"What's going on Sev?" She asks.
"No one cares about me." He replied.
Step one, you say we need to talk
He walks, you say sit down, it's just a talk
He smiles politely back at you
You stare politely right on through
"Sev, that's not true. I care about you," Poppy said. The fourth year was sitting against the wall in a dimly lit hallway. The paintings on the wall acted like nothing was going on. Poppy knew that it wasn't normal for a young boy to be sitting against the wall, with his knees up to his forehead. But the paintings were acting as if that was a regular occurrence. Poppy knew she would look into it later.
"What does it matter," Severus replied. "No one else does." Normally, he would have said two people cared about him, Poppy Pomfrey and Lily, but that wasn't as true anymore. He had been drifting away from Lily for quite some time and this meant that she wasn't around as much anymore. She also didn't know about the molestation, the pain he was forced to go through every time he saw his father's eyes. Lily only knew about the physical bruises and the broken bones. He prepared to leave.
"Sev, we need to talk. Would you like to do it in private?" The mediwitch asked.
Severus shrugged his shoulders, "I guess."
"Let's go to the hospital wing then," Poppy says, the two of them and they slowly reach the room. It smelt faintly of antiseptic and the air had a sharp tang to it.
Poppy invited the boy into her personal office and pulled out a chair for him to sit in. Most people didn't know it, but Madam Pomfrey was actually a licensed therapist. This was beneficial for talking to students who might happen to be suicidal. She couldn't help but notice how uncomfortable Severus was. He was fidgeting and seemed quite apprehensive about the whole situation.
"Severus, why do you feel that no one cares about you?" Poppy asks, pulling out a dictating quill and a piece of parchment to record what Severus said.
"I just do," Severus says, seemingly unsure about his answer. Any good therapist could tell he was lying and that the
Poppy waited for her quill to finish recording his response and then asked, "Severus, I know that's a lie, can you please tell me the truth?"
Some sort of window to your right
As he goes left, and you stay right
Between the lines of fear and blame
You begin to wonder why you came
The boy sighed and said, "No one in my house really likes me. They think I'm inadequate because of my blood status, which is unfair. It's like me saying that they're automatically amazing at magic because they're all pureblooded. I have to constantly prove myself in order to fit in. And yet- they can get away with being terrible at magic just because they have four magical grandparents."
Those words rang completely true for Poppy who was also in Slytherin. She had been bullied for the same reasons and also found it hard to fit in. There was no doubt about it- Slytherins were the most biased out of all of the houses. "Do you have any friends in other houses?" she asked.
"Well, I guess I kind of do; we aren't really that close anymore. I miss her" Severus replied, thinking of Lily. Oh, how he missed her long red hair and emerald eyes. The four bullies had separated the two of them. His heart hurt just thinking about it.
"What's her name?" Poppy asked.
"Lily Evans."
"Have you been harming yourself lately?" Poppy asked, deciding she would trust the boy and not pry, even if he sounded like he was lying. She needed to establish a trusting relationship with the boy in order for him to open up to her even more. "No, I haven't," Severus lied, looking dead straight into the mediwitch's eyes.
"Very well. Just one moment." Poppy searched through her desk and looked for something. Her fingers settled upon an emerald orb and pulled out of the drawer. "If you ever have the urge to hurt yourself, please say Paulo Domum. It will transport you to me and I will be able to help you. Even in the middle of the night."
Severus nodded, blushing slightly. He missed having someone care about him, even if that someone was his teacher.
"You are now dismissed."
The boy slipped the orb into his pocket and left the room quietly.
Where did I go wrong?
The memories pulsed through Severus' mind as he lay in his bed at one in the morning. Finding his mom dead in the kitchen. His father raping him. Being bullied by both the Gryffindors and Slytherins. Getting called names by his housemates.
He was unable to sleep after his conversation with Poppy. The talk had forced memories that he pushed to the back of his mind to resurface and he didn't like that at all. His wrists itched and the urge to slice them open was stronger than ever. On his nightstand laid a potions life. Severus slipped that into the pocket of his sweatpants, ignoring the emerald orb that Poppy had given him. She would never understand; she was the one that had forced those memories to resurface in the first place.
Severus snuck out of his dormitory stealthily and into his common room. No one was up that late and he was unnoticed. He slipped out of his common room and into the hallway. He couldn't stand the dungeons any longer, the stench of death and depression was too much to take anymore! Plus, it reminded him of his father and that made things one thousand times worse. He needed to talk to Lily, damn it.
Slowly, Severus found himself in the hallway that the Gryffindors dominated. He slipped into the nearest bathroom (unaware that this bathroom was startlingly close to Lily's dorm) and unsheathed his knife, pressing the cool blade against his wrist. Adrenaline rushed through his body and he pressed the blade down and ran it against, biting down as he felt the stinging pain. All the negative memories slipped away as the pain sizzled down and Severus did it again, longing to feel the relief of pain. The blood began spurting out of his wrist. This startled Severus as he realized he had cut an artery. This didn't stop him though, he ran the blade against his wrist quicker and quicker. He became extremely lightheaded and passed out with a loud 'thump'.
I lost a friend
Idalia Meyers, the Gryffindor Prefect was concerned. She had seen a shadowy figure sneak into the girl's bathroom. Usually, the Gryffindors would use the bathroom connected to their dorms, but this person hadn't. She must have been sick and not wanted her housemates not to know. Idalia became even more concerned when the person didn't leave the bathroom and she heard the faint noise of someone collapsing on the ground. Taking a deep breath and with her wand in her hand, Idalia entered the bathroom.
What Idalia saw next left her feeling extremely nauseous. A boy, one with greasy black hair, laid in a pool of his own blood. Idalia felt the contents of her stomach enter her throat and she vomited into a toilet, her eyes burning. She reached up and flushed the toilet and cast a quick spell to clean her hands. The boy held a knife. Blood was spurting from the other hand. Idalia ripped her robe and applied pressure to the wound. This didn't stop the bleeding at all and she ripped another strand of her robe off and turned that into a tourniquet, trying to prevent the boy from losing any more blood. She yelled, "Help me!"
Somewhere along in the bitterness
Lily Evans was awoken by her prefect yelling and sat up quickly in her bed. None of her dormmates were awoken, but she also had the reputation of being the lightest sleeper. The yelling sounded like it came from the bathroom outside of their common room. She quickly put her slippers on and ran out, entering the bathroom and noticed the enormous bloodstain first. Then she noticed Severus Snape laying on the floor with a knife in his hand. Her Prefect, Idalia, looked awfully distraught.
"Severus," she whispered to herself, "Why?"
"Can you help me?" Idalia asked, "I need to report to McGonagall. Just keep applying pressure to his wounds and prevent him from bleeding out. Don't remove any bandages, I've ripped my own robe into a few shreds so keep adding more."
"Yes m'am," the redhaired girl replied. Idalia ran off to go tell McGonagall. Lily had no idea how Severus even ended up here but she assumed that Severus couldn't stand the stench or the dark emotion of the dungeons anymore. Or maybe he had wanted to talk to her. This thought stung and she couldn't stop a tear from trickling its way down her cheek. She couldn't help but think that she was somehow responsible for this.
Lily gently removed the knife from Severus' grip. His robe slid down his arm a little and Lily could see the letter 'w'. Morbid curiosity prevented Lily from stopping there and she slowly rolled it down, seeing that he had carved the word 'whore' into his arm. The cuts also looked to be recent. Tears began running out of Lily's eyes uncontrollably and she let out a sob. Why wasn't she there for her friend when he needed her the most?
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Idalia entered McGonagall's living quarters (she had been granted permission beforehand) and found her professor sipping tea next to a fire. Her grey hair laid flat on her back. "Can I help you, Idalia?" Minerva asked before she saw Idalia's appearance.
"There's a kid in the bathroom- he tried to kill himself!" Idalia had a rather dishevelled appearance. Her normally pristine robes were in tatters and her blonde hair was falling out of its bun. Idalia's clothes were covered in blood and there was a streak on her face when she tried to wipe a tear out of her hazel eyes.
Minerva floo called Poppy, who then flooed into Minerva's living quarters. The two of them followed the prefect to find Severus unconscious on the ground and Lily crying, holding a bandage to his arm that had managed to stop bleeding. "Oh dear," Poppy said, remembering how she had asked whether he had self-harmed after his fight with the Marauders.
Had I known how to save a life
Severus had lost so much blood that Poppy needed to get another healer involved with healing him and assessing the damage. Enter Johnathan McCloud, a muggleborn healer with a passion for medicine. The older man's brows wrinkled with concern when he saw the boy. "There's been so much blood loss and not enough blood flow to his arm. I think we need to amputate it."
"But John, he has a passion for potions. How will he react to this? He might never get to make a potion again in his life!" Poppy asked, looking down at the boy. She had managed to heal Severus' wrists, but he would have some scarring there for the rest of his life.
John furrowed his brows even more. "It's either we amputate it or he dies from infection. He'll have to learn how to adapt."
He spelled a painkilling potion and blood replenishing potion into the stomach of the boy and called for a surgeon who would amputate the arm. "He's extremely lucky he was saved when he was. Without the tourniquet, he would have bled out."
Let him know that you know best
Cause after all, you do know best
Severus woke up, surprised as to why he was in the hospital wing. On his left was a red-haired girl that he immediately recognized as Lily. His left wrist was itchy, but when he tried to scratch it, there was nothing there. "Where's my arm?"
Poppy heard this and ran into the room, "Thank goodness you're up. Unfortunately, we were forced to amputate your arm because you had lost so much blood."
"B-but how am I supposed to do anything," Severus asked, wiping a tear from his eye. Lily also had red eyes, signalling that she had been crying earlier as well. A third person, a Gryffindor prefect entered and looked at Severus, also with red-rimmed eyes.
"You'll learn to cope, Severus," Poppy said, stroking his hair.
Try to slip past his defense
Without granting innocence
"Why can't I fucking dress myself!" Severus yelled at Pomfrey. Everything was fine with the boy physically, but Poppy needed to work with the boy, helping him to adapt to his one-handed state. He may have just woken up but that didn't mean that he wanted to spend more time in the hospital wing than he should. Severus was struggling to dress himself and he hated it. He couldn't even put on his shirt without help.
Throughout the day, Severus slowly learned how to put his shirt, pants, robe, and shoes on. After each accomplishment, Poppy gave him a thorough amount of praise. Severus thought this was awfully stupid. Why is she praising me for things I already knew how to do? Is it really that hard to put on a shirt? He thought.
"Can I go now?" Severus asked.
"First we need to talk about what your father did to you. And then I'm going to have you come in every Wednesday after today." Poppy said.
"It's none of your business!"
Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you've told him all along
And pray to God he hears you
And I pray to God he hears you
Severus slowly began to recover throughout the school year, except he was constantly afraid of going back to his father at the end of it. How was he supposed to deal with his father after all of this?
At least he had Lily. He and Lily were now closer than ever. She helped him with simple things. She was even tinkering around with a prosthetic arm to move as his old one did. It was proving to be extremely complicated. Severus had told her numerous times that she didn't need to do it at all.
Severus had a few slip-ups. He had been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from his sexual abuse and had often experienced flashbacks. Thanks to his physical therapy/emotional therapy with Poppy every Wednesday, those flashbacks had reduced in number and severity. He had also learnt how to function with one hand.
Poppy had also placed a charm on Severus that would alert her whenever Severus tried to hurt himself. Slip-ups happened infrequently, but each time Severus tried to hurt himself, he was transported to Poppy's office where he was forced to talk his feelings out.
One day at supper, Severus was given a letter from Poppy, instructing him to meet with her and Dumbledore in her office.
How to save a life
How to save a life
"I've chosen to adopt you," Poppy said, during her meeting with Severus and Dumbledore. "I know what your father does and no muggle officer will let him get away with it. But you will be staying with me and once I adopt you, you will be free from him."
"Thank you," Severus said, a rare smile on his face.
Wow, this was more intense than I planned it to be. I'm also sorry about the late update, I got tracked up in finals :/ and I am still waiting for my results to get back. Anyways, I really liked writing this, it was super intense. I didn't really have an idea planned out but I really like what I decided to go with.
The next (and final) chapter will be the epilogue and will likely feature Snape/Lily. I'm planning on using another song by the Fray (I'm debating whether to use Never Say Never, Dead Wrong, Syndicate, or You Found Me)
Thanks for reading!