"Tell her to stop, Mum!"
"Stop what?" Lily whined, trying to sound innocent.
"Stop THAT!" Petunia pointed at Lily's hair, which she had adorned herself with a variety of flowers. It wasn't the flowers that Petunia objected to but the way that they were opening and shutting, without any breezes to ruffle the petals. In truth, they weren't really flowers, but they didn't live in an area that allowed for gardens and so the young girl had been forced to make do with dandelions, and a few daisies, as well as one big daffodil that she had pinched from Mrs. Thomas's garden, the rich old lady that lived on the corner.
Lily was already feeling bad for stealing the flower, but she had really needed it, and the large bloom seemed to tip Petunia over the edge.
Mrs. Evans came out of the kitchen, and Lily's flowers curled up and stopped moving. It was one of those strange things that Lily could only do when no one was looking, except Petunia but she didn't count, Lily didn't need to show off to her sister.
"What is it, Petunia?" Mrs. Evans asked, her blonde hair slightly imperfect and frizzy with the heat of cooking, and her upturned nose and reddened cheeks were dusted with flour.
"It's Lily, look at what- Oh!" Petunia, who had been desperately trying to get Lily to stop, seemed a little disappointed. Lily knew she had been enjoying it.
Mrs. Evans turned to her younger daughter, stern, preparing to have to deal with one of the battles that had grown more frequent as the pair grew older. She took a look at the red-haired seven year old and burst into riotous laughter.
Lily didn't understand what was funny about her attempt to look like one of the forest nymphs in the big book of fairy tales that her father had been reading to her. She thought that she had done a very good job. It had taken a long time to braid her hair into a rope that sat at the top of her head, though the braid had ended up a little uneven and there were several stubborn bits that stuck out.
The next step had taken even longer. The picking of the flowers had required her to go all over the patch of grass that qualified as a park, and once gathered, she had needed to sit still and fix them all into her hair.
Then came the best, or worst if you agreed with Petunia, bit of the whole thing. If Lily concentrated, held her breath and screwed up her face until she felt that familiar tingling that meant power, she could make the flowers move, make them live. It was that bit that made Petunia scream, and that made Lily feel like a real Forest nymph. She knew they weren't real, Petunia had told her that enough times, but Lily didn't share Petunia's distain for things that weren't real, Lily quite enjoyed them.
"What are you supposed to be?" Mrs Evans asked, her face arranged in interest as she lowered herself down to her daughter's level.
"A forest nymph."
"A forest nymph, of course!" The woman touched her forehead, as if it were obvious. "Well, what else could you be? That's a perfect costume! You look almost real, maybe you could bring some flowers back to life for me?"
"Of course I can!" Lily yelped, excited that her mother believed in her. Normally, Petunia told her to stop pretending, or shouted at her to stop or once, a horrible time that Lily was sure she hadn't meant, slapped her in the face. It was about time, in her opinion, that she be taken seriously.
"Right!" Her mother nodded, a light smile staying on her face. She straightened back up and crossed to the dining table, from which she plucked a vase full of sunflowers that had seen better days. She sat them on the side table nearest Lily, and offered them to her daughter. Petunia gave a harsh, cold laugh.
"You don't believe I can, do you?" Lily said, wary. She remembered Petunia telling her that adults didn't really believe these things, they just lied to children.
"Of course I believe it! Do you?" Her mother sunk back down to her, held both of her hands, and met her gaze. They shared the same eyes, and Lily could see herself reflected in her mother's green eyes. She had had quite a different picture in her head. In her mind, she had been wearing a long, pale, flowing dress, not her old, tattered one with its red and blue checked pattern. Her hair had been a crown, with loose tendrils curling gently down her back, thick and thin ropes of braid winding like ivy round a tree. Now it was lopsided, and silly. The flowers had been delicate blooms of varied colours, but they looked now to be weeds, and wilting ones at that. She saw what Petunia must have seen and it stung.
She rubbed at the smudge of dirt on her nose, and felt a sting in her eyes as she looked at Petunia, whose expression was one of smug satisfaction.
Lily bit her lip, feeling it wobble, and her mother stood up.
"Come on, Petunia, why don't you help me make some icing for the birthday cake? Lily, you can lick the spoon?" Her mother's tone was enticing, and Lily slowly nodded. She turned to follow her mother into the kitchen, putting her hand into her mother's and letting herself be led away. Her sister smiled, almost kindly, and plucked a dandelion from the top of Lily's head, dropping it into the bin. A thought crossed into her mind, the voice it used sounded a lot like Petunia.
It's childish to pretend you can bring flowers to life, and you're too old for it.
She sat on the countertop in the cramped, little kitchen and let Petunia pull the flowers from her hair. Her sisters hands were gentle, and she worked slowly, weaving her fingers through the long curls and extracting the bits of dirt and root, and occasional piece of twig that had worked its way into her hair. She undid the braids, and Lily let her, though she had spent the whole day working on them. Her mother protested, saying that Lily's hair was beautiful and that she really looked like a forest nymph, but Petunia had sneered and Lily wanted her sister to smile again.
The birthday cake was for Lily, and an eight year old, as she was to become tomorrow, ought not to be as childish as Lily was. She needed to be more like Petunia. When the cake was iced, Lily refused the spoon of icing, and the bowl too, even though they had enough icing left to make a second cake. She had sniffed, as Petunia might, and shook her head.
When the dinner was ready and the plates set out, Lily settled herself into her seat at the head of the table, a special treat for the birthday girl. Petunia had let her wear one of her favourite ribbons in her hair, and, although they were not going out anywhere, Lily had worn her best dress for the occasion. The meal was nearly ready to be served, as soon as her father got home, and Lily's mother decided the table needed something more.
"Are you sure you can't help?" she asked, holding out the sunflowers before setting them on the table. "Well, they're good enough for a few more days, they'd definitely be better with a little help from a forest nymph though..." Lily saw a familiar sparkle of mischief in the green eyes, and her mother winked at her.
"Oh for goodness sake! Stop telling Lily that she can do that! She can't, she just can't!" Petunia shrieked, losing her temper and stamping her foot.
"Petunia!" her mother retorted, not raising her voice, but clearly irritated.
"Tuney!" Lily shouted, annoyed. "You know I can, I showed you, you've seen it! You know I can do it! Tell her!"
"I haven't! I just pretended to make you shut up!"
Lily wanted to cry, but there was something else, something powerful. It was a kind of anger, but not like the kind that made you want to scream, it was a determined kind of anger, the kind that Lily got whenever she was told she couldn't do something. An anger with a purpose.
As if in response to the earlier Petunia-voice that been in her head, a very Lily sort of voice shouted back, louder than anything. It was so loud inside her, her ears felt like they were aching from the pressure, her fists clenched and her eyes could see nothing but the wilted sunflowers, and Petunia's face.
I can do it if I want to!
She didn't hear her mother saying to Petunia: "Lily can do anything she wants, and so can you for that matter, but I didn't raise you to tear one another down, you're sisters, for goodness sake!"
She didn't see Petunia sneer once more, and look at Lily with revulsion, with a look that might have been intended as superior, but which betrayed the slightest fear of her sister.
She didn't notice her father burst through the door to the slightly odd scene of his wife yelling at his daughter, who was glaring at his other daughter, who seemed to be locked in a staring contest with a vase of flowers.
She did see, after a desperate second of willing a change, the browning shade of the petals fade, then brighten to golden yellow, she did see the heads of the blooms lifting, as if they were growing in high speed, she did see the leaves raise themselves and unfurl a little as they returned to their earlier state. She did see, after a moments silence and a look of disbelief from everyone present, her mother fall to the ground in a dead faint.
After she had been revived, with the help of a glass of whiskey and a large slice of birthday cake, her mother had smiled and remarked that she must not be the only one in the family with special powers, because only someone with the gift of foresight could have decided to give the name 'Lily' to a little girl who could bring flowers back to life.