There was nothing more that Lily Evans both loved and hated than being a woman. Being a child and running through grass barefoot, throwing her head back and laughing as she ran but shuffling away from older mens unwelcomed, wandering hands.
She preferred to think about the more positive side of girlhood, it being all she had to look back on as she was told she’d have to hide from a power hungry man who wanted to take her son from her. As she lay next to her husband in bed, with her son in his crib in the next room over, still awake despite the late hour, staring at a ceiling that she can’t actually see due to the pitch black darkness that swallowed the room whole, she thought about what she had been.
Laughing until the air was sucked from her lungs with her two closest friends, Mary and Marlene, moonlight bleeding through the window that was wide open in an attempt to stop them from boiling alive in the hot summer, wine that they should not have had, dangerously close to spilling as she bent over with her giggling. Face aching from grinning and cheeks red from the alcohol that had burnt down her throat and the scorching temperatures.
Braiding hair, her own and her friends, having her hair braided. Dressing up to go nowhere just because she adored the process of getting ready, the foundation she’d only used for a few months to cover her freckles before stopping because her friend had said she missed Lily’s freckles. Getting home after going out and collapsing on her bed, using the heel of one foot to take off her other shoe with the air from her fan sweeping over her.
Crying for her mother when she got her first period at 11, her mother rushing up the stairs in alarm only to realise what was happening and smiling warmly, brushing away Lily’s tears with the pad of her thumb, explaining what was happening and what she needed to do and then sitting outside the bathroom until Lily came out and cupping her daughters cheek with the palm of her hand with a quiet “I love you.”
At 20 she met a young girl in the street, similar blaring red hair, after some talking the girl had declared that she couldn't wait to grow up, that being a child was so boring, Lily had smiled down sadly at the girl, as many older women had done to Lily when she had said the same thing, and quietly told the girl “I wish I could be a child again and be one forever, don’t wish your childhood away when it goes so quickly” The child had tilted her head to the side as though confused and responded with “But then you’d never grow.” and moved on, as most children did. The girl hadn’t meant it as anything deep but Lily had interpreted it in her own ways, she had realised if she never grew then she’d never mature, never experience anything new, never live.
Her first crush had been exhilarating, a random boy in her year in primary school, he’d always won all the races, the fastest boy in the class and she’d thought he was the greatest thing in the world! For approximately 3 days until she’d gotten over it. The boy that had told her she was pretty before going red and running off when they were 7. A boy she’d seen while on holiday, they’d constantly ran into each other, always had eye contact, just looking at each other. She’d gotten onto a plane to go home and never saw him again.
Mary Macdonald, her best friend who had looked heavenly, especially that night when they’d been stumbling through the halls of Hogwarts after a Gryffindor party, alcohol running through their systems and rosy cheeks that were just visible in the dark. Mary’s flawless dark skin and brown eyes that gleamed in what little light there was coming through the windows, smooth dark brown hair that looked perfect for running your finger through. Lily had leaned back on the wall and stared at the other girl as she rather passionately spoke about how they should keep the halls more lit, she hadn’t even realised when Mary had stopped speaking, staring back into Lily’s glowing green eyes, hadn’t noticed when Mary had stepped closer until they were almost brushing noses. She had just focused on what her best friend’s lips would feel like on hers and she’d simply had to know and so she had slowly brought her head forwards until her lips swept Mary’s and then they were kissing.
They’d had something akin to a relationship after that but it hadn’t lasted, they’d liked each other, maybe even loved each other but they’d had completely different wants in life, completely different goals. It had been beautiful while it happened though, creeping between beds, leading one another hand in hand. Arching under the sheets, breath lost to the heat of the moment, soft touches, rough pulls, worshipping each other. Glances across the table at lunch. Lingering hands. Compliments that would swirl around their heads for the rest of the day, a loving look in their eyes. Helping each other get ready, laughing into the wind, heads thrown back. Dancing and singing with each other even though both of them couldn’t sing or dance to save their lives.
Then, there had been James Potter, she had majorly disliked him from ages 11 to 14 due to how she had believed his genuine love confessions to be attempts at publicly humiliating her. The boy in her last year of primary school that had asked her out, only to laugh and call her ugly and fat when she said yes, had not been forgotten quickly. Eventually James had just attempted to befriend her and it had worked, only then had she seen his genuine intentions and they had begun to date in their final year. She knew that James had seen someone in their 5th and 6th year secretly, the years he had accepted her friendship, she also knew that that relationship had taken a disastrous turn towards the end of 6th year but she had not asked questions, just held the boy as he cried, silently crying herself as that happened to be the same night she and Mary had buried their relationship, he had not asked her questions either. Neither would have answered any.
She remembered her sisterhood with Petunia, before Lily had gotten her Hogwarts letter and Petunia had decidedly not. Remembered when Petunia had told her a quote she’d once seen ‘Sisters are different flowers from the same garden’ her older sister had told her it had been made for them, that Lily would always be her little sister. Memories of eating biscuits at night, under the duvet and then complaining and giggling about crumbs in the bed. Taking the blame for one another. Petunia's piercing gaze as Lily left for Hogwarts. Lily’s piercing gaze as her sister married that poor excuse of a man.
Growing up in mid Wales where Welsh wasn’t really spoken, learning what should’ve been her mother tongue and hating every minute of it because she’d never met a good Welsh teacher in her life. Living in a tiny area and everyone knowing each other, the horror of getting pregnant at 19 in an area where everyone knows each other. The judgemental eyes of those who knew her and those who knew someone who knew her as in an area as small as that there is no one who isn’t one person away from knowing you.
The rivalry of the high schools that she would’ve gone to if she hadn’t gotten that Hogwarts letter. Playing tag in the playground and stuck in the mud. PE being bulldogs every single time in primary school. The park she and her childhood best friend would always go to. The same park that she took Marlene and Mary to and they smoked cigarettes in.
Girlhood had been precious to Lily Evans, she loved it and she hated it, and as she finally drifted off to sleep with her husband James Potter in bed next to her and her son Harry in his crib in the next room over, she smiled. She smiled because she was a woman and she had been a girl and was unknowing of what would happen too soon that very halloween night.