The Awakened Sleeper

"The time to hesitate is through
No time to wallow in the mire
Try now we can only lose
And our love become a funeral pyre"

--"Light My Fire," The Doors

Chapter 14

Hesitation's End

Sirius was exhausted. He had spent the entire day trying to keep tabs on Cressida from a distance. When he had been unable to do it himself, he dispatched one of his fellow Gryffindors to do it for him. After seeing the faces of some of the Slytherins during Sunday dinner, he had known that today would be a battle zone. Normally, the prospect of dueling Slytherins filled Sirius with excitement. He loved being in a good brawl from time to time; it kept him on his toes. But after everything Cressida had gone through on Saturday, there was no way he was going to let anything else happen to her, not even a silly prank.

He now sat on the floor of the nearly empty common room, waiting for Cressida to arrive. He stared into the fire as he tried to reassure himself that even though she was out of sight at the moment, she was in good hands. Lily was with her now, and he knew she'd do whatever it took to keep her best friend safe.

At the sound of the portrait door opening, Sirius quickly picked up his Potions textbook and pretended to read. He could hear a female voice murmuring words of gratitude and farewell before he heard the sound of the door closing and the shuffle of feet across the floor.

"Oh, it's you," Cressida said. "I know you're pretending to read that book, so you might as well put it down."

"Who says I'm pretending?" Sirius asked, his eyes still glued to the pages of the book in front of him. "I happen to find potion-making a very fascinating subject, you know."

"Sirius, the last time I saw you open a textbook, I was still in training bras. Needless to say, that's been quite some time ago."

"Bras?" He snapped his book closed and beamed up at her. "Now that's a subject worth skiving for. I say we start with color and work our way up to size."

"Oooh, then we can sit up all night, braiding each other's hair and talking about boys!" Cressida gushed. She rolled her eyes and set one of the two cases she was holding on the floor.

"Well, you brought it up." Sirius took a closer look at the case. It looked like a small suitcase, except for the fact that it was shaped like a cube. "Planning on taking a trip, are we?"

Cressida placed another slender, square-shaped case beside it as she sat down next to Sirius on the rug. "Nope. They're not suitcases."

"Well, what are they, then?"

Cressida unfastened the clasp of the first case and flipped the lid back on its hinges revealing a contraption of some sort. There was a round platform in the center of it, with a short spindle sticking up out of the middle of the platform. There was a strange arm sitting beside it, and there were two little knobs on the other side.

"Surely you know what this is," she said, beaming like a person gone mad.

Sirius shrugged his shoulders. "Sorry, don't have a clue."

After an obligatory roll of the eyes, Cressida replied, "It's a record player!"

"You mean a phonograph?" He'd seen a phonograph before, but it had looked much different than the one that sat before him now.

"Oh, very good, Mr. Black! I won't have to start from scratch with you, will I?"

"So why'd you bring a phonograph--"

"Sirius," Cressida said, "Muggles don't really call them phonographs anymore. They call them record players."

"Fine, then. Why'd you bring a record player in here?"

"Well, I felt like listening to some music, obviously."

"But how? I mean, don't they work on electricity?"

"Normally, they do, but some bloke Professor Mundie knew when she was a student here bewitched it so that it works on magical energy instead. She's got several of them in the Muggle Studies room, and she lets students check them out from time to time. Her album collection is amazing." She opened the second case which was full of thin squares made out of some type of stiff paper and decorated with artwork and pictures.

"See," Cressida said, taking several of the squares out of the case. She started sifting through them like cards as she said, "She's got old stuff, new stuff, everything!"

She finally found the one she'd been looking for, running her hand across it and studying its picture for a time longer than what Sirius thought was necessary. Cressida's hair was hanging in front of her face, so he was unable to gauge what was going on in her head as she looked at the picture.

She slid a flat, black disk out of the side of the square, and Sirius was finally able to see the picture on the front of it. There was a trio of guys standing on the right side of the picture, with a fourth bloke's face in the foreground on the left. At the top of the picture, the words The Doors were superimposed over all of this.

What's so special about them? he asked himself, scrutinizing the picture as he tried to understand Cressida's interest in it. They don't look all that good, and the guy in the front looks a bit dodgy to me.

"The Doors?" Sirius said, watching Cressida place the--record?--on the record player. "What kind of name is that for a band, anyway? It sounds silly, if you ask me."

"Well, they didn't ask you, did they? Besides, I don't remember The Mystical Merlins winning any awards for their amazing band naming abilities," replied Cressida as she twisted one of the knobs next to the platform. When the platform began to spin, she lowered the arm onto the outermost groove on the record.

Expecting to hear music, Sirius was surprised to hear static filled with crackles and pops. Just as he was about to make a snarky comment about Muggle music, a tinny rhythm being tapped out on cymbals began. Then an organ began playing over the subtle beat, with a guitar riff joining the tune soon after that. Finally, a voice--rough, strained, and slightly scratchy--began to sing about night, day, running, and hiding. Soon the song progressed from being slightly mellow to raucously anarchic and back again. It was like nothing he'd ever heard before--and he liked it.

Sirius looked over at Cressida. With closed eyes, she was bobbing her head with every drum beat and shaking her hair wildly with every crescendo. As she listened to the song, it was as if she became the music. He sat there, watching her mouth the words to the song, totally oblivious to everything else. Soon she was swaying and bouncing around, her movements matching the ferocity of the bloke singing.

Just when Sirius was beginning to fear for his safety, the song ended and Cressida stilled her movements. She turned to him and managed to say between pants, "So, what d'you think?"

"Well, it was... different, but I liked it." As he took in her disheveled appearance, Sirius couldn't help but notice the bruise on her face, which had healed to a sickly, yellowish color. She's hiding it. No wonder she hasn't pinned her hair up today, he thought as anger roiled up in the pit of his stomach like a sickness.

"So," he said, determined to keep things as normal as possible, "that's what Muggles are listening to?"

Apparently, Cressida had noticed Sirius noticing her bruise, for she quickly ran her hands through her hair and around her face. "A-actually, that song is nearly a decade old. One of the things we do in Muggle Studies is listen to different types of Muggle music from different eras. We listened to this one fifth year, but I knew about it before we discussed it in class. My brother used to listen to The Doors all the time when... when he was my age. I've been thinking of him a lot lately."

"Have you? I seem to remember you saying something a long time ago about not getting along with him very well. Something about him being too much like your younger sister?"

"Oh," she said with a wave of her hand, "that's Alex. I'm talking about my eldest brother, Thaddeus. Ugh, these shoes are driving me insane!"

Sirius watched as she toed off her loafers, revealing red and black socks striped like an evil candy cane. She propped her foot on her lap and began massaging it. "That's better. I really should order some more comfortable shoes."

Sirius had the feeling that she was trying to avoid discussing her family. In the past, he'd been reluctant to pry into her personal troubles, but after everything they'd been through on Saturday, he felt that the time for reluctance had come and gone.

"What were you saying about your brother?" he prompted.

"Nothing really," Cressida said. "You've been reminding me of him over the last few days, that's all."

I remind her of her brother? Sirius thought, panicking at the ramifications of this revelation. That's the kiss of death! Where did I go wrong?

The horror he felt must have been prominently displayed on his face, because Cressida quickly said, "Oh, no, that came out wrong! I just meant that you've made me feel safe, like he used to when I was little. The way you've taken care of me and followed me around all day to make sure I was okay... It's what Thad would've done if he'd been here."

"Followed you around?" Sirius said, attempting to affect an air of ignorance. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Sirius, you're about as subtle as a dragon in an apothecary. I know what you've been doing. You've been watching my every move today. You even used my best friend as one of your agents."

"You can get angry with me if you want to, but I knew you'd be a target today so--"

"Calm down, you," Cressida interrupted. "I know why you did it, and it's appreciated."

"Oh." He'd fully expected Cressida to balk at his interference. As he had been gearing up for an argument, her surprising reaction left Sirius feeling deflated. "Well, it was no problem. Really," he added when he saw irritation pass over Cressida's face.

"It becomes a problem when you start skiving just to keep up with me. I'm not worth..." She closed her eyes for a moment, took a deep breath, and said, "Never mind. Your attendance has always been spotty at best, and you're still one of the top students in our year."

"I call it 'The Sirius Black Method,'" Sirius replied, choosing to ignore Cressida's very poor self-assessment of her worth. Instead he cleared his throat and, in his best imitation of the annoying advertisements often heard on the Wizarding Wireless Network, said, "Never take notes, open your textbooks only twice a year, and watch the high marks roll in. Extraordinarily high intelligence and a best friend who takes notes on a regular basis so you won't have to not included."

"Neither is modesty, apparently," Cressida replied, grinning as she reached over, carefully picked up the arm of the record player, and set it down on another groove on the record. "Now this is my favorite song of theirs," she said over the static Sirius now assumed preceded every song on the record. "One summer it seemed like this was the only song my brother listened to."

Sirius listened to the opening measures of the song as Cressida settled herself next to him once more. As he listened to the lyrics, it seemed like the dodgy bloke with the raspy voice was in love, telling his girl to light his fire.

"My brother used to dance with me to this song," Cressida said as an instrumental bridge began. "We'd spin round and round until we were dizzy." There was a light smile on her face as she revisited old memories. "Do you know what it's like to love someone so much you'd die for them, but at the same time, hate them so much you think you'd kill them on sight?"

Sirius stared at Cressida in amazement, not because he was shocked by her question, but because it was like she had read his mind. In one sentence she had accurately expressed exactly how he felt about his younger brother. Speechless, he merely nodded his head in response.

"When I listen to this music, I think of all the fun we used to have together. But then," she said, the reflected firelight giving her eyes an eerie, phosphorescent glow, "I think of how he just turned his back on the family--on me--and it makes me want to scream, or-or just hit something really hard, you know?"

"What'd he do?" Sirius expected Cressida to clam up and attempt to change the subject. To his surprise, she told him the whole story. She told him about the row between Thaddeus and her father that escalated to a duel, the curse that cost her dad his eyesight, and Thad's abandonment of the Wizarding world.

"I thought my family was bad," Sirius said after taking a minute or two to process the tale. "We haven't thrown curses at each other yet. Not this century anyway..."

"I still don't know what they were arguing about. I mean," she said as she turned to face him, "what was so bad that it would make them use magic against each other that way? I've asked my dad about it, but he won't tell me. If he won't help me, then I'll find out from Thad."

Frowning, Sirius replied, "I thought you said you don't know where he is."

"I don't, but I'm going to look for him as soon as I'm finished with school." She turned stare into the fire again. "No matter how long it takes."

"Oh," Sirius said, suddenly finding interest in a snag in the rug. For some reason, he was less than thrilled with this new bit of information.

"Anyway, enough about me. What about you? Who is it you love so much you want to kill them?"

"Er..." Sirius said, struck by the bluntness of her question, "my brother, Regulus."

Cressida snorted. "No offense, Sirius," she said, "but Regulus is a wanker. I don't know anyone who doesn't want to murder him." She looked at Sirius as though she regretted being the bearer of this bad news. "Sorry, but it's true."

Sirius settled back against the sofa and sighed. "Well, he wasn't always like that. He used to be all right. Before we came to Hogwarts, Regulus was like my second shadow. He followed me everywhere. I didn't mind, though. He always knew what to do to make me laugh. I remember once my mother was really letting us have it. She'd caught us playing with some of the Muggle children in the neighborhood. Since I was older, she unloaded on me. But the whole time she was yelling at me, I had to bite my tongue to keep a straight face. Regulus was behind her, mimicking everything she did.

"He's really smart, too," Sirius said. "I mean, he's not a swotty little know-it-all or anything, but he never takes anything at face value. At least he didn't before he came to Hogwarts. But once he was sorted into Slytherin, Mum started favoring Regulus instead of me. I couldn't care less about that, except that now, instead of thinking for himself, he spouts off all the rubbish our parents believe about being pure--because he thinks that's what it'll take to please them. Every time I see him, I just want to--to--hell, I don't know. He just makes me so angry, because..."

"He's better than what he's become, right?"

Sirius stared at Cressida, too overwhelmed to answer her right away. She understood. She truly understood how he felt about his git of a brother, because she had one too. He didn't talk to his friends about Regulus very often because none of them had any siblings, and most of the time they just didn't get it. But Cressida did.

"Yeah."

Cressida didn't say anything else. She simply hooked her arm around his, laced their fingers together, and laid her head on his shoulder. As they sat there listening to the music, Sirius decided that the time was right to ask Cressida a very important question.

"Er, Cressida?"

"Yes?"

"I was wondering if--I mean, if you've already got plans it's okay, but... would you like to sit with me during the next Quidditch match?"

Cressida sat up, her face obscured by her hair. Desperate to see her, Sirius reached up and tucked her hair behind her ears. Even with a bruise on her face, he was struck by how pretty she was when she smiled.

She's smiling! That must mean--

"Of course, I'm sitting with you!" Cressida said, interrupting his thoughts as she playfully hit his arm. Rolling her eyes she added, "Asks me a question like that and he thinks he has extraordinarily high intelligence. Honestly..."

Sirius smiled a smile so big it felt like his face was going to crack. He knew he looked like a fool, but he didn't care. "Just making sure. I didn't want to make any assumptions."

"Well, there's nowhere else I'd rather be than sitting next to you, screaming my throat raw and supporting the team." Cressida looked thoughtful for a moment before adding, "You may want to invest in some ear plugs."

"Thanks for the tip," said Sirius, studying her face so he could replay this moment later. "I kind of like being able to hear and all..." His voice trailed off as Cressida started running her fingers through her hair, trying to hide her face again. He gently grasped her fingers and freed them from her hair.

"Don't," he murmured. He rested one finger against her lips to silence her when she began to protest. "I've been following you, but I feel like I haven't seen your face all day." Without another word spoken, Sirius leaned over, pushed her hair away from her face, and placed a single kiss on her bruise. When he had tucked her hair behind her ear once more, he sat back and said, "That's much better."

The corner of Cressida's mouth upturned in a sort of half-smile. The action was so endearing Sirius longed to kiss her again--properly this time. He leaned toward her again, and just as their lips were about to meet, a small sigh that belonged to neither one of them directed their attention behind them.

They had been so engrossed in each other they had neglected to notice they had an audience. A trio of first year girls was leaning against the back of the sofa, their wide-opened eyes and ears taking in every sight and sound. With the mood and their moment effectively ruined, Sirius expelled a frustrated breath and flung his head back on the cushion of the sofa.

"Show's over," Cressida managed to say through peals of laughter, "so toddle off, would you? You've got plenty to keep you gabbing for the next few hours."

Giggling like mad, the girls turned and raced toward the girls' dormitory, loudly whispering things like, "That was so romantic," and, "She's so lucky," on their way.

Cressida laid her head on the sofa next to his. "You aren't angry, are you?"

"Why should I be angry?" he asked with a note of derision as he stared at the ceiling. "They only kept me from doing something I've been thinking about doing for the last two years."

"Two years? Really?" she said.

Sirius turned his head so he could look into her eyes. "Yeah."

"Well, you've waited this long. You can wait a little longer." Cressida kissed the pad of her index finger and touched his lips. "Besides," she said, an impish smirk spreading across her face, "I promise I'll be worth the wait. So, what are we going to do about James and Lily?"

Coherent thought had ceased the moment her finger touched his lips.

"Who?"

*~*~*~*

Severus sat on a tabletop in the empty Potions classroom, his feet propped in the seat of a chair, his shoulders slumped, and his head in his hands. Long clumps of hair hung in front of his covered face, limply swaying to and fro with each breath he took. His defeated stillness on the outside betrayed the whirlwind of thoughts and feelings on the inside.

He just couldn't understand it, the invisible pull Lily had on him. Each time he made a plan to regain a semblance of his former independence, it was forgotten the moment she entered the room or opened her mouth to speak. She even infected his thoughts when she wasn't there. Despite himself, his early mornings were spent thinking of his schedule and the times he would be likely to run into her. His afternoon and evening meals were spent trying to sneak glances in her direction--until he'd started forcing himself to sit with his back facing the Gryffindor table. If he came across something interesting during his studies, he'd wonder for a fleeting moment what Lily would think of it, before quickly stuffing the thought into a lockbox in his mind. And, of course, she even haunted him in his dreams, for he had determined the significance of the red flame after the first night he'd dreamed of it. She was the red flame that soothed and comforted him night after night, keeping the darkness and his father's sadistic laughter at bay.

Severus glanced at the clock on the wall. It was two minutes until six o'clock. She would be there any minute. He could feel his pulse quicken--with anticipation or dread, he couldn't be sure. He'd toyed with the idea of not showing up for their study session, but ultimately decided against it. His reputation as the top Potions student in his year was on the line, and the prospect of giving Lily grief over being late was too inviting to pass up.

Has her presence in your life really been all that bad? asked a small voice in the back of his mind. His first impulse was to take that voice and mentally stomp it into the lockbox, but something made him stop to consider what it had asked. There certainly hadn't been many dull moments since the term had started, and Severus had to admit to himself it had been pleasant and outright enjoyable to talk to someone on his intellectual level for a change. Not to mention the fact he had been greatly relieved earlier when he realized she didn't hate him after all.

No, he thought, none of that matters. The fact remains that I've become too dependent on her. Severus knew too well the folly of depending on others. He had witnessed first-hand the end result of binding one's well-being to the whims of another. He had seen it ruin his mother; he would not let it ruin him.

"Sorry, I'm late!"

At the sound of Lily's bubbly voice, Severus heaved a sigh and tucked his dark thoughts away. And so it begins.

"I would've been here sooner," she continued, the echoing sound of her footsteps getting louder as she approached, "but I needed to help Cressida with something. Besides, I know how much you love ragging me about being late so..." He heard her stop and stand beside him as she asked, "Severus, are you okay?"

"I'm fine," he said, his voice muffled by the hands that were still covering his face. He quickly scrubbed them over his face and through his lifeless hair before adding, "Never better."

"Are you sure? You looked like you were agonizing over something."

"Just because I don't have the personality of a Fizzing Whizbee," Severus said as he slid off the table, "doesn't mean that my world is about to come to an end."

"All right, Severus, it was only a question!" Lily retorted, dropping her bag onto the table with a loud thud. "You don't have to get your knickers in a twist over it."

He narrowed his eyes at her as she continued. "Anyway, Cressida wanted to pick something up from the Muggle Studies room, so I escorted her there and back. With all the hexes flying around today, I thought that two pairs of eyes would be better than one."

"Why are you telling me all of this?" Severus asked, leaning against the table and folding his arms across his chest in the manner of one experiencing an intense bout of ennui. "You don't owe me any explanations."

Lily opened her mouth and promptly closed it, as if she was going to say something and thought better of it. Instead, she walked to the other side of the table. As she sat down, she finally said, "You know what, Severus? You're right, I don't have to explain anything to you. Let's just get this over with."

Severus stood there and watched as Lily took out her stack of professional journals and began to read. He couldn't tell if she was angry, irritated, or simply unconcerned. She hadn't yelled at him; on the contrary, she had been extremely calm, maybe too calm. Deciding that he didn't care how she felt, Severus sat down next to her and proceeded to take out his own reading materials.

He had finally begun to read, when out of the blue Lily asked, "Why do you do that?"

Severus expelled a frustrated breath before asking, "Why do I do what?"

Lily clasped her hands as if silently praying for patience. "This morning, I thought we understood each other. I thought that we would finally be able to get through something without you being so... nasty."

"When was I nasty?" he asked, frowning.

"Severus, I was just trying to let you know what kept me from getting here sooner, and you bit my head off."

"I did not bite your head off. I only said you didn't have to explain why you were late."

"But it was the way you said it!"

"For God's sake!" Severus swept his books into his bag as he said, "I can't do this again!"

"Where are you going?" Lily asked, panic taking hold of her voice.

"Relax," said Severus. He stood and kicked his chair under the table. "I'm moving away from you. I cannot concentrate with you blathering on every five minutes. That's why we didn't get anything accomplished this morning."

"Fine, then, just shut me out like you always do. I'm used to it!"

"I'm not listening to you!" He stopped at a table two rows in front of Lily, jerked the chair from underneath it, and plopped into the seat, his back to her.

"Fine," mumbled Lily.

Then, thankfully, there was silence. There was a small part of Severus that longed to have the last word, but he fought to overcome it. He'd let her have it today. There was no way he'd give her the satisfaction of continuing to participate in her idiotic conversation. He could see her in his mind's eye, sitting there with her head propped up on her hand, her lips pouting in response to his non-participation. The temptation to turn around and see his imagined portrait of Lily in the flesh was great, but he successfully resisted it. Severus congratulated himself on triumphing over his more puerile urges and finally settled into his studies.

The two of them sat in silence for the better part of an hour, the occasional rustle of pages turning the only sound that was heard. After days of reading journal after journal and finding nothing, Severus was beginning to think maybe they were wrong about the potion being a fairly new one. Yet something kept telling him their theory was right.

Maybe we just aren't reading the right types of journals, he thought. They had limited their search to healers' journals, thinking that of all possible wizarding professions, healers would be the most likely to use a potion that had the properties of their mystery brew.

He was ruminating, trying to decide where the two of them might have gone wrong, when Lily said, "Severus? I think I--"

"Honestly, Lily," he interrupted without turning around to acknowledge her, "I'm trying to think here!"

"But, Severus, if you'd just listen--"

"No, I'm not going to listen," Severus said, twisting around in his seat to glare at her. "Why do you feel the need to talk every little subject to death? We are never going to get this thing figured out with your irritating need to talk incessantly about any and everything, so just leave me--"

"Bloody hell, Severus Snape!" Lily bellowed as she jumped out of her seat and slammed both hands on the table. "Just shut up and get over here! I think I may have found something."

Severus leapt out of his chair and raced to where Lily had returned to her seat. He leaned over her shoulder, bracing himself by placing his hands on the table and effectively caging her. "What did you find?"

"This article from four years ago," she said, pointing to an article titled, Breakthrough Found in New Hybrid Potion. "It describes a potion that sounds a lot like ours."

Severus scanned the article, checking the properties of their potion off his mental list. The potion described in the article was a cross between the Draught of Living Death and the Draught of Peace. Yes. It had increased levels of valerian and no sopophorous bean juice. Yes. The potion was an iridescent, silvery color before a final preparation was made prior to administration. Yes. She's found it! Severus was so excited it felt like his heart was going to beat its way up his throat and out of his mouth.

"The article says that researchers were trying to create a potion that didn't induce a sleep as deep as Living Death but allowed a person to sleep without dreaming," Lily said. Even though he wasn't looking at her, Severus knew she was just as excited as he was. He could hear the grin in her voice.

"The sleeper," she continued, "can be awakened quite easily, without feeling any aftereffects like grogginess." She swiveled in her seat so she could look at him, gripping the back of her chair. "I've seen this potion being used. Saturday, when we were in the hospital wing with Cressida, Madam Pomfrey gave her a purple potion that put her to sleep right away."

Severus wanted to respond, but his thoughts were supplanted by the scent of Lily's hair. The faint, sweet scent of vanilla wafted past his nose when she'd tossed it back to look at him. Something about the smell was familiar to him, but he couldn't figure out why. It was as if a memory was trying to break out of the lockbox, and the fragrance of her hair was its own Alohamora spell.

"Well?" asked Lily, practically bouncing in her seat as she waited for his response.

Severus shook his head and frowned. They were finally getting somewhere with their project, and all he could think of was the scent of her hair. He felt like he was slowly, but surely, losing his mind. He straightened himself and stepped back, putting a few feet between them in the process.

"What does that potion have to do with ours?" he asked, finally getting his thoughts back on track. "Our potion is silver, and so is the one in the article, isn't it?"

"It is, but after the final step the potion turns purple." She stood up, hugging her elbows and giggling. "We did it, Severus, we finally did it!" Without warning, Lily threw herself forward and locked her arms around his neck, capturing Severus in a hug and nearly bowling him over in the process.

She did it, so why is she hugging me? I don't hug; surely she knows that. Severus was paralyzed by his discomfort. His body was so rigid it felt as though someone had cast a Body Bind on him.

"I know I said I didn't have a doubt in my mind that we'd figure it out," she whispered in his ear, "but in all honesty, I was about to give up."

"I'm glad you... didn't," said Severus. He had suddenly become very aware of her hand lightly stroking his back and two very prominent parts of her anatomy pressing against his chest with every breath she took. Along with that awareness, Severus felt an odd writhing sensation in the pit of his stomach. It was fleeting, but unsettling, nonetheless.

What the hell is she doing to me? Then he remembered a trite, sickening expression he'd heard a time or two. Butterflies in my stomach? She's giving me butterflies in my stomach? That's it, this has to stop! Maybe if I just stand here she'll get the point and walk away. Severus closed his eyes and waited for that glorious moment to arrive.

It never did.

"Er... Severus," Lily began with a hint of annoyance, "it's common practice for a person who's receiving a hug to return said hug." She ran her hands over his shoulders and down the length of his arms. "It's easy, and it won't kill you, I promise."

When she took his hands and placed them on the small of her back, his brain screamed, Run you fool! But his feet wouldn't cooperate.

"See," Lily said as she wrapped her arms around his neck again. "Easy."

She looked into his eyes, and he stared back into hers. Severus knew he should look away, but for some reason, he just couldn't. Their eyes remained locked on each other, a momentary meeting of green and black, two colors symbolic of the greatest dichotomy of existence--life and death. The two events were opposites, and yet neither could exist without the other. The irony of this was not lost on Severus, for with each passing day his undeniable dependence on her grew stronger and stronger. For the briefest moment, he wondered if Lily felt the same way about him. At that very instant, she broke eye contact, leaning her forehead against his shoulder and breaking the spell.

I'm standing here waxing poetic about the color of her eyes. Enough is enough. Just as he was about to remove himself from her clutches, that familiar scent of vanilla invaded his senses. Almost of their own accord, his eyes slid shut as he tried to pry the memory connected to the aroma out of his brain.

Before Severus realized what was happening, his body had declared mutiny on his mind. His lungs expanded to fill themselves with the scent of her. His heartbeat, which had sped up in panic, was now slowing down. Muscles that had tensed up at her touch were relaxing. The warmth from her hands seemed to have caused some sort of reaction in his skin, because now his whole body felt warmer. Then he felt it--the feeling of well-being he thought could only exist in his dreams washed over him like a hot shower on a cold morning.

Lily finally stepped away from him, and just like that the feeling was gone. Severus opened his eyes and glanced at the clock, wondering just how long they had been entwined. He was amazed to see that their embrace had lasted barely a minute. It had seemed much longer to him.

Lily folded her arms across her chest and bit her lower lip. Severus felt a flicker of annoyance because he knew she was trying not to laugh.

"What?" he snapped.

"Nothing," she said, her smile escaping as she spoke. "A simple hug and somehow Severus Snape lives to scowl another day."

There had been nothing simple about the hug. It was complex on several different levels, one of which dawned on Severus at that moment. "I haven't been hugged since I was seven years old," he said, frowning.

"You're kidding, right?" Lily said.

Severus jumped slightly at the sound of her voice. He hadn't realized that he'd spoken his thoughts aloud. He looked at Lily and saw that she was frowning too.

"You're not kidding, are you?"

"So," he said, walking past her and back to the table where his things were. "What of it?"

"What of it?" Lily repeated, incredulous. "Severus, you were a little boy! I don't understand how--"

"It is not for you to understand! I didn't ask you to understand, and I don't want you to understand."

"But... why? I told you before, Severus, you can trust me."

Severus rolled his eyes in defeat. The only way to quash the current topic of discussion was to actually discuss it. Lily wouldn't give him a moment's peace until he did; he knew that now. He removed his wand from his pocket and quietly levitated his belongings to another table. Then he sat on the table top, put his feet in a chair, and with a wave of his hand, he gestured for Lily to do the same.

"You know," she said as she vaulted onto the table, "you're awfully good at casting spells nonverbally. I haven't quite got the hang of it, yet."

"You will," Severus replied with certainty. "It just takes concentration... and practice." He looked down at the palm of his hand, studying the lines with intensity. "It was my father's doing, of course. I was seven, and I had just discovered drawing. I would go outside for hours, just drawing the things I saw outside. One day, I climbed a tree in the garden behind our house to get a better look at a family of birds nesting in it. I fell out of the tree and broke my arm. I cried."

"Of course you did," said Lily, "anybody would!"

"Anyway, that didn't sit too well with my father," Severus continued, staring at the classroom door as he revisited another place and time. "My mother tried to comfort me and calm me down by hugging me. He made her stop. He said I was too old to be coddled and that was why I was crying so much. He called me weak and said my mother was making me that way. She wanted to take me to St. Mungo's to be healed, but he insisted on taking me to a Muggle doctor to have my arm set in a cast. He said it would build character and toughen me up. I suppose he was right. I haven't cried since that day, not even when he died." He felt gentle pressure on his hand and was confused when he saw Lily's hand linked with his.

"You're lucky, you know," she said, her eyes sparkling with mirth.

"I'm lucky that my father was cold-hearted, and my mother was too scared to protect me from him?"

"No. You're lucky you have me as a friend. I happen to be a world class hugger."

All thoughts of his family dysfunction vanished. "What?"

"The way I see it, you have nearly ten years' worth of hugging to catch up on. You need all the help you can get." Lily hopped down from the table and pushed his chair out of the way. She positioned herself between his dangling legs and linked her arms around him again.

This time Severus reached up and removed her arms from his neck, but not before the nearly intoxicating scent of her hair filled his nose again. Holding her at arms' length, he said, "The concept of personal space means nothing to you, does it?"

Lily put her hands on her hips. "Severus, I'm going to figure you out if it's the last thing I do."

"I don't like to be hugged. What is there to figure out?"

"Most blokes our age would like nothing more than to have a girl wrap herself around them, but here you sit whining about personal space. You don't make sense."

"That's rich coming from you, because you've never made sense to me."

Lily threw her head back and laughed. "That's funny! You know what's even funnier, though? You didn't seem to have a problem with the lack of personal space when you were sniffing my hair a few minutes ago."

Severus could feel his face whiten. He worked to quickly regain his composure, but one look at Lily told him she knew she'd struck a nerve. He ignored that fact and said, "You're deranged."

"Maybe, but you were sniffing my hair."

"You were dropped on your head as a baby, weren't you?"

"Oh, come off it, Snape!" Lily sat on the table opposite Severus and crossed her legs. "We were hugging! Very closely, mind you. Unless you've got a head cold, it was unavoidable. It just seemed like you were enjoying it, that's all. Were you? I mean, it's okay if you were." She looked away and muttered, "I did."

Severus stood up, hardly believing what he had just heard. "You did?"

"I did."

"Did what?" He wanted to hear the words come out of her mouth.

Lily expelled a breath and folded her arms across her chest. "I like. The way. You smell."

Worried that she was pulling his leg, he mimicked her by folding his own arms and asked, "Why?"

"You..." She hesitated for a moment, and it seemed to Severus that she was trying to find the right words to say. "You smell like winter. Things that remind me of winter."

"Things like what?"

"Cold air, firewood burning..."

Severus resisted the urge to sniff his robes, choosing instead to say, "And you like the smell of those things?"

Lily nodded. "Winter is my favorite time of year. Odd, isn't it?"

"Why would that be odd?"

"I don't know, most people would say spring or summer, wouldn't they?"

"Most people are idiots."

"True," she managed to reply through her laughter. "I like snow. I like curling up by a fire and breathing in the smell of the wood burning. And I love Christmas, which is easily my favorite holiday." She paused and placed her hand on her chest where her locket would have been. Severus noticed that she had that same faraway, wistful look in her eyes that she'd had when he sketched her portrait. He knew she was thinking about her family, most likely her sister in particular.

"You didn't happen to pick up my locket on Saturday, did you?" Lily asked.

"No," Severus lied. He didn't know why he did it. The lie just flowed right out of his mouth. "I haven't seen it since you threw it at me."

"Oh. Anyway," she said, "when we were hugging, you smelled like all of those things to me. So, what about me? What do I smell like?"

Severus pushed his hair out of his face, annoyed because he'd allowed himself to get caught up in yet another ridiculous exchange with Lily Evans. "I cannot believe we're talking about this. It's demented. I am not participating in this... conversation."

Lily leapt off the table and said, "That's not fair! I'm not in the habit of telling people what they smell like, in great detail no less. You asked me to tell you, and I did. Now it's your turn, so start talking!"

"Vanilla, all right! You smell like vanilla," Severus said as he acquiesced to defeat.

Lily nodded her head, apparently trying to coax more information out of him. "And?"

"And what?"

"Is that good, or bad, or what?"

"It's... good."

"Why?"

"I don't know."

"You just don't want to tell me," Lily said with a pout.

"No, it's not that," Severus admitted. "I can't remember why. I've been trying to remember. The memory is there, but I just can't get to it."

"Maybe this'll help." Lily walked up to him and hugged him again. "Maybe it'll come back to you if you smell my hair again." Soft laughter escaped her, and Severus could feel her breath tickling his ear. "You're right, this is demented."

Severus made no moves to resist her; his desire to unlock the elusive memory was that strong. In fact, he willingly hugged her back this time. He buried his nose in her hair and drew the scent of her into himself. Wisps of recognition tickled his mind as he breathed in and out. Desperation compelled Severus to cling to Lily as he tried to latch onto the memory and the feelings it triggered. He closed his eyes and let his mind drift.

After several minutes he murmured, "It feels like it happened in a kitchen."

"That makes sense," Lily replied. "Maybe someone was baking something."

"My mother... I can see her. She was baking something, and I was helping her. I was very young... four or five. I can see her showing me the recipe and explaining how to read it, what the abbreviations stand for, how to measure the ingredients properly."

"No wonder you're so good in Potions. I mean, brewing a potion is really nothing more than following a recipe, isn't it?"

Severus heard every word that Lily said, but he was too confused by what he was remembering that he couldn't respond to her. "She's smiling and laughing. She's... happy, and so am I... I can feel it. I didn't think I was capable of being that happy." He felt Lily pull away from him slightly, and he opened his eyes to see an indignant face staring back at him.

"Why wouldn't you be?" Lily asked, flames of anger licking at her every word. "You're a human being, Severus."

He knew that she was angry for him, not at him. Severus could only remember one other time in his life when someone had been angry on his behalf--that someone had been Lily. Somehow, this realization made the warmth within him grow.

"I am the product of two miserable people who, for some reason known only to them, decided to procreate," he said. "I've always thought it was a genetic impossibility for me to be happy."

"I've told you before, we are not our parents. We're the ones who have to decide how we want our lives to turn out, not them. You can have happiness and joy in your life, but you have to want it. Most of the time, happiness doesn't just happen. You have to seek it out. You have to find it, and when you do you hold on to it for as long as you can."

Maybe Lily was right. Maybe it was time for him to take a risk and let someone in. Ignoring the voice in his head that was telling him how mad he was, Severus squeezed her tighter and said, "Like this?"

"Do I make you happy, Severus?"

He began to hesitate, but instead he pressed on. "I... I think you do. I never would have remembered... never would have known it was possible if not for you." He might regret it tomorrow, but at this moment the time to hesitate had come to its end.

"Then yes," she answered, squeezing him tighter in return. "Exactly like this." A smile graced her lips and shined in her eyes before she laid her head on his shoulder.

The two of them stood there holding each other, neither one saying a word. Severus couldn't speak--he was too preoccupied with trying to make sense of the situation in which he now found himself. Just as being in the presence of the red flame brought him contentment, so too did being in Lily's arms. Against his better judgment, he had stopped trying to run from his true feelings, and remarkably, the discomfort he felt from being so close to her had disappeared. When he left all of his reservations behind, holding her felt natural; it felt right.

"Severus," Lily murmured, her breath feather light on his neck, "one of us is going to have to let go soon. I'm on patrolling duty tonight."

Severus made a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat, making no move to release her.

"You could come with me," she said, her palms tracing small circles on his back. "As long as you're with me, no one will give you grief about walking around the castle after curfew."

Again, Severus remained quiet. He liked the way Lily made him feel, and he was sick and tired of pretending he didn't. He wanted to hold on to it--and her--a little bit longer.

Lily lifted her head off of his shoulder and studied his face. "You're awfully quiet, Severus. What are you thinking about?"

"This."

In a split second, the decision was made, and while he was feeling this strange melding of bravery and stupidity, Severus was going to execute it. As he leaned closer to Lily's lips, terror transformed his heart into a beast trying to escape its cage. He was scared Lily would reject him or ridicule him for this unprecedented show of emotion, and the beast responded by becoming more and more merciless the closer he got.

His lips lightly brushed over hers, and as he reveled in their soft fullness, he was sure his heart would finally explode. To his amazement, Lily didn't turn her head away from his, or make girly noises of disgust like he expected her to. She did the unimaginable and kissed him back. Relief made him grip her even tighter.

A symphony of sensations coursed through him, growing in intensity with every passing second. His hands found her hair and in that moment, his dreams became reality. The red fire that eluded him in his sleep was now slipping through his fingers. As Severus continued to play with Lily's hair, a small sigh escaped her and her lips parted. Spurred by her reaction to his touch, Severus accepted the invitation with no hesitation.

It seemed that she was everywhere at once, surrounding him as the kiss intensified. The taste of her was just as sweet as the scent of her, and he craved more. He could feel her small hands kneading his back and sending ripples of bliss down his spine. Her heart was just as competitive as she was, for it felt like it was challenging his, matching it beat for beat.

For a while Severus felt weightless, as if all his worries had vanished. Then a voice invaded his thoughts. To his dismay it wasn't his own pesky little voice of reason; it was the memory of another voice spouting off unwanted advice.

You know there's only one thing a Mudblood girl is good for--and it isn't studying Potions... Don't let feelings get in the way of what you want. Just give her a good ride and make a clean break. When feelings get involved, things get right messy. But I'm sure that won't be a problem for you, Severus.

Immediately sickened by the memory of Evan's perverted ramblings, Severus pushed Lily away from him and staggered back, inebriated by their kiss. He stared at her across the short distance between them. She was bracing herself against a table, her hands gripping its edges as she fought to control her breathing. Her face was flushed, its color rivaling that of her disheveled hair.

"Severus, what's wrong?" she asked with breathless urgency. "Say something."

In what appeared to be an act of frustration, Lily bit her lip, swollen from their previous extracurricular activity. With that one simple action, Severus felt compelled to walk over to her and continue where they left off, and because of that, he turned around, summoned his bag, and rushed toward the classroom's exit.

"Severus, don't leave, just tell me what's wrong!"

Ignoring her pleas, he increased the pace of his steps. As he raced out the door, he willed her not to follow him. He didn't dare look back to see if she was. Once he was in the corridor, Severus began to run flat out towards the Slytherin common room.

When he reached the entrance, he didn't enter. Instead he paced in front of it muttering, "I'm not like Evan," over and over in disgust. Frustrated and confused, he threw his back against the wall of the dank corridor and slid down to the floor. He reached inside his bag, pulled out his sketchbook, and quickly found Lily's portrait. As his fingertips traced the outlines of her face, he felt an ache in his chest. His sketch was a poor facsimile of the girl he'd held mere moments ago.

He almost hated Lily for allowing him to kiss her, because he now knew that he could completely lose himself in her. What scared him more than anything else was the fact that he didn't care. Now that he knew what it felt like to hold, touch, and even taste her, there was no going back. A depression as black as the darkness that pursued him in his nightmares descended upon him. It was becoming clear to him that what was quite possibly the greatest moment of his life so far was also his biggest mistake, and he knew it was a mistake he could never make again.