A/N: A reply to the Random Character Challenge.
He rarely smiled growing up. What was there to smile at? He fell asleep every night to his parents bickering, and woke to find his father having left and his mother lying unresponsively on the sofa, a bottle of firewhiskey clenched in her hand. Neighborhood children teased him horribly. There was no light in his life until Lily came.
Just seeing her unruly mane of red hair would make him want to laugh and see the good of the world, and when he smiles for the first time at her, he barely recognizes the feeling of the corners of his mouth turning up. She glances at him with questioning green eyes and he grins even more. To have this angel idolize him is unusual at first, but soon it is natural and…wonderful.
When they go to school together, Severus soon predicts his laughter and smiles fading away. He sees damned Potter and his horde of Gryffindor fans, and then spots Lily perched hesitantly at the edge of their group. By fifth year, she is a regular among Potter, Black, and all the rest of them. By seventh year, she and James are a couple. Only two years out of Hogwarts, Severus receives word of their marriage. Gone goes his smile.
He becomes the Potions teacher out of remorse. Dumbledore won't give him the Defense of Dark Arts position – Severus wants to release all his anger and confusion into dark magic, but only Dumbledore knows that he'd just become worse by doing that.
He finds himself snickering evilly sometimes when conversing with dark wizards – his mouth's corners turn up but it's not the same.
Severus almost smiles genuinely one time. He sees first years out in the courtyard on a fall day, twirling in the warmly-colored leaves that have fallen from the Whomping Willow. There's Parvati Patil, and Seamus Finnigan, and Dean Thomas, best of friends only two weeks into their first school term. But it's Lavender Brown that catches the professor's eye. She is laughing, dancing in the grass as leaves catch in her uncombed ebony hair.
For a moment, Severus is reminded of Lily, and his mouth flinches.
After that, he only cries, sorrows, and mourns. There is nothing to smile at.
A/N: Please review!