An Uncertain Future

A/N: Thank you to Phantom of Desire for Beta-ing.

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It was strange, Lily thought as she traversed the snow-strewn fields, how uncertain life was. She'd been young once; naive. She'd believed that there was a certain order to life. That you could live the fairytale life. Maybe without the knights in shining armour or the singing birds and talking mice, but with that perfect, ordered rhythm. You were born. You went to school and made some friends. Maybe got into a little trouble and acted out petty rebellions that your parents could tease you about one day. Like your wedding day. That was another of the constants: you got married, always. Your spouse would be wonderful and yes, you'd argue on some days, but you'd raise a couple of beautiful children and their friends would be the children of your friends. You'd take everyone to Christmas with your parents and watch as your mother spoiled the children rotten. She'd never fed you many sweets, but she didn't have to get a pack of hyperactive little monkeys off to bed now.

And then, after all was said and done, when you'd loved and learned and slowly aged, you would die, peacefully, with all your family about you. And that would be the end of you.

People weren't meant to end in a splatter of gore, their blood drenching the curtains and leaving the carpet to squelch beneath your feet.

There was a dry stone wall in front of Lily with a stile over it. She'd been heading in this direction, slightly uphill and into the biting wind for just this reason. Farmers got ratty when you damaged their walls scrambling over them as James and Sirius had proven on more than one occasion. But now that she'd reached the stile, Lily found she hadn't the strength to surmount it and collapsed on the lowest step instead. Her every bone ached. She felt a thousand years old. So she wrapped her arms around herself and then tried not to shiver, not to panic and - most importantly of all - not to think.

Not thinking was harder than it sounded and for a moment it occurred to her that maybe she had been a little harsh with Sirius in all of those wild times long gone when she had chastised his lack of thought. Clearly he must have managed some high meditative level to remain quite so free from worries. Maybe she should have asked him about it before the funeral. Hell, asked him about it even after the funeral if it helped to keep the nightmares away. It wasn't like the intervening week had helped at all.

Dumbledore had said that time cured all ills, but at right that moment Lily wasn't so sure that it didn't just leave the ills dead and forgotten in the ditches of time. It seemed like her heart would never heal and only her death could wipe her grief from the face of the planet.

Family was meant to offer a haven in the storm, but there would be no help forthcoming from Petunia, of that she was sure. Causing one's parents' deaths did rather tend to drive a wedge between siblings. All throughout the funeral Petunia had sat, frozen in fury, on the opposite side of the church aisle and when the twin caskets were finally laid to rest in the winter earth she had glared across the yawning maw with open loathing in her emerald eyes. No, there was definitely no comfort to be found from Petunia and her new husband.

Damp had soaked through the seat of her skirt by now, the muddy water cold on the back of her legs. It stole what little heat her body seemed to generate and she shivered harder. For a moment she wondered if she should just sit out here in the cold until she fell ill or died. Perhaps there was relief from her pain in the heat of a fever or absolution of her sins in the darkness of death. She knew that such thoughts should have sounded desperate or maybe just pathetic. Instead she was warming to the idea with the desperation of the damned as she'd seen sweet Jean do after the Death Eaters took her and her sister, raped her and tortured her, and finally made her watch as her sister was fed, alive, to a pack of werewolves. The Order could save Jean from the Death Eaters, but they couldn't save her from herself. Perhaps Lily should be horrified by the idea of death and fling it from her mind with disgust and twist her lips as though she'd tasted something foul just like Deirdre had when she and Lily had read the note that Jean had left behind. She should think of it as the ultimate cowardice; the most traitorous retreat.

Oddly though, her mind studied the idea with shocking levels of remoteness. As a plan it was simple; all that she had to do was sit here. Night was coming on, bringing a freezing cold with it, but no one would think to look for her for a good few hours at least. She was hurt right down to her soul; she was in shock. She wondered numbly about the people in the house and reflected on how James had become accustomed to her long thought-cleaning hikes. No, James wouldn't suspect that anything was wrong until well after seven and even when he did start to look he'd discover it hard to find her. The earlier sleet would have disguised any signs of her passage. How strange to think of hiding from her husband with all the seriousness she'd put into evading Voldemort's minions; to contemplate that, rather than preserving her life, she was planning to protect her death.

It was something in the absurdity of it all that brought her back to herself. Just a little; just enough to feel the grating cold in her flesh as though the winter were trying to steal inside her body. Maybe it was Jack Frost come to possess her. Why should he not? Every other unimaginable monstrosity that she might have feared in the past had proved true.

She couldn't leave James though. She loved him and he needed her. If she thought there was no hope left now how could she possibly expect James to go on without even her support? No, the only sensible thing left to do was to head home. She could warm up and cook some dinner. There might be enough hot water left for a decent bath - the Scouring Charms were simply not meant for cleaning bodies - and afterwards, maybe, there would be some peace. She could lie with James and feel his warm, solid heartbeat and convince herself that this was enough. Convince herself that they, the Order, were enough and that Voldemort would be gone one day - a tale to frighten babes - maybe even their own children when the pain and horror dimmed. If it dimmed.

Standing, she brushed off her coat as best she could and scrambled over the stile. Her limbs were stiff from inactivity and her teeth couldn't seem to stop chattering. James would have 'words' with her when she got back and she almost grinned at the thought of him daring to chastise her for once. That was the end of it, Lily decided. Those bleak thoughts would have to be over and done with. She had a war to help win.

Oh, if only she knew there was hope!