»»————- song: ————-««
dreams drive out the days
★ jef martens ★
❝Above all else, guard your heart,
for everything you do flows from it. ❞
~ Proverbs 4:23 ~
♢ ♢ ♢
It was always strange to walk into his house at Spinner's End after a full year at Hogwarts. Year after year, it was always the same: the funny sensation in his stomach, the unease, the feeling that he had both come home and left it at the same time. And oh God, the dust.
"This is not home," Snape would chant as he moved around the house carefully, pretending to be a stranger, pretending he didn't know that the tenth floorboard from the door always creaked and that the corner of the coffee table was chipped because his head had been thrown against it when he was eleven years old. Because for the first few days, it was easier to pretend he was a stranger than pretend this was his home.
The fine velvet layer of dust, shuddering as they softly floated upward, disturbed by his footsteps. The walls themselves almost sagging in relief at the quietness. The warmth. Like a final hug. The sun would catch the ascending dust in just the right way, and the air would turn a brilliant gold, and suddenly the summer of 1976 and his mother's body in the kitchen would blind him.
Death is beautiful. Not despite it, not in spite of, but in itself.
Snape didn't cry, not when he found her on the floor the day he came home sixth year, not when he called for an ambulance, not after they took her away to the morgue and the nurses told him there was nothing left for him to do but to go home. Not at their pitying faces when no father came to comfort his son, when no husband came to send off his wife. And when Tobias lumbered home and shouted for Eileen to take his coat, Snape said to him calmly, "She's dead," before pushing past him out the door.
And Snape was glad for it.
I may go to Hell for it, he told God, But what kind of son isn't grateful that his mother suffers no longer?
Death is beautiful. Because the last thing she carried with her, and the last thing she left her son, was a smile. The first in years, and her final.
"You're free, Mum," Snape whispered to the smoke rising from the smokestacks in plumes.
The smoke disappeared into wisps. And so would 1976.
It was 1994, and every year it was the same. And why shouldn't it be? The house was the same. Every single piece of furniture the same. The carpet, almost threadbare, the creaking floorboard, the chipped fucking coffee table, he had kept it all the same. Of course he saw his dead mother every time he came back from Hogwarts. He couldn't bring himself to change anything. Because even if he tried to erase his father, it would mean erasing his mother, too.
If Heaven exists, it means you made her suffer. And that means I have every fucking right to hate you. Death is beautiful because you made her life ugly.
He could never be sure if he was talking to Tobias or to God.
♢ ♢ ♢
The church wasn't small. It was one of the largest buildings in Cokesworth, or perhaps the only large building—large didn't really mean much in a town where everything was a bit stunted. The steeple, though, was visible from almost anywhere in town, and the spire so tall and sharp it might've killed God himself, intent on impaling whatever descended from the heavens.
The last time he had come here, it was to bury his mother in the cemetery, as Tobias had requested. And even then, it had been years since he had stepped foot inside the church itself. He barely remembered it—only bits and pieces of loud, fiery sermons and his father hissing at him to fix his tie—but he never forgot the stained glass windows. They were just as he remembered, carefully preserved in the annals of his memory. He stared at a geometric lamb in Jesus' arms, the glowing golden halo around his head. He used to think the windows were sugar glass, he recalled. So brightly colored, and so tempting for a young child.
"The Lord be with you," a quiet voice said from behind him.
Snape turned around slowly. But it was not the white-haired man he expected, wizened through the years, a face he only knew as a blur from his memories. This was a much younger man, in his fifties, perhaps. He wore the clerical collar, though, neat around his neck, and he was smiling.
Snape nodded hesitantly. "Sorry to ask... is Father Nevin no longer..."
"I am Father Nevin," the man said, still smiling. "But I suppose you're talking about my late father?"
"...Late," Snape said, after a pause.
"I gather you haven't been here in a while," the man said, but not unkindly. "Yes, my father passed a few years back, may God bless his soul. Were you looking for him?"
What could Snape say? What could he possibly say?
"I..." he struggled. "I... yes, I guess I was."
"Any particular reason? I'm not my father, but perhaps I could help. I was just about to leave"— The priest checked his watch— "but I suppose paperwork can wait."
I'm not my father.
When the silence pressed on too long, the priest laid a gentle hand on Snape's shoulder. "Would you like to sit down?" he asked, gesturing to a pew in the very back.
Numbly, he sat. The priest sat in the row in front, turning around with a casual arm slung over the back. There weren't many people in the church—it was a Wednesday, and only three in the afternoon—and only a scattering of people sat in prayer.
Snape shifted in the bench, dully realizing that the hard, uncomfortable wood had at some point been replaced by cushions. He could still remember wriggling in his seat and being pinched by Tobias for it.
"Well," Snape said, clasping his hands together. "I don't really know why I came, honestly."
"Not many do," the priest said, smiling again. "The uncertainty drives them here. They usually leave with more questions than they came in with, which why they rarely come back, I think."
"Do they," Snape murmured.
"Do you have questions?"
Snape looked up. "Oh... no. I used to come to church, I don't anymore. I don't really have any questions about... God, or anything. I..." He looked up at the arched ceiling, taking in a deep breath. He could only let out a sharp, shallow exhale as he lowered his gaze to a hymnal in its rack on the back of the pew. Worn pages, same red cover. "Look, I came because I was just wondering if your father remembered mine."
"Your father?"
"He's dead," Snape said. "He died thirteen years ago."
"I'm sorry to hear that," Father Nevin said, and Snape had to look up, because he had never heard anyone sound so genuine in their condolences. Not even Dumbledore.
He cleared his throat. "Well, I wasn't," he said. He meant to be blunt, but it came out as... something else. Something a bit quieter. Some part of him was still scared of the God he grew up with, scared of the pulpit and the people who stood behind them.
But Father Nevin's expression hadn't changed, and no trapdoor opened beneath Snape's feet to drag him to Hell. So he kept talking.
"I was twenty-one then. I was never on good terms with him, so we had already stopped corresponding when I left school at seventeen—" Snape knew it made him sound like a drop-out, given that most Muggles graduated at eighteen, but he really didn't have it in him to lie about something that trivial. Besides, it painted the right picture. "I was in prison, at the time. I got the news he wasn't doing well, but it was too late for me to go see him."
This was a lie. It hadn't been too late—he wasn't allowed to visit, period. The Ministry would never have permitted it. This wouldn't be a strange concept to anyone who knew that Snape had been put in a temporary jailed before his trial to face charges of being a Death Eater, although he managed to avoid Azkaban. To a Muggle, though, it would have sounded strange that an inmate wasn't allowed to see a dying relative.
"To be clear," Snape said, "I wouldn't have gone to see him anyway. I don't think he would have wanted me there in any case."
The priest nodded, neither in agreement nor in appeasement, but with understanding. Snape suddenly had the urge to pull up his sleeve and make the priest see, really see what kind of a man Snape was, how tarnished and defiled he was. Surely even a man like Father Nevin wouldn't think Snape was worthy of being saved.
"I was guilty, by the way," Snape said suddenly. "Of the charges against me. I did everything they accused me of. But the charges were dropped. I didn't even serve time."
"And you think you should have?" the priest asked.
"I know I should have, Father," Snape replied.
A silence descended over them. It was a few moments before Snape could gather his words.
"In the end... It wasn't alcohol poisoning that got to him. After all that, it wasn't liver disease or kidney failure, or... or a car accident. It was lung cancer." Snape shook his head. "It was the air of this town, all this smoke, I know it. He never even touched a goddamn cigarette in his life."
Too late, he realized he was in a house of worship. He glanced at the priest apologetically. What was it about a church that turned him into an seven year old again?
But the priest just gave him a shake of the head. "We've all said the Lord's name in vain at some point or another. Who am I to reprimand? Besides," he gave Snape a humorless smile, "By the looks of it, you've had enough Catholic guilt for a lifetime."
Snape swallowed. He had never heard of the term "Catholic guilt" before, but he could guess at its meaning all too well.
"What was your father's name?" the priest asked. "Out of curiosity."
"Tobias. Tobias Snape."
The priest closed his eyes and smiled. "I knew it. I knew you looked familiar, the second I saw you." He opened his eyes and looked directly into Snape's. "Hello, Severus."
Snape searched the man's face, desperately trying to remember. "Who..."
"Chris," he said, holding a hand over his heart as he stood up. "I'm Chris. Remember me?"
Oh. Chris.
Of course he remembered Chris. Not his face, or his smile—because Snape always had trouble looking at people's faces when he was little—but his voice.
♢
Snape smiled to himself. He had managed to sneak away from his dad, and even managed to open the big doors by himself. He hated singing with other people, and his dad always made him sing. So amidst the rustling and hustling as everyone rose to their feet for hymns, Snape simply ducked his head, slipped past knees and and purses and jackets, and was out of reach of his dad in no time at all.
But now what to do? He was just as bored out here as he was in there. At least he could walk around. Deciding hopscotching from one end of the hall to the other was a good idea, he began jumping across each linoleum tile.
A gentle tap on the shoulder startled him so bad that he jumped away, limbs flailing.
"Hey, hey, I'm sorry, did I scare you?"
Snape resolutely shook his head.
"Okay, that's good. What are you doing out here?"
Terrified, Snape ducked his head. He hadn't thought about how much trouble he would be in with his dad. Now another person was going to yell at him.
"I'm sorry," he mumbled.
"Hey, no, don't be!" the man said. "Listen, I get it. It can get pretty boring in there, can't it?"
Snape looked up in shock. He couldn't quite muster up the courage to look at the man in the eye, but he was so surprised to hear someone talk about church this way that his shyness was momentarily forgotten. His dad would definitely slap him if he said something like that.
"You shouldn't say that," Snape whispered. "You'll get in trouble."
The man laughed. "Well, I don't really know about that. I know the priest really well, see."
"But what about God?" he asked. "He'd know, wouldn't he?"
The man seemed to sober. "Well..." he said carefully, "I think that God knows us pretty well. Since He made us. Right?"
Snape nodded hesitantly.
"And since He knows us pretty well, I think He'd understand that even if some people get a little restless sometimes at church, it doesn't mean that they don't love Him. What do you think?"
No one ever asked Snape what he thought. He was too scared to answer.
"Think on it. You can tell me what you think the next time you come. How's that sound?"
"Okay," Snape said.
"Awesome. What's your name? Oh, want some sweets? I got leftovers from the children's ministry. We ended early today."
Snape couldn't remember the last time he'd been allowed to eat sweets. He reached out slowly to take one. "Severus," he said, then remembered his manners. "And thanks."
"Wow, that's a crazy cool name. I'm Chris. Kinda boring, huh?"
Snape wasn't in the habit of insulting adults, or calling them by their first name, so he didn't respond.
"So, once you're finished, I think you'll have enough energy to power through the sermon. What do you say, you think you can handle that?"
Snape nodded.
"Alright kiddo, let's take you back."
♢
Snape had been right. The second Snape returned to his seat, Tobias was up in an instant, his hand around Snape's thin upper arm in a vice-like grip. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Chris look over his shoulder in concern as he made his way back to his own seat, and Snape hurriedly broke eye contact. Back outside he was dragged, but this time, it was to be berated, cuffed on the ear, arm still in Tobias' grip and slowly losing feeling.
Snape had squeezed his eyes shut for most of it, but when he opened them, he saw Chris step out into the lobby quietly. Snape had never seen someone's eyes look so sad.
But Chris didn't do anything. Besides, Tobias had already spun around back toward the door, ignoring Chris as he dragged Snape back. The humiliation Snape felt was so overwhelming, it nearly brought him to his knees. Well, it would've been the right place, at least.
He hoped never to go back, to never have to see Chris again, not after what he saw. But week after week, Sunday would come, and every time, when Tobias wasn't watching, Chris would give him a small wave. The embarrassment subsided gradually, and Snape would come to take solace in those waves.
And then somehow, Chris persuaded Tobias to let Snape join the church's Sunday school. Even Snape was awed by how smooth of a talker he was. "I can take him off your hands for a couple hours during the regular service, it's really a good program for the kids—"
It was actually fun. In hindsight, Snape doubted most other Sunday schools were like the one Chris taught. Every class began with a question, and they'd try to answer it to together. Snape never dared speak in front of the others, only when everyone left, but it felt safe to ask Chris, who always had good answers, or would at least try to give a good one. And one day, when Chris caught Snape humming a hymn to himself, he suggested joining the choir. He eventually did, and he was an outsider there just as anywhere else, but at least he came to enjoy the singing. He could lose himself in it.
He only attended both for about two years. By the time he was nine, Tobias' drinking problem started. Looking back, this perfectly coincided with his mother's confession to her husband about the truth of her identity: the fact that she was a witch, and so was their son.
"You brought the devil into my home. Into my heart," he had said to her through clenched teeth. Truthfully, it was the only time Snape could think of that Tobias ever let on that he had been in love with Eileen, once. And whatever affection he had showed to Snape as his only son—his pride and joy, even, on the good days when Tobias would place him on his lap and read him a book—vanished forever.
With that, no more Sunday school. No more choir. And anyway, Snape's newfound interest in magic was beginning to overtake any interest he'd had in religion. He clearly hadn't belonged in church, with those smiling families and happy children. Prayer and magic, Snape had decided, were similar in that you couldn't really see them. But unlike prayer, magic worked.
He never saw Chris again, after that.
But here he was, twenty-four years later. The lines in his face hadn't been there before, nor had the clerical collar, but the voice hadn't changed. Snape couldn't believe he hadn't recognized it before.
"Chris," Snape said in shock, rising to his feet. The priest reached out and clasped his hands warmly. "Of course I remember you. Sunday school..."
"When I first met you, you were hopscotching down the hallway out there," the priest laughed, letting go of Snape and gesturing toward the doors. "And you were this small! Pocket-sized!" He lowered a hand toward around waist level, shaking his head in disbelief. "How many years has it been, Severus?"
"Twenty-four," Snape said, not really believing his own calculation.
"And you were... eight? Nine, when you stopped coming?"
"Nine."
"My goodness, I feel old," the priest said, sitting back down. Snape followed suit. "I was... twenty-seven then, I think. I'm fifty-one, now. Positively ancient. Tell me, what is it that you do now? How have you been doing?"
The first question was easy to answer. The second, not so much.
"I teach chemistry," Snape said, the closest parallel he could think of. "I do a bit of research."
"Good for you," the priest said, as genuine as anyone could make the phrase sound. "That's amazing, Severus. You always had the best questions. You had the makings of a great teacher."
Snape chucked bitterly. "I don't make a very good one, unfortunately."
The priest shrugged. "Even if you aren't, you have the potential to be," he said simply. "You have it in you, kid."
He sounded so confident, that even Snape believed it for a second. But he shook his head. "I don't think so." He looked down at his hands. He had perfected the art of stilling his hands when they trembled a long time ago, but they were colder than usual. He took a deep breath.
"I'm sorry," he said.
The priest frowned. "For what?"
"I'm sorry I didn't turn out to be the kind of person you tried so hard to see in me."
"Hey now," the priest said, leaning forward in concern, and suddenly he sounded like he was twenty-seven years old again, trying to comfort a closed-off child. Come to think of it, Chris hadn't been much younger then than Snape was now. And he yet was better with children—a better person—than Snape had ever been. "What are you saying? Tried to see? No, Severus. I didn't try to see anything. I only saw what was already there."
Snape was used to platitudes. Parents were really good at them, especially wealthy purebloods who thought they could buy their children's grades with money and flattery. Their words never meant much to him. But Chris sounded like he meant it, and that hurt even more. Again the frustration rose to the surface.
"So you were in prison," the priest said. "Plenty of people go to prison. What did I always say, Severus? Contrition, not guilt." He paused. "I guess I was right about the Catholic guilt thing."
A little too late for that, after half a lifetime of guilt wrapped around his neck like a parasite. He had never stopped to consider if his propensity to maximize his guilt, to force himself to suffer, was a product of his religious upbringing. But this revelation didn't stop the bubbling frustration, the impulse to reveal the worst parts of himself.
"I was in a gang," Snape said brusquely. "I was initiated when I was fifteen. I won't lie to you and say I didn't know what I was getting myself into. I knew what kinds of people they were and what they did, and I still joined. I was the nerd, but I knew how to handle drugs. And I know for a fact that some of them have seriously hurt and killed people."
Up to this point, he had kept his composure, kept his breath even and his head clear, his words cold and his lies straight. Why was he even bothering with this charade, spinning an alternate story just to be able to confess? But something in him broke. He felt it, somewhere in deep within his chest, something cracking irreversably. Broken in the way a dam is, the kind that only happens when you confess something you never meant to confess.
Snape leaned forward desperately, faintly aware that his lungs didn't feel like they were getting enough air. "How does that bullshit go... 'Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,' was it? Well, here goes, it's been tweny-four years since my last confession: I fucking killed people." He hissed the words through clenched teeth. "My friend. My friend died because of me. They killed her. Because of me."
He didn't even realize that the priest had sat next to him until there was a hand on his back, and a voice commanding him to hold his breath.
♢
"I don't... wanna... go home," Snape hiccupped. Funny. He was taking great big gulps of air, but it didn't seem like it was doing his lungs any good. Crying turned to panic. "I can't breathe!" he gasped, turning to Chris in desperation.
"You're breathing too much," Chris corrected gently, and guided Snape to a chair. "I know it's scary, but you gotta hold your breath for me, okay buddy?"
"No!" Snape choked. Holding his breath was the last thing he wanted to do when he felt like he was suffocating.
"You have to listen to me, and try to hold your breath," Chris said patiently. "I promise you, it won't hurt you. Hold your breath, just for a few seconds. Okay?"
After gasping a bit more and deciding what Chris was saying was probably better than whatever was going to happen next, he did his best to comply.
"One... two..." Chris counted, "Okay, good, now let go of that breath as slowly as you can."
'Slowly' didn't work out so well at first. The exhale came in shaky sputters, and it was a while before he could actually hear what Chris was saying, but the counting helped.
"... three, two, one," Chris counted down. "There, just keep breathing, just like that, okay? I'm gonna get you some water."
It was a little alarming to have Chris stand up, but Chris kept counting even as he backed away. "Inhale, one, two, three, four, five, now hold... Good, now exhale..."
By the time Chris cracked open a water bottle for him, the breathing was more or less steady. Snape took the water from him, refusing to make eye contact.
"It's okay," Chris said. "You just had a panic attack, that's all. A lot of people get them. I used to get them too, sometimes."
Snape frowned dubiously. "Y-you?" he said, still hiccupping a little.
Chris nodded. "Mm-hm. But you know what made it a little better each time? Knowing that it's coming, and that nothing bad is gonna happen to you. You just gotta remember to breathe, and it'll all be over soon."
Snape kept breathing slowly. "But I really don't wanna go home," he whispered. "Can't I just stay here for the day? I can walk home by myself!"
Chris shook his head. "I wish I could, I really do. But your dad is probably almost here, and you gotta go with him." He crouched down to get a better look at Snape's face. "But please: can you tell me why you don't want to go home?"
For the third time that morning, Snape shook his head.
"Is something happening at home that you... don't like?"
A hesitant nod.
"Does it involve someone getting hurt?"
A pause, and then a vehement shake of the head.
"Are you sure? Because, Severus, if it does—if you or someone else is getting hurt—we can get help for that. We can keep you safe."
Snape didn't doubt that Chris was telling the truth. But what could he say? That his mother had told him and his father over dinner that they were witch and wizard, and his father had gotten so drunk that he trashed the entire house and accidentally threw a dish at his mother?
It was only an accident, after all. He didn't mean to do it on purpose.
"I'm sure," Severus said. "I would tell you if I were. Honest."
Panic sprung in his chest when Chris was clearly not convinced. But at that moment, his father's heavy footsteps announced his presence outside the door of the classroom. Wiping the last of the tears from his face, Snape screwed the lid of the bottle back on and left the room without a word.
And went home to the hellish nightmare he knew it would be.
"Stop," Snape shrieked, lunging at his father and beating at his back with small, bony fists. "Stop it, goddamnit, stop! You're going to kill her!"
Tobias paused, looking back at Snape with bloodshot eyes, and stood up unsteadily.
"Oh my god, oh my god," Snape sobbed, pushing past Tobias and sinking to the floor, covering his mother's frail, bruised body with his own as best as he could. "God, please, stop."
"Do not. Take the Lord's name in vain," Tobias snarled. "Where did you learn that filthy language?"
"GO TO HELL," Snape screamed, the words ripped from his chest, tore at his vocal cords. Immediately he froze. What had he done?
Even Tobias looked taken aback by his usually meek son's audacity. But the surprise was quickly overtaken by a rage Snape had never seen before. It was as though he were watching his father turn into a different being, a demon. His face just... changed. It was unexplainable, indescribable unless one saw it for themselves. It would be the most terrifying thing Snape would ever see in his life, even after all that was to come. And he would carry this fear, the fear of people's faces changing and morphing in anger, to his death. Why he would come to take comfort in Voldemort, he would never be sure of afterward. Perhaps it was because Voldemort's changes were more gradual, didn't reveal himself to be the devil so quickly. Which one was the more hellbound... Well, who could say?
"You dare?" Tobias said, his face still looking like the devil had taken it upon himself to haphazardly fit Tobias' skin across his own monstrous face. And worse, the words were quiet.
Snape clutched his mother as every nerve in his body went cold. He screwed his eyes shut. He couldn't run. He couldn't leave his mother. He couldn't leave if he wanted to. He couldn't escape this nightmare. A hand raised. Even at his worst, before the alcohol had consumed him, it had always been a flat hand.
It was a fist, this time. It came down.
But it never struck.
Snape opened his eyes. Tobias' were wide in horror, staring at the fist that refused to move against an invisible barrier. No matter how hard he swung, each time his blows came down on air that refused to give. He gave up, panting.
"Devilry," he whispered. "Witchcraft."
Maybe I should be thanking Satan, Snape thought, if this is the devil's work.
♢
Staving off panic attacks got easier, after that. He only had two or three more full-blown ones, but the whispers of impending suffocation never really went away. Sometimes he would take a deep breath and find that all he could manage was a shallow inhale—he became very good at pretending he was completely fine while he silently fought to avoid hyperventilation.
He was supposed to be good at pretending he was completely fine.
"I'm fine," he said. The adrenaline was unavoidable, and he could never be sure that he wasn't having a heart attack, but the quietness of the church helped. And holding his breath.
"You're fine," the priest agreed. "But you're also not fine, and it's okay to say that you're not."
"And then what, apologize to God for not being okay? And for committing murder, I guess that's important, too." A strange, uncaring calm came over him.
"Technically, asking for forgiveness is more biblical than apologizing," the priest said. "I'm not going to sit here and preach to you about the Bible, but I think you're apologizing for something for which an apology won't help. Maybe it's time you realize asking for forgiveness is okay. That you deserve to be forgiven.
"You were responsible for people's death. True, that can't be excused away. Those consequences are yours to bear. But look at yourself, Severus. You're a wreck over this. Extraordinary circumstances can drive men into corners, and I don't need to be inside a confessional to see that you're no stranger to repentance. You've suffered the guilt, and personally, I think that's doing time plenty, spiritually speaking. And in your case, maybe God has nothing to do with it. I won't tell you what to believe or who to ask forgiveness from. But I'd suggest starting with yourself."
The thought was so comical, Snape almost laughed.
"Well, I'm going to hell anyway, given that the other side of that coin is to forgive those who have trespassed against me," he said, stretching his legs over the kneeler in front of him. "People say it's easier to let go, but—"
"Letting go feels like you're betraying a part of yourself?"
How did he get it so spot-on?
"It's like... if I do this, I lose every bit of self-respect I ever had. Which I didn't really have in the first place. But I had to believe some part of me was better than them."
"It got you through the hardest days, right?" the priest said. The youthful twinkle in his eyes were gone, replaced by an unfamiliar haggardness.
Snape was silent for a moment. "Does that count as pride, Father?"
"You can call me Chris." The priest sidestepped the question with a chuckle. "Seriously, it's kind of bothering me now, realizing that I'm so old. You knew me as Chris, not Father. I was kind of a kid myself back then, honestly."
Like the seven year old he used to be, Snape wasn't eager to take him up on the offer.
"I can't believe I didn't know you were the priest's son," he said instead. No sooner than the words were out of Snape's mouth did he realize this statement was off, considering the fact that ordination was impossible for a married man. "Wait a second... why..."
"Ah, right. Well, I didn't make it public knowledge. I found the kids were far more likely to be intimidated by me if they knew. They probably thought I snitched on them in my spare time." He laughed, but then sobered. "And as for my father... Yes, a lot of people had questions. Which is why I hid it all the more."
He cleared his throat. "My mother passed away when I was eighteen."
Snape opened his mouth to offer condolences, but the priest had already moved on.
"Her death hit him hard. Extremely hard. He was already an extremely devout man, but... I think he saw this as a sign from God. In the eyes of the church, of course, my father was no longer married. That meant that he no longer had any earthly attachments. He probably felt that he was therefore obligated to dedicate the rest of his life to His word.
"For people like my father who have had children, they can't be ordained until their child is eighteen or older. Which checked out, in our case. He spent a few years in a seminary, became a priest, and suddenly there was all this pressure on me to be the perfect kid, a good lay pastor, good community member, all these things."
Snape listened wordlessly.
"When my mother passed, I went in the total opposite direction of my father. I wanted nothing to do with the church, or with God. But I couldn't leave my father alone, either. So I stuck by him, all those years. And through those years, I started to realize that I could make a better priest than him."
He sighed. "I never said it out loud. I didn't hope for his death, God forbid, or to replace him. I never wanted that. But still I felt like my calling was to be a better Catholic than him. I guess some would call it pride."
"The deadliest sin," Snape murmured.
"Mm. But I don't think it was pride. It was resolve. My father wasn't a perfect man. I'm not either. And God may be the final judge, but between the two of us, I know who was a better Christian. And a better person."
He lookd at Snape grimly. "'Beware false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.' Popular verse, that one."
"'You will recognize them by their fruits,'" Snape responded automatically, startling himself.
"I know it's technically talking about the Messiah," the priest said, "But I taught you better than to take things at face value."
Snape knew what he was trying to get at.
"My father was a model Catholic when the doors were open," the priest said. His voice became softer. "And I'm sure your father was too. Until he thought the doors were closed."
Snape closed his eyes briefly, the scene of that day seared across his eyelids.
"And I'm not telling you who to forgive or how to forgive. I'm not talking about the doctrine that you have to forgive to be forgiven. But from a psychological standpoint, forgiving is a whole lot healthier than any false self-esteem you keep clinging to."
Lily couldn't forgive me in the end, Snape thought. She had, so many times, but he always took it for granted. Lily was not God, but Snape undeniably clung to her more than he ever believed in Jesus.
"I think I forgave my father a long time ago, without realizing it," Snape said. "At some point, it just didn't matter to me anymore. I acknowledged he did wrong by me, and I moved on. His death didn't affect me because I already made my peace with him. Sort of, anyway."
"Sort of" meant that he had gone to see Tobias at the nursing home once before he died, when he was nineteen. By the nurses' accounts, he had given up alcohol and had gone back to church fairly recently.
"If you knew what's good for you, boy," Tobias had told him with labored breathing, "You'd repent. You'd denounce all this... witchcraft and wizardry nonsense, and accept Jesus as your savior."
"I'd rather burn in hell," Snape had replied calmly. "If I believed in it."
Tobias peered at him through rheumy eyes, the bags under them no longer nourished by alcohol but by age. "I've done a lot," he said slowly, "To do better by you. To be a better father. A good father. But you..." He turned away. "You have done nothing to be a better son."
Snape scoffed quietly. "Since when? You never saw me as your son."
Tobias stiffened. "I did. Once. I gave you your name, you know. Your mother wanted one of those devil names—thank God I didn't let her and stood firm, gave you a proper christening."
"Right. The name you never call me by."
"Don't talk back to me, son."
"I'm not your son," Snape said. "You might have stopped drinking yourself halfway to death and put on some nicer clothes and gone to church, but you're a snake. I know you, and I know my scripture, Father. Or should I say Tobias? Jesus said God is our only Father, after all."
Tobias said nothing. The room felt both large and small at the same time. The exhilaration of being able to say these things, finally, without the fear of a raised hand, had been overwhelming.
"I will walk upon the asp and the basilisk," Snape said, standing up and turning to leave. "And I will trample underfoot the lion and the dragon."
"It's 'tread on the lion and cobra,'" Tobias said suddenly. "'Trample the lion and serpent.'"
"Douay-Rheims Bible," Snape replied. "Which you've never read. You know, it's interesting what the fear of death can do to people. Scrambling about in their last moments, searching for something that might save them. Funnier still, despite the fact that I don't even believe in God, I think I make a better Christian than you, logistically speaking. Don't flatter yourself and think that God will have mercy on you. Personally, I think you should be more concerned about the devil. I'll trample the basilisk and lion and cobra and whatever I damn well please."
There was a silence.
"Remember your commandments," were Tobias' last words to him.
"You lost me at honour thy father," were Snape's last words to Tobias.
Nineteen-year-old Severus Snape was a hypocrite, for sure (He had already fallen prey to idolatry, given that he bowed to Voldemort in the stead of God, and the not murdering part goes without saying). But that was all the closure he needed. Tobias Snape was an asshole, and that was that. Maybe it wasn't forgiveness in the traditional sense, but it was something.
"Interesting," the priest said. "Who, then, can't you forgive?"
Snape didn't answer the question. "The reason why I wanted to see your father was because he knew mine," he said. "The last time I saw him, he'd apparently quit drinking and started going to church again. I wanted to know. Did he really change? In his heart, I mean."
The priest considered this. "I remember Tobias," he said. "Although not as well as my father, I'll admit. He was... quiet. A bit more reserved, less haughty than he used to be. Withdrawn into himself. Truthfully..." He hesitated, and looked over at Snape.
"Tell me."
"He reminded me of you, in his last days," he said quietly. The words, though anticipated, still came as a muffled blow. "The kinds of questions he would ask me after service. But... that's where the similarities ended, I assure you."
He sighed. "As a priest, I'm supposed to to be a vessel for forgiveness. I remember thinking to myself, what kind of godly man would I be if I couldn't personally forgive this man in front of me? He never came for confession so I never actually did, I suppose. And I can't really say, in the end, whether he repented, or felt remorse, or had truly opened his heart to the idea of God."
He glanced at Snape. "Does that at least somewhat answer your question?"
Snape wasn't really sure. He really ought to filter his next words, he thought, but they spilled out of him anyway.
"I ask because I need to know if I am capable of change," he said, holding his hands out in front of him as if reaching for a globe. "If Tobias was, really was, then maybe... I am too."
"In terms of...?"
"A student of mine at the boarding school I teach at was orphaned at infancy after his parents' murders," Snape said, knowing he probably shouldn't be saying this, but needing to say it anyway. "His godfather couldn't take him because he was arrested for the murder—wrongly convicted, by the way, and still awaiting retrial. His relatives took him in for twelve years, but recently their abuse came to light. It's a long story, and it's complicated, and I know it doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but I somehow ended up becoming his guardian. Foster care, you know."
He placed his chin upon clasped hands, vaguely aware that it looked like he was praying. And maybe he was. "His father viciously bullied me when we were younger. He and his friends, including the godfather. And his mother... was the friend I mentioned before." He shook his head, aware of how bizarre it all sounded. "I admit, I treated the boy unfairly for it. I was spiteful, and cruel. He looked exactly like his father, and I was too blind to see past it, or to see the friend I once had in him. We came to an understanding a year ago, and he's come to trust me. He's coming to live with me in just a few days. Father, every day I ask myself. What in the world am I doing? How could I possibly do this, when I've never had a good role model in my life?"
That's not entirely true, a voice whispered in him.
Snape looked up. "Except for you," he amended. "You were the only adult that really cared." A person who cared without an agenda.
Surprisingly, it didn't feel embarrassing to admit it. It felt like the right thing to say.
The priest's eyes shimmered. "I did care," he said. "I always did. I thought about you, even after you left. I worried for you, and prayed for you. You were like a little brother to me." He gave a raspy chuckle. "What a roller coaster of a life you live, Severus. Truth truly is stranger than fiction, isn't it?"
"I'll say," Snape said.
The priest dabbed at his eyes with a handkerchief. "Well, 'break the cycle,' as they say. I think you're already well on your way to smashing it to pieces, personally. 'There is no fear in love,' they say. John 4:18. But more often than not, love is fear, at least for us mere mortals. I don't think you can do as much wrong as you fear, if you care about this boy half as much as I cared about you."
You have no idea.
"Not to say it isn't massively difficult to break the cycle," the priest added. "But you're not just talk, Severus. You never were. I think you know what you're doing. Besides, after talking to hundreds of parents through the years, if there's one thing I've learned, it's that no parent really knows what they're doing. You know, at least, not to make the mistakes your father did. Trust me, Severus. You're not your father. None of us are."
Snape opened his mouth, but found both his voice and his words had gotten lost somewhere along the way.
"I think I know why you came," Father Nevin said. "You're looking for the proof of the bad that you see in yourself. You're asking others to seek it with you, for them to confirm your fears. And I? I refuse to be a party to your self-destruction."
Snape couldn't argue with that.
They sat there silently. There was no one left in the church except the two. Cokeworth wasn't the most populous town, nor the most devout parish. Yet the only ones in Cokeworth who were presently staring at the large crucifix above the altar were neither parish nor pious. Not in the technical sense, anyway.
"Do you even believe in God?" Snape asked.
The priest smiled. "I do," he said. "Although if I said half the things I really thought at my sermons, I'd probably be excommunicated by now. You know, sometimes I wonder to myself whether Hindus are happier than any devoted Catholic. The hope that comes with reincarnation—a next life—must be quite something. Their concept of hell is very different from our eternal damnation, isn't it? The idea that life itself has the potential to be hell."
He grinned. "But we—or I, rather—unfortunately are theologically stuck with the one earthly life we get. Make it good, Severus. Some people need God to guide them. Others just do what's right because it's right, not because they think God is watching."
"I wish my father did," Snape said softly.
"He probably knew, deep down, that he had problems religion couldn't fix," Father Nevin said. "But he didn't do anything about it. Religion can be healthy in doses. Adjustable, prescribed doses. Not everyone needs the same medicine. He was waging a war with God, and with himself. And I'm sorry you had to be caught in the crossfire."
Words can cut deep. To the bone, even. But although it's quicker to hurt than to heal, words can do that too. Slowly. Tenuously, but carefully.
"Thank you, Father."
"I told you. Chris."
Snape hesitated. "Thank you... Chris."
Perhaps he was right. The deep-seated anger Tobias held for so much of his life was directed just as much toward God as it was toward his family. And despite that anger, he could never quite let go of his faith, as superficial as it was.
But Snape could, among other things. It was his choice to make. And what irony it was, that it was a priest who helped him to make it.
"Peace be with you," Chris said.
Snape smiled. "And also with you."
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they shall be comforted.
~Matthew 5:4~
a/n: i've always been a catholicism enthusiast (more in an academic sense than the religious sense) but man i don't think i've ever done this much research on a topic since the six-page research essay i wrote last year on music lmao, i also have an obsession with church music (i almost set this chapter to allegri's miserere... the vibe wasn't quite right but FUCK i love that song)
fun fact: i set a new personal record with the word count of this chapter, which is 7612 words. i wrote half of this in a feverish frenzy across several nights at 3 am, and the other half after i got the pfizer booster and was a bit loopy the entire day lol, so i hope the whole thing was coherent.
i've been planning this chapter and writing bits and pieces of ideas for almost two years now, and finally getting to write it was honestly immensely gratifying. i've never picked apart my words with so much scrutiny before, writing and rewriting sentences until they looked just right. i think my poor backspace button is suffering lol. seriously guys, thanks for reading my shit. the fact that people are about to read something i poured so much of my efforts into is kinda mindblowing.
<3