Chapter Text
“I would like my love to die
and the rain to be falling on the graveyard
and on me walking the streets
mourning the first and last to love me."
--Samuel Beckett, "Trois Poèmes"
"It is your turn, beloved,
It is your flesh that I wear.
It is your world, beloved,
It is your flesh that I wear.
It is your song, beloved,
It is your flesh that I wear."
--Leonard Cohen, "Avalanche"
Once upon a time he had said he would do absolutely anything for Lily Evans. When he'd made that proclamation though he'd hardly expected her to attempt to wrangle him into something as ridiculous as getting a pen pal.
“Come on, Sev, it will be fun,” she pleaded as her friend perused the bookshelves he'd all but memorized. Since his indoctrination into wizarding culture he'd spent the better part of every visit to Diagon Alley in Flourish and Blotts, enjoying the quiet serenity the shop offered. Though he often didn't have enough money to procure new reading materials he still found solace in simply being surrounded by the printed knowledge of those who had gone before him.
“I don't understand why you can't do it without me,” he said as he took a book off the shelf and thumbed through it. Upon realizing that it was a text on divination he scowled and pushed it back into its place on the shelf.
“I just think it will be good for you. Maybe you'll meet someone you get along with who isn't me or a future Death Eater for once.” She tossed a handful of Bertie Bott’s into her mouth and winced, obviously tasting something she'd rather not.
“You ought to be careful with those things. What's got you making that face?”
“Grass? Maybe...vomit? I'm not entirely sure. Even vomit is bearable when it's pumpkin flavored as well.” She offered the open bag to Severus only to have him wave it away. “Stop dodging the question.”
“I don't want to meet anyone, Lily. Even if I do, what would I write to them? I highly doubt there's anyone in the world who’d like to hear the woes of a poverty-stricken adolescent from Cokeworth.” He watched her as she re-tied the top of the bag of beans and shoved them into the inner pocket of her coat, tucking the snack close to her side.
“Maybe you could write to your pen pal about more cheerful things?”
“Like?”
“I'm not sure. What makes you cheerful?”
“You,” he said. She laughed quietly and he could feel himself blush, warmth tinting his cheeks. “And potions, I suppose.”
“And the dark arts.”
“You don't enjoy those.”
“But you do.”
“Yes and you often chastise me for having an interest. It's easier to keep it out of our conversations entirely. Are you buying anything or shall we leave?”
She glanced at the door and bit her lip gently. “You go on ahead, I'm going to sign up for the pen pal service.”
“Suit yourself. Maybe you'll find someone who loves charms and nasty sweets as much as you.”
She watched him leave, the bell over the door tinkling gently as he did. As she approached the counter she smiled inwardly, genuinely pleased with herself for scheming as shamelessly as she was.
Maybe you'll meet someone who’ll have a positive influence on you. Merlin knows I can't deal with you alone.
-----
The first Saturday after the start of his fifth year Severus had decided to skip breakfast in favor of working on a paper for his advanced arithmancy class. He thanked the Gods that enough light had been able to stream through the window of his dorm despite the murky water on the other side as he had been developing a headache since he'd opened his eyes that morning. All at once that piercing pain had come to a head as Mulciber banged the door of the room open, a small stack of envelopes held under his arm.
“You got mail today but you weren't there so-” he held a pair of letters out to the boy gingerly, a small smile on the corner of his mouth. “One's from your mum and the other’s from some girl. I didn't look too close but the address seemed to be foreign.” After handing the two off he kicked off his loafers and hopped onto his own bed, the wood creaking under his weight.
He set the letter from his mother to the side in the spine of the book he'd been studying and turned the other over in his hands. It was addressed neatly in a font bearing certain feminine similarities to his own but Mulciber had been right, it certainly was foreign and the sight of the front of the envelope sent a wave of anger towards Lily rippling through him.
Lisa Roth
Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Massachusetts, USA
Severus Snape
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Highlands, Scotland, Great Britain
It bore no postmarks, other than a faded pink stamp in the effigy of a feather quill scribbling across thee corner, the name “Callidora’s” written across the top. He immediately tightened his grip on the letter, crumbling the edge a bit as he realized that this icon was the same as the one that had been in the window of Flourish and Blott’s, the name of the pen pal service he had most certainly not joined of his own volition.
-----
“What in the bloody hell is this, Evans?” he spat as he tossed the envelope onto the girl’s book. His inquiry was immediately met with a harsh “shh” from Madam Pince and so he silently took a seat across from his friend.
“Someone wrote you! I'm still waiting for someone to write to me. This is so exciting!” she whispered to him. He frowned and shook his head.
“How did this person get my information?” he asked, only to be met with another, more passionate “Shh!”
“From Callidora’s, of course.” She said with a smirk. He sighed heavily and hung his head, angry at the slight betrayal he felt.
“You gave my information away? Even after I'd thoroughly expressed my disdain at the idea?”
“You need more friends, Sev. It'll be fun. Just give it a chance.”
“You're a pain in the arse, Lily.”
“Maybe so, but you keep me around, don't you?”
-----
Hello Severus! My name is Lisa and I got your information from Callidora Fancourt’s pen pal service. I hope you don't mind my writing to you and I hope this letter finds you well.
I'm currently sixteen and I just began my sixth year at Ilvermorny in Massachusetts which is a state in the North Eastern United States. I'm from Chicago, Illinois though, which is a state in the middle of the country that has a lot more corn than Massachusetts does. Some of my favorite subjects are charms and herbology and I'm also a member of Dueling Club but I'm not a very good member. I usually lose duels.
I come from a small family, just my parents and one brother though unfortunately my mother is no longer with us. My brother was also drafted into the Vietnam war a handful of years ago but he just got to come back home for good on account of him getting hurt.
I noticed in your profile that you're interested in potions and even though I'm not too into potions I figured we would have something to talk about there. I like herbology after all and what would a potion be without ingredients?
I'm just looking to make a new friend is all. I saw the sign and thought that it would be fun to talk to someone from somewhere I've never visited. Additionally I don't have many friends to begin with. If you decide to write back please tell me a little about yourself! Are you a good duelist? What do you like so much about potions? What is your family like?
Thanks for taking the time to read this. I hope you write back!
Yours,
Lisa Roth
He tossed the paper onto his bed and buried his face in his hands in an attempt to squelch the pain radiating from his temples. He rubbed at his head in circles, still angry that Lily had solicited his personal information without his consent. How many more damn letters can I expect? What if this bint becomes fixated on me? With a sigh he moved the paper from his bed to his night stand and he turned off the light, intent on figuring out what to do to stop the letters in the morning.
-----
Lisa Roth:
I'm sorry to say that I would not like to continue correspondence with you. Unfortunately a meddling friend of mine volunteered my information when I had made it abundantly clear that I did not wish to participate. I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you as it seems as though you were quite excited to make an acquaintance. I'm sorry to disappoint you.
Good luck in your future endeavors.
Severus Snape
-----
“You wrote her back just to tell her to piss off? Merlin, you're a bigger bugger than I thought.” Lily took a break from reading over her essay from the night before to catch a letter in her hand as the morning post arrived. She smiled as she read the sender’s name and put it into her school back quickly, as if to keep it out of sight.
“If I were in her place I'd like to get some sort of response rather than silence. Imagine if there were a dozen people she wrote to and none of them ever responded. At least this way she knows she won't be getting another letter from me.”
“Yeah but she's going to open your letter and be overjoyed to have received something back and then that's going to come crashing down once she reads your message. I'd be heartbroken.”
“It's not as if I was rude to her. I simply told her that my involvement in the exchange had been nonconsensual and I didn't wish to continue.”
“You make it sound as if I was asking you to kill someone’s cat and you just couldn't bear to do it. You could have at least humored me a little bit.”
“And you could have respected my wishes but you didn't, Lily. You're always doing things like this.”
“Like what, Severus?”
“Forcing me into doing things I'd rather not. I often don't want to be sneaking around after curfew, I hate it when you try to coax me into spending time with you and your Gryffindor pals and now this. Honestly, Lily, you could consider my feelings once in awhile.”
“Well excuse me for trying to get you to have a bit of fun. You're so tightly wound sometimes it's hard to tell if you'd even like to be friends anymore.”
“What do my mannerisms have to do with our friendship? I'm simply busy with my studies most days, aren't you as well?”
“My studies don't include dark magic.”
“Here we go again with that lot…”
“I'm serious, Sev. Maybe if you didn't hang around with those Slytherins all day you'd be in a better mood.”
“The more you say about them the more I begin to think you're only jealous, Lil.”
She audibly scoffed as her jaw dropped an inch at the disparaging remark. “Me, be jealous? Of your affiliation with the children of confirmed Death Eaters? Of course, Sev. Whatever you've got to tell yourself to sleep at night.” She shoved herself out of the bench she'd been sat in trudged away in a huff. As he watched her leave he sighed and once again enclosed his head with his palms against his temples, the slight skidding of a paper on the table under his bone drawing his attention. He looked down at it and was almost alarmed to see another envelope, his would-be pen pal’s name emblazoned on the front. Instead of waiting to retire to his dorm he opened it there, casting the envelope aside carelessly.
Severus-
No worries. I understand. If you ever change your mind and do want a friend feel free to write back sometime. Good luck in your own life.
Yours,
Lisa
-----
As Madam Pomfrey diligently knotted the bandages riddling his forearms Severus only stared blankly at the wall in front of him, gritting his teeth and tightening his fists in an effort to contain his rage.
“Those boys have been causing trouble since the day they arrived. It's dreadful that you're always the one they single out.” She finished the knot and stepped away to wet a washcloth which the boy took from her and only turned over in his hands.
“They almost killed me tonight and that's all you've got to say? That their behavior is dreadful?”
The nurse pursed her lips and gave him a condescending pat on the shoulder in an attempt to comfort him. “They're only boys. I hardly believe your death was their endgame.”
“Maybe you'd be more inclined to believe it if you were living in my skin,” he said coldly. He scooted off the bed he'd been sitting on and winced as a shot of pain radiated from his ankle as soon as he hit the floor. “But it's clear to me that I've no one on my side in this. Thanks anyway.” Before the matron could speak another word he was out the door, trekking his way back to the dungeons in silence as the early morning light began to drift through the castle’s windows. As he approached the entrance to the Slytherin common room he let out a deep breath and let the tears that had been welling in his eyes for the past few hours falls. He'd been tricked and worse, tricked by Sirius Black and his gang of miscreants. When had he allowed himself to slip so far as to trust them? When had he mentally reasoned that his morbid curiosity was more important than his physical safety? As his anger at himself came to a head he balled up his fist and struck the brick wall as hard as he could, the knuckles in his right hand becoming red and sore as they scraped along the rock. Deciding that release had felt rather good he took another swing at it and another until the back of his hand was raw and open, the blood dripping down his palm and into the end of the bandages he'd just been equipped with. When he realized what he'd done he closed his hand into a fist once more but this time cradled it to his chest as he cried silently, the anger and anxiety that had been boiling within him finally tumbling out in a torrent of emotions that caused his breath to hitch unevenly with each quiet sob.
They've gone this far. They've actually tried to kill me. I almost perish at their hands and I'm the one sworn to secrecy? What a load of bollocks. As he thought he began to kick at the stone, managing to dislodge a handful of clouds of dust as he did before he tired and leaned against the wall to take inventory of himself.
He'd been scratched by branches and foliage as Potter had drug him out. His arms and legs were riddled with gashes that were still weeping under their bandages and his clothes were in a sorry state but he was alive. With one look at the glistening blood on his hand he turned and entered the common room, stealing his way to his dorm silently as he descended the last long staircase he would that night. Once he'd collapsed into his bed he drew the curtains around himself and silently cast episkey over his hand, thankful that he'd long ago trained himself to be ambidextrous. As his wounds knit themselves shut he leaned back against his pillows and withdrew his arithmancy notebook from the stack of texts on his nightstand. As he flipped it open a single page fell out and he read it again for the first time since the second he'd opened it to begin with.
Severus-
No worries. I understand. If you ever change your mind and do want a friend feel free to write back sometime. Good luck in your own life.
Yours,
Lisa
He grazed the words with his fingertips, noticing that she had a habit of pressing rather hard against the parchment with her quill, a habit that had cost him a few punctures in his own copy of Advanced Potion Making through the years. Absently, he couldn't explain to himself why he was doing it, he reached towards his school bag on the floor and withdrew a capped bottle of ink and a frayed quill of his own and got to work writing back to the girl he'd been so disgusted with only a few weeks before.
Lisa:
Perhaps you're right. Perhaps I could use a friend though I'm wary to admit it. I apologize for shooing you away as rudely as I did. Thank you for reaching out to me and taking the time to write to me.
He cast his notebook aside and began to scrounge on his night table in a desperate search for the girl’s first letter and audibly gave a sigh of relief when he eventually found it crumpled at the bottom of his stack, bent and folded awkwardly by the weight that had been pressing on it.
To begin, I'm terribly sorry to hear about your mother. I come from a small family as well (just my parents and I) and I cannot imagine the emotional turmoil I would face without my mother in my life. Additionally I'm sorry to hear your brother was drafted into the war but I'm happy that he came home. Judging by what little of the fighting I saw on the telly I can't fathom the horrors he's seen.
I have a passing interest in herbology given that it is of a great importance in potion making. Have you made any discoveries pertaining to your studies? I've managed to make slight improvements on a handful of potions in my years and I find them to be a great source of personal pride.
The only club I am involved with at Hogwarts is a potions club which I currently head. It only has two other members besides me but it's generally a good time nonetheless. We don't have a dueling club yet but I've managed to stand my ground in a variety of one on one battles with some of my peers. I suppose after a few years of torment I should be at least a little adroit in defending myself.
Please feel free to write back. Again, I apologize for my previous nastiness.
Sincerely,
Severus Snape
Knowing full well he wasn't going to catch a wink of sleep with the sun now out he took the last hour of peace in the castle to take a walk to the owlery where he tied his letter to the leg of a Hogwarts owl and sent it out the window. As he watched the animal fly off he couldn't help but feel a smidge of his anger dissipate as the morning sun crept over the skin on his hands and face. He felt its warmth pierce his skin and he was grateful that he had survived the night to see another day.