Marriage. It's meant to be the happiest day of your life. And for Lily Evans, it was. Who would ever have guessed that she would spend the best day of her life marrying James Potter, had anyone told her before their 7th year, she'd have declared them insane and sent for a healer from St Mungos.

As she put on her wedding dress that morning a memory of when she was 6 years old and she made Petunia, who was 12, marry her in the garden in one of her mothers old nightgowns, sprang into her mind, creasing her face into a radiant smile, it was a nice memory. Although Lily had tripped over a loose stone and grazed her knees, which meant she spent the next half hour bawling whilst her mother tried to wash the grit out.

She was bridesmaid for her cousin Sophie when she was 9, it was magical, she felt she was too grown up to get excited about dressing up, but when she put on her dress she knew she was wrong.

The last wedding she'd been too had been Petunias, when she was 14. Petunia screamed at her at the reception that she had ruined her life and then tried to throw her out. Lily hadn't bothered to retaliate and had retreated to the car and her father had driven her home trying to tell her that she hadn't meant it whilst Lily sat in stony silence and wished she hadn't come. A slightly less pleasant memory.

Petunia was not attending Lily's own wedding.

The whirlwind of her last year at Hogwarts meant she hardly remembered the months leading up to the event. She started her seventh year with her shiny new head girl badge hoping that James wouldn't make life too unpleasant for her and that they could be mature and civilized. She ended it wearing an engagement ring and planning a wedding.

He proposed to her the night before her first NEWT exam when she was trying to study. She'd never thought she'd marry straight out of school, but she pushed that aside thinking that if there was a time to live in the moment, it was now, with Voldemort gaining ground and the ministry failing to stop him, and besides, of course she'd never planned to marry straight out of school - she hadn't been in love with someone in her school. And there was no doubt in her mind she was in love with James.

The night before she walked down the aisle her best friend, Natasha, had sat her down and asked her a very odd question,

"Lily" She'd said hesitantly, "You will be happy won't you?"

"Of course!" She'd exclaimed, her face flushed with excitement and anticipation,

Natasha had beamed at her and given her a great big hug, "I'm so happy for you!"

Lily hadn't had any intention of staying at home and doing nothing, she had passed her NEWTs well enough to apply as an auror for the ministry, and in the current situation, she was accepted at once. As was James. In the heady excitement of the first few months of their new life, everything seemed perfect. They left for work, and from work at the same times, there was no waiting for the other to return home, many of their friends worked in the same department, and despite the darkness looming, everyone had as yet remained upbeat and cheerful.

Lily discovered she was pregnant one Monday lunchtime in early November. She refused to leave work until the last minute, when they practically threw her out, before she had the baby at her desk, Sirius had commented, and received a smack round the head from a shrieking Lily, much to the disapproval of the other people subjected to working with them. Harry was born after an exhausting 24 hour long labor, and for the first few days, it was sheer bliss.

When they returned home and James went back to work, and she spent hour after hour trying to soothe him into sleeping and having little rest herself she was exhausted and sank heavily into post natal depression. She'd sit for hours at a time staring vacantly out the window with tears rolling down her cheeks and her son held in her limp arms. She felt her perfect life had disintegrated before her eyes.

The attacks had moved on from just muggles and muggle borns, now any family, pureblood or otherwise, who rejected Voldemort's cause was at high risk. The Potters were the first purebloods to be murdered. After the death of his parents, James worked even more obsessively then before, sometimes Lily didn't speak to him for days, as he got home so late, and left so early, he was often only there during the few hours Harry slept and she lapsed into much needed sleep, so deep she was left practically unconscious.

Two weeks before Harry's first birthday Peter was the only thing between them and certain death, and the depression that Lily had been promised would subside within a matter of weeks had yet to lift.

A few days after his birthday she jumped as she heard the door open,

"Hi" James called as he came into the hall and slammed the door,

"Hello" she replied, looking in through the kitchen window, she was stood in the small garden smoking a much desired cigarette, whilst Harry slept. "Why are you home so early?" her voice was hollow, void of feeling. He'd become a stranger to her.

"They asked me to check out a house before I left, turned out there was nothing to see, and here I am"

She nodded silently, the pain of sitting at home aimlessly, when she swore she could feel her IQ dropping point by point, and her brain turning to mush was accentuated by his success at work. Not, she persuaded herself, that she could consider working her present state. Nor that she could leave Harry alone with the ever present threat looming above their heads.

"How was your day?" He asked conversationally, as he sat down in a kitchen chair,

She gave a small sardonic laugh,

"Lily…"

"Don't"

He sighed heavily, "I know things are hard but, you could go back to work, Harry would be fine, so long as Peter-"

"I don't trust Peter" She snapped

"We've been over this" he said rubbing his temples,

"No. You talked, I listened"

"What? I asked you, you agreed"

"And if I'd said no?"

"We could have thought about it"

"Before you made the decision anyway"

"No"

"Yes." She said glaring at him,

After a moment of silence he suddenly said, "What did I do?"

"What?"

"Its been nearly a year Lily, you haven't gone back to work, you're keeping yourself here by some ridiculous idea that he won't be safe without you, you never speak to any of your friends, you never speak to me"

"Of course. That's what this is all about, that's what this has always been about"

"No, course not, but we're married, and we haven't had a conversation in days, not had a proper conversation in weeks, months maybe, and as soon as we do, we fight"

"How can we have a conversation when you're always working?"

"How can we have a conversation if all you do is act like we're back in 5th year at school, like you wish I'd go away and stop bugging you" he shot back angrily,

"Sometimes I wish we were still in school" she murmured,

"Yeah? Well me too Lily, you act like you're suffering, but what from? Have your parents been killed? Have you been working 18 hour days? Do you hardly see your kid? And then to be told that one of your best friends can't be trusted? What can I do! Have you maybe stopped to think that just maybe, working all the time is all I can do to try and get rid of the threat that's all around us every day? So that we can be normal again?"

"Don't belittle me! Do you-" There was a resounding crash from the living room, she stopped mid flow and her eyes grew wide. "James…what was that…" she asked softly, her anger and resentment ebbing away,

"I don't know" he breathed, getting up silently and pushing the door open a crack, "Get Harry"