This is my first fic, so be kind. :)

Disclaimer: None of it's mine, except the AU portions.

A/N: So I'm going back through all of my old stories and kind of hating them. I do this a lot. I'm editing the parts that I really can't stand, so I guess you can call this a bit of a repost. Enjoy, none-the-less.

Awareness slammed in suddenly, heralded by the blaring of the alarm clock next to her ear. Lily sat up in bed with a gasp, breathing quickly. She slapped the alarm off quickly and slid out of bed without a sound, tiptoeing lightly across the floor to her closet and pulling on a semi-clean pair of jeans. Lily flipped her coppery hair back into a bun and slipped, barefoot, out of her 'room'. It was more of a large walk-in closet, really, but she didn't complain. It was bigger than her old room in Cardiff. She and her father had moved from Wales about a month ago, and Lily was unbelievably happy and hopeful about the move. In London, she could have a new beginning. She had transferred schools, as well. Her old school, St. Evans Academy, had been well enough. It was the students there that had hated her. She wasn't sure why; she was just…different…in some way she couldn't name, and it set her apart from everyone else. Moving to England had been her salvation. The one thing she missed about Wales, though, was the scenery. She had had places to run to, to hide in. There were small ponds in the forests near her home, and small caves in the mountains. But here in urban London, there was no place to go. Just row after row of houses. Lily occasionally thought she would suffocate from the normality. But tomorrow… tomorrow morning, she would take the Hogwarts Express to her new school. It had been her dream to go there ever since she had discovered she was a witch. Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was recognized worldwide as a first-class wizarding academy. It had turned out Britain's best wizards.

She shook herself out of her reverie and began to prepare breakfast. Ever since her mother, Branwen, had walked out on her father, taking Petunia, Lily's sister, with her, he had been angry, volatile, and liable to vent his wrath on whoever was closest. Which, often enough, was Lily. She hadn't told him about her 'talent'. He believed that the school she had attended was a normal school in the country. Her father had never cared enough to ask about it or check her homework, and she didn't think he ever would. This didn't bother Lily at all. In fact, she preferred him when he was either passed out or asleep.

He tended to be unconscious more. Her father simply refused to acknowledge that his system could carry no more than seven or eight beers in one night before overloading.

So, almost every night, Lily would drag him into his room, put a pillow underneath his head, and brew a hangover remedy in the kitchen. It had only gotten worse when they moved to England, though she wasn't sure why. Lily lived in dread of the nights when her father came home drunk, but not sufficiently. He would stomp around the house in a drunken stupor, ranting about 'that bitch Branwen', Lily's mother. Then he would throw things for about half an hour, during which Lily would frantically try to hide, though she knew by now that it was no use. Even if she did find a good spot, she would have to come out sometime, and when she did, it would hurt much, much, more.

Then, after the enraged shouts ceased, her father would come looking for her. This was the time she most dreaded. Sometimes it was just a couple well-placed kicks or punches. He had surprisingly good aim for a drunk. If he was completely smashed, he would take off his belt. That hurt. A lot. At last, he would either pass out or lose interest in whipping her. Then Lily stumbled to her room and fixed herself up as best she could using only potions. But, inevitably, she would run out of ingredients or potions, and, seeing as this tended to happen in the middle of summer holidays, Lily would return to school covered with bruises and cuts. At dawn on the first day of term, the beginning of the time she was allowed to use magic, she would cast a concealment charm on herself. It projected a fake image of herself onto herself, one with flawless skin. Only someone who was carefully scrutinizing her would notice anything wrong. I'll have to do that again this year, she thought as she carefully balanced her father's breakfast tray on her hip, making her way upstairs.

"Good morning, Father. I brought your breakfast." She hated saying those words.

"Bring it here." Lily walked over to her father, where he was sitting upright in bed. His red face jiggled (for lack of a better word) on a virtually nonexistent neck, and his small beady eyes glared at her, as though it was her own fault she was alive. He greedily seized the boiling hot coffee mug, and gave a startlingly girly screech. Lily would have laughed if her father hadn't thrown the mug at her in a fit of rage. The scalding hot coffee burned her side, and the mug shattered inches away from her, driving sharp porcelain shards into her leg. She bit her lip to keep from screaming, and gingerly picked the protruding pottery out of her leg while her father screamed in the background.

"Idiot girl! You've gone and ruined the carpet-" Lily looked down at the floor and allowed her father's words to pass by, focusing on the feeling in her leg. Some of those pieces had to be at least three inches...

"Are you listening? Do you hear me?" She could hear her father, but she couldn't comprehend what he was saying, and frankly, she didn't care. Suddenly, she felt an iron-strong grip on her arm and was seized from her position on the floor. Her father yanked her up by her forearm and said, pointing at the floor, "Clean. It. Up. Now." Lily was dropped unceremoniously on the floor again, and she took a napkin from the abandoned tray and began to sop up the coffee. She was back in that familiar place again, where nothing outside her task mattered. There was nothing more than the brown stains, no pain, no voices, no fear, just a task to be completed.

And suddenly, there was more; there was a line of fire across her back, and pressure on her stomach as she collapsed on the floor, and a familiar hiss over her head.

She squeezed her eyes shut and forced the feeling back, but it wasn't enough (had never been enough, ever, and she knew it but there was nothing left if she couldn't still try) and she cried out in anguish, and was rewarded by more savage blows…and then it was all over. Lily rolled over weakly and was rewarded with a kick in the stomach as her father strolled past her on his way out of the room. She allowed herself a moment's labored breathing before pulling herself to her feet and dragging herself down the hall, back into her room, and into the welcoming darkness.