After the waitress had left, Petunia snickered loudly, "It looks like you have an admirer, Severus."
"I'm sure she was just being polite," Severus grumbled having noticed the waitress's uncomfortable attentions.
"Well, Severus is rather handsome, she'd be a fool not to notice!" Lily jumped up to his defense, before fiercely blushing.
A gleam of hope appeared in Severus's eyes as the conversation was changed to other topics. Such as during the English League's first match a hooligan riot that had occurred on the 16th of the month. It was a shame as Andrew and his uncle had wanted to go see a match before the start of Hogwarts. But with the opening as it was, it might be a tad dangerous to attend any of the league matches for this season.
Soon enough their waitress arrived with their food and they fell silent except for the clinking of their silverware. The diner began to fill up a bit more until a group youths entered the diner just was their group was finished. They were in fact paying for their meal and were about to leave when a good-looking strapping lad said, "Well if it isn't Lily Evans. Too good for us to attend the local Secondary School. Instead, Miss Evans goes off to some posh boarding school."
His friends strapping boys and girls in upper thigh length miniskirts snicker out loud. Ignoring Petunia and her round-faced boyfriend from out of the town, the wheat haired strapping lad sneers at the two posh looking brother and sister pair. They were both raven haired, pale, tall, and thin with dark eyes. Though something about them seemed vaguely familiar in the back of his mind.
"So, who might the two of you be?" The wheat colored muscled young man asked.
"Well, well, you're still as short as ever Cliff Jamerson," the raven-haired young woman said.
Cliff Jamerson narrows his eyes at the girl and says, "What's height got to do with anything? It's all about whether one's got a package, and I've got it all right." Pointing his thumb down at his pelvis.
"Really, it still works?" Rowan smirked as she took a step toward him. "I thought I broke it in my second year of primary."
All traces of color vanished from Jamerson's face as he finally recognized the duo before him, the Snape twins. Rowan flashes a cold wolfish smile in satisfaction as she says, "Yes, well, I still happen to have a violent streak left after all these years. Shall we settle this outside or continue on our separate ways?"
Jamerson stiffly nods at Rowan as the boys behind him had paled as well in recognition. Two of them had earned broken noses at the hands of Rowan, while the third had his wrist broken twice. Neither of the four of them wanted to mess with her. She had traumatized them in their primary years that none of them dared to rebel now.
Shuffling to the side, the girls openly gaped at them as they suddenly recognized the pair before them. A pretty girl with too much makeup says, "You're the scrawny Snape twins!" Pointing at Severus in utter disbelief.
Severus stares down his nose at her and says, "I'd hope I'd grown out of being scrawny all these years. And thank goodness, I did. It would be awful to remain as a beanpole for my entire life, Miss Cassidy. Though might I say, you have not aged well at all."
The girl wearing too much makeup flushes in mortification at being recognized and being told that. The five of them move past them leaving the gawking teens behind. Either way, the whispers about how the Snape twins looked like now would-be all-over town by lunchtime.
The moment they were all a short distance away from the diner, Andrew wryly asked, "Rowan exactly what were you like during your primary years?"
Rowan flashes a sharp toothed smile and says, "Severus and I were typically looked down upon for being Snape's. As such, I endeavored to beat it into their scrawny minds what would happen every time they dared to touch either of us. It was mostly Severus and so I tended to be a bit wilder in my younger years."
Andrew just stares blankly at Rowan making a firm point to never get on her bad side. Petunia smirks and says, "Yes, well, you always looked a bookworm, Row, until you get mad. And then all the hidden viciousness that is pent up always comes out."
"True enough," Rowan said with a faint smile. "I'll not deny it."
Lily just stares blankly at Rowan having never witnessed this side of Rowan. "Did they really bother you and Severus that much?" Lily asked with mixed feelings.
"Really, Lily?" Rowan muttered. "Did you not recall what the children used to call us? What was it, Sev? Ah, yes, the Raven twins come and go, thin and black, all a fro, soon they'll come for our lives, so let us stone them before they take flight!"
Lily looks rather guilty and ashamed at having failed to notice her friends' distress. Despite being in different classrooms she really should have noticed. "I'm sorry," Lily blurted out. "I should have realized."
Rowan sniffs and says, "Severus wouldn't have ever mentioned anything, Lily. We have our pride after all. And besides, it wasn't you who was chanting the ridiculous childish rhyme."
Andrew just stares at Rowan trying to avoid the subject. But it must not be as lighthearted as she made it out to be. If it truly had been that bad than was it any wonder, why Rowan and Severus were as cold as they were at times? They had not trusted anyone easily much less made friends.
Feeling rather warm and fuzzy at being a privileged friend, Andrew says, "In that case, what shall we do now?"
"I'd like to pick up a couple cassettes and another cassette player," Rowan staunchly replied. "I gave mine to Sirius the summer before our third year. And I still haven't had time to buy a replacement and I'd very much like one." Plus, Queen finally dropped their album, "A Night at Opera." It was a great album and plenty of other artists were getting big this year such as Kiss and Fleetwood Mac. And not to mention the one and only ABBA with SOS and Mamma Mia! And the upcoming singles in 1976, Dancing Queen and Money.
Yes, she was a hidden closet fan of the Swedish pop group. It was her deepest, and darkest secret. And never in a million years would she publicly admit otherwise. Slytherin's did not listen to such joyful, pop music. It would only serve to ruin their fearsome reputation!