title from e.e. cummings and miss swift's my tears ricochet. if you enjoy music as you read, i have playlists! check out this story on ao3 (same title and username) to find them
may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.
For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea
maggie and milly and molly and may, E.E. Cummings
Somewhere in Cokeworth, a young witch's life begins with a letter and a boy with black hair.
The cogs have always been in motion, Lily Evans knows that. She's always known herself to be different from others, known from the way her tea stirs itself. From the way her small plot in the family garden grows much faster than the rest and the way her hair stays long, dark red curls defying gravity despite their weight and her mother's frequent attempts at grooming them.
So when the boy with the black hair quite literally drops a tree branch into her life and changes everything, she's not surprised. And when the letter from someone called Albus Dumbledore arrives, well, it just confirms what she's always known.
Lily Evans is unlike everyone else in her young life and she is bound to a destiny that they can't even imagine. Not that she can either. But she can daydream about Hogwarts, and she does so constantly.
"And what do they call the Houses again?"
"Slytherin, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Gryffindor."
She's found that Severus is the only one who can tolerate her musings anymore.
"Which do you think I'll be in? I fancy myself quite smart, you know."
She teases him in a posh accent, because she already knows the answer to this one. If she's insufferable about Hogwarts as a whole, Severus is equally so about Slytherin.
"Slytherin, of course. We're perfect for it. We'll do so well there that I imagine we'll never have to come back here again."
"Well, I'm not sure about never. I think I'd miss my parents and Tuney too much for that."
"You don't think they'd understand? They have to know you're better than Cokeworth and all the Muggle shite."
Lily hates when he curses, but she knows it comes from his home. She hates when he hates where they come from even more.
"You know I don't actually mind it here. It can be a lot of fun."
"Once we get to Hogwarts, you'll realize how boring this place is and you'll get sick of it just like me."
"Maybe I won't. Maybe I'll get homesick instead and live here forever. The Cokeworth witch."
She doesn't want that. Not at all and especially not without him.
"Fine. Stay here then. Go to a boring school with your boring sister and become a boring Muggle. I don't care what you do."
He storms away. Lily doesn't argue with Sev often, but when she does, she swears she feels heavier. A stone made insignificant, sinking into the earth.
When she finally returns home, she can't bring herself to answer Petunia's questions.
Boring, he'd called her. A boring girl with a boring life ahead. Lily would never say it out loud, but she's relieved that she's not a Muggle like Petunia. And that makes her feel much worse.
Summer passes slowly. Groggy with smog and sweat, Lily and Sev come back together as she and Petunia pull back apart.
He apologizes sweetly on her doorstep and Petunia sneers from the cramped staircase. They flee to their favorite spot in the park.
Repeat.
They steal chocolates, only to have them melt in their pockets while they whisper about magic they can't yet comprehend.
Repeat.
Petunia writes the Headmaster of Hogwarts and begs him to not leave her behind.
Lily will never know.
Repeat.
Lily's flowers grow, shockingly so. Petunia's stay short and wither in the summer sun.
Repeat.
But as all things eventually do, the heat wave breaks, and September arrives.
On her final night at home, Lily's parents cook her favorite meal and even let her sip on a glass of wine, like a real adult.
"My sweet girl. I'm so proud of you. But I can't believe you're leaving us already! How are we going to get on without you?"
"Mum," Lily blushes and looks away, catching a glimpse of Petunia's blank face next to her. She wasn't offered any wine, so Lily slides hers over with her pinky.
"Anyways, I'll be back for hols soon as you know it. You won't even have time to miss me."
"That's not likely," her dad answers from the sink, a wet glisten in his eyes. "And your plants certainly will. We'll miss that green thumb most of all, Lily."
Petunia slides the glass back silently.
Later, after hours of sleepless tossing in her own bed, Lily crosses the room and slides under her sister's duvet.
"Tuney? Are you awake?"
"No."
"Hm."
Minutes pass, but Lily still can't bring herself to sleep.
"Tuney? I'm scared," she whispers, almost inaudible. "I don't think I can do this. What if everyone thinks I'm a freak? What if I'm different from them too?"
Petunia is silent, but Lily can feel her stiffness across the mattress they share. Finally: "Lily, you are different. No one else in the world is like you. Own it."
She doesn't turn around or hug her or offer anything else. Instead, Lily presses her feet to her sister's, skin to skin, and smiles. She falls asleep soon after that.
From across the bustle of King's Cross, Lily catches Severus' eye. She grins at him and her mother doesn't miss it, or the intended audience.
"You stick with that boy. Lord knows he needs it, but don't let him walk all over you. This is your education too."
"Yeah, I know Mum. It's fine. It's going to be great, actually."
At that, her mother smiles. "Yes it is. Now off you go!"
After a series of increasingly long hugs from her parents and a stiff goodbye from Petunia, Lily walks to the Hogwarts Express and Sev, waiting there for her.
"Lily, wait!"
She's barely able to turn back before she's enveloped in her sister's knobby arms. There's a wetness in her hair, close to where Petunia's face is pressed.
"Don't forget about me."
And then she's gone, dry-eyed and back at their parents' side. Lily takes a deep breath and a last look, before she's on the train and headed onward. She'll have plenty of time to miss them later.
They're wandering the train searching for seats when she hears a commotion ahead. Turning, she finds herself facing an unattended trolley, loaded with candy, barreling straight toward her.
Just in time, Sev grabs her hand and tugs her into an empty compartment where they watch as the cart flies past.
"I suppose this is just the start," Sev jokes.
Lily laughs in relief.
It's easy to fall back into the rhythm of the summer, the two of them, alone, speaking nonsense that could easily become future or fiction. They sit, poring over textbooks that they've already read twice over.
"I think we'll be aces at Herbology, Sev. I mean, magical plants! Can you even imagine?"
He makes a face.
"Not so sure about Herbology for me. Perhaps Potions… hopefully we can be partners."
"You'll be great in Potions! Although, I can't see you being particularly bad at anything."
The door flies open and a pair of boys stumble in breathlessly, twin dark heads tousled.
"Did you see that-"
"She looked fuming-"
"Mad! You're a madman!"
"You're one to talk- Oh. Hello!"
Finally noticing the company, one of the boys manages to pull himself from the other's orbit. He turns his bespectacled eyes on them, one hand leaping into the organized chaos of his hair.
"Do you mind if we-?" He gestures erratically at the empty seat.
"Of course!" Lily answers brightly; she's eager to meet her first wizards aside from Severus.
Their robes and trunks shine against the drab surroundings of the car, including Severus and Lily. She waits as they throw their things into the bins above and sit, but they quickly resume their strange, overlapping conversation.
Resignedly, she leans back into Severus, sitting tensely beside her.
"I just want to be there already," she whines. "I want to get Sorted as soon as possible."
"You'd better be in Slytherin with me," he responds eagerly.
"Slytherin?" The boy with glasses deigns to address their presence again. "Who wants to be in Slytherin? I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?"
The other boy, leaner and distinguished in an indescribable way, looks disinterested. Later and often over the next few years, Lily will wonder whether to chalk up this characteristic countenance to the conversation or just his inherent boredom with anyone other than James Potter.
"My whole family has been in Slytherin," he says.
"Blimey, and I thought you seemed alright!"
The grim facade cracks into a barking laugh, his dark mood instead passing to Severus.
"Maybe I'll break the tradition. Where are you heading, if you've got the choice?"
"Gryffindor, of course! Where the brave dwell at heart! Like my dad."
The boy mimes swinging a sword and grins at Lily. She meets his gaze and giddily smiles back. He's all energy and limbs, liquid mercury, and she feels oddly shaky to have all of that focused on her.
Severus scoffs and the boy's eyes snap to him, the moment screeching to a stop.
"Got a problem with that?"
"No. If you'd rather be brawny than brainy-"
"Where're you hoping to go, seeing as you're neither?" drawls the bored one.
The boy in glasses bursts into laughter and a pleased flush finally darkens the face of his new friend. Lily instinctively catches Severus' hand before he can do- something- and tugs him to his feet.
"C'mon Severus, let's find somewhere else to sit."
"Yeah, Snivellus!"
She leads him out and down the hallway, escaping the boys and their laughter. Soon enough, the taunts are no longer audible, but the damage has already been done.
They find a new compartment, this one partially occupied by a group of girls whose blossoming friendship warms Lily where Severus' cold shoulder does not.
One of them, tiny with a shock of yellow curls, smiles in greeting. The girl next to her, taller and pointier, catches Lily's hand in a firm shake.
"Emmeline Vance, this is Mary Macdonald," she gestures at the smiling girl at her side and continues to introduce the rest of the cabin in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. "Over there are Jacqueline Jones and Ruth Merray."
"I prefer Mac, but thanks for the introduction Em. And you?" says the girl Emmeline had called Mary Macdonald.
Lily notices Emmeline blush into her lap as she answers.
"Lily Evans. Oh, and this is my friend Severus!"
He stares balefully out at them from under his fringe for a moment, then back out the window.
"Oh. Pleased to meet you both." Mac says with a bit less charisma than before, looking only at Lily.
The mousy girl called Ruth nods in hesitant agreement. Jacqueline, dark skinned with tight ringlets framing her face, smiles tightly in Lily's direction before drawing the girls back into their prior discussion, something about a capsized trolley and a very angry witch down the way.
Lily senses the shift and turns to Sev, bumping him with her shoulder.
"Sev, hey." He doesn't respond.
"See-verr-uss," she sings quietly and is rewarded with a small smile. "Come on, forget about them. Those boys were idiots, bound for Hufflepuff, no doubt. But they don't matter, because guess what!"
"What," he asks drily.
"We are going to Hogwarts! Right now, in fact!"
He looks around sarcastically. "You don't say."
The task of getting settled and cajoling Severus back into some semblance of his earlier mood distracts Lily for the remainder of the train ride, so much so that she's shocked when the brakes begin to squeal.
"Oh god, we're here. Sev, oh my god."
She launches herself over Severus toward the window, the view only allowing a glimpse of a train station.
"Oh my god. This is it! Look!"
"I am looking. Fascinating." His calm exterior is betrayed by a slight shake to his hands and Lily grins, climbing off of him.
"You're excited too, I know it. Now up! Let's get moving," she commands.
She's barely able to spare a thought for the group of girls they leave behind in their haste, or even the pair of boys from earlier. Perhaps they will become her friends, housemates, lovers, enemies. But those are possibilities to ponder another day.
Lily's grateful for Sev's willingness to be dragged through the Hogwarts Express and beyond, because she's sure her feet would stop working without him giving them a reason to function. She barely let's herself marvel at the hulking man who leads them out of the station, or even the massive lake and the enchanted boats waiting on its surface, but when she first catches a glimpse of the castle, Lily is unable to hold back her gasp.
"It's beautiful," she whispers, managing to pull her eyes away to look back at her friend.
Severus's inky eyes shine back at her, reflecting the candlelight and the black water surrounding them. He was right, before. They are so far from the cramped streets of Cokeworth already. Even the Old Mill, once the biggest thing she had ever seen, seems minuscule in comparison. Lily already dreads the idea of leaving.
The first years shuffle along the entrance hall, eyes wide and necks likely to be sore later from all the looking. There's just too much to see, all at once. Lily spies the rude boys from earlier who, clearly accustomed to magic in some form already, look gobsmacked along with everyone else. A stern looking witch who'd introduced herself as Professor McGonagall leads them into another chamber, where their collective anxiety seems to echo off the cold stone walls.
"Students," she calls and the murmur of conversation comes to an abrupt silence. "Welcome to Hogwarts, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Here, you will learn to harness your magical abilities and use them to remake the world in your own image. You will learn your strengths and test your limits. Before we proceed, I would be remiss not to warn you of the dangers within these walls and outside of them. Spend the next seven years wisely."
Lily suppresses a shiver at her words. A warm welcome, not foreboding in the slightest.
"Shortly, you will enter through these doors into the Great Hall and join the rest of the school for the start-of-term banquet. Before you do so, you will be sorted into your houses: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, or Slytherin," she continues.
Severus grabs Lily's hand again and her nerves hardly allow her to pay attention to the rest of Professor McGonagall's speech. After a few minutes, Professor McGonagall finishes and the doors swing open. They begin their procession inside.
Fragments of moments manage to penetrate Lily's anxiety. Expectant stares all around. A wide expanse of stars above. Candlelight, flickering across ghostly spectres. A twinkle of blue eyes behind half moon glasses, impossibly noticeable across the hall. A cold palm pressed to hers.
The cracking of a stool on tile pulls her back to herself. McGonagall stands above it, holding what appears to be a pointed hat, although centuries must have passed since it was last used. One of it's many wrinkles opens and begins to sing. Lily's jaw drops.
Severus prepared her for many oddities, but not this. She listens raptly to the Sorting Hat's song. Perhaps in Slytherin, you'll make your real friends. When he finishes, Lily joins the rest of The Great Hall in a clamorous applause.
With a word from Professor McGonagall, the Sorting begins. One by one, nervous students file up to the stool and with a brief touch of the hat, they're off to join their new housemates. Most of them are greeted enthusiastically when they sit, except for one odd moment.
One of the boys from the train is soon called forward. Sirius Black, Lily learns. When the hat quickly exclaims Gryffindor, whispers erupt from two opposite sides of the hall. As if completely unfazed, Sirius Black grins and easily strides over to the table decked in red. He receives only a slap on the back and a few smiles, practically a funeral compared to the other new Gryffindors, but his expression never falls.
Soon enough, Lily hears her own name being called. She takes a moment to disentangle her fingers from Severus' before approaching.
"Wish me luck!" she whispers as she goes.
She takes her seat on the stool and looks out at the four tables before her. Green, red, blue, yellow. Then, she seeks out Severus in the crowd and finds him by the desperate lean of his body. Lily knows the pleading words woven taut in his muscles, for it is the same in her own. Please. Not alone.
Professor McGonagall places the hat on her head.
Hmm. Curious.
She's shocked when a voice, the same singing voice from earlier, speaks in her mind.
Yes, you're curious and you are curious. Ravenclaw, perhaps.
No, she thinks sharply, her eyes closed tight with the effort. Slytherin.
Ah, brave too! A true Gryffindor. I can see you'd do very well there.
Not Gryffindor, Slytherin, she begs. Slytherin, only. Please.
Not Gryffindor, eh? Are you sure?
Slytherin, Slytherin, Slytherin.
I can see that you are. Interesting... Well you certainly have got the drive and the ambition to boot. Very well then.
"Slytherin!"
Her eyes fly open, searching, but she can't find Severus again. Instead, strangely, she finds herself staring at the boy with glasses from earlier. He stares back for a moment, his face unreadable, then looks away. So does she.
Some things, some moments, some people are immovable in the current of time. Some are not. Boulders and pebbles. Lily Evans is a Slytherin. Lily Evans will do something great. Lily Evans will fall in love and out of love and in love again. Lily Evans will remake the world and the world won't even know it.
But for now, Lily Evan's life is just beginning.
Notes:
This fic will span Lily's time at Hogwarts, i have plans to write the after too (there aren't too many years to cover there oops). Later years will be longer, because they're more interesting, but i do enjoy baby Lily
I have adjusted some canon moments and removed others. Some may come up in later chapters. I wont tell you which in case you didnt notice. I have done so on purpose because I think it makes for a better story
Other misc comments:
-sorry for any hufflepuff slander, it will be rectified
-herbology is vastly underrated in canon and fanon. how is it not essential for potions? Lily or Snape must have had some talent there. I also love the irony of Harry's mother and foil (Neville) both being plant prodigies while he can't be bothered with it
Lastly! This work is in no way associated with the original author of the series. Fuck off terfs