Snape's POV
I was down in my office at Hogwarts, eating lunch, when there a knock on my door. This surprised me, as there were few teachers around Hogwarts this early in the Summer.
"Come in," I said, setting aside the sandwich I had been eating. The door opened and Albus walked in, an envelope in his hand.
"An owl brought this for you, Severus," he said, handing it to me, "a ministry owl."
"Thank you, Albus," I said as I opened it. I read it quickly and swore softly.
"Anything wrong?" he asked mildly.
"No. Well, yes. I'm supposed to clean out Ellen's rooms at the bookstore in Diagon Alley. I've been putting it off for months. …I'll have to do it today…and I'll have to take Olivia with me."
"Poor child," he said sympathetically.
"I hate to have to put her through this," I said heavily.
Dumbledore smiled his knowing smile and I cleared my throat and straightened up.
"Still, she is a strong girl," he said.
"That she is," I said, then cleared away my lunch with a wave of my wand, "I have to go now, Albus."
"Of course. Good luck."
"Thanks."
I Floo'd back to the house after Albus had left my office. I stepped out of the fireplace to find Olivia was not in the sitting room, though everything looked significantly cleaner than I had ever seen it. I checked the kitchen- no Olivia there either, but it was also clean. I headed upstairs to check her bedroom. Halfway up the stairs my ears detected the sound of music. It wasn't uncommon for Olivia to play music on her battery-operated stereo, but this wasn't the Muggle rock and roll she usually played- this sounded like the Eagles. I would have dismissed it as just my imagination, but the farther I got up the stairs, the louder it sounded until I was certain that someone was playing "Victim of Love".
When I reached the top of the stairs, I found the attic door open. I climbed up to find Olivia sitting at the end of the attic, her back to me, looking at a book. My father's record player was sitting on the floor, the record spinning around and around. As I approached, I saw that the book Olivia was looking at was actually my photo album from my days at Hogwarts. Instantly livid, I grabbed her shoulder. She yelped loudly, whirled around awkwardly, and threw the photo album at me defensively. It hit me rather painfully in the stomach and fell to the ground.
"What are you doing in my attic?" I demanded through clenched teeth.
"Oh…I…uhm…" she stammered fearfully. She was cowering before me and looked genuinely afraid. I didn't like seeing her frightened, especially of me. I took a deep breath and tried to calm myself- this was as much her house as it was mine now. Just then the song that was playing ended and the song "Desperado" started to play. I closed my eyes and listened- this had been my parent's song. My mother told me they had danced to it on their wedding day. I remembered hearing her sing it a lot when I was younger, as she washed dishes, did laundry, or cleaned the house. If Tobias wasn't home she would open all the windows and sing at the top of her lungs while she cleaned.
"Snape?" Olivia said cautiously, jolting me back to the present. I opened my eyes and looked down at her.
"Are you mad at me?" she asked concernedly. I exhaled slowly and closed the photo album with my foot. I picked it up and put it back in the box I had been in.
"I'm not mad," I said finally, "Come on."
I extended a hand and helped her to her feet. She followed me to the stairs. I paused long enough to turn off the record player.
"I like that band," Olivia said quietly, more to herself than to me.
"…That record player belonged to my father," I muttered. She said nothing, but looked at me. I shook my head and ushered her down the stairs. When we were on the floor, I waved my wand and the stairs disappeared back into the ceiling.
"Now, stay out of the attic, understand?"
She nodded her head.
"…I got a letter from the Ministry today," I said heavily.
"Oh?"
"Yes, uh…we're supposed to clean out the bookstore. I've been putting it off for months now. It must be done."
She said nothing for a moment, then nodded.
"Right. Let's go then," she said. It was hard to tell from her expression if she was upset or not, but I got the feeling she was.
The two of us went downstairs to where the fire was crackling in the fireplace. I took a fistful of Floo Powder and handed her the sack.
"I'll go first," I said to her, "See you in a bit."
I tossed the powder into the fire and stepped into the emerald flames.
"Cain's Books," I said.
The last thing I saw before vanishing was her pretty face. She smiled a small smile and waved. I allowed myself to smile back, then was gone.
A moment later I stepped out into the bookshop and looked around while waiting for Olivia. Someone had already come and taken all the books off the shelves. Olivia stepped out of the fireplace a moment later and looked around.
"Where'd all the books go?" she said.
"Someone came and took them already. The person your Mother rented the shop from I imagine."
"Yeah. …Let's just get this over with. There's only my room and Ellen's. We have some boxes out back- Ellen threw them out there whenever she got new shipments of books. I guess they're still out there, unless someone took those too. …You can clean out her room, I'll clean out mine."
"Okay," I said with a nod.
We went out back and gathered as any boxes as we could carry, then went back inside to begin our tedious task.
Olivia's POV
A few hours later, the bookstore I had lived in my entire life was completely void of any personal artifacts. Snape and I used our magic to send the boxes of stuff back to Spinner's End. Now all that was left was the pot of Floo powder Ellen kept on the mantle piece. I took the pot and offered it to Snape. He went first, then I followed, taking the pot of Floo powder with me.
When I appeared in Spinner's End, there were boxes all around the sitting room. I pulled out my wand and levitated all of my stuff up to my room, then came back down.
"What should I do with Ellen's stuff?" I asked Snape dully.
"You can put it in the spare bedroom, if you like," he said from where he sat in the armchair. I nodded and with a flick of my wand, started to levitate the boxes upstairs.
"By the way," he said and I paused, "…Thanks. For cleaning the house."
"You noticed, huh?" I said with a somewhat bitter smile.
"Three decades worth of dust and grime gone, of course I noticed. You did good."
"Well, you're welcome. If I wasn't going stir crazy around here I wouldn't have done it," I said and continued upstairs.
The next morning I woke up earlier than Snape and went downstairs to the kitchen. By the time he came downstairs I had prepared a large breakfast for the both of us. He sat down at the table, rubbing his eyes blearily.
"Coffee?" I asked, pouring him a cup.
"Yes please," he said with a yawn, "…Why are you making breakfast anyway?"
I shrugged and set the cup down in front of him. There came a faint tapping at the window.
"Ah, that'll be the newspaper," Snape said, starting to stand.
"I'll get it," I said, beating him to the chase. He sat back down while I opened the window for the owl. It wasn't the paper, however. It was a sleek-looking black Ministry owl, loaded down with papers. It hopped through the window and fluttered past me to land on the table beside Snape.
"What's all this?" he said, untying the papers. When the owl was free of its burden, I fed it some toast and gave it some water. It hooted gratefully before flying off. I sat at the table to eat, looking curiously over at Snape, who was reading over the papers. Finally he set them aside and continued eating.
"Well?" I said through a mouthful of eggs, "What is it?"
"Don't talk with your mouth full," he reprimanded.
I swallowed and repeated my question.
"It's paperwork," he said.
"What kind of paperwork?"
"Paperwork concerning you. Adoption papers and whatnot. Another thing I've been putting off. Guess I'll go into Hogwarts later than I intended."
After breakfast, Snape went and sat in his chair in the sitting room to fill out the paperwork. I grabbed a book off the shelf and flopped down on the sofa to read. A short while later, Snape looked up at me.
"Your middle name is Turtle?" he said with a slight chuckle.
This struck home for me. I slammed the book shut and chucked it at him.
"Don't ever call me that again!" I growled and headed upstairs before he could react.
I lay facedown on my bed for a long time, until I felt certain Snape was gone. I got up slowly and started downstairs. When I approached the sitting room, I heard voices. One was definitely Snape, whereas the other I didn't know. Visitors at Spinner's End were very uncommon and I went quickly down the stairs.
"-come to discuss the land in Ireland which, according to my records, now belongs to you," said the unknown voice.
"I wasn't aware my family had land in Ireland," Snape said.
I hurried into the sitting room.
"It's a farm," I informed him.
"I wasn't aware you had a daughter," said the man who wore Ministry robes.
"He doesn't," I snapped, sitting on the arm of Snape's chair so that I wouldn't have to sit on the couch beside the Ministry man.
"Oh. Well, that's highly inappropriate-"
"No one asked your opinion," Snape said stiffly.
"Do your parents-"
"They're dead, okay?" I said coldly, "He's my cousin and he took me in."
"Oh! Are you-" he paused to shuffle through his papers, "-Olivia Cain?"
"Yeah. So?"
"The land in question belongs, in part, to you when you become of age."
"Which won't be until December. I used to visit that farm when I was little. Ellen used to send half the shop's profits down there. What happened to it?"
"That's the thing. They haven't had enough money to keep the farm going and no one to be in charge- Ellen Cain used to give the orders and with her gone… Well, the most advisable thing to do would be to sell the land, Mr. Snape."
"No way!" I protested loudly. Snape and the Ministry man both frowned at me.
"I'll have to get back to you on that, Mr. Moore," Snape said to him.
"Of course. I'll expect your decision by owl within a week," said the man. Then he stood and Snape stood as well and showed him out.
When Snape came back into the sitting room he sat on the couch with a sigh.
"Snape, please don't sell that land," I begged, sitting beside him on the couch. He looked over at me and I put on my sad puppy-dog face which I had used often with Lupin to get my way.
"Well…what do you want to do with it?" he asked, looking away from me.
"Keep it a farm, of course. I could go down there for a few weeks, straighten things out. I'll use the money Ellen left me in the bank…"
He was silent a moment, then looked over at me.
"…You mean we shall go down there for a few weeks," he said finally, "And I will take care of the money."
"You mean it?" I asked, elated.
He nodded. I threw my arms around him and kissed his cheek. He cringed and pushed me away.
"If you ever do that again, I'll lock you in a dungeon for the rest of your life," he snapped.
"Could be fun," I said with a grin. He scowled at me.
"It's remarks like that which make people like him say things like 'inappropriate'."
"Could be," I said, still grinning. I headed for the stairs to pack my things.
"Wait, what could be?" Snape asked. I just smiled and continued upstairs.
Author's Note: This is where I decided to make the break between Year 5 and Year 6. I'm not really sure why. It just is. Oh and I also wanted to remark that I haven't done any sort of calculations, but I'm sure the Eagles probably wouldn't have been in the same time frame as Snape's childhood, but I really really like that song and I might make a future reference back to it, so please no one complain about it. I know it's not the same time frame, but this is fiction and it's my fiction so I think I can do that.
Sorry for that little rant. Everyone please read and review. J And stick with the story, it gets good. Don't you want to come back and read what happens when Snape and Liv go to the farm?
~LilReporterGirl