The Love I Don't Deserve

Growing up never was a fun thing for Severus Snape. From the day he was born he had been an unwanted presence not only to his magic hating father, but also to his mother. Because he too was a wizard like his mother was a witch, his father would be angry at his mother for giving him a useless son. So in the Snape household there was no love spared for the young boy.

Severus often fled the house to stay form under the belts, frying pans, empty bottles or even bare hands, as all were eager to hit him at any given moment. Even if he fled the house the neighbourhood bullies were always happy to let him know that he wasn't wanted. At a young age the boy had turned into a very gloomy person and spend his time mostly hiding in the garden shed all the way at the back of their neglected backyard.

Sometimes Severus did visit the playground just behind the fence surrounding the overgrown garden, interested in the voices of two girls. They had moved to Spinner's End a year ago, and so Severus slowly but surely got curious enough about the to spy on them from a considerable distance. That was until the one with the red hair one day flew of her swing.

Even if his father hated magic and his mother didn't love him, he knew what magic was and what it looked like. And what he had just seen was definitely magic. Throwing away all caution he approached the girls and told them it was magic that the red haired girl had just done. At first they didn't believe him, so he showed them a little magic himself by making several fallen leaves float around the tree.

After that they met regularly behind the fence of the backyard. The girls watching him do magic tricks for them. This went for quite a while and the girl with the red hair started mimicking him in doing magic tricks and soon the afternoons doing magic tricks tured into studying magic. The other girl didn't like it one thing she couldn't participate in their magic tricks made made that know to Severus whenever her sister wasn't looking.

It started with subtle sneers and hurtful whispers. Severus easily ignored them, as he was already used to behavior alike to that from his parents and neighbourhood bullies. So the other girl went further in letting know she didn't like it she was being casted out of the fun by giving Severus a push, kick or jab here and there. Even if he didn't like the abuse he thought he deserved it because he was already wanted, the only reason he helped the red haired girl was because she was like him and he wanted to protect her from people like his parents and her sister.

So Severus continued helping the red haired girl and taking blows from the younger sister, every time he went behind the fence of the jungle like garden he returned later that day with more bruises than he had left with. Thing escalated the summer when both he and the red haired girl received their Hogwarts letter. The younger sister wanted to go too and started to threaten Severus verbally, again nothing new to him as his parents did the same thing.

When words didn't seem to work the girl took to worse. Two weeks before they were supposed to go to Hogwarts she snatched one of the shard knives her mother used to cut vegetables with. Thinking her sister wasn't looking she took out the knife and pointed it it Severus, at first he didn't even register it as a danger until the girl shoved it up his neck, almost slicing into his skin.

''You are going to make that old coot make me go to that magic school too, or I will slice you up in pieces,'' She whispered in his ear. ''You have been playing with that magic in front of me for years and I deserve it much more than you, as I am much better than you are.'' The girl was about to say something else when her sister looked up from one of her new study book to ask Severus about the paragraph she was reading. To her surprise her younger sister was pushing a knife to the throat of her best friend.

''What are you doing Petunia!'' Lilly yelled at her sister in shock, startling both Severus and Petunia. Not having an explanation to her sister Petunia just stared at her sister, Severus on the other hand stepped away from the knife and answered, ''Your sister was just asking me to make the headmaster accept her to Hogwarts.'' Calmly like she didn't just threaten him with a knife.

Lilly was looking very unhappy with his reply, ''Again Petunia, what are you thinking?'' she asked, ignoring Severus. ''Threatening my best friend with a knife to learn something you can't do.'' Again no word came from her sister, Lilly did hear a gasp from Severus. What had she said that made Severus gasp for breath she wondered, as she looked at him. His eyes were wide open and his mouth slightly agape, never before had anyone ever called him a friend.

For as long as Severus could remember he was always unwanted and unloved. So of course he wasn't worthy to be anyone's friend, and now he was named someone's friend, someone he had only been helping because he thought he was protecting her. Now she was protecting him from her crazy sister.

The moment was interrupted as the mother of the girls walked into the playground, having heard the commotion going on. She quickly took the knife and made her apologize to Severus and was taken inside. Leaving Lilly and Severus alone.

''Hey Sev, why did you seem so surprised by me calling you my best friend?'' Lilly asked boldly to the dark haired boy. Severus pulled a face of indifference as he said, ''Someone like me doesn't deserve to called a friend.'' turning his face away from Lilly he went on,''My parent always said I shouldn't have existed and that I am a bother, what your sister did was something I deserved.''

Getting up he left a speechless Lilly behind at the playground, why would he think that, he had always been nice to her and had always helped her when she asked. She couldn't even wrap her mind around what her sister had just done, and now her best friend saying he wasn't her best friend. A sad Lilly went home for dinner. The remaining two weeks Lilly went to the playground in the hope of talking to Severus, but he didn't show up.

So the day they were going to Hogwarts she made her parents go early so she could wait for Severus. She had also talked to her parents about what Severus had said about that he deserved what had happened, that was also when her parents told her that Petunia had been bullying him ever since she knew she couldn't do magic.

Her parents had said that Severus most likely thinks he deserves the lack of love he gets from people around him, as the boy had always seemed a bit drawn back to them. So that day Lilly went to King's Cross station, determent to tell Severus he was her best friend and she was his and that he was worth the love she was giving him.

She stayed determent to convince him during the next five years, defending him against James and his friends and talking to him even if they were sorted into different houses. That was until he went too far and called her a mudblood, after all that time that she was trying to be his friend she gets repaid with being accused of having dirty blood. Enough was enough and it seemed like Severus just didn't want to be loved, just like her parents had thought years prior, people accept the love they think they deserve, and Severus definitely thought he didn't deserve even an ounce of it.

Thank you very much for reading! Don't forget to leave a review, because those will be appreciated a lot. And maybe check out my profile and other stories.

This fiction was written for the Prompt of the day Challenge from The Golden Snitch forum.

For this fiction I used the prompt: (quote) we accept the love we think we deserve (March 3rd)

Word count: 1365

LadyMuis, Mahoutokoro School of Magic, Kaze