THC Year 8, Round 2

House: Slytherin

Class: Potions

Category: Drabble

Prompt: [Location] Kitchen

WC: 678

Beta: Aya Diefair, DaughteroftheOneTrueKing, Ash Juillet, beawrites, The Majestic Dophin

A/N and Warnings: AU

She gasped and held the child closer to her. Had running always been this hard? She calculated how many more stops it would take, and prayed that her child would keep quiet. Her thoughts ran wild, but she refused to let them go any further than the surface; she needed to keep them safe. Two more stops and they should be safe.

She shut her eyes and let the squeeze of Apparation soothe her soul. If she kept moving, they wouldn't be able to find her. She took in a gasp of breath, recasting the Silencing charm on her child. The swing set where she'd had her first kiss glinted maliciously in the night. She shook her head; there was no time to reminisce.

One last Apparition and she should be there. Another deep breath in—she could have sagged with relief at the sight of the spotless white backsplash. There was a piercing scream, and Harry cried out at the sound. Lily sank to the floor, Petunia was here, and her big sister would be able to solve her problems.

It had been more than a year since she had last seen her sister. Petunia looked the same, a picture-perfect housewife in her magazine-ready kitchen, like something out of those fifties magazines. Her bright and inquisitive blue eyes scanned over Lily and then rested on Harry.

"The name of your childhood teddy?" Petunia asked, her eyes narrowed. "Don't try your magic nonsense here, it won't work."

"I didn't have a teddy, so you gave me yours, Trouble, to take to Hogwarts," Lily answered, trying to calm Harry down.

Petunia knelt down next to her sister on the kitchen floor. Lily could feel the dread and weight of her sister's next question. "What happened? Why here?"

At that, any semblance of control that Lily had broke. "James told me to take Harry and run. I couldn't stay, not when I knew that leaving meant Harry would still have one of us. This was the most normal place I could remember."

"Lily!" Petunia exclaimed. "Look at me, you did nothing wrong by leaving." She got up and turned on the kettle.

"I never felt the wards fall the way they did tonight. Every bit of protection that we layered over the house, it was like they had vanished. God." Lily froze at the thought. "He could find me here."

Petunia cleared her throat, handing a huge mug over to Lily. "You don't have your wand on you?"

Lily placed the mug on the floor and stood up quickly, Petunia steadied her hold on Harry and tapped her jeans pockets furiously. She hadn't even realised she'd lost it, and she couldn't go back without risking a splinch. She must have lost her wand at the last stop. There was no way she would have been able to travel more than once without it. She was exhausted, both magically and physically, she did not have it in her to mourn her wand.

"Petunia, please tell me what to do. I am begging you," Lily said, her eyes tired and itching from the unshed tears.

Petunia handed Lily the mug. "You always come right back to ask me to help, don't you? First, you drink this. It has chamomile in it, Mum's recipe." She then turned around and took out a set of documents from one of the kitchen cabinets. Lily had forgotten she had sent over important paperwork for Petunia to hold onto just in case.

"Your people aren't smart about navigating normal places, so I'm going to send you to Marge's. Unless you have any other contacts?"

Lily thought hard. She had been betrayed because she trusted James and his naive belief in his friends to keep them safe. She was done with being a scapegoat for their cat-and-mouse game. If she was a mudblood to them, then she would embrace that muddy heritage to keep herself and Harry safe.

And there, in that immaculate kitchen, she vowed to never turn her back on the ordinary to feel special. Never again.