FIRE KISSED, TEAR STAINED

She was born too small, too frail and too loud. The first four months that the world had Lily Evans in its hands, she was upset every night by quite possibly the worst bouts of colic an infant could have; nothing ever sated her crying that lasted for hours on end but being held by her mother, who lost precious hours of sleep through cooing and coddling her newborn daughter endlessly. 

The earliest definition of a freak, she’d learned, was a baby who wouldn’t shut up -- babies born to the Evans family were quiet and obedient. A baby girl who kept her mum awake, and took away attention from her sister, all while disturbing her father’s much need of peace and quiet after long shifts at work, when she screamed and sobbed all night long.

Her hair was red, her eyes were bright green, and Evanses were brunettes or blondes. Neither did they have huge feet or short stature, all of which Lily seemed to posses. At family gatherings, she stuck out like a sore thumb, always looking and feeling misplaced. Why did she have to inherit her grandmother’s fiery red locks? Why couldn’t she be normal and be an Evans?

“You’re adopted,” Petunia had teased, once upon a time. And her cousins, who’d come to visit, thought it would be funny to jump on the bandwagon. And as Lily cried and protested that she wasn’t some misplaced foundling, and Petunia and the others scolded for ever saying such things, Lily soon learned the next definition of a freak. A sore thumb, the odd one out -- the ugly duckling.

Her magical abilities were a catalyst -- it was then that the word freak was carved into her bones and emblazoned into her being. Petunia was sour and her father was shocked and her mother taken aback. Even when McGonagall had come to their door to debrief the family of Lily’s abilities and future and education, it was like the elephant in the room.

An official freak, she’d become -- the kids on the street only ever played with one of the Evans sisters, for the other kept to herself and only ever was with one other child in the area -- the Snape boy, who had been equally branded as a freak as well. Lily didn’t know how much Petunia had said about her to all of her friends.

When Petunia’s friends did come over, one summer after her first year, Lily upstairs, creeping down the stairs just enough to see but be unseen, wishing she could be a part of the sleepover. She woke up the next morning with freak written on her forehead in permanent marker -- the girls had snuck up to her room and wrote it while she slept. Lily burst into tears, but wouldn’t tell on her mother, and instead, spent hours in the bathroom trying to scrub it off (because underage magic wasn’t allowed), only to be forced out by her mother, who then proceeded to scold her sister and have her grounded.

At Hogwarts, freak was quickly replaced with mudblood, which carried the same weight as her old title did. Because of this, her first friend, wouldn’t sit with her and was embarrassed of her, because of the friends he had. The blood supremacist friends he had, who disapproved of their friendship and, in turn, turned him into a monster for the dark arts. 

She resents the word freak, and reprimands any and all students who use the word so liberally.

“ -- Thank you all, for coming today. ”

Her voice shook and she knew it, and the catalyst to her tears would be looking up at the crowd, scanning the faces that she knew and didn’t, seeing all of their weary and tear stained faces. And yet, she still did, green eyes cast onto the throng of people that sat on wooden chairs painted white, and caught sight of those who she remembered. Nancy Lee, her mother’s childhood best friend, the woman who brought her family a bottle of wine and sweets every time she came home from her travels. Gene Lloyd, the gardener down the street, who always showed up at their door every Sunday morning with a bouquet of flowers. The parents of Petunia’s many friends, those of whom her mother had entertained and chatted with all those years ago. Her father, in his best suit, sitting right beside her sister who cradled his shaking hand in hers. And James, who sat sandwiched between two neighbors, who returned her pained gaze, nodding his head as if to urge her on to speak.

And to be frank, she wasn’t sure if she could speak. Lily Evans felt like her throat had ran dry of all the words to say; her head was muddled and she felt like the darkness of the black clothes she donned. Her legs quivered but her feet were rooted onto the grass, the heels of her shoes digging into the earth underfoot. She could see the casket to her left at the corner of her eye, and as soon as the reality dawned on her, hitting her like a brick wall, her lip began to quiver as well. Suddenly, she felt as though she should just sit down, because she felt like she would shatter at any given moment, and that her knees would lock and give in -- she could see James poised to stand up, as if he would need to race over and catch her. But she cleared her throat and spoke, fingers shuffling the cards in her hands.

“ A-As you may know, I am -- I was Rosemary’s daughter, ” It cut like a knife to say that, one little replacement in a fragment of a sentence managing to crumble her, a shaky breath escaping her lips. Her eyes were glued to the paper her shaking fingers clung onto, taking a deep breath to collect herself. Ice water felt like it trickled down her spine as it settled that she was eulogizing her own mother, the mother who loved her and embraced her freakishness. And now she was paying the ultimate price, for having loved and embraced her freak of a daughter and attempts to understand the Wizarding world -- death. Lily remembered the day so clearly -- she was in town with some friends, celebrating the end of her final school year; Petunia was on a date with Vernon; her father was at work. And she came home to see her mother lying dead on the floor of their kitchen; it was obvious that this was no work of a muggle criminal -- the valuables, jewelry and what money they kept at home was untouched; the doors and windows were unbroken and untouched, as if nobody had even entered in the first place. Before she even knew it, she was in tears and the Wizarding Police were there -- the works of deatheaters, most definitely. Petunia yelled at her, in tears too, blaming her, to the point that she had to be taken away from the scene; her father stood in frozen shock, the love of his life taken away. 

A sob hit her then, the ragged, pained cry hitting the air with a pang. 

“ I know many of you knew her just as I did. Loving, caring, beautiful both inside and out. Her heart was the size of her fist, tenfold. All she ever did was love her family to the core, from the tips of her toes to the hair on her head, and it is so unfair that she was taken away from us so quickly. ”

Her words were genuine, another breathy sob wracking her system at the thought of it all -- her mother, killed before she could even see any of her daughters be wed, have grandchildren and barely even cross her 50s. All because of me, Lily thought. Caught in the crossfires of a war she didn’t even need to be involved in, only so through her daughter with her so-called dirty blood. If she hadn’t spoke up all those years at Hogwarts and jumped headfirst into the war, her mother wouldn’t have died. The threat wouldn’t have been dangled on the rest of her family -- the words were painted in blood on her kitchen wall, making it difficult to forget. But to their muggle friends and family, they had to make an alibi, a different story because god knows how they would react to their beloved Rosemary Evans killed by a terrorist organization in a world they barely knew anything about. Lily swallowed, somewhat returning back to reality, realizing that there was a mass of people waiting for her to continue, to honour her mother with her words.

“ William Cullen Bryant once said, ‘And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief,’ -- and it is true. Mum just turned 48 in the spring, and for her fiftieth, she had big plans, ” a shaky laugh made its way through her lips. “ But unfortunately, they won’t be lived through. However, all of us carry mum in our hearts, forever, with the memories that we had with her. And she’s up there, in the clouds and dancing in the stars, watching over us all. ”

She said it all with finesse, having composed herself enough to even squeeze in a small, tiny smile at the thought of her mother dancing in the stars. For the sake of the guests, for the sake of her family, for the sake of her own mind. But on the inside, there was this voice that drummed and insisted, on and on, gradually getting louder and louder -- 

YOU CAUSED IT. YOU KILLED HER.              YOU CAUSED IT. YOU KILLED HER. 

“ Rosie Evans, loving wife, daughter, friend and above all, mother. ”

At last, her smile had crumbled, and as she walked to her seat, crumbled and fell apart in tears, soon finding herself sobbing into James’ arms. The entirety of the rest of the ceremony was almost a blur -- one right after the other, each of the friends and family that had come to pay their respects in speech did so; anecdotes and fond memories just a twist of words to Lily, who still sat there, shaking. And then the fear set in -- the realization that the very same monsters who had killed her mother could be there, watching, enjoying the sight that they had orchestrated. The occasional looking over her shoulder turned into almost every minute, tense and paranoid and above all sickened at the mere possibility, Lily grew agitated, almost hysterical, and kept it bottled up enough until the end of the ceremony when the guests had dispersed. 

She spent those moments after, pleading for her sister and father to stay safe and take care, insisting on arranging new living conditions for her father, all while being in tears. Her heart yearning to tell them that they were possible targets but she knew she couldn’t bear the thought of them not understanding and being dangled into danger even more. 

And the words, they kept drumming on. Every day, every night, every waking moment spent without having anything else in her mind, and slipping in when she least expected it.