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Lily

“Wake up, Tuney, wake up!” Lily’s voice was rapt with excitement as she shook her twin sister’s shoulder. “Oh do wake up Tuney. Wait ‘til you see!” She scrambled away from the bed excitedly, unable to stand still long enough for Petunia to wake up all the way.

When Pentunia pushed back the bed curtains that surrounded her four-poster, she found quite a scene indeed… “What - what is all this?” she stammered, looking about… for the girls’ bedroom had become a miniature winter wonderland, with snowflakes falling gently from a tiny cloud that hung by the ceiling fan overhead. Lily was already excitedly working on rolling out the body of a snowman.

It was Christmas and the weather had been uncharacteristically warm for the winter, not a single flake of snow had fallen yet out of doors. Petunia, whose favorite thing about Christmas was the snow, had been telling Lily not even a week ago how sad she was feeling without the snow fall that usually came with winter, and now here it was… their own personal blizzard. Outside the window, the grass was still dead and rotting on the lawn, but inside the finest powder, perfect for snowball fights and fort building, had fallen overnight. Like magic.

Lily grinned happily at her sister. “Surprise!” she gasped, then covered her mouth with her fingers, giggling to herself with nervous glances at the door to the hallway. She didn’t want to wake up their parents, afraid they’d be angry about the snow inside the house. Lily’s eyes were dancing with enthusiasm, though. “It’s my Christmas present to you, Tuney!” she whispered. “Happy Christmas!”

Petunia was sitting on the very edge of her bed. She stared at the sparking flakes around her. “But - but how?” she asked.

“Magic,” whispered Lily.

Petunia frowned. “Stop that lying, Lily, and tell me how.”

“I’m not lying and you know it, Tuney,” Lily replied. “I told Sev about how you wanted the snow for Christmas and he showed me a spell to make it. I made the snow myself, just for you, Tuney.” She smiled, quite proud of herself, then waved an arm eagerly, “C’mon. Come help me with this snowman. We’ll make him look really cool and show mummy and da. C’mon. It’s not cold, really.”

Petunia hesitated, torn between telling off Lily and joining her. Finally, she was overcome by temptation and slipped out of bed in her nightgown and walked gingerly to where Lily was kneeling by the ends of their beds. Lily was right; the snow wasn’t cold, it just looked like it ought to be. In reality, it was as warm and squishy between Petunia’s toes as beach sand would be. It was the most amazing thing she had ever experienced. Her eyes were wide and her hands trembled with excitement as she joined Lily in pushing a giant ball of snow around the room, forming the base of their snowman. They worked together, petting and pawing at the snow, until they’d formed the most handsome snowman either of them had ever seen before. Lily shoved a school pencil in for a nose and a couple of spare buttons from her wool coat pocket for eyes. The two sisters stood back and stared at their creation, giggling at him happily. They fell back onto the floor and made snow angels before laying quiet, side by side, staring up at the ceiling breathlessly.

“Sev will be really proud,” Lily commented. “I can’t wait to tell him the spell worked.” She grinned and rolled over to look at Petunia.

At this, Petunia frowned. “Sev?” she said shrilly, then, “Not that boy from Spinner’s End?”

Lily sat up. “So what if he’s from Spinner’s End?”

Petunia made a face. “Lily, Spinner’s End is where the poor people live. They’re filthy there. They have cockroaches and smell funny because they don’t take baths.”

Lily’s eyebrows came together in concern, “Sev can’t help where he’s from, Petunia.”

“His hair is always filthy.”

Lily stood up and walked away from where Petunia lay in the warm snow, fuming. She stood by the window and stared out across the front lawn at the Christmas lights twinkling in Mrs. Nextdoor’s yard as the sun was beginning to come up. Soon, their parents would be expecting them to get up and go downstairs and see the presents from Father Christmas and they’d all have a great breakfast together and a feast. The thought of these Christmas luxuries had been haunting her for some time now, ever since she’d met and started getting to know Severus Snape.

Petunia was right. Spinner’s End was where the poor people lived and the Snapes were among the very poorest of the poor there. It was because Tobias Snape, his father, had married his mother for money. A lazy muggle man, Tobias had been fired from every job he had ever tried to hold in all of his life and he’d been searching desperately for his lucky break when he met Eileen Prince. Eileen had seemed to have an unending amount of riches and Tobias Snape had envisioned a life of luxurious living, servants to wait upon him hand and foot, and a beautiful wife to boot - and so, more for thirst for money than for love, Tobias courted her. The problem, of course, came when Eileen’s pureblood wizarding family had discovered that she was marrying a common muggle man and disowned her, cutting her off entirely from the family’s wealth. She’d told Tobias only after they were married. Tobias felt he had been tricked into marrying her, suddenly seeing her as somehow damaged or deformed because she was a witch, and Eileen’s heart was broken because of all she’d sacrificed for him, only to learn that he did not love her. So, dependant on Tobias’s paychecks, which he rarely managed to earn, the family had fallen into a state of disrepair.

Severus had told her the story once as they sat under an oak tree by the pond. “They fight all the time,” he said, staring down at a long blade of grass he had plucked from a nearby clump. He was folding it carefully. “They’re always yelling so loudly that the neighbors can hear and the kids always make fun of me. They think they’re better than I am. They think I’m rubbish.”

Lily had put a hand on his shoulder, “I don’t think you’re rubbish, Sev.”

He had felt a lump rise up in his throat at these words and continued staring down at the grass blade he’d been playing with, then he turned to her and wrapped his hand closed around it and breathed into his palms, opening up his hands and releasing a brilliant green bird that fluttered over and landed on Lily’s knee before -poof!- turning back into a carefully folded blade of grass.

Severus Snape might come from the poor side of town but he was kinder and gentler than any of the nasty boys that lived around the Evans neighborhood here in the ‘nice part’ of town. Lily didn’t understand why Petunia couldn’t see that. Money didn’t make a bit of difference about who a person was. Good people could have money or be poor and still be good people, and likewise one was not necessarily a bad person for lacking money.

Lily turned around to face Petunia, who had gotten back onto the bed. “I was only able to make you the snow for Christmas because Severus helped me,” she said.

Petunia lay back into her pillows, staring up at the cloth ceiling of her four-poster, acting as though she could not hear Lily.

“I made your biggest Christmas wish come true, Tuney, because you’re my sister and I love you,” Lily said. She crawled onto her own bed so that she was kneeling, staring at Petunia across the three foot gap between their bedsides. “You know what I wish for more than anything in the whole world?” she asked. Petunia didn’t respond, so Lily pressed on, “I wish that you wouldn’t be so hateful to Severus. Just give him a chance, Tuney.”

But Petunia rolled over, putting her back to Lily.

Lily felt hot tears in her eyes.

“Fine,” she hissed, “Fine, be that way.”

Lily got up. “Incendio,” she said as she waved her hands at the snow, melting it all away, just as Severus had taught her to do, leaving only the snowman, looking sad and droopy now that he was the only snow in the room and she said, “There I’ve left you a new sister to replace me, since you don’t give a damn about me anymore.” She stormed out of the room.

Petunia rolled over and sat up as the bedroom door closed and she stared at the snowman from the foot of her bed. She hesitated, afraid Lily would come back, or that she was just outside the door, listening. But Petunia didn’t see her shadows beneath the door, so she climbed down from the bed and walked over to the snowman. They’d drawn a curved line in his face for a mouth and he smiled at her with it now. Petunia hesitated, then carefully raised her hands as Lily had done and whispered, “Incendio.”

Nothing happened.

“Incendio,” she whispered again.

Still nothing happened.

Petunia felt hot tears burning her eyes. “We’re supposed to be twins,” she hissed, angry, “We’re supposed to be just alike.” She reached forward and shoved the snowman down, watching as his head fell off and broke apart, the button eyes rolling away across the room.