We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.
- Sam Keen, from To Love and Be Loved
Prologue
Lily Evans was crazy.
This much had always been true. Everyone at Hogwarts knew it; the sky was blue and Lily Evans was crazy.
She wasn't the bad kind of crazy though; Lily Evans was the kind of crazy to sit on the roof of Gryffindor Tower during a thunderstorm while her room mates yelled at her to get down, not the kind of crazy to poison her boyfriend's porridge because she suspected him to be cheating on her.
Lily Evans was the kind of crazy to answer a personal question with a small, secretive grin, and turn away without a verbal answer, not the kind of crazy to flash the Marauder's spot at the Gryffindor table to make sure she was one of their 'chosen girls' that day.
Lily Evans was crazy.
But she was the good kind.
Sirius Black figured this out on the first train ride to Hogwarts. No one in their right mind would be friends with that dick, Snivellus , he reasoned. The guy is greasy and looks like a bat. Plus, thought young Sirius, sitting next to his future best friend and brother, Snape was too much like the family Sirius had left behind. The craziness of Lily Evans was only reaffirmed after she continued her friendship with Snape, long after they'd been sorted into enemy Houses.
Dorcas Meadows figured this out in the summer after their third year, when the Hufflepuff had spotted Lily in their shared hometown. Lily had been riding on the handlebars of some gangly teenager's motorcycle, her head thrown back and her burning hair flying, with a careless grin upon her face; she made no sound, however, and Dorcas decided then, that Lily Evans was crazy.
Remus Lupin figured this out that same summer, when he had confessed Lily, his long-time trusted friend, about his lupine condition at Florence Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor. She had given him a small smile, and murmured "I know," before kissing his cheek and walking away, not to be seen by anyone until term started.
Marlene McKinnon had discovered this the winter of fifth year, when she came upon some bloke with his hands up Lily's skirt in a broom closet. Lily's face was expressionless; even a tad bit sad. The girl looked into Marlene's gray eyes as the boy's lip's traveled to her collarbone, and didn't move or make a sound; Lily just waited until Marlene closed the door.
Everyone knew Lily Evans was crazy, and, no matter when they had fully realized it, everyone had known it all along.