Uncontrollable

Hermione had just settled into her bed, the day's events playing through her mind. Crookshanks rumbled next to her, a sound she decided was as close to a purr as he would ever get. She scratched behind his ears, wondering idly what effect being in Snape's house would bring out in her and her two best friends. Pushing the thought out of her mind, she reached over to her nightstand to turn off her lamp; a Muggle habit that she found comforting. As her hand touched the base of the lamp, her eyes caught the shimmering surface of the pensieve.

From what Harry had told her about the pensieve in the past, she was surprised to find the memory reflecting in the bowl was not the memory she had experienced a few days ago. She quickly glanced at the glass bottles and saw that each was still filled with the milky memory substance. Could the pensieve store more than one memory at a time?

She stole a glance at the ginger cat to make sure he was still asleep before she timidly stepped out of bed and stood over the basin of the pensieve. Moving her head down closer to the liquid, she felt a sudden lurch and the floor seemed to fall from under her. The room span, and she found herself dumped on a hard, dirty floor.

She blinked, willing herself to stay calm. Glancing around, she found she was in an old room with crusted, yellow walls, and a filthy, cracked linoleum floor. The windows, of which there were scarce few, were grimy and let only a subtle glow of light permeate the room. Hermione squealed and leapt to her feet as a particularly large cockroach scurried inches in front of her. She watched the insect intently as it altered its path across to room to avoid being stepped on by a black and white trainer that seemed to be oblivious to the bug's existence. Attached to the shoe was a leg clad in dark blue jeans, that met with a waist and then torso that was decorated with a black and heather grey horizontally striped jumper. She blinked as a young Snape came into focus, his revolting, lank hair seemingly the only thing that ever stayed constant from childhood to adulthood.

He stopped before her, and for a moment she panicked. No, no, get a hold of yourself. He can't see you, she repeated to herself. She couldn't hide the relief she felt when she realized he was looking through her, to someone behind her shoulder. She whirled around and backed away from the man stood on the other side of her, a man that stared at the little Snape with a deep hatred that he didn't even try to hide.

"That's better, you filthy son of a bitch," the man spat at Snape. "You ever dress in those clothes again, you freak, and I'll make sure you're buried in 'em." The complete and utter contempt that radiated from the man made Hermione shrink in fear.

"Yes, sir," mumbled the small boy, who seemed only a few years older than the first year Snape she had witnessed in the previous memory. She calculated he was either twelve or thirteen years old now, and still very short and thin. As if he could hear her thoughts, he seemed to slump down in order to make himself even smaller. The man spat in Snape's face suddenly, and the boy merely closed his eyes.

"You are not my son. No! Your slut of a mother slept around! No way that you could have come from me. You're disgusting, weak and stupid. You still piss your bed like an infant." At these last words, she heard Snape inhale sharply. "And you have to go to a special school for defective children! You are not mine. You are lucky, boy, that I let you use my name. Do you know what kind of looks I get when they find out you're a Snape? Do you, boy? Answer me, for fuck's sake!"

Snape shuffled, eyes still closed, but did not answer. Hermione felt a surge of pride for him. His father, it seemed, did not share the same feeling. His face twisted into a look of ugly rage, the veins at his temple throbbed. For a second, Hermione thought he was about to hit Snape, but just at that moment, a woman's voice called to the man from the doorway.

"Tobias." The woman, whom Hermione recognized as Eileen Prince, pleaded weakly. "Please," she said softly, looking utterly terrified, shaking like a leaf. "Please, Tobias, don't-"

"Don't you tell me what to do in my house, bitch!" he screamed at her, forgetting Snape altogether. "Don't you tell me what to do!"

He strode over to the doorway and grabbed Eileen by her hair. Hermione looked on, horrified. Tobias Snape wasn't a big man, but he towered over his frail-looking wife. She seemed to want to cower away and shrink down, but Tobias jerked her head back, forcing her to look into his crazed eyes. Eileen was pale and drawn. Fear had plucked the strength from her limbs and stolen the colour from her face. She couldn't have been more than about thirty, but she looked old and tired.

"Please," she breathed, staring up at him, her eyes so wide and fearful that they looked about to pop out of her head.

She shouldn't have spoken, Hermione knew instinctively. Still holding her head with one hand twisted painfully into her greying hair, Tobias raised his other fist and punched her straight in the face. She gave a whimper of pain.

"Shut up, bitch!" he shouted, pushing her face up close to his own.

Hermione, who throughout the memory had been silenced by shock, screamed loudly when the blow had struck Eileen's delicate face. She knew that she couldn't be heard, that the figures she saw were only memories, but she checked her scream almost as soon as it had escaped her.

Tobias hit his wife again, and again, and again, screaming at her almost incoherently all the while. He worked himself into a sick frenzy, at times having to hold her up by her hair when her knees gave way. Eileen sobbed and moaned and tried to worm her way out of his grasp, but he was too strong for her. He began to hit her in the chest, each blow punctuated with foul accusations of infidelity or even fouler insults, each blow making a dull thud as it connected. Eileen shrieked through her bleeding lips, but was quickly silenced with a fist.

Not able to bear the sickening spectacle any longer, and yet knowing no way of getting out of the memory, Hermione turned her face away and wept, leaning against the wall for support.

Looking up, she realised that Snape was still in the room. He hadn't moved from the spot where he had been before, he just stood stock still, gazing into the middle distance. He wasn't watching what his father was doing; he didn't seem to hear his mother's cries. Hermione looked at his face, sure that there must be some feeling shown there, some reaction to what was happening, but there was nothing. What was going through his mind, whilst he stood there staring at nothing?

Mercifully, Tobias' rage didn't last long. He eventually stopped hitting Eileen, then spat in her face and dropped her onto the filthy floor. He stepped over her and left the room without a word. Seconds later, Hermione heard the front door slam shut.

When his father had gone, Snape didn't move. The only sign Hermione could see that he was aware that it was over was that his breathing became heavier. There was a slight hitch to each breath, but it was a few minutes before Snape came back to himself. He walked slowly over to where his mother lay, moaning and crying softly. He looked down at her, his face showing a cocktail of emotions which Hermione couldn't decipher.

Watching in a daze as Snape calmly sat his mother up and brought her a cup of tea, Hermione couldn't understand what was wrong with him. She was very deeply shaken, not only at witnessing the father's unimaginable violence, but at Snape's seeming indifference to it and to the condition of his mother. The looks he gave her were laced with... something, but Hermione was at a loss as for what it was. He wasn't angry, he wasn't afraid, he wasn't upset. She found herself wishing he would start crying, that he would fall down on the floor and cling to his mother, bawling like a baby. It would make her feel better.

But the whole situation was utterly bizarre. Despite having seen it with her own eyes, Hermione couldn't believe it. It was too terrible, too appalling to be real. Domestic violence was unfortunately something that happened in life. Despicable as it was, it wasn't terribly unusual. But the short, concentrated violence, followed by... nothing. It defied comprehension.

Hermione realised she was crying again. She wondered for a moment if she'd actually stopped at some point, or if she had been crying all the while and simply hadn't noticed. Everything seemed too much, the room was too quiet, her breathing was too loud, the air was too heavy. Hermione looked down at her hands and found they were shaking. She looked up again to see that she was alone in the room, Eileen having limped off aided by her son.

Pull yourself together, girl, she scolded herself. You are here for a reason. Attempting to steel herself with a resolve she didn't really feel, she set out to find where Snape had gone off to. The significance of the memory might have been the... incident, but there might be more to come, and she definitely didn't want to have to come back for another look.

Hermione set off through a likely looking door, and walked up the winding hallway, oblivious to the many insects at her feet, until she reached a large parlour. She gazed at the room in wonder. Unlike the rest of the house, this room was clean, almost cozy. Bookshelves lined the walls and above them, protected by Muggle-repelling charms for their preservation, were the symbols of his mother's achievements while at Hogwarts. Medals for her success while captain of the Gobstones team, framed certificates of achievements in her classes and her school leaving certificate showing her NEWT levels attained. She felt a sharp pang as she realized how hard it must have been for the young Snape who had yet to have his talents appreciated. It gave her some insight into why the older Snape had turned to Voldemort - he had sought the recognition and acceptance which had never been his as a child.

Against the far wall stood a weathered, ebony Welmar upright piano. Snape was sitting on the stool, just looking at the instrument. She watched as he picked up a cloth from a nearby table and thoroughly, carefully cleaned the piano. He closed his eyes and gently dusted every crevice of the instrument, lovingly caressing the keys as he hummed to himself. For a few moments she was transfixed, watching him treat the piano with such care, even after seeing something so horribly, brutally violent happen. Her heart swelled. He loves this piano. He can feel love. She had wondered for a while if he was completely cold and unfeeling, but he seemed to lavish all the love he had on that piano. Hermione found that sad, particularly when somewhere about the house there was a woman who could have done with a little love from her son.

He put down the cloth on the table and smiled. His smile, when not coupled with a smirk, sneer, or snarl, appeared to be very flattering. It was boyish and hinted at mischief. She found herself smiling back at him. It felt utterly surreal for her to be smiling and watching him smile when not a quarter of an hour ago he'd witnessed his father savagely beating his mother.