Sugar Quills and Chocoballs: One-Shot

by broomclosetravenclaw

Severus walked down the small side street in Hogsmeade. Needing a new quill, he’d planned to visit Scrivenshaft's Quill Shop, make his purchase, and then return to Hogwarts. But the morning mist had cleared, and the unexpected sunshine was unseasonably warm; so against his better instincts, Severus decided he would walk down High Street and enjoy a day in the village.

He was just coming up on the post office when, across the street, he spotted a flicker of familiar red hair as the bright yellow door to Honeydukes closed, silencing the chime that had rung upon its opening.

Slinking across the street, Severus took a cursory look into the sweetshop’s window. His four Gryffindor tormentors were not there. In fact, the store was rather empty for a Hogsmeade weekend, only Lily and a few third years, who were daring each other to eat the more putrid coloured Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans—one still gagging after an ominous looking tripe-flavoured one. He entered the shop. Blowing a rather large blue bubble, Lily turned towards the door. Upon seeing him, her eyes smiled as her mouth was grappling with her gum and its persistent bubble. Staring back at her, Severus noticed how the harvest-gold and orange striped wallpaper matched her hair and made her eyes look even greener. Severus felt as if he’d swallowed a whole treacle tart, his mouth suddenly dry, his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. He looked down, his shyness painfully obvious in public, and noticed that she was wearing the mood ring he had given her two summers ago as a Muggle joke after they had spent a torturous year in Divination class; it was as green as her eyes. Giving up on her gum, Lily took care of it with a quick Evanesco!

“I’m surprised to see you here,” she said, as he asked, “Where is everyone?”

Severus let her answer first. “Most everyone is down at Zonko’s—they got a bunch of new stuff in.”

“I needed a new quill,” he said self-consciously.

Lily reached across him, picked up two sugar quills, handed him one, and placed the other one between her lips, lightly teasing the sweet feathers with her tongue before sucking the end into her mouth.

Severus felt a sudden heat jolt through him, as if he had eaten a handful of Pepper Imps and the fire had shot straight to his Licorice Wand. He watched her mouth work the syrupy nib until he thought his bon-bons would explode and his Whizbee fizz. Looking for a distraction before he embarrassed himself, he focused on a bin of Cockroach Clusters and Fudge Flies.

“I should be heading back,” he said when he no longer thought his voice would betray him.

As he went to the front to pay, he noticed Lily rolling two Chocoballs in her hand; the thought of her licking the cream filling made him shudder. He left before he noticed her mood ring had turned dark blue.




A/N: Exactly 500 words written for LJ Community Romancing the Wizard's Marauder's Map Challenge. My prompt was "orange stripes."

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