Chapter Text
Severus first heard Nymphadora Tonks singing in the street while her father played guitar: Hogsmeade, January 30th. Lily’s birthday. He was slinking through the alley with a vial of purgative from the apothecary, nearly blinded by a hangover. He was waiting for just the right moment to vomit, then apparate back to the school gates, when he heard the (brutally) familiar (muggle) music and peeked around the the corner like the spy he was.
Ted Tonks’ nose was red and running and his eyes were leaking and he smiled a tight and stupid smile as he sang. He must have charmed his guitar against the elements since it stayed dry and gleaming in the snow that fell around him, gathering in the folds of his hat and his battered leather jacket. Must have had a warming charm on his hands as well; he wore fingerless gloves and had a deft and gentle strum.
(Only muggle-born wizards ever seemed to play guitar. Among the so-called pure bloods, it was mostly Hufflepuffs and some Ravenclaws that bothered learning to play music at all. Severus didn’t like to admit it to himself, but he could see that many wizards lacked a certain type of patience.)
Nymphadora Tonks’ hair was a legend in its own time; hot pink, electric blue, vampire black (which looked awful), classic blonde (which looked worse), wine-red (which looked so pretty he felt compelled to comment on it: “Yet another pathetic color experiment, Miss Tonks? Will you never learn that one can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear?”)
Teen witch animorphmagus! How very… colorful! And did you know she could shift her face to look like other people, like animals even! Oh, do say she’ll come to our son’s birthday party! And did you know she’s the daughter of the disgraced Black sister, the pure blood socialite who married a mudblood? Oh, what a romantic scandal! And did you know, did you know, that her dear auntie Bellatrix put a price on her head the day she was born? Oh what a fascinating story, the girl’s life was!
Severus had heard all about how utterly special darling Nymphadora was before he ever encountered the brat. One would think he would have no trouble ignoring some silly little Hufflepuff until she graduated and ran off to squander her not-that-impressive gifts on stupid Hufflepufflian projects (or until she was finally crushed under the Black family boot).
Nobody had ever mentioned her singing voice, though, and shivering and retching alone in the alley, Severus was utterly defenseless against it. It was strong and a little scratchy and so filled with longing that it should have been a sound impossible to control, let alone wield with such precision.
“So won’t you say you love me?
I’ll make you so proud of me…”
That song had been one of Lily’s favorites. She used to lip-synch to it (couldn’t carry a tune to save her life), clasping her hands over her heart, batting her eyes beseechingly, mocking herself a little as she succumbed to the spell of… it was the Ronettes, wasn’t it? Yes, the Tonks brat sounded just like Ronnie Spector.
He used to pretend that Lily was singing that song to him. Well, sometimes Lily did sing that song to him, playfully. But he used to pretend that she meant it. That made him hate this song. Then one day, after it was far too late, he realized that there had been moments during her blushing, teasing little performances, moments where there were little flickers of sincerity here and there, and that he most certainly extinguished those flickers himself with a contemptuous huff or a snort of dissatisfaction. That made him really hate this song.
“Oh, since the day I saw you
I have been waiting for you…”
The girl even had those hungry round American “Oh” sounds down. No breezy upper-class-English vowel sounds for Tonks Brat.
People were standing around and listening. Severus realized with absolute outrage that all this was, in fact, for Lily; some kind of birthday memorial.
Naturally! Sirius Black must have mentioned to his naughty muggle-loving cousin Andromeda that his token muggle friend liked this song; some time between his attempt to murder Severus and his decision to turn his best friend’s family over to the Death Eaters. So now here was big dumb Teddy Boy, who’d have bored Lily to tears, singing and weeping as if he’d had some connection to her. Here was Andromeda’s Little Scandal, too young to know sweet fuck-all, marking Lily’s birthday in front of an admiring audience.
It was possibly meant to be a sing-along, but only Ted and Nymphadora sang. The people in the square stood rapt, some holding hands, some swaying a little to the music. Wizards couldn’t be counted on to know the words to popular muggle music. Some of them might never have heard the song before, might be hearing it for the first time in Sirius-fucking-Black’s little cousin’s lying voice.
Lily really would have loved the idea of a sing-along.
“We’ll make them turn their heads
Every place we go, so won’t you be…”
The father was singing backup but his nose was clogged, his voice raspy. The daughter wailed, into the crowd, pleading for love, now and forever. That was enough to make Severus vomit, no purgative required.
As Severus wiped his mouth on his sleeve, he tried to remember what year the Tonks brat was in. Time was too slippery to hold onto and his head hurt like someone was pressing ice to his brain. How long had it been, since Lily died? What anniversary was this? He had known last night. Last night he had known how many days like he knew his own name.
How long had he been shuffling through the dungeons, rattling his chains, pretending he didn’t know what a miserable piece of shit he was?
He had a sudden impulse to jump out from behind the wall and scream “Here I am! I’m still here! I loved her more than you did and I loved her first and I knew her better than anyone and I destroyed her! And I’m still here. That’s the world we live in. So go ahead and sing and cry and raise children if you can bear it, but know that it’s just a matter of time. Because this is a world where Lily’s in the grave and Severus Snape is still here!”
It didn’t matter, he decided, just before he apparated. It didn’t matter what year the Tonks brat was in. As soon as he was back in the castle, he was taking fifty points from Hufflepuff.