Daisy Chains
Chapter I
The Evans Girls
It wasn't fair. Sansa had everything. Sansa was two years older; maybe by the time Arya had been born, there had been nothing left. Often it felt that way. Sansa could sew and dance and sing. She wrote poetry. She knew how to dress. She played the high harp and the bells. Worse, she was beautiful. – Arya Stark, Game of Thrones
There used to be three of them. The Evans girls, the neighbours had called them.
They had been born on the right side of the river; went to the good school and not the other one; had a respectable white-collar father and a house-proud, house-wife mother; they had walked to school on sunny days, crisp white blouses and starch grey skirts; they had got stopped in the street by old biddies and family friends – how is your father? How is your mother? School working you hard eh?
They had been those sort of girls.
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Tall Petunia and lovely Lily; both of them had been as pretty and proper as the flowers they had been named for.
Petunia was the eldest, and therefore had been the idol of her childhood; too old to be a competitor, and too different from Lily to be anything other than a staunch ally. It was Tuney she had ran too, with scraped knees, when Kevin Small had thrown paint over her hair, when Lily had teased her about something or another.
Lily had been born two years before her. Daisy wondered sometimes if there had been nothing left for her, because Lily had somehow taken it all.
Lovely Lily; Lily who could cheek their father and get away with it; Lily who made the teachers laugh, no matter how much she spoke back; Lily who everyone remembered for her hair; who could count better than Tuney; who could run faster than Daisy, and who had punched Kevin Small, only to go and make friends with him the next day.
Both her sister's had been named for flowers.
Daisy had been named for a weed.
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"It's not right," said Petunia, but her eyes had followed the flower's flight to the ground and lingered upon it. "How do you do it?" she added, and there was definite longing in her voice. - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
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At eight years old, Daisy's greatest accomplishment is that she can turn a cartwheel. She spends that summer turning them on the springy grass of Bounderby Park, with Tuney and Lily as her captive audience.
Lily tries to copy her, attempts to mimic the movement of arms and kick of her chicken-legs, while Tuney threads daisies together with her slim fingers, until she wears a crown of pale petals.
Then everything changes with the appearance of the Snape boy. Daisy has seen him before, shadowing his mousy mother around the shops like a bedraggled dog. Mrs Evans had pointed them out once, whispering in a hushed voice, equal parts pity and scorn.
The boy whispers now, greasy haired with a gaunt, feverish face. Of witches. Of wizards.
Tuney is quick to point out that he's from Spinner's End, and a bad sort. Tuney would know these things; she's twelve and in Middle School, and to Daisy, on the threshold of a conspiracy only adults are a part of.
Yet Daisy, who still believes that a ring of toadstools hides a fairy den, and receives a handwritten letter from Santa every year, is positively bouncing at the idea of magic, and sorcery, and so finds everything he says intensely delighting.
Until it strikes her that he's not looking at her when he says it.
He's looking at Lily.
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The Snape boy – or Sev, as Lily now calls him –enters into their lives like an unexpected sneeze, carrying with him a horde of contagious germs and diseases.
At first their mother is wary of Lily's new friend, treating him the same way one might treat a malnourished, but parasitical cat. She is kind to him, she smiles at him, sometimes even feeds him biscuits and asks Lily - very innocently of course – if Severus is getting on well at home.
Petunia grows to hate him almost as much as Lily grows to love him and so Daisy hovers in between, unable to boast the spiteful resentment of Tuney, but incapable of being as fond of him as Lily.
She follows them sometimes, listens to their chatter, and joins in their games. She is never treated with as much contempt as Tuney (because she is the little sister after all, and there come some perks to being little Daisy, as Kevin Small was quick to learn) but she feels like an intruder, a spy, and there is a bitter taste in her mouth when Lily tosses her hair and says, 'Sev told me…'
Tuney is sympathetic, and when Lily starts to push her further away, Tuney welcomes her with open arms. 'He's filthy,' she snipes, 'look at him.'
Daisy cannot help but nod and agree, feeling very grown up as Tuney smiles at her approvingly, threading flowers into her hair.
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When the letter comes, accompanied by a stern-looking woman, dressed in a tweed coat, it is as though a dormant volcano has suddenly and inexplicably decided to erupt.
There is a sort of dread that comes with watching her parents stumble and wobble; her father's voice trembles with the sort of caustic rage reserved for politicians and the news, and when he starts shouting at the woman, her Mother sends them all up to their rooms.
The three of them crouch next to the upstairs railings trying to catch snatches of what is being said.
It isn't difficult, her father has a powerful, booming voice, and her mother's protests are shrill, and desperate, 'be quiet Jim! Mrs Partridge will hear you!'
But when it grows quieter and quieter, Daisy becomes more and more uncertain, squeezing Tuney's hand and becoming engrossed with picking bits of fluff out of the tangerine carpet.
"This is all your fault," she hears Tuney gripe at Lily.
Lily says nothing, her silence condemning her.
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More letters come after that, all of them from Lily. They arrive in flurries twice a week, accompanied by an enormous bird which terrifies Tuney.
Their mother, who is equally as nervous of the owl, pours the orange juice and speaks in the same bright, cheery voice she usually reserves for Mrs Partridge and their Grandmother. "Oh look, a letter from Lily. Isn't that lovely?"
It almost becomes normal, to find a bird of prey at the breakfast table. Soon in becomes another domestic oddity, like the way her Dad likes to have marmalade in his porridge, or how her mother slurps hot chocolate from a spoon, in a most unladylike fashion.
Lily's name is mentioned more and more, as though their mother is terrified they might forget they have a sister.
Cakes are baked, parcels of scones and millionaire shortbread, all for their Dad to apprehensively attach to the owl while their mother frets over how long it might take to reach Lily and the hygienic ramifications of postal birds.
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When Lily does eventually return to them, three months later in December, her presence is both welcoming and disorientating.
The build up to her homecoming is fraught with impatience and tension; all the linen is washed, and all of Lily's favourite meals are cooked.
Tunney is not allowed to go out with Wendy McGowan that night and Daisy has to spend an afternoon polishing Lily's bedroom while her mother scrubs the bathroom until her fingers are dried up like prunes and the whole upstairs landing reeks like a hospital ward.
The three weeks revolve around her sister, as though every day is Lily's birthday, and they must all do their best to make it as wonderful as possible.
They take her to the cinema, out for dinner, and into Nottingham for Christmas shopping. When their Grandmother comes to visit, she coos and fusses, praising her clever granddaughter and congratulating her repeatedly for her acceptance into a private school
Lily speaks to Daisy of Hogwarts, of Gryffindor and Charms, of her new friends, of her teachers. There is a look in her eyes too; a sort of sparkle, an ember of longing.
"You'd rather be there, then here," Daisy accuses. It's Boxing Day and their watching 'It's a Wonderful Life' though Lily has her nose buried in a Potions book.
"Don't be such a baby," Lily snaps back, without looking up.
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It's natural, what with Lily hardly being there anymore, that Daisy should grow closer to Tuney. Tuney teaches her how to paint her nails and whispers to her about boys, about girls, and shows her off to her friends.
When Alfie Adams asks Tuney to the school dance, it's Daisy who sits on Tuney's bed as she gets ready, fussing and panicking over dresses, and make-up and jewellery.
Tuney is fourteen and part of a world filled with rituals concerning boys and fashion. Daisy is ten and as much as she feels privileged to be privy to such a mature and alluring realm, she cannot comprehend the excitement over Alfie Adams, with his pimples and his squeaking voice.
His older brother Brian, with his guitar playing and motorbike riding is far cooler.
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For her eleventh birthday they all go into Nottingham and visit the zoo.
It's the first time Daisy has ever seen an elephant and she spends all day taking pictures with the Kodak camera Granny Flo gave her as a present. Lily sends her a ring in the post; a real mood ring, she elaborates in her letter, not a stupid muggle one like the one she'd won at the Fair, four years ago.
When they go home, it's waiting for them, lying innocently on the Welcome mat.
Daisy tries to swallow the burst of ecstatic excitement bubbling in her chest, when she catches Tuney's eye and feels the disappointment, the anger, and the bitterness radiating from her like a January chill.
She's just like Lily now.
Basically this is the lovechild of procrastination and a random idea floating around in my brain. This will be three chapters long. Feel free to goggle at it and let me know what you think :)