Chapter 12: I Do Something stupid. No One Is Surprised.
Things go by blissfully until mid-October. Well, there are minor hiccups. The odd kidnapping, an occasional inferno, a few small near death experiences, but nothing out of the ordinary.
Of course, I knew it wouldn’t last. These things never do. But it was nice while it happened, I’ll say that. Even if L.O.V.E did continue to try and stick their oar in, to stir us up, cause a scene, it never really worked, so I guess it doesn’t matter.
It’s one night in the Common Room that everything subtly kicks off. As the Marauders “work the crowd” (or rather, try to entertain first years to avoid doing their homework), Iola and I sit by the fire. Yesterday, she had got upset about her Dad again. I’m not sure what kicked it off, but she and James had to walk around the lake about three times. I’m glad she got it out there again, but despite what Sirius says, it still makes me feel bad that she can’t talk to me about these things.
Although ... well. I could always talk to her anyway. No Lily, leave things be. Don’t meddle, you should know by now. Don’t you know by now? Remember our favourite friend, “Don’t meddle in things you don’t understand”?
I should listen, but of course, I don’t.
“Iola ... Iola, can I ask you something?”
She shrugs. “You can do whatever you like, Lily, it’s what you may do that’s the question.”
“It’s just ... well, you know your Dad?” I ask, deciding to voice something that I’ve thought about, but never come to any kind of conclusion on.
“We’ve met,” she says, in a warning tone. Key word, Lily, WARNING. Don’t do this.
“Do you ... do you ever miss him?”
She snorts with contempt. “Excuse me?”
“Deep down I mean. Not miss the way he is now, but miss the way he used to be?”
“Of course I do. Is there any reason for asking, because I’d really prefer it if you didn’t.”
“But despite what he’s like ... do you love him anyway? Because I was thinking, and ...”
“Lily, could you drop it? I really don’t think I can handle this right now. You do know why I was with James for so long yesterday, don’t you?”
“Yes, that’s what got me thinking. See, if you talked about it more, often, it wouldn’t be so hard on days like that, because instead of all your emotions pouring out at one time, they could be spread out ...”
“I don’t care, Lily! Please, can you drop this? I want to enjoy the times I don’t have to think about him, if that’s alright.” She looks away, stares hard in the fire. Missy jumps from my lap to hers, and she strokes her head automatically. As I well know, it’s a perfect stress reliever.
I pick up an Advanced Charms book, and try to make sense of some old guy’s theory on inanimate objects having life. Mad old codger, if you ask me, but Flitwick seems to think he’s some kind of revolution, so I guess I should try and get to grips with it.
After a couple of minutes, Iola says, “I still love him. He’s my father, and I wish I could have some kind of relationship with him. Why wouldn’t I? But I got the dud parents, didn’t I? If I’d been born into James’s side, things would have been so much different. I’d love to have him love me. What daughter wouldn’t?”
Ha! She’s opening up. Take that, conscience. Who says you’re always right? “If you could say something to him “ in a letter “ what would you put?” I ask, leaning forwards. I pass her some spare parchment and a quill.
She sighs, and leans on a book, writing a few words in a flurry. She passes it back, and I read the following words:
Dad “ Love you really. My leaving and swearing to never lay eyes on you again because I can’t stand you was just a JOKE. Because I love to JOKE about these things, as if they don’t matter. An idiot could see that. “ Iola
I look at her, an eyebrow raised. She looks determinedly stubborn. I told you not to meddle. Now she’s annoyed.
I ignore the voice, of course, and hand her another piece of parchment, without a word. She sighs, probably thinking that if she gets it over with, I’ll shut up. That’s what I would think if I were her, and I was annoying me.
Wait, what? Never mind. James is transfiguring a First Year’s hat into a dancing rabbit. She’s practically swooning. Sometimes I wonder how half of these Gryffindor girls got put in here.
Missy looks happy. That cat is spoilt, if you ask me. She’s putting on the pounds, and she’s not exactly getting younger.
Iola hands me back the parchment, barely acknowledging me. I cast my eyes downwards.
Dad,
What is there to say? Some days I wish things were different. Some days I want to beat you with a stick until you bleed. Some days I want to run away. Some days I want to be orphaned. Some days I want to find Mum. Some days I want to kill Mum. Some days I want to forget. Some days I want to die.
Most days, I want you to love me, as a father loves his child. But I fear you’re not a father. How could you be? A father would love his daughter. A father would care about his daughter. A father would not be you.
Until we meet again, whenever that may be.
Iola. Your daughter.
Tears prick behind my eyes.
“If you don’t mind?” she says, as she takes it from my hand, and throws it in the fire. She leaves, running up the stairs to the dorms. James catches my eyes, and frowns questioningly and “ quite rightly “ slightly accusingly. I shake my head, briefly, and he shrugs, turning back to the people he is entertaining. Something to do with tweezers and a block of cheese, but I don’t bother to investigate.
The parchment catches my eye. Glancing around, and checking no one is looking, I whip out my wand, and whisper, “Accio letter.”
I fold it, and store it in my bag, biting my lip. Now what? I check my watch. James and I don’t have to patrol tonight, some Prefects are doing it. I’ll have time, though. And no one can accuse Head Girl of being out and about at night, when it’s my job to patrol anyway.
No. I won’t. I can’t do it, so much could go wrong. But then ... but then, so much could go right. I imagine it. Iola’s Dad turning up, eyes streaming. Iola looking shocked, but kind of pleased to see him. Him running towards her, desperately. Reaching out, both of them forgetting everything, hugging, all forgotten, a true father and daughter.
Iola’s done so much for me. If by sending this letter, I could do something for her, that would ... well, it would be like repaying a debt.
I scoop up Missy for moral support, and head out of the Common Room, ignoring my conscience, which is screaming at me. I reach the Owlery, and Missy begins clambering up the shelves of owls, disturbing them, waking them, annoying them.
Practically in slow motion, I reach up towards one of the school owls, and bring it closer. No longer thinking about what I am doing, I attach the letter to it’s leg, and take it to the window, but I don’t let go.
There’s still time, Lily. You don’t have to send the letter. In fact, you can take that owl right back to it’s stand, and leave. Listen to me, damn you! Are you really this stupid? Imagine what it would do to Iola if this went wrong! Imagine how much it would hurt her! Just turn around, Lily, leave things be!
I should. I should just turn around. Iola is happy without me meddling.
Bang! The door opens loudly, and an, um, “engrossed” couple stumbles in. The Owlery is where they have come for this sort of ... activity? That’s odd, it smells funny in here. I cough, loudly, and they turn around.
“Oh,” the girl says. I recognise her as a sixth year Hufflepuff. The boy looks up, too. A seventh year Slytherin, I believe.
My, my.
“I’ll just be going,” I say, trying not to laugh at their guilty faces. Being caught out by the Head Girl is any couple’s nightmare, and I could have a lot of fun reporting these two ... but I don’t. It’s the company I keep, if you ask me. They’re killing my morals. But, to be honest, I feel better for it. Why shouldn’t I bend a rule here and there? I leave them to it, and head back to the Common Room. It is only when I go to bed that I realise the owl must have flown out of the window when I left, taking it’s letter with it.
Oh, dear Merlin. What have I done? I slip out of bed, and head to the window, peering out, as if I will somehow be able to see the bird, and bring it back, even though it left nigh on two hours ago. You’ve done it now. You can kiss goodbye to any friendship you might have with Iola, my girl. How could you go so wrong?
“Shut it,” I hiss, under my breath, as my forehead falls forwards, and rests on the cold glass.
“Who are you talking to? Going mad, Lily?” Eve asks, a her voice laced with nastiness.
“Go die in your sleep,” I retort, and head back to my bed. I cannot sleep. All I keep seeing is a Victorian looking man (I’ve seen him from a distance and he doesn’t look like that, but my imagination runs away with me) opening a letter in “Potter Land”, reading it, his eyes maddening with each word. By morning, he is drunk, and smells of tobacco and alcohol, he has a knife covered in blood and a twitchy eye, but as I have said, my imagination has run away with me.
Iola suspects nothing the next morning “ a Friday “ which just adds to the irony. How could I have done this to her?
I am a quivering wreck for most of the day, constantly checking the skies in case her Dad replies, and jumping every time someone speaks to me. Eventually, after three lessons of this, James pulls me aside.
“Lily, what is wrong with you?”
Staring at his face, which has a very interesting mix of emotions, only makes me feel worse.
“Is L.O.V.E giving you a hard time again? I mean ... Are “The Perfects” giving you a hard time?” he asks, grinning. They are still trying to commercialise their new names, but no one is really paying much attention.
I snort with laughter. “Merlin, no! I’d like to see them try!”
“Well, what is it?”
I bite my lip. Ow. “Um ...”
“Lily,” he says in a slight warning tone. Oddly manly. Wait, did I just say that? Of course I didn’t. Keep telling myself that I didn’t just think of James Potter as manly. You can tell yourself that all you like, but “ Shut up!
“I ...” I begin, to distract myself, “I think I’ve done something stupid.”
“Are you offended that I’m not entirely surprised?”
I whack him on the arm, but not with much feeling to be honest. He’s probably right not to be surprised.
“So what have you done?” he asks, raising an eyebrow ever so ever so slightly.
“I can’t tell you. But I think you’ll find out pretty soon. You guys ... you would still like me even if I screwed up really bad? If I did something that made something a whole lot worse, and it could have been prevented had I not got distracted by something, and the original something was really bad, and likely to upset someone we like, you would still like me, right?”
“Okay, Lils, say that again, but a hell of a lot slower.”
I scowl, obviously Iola’s nickname for me is spreading. “Please don’t call me Lils.” And I stalk off. Partly because of the way he was smirking, and partly because if I stayed, I would end up telling him what I did, and then Iola would find out, and ...
Damn it.
What am I going to do now? Die a hated and friendless old crab? With only Missy for company? And she only stayed because she knows I feed her? Except she’s showing signs of being a scavenger anyway, so doesn’t need me anymore? Oh Merlin, I’m not even going to have my cat around when I die so she can howl pitifully? She’ll probably be in a dustbin somewhere, chowing down on some old chicken, without a care about her master, who is lying dead and friendless and alone? My death will be as pathetic as my life? How can this be?
James doesn’t mention our conversation for the rest of the day. Instead, everyone chats happily about the Hogsmeade trip tomorrow, and I pretend to be interested. How can I care about Hogsmeade, with this hanging over my head?
And yet, I find myself following them there the next day, still pretending that I am looking forward to this opportunity to relax. Relax. Ha. It’s weirdly ironic.
When we are on our way to the Three Broomsticks for an early morning drink, Iola stops dead in the middle of the road. She is staring, frozen, ahead.
“Iola?” I ask, worried. Has she suddenly developed an overwhelming skill for Occlumency, and knows why I’m not being myself? Please say that’s not the case.
“What did you do, Lily?” she utters, so quietly I can barely hear her.
“I didn’t do anything!” I squeak, unconvincingly.
“Iola, what’s going on?” asks James, frowning. Iola keeps staring straight ahead, and eventually, we turn and look where she is looking.
James swears under his breath, and I pretend not to hear. Sirius makes weird spluttering noises. Peter says, “Is that ...?” and Remus confirms that yes, that is.
I have, of course seen him from a distance. I didn’t really like the look of him then. To see him up close, is even worse.
Bloody hell. What have I done?
We all, instinctively, begin to close ourselves around Iola, protecting her. It’s the least I can do.
“James,” he says, nodding his head.
“Uncle,” James replies, not inclining his head at all, but staring him straight in the eyes ferociously. I shiver.
“Iola,” her father says, emotionally. We square our shoulders protectively. “Iola, I’m sorry. I never meant to ... I didn’t know what I was ... when I got that letter, I just ...”
“Letter?” Iola hisses, her eyes flaring up, so the angry fire in them is particularly apparent. She turns them to me. Oh, sh “ No time, Lily. Apologise you half-wit!
“Iola, I’m sorry. I didn’t even mean to. I mean, I did, but I changed my mind, and then that couple came in and the owl must have gone before I had a chance to “”
“You sent it?” she spits, my hurried words falling on deaf ears.
“Well, I didn’t exactly send it, exactly, it kind of sent itself, and “”
“You sent it?” she repeats.
“Yes,” I say, pathetically.
“Wait a minute ... YOU sent that letter?” her Dad asks, looking at me.
“What letter, Lily?” James asks. “Iola, what letter?”
He is ignored by all except Sirius, who shrugs at him, clearly in a manner that suggests he is saying, “We’ll-find-out-when-they-tell-us-so-don’t-push-it”. I feel grateful for Sirius’s input. As for Mr Potter, he is ignored completely. Until Iola turns to look at him.
“You, I hate,” she says, but by her voice I can tell she isn’t finished yet. She turns to me. Brace yourself. Even my conscience sounds afraid. “You, I loathe,” she finishes. I flinch. You deserved that. Thanks.
Iola leaves, and her dad begins to follow. James steps in his way. “I wouldn’t,” he warns. Iola’s dad is angry.
“And why not?” he asks his nephew.
“Because then I would have to hit you. I don’t want to hit you. Well, I do, but I won’t unless you try and get any further.”
“She’s my daughter!” he says, angrily, as if we don’t know.
“It took you long enough to act like it. If you didn’t want to start seventeen years ago, there’s no point in starting now,” James says, coldly. This is a little harsh, but true, I guess.
“I refuse to be spoken to this way!” he insists.
“Then go,” James says. Mr Potter looks at each of us, wildly, before swearing, and disapparating.
With him gone, they turn to me. I look away.
“Lily, what’s been going on?” Sirius asks. I feel like a naughty child, and as I tell them the story, I stare straight downwards guiltily, not wanting to look up at them. James leaves as soon as I am done, heading in the direction Iola left, scowling and muttering to himself, several of the words being less than ethical.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper. “I didn’t mean for it to send. I changed my mind, but by the time I realised what must have happened, it was too late!”
“Yeah, we know Lily, it’s okay,” Sirius assures me.
“Of course it’s not! Look what I’ve done!” I cry, throwing my hands in the air.
“They’ll come round,” Remus says, “They’ll understand.”
“Come on, let’s go and get a butterbeer,” Peter says. When we look at him incredulously, he says, “To calm down, you know? And to give James and Iola time to calm down before we go find them so that Lily can apologise.”
“Yeah, good idea,” Sirius says. He turns to me. “You see? It will work out, you’ll see.”
If only I could believe them. I know I’m lucky that they don’t hate me too, but I don’t feel lucky.
For the rest of the weekend, I am not even acknowledged by James or Iola. I try and apologise to both of them, even though I didn’t actually do anything to James. But he’s just protecting Iola, so I kind of have to forgive him.
I thought I would have to spend my time in the Library alone, but I think someone makes sure that this isn’t the case. I think it is Sirius. He makes sure that at least either he, Remus or Peter is with me at any one time, which is very nice of him, and I don’t really feel I deserve it.
“I mean, Iola is your friend too. You have every right to hate me as well!” I tell him on Sunday afternoon, as we walk around the lake. Because of the season, the ground is covered in leaves, from pale yellow to bright orange to deep red, and we are both kicking them about as we walk along, enjoying the sound and the feeling.
Sirius shrugs. “Nah, not really,” he says. “I know you never meant for anybody to get hurt. But at the minute Iola is too angry and afraid to see that, and James ... James is angry and afraid because Iola is angry and afraid. He needs to protect her.”
“Basically, everybody’s angry and everybody’s afraid?” I ask, a little cynically.
He puts on a dramatised thinking face for a moment, then relaxes and says in a defeated tone, “That’s it, yeah.”
We return to the Common Room dejectedly. When we clamber through the Portrait Hole, I am suddenly aware of someone running towards me, and throwing their arms around me.
My first thought is that it is James, and I have no idea why. Then, when I realise that my first thought is wrong, I move on to my second thought. Something along the lines of ‘Someone’s been drinking a little too much for a Sunday afternoon ...’ Until I then realise that that is wrong too. This was no drunken embrace, this is someone hanging on for dear life.
I realise that it is Iola, but can do nothing except signal desperately to Sirius, as my arms are pinned to my sides. He gently pulls her away from me, and she brandishes a letter in my face.
To a Miss I. Potter,
We are writing to inform you of the death of your father, Arthur Alexander Potter. He was at his brother Harold’s residence when he was found, along with Harold Hadrian Potter. The alarm was raised by his wife, Ruth, when she returned home from her own sister’s house to find them both dead.
The Dark Mark was above the house, so we can presume that this was an attack from Lord Voldemort and his followers. Rest assured that we are doing all we can to find and defeat your father’s killers, and that his was an honourable death, as there was evidence of a struggle.
Our deepest condolences,
Alistor Moody
Head of Auror Department
Ministry of Magic
Oh my ... I look over to James, who has an unopened letter in his hand, the envelope bordered with a thick black line. They must have realised what was in the letters, and opened Iola’s ... which also gave them the contents of his letter.
Oh my goodness. What do I do? I see Sirius take the letter from my hand, read the first couple of lines, and drop it, before grabbing Iola and letting her burst into sobs on his shoulder. Nothing you can do there. Go to James. Go, you fool!
I walk softly over to the armchair he is slumped in, and perch on the armrest. “Hey,” I say, softly. He looks up, and smiles briefly, but without much feeling. It is clear that I am forgiven. Well, obviously. This kind of gives things a little more perspective. I place my hand on his shoulder, but do not say anything. What is there to say?
Remus and Peter are sitting opposite, both of them silent as well. Eventually, Sirius and Iola come to join us. Iola has stopped crying, and it seems that we sit here forever, silent.
But it is not forever. Iola and James are allowed to go home for the next few days. It is strange without them, but when they return on Friday, it is clear they are both coming back to themselves. They haven’t forgotten, but they can continue with their lives. They’re strong. And now, they have even more of a reason to go on. They’re not the kind of people to let this defeat them.
Although it seems meaningless, I still apologise to Iola the evening she returns, when we are in the dorm. L.O.V.E are nowhere to be seen, and have not said anything to any of us ever since last Sunday. They are being respectfully distant, and although they hardly like us, or we them, it is a gesture to be thankful for. They’re not completely inhuman, after all.
As for my apology, Iola makes me feel a lot better, even though she is the one who has been hurt.
“It’s okay, Lily. I may not like the way you went about it, but it meant I got to see him one last time, even if we didn’t exactly make up. If he came all the way here to see me because of what was said, it means that somewhere inside him, he still had that spark of love for me somewhere. It’s comforting, even though I wish I hadn’t left without talking to him. He was able to know how I felt before he died and that’s a good thing.”
“Trust me, I’m not going to do anything like that again,” I say.
She smiles, and a shadow of her old spark jumps in her eyes. “I wouldn’t swear on that, Lily,” she says.
I grab my pillow and throw it at her, softly. She catches it, though, of course, and just grins.
And I know things will be right again soon.
AN: A sad chapter but at least it has a semi happy ending, right? Only ... *thinks* three more to go now ... My word, where has the time gone? Review, of course, and tell me your thoughts!