Jily Oneshots (pt2)

Snow

by The Silent Rain

Christmas of 1977 was a lonely one for Lily Evans. Sitting alone in the Gryffindor girls' dormitory, she had never felt so desolate in her life. As she stared out the window at the frozen lake and the trees laden with snow, a tear leaked from her eye.

The first Christmas without her parents was a lonely one.

I have no home to go to, Lily thought bitterly. I have a sister that hates me, I have nothing. What's left for me?

Her parents had been killed. Not by Voldemort, not by Death Eaters, as many of her classmates hypothesized. It was a car accident. Nothing magical. So mundane and yet so deadly. She remembered the scene in her mind.

Suddenly it was August 23rd all over again.

Lily was sitting in the backseat of her parents' beat-up Ford, and the sun was just beginning to go down. She looked out the window at the golden orange sky, the hints of blue disappearing slowly, and the day would soon fade to black. Within an hour the night would be alight with bright stars, shining down on the world below.

They were driving home from the college Petunia was attending, dropping her off for her next year of schooling. They were about twenty minutes from home.

"Mum, what time are we getting home?" Lily yawned. "I'm really tired."

Her mother sighed from the driver's seat. "Lily, just sleep in the car, you'll be fine."

"But I'm exhausted, and I can't sleep in cars," Lily complained. "How long will we be?"

"Just a little longer," her father replied for his wife. He turned around and looked at Lily. "My God, you really do look terrible!"

Lily shot him a withering look. "Thanks dad."

"It's true!" he said, throwing his hands up, deliberately overdramatic. "Look at her, Emily!"

Her mother turned around from her seat. "God, Lily, when was the last time you slept? Your dark circles are—"

But Lily would never know what her dark circles were, because the next second, there was a terrible impact, the sound of metal on metal and shrieking, the smell of smoke, and then everything around her went black.

When Lily woke up, days later, she was covered in bandages at St. Mungo's Hospital. She had cried out for her parents on borderline hysteria. A sympathetic nurse came over to her. Her parents were killed.

The memory twisted Lily's heart. She pressed her face into the bedspread covering her mattress, and sobbed.

Lily had always loved snow. She was one of few extraordinary girls that basked in the cold of winter, and adored the beautiful white that blanketed the Earth for a few months a year. For the first time in her life, she was indifferent to its beauty. Nothing was left for her.

After a long time of sitting on her bed, she rose and tread down the steps into the Gryffindor Common Room. A fire was roaring, and the room was empty. She sighed quietly and sat down in one of the many plush armchairs. As she gazed out the window, a sudden noise pulled her from her despondent reverie. Someone had entered the Common Room.

Despite the fact that almost no one stayed at Hogwarts for Christmas, she bore no interest in whoever it was that had just joined her company, until a voice calling her name compelled her to turn around.

James Potter stood behind her, his ruffled black hair flecked with snow, and his impeccable complexion marred by his nose that was red from the cold outside.

"Hey, Evans," he said quietly.

"What are you doing here, Potter?" Lily asked, turning back to the window. "Don't you have family to go home to over Christmas?"