Annabel Lee

Slughorn's interruptions turned out to be nothing more than to raid his stores of potions; Veritaserum and Polyjuice (he had laughed out loud when Slughorn had asked for Amortentia). "And I'll give them back to you, you know, I just need to use them in my sixth year class. Perhaps you remember seeing them for your first time in my class-"

Snape scoffed "I had already brewed Polyjuice potion in my fourth year. Veritaserum was an easy brew, if only a long one." Slughorn looked completely startled, opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water. "I didn't know you had such the talent-"

"Of course you didn't." he snapped back. "Anything else?"

"N-no." Slughorn replied weakly

"Have a good day then." he said sarcastically. He shut the door in Slughorn's face, then walked back over to the bottle of gin he was about to start drinking. He ignored the glass he had brought over for himself and downed the stuff from the neck of the bottle. Satisfied, he pointed his wand (which had gotten knocked over onto the floor when the bottle crashed the night previously) at the fire and it roared to life.

No, Slughorn hadn't seen Severus' talent when he attended school. He was not well known or liked by his peers, his parents were not well connected or rich. He had quietly excelled in all of his classes, particularly Potions, which, other than the Dark Arts, was something he seemed to process a natural talent of. He had started modifying Potions in his fourth year. Simple ones at first, like Pepper Up and the Shrinking Solution. By the time he was in his sixth year, he was modifying much more advanced brews. A Hair Growth serum could be tasteless and odorless, providing hilarious results should you accidently slipped one to someone. Polyjuice could tickle your insides instead of burn them, and Flex Filix could taste like chocolate.

But Potions has never captivated him like the Dark Arts had. He supposed it was mostly the pain that his younger self had bottled up. He would sit in his dorm and fantasize about how easily it would be to make his father suffer the way he had. Then Potter and the rest of the Marauders. His housemates and mother convinced him that Muggleborns too needed to be punished. But there was the flaw in his brain, the acute crack that ran up his skull. It seemed to work against all of his logic or reason. For how could anyone want to harm someone so beautiful and innocent as Lily was? It was easy to picture Potter being subject to the Cruciatus curse. He deserved to suffer, because it didn't matter to anyone else that he was a bullying cunt. He should at least know it himself. But he couldn't even picture seeing Lily in that much agony, couldn't picture her screams, her red hair shaking as she cried from the pain. But as time went on, her screams faded out over everyone else's laughter when Potter threw more hexes and curses at him, when people laughed at him and mocked him in the corridors. By the time his fifth year rolled around, he was a time bomb; blinded by rage and excited by other people's suffering. In his eyes, a judge. In others, a sadist.

Lily hadn't missed this, he supposed. He should've noticed the way she slowly distanced herself from him, the way they had less and less in common until it was only their past holding them together. This has come to ahead, of course.

He stared at the fire for a long time, eyes unseeing. It had been a lesson he had learned much later, when Voldemort had moved in the open. When 'pain' became 'torture' and 'punish' became 'murder'. He didn't want to murder everyone that had laughed at him. He didn't want everyone to suffer. Why had Lily suffered? Other than blame himself like he had been for the past fifteen years, he didn't see a reason. Which brought him back to his current train of thought.

"Six more days."

So he did he always did for those six days. He wandered the halls of the school late at night, when everyone was asleep. He didn't have to worry about patrol, after all. Whenever he went exploring, it seemed he always found something new. Twice he found himself in the deeper dungeons. They hadn't been used in centuries, and no student would've dared to go there, even to cause trouble. Here, he had found chains and whips. Books on human body anatomy, and old potions. He had taken the books and potions up to his room once he found them to study them; they turned out to be very interesting. Going up into the main castle, he constantly walked by the Room of Requirement, and it was highly amusing to walk in and out of the room, having it design something completely new every time he opened its door. He had walked in on everything from a torture room for Sirius Black to the house he envisioned himself having with Lily. Every once and awhile, he wondered if they would've had children together. He knew that she hadn't wanted them when she was still on speaking terms with him, prefering to travel and explore new things. The thought of Potter forcing her into it made him hate the James Potter even more, had she even wanted Harry? Or did she just decide she found the right person for that kind of thing?

Many times over the course of the years, he had tried to be happy for her. He really did want her to be happy. If she was happy with Potter, then he should be happy for her, right? But he could never quite manage it. His love for Lily was equal to his hatred for Potter.

Sometimes his thoughts would randomly stray to Petunia. It was odd to him that he hadn't seen her for years, but Potter saw her every summer. He wondered if she was as much of a bitch now as she was when they'd been young. He thought it very likely. But she had taken the boy in as well. If she was such a bitch, and she hated her sister so much, why did she take him? His mind felt like it was being split in two. But that was what happened when you mixed drinks, he supposed.

Drinks, drinks, drinks. His whole life was starting to revolve around them. It had been all he thought about for the entire summer. He tried to stop. Tried to invest in books, potions, and inventing new spells. But his day always seemed to come back to what he had in his secret booze room.

Yes, that had been constructed nicely, and he had wanted a secret room since he had been a young child. Tho potions lab was the natural choice for such a room because never let anyone go in there, not even Dumbledore and he was typically the one to ask about his progress with his experimental potions. Snape thought about what it would be like to make a potion with him. There were two person potions, but they didn't get taught until N.E.W.T level anyway. Unless you were studying them for your profession, you didn't really need to know how to brew them. Even he had only done it once or twice, though that was simply lack of a partner that stopped him.

Double person potions were complicated, even for him. You had to know the properties of each ingredient first, then you needed to put that list in order to figure out how the first ingredient would react to the second, and how that combination would react to the third's properties, and so on. The problem with double person potions was they typically required you to mix upwards of four ingredients all at once, and none of them could be mixed prior to putting them in the cauldron. You need the extra pair of hands to get the whole thing right. He had met and worked with some very experienced potioneers over the years, but the one thing he fantasised about more than anything else was brewing one of these potions with Lily. She was a natural at brewing, he had exploded or otherwise ruined his work on multiple occasions from paying attention to what she was doing.

His bleary eyes were set on the fire. He would give anything to talk to her again. He would give anything to just get an icy glare from her, or hear her call him Snivellus. It didn't really matter what she said to him or how she looked at him. He could live with her hate. It would have hurt, but to be in a world that was completely devoid of her beauty was so, so much worse. She gave light to everyone who knew her and gave selflessly to the people around her. He wished that he could do that the way she did, but the darkness was already set in by the time they met, she couldn't save him. He wished he had the mentality to give. His father had taken that long ago; nothing was more important than not being vulnerable. Vulnerable people are weak. You can get hurt. And from a very young age, he had decided he was tired of getting hurt.

His room was now as sweltering hot as the house on Spinner's End. Not to mention how the alcohol will warm your body right up, if you consume enough. Which he did. If he had been sober, he wouldn't have removed any clothing, but he wasn't, and that was okay with him at the moment. He stripped down so he was wearing nothing but his work pants. He felt no shame at all about being exposed. Being naked simply meant that you didn't have any clothing to protect you from physical attacks. But that was laughable here, especially with the schools highetened security.

He sighed. He didn't know what he was feeling. He didn't even know if he could feel anything right then. But there was one person who always gave him comfort in moments like these, even if she was long gone. He grabbed his wand and whispered "Expecto patronum." And she was there.

He couldn't quite explain how the doe resembled Lily, but it did. Flawless, silent in its grace, it sat down on the floor beside him and watched the fire, just as he was. He could almost feel the red hair in his hands, hear her voice and her laughter. The way she said his name.

Almost.

His face twisted then. He immediately got angry with himself for having emotions like these but a tear had already fallen. The doe looked up and rested her head on his knee. It was weightless, but comfort was what Lily would've done. His anger faded when he looked down at it, their eyes meeting. He remembered the way she looked when she was concerned, there had been a crease in between her eyebrows and she tilted her head slightly to the left. The doe immediately did so, crease and all. He chuckled "If I tell you that everytime you go outside you come back in with another freckle, does that mean you'll have those too?" All it did was blink slowly, but that was enough for him. He let her fade, and he let the tears fall. Five more days.

And they flew in a whirlwind of alcohol, potions ingredients, and tears. He had never cried so much in his life, but the night terrors happened so frequently they never seemed to really go away at all anymore, and he always woke up either terrified or angry. He supposed he was going to have to start brewing some Dreamless Sleep, otherwise they might never stop.

Flashbacks were becoming a problem too. He used to be able to just see the place, hear the words like they were a faint echo. Like a dream. Now, it was as if his father was back in the room with him. He could feel the flecks of spit that his father got on him when he screamed. He could hear his mother cry in perfect heart wrenching sobs. Potter and Black visited him almost nightly, and he could feel the breeze whenever they attacked him outside. The house in Spinner's End was crisp too. He could smell the mist, feel the floor on the soles of his feet, feel the texture of the faded paint on the walls.

But it was complicated too. Because Lily was there. He supposed this was because her death was the most significant thing that had ever happened to him, but he could smell her strawberry shampoo. He could hear her voice, watch her brew potions, feel her touch, and all the other little things he missed about her that he hadn't even remembered before the dreams started. It was his only relief from the constant beatings, and jinxes he put up with in his sleep. And it was the only thing that was preventing him from brewing a huge vat of the draught, because as much as everything else hurt, sometimes, he had her in his flashbacks too. And in some fucked up way, that made it worth it. Right?

It was a question he had no answer to. And the more he thought about it the more it drove him insane. But it killed time. Drinking and thinking definitely killed time. Before he realized it, there were only two more days to go until term began, and he only had another nights worth of alcohol.

Once again, he started his evening ritual. Wake up, hangover cure, water, shower, clothes, alcohol. A shot for breakfast, because he needed something to wake him up and the taste of liquor always seemed to do the trick. He had just downed the first one of the night when he heard a knock on his door. He frowned; the others knew not to disturb him. He strided over to the door, pulled it open a crack. The first thing he saw was a thin lipped frown.

Oh here we go he thought bitterly as he yanked open the door the rest of the way. McGonagall didn't flinch. They stood there in silence for a few moments, staring. But Severus had had enough. Before he was even aware of what he was doing, he was spying on her thoughts. He heard minimal dialogue before he pulled out of her head and said "Yes?" He knew what she wanted but he wasn't going to help her get there.

"Were you aware that Dumbledore sustained an injury this summer?" she asked bitterly

"Yes?" he said again

"And it did not occur to you to get Poppy? Or another teacher? You couldn't have even just told us?" she spat " We could've helped him recover-"

"As you may have noticed, I already did that-"

"Oh yes." she leered "I saw your handiwork. You are, of course, clearly capable-"

"Have you spoken to Dumbledore about this matter?"

She hesitated for a moment, then said "We were informed you were summoned-"

"Then I'm not exactly sure what the issue is here, Minerva. He summoned me, not any other teachers. I performed many counter curses while he was semi conscious, and I contained the curse to a single hand. Had he not summoned me, I think it likely the curse would've spread almost immediately. He would have died, and you do what? Knock on my door because he didn't summon you?" he sneered "Didn't want you to transfigure his arm into a tea kettle-"

"We are just as able as you-"

"Then go tell him that, with all your damn Gryffindor bravery instead of coming to my rooms to complain."

She looked ready to hit him for a moment. He stood, waiting. Finally, she turned on her heel without a backwards glance in his direction. He was just about to slam the door shut behind him when her voice said "Have you been drinking?"

His body swung around to face her but his mind had stopped dead, floored that he didn't have a half decent response. She seemed to gather from his silence "Just sober up for the students, Severus." And just like that, she was gone.

That was petty. said the logical part of his brain.

I was right. Argued a different part of him If she has an issue, she should be taking it up with Dumbledore, not me.

You could've been more civil. Offered the first voice.

I don't owe her a damn thing. He argued back.

His head was spinning. He needed another, and another, and

another decision. Why couldn't Lily understand that he couldn't choose his housemates, couldn't choose what actions they took in regards to other people? "They're evil, Sev! I don't know how you can be friends with them!"

Does that mean I'm evil too? He had wanted to shout back at her. He wanted to know if that's how she truly felt about him.

He wondered if she had thought about him at all after they parted ways. He knew she did at least once, but that was a memory that would have to be ripped from his very soul before he relieved it.

The thoughts seemed to make the room spin around him. He groaned, took a step back, but the room only flew faster. He stumbled across the room and to the door, flung the thing open and walked out into the corridor. He took a right down the hall, then a left, then a staircase or two. He needed to get as far away from himself as he could. He only stopped when he reached the Astronomy Tower, breathing in the fresh air. Yes, this is what he had needed.

He leaned over the edge and looked up at the stars. Once, he and Lily had snuck up her in their third year, and he had pointed out all the constellations he could find to her, and the story behind each one. They had been there until sunrise, when, laughing, Lily had dragged him into the Great Hall for breakfast. It was one of the best nights of his life.

He didn't need to sleep with her. He would've stayed a virgin his entire life if that was what it took to have her. No, it was her laugh. Her hugs when his parents fought. The smell of her hair, how he had buried his head in it and felt the fiery locks move on his face. Her. He just missed her.

He sighed, eyes still on the sky. Where was she now? Her body was bones, but had her soul lived on somewhere? He wondered where she was, if she could still feel. He hoped he wouldn't be able to when he died. He didn't want to feel anything ever again. He hung his head, defeated. But he wouldn't cry. He only looked back up when the sun started to rise.

It cast a familiar red glow over the entire sky.

Sorry I've been away for so long, I've been dealing with my own PTSD and depression. Hopefully the longer chapter will make up for it. :)