To Fix a Ruptured Heart

Always

It was by far the worst thing Tobias had ever had to live through. As a teen he had identified his mother body after the blitz, and lost his father in Dunkirk, but nothing amounted to what he was seeing now as he felt Eileen's long cold fingers clench onto his arms. He barely felt the vice grip that was surely going to leave bruises.

Instead, he focused on Severus open eyes, dead and unseeing. So cold and unfathomably empty, framed by long dark eyelashes which casted shadows across his cheeks. His skin was white, with blood and grime sticking to it, his lips partly opened exposing the blood stains on his teeth as well. His long black hair had a natural curl to it, falling past his shoulders and framing the grotesque viscera of his upper body and neck.

His throat had been ripped open, and no care had evidently been shown transporting his body. The once deep gash was now a gaping hole that had opened up wide enough to expose where flesh had been ripped away from his neck vertebrae or acidified by poison.

No words could be formed between Tobias and Eileen. There was nothing to say. Their son was dead, and both were well aware of the weight of their share on the blame. Severus had made his decisions, yes, but he had been pushed to the point where there were no other roads for him to follow. Eileen and Tobias were path makers, and proof that forging your own path would not necessarily be your happy ending.

They didn't have fond memories of Severus as a person. As a small child, he was obedient and sweet, but he lived in the bubble of a world his parents created. His identity was one of a small child, crafted by parents who watched and taught him. Severus as a person developed as a means to survive in a house of horrors and a school made to birth a generation of evils. They did not know Severus as his own person, and they would never get the chance to.

They never saw their child transition to an adult. It had been forced upon him, and then one day he was gone. And there was nothing left to keep Tobias and Eileen together. Eileen soon followed after Severus, and Tobias had to confront the past of his teen years. Being utterly alone.

He left the little house on Spinner's End to Severus, and practically drank himself into liver cirrhosis mourning the loss of a family that had barely existed. A good mate of him made him clear himself up, if not for himself, than the little boy that had practically died in Tobias' mind. Tobias had lost his wife, and son in more ways than one. His son more permanently. There was no bringing his son back.

The realization of grief apparently hit Tobias first, because he knew nothing of Eileen's reaction. The world gave out beneath him as he released a sound beyond earthly description. As though his mind, body, soul were being fused to one another and painstaking ripped apart. He would never get the chance to apologize. Not that the words would've mattered.

For not believing about the bullying, for the beatings, for the drinking. That fact that there was never enough food. His clothes worn down to rags, climbing out of windows to avoid rotting door ways and steps. For not being a father.

And Tobias saw Severus at sixteen, bruised and bloody after a beating, with a fire in his eyes that pledged to put him into an early grave. Trying to explain his grades, the eerie nothingness in his eyes when that Evans girl stopped being heard of. The appearance of having nothing to live for but spite. It was really the last time Tobias had seen Severus so closely. Image after image haunted him, the stories Severus tried to giving melting into the crevices of his mind like molten lava, and Severus had been alone. Severus battered on that mortuary table was the lid to the casket. So cold and alone.

Tobias was barely aware of the blood smeared against his body as he clutched Severus' lifeless, nearly decapitated form. He needed to warm up and he'd be fine. Just like his Tobias' mother. If he warmed them up enough, their hearts would beat and eyes light up again. And none of them would ever have to be alone. Eileen had collapsed holding onto Severus's hands.

Her miracle child. A miscarriage and two stillborn twins before him. And a difficult winter labor. And the mourning parents sobbed. A fourth name to headstone bearing the previous three. The pain and suffering was insurmountable, with exhaustion weighing down whatever shred of their souls left intact.

They stayed there as world seemed to disintegrate around them. It held little purpose for them now. And Severus began to warm in Tobias and Eileen's arms, before a light blinded Tobias eyes as he launched forward to grasp at the form of his son, before it too melded away to Tobias with his hand extended towards Eileen's back. She was facing the window of their old room in spinner's end, an owl perched watching her peculiarly from the window sill.

His mind was swimming as Eileen turned around, looking weary and worn thin, wide eyed and shaking. Not a day over how she had been at thirty six. There were no words to be given as she handed him a sealed letter, labeled by sharp gothic writing Tobias had seen scrawled across Severus' belongings. It was certainly from him, addressing both of his parents, dated the 17 October, 1976.

Tobias remember originally shooting the owl and throwing out that letter. It had been the source of another early morning argument. Now it was more precious than ever. Needing to be perfectly preserved.

Eileen pressed to his side, they carefully retrieved the letter and unfurled it, revealing a message long lost.
Severus was told to contact home after another violent altercation with a group of boys, and that his parents presence was requested to monitor him at the school.
No would not be an option this time.
Severus would not be left alone anymore.
Tobias and Eileen were going to protect him. They remembered that despite everything Severus Snape was, he was their son first. Always.