The Seven Year Itch

Chapter 14

The Hogwarts Express slowed down and finally came to a halt. The few students who had decided to return home at Easter piled out, dragging their luggage behind them. The last ones to leave Platform Nine and Three Quarters were three Seventh years, two girls and a boy.

"Benjy! It's good to have you back!" Mrs Fenwick exclaimed, hugging her son tightly. "Lily! Dorcas!"

"Thanks for inviting us over, Mrs Fenwick," Lily said.

"Please, Lily! You know you and Dorcas are always welcome at our home!"

They used a Muggle bus to get to the Leaky Cauldron. Mrs Fenwick chatted away about the ghoul that lived in the basement while Lily's eyelids began to droop.

When she awake, she was lying on Benjy's bed. Dorcas was lying next to her, reading a bok. From the sky outside Lily could tell that it had to be about seven p.m.

"Oh, you're awake," Dorcas said. "You fell asleep on the bus. Benjy had to carry you home."

Lily wasn't surprised-that had happened to her quite often in the last few weeks because she had difficulties sleeping at night. Her thoughts always revolved around her father, Petunia and James Potter. She sighed.

"Are you all right?" Dorcas asked.

"I have to tell you something that happened before I went to Dad's funeral," Lily said, rubbing her eyes. She then proceeded to tell her everything that had happened between her and Potter in that hallway.

After Lily had finished, there was a silence. Finally, Dorcas said, "I thought so."

"What d'you mean?" Lily asked, bewildered.

"You have been skipping Defense Against the Dark Arts ever since the funeral," Dorcas said, smirking. "So I thought something might have happened. Something different than the usual 'I hate you Potter, you're an asshole!'-'Detention, Evans.' Especially since you two were on rather good terms the three months before. So, what are you going to do now?"

"I want him to stop messing me around," Lily said.

"Messing you around?" Dorcas questioned. "I don't know James Potter very well, but I don't think he's messing you around."

"What's he doing then?" Lily said.

"Oh, I don't know, ask him!" Dorcas replied impatiently. "I'm not Potter's brain, am I? All I'm saying is that I think Potter had a reason to kiss you and that he wasn't thinking, 'Oh, there's Evans, I'm bored, so I'll go and hurt her'."

"And what makes you think that?" Lily inquired.

"Dunno," Dorcas replied casually. "I need to go to Diagon Alley next week... you coming with me?"

"Now that was a very subtle way of changing the topic," Lily said sarcastically.

"Yeah, well, what am I supposed to say?" Dorcas said. "I can't tell you, can I? You just have to go and talk to Potter."

"It's not that easy, Dorcas."

"Yeah, because you're making it difficult," Dorcas answered.

Lily sighed heavily.

***

Lily put the book she had been leafing through back on the shelf and took out another one. She was looking for a book that could help her with Transfiguration. After looking through the other one, she nodded satisfied. It seemed rather good. She went to the till to pay. When she was bout to leave Florish&Blotts, a middle-aged wizard in a green cloak stormed in.

"Death Eaters!" he yelled. "Death Eater attack! We have to barricade ourselves in!"

Panic flooded Lily. She took a few steps backwards, but then she remembered Dorcas.

"Fuck!" she yelled and stormed towards the door.

"No-miss, you have to stay here!" the wizard in the green cloak called out to her.

But Lily had already left the store, hurrying down the street. Curses were flying everywhere. The Aurors had already arrived and engaged in a furious battle with the Death Eaters.

"Where are you going, young lady?" one of the Death Eaters screamed, sending a curse flying her way. Lily ducked and shouted, "Impedimenta!" The curse hit the masked man straight in the chest. Lily got up again and proceeded to run, ducking curses as she went. The apothecary where Dorcas wanted to buy some potion ingredients was already in sight-

"Catch her!" she heard someone shout, and the someone got hold of her hair and pinned her up against the wall.

"Oh, Crabbe, see who we've caught... Severus's little mudblood friend," her attacker said with obvious glee in his voice.

"I guess Dumbledore will have to look for a new Head Girl, then," Crabbe replied, chuckling. "Finish her off, I bet Severus will be thankful. He must be so embarassed that he used to hang out with her..."

"I'll do it the muggle way, it's much more fun," the other one said, and now Lily recognized the voice.

"Mulciber!"

"That's right," Mulciber cackled. Then he muttered a spell, and suddenly Lily's body seemed to be glued to the wall, and Mulciber put his hands around her neck and began to strangle her.

Lily was terrified, she tried to break the spell, but the lack of air weakened her. Rasping sounds came out of her mouth-

"Get your fucking hands off her, you wanker!"

And then a man tore Mulciber away from her and punched him right in the face. The sound that resulted from this made Lily want to be sick. The spell on her was lifted and she slumped to the floor, coughing and gasping for her.

"Are you OK?" her rescuer asked, grabbing her upper arms and lifting her up.

"Sirius..."

She swayed on her feet.

"Go and hide, Lily! Hurry up!"

"I cant't, I have to look for Dorcas!"

"She's been evacuated, and you better join her!"

A curse was flying their direction and Lily parried it, immediately fighting back, because she was attacked by three Death Eaters at once. Sirius came to her aid.

"Now that's nice," one of the Death Eaters shouted, sending a curse. "A blood traitor and a mudblood!"

"Stupefy!" Lily yelled, and this time she hit him, but his curse made Sirius fly head first into a wall. A crunching noise was to be heard.

"Sirius!" Lily screamed, unattentive for a second, which proved to be a mistake, as she, too, was sent flying backwards. She landed on her back, groaning as her head hit the ground.

"Goodbye, mudblood," she heard the Death Eater say. "Crucio!"

Lily screamed, screamed like she had never done before, and somewhere in the distance, she could hear the Death Eaters laugh-

"Bleed to death, bitch," he said as he lifted the curse and flicked his wand. And Lily screamed again because her right arm felt as though someone had sliced it open with a knife. And then her arm started to feel hot and sticky; Lily could feel her blood drenching her sleeve and running into the hollow of her hand as consciousness began to leave her...

She was dying and she knew it, but it wasn't nearly as terrifying as she had always thought it would be. On the contrary, living on seemed more terrifying than dying.

Then she felt how someone shoved their arm under her neck and pulled her up against them, and Lily knew it was Dorcas. Her best friend had come to stand by her in her last moments.

"Dorcas... you know I love you, right?" she said, slurring her words. She tried to open her eyes, but failed. Her eyelids felt incredibly heavy.

"Say goodbye to everyone frome me," she continued mumbling. "And tell Potter-tell him that I'm sorry, so sorry."

The arms holding her twitched violently as she said this, but they didn't let her go. She heard a spell being muttered. The blood seeping out of the wounds on her arm seemed to become less, and her mind a bit clearer. This time, she managed to open her eyes, but instead of Dorcas brown, warm eyes, she saw a pair of black eyes, unreadable, like dark tunnels. A pair of eyes she had thought she'd never see again.

"So you joined them?" was everything she managed to get out. "You really joined them?"

"OI!" one of the Death Eaters shouted. "We have to leave right now! Get- what are you doing with the mudblood?"

"I just checked if she was really dead," Snape replied calmly. He lied Lily carefully back down and then he was gone. Lily's eyelids began to droop again; Snape's spell had helped a bit, but now it was getting worse again. She knew she should try to keep her eyes open if she wanted to survive, try to stay awake, but she closed her eyes and let the darkness overcome her, aware that she was walking right in Death's welcoming arms, but not really caring anymore.

"Bloody bastards," James said hatefully. "Are you sure you're OK?"

"Yeah," Sirius, who was holding an ice pack to his head, replied groggily. "You can go and help."

James nodded and went to join the Aurors who were looking for the injured and the dead. His insides clenched. The Death Eaters had killed everyone who got in their way, even a few little children. He helped where he could, carrying the dead and the injured into the Leaky Cauldron where Healers had already arrived. Those who had serious injuries were brought to St Mungo's.

He hurried up and down Diagon Alley to look for the victims. Suddenly, he heard desperate sobs coming out of a small side street. Immediately, he hurried to the see what the source of it was. He startled when he saw Dorcas Meadowes, trying to revive one of the victims, her face streaked with tears and a huge pool of blood on the ground.

And then he saw who had been attacked. The scream that left his mouth didn't sound like something a human being could produce, didn't sound like something any living being could produce.

Dorcas looked up, terrified, but he paid no attention to her.

"Lily!" he yelled, slumping down on the ground next to her, not caring that he was kneeing in her blood. Her face was as white as a sheet, but she looked strangely, no, frighteningly at peace... as if she had already left this world-left him. "LILY! No... please..."

With shaking hands, he tried to feel her pulse.

"She's alive," he whispered. Dorcas sighed, relieved. He put one arm under Lily's neck and the other one under her knees and picked her up. Then he Apparated to St Mungo's.

"A Healer! Hurry up!" he yelled. The Healers looked at him dumbfounded, but they reacted quickly. Lily was laid on a stretcher and carried away. James wanted to go with her, but he wasn't allowed to.

He looked after her as the Healers brought her away. This might have been the last time he had seen her. At this thought, he felt as though his inner organs had been ripped out. He looked down on his body; his hands and his clothes were covered in Lily's blood. People were staring at him, but it didn't matter. What if Lily really died?

I was there, he thought, I could have helped her.

Tears spilled from his eyes. If Lily really died, he didn't know if he could live on.