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“Sev, it’s okay, you’ll be fine!” Lily said, putting her feet down and balancing carefully. “It’s easier than a broomstick, and you managed that just fine.”
Severus frowned down at the bicycle beneath him. Lily swore up and down that it’d work just fine and he’d only fall a few times –not the most comforting information for a twelve year old– and said it was really fun. He was stuck on Petunia’s old bicycle, and it was pink and sparkly, so he wasn’t certain it was going to be fun, but he would try.
It was pure luck he was even there, Lily’s parents let him stay over a lot during summer holidays, both so he and Lily could do homework and so that he didn’t have to go back home. Severus suspected Lily had let slip a bit more about his home life than he would’ve liked, but it was okay. They were friends, and so long as Petunia didn’t know, he’d find a way to deal with it.
Lily was so nice to him; the least he could do was try out one of her Muggle toys. After all, he’d found some of the Muggle things pretty entertaining, especially the sweets. They weren’t as good as the ones Lily would get from the trolley on the Express and share with him, but they were still pretty yummy.
So he took a deep breath and made sure his wand was still firmly in his front pocket, and picked his feet up to start pedaling like Lily had shown him. Lily beamed, and he smiled tentatively back. She started to pedal down the street and he wobbled after her, at a much slower pace.
“C’mon Sev, faster!” Lily laughed, riding in circles around Severus.
Severus frowned a bit but started to pedal faster, picking up speed as he and Lily both went down the street. Slowly, a smile spread across his face as he gained speed, and he looked up and away from his pedaling feet to see Lily cycling ahead of him, red hair streaming out behind her.
He went faster and faster towards the end of the street, where it hit a cul-de-sac. Soon, he was going too fast. His feet wouldn’t slow down, and his hands were locked too tight on the handlebars to move for his wand. “Lily!” he called out, panicked. “Lily! How do you stop?”
Lily turned over her shoulder to answer, but it was badly timed. She went over a huge pothole and flew over the handlebars. Severus leapt off the bicycle without being entirely aware of how he managed it. “Lily! Lily, are you okay?”
She was sprawled out on the pavements, hair spilled across the ground. As he got closer, he could see her shoulders shaking and assumed she was crying. “Oh, Lily, no, no it’s okay, I’ve got my wand, you’ll be fine-” Severus babbled, pulling his wand from his pocket.
“That was so much fun!” Lily shouted, pushing herself up on her hands and then to her feet. She had a cut across her forehead, her palms were ripped apart, and the knee on one of her jeans had torn. He understood now that she had been laughing, not crying. “I must’ve flown!”
Severus looked over at her, eyes sparkling green and hair flashing as red as the little bit of blood on her forehead. “Yeah, Lil, you really did.”