What Lies Beneath

1. GOODBYE DADDY

Five-year-old Lily Evans looked up at her father, tears welling up in her eyes. She was desperately trying to understand why he was leaving her.

"Where are you going, Daddy?" she asked.

"I have to go away for a bit," Thomas Evans told his younger daughter, stooping down so that he was on her level.

"When are you coming back?" Lily asked worriedly. Thomas tried valiantly to choke back his own tears.

It was absolutely heart-wrenching to have to leave his little girls like this but he had no choice. It was especially difficult saying goodbye to Lily. He loved both his daughters equally but little Lily had a way about her that enabled her to steal your heart with just one look from those big, beautiful, green eyes.

"I'm not sure, Princess," he replied, unable to tell her the truth; that he wouldn't be coming back.

Someone cleared their throat loudly and Thomas looked up. It was Andrea, his ex-wife trying to tell him, not so subtly, to hurry it up. He narrowed his eyes at her before slowly standing up. It was because of her that he had to leave. It was because of her that Lily was on the verge of tears. Nine-year-old Petunia was upset too but she seemed to be able to control herself better than Lily could. She was currently standing with her mother, holding her hand.

Thomas took a deep breath.

"Bye, Andrea," he said shortly. She merely nodded in reply. He turned to Petunia with a lot more warmth.

"Bye, Honey," he smiled at her.

"Bye," she replied, quietly. Thomas turned and began to walk to the car.

"Daddy! I want to go with you!" Lily cried.

"You can't, Princess. Stay with your mum, okay?" Thomas replied, a pained look on his face. He turned and started to get into the car.

"Daddy!" Lily tried to run after him, but her mother grabbed her hand to hold her back. Lily burst into tears. Through her sobs she managed one last plea.

"Daddy, please don't leave me!" The car pulled out onto the street and disappeared from sight. Her father never looked back.

To a five-year-old girl, one of your parents leaving puts you in a pretty bad way, but Lily could not possibly have any idea of just how bad a way she was in. As for her father, well, that was the last time they ever saw each other. Twelve years would pass before Lily would ever love another man as purely and completely as she had loved her father. A man who was still a boy in many, many ways.

2. A RAY OF HOPE

Six years had passed since Thomas Evans had left but Lily had not forgotten him. She still had the picture of the two of them fishing when they went to the Caribbean on holiday the year before the divorce. Lily had been four. The picture had pride of place on Lily's bedside table and was surrounded by other personal knick-knacks.

It was painful thinking about her father now because it made her sad and sometimes she could feel the tears welling up in her eyes again. Also, it made her think of the divorce and the furious custody battle which had taken place and ultimately decided that her mother would get sole custody of her and Petunia. But her mother was and always had been a gold digger. She'd taken Thomas Evans for everything he had and every penny he possessed. It didn't help to think about this either because it made Lily think of the way things had gone to hell ever since.

An almighty crash jerked Lily out of her melancholy reverie. It was now commonplace for sudden crashes like that to be heard throughout the house, but Lily's heart sank and her stomach flipped over all the same. The crash could mean only one thing - Mommy was drunk.

Lily cracked her bedroom door just a bit and peeked out. She could hear her mother moving around downstairs and she crept to the top of the staircase to take a look. As she passed her sister's bedroom she noted that it was empty. Petunia still wasn't home. Good thing too, Lily thought. Of course, when she did get home there'd be hell to pay. Their mother was never in a good mood if Petunia got home late, especially when she'd been drinking. Petunia was fifteen and not stupid enough to stay at home where she ran the risk of getting smacked around if she got in her mother's way. Lily, on the other hand, would go out and return when it got dark and try to stay in her room unless it was absolutely necessary to go downstairs.

Lily reached the top of the staircase and peeked down, trying to see where her mother was. As she did so, another empty liquor bottle went flying across the room and shattered on the floor. It was worse than Lily had thought. She was already drunk, but she was looking for more. Lily turned around, intending to head back to her room.

"Lily!" her mother roared up at her. (She could never say anything at a normal volume when she was drunk). Damn! She'd been spotted! Lily slowly turned around. Her mother swayed drunkenly on the spot.

"Get down here!" she yelled. Lily started pulling on her shoes.

"What are you putting on your shoes for?" her mother roared. Lily stood up.

"There's glass all over the place. I might get splinters," Lily explained. But this was evidently quite the wrong thing to say.

"Splinters? Splinters! I call you down here and you're worried about splinters? When I call you, you come!" her mother screamed at her. Lily opened her mouth to say something but her mother cut her off.

"I'll give you splinters! You ill-mannered wretch!" she shrieked. And with that, she bent down and picked up a large, jagged shard of glass and started up the stairs toward Lily. When she reached her she shoved her roughly onto the stairs in a sitting position. Lily, fearing the worst, struggled in an attempt to get away but her mother slapped her hard across the face. She cried out and promptly stopped struggling. Her mother pulled one of the shoes off her feet and stabbed the jagged shard of glass into her sole. Lily screamed with pain. Her mother slapped her again.

"Don't make any noise! D'you hear me?" she said, threateningly. Lily fell quiet and bit her lip in an effort to remain silent as her mother twisted the piece of glass in her foot. Lily whimpered and her mother glared daggers at her. Finally, she pulled the now bloody piece of glass out of her foot and showed it to her.

"When I tell you to do something, you do it! Clear?" her mother told her. When Lily didn't answer right away, her mother slapped her again.

"I said, 'is that clear?'" she screamed.

"Yes!" Lily sobbed.

"Good. Now, get out of my sight!"

Just then, the front door opened and Petunia walked in.

"Where the hell have you been?" their mother roared at her.

"Out with my friends," Petunia replied. Their mother went right up to Petunia.

"If you stay out this late again, you'll regret it, just like Lily regrets not doing what she's told!" she threatened. Then, she stormed out of the room and resumed her bottle smashing. Petunia completely ignored Lily until she got to the top of the stairs next to her. She looked down at her sobbing younger sister with her bloody, cut up foot.

"You got in her way again, didn't you?" she whispered, accusingly. Lily shook her head. "You're always getting in her way! How many times do I have to tell you? Stay out of her way and you'll be fine! Honestly, I can't wait for you to leave and go to this freak school of yours! I won't have to worry about your worthless skin anymore!" She turned around and headed to her room.

"Petunia?" Lily whimpered. Petunia turned around.

"What?" she said, exasperatedly.

"My foot..." Lily trailed off.

"There's some stuff in the bathroom. Go clean it up," she said and she entered her room and shut the door. As Lily got up and hobbled on one foot back to her room, Petunia reappeared.

"Lily, don't get blood all over the place or Mum will be really mad!" And she disappeared again.

An hour later, Lily had managed to get all the broken off shards of glass that had been stuck in her foot, out of her foot and the bleeding had slowed considerably. She had cleaned the cut the best she could and bandaged it. She hopped on one foot back to her bed and turned off the lights.

But she couldn't sleep. Pain sliced through her foot from the cut and she thought about everything that had happened. She started to cry silently as she did so. Petunia had been right though. At the end of the summer she would be going to her new school, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. A ray of hope burgeoned within her. She wiped away her remaining tears as she thought. It couldn't be as bad as Petunia made out. Anywhere would be better than here. With this last comforting thought and the remnants of the last few tears on her cheeks, she fell asleep.