The First Day of the Rest of Your Life

He didn't even register waking up. He didn't even know whether he was awake or that bright purple skies with orange clouds were part of his dream. He had forgotten if he had dreamt or not, he wasn't sure if he had ever dreamt of sky-gazing, a lazy leisurely thing to do. He didn't know how long he stared at it wondering when the procession of orange clouds would change into something else.

"You're awake, finally," someone said from somewhere over there. He tried to turn around but his muscles were foreign to him. It was a struggle, his brains frantically sending signals to his muscles to move, and the effect felt strange to him. He saw, rather than felt, his arm moved slightly sideways and he saw the room rotate as he turned his head to face the person speaking.

He saw her, and his cobwebbed brain recognised her somehow. Then belatedly it gave him her name. He opened his mouth to greet her but all that came out sounded like a rusty hinge of a cemetery gate.

Something cool touched his lips and soothed his parched throat. Madam Pomfrey loomed above him as she helped him, and Severus watched her in a small wonder. And when she moved away he was left staring at the ceiling.

He felt the walls to the side of him, and the sound of birds singing outside of it. Not exactly singing, he thought, they sounded more like fire engine sirens, like he so often heard when he was young. The moving clouds made strange light patterns across the ceilings and walls. The effect, he found, was not too unpleasant. Intriguing in fact. Everything was rather pleasant, he supposed, unconsciously humming to match the annoying bird's sirensong.

And so it dawned to him, and when Madam Pomfrey returned, he opened his mouth and cleared his throat, "Not. Azk..."

"No," she did not let him finish his words, placing the back of her palm on his forehead and looking down at him in a way that felt unthreatening.

"Hog. Warts?" he asked, trying to rush through his words, but failed to do so with his foggy brain and rusty throat.

"Yes, of course," she smiled as she helped him scoot higher up the bed.

"Why?"

"Why ever not?" she answered cryptically, and Severus thought that her smile, in this light, looked like that of the Sphinx.

He didn't know if Madam Pomfrey returned to do anything else to him. He only remembered staring at the sky through the window by his bed. He rememered falling asleep, too. And remembered to wake up the next day.

He still had difficulty telling his limbs to move the way he wanted them, at the speed he wanted them to. He still had difficulty conversing, his throat so long unused. He wanted to ask how long he'd been asleep, but was afraid to hear how lazy he were.

The annoying fire engine birds were still singing outside, and he made a silent vow to track them down once he could. He couldn't remember hearing these birds all those years ago when he was still a student. Maybe he did, maybe he just didn't pay any attention to them, then. He hadn't paid as much attention to most things back then.

He gradually woke up earlier and earlier and stayed awake longer and longer. He heard Madam Pomfrey tinkering in the background, preparing things to greet the first day of September. He heard her told him off-handedly how the Headmaster had been a frequent visitor when Severus was sleeping ("must be some interesting dreams, to make you sleep that long," she chided).

Severus found it hard to believe. He's been awake for days and he had seen neither beard nor garish robes of the Headmaster. But he kept quiet. Madam Pomfrey seemed too preoccupied to lie. Later on that night, she told him that the Headmaster had business in London, and wasn't expected to be back anytime soon. Maybe a week, she had said.

They talked about nonsense, skirting around some subjects that she wanted very much to ask and he wanted very much to avoid. Like him being here, like his 'career' after leaving Hogwarts, like a lot of other things.

He began to move more, his limbs now recognising the commands given by his brain. "You've been asleep for weeks," Madam Pomfrey had said, had assured him that it wasn't some permanent disability. Only sluggishness after being unused for so long. He'd started by sitting up, then taking short steps around his bed, and then the Hospital wing. He never dared move outside of the wing, afraid of overstepping his boundaries. Because as far as prisons went, the Hospital wing wasn't so bad at all.

A few days later, he was sitting up in his bed, preoccupied with his latest hobby of watching the clouds and trying to figure out what the fire engine bird looked like. He had discarded bright red with flashing beaks, and was now contemplating something more sedate, but with a larger shape.

"I've been meaning to ask you," Madam Pomfrey said as she sat by him. She must've just finished brewing some potions for the stores, she looked a bit tired but quietly satisfied.

"Ask me what?"

"That burn mark," she said, pointing to the side of his face.

Surprised, he turned around to face her. "Burn mark?" his fingers rose up to touch the spot she was pointing at.

"It appeared when you were sleeping. It didn't appear abruptly, mind you, but slowly, like an optical illusion. It was very faint at first I thought the light was playing tricks on me. But every day I visited you, it became a bit more vivid. What is it?"

Severus stared at her, his fingers worrying the disfigured skin under his right eye, across his cheek. "I... I've forgotten about this... but..." he stared at her a while, eyes growing larger and larger, it had caused some irrational worry at the back of her mind that it would pop out. "But... That... that means..."

He almost hit the nurse as he brought his left arm up to his face. He squinted at his forearm, then looked up at her in disbelief. "It worked!" his exclamation came out in a harsh whisper, his eyes glittering wildly, surprise, disbelief, joy, and something else Madam Pomfrey couldn't know. For a while, she thought she was looking at a younger Severus, younger than his twenty years of age. Like a burden had been lifted from him.

"It worked! It's gone!" he jumped onto his feet.

"Yes, I wondered about that, too," Madam Pomfrey replied. "It disappeared slowly, too. I thought it was just some ink that disappeared as it's bleached away by the sun. You know, like some non-permanent ink, like henna."

"It's not henna," Severus replied, amusement in his eyes.

"It disappeared as slowly as that burn mark appearing on your face. I recognised some shallow scars appearing as it did, too. What happened?"

"It's... it's a..." he floundered for words, each syllable swimming in his mind trying to come out in a torrent all at once. "It's a long story," he finally said, unable to keep his eyes away from his unblemished forearm. He hadn't dared look at it these past few days since he woke up, a small irrational fear had gripped him every time he had tried to look. But now, how odd, he couldn't stop looking.

Madam Pomfrey stared at Severus, who looked so odd. She didn't remember him being so... gregarious, in the years that she knew him as a Hogwarts student. She remembered him as a small shadow flitting across corridors, a sullen boy with bad posture like a bad omen was hanging on his shoulders.

She had to smile now, looking at Severus, all grown up, no longer a school boy, trying very hard to keep his body from doing a silly dance, staring all the while at his forearm. She smiled and sighed fondly, rising up to her feet. "Well, I suppose it would be an interesting one. The Headmaster would probably like to hear it, too."

That seemed to sober Severus up quite a bit. He stood rigidly straight, looking at her now. "The Headmaster's here?"

"He's not back yet, no," she said, brushing small wrinkles off her apron. "But soon. At least that's what he said when he floo'd this morning." She looked at him as he stumbled back to bed, all excitement gone, replaced by a sort of anxiety that made her a bit sad. "I was about to leave a note for him to come down and see you." Severus turned to study her intently, quiet. And to her horror, starting to close in on himself once more. "But, I think you've been cooped up with an old lady like me too much these past days, don't you think?" She smiled and helped him up. "You do still remember the way to the Headmaster's office don't you?"

He stared at her, and nodded minutely. "Well then, I think a longish walk would do you a lot of good," she said, merrily, pushing him towards the door. "And it's still lemon drops."

Severus nodded at Madam Pomfrey (who promised she'll join him and the Headmaster as soon as she's able), and went out of the door as in a daze. Before he reached the door proper, however, her voice called out to him. He halted and turned around. "Wait," she said, as she made her way to her office. "I think I have your wand here somewhere."

"It's fine!" he called to her, stopping her on her tracks. "I don't think I'll need it anymore."

(tbc...)

a/n: well, he's awake! he's alive!
*grin*

to excessivelyperky: i'm glad you've enjoyed it thus far, hopefully you'll continue to enjoy it. and about Dumbledore, i think he's just being a big softie, and an educator at heart. i suppose, technically one can only hope and do the best for each student passing under one's care, but still it won't stop a teacher from being a bit sad if a student turned a bad leaf. it's just something i thought about following a conversation with a teacher a few months ago. she's been teaching for more than 50 years (and still going strong), and she admits to feeling a bit guilty when she hears about some 'unfortunate' turn of life of some of her students, even though she realistically knew that she can't help them all. hopefully, it doesn't make Dumbledore off-colour too much.

risi: i must confess half the reason why severus spent so much time sleeping was because i didn't quite know what to do with him once he's awake :) and we'll definitely learn more about his backstory now he's awake enough to tell it! and hopefully, i'll still be able to do it without further confusing everyone. the story, i think, is confusing as it is already.

duj: thank you for bearing with me all this time! i thought at first it was 'puppy-love' for him, Lily a refreshing change to the sullenness of his own family; and that he clung to this image of her that he's made up in his mind, until his death. hopefully, here he'd have more interaction with Lily, discover a few things about himself, and her also; and since it's 1980, Lily would be Mrs. Potter anyway. So, I suppose it'll be interesting how Severus interacts with his ex-school friends without the trappings that so limited his interactions in canon.

thank you to everyone who reviewed, and thank you to all the readers :) i hope i haven't dug myself into an irredeemable hole with this story.