
His fingers stilled on my buttons. "You don't want to be called Albus?"
"No, I'm used to Albus. I thought I might add something."
"Such as?" he asked, taking an inordinately long time on the third button.
"Would you be okay with it if we made my middle name Severus?" What? There's a precedent! Ask Harry why he did it, how would I know. As for myself it would be nice to be truly part of him. This will make me two thirds Snape and only one third Dumbledore and this was as close to the L-word as I was willing to go. "I thought maybe it could be Albus Severus Snape?"
Severus's shoulders relaxed and he finished buttoning me up, straightened my collar, then held the covers open for me to climb in. I stuck the parchment under my pillow, daring him with a pre-emptive scowl to make a comment and let him tuck me in.
"You didn't answer me," I said.
His mouth twitched.
"I feel very honoured, Albus. But I think not—"
"What? Why!" I struggled out of the tightly tucked covers to sit up.
"Tomorrow I will show you our family tree and you can pick any name you fancy from there," Severus said. He prodded me to lie down and repeated the tucking process a second time. "Traditionally a child will be named after his grandfather." He stopped patting my blankets and for one horror filled moment I thought he was about to cry. He snickered. "And we will be considering the initials very carefully before you make such a big decision. Goodnight, Albus."