Go check it out at AO3 :)

 

 

 

Petunia Evans does not remember life before Lily. But she remembers Lily forever in the life she lives after.

-Dripping Fingers by May_May_0_0

"Is it… Is it her?" Draco whispers, and from the corner of his vision he sees Potter's lips part over a question. Draco can't hear it, can't hear anything apart from the spinning in his head, the whooshing of his own blood, and the constant mantra of please no, no no no no. Granger's face contorts with pity, and something in her eyes shimmer, and it makes Draco mad, so fucking mad — but he can't even shout, his voice only wavers and croaks, "Is it her?"

She nods, and Draco stands shakily. He feels distant from his own body, as if he's watching from afar as he stumbles towards her. She's lying, she must be lying. It isn't true. They said — they promised —

A hand coils around his elbow, and he hears a voice — almost urgent, saying, Malfoy, Malfoy what's happened? What's going on? Hermione?

"Is it my mother?" That can't be his voice. Because Draco has never before sounded so broken and unsure — so raw and in pieces.

Granger's lips tremble. "Y-yes."

And then everything is falling falling falling. Falling apart.

-Temptation on the Warfront by alizarincrimson

 

The answer comes easily: Because I know that fairyland is beautiful but when you are spirited away you don’t come back.

-Dripping Fingers by May_May_0_0

 

And Lily looks back, emerald eyes defiant, gorgeous in her gown the way little girls always dream of, (the way Petunia dreamed her baby sister would be, blushing and resplendent and magical in the way Petunia will never be,) and says, “I love him! And there’s a war on, Tuney. There’s a war. We have to live while we can.”

And then all the anger seeps right out of Petunia’s boney fame. “What?” She asks, “what war?”

Lily shakes her head. “Please,” she pleads, voice vulnerable, “Just let me be happy on my wedding day.”

James will forever (for four years) remember Petunia as the person who yelled at his bride at her wedding. But Lily will forever remember the way Petunia sat next to her when the party was over and tucked her against her side and the sound of her older sister’s voice as it said, “You looked beautiful tonight.”

And then Petunia learned about the war. Learned about the dark mark. Magic was scarier than it was dazzling. 

 

“Come back,” she’d begged her little sister, “It’s not worth it. It’s not.” (I’m worth it. Don’t leave me.)

 

“I have to. Stay safe,” and Lily went back to where Petunia could not reach her. (I'm the older sister. I'm supposed to protect you.)


-Dripping Fingers by May_May_0_0

harry: i… actually have a life outside of you

voldemort:

voldemort: *desperately reading ‘Emotions For Dummies’ upside-down*

all of us, trying to be encouraging:

flopsy, popping tf outta that incestuous shit:

“Hello, Harry love,” Voldemort smiled as he spoke.

He had long ago learnt to ignore the fact that Harry was slightly transparent now, and tinted blue around the edges. He could ignore the greyness of the boy’s usually jet black hair and the whiteness of his tanned skin, and the blue sheen to his normally pink lips. His green eyes were as bright and beautiful as they ever were though, and they were the only part of him that did not remind Tom Riddle of a ghost.

But he chose not to be reminded of anything, he ignored the memories probing at his mind, ignored the tightening in his chest as faint silver lines on Harry’s wrists glowed in the light, and he certainly ignored the way that he could no longer touch Harry, no longer cup his cheek or his chin, or brush his nose or neck with his fingers, or kiss his lips, or take him to bed. Ghosts had no need for physical pleasures, and Tom chose to ignore that he, himself, did.

Whenever he managed to find Harry, he always greeted him the same way. “Hello, Harry love.” He’d start and Harry would smile softly back, raising his hand as if to touch him then letting it drop limply to his side. “Why would you leave me? I’ve been searching for you.”

“Because you stopped loving me,” Harry would whisper with sad eyes. Voldemort usually changed the subject then, and they talked about the world and life and everything but death, but on the exact day Harry had died two years earlier, Voldemort found Harry in the Astronomy Tower.

The boy had never gone there before.

“Albus fell, right from where I’m standing,” Harry told him, after telling Voldemort ‘because you stopped loving me’, knowing by now that Voldemort would have changed the subject anyway.

“I never stopped loving you.” The Dark Lord said, unexpectedly. “I didn’t even know I loved you until I had lost you. I didn’t know how… to say it, to feel it, or accept it, and Harry!” He gasped, surging forward to pull Harry against his chest, but couldn’t. There was a wall of coldness, an invisible sheet of ice between then, and Voldemort could have pushed through the wall but he knew he would have gone through Harry as well, and Voldemort wasn’t able to handle that kind of reality check. So he stopped, pulled back unwillingly, and gritted his teeth.

“I’ll never lie to you again,” he promised desperately, “but you have to come home to me. I need you to come home, Harry!” Sad green eyes looked up at him in silence. “Please come back.”

“I can’t,” Harry told him sadly, softly. “But you can come to me, if you wanted?”

Voldemort thought about it, thought about his Horcruxes and his familiar and his world. But his world was standing right in front of him, blue around the edges and shimmering in the middle, and he would have given anything to make the boy flesh and blood and real again. “What do I have to do?”

“Come to me.” And Harry held out a hand, waiting. Voldemort walked slowly forwards, his own arm outstretched.

He kept walking, ignoring Harry as the boy stepped to the side. Then he was falling, from the same window Dumbledore had fallen, landing with crunches and cracks on the same ground Dumbledore had landed. And Harry watched, as he had watched Dumbledore’s death, from the Astronomy Tower in silence.

Two students, who had stayed at Hogwarts for the summer holidays, found Voldemort an hour later. There were tears on his pale cheeks, and a halo of blood spread out from his head. But he was smiling.

When Death Eaters attempted to use the Horcruxes to resurrect their Lord, when they went looking for them, when they found them all of the Horcruxes were destroyed, smoking and blackened with tiny lightning bolts scratched into their surfaces.


-Cardiomyopathy by AislingSiobhan

 

Harry asked every year until he was eight if he could try one. Petunia always said, “those are Dudley’s,” and Vernon always said, “Only little boys who deserve these get them, ungrateful brat. And you -- you will never be good enough.”

Harry knows Petunia remembers Harry’s questions and the answers he received. Is the candy to say, “you’re mine as much as Dudley’s mine?” Is it to say, “You deserve these?” Is it to say, “You are good enough?”

Petunia’s heart is ink, dripping and drying and layered over in scratch marks and sketch marks as she tries to become the person she will be even as she can’t (won’t) ever leave the person she was behind. 

 

He unwraps the candy and puts it in his mouth. It’s sweet, probably, and smooth but… Harry can’t taste it. 

 

 

Maybe it’s twelve years too late for her to decide that he’s her family but Harry knows enough of souls and forgiveness to say that this small thing is enough for him to imagine a future where he loves her. It’s enough for him to imagine a future where she loves him, a future where she thinks he’s good enough.

 

Maybe it’s never too late to love someone. 

 

“I deserve nothing,” Sirius says, “But I can’t do anything about that. James deserved everything but he didn’t get it. James didn’t get you, Harry. I got you. And I’m trying my best. I promise. I promise. I promise...”