Title: Day 12
Author: tarotgal
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: G
Pairing: Snape/Lily references
Disclaimer: Not my characters! I make no money from this.
Summary: Lily and Snape run into each other during break at Hogwarts.
Notes: Written during my 12 Ficlets in 12 Days in 2012 project for Anonymous

When Professor McGonagal had suggested Lily spend her fifth year Christmas holiday break at Hogwarts getting some practical experience utilizing her charms skills, she had thought of course she might be allowed to perform spells to enchant parts of the school, like making the Christmas trees at the feast spin. Or perhaps get the library in order by working on levitation and homing spells so the books would learn their places on the shelves. Or maybe even use some advanced spells to prepare some durable practice rooms for students working toward their N.E.W.T.s.

What she did not expect was to be learning how to fold sheets in the hospital wing. After demonstrating a few times and making sure she had the wand movements and pronunciations right, Madam Pomfrey stripped off the sheets then handed them over. “Your turn, Miss Evans.”

Lily took the sheets and levitated the fitted one in the air. She used spells to unfold it and pull it crisp and tight overhead. She directed it down, snug over the mattress. Then she put the other sheet on, using the charm she’d learned to tuck it under and do hospital corners and make it neat.

“Very good.” Madam Pomfrey gathered the sheets, rumpled them up, and handed them back. “Practice that again another twenty times. And don’t forget to plump the pillows.” She gestured to the pillow with her wand.

Lily tilted her head slightly. She couldn’t remember a plumping charm of any sort. “What do I use for that?”

Madam Pomfrey smiled. “Your wand, of course.” But instead of a spell, she reached out and poked the pillow with the end of her wand until it was nice and fluffed up.

Lily laughed.

“Excuse me?” They both turned to see a young Ravenclaw first year in the doorway to the hospital wing.

Madam Pomfrey started forward. “May I help you?”

The little boy shook his head. “Professor Slughorn was helping me with some potions homework and he kept sneezing. He wanted me to fetch you. He’s in his office now.”

“I’ll be right along to see him, thank you for letting me know.” The boy left and Madam Pomfrey clucked her tongue against her front teeth. “There’s been a cold going around Slytherin house. Sounds like their head has come down with it. I told him he should take one of my preventative draughts but he said he’d take something of his own.” She shook her head and redirected her train of thought. “Miss Evans, would you fill a bottle with pepper-up? It’s simmering on the fire there.”

There was only enough in the cauldron for one bottle, not a drop more. She stoppered it and handed it over. “Tell Professor Slughorn I hope he feels much better soon.”

Madam Pomfrey nodded. “Would you like to come with me? I don’t regularly do house calls, but sometimes the professors prefer not to visit me here.” Madam Pomfrey was young compared to most of the Hogwarts professors.

“I’d like to see how you administer it, yes, Ma’am.” Lily was certain Slughorn wouldn’t mind her presence. Professor Slughorn liked her; he had called her potions skills quite promising and he had even invited her to several slug club meetings.  She hoped very much she would earn a good mark in her Potions O.W.L.s this year so that she could continue studying the subject under him.

*

After visiting Slughorn’s office, Madam Pomfrey set to work immediately on another batch of Pepper-up. If Slughorn was any indication, this was a particularly bad cold and it wouldn’t hurt to have as much of it on hand as possible. Slughorn had barely been able to stop sneezing long enough to turn on his normal level of charm.

“Miss Evans?”

Lily stopped midway through her fifteenth set of sheets, letting the sheet fall, wrinkled and askew, onto the mattress.

“I’m going to pop over to Hogsmeade for some meadowsweet. Will you look after the infirmary for me for a few minutes?”

“Of course,” Lily promised.

She went back to practicing making the bed. If she were honest with herself, it was pretty damn boring. But if she showed Madam Pomfrey she had it down perfectly, maybe they could move on to something more exciting. So she found clean sheets and put them on every single cot in the wing, making everything look beautiful, clean, and ready in case of some sort of emergency.

“Ahhh-EHGGSchhhhhh!”

She turned away from one of the beds, expecting to see another little first year. It seemed the noses of the first years never stopped running anyway; one of them with a cold would be a nightmare.

But it wasn’t a first year student. It wasn’t even a professor. It was Severus Snape. Severus looked at her, wide-eyed, hands clenched at his sides. He bounced on the balls of his feet, looking around anxiously. “Lily? What are you doing here?” He sniffed softly, almost imperceptively. “Where’s Madam Pomfrey?”

“She had to run to town for some ingredients. I’m putting some time in here.”

“For class credit?”

“No…”

His eyes widened even more. “Lily Evans! Did you earn a detention?”

“No!” And then she realized how it must look. She was spending her winter holiday making beds in the hospital wing—beds that house elves surely would have been able to make as well as she could, if not better. This looked like a punishment, not a reward. “Yes, it’s for extra credit,” she lied. “But I’m not supposed to tell anybody, all right?”

“I won’t say anything. I’m… good at keeping secrets.”

She smiled sweetly at him. “I do remember that.” Once this—this whole magical world—had been their secret. And he was her best friend; she would have done anything for him. “What can I do for you, Severus?”

He looked around uncomfortably then began backing up, out the door. “Nothing important.”

“But you must have needed something if you—”

“I’ll come back later.” He turned and fled down the hallway.

And, after a few seconds, Lily ran after him.

She caught up to him one corridor away, because he had planted himself in front of the trophy case. She had looked at it a few times since starting at Hogwarts, but she hadn’t paid much attention to it really. It was just a trophy case full of awards students had earned years ago. They didn’t matter much to her. But Severus looked upon it with reverence, longing. “Maybe you’ll be in there one day, when you’re older.”

He shrugged. “Some people we know are in there already.” He waved his hand at something inside and then closed it into a tight fist. She followed his gaze and saw last year’s Quidditch standings. The names James Potter and Sirius black were impossible to miss, engraved on the shiny gold plaques. “Some people who like to take the piss out of a person every chance they can get.”

“Sev, that’s—”

She broke off as he leaned back and pitched forward. “kahhhh… EHKshhhh!” He didn’t seem to be too broken up about sneezing in the direction of the award, however.

“Bless you.”

“Tha-thanks,” he managed, rubbing his hand against his nose. “I-ahhh- I’m… aahhh-HUFSchh!”

“You’re sick is what you are.” She reached over to feel his forehead. He flinched at first, startled at the feel of her skin against his. Ashamed or embarrassed, he relaxed again but would not meet her eyes. Her hands wrapped around his upper arm, and she felt his arm tense. “Let me take you back to the hospital wing and get you something for that.”

He hesitated, and she realized that he was doing this because he didn’t want her to see him like this—sick and weak. He wanted to be strong, talented, special. He wanted to be a person who could have his name engraved on an award. He didn’t want to be the boy standing in the hallway, nose dripping after he sneezed. “Sev, I just want to get you back to the hospital wing and fix you up before you go so no one else finds out you’re sick.” She patted his arm. “What do you say? Do you want to come with me?” She gave him a little tug. “Please?”

Overwhelmed in what was not a fair fight, Severus practically melted into his arms. More than willing, he followed her back down the corridors to the hospital wing.

Lily parked him on one of the beds she had proudly made up with clean sheets, though she didn’t mention that because she didn’t think he’d be very impressed with those skills. Instead, she went over to the Pepper-up potion Madam Pomfrey had prepared before she left. She filled up a gobletful and brought it over to him with a fresh handkerchief as well.

She had watched Madam Pomfrey give Slughorn the potion earlier, but this was different. This was Severus—Severus who had been her best friend once upon a time.

“ahh-“ He took the handkerchief from her at once and cupped it to his face. “ahhh-Huhkkshffffff! Chufffff!” Even smothered, his sneezes were strong; they seemed to exhaust him, but he still took a deep breath to blow his nose fully.

 As soon as he finished and had straightened back up again, Lily handed him the goblet. “Pepper-up. Fresh batch. It’ll help.”

Trusting her, he lowered the handkerchief and took the goblet. He drank it down completely, swallow after swallow. And then they both waited. Pepper-up made steam stream from the drinker’s ears. But that didn’t happen to Severus this time.

What happened was that he pitched forward with another, sudden, uncovered sneeze. “hahhh-Ergshooo!” He clapped his hand to his nose and mouth, shocked.

“I don’t know why it didn’t work,” Lily muttered, taking the empty goblet back from him. She stared into it. There were a few small drops left against the bronze bottom of the cup. He’d taken it all, but he was still sneezing.

“Help me uh-up,” he requested, holding his arm out again. She helped pull him up, and he snapped forward, nostrils twitching. “ehhh-Geggxxxxxtttt!” He rubbed at his nose as she walked him in the direction of the cauldron. It was simmering, an occasional small bubble rising to the surface before popping. Snape studied it a moment then looked up at Lily. “Did she say she was going to get meadowsweet?”

“Yes!” It took her a moment to realize what had happened. “Oh no, Sev… don’t you dare tell Professor Slughorn I missed the color indicator; he’d never pass me.”

He chuckled. “Don’t worry; it won’t hurt me. Sniff! I won’t tell anybody you gave me some before it was done.”

 They sat back down on a bed, laughing. “You should stay until she comes back,” Lily told him. “I’ll look after you and keep you comfortable. How about some tea? I should be able to make that without messing up too much.”

He nodded and lay down on his side to get comfortable as he waited with her.