Sisters

My father was a horticulturist and my mother was an ordinary housewife. We lived happily together the three of us until the day she came. I was almost four when my sister Lily was born. I hated her from the moment she came home from the hospital always the center of attention with her nappies being changed or feeding time. Mummy was always saying, "How much Lily loved her big sister Petunia!" But I knew she didn't love me, she was there to steal their love away. Lily with her great big blue eyes and charming smile. She was always laughing at everything, always smiling and cooing. I hated her.

When she was four and I was eight we were playing with our dolly's in the tree house I can remember being angry with her for touching my new dolly. I shoved her out of the tree house and she did not fall. I screamed to see her not fall, Lily scream to see herself floating and mother came running from the house. She climbed up the ladder and took Lily down and into the house. No one talked about it. There were many things that happened that no one talked about. Doors would slam closed by themselves when we would argue. A spoon that stirred her soup when she was sick. Mother and Father would never say that something was wrong with Lily, but I knew better.

Lily was always trying to hug me and wanted to follow me everywhere. She said that I was her best friend and the best sister that anyone could have, but I knew she was lying. She was just trying to make me like her the way everyone else liked her. I was so happy the summer I turned fifteen because I would finally be in a different school than she was. To my surprise, it was Lily who was to go to a completely different school.

We were having dinner and suddenly an owl flew into the kitchen window and dropped a letter into my sisters hands. Mother and Father gasped in shock at seeing a bird in the house and immediately asked Lily who the letter was from. It was something to do with magic and our parents chortled with delight.

"A witch in our family, oh Petunia isn't that exciting, our Lily is a witch!" gushed my mother.

"Both girls are getting so big! First our Petunia is an honor student and now our Lily is going to Hogwarts. Mother I think this calls for the dandelion wine!" father said getting the bottle to share with the family.

Lily just sat there smiling, beaming her whole face a glow with happiness. I threw my tea in her face, screaming "I never want to see you again Lily, I hate you!"

I did not go to the train station to say goodbye, I did not speak with her until she came home for the Christmas holiday break. She was gushing with strange new words such as Qwidich, and speaking nonsense about flying broom sticks, potions, and teachers who transformed themselves from cats into people. Then more letters came to her over the break from owls. She sent and received more letters over the time we where home than I did in the past year. I hated her for her all her strangeness. I was glad when she left again. Mother and Father received an owl letter once a week and always wrote back. She wrote to me as well, but I never wrote back. I wanted no part of her strange ways. I like my life normal, without surprises.

It was over Christmas break of my last year at school when I first heard the name James Potter. Lily whispered to me as we lay in bed talking in the room that we still shared. "He is the meanest boy I know. Why just before break he treated to dump another classmate head first into the lake if I didn't go out with him..." I never listed to her rambling but I knew from her voice that she like that Potter boy, even if she didn't know it yet herself.

The years past and I heard more of his name and then the day came when I was home visiting Mother and Father and I heard a strange voice from the kitchen. "Petunia I want you to meet my fiancé, James Potter" Said Lily hugging me and a strange looking man with very shaggy hair that stood up in all directions shook my hand. "A pleasure to meet you at last!" He said his voice warm and friendly. I scowled at them all and left, I wanted no part of her or him or the strangeness that my parents embraced.

I did not invite Lily to my wedding, she sent me an invitation to hers but I did not go. Our parents health declined and they both died within six months of each other. The last time I saw Lily was when we buried my mother. Both of us were very pregnant and I recall her saying something about not being able to visit, that they would be out of town for sometime due to business. I did not care, I wanted nothing to do with her.

I was not quite two years later when I opened the door to find a baby on the stoop with a note. I read the note that told of my sister and her husbands death and that I was now responsible for her son Harry. We sat the baby on the kitchen table and put our son down for a nap. My husband was reluctant to take on a new financial burden. I did not want another child to raise. The baby began to cry and I changed his nappy and gave him a bottle. His big blue eyes stared at me and I blinked back tears that I did not know I had. "I'll clean out the cupboard under the stairs, he can stay there." I told my husband. He kissed my check and left for work. I began to clear out the cupboard feeling tears fall on everything I touched.

"Lily!" I raged in my heart. "How could you let yourself be killed and leave me to raise your child. How dare you leave him like this without parents or money. How selfish of you to do this to him, to me. I hate you Lily!"

I picked up the baby and set him in the cupboard. I leaned over him to pull the empty bottle from his slack sleeping mouth and a tear fell upon the lighting shaped cut on his forehead. He opened his eyes, Lily's eyes, and smiled at me with Lily's smile.

I shut the cupboard door on the cherubic face and as more tears fell I whispered, "I love you Lily... goodbye..."