Title: Blue October, Volume One – Chapter Twenty.

Author: Woodland Goddess.

Rated: M

Author's Note: Sorry for the delay on this one guys! I got side-tracked by a really awesome fic that I was reading ^_^ I'm sure you all know what that's like! Thanks for reading/reviewing; I appreciate all of you! Feel free to let me know what you think of this chapter.

Chapter Twenty: Sparks and Sonic Screwdrivers

Severus quickly went to work in the backroom at the Pharmacy, doing his best to catch up on the work that he had missed while engrossed in The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection. Though he did not manage to get all of the work done, the progress he made in such a short space of time made Mr Evans happy regardless. Severus was just finishing up his final essay when the door to the backroom opened. Severus did not raise his eyes; he knew who stood in the doorway. Even peripherally, that fiery red hair was impossible to miss.

"Aren't you even going to look at me?" Lily demanded of him, her hands on her hips. Her satchel was resting against her leg, hanging from her shoulder. "I didn't mean to upset you, yesterday." Severus nibbled his lower lip, but still he did not look up at her. While he wanted, more than anything, to share his exciting news about his newly acquired wand, he did not want to do so at the risk of forsaking his pride; it was the only thing he had left. He would not acknowledge Lily's presence until she offered a proper apology to him. Lily made a noise of frustration and stomped across the room to him, the door swinging shut behind her. "Don't make me hit you," she whined, coming to a stop beside him.

Those words were enough to make Severus look up. It was a slow process; he dragged it out as much as possible, irritating her all the more. "Did you say something?" he asked innocently, raising his brows questioningly. Lily glared, but the expression only amused him, bringing the slightest smile to his mouth. Lily sat in the chair on the opposite side of the table and stared pointedly at him, folding her arms across her chest. "Judging by the look on your face, you clearly expected me to say something else."

"Obviously."

"Well, I'm not going to; in fact, I'm going to sit here and wait for you to say what I want to hear." Severus fell silent and reached into his book bag, withdrawing his Defence Against the Dark Arts text book. He flipped it open to the last chapter that he had been viewing earlier that day and began to read. He was quite adept at ignoring people when it was necessary. He knew that Lily was staring at his book, wanting nothing more than to read it with him, but he denied her the possibility.

The silence stretched for an indeterminable amount of time, until Lily finally muttered something. He almost did not catch it, but it was too quiet of an apology, as if she were only apologising for the sake of reading the book and not because she truly meant it. Severus, turning the page over almost casually, questioned her on what she might have said to him. "I said I'm sorry," Lily groused, throwing her hands up in the air. "Are you always this much of a pain in the arse when things don't go your way?"

"Yes." Severus dragged his gaze up from the pages of his book, to see Lily eyeing it with a covetous expression. Amusement tugged at the corner of his mouth. Lily was as greedy for knowledge as he was. "I'm assuming you want to know what this is, now?" he asked, waving it around dramatically.

"Yes!"

Severus dived into a rather in-depth explanation about the book and its relevance to the Wizarding World. The excited look that lived on Lily's face throughout his explanation was priceless. He puffed his chest out with pride, pleased that he had been the one to introduce the girl to the book. "It gets better," he said brightly, before reaching into his book bag. Severus withdrew his wand and Lily gasped in shock and awe, that covetous look returning to her face. "My wand; I got it this morning, for my birthday."

Even as an expression of bliss came over Severus, one of horror came over Lily. She stared across the table at him in muted dismay. "Hey, what's the matter?" he asked her, confused.

"I forgot about your birthday! I didn't get you a present!"

"So?" Severus asked, utterly bewildered by her reaction to the knowledge. No one had ever cared whether they remembered his birthday, save for his own mother and even she had difficulty finding the funds to get him a present every year. Today had been one of the extremely few times he had even been given a present at all. Not even Mr Evans had inquired about his birthday in the past. In truth, Severus was not certain what he would have done with himself had he been given more than one gift that day.

Lily buried her face in her hands. "I'm a terrible friend," she wailed in misery.

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic, Lily," Severus chided lightly, frowning across the table at his friend. "It doesn't matter, really. Besides, it's not like I'll be able to get you a present for your birthday, so we're even..." Lily shook her head, but Severus could tell that she did not understand how he could be so unconcerned about the whole thing. "In the future, when I get a job," Severus continued, "we'll get each other brilliant presents to make up for it. So, don't...you know...worry about it."

Lily began to whine about it, before Severus cut her off, waving her concerns away. Silence ensued, thick and awkward, as Severus rubbed his left arm. After a while, Lily broke the silence, asking how long they had to wait until he was free to leave. "I could probably go now...there's only about fifteen minutes left. I'll ask Harry." Lily waited patiently in the backroom, staring at Severus' wand and text book desirously, while Severus toddled out to the front where Mr Young and Mr Evans were handling customers.

Severus waited until Mr Evans was free, before slipping up to him, quietly speaking to him. Severus beamed when he returned to the backroom once Mr Evans had given him a positive answer. Severus tidied up his things and the pair of them left the Pharmacy, happy in the knowledge that they had made up after yesterday's debacle. Though he had thought that Lily should be the one to seek him out and apologise, Severus would have hated for it to drive a wedge between them, especially when it had happened so close to his birthday.

Severus accompanied Lily when she suggested that they go to her house. He did not mind; it was better than parting with her and going home. He could survive through any looks Mrs Evans gave him or harsh words thrown at him by Petunia, if it meant getting to spend time with Lily. Slipping into the garden at the back of the house, Severus and Lily curled up on the grass, surrounded by flowers and shrubbery and garden benches. Her hair was like a river of fire in a forest of green and brown. "What does a wand do, exactly?" Lily asked as Severus withdrew said item and his textbook from his bag.

"Oh, it does loads of things," Severus said excitedly, pushing a lock of his hair behind his face. "People can make it open and lock doors, do medical scans, detect life forces and –"

Lily interrupted him almost immediately, causing his excitement to deflate a little. "So, it's basically like a Sonic Screwdriver?" she asked curiously, reaching out to take the wand in her hand.

Severus' grip on the wand tightened immeasurably and he jerked it away from her approaching hand, a possessive expression coming over his face. "I don't know what a Sonic Screwdriver is, but it's probably nothing like my wand," he answered, feeling only slightly guilty when a slighted expression danced across Lily's face. He knew she was as excited as he was about it...but he had only received the gift that morning; it was not a requirement to share birthday presents on the day one received them. He would let her have a go the next day.

"How can you not know what a Sonic Screwdriver is? Every British child knows what it is! It's only a very useful item that The Doctor carries around when he goes on his adventures!" Her offence at not being allowed to touch the wand quickly melted, being replaced with a scandalous expression.

"Doctor?" Severus asked, bewildered, looking at his friend as though she had lost all of her marbles. "Doctor who?"

"Exactly," Lily replied, clapping her hands excitedly. "Doctor Who – the television series broadcast by the BBC! Dad and I love it!" Severus stared across the space between them for a long moment, waiting for it to sink in. Gradually, her chipper attitude began to deflate as she realised that Severus was looking at her in that unfathomable way of his, though it was clear that there was something the matter with him. She gnawed on her lower lip. "Severus...why are you looking at me like that? What did I say?"

"Lily...I don't have a television," Severus answered pointedly, his eyebrows knitting together in a heavy frown. "Why else would I have had to watch the moon landings at your house?" He shook his head and tore his gaze away from his friend, looking off into the distance. He could hardly believe how forgetful the girl was; she normally remembered everything. "How could I know the same things that every other British child knows? I'm not like the rest of you. You should know that by now..."

"Well...we'll have to remedy that, won't we?" Lily said, taking hold of his free hand, gaining his attention once more. Her cheeks held traces of pink, as if she had just been blushing with mortification. She squeezed his hand lightly. "The next episode will be airing tomorrow night! You'll have to come over and watch it with us! I'm sure you'll love it! It's brilliant. There's science. There's fiction." Lily rambled on about Doctor Who for several more minutes and, amused, Severus listened to all of it.

Severus admitted, even if only to himself, that the television program did sound intriguing. Time-Travel was nothing new to the Wizarding World; it would be interesting to see how the Muggle World viewed the concept as a whole and how they could justify it without the use of Magic. Severus would withhold his full opinion on the matter until he had, at least, seen one episode. He supposed there would be a temporal flux capacitor of some sort involved – something that could create a temporal vortex, at any rate.

Severus shook his head. The science that would be involved for a Muggle method of time-travel was too mind-boggling for him to comprehend at the present time. "Can we get back to the topic at hand?" Severus complained, waving his wand in the air demonstrably. Derailed from her babbling, Lily nodded, looking at the wand with exceptionally eager eyes. "I was reading the textbook earlier; the first spell mentioned is the Wand-Lighting Charm. It doesn't seem too complicated; we should start with that one."

Gripping his wand tightly in his right hand, Severus opened his textbook to the page which indicated the wand movements and incantation for the spell. He practiced the wand movement without the incantation first, ensuring that he had perfected the single-swivel flourish that the book's moving diagrams indicated. Once he had it down to an art, he began memorising the incantation. His heart beating rapidly in his chest at the thought of using his wand for the first time, Severus incanted the spell while performing the flourish with his wand-hand.

A rush of excitement filled him when the end of the wand glowed with a soft light. The positive result was clear to them; the evening was settling heavily around them, the sky darkening with every minute that passed. Lily squealed happily and clapped her hands together. "Well done, Severus! Can I try?" Severus opened his mouth to decline her request, but that damnable pout pulled at her lip. Severus allowed the spell to die, feeling distinctly uncomfortable as Lily gazed at him, still pouting.

Severus finally caved to Lily's desires, wincing as he reluctantly held the wand out to her. A look of triumph flashed in her emerald eyes, the pout vanishing instantly as she reached eagerly for the wand. As soon as her fingertips touched the red wood of the wand a series of angry sparks shot out from the tip. Lily jerked her hand back with such speed that Severus was worried she had been burned. The sparks fell upon the grass, igniting into flames. Panicking, Severus grabbed the book and began beating at the small fire, smothering it to the best of his ability.

It was fortunate that the grass had been laced with a growing amount of dew as dusk approached. Breathing heavily, Severus asked if Lily was alright. She was fine, of course, though startled. Neither of them had expected his wand to react that way. Severus supposed it had reacted to its master's reluctance to let Lily use it. "Maybe we should call it a day," Lily whispered, her face pale. "It's...it's getting late." Severus knew that was just an excuse, but he let it slide; she was bound to be frightened of him after the wand had reacted that way.

She would be right as rain the next day. Packing away his things, he offered a soft apology for his wand's behaviour and hugged the shaking girl warmly. Lily's grip on him was tight, but brief. After she ran into the house, shutting the backdoor on him without a word, Severus made his way out of the garden. Armed with his wand, Severus had no fear of the encroaching darkness. He walked home at a good pace, though it was not one that would cause him much pain. He was quite used to the burn of walking at this point that he had a rather high threshold for it.

When Severus arrived at the house he found, to his intense irritation, that Tobias had already returned home for the evening. Eileen was serving the man his dinner. Severus was surprised he could even manage to get the spoon into his mouth, considering how inebriated he was. When Eileen saw Severus in the doorway, she readied a bowl for him. A sneer curling his lip, Severus deposited his bag upstairs, washed his hands and returned to the kitchen. He sat in his usual chair, adjacent to his mother and opposite his father.

"You were late home today, Severus," Eileen commented, taking her own seat at the table.

"I was...reading," Severus answered airily. Judging by the expression on his mother's face, she understood perfectly. Tobias, at the other end of the table, snorted into his bowl of broth. Severus ignored his father to the best of his ability, reaching for his spoon. He ate a few spoonfuls, refraining from wincing at the lack of substance to it. He knew his mother was trying her best. A Witch cannot conjure food out of nothing; one must have it on hand in order to multiply it. If one does not have it, one cannot make more. "Mr Evans has always encouraged a healthy obsession with reading. He says that you can never go wrong with a good book."

"They never go wrong with a good wallop, either." A heavy silence fell upon the kitchen at Tobias' words. Eileen's knuckles turned white she was gripping her spoon so hard. Severus' spoon froze on its journey to his face. The expression on Tobias' face was frightening. "I don't want to hear about your precious Mr Evans." Tobias spoke of the man as if he were the most disgusting topic that could ever be discussed at the dinner table.

"It's not my fault that you feel inferior," Severus muttered, his voice barely more than a whisper. His heart leapt into his throat when Tobias jumped up from his chair, hands sending the table flying. Eileen let out a gasp, lunging for the bowls, trying to save them from hitting the floor; she could not abide such waste. Tobias, in a fit of monstrous rage, struck his wife across the face with the back of his hand for getting in his way, knocking her to the floor. Severus fled from the kitchen, his chair toppling over in his wake.

Tobias followed after him, his boots thudding heavily with each step he took. Severus was quick on his feet, but not quick enough. Tobias caught up to him near the top of the staircase, his hand grabbing a fistful of Severus' hair. The boy let out a scream of pain as Tobias yanked on his hair, almost ripping the scalp from his head. "I'll show you who's inferior," Tobias hissed, hauling him up the rest of the way, dragging him – Severus struggled every step of the way – into Severus' bedroom.

Severus almost bit off a chunk of his tongue when Tobias flung him down upon the floor. Severus scrambled to get up and run, but a boot to the abdomen put a stop to that idea. His body curled in on itself automatically, trying to protect his innards from Tobias' assault. "You bast –" Severus began, coughing the words up as his recently swallowed broth surged back up his throat.

"Don't make me hit you!" Tobias roared with fury, cutting the boy off mid-word. It was a cruel parody of Lily's words from earlier. "Honour thy father!"

"What for?" Severus spat at him, not even deigning to raise his head and look at his father. Severus did not raise his voice, but the hatred and bitterness were all too evident in his tone regardless. "You don't do anything but abuse your family; Mr Evans is ten times the father and man you'll ever be."

"SHUT UP!" Tobias struck out with his foot again, landing another hard blow to Severus' torso, earning a whimper of pain. Severus wanted nothing more than to whip his wand out of his satchel and threaten him with Magic, but he was afraid that Tobias would grab it from him and snap it in half, like he had snapped his bone, once upon a time. "Don't talk back to me, you little demon!"

"Hit a nerve, did it?" His question was decidedly barbed. He knew that it would make things with his father even worse, but he could hardly help himself. Severus glared up at Tobias contemptuously, his lip curling in a sneer at the sight of him. A vein in Tobias' forehead pulsed violently and he grabbed Severus' arm, pulling up him from the floor, only to strike him hard, sending him sprawling again. There was a rustle of fabric and a jingle of metal as Tobias pulled off his belt. When Severus tried to crawl away, he rammed his foot down onto Severus' rump, holding him in place.

The whip came down in a whirring arc, lightning fast...

To Be Continued