Chapter Text
“Are you nervous?” The question came from a small eleven-year-old, two bright red messy braids down her back. Lily Evans had insisted upon doing her own hair that morning, no matter how much she wished for her mother’s steady hands braiding each strand.
She was older now, and she was going on an adventure.
Lily glanced over at her friend, Sev, a grin of excitement on her face, even while her legs bounced with jitters. She could have never imagined how one summer day with her best friend could lead her to this. To a magic school, to a place where she would learn so many new things.
To a whole new world.
One moment she was dreaming up ideas with Sev to make the hot day better. As sweat trickled down their backs and they drank the last drops of their water, they imagined turning the lake they laid beside into cold ice cream, turning the leaves into sugary snow.
The next, in her hands, was a daydream come true. Flower petals, turned into already-melting ice-cubes.
Sev had dragged the tearful Lily to his mum, Ms. Eileen, who calmly explained to Lily about this other world that existed. Lily had never known about it—neither of her parents had magic, but now that she did, she never wanted to leave.
Sev was an only child, but he’d still been told hundreds of stories about Hogwarts and spells and Quidditch from his mum. Nothing could have brought Lily down from where she’d flown up high into the sky on excitement and elation that she could be a part of something so wonderful with her best friend.
Nothing except for Tuney.
In the train car, brown eyes met green. Sev and Lily had known each other for almost their whole lives, and he didn’t tend to express his emotion freely.
But he gave her a small, reassuring smile.
“Don’t worry too much,” he said, his gaze letting Lily know he wasn’t talking about the Sorting. Lily had tearfully repeated the words Tuney sneered at her earlier that morning, and he’d given her a tight hug in response. Don’t worry too much.
Give her some space, Lily’s mum had said. She just needs time to process, and then everything will be the same between you two again.
Except it wasn’t one morning of older sister grumpiness. It’d been an entire summer of slammed doors and snarky comments. Of hurting so much and all of it because of the one person who’s supposed to be there to comfort you no matter what.
Freak.
Lily stared down at her hands, fiddling with the charm bracelet she always wore.
“Thanks,” she mumbled. Unable to handle the pity in his eyes, Lily didn’t look up—but on the edges of her vision there was a blur of motion as Sev moved to sit next to her.
He took her right hand, and she let him.
“I’m here, okay?” On her palm, his fingertips tapped out a message. Short long, short long short short, short long long, short long, long short long long, short short short.
Lily smiled to herself, finally meeting Sev’s eyes. Always.
After a very boring English lesson in third grade (really, they already knew where to put commas and when to use periods and not exclamation points), Lily’s dad had introduced them to Morse code, handing them a book on it with a wink.
It was rough and slow at the beginning, but many more boring English lessons later, Lily and Sev were tapping on the other’s desk or hand or leg constantly.
Lily took Sev’s other hand, the one not holding hers, and asked again, Nervous?
A little. The Sorting seems really scary.
The words to reassure him were on the tip of her tongue when Sev pulled his hand away for a moment, messing with his tie. Lily watched, noticing the new robes—that matched her own, but seemed like they might have been a little much for the Snapes.
The Evans were well-off, Lily’s parents both held steady and well-paying jobs, but Sev’s home-life was…different. Harder. That’s why they were always plotting ways for him to come over to her house for dinner, unless his dad was gone.
Ms. Eileen has a good job, working as a teacher alongside Lily’s mum, but it’d been years since Sev’s dad held a steady job. He constantly bounced around, working a different job almost every week, and Lily’s mum warned her to stay at the park or at their own house when Mr. Snape was home.
Sev was welcome to sleep on the floor next to Lily in their sleeping bags on nights like those. Lily’s mum also made sure there were always leftovers for him to take home the next morning, along with his clothes from the day before that completely accidentally got picked up and put in the wash.
It hit Lily that maybe she won’t be able to see Sev as much as she would like. That they could be put into two different dorms, on completely different sides of the school.
After a moment, Lily voiced her thoughts. As a nervous eleven-year-old, she had little filter.
“We’ll still be able to see each other even if we’re in different Houses, right?” Her voice quavered, but thankfully Sev didn’t point it out.
The grin on her face had faded, almost completely gone as she looked into her friend’s eyes. “Right?” she asked hesitantly.
Sev was quick to respond. “Definitely. We’ll study together and get the highest marks in all our classes.”
At muggle school, Severus and Lily had already been the top of their class—but everything they would learn at Hogwarts was going to be so much more interesting. It was magic after all. They’d learn all sorts of new spells and wizard history that they never even knew existed.
Sev has particularly been interested in potion-making, but Lily had been reading all and any magical books she could get her hands on. Ms. Eileen gave them each a wrapped present before they left, and Lily’s looked just the right size to be a brand-new copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.
Lily was finally about to come to a decision on whether she should read her worn copy of Little Women or start her new book when the door to their compartment squeaked open.
A head poked in, with curly dark hair in need of combing and glasses askew.
“Is there room in here?” He had a smile on his face, a bit lopsided—but one of those contagious grins that’s full of happiness and friendliness.
Lily glanced over at Sev, meeting his eyes for a second before turning back to the boy. In addition to their morse code, passing meaning through eye contact had come easily to them—especially when their teachers tried to split them up across the classroom.
“Yes,” she responded, giving the boy a small smile, but making no move to make room for him on their side of the bench.
The train car had enough room to seat six people comfortably; three on each side opposite each other, so he could and did sit across from them, which Lily was grateful for.
As much as her dad’s voice was in her head reminding her to reach out and make new friends—real friends, not just acquaintances, she still wanted to stick close to Sev’s side for as long as she can.
She wasn’t quite ready to let go of home. Out of habit when thinking about home, her fingers rubbed on the half-heart charm on her bracelet—the other half lost somewhere in Tuney’s room.
Lily was quite excited for magic, but not so much for the making friends part—or the overwhelming smell of this boy’s hair product.
In the doorway appeared another figure, a smaller, pudgy boy who smiled cheerfully at Lily and Sev before sitting down next to James, in the seat by the window—where he began waving excitedly to someone. On the station, Lily caught a glimpse of a mother and two small children waving back at the small boy with equal amounts of joy.
Lily craned her neck, leaning past Sev to try and find her own family. Her eyes scanned the crowd—how could there be so many people in one place? —when at last she caught sight of a familiar face.
“Dad!” Lily fully squashed Sev now as she waved to her dad, standing alone. Lily didn’t know what she was expecting—Tuney was forced to come this morning, why would she stay longer than she needed?
Still, Lily’s face fell, and Sev squeezed her hand. “Why’d they have to go?” she murmured quietly, before biting her tongue and silently cursing herself. “I’m sorry, I—”
Sev stops her, saying, “Don’t.” His own mum had left to work earlier that morning and so the Evans had brought Sev along with them. He’d seen all of the Tuney drama unfold firsthand.
The dark-haired boy must have sensed the turn in mood of the two seated across from him, because he cracked another grin and pulled something from his pocket, offering it to the others.
“Want any?” He raised one eyebrow, making it a challenge.
Lily curled inward, pulling herself back to her own part of the seat so she wasn’t in Sev’s space anymore. He was being kind about how blatantly she’d been disrespecting his personal bubble, Lily didn’t want to push it and overwhelm him.
The boy shook the box, drawing Lily’s attention to it.
Make new friends.
Her dad’s voice wasn’t going to leave anytime soon, so she looked over to the small striped container to see it more closely, and it looked like—jellybeans?
She was going to a magical school and had a wand tucked away in her suitcase yet the boy across from her was offering jellybeans. Lily laughed aloud at the absurdity of it all because why should she have expected any different?
Things were going to be okay, and though there were fear inside her mind she didn’t care to admit to feeling, Lily’s gut told her that this year—and the ones that followed—were going to be okay.
The voice in the back of her mind still whispered the hope that Tuney could be here next to her—so she could say see, things aren’t all that different. I’ll still be the same when I come back.
Lily’s laugher confused the boy, and though she couldn’t explain why she was giggling—she did hold out her hand to try some.
The dark-haired boy poured a small handful into her open palm with a grin before his eyes went wide.
“Wait—sorry, my mum said I’d do this, but I haven’t forgotten! So, that’s something.” He grinned—again, how many times would he keep grinning like that?—a look of pride in his eyes for something.
Lily, Sev, and the small boy by the window all exchanged a glance. What were we missing here?
The boy hit his palm to his forehead. “James! I’m James! My mum told me I’d go too fast and forget to introduce myself—but I haven’t!”
Lily held back another bought of giggles—because her mum, too, in her worrying, gave both Lily and Sev a lecture on introducing themselves to other students.
A lecture on making friends. Really, sometimes Lily’s mum worried too much.
The boy by the window wiped his hand on his trousers before holding it out to the others, a half-smile on his face as he mumbled, “Sorry, I’m nervous.”
His voice was quiet, but louder when he said his name. “And I’m Peter. Peter Pettigrew.” His face lifted up into a full smile as they all shook hands.
“Lily Evans.”
“Severus.”
Once introductions were made, the compartment was consumed with quiet.
Peter was the first to speak up. “What’s your favorite flavor?” he asked, chewing on a jellybean from his own handful of them.
Before any of them can answer, he spat it out and blanched, giving James a dirty look. “What is this?”
A mischievous smirk filled James’s face. He shrugged. “Sometimes you get lemon—other times you get earwax.”
“Eww!” Lily scrunched up her face in disgust. Sev reached over to poke them with caution, one eyebrow raised.
“How do we know they all aren’t bad-tasting?”
Another shrug from James was the only answer Sev got, and after a mostly careful inspection of the jellybeans in her hand, Lily decided to go for it.
A smile almost matching James’ filled her face as she lifted her chin with her own challenge. “What is there to lose?”
She popped the red jellybean into her mouth and wanted to sigh with pleasure at how delicious it was.
Cherry. She was much luckier than Peter. That meant that the other red must be the bad tasting one. A plan formed in her mind, and she pretended to spit out her jellybean.
“Yuck,” she said, wiping her mouth as if disgusted by the taste. It took all her concentration not to smirk. “Guess you’re safe now, Sev.” Lily offered up the other red one to her friend.
An offering of something cherry flavored was nothing unusual between the two—cherry was the agreed upon ultimate flavor, orange being second for Lily and grape second for Sev (Lily would never understand how someone could possibly like grape, but they were surprisingly able to pass that hurdle in their friendship).
Lily lost any self-control when she saw the ridiculous look of betrayal and disgust on Sev’s face. Unable to hold back her amusement, she burst out laughing, not the cute giggling—but the full-out, deep, belly laughs. Falling on her side, Lily clutched her stomach as she laughed and laughed and laughed at her friend.
It wasn’t even her best prank, but sometimes the moment hits when the anxiety and nerves of a day are too much, and you simply need to laugh at something stupid.
Or, in this case, laugh at your own friend in a very loving way.
In her amusement, the jellybeans once in her hand scattered across the floor and the seat. Sev, still trying to rid his mouth of the taste, picked one up and threw it at her, hitting her on the nose.
Startled, Lily stopped laughing, looking at Sev with wide eyes. “Oh—you—” She didn’t know how to finish her sentence, so she settled for throwing the jellybean back at him.
Her aim was off from where she laid on the seat, so she ended up throwing it more towards James and Peter than Sev. After a moment’s consideration, Peter picked it up, tossing it back to Lily, who promptly began new attempts to hit Sev.
A very indignant look came over Sev’s face when Lily as successful, and the jellybean got lost somewhere in the folds of his robes. “Mum said—”
Lily tucked her arms behind her head, getting more comfortable lying down on her seat. “I don’t care what Ms. Eileen said—”
They were being good-natured, so they glanced up sharply when James let out a squeak of surprise.
“What did you say your last name was again?”
Sev’s face closed, his body bristling beside Lily. “I didn’t.”
Lily sat up, reaching for his hand, but he either didn’t notice or ignored her. School had been long and fully of teasing and bullying for Sev, no matter how much Lily stood up for him, no matter how hard he tried.
Whether because of his name, the bruises and cuts on his face, his mother being a teacher at their school, or the timidness that he held himself with—Sev and Lily’s classmates had never been kind.
As much as this was an adventure for Lily, it was a new start for Sev. It was a place where he knew he could fit in. And now it might all be about to end before it even truly began.
Sev and James stared at each other, their shoulders both tensed. Lily and Peter’s eyes met, but neither knew the other well enough to do or say anything helpful.
James broke their silence first, sighing with frustration and mumbling to himself, “I wasn’t trying to make you mad, sorry I even asked.” He didn’t look at Lily or Sev, instead turning to face the doors of their train car.
Lily had known boys like James before. He seemed kind enough at first, but even at their public school, there were still rich boys.
Oblivious to how their words sounded, yet continuously talking because they loved the sound of their own voices.
Peter fumbled with the cuffs of his shirt, the sound loud in the silent compartment. Nobody seemed capable of eye contact anymore.
Peter stood up awkwardly—again, the sound loud and startling.
When all the others turned to look at him, his face filled with confusion as to why he was standing up. Peter reached for his bag on the ground, fumbling and almost dropping it as he moved towards the door.
“Er—I’m gonna go put on my robes. Seems everybody else already has, so.” With a little wave, he walked away.
“To your right!” James called after him, gaining a “thanks” as Peter moved to go in the right direction.
Lily wanted to hate him already. His smirk and his lack of conscientiousness for Sev. His jellybeans and stupid hair. Why’d he have to go and be helpful?
The silence once again filled the air around them, suffocating in the small compartment. At last, James turned himself to face Sev, his hands on his knees as he took a deep breath.
“Is your last name Snape?”
Lily watched the two boys closely, seeing Sev’s shoulders tighten up even more. She’d tried in the past, to stand up for Sev, to yell and punch the ones who mocked him—but he never spoke to her after. Now she could only watch and hope it didn’t crash and burn.
“It wasn’t my choice. Besides, isn’t James a bit common?”
His voice was cold, and Lily, trapped on her seat, had to sit on her hands to stop herself from doing something. She told herself she’d give them five counts—long ones, too. Then she’d step in, even if Sev wouldn’t like it. Lily wasn’t letting her friend get in trouble on their first day.
“No—I didn’t mean it in a bad way,” James said. “It’s just—not a very common name, that’s all.”
Lily crossed her arms, and she stared at James with eyes she usually reserved for Tuney. That was it, she’d given it four counts but as her dad would say—James seemed like a bit of an ass.
“So?” she challenged. “What does it matter?”
James made a noise of annoyance, putting his head in his hands. After a moment, he looked up at them.
“Look,” he said, sighing. “I’m sorry if I’ve insulted you in any way—it’s just, my mum had a roommate just out of Hogwarts named Eileen, said she married a guy named Snape and they haven’t spoken much since.” James ran his hands through his hair (making it stick up even more, that stupid hair) and looked hopefully at Sev. “I just recognized the name and was trying to make a connection, okay?”
“Oh,” was all Sev said in response.
“Am I interrupting something? Do I need to go back out and do something else?” Peter stood at the doorway, half-in and half-out.
“No,” Sev said, pausing for a moment before looking at James with an almost-smile. “You can come in.”
Lily reached over to tap on Sev’s leg. Good?
Always.
The warning bell sounded for any late arrivals, and the four made themselves comfortable—all uncomfortable silences out of the way for the moment.
Peter waved out the window again at his family, now increased with another woman who Lily assumed to be an aunt and three more small children. He even began blowing kisses at them (which, as an eleven-year-old, is a little childish—but the other three students graciously didn’t mention it).
When all of them were finally settling in to their own comfortable quiet, they froze—because the words of a conversation occurring just outside their compartment was reaching ears that it wasn’t supposed to.
Sev reached for a book—which ended up being Lily’s copy of Little Women—burying himself in it so not to intrude. Lily picked up a book as well, attempting the same nonchalance as Sev, but utterly failing as her eyes peeked over the top, glancing out the compartment window.
There was no attempt at discretion from James, who pushed his glasses up on his nose, peering out through the glass window, trying to get a good look at the participants of the shouting match.
“—well don’t even think I would even want to sit with you!” A boy with dark hair, slicked back into a ponytail, yelled down to a striking girl with matching black hair, standing down the hall from them. His face flushed with anger and his grey eyes were stormy as he turned sharply away from the girl.
“Oi! Can I sit here?” he asked, looking around at the group of them.
While he spoke, the train began moving, so he lurched onto the seat next to James. The boy immediately held out his hand confidently, sitting up proudly.
“I’m Sirius.”
“Black?” James asked, his tone different than when he’d spoken earlier. Colder. Lily glanced between him and the new boy—Sirius, wondering how they could possibly already have bad blood between then.
A dark look crossed Sirius’ face. “Yes,” he said, his voice a little less sure. “But I’d prefer it if we left that part out.”
Since (most) of the passengers in this particular compartment were polite, the subject was left untouched as the rest of the group introduced themselves.
Lily was last, or so she thought—until a quiet boy sitting next to her introduced himself as Remus Lupin. She gave him a small smile (she felt as though she’s smiled more today than ever at her old school—unless she was with Sev of course). He must have slipped in just after Sirius.
His hair was a dusty brown color, his eyes a light green. Lily took a moment to study the boy.
Remus’ face looked worn beyond the age of 11 years old—two scars running down the side of his face, eyes tired. His features were striking, cheekbones sharp and prominent. But his body was frail, too skinny for an eleven-year-old.
Lily noted that he was also wearing long sleeves—and it wasn’t even fall yet!
“Didn’t notice you there,” James said, giving the shy boy a grin.
“Yeah, I just slipped in, I guess,” he replied, his voice quiet. Peter looked over and gave him a large grin (similar to Potter’s).
Lily had only been on a train once before, visiting her grandparents for a weekend and she barely remembered any of it. What the train ride had taught her, though—was to bring something to do.
So, she pulled out a pack of cards, and made some friends.
By the time the trolley cart rolled around, they were talking animatedly over the playing cards scattered across the floor and their seats.
Thankfully, they easily found an exciting topic to discuss that all of them could agree upon—Hogwarts.
All of them were worried about the Sorting and some even shared their parents’ or sibling’s stories about it. Lily was the only one who had no stories, but she had Sev by her side.
Sev who knew what was going on, Sev who had been hearing these stories since he was barely old enough to talk. Sev who didn’t laugh at her when her dad went on a work trip and she cried. Sev who was always going to be by her side.
The subject of Hogwarts gave them so many things to talk about that it kept them going until they could see the distant lights of the real place.
Noses pressed to glass, fogging it up, as the six of them squished to each catch a glimpse of the mythical place.
It was everything Lily dreamed it could be—and so much more. The castle itself looked like a work of art, even from a distance, and she couldn’t wait to go and live inside of it. All of her nerves were whisked away once she realized that as long as she was there, everything would be wonderful and new and exciting.
She was learning magic, for heavens’ sake! What did it matter what House she got put in?