A Hogwarts Christmas Carol
By Rose Green
"Harry Potter!" a voice roared.
Harry swung around, his wand still poised at shoulder-length. Malfoy lay on the ground in front of him, twitching violently, squealing.
Professor Snape was staring from Harry to Malfoy, his black eyes glinting furiously.
"What--no magic in the corridor--you know--Malfoy--what have you--"
Snape was so angry he could barely speak.
"POTTER!" he finally burst out. "Harry Potter, the first thing you will do is set him right."
Harry waved his wand. Malfoy stopped squealing and twitching and slowly got to his feet.
"Now you will come to my office--"
"LIGHTS OUT," a voice, magically magnified, rang through the corridors.
Snape looked murderous. "I shall see you in the morning, Potter," he said maliciously. "Mr. Malfoy, please return to Slytherin...Potter...go to your tower...."
He watched them set off in their different directions as he headed for his bedroom. He shook his head. "Maniacs," he thought.
Snape had barely closed his eyes, when all of a sudden, a ghost floated in. Thinking it was Peeves the Poltergeist, Snape waved his hand, muttering "Go....go away, Peeves..."
"I AM NOT PEEVES," a voice boomed. Slowly, Snape turned. And shouted in shock.
The ghost of James Potter was standing before him.
"James!" Snape shouted. "What--how can you--"
"I am a memory, Severus," James said coldly. "A memory, tonight, of Christmas. Christmas past."
"Can this wait?" Snape moaned.
"SILENCE!" James yelled. He grabbed Snape's hand, waved a transparent wand, and they were falling, falling through a black whirlwind with backwards clocks, until Snape and James landed with a thud on a hardwood floor.
"This is the old Slytherin common room," Snape whispered. "From when I was--thirteen or so--"
He watched, amazed, as his thirteen year old self entered the common room, which fell silent.
"Well? What's gotten into you all?" his young self said icily. "Quiet on the holidays. Aren't you all thrilled now that you're free from studies for an entire week?"
This continued on for a while.
"James--what's going on?" Present-day Snape said.
"I cannot tell you that," James said mysteriously. He vanished--as did the room around him--and Snape found himself back in his bedroom.
James's voice sounded out of nowhere. "Another is coming, Severus," it said.
Silence for a minute. Then--
"SEVERUS! Severus Snape! How are yeh?"
"HAGRID?"
"Glad ter see yeh haven't lost yer memory."
"But--you're not dead--"
"Nah, I'm the Ghost o' Christmas Present, Severus," Hagrid yelled. "Present! I ain't dead! I'm just a dream thing, yeh know..."
Suddenly, they were falling again, back to the scene that Snape had just left, where he'd yelled at Harry. Then they were in the Gryffindor common room. Harry was talking to Ron and Hermione.
"So then he yells at me," Harry was saying. "Even though Malfoy was the one insulting me, I just raised my wand and he threw himself on the ground, I have to meet Snape in his office. He'll be so happy now that he can finally expel me," he finsihed sourly.
"That's awful," Snape muttered.
"Yeh haven't seen Malfoy yet, Severus," Hagrid whispered back. "It's a sore sight, that is."
They found themselves in the Slytherin common room, where Malfoy was laughing coldly.
"So I saw Snape coming, so I threw myself on the ground just as Potter raised his wand. He has to meet Snape tomorrow. Hope he gets expelled, no chance he won't..."
"Malfoy!" Snape yelled, beofre he realized no one could hear him.
All of a sudden, he found himself in his bed again, and Hagird's voice said "Another one's comin', Severus...just wait an' see...."
Not two minutes later, another ghost appeared. It didn't speak. It was an Azkaban dementor.
Even though Snape wasn't really affected by dementors, he felt a wave of cold wash over him as the dementor beckoned to him, and they fell....and then they were outside by Hagrid's cottage. There was a large casket there.
"And so," Dumbledore was saying to the entire student body, "we say farewell to Severus Snape, our Potions Master. He suffered heart problems--"
"I'll bet," Harry said, and some of the other Gryffindors nodded.
"I'm--I'm dead?" choked Snape. "My attitude--I'm a rotten person--and it's killed me!" he said, and he burst into tears. "I'm horrible!" Then he found himself in his bed, James the Ghost staring at him once more.
"Severus, I never had a chance to set things right beofre I died," he said softly. "But you can. Do it...before it kills you."
He vanished, leaving Snape with his thoughts.
The next moring, Snape found Harry in his office like he'd told him.
"Harry Potter!" Snape said cheerfully. "Why are you cooped up in my office when you could be eating at this very moment? Please, join the rest of the students in the Great Hall!"
Harry fell off the chair he was sitting on.
"Sir--sir, are you serious?" he said, then ran out of Snape's office. Snape smiled.
He entered the Great Hall a moment later to whispers and points, but it didn't bother him--within a few days, everyone would come to terms with the new him.
Severus Snape learned an important lesson that night. It's important not only to make up for what you've done wrong, but to forgive--as all of Hogwarts eventually did.
Professor Snape became one of the most favorite teachers at Hogwarts from then on.
He even started giving Gryffindor points.
Author's note: People always see Snape as such a miserable man with no heart left in him. I'm just trying to make sure that he's not discarded that way, that maybe if he were given the oppurtunity, he would change his ways.
