Lily sat there, staring at James.
"Dead?" she asked. James nodded.
"How?"
"You know that building down the street Voldemort attacked? That's where they were. I'm so sorry, Lily, it's my fault," James said quietly; there were tears forming in his eyes.
"It's not your fault, you didn't do anything, James," Lily replied with a confused look on her face.
"Yes it is, they decided to let me see you first this morning. If I had let them go first they would've been in there with you instead of shopping for the baby. If I could have just gone down there instead of leaving with you I probably could have done something about it," James said quickly.
Lily looked surprisingly calmer than she had been a minute ago, "It's not your fault, James. I think that's it's better for them to be…dead than having to worry about Voldemort for the rest of their lives. I was just about to tell them this morning that they were in danger because of the baby and me," Lily replied.
James wondered why Lily wasn't acting sad about the news of her parents' death.
"What do you mean they were in danger because of you? Just because they're related to you doesn't put them at that much of a higher risk." James asked curiously.
"James I have to tell you something, it's the reason I-" Lily started, but she was interrupted by the baby's cries echoing around the apartment, Sirius walked in immediately.
"Hello fair Lily, how are you feeling?" he asked passing the baby over to her, giving her a kiss on the cheek as he did so.
"Better, Sirius, how are you?" replied with a small smile.
"I'm sure I'm feeling a lot better than you are," he said returning the smile, Lily laughed again.
Lily looked down at the little boy in her arms and smiled, "Hello Harry," she cooed. He stopped crying immediately.
"Harry?" Sirius and James asked at the same time.
"Yes, Harry James Potter," Lily said with a tone of satisfaction in her voice.
"You mean you'll let him take my last name?" James asked doubtfully.
"Yes, and I will too, if the offer still stands," Lily replied, looking at James nervously.
"I'm going to go," Sirius said awkwardly as he opened the door. Lily and James didn't notice.
Lily waited with bated breath. James still didn't say anything, "Well it's ok if you don't want to, I wouldn't either if I were rejected so many times, it's just, well I guess, I mean-" Lily couldn't figure out what she was trying to say, it was just so complicated. Tears were welling up in her eyes. One fell onto Harry's face.
James saw it right away, "Oh Lily don't cry, I still want to marry you, I just, well I just didn't know what to say. You kept rejecting me, I thought that it might have been a cruel joke," James said quickly, wrapping Lily and Harry in a big hug.
"I'm so sorry for that James, I always wanted to say yes, but I just couldn't," Lily said through her tears.
"Why didn't you say yes then?" James asked.
"I can't tell you, James," Lily said quietly, pulling away from his embrace.
"Please tell me, Lily. How can I fix whatever it was I did if I don't even know what it is?" James asked, holding out his arms for the baby. Lily handed him over and James cradled him.
"James, I can't it's just that we're in a lot of danger with Voldemort around now. More trouble than most wizards and their families. Please just listen and don't interrupt, I don't want to tell you in the first place, but I figure you should know what you're getting yourself into by wanting to marry me," Lily said quietly.
James nodded, his eyes pleading for her to get on with whatever it was that she was keeping from him. She took a deep breath, remembering what had happened the day she found out she was pregnant.
Lily was sitting in the kitchen making dinner for James and herself. All of the sudden the door opened and James walked in, followed by Sirius, Remus, and Peter. There were three young women, wearing almost nothing, standing in the door behind them.
"Hey James," Lily said happily, while walking up to him. She wrapped her arms around his waist and kissed him on the cheek. "Are you ready for dinner, honey?" she asked, "I have some good news," she said smiling even wider. James grabbed her arms and untangled them from his waist and pushed her away.
"Get off of me, they're all watching," James said angrily. She could smell alcohol on his breath.
Lily stayed in the spot where James had pushed her away. She knew that he didn't know what he was doing to her, and this was the first time that she could ever remember him being that drunk, but it still hurt. He only went out to parties once every couple of weeks, she could deal with that. She even used to go with him, but she got sick of it. People would just stand around getting drunk and stoned. That was not the kind of thing that she was into.
She heard laughter outside at the bottom of her window and car doors opening. She ran over to the window to see if she could see James. She could hear the girls around him laughing and a couple more were jumping out of the car and hugging him. Pieces of their conversation drifted up to the window.
"Who was the woman in your apartment, James?" asked one of the girls that was hanging on him.
"That would be my girlfriend," James replied, with a tone of disgust.
"She must be pretty good in bed if you're keeping her around, she's not even pretty," one of the other girls asked, she was a blonde.
"Oh she is, and her cooking is good. I pity her sometimes," he replied sadly.
Lily couldn't bear to listen to the rest of James's conversation. So that's all he really thought of her? He was only keeping her around for her cooking and sex? Tears were stinging her eyes and she went straight for the closet where she kept all of her clothes and her trunk. She quickly threw everything that she couldn't bear to lose inside messily. She would leave in the morning. Her baby didn't deserve to have a father like that. She would raise the baby by herself.
James stared at Lily intently, waiting for him to tell her what happened.
"At first I left because I didn't want to raise a child in that kind of environment. You were always out with your friends, and you would treat me horribly when you came back, every single time. I got sick of it. The last straw was when I heard you tell a girl that you only kept me around for the sex and my cooking.
I didn't have a clue as to where I could stay. I couldn't stay with my parents because they would hate me if I came knocking on their doorstep, knocked up." She saw James wince when she said that she had been knocked up. She took another deep breath. Some of her anger towards him was coming back.
"I had always maintained close contact with Dumbledore, and he told me that I could stay at Hogwarts for as long as I needed. I stayed until the Holidays were over and then I found my own place near Hogwarts because someone from the school would occasionally come down and check up on me. I taught some classes for Flitwick who had left for a family emergency. That only lasted until March. Then, I went back to London to catch up with some of my old friends from primary school that I had still kept in touch with over the years. Along with a couple of my cousins, they invited me to stay with them until I got my own apartment, which ended up being right across the hall from them.
They found me a job and supported me. I had a lot of time to myself, and realized that I couldn't possibly raise the baby all alone, and I had decided to go get an abortion, but I chickened out at the last minute, when I saw some of the other girls walking out. I knew I couldn't do that to my baby, so then I considered giving it up for adoption, and realized that I couldn't do that either, I already loved the baby so much, even though I had never seen it. So I decided I just wasn't going to worry about it anymore, I'd find a job with the ministry, and hopefully find another guy that would eventually help me raise the baby like his own, and I always had my friends to help me too.
Then one night Dumbledore sent for me, telling me that I was in danger and I needed to get out of there fast. That was a few nights before you found me again. He told me that there had been a prophecy and that Voldemort might be after my child and me. I ran away from you because I didn't want you to be in the same danger as the two of us. I thought it would be easier, but I realized while I was in the hospital, holding Harry for the first time that I couldn't do this without you, James," Lily said, and started sobbing at the last part.
James felt tears in his eyes too. He couldn't believe what he had done to Lily. She didn't deserve to be treated like that; he didn't deserve someone as wonderful as her.
"I'm so sorry, Lily," he whispered. Lily smiled a little, knowing that James would always be there for her and Harry. They would get married and everything would be alright. She would finally have the family that she had dreamed of, and they'd have more children running around for Harry to play with and no one in their family would suffer anymore. At least, that's what she dreamed, but things like that are never so simple.