Thunderstruck [Harry Potter]

II

They ran through through the frozen rain, little giggles escaping from Lily's mouth. Every so often, Severus would turn around to look at her wide smile and let out his own tiny one in return. Lily barely paid attention to the way they were going; she was still fascinated by Sev's charm. Thunder rumbled nearby and rain fell a few meters away from them, but Lily felt no droplets on the top of her head. She looked up to see a dome of motionless raindrops accumulating above them.

    It was only when Sev pulled her behind a moss-covered house and reached down to open a rotted cellar door that the charm was broken and Lily pulled out of her trance. The rain instantly continued to fall around them again and Lily's blouse wilted slightly.

    Weeds grew up to Lily's ankles and moss and vines twisted between the broken and crumbling bricks of the house's wall. Sev looked up at her from where he was reaching down to open the cellar doors. He looked almost...embarrassed. His pale cheeks were reddened slightly and his eyes were crinkled at the sides.

    He glanced into her eyes for a moment before silently bending back down to open the rotting cellar doors. He wrestled with them for a moment before aiming his wand at the lock and whispering, "Alohomora."

    He had told Lily that his mother was a witch and therefore he was allowed to do magic at home. She was unsure if that meant she could do magic as well.

    The lock sprang open and Severus opened one of the doors as quietly as he could. He gave Lily one last look, before turning and jumping down into the darkness. There was a thump as he landed below and moments later, a dim, flickering light filled the open space beneath the cellar doors.

    Severus's hands appeared to lift his friend gently down into the basement. She moved forward and Sev's long fingers wrapped themselves around her waist. Lily couldn't help but shiver at his touch. She hoped he didn't notice. She had held those hands multiple times before, but the coldness of his touch and electric energy that passed between them always surprised her.

    Sev was surprisingly gentle. He pulled her down gracefully into the dimly lit room and placed her gently in front of himself. Lily was shorter than him and her eyes only reached his hooked nose. Still, they were very close and Lily found Sev looking deeply into her eyes once again.

    After a few moments, he blinked multiple times and shook his head like a dog and droplets of water flew everywhere. When he noticed that he had gotten his best friend wet, Sev opened his mouth to apologize, but Lily shushed him by shaking her hair out, too. Lily giggled and Severus couldn't help but let out a little chuckle.

    Lilly broke his gaze and turned around to examine the dimly-lit basement. Little cages with all sorts of spiders and rodents and toads littered the ground and hung from the ceiling, each of them making their own animal noise. Lily had to force herself not to squeal as her head almost bumped a hanging rat cage.

    A rickety-looking wooden bookshelf held stacks and stacks of tattered, leather-bound books on one side of the room. Even more books littered the floor, most of them open, their pages subject to the breeze of Severus' terse stride. Two brass scales, one wooden table, and three standard-sized pewter cauldrons sat on the cement floor at the other end of the room, the cauldrons bubbling and smoking in different colors. 

    Beside them sat another rickety wooden shelf, this one holding countless glass jars of potion ingredients, most with unscrewed or absent lids. Upon closer inspection, Lily noticed that many of the items inside the jars were still moving, such as a snake tongue and what looked like a human eye.

    Another wall was bare, except for multiple cracks and abrasions that symbolized rogue spells had hit it multiple times. The whole basement was eerie, as the single lamp in the corner cast dancing shadows on every item and the wind from outside howled against the dilapidated house.

    When Lily turned back to Severus, his eyes were alight with an interest and excitement that Lily hadn't seen since their first day at Hogwarts.

    "D-D'you like it?" he asked, obviously hoping with all his heart that Lily thought it was as wonderful as he did.

    A flash of lightning outside illuminated his face in an almost eerie way, but Severus didn't notice. The rumble of thunder that followed shook the house slightly and dust fell from the ceiling.

    "I-It's great, Sev," Lily said, trying with all her might to believe the words. "It really is."

    "So what did you want to talk about?" Sev asked, the excitement still shining in his eyes.

    "I need some help with potions homework, actually," she told him, retrieving her books and sitting down. 

    She opened her potions textbook to the page she had bookmarked and got out her parchment and quill. Sev scooted closer to her and looked over the report.

    "Oh, I did this," he said. "Personally, I think the eel eye doesn't work nearly as well in this potion as an ashwinder's eye does."

    He got up and paced over to dig through his bookshelf. He rifled through stacks and stacks of books, before pulling out a grimy, worn, leather-bound book. He opened it to the same page Lily's book was on and sat down beside her.

    The page he was on had the same black type hers did, but in the little margins he had scribbled hundreds of notes. There wasn't a square centimeter of space without his long scrawl written in black ink all over it.

    Severus pointed to a few barely-legible notes, "See? It changes the color of the potion, but increases its effectiveness by at least 130 percent!"

    Lily offered a weak smile at her friend's enthusiasm, "So what else do I add in?"

    Severus tapped his chin, "Why don't we make it? Then you'll remember it more easily."

    Lily shrugged, but let Sev pull her to her feet and over to an already-boiling cauldron. He poured it's contents into three glass phials so he could fill the cauldron with Lily's potion, before completely forgetting his mission and holding them up to Lily.

    "Guess what this is?" he asked excitedly.

    "I have no idea."

    "It's a potion I created. Here, I've got the notes, somewhere."

    He bent down and picked up a tattered notebook from below the cauldron. Lily noticed the words Snivellus Greasy written in bold red ink across the first few pages. She recognized that handwriting, and it wasn't Sev's. It was James Potter's.

    Severus found the page he was looking for and showed her. The notes on this particular potion were extremely intricate and Severus had filled up at least five pages about this particular brew.

    "What does it do?" asked Lily.

    Severus smiled, but didn't answer. Instead, he muddled through his storage shelf of potion ingredients. He found a small dropper and filled it with the potion from one of the green phials. He passed silently over to a cage with a toad and picked up the creature.

    When he came back, he placed it on the wooden table in front of Lily as she watched in fascination. He looked once into her eyes, searching for interest or excitement, before squeezing a single droplet of the potion onto the small creature. Instantly, the frog squealed in pain as the potion burned a hole through it's slimy hide.