Word count: 1542

Chapter 1

Humming softly, Lily put the bags of groceries she had just bought on the floor, going through her pockets until she found her keys. She pushed the door open with her foot while she tried to make sure none of purchases fell down. She had bought enough food to last her and James a week, and she didn't have the courage to clean her floor should something break now.

She had met James almost seven years ago, when she had transferred to Hogwarts for her two last years of High School.

Hogwarts was a private school in Scotland and though she had hated having to leave her family behind in London, she also had known her public school just hadn't been what she needed. Leaving her friends behind had been as hard as leaving her family, but everyone had agreed it would be best for her to leave for a better school. In fact, her best friend had already moved away in the summer, so staying wouldn't have been as great as before anyway.

This new school had been the weirdest school Lily had ever been to but despite the fact that the school was actually a castle, life hadn't changed much for her. She had easily befriended the girls she shared a dorm with and the school had soon turned out to be exactly the kind of challenge she had needed and missed.

She had found herself in the same House as James – they had been created to encourage friendly rivalry between students, and each House had its own specialties, subjects they favored – and though she had loved it, the same couldn't be said of the young man who had spent two years trying to catch her attention in all the stupidest ways possible.

At the time he had been everything she hated and she hadn't been able to stand him. It wasn't until he finally understood that his attitude was working against him and he stopped acting like the playboy he admittedly was that Lily began to consider him as nice.

Nowadays, everyone told them all about how good they looked together and how it seemed they were made for each other, but back then, there had hardly been a day when the two of them didn't end up having a shouting match for their entire Tower to hear. It always made them laugh to see people's head when James told them that things hadn't always been that easy between them.

Still humming, Lily managed to drag herself from her memories as she finished putting everything she had bought in their brand-new kitchen. They had moved in not two months ago – a gift from James' parents for their long awaited wedding – and Lily was still getting used to the two-storey house.

Finally everything was done, and she wandered toward the living room in search for her husband. His parents never had a television and when he had discovered that he could easily install one in their home, he had done so and since then often spent hours watching stupid programs – and that was when he was alone. If Sirius, his best friend, came, then there was absolutely no hope for Lily to get them away from whatever soccer match they ended up watching.

Lily ended up watching them with a desperate air, while talking to their only sane friend, Remus Lupin. Fortunately, James' job as a policeman didn't let him a lot of time to watch sports on TV, and Lily was sure that once the novelty of having his own TV had worn out he would be back to normal. At least he had nothing against watching rented movies with her, and even Lily had to admit that it was easier than to go out to a cinema and hope they'd get good places.

The door to the living-room was closed, though, and when she opened it she was surprised to see it empty. Rolling her eyes, she moved back to where she had left her bag to fetch her phone. If James had once again ended up in some mischief with his friends, she'd never let him see the end of it, not when he had told her he'd be back before her. Which actually meant he owed her money – again. You'd think he would have learned he couldn't win a bet against her in all the years he had tried.

Three rings, and then his voice telling her he wasn't available for now, and that if it was important she should leave a message. Knowing it would be no use to do so since seeing a missed call on his phone would be enough warning for him, she hang up and tried Sirius' number.

He didn't answer either, but this time she left a message that went along the lines of 'if you know where my husband is, please tell him that I'm waiting for him".

Sighing, she looked at the clock and then back at her phone. It wouldn't hurt to try again, now would it? Her fingers composed the now familiar numbers, but this time she heard something. It was a very familiar tune, but it didn't come from her phone. Instead, it came from upstairs. Had James once again forgotten his phone? It was no surprise she couldn't get a hand on him then…

There wasn't really anything she could do but wait for him to come home, so she set to go find his phone. That way she would be sure the next time he left the house he'd have it with him.

She called again, and followed the sound to their bedroom. The corridor wasn't long, but the room they had chosen was at its end and there unfortunately wasn't any light that didn't come from half yellowed neon that they had promised themselves to change soon.

Perhaps it was because said lights were dim and currently flickering, or perhaps it was because she was so used to walking that corridor and was busy watching her phone, but when she reached the closed door to their room, she didn't notice that there was red on the floor. After all, the flooring they had chosen was quite dark and she had no reason to look down.

It wasn't until she opened the door, stepped on their light carpet and saw red footprints where her shoes had been that she noticed something was wrong. She turned around, her heart beating faster against her chest and the phone with which she had been ready to call again slipped out of her hand as she took in the sight of her dead husband's broken body.

There was blood everywhere. Somehow he had been pinned against the door in a way that hadn't hindered her opening it and she stepped closer, trying to will the scene she was seeing into disappearing. It just wasn't possible. James couldn't be gone, not now, not ever.

Then her brain noticed what her eyes were seeing and she screamed. She scrambled as far away from the door as she could, her fingers opening and closing on emptiness uselessly as she struggled to breath. Her eyes were burning with tears and her limbs felt heavy, but she somehow managed to call Sirius with her phone before her world faded to black.

When she came around, the room was empty of James' body, but the blood, the red she was seeing everywhere was still there. She slowly got up, leaning heavily on the bedside. Her legs felt like jelly and her mouth was dry and she was ever so thankful when Sirius arrived.

He stayed frozen in the doorstep, his gaze fixed upon something beside her. Slowly she turned around and froze too when she saw the blood red message written on the wall. She didn't scream this time. She was too shocked for that.

Let's play

"Sirius?"

"Hm?"

"Call the police."

"Already done, they're coming."

Lily took a deep breath and crossed the room trying not to look at anything. When she arrived by Sirius' side, she flung herself at him and finally cried.

Sirius let her cry for a moment but each time he lifted his head he could see the ravaged room and he just had to know.

"Lily, I'm sorry but… What exactly happened?"

Lily stiffened.

"Do I have to?"

"I know it's hard, but you'll have to say it eventually."

"I… I don't know what happened. I just got here and James was… he was… just lying there-" She gestured toward the open door where there was the biggest blood stain "and I think I fainted because I can't remember anything after that…"

"Lily? There's no body here anymore…"

Lily paled even more, if that was possible.

"But… That means whoever did this was still there when I got home."

Sirius didn't answer, but his hold tightened around Lily, almost like he was trying to convince himself that she was still there and not somewhere dead like James was.

It was how the police found them, people Sirius worked with and James had worked with, and they didn't say anything either as they saw the room and understood from James' absence what had most probably happened.

AN/ So I'm once again beginning a multi chaptered story, something I really shouldn't do… But I just couldn't get rid of this idea once it showed up, and I have so many plans for this…

This was written for the

-As Strong As We Are United Competition

- Colors of the Rainbow Drabble/One shot Challenge, Red.

Please leave a review to tell me what you thought of this.