February 2007
Severus grew increasingly frail. What little weight he'd managed to gain since the end of the war had melted away. As January fed into February, Harry had little choice. He could either put Severus in a hospital, where he would get care but be treated poorly by nurses and doctors that judged him harshly, or they could bring in a hospice nurse and he could be kept comfortable at home.
In the end, what could Harry do but accept hospice. So a nurse, an older woman named Nancy, moved into their house so Severus could have around the clock care. She was confident in her ability to keep him stable, but warned Harry he didn't have much time left.
Severus spent the short weeks of February listening to music, mostly Queen, and thinking how ironic it was that the very same illness that took Freddy Mercury from the world would take him as well. He also spent time getting to know the new young people in the house and played games with Teddy when he had the energy.
February was ending and it was a beautiful winter day with three foot of snow. Something Severus had loved about Montana, the snow. In Cokeworth, what little snow happened to fall was quickly turned sooty and dark with pollution. At Hogwarts, they got more snow but it was ruined by the fact that he hated being there. Here in Whitefish, the snow was so deep at times it felt like nothing could ruin it. There was also more wilderness here; deer, elk, bears. He'd seen a bear that morning. It felt like a sign.
It was his time. He called Harry in to sit with him and held his hand in a rare display of affection.
He said softly, in a rasp of his former silky tones, "I have a fragment of a poem to tell you."
Harry smiled at him and nodded.
He started coughing and then recited, "
Whoever you are, now I place my hand upon you, that you be my poem,
I whisper with my lips close to your ear,
I have loved many women and men, but I love none better than you.
O I have been dilatory and dumb,
I should have made my way straight to you long ago,
I should have blabb'd nothing but you, I should have chanted nothing but you.
I will leave all and come and make the hymns of you,
None has understood you, but I understand you,
None has done justice to you, you have not done justice to yourself
None but has found you imperfect, I only find no imperfection in you."
Harry's eyes started to water, seeing what Severus was avoiding saying, or trying too hard to say. "I love you too, stubborn man. Whose poetry is that?"
"Whitman…Walt Whitman. Do you remember?"
He burst out a laugh in surprise. Severus meant that poem he had read to Harry when they first reconnected on that special trip.
Harry squeezed his hand and made to stand up, but Severus gripped his hand tighter. The younger man must have seen something in his face because he stayed put and even kept Teddy home from school. Teddy, with all the grace of the eight year old he was, climbed carefully into Severus' lap. The family sat that way for a long while, then Severus said he wanted to rest his eyes.
Harry guided Teddy out of the room and turned back. Severus looked deeply into his eyes from the couch he lay upon and smiled at him. He smiled back and left to prepare lunch. When he came back an hour later, Severus had his eyes closed. Harry lightly shook his shoulder, but a feeling of unease settled in his gut. He checked Severus' pulse point. Nothing. He was gone. He fell to his knees beside the couch, clutching Severus' arm to his chest as tears came and didn't stop.
They had just not had enough time. Harry sobbed for what had been and what could have been. Teddy heard him crying and came in. He was old enough to understand death as a concept, they had talked to him about his birth parents after all, but this wasn't some far off idea of a person. This was Severus who had helped raise him. The man who helped him with math homework and let him pet horses at his job. The young boy's hair went black as ink, as black as Severus', and he gripped Harry's shirt and they mourned together.
Harry could hear Hermione walk by and was relieved when she went to the phone to call the children home from school so they could mourn themselves.
How would he recover?