He was sitting on the bank, by the lake, hugging his knees as if he were seven, not seventeen.
She sat down beside him, legs long in front of her, ankles bare and pretty, Lily-white against her black school robes. Not that he was looking. Her arm brushed his as she leaned back.
He bit his lip, hard, and fixed his eyes on the lake. The lake was calm, safe – untouched by the maelstrom that threatened to engulf him.
"This doesn't make us friends," she said, "We're not friends."
The lake was calm. Hell. The lake was dead, dark and still, picture-pretty and lifeless. Sick, he thought. Dead. Bereft. Not vacant, not empty, not even bereft of. Just bereft.
Silence stretched.
Her tentative "Severus?" came in the same breath as his "So I've heard."
They hadn't "been friends" for a year.
She looked at him, he thought. He looked at the lake. His fingers were sore, and, Merlin, wasn't that a stupid thought to have, then, there, beside her, but he'd been gripping the backs of his calves for the last hour, maybe two. His fingers were sore.
He'd been trying so hard to think about nothing that new thoughts were slow to trickle in.
"Are you alright?" she asked.
He scowled, at her, at no one. At the lake.
Of course, he was alright. He was an adult. It wasn't like he was an orphan or anything. Nothing so bloody trite. He couldn't be an orphan if he was an adult. Of course, he couldn't be an orphan when he still had a father either, however little use he was.
He didn't need her pity.
He didn't need her.
"Severus?"
"Not precisely."
And that did it, didn't it? Her arm slipped around his back, to hug him, and she was apologising like a bloody greeting card, all sorry-for-his-loss and far too sweet.
He pushed her away, snarling. "Don't touch me."
Her hand struck back at herself, like a snake in reverse, and she stood, looking down on him, affronted. "And I suppose that's a Mudblood thing, as well," she said, hotly, "It's like having cooties."
He gave a single, short "Ha!" of laughter, or disgust, he wasn't sure which, and his breath stuck in his lungs. He couldn't take the next, he couldn't, because it would be a sob, and he couldn't.
She saw, perhaps, how he tried not to be seen, his shoulders hunched, his face turned so far away she could have seen behind his ears, but for his hair. Maybe she could see the sudden, breathless rigidity that froze him through. Either way, she saw.
She knew.
Her touch broke free that nasty, clawing sob, and more beneath.
Her arms encircled him, she dropped to her knees, and he noticed this, blearily, through quiet, shameful tears and gulping, desperate breaths, as she held him on the bank, by the lake, alone together under the pale, cold sun.
The maelstrom had hit. His mother was dead. He was alone – but not alone, not then.
Time exhausted him. Time does. His breathing evened, and the hot, acidic tears that had been eating him, inside out, for days, since he'd had the news, ran dry.
His fingers had long since betrayed him, gripping her wrist, holding fast to his Lily-halo, his visit from grace, when the gentle tug of her arm said it was over.
At first, he didn't let her go. He'd forgotten himself with her. He didn't want to remember.
Then reality resurfaced. It does.
His fingers sprang open, painfully. They left whiter marks on her white skin.
"Don't tell," he whispered, harsh with shame, "Don't you dare."
Whatever sweet-sweet thing she'd been about to say evaporated. She stood, and glared down at him. "I wouldn't."
She waited, in a huff, for him to look up to catch the glare. She waited for him to apologize. She waited, got nothing, and turned, finally, to stalk up the bank.
"I'm still yours," he said, and suddenly they were ten feet apart but looking straight at each other for the first time that day.
"Your friend," he added, quickly, "If you ever need one."
She seemed to consider him for a tortuously long moment before she broke the gaze, looking down, away. "We'll see," she said, "Get some sleep, Sev. You look horrible."
And she walked away.
A/N: It doesn't add anything to the story, but it doesn't conflict with anything, either, I don't think. I thought it, so I wrote it, so here it is. The End. XP