Disclaimer: I'm too young to be Rowling so there is sadly no way Harry Potter is mine…
Placing: Before the war - could be canon…
Just an idea I had, nothing more.
Excerpts from HP OotP and DH.
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LILY'S CHOICE
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"Stand aside, girl."
Today was the day.
The one day she had sacrificed everything for.
"Not Harry! Not Harry! Please! I'll do everything!"
But there would be no mercy – and she knew it.
She looked him in the eye with determination and in defiance of her death.
Her green, green eyes lit up with death.
"Avada Kedavra!"
When she met the young, dark haired boy, she knew instantly, that she would break his heart one day. And yet, she still searched him out after leaving with her sister that day. She simply could not not befriend him.
"Why? Why do you do it if you know how it will turn out in the end?" her sister asked her in a pleading voice one day.
"Because loosing him is far more acceptable, than knowing how it should have been and not having loved him at all," she answered truthfully.
"But –"
"It is my decision," she interrupted her sister softly.
Like everything else was her decision as well.
"I am sorry, so very, very sorry! I'm so sorry – but I won't plead for forgiveness! At least not until I am long since dead!"
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"Lily, take Harry and run! He is it! Hurry! I'll stop him –"
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"… I'm sorry, Tuney, I'm sorry! Listen –" She caught her sister's hand and held tight to it, even though Petunia tried to pull it away. "Maybe once I'm there – no, listen, Tuney! Maybe once I'm there, I'll be able to go to Professor Dumbledore and persuade him to change his mind!"
It was an empty promise – a promise solely there to try to prevent the break of their friendship to happen. A break that had long since happened, because she had chosen the dark haired boy over her sister long ago.
But she couldn't not try – knowing that there was no way to reconcile. She had long since done everything so that the break between her sister and her was fair and square.
Even if she cried in her heart, Petunia had a right to live.
And her sister wouldn't be able to live as long as she was still in her sister's life.
So she hadn't pleaded with her sister until it was way too late to plead.
"I don't – want – to – go!" said Petunia, and she dragged her hand back out of her sister's grasp. "You think I want to go to some stupid castle and learn to be a – a –"
She thought not – she knew her sister wanted to go.
But there was nothing she wouldn't sacrifice to rescue her sister's life.
"- you think I want to be a – a freak?"
Her eyes filled with tears, when the future in front of her eyes shifted.
Instead of dying with fifteen, her sister would now die of old age.
The price was that she would forever live with the guilt for what she had done to her son – and at the same time with no guilt at all.
Because there were people in her life, she would sacrifice everything for.
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"Not Harry! Not Harry! Please – I'll do everything!"
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"Evans, Lily!"
She walked forwards on trembling legs and sat down upon the rickety stool. Professor McGonagall dropped the Sorting Hat on her head and she opened her shields for it so that it could see what she knew.
"Oh my!" the Hat exclaimed.
"There is no choice for me," she said. "I'll do everything for him – and you can't make me loose him. You can't sort me because there is nothing to chose from."
"Do you truly know the end of the path you are taking?" the Hat asked her and she laughed a bitter, mental laugh.
"Even if I have not yet born him, he is still my son. Even if the prophecy is not yet spoken, it will still come into play and destroy the life of the one I love the most. Sort me. There is nothing to chose."
And barely a second after the Hat had touched her dark red hair it cried, "Gryffindor!"
"I am sorry," it said as parting words to her.
"Whatever for?" She replied. "I knew since I was born that I would never even try to change my fate. There is nothing to be sorry for."
And she stood up and walked away from the safety she could have gained from every other house – from every other path she could have chosen.
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"Lily, take Harry and run! He is it! Hurry! I'll stop him –"
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She saw him in the air, embarrassed and furious.
She saw herself standing there and watching how he was humiliated beyond what had ever happened before. He broke afterwards. His spirit taken by the assault and brokenly he turned to the dark, wishing for revenge.
He died when he was seventeen.
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She saw him in the air, embarrassed and furious.
She saw herself standing up for him and forgiving him. He returned to the light afterwards, simply because he couldn't loose her.
So she lost him.
He died not even a year after his return to the light.
And her heart broke on the knowledge that the one who killed him would never be stopped because she was unable to tell them who had done the deed.
His murderer was never caught.
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"You – wait," he panted, staring up at James Potter with an expression of purest loathing, "you – wait!"
"Wait for what?" Sirius Black said coolly. "What're you going to do, Snivelly, wipe your nose on us?"
He let out a stream of mixed swear words and hexes, but with his wand ten feet away nothing happened.
"Wash out your mouth," said James Potter coldly. "Scourgify!"
Pink soap bubbles streamed from his mouth at once; the froth was covering his lips, making him gag, choking him –
"Leave him ALONE!"
She said it because she couldn't stand by.
She said it, because it had to be said – even if it would break her heart in the end.
And the only thing she could do was argue for him until that word fell – the one word she would use as an excuse to rescue his life.
There was nothing she could do but close her eyes, when his mouth opened and the one word fell that she would forever be unable to forgive him for.
"I don't need help from filthy little Mudbloods like her!"
One moment of hesitation.
One moment for her heart to break.
'I am sorry, so sorry, Severus! I am sorry for everything I am condemning you for!'
Then she gave in and broke their friendship apart.
Because he had a right to live another twenty-three years – as dark as they might be.
Because he was one of those she would do everything for.
And he was better of broken than dead.
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"Not Harry! Not Harry! Please – I'll do everything!"
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They were called to the headmaster one night.
In her hands, her new born child was fast asleep.
"Lily, James, I fear, I have grave news for you –"
But it wasn't news.
It was just the final nail in her coffin – the one final nail that she had waited for since the day she had birthed her baby boy.
"- there's a prophecy about the fall of Voldemort. It could fit either your child or the Longbottoms'."
But there was no child to chose from.
The headmaster might believe it.
James might believe it.
The Longbottoms and every one else might.
But she long since had known the truth.
"I am sorry, Alice, Frank," she whispered that night in the darkness. "I am so sorry, but I can't rescue you. Forgive me! Forgive me for my deeds!"
Because she had known since she could remember, that it was her fate to die for her child. She had known since she could remember that it would fall on the shoulders of her child to destroy the man that had fallen into the darkness long before she was even born herself.
"Forgive me for what I am about to do!"
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"Lily, take Harry and run! He is it! Hurry! I'll stop him –"
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"You shouldn't use me, you should use Wormtail," Sirius Black said pleadingly. "I'll hide myself! I'll be the decoy! No one will ever know you used Wormtail to cast the Fidelius! You will be safe!"
"What do you think, Lily?" James asked her and she smiled at her husband while caressing her son's hair.
"I think the idea is a good one," she said.
And while she smiled, she cried bitter tears inside.
For one to live, two had to die for him.
There was nothing to chose.
That night when James asked her in distress why she was crying, she couldn't answer.
There was no way to plead with him to forgive her.
She was taking his life, like she was taking her own.
'I'm sorry! I am sorry, so sorry, James!'
But there was no way out.
The only way for her son to live was for them to die – and she would do everything for her child.
"Hide him, sister of mine. Hide him from the world," she pleaded. "Shield him, Severus. Shield him until you die!"
Because those two had always been the only things she could leave behind to shield her son from the darkness of the world.
"I am so, so sorry, James."
But their deaths were something she would never change.
"Don't forget, mummy loves you, daddy loves you!"
The door was blasted open.
She let go of her son and turned to face her soon-to-be murderer.
His red eyes were looking at her with hatred.
"Stand aside, girl," he hissed and she thanked Severus with all her being for his pleading with the monster.
"Stand aside and I won't kill you!"
Today was the day.
"Hide him Tuney! Hide him from the world!"
The one day she had sacrificed everything for.
"Shield him, Severus, shield him until you die!"
Today was the day she would die.
"Not Harry! Not Harry! Please! I'll do everything!"
But there would be no mercy – and she knew it.
She looked her would-be murderer in the eye with determination and in defiance of her death.
She looked him in the eye with the knowledge of her end.
It had been her fate from the start – but she would not have chosen anything else because it was the only way for her son to live.
Her green, green eyes lit up with death.
"Avada Kedavra!"
And Lily Potter's eyes closed for the last time in her life.
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Some sacrifices were worth making – and dying for your child was the uttermost sacrifice in Lily's eyes.