James Potter: The Marauder's Year

Chapter One - The Extremely Ordinary and Normal Lily Evans

The Extremely Ordinary and Normal Lily Evans
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Third Person:

     Lily Evans was a redheaded little girl, with bright green almond-shaped eyes. Her hair wasn't a light red or orange type of hair. It was blood red. Beautiful and silky. Her eyes were like no other. Green as freshly mowed grass. She had light freckles plastered all over her face, and her skin was a beautiful pale color. But this was not all Lily Evans was. She was much more than that. And she would go through a lot in her life...but I'm getting ahead of myself.
The Evans family considered Lily to be a normal girl. She went to school, had lots of friends, was very bright, and overall a kind person. Scratch that. There was one thing, that they might find strange about her. And if her family, who adored her, thought it was strange, then Lily assumed it must have been.
"Lily Evans, you get back down here!" Mrs. Evans screamed up the stairs.
Lily had run up the stairs, for she had not wanted to put on a dress for her Father's work dinner. Now, being a child alive in the late 60s, it had become normal for girls and women to wear pants. However, Lily's family seemed to still be stuck in the 50s.
"Lily, no matter what people might tell you, a proper lady must not wear pants in their day-to-day life. A proper lady wears dresses or skirts." Her mother once told her.
Of course, for all her stubbornness, Lily had managed to convince her mother to let her wear pants. But her mother would not ever permit her to wear pants at anything as formal as a work dinner.
"But, Mom! I don't want to! Besides, it's just a work dinner." Lily whined.
But alas, Mrs. Evans wouldn't budge, and Lily was now sitting at a dinner table in an uncomfortable flowery dress. Of course, this wasn't the only traditional value her family held. Her mother, though very bright and ambitious like her daughter, was a housewife. It had been sealed to be her fate as a young girl as well. Mrs. Evans used to fight it, but over the years, she just gave up on it. Lily would not let that happen, "nope, I will not be a housewife" she thought to herself.
"Lily?"
Lily's eyes snapped over to her father. "huh?"
Her mother sighed and shook her head. "Mr. Williams wants to ask you a question, Lily."
"Oh, okay. Shoot."
"What would you like to be when you grow up?"
What a question. It should be simple for any family, but unfortunately, it isn't for this one. Ever since Lily was little, she was determined to be a doctor. She wanted to help other people feel better and happy. Lily's mother looked startled and was glancing worryingly at Lily. Mr. Evans, (Who was not as traditional as Lily's mother) looked amused at the look his wife gave their daughter. Mr. Evans never took any of his wife's scolding of their daughters seriously. Petunia, looked admiringly at Lily. She was a little envious of Lily's boldness with their mother. And Lily, looked as though the question had not affected her one bit.
"I want to be a doctor when I grow up." She stated confidently.
The rest of the dinner was Mrs. Evans sitting awkwardly while the rest of the conversation kept going. Petunia, though she admired Lily, was still afraid of their mother, and didn't talk much after that. Either Lily didn't know about her mother's uneasiness, or she was a damned good actress because she carried on the dinner easily.
That was when she was 8 years old. It was just one of the many occasions that Mrs. Evans had tried to limit her daughter to her anti-feminist ideas.
At school, she was given great grades. She was a high achiever...and she was not ashamed of it. Every grade she got had to be 90% or higher, or else she'd go nuts.
"Lily, would you put that away? You got an 89%, it's not even that bad." Her friend, Ellie whined during lunch break at school.
"Not a chance, I can't go home to my parents with this grade and hear my mum say 'I told you, Lily, you don't have to worry about school, you're a girl' in her snotty voice." She replied simply.
A lot of her problems stem from her mother. They weren't always like that, they used to do everything together. But it was the older that Lily got, the more things she started to be interested in, suddenly she wasn't enough for her mother. It saddened her sometimes.
At least she had her sister. Petunia and Lily Evans were inseparable since Lily was born. Some of the family joked that they were meant to be twins. They would bake cookies, watch Christmas films, and decorate their house together during winter. Collect flowers and garden in the spring. Go to the public pool, go camping, and play in the sun together during the summer. And annually they would make scavenger hunts during the Fall (don't ask why usually it's an Easter thing).
But enough of that! I've saved the best and probably one of the most important details of her story for last. Lily Evans had a best friend, Severus Snape.
Severus Snape was a poor boy from Spinner's end. He had greasy black hair and he was very skinny. When Petunia found out that Lily was a witch and started to become distant from Lily, Severus replaced her. However, there was just one problem. Her family and friends didn't seem to like Severus so much.
"Why would you want to hang out with that greasy boy?! He is awful." Her sister wrinkled her nose in disgust the first time she met Severus.
"Don't be so mean, Petunia!" Lily bit back, to which her sister just rolled her eyes.
"Darling, I don't want you hanging out with that boy. He is nothing but trouble." Her mother said once.
"You just say that because he doesn't have as much money as us! He's my best friend, and I would appreciate it if you accepted him." Lily was crying now, she didn't want to stop being friends with Severus, but unlike the pants situation, she couldn't convince her mother. "Dad, please tell her!" Lily pointed at her mother as she turned to her father.
Now normally, Mr. Evans would have agreed with his daughter. But that very day he saw something suspicious about the boy and didn't want his daughter to be friends with him either. But he couldn't bear the distraught look on his daughter and turned his head away cowardly.
"Hey, girls! Want to sit with me and Sev?" She asked her friends one school day during lunch.
Severus turned away from them, his eyes revealing a look of shame as if reminiscing an unpleasant memory.
"Sorry, Lily, but he just gives us the creeps!" her friend Bethany said as she and Ellie shivered while looking at Severus.
That was the last time she spoke to Ellie and Bethany.
Just between you and me, there was another reason why each of them disliked Severus. But more on that later.
Anyway, the Evans family thought Lily was a normal girl. Well.. that was until-
"AAAHHHHH!" A voice shrieked in the kitchen.
Mr. Evans, Lily's father, ran to his wife. "Darling, what is it?"
Mr. Evans lost his voice once he saw the catastrophe that was in his kitchen. Owls were everywhere, flapping about the house, holding letters in their claws, and just about entered their living room. Petunia and Lily dashed down the stairs and entered the kitchen. Lily grinned and started running about the house, trying to collect a letter in her hand.
"I told you, you couldn't keep them away from me!" She laughed.
Once she finally caught a letter, she ran up the stairs to her room. Her mother tried to catch her, but she wasn't quite fast enough. Lily slammed her door shut and bounced onto her bed.

Ms. L. Evans
The bedroom upstairs, on the right, down the hall
8, Spinner's street,
Cokeworth,
Surrey

She smiled excitedly, got up from her bed, and jumped up and down. She was going to Hogwarts! After 2 years of knowing that she was a witch, she-
Wait, do you know what Hogwarts is...? No? I should explain. Let's go back to the beginning...
Actually, the story is not important right now, so let me just summarize. Lily had always been able to do strange things, she met a boy who knew magic (Who eventually became her best friend). And her sister had hated her ever since and doesn't want to speak to her ever since she found out. But don't tell that to Lily, the poor girl still has hope she can repair their relationship. Anyway, Severus had told her about a magical school that taught young kids like her about magic, and she has been waiting for her acceptance letter ever since.
Back to the present, Lily tentatively opened the letter and pulled out an official document.

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Ms. Evans,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find an enclosed list of all necessary books and equipment. Professor Dumbledore will visit your home and explain further instructions.

Term begins on 1 Steptember. We await your owl no later than 31 July.

Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall
Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress

Very exciting for Lily! Let us check on Lily's parents, shall we?
Mrs. Evans yelled in frustration. There were quills everywhere around her kitchen and living room, along with letters all addressed to her daughter. Petunia had started crying hysterically the moment she entered the kitchen, and Mr. Evans was standing beside his oldest daughter with a dumbfounded expression.
"Wha- How- Why?!" He asked no one in particular with a tired expression.
"Ask your daughter." Mrs. Evans retorted with an irritated expression.
The woman threw a letter at her husband. Mr. Evans opened up the letter and nearly fainted at the first words.
"We've been getting these letters for a long time. They wouldn't go away! I tried throwing them out, I TRIED! But they won't leave us alone." Mrs. Evans was now crying as hysterically as her daughter.
"Well, then I guess there is only one thing we can do." The man uttered solemnly.
     And after hours of shouting and yelling, crying and sobbing, Mr. and Mrs. Evans finally agreed to let Lily go to Hogwarts. Of course, this had elated Lily so much, she wanted to go visit Sev.
"Sev! Open up, I have important news." She used the knocker.
The door opened up to a glum-looking Severus Snape, well a used to be glum-looking. Severus smiled widely when he saw Lily. The two of them walk to the park together talking about Hogwarts.
"I finally got my letter!" Lily squealed. She stepped in front of him and pulled out her letter as she walked backward.
Severus grinned, "I told you your mum hid them. It usually happens like that with Muggle-borns. Muggles usually act hysterical when they get them."
Lily's smile faltered a little. She nodded and kept on walking. Lily and Severus got along well, it was just annoying how sometimes Severus would say little things that were demeaning toward Muggles. Something like, "Of course, they acted that way, they're Muggles..." or "Which Muggle invented that? It's funny how they come up with stuff like this" as if Muggles were inferior to wizards. It bothered Lily a lot, but she didn't say anything. He's just being playful, she thought.
She spent the rest of the day with Severus, talking, laughing, and having a good time because she knew greater things were to come for her.