Afternoon Death Wishes
Disclaimer: Do you think I could come up with such a brilliant idea without some help? Geez, it's obvious it's all J. K. Rowling's work. I just came up with the plot.
It was on a Saturday afternoon when she decided to kill her son.
Honestly, the boy would not keep quiet. It was always crying, wanting attention, "Waa, waa, waa,"-ing all the time.
And her husband wasn't much of a help. He just lazed around on the couch, never moving, expecting all of his meals to somehow make themselves and fly over to him. And he never helped with their son.
Maybe she should kill him, too.
"Lily! When's dinner?" called James from the living room.
"When I got Harry to sleep," Lily called back, frustrated with her husband and the fact that she couldn't get baby Harry to sleep.
"When will that be?"
Lily groaned in annoyance. She rocked Harry as he kept crying. "Shush, baby, shush, mummy's here, don't cry, please…"
"Lily," called James, now in a whinging tone. "I'm hungry."
"Can't you wait?" said Lily, irritation showing in her voice.
"No! I'm hungry now."
Lily groaned again and kept rocking the crying Harry.
The doorbell rang.
"Lily? Can you get that?" said James, not moving from the couch where he was reading the Daily Prophet.
"I'm trying to get Harry to sleep! You're right next to the door!" cried Lily, exasperated.
The doorbell rang again.
"Lily!"
Lily let out a cry of clear annoyance, and walked through the house to the front door, still holding the bawling Harry. She threw the door open and was met by the grinning face of Sirius Black.
"Hiya Lily," he said enthusiastically. He spotted Harry in her arms and bent over him. "Hello little Prongs, how's my little godson, how are you?"
Harry went quiet and reached out for Sirius' outstretched finger. He closed his tiny fist around it and let out a gurgle of happiness.
Lily let out a sigh of relief. "Oh Sirius, thank you. I've been trying to do that for hours and –"
Harry began bawling again.
Lily sighed again, but this one was of anxiety.
"Sorry Lily, I'm not that great with children," Sirius said as a way of apology. "Where's James?"
"I'm in here!" called James. "And I'm starving to death!"
Lily rolled her eyes. She decided to take Harry to his room and just lay him down for a while, while she made James and Sirius' dinners. Just as she laid her son on the mattress of his cot, Harry fell silent and asleep. Lily sighed, relieved again. But just as she made to leave the room, Harry started crying once more, but Lily kept walking to the kitchen.
After making two bowls of hot soup, Lily took them through to the living room.
"Wish we still had it," Sirius was saying sadly as Lily put the bowls down on the coffee table. "Pity Filch got it. One prank too many, I suppose."
"Could have passed it onto Harry," said James, taking a spoon from Lily without a word of thanks.
"That would have been brilliant. Thanks Lily," said Sirius, also taking a spoon. "Little eleven year old Harry, sneaking off to Hogsmeade…he could have been a new Marauder."
"I'll give him my Cloak at least," said James, filling his spoon with the boiling liquid.
"That's good," said Sirius, filling his spoon as well. But then he spotted the expression Lily was giving James as he placed his spoon in his mouth, and he let his spoon fall back into the bowl.
James swallowed and it took a few moments for the heat of the meal to hit him.
"OW!" he bellowed, racing around the room. "Hot! Hot, hot, hot!"
Lily kept smiling as she watched her husband race around the room.
"Um, um, you need, um, water! I'll get water!" said Sirius as James continued racing around the room, fanning his mouth. He pulled out his wand. "Aguamenti." Nothing happened. "Aguamenti!" Sirius commanded again, stabbing his wand through the air. "AGUAMENTI!"
A huge jet of water began raining over the living room and Lily's smile slid off her face as she hurried to protect an old armchair that her mother had given her. "Sirius, what did you do?" she yelled through the pouring rain; it was if there was a small rainstorm was just inside their living room.
"I don't know!" Sirius called back but Lily could hardly see him through the pouring torrent. "I just said, Aguamenti sorta loudly and then, well, you can see…"
"Well, stop it!" shrieked Lily; the rain was coming down harder now.
"I don't know how!" yelled Sirius, but as soon as he said it, the rain stopped.
Lily could now see that James was standing in the middle of the room, his mouth open and waiting to catch the now no longer pouring rain. Sirius had fallen onto the sofa, and his long black hair hung in his face, sopping wet. Lily's own red hair was over her eyes and she could hear that Harry was still crying. She stood up and squeezed her hair out. "It was just hot soup, yet you turn it into a miniature rain storm in my own living room. Why I bothered to marry a Marauder, I don't know," she muttered, walking out of the room.
Lily entered Harry's room and took a deep breath. Harry stopped crying as soon as Lily sat beside his cot. Closing her eyes slightly, Lily stroked her son's head and became calm.
After almost an hour, James stood in the doorway to Harry's room.
"Um, Sirius has left," he said.
"Good."
"I tidied up the living room and everything."
"Good."
"Your mother's chair is still good."
"Good."
"Lily, are you mad at me?" asked James.
"Mad?" repeated Lily. "Oh no James, I'm not mad."
James sighed in relief. "Oh good, 'cause for a moment there –"
"I'm not mad," continued Lily, over the top of James. "I'm just incensed."
"That means really mad, doesn't it?" asked James nervously.
"Of course it bloody well does!" said Lily, getting to her feet.
"Now, now Lily," said James, backing away slightly. "No need to get mad now, you just got Harry to sleep, and I know you wouldn't want to –"
"You have no idea what I want!" yelled Lily. Surprisingly, Harry didn't stir. "I do everything around this house and all you ever do is just sit around, waiting for everything to come to you! I want you to take a more active part in Harry's life! I always have to be the one to get him to sleep, you never put him to sleep, oh no, it's always, 'Lily, can you shut that kid up?' Why don't you try fatherhood one day! Maybe you'll actually be good at something, but you'll never know 'cause you never bother!" Lily stormed out of the room.
As soon as she left, Harry began crying again.
James blinked once after Lily had left before realizing that Harry was crying. He smiled, thinking that he'll do what Lily wanted him to do: try his hand at fatherhood.
"Hey, hey Harry, come on son, it's alright, it's daddy," he murmured to the baby as he picked him up. Swaying him gently in his arms, James kept quietly talking to his son til he fell asleep again. He placed him back into his cot and tiptoed out of the room.
I'll murder them both, she thought. Harry and James. They both need to die.
James entered the kitchen. "Lily, did you break into my booze cupboard?"
Lily looked up at him. "If you mean your liquor cabinet, then yes, I did," she said, slightly groggily, but defiant. She poured herself another glass of Firewhiskey.
"Look Lily, I'm sorry," said James, sitting beside and trying to gently prise her fingers from the glass. "I know I should help out more. But Harry's room is just so far away…"
Lily didn't say anything but continued in her silent battle for the Firewhiskey glass.
"I got him to sleep though," James added.
"Thank you," Lily said grudgingly and yanked her glass from James. The drink spilled out and all over the floor.
James pointed his wand at it and it immediately disappeared.
"I'm a natural," boasted James. "He went to sleep straight away."
"Whatever James," Lily sniffed.
"Come on Lily. Replace the lock on my liquor cabinet, put a Silencing Charm on Harry so he won't wake us up – when you're a witch, you can't try and get your children to grow up as Muggles," he said, noticing Lily about to object putting a Silencing charm on her son. "My parents did it to me," he added. "Anyway, do that, and then let's go to bed."
Lily smiled and James gently wiped away her tears.
Maybe I won't murder them, she thought as she climbed into bed next to James. Maybe they don't need to die.
Harry began crying yet again in his room.
"I said, put a Silencing Charm on him," said James, rolling over, but otherwise not moving.
Or maybe not.
It was on a Saturday night when she decided she would strangle her husband as a way of killing him.