like an amputated limb

Author's note: I'd like to thank my fantastic betas Ruichi (who took the time to helpme with my tres crappy first draft! ILU!), Sami, and Jules. You guys are so amazing. Without you, there wouldn't be a story. <3.

Lily

I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal.

-Jane Austen

May 26th 1977, 5:00pm.

IT'S GONE. MY BEAUTIFUL, LEATHERBOUND, SHAKESPEAREAN MASTERPIECE OF A JOURNAL IS GONE.

I BET POTTER TOOK IT.

THE BLOODY, SODDING, EVIL, SHIT-EATING BASTARD.

IF I FIND OUT HE'S READ IT AND TOLD ANYONE (BLACK) ABOUT THE CONTENTS I SWEAR I'LL RIP HIS TONGUE OUT AND SHOVE IT UP HIS ARSE.

June 12th 1977, 12:30 am. Bedroom. Bijou's been licking my face for the past two hours. I love the dog but I'm starting to smell like roast beef and dead squirrel.

Note to self: Give my dog a bloody bath.

I've just been shopping down in the village and found this little diary. It's not my wonderful journal from sixth year which was absolutely SHAKESPEREAN but it's perfect for flower pressing, and since my first one disappeared in the flurry of end-of-the-year packing in May, I figured I could splurge a little. (Turns out Potter didn't take it. Damn, I was looking forward to hexing him.) Mum gave me something extra with my school money this term anyway, and it's safer to buy a Muggle diary than a Wizarding one.

Wizarding diaries write back. I don't think I could handle something like that. I might run screaming to a mental institution.

Haha.

June 14th 1977, 9:12 am. Bedroom.

Dorcas hasn't been writing me back. I've received the regular summer letters from Alice and Marlene, but nothing from Canada. I'm really worried. She always writes back at around this time, especially to moan on about Vancouver, her family's yearly vacation spot.

And speaking of letters, I haven't got any from Potter the Prick, for which I am grateful. It takes far too much energy to order a Howler. Plus, I'm completely broke. Note to self: Arrange a meeting at Diagon so I can beg for money.

Maybe he didn't really break up with Fern Bagshot at the end of last year.

Who bloody cares. He's evil. She's evil. Their mates are evil.

It's like a cornucopia of evil.

June 14th 1977, 10:22am. Kitchen table, sparrow watching.

Fern Bagshot is the biggest slag. She's a sixth year Gryffindor (a year behind me), and last year I caught her stuffing her bra in the third floor girls' loo with tissues. She, along with half the female population at Hogwarts, has no qualms about falling at Potter's disgustingly arrogant feet and started dating him in early October of last year. They broke up once (he dated Susie George from Hufflepuff during that time. The only reason I know this is because they spent inordinate amounts of time with their tongues down each other's throats outside the Runes classroom), but they got back together. I'm just surprised he started going out with her in the first place, because he's had a fairly steady, fairly slaggy girlfriend since fourth year named Rebecca Knightly. She's pureblood (like him), a brunette (like him-or is his hair black? Who cares?), and the two of them are practically worshipped by McGonagall for their ability to turn a hedgehog into a kettle, or some such nonsense. She IS fairly nice. We did a study project in Charms together third year and she never said a harsh word about anything.

Nice or not, you'd have to be dumb as rocks to date James Potter.

June 14th 1977, 10:30am. The bloody birds are eating my tomatoes. Aren't there berries somewhere else? Wildlife.

Just received a letter from Marlene. (Third of the summer. Excitement!)

Lil-

How's everything up north? Has it reached 60 yet?

Haha.

The Hollow's just fine, thanks. Boiling (70, for your information). I've met up with Potter and Black enough times to collect some juicy gossip. Read it and weep: Potter and Bagshot REALLY broke it off in May after Rebecca Knightly threatened her with boils, and he's now officially shagging a Muggle named Frances. I caught them in a garden shed a while back arse over tit, if you know what I mean.

Yes, love, a MUGGLE named FRANCES. What kind of name is Frances? She's a redhead, but more of strawberry color than you, so don't worry. She's also rather blank in the brainpan too, which means Potter's only after her for one thing, and it's definitely not the conversation. I asked her if she'd heard of Socktees or whoever, because he's the only Muggle person I could remember that you particularly like, and she didn't have a sodding clue what I was talking about.

Oh Potter, what standards you have. Pathetic duffer. I think you're little lovefest after the Defense OWL actually got through to him.

Bad luck, Lily love.

I haven't included the rest of the letter because any coherent point she's trying to make ends there. That's the thing about Marlene. She could be arsed to write a good letter without mentioning Potter, Black, or Quidditch. (In fact, the rest of it was about Puddlemere's chances of losing miserably to the Pride of Porktee or whatever. For a moment I thought she meant one of those vile American groundhogs; they have stupid names too. How should I know anything about Quidditch? Useless sport.) If I didn't know for sure she liked girls, I'd assume she fancied them both something awful. Black and Potter, I mean. Not the Pride of Porktee.

I'm not even going to address Potter and this poor Muggle girl. He's so horrible, taking advantage of a poor girl like that. And on vacation too! Marlene's right. He IS a pathetic duffer. What she left out was that he embodies everything negative about the opposite sex.

I don't know what she means by "bad luck, Lily love," but he deserved what he got after that OWL, torturing Sev the way he was. I wish he'd give up, keel over, and die. Potter, I mean. Possibly Sev too.

Speaking of dead people-SOCKTEES? No wonder the poor girl was confused. Pure-bloods and their vocabulary handicaps.

I still haven't received one owl from Potter. I don't know how many times I should write it, but I am so relieved. Hallelujah!

June 14th 1977, 1:30pm. Munching on a tomato sandwich from the garden, yum.

I don't know why he ever bothered. Potter, I mean. I sent them all back unopened. In fact, I don't think he ever fancied me. He just likes a good challenge. Why else would he try to ask me out four million times? Who does that? It's sick.

It's some massive joke, I can tell you, because the idiot knows NOTHING about me. He doesn't know that I used to be in my town's junior football league, or that I'm obsessed with food. He isn't aware that my favorite sport is rugby or that I adore maroon or that I hate flying because my aunt died in a plane crash and I just cannot STAND heights because of it. He doesn't even know my birthday or that I have a sister, or that my mum's from Ireland. Nothing. I mean, a bloke who thinks he fancies you should at least know your birthday right? If he took more time trying to get to know me (or at least asking my friends like normal blokes. He's friends with them too) and less time cursing first years, maybe I wouldn't reject him so harshly.

So in honor of this auspicious occasion, I present to you a list. (He doesn't even know that I make lists! How can a prat who professes to fancy a girl not even know that she makes lists? That her trunk is full of lists upon lists upon lists?

Ugh.)

Twenty Things A Boy Who Thinks He Fancies Me Should Know (About Me):

1. Boys are a total waste of time and energy. I've kissed three boys and one girl, and have gone out on five dates. Two of the boys I've kissed were Muggles, and the other was Jeremy McMillan, a total pureblooded dunce from Hufflepuff. The girl was Marlene, and it was after I tried Firewhiskey for the first time in fifth year. She called me Dorcas.

I didn't ask.

2. I love knitting scarves. In fact, the only reason I even like England is because it's cold almost all year round, which gives me a chance to show off my handiwork. I've knitted a total of 37.

3. That the way to a girl's heart is through her stomach, not shoving her off a broom twelve feet in the air.

4. People shouldn't constantly act like bullying, egotistical toerags.

5. Or curse her best friend EX best friend (he's still a human being who deserves to be left the bloody hell alone, despite his creepy fascination with the Dark Arts and the whole blood fiasco)...either.

6. Sometimes it's just better not to exist.

7. My mother's name is Mary Kelley and she's a florist. My father's name is Douglas and he works in a steel factory. My mum loves romance novels and was born and raised in Limerick, Ireland, and my dad is the best at fixing things (my mum wouldn't know a wrench from an elbow injury). He's also the best cook-sorry, Mum. Tuney and I used to think this was well strange for a man who stands at 1.9304 m with hands as big as our heads.

8. The first time I exhibited "magical talent" was when I was five. I was swinging in the dingy playground near our house and, as always, decided to jump off when the swing reached the highest it could go without jerking (I was very daring as a girl-and in hindsight, I was also very stupid. Sod off). Instead of falling on my arse, which is what's to be expected, I hovered for a good twenty seconds before my feet hit the ground with barely a thump. I was so excited. I thought I was Peter Pan (you know, happy thoughts and all that). Mum banned me from the swing after I told Tuney though.

Tattle. Riffraff.

9. I played Peter Pan in a primary school play when I was seven. I tried to hover on stage, but apparently it doesn't work when you want it to.

10. My favorite holiday isn't Christmas. I hate the carols and the too-bright baubles and the false cheer everyone adopts because it's the bloody "season." I don't like buying gifts for people (I'd rather write them letters or give them encouraging embraces or something, what's so wrong with that?) and I certainly don't like battling the Great Mob in shops at Christmastime (I avoid Hogsmeade like it's the bubonic bloody plague). In short, holidays are well tiresome.

11. I like the Beatles music-wise, but I think they're all as good-looking as doorknobs. Especially John Lennon, with the glasses and dark hair.

12. In fact, I hate men with glasses and dark hair. I prefer blondes.

13. My favorite animal is the sheep. I think it's highly underrated.

14. I'm terrified of koi fish. They suck on your fingers and their mouths are little sucking machines that could possibly suck out your soul. (My mum has a few in the "exotic plant life" section of her flower shop. Believe me, if you think you can just stick your fingers anywhere you'd like, you're sadly mistaken.) Really, they're distant relatives of Dementors.

15. Severus Snape used to be my very best friend in the world.

16. I wanted to be in Slytherin for that reason. If Potter knew, he'd pee himself. I hope.

17. Yes, three of my other, very best friends are friends with Potter and that therefore makes me doubt both their intelligence and their sanity. My friends, I mean.

They are undoubtedly unhinged anyway.

I don't know why I was drawn to those prats. You know what they say: 'close quarters equals companionship.'

Or I could've made that up.

18. Yes, I read too much. Yes, if you take my book I'll hex you within an inch of your life.

19. I do have a temper, so maybe it isn't wise to upset me. Obviously.

20. I'm allergic to cats, so this means STOP SENDING YOUR MANGY ANIMAL INTO MY DORM AT NIGHT. THAT MEANS YOU JAMES POTTER. (When doesn't it?)

See? Are those tidbits so difficult to find out? I mean, I spout my hatred for Potter every day, so that should be the easiest. That's the worst thing about Potter's stupid so-called crush-it's simply half-arsed. HE'S FRIENDS WITH MY FRIENDS FOR MERLIN'S SAKE. MY INSANE FRIENDS. If he professes to fancy me so very much, why not just ask them about me?

(Or is that encouraging stalking?)

I do not proclaim to know the nuances of Potter's clearly inferior mind.

That is all.

June 15th 1977, 4:30am. Can't bloody sleep. I blame Potter. In fact, I blame him for everything.

I just received a letter from Alice. Here's the one I sent her:

Al-

How's Paris? Any fit blokes (to take your mind off Hem Frank Hem?)

My holiday's just fine so far, thanks. We haven't actually gone on holiday yet, but we're expecting to spend about a week in London, hitting some wizarding spots and ignoring others (Diagon! It's tradition after all), and then another week touring Bath and then Brighton. I can honestly say I'm not looking forward to Bath. I'm afraid Austen spoiled it for me in Northanger Abbey and Persuasion.

Damn her.

So I just received an owl from Marlene before I started writing this. Apparently Potter was found in flagrante delicto with some busty redheaded Muggle, and everything's off with Bagshot. She concluded this point with "bad luck, Lily love."

En contraire, mes amis. I am GLAD Potter's with someone. In fact, I'm bloody ECSTATIC. Maybe she'll take his mind off tormenting me. I haven't received a single owl from the prat and I'd like to send the girl some good chocolate.

Who cares if she's not very smart. You can't have everything.

So in conclusion: HAVE YOU HEARD FROM DORCAS? She's been ignoring both Marlene and me for weeks. I was thinking, as the nicest of our little group, maybe she would've told you what's bothering her. I'm really worried.

Well, stare at some paintings with longing for me.

All my love!

Lily

Here's her response:

Lil-

Paris is beautiful! Horribly hot, I'm afraid, but beautiful. So relaxed, compared to England. The French in the south get up whenever they like and eat all the chocolate they can hold-and the wine! I could die. No fit blokes though. They're different outside of England, Lil. They dress in gauze with girly legs and sunglasses and although they're probably great people, they don't look very friendly, especially when you attempt to speak to them.

So, why hello, Mr. Hem Hem (we need to think of another nickname). He hasn't sent me any owls all summer, rather like your Mr. Potter. I can survive though! I'm perfectly happy here, with all the fancy churches and museums and palaces to tour. Everything will be fine.

Oh, Marlene. Did she mention anything about Portree in her owl? Because she went on and on forever in the letter she sent me. Portree's all fine and wonderful, but Puddlemere's going to win. I just didn't have the heart to discuss Moran's tact-

Okay. I apologize. James Potter. I can focus, I promise.

First off, James has been obsessed with you for years, Lily, long enough to face humiliation every day on account of his...slight issues. Which can be changed and/or overlooked! Maybe this Muggle girl's a nice person, but I suspect something far more shallow in their relationship, which you do too, otherwise you wouldn't have mentioned "in flagrante delicto," as you put it. He's a boy, and therefore that's all there is. Except in your case, of course. I doubt he's spent so much time chasing after you for sex.

(Also, have you noticed that she's a redhead?)

I'm sad to say that after they break up, he'll definitely be sending an owl. But what do you expect after each rejection?! Pining away isn't for men, it's for girls like Penelope and um, me. It's a feminine trait. Boys just get angry and shag whoever's available.

Oh well.

I'm not attacking you or anything, Lil, you're my best friend. But just consider James, all right? He's not the pricky prat he was in 5th year. Or all the years before that. Well, the term pricky prat is a little harsh. He just had an attitude problem. A slight attitude problem.

Promise.

Also, I will continue to stare at many paintings for you, including the Mona Lisa. When you think of Potter, just remember how you feel about Da Vinci and Raphael. Apparently they were egotistical little sods too.

All the love in the world, and tons of kisses too,

Alice.

P.S. I haven't heard from Dorcy, and I'm also terribly worried. Gideon Prewett sent me a letter asking if I'd heard from her a few days ago. It's included. Maybe we should try owling her mum?

Alice:

Toot toot and all that. Sorry about not knowing your address, no one gave it to me. Have you heard anything from Meadows? I've sent her at least six owls and I've got shit.

Gideon

I've suggested a Howler. Thoughts?

Alice.

I don't know what she was trying to get at. Consider Potter? CONSIDER POTTER? I would rather have an owl peck out my tongue and thrust it down my throat or peck out my eyes and make me eat them or rip open my chest and devour my still beating heart or even choke on a bloody turkey bone, thank you very much. And on that nauseating note, A SLIGHT ATTITUDE PROBLEM?! That could possibly be the biggest understatement of the last century.

How dare she bring up my fondness for Renaissance art? So what if Raphael and Da Vinci were 'egotistical little sods?' I think, out of anyone, they have the right to think highly of themselves. Just look at Maiden on the Bloody Rocks will you or the Alba Madonna and TRY to tell me how they could, in any way, be humble. JUST TRY. They were geniuses, bloody geniuses. Potter, on the other hand, is not, despite what everyone says about Transfiguration and Arithmancy and his stupid 'Quidditch talent.'

I've decided that, for the rest of this month, I'm going to refrain from bitching and moaning about the Prick. If I am forced to discuss him at length, he will be known as the Prick, because He Who Shall Not Ever Be Discussed is Frank Longbottom, who's on holiday in Belgium. He was a Prefect last year, and Alice has this horrible fancy for him.

She has the same plan every summer: Get over Frank Longbottom. I too, have the same plan every summer: Refrain from Bringing about Potter's Demise.

Let's see if I can restrain myself a little longer.

Just keep telling yourself that you are above the riffraff, Lily. You are ABOVE the riffraff. You have friends and homework and a LIFE. A LIFE THAT IS ABOVE AND BEYOND THE RIFRAFF.

Note to self: Send an owl off to Canada IMMEDIATELY to Dorcas and her mum. Possibly with fudge. Mrs. Meadows loves fudge. I'm willing to accept Dorcas might not want to answer, but I've got to write anyway because, bloody hell, this is worrying.

Hopefully her mum can shed some light on things.

To Dorcas Meadows

Christ Dorcas, really. What's going on? You've had owls from all of us, including bloody Gideon Prewett, and still no reply. We're all so worried. If you don't send me something in the next two DAYS I swear on Merlin's spotty socks that I will buy a ticket to Vancouver.

That's a plane ticket.

And don't doubt that I will. If I have to, I will tie my sodding trunk to my sodding broom and FLY THERE.AND YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I HATE FLYING SO WRITE BACK ALREADY WILL YOU??

Just remember that we love you, Dorcy, okay? We love you so very much. If I'm a little insane it's out of devotion to our friendship.

Missing you like an amputated limb,

Lily.

To Julia Meadows

Mrs. Meadows,

This is Lily Evans, one of Dorcy's friends from school. I stayed over during the Easter hols? The redhead?

Anyway. We're all terribly worried about Dorcas. We've sent her quite a few owls and she hasn't replied to ANYTHING. Could you maybe give me some information so I can pass it along?

Here's some fudge, with love.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Lily Evans.