#hiddenpolkadots

“Lily? Is that you?” her Mum calls from the kitchen as the porch door shuts behind her and Lily debates turning around and walking back out.

She can’t, though. “Yes Mum, it’s me.”

“Where have you been?”

“The hill,” she says as she walks into the kitchen, not surprised to find her mum at the stove and her dad sitting at the table, crossword in front of him.

“You didn’t tell us you were going out,” he says without looking up.

“I told Mum,” Lily says.

There’s a pause then her mum says quietly, “Sorry love, must have slipped my mind.”

“It doesn’t matter, she’s back now.” Her dad is looking at her now, staring at her over his glasses, and Lily thinks he’s probably wondering if he should have just stuck with having one child.

“I’ll write a note next time.” It’s an apology, sort of, and he nods and then pulls out the chair next to him. “Come help me with this whilst your mum finishes tea. I’m stuck.”

All Petunia needs to cause a fight these days is just to be there, so Lily takes the high road when she comes through the front door and promptly stuffs a forkful of mash potato into her mouth.

“You started without me?” Petunia asks from the doorway, affronted. Lily is tempted to roll her eyes. Of course they started without her, she’s an hour late.

“You said you’d be back at five and it’s gone six, love,” her dad tries to reason softly. Lily watches Petunia consider this, and then wonders how her parents can stand her recently. She never used to be like this. So… entitled. At least Lily gets to leave. They’ve had to put up with it all year round.

“Yours is hot in the oven, don’t worry, don’t worry.” Her mum leaps up and opens the oven for Petunia to see, trying to appease her. “See?”

Petunia takes a moment then absentmindedly humphs. “Right. Well, Vernon is visiting tomorrow so you better not start without me then!”

Lily almost chokes on her forkful of peas. “What?”

“Vernon is visiting tomorrow,” Her sister says, looking down her nose at Lily whilst she takes off her gloves and sits down. “I thought I told you?”

“You didn’t,” Lily says, looking at her dad and trying not to be accusatory. “No one did.”

“We thought we’d take you two out for tea, love, let Lily stay at home to finish her summer homework. Then there’s not a crowd at the dinner table.”

Oh, thank fuck, Lily holds back a sigh of relief.

“Well, that would be nice, I do think Vernon prefers it when it’s just us,” Petunia sniffs, sickly sweet. Lily wants to kick her under the table. That would wipe away the snooty smile.

Her dad just nods and says, “perfect.”

“That’ll be lovely.” Her mum smiles. Lily wonders if her mum can remember that Vernon is a knob or if she’s just pretending for all their sakes.

Lily’s dad waits for her mum to sit back down then says, carefully, “will you be going back to London with him?”

“Yes,” Petunia replies, as if it’s obvious.

“Well, do you think he’d mind giving us a lift too? It means we don’t have to buy two sets of train tickets.”

Petunia looks at her dad as if he’s asked Vernon to cut his toenails. “Why are you going to London?” Her furrowed eyebrows and pursed lips make her look almost a decade older than she really is.

“Lily needs to get her school things, doesn’t she?” Her dad clears his throat. “We’ve already left it quite late.” He smiles at Lily and Lily smiles back, ignoring Petunia’s sour face across the table.

“I can ask… I don’t know if he’ll say yes. And we’re taking the last of my things back too, so there might not be room.”

Vernon’s car is too big for its own good and they all know it. But her dad just nods, and asks someone to pass the gravy.

When the doorbell rings the next night, Lily turns off the TV set and runs upstairs so she doesn’t have to deal with the prick for even a second. His booming voice fills the house and, in retaliation, she turns her cassette player up too loud.

It hurts her ears and she lets it, flopping onto her bed too hard and then jumping right back up when she sees an owl sitting on her desk.

“What the –“ Lily turns the music down, not wanting to hurt the owl’s ears. She takes a second to realise that it must have come in through the open window. It hoots softly at her and sticks its leg out. There’s a small envelope attached, and a muggle stamp in the corner, which seems very pointless given the method of delivery. She unties the envelope, giving the owl a few strokes, and apologises that she doesn’t have any snacks. The owl hoots, less softly, and flies to sit on top of her wardrobe. Clearly whoever has written is expecting a reply.

Vernon’s voice drifts up from the living room, but Lily’s too distracted now too care that he’s lingering instead of making sure they make the reservation. As Suzi Quatro tells her to come alive, Lily breaks the envelope’s seal and pulls out the parchment inside. She sees the handwriting, looks back at the owl, and then – “Of course. Idiot.”

Dear Evans,

Please read this before you throw it in the bin. I never said sorry last term for what happened and I wanted to but I didn’t know if you wanted me to. So I didn’t and that was stupid because I should have. Hopefully this letter will show you that I am sorry and that I was sorry and I probably will be sorry until I die.

Snape called you a you-know-what and he shouldn’t have and that doesn’t make what I did okay, I just want you to know that I’m sorry he called you that too. Neither of us should have done what we did that day. I thought it was my place to defend you and it wasn’t. I shouldn’t have asked you out either. I don’t know why I did. It was an in-the-moment thing, I think. All I know is that I wasn’t thinking at the time, obviously, and thinking about it now is painful because it was such a class arse thing to do. Godric would be ashamed. Sirius told mum about it and she threw a spatula at me.

But yeah, I’m sorry, and I hope you’re okay.

Enjoy the rest of your summer, see you at school.

James

P.S. I told Babbity not to wait for a reply, but she’s a big fan of bread, so if she’s hanging around, that’ll be why

Lily reads the letter once, twice and then looks at Babbity on top of her wardrobe, and wonders if the owl would tell James if she threw it in the bin. She doesn’t want to throw the letter in the bin, she’s just considering all her options. One option is replying. Except she has no idea what she would say. She reads the letter again, just to make sure she hasn’t misread any of his scrawl. And it is a scrawl, a messy, languid scrawl that means almost all of his essays have to be rewritten so the professors can actually read them. Lily thinks of him sitting in his room writing the letter. Did he have to rewrite it? Did he do drafts? Was his bin full of scraps of paper, like in the films, with half-started and half-hearted versions he just couldn’t get right? Does she care? Did he get halfway through and realise no one but him would be able to read it? Does she care?

“Don’t look at me like that,” she tells Babbity when she realises that she’s been standing in the middle of her room, rereading the letter for a good four of Suzi’s songs. “I don’t care. I don’t.”

Babbity cocks her head, ruffles her feathers and hoots. Probably asking for bread. Lily looks at the letter, her name, Evans, taking up half a line in his handwriting. Then she tells herself to stop being such a fucking flannel, Evans, throws the letter on her desk, and tells Babbity, who is incredibly judgemental for an owl, that she’ll be back in a minute with some bread. At least this gets her a happy hoot.

Downstairs the trumpet that is Vernon’s voice is even louder but Lily heads straight for the kitchen, grabs a slice of bread from the bread basket and jogs back upstairs before it gives her a headache. She looks up at the wardrobe to find that Babbity has moved from her original perch and is now on Lily’s desk, pecking at her Prefect badge. “What are you, a magpie?” Lily asks, quickly tearing the bread into small pieces and making a mental note to clear the crumbs up later. Babbity loses all interest in the badge immediately and Lily picks it up out of harm’s way.

Sirius told mum about it and she threw a spatula at me…  James’ words stroll back through her head and she sighs, rubbing her finger over the badge’s shiny surface. His mum knows about her, that he asked her out. Does she care?

It annoys her, the question, repeating itself over and over, squeezing out the memory she’s been trying all summer to forget. Does she care? She knows the answer, or she thinks she does, except she doesn’t really know at all, does she.

“Lily?” Her dad knocks on the door, and Lily jumps, not having heard him on the stairs. “We’re just about to leave, just wanted to let you know.”

“I thought your reservation was at eight?” She asks, looking at her watch as she goes to meet him on the landing. It’s half past.

Her dad shrugs. “You know what Vernon is like.”

“Unfortunately,” she says, not thinking. He shakes his head but laughs too, looking only vaguely disapproving.

“We’ll be back by eleven hopefully. Make sure you’re not hurting your ears,” he says as he nods to the cassette player. “I’ve written the restaurant’s number down in case there’s an emergency.”

“Thanks dad. Have a good time.” She gives him a dutiful hug, dragging it out for a second longer than she would normally, and he gives her a kiss on the forehead.

“Don’t wreck the house,” he says after, over his shoulder in way of a goodbye.

“I’ll try not to. Bye mum!” Lily leans over the bannister, purposefully not acknowledging Vernon, whose thick neck bulges over his collar as he looks up at her from the hallway, frowning.

Her mum waves then is hurried out of the house by Petunia. Lily watches them go, flipping Vernon off once his back is turned. The front door shuts after her dad and Lily waits for the roar of Vernon’s car to start before going back into her room.

“Finished?” she asks Babbity, who just looks at her, picks up the last piece of bread in her beak, ruffles her wings and then soars out the open window, disappearing into the dark sky. The force of the owl’s flight knocks the letter off her desk and Lily crouches to pick it up, placing it and her prefect badge carefully on top of last year’s books. Her name in his handwriting screams at her so she just turns her music back up and drowns it out.

The front door opens again a little past midnight and Lily can hear her parents shushing each other as they come up the stairs. Her light is off and she pretends to be asleep when her mum pokes her head in to check.

“She’s fine,” her dad reassures from behind her mum, in the corridor and Lily waits for the floorboard outside their bedroom door to creak before opening her eyes again. Vernon and Petunia come up the stairs a few seconds later, and they’re much less concerned about waking Lily up. Vernon’s feet sound like bricks every time he steps and it’s only when Petunia’s door shuts behind them that his voice, complaining about how dry the chicken was, is muffled. Although at the time it had been horrible, Lily’s glad that she and Petunia had been given separate rooms when Lily returned from her first year at Hogwarts.

She imagines the havoc it would cause if they were still sharing and Vernon was relegated to the sofa.

A few minutes later the house falls quiet again and Lily pulls her magazine from under the covers. Witch Weekly had generally never been considered highly political or even worth reading by a lot of witches and wizards she knows. It’s known for waxing lyrical about quidditch players and advertising the latest cleaning potion, not strong political stances. Lily had thought the same until a few months ago when she’d flicked to the back and found a list of all the wizard and muggle disappearances that were believed to be linked to the Dark Arts. There was no commentary, no accompanying article. Just three columns of names, ordered by the date they were reported missing. It was too many names and it wasn’t enough, was never going to be enough, to simply be reading the list. It’s all Lily can do though, for now.

Read the list, commit the names to memory and wait.

Vernon’s car is a monster and yet it still feels too small with all five of them squashed in, Lily wedged between her dad and her sister in the back. The radio is barely audible over the engine, which Lily doesn’t really mind because Afternoon Delight is playing again, for the third time since they left Cokeworth, and she’s not sure if she’d be able to handle it full volume. No one is talking because, well. They have nothing to talk about.

Any appropriate topics of conversation were probably worn out at dinner last night and no one’s about to ask Lily if she’s excited to return to her magic school when Vernon is in the car. When Petunia had introduced Lily to him, she’d pulled her aside first and sternly informed her that Vernon believed Lily attended a strict, all-girls boarding school in Scotland for young women who needed guidance. What sort of guidance has never been made clear. The general fib the Evans family stuck with was that Lily attended a posh, private school in Scotland which accepted five scholarship students a year and weren’t they lucky to have such a clever daughter? Clearly, Petunia was not a fan of this version.

Lily notices Vernon looking at her in the rearview mirror now, eyebrows creased together as if he too is unsure of what guidance his girlfriend’s sister needs. She smiles sweetly at him. Then she rests her head on her dad’s shoulder and tries to sleep.

She’s shaken awake later and opens her eyes to see that the countryside is long behind them. They’re stopped in a bus bay just beneath the Charing Cross street sign. “Come on Lils, there’s a bus coming,” her dad says, hurrying her out. Her parents are already on the pavement and Petunia is in the front seat, trying to justify why the only place that Lily can get her uniform from is in London.

“Thank you,” Lily says as she scrambles out. There’s a grunt in reply then the car is roaring away again. Lily and her parents have to dive back as the bus pulls in and a swarm of commuters and tourists tumble out.

She grabs her mum’s hand and leads the way out of the melee, her feet instinctively carrying her towards The Leaky Cauldron. It sticks out like a sore thumb to her, but she knows that to everyone else it’s just the weird gap between buildings. McGonagall had helped her parents see it on their first visit and, ever since, they’ve been privy to its existence.

“Ready?” she asks her mum over her shoulder, checking that her dad isn’t far behind. Her mum smiles excitedly. The illness is nowhere to be seen, not even hidden in her new wrinkles. There’s a steady stream of witches and wizards walking through the pub’s door and they join the queue, behind a family struggling to keeps its youngest member calm. Newly eleven, Lily guesses.

“Remember that?” her mum asks, squeezing Lily’s hand.

Lily grins. “I couldn’t wait. McGonagall had to ask me to be quiet because she was worried I was drawing too much attention.”

“You were,” her dad chimes in, ruffling her hair.

“I can’t believe you’re going into your sixth year already.” They both beam at her and Lily thinks their smiles could power her for the rest of her life.

“And top of my class,” she winks, trying to disguise her blush.

“Intelligence,” her dad notes with a solemn face. “It’s a family gene.”

“Not from your side,” her mum says as she nudges him in the stomach and Lily wishes this moment could last forever. They reach the door then and shuffle through, all breathing a sigh of relief as cool air replaces the thick humidity of London. There’s no way that the temperature isn’t being magically controlled and Lily is grateful all over again for this wonderful world she’s lucky enough to be a part of.

“Please no dawdling! Lots of traffic today, Hogwarts students please go through. No dawdling!” Someone is calling from the back of the pub and they follow the sound. “Peak time, peak time, Hogwarts students please go through.” It’s Tom, the landlord, and he looks exhausted. “No dawdling!”

They join the queue at the back of the pub and, in no time, have been herded through the archway. “Good to see we aren’t the only ones leaving it to the last minute!” her dad jokes as they’re swept up in the crowd.

Diagon Alley is bustling as always except, compared to when Lily visited at the beginning of the summer with Mary, there’s a lot more people her age and younger and a lot of names being called. She loves it. Everywhere she turns someone is carrying a cauldron full of books or the latest broomstick or a cage making noises she can’t quite name. The fear she’d woken up with this morning of possibly bumping into the Slytherins or, worse, Potter, is replaced with excitement and she can’t help the smile on her face.

Her mum pulls the list from her bag and they start shopping, spending longer than necessary in every shop because they all want to look at what’s new. Lily is stopped every few minutes by friendly faces and students she’d helped pass Potions or Charms at some point. Her parents’ smiles grow wider with every hello and wave until Lily is worried their faces will break.

Her friends and dormmates have all done their shopping already, able to get to London much more easily with at least one parent being magic. Lily had been upset at first that she wouldn’t be seeing them but being with her parents is just as nice. It’s only ten days until they’ll all be back on the Hogwarts Express together anyway.

“Don’t be fooled Evans.” Hot breath tickles her neck and she spins, hand ready to jump to her hair where her wand is keeping it in a bun. Avery leers over, her turning a pack of Exploding Snap cards in his hands over and over again. Her heart races and she looks desperately around for her parents. They’re on the other side of the shop, watching a demonstration of Gobstones. They’re safe.

“Having a good summer, Avery?” she asks, meeting his gaze without flinching. He can't do anything here. Not in Diagon Alley.

“Don’t expect special treatment anymore, Evans. You’re filthy,” he sneers. “Snape won’t protect you now, your time is coming.”

Lily’s hand twitches, “Thanks for letting me know, I’ll be sure to keep that in mind.” She steps around him, “See you at school.”  

He doesn’t follow.

As soon as she’s stepped into another aisle she lets her breath out, sagging against the shelves.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck

Avery doesn’t scare her, not when they’re in public and he wouldn’t be able to do anything without causing chaos. Avery hadn’t ever scared her. What does frighten her is his confidence, what his words meant. It’s getting worse, growing, spreading like an infestation. When rumours first started spreading that something was happening, that someone was building an army, that he was as strong and powerful as Grindewald, she hadn’t understood. She’d been too young, too new to the world and its history.

All the wars she’d learnt about in primary school had been fought with guns, tanks, and planes. Not wands and creatures. Magic. None of them had lasted this long without any real battles. No leader had waited this long to actually start something instead of just threatening it. They’d all ended too, within a few years. Lily knows this one hasn’t even begun properly. He’s still preparing. They call him the Dark Lord and revere him as a god. Lily isn’t sure if she believes in God, any god, but she knows he isn’t one.

She counts to ten, pushing Avery to the back of her mind with every number, and then goes to find her parents. The shopping is all done and they’re all weighed down with books so she suggests they go for an ice cream then head home. They ask if she’s okay and she forces a yawn for their benefit. Lily doesn’t want to let Avery ruin their day but now that she knows he’s there she can’t help but want to protect her parents. And the best way to protect them is to get them out of Diagon Alley and back into London, the muggle side.

On the train back, two hours later, Lily watches the city turn to country. Then back to city. Then country… county… country and then Cokeworth; home, the factory’s chimney rising up in the distance. Her parents are still doing the crossword together and she’s been pretending to read her new Potions book but she hasn’t been able to focus. Ten days and the view from the window will be country, country, country then her second home, Hogwarts.

Ten days, and she’ll be back with her friends, and her parents will be alone. With her at school, there will be no one to protect them.

Her thoughts run before she can stop them.

Maybe it’ll be my parents tomorrow.

You’re filthy.

Enjoy the rest of your summer...

She lingers on that one. It is, decidedly, a much nicer thought than everything else. She won’t think about Sev or Avery. Not anymore, not till she’s back in Hogwarts. She’ll spend the next ten days with her parents, hot, sweating, happy, safe.

Enjoy the rest of your summer.