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Charlie had been trying to pick up some semblance of routine in the new dwelling. In Snape’s dwelling. That’s all he could think to call it because it was sure as hell wasn’t a home. Hadn’t been as terrible as he imagined, but the place was testing his patience. He had heard of the man’s discipline techniques. A few of his best friends were Slytherins after all. If anyone was familiar with Snape’s office it was Barnaby Lee and Liz Tuttle, and no one was in there more than his fellow dragon-lover Felix Rosier for prefect duties. Charlie had heard their horror stories. Snape had emotional manipulation down to a T, and he’d already used it on Charlie the other night. He was still angry he hadn’t thought of a response for Snape other than walking away. The last thing wanted to be was another kid Snape thought he could push where wanted.
He wanted to make that clear, but there hadn’t been any one-on-one time. Everyone had been busy moving in or planning the funeral. Charlie had been so tired after Bill and he finally got the younger kids to sleep most days. His siblings had been crying all day, and only stopped when they passed out in their beds. He only vaguely recalled shuffling to his room and crawling into his own. A room to himself was another adjustment for this place. The castle had expanded to a room and bathrooms for them all. Not having Bill as a roommate probably would have made Charlie excited if he wasn’t so blank (and you know if his parents weren’t dead.). He didn’t know why he’d been so calm over these last few days. Even now he felt sad, sure, and he felt like he should be crying at some point. It just wasn’t coming, nor was any other emotion. His brain was a fog. Emotion certainly hadn’t served him the first time family members died, so maybe his mind had just throw it out the window for this round.
Charlie looked out the window. He watched the sun barely coasting the treetops. It was six in the morning, as usual for Charlie. At least he knew his internal clock hadn’t gotten derailed too. Yay. The world could be on fire and he’d still wake up at the crack of dawn. Good to know.
Tiptoeing to the kitchen, the magic candles sputtering to life as he walked. He searched around for the pans and his usual breakfast ingredients. Walking around the kitchen and preparing for the day ahead. Charlie had been the one to help his mum cook, so making his own breakfasts at this point was more of a habit than a chore. The usual breakfast for him was two pieces of toast with cheese melted and an egg on top, some bacon, and the biggest cup of coffee the school or his mum allowed. Shuffling around for a coffee brewer, flinching whenever an appliance or dish made a sound. He needed to be quiet. Not even the elves were up at this hour. The last thing he needed was his usual morning to wake up Snape or one of his siblings. They needed the rest.
He’d just finished making his sunny side eggs when Snape shuffled in, rubbing at his eyes. Snape froze when he saw Charlie. Whatever the potion's master was expecting that morning, it was not a 12-year-old standing on a stool and working his stovetop. He raised an eyebrow at him, looking from the clock to Charlie to the sliced bread and cheese and back. It was odd seeing a teacher in nightwear. He never imagined Snape with a life outside the potions classroom. As if each morning he had just creeped out a shadow in the wall and sauntered into the potion lab. Now he was staring at Snape with bedhead, and he just had to get used to it. This was his life now until he turned 17.
“Eggs are almost ready,” Charlie said cutting Snape’s confusion off. Maybe this would keep the man from getting angry “and coffee is on the table.”
“Aren’t you too young for coffee?” Snape said eyeing the table with said coffee. “Wouldn’t want to stunt your growth.”
The phrase “even more” was left hanging, and Charlie didn’t appreciate it. He was already shaping up to be shorter than Percy by the end of this year. Bill was a tree of a boy in comparison, taller than any of them ever would be. Charlie didn’t mind being short, but he did mind people commenting on it endlessly. He was the shortest in the family, and he refused to feel bad about it like his bullies wanted him to.
“Rather be short and awake.” Charlie shot back, putting the finishing touches on his eggs on cheesy toast. He got out another plate and dished out more food, hovering Snape’s over to the table with his wand. Snape’s face seemed impressed by the spell work, thought Charlie had no idea why. He’d been helping his mum cook as his main chore before he could trot. Of course he knew all the basic kitchen spells. He kept his back to him as he put the stool away and cleaned up his mess quickly. Once done he set himself up a few seats down, not wanting to be so close to Snape.
"You know, there are elves to make you food."
“It didn’t look like Loco was up yet. I didn’t want to bother him.”
“He’s tasked with taking care of you” Snape counters.
“I can take care of myself,” Charlie snaps, glancing over at Snape. “I’m fine doing it on my own. I know what I like and how to get my breakfast right. I don’t need anyone else messing with that.”
Tense silence cloaked the two, the sound of forks on plates echoing throughout the stone walls. It was true sometimes Charlie’s particular for specifics on his routine got in his and other people’s way a lot, but he refused to let breakfast be one of them. Or for it to be an issue that was argued about this early. Charlie glanced from his breakfast to the other parts of the kitchen. Anything that wasn't Snape. This method wasn't long-lasting, as the kitchen was barebones empty. The oven and larder were flanked by countertops with a sink on the right. Pots and pans hung from a wrack on the ceiling. That was it for the room. Just that and the small wooden table. No decor, no spice rack, no evidence this place was touched by another human. Just cold stone and metal. Charlie hadn't even managed to find a kettle. Were they even in England if there wasn't a kettle? Did Snape not want people to think anyone lived here?
Charlie had started to count the wood grain lines on the table before resolving to get out with it. This silence was ridiculous. If Snape was waking up at the same time as him every day he needed to learn to talk to him one-on-one. Else every breakfast would be just silence bouncing off the sad empty kitchen.
”You could have just told me to sit down.” Charlie started quietly.
“Pardon?”
“Don’t act like you don’t know what you did that first night with Ron. I know manipulation when I see it, Snape. You want me to do something just say so. I don’t need to be coerced.”
There was a beat of silence, Snape’s forehead wrinkling in thought. “I’m surprised you recognized it.”
“I was almost put in your house. Give me a little credit.”
“You were?” Snape exclaimed with his eyebrows to his hairline.
“Yes, but I took one look at Bill and found myself in Gryffindor. Now most of my friends Slytherin. The hat is one for cruel irony sometimes.”
Snape mulled this information over, tossing around his eggs for a moment. ”Most of your friends are in my house. I didn’t realize it until now. Are the rest in Gryffindor?”
“No, Tonks is in Hufflepuff and Andre is in Ravenclaw.”
“No one from your own house?”
Charlie shook his head, shrugging lightly but staring at his bacon instead of Snape. “Guess they all grew sick of me.”
“It is only your second year. Surely people cannot grow sick of you in that short amount of time.”
“Apparently so.”
Snape looked up at the boy. He hadn’t properly all morning, favoring to look at his child-made breakfast or the state of his kitchen. His shoulders were ever so slightly hunched in and his brown eyes downcast to his plate. He wanted to seem unbothered, but his small frame was giving him away. Snape then looked around at the rather organized mess Charlie has caused in the kitchen. A pile of the boy’s hide boots, a light coat, and a bag of carefully wrapped up something that smelled like spices. He was slightly impressed at the chaotic neatness of it all. Charlie had not been particularly messy in his potions classes, but he was not up to Snape’s standards of organization. There was some work to be done.
“Have plans for the day, do we?” He asked motioning to the bag and outerwear.
“I’m feeding the thestrals” Charlie explained with a nod.
“And what possessed you to plan that?”
“It’s Tuesday,” Charlie stated plainly as if that was all Snape should need for why a 12-year-old was feeding a heard of death omens. He just raised an eyebrow at him.
Charlie huffed when Snape continued to stare in confusion. “Every Tuesday I’m at Hogwarts I take jerky to the thestrals. I’ve been saving jerky for Doc for ages.”
“Doc?”
“The big one looks over the babies in the herd," Charlie explained with a smile he couldn’t seem to help. "Monday is bowtruckle day, Wednesday is mermaid day, Thursday is fire crab day, and Friday I take cereal to the giant squid. She likes corn flakes.”
“And the weekend?”
“Quidditch and dragons,” Charlie said with his grin growing “obviously.”
Snape had to give himself a few slow blinks to process. First, there was the obvious fact of charlie going into the Forbidden Forest every week. That would have to be addressed at some point, although it seemed Charlie hadn’t run into anything he could not make friends with. Snape was even afraid to ask how the boy got to the point of knowing the squid liked that specific of a cereal. Molly had mentioned Charlie liked to be outside and preferred animals to people, but he wasn't prepared for such organized oddity.
“Not many students are aware of that heard. How do you?”
“I saw them in the Forest and asked Hagrid about them last year. Been feeding them jerky ever since.”
“You can see them?” Snape asked, clearly shocked but mixed in was a deep sadness.
“Yep,” Charlie said, putting a pop to the p “I was there when the Death Eaters killed Fabian and Gideon. I was nine.”
“I didn’t ask-“
“Everyone does, eventually” Charlie states with a shrug “I’ve learned it’s best to just get the answer over with.”
“I see” Snape nodded. “I had no idea you were there that day.”
“They made me watch.”
An icy cold went up Snape’s spine.
Charlie looked down again, brown eyes fixated on his hands. He hated eye contact, but especially when talking about something so emotional. He twirled the ring on his finger just to get the overwhelming feelings out. It was Fabian's ring, with the Prewett crest and an emerald in the center. His uncle had handed it down to him in his will, along with a suit and a few other belongings he had yet to grow into. Mafalda may be the Prewett heiress, but that didn't override him being Fabian's heir. He still didn't know what to do with most of the items stored in his (very tiny) personal vault. The ring though he had worn since the funeral. It felt too close to Fabian to be left in the ground like Gideon's matching one. It had been on Gideon's person when they laid him 6 feet under, now only two spots away from where his parents were going. Charlie kept fidgeting until he noticed Snape staring. The onyx orbs fixated on the ring. It was an odd face, like he was seeing a ghost and trying his hardest not to scream at it.
"Did Molly have the Prewetts watch all of you frequently?" Snape asked turning to his plate away from Charlie.
"Just me" Charlie corrected shaking his head before explaining further ”Fabian was my godfather.”
"I'm surprised your mother didn't mention any of that in her letters."
“Not many people know” Charlie sighed, sipping at his own cup of coffee. Although he had significantly more sugar and milk than Snape's. “I’m sure she just forgot.”
“You don’t forget something like that” Snape argued, appalled that he’d imply Molly forgetting such a trauma.
“You’d be surprised” Charlie muttered into his cup before he could stop his mouth. He wasn’t sure that Snape even heard, but he didn’t care at this point. How had that slipped out so easily? He never made comments like that around the house when she was alive. Only to his close friends did he even breathe a slightly bad word about his family, and it was few and far between. Mostly people comparing him to Bill. So where had the bitterness come from? He knew he was angry about some things his mum had ignored, but it wasn’t like it was her fault she had so many kids and Charlie got swept to the side since he wasn’t causing chaos or wasn’t her firstborn. Combine those feelings with the recovering rage of his dad locking them in that room, and he had a lot of tension swirling around in his head he felt he couldn't show. It wasn’t going to solve anything. It still left a lot of things unsaid, but it would only leave a sour after taste. What good would being angry at the dead do him? It’s not like there was anywhere for the anger to go now. He wasn’t about to let it out on his siblings or Snape. He had enough mixed feelings about the man as is (seriously, you mess up one potion. He had done every other one perfectly but did it change his attitude? No. It wasn’t his fault his motor skills were rubbish and he needed extra time. It still got done.)
“So they had you visit often?” Snape asked getting Charlie out of his head and not scowling at his eggs.
“They used to watch me a lot, let me come over when the house got too overwhelming.”
“Did that happen often?”
“Still does, now I just don’t go anywhere.”
“And what should I do if this happens?”
“Not emotionally manipulating me might be nice,” Charlie said with a slight glare. “The younger ones might be difficult to deal with sometimes, but you’re not going to earn anyone’s trust like that, least of all me.”
Snape put down his cup of coffee and turned back to Charlie, looking the boy up and down. It struck Snape how much he looked like Fabian at that moment. The physical attributes were obvious. What with Charlie's hair being a curly aburn instead of Arthur's straight bright orange, his small flat-bridged nose instead of Gideon's big one, and his eyes a burning brown instead of the sky blue the rest of his siblings had. No, that Snape had seen right when the boy had been sorted. The poise is what was striking him this morning. Charlie had his head raised high and back straight, but not in an arrogant way, and somehow still managed to look relaxed as he did. That was all Fabian and Gideon to a T. The fierceness that came with combining Fabian’s Ravenclaw intellect and Gideon’s Hufflepuff loyalty. It was making the revelation that the boy was there for the brothers' demise even more depressing. He would never get to see the people he was most like again, and it had happened to him twice now that his parents were gone. He had not done much with Charlie these last few days in favor of the reck that were the younger Weasley children. This was the first time Snape was alone and forced to notice him fully. He would not make the mistake of ignoring him again. As he had a feeling so many at the school and beyond had.
"Alright," Snape nodded.
"Alright?" Charlie jolted with surprise "just like that?"
"Just like that, yes." Snape took another look at him, sipping down the last of his coffee “I’ll leave you to your thestral jerky,” Snape said whisking his dishes away with his wand. “Thank you for breakfast. It was...nice.”
“...Thanks.”
Charlie started cleaning up and Snape shuffling off deeper into the house. That could have gone better. But it could have gone worse. Overall, not a horrible morning, and that’s all he could hope for at this point. Now Charlie just needed to remember how to get to the entrance hall.