Part Two: The Ghost of Christmas Past
Snape woke with a start. As the haze of sleep began to fade away, he wondered what time it was.
"If it's near one," he remarked softly, "I should prepare for my next visitor."
Then, a delightful thought occurred to him. It was all a dream! Pettigrew's appearance--the chains--the battalion of phantoms in the sky--all due to some bad soup from the kitchens! He gently sighed, too relieved to began to berate himself on his foolishness.
The clock on Snape's bedside table struck one. He sunk deeper into his bed. Certainly no one was going to visit--
Suddenly, Snape saw light behind his bed curtains. And then, a pale hand drew back the curtain.
The ghost was a young man, as though on the verge of graduating from Hogwarts. He was tall, thin, and lithe, an excellent build for a Quidditch player. He was wearing a white tunic, with a tan cloak swirling majestically around his feet. In the hand that didn't open the curtain was a branch of fresh holly, looking like it was picked off one of the bushes in the countryside. The crown that rested on his messy black hair seemed to be made of pure light.
Snape took this sight all in at a moment. Then, with a snarl, he recognized the spirit.
"Potter?" he spat, "What are you doing here?"
The spirit blinked his bright green eyes behind black glasses a few times and laughed softly.
"I'm sorry," he answered, in a very familiar voice, yet without the scorn he normally addressed Snape with, "But I don't know who you're talking about."
Infuriated that not even in death did it seem that he could rid himself of The-Boy-Who-Lived-To-Make-His-Life-Hell, Snape snarled, "You are the ghost I have been promised?"
"Yes," he answered gently, "I am the ghost of Christmas Past."
"Long past?" Snape asked, the growl still evident.
He shook his head. "No--your past."
While Snape found it disturbing that Harry Potter should be the spirit associated with his past, he realized that the spirit, however unpleasant the form it took, was not Potter reincarnated; the lack of overall hostility and the ambiguity of his statements was not what he associated with the former Gryffindor. Hoping to get this over with quickly, Snape grunted in return.
The Ghost of Christmas Past moved away from his bed and pointed to the window. "Come with me."
With a wave of his hand, the window opened and two ghostly broomsticks appeared. Snape tried not to make his gulp audible.
"You mean--fly?" he asked, his eyes narrowing.
The ghost nodded.
"I'm a mortal, I would sink right through those," Snape started explaining, "And I--I never did especially well with flying when I was in school, you see…"
"You don't have to be afraid of heights when you are with me, Severus Snape," the ghost replied, laughing again, grinning mischievously.
Snape stiffened immediately, that grin altogether too familiar from both James Potter and his blasted son. "I am not afraid. It's--not my forte, that's all."
"These broomsticks can take you anywhere, Severus Snape, and safely as well," the Ghost said, drawing Snape from his bed with a tug that was gentle yet, at the same time, not to be denied.
A moment later the ghost and Snape were on the broomsticks and flying into the night sky. Snape took one look at the ground far below, felt his stomach do a queasy back flip, and determinedly looked at the ghost. Luckily, the view wasn't a long one--the sky vanished and suddenly they were on solid ground, outside of Hogwarts, during the morning.
Joyful peals of laughter echoed over the snow-covered grounds. Snape turned to see some of his Slytherin companions having a snowball fight.
"Why, it's Avery and Nott," Snape murmured, "They must be in their second year, at oldest…long before we had ever heard of the Dark Lord."
In place of the usual reverence in which he said the last two words was a dull, deadness. Briefly, Snape's poorly used imagination wondered what Avery, Nott, and himself would be like if the Dark Lord never had appeared in the first place.
"This is the school you attended, I believe," the Spirit said, "Do you recognize it?"
"Recognize it?" Snape sneered, shoving his broomstick into the ghost's hand, "I could walk around with my eyes shut!"
They walked into the school. Subconsciously, Snape started to walk toward the library.
"It seems to be deserted for Christmas," the ghost remarked, "But not everyone has gone, have they?"
Snape already knew who they would see when they entered the library--but it did not completely prepare him for the lurch of his so-called frosty heart he experienced.
The boy he saw was rather ugly and strangely put together. He had stringy black hair, a long nose, a pale face, and a pair of lonely, sad eyes. It was the younger version of Severus Snape.
"Yes, I remember this book," the older Snape murmured, "It was an idiotic book I suppose--all about wizards defeating great creatures and triumphing over incredible adversities and helping witches…but I did enjoy it so."
Snape sat down next to his younger self and started reading the pages. Before he knew it, the scowl which he always wore started to twitch upward--and upward--and upward--until one could almost say that Severus Snape, the cruelest, harshest teacher ever to teach at Hogwarts, was smiling.
Suddenly, he became evident of the fact himself and dropped the expression and muttered something about "stupid" and "ridiculous." The ghost gave no evidence of either seeing or hearing anything but only smiled slightly.
Suddenly, from the door of the library, a woman's voice gently called, "Severus?"
The forlorn child looked up from his book and smiled. "Mum!"
The older Snape stared avidly at the woman walking into the library. She wasn't exactly much to look at. She had thin, mousy hair and a long pallid face. Her face did look slightly more pleasant with a happy smile, looking at her son.
"Merry Christmas, Severus," Elieen Snape warmly said, embracing her only child, "Reading again, I see?"
The young Snape readily shook his head, his black eyes full of eagerness and delight. "Yeah, Mum--it's the best book--about these wizards fighting dragons and trolls--and saving witches-in-distress--and--"
"As much as I'd love to hear about your book," Mrs. Snape said, smiling ironically, much like her son, "I have an uncanny feeling that we'd never get around to opening up your present if I let you go."
The child smiled brightly. "What d'you get me?"
"Open it and see," his mother said, handing him the brightly wrapped package.
Impatiently, the boy ripped apart the paper, revealing an old, slightly tattered book entitled Advanced Potion-Making.
"Was this yours, Mum?" young Snape asked, his eyes wide, as his long finger traveled down the books spine lovingly.
"That's right," Mrs. Snape replied, "And I thought, since you've been complaining about you classes being too easy, that you could learn ahead with my old potion's book. Perhaps it'll keep you out of those Dark Arts books."
Young Snape looked up, his eyes full of innocence still. "But I like the Dark Arts books, Mum."
"Yes, I know you do," she replied, sinking into a chair, suddenly looking older, "But they…scare me a bit, Severus. Promise me that you won't get too involved with them--not when I'm still around to watch you grow."
The young boy nodded. "I promise."
He seemed to have sobered immensely since the mention of the Dark Arts book. Tentatively, he looked up. "Is Father allowing me to come home for the holidays?"
Mrs. Snape looked even older. "No, Severus…not this year. Perhaps next year."
The real Snape glared bitterly at the ground. "She always said that--'perhaps next year.'"
"But there never was a next year, was there?" the Ghost asked, keeping his eyes riveted on mother and son.
"No," Snape answered harshly, "My father despised me--and I returned the sentiment with all my being. All he ever did was scream at me…but I didn't hate him for that. It was when he screamed at her."
Snape didn't seem to be speaking to the ghost--more or less to himself. The ghost gave no hint that he heard Snape at all and continued to watch the scene in front of them.
Mrs. Snape smiled with effort. "But I do have another surprise for you."
"What?" her son asked, somewhat despondent still.
"What if I told you that you're going to have a little brother or sister?"
Young Snape's eyes widened. "You mean--you're having a baby?"
His mother nodded, her joy evident. "That's right…you won't be alone anymore."
"Well," the boy said, thoughtfully "I suppose it would be cool to teach him things…maybe even a few spells before he goes to school."
"Do I have your permission, then?" Mrs. Snape said dryly.
"Yeah, I guess," Snape replied, completely poker-faced.
The two looked at each other and started to giggle. Mrs. Snape reached forward and embraced her son. "My little Severus…you're growing up so fast."
Snape turned away from the scene, his eyes tightly shut, his hands clenched into fists.
"You never had a brother or sister, did you, Severus Snape?" the ghost questioned softly, the giggles between mother and son still audible.
Snape didn't answer the ghost. He continued to keep his back turned
"And your mother never came to visit again for Christmas, did she?"
Once again, his only reply was silence.
The ghost paused briefly and then touched his shoulder. "She died a week before you came home after your second year of school. An accident…tripping down the stairs…"
"Like hell it was an accident," Snape snarled at the spirit, his black eyes flashing, "He pushed her--that filthy pig pushed her, I know it!"
The ghost didn't do anything to pacify him or correct him. He merely stood, his great green eyes looking into his.
"I went to Dumbledore about it," Snape remarked, sounding much calmer now, letting out a scathing laugh, "As if he could fix everything. Although he asked some of his Auror friends to look more deeply in the matter…all they could discover was that my father's story was slightly 'suspicious,' but there was no conclusive evidence to prove it!"
He stopped to take a deep breath. "But Dumbledore knew the truth. I'm not sure what he did…but he must of put the fear of God into my father. The beast hardly even stayed in the same room with me for the rest of his life."
"Yet, after Dumbledore had tried to protect you and discover the truth, you still turned to the Dark Lord?" the ghost asked, pausing for a moment before adding, "And you also broke your promise--you started reading the Dark Arts books again."
"I never broke my promise," he answered, furious, "I said that I wouldn't as long as she was around to raise me--and I started reading the books again after her funeral. And as for Dumbledore…I was grateful to him when I was young…for showing pity to a boy who could find none anywhere else."
"Pity!" the ghost remarked, in mock surprise, "But I thought that pity was 'weakness masquerading as charity-- infirmity parading as kindness!'"
Snape opened his mouth, only to realize that the spirit was using his very words against him.
"But never mind," the spirit said, "We have other things to see tonight."
Extending the ghostly broomstick to Snape once more, the ghost and Snape lifted off the ground again and landed, this time, in the dungeons, which were looking very festive, indeed.
"Severus!" said a buoyant voice from the other side of the room, "Rodolphus! Come help me move these tables! We must have this place ready in an hour for the party!"
The voice belonged to none other than Horace Slughorn himself. He was a short, rotund man, with quickly thinning blondish hair and a huge mustache. He was wearing a scarlet-colored pair of robes for the evening, which looked as if they were straining at the seams.
"Of course," Snape murmured out loud, "I was an in and out member of the Slug Club--he remembered my mother and thought I was brilliant in potions, but saw that I had no family relations to boost himself to more comfort. And this is Old Slug's Christmas party. It was the highlight of the year for the entire school."
"And yours as well?" the ghost asked, smiling slightly.
Snape coughed. "Oh--well. I could take it or leave it. Only a foolish party, you understand."
But the spirit seemed to understand Snape's delight more than Snape did himself. He watched his younger, sixteen-year-old self levitate tables with his wand, shouting things to Rodolphus Lestrange every so often, smiling a very rarely seen smile. And Snape followed his younger self's every movement, his black eyes sparkling with something that was not malice.
Time flew by. Students poured in, as well as teachers. Snape had a remark for every person that passed by, some scathing, but other times, more often than not, reminiscent. Then, unexpectedly, Slughorn lead a young Sprout on the dance floor and did a marvelously funny jig. The entire room of students burst into laughter, not knowing that amongst them, a foul-tempered, moody Potion's Master was joining in with their mirth!
Just as Snape regained control of himself, giving the ghost suspicious glances, as though he would inform the entire student body of his unprecedented outburst, Narcissa Black walked up to the young Severus Snape. She was incredibly beautiful, even at such a young age, with golden flowing hair, china blue eyes, and a smile that made every male in the room feel slightly weak in the knees.
"Hello, Severus," she said, smiling, "Happy Christmas."
"Happy Christmas, Narcissa," he replied, gulping ever so slightly, "Where's Lucius?"
Narcissa frowned. "Who knows? Off and about, I suppose, plotting something idiotic."
The music went from a jolly jig to a slower dance number. Awkwardly, the young Snape stepped forward slightly. "Er--would you like to dance with me--until Lucius comes back, of course."
Narcissa smiled. "I'll keep dancing with you even if Lucius comes back. He'll have to wait his turn."
At the beginning of their dance, young Snape looked incredibly nervous and slightly shy. But as Narcissa continued talking, his confidence grew, until the point that her laughter at the things he said could be heard on the other end of the room.
"The best night of my life," Snape murmured out loud.
"What was that?" the ghost asked.
"Nothing," Snape quickly lied, "I just remarked that it was a--a very merry Christmas for me."
"Strange," the spirit said, "I thought that the fool who walked around with the words 'Merry Christmas' on his lips deserved to be boiled in a vat of your Draught of Anguish?"
Once more, the spirit had used his own words against him. Snape looked away and frowned, thinking over the other things he had said in that office that morning.
"Come," the ghost said, as young Snape and Narcissa left the dance floor for a bite to eat, "We must move on."
This time the scene was not so jolly, yet--as Snape's memory served him correctly--it was only a year after the scene from Slughorn's Christmas Party. Still, young Snape looked older, colder--and more bitter than ever.
He was seated in the dungeons, his breath becoming puffs in the cold winter air, deeply engrossed with the dark bounded, slightly foreboding looking book. His black eyes were shrouded by his black eyebrows, which were pointed downward in serious contemplation. The lines in his face had just begun to appear, lines that would become much deeper as the years went by. And, replacing the shy, ironic smile from the last scene of the past, a scowl darkened his features, making them uglier than ever.
Suddenly, the door opened. Narcissa Black walked slowly towards the deeply engrossed boy. But she, too, looked different. She didn't seem to be so young and bubbly. Now she was a beautiful yet saddened woman who didn't appear to smile often.
"Severus," she said, softly.
He looked up from his book disinterestedly. "Yes?"
"Do you know what time it is?" she asked.
His expression slid to one of deepest irritation. "Damn it--I'm so sorry, Narcissa--I completely forgot. I just got so--"
"Preoccupied?" Narcissa inserted, her own voice full of bitter irony, as though she had heard that once before, "Yes, I see--just like every other time I asked you to be somewhere."
She sat down, gently spreading her pretty blue robes over the chair. Snape frowned at the blonde beauty. "It's not like we're actually going together, anyway. You seem to be on the arm of Lucius Malfoy all the time now."
"Because you have given me no other choice," Narcissa replied, her voice shaking with sudden emotion, "I have been replaced in your eyes."
"Replaced by what?" Snape asked.
"By that," she answered, pointing at the book scornfully, "And all the other Dark Arts books you submerge yourself in--and all the spells that you do and learn in the dungeons at night with the other boys, all in the name of the Dark Lord--"
"The Dark Lord is my future, Narcissa," Snape explained, slightly impatient, "Under his leadership, his servants will rise to positions of power and esteem! Would you prefer to see me selling Potions in Diagon Alley, barely getting enough money for all three meals, or helping free the wizarding world from those Muggle-loving fools?"
Her blue eyes glimmered with tears now. "When I first talked to you, last year at the Christmas Party, you were more than happy to spend the rest of your days reading books and working at Diagon Alley--poor, yes, but content. And then the Dark Lord came…and you changed."
"I was a boy," he scoffed, "A boy with a stupid, insignificant dream. No one lives happily ever after!"
"Yet I cared dearly for that boy with a stupid, insignificant dream," Narcissa quietly whispered, tears pouring freely now, "I could almost say that I loved him--sarcastic as he could be, impatient as he sometimes was--but I still loved him and his foolish dreams anyway."
She rose from her seat, brushing back her long blonde hair as well as her tears.
"I release you from any further attachments to me, Severus Snape," she firmly said, "I have--I have agreed to marry Lucius. He has proposed--and my family is in utter ecstasy at such a fine match. But just know that I loved the boy you were and not the cold, insensitive man in front of me. May you be happy in the life you've chosen!"
With one more heart-wrenching glance at him, Narcissa fled the room, off to the party where her fiancé and host of friends awaited her.
The real Snape had watched all this with a blank face. But as she was leaving, he urgently hissed, "Follow her, you idiot, follow her!"
But the young Snape gave no sign of hearing his older self and remained at the table, giving only a distant glance at the door before returning to his dusty volume.
"No more, ghost," the older Snape shouted, adamantly, "Show me no more!"
"Only one more, Severus Snape," the spirit replied, touching his arm, handing him the broomstick once more.
Despite himself, Snape wrenched the broomstick out of the ghosts hand and left the dungeon. When they arrived at their destination, Snape realized they were not in Hogwarts. They appeared to be in a very opulent house, with a gaggle of House-Elves cleaning here and there. The mistress of the house sat by a large chair by the fire, looking positively lovely. Her long golden locks were pulled back in a majestic uptwist, her robes were fitting of that of the highest rank possible--but she still seemed to be as melancholy as before. Narcissa Black, now Malfoy, was the mistress of Malfoy Manor--but she did not seem to be any happier than the days she was at Lucius Malfoy's elbow at Hogwarts.
The door opened and a motherly witch put down a young boy, not more than four years old at the oldest, with golden blonde hair and large gray eyes.
"Mummy!" he cried, "Look what I made!"
He showed her a finger-painting of a lopsided Malfoy Manor, accompanied by stick figures of his father, his mother, and himself.
"Oh, that's beautiful, Draco," Narcissa told him, smiling in genuine happiness, "You'll have to show your father when he comes in."
Speak of the Devil, his father entered.
"Daddy!" Draco cried, "Look!"
Malfoy took a glance at the picture and waved his son away with, "That's nice, Draco."
The boy, slightly put out, was lead away by his nurse, casting a sad, disappointed face at his father as he went. Narcissa didn't miss this.
"Could you have been less enthusiastic?" Narcissa asked, coldly, "He just wants to you be proud of him."
"He's four," Malfoy dismissively replied, "I'll have plenty of time to be proud of him, rather than pour almighty praise over a fingerpainting that looks like Dobby the House-Elf did it. And--anyway--I met an old friend of yours at Diagon Alley today--he was looking in the apothecary for something or other."
Narcissa turned her face away. "The only old friend of mine that would be in an apothecary would be Severus Snape."
"That's right," her husband answered, "He's apparently teaching potions at Hogwarts, under the crooked nose of that Muggle-loving fool! Just as the Dark Lord ordered asked him to, three years ago. Isn't that pathetic?"
Narcissa tried in vain to smile with her husband but failed miserably. However, Malfoy didn't seem to care about her thoughts toward the subject of Severus Snape and continued talking about his important business with Fudge. Narcissa turned her face away from him as a tear slid down her pale cheek.
"Enough!" Snape exclaimed, unable to watch any longer, "Take me away from here, you cursed ghost!"
"These are the things that have already been--don't blame me for how they turned out," the ghost replied, with a contemptuous laugh.
The crown on the ghost's head, as it had done on all other occasions when they were moving from scene to scene, glowed brightly once more. In a wild, irrational attempt to stop any more terrible memories, Snape reached for the ghost's head--possibly to block out all the light as well as choke the spirit causing it. But it was no use--the more his hands covered, the more light shone through. Then, before he knew it, he was gripping his bed curtains, the spirit no longer there. Once more, for the second time that long night, Snape fell into bed and into a heavy doze.