Virgin Mothers and Reconciling Lovers or It's a Man's World
louisaeve
Isn't it odd? After all of this none can remember them (or more specifically her) as they were?
You'd think that of their many friends and teachers and loved ones, someone could tell him how they were?
Someone could tell him that before they were Lily and James Potter she was Lily Evans (and she wished to keep that name with all her heart, but she would always do what was best for her family) and he was James Potter (and he was so sick of that name because honestly the upbringing that was the price had taken its toll on him).
But none can?
They can tell him that she was brave and beautiful and kind.
She would laugh at that, turning up her nose, reminding them she wasn't.
Because Lily Evans at eleven was scared of the world around her, scared at how everything was changing, changing, changing. And Lily Evans at thirteen was scared she'd never get asked to Hogsmeade when Marly and Mary and everyone else already had a date (she got asked out, but not by the handsome Hufflepuff she'd been crushing on). And Lily Evans at fifteen was scared of her sister hating her and Ainee moving away and Marly's parents dying and scared of the world around her. And then Lily Evans at seventeen and eighteen and nineteen was so very scared that she wouldn't be able to support herself and scared that all of her training and hard work at school wasn't going to pay off because no one was hiring muggleborns. And when she became Lily Potter (and ;it always sounded weird to her because she was Lily Evans really at heart and that's the name and the life she had lived for all of her years and Lily Potter sounded like a stranger) she was scared for herself (she was selfless yes, but at the same time as selfish as the sun as it rises and spreads its rays everywhere, claiming the world) and she was scared for James and her child and all of her friends and her sister and scared because she could do nothing.
And Lily Evans had sat on the swings of the park with her (ex) best friend and cried because all the other children teased her about her knobbly knees and her carrot top and her sharp elbows. And Lily Evans sat near the fire and wrote a diary on the Hogsmeade weekend (oh how she'd look back in scorn - what was possibly so exciting about her life that it merited documenting?) and moaned and whined and teared up about how absolutely ugly she was. And then Lily Evans in sixth year before her date with the dream and positively charming Quidditch captain of Ravenclaw had sat on Marly's bed in the dorm and picked at the giant zit on her face and had cried loudly about how he'd never want to go out with her. And Lily Evans (or newly Potter?) had fidgeted with her wedding gown (her mothers as a matter of fact) and had worried that her new husband would think her unattractive or maybe ugly and maybe be so horrified he divorced her immediately. (Marly and Mary had smoothed her hair and told her to calm down, told her that it would be okay, that it would be fixed).
And Lily Evans at five had stolen toys in the playground (well as a matter of fact they managed to make their way into her hands so really it wasn't stealing) and she'd slapped her sister hard when she wanted to be the mum when they played house. And Lily Evans at eleven had come home and purposely exaggerated and embellished exactly how much fin Hogwarts was (she didn't mention the tears that slipped out at night). And Lily Evans at fourteen had spilt ink all over Kaya McHenry's dress robes after an argument (and when Kaya launched herself onto Lily, Lily didn't hold back). And when Lily was at her sisters wedding she tore her a new one and made it all about her (and Petunia deserved it but Lily felt guilty because her mother had raised her better than that). And Lily Evans at twenty threatened to go to France to visit Ainee and take Harry with her because France isn't in this fucking war and God why do I have to put up with this shit?
So yes she was beautiful and kind and brave and any version of those words but she was also ugly and spiteful and cowardly. Because she wasn't perfect and that was okay and yet no one remembers.
James Potter will be remembered, as mischievous and brave and any version and inversion of himself and people will remember him differently. But Lily Evans, poor Lily Evans, that little Muggleborn girl will become one story told over and over again, washed like a shell and watered down until she is little more than a small, reflective, piece of glass. Everyone will want to see themselves in her and think that they could be that brave and kind and beautiful and they'll forget her, one by one and she will stand by herself and weep. Because she has become the matyred Mary and if anything that was the last thing she'd want because she's more of a Mary Magdelene really.