1980

“Push, Mrs. Potter, push!” a motherly nurse instructed.

“I’m trying!” Lily screamed, agony lightening her eyes.

All of the nurses and the doctor came in, and exactly five hours and twenty-two minutes after she had began to go into labor, Lily was officially a mother. Tears streamed down her eyes the moment the pain ceased, and she could not keep her joy and excitement down for long. “It’s a boy!” came the elated declaration, and the new mother could not keep from crying harder.

“Let me see him!” she begged, wanting to hold in her arms that which had taken so long to come. This baby was all that she had left.

After cleaning up the little bundle, through the shouts of dismay on the infant's part, the doctor placed the fleshy pink baby onto his mother’s chest. The first thing noticed about the child was his already thick, black hair, and his startlingly green eyes that were so similar to his mother's own. When the child looked into the face of his mother, Lily felt a spark shoot through her body. It was known as the parental link in the wizarding world, and she had been expecting it, but that spark? It was breath taking. “He’s perfect!” she sobbed, smiling down at the baby even as a pang of grief hit her heart.

Grinning broadly, the doctor nodded happily. Another safe delivery! “We’ll let you two to get acquainted,” he smiled once more before he and the rest of the nurses left the room.

Once the door closed, Lily began weeping uncontrollably. She smiled, she laughed, she was so happy, yet she was so miserable. This was supposed to be one of the happiest days of her life, she knew, everyone told her so, and Lily would have believed it too if only her Severus was here! The thought of him had her crying harder still.

When she was able to see her child’s face clearly, after wiping her tears away, Lily gasped. She was staring into the infant face of Severus Snape. Even just born, the witch could tell that this baby boy would grow to take on his father’s more striking features. There would be no denying that the child was the son of her beloved Severus Snape. Scanning the face of the baby, Lily could detect every hint of her late husband in her son’s face. It was both joyous, and grievous.

“My, my,” the mother cooed, sniffling. “You will grow to be a handsome one, won’t you?”

Carefully, Lily cradled her little baby, and allowed her son to feed, rocking back and forth. Again, another spark of familiarity shot through the tired mother. Yes, this was her son, this was hers and Severus’s. Sev would be so proud! She could just see his face, alight with wonder and love, the way she always loved to see…

Again, tears began to flood from Lily’s eyes. This was Severus’s son, this was his son, not James’s! She longed to tell the world, she longed to scream on a mountain top that this was her child with Severus Snape, not that glory-seeking bastard James Potter.

At that moment, a nurse came back into the room and saw Lily clutching her baby desperately. The old woman smiled kindly. “He seems taken with you,” she laughed lightly. But when she noticed that Lily was crying due to distress and not from overwhelming joy, she was at the younger woman’s side in an instant. “Oh deary! What’s wrong?”

“I-I j-just w-w-want m-my husband!” the red-head sobbed dejectedly.

Taking pity on the despairing young woman, the nurse rubbed Lily’s back as well as she could. “Don’t worry, deary,” the woman crooned gently. “Not to worry. I believe I heard someone say that Mr. Potter was on his way here right now! Don’t worry, he’ll be here soon.”

Lily just wanted to scream. She wanted to stomp her feet, she wanted to break everything, she just wanted to be left alone! She did not want James, she wanted Severus! But no one seemed to understand this. But then, no one was supposed to know the truth.

Mopping the tears from her watery eyes, Lily tried to smile at the nurse, but it was only given half-heartedly. “Thank y-you,” she tried to sound as though she really cared if James was there or not. “Where is the birth certificate?” she asked instead.

Smiling once more at the mother and son, the nurse conjured the certificate, and took out all the creases with her wand. "There you are my dear,” she patted Lily’s shoulder. “And here is an inkwell and a quill for when your husband comes so you can sign the names in.”

When the old nurse was gone, Lily ceased the certificate and quill instantly. In her flowing handwriting, she signed her own name in the shining green ink. Taking a deep breath, the witch signed her husband’s name, Severus Tobias Snape, before spelling it to look like his own handwriting. He would want everyone to know that this was his son. Seeing the sharp, spidery handwriting made Lily want to cry, but she did not want to smudge the ink.

And finally she came to the line where she had to fill in the child’s name. She had thought long and hard about this, had taken into consideration the names Severus had said he liked and disliked. Since the child looked so much like his father, the name she had chosen only seemed fitting now. It would make Severus so proud!

With that thought in mind, Lily wrote down the name, just she had decided months before the baby had been born. In the same flowing green ink, the mother wrote out the name, “Severin Harrison Tiberius Snape.” The parchment glowed for a moment before it faded into the parchment before reappearing, signaling that it certification was complete.

Once she was sure that the real name was protected, Lily cast several charms on the parchment before she wrote down the false name James had wanted. With a quick scrawl, she left her name, but wrote James’ name and then the name the child would, unfortunately,have to live with for a while. “Harrison James Potter.” It did not sound as pleasant on her ears as the other one did.

Not a moment later, James burst through the door. “Is he out yet? Is my son out?” the wizard shouted loudly.

Scowling at the vulgarity of the words, and the fact that James claimed Severus’s son as his own, Lily had to look away. Pushing back her feelings, Lily tried to smile at the man she had been forced to marry. “Come see little Harrison,” she invited.

Bouncing over to the bed, James was all smiles when he leaned over Lily to inspect the new life cradled in his wife’s arms. But one glance at the baby, James’s smile turned into a concentrated frown. “He’s all…ugly and squish,” he comment flatly, angering his wife. “He’ll get less red and stuff, right?”

Scowling at her husband, Lily tried to keep calm. “He was just born, James,” she tried to be patient. “He’s still a little puffy. He’ll fill out soon though. Where were you anyway?” she glanced up suspiciously.

Annoyingly, James merely shrugged. “I was with Sirius,” he said offhandedly. “I guess I thought you’d take longer.”

That was it! That was the final straw! “Potter,” she growled. “Get out. I don’t want you in here you inconsiderate jerk. Out. Just get out!”

The doctor rushed back in when Lily’s monitors went off, indicating her rising blood pressure. When James refused to leave at Lily’s request, the doctor escorted the wizard from the room, saying he could wait until his wife had calmed down. “I will not allow anyone to upset my patient,” he said bluntly. “Not even her own husband.”

Once alone again with her baby, Lily began to cry once more. How had she gotten into this? Why had she listened to Dumbledore and gone back to James? Because you panicked, she thought bitterly. But what could she have done? She could not support a child on her own, and people would start asking questions about who the boy’s father was, questions that she preferred not to answer.

Looking into the baby’s face, Lily smiled gently. “I suppose I should start calling you Harrison,” her words, despite her anguish, dripped with affection. “My little Harry. Don’t worry, someday soon you’ll get to have your real name and learn about your real father.”

Closing her eyes tiredly, Lily did not want to worry about the next day. She did not want to face James, or that despicable Sirius Black. She did not want to see the Headmaster; she did not really want to see anyone. All she wanted to do was take her baby away from everything, to a place where they could be happy, to a place where Severus was alive to take care of them.

With that in mind, she drifted off into sleep, not realizing that a nurse came to take Harry away.

Had it not been such a tense situation, or perhaps because it was, Petunia had to fight off laughter. Sitting and standing by her, wearing identical shocked, horrified faces, were her nephew and her former brother-in-law. She knew that had Harry not been magicked to look like James, the faces would have mirrored each other perfectly.

“What?” surprisingly, Harry was the first one to recover from the ordeal. “Snape’s not my father!” the boy shouted. “James Potter’s my father!” desperation leaked into his voice. “This can’t be happening!”

When Petunia looked back over at the older wizard, she was surprised, and terrified, to see that the Potions Master’s face had twisted into something murderous, his black eyes glinting with rage. “S-Severus?” she backed away from him.

“That’s not very damn funny!” he whispered venomously.

Pushing back her own fears, Petunia turned to both wizards. “This isn’t a joke,” she said lightly. “It’s the truth. Although I don’t know why you don’t remember,” she said again to Severus, “you and Lily were actually married several months before you died.”

While Harry just looked ill, Severus’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “I do not recall any of those memories,” his deep voice pensive, yet also doubtful. “You have proof of this, yes? Or are you just trying to have some sort of sadistic fun out of all this?”

“How can you be so calm!” Harry shrieked at his professor. “She’s trying to feed us the huge piece of shit, and you’re taking the bait just like that? What’s wrong with you?”

“Mind your tone, boy,” Snape growled, causing the younger wizard to back down a little. “This is... absurd, we both know that, but I want to know why your aunt seems to think it’s necessary to say such things,” he turned expectant, cold eyes upon the woman before him.

Feeling distinctly uncomfortable, Petunia shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “I’m not lying!” she pleaded desperately. “I-I do have proof!”

“And what would that be?” Severus hissed. “Petunia, I have absolutely no idea why you’re doing this, but I can assure you that this in not amusing in the least,” his scowl darkened. “Whatever possessed you to come up with this atrocity was in bad taste. Now, you will shut your mouth, or I shall shut if for you.” Neither Petunia or Harry doubted the man’s words.

“I’m not lying!” Petunia started to panic. “Here!” she pulled out a small inlayed wooden box that Lily had given her from Spain. “It’s all in there.”

Taking out his wand, Severus snatched up the box, while Harry scurried over, just as eager to see what was inside. When Snape opened the lid and shook out the contents, the two wizards and the Muggle watched as each object grew instantly. Harry’s face lit up with dreaded wonder while the Potions Master’s face was grim. Both men’s thoughts had the same question; what was all this?

Something on the table caught Severus’s eye and he picked it up cautiously. It was a ring, a small diamond wedding ring. It was simple, yet elegant, instantly reminding the Potions Master of his beloved Lily. Carefully inspecting it, his eyes widened and his breath caught as he read the words on the inside of the band:

“My love for you is eternal. I will always love you. Always.”

As though a damn broke loose, Severus’s mind was assaulted with many different images. He saw a dark rainy night; he was with Lily, she told him how much she loved him. There was a image of a simple, quiet wedding. Lily floated down the isle, her face glowing. He saw himself in the room he had woken up in this morning, only it was very nice and well kept, he and Lily were lying in bed together. There was a memory of spending the afternoon in the Lake District, a memory of meeting up at Hogsmeade. That night when he had gone to Dumbledore to tell him about his marriage…

“Oh God!” Severus exclaimed, his head pounding uncontrollably.

It had been Dumbledore! It had been Albus! As sickening as it was to believe, it had been his mentor, his friend that had betrayed him. The spy could see everything clearly now; the look on the Headmaster’s face when Severus had told him the truth, the man’s disappointment, the pain, the betrayal…

“Severus!” Petunia’s voice floated into the wizard’s thoughts. “Severus, are you alright?”

The Potions Master snapped his head up, not remembering slumping over, looking around with wild eyes. When the obsidian fell on the boy who had stay unnaturally quiet, his heart jumped into his throat. Potter…this boy, was his? This duplicate of James was really Severus’s son? The wizard did not think he had ever felt so ill in his life.

So was that why he had felt a jolt every time he had seen the boy, ever since first year? Was it supposed to be the all famed “parental shock” that all the housewives so firmly believed in? Was that what it was? Severus had always thought it was just some sort of bitter jolt that reminded him of how he had lost Lily. He had thought it had been created by hatred, but had it been this odd parental bond?

“Bloody hell!” the man growled, his hair falling into his face once again. He just needed to think. This was not possible, this simply could not be possible. But with each passing minute, more and more memories came flooding back to him, making the truth harder and harder to ignore.

Harry had watched silently as his professor picked up a small ring to look over. It was beautiful, and he could see why his mum must have loved it, but when Snape’s face lit up with recognition, the younger wizard had fought illness. Dear Merlin! The man remembered these things, he remembered! That meant…

The boy could not believe this, he simply could not believe that he was the son of the hated Potions Master, the Head of Slytherin! This was impossible! This was ludicrous! This was… true?

Collapsing in a chair, Harry stared at the other objects on the table. He shuffled them around until his eyes caught sight of a birth certificate. Snape looked up at that moment, but the Gryffindor ignored him for the most part in favor of reading what was on the paper.

There, written in brilliant green ink, was the name, “Severin Harrison Tiberius Snape.” Harry gasped, Snape made a odd noise in the back of his throat. Both men looked up. Emerald met obsidian, a spark of recognition passed between the two wizards.

“Oh bloody hell!”