All is Full of Hate

Severus staggered through the cave under the cliff, trying to ignore the ominous creaks and shudderings that spoke of serious curses being hurled about on the cliff-top above him. He could move his legs, but his feet were unresponsive, so he dragged them under him and stumbled over them, as though he was wearing cumbersome flippers.  

There were no plans now. Putting one foot in front of the other was hard enough. His footsteps echoed in his empty head.

It was dark down here. He had lit his wand, but the air was so thick with moisture that it only illuminated a fuzzy circle around his head, like a dandelion clock. It was lucky the cave floor was so even, because he couldn't imagine his legs – or, indeed, the rest of his exhausted body – being of much use if he were to tumble into a pot-hole.

The parts of him that weren't numb with shock were imagining what Lily was doing on the cliff-top above him. His restless imagination even conjured up glowing footprints that danced across the cave-ceiling, mapping her movements as she tried to evade Voldemort's curses. Whenever the footprints stood still, he would stop in his tracks, dread crawling all over him like thousands of tiny beetles. His heart would rise bulgingly into his mouth, as though he'd heard the first, distant rumblings of a cave-in, and fifty thousand tonnes of rock were about to come crashing down on his head.

But the footprints always started up again. Was this his inability to despair where Lily was concerned? He had just seen her freaking die, for God's sake! All frail and damp and alabaster-white, with her hair clinging to the rocks like seaweed. She had been Lily. Whether that meant Lily had to be her, he didn't know.

But he couldn't risk it anymore. If his relationship with Lily led to her bleeding to death on the rocks like that – in any fucking universe – then it couldn't go on. He couldn't watch her die again. He wasn't even sure he could recover from watching it once.


Everything had been in black and white, apart from her eyes: the black rocks, the grey sand, her progressively whitening skin. She had been struggling to breathe by that time, but she seemed otherwise comfortable, despite the fact that there were rocks underneath her shoulders and grains of sand clinging to her skin.

The tide had been coming in. Waves were lapping up around the ends of her hair, lifting them, making them dance like waterweed.

Severus had been kneeling beside her on the sand. But, at the same time, his body was constantly aware of the other Lily, up on the cliff-top. He could feel her presence like a grappling hook lodged in his spine, pulling him backwards. It was literally like being torn in two. Pretty soon, the Lily on the cliff-top would get his skeleton and the Lily on the beach would get his skin – and, heavens knew, there was precious little in between.

And, as he knelt on the beach beside the Boggart, feeling as though he was sinking into the sand, inch by slow, torturous inch, all he could think about was Auntie Iris.

She had been Tobias's sister and, as such, Severus had always regarded her with caution. She used to babysit him, when his father was too drunk – and Eileen too badly beaten – to look after him. He remembered thinking that her name suited her. Irises were droopy, strong-scented, watery-looking flowers, and Auntie Iris was always sighing and flopping into the nearest chair, as though the exuberance of the world – and there was precious little of it in Spinner's End – exhausted her.  Severus had hardly been a handful as a child – he had been quiet and watchful, and very economical with words – and yet even he was too much for Auntie Iris. Once, he had done nothing more complicated than ask for toast and jam, and she had accused him of being a 'hell-raising little handful'.

He had only ever seen her willingly hold her head up in the weeks before her death.

Auntie Iris had a son; one of the neighbourhood's very few escapees. He had gone to university and everything. He lived in Surrey, and earned a Doctor's salary. Severus had always wondered why Auntie Iris persisted in saying 'Peter earns a Doctor's salary' rather than 'Peter is a Doctor'. To him, it had always sounded as though there was something suspicious going on there.

At any rate, she was dying, and she kept insisting that it was out of the question for Peter to take time out of his busy schedule to visit her. So she telephoned and asked – carefully avoiding any references to her imminent demise – whether she could come and stay with him and his wife for a while.

They kept putting her off, and she kept holding herself together, with the quiet dignity of a woman who has only one priority in life. The children were starting a new school; Peter had an important conference to attend. There was no hurry, was there? After all, this was just a social call, wasn't it?

Auntie Iris didn't rise to that. Of course it was just a social call, she had said. Of course she didn't want to put anybody out. She would wait.

And, somehow, she managed to delay the inevitable. When Death came calling, she pretended she wasn't in. Severus had never seen anybody so… concentrated. She wouldn't die until she could die in Peter's house. Whether this was due to affection or malice, Snape was never certain. After all, she was related to Tobias, so there must have been a streak of cruelty in her somewhere.

They caved in eventually. Auntie Iris had caught the train as soon as they said they were free, without stopping to say goodbye to any of the residents of Spinner's End. She died on her first morning in Surrey. And Severus – who, even then, had possessed a crookedly morbid imagination – liked to imagine all the inconvenience it must have caused in Peter's house.

That was how the Boggart-Lily seemed now. She was losing blood at a rate of knots. Severus had to concentrate every second to keep himself from vomiting out of sheer, horrified desperation. And yet she took a long time to die. She had something to stick around for. He could only assume it was the prospect of tormenting him.

And she didn't even need to speak. Everything about her caused happy memories to jab him sharply in the ribs. She had been Lily. They had stolen potion-ingredients from Slughorn's store-cupboard together. There was a horrible continuity between the Lily on the cliff-top, and the Lily down here on the sand, struggling to breathe, and he didn't understand how he had missed it before.

You missed it because you were idealizing her, said a nasty little voice in his head. You thought this future was impossible. Or worse, you saw it as some kind of not-quite-perfect first-draft that you could tune up to your satisfaction.

Still, it was odd that he couldn't stop thinking about Auntie Iris. He hadn't thought about Auntie Iris very much, even when she'd been right in front of him, wincing every time he spoke.

He supposed it was because that world was dull and boring, and about as far from his present situation as it was possible to be. Severus had never thought he wanted a quiet life before he saw Lily dying on the sand beside him. Suddenly, he would trade it all in – all the robes and potions and talking hats and fantastic creatures – for a lifetime of that dull, stifling muggle squalor. Suddenly, all the exciting things in the world made him sick, and he just wanted to sit down in a quiet room, with nothing to quicken his pulse or aggravate his senses, until the world stopped spinning. Suddenly, he yearned for beige carpets and net curtains.

It was the ultimate shame for a Slytherin. And he heard himself thinking, quite distinctly, 'She's broken me. I don't work anymore'.

But he gritted his teeth and tried to think anyway, simply because it was a hard habit to break.

"Listen," he tried tentatively, biting back the swear-words that were building to critical levels behind his teeth. "If I take the necklace off you, you'll still be dying, won't you? Because that's what I'm afraid of?"

The Boggart raised her eyebrows. It was probably all she could manage in her current state.

Severus took it as a good sign. He licked his lips, leaning forwards slightly. "Well, what if I took the necklace off you and went away? As far away as I could get?"

It would be good practice, he thought grimly. He was going to have to spend the rest of his life avoiding Lily, after all.

"Wouldn't you turn into the nightmare of someone who was nearer?" he persisted. "And that person's nightmare probably wouldn't be bleeding to death. Because a nightmare that couldn't even stand up wouldn't be very scary."

"Your logic is impeccable," said the Boggart, in a ragged voice.

Then, with what seemed like a colossal effort, she brought a hand up to the pendant of Hogwarts masonry and clasped her fingers round it. "I don't care," she said. "I'll take it. I'm tired."

Severus sat back on his haunches, feeling as though she'd physically knocked him backwards. "You know what?" he said brightly. "I really hate you."

"You hate me for being mortal?"

"Amongst other things."

She gave him a sad, lop-sided smile – but it was probably only sad because she was feeling too weak to take pleasure in his suffering. It must have seemed like a terrible waste. Like an ice-cream sundae you just couldn't manage at the end of a very heavy meal.  

"It's not so bad, you know," she said quietly. "There's no pain where I'm going. I won't miss my husband anymore. Or Tabby."

"Tabby?" The word was out of his mouth before his brain unearthed the pertinent memory. It crawled out of its hiding place and bit him. "You mean our – your-." The word 'daughter' was unbearable to utter. It felt like a razor blade in his mouth. And, since she was the Boggart, she watched him struggle. She might have only had a few minutes of consciousness left, but she wasn't going to pass up an opportunity like that.

"You mean Tabula Rasa?" he said at last, hating her with every bruised, numb, shaky inch of his body.

"That's right," she said dreamily. "You know, in Cornwall, they used to think the souls of unbaptized children appeared in the meadows at twilight in the form of little white moths? I could never kill a moth after I'd heard that. I could kill people – and frequently did – but never moths."

"How did she die?" said Severus, knowing that he was opening up a world of pain for himself even as he said it. He had to ask. It was better to be well-informed than happy - and that was easier to accept now that he knew happiness was impossible.  

The Boggart raised her eyebrows mockingly. "You think you can prevent it?"

"No," said Snape, his voice hardening. "She's never going to be born. That's why I can ask about it. She's a hypothetical problem."

The Boggart laughed. It was slightly hysterical, and it pumped even more colour out of her. Severus plunged his fingers into the wet sand to try and keep the world from spinning.

"It was cot death," she said shortly. "Nobody's fault. The healers told us nobody could have expected or avoided it. But it was so… random. I think that's what bothered you. If there had been a reason for it, you could have rationalized it – or at least blamed somebody else. But, because it was sudden and pointless, you thought it was the Unicorn Curse. You couldn't comfort me. You saw yourself as her murderer, and how could a murderer comfort his victims' grieving relatives? You thought fate was picking off your loved ones just because you loved them. You thought, as long as you were alive to care about me, I wasn't safe."

Snape glared at her. "So you understood?" he demanded. "You never told me you understood!"

"Of course I understood!" she snapped. "If I hadn't understood, I wouldn't have hated you so much! I chose to share your fortunes and your misfortunes – in sickness and in fucking health! – you had no right to separate us! You had no right to make that decision for me!"

Snape dug his fingers deeper into the wet sand, trying to anchor himself to something. He wanted her to calm down, but there didn't seem to be any way to begin. And, meanwhile, Lily was still up on the cliff-top, with only a whimsical madman to stand between her and Voldemort – and no guarantee that the whimsical madman would do even that!

The Boggart swallowed and forced her eyes upwards, taking a deep breath through her nose. Some kind of calm settled around her – although it was like a scrap of clothing that didn't quite cover her; she was still horribly – and somehow enticingly – exposed. She started muttering under her breath, as though she was chanting a soothing mantra. Severus had to strain his hearing to make out the words. But, after a while, he found his brain filling in the gaps – penciling in the words he couldn't make out – because they were so familiar.

"If the heats of hate and lust
In the house of flesh are strong,
Let me mind the house of dust,
Where my sojourn shall be long."

Where had he heard that before? Was it another wizard rhyme? Had his mother whispered it to him when he was still aching from his father's beatings, to try and get him to go to sleep?

No, it was a poem – a muggle poem, as far as he could recall. Some guy who lived in the countryside and had a bit of a death-fixation. Severus had found the death-fixation easy to empathize with, but had been baffled by all the rural details. Swallows and sky-larks and wild-flowers under the hedges, and the poet still didn't seem capable of cheering up. Some people were just ungrateful.

He wasn't sure whether he was actually hearing the end of the poem or remembering it; the world was spinning too fast. It was all a blur of sickening colours – mostly red and white – and he couldn't pin anything down.

In the nation that is not
Nothing stands that stood before;
There revenges are forgot,
And the hater hates no more;

Lovers lying two and two
Ask not whom they sleep beside,
And the bridegroom all night through
Never turns him to the bride.

The last two lines stabbed him in his churning guts, and he wrenched his lips apart angrily. "I'm sorry," he said, every syllable dripping bitterness. "Was I bothering you at nights?"

The Boggart laughed again - in the same way, and with the same, horrible bleaching-effect on her skin. "Listen," she said, licking chapped and colourless lips. "There'll be some kind of test in the cave. I don't remember the particulars. He was – I was pissed off that I couldn't break the Phoenix Curse on my own. I wasn't going to make it easy for anyone who could."

"But I didn't break the Phoenix Curse."

She sighed. "Yes, but Poppy can't collect the reward, because she doesn't have the Light Mark and the Dark Mark. You can share it with Poppy, if you like. That should be easy enough. If she's… you know…"

"Yes," said Severus sharply, just to stop her talking.

"Anyway, you'll get through the test. You're the ultimate Slytherin, so I don't see how you could fail to please him."

A few more shaky breaths. Severus wanted to cry out when she shut her eyes, because it seemed as though he would never see that green again. He wanted to shake her by the shoulders and tell her she was being stupid – this whole thing was stupid! Death didn't apply to her. How could it? Death was for other people. They had stolen potion-ingredients from Slughorn's store-cupboard together! It couldn't – it couldn't – all be over now!


Whether he did cry out, or shake her by the shoulders, he had no idea. He must have blacked-out, because the next thing he remembered was looking at a Lily that was so motionless – so very obviously not-Lily – that he was actually tempted to look over his shoulder to see where she'd gone. It was a dumb idea. His vision was streaked with either tears or panic, and some rusty, keen-edged conviction told him, as it burrowed into his guts, that there was nothing he would be able to find. Not nothing to find. He couldn't handle that thought – not yet. Something had obviously left her. It just wasn't something he could track.

He had dragged himself up and limped into the cave. There was still an overwhelming temptation to climb the cliff and go after the other Lily – just to convince himself that she still existed, somewhere – but he felt so tainted in that moment. It seemed – for the first time in his life – that the only way to keep her safe was to keep away from her. However incompetent her other protectors might be, at least they weren't cursed – at least luck didn't hate them.

He had been so stupid. He had told himself he was being realistic while his brain leapt after these wild fantasies. He had never pinned his hopes on happily-ever-after. But infrequently-troubled-ever-after – occasionally-disturbed-ever-after – had seemed attainable, if you really worked for it.

Now he knew – actually knew – that the universe was just playing with him. It was unnatural for the living to lose hope; they were programmed to think that their actions mattered – presumably so they would stop questioning things, find a mate, pass on their genes and die without ruffling any evolutionary feathers. And it was a crock of shit for everybody, but especially so for him. He had been cursed before he was even born. That unicorn wouldn't let him lead a normal life. He couldn't have things like girlfriends and children. If he wanted to save the people he cared about, he had to stop caring about them, because even his unrequited love was bad news.

She had to run, before it was too late. Before this happened again.  

Would she run to Potter? Would she give birth to that bloody child of prophecy and sacrifice her life for him?

There would probably be less pain that way – for her, at any rate.

Snape staggered onwards, feeling – with increasing irritation – the strength ebbing back into his limbs. It had no reason to. There was nothing to return for. He didn't even know where he was going. But it came back anyway, like a bad penny, making him go on, powering each pointless footstep.

After a while, the mist that surrounded his head began to broaden out. Some vague, grey approximation of daylight infused through it. And a handful of figures – stocky and faceless, like gingerbread men – detached themselves from the mist.

Snape's heart was too exhausted to speed up. The figures didn't seem to be paying him much attention anyway. They were chattering amongst themselves – pushing, shoving, prodding and laughing. It was a migraine-inducing blur of sudden movement.

Some of the figures were bent under the weight of large trunks and suitcases, but their companions were still endeavouring to trip them up. And it was amazing how quickly – and with what a scarcity of information – Severus recognized the place. He couldn't make out colours yet – everything was still misty and grey – but he recognized the darker shade of grey that must have been the scarlet steam engine, and the lighter shades at floor-level that must have been the muggle-trainers donned by the students for their journey home.  

He was back on Platform Nine and Three Quarters. The clinging mist turned out to be steam from the Hogwarts Express. Cats were winding their way through the tangle of legs, occasionally howling in that shrill, inhuman way they had when somebody trod on them. And the – for want of a better word – humans were all seething together like the contents of a cauldron, each ingredient reacting violently against the other – each one desperate to make their voice heard amongst the throng.

Snape stalked through them invisibly, just as he always had. The steam from the engine was beading on his forehead, making him feel hot and agitated. Would she be here too? Was she about to emerge from the steam like the sun coming out from behind the clouds? Yawn at Potter's antics and then give Severus a tentative touch on the shoulder? He didn't think he could take that. The noises on the platform were already shredding his nerves as it was.

There was the barking laughter of Sirius Black, combined – as it always was – with the wet sniggering of Peter Pettigrew. God, it was like fingernails down the blackboard of his soul! It set his teeth on edge. Why didn't anyone ever mention that? Why didn't anyone ever say: "Pettigrew, you laugh as though you're choking to death on your own smugness, and everyone who ever hears you wishes to god you were."

There were adults too, but they did nothing to calm the chaos. Severus recognized their types, but not their faces: couples who weren't talking to each other, and had been saving up their animosity all year, just so they could play it out in front of their kids. There had been a hundred thousand dress-rehearsals during term-time, but now the curtain was about to go up on opening night. And, when they hugged their little son, they grappled for him, gripped him, dug their nails in, as though they were quite prepared to tear him apart as long as they got to keep a limb or two.

The poor bastard would be in that demonic embrace for the rest of his life. You couldn't outrun it.

Severus shut his eyes and tried to think. This was obviously some kind of illusion created by the Boggart Slytherin. Probably some kind of test. What did he have to do? Find his way off the platform? Resist the urge to kill everyone in sight?

And what for? What could the Boggart-Slytherin possibly offer him now? What was he even doing here?

And how dare he – how dare he – use this memory? Granted, it didn't seem to contain Lily and, without Lily, this memory was the same as a hundred depressing others. But how dare he raid Severus's head for scenery like this? How dare he put Sirius Black in front of him and expect him to behave?

He limped on through the steam, trying to find the barrier between platforms Nine and Ten that led out of this nightmare and into the relative sanity of the muggle world. Already, there was something strange happening in his muscles – a kind of fizzing which put the pain on hold. His legs were sending back signals that they could, if it was necessary – and, oh, how they hoped it was – kick somebody to death.

And that was when he saw them.

Tobias could have waited in the car. And it wasn't because he was impatient for a glimpse of his son that he hadn't done so. He didn't want to leave them alone together. He was convinced that his wife and son would talk about him – that Eileen would poison Severus against him – if they were given half a minute of private conversation.

Severus had wanted – for so long – to point out that he knew quite a lot about poison, and one of the first things he'd learned was not to over-use it. Poison was quite unnecessary when the victim in question had already been copiously poisoned beforehand. Additional poison was likely to either have a salutary effect, or none at all. But you couldn't explain any of that to this ham-fisted moron.

Eileen had a black eye.

Severus turned sharply and lurched away through the steam. He had to think. He was supposed to get to Salazar Slytherin, because… because…

Bella's screeching laugh suddenly cut through the chatter. She was giving one of her minions a Chinese burn.

Because…

Narcissa, who was standing with her sister, gave Severus a disdainful look through her dead, grey eyes. Other girls were with her, shrinking away at his approach, as though his very existence made them shudder.

Because…

The shrinking girls would have been alright – after all, they were morons, and, if he couldn't have their admiration, at least he had their fear – but they shuddered at his approach, and then threw misty-eyed glances at the figure across the platform. The steam had covered him before, but now each loathsome edge was getting clearer – he was looming like an iceberg out of the steam.

Snape's stomach sank. He could feel sanity dancing away from his outstretched fingertips.

There was some kind of point to this illusion. Some kind of lesson.

But he didn't want to learn any lessons. He didn't want to recuperate or take heart or find answers. He wanted to hit somebody. And the man who would always make top of his list of people to hit had just emerged through the steam.

He was, in a way, a terrifying sight. It was easy to be frightened of Potter – because he was always appearing out of thin air from under that Invisibility Cloak, and everything just went right for him. He seemed like an elemental force – like luck personified. A nasty, grinning, darting, messy-haired bottle of Felix Felicis.

Snape shut his eyes tight and groped around in the dark for his lost train of thought. This illusion had to have a purpose. The Boggart-Slytherin was probably trying to tell him something. Of all the Hogwarts founders, he was the one who had been born to teach. The history-books insisted on that, even though they also mentioned – as though it was a charming eccentricity – his use of chains and thumbscrews in the classroom. Apparently, he used to say that life was a test, and you would only find out if you'd passed it when you died. This scene would be… some kind of allegory… symbolizing…

Severus licked his lips and tried hold on to his inner monologue. It was getting fainter.

Symbolizing…

"…And then I pulled my broomstick into a sheer vertical drop – must have been about fifty feet! The Slytherin Seeker took one look at it and wet himself…"

Oh, fuck it.

He speeded up, trying to outrun his second-thoughts. Pigeons skittered out of his way. He had to shove several people aside, but he didn't even see who they were. He just relished their yells as he whipped past them. Each one seemed to make his footsteps lighter. The anger was buoying him up. Whenever he remembered it afterwards, he swore that he must have been standing in the middle of some kind of heavenly spotlight, because everything seemed right in that moment – it was as though he'd been pushed off the end of his tether and landed in the clear, calm waters on the other side.

By the time he reached Potter, he was dragging the momentum of the run along with him, and he delivered it all on the end of a clenched fist.

Nobody was ready for it. Who in the world would want to attack James Potter – the Head Boy, the top of every class, the hero of six Quidditch Cups?

Someone rushed at him from the side – probably Sirius Black, because he was always standing closest to Potter. He was certainly huge – but Severus had learned to fight in a muggle playground, with beefy Northern kids who were always twice his size. He knew the secret of it. Target the soft, squishy bits of your opponent and they'll double up and obligingly bring their heads down to punching height.

The other secret was to enjoy it while you could. Because no back-up was coming.

He elbowed the mystery man in the stomach, and heard a satisfying whoosh of breath as he doubled up. Then he brought his knee up hard against the figure's nose and paid no further attention to him. There were other attackers by this point.

He would have liked to see who he'd hit – if only to gloat about it later – but time was of the essence. He could hear big, lumbering footsteps hurrying down the platform, and they always spelled the end of fun and the beginning of pain. He was almost supernaturally sensitive to the sound of those footsteps and, the closer they got, the higher the bile rose in his throat.

"Accio!" he shouted, and was immediately pelted with wands from all corners of the platform. Some of them clattered to the floor and snapped under his feet as he rushed back to Potter. He had about thirty seconds before the sheer weight of numbers crushed him – or before someone managed to locate their wand amongst the tangle of legs – but it was glorious – it was all glorious – because he was free.

He hated everyone on this platform. Without exception. There was nobody to protect.

More figures were leaping on him now. Somebody had fastened their hands around his throat. But they didn't know how familiar – how almost homely – this position was to Severus. They didn't realize how many family get-togethers had ended this way. They didn't know how long his heart could pump hatred in place of oxygen. Sometimes, in the thick of those moments, he felt as though oxygen, food, and sleep had all been wasting his time, because he didn't seem to need any of them. He didn't need anything.

And it was just as well.

The footsteps were getting nearer. As he ducked down to avoid a spinning kick from a Gryffindor who had seen too many kung-fu movies, Severus saw his mother – an unwelcome reminder that there was someone on this platform who he felt at least ambiguous about. Tobias had shoved his jacket at her, but he had done it with his usual ham-fisted clumsiness, thrusting it into her stomach and causing her eyes to water.

Perhaps they had been watering anyway. Perhaps she was ashamed. But at least she was looking at him now. That was something.

"Oy!"

Without meaning to – without knowing what was funny – Severus started laughing. It had always been 'oy'. The gin-soaked gorilla couldn't even threaten with real words. Where had Severus got all his articulacy from?

"Go ahead," said Snape brightly, as he ducked under another flailing fist. "I dare you – I dare you – to punish me for this! The hypocrisy alone would make my day!" He paused delicately and added: "'Hypocrisy' means professing beliefs that aren't borne out by your actions, by the way."

"I'll kill you!" said his father, as witty as ever.

Snape turned and punched the next onlooker square in the jaw. He saw Meg Valance falling down, and felt a strange, worrying thrill of exhilaration. Oh, he had been wanting to do that for ages.

"You see, dad?" he shouted, between punches. "I'm hitting a girl, and I'm still not as sick as you are! Not even half as sick! Because I don't do it every day – " thump, "- in front of her kids – ," thump " – in places where the bruises won't show, if I'm sober enough to care!"

Tobias started shoving people out of the way – presumably because the figures on the platform were not beating his son properly. One of the graspy parents – the ones who had dug their fingernails into their sons' pudgy little shoulders – was thrown off the platform and onto the rails.

And Severus wasn't frightened. He was almost impatient for his father to reach him, and prove him right. Even if he was going to die, at least he was going to have it confirmed that there were worse people in the world than him, whatever the unicorn said.

Someone clamped their hand over his mouth, and he bit down hard, eliciting a shrill, rat-like squeal that could only have come from Peter Pettigrew. Severus felt elated and disgusted at the same time. He wanted to spit out the horrible taste and yell with triumph simultaneously. As it happened, he couldn't do either of those things, because somebody's elbow knocked into his teeth, and the taste of blood soon replaced the taste of Pettigrew.

Then he felt a set of knuckles slam into his kidneys. Probably Lupin's. Nobody else in the school had hands that bony. He fell to his knees, on top of some limp bundle of clothes and bones, and realized dimly that he was still holding onto the collar of Potter's robes. He had been dragging the creep with him through the throng.

"And you," he said, trying to focus through the blur of adrenaline and pain, "are not the luckiest man alive. You haven't been for ages. You had thousands of Galleons – sycophantic hangers-on – teachers lapping up your every word – and she still chose me. And it doesn't matter if it was the worst choice she ever made – she still made it."

"And you know why I think it is?" he added, trying to look directly into the narrow gap between Potter's swollen eyelids. "It's because happy people are boring. You're boring. For all the shit that's been inflicted on me – and all the shit I'll probably end up inflicting on other people – I would never be you. I wouldn't trade it for a Quidditch Cup or a fanclub of moronic girls." He lowered Potter to the ground, frowning in puzzlement. "In fact, even punching you is boring me," he said. "I can't tell you how weird that is. Go and live your boring life somewhere else. Win Quidditch trophies and get into various amusing scrapes. Give Sirius Black a break and sleep with him, if you can stand it. It'll probably clear the air. Just stay the fuck away from me."  

And just as he looked up into the livid, red face of his father, whose fists were poised to knock his brains out, everything stopped. Pigeons froze in mid-flight. A drop of blood from the streaming nose of some burly Gryffindor was just hanging in the air in front of Snape's face, awaiting further instructions.

Then, very slowly, the mist thickened, reclaiming the figures on the platform – even reclaiming that hanging drop of blood – until Severus could see nothing but whiteness.