Love at first sight.
Severus refused to believe in it. It simply didn’t exist, even if it obviously did. It was weaved into the very fabric of everything Severus really did believe in anymore. Which was a Slytherin boy with dark skin and a smile that could swallow him whole.
Bruce was made a believer. A skeptic in the past, he couldn’t deny the infallible evidence. The blinding presence in his life, sparked by one moment of brief eye contact on a train.
Commotion lived in the train’s bones that day, every first year Hogwarts student buzzing with anticipation for the sorting and the feast and the incredible year to come. Bruce liked the way his feet could feel motion beneath the flooring as the train roared through the Scottish lowlands. Severus did not, frankly it made him feel sick.
Figuratively and literally; he was still dealing with the aches and pains of a cold.
The latter boy was glued to his best friend’s side. Lily Evans was like a comfort blanket, Severus was so overwhelmed with all happening at once he couldn’t help it, even to his detriment. He’d nearly begged her to find an empty compartment with him so they could just watch the countryside passing by in the windows, enjoying each other’s company as they usually did. But no, Lily was quite determined; according to her, they had to mingle. Which would maybe be fine if Severus could find a box of tissues anywhere, he felt drippy with the flu.
‘These first years will be our year mates until we graduate, Severus, we should say hi! It’s never too early to make friends,’ she’d insisted, gently taking his hand and dragging him into the train’s long stretched hallway.
Curse her and her sunny desire to love and be loved. As if she’d really needed more friends than Severus himself, he’d thought with perhaps more a stab of jealousy than he’d like to admit.
Futile resistance out of the way, Severus allowed the red headed girl to drag him from compartment to compartment. She was fishing for bites of friendship, it seemed. More than often those baits were declined- it seemed their ‘year mates’ were vaguely standoffish in nature. Severus was alright with that, it was something he already held in common.
After Severus had managed to pass through the stages of grief and finally came to terms with the fact he wouldn’t sit down for the duration of the ride to Hogwarts, they stopped at a compartment in which the contents were particularly harrowing.
Four boys were grouped across from each other, giggling about something one of them said. The joke-teller was a tall and lean boy with skin like copper, warm brown eyes, curly black hair, and round spectacles hugging his small nose. He hadn’t yet dressed in school robes, and the clothes he was wearing were of wealthy quality. Everything about him screamed ‘rich heir to a rich family’. Handsome, rich, and a pureblood. That was infuriating to every degree, given this boy seemed like the perfect concoction of an arsehole.
Which turned out to be true.
Severus was mildly zoned out at this point, awkwardly standing behind Lily like she was his mum reconnecting with another at a grocery store. He was, however, snapped to attention when for the first time that day someone referred to him directly.
“And who’s that with you, Lily Evans?” a boy with longer curly hair asked, trying out the new name on his tongue. He was wearing stuffy heirloom clothes, similar in rich quality to the other boy’s, but looked like he would much rather be wearing a Metallica t-shirt.
“Ah!” Lily backed up, level with where Severus stood, and looped herself on his arm. “This is my friend, Severus Snape! We’re neighbors back home in Cokeworth.”
“Severus?” echoed the first boy with the round glasses. A smirk etched onto his god-sculpted face and he chuckled. “What kind of a name is Severus?”
A pudgier, round looking boy with short brown hair and clothing as plain as they come laughed immediately, as if on cue. Severus’ feet shuffled beneath him. He didn’t like this compartment.
There was one last boy in the compartment, curly brown hair and odd scars littering his face. He seemed quiet, but keen. Observant. Severus felt practically naked under his scrutinous stare. He had the feeling this boy could peel back every layer of Severus’ discomfort and find just how insignificant he really felt. Trying to put it out of his mind, Severus sniffled. Damn, if he could just find a tissue…
“Well, snivellous,” the boy with glasses said, pausing for his friends to laugh, “we don’t have room in this compartment for the both of you. But Evans, you’re welcome to sit with us.”
Of course, she wouldn’t. Not after that incredibly rude display.
“Mm, alright,” she conceded, letting go of Severus’ arm to look up at him. “You wanted to sit by yourself anyway, right Sev? I won’t drag you around anymore, you can go find an empty compartment now.”
Wait… seriously?
Severus was dumbfounded into silence and could hardly protest as she shut the compartment door behind her and seated herself next to that moronic ruffian with round glasses.
What a shit show.
Severus stood there for a minute, mute and motionless. He turned on his heel, looking around as if getting his bearings back. All the noise seemed louder without Lily around.
As he turned, however, he made direct eye contact with a boy sitting in the compartment opposite the one Lily stepped into.
Dark skin, narrow face, bright brown doe eyes..
This boy was beautiful. More so than the glasses guy could ever hope to be.
He seemed to take Severus’ overwhelmed expression in a moment, face contorting to mild concern. It was then that Severus shied away, rushing off to find an empty compartment for himself. If there were any left, anyway.
There weren’t. Severus ended up in one with a bone white-haired boy and a black girl with a stern but kind looking face. She wore astral earrings and occupied herself with braiding her own hair. He didn’t say anything, but then, the pair already in the compartment didn’t make him. They all sat in comfortable silence for the rest of the ride to Hogwarts.
~~~
It was during the sorting that Severus came across that stunning boy from the train again. His name was called before Snape’s (Mulciber, Bruce), and the Sorting Hat barely took ten seconds before loudly declaring, “Slytherin!”
Interesting, Severus thought. They would be spending a fair bit of time together, then. It almost distracted him from the recent blow of Lily being sorted in Gryffindor. Given that of course Severus would be a Slytherin himself. He knew that for fact. It was all centered on the pearl of his mother- he wanted to make Eileen proud.
Sure enough, the hat was placed on his head a short while later and didn’t have much to consider either. “Slytherin!” it shouted, words weighted by the hundreds of generations of Princes in this very house. Severus glided to the Slytherin table, where nobody was particularly prone to clapping but several faces looked pleased with the ‘new recruits’. His fellow Slytherin first years, including Mulciber, Bruce, gave him little smatterings of greetings.
Enter the mind of Bruce himself.
Mulciber was completely overtaken. Pale skin, stuffy nose, long black hair… Snape, Severus was like a mythical creature with a measly first impression but a divine content. Thinking about that shared glance on the train nested a lump in his throat and he couldn’t begin to fathom what could have made Severus look so heartbrokenly starstruck.
Even now, at the crowded table of anxious eleven year olds and empty dishes itching to be filled with a feast. Severus sat there, watching the remainder of the sorting, but his eyes never truly focused. Little onyx orbs inspected the room in such a calculated, scrutinous way.
Bruce found himself desperately wanting to know what the boy was thinking. Was Hogwarts living up to his expectations so far, or was it void of something he needed? Was he actually interested in who else would be sorted to Slytherin, or could he care less? Was he happy to be a Slytherin, or did he long to sit with that girl he seemed so attached to in Gryffindor?
Bruce didn’t like the idea of that last speculation, so he told himself ‘no, he clearly belongs here.’
Only as time went by, Bruce began to realize it wasn’t as clear as that.
Weeks into their first term, the population of Slytherin first years began to regard Severus Snape as a shadow or a phantom that came and went and said little. People’s conversations would die as he walked into the common room— he had that look of calculation on him like a mask he took on and off regularly. And when he was wearing it, nothing felt safe to say, even from across the room. What was he listening to? Picking up on? Judging from afar?
What seemed worst of all, to Bruce anyway, was his prolonged attachment to that red headed Gryffindor girl. The only time Severus ever really looked like an (alive, breathing) eleven year old boy and not a hollowed marble statue was when he sought her out. They’d chat in and between classes, and from what Bruce had gleaned from little snippets of conversation, he was much more attentive to her than was requited.
Bruce decided, after some time of shamelessly eavesdropping, that he’d learned loads more about Lily from those conversations than Severus. Even to his closest friend he still seemed a mystery.
However, moments like the one on the train their first day at Hogwarts came frequently. Their renewal of that curious flame was constant and left Bruce with shivers or the strong impression he’d caught a glimpse of infinity in Snape’s eyes.
Severus noticed it, too. He’d noted from day one that Bruce Mulciber was a stunning being. From the shade of his skin to the depth of his eyes to the way he walked and talked and made everyone fall in love with him so effortlessly.
Unbeknownst to Severus, Bruce was never particularly a heartthrob. It wasn’t as if everyone was swooning. That was reserved for people like Edmund Avery, who seemed blessed by Cupid and kissed by stars. But Severus was jealous by nature, and any look Bruce’s way felt like an increase to his eye-candy status.
They’d never spoken a word to one another, and yet both boys regarded the other as his own little secret.
Their mutual silence, however, was ruptured several weeks into the term.
As first year Slytherins, Snape, Mulciber, Avery, Wilkes and Rosier shared dorms and classes and were, in any case, intimately connected for the time being. While most of the boys had already formed friendships, Snape’s ‘void status’ extended to them as well. He came and went and slept in the same room with the lot of them but hardly spoke a word if he didn’t have to. His every breath, it seemed, was dedicated to Lily and Lily alone.
Bruce lied awake at night and thought about that sometimes. He knew so little of Severus, though weeks had gone by.
At some point, that had to stop. Clearly Severus wasn’t going to insert himself or make an effort to get to know any of them on his own- which meant he forfeited the play to Bruce, in Mulciber’s eyes.
So, one Friday evening (bright with the promise of a nice, long weekend), Bruce and the other Slytherin boys sat gathered in their dorm room. Sheets and pillows piled onto the floor, cozy fire lit in their hearth, they traded Tasmanian Taffies and Bertie Bott’s Beans and every conspicuously magic candy they could get their hands on.
Wilkes’ face screwed up in disgust, giving Edmund a light punch on the shoulder. “This tastes like bogies, arsehole!” he shouted between giggles and spats as he feverishly attempted to get the taste off his tongue.
“I told you,” Eddie laughed, giving a shrug, “it’s either watermelon or bogies.”
“You didn’t say the bogies part.”
“Yeah, Ed, don’t act like you didn’t know exactly what you were doing.”
Severus entered the dorm on the resulting laughter from the accusations, giving the room a once-over. Suffice it to say, he wasn’t expecting to return to a sudden mess. His roommates usually kept to themselves.
“Hey, Snape!” Mulciber called, scooting away from Rosier to provide extra room. Usually when someone said Snape it was laced with malice or somehow unkind. But Bruce’s greeting was nothing but friendly. That sent shivers up Severus’ spine. “Come hang with us, yeah?”
Severus quickly opened his mouth to protest, but was cut off by Bruce’s warm voice once again. “You do nothing but study, we all know you’re not behind on homework. And I need an opponent for Wizard’s Chess, these guys refuse. Do you play?”
He stood there for a moment, going back and forth in a mental debate… but ultimately decided, tonight, fuck it. Throw caution to the wind. (It was definitely a devil-may-care attitude and totally not that Severus’ new discovery of the day was that he was physically incapable of saying no to Mulciber.)
The idea of mentally sparring over a chessboard with the boy was actually an exhilarating thought. To both parties.
Severus strolled to the spot Bruce made for him and curled into a criss cross, hands gripping his knees as he looked around the room of faces. It wasn’t as if he didn’t recognize these people, for salazar’s sakes they’d all been sleeping in the same room for weeks now. But something about looking at them and trying to find a friend embedded in their features made them look different.
All of a sudden, Avery seemed much less unapproachable. Wilkes seemed significantly less annoying. Rosier felt less daunting. But Mulciber? God, he only seemed more beautiful. Severus was completely overwhelmed, knowing Bruce’s eyes were on him now. He hadn’t really thought about befriending his fellow Slytherins before, but at Mulciber’s invitation, Severus wondered if there was anything he wouldn’t do.