Severus Snape Oneshots

Failures, Dreams, and Wisdom

Summary:

It's after the war and Severus confides in an old friend after he is left with clean up duty. But not for the castle. For himself.

~Watch for the two little Easter eggs I left! Comment where it's from- I'll reveal it in the next post!~

Warnings: PTSD, night terrors

Severus lay in his bed, staring at the old popcorn ceiling of his childhood home. He never thought he'd move into this room specifically. He never thought that he would be falling asleep to the view of the exact same cold, rigid ceiling that his father once lay under.

It gave him chills to think about it.

But sometimes those memories of him and of his childhood were no less emotionally impairing than the recent traumas of the world.

It was obviously quite depressing.

Severus eyebags had become more pronounced than they were when the students would tease about them behind his back.

Those little bastards didn't know what it was like to get three hours of sleep each night for over a decade straight. You try  teaching a class full of dwarf-sized dumbasses while your brain is still in bed.

It would be quite cruel to say that now most of them were experiencing the karma of their actions.

(But Severus could be fairly cruel)

Not that he was blaming trauma of the second wizarding war on moronic superstitions....

This would be the last thought Severus had before succumbing to his slumber.

Having fallen asleep thinking about how much he hates children.

---

Severus had a long day.

He felt physically and emotionally drained.

First, he lost his muggle inhaler while going for a walk to try and clear his mind.

When having fallen against the glass pane of the boat house after having his throat slashed by a wizard-snakeman-hitler hybrid, something happened to his esophagus.

Or was it his rib and lung? His spine-

He can't remember. When in the hospital, the man didn't want to listen to anybody- too enveloped in his own self-pity.

Their voices played in the background, sounding like the adults in Charlie Brown as he found himself slipping into a dissociative episode.

One of many that he would have.

As he went to start something to eat, he also dropped a pan and it hit the ground with such a harsh clattering noise, he had a small panic attack. Cue lost inhaler again.

He felt pathetic.

Severus felt like he was losing it. He could take pride in admitting that he had held it together pretty well for someone in such a shite circumstance(s).

Now, he felt like an old man with COPD, and a fragile child scared of fireworks.

That doesn't even begin to describe the nightmares he's had.

Oh, the nightmares.

You could almost call them night terrors. Screaming Meemies. The worst of the worst- the ones that shake you so badly you can hardly tell the difference between being awake and being asleep. Those Screaming Meemies would have him paralyzed, sweating through the bedsheets and praying for any higher power to end it all.