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Agapanthus - A flower whose name means "love letter"

Dear Professor Snape,

First and foremost, let me wish you a Merry Christmas. I certainly hope you are having a better Christmas than I am...because despite it being the season "to be jolly", I find that I am anything but. My days at Hogwarts are drawing to a close (how quickly the year has flown!), and with them come a sense of deep sorrow of which I am unable to rid myself of. Sorrow because, of course, I will soon be leaving Hogwarts and - unlike past years – I will not be coming back. Hogwarts has become something of a home to me, I have grown used to it, it is familiar, it is somewhere I am comfortable; I am sad, and frankly quite scared, to leave it. I will miss my friends, classmates, lessons, the Halloween feasts, the Sortings, Quidditch matches – all of what makes Hogwarts what it is. But there is nothing I am sadder to leave than you, Professor.

With the sadness, comes a sense of urgency to spill all of my withheld feelings onto this piece of parchment so that you may read it. Please do not be alarmed – I will save us both the awkwardness of revealing my identity, and I do not, by any means, expect you to reply to this, though I do beseech that you read it till the end. Bare with me, I have never before put these feelings onto paper – rather, they have remained repressed in the back of mind and in the recesses of my heart, building in pressure as the years pass. Hopefully I will feel a sense of alleviation after this letter has been sent to you, though I do not disillusion myself by presuming these feelings will go away after I have transferred them to paper. I just want you to you know that I love you.

I do, yes. I have loved you since my fourth year, I believe. I cannot tell you exactly why (does anyone know the exact reason why they fall in love?), but it was gradual. It began as an attraction...the way you spoke, the way you owned your words, the way those words formed on your lips; your deep, velvety voice that would almost always send me into a kind of trance; you're endless black eyes that so often would suck me into their depths, making me wonder what lies behind them; the way you moved, seamlessly, gracefully, always with purpose...I even grew to enjoy your sarcasm and snarky comments, even though, occasionally, they were directed at me.

But it's not just attraction. It's admiration, as well. During my fourth year, I (unintentionally) overheard a conversation that implied you were a Death-Eater-turned-spy. After the initial shock of discovering that you were once a Death-Eater dispersed, I grew to fully understand the implications of what you were doing – or, at least, as fully as anyone but yourself could understand. It was quite plain to me that you were (and still are) risking your life in order to help bring about the defeat of He-Who-Must-Not-Ne-Named; for that, I deeply admire you, and it pains me that so many people don't know this, and therefore, cannot appreciate this. I hope that one day you will get the recognition you deserve. I worry for you, Professor, and for what the future holds. I'm sure things are becoming increasingly dangerous for you – I only wish I could somehow help, but I know I cannot.

My feelings for you are...they are hard for me to deal with, but I've learnt to stow them away, much like you may stow things away. The hardest things about it...loving you...are not that I can't hold you in my arms, that I will never know the taste of your lips, that I can't make love to you. Those things can be difficult, but they aren't the hardest things. It's being unable to send you the love letters (except until now, of course), being unable to brush that lock of hair back from your face, and to smile at your beauty as I do it. It is being unable to do all of the infinitesimal things that love requests me to do that really drives me mad.

It's all worth it though. I still get to see that lock of hair fall down across your face, even if I can't touch it. Perhaps once in a great while you might accidentally brush against me with your hand, and even if it does not stop my heart, please do not be surprised when I stumble in mid-step because my knees have given way, and my voice falters as I try to think of a decent reply to your question. Only you could do this, and I would only ever want you to be the one who led me to such a state.

I wrote this letter not only so I could feel better, so I could give myself some of closure, but also to let you know that someone cares. And I do - I care very much about you. You may be snickering, you may be disbelieving, you may be angry or amused...but somewhere, deep inside of you, you are smiling with contentment – which is why all of this heartache, all of this anguish and longing, has been worth every minute.

I wish you all the best,

My love will always be yours.

This letter was written by an anonymous student only a week before the battle at Hogwarts, and read by Severus Snape only days before his death. He never did find out which student it was, but somehow, that didn't matter in the least.

A/N: For my own closure, I wanted Severus Snape to know that at least someone cared for him, and even loved him, before he died. Any reviews mean a lot to me. And I know, the whole Christmas timing thing is probably off, but ah well.