Threaten and Adore
A.N. This is my version of two things; how Harry got his name from his parents, and why Lily and James went into hiding 'shortly after Lily fell pregnant'.
It was Christmas Eve, 1979. From the shadows, a thin young man watched another be kissed by his red-haired wife, and walk off down the street. Both men pulled their cloaks tighter as snowflakes began to sprinkle the road and hedges.
The two men were not so different, the stationary one reflected with distaste. She, the wife, had been correct about that, that summer's day four and a half years ago. Then again, she was right about most things. Severus had joined the Death Eaters, as soon as he had heard Lily had married the man who had just Disapparated.
But it was now or never. He had to see her, and with Potter gone, it was the perfect opportunity. (Why had he left, anyway? Did they not have a tree yet?)
Severus gathered his courage. It isn't a quality usually associated with Slytherins such as himself, but it was a little-known fact that Severus possessed it. In spades. So, he strode towards the door of the cottage, where he stared at the knocker.
A lion. Naturally.
Undeterred, he used it. The door was made of oak but Severus was an excellent spy. He could hear her footsteps coming back, very slowly, towards the door, with the help of a Supersensory Charm. Ironic, really, as she had been the one to draw his attention to that particular charm in the first place.
Lily opened the door. "All right James, what did you forget this – Severus?" She stared at him in shock.
He looked just as shocked to see her. Then again, he may have just been shocked to see her in her condition. She couldn't blame him. She'd never pictured herself pregnant before she was twenty, either, and yet here she was. His gaze, first trained on her face, flicked down to her slightly swollen belly and then rose to look once more upon her pale and stunned face.
What was the decorum in a situation such as this? Lily wondered. What exactly did you say to someone with whom you had parted, on not very nice terms, so long ago?
Severus shivered slightly, and Lily realised just how cold it was on the front steps. "Would you like to come inside?
"Thank you," he said gratefully (his first words to her since he had given up trying to make peace wit her), and followed her into the sitting room.
"Do you want a cup of tea?" she asked, to fill the awkward silence that ensued.
"Er, no, thank you."
Making the tea would have given Lily a chance to collect herself. She sighed. It would have been inaudible to Severus without the Supersensory Charm. They both sat down.
Severus got straight to the point. It wasn't the one he'd had in mind when he woke up that morning. It wasn't the one he'd had in mind as he's watched James Potter saunter off. It wasn't the one he'd had in mind as he'd knocked on the door of their cottage. (Severus hated third-person-plural pronouns). But it was a point nonetheless.
"He's the father, isn't he?" Better to say it bluntly, and not let her guess what he really thought, really felt about it. Although, now he thought about it, she might have seen the shock and anguish in his eyes as he had seen her, really seen her, when she had opened the door to him.
Lily didn't have to ask who he meant. "Well, yes," she replied, as though speaking to a small child. "We are married."
Severus winced – he couldn't help it – and turned away from her. He hated first-person-plural pronouns too.
'Due at the end of July," Lily, added, seemingly oblivious to the pain she was inflicting on him, pain which he deserved for calling her … that name.
Severus's gaze snapped back to her. "When?" he gasped.
"The end of July," Lily repeated, frowning. And why shouldn't she? She didn't know about the Prophecy. She didn't know that, because of their (ugh) failure to use contraception effectively, she was a target, she was in danger, she was the Dark Lord's bargaining chip with him, with Severus.
Suddenly, Severus regretted getting that tattoo on his left forearm. Dimly, and mainly thanks only to the Supersensory Charm, he registered that Lily was saying something, so he asked her to repeat it.
"I said, you didn't come here to comment on my pregnancy."
A vein was jumping on Severus's left temple. What made that even more disturbing was the fact that Petunia's husband, Vernon the whale, had almost exactly the same tic.
"No, I didn't," he agreed.
"Well, what did you come here for?" Maybe it was the hormones, but she was becoming very frustrated.
"I had to see you."
Yes, very frustrating. And so vague! "For what purpose?"
"I had to see you," he repeated. Almost before Lily could blink, he rose from his seat, crossed the room and was kneeling in front of her. "I wanted to wish you a happy Christmas. In person," he added.
Lily swallowed, uncomfortable. He had sent her a Christmas card every year since they had met, even after the insult incident. Since the insult incident, she had neither replied, nor sent him one herself.
"I had to tell you –" Inexplicably, he broke off.
Lily continued to look expectant. (Oh, sweet Merlin.) Severus took a deep breath, and tried again. "I had to tell you –"
As usual, Lily pre-empted him. As usual, it was almost nothing like what he had intended to say. "You've joined the Death Eaters, haven't you?"
"I –" Severus began, planning to deny it wholeheartedly, then thinking better of it. Hadn't he promised himself that he would stop lying to her? "I only joined when I heard you'd married him."
Lily apparently hadn't heard past his admission of being a Death Eater. She stood up. "Get out," she said in a voice of cold fury, pointing towards the hallway. "Get out of this house."
"Would you let me finish for once?" Severus demanded as he stood up too.
"Do you think I want to hear – do you think I give a – I don't care what you've got to say!" Lily spluttered. "I won't have a Death Eater in my house – I'm a Mudblood, remember?" she added viciously.
Severus couldn't stand it any longer. He did what he had wanted to do every day without fail, since he was ten years old. He kissed her.
To say that Lily was surprised would be like saying that Molly Weasley liked Gilderoy Lockhart, or Lord Voldemort had psychiatric problems, i.e. a huge understatement.
Still, she had the presence of mind to reflect that both Severus and James kissed her in exactly the same way – they gave of themselves, and let her give of herself what she wanted to. This was somewhat puzzling, as the men themselves were so radically different. (A.N. That's what she thinks.)
When he pulled away, she could only stare at him, open-mouthed in shock.
"I'm in love with you," Severus said softly. Finally he had found an effective way to silence her.
Of course he was in love with her! Why was Lily so shocked? The way he looked at her, the way he was so jealous of James … it explained everything.
Still cupping her face with his hands, he spoke again. "Your child … would you please call it something nondescript? Jane, Susan, Emma – Tom, Dick, Harry. Not something that would stand out in a crowd, in a list. It'll be safer."
He let go of her and walked along the hall. Lily followed him, dazed. She had a feeling her child would be a boy. Tom Potter … no, hadn't Hagrid been expelled from Hogwarts on the evidence of someone called Tom Riddle? Dick Potter … definitely not, what else might the poor kid be called? Harry Potter … that actually sounded quite nice.
Severus stopped on the top step and turned around. They put their arms around each other for a hug, and then he pulled away, again. He pressed his lips to her forehead, met her eyes, and then walked away.
Lily had dinner on the table by the time James had come back from the weekly-but-informal Marauder meeting. "I think we should do something about the security of the house," she said as they sat down. "We don't really want any unwelcome visitors."
Predictably, James overacted. "Did you have one of those today? Were you hurt? What about the baby?"
"James, calm down!" Lily said, almost sharply. "I didn't have an unwelcome visitor."
Severus hadn't said goodbye. He hadn't had to. The look in his eyes had told Lily everything he couldn't say. Lily knew that, to her dying day, she'd never forget what she saw in his eyes that snowy afternoon.
And in his eyes, all the sadness of the world
Those pleading eyes, that both threaten and adore
A.N. I can't write James. He's never come naturally to me. Lyrics at the end, and the title are from The Phantom of the Opera, which I happen to think is an eerily similar parallel to the Severus/Lily/James triangle.