Chapter 1
Severus Snape does not have a happy life.
In fact, he’d go out on a limb and say that he had the worst life he could possibly have imagined.
An abusive father who hated magic, a pureblood witch mother who gave him his magic. The pureblood witch that didn’t care about her own son.
Hogwarts.
How he hated the place.
The place he would be repeatedly humiliated and harmed under the pretence of pranks.
The place he got wronged so many times. He hated the place with a passion.
But also, it was the only place he felt a sense of freedom. No father looming over his back, searching for any reason to beat him.
And best of all, he could use his magic freely. He could practice magic and do potion-making.
Potion-making.
How he loved potion-making. He got the skills from his mother, as his head of year would say.
But there was another reason Severus Snape loved coming Hogwarts.
Poppy Pomfrey. The witch in the hospital wing.
She knew all of his secrets and kept it for the last three years. His abuse, his pain, his tears, his frustrations, he told it all to her.
She was the only one he truly trusted in Hogwarts. Like a distant aunt.
She treated him normally.
She didn’t care that he was a Slytherin. Didn’t care that he was sarcastic and snarky. Didn’t care that he would break down in front of her in the middle of the night, after curfew.
She had given him nutrition potions that made him more than skin and bones. She fixed his broken nose and made it straight. She smiled at him and told him stories at night.
She was more of a mother than anything he ever knew. He couldn’t trust anyone else. He couldn’t be himself with anyone else.
And that’s why he hid when he entered the Hogwarts Express Train.
Severus walked into the train and immediately went into the farthest compartment, locking the door.
He opened the window and kept his trunk on the seat opposite to him.
He sighed as he looked out the window, watching all the greens blur past as the train moved. And a few poppies.
He thought of a certain Poppy he knew and the corner of his lips twitched up.
Poppy Pomfrey. He considered her his mother at this point.
And then his lips pursed.
She wouldn’t be happy. His father was mad at his mother for lazing around all day and took it out on him. He still felt the searing pain on his body as his father hit him with a hot pan. It didn’t hurt that much anymore, but still quite considerably.
His fingers twitched at the memory, his chest tightening.
He took a deep breath. He couldn’t worry Poppy. She’d already done so much. He’d play it off.
Play it off. Right.
He closed his eyes, staying still. He didn’t move at all, his threadbare clothes already hurting him.
Poppy had told him to take a deep breath and close his eyes everything he got a panic attack. Just breathe in, breathe out. Think about potions.
She was beyond what he deserved. A snarky, ungrateful Slytherin.
Yet she stayed. She was amazing.
Severus stood up and closed the window as the train neared the school of wizardry and witchcraft.
No one was in his compartment so he just changed into his robes there.
His injuries stung and tingled when his clothes brushed against them.
He hated himself.
His greasy hair, his scrawny body, his weak and fragile body.
He truly hated himself.
With nothing left to do, he simply sat down again. He took out the potions textbook for the fourth year and started reading it.
It was one of his favorite past-times. Correcting mistakes and improving recipes for potions.
He loved potions. He sometimes brewed some for Poppy.
She would tell him about people who got rehabilitation and therapy.
He scoffed. Those people were weak.
But he admired them. Having enough strength to admit they needed help… was a strength he couldn’t find in himself.
He sucked a breath as the train suddenly stopped.
He would talk to Poppy and hide his injuries. He would play it off.
Right.
He walked off the train.
In the hospital wing of Hogwarts, Poppy Pomfrey had a bad feeling in her gut.
And she was a hundred-percent certain it involved that little Slytherin she was fond of.