She was just paying for her food at the market when it happened.
"That’ll be all for you, ma’am?" the salesclerk questioned, tallying up the price of her food.
"Yes, thank you."
She paid her money and the sales woman held out a receipt for her to sign. Selena scrawled her name and handed it back to her, feeling a knot pulling in her stomach as she braced herself for the comments on her last name. But they didn’t come. The lady merely glanced at her name absented-mindedly. "Well, have a nice day Ms. Snape!" the woman said cheerfully.
Perhaps doing this sort of thing had become so routine that the clerk simply did not really read the names of her customers. Or maybe she just did not connect the facts in that instant. Whatever the reason for her unaware attitude, Selena was not about to question it. The knot in her stomach loosened. "You too." She made her way out the door.
"Excuse me, miss."
Selena turned. A young woman with short, tight brown curls that spiraled all over her head and a eager, almost hungry look on her face was standing there. The knot gripped tight.
"Yes?"
"I hope you don’t mind me being forward," she began, "but I couldn’t help overhearing a little – back in the shop that – well, your surname is Snape – "
"If you’ll excuse me for being so abrupt," said Selena, smiling innocently and turning around, "I must get going."
"Oh no, wait," said the woman, stepping in front of Selena’s path. "Look, I’ll cut to the chase – are you related to Severus Snape?"
Selena blinked down at her. "Excuse me?"
"Severus Snape," said the young woman, "the man who murdered Dumbledore – it’s not a very common last name – you must be related to him – " To her astonishment, the woman began rattling off various members of Selena’s family, asking which she was.
"I only ask ‘cos I just joined the Prophet," she babbled on, "and a interview with a member of his family would be fantastic, you know – ‘Relative of a Death Eater Reveals’ – ‘Secrets of Having Blood Ties with a Murderer’ – " she said quietly to herself, testing names of her potential interviews. "Or maybe – "
"Well, you see," said Selena in a coldly sweet voice, "as ah, ‘fantastic’ as it might be, I don’t have time for a interview." She side-stepped the lady and continued on her way. But this journalist was persistent. She just danced in front of her again, bouncing on the balls of her feet.
"Miss, are you saying you are related to him?
"I did not say that, actually. I said I need to get going." She moved to start walking away, but the young lady blocked her.
"Hold on, miss," she said. "Just tell me what your relation is, I’ll leave after – I’m jus’ curious – "
"Yes, I’m his sister," Selena barked, irritated. "Now will you leave me be?" She began to move forward, but the next thing she knew someone had grabbed her arm.
"Oh-my-gosh," the witch (who, in Selena’s opinion, was one literally and figuratively) said breathlessly, continuing to pull on Selena’s arm. "I don’t believe it – see, I – you’re – wow, this is – can I ask you a couple questions?"
"We had a agreement," said Selena through her gritted teeth, attempting to keep a hold on her temper.
"Not as an interview," the young woman babbled, "jus’ to – you know, get to – see, I would jus’ want to know a few things – about you – and about him – what was it like, growing up with him?" Her drilling, reporter tone was kicking in; she suddenly sounded much more professional. "Did you two get along when you were younger? Were you close as you got older? When did you realize that you two would never be alike at all? At the time, did you have any idea that you were growing up in such close proximity with a murderer?"
That did it. Selena wrenched her arm from the girl’s grip and stalked away, her hands shaking from suppressed anger.
The young lady couldn’t take a hint, though. She was soon in front of Selena’s path again.
"Move," Selena growled.
But the reporter side of her had completely dominated; she continued firing off questions like there was no tomorrow. "Did you, like everyone else, believe that he had changed? How do your parents deal with the fact that one of their children is in You-Know-Who’s league? If you could see him now, what would you say to him?"
I would say I wouldn’t mind if he murdered you, Selena thought, as she stormed forward and pushed her to the side.
Yet the reporter pranced in front of her again, grabbing her arm and talking a mile a minute about everything Selena did not want to hear about.
Selena had lost her hold on her temper. So she pulled her arm roughly from the girl’s grasp, and then acted like the adult that she was: stuck up a certain finger on her right hand and told the idiot to go somewhere rather warm.
That sure shut her up. That and probably Selena’s expression too, which was contorted hideously with rage. So Selena turned on her heel and Apparated to her house. She collapsed into a armchair with a heavy, defeated sounding thunk; trying to block out the painful memories that were surfacing as a result of that moron’s questions. It didn’t work; they continued to drift to mind, one by one…
***
Selena sat on her bed, finishing up the homework she had to do over the summer.
Question 13: How do you register to become an Animagus?
She could feel her attention ebbing away as she continued to do the tedious work. True, she did not have many ways to spend her free time at home during the summer, but really…she could do better than this. She dipped her quill in the ink and began an answer:
To register as an Animagus, you need to be of age. Once you are, you are able to begin your training at
There was suddenly loud yells coming from outside her door. Selena cringed. She knew what was happening instantly, like a second instinct. She didn’t even have to think about the possibilities. There was only one, after all.
Sometimes it was hard to tell whether it was worse to listen to her dad get angry at someone, or to be the victim of the anger. The yelling continued, getting louder and louder. Selena nervously rapped the end of the quill on her parchment, splattering small dots of ink all over. Even though she was used to this sort of thing, that didn’t make it any easier to deal with. More yelling, a loud thud, a door slam, silence. Selena waited several moments before poking her head out into the hall. No one was there. She silently slipped out and knocked gently on Severus’ door.
"It’s me," she whispered.
The door opened a crack, Severus peering at her through one narrowed black eye. Upon seeing who was there, he opened the door wider and jerked his head to indicate her to enter. She quickly went in and Severus shut the door behind her.
"Oh!" Selena gasped, as she caught sight of her brother’s cheek. It was bright red; the outline of a hand clear and pronounced.
"It’s nothing," Severus muttered, glowering at the wall.
"No it’s not," said Selena, striding back over to him and drawing out a wand.
"Don’t!" Severus hissed at her, pushing it away. "You want to get expelled?"
"This is Mum’s wand, not mine," Selena said, gesturing at the old, frayed end of said wand. "The Ministry’ll think she’s using magic." Severus tried to dissuade her anyway, but she didn’t listen. She raised the wand and pointed it at his face. The red slowly faded until Severus looked perfectly normal.
"Thanks," he mumbled grudgingly, glancing at himself in the reflection of his window.
"Don’t mention it," said Selena softly.
"You shouldn’t have done that," Severus responded. "Dad’ll know one of us has used magic if there’s no mark."
"What, would you have rather walked around with that huge stinging handprint on your face?" Selena retorted. "I can make it come back, if you really want," she added, raising her hand and lifting one eyebrow to indicate she was kidding.
Severus gave her the ghost of a smile. "No," he said. "I’ll pass."
"So?" Selena asked him. "What happened?"
"Just Dad going on about the usual…you know, no magic related things in the house…I was testing out a new potion…saying he’ll beat the snot out of me if I keep on disobeying him…. If Mum wasn’t so damn afraid of him, maybe he’d be the one cowering instead of her. She’s got no reason to be."
"Fear isn’t something you can always get rid of," Selena said quietly.
Severus stared at her incredulously. "She’s a witch, Selena. He’s a Muggle. What could he possibly do to her if she used magic?"
Selena shrugged and sat down on his bed. "I don’t know. I don’t think we’ll ever really know."
Severus frowned and sat down next to her. "It’s not the bruises that hurt," he said quietly, after a moment. Selena glanced at him out of the corner of her eye; Severus was not one to typically express his feelings to others. "It’s not even the words. It’s the whole point. You and I are both much more powerful than he is, and he knows it. He knows we can’t use magic at this age." Severus was cracking his knuckles angrily now. "Oh, I can’t wait until I’m of age, it’s only about six months away now…"
"But even when you are, what are you going to do? I mean, you can’t hurt him seriously…"
"Why not?"
"Severus!"
His frown increased, and he began tracing his mouth with one finger.
"You didn’t really mean that," said Selena quietly, though a tiny voice in her head suspected differently.
Severus remained silent.
"Did you?"
"I suppose not," he said slowly. "If you really don’t want me to. But I am going to do something."
"Just…don’t get carried away with the idea. I mean…obviously, you will have a large advantage on him once you can use magic. And you could, if you wanted, do far worse things to him than he could ever hope to attempt." She was getting uncomfortable with this conversation, but this had been something that had been pressing at the back of her mind for some time now. Pinching and unpinching a small bunch of her ragged pants nervously, she said, "Just…just keep that in mind, alright?"
"You’re acting like I’m going to perform the Crutacious Curse," said Severus. Selena couldn’t respond, but Severus read her facial expression and answered that instead. "Relax. I wouldn’t do that to him."
"Good to hear," said Selena, releasing a tight smile. She wished that she could actually believe what she was saying. She knew how much her brother loved revenge…cruel revenge…
Nothing’s going to happen, Selena tried to reassure herself, as she left Severus’ room. Everything is going to be fine. Severus would never do something like that.
Why was it that it was so much harder to lie to yourself than others?
***
When Melissa came into the staff room the next morning, Selena could tell that something was up. Her friend had a glowing, mischievous look on her face.
"What happened to you?" Selena asked as Melissa sat down opposite her, still beaming.
"Oh, it’s not what happened to me," said Melissa casually. "It’s what’s going to happen to you."
"What did you do?" said Selena cautiously.
"I arranged for you to go out tomorrow night," said Melissa apathetically, trying and failing to look as though she did not have something that she could not wait to tell.
"You arranged for me to go out tomorrow night?" Selena repeated slowly, attempting to dissect Melissa’s words in her mind.
"Uh-huh," said Melissa, her smile fighting its way back onto her face.
"And where are we going?"
"There are two parts to that question," said Melissa, her smile becoming more radiant. "Which part shall I answer first?"
Selena ran her question over in her mind. It took a minute for the ‘second part’ to click, then her eyes widened. "You didn’t."
"I said, which part do you want me to answer first?" said Melissa, eyes gleaming brightly.
"You – are – dead."
"Perhaps I’ll start with part one," said Melissa cheerfully. "You will be going to The Three Broomsticks; I think it’s one of the better pubs at the moment, what with the present situation of most of them being shut."
"Melissa – "
"As for the second part, you’re not going out with me," Melissa continued over her. "It happens I have plans. But I found someone who doesn’t."
"You – "
"So you and Mr. Blackwood will be going to The Three Broomsticks together." Melissa, still smiling, had a coy, determined glint in her eyes.
Selena made several attempts to say something but could think of nothing, so she slumped in her chair, put her head in her hands, and cried out in frustration.
"You’ll have fun."
"I don’t believe you," Selena muttered, glaring at her friend through her fingers.
"Yes, you do," said Melissa happily. "You just don’t want to believe me."
"He didn’t say yes, did he?"
"Of course he did. He says he looks forward to it."
"Did you tell him that I don’t?"
"I think that I probably left out that detail," said Melissa airily. "Besides, you’ll have a good time once you’re out."
"No, I won’t," Selena argued through her fingers.
"Well, I’d better be getting on with work!" said Melissa joyfully, springing up from her chair. "See you later, Selena!"
Seeing as the pair of them had been on rocky ground lately, it was probably a good thing that Melissa shut the door before Selena’s next spiteful words could reach her ears.