Ch. 12 Snivellus and the Mudblood

(A/N) ok if you think this is a stupid or sad chapter, blame JK Rowling because this is the chapter where there is a lot of stuff from the books (because she put a lot of things from the past at the end of fifth year...) Anyways I'd like you to notice that this chapter is also out very quickly. :D

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or it's characters or the scene from chapter five. It has been shortened because I really didn't want to put the whole long scene in and I added my own flare.

Life continued on as usual except for the fact that Severus continued to actually study for his exams. Last year's results had really had an impact on him, Lily noticed. Tara and Lily had had a long discussion after the dance about their dates. Apparently Tara had had a wonderful time but she didn't get kissed either. Lily felt strangely relieved but pretended to be sympathetic while Tara sympathized with Lily over the stupid things James had done on the date.

Lily ignored the Gryffindors, with the exception of talking to Remus a little now and then. James didn't seem to have lost any of his confidence by getting turned down and continued to strut down the hallways, playing with his snitch. When did James become this cocky? Lily asked herself. Hopefully it was just a phase he would grow out of eventually.

Because she did not hang out with them anymore, Lily didn't notice any strange behavior on their part, unlike Severus. He kept mentioning it to her and she eventually watched them one day. They did seem to be hiding something and sneaking outside all of the time, looking over their shoulders. She brought it up with Severus one day in the common room.

"You're right, I think they are up to something," Lily stated blandly as she walked into the room.

"Who's up to what?" Severus asked as he was hurriedly finishing his potions homework.

Lily sighed. "James and Sirius and...the rest, and I don't know what!" she said, frustrated.

"Oh," he said, putting the finishing touches on his homework. "Yea, I think I'm going to follow them tonight to find out," he said casually.

"No! I mean...that's probably not the safest or best plan, Sev. What if they try to frame you or something? You know how they always have plans..." she argued.

Severus laughed. "Lil, no offense but I think I can take care of myself when it comes to those four if I want to."

Lily raised her eyebrows. "Oh really?" she asked skeptically.

"Yes!" he said indignantly. " I'll go follow them tonight and find out what they're doing. It'll be no problem at all."

"Maybe I should go with you..." Lily started

"No Lil that's not necessary. Besides, I don't want you to have to see that conniving little Gryffindor's evil plots. I'm sure it won't be very pleasant," he said insistently.

Lily sighed realizing that she wasn't going to win. "Fine, just be careful ok? And don't take to long or I'll be sitting up in the common room all night worrying."

"Who sounds like a mother now?" he asked grinning as she glared at him. "I'll be fine; there's nothing to worry about."

***

Later that night, Lily sat up in the common room staring at the door. She had tried reading at first, but that was no good, especially since the book she was reading was a muggle mystery horror story where a man gets killed when he was on a walk. Next she had tried pacing, but she soon became tired and people got annoyed at her. After a while she just sat down and tried to think of something else as the common room emptied when it became later and later. The hours crawled by but Lily couldn't sleep or relax. Where was he?

Finally, she saw him burst through the common room white as a sheet with his hair rumpled and scrapes all over his face and arms. Lily ran over to him.

"What happened?" she asked, alarm apparent in her voice.

Severus let out a few shuddering breaths and fell into her arms. "I...I went to the shack with the whomping willow in front of it...and...Lupin...was there...L...Lily...Tara was right! He is a werewolf!" He took a deep breath and added in a scornful voice, " Just as I was about to be attacked, James jumped in...and pulled me out."

Lily gasped in amazed horror at this. "Lupin a werewolf? That's impossible..." she whispered.

"No, no I saw him Lily...stupid Gryffindors. I was almost killed...and worst of all, James saved my life! JAMES! Of all the idiotic, stupid, horrible things that could happen in my life..." he spat out spitefully.

"At least you're alive," Lily consoled, getting hold of the situation finally in her mind.

"Bah!" he growled so spitefully that Lily jumped. "What good is it if I owe Potter my life?"

Lily shook her head. "You don't owe him anything, Sev. He should have told me about this or something."

"Well, everyone will know soon enough. We need to go to the Ministry of Magic and report him! They can't expect us to go to school with a werewolf!" he practically yelled.

"No, Sev! We can't tell the Ministry! It'd be awful for him to be kicked out; it'd ruin his life! We can't do something that heartless...in fact I don't think we should tell anyone at all," she said.

Severus looked at her strangely. "What?! You can't be serious. He almost killed me tonight or turned me into a werewolf...he'll be dangerous for other students too."

"No he won't Sev! Think about it! Who else is going to follow him there besides one of us or one of his friends who already know. We shouldn't tell anyone!" she pleaded.

"So basically you're saying you don't even care that I was almost killed!?" he yelled.

Lily sighed. "Of course I care! It's just we can't ruin..."

"Well he almost ruined my life!" he growled.

"Well you can stop just thinking about yourself!" she said back, getting annoyed.

Severus snapped. "What good is a friend if they don't care at all about you!?"

"Do you think I don't care? Why do you think I've been sitting up here waiting all night?" she screamed, very annoyed.

"And yet, when it comes to one of the precious Gryffindors or me you'll pick them every time. Oh don't hurt precious REMUS, oh James isn't that bad, oh James is so hot, James James James...I want to go with James...honestly Lily do you ever talk of ANYTHING ELSE?" he yelled.

Lily's face turned red in anger and her fists clenched at her sides. "That's NOT true! If you weren't so caught up in yourself and actually LISTENED you'd know that!"

"Ingrate."

"Jerk!"

"Witch!"

Lily laughed, "Thank you!"

"That's not what I meant!"

"Greasy haired idiot!"

"Mudblood," he said in a deathly quiet voice.

"WHAT did you just call me?" Lily cried out.

Severus's voice rose. "You heard me! Mudblood! Yes stupid little mudblood who ruined my life, who made me turn against everything I ever valued, who stripped me of my pride, who made me turn against everyone that I cared about!"

Lily looked deep into his dark, anger filled eyes as hers filled with tears. "Don't ever speak to me again," she said in a deathly quiet voice and went up to her dormitory.

***

For not the first time Lily thought she was the most miserable she had ever been in her life. The only friend who she was still talking to was Tara and she had refused to take sides in the fight and still hung out with Severus. Lily tried not to resent this, but it was hard. Why did people have to be so stupid all of the time?

As Lily watched from afar, she noticed Severus becoming more and more sloppy and caring less and less about his appearance. He spent most of his time in his room or studying defense against the dark arts in the common room. He let his hair fall free and long where it often fell in his face. The only time she saw him look happy was when he was with Tara. He rarely looked at Lily and the few times she caught him looking at her he quickly turned away.

With lack of anything else to do, Lily started hanging out with Tara's Ravenclaw friends. Time crawled on and on. Gryffindor beat Hufflepuff for the Quidditch Cup, much to the disappointment of Tara and Lily, who were cheering against James and Sirius.

Finals approached and everyone started to study like crazy. As usual, Lily became a book worm trying to cram as much information in her head as possible, but she couldn't make herself care as much as usual. What was the point? she thought. She had lost two of her closest friends. Even though Severus had hurt her very deeply, she knew that he didn't really mean what he had said. Everyday she promised herself that she would resolve the problem between them, but she couldn't quite get the courage to finally do it. She couldn't even think about becoming friends with James again while he had that stupid snitch, either, so she was stuck.

Exams came as usual and Lily went through the motions of taking them. She tried her best but didn't really care how she had done. After her last test, Lily went out on the lawn, towards the lake, thinking. To her disgust, she saw a crowd around James and Sirius and someone they seemed to be picking on. Lily started running until she came to the scene. To her horror she realized that they had knocked Severus down and were jeering at him.

"Leave him alone!" she screamed at James. "What has he ever done to you?" she questioned feeling tears form in her eyes.

"It's more th fact that he exists..." James said with a laugh, "But I'll leave him alone if you go out with me, Lily."

"I'd sooner go out with the Giant Squid than you," she said haughtily. "He'd probably be a better kisser anyway."

Some people in the crowd laughed a little including Severus.

"Bad luck Prongs," Sirius said. "Oy watch out!"

But it was too late and Severus had created a large gash on James' face. In a flash Snape was upside down. Lily paused a minute in surprise.

"Let him down," she said turning to James again.

"Fine," James said putting him down, but Sirius cursed Snape again.

Lily was appalled. She pulled out her wand. "Leave him alone!" she yelled.

"Very well," James said, "you're lucky Lily was here for you Snivellus."

"I don't need help from mudbloods like her," he sneered.

"Fine, then I won't in the future," she snapped at Severus, hurt. "And change your pants," she said. She hated to see him like this, so uncaring about his appearance and his pride, not to mention calling her a mudblood. After a minute she added, "Snivellus" to the end of it.

He glared at her as James sneered, "Apologize to her."

"I don't want you to make him apologize...you're just as bad!" she yelled.

"I would never call you a you-know what!" James said defensively.

"It doesn't matter–you're so cocky with your stupid snitch. You don't care at all for others! Get away from me," she said stalking off, tears forming in her eyes. When she was a little farther away she turned around to see Tara yelling at James and Lucius, Crabbe, and Goyle helping Severus up.

"YOU IDIOT!" she heard Tara yell and saw her pop him one in the jaw, say something to James that wasn't loud enough for Lily to hear, turn around to make sure Severus was alright and then stalk off with the four Slytherins.

Lily ran to her dormitory and cried until she fell asleep.

***

She woke to pounding on her dormitory door.

"Let me in Lily!" shouted Tara's voice.

Lily groaned. "What do you want?"

"Come down to the common room," Tara yelled back.

Grumbling, Lily got up and ran a brush through her hair before going to the common room which was empty except for Lucius and Tara.

"What do you want?" asked Lily, yawning.

"We decided," Tara said glancing at Lucius who looked as if he would rather be anywhere but there, "that you and Severus need to make up. It's making you and Severus sad and is just making life miserable for all concerned."

She turned and looked expectantly at Lucius.

"Um," he started, "yea, Sev's been pretty down and although you're just a m..."

Tara elbowed him.

"Muggle born, he for some reason thinks you're something special, no matter what he might say to you. He's been moping for months. Just apologize to him."

"ME!? Apologize to him," she yelled, "after all he's done to me?"

"I'm sure he'll apologize to you after," Tara pleaded. "Please? For me? You know you want to..."

Lily was still mad beyond anything at Severus, but she missed him terribly. "I still think he should apologize first...I mean he..."

"Called you a mudblood," Tara stated blandly. "Oh boo hoo. You insulted him, called him names and humilated him. I think you're more than even." Tara thought for a minute and then said, "I know he hurt you, hun, but please let's end this?"

Lily felt a rush of anger come over her at this, but only, she realized, because Tara was right. They were more than even. Slowly she climbed the stairs and knocked on the door. Severus opened it and just stared at her blankly.

Not knowing quite what to say, she followed her insticts and jumped into his arms crying, "Oh Severus, I'm so sorry! Will you please forgive me?"

Severus was completely taken aback by this and stumbled a few paces backward under Lily's weight. He stood there for a second and Lily became worried. What if he didn't forgive her? But then he put his arm around her and stroked the back of her head with his other hand.

"Of course, Lil," he said quietly. "But only if you forgive me. I've been...terrible."

"Of course I will," Lily said choking back tears and finally taking a step back from his embrace to look at his face. She smiled. "I've missed you."

Just then Tara and Lucius walked into the room.

"You've made up!" she exclaimed happily, throwing her arms around both of them and motioned Lucius to join them.

"Yea, it's a group hug, come on Lucius," Lily teased.

"Um, no thanks," Lucius said backing quickly out of the room. "I"ll catch you later Sev..."

All three of them burst out laughing.

***

The end of the year seemed to come to quickly now that Lily was happy again. As usual, Lily and Tara sat by themselves on the train ride home, discussing life.

"I wonder if James will ever get a clue?" Lily sighed.

"I wonder if his bruise has healed yet," Tara laughed.

Lily laughed back. "I wonder if we'll be prefects," she speculated after a moment.

"I wonder if you two will ever shut up!" a boy yelled from across the aisle who was trying to sleep. It was Gilderoy Lockhart.

Tara raised an eyebrow. "I wonder if people will ever start being nice to each other," she sighed.

"Most likely not," Lily stated plainly.

"That's a cheerful thought," Tara said sarcastically.

Lily grinned. "I try," she said in a mock cheerful voice.

There was a slight pause.

"Do you think these are really the best years of our life, Lily?" Tara asked suddenly.

"Why?" Lily asked.

Tara smiled ruefully, "Because they haven't been very good lately."

"No," Lily said, "that's probably a myth. The best years are probably when we are in our 20's," she said nodding sagely.

"Of course when we're 20 and trying to get a job but failing, you'll wish you were back at Hogwarts."

"Of course," Lily said grinning.

And so the girls rambled on about life until the train reached the station.