Chapter 4: China and Chocolate
The return trip on the bus was actually more enjoyable than the previous one, almost as if the driver was trying to be careful due to the growing storm. But it was also due to that that Lily was starting to feel drowsy, and within a few minutes was laying her head on the pillow as she took a short nap.
While she was resting Severus looked at her sleeping form, and watched with a mixture of facination, lust, and love with every breath that she took. He could not believe the luck he had today, despite how it all started out with Tobias yelling over his mother, Eileen, as she cowered over the sink washing the dishes, then turning on him as Severus ran out the door and out of the house. It was something he was used to, but it still hurt him knowing that his father would never love or care for him as he had hoped he would. This was something Snape never told anybody, even Lily.
Eventually, the day grew better as Severus found refuge in an old house a few blocks down that he and Lily used to hide in when they were little. They now used the house as a private studying area and brewery for some new potions they created, because it would look suspecious if a Muggle saw them with textbooks that had moving covers and titles written in old runes while a phial with a violet substance was emitting steam from the top. He stayed there and worked on some new spells he had been developing over the summer, and could not wait until school started to try them out.
Soon it was time to meet Lily at the park, as she had written earlier and sent their pet black bat, Reinfield, to 'their house' with the message to meet there at five-forty that evening. Her parents had gone to the cinema to watch a double feature, and Petunia was expecting her boyfriend over and decided to make him dinner. So that left Lily all to himself for the remainder of the day.
What he did not expect was the mark on Lily's face while they talked in the glade. He was used to getting manhandled and bruised, but there was no way he was going to let Lily suffer the same fate, no matter who it was that harmed her. He also did not expect to find out that Lily, the sweet Lily Evans that he knew since he was nine years old, had a darker side to her that called for vengence against her older sibling.
Looking back on that, he did seem to notice that she was also trying to keep a friendly distance between them and kept getting a perculiar look in her eyes, as though she was arguing with herself about something. He just could not place it...
Suddenly the bus jolted to a stop and both the young witch and wizard rolled out of their beds and on the floor between them. When she looked around Lily once again found herself in the lap of Severus Snape, and, once emerald met obsedian again, both of them started to blush.
"Last stop, Westminister Park! Everybody off!" cried the conductor.
After detangling themselves from their awkward position, Lily went to get the umbrella from the bed but it was gone.
"Sorry, Miss," Ernie cried from the driver's seat. "But I think it fell out of the basket and someone probably grabbed it. Look's like you'll have to share with your friend there," he added with a bitter taste in his mouth.
Grinning sheepishly Severus lead Lily toward the door. Once he stepped outside, he opened the umbrella and offered her his hand, which she took, though shyly. Then they set off to Lily's house, squeezing tightly under the umbrella to protect their exposed limbs.
On the way both of the fifteen year olds kept stealing glances at each other, as they did earlier that day, barely noticing they were still holding hands. To Lily it felt both shocking and beautiful all at the same time to be this close to someone who was like a dear friend to her. But to Severus, it felt like the most natural thing in the world and he wanted to stay that way forever.
"It feels like we just got married," he thought brightly. "I know she only wants us to stay friends, yet I can't help but feel like she wants us to be more as much as I do. Perhaps I should make the first move, but not right now. Right now, I feel like the happiest man on the planet."
"See how right this feels?" Lily's other half asked. "This could turn out to be something more if you'll let it."
But Lily kept trying to shrug it off, trying to convince herself that they were just going to stay friends, yet she felt like she was failing, which infuriated her more. She hated to fail at anything.
Finally, they reached her house, and saw her parent dark blue, 1972 Chevrolet parked in the driveway. When they got closer to the door they could hear the muffled sounds of her parents and sister's voices behind the door. Severus stepped forward and rang the doorbell, which silenced the voices for a moment.
The door opened and a whirl of short, light red hair came out and clapsed Lily in a tight hug, followed by the sound of Adriana Evans' tearfilled voice in her daughter's hair.
"Lily! Oh, my Lily, Lily, Lily!" she kept saying.
Alarmed Lily lifted her mother off her shoulder and looked her in the eyes before saying, "Mama! What is it? Is something wrong? What happened?"
"Everything's fine, love," Harry Evans answered as he stood at the doorway. "Ana, why don't you let the kids come in first before you all catch pneumonia out there?"
Nodding, Lily's mother lead the young ones inside while her father stepped aside to let them pass.
Upon seeing Severus, Harry smiled and said, "Hello there, Severus! How have you been? Thank you for taking care of my daughter for today. Petunia said she was spending some time with you, and we knew you would be ever the gentleman. Right?" he added, with a protective twinkling in his eye for his youngest daughter.
"Y-Yes sir. Of course, sir," the black haired boy answered nervously. He always liked Mr. Evans, and he knew he only had his daughters' best interests at heart, but he was always nervous when addressed about his time with Lily. Severus was always hoping to make the right impression as far as her parents were concerned, because he, very much, wanted to be considered as a worthy suitor for Lily.
Clapping him on the back, Harry took Severus over to the living to sit on the floor by the fireplace close to Lily, while Adriana went to make some hot chocolate.
Petunia, was sitting at the far side of the sofa, looking angry and defeated at the same time. Her lips were pursed so thin they looked like they would disappear into her mouth. Her limbs were crossed in a way that she looked like a crinkled, pink raisin, and her feet were close to her chest, while her pale eyes were swimming in bitter tears.
Every two seconds she would look at the pair sitting underneath some towels her father draped over their shoulders, and shoot threatening daggers at their backs. She quickly looked away when her father meet her gaze with a warning look. But she quickly did it again when she felt her younger sister's gaze on her form.
Adriana finally came into the living room, bearing a silver tray with five steaming mugs of hot chocolate, and a small bowl of miniature marshmellows and serving tongs.
When everyone got a mug and how ever many marshmellows they wanted, Mrs. Evans sat down next to her husband on the loveseat and everyone feel into silence as they sipped their drinks.
Gradually the silence and the tension were getting to her, so Lily tried to strike up a conversation with her parents, who were still giving their eldest daughter disapproving looks.
"So, h-how was the cinema?" Lily asked with a half-hearted smile.
"Oh, pretty well. Thank you for asking dear," her mother replied.
Petunia gave Lily a scathing look before returning to her drink.
"Yes, very well," Mr. Evans added, once again giving his blonde daughter a warning look. "Two great movies in a row. All starring your mother's crush, Michael York," he said with a small chuckle as his wife playfully hit him on the arm.
"But enough about us," Harry continued after everybody, except Petunia, stopped laughing. "Tell us about your day, little Tiger Lily. What all did you do after your mum and I left for the cinema?"
Blushing slightly at her nickname, Lily said, "Well, first, I went to the park to meet Sev and just talk about school, what classes we would have later...That sort of thing."
"Oh," Harry said with a small nod.
"Then we took a ride on the Knight Bus. That's the local transportation for any witches or wizards that are in a place where there are no other means of travel," she explained to her parents, knowing she will have to go more in depth about it later. They were always facinated by the wizarding world.
"We went to The Leaky Cauldron and had dinner, then we came back here," Lily concluded while she and Severus finished their hot chocolate.
"So they can go on a date together, but I can't spend one afternoon with my steady," Petunia whispered with venom leaking from her voice.
"Petunia, it's not that at all," Lily tried to reassure her as she stood up and put a hand on her shoulder. "Sev and I were just spending some time together to give you some time with Vernon."
"SHUT UP!" Petunia screamed. Lifting her hands over her head, she sent her still full mug crashed to the floor as she stood up to face the red head. The contents and china spilling everywhere on the white carpet of the living room, and close to Lily's feet.
"Petunia Diana Evans!" her father exclaimed. "That is no way to speak to your sister, or act in front of our guest," he indicated to Severus as the remaining people in the room stood up from their seats. Severus moving closer to stand behind Lily.
"You're in enough trouble as it is with what you did earlier," Harry continued. Then he turned to Lily. "Lily, when we were at the cinema, about to watch the second movie, a call came for us at the front desk. I went up there and heard Mrs. Sullivan on the other, and do you know she told me? She told me that she saw Petunia, our own Petunia, push you out on the path and yell at you about your "abnormailities" and to stay away until we came back at nine o'clock.
"So we cut our movie date short and came back here to see if any of this was true. When we came in you were gone, and we found Petunia act most... un-ladylike with this Vernon Dursley chap. Naturally, I had a few good words to say to him," he said while clenching his fists and unconsciencly flexing his toned arms. "Then he left and we had your sister explain what was going on. Then waited for you to come back safely. Thank you again, by the way, Severus," he nodded at Severus with a smile, which Severus returned.
"When I asked you to tell us what you did while we were gone, I knew you would omit the incident between yourself and your sister. But I must ask you, to honestly and completely, tell us what happened after your mother and I left."
Looking back at Petunia with sad eyes, Lily retold what happened to her before she went to meet Severus, all the while taking his hand and squeezing it slightly when her tears threatened to spill from her eyes. After the truth was told Mr. and Mrs. Evans took their eldest daughter to the kitchen to discuss punishment, leaving Lily and her guest in the living room alone.
Trying to find something to do to fill the silence that returned, Lily gathered up the shards of the broken mug while Severus collected the others and placed them on the tray, tears beginning to fall from her eyes.
Just then, a pale hand with long fingers was on top of her outstrechted hand as she moved to collect more pieces from the carpet with his other hand grasped his towel, and, for the third time that day, green met black. Again, there was the temptation to turn from friends to lovers as they studied each other's faces and settling their sites on the lips. Quickly turning away they continued clean up.
Soon the other three returned to the living room before going there separate ways: Petunia rushing to her room upstairs, but not before giving Lily a look that was clearly soaked with vengence; Adriana thanking the young people for cleaning up the mess and taking the tray back to the kitchen, and Harry walking Severus to the door while Lily followed.
The umbrella from the Knight Bus was gone when they came to the front door.
"Severus," Mr. Evans said. "Why don't you let me drive you home? Heaven knows I can't let you walk out there with it still pouring down. You may catch a cold, and I wouldn't want you to be sick before you and Lily headed back to school."
"That's very kind of you, Mr. Evans," Severus replied, quite surprised but pleased.
Turning back to get his coat, car keys and spare umbrella the two tempted friends were once again left alone.
"Wow, Sev!" Lily said with a smile. "Papa really seems to like you, and I don't think it's because of what happened with Vernon," she added when it looked like he was going to say the opposite.
Grinning, Severus said, "Yeah. Things seem to have been going my way today. But what about you? Did you enjoy today?"
Thinking back on what happened to her today she said, "Honestly, Sev? I didn't think things were going okay with me."
"Oh," he said sadly.
"But," she said gazing into his eyes, a mysterious and mischievious look playing in her eyes. "After spending some time alone with you, yes, I believe I did enjoy today. We should probably do this again soon."
"I think so, too, Lily," Severus said, a smile playing at the corners of his lips. "How about, when we get our letters for this year's school supplies? We can make plans to meet at the Leaky Cauldron and see what happens from there."
Smiling brightly at the suggestion Lily said, "Great! So, I'll let you know when we get our letters."
"Okay. See you then," he said quickly when Mr. Evans returned, holding a spare umbrella in one hand while the other was around his keys and his own umbrella.
A few minutes later, after telling Severus it was okay to keep the spare, both men headed outside into the summer storm, in the car and drove off to Spinner's End.