Ages 6-9
Lily had always been a chubby girl. Not that she knew it yet. She was happy and thought she was strong and her father took her and her friends running every Saturday.
One day when she was around 7 years old, she was running with her friends and her father. Sara Cecil, Carys Griffiths, Gwyneira Cadigan, her father, and her.
Lily had always been tall for her age. As they took a break from the running, she commented on how short Carys was.
Carys took this to heart. Looking back, it was a rather rude thing to say.
“Not my fault you and Gwyneira are bloody giants.”
Gwyneira had yelled quite a bit at Carys, but Lily had stayed silent. She wasn’t really a giant, was she? Mummy said she was perfect and beautiful. Daddy said she was a princess, and she was strong. Pet didn’t really seem to notice, and Pet was mean to Lily about everything she could fault within Lily.
So in the end, she decided Carys was just being mean like usual, and lying. After all, Gwyneira and Sara didn’t seem to think so.
That was the first time Lily had ever doubted her appearance.
When Lily was that age, she wore fitted t-shirts, like all her friends.
Except their fitted tees never really seemed to… fit.
All of their tees were too loose for them, and they always complained of never being able to find clothes their size.
Lily always felt uncomfortable wearing her t-shirts. She would keep tugging them down, cross her arms around her belly and hunch her shoulders for the fabric to loosen around her tummy.
And the worst part?
She couldn’t even understand why.
Couldn’t understand why she sat down with her ass on the edge of her seat so her toes could touch the floor and she could raise her thighs so they didn’t flatten and get bigger still.
Couldn’t understand why she raised her chin high so the fat below wouldn’t bunch.
It wasn’t until she was nine that she understood. She had moved to a new town had a new group of friends. She had Severus, but he didn’t really like anyone except her.
She had Rachel and Naomi. Naomi had been her friend for ages, and had introduced her to Rachel a few months ago. For a while, it was good. Until one day, she met Rachel and Naomi and Rachel looked her up and down. “Is that what you’re wearing?” She asked. “You look horrible, Lily.”
And Lily had been upset.
Age 10
It wasn’t until Lily was ten that everything went to shit.
She had recently stopped being friends with Rachel, but she was upset that Naomi still hung out with Rachel. They’d found their third member too—Samantha.
But Lily had found a group of friends too—Nina, Anna Kate, Anna Smith, Kiara and Yasmine.
Severus was still there, but he still didn’t like anyone except her.
She had a rather large crush on a family friend, Richard Phillips, which she hid from Severus.
And so the year passed. It passed with hiding love handles and jackets around waists and secrets and reconciliation and closure.
And on her eleventh birthday, she was happy.
Age 11
When Lily turned 11, she went to Hogwarts. She met Elizabeth Warner and Jenna Paltrow.
They were her best friends, but Betty had always liked Jenna better.
When she went to Hogwarts, she learnt to tuck her shirt out of her skirt and pull her two-sizes-too-big robe around her body and drown in fabric so no one could see her chubby stomach and arms.
She was sad, then. Her grandfather had gotten cancer, she’d got her first period, she was fighting with her parents and she felt worse about herself than she ever had.
Once, Jenna had asked her weight. Lily did not want to tell her. And yet, she did.
Months later, she forgot about that.
One day, she, Betty and Jenna were talking. Betty asked Lily her weight. Lily did not tell the truth.
She lied, lied with a straight face, because she was good at telling lies.
“Last time you said it was something else though.” Jenna said.
“Not anymore.” Lily lied quickly.
“Oh, you lost weight?” Jenna asked.
“Yeah.” Lies upon lies upon lies.
“Really?” Betty asked. “Doesn’t look like it.”
Lily never said it out loud, but after that, she would never see Betty the same way again.
Age 12
When Lily turned twelve, she became happier. Things were looking better. She’d found the perfect friends—Mary and Marlene and Remus. She didn’t really speak to her friends back home, except for Naomi and Richard, who was more like a brother to her now.
Severus was always there, too, but he had his Slytherin friends.
And persistently, she felt fat.
Wearing loose crop tops with skinny jeans and loose t-shirts with loose shorts turned to wearing baggy sweatshirts with baggy pants to hide her thighs and her stomach and her arms.
Her father constantly told her to eat less, but he didn’t know just how less she ate. He told her to exercise, but with no food comes no energy and yet the love handles don’t come off.
She also had a huge crush on James Potter, a boy in her year and house.
Her friends thought he might like her back, and Lily hoped he did.
And yet.
And yet.
She didn’t have the heart to believe in it.
Once, while she was talking to him, he had said, “You would beat me in a fight easily, Lily.” He chuckled. “You’re way bigger than me.”
Looking back on it, he probably meant it as a compliment, but at the time, she felt like the worst person in the world.
It weighed on her.
Months later, and it still weighed on her.
Age 13
Eventually, she moved on.
James was just a stupid, rude boy who had a nice looking face.
And Lily was done with boys that made her feel uncomfortable in her own body. It was hers, and she might not have had the best relationship with it, and she may have felt insecure about it, but it was hers, and it was not for boys to comment on.
She forgot about James for the most part, except for when she’d yell at him for messing with Severus.
She also developed the worst crush on her very good friend.
God, why did it have to be Mary?
And even though she was having a better time about her body, she still had a hard time believing someone could like a fat girl. Or a queer girl.
And that too, the straightest girl in Hogwarts.
But unrequited love was the smallest problem she’d had, compared to everything else she’d been through, so Lily was not bothered.
Age 14
Her fourth year in Hogwarts saw Lily walking into an empty compartment. Well, almost empty. There was one crying Remus Lupin. Remus was one of her best friends, and she was close enough to him to know that he was a werewolf. So when she saw him curled up like that, she immediately rushed to his side.
“Rem, what’s wrong?”
She’d never seen Remus cry before, so she was unprepared for how heart breaking it was.
Red eyes and a red nose and the most lost expression on his face. His nose and lips twitched like he was trying not to contort his face into one of extreme sadness. Lily almost wanted to cry herself.
But Lily never cried.
“It’s—it’s.” Remus finally seemed to have lost a war with himself. “Promise you won’t tell anyone?” He asked, sniffling.
“Of course not!”
“Well… it’s Sirius. He’s… he’s just so… pretty! And sweet and pretty and…” Remus’s voice was now barely a whisper. “I think I might fancy him, Lily.”
“Oh, Remus.” Lily whispered, sitting beside him, and leaning her head on his shoulder. “My love, trust me, I know how much it hurts when you love someone you know will never love you the way you do. And I’m sorry either of us have to know.”
And then Remus started sobbing all over again. “He’s… he’s never going to, Lily. I wish I’d never met him. I hate him, I hate him, I hate him.”
And it hit Lily. She was in love with Mary, and Mary would never love her in the way she loved Mary. And it hurt. It hurt, and Lily wish it didn’t, and suddenly, she felt like crying right along with Remus.
“Come on, Rem, you don’t mean that.” Lily said, lump in her throat.
“I wish I did.” Remus said, crying, and the floodgates broke.
Lily closed her eyes and leaned against Remus and sobbed. Cried about everything she’d never let herself cry about since she was six.
Age 15
The day Lily found out James Potter liked her was the day she realised she hated James Potter.
He’d passed her a note, saying “Will you go out with me, Evans?”
No, James, no, she will not.
And that same year, she stopped being friends with Severus. And that same year she kissed Mary Macdonald.
They were drunk, and Marlene was off fucking Dorcas, and they were fighting and pushing each other in anger turned into Mary shoving Lily into the wall and kissing her hard.
That same year, they discussed boundaries and sexualities and started dating.
And that was the year Remus and Sirius stopped talking.
Age 16
Eventually Remus and Sirius got better again. It took tears and anger and pain and hurt but it happened.
And then they kissed and they got together and Lily was happy for her friends.
At the age of sixteen, she had sex with Mary for the first time.
She’d never been nude in front of anyone before, and she was scared of showing her body to anyone.
She’d begun to love her body, but it was a battle, and she was afraid that Mary would be disgusted.
But it turned out alright, in the end.
Age 17
When she was seventeen, Lily started talking to James, who did not like her anymore. He was going out with Regulus Black, and he was happier than she’d ever seen him. He’d grown mature and Lily had grown to appreciate his kindness, and general presence. Although she was happy with Mary, she really liked James as a friend.
And she was happy.
Some days were still hard. She’d look at her stomach and she’d wear baggy clothes to hide it. She’d cry when she had to eat sometimes, but at the end of the day, she had her love, she had her freedom and she had her body, and no one was going to make her feel like they were bad ever again.
Age 18
“I love you.” Mary whispers as she kisses her girlfriend. “If you asked a genie to make you the prettiest girl in the world, you’d wake up the exact same.”