Written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition Round 11. Prompts were Trickery and Change.

Lily was dead.

Over and over again, the words ran through her head. Dead. Gone. There was no more Lily in the world. She was six feet under, never to see the light again. Lily Potter was no more.

Petunia clenched the letter tightly, ignoring the baby by her front door for a moment, running her eyes over the short letter again. The words remained the same. Lord Voldemort… Lily and James… Harry Potter.

Lily was … dead.

This was what she had always wanted, wasn't it? Petunia hated Lily, had loathed her with all of her being. Because Lily had always, always, gotten everything. She had been pretty and smart and loved and everyone liked her. It wasn't fair. Petunia had thought she could ignore it, back when they were younger and when Petunia didn't quite understand how the world worked. She used to think it didn't matter if everyone liked Lily, because Lily liked her and that was all she needed. And if Lily liked her, then wasn't it the same as everyone else liking her too? She could be happy with that.

But then it happened and that boy came and everything was ruined.

Magic. She had loved that word, and then resented it. It spoke of nothing but hurt and pain. But Lily had been enchanted by it. She had clutched that letter and hung onto every word of that professor that came. Lily spent the entirety of the summer before school talking on and on about Hogwarts, and spending time with him.

Come play with us, Lily would call to her. Join us.

But she never really understood that Petunia didn't belong there. They all went shopping in Diagon Alley once, and Petunia wanted it so bad. She wanted to join that world as well. She had tried, really. She had sent that letter with her hopes and dreams on it to Dumbledore, asking for entrance, and she had been rejected. After all, she was a muggle. There was no way for her to join that school.

But that was okay. Petunia was fine with that. She was normal. Lily was nothing more than an anomaly. Being normal was so much better. Normality was good. Normality was everything.

Lily was a freak. There was nothing worse in the world than a freak, and Petunia hated her.

Lily was also selfish.

On the September first, Lily had left them all without a backward glance. They were just muggles, left behind by a dreaming girl, trapped in the ordinary world.

Without a thought for her or her parents, she had left for that school. Lily never saw what it did to them, their parents. They never really understood her, although they did adored her. And as the years passed by, Lily changed. She didn't see how her vague letters that didn't say anything created worry lines in their parents faces, and her visits dwindled down to nothing. She never saw how their backs stooped, how they fretted every day. They never wanted to show their precious daughter how worried they were. It was something only she saw, something dumped on Petunia because of Lily's selfish whims.

She never saw how they died. She never went to their funeral either. At that point, they had lost all communication with her.

And now, Lily was dead.

Feeling a heavy surge of some feeling settle on her heart, Petunia returned inside and set the baby in the crib with Dudley. The feeling was hatred, she decided. For having dumped her baby on her. For pushing Petunia into the shadows. For taking everything away from her, and then leaving

Petunia entered the cheery flower shop, not feeling like not-so-secretly making her thoughts on the puke green wallpaper known. She was only here for one purpose.

"Hello! How can I help you?" A shop attendant had come around the counter, bright smile in place.

"I'd like a bouquet of petunias, please," Petunia said.

The shop attendant's eyebrow rose. "Are you sure about that, Miss? Petunias mean anger and resentment. You don't want to send the wrong message to someone."

Petunia's cheeks burned red, as irritation grew within her. She clenched her hands together. "I said I wanted a bouquet of petunias, not for you to nose around in my business," she snapped.

The attendant fell silent, and quickly got her the flowers. Petunia paid and left; not noticing the attendant think quietly for a moment.

"Petunia's… I think they also mean something else too."

She got into the car, focused on her destination. She had one last stop to go to before returning home.

The path was a familiar one. She used to go there often, before she had gotten pregnant with Dudley, and Vernon had insisted on keeping her close. It was an old graveyard, with moss and vines growing freely through the place. It was like her resting place. No one ever went there anymore. It was there that she could relax and not have the eyes of the world on her.

Petunia got out of the car and entered through the creaky gate, winding through the headstones until she arrived before two.

Violet Evans. Harold Evans.

She set the bouquet down between the graves. Petunia. A flower of anger and resentment. Petunia chuckled softly, bitterly, to herself. She had been named after this flower. She wondered if her parents knew what would become of her when she had been born. Nonsense, of course. There was no way they could've known.

"Hello, mum, dad," she said. "I'm here again."

She shuffled forward, coming closer to the headstones.

"Lily's dead," she said dully, feeling that heavy emotion she couldn't place press down on her again. "Killed by the very world she loved so much. Ironic, isn't it? Well, I'm glad she's gone. I hated her, thought I don't suppose you guys noticed, with your infatuation with her."

Here, Petunia fell silent. She stared at the bouquet for a moment.

Lily was dead.

Pursing her lips together, Petunia left. She couldn't believe that she thought for even a moment coming to the graveyard would give her some kind of relief.

She hated all of it. She hated Lily, and how her life went wrong, and how her parents were dead, and how she bought a bouquet for her parents even though she knew they weren't really for her parents. She hated how she managed to trick herself her whole life, into believing in something she never did.

Petunia hated how she never really hated Lily at all.

And Lily was dead.