a life of smoke and silvered glass
dirgewithoutmusic
Summary:
Albus Dumbledore rose to his feet, smiling at them in that way of his, like he knew something you didn't and he was proud of you for it. "Friends," he began.
The door thudded open and the Marauders burst in, late and pink-cheeked with cold. The headmaster smiled at them, too, and Sirius gave a cheery little salute back.
Severus sunk lower in his chair, staring witheringly over his butterbeer. "You told Potter about it, too?"
"He might as well put all that energy to good use," said Lily. "And, to be accurate, I told Remus."
"But Potter, really?" said Severus.
"He and Black cooked up a jinx that gives you a boil every time you say a slur to a Muggleborn," said Lily. "It was either invite them to Alice's war club or bake them cookies, and I know where my skills lie."
Severus sniffed. "Don't come crying to me if he tugs your pigtails."
"Come crying to me if he pulls yours, and I'll deck him," said Lily.
(Slight AU in which Severus apologizes, tries harder, and stays friends with Lily)
Notes:
anonymous asked:
i have a prompt for you: what if snape hadn't called lily 'mudblood' that day. what if their friendship had stayed strong, unbreakable. would he have grown to be a better person? would lily have loved him, rather than james? would harry just have another godfather? would james and lily have survived?
And I sort of answered.
Work Text:
When Severus was seven, he fell in love with the girl down the street. She had long red hair and dirty knees and she offered him half her candy bar one drizzly afternoon, waiting outside the school for her parents to come pick her up.
His parents weren't coming— dad working late and mum at the pub recounting old Hogwarts glory stories, talking of years when her life was magical-- but he didn't tell Lily that. He was just waiting for the older bully boys who lurked in the empty lot on his way home to get bored and leave.
He ate the candy slowly in neat little bites while she grinned and told him about her big sister's feud with the science teacher, like her Tuney was some sort of hero in a political espionage drama. She talked with her hands, narrow little things with freckled backs. He watched her wave from the back window of her mother's car and then he started the long walk home.
When Severus was fifteen, James Potter dangled him upside down in the quad and laughed. Severus landed on elbows and knees. The bruises would stay for a week. The memories would not die with them— James's cocky grin, the laughter in the spring air, the long whip of Lily's red hair.
He felt small, bug-like, his knees pressing into the grass. His mother would come home some nights, kick the threadbare carpet, rattle the battered old pans in the cupboard, curse a Ministry that hated purebloods, that sucked up to halfbreeds and Mudbloods, that left the true wizards to rot in filth. He would curl up, make himself small, bug-like, imagine a chitinous shield growing over his shoulders, his spine, the softness of his kidneys. Some days, his father slept through this. Some days he screamed back.
After Severus met Lily, he would curl up under his covers, small, bug-like, and read through the comics she'd lent him with his hands pressed up over his ears. He wanted Professor X to come take him away. He wanted to be someone special, someone saved. He wanted a giant to burst through his door and frighten his mother and offer him a squashed birthday cake and a way out.
When Severus was fifteen, he slammed to his knees on the green Hogwarts quad. Laughter burrowed into his ears, like curses, like the nights his father screamed back, and when Lily stepped toward him he snapped, "I don't need help from a Mudblood."
