11

Chapter 11 Avocado Appliances

Not even one day had passed before Severus sat on the stairs of the Evans' back porch waiting for Lily. It was still early, but after Mr. Evans had taken the car to work.

At home, Severus did not dress as nicely as he did at school. One could probably find better shoes discarded on the side of the highway or hanging as a pair from a telephone line. The brown leather was cracked, and there was a gap between the upper section's toe and the sole of the left shoe. The shoelaces were a series of knots to hold them together. His trousers were a stained, medium grey corduroy with the cords worn away from the seat and knees. They were sized for a heavier man, but there was an old pair of braces holding them up. The braces themselves had a couple knots likewise to size them for Severus. Underneath the worn cotton jumper that was once black, but now a faded grey, he wore a plain cotton undershirt, that was also a shade of grey, instead of its original white, and riddled with holes. Both the undershirt and jumper were too large for him also. The jumper was also horribly stretched out of shape, with the neck opening being an ill-fitting mess, and the sleeve ends were folded over in cuffs to expose his hands.

Severus rested his elbows on his knees and allowed his hair to hang forward, curtaining his face. It did not matter how long he waited since he had nothing better to do with his time, and he certainly preferred here over Spinner's End.

After the shadows started to move across the back lawn, the door opened behind him, and Mrs. Evans asked, "Care for a cuppa, Severus?"

Looking up, Severus saw that Mrs. Evans already extended a large mug of tea to him. He stood and took it. "Thank you, Mrs. Evans."

She held the door open and motioned Severus to come into the kitchen. It was the antithesis of his family's kitchen at Spinner's End. This kitchen was full of color – white, sunny yellow and avocado – and was clean, modern, shining and sparkling. His kitchen also had windows, but the sun actually penetrated these to light the room. The Evans kitchen was larger and had a nice counter with two comfy stools, in addition to the table with four chairs for the family members. Severus took a seat at the counter to stay out of Mrs. Evans' way because she had already gone back to the stove after picking up some ingredients from the refrigerator.

Knowing Severus for some years now, Mrs. Evans didn't bother making small talk for his sake. He was a fascinating conversationalist when motivated, but the only thing that got him talking was her daughter, Lily. Petunia could also provoke him into speech, but the two preferred to argue rather than discuss things like two civilized people.

Filling a breakfast bowl, Mrs. Evans placed the bowl of porridge in front of Severus and commented, "The girls are up, and should be down soon, dear."

"Thank you, Mrs. Evans." He looked her straight in the face as he accepted the spoon from her hand.

Mrs. Evans gave him a quick visual inspection before turning away. At the moment, he looked uninjured. Were his parents actually glad to see him home after so long? The unnaturalness of that family had made her uneasy for years. Of course, she had called that child abuse number anonymously a number of times now, but nothing ever seemed to happen. Talking directly to Severus did no good because he went into a state of denial when he did have a black eye or evidence of being mistreated. In fact she felt she had made it worse because to stop all the bother and avoid trouble, Severus would stop coming round when he was injured so in an odd way, Mrs. Evans was happy to find him on the porch any morning.

Of course it was a blessing that Severus had manners, even if he was not much in the way of company. And if Mrs. Evans asked him to do any kind of work, he'd do it without complaint. He also helped Lily complete her chores, in order for her to be able to leave the house that much sooner. She wished some of Petunia's boys would take a page from Severus's book in that regard, instead of acting like they should be waited on hand and foot.

Petunia came into the kitchen first and immediately made a sour face to indicate what she thought about Severus Snape bringing his filthy self into her home. Since her mother was in the room, she restricted herself to giving him the stink eye whenever Mrs. Evans was not looking in her direction.

To annoy her, Severus smirked, and was even bold enough to say, "Good morning."

Shortly after that, Lily entered the kitchen with a bright, "Good morning, everyone."

Although he knew it was silly to think so, Severus felt that the sunlight streaming into the kitchen became brighter in response to Lily's presence. The air became effervescent, and any bodily aches he thought he suffered from, disappeared.

"You know, Lily, it's a good thing I had some of those coins left in the jar from last summer. That owl was already here this morning with your newspaper," Mrs. Evans commented as she brought Lily her own bowl of porridge and her paper.

"Oh, good. I have more coins upstairs, mum."

Since Petunia had been given another stern talking to by her parents, she restrained herself to just a sniff of disdain. She wouldn't have to put up with this much longer. Petunia was 19, had a part-time job, was a good cook, and was doing just fine with meeting gentlemen with good prospects. It was regrettable because Petunia did love her parents deeply, and if tortured, would admit she loved Lily too, but this introduction of magic into their lives was abominable. Rather than treating it properly like they would a mental disorder, and get Lily help, they embraced it and tried to make it part of all their lives.

Severus kept an eye on Lily to make sure he ate just fast enough to finish when she did. He made a sort of game out of how long he could make a bowl of porridge last because if he finished too quickly, Mrs. Evans tried to force more food on him.

Rather than being impolite and holding the paper in front of her face, Lily folded it over twice and glanced at it while eating.

After the second flip and refold, she announced, "They are going to let Aurors cast Unforgivables."

"All three?" asked Severus.

"Yes."

"They don't need to cast any of them. It's a huge mistake for the Ministry to allow it."

"They need to protect themselves, Severus."

"Unforgivables are not protection."

"That's a rich one, coming from you."

"What?" demanded Severus hotly.

"I know the types of books you read."

"Those are about things that everyone would rather leave forgotten until someone uses them. Whoever is casting it is doubtfully not going to be polite enough to reverse a Dark Arts spell if you add 'pretty please' to your request. A little education wouldn't hurt in case you need to protect yourself, even if it's from your own ignorance." Severus waved his hand in agitation, and continued, "You know how easy it would be to get a wizard to stick something metal in an electric socket? Because they don't know any better?"

Although she obviously wasn't listening to their nonsense, Petunia did laugh out loud.

Lily glared at Petunia because she didn't want Severus to think he was right. He had it all wrong.

Pressing his current control of the conversation, Severus turned it back toward the original topic. "What good reason could an auror have for casting cruciatus on someone?"

While Lily thought, Mrs. Evans asked, "Which one is that?"

"Unbearable pain, and if it is held on a victim long enough they could be driven insane. Kind of interesting that the word to cast it resembles the word crucify so much, isn't it, Mrs. Evans?"

"Well … they shouldn't be casting that one, Severus," Lily answered.

"Exactly. Even if the victim had a trial and was found guilty, there's no reasonable explanation to condone that sort of torture."

"But the other two would be all right," Lily countered.

"Why would imperius be alright?" asked Severus. He then added for Mrs. Evans benefit, "The victim is under the control of the caster and has no will of their own."

"It could be used to help catch other criminals."

"Who would it be cast on? Someone who they think is guilty, but who hasn't been tried? Or maybe the relatives of a suspected criminal?"

"Hmmmm … maybe if they had some sort of way of getting approval, like they do with a warrant to search or wiretap."

"I think the urge to cast imperius would be stronger than that. They could even use it to suggest crimes to their potential lawbreaker."

"What do you mean?"

Severus gave it a moment of thought before suggesting, "Let's say Longbottom goes on to be an auror. He remembers that he confiscated a questionable book from me back at school. That leads him to believe that it's possible I could commit crimes. So he gets permission to cast an imperius on you to find out if I'm doing things. He instructs you to meet up with me and suggest that we … oh let's see … burn down Potter's house. I tell you that's a jolly good idea and we'd have an absolutely spiffing time and off we go and burn his house down.

"You would be innocent because you were under the imperius curse, of course. I'd be in big trouble alone. And to tell the truth, I probably wouldn't have thought to burn down that dunderhead's house in the first place if you hadn't suggested it, and given me his address."

"They wouldn't use it like that," asserted Lily.

"Wouldn't they?"

Mrs. Evans took care of offering tea quietly, even to Petunia who had not left.

"No, they wouldn't, Severus. Stop thinking the worst of everyone. And anyway, I think the only one that they'd really use is the killing curse."

"There's still too much chance of a mistake with that. How many spells get cast in the hallways in school and miss the intended target? Can't say 'whoops' and get it sorted after you've killed someone."

"They wouldn't be aiming that around while there's innocent people in the way."

"How do they know who's innocent? That's a very quick spell to cast so not much consideration is needed."

"Ah ha, but you have to mean it when you cast any of these spells."

"You are putting a little too much emphasis on that minor point, Lily. It's just a whim that you want someone dead, not a soul-wrenching angst that will prevent it from being cast if it's really a person who doesn't deserve to die when it's aimed at them."

Lily studied Severus closely. Had he ever cast it? Would he even answer her if she asked? Or did he know someone that cast it? Everyone at school knew what those Slytherins were up to, and who they supported.

Severus didn't like the considering look in Lily's eye, so pushed on with, "I concede that in a pitched fight between wanted criminals and law enforcement, it would be useful to have a method to eliminate their opponents, rather than incapacitating them in a manner that may be reversed by their cronies. It wouldn't do to tie up or stun someone, and then have them pop back up, rejoin the fight, and start trying to kill the good guys again."

"At least you can see some sense in it, I suppose."

"At least in the real world," Severus used that term for the benefit of Petunia and her mother, "they are civilized enough to not allow police to normally carry guns so less accidents happen.

"In the wizarding world, the law is a little backwards with regards to the killing curse as opposed to other murders, don't you think?"

His question had exactly the effect he wanted, when Lily practically exploded, "What?!"

"If someone uses the killing curse and it results in the quick and painless death of someone, even in a moment of anger that they regret, they go to prison for life. However, if someone plans and carries out a long, suffering death of another, they are not guaranteed a life sentence. Some can get off in a few years if they have enough money and a plausible defense."

Lily took a deep breath, scrunched up her face and admitted, "I guess that's true, but if I had a say in someone torturing another to death, I'd make sure they never got out."

"I wouldn't expect less from you," Severus pleasantly replied.

"All this talk of death and killing," interrupted Mrs. Evans, "you make it sound so violent."

Lily shook her head and muttered, "So many jerks at school, casting mean things at people left and right, it's a bit terrifying to think that one day they could be either police or members of the government."

"Dear, this probably isn't the right time to bring it up, but your father and I do want to discuss a letter we got from school … about you know, and I just want you to know that we'll understand."

"You don't have to say 'you know', mum. Severus was there. He reversed the spell on me, once he was able to. He got attacked too."

"Oh my … Severus, are your parents …?"

"What? I've never seen any definitive evidence that they can read so if they were sent a letter, they probably used it for bog paper," Severus replied in order to prevent any further discussion regarding his home.

"Aw come on, your mum sends you howlers, Sev," Lily playfully reminded him.

"They aren't from my 'mum', Lily. She can't put words together for a whole sentence, how's she going to dictate a whole letter, when she can't say my first name in less than thirty seconds? I think Black sends them. He's such a sterling wit … besides being Tunie's new friend," Severus alluded to them being more than just friends with a sly wink in Petunia's direction.

"I don't know any of your freak chums," Petunia said with a scowl.

Since Petunia was so obliging to turn the conversation firmly away from his parents and Black's hilarious howlers that promised bare-bottomed spankings and blatant hints that his mother still bathed him because he didn't know how, Severus decided to be kind. "That barmy bloke at the station yesterday."

"Uh! That lairy sod that thought I was your sister, Snape?"

"Well, we already knew he was blind when he initially insulted you."

"Of course," Petunia agreed while absently rubbing her neck.

Concerned that Black thought Petunia was Severus's sister and jinxed her, Lily asked, "He didn't … uh … ?"

"No way," Severus emphatically commented. "Tunie stared him down, and he went running over to his mother."

From Lily's current blush, and Severus' initial reaction yesterday, Petunia could only suspect what exactly her mother referred to by 'you know' in Lily's letter from school. Nasty freaks!