Petunia and the Little Monster

August 1973

"I'm going back tomorrow," Petunia explained, carefully weaving the few strands of hair between her fingers into a small braid. "This time I have to make sure to visit Ivy. Last time I was simply ... distracted."

Her companion shook his head, almost making his hair slip from between her fingers.

"Hold still. This time Eugene knows I'm coming and he knows why I'm coming. So he'll take me straight to her."

Finishing the braid she toyed with it a bit, voicing thoughts that spun through her head like a merry-go-round. "Do you think that he was serious about what he said? That he didn't care if I'm a muggle?"

"You're insane."

Petunia startled so badly she almost ripped out part of Aspen's (already pitiful) mane when she whirled around.

The wretched boy stood behind her, his form lanky and shadowed. He had shot up a few inches since she'd last seen him, his stature even more macabrely thin and stretched than usual. Not only his frame had grown but also his nose, dominating his face like a hooked beak. Petunia thought it made him resemble a scavenging bird, with his grey, flapping coat and longish, black hair.

"You're wiggling your fingers through the air and talking to no-one," he continued, his voice nasally and gleefully mean.

"I'm talking to Aspen!"

Upon hearing his name, Aspen shook his mane again and trotted a few paces away now that his coarse hair was free from Petunia's grasp.

Severus' sneer deepened. "Sure. And what interesting input does he provide?"

Petunia ignored his stupid question, her eyes once more darting over him. He was wearing a loose blouse that looked like something a woman might wear as a nightgown, a faded, thin coat thrown over it. Through the gaping neckline Petunia could see his sharp collar bones outlined starkly, and for one horrifying second Petunia almost expected them to cut through the tightly stretched skin.

Lily is always bragging about those fancy feasts at her stupid school, so how come the wretched boy didn't put on any meat?

Petunia grit her teeth as if she wanted to pulverise the unspoken question before it could escape. "What do you want? Lily is visiting her friends."

Previously such a statement would have caused the wretched boy to flinch or scowl, but now he just blinked very slowly and turned his face away. "I know. She asked if I wanted to come."

Seeing as he was prowling around through the fields behind their house like a scraggly scarecrow come to life, Petunia could guess what his answer had been. Not that she was overly surprised that Severus didn't necessarily want to watch Lily's merrymaking with people that weren't him. Not only that, but people that were vastly different from him in that they were happy and nice and not at all greasy (Petunia assumed for Lily's benefit).

But it was still strange, witnessing him like this. In the past he might have been resentful or lashing out to disguise how abandoned he felt, but now there was something very bitter and hardened curling in the corners of his thin lips. It made him look ... too old.

Petunia always thought of herself as the oldest. Despite in reality being only a bit over a year older than Severus, fourteen to his thirteen, he was the same age as her little sister. Her baby sister, the one she had always been told to look out for - 'You're the older sister, Petunia' - and to take a measure of responsibility for.

But now standing in front of Severus and catching a glimpse of the bottomless black wells of his eyes, she felt young. Childish. Innocent and naive and sheltered.

And she didn't like it. Petunia was the sensible one, the one who didn't throw tempers or drag muddy footprints through the whole house. She'd taken care of herself, always, while the wretched boy had the audacity to waltz around with his obviously ill-fitting clothes and hollow cheeks.

"Why can't you take care of yourself?"

The accusation burst out of her with a lot more heat than Petunia had intended.

For the first time she had ever witnessed, Severus' brows twitched in something like surprise instead of annoyance. "What?"

"You're way too thin! Lily always goes on about roasts here and cakes there, how come you look so emaciated?"

His scowl was back. "It's none of your business."

"Then stop strutting around in front of me!"

"I'm not - !" He took a deep breath to bring his voice back under control. "You would never understand. Stop trying to stick your nose in things that don't concern you."

Petunia crossed her arms. "Is this about the whole blood-purity thing?"

The shock washing over Severus was as visible as if he had written How could you know? on his forehead. His shoulders stiffened, his eyes widened and his jaw tensed.

"Lily told me." For a few seconds Petunia debated if she really wanted to give him the satisfaction before she forced another sentence from her lips: "She's worried."

Instead of the gratification Petunia had expected Severus would display upon hearing about Lily's concern for him, she was surprised to see - anger.

"It's because she doesn't understand! None of you do, especially not a muggle like you! You're the problem, you've always been the problem, the whole lot of you! If my mother -"

He actually bit his lip to stop his words and Petunia felt a slight shiver of apprehension when she saw how hard his teeth were mashing the bloodless flesh.

"If your mother, what?" She had meant the question to be scathing, but instead it came out quiet.

If before his eyes had been hollow, now they were filled with toxic tar, so viscous Petunia almost expected to see it dripping from his eyes in black tears. His next words were as quiet as hers, but it was more a hiss than actual human speech. "If my mother had never let herself be touched by muggle scum, by filth like you or my father, I wouldn't be forced to live like this!"

Petunia's chest heated with anger, but before she had any chance to retort, he whirled around and stalked off the way he came from, his lanky silhouette morbid against the backdrop of sun-kissed fields and a merry blue sky.

Petunia wanted to hurl an insult after him in reciprocity for calling her 'filth', something that would blister in his ears whenever he clapped eyes on his mother or father. She wanted to stab at the dripping wound he himself had exposed in a quest to get back at him. But when the image of his stick-thin arms swinging wildly, the tattered coat flapping around his bony elbows like a funeral shroud, hit her eyes, something else entirely escaped her throat.

"For God's sake, eat something!"

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