No Place For Charity

Chapter 1

You've Got A Friend

Charity. To love human beings in so far as they are nothing. That is to love them as God does

Simon Weil

July 1997

Snape didn't look directly at the woman suspended over the table, he couldn't bear to. She had been tortured beyond human endurance and was now merely a shattered wreck of the brave, intellegent woman he had known. The mental and emotional discipline he had developed over a lifetime was being strained almost beyond it's limits but it held.

"Severus please. We're friends." A last whimpering plea.

A crackle of green energy and her body dropped like a sack of potatos. She was dead before she hit the table. Her empty blue eyes stared at Severus accusingly.

He was aware that the Dark Lord was watching him. The slightest twitch, a single tear could mean his death. Not that he wouldn't welcome death at this moment but that would mean that Voldemort would win. He could never allow that to happen. Then everything Charity had worked for her entire life, everything she died for would be destroyed. The world Voldemort had planned was a dark and cruel world. It had no place for Charity.

He never even told her that he loved her.

"Dinner, Nagani."

September, 1993

The first thing Snape noticed about her was her smile. There was nothing really unusual about it. He'd seen smiles before. But what was unusual was that it was directed at him. "Hello! I'm Charity Burgage, the new Muggle Studies teacher." She extended her right hand.

He grasped the hand and quickly released it. "Severus Snape, Potions Master, Pleased to meet you." He didn't look or sound pleased to meet her. Snape looked her over suspiciously. Nothing particularly special about her. A small, rather average looking woman in her late twenties, blond hair, no makeup, wearing a rather dowdy looking blue dress with an ankle length skirt and a faded red wool sweater. It was just her smile that held him. As if she was really happy to be with him. No woman had ever smiled at him that way. Not since Lily did so many years ago. He gave a curt nod then turned on his heel and left.

That evening at the opening feast he had just settled into his seat when Charity appeared and pointed at the empty seat next to him. "Is someone sitting here?"

Snape glanced at the empty seat. "Obviously not." He said curtly..

She quickly pulled out the chair and sat in it. "Isn't this exciting? The start of a new school year. I can't wait to get started!"

"I'm afraid your enthusiam will soon run aground on the jagged rocks these students use for brains."

"Oh, I don't think it will be that bad."

"Perhaps not for you, Professor Burbage, Muggle studies is well known for being an easy class."

She gave him an exagerated pout. "It's a lot more complex than you think. For example, do you know how muggles make electricity?"

"Don't know, don't care." Severus stared straight ahead hoping she'll just shut up.

"They do it by spinning magnets inside a coil of wire."

"I'm sure that information will prove very useful to me some day." Severus looked down the table at Professor McGonnagal. She had just received a note by owl. She read it and quickly got to her feet and walked out of the hall.

Charity seemed somewhat curious. "Wonder what that's all about?"

"It might have something to do with the dementors surrounding the school. I assume though that it probably involves the Potter boy. He's rather fond of grandious gestures that make him the centre of attention."

Later during the meal Severus noticed Charity was just quietly picking at her food. Finally his curiousity got the better of him. "Now what's the problem?"

"It's nothing important. It's just that Professor Dumbledore announced we had two new professors. He introduced Professors Lupin and Hagrid but never even mentioned me."

Snape glanced down at Dumbledore. "Professor Dumbledore's got a lot on his mind right now. He tends to be absentminded sometimes. And trust me, around here sometimes going unnoticed is the best way to survive."

October, 1994

Professor Snape was sitting in his office grading papers when Charity walked in on him. Did the woman have nothing better to do than pester him? She seemed to make a hobby of it. Today she was angry.

"Professor Snape! Why did you send Dennis Creevy to the kitchen to scrub pots all night? Is it because he's Muggleborn?"

"No, it's because he called his caldron a pot. He did it four times today."

"He doesn't know any better! Besides, what difference does it make!"

Severus was getting more and more irritated. "It makes a big difference. A caldron is for making potions in. It is an important instrument for any wizard. A pot is for making soup or boiling spagetti. It is not a caldron."

Charity crossed her arms and set her jaw. "It's just a minor difference in language. Dennis grew up in a Muggle house. He doesn't know all the terms yet."

Snape stood up. He towered over Charity. "Then it's about time he learned! Language is very important for wizards. Our spells are words. Our potion ingrediants are words. The wrong word can get him killed. Being muggleborn is no excuse!" He waved his hand dismissivley. "I'm sure the house elves are plying him with cupcakes and tarts. He's probably having the time of his life down there. But he will learn the difference between a caldron and a pot."

Charity looked him in the eye and looked down. "Okay, I guess you're right."

"Of course I am, now if you have nothing else to whine about, I have papers to grade."

Charity glanced around the office. "Don't you ever get tired of this place?"

"It's my office."

"There's no windows."

"We're underground. Windows would be pretty useless."

Charity smiled, "Why don't you bring your papers up to my office. We could grade our papers together. My office is on the first floor, it has a nice view of the lake."

Snape didn't really want to carry all his work up all those flights of stairs. But on the other hand a change in scenery would be nice. He finally nodded and gathered his papers together.

Charity's office was pretty nice. She had the window open to admit a cool breeze off the moonlit lake. Snape sat down and pulled his parchments out of his satchel.

Charity looked out the window. "In America this would be the second floor. The ground floor would be the first floor."

"What do you know of America?"

"I have a squib cousin named Lyman who owns a small ranch in Idaho. He's also the manager of a Burger King. That's a muggle resturant. I went to stay with him for four months," She shook her head sadly. "My whole family's pureblooded. The idea of a squib in the family was so horrifying to them that they pretty much drove him out of the country."

Severus was surprised. "I assumed you were either muggleborn or half blooded. I've never met a pureblooded Muggle studies teacher."

"I decided to try to live as a muggle for two years. I've always been curious about them and how they get by withour magic. There was also a bit of teenaged rebellion thrown in. I wanted to piss off my parents. Getting sorted into Hufflepuff instead of Slytherin was bad enough. This was the last straw. They completely disowned me. So I decided to visit the other family exile. I even rode over there on a muggle airplane." She grinned. "Lyman went completely native except for the British accent. Cowboy hats, boots, pickup trucks. He's got quite a gun collection too. Those are muggle weapons where a chemical explosion propells a small piece of metal down a tube at hypersonic speeds."

"I'm completely aware of what a gun is." Severus said dryly.

"Okay, most wizards don't. I got to be quite a good shot shooting at cans and bottles. He also took me and his family on a tour of the American West. We went to Yellowstone, Yosemite, The Grand Canyon. They have huge forests over there. It was nice but it wasn't home. So I came back and got a job as a gardener for the city of Birmingham." She shook her head. "It's a lot of work doing things the muggle way but you get used to it. After a couple of years I'd had enough and went back to being a witch. But my family still wouldn't even talk to me. Gringotts hired me. They do quite a bit of work with muggle banks that the muggle banks aren't even aware of. It was steady work but boring. I was delighted when Professor Dumbledore offered me this job."

She pulled out a parchment and began grading it. "So, enough about me. What's your story?"

"I don't have a story." Severus said. He was marking one of Granger's papers. It was so perfect that it was annoying him.

"Yes, you do, I can sense it. You've been hurt. You've been hurt so many times that you don't even know how to be happy. You're also lonely. You crave friendship but you don't know how to be a friend."

"I don't need any friends!"

"Well, it's too late. You've got one."