The Tale of Severus Snape and Lily Evans

Beginning a Magical Journey

"Sev, hurry! You've got to see this!"

Lily Evans was running towards a window, not far from Flourish and Blotts, now dragging Severus Snape along with her. Finally when they reached the window she pointed up excitedly. Levitating on the other side of the shiny glass window was the newest broom, the Nimbus. It was the first of its kind, and as far as Lily was concerned, it was a miracle. "I didn't know you actually flew brooms in the Wizarding world! Do people do it for fun? Is it rare?" she asked eagerly. Severus smiled slightly, the corners of his lips turning up in amusement. She had a lot to learn.

"Yeah, Lily loads of wizards fly. It's very common. There's a sport called Quidditch played on broomsticks." Then he paused. "I can fly you know," he pointed out proudly, nervousness mildly evident in his voice. But Lily didn't notice.

"Really? I want to see! Will you show me when we get home?" Lily asked. Severus's ears turned a couple shades of pink. He hadn't expected her to be so impressed.

"Well, sure, I guess I'll show you. But I'm not that good. And my broom is practically ancient. It's nearly impossible to do any cool tricks on it or anything."

"Don't worry. Obviously I wouldn't know any difference seeing as all this magic stuff is brand new for me." It was true that Lily Evans was a muggle-born witch who, until meeting Severus at their neighborhood playground several months ago, had no idea who she was or what she could become. This seemed to relax Severus slightly as he motioned for them to move along. The Hogwarts Express was scheduled to leave in two days and since they were First Years, Lily and Severus had arrived with loads of shopping to do. Neither of Severus's parents wanted to take him to Diagon Alley, so Lily convinced her parents to let her go with him instead. They reluctantly agreed, but only because Petunia was throwing a fit about not getting to go along as well.

The two young students had already purchased their robes, books, and tools. The only thing left on their lists was wands.

"Over there," Severus said, pointing to Ollivander's. "That's where everyone gets their wands." He glanced at Lily who had stopped in her tracks and was staring across the street at the wand shop. "What's the matter?" he asked her, noticing a mild look of fear spreading across her beautiful face.

"What if - what if they don't work for me, Severus?" Lily asked, suddenly turning to him, barely visible tears forming behind her green eyes.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, what if, what if wands don't work for me? What if I'm not really a witch and all those other things were just chance, and Dumbledore made a mistake in accepting me to Hogwarts?" Severus shifted in his tracks, not really knowing what to say to her, fearing that if he said the wrong thing she may never talk to him again.

"Lily, that won't happen. I promise," he said, bravely brushing his fingers across her hand. "I know you're - you're going to become a great witch." Then to his joy as he daringly looked into her eyes, Lily smiled slightly and wiped the forming tears away with the back of her hand.

"Thanks Sev," she muttered. "I guess it just - it just all seems too good to be true, you know?"

"Yeah. Yeah I definitely know," Severus muttered. His mind drifted to his arguing parents at home. Or, could it even be considered a home? When the only place he felt at home was here? With Lily? Because home was a place where people talked to you, helped you, and cared for you, wasn't it? He hoped that Hogwarts could replace the home he never really had. He and Lily would together escape the places in which they did not belong and find solace in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. With one last comforting smile, the two young friends together walked across the street to Ollivander's where they would retrieve the most essential magical possession of all.

"Ah, yes hello my two young friends!" Mr. Ollivander called from the back room. Lily and Severus looked at each other; clearly both were wondering how he knew they had entered. The door hadn't made a sound and neither had spoken a word since they'd crossed the street. "I'll be right with you. I'm just about to send this wand off to its owner. Camoose! Hold still!" They could see from their distance that Mr. Ollivander was attempting to tie a package to his owl's claws, and yet it was resisting most peculiarly.

"Looks like Camoose knows something that he doesn't," whispered Severus in Lily's ear. She smiled and then bit her lip to keep from chuckling as she gazed around the shop. It was small, and yet every wall from the floor to the ceiling was filled with hundreds, perhaps thousands, of long skinny boxes. Each box looked different. Some looked to be made of old, ripped cardboard, and others appeared shiny and new in boxes of tin.

"Well then, sorry about that," muttered Mr. Ollivander after he finally managed to send the owl off. "Who would like to be first?" The old man smiled kindly revealing tiny yellow teeth. His hair was white and messy but he had a gleam in his eyes that allowed him to look ten years younger, despite the wrinkles on his long face.

Severus and Lily looked at each other.

"You go first, Sev, please - I... I want to see, you know, how it's done," Lily whispered, her cheeks turning slightly pink. Severus nodded.

"I'll be first, sir," Severus said. He took a step forward. Mr. Ollivander smiled.

"Wonderful! Well let me have a look at you." He glanced up and down at Severus. Although his clothes were slightly awkward, it was clear the boy had potential to be handsome if he cleaned himself up a bit because of his striking and unique features; pale skin, sleek black hair, and eyes so dark you could almost gaze at them for a moment and surprise yourself with a sudden fear of falling into them and never coming back out. Mr. Ollivander turned towards the nearest wall and yanked a ladder in his direction. Climbing up to the top shelf he grabbed a light green box and brought it down. "Try this one," he said to Severus while handing him a long, brown wand. "It's twelve and a half inches, sanded Oak, with centaur hair core. Severus gazed at it intently before waving it quickly down one edge of the room. Dust rose from the tops of the boxes and formed a steady whirlwind that spun towards them and collapsed abruptly in Ollivander's face leaving him coughing and wheezing.

"Erm - I - sorry..." Severus muttered awkwardly as he quickly glanced back at Lily. She smiled excitedly at him, and he was glad to see that his clumsiness with that particular wand cheered her up a bit.

"Right. I don't think so," Ollivander stated as he removed the wand from Severus's hand and replaced it in the box. "Ah, I think I know." Then Mr. Ollivander walked quickly down another little hall and grabbed a dark box from a middle shelf. "This is ten inches, ebony, with root of asphodel for its core." Severus liked this wand much better. When he took it in his hands he felt a wift of power and strength sweep through him like a tidal wave finally reaching the shore. When he waved it around the room the lights flickered eerily and when his wand reached Lily, two white flowers appeared in her right hand. She grinned widely and beamed at Severus. Mr. Ollivander laughed triumphantly. "Asphodel flowers, native to eastern Europe, exactly the root that fills the core! Well done. Now my dear, it is your turn." Mr. Ollivander gestured towards Lily. She seemed much less afraid now after seeing Severus's wonderful performance.

Taking a look up and down Lily as he had done for Severus, Mr. Ollivander narrowed his eyebrows and asked, "You're a muggle born are you?"

Lily nodded nervously.

"Not to worry, my dear. I only pointed it out because I could sense that I have never sold a wand to your family before today! But I know which one to try first."

He grabbed a dark brown box from a place hidden behind the counter and handed her the wand. "Eleven and a quarter inches, mahogany, mermaid scales core."

Lily held it in her hand, and with only a little hesitation she waved it. A stream of water came rushing out of the tip and before she would willingly allow it to do anymore damage, she dropped it on the floor and the water stopped. Looking back at Severus, the two friends both giggled. It took Lily several more tries to find her perfect wand, but in the end she went home with a wand eleven inches, Banyan, and a unicorn tail hair for it's core.

The two friends sat facing each other on the ground in their secret hiding place under a canopy of trees, about a kilometer away from the main path of the neighborhood. They both were carrying their wands and their copies of "Standard book of Spells." The Hogwarts Express would depart the following morning, and the young witch's and wizard's excitement had been steadily increasing.

"So right now we can practice with them? You're sure?" Lily asked Severus, sweeping her full, ginger locks out of her face as she spoke.

"Yeah definitely. I mean, I think so. See, we can't get in trouble until we've actually been to Hogwarts. Right now if we did magic, we could easily just say it was an accident because we haven't been taught how to control it yet."

Lily bit her lip, as she looked skeptically from her wand to Severus, clearly unsure of whether or not she should give in to such a temptation. However, it would seem that the professors at Hogwarts would prefer their students to arrive having read and practiced a few of the lessons, wouldn't it?

"Well, all right, but only a simple one, okay?"

Severus grinned at her and immediately whipped open his Standard book of Spells to Chapter One and began to read out loud.

"...this simple charm of levitating small objects must be done with a certain motion of the wand to be remembered as 'swish and flick."

There was a diagram displaying the way the general motion of the wand should look.

"...then be sure that your first practice is only on a light item such as a feather or a leaf. Recite the phrase 'Wingardium Leviosa.'" He looked up at Lily after finishing the paragraph. She looked positively enthralled, and the gleam in her eyes made Severus's stomach flip elatedly.

"Well, let's try it!" cried Lily.

"All right. First, the swish and flick thing," Severus replied. Together they practiced the motion for a while until they both felt satisfied with their performance.

"Now, what was the spell again?"

"Wingardium Leviosa," Severus answered. "I've seen it done before once or twice by my parents."

"Wingardium Leviosa," she repeated. "Can I try it first?"

" 'Course you can."

Severus was delighted by Lily's excitement. Her eagerness and fresh, new magical skill was so refreshing to observe in progress.

Lily grinned. Then, handing one of the two asphodel flowers to Severus, she set the other one down on the leafy ground between them and pointed her wand at it.

"Wingardium Leviosa," she muttered with a swoosh of her wand. The flower lifted only a few inches from the ground and then dropped again. Lily looked irritated.

"It's because your 'swish and flick' was more like a 'swoosh,'" Severus explained. "Here let me help you." Severus scooted closer to Lily, and hesitantly placed his hand over hers while demonstrating the motion for her.

"Ah, I see!" she said. Then as Severus scooted back to his original place across from her, she tried again and successfully lifted the pretty white flower into the air. "You try now," she said.

"Let's do it together," Severus suggested while placing the Asphodel flower he had been holding back in between the two of them, next to the other. They both aimed their wands at the flowers.

"Wingardium Leviosa!" they chanted together. And slowly the two flowers rose higher and higher into the air until the young witch and wizard took their eyes off the flowers and instead gazed at each other in amazement. At that moment the flowers fell from the sky, landed on their heads, and the two friends laughed relentlessly for what seemed like hours until the sun began to set across the river. They grudgingly agreed that it was time to depart their private haven because their families would be expecting them for supper.

"Bye, Lil," Severus said when they finally reached the playground and had to go their separate ways. "I'll meet you at Platform nine and three quarters tomorrow."

"I'm so excited, Sev!" Lily said gripping his cold, white hand. He drew in a quick breath, and before he could say another word she had vanished across the street and into her home.

"Me too," he whispered. When he could no longer see her, he turned around and slowly headed towards his own house a block away. He was in no rush to return to that miserable place, especially after spending an entire day with Lily. But his heart rushed when he thought of the year ahead. He wouldn't have to spend another night under the roof with his arguing parents. And best of all, he and Lily could be together whenever they pleased.