She was bright, beautiful, graceful and light like a butterfly, or a nightingale, or a dream he’d once had. And she would run at nothing, as if trying to catch the wind, wanting to keep it in a jar, to save it for later. But in the end she always thought it was cruel to keep things locked up and she let the wind out. She fought battles with the rain and neither ever won; they always emerged with a truce. Then the sunshine would come.
Sunny days made so much more sense to her if she could just lift off the ground.
She was an angel, she was a star. She was a bird. She was anything she wanted to be, and as much as she wanted. She was fierce, determined and brave. She brought down the walls of fear, prejudice and heredity with stories of mermaids and children who had wings. She was a formidable warrior, armed with crayons, lace, kites and limitless imagination.
She was a ten year old girl, short for her age, with bright red hair, bright green eyes and the uncanny knack of thinking big things…
…While he was a thin, scrawny ten year old boy, with neglected hair, hands and needs, who stood before closet doors and was an expert at keeping the good things hidden. His most precious secret he buried under the first folds of his heart and even so it found a way to peek through everything he did: her smile was his sunlight.
Every day there was a new irresistibly enchanting thing about her. And that day it was the way the light shone off of her hair as she came running around the corner, almost colliding with him, holding her kite above her head.
“Run, Severus, run!” she screamed, delighted. Her short legs took her surprisingly fast down the road as the wind blew her hair and the kite tail after her.
Severus struggled his hardest to get closer as she ran but she was too fast, too determined and too full of life. They ran in the middle of the road as she laughed, and laughed a tune for his heart to dance to.
“Lily, wait!” he called as she was already turning onto another street, the kite tail the last thing to disappear around the corner.
“Faster, Sev! Come on!”
He pushed himself a little harder, until he was almost getting close enough to touch the kite tail as it whipped around before him. He heard a dog barking at their running feet but he didn’t see it.
They rounded one last corner and the long stretch of park was before them. Lily collapsed onto the grass there, laughing and panting and holding her kite. Severus collapsed next to her, panting even harder.
Lily lifted her arm up to check her watch. She shouted out in victory. “Yes! We beat our record, Severus. Two minutes and a half.”
Severus laughed between his panting. “I thought that was what you were doing. But you beat our record. I got here at least half a minute after you.”
“Oh, don’t exaggerate; you got here only five seconds after I did. And that’s only because I got a head start,” Lily huffed dismissively, lifting herself into a sitting position. She stood her kite up before her. The sun light filtered through the green and violet plastic, making her skin look painted. She touched a little torn part of the material, her face saddening. “My kite’s getting old. I’ve asked Dad to get me a new one, but he says I should learn to take better care of my things so that they last longer.”
Severus continued to look tired upon the ground. He did not like to speak when she brought up her parents. “It is getting old,” he agreed vaguely, not knowing what for.
“It is,” Lily enforced. She put her pinkie finger through the hole, full of care. “See how big that hole is?”
Severus nodded his head, knowing she couldn’t see him. But she had asked knowing he wouldn’t answer. He weaved his fingers through the grass blades, feeling their smooth warmth against his scratchy pale skin, watching her study her kite. She loved that kite as if it were her wings. He loved her because her face looked painted.
After a while she stood up, gazing around the park. He pushed himself up as well, although he was still tired. They looked around the park for a while. Some children played on the swings and slide over to the left, while a couple of teenagers kicked a ball around at each other to the right. On the scattered benches around the grass and under the few trees, older couples sat together at peace. Under a far away tree a family of many children was having a picnic.
“Let’s race down the hill?” Lily suggested, and she was happy and smiling again. She looked over at him encouragingly and he couldn’t help but grin back. Down the hill they went, Lily screaming and laughing, the kite tail winding above her, Severus always slightly behind and silent. They made the old couples on the shady benches miss youth in pangs of colorful memory, racing feet and kite tails.
When she made it down the hill Lily continued to run, calling over her shoulder as she let her kite be born upon the wind, “Catch up now, Severus!”
“Lily!” he shouted back, not knowing what for. Sometimes he didn’t need reasons.
The green and violet kite was bright in the sky as it reached for the sun and the clouds and impossible places. Her hair was brighter than the kite, as was her smile.
“The kite might be old, but it still flies like a bird,” Lily shouted as he made it down the hill and they stood, panting once more, watching the kite be gracefully jerked around by the wind.
Suddenly the wind picked up speed. This delighted Lily and made her start to run again. Severus ran after her once more. And as Lily held onto the kite the wind pulled extra hard, the kite lifted further toward the clouds, Lily lifted off the ground and Severus’s heart leapt into his throat.
She shouted out happily as she was ten feet above the ground. She seemed like a graceful bird, weightless, bright and born to soar above the world. She held on tightly to the kite as the wind weakened and she began to descend back to Earth. Severus waited for her on the ground, having been strongly jolted. As her feet skimmed the grass, he held on firmly to her arm, so as to be sure she wouldn’t fly away again.
“Lily, you’re crazy! You can’t do that. There are Muggles all around and they could’ve seen you. Do you want to be arrested and never make it to Hogwarts?” he demanded of her in a whisper.
“There’s no need to be so scared, Sev,” she attempted to coax him. Her eyes gleamed with delight and she wasn’t in the least disturbed. “Nobody saw me.”
“How do you know that?” he persisted, lowering his voice even further. “You can’t know that.”
“But I do,” she told him stubbornly, yanking her arm out of his hands. “And even if they had seen me, they would have just thought I was so skinny and so small that the wind could take me away. They wouldn’t think I was a witch.”
“Shh!” Severus urged, gazing around in horror. “How can you just say that without even whispering?”
“Because, Sev, there isn’t anyone near us. And it was you that told me that before you get a wand they forgive you, because you can’t help it.”
Her eyes were fierce. She was already showing signs of wanting to run again, as the string of the kite jerked around in her hand. They had run across half the park already, nearing the picnicking family. But the family was not in fact close enough to have heard a word of what they said. He sighed, pushing away the desire to tell her that she could have helped it.
“You’re right. I’m sorry, I just got paranoid. I really don’t want you to be expelled,” he admitted before he could stop himself, and he blushed violently under the gaze of the sun and her own, which was much stronger and brighter to him.
Lily smiled at him. “Neither do I.” She did not notice his embarrassment. “How about we go slowly for a while?”
“Good,” he sighed in relief. She no doubt thought he was relieved that she would not soar into the air again. He was grateful she could not see through his shabby mask, into his secrets and his heart that beat along with her voice.
They walked across the grass idly for the rest of the afternoon, even after Lily had pulled her kite in. Severus had felt the urge to walk very far away from the Muggle family’s picnic, but didn’t dare do so near Lily. Lily had felt the urge to let the kite take her away again, but didn’t dare do so near Severus. It was one of those rare wonderful days they had entirely to themselves, with no interruptions from Petunia and her jealousy or awkward and strained encounters with his parents.
He had quieted around sunset. She did not question this. She did not notice he had quieted to watch her in the colorful lights of the ending of a summer day. They did not race home, but walked in companionable silence, this time on the sidewalk. Her hair was redder than ever.
“Hey, Sev?” she asked at long last, as they waked down the street of her house.
“What?” he prompted when she didn’t continue.
She hesitated. “Sometimes…sometimes I wish I were a bird. Is that weird?”
He saw in her face that she longed for his opinion; that she truly wanted to hear about the things he thought. This elated him more than he could say.
“Of course not,” he told her full of brimming confidence and pleasure. “You just like adventure. You wish you could fly and you like to feel the wind. I think that you’re brave, not weird.”
Lily smiled in relief and contentment. They both stopped as they stood before her house.
“I knew you’d say that!” Lily exclaimed, even though she had looked anxious moments before. “You always understand me.”
You always understand me…
Those words were the echoes he fell asleep to that night.
A week later it was raining and they sat on a bench under a tree at the park. The green and violet kite lay on the ground near them, torn almost in half. Lily was disgruntled and Severus watched her hands that day. That day, they were her charm. They gripped the polished wooden boards of the bench dejectedly and little droplets of water spiraled down her equally small fingers. Her feet kicked moodily at the muddy puddle beneath them and she ignored how wet and dirty her socks were becoming.
“Do you think you want to go home?” Severus chanced gently.
Lily sighed. “Why do new kites have to be so expensive?”
“A lot of things are expensive,” said Severus with a grimace.
Lily looked up into the canopy of leaves. A raindrop fell onto her cheek and she lifted a finger up to spread it across her face. Severus lifted his finger to his face the same way she had and wiped an imaginary raindrop away, watching her in that innocently desirous way.
“Why don’t my parents just buy me the kite? They know I don’t have enough money.”
Severus’ look darkened. He kicked once at the puddle as well, sending dirty water splashing out before them and over the torn kite.
“Your parents buy a lot of things for you,” he muttered quietly.
Lily glanced over at him, looking regretful and sorry.
“I’m sorry, Sev. You’re right, I shouldn’t complain. My parents are great…but I do really want that new kite.”
He smiled at her a little. “I know you do. You love kites.”
She nodded her head slowly, watching a rain drop roll down her arm. He watched it too, in his greedy way.
“Why did it have to rain today?” she asked, returning to her gloomy voice.
Severus laughed. It was the first bright sound that either of them had heard that day. Lily smiled reluctantly.
“Nobody controls the rain, Lily,” he told her laughingly.
“I wish I could. I’d order it to keep well away,” she said wistfully.
“Then the plants would die,” he reminded her practically.
She sighed again, finally standing up. “You’re right. You’re always right. I think we’d better go. Maybe we can find something fun to do inside.”
Severus watched her from where he traipsed beside her, dragging her kite, with her head turned down to avoid the rain. The bright tail of the mangled kite had been lost a long time ago. He imagined it at the bottom of a muddy puddle somewhere, and he was suddenly struck with a very fantastic, very tantalizing idea.
If she loved to fly and had lost her wings, he would make her new ones, so that she could fly back out of the puddle.
Two weeks later, the rain had done as Lily wished, keeping well away. Severus waited under the moonlight at her door, while listening to distant chirpings, grasshoppers and his own rapid heart. He shifted his weight nervously from one foot to the other, impatient, although he had waited no more than two minutes past the time they had agreed on.
And finally she showed up, wearing a pretty short-sleeved green dress that brought out her eyes dramatically. That night he watched her eyes. They glowed like he imagined emeralds would. They were prettier than emeralds.
“Sorry I took long, Severus,” Lily explained in a whisper as she stepped out into the moon and starlight, pulling the door shut behind her. “I wanted to be extra careful not to wake my parents. They’ll be very angry if they find out I’m sneaking out at three in the morning.”
“So will mine,” he said, hoping to coax her into comfort. “And my parents would be angrier than yours.”
“Well, you were the one who had the idea of coming out here at this hour,” she whispered back angrily. “And you still haven’t told me what it is we’re doing.”
“Shh,” he begged as they walked cautiously on the sidewalk, glancing around all the while. “It’s a surprise.”
Her entire demeanor changed. She straightened up slightly and aligned her step with his, looking eager. “A surprise? What do you mean, ‘a surprise’? It’s a good surprise, right?”
Severus grinned in happy excitement as they turned down the corner to the park. “You’ll see.”
“Well…where is the surprise?” she persisted, and he noted with glee that she was becoming almost as excited as he was. “Is it at the park?”
He pretended to sound clueless. “I don’t know.”
“Severus! Tell me! It’s at the park, isn’t it?”
He stopped as they walked toward the other corner. He faced her, saying, “Close your eyes, Lily. It has to be a surprise. Close your eyes and I’ll lead you there.”
Lily squinted at him searchingly. “But I just know it’s at the park.”
“Close your eyes,” he insisted, answering no questions. As she shut her emerald eyes, he took her hands and began leading her down the sidewalk.
Her hands were wonderful to hold. He wanted never to let go. For those moments when he lead her, that entire night, his entire life lead up to this merely so that he could hold her hands. It was bliss, to hold her hands.
They went slowly down the hill of the park and Lily exclaimed as she felt the wet grass upon her sandaled feet, “Ha! This is the park. I knew it, you can’t fool me.”
“But you still don’t know what we’re doing here,” Severus taunted playfully. “And you won’t find out if you keep talking. I’ll just turn us both right around.”
He smiled a large smile as she clapped her other hand over her mouth, indicating that she would be silent. In that way they made it across the park, listening to nothing but the grasshoppers and their hearts. It struck him that those simple instants were among the most glorious of his life.
And it seemed they had made it to the other end of the park too soon. He stopped her when they reached the tree under which a family had picniced weeks ago. His heart had never beat faster as he let go of her hand and, with a slightly shaking voice, said, “You can open your eyes now.”
Lily’s eyes flew open and at first she gazed at him. He tried very hard to pretend that he had once been more nervous than he was at that moment. Then her eyes roamed around the scene, after a while resting upon something leaning against the tree.
She gasped.
“Severus! You…you bought me a kite?”
She was gazing in astonishment at the red kite. He knew that she would notice it was made of sturdy sticks instead of plastic white poles once she got closer. And he thought that maybe she could see that the kite tail was made of pieces of cloth. Suddenly, he was mortally embarrassed.
He looked sheepish. “Er, well, no. I “ I made it.”
She stared at him for a long time. He was beginning to worry that his heart would pound a whole right through his chest when she spoke again. “You made me a kite?”
“Well, yes, I did. I mean…you know I can’t afford things like that, Lily,” he reproached her in a weak, wounded and defensive voice. “I know it’s made of cheap paper, and sticks and pieces of my mother’s table cloth. But I knew how much you wanted a new kite, so I just-”
He was cut off abruptly as she ran at him, hugging him longer and tighter than anyone ever had. He almost fell to the ground in shock. He didn’t doubt she could feel his desperate heart. And he knew that moment was more glorious; the most beautiful of his life. For days he would walk around in a daydream, remembering the way her arms felt around his neck.
“Severus, thank you so much,” she whispered as she pulled away, leaving him to feel empty and dazed on his own. “No one has ever done anything like this for me. I can’t believe you made me a kite. Thank you! I love it.”
Waves of relief and happiness crashed over him. He felt almost light-headed. “I’m glad you like it, I worked really hard on it. My parent’s even got into a horrible argument because I used the green table cloth for the kite tail. And I’m sorry I made you come out at this time of the night, I just thought that no one would be around to see you, so you could do whatever you wanted, and I know how much you love-”
And then he experienced another glorious, indescribably beautiful thing. Never, for as long as he lived, would he experience something as wonderful. She kissed him on the cheek.
That time he did stumble back, although thankfully she didn’t notice. She had run toward the tree, picked up the kite and in an instant she had already unwound it into the wind. And she let herself soar into the air, higher than he had ever seen her soar. The look she gave him as she passed by him made him think a crazy thought. A crazy and wonderful thought that made him almost lift off the ground to join her.
She loves me…
As the years went by and he sold away all of his life for pride and expectations, leaving only the things that could not be sold (the black, the white and the memory of her), he often visited that age, those summer months, specifically that night. That silly, childish kiss on the cheek had been the best moment and the best touch of his life. And that thought, even though as the years went by it became an impossible dream, had been what seemed to keep him alive for so long. As the years went by he had resorted to being kept alive by another thought.
I love her. It was never the same. Loving her had never felt like an accomplishment. It was the one need of his soul.
When he’d been young he had imagined that on that night he had given her wings. But later he discovered that Lily Evans did not need the help of a kite to fly. Lily had wings inside of her. She was all wings, and dreams, and love, and sunlight, and kite tails and raindrops. He realized too many years too late, that he had given her his heart on that night. And he would never get it back.
He wondered many times where that kite was. He wondered if she still had it. Did she keep it in her attic? Had she let him throw it away? Did she give it to her son? Of the many kisses she had given people along her life, could she remember that one?
Did she know he loved her? Could she have told, after the years went by, that there was a heart tied to the tail of that kite along with all of the fabric?
They had stayed in the park until the sun threatened to rise. And they had been pools of laughter flooding the streets as they walked back home, bringing the sunshine in her wake.
“Severus?” she had called softly once she’d climbed up her doorstep and he’d turned toward his street. At the sound of her voice he quickly reappeared at the fence to her house eagerly.
She smiled with his kite and his heart in her hands. “You’re my best friend. For always.”
Always…
*¨*¨*¨*¨*¨*¨*¨*¨*¨*¨
I was all set upon having Severus give Lily a homemade flower, but then I watched Mary Poppins, and I just couldn't resist writing about kites. Well, I hope you enjoyed it, and thanks again to my beta!
Anyone feel like reviewing?
I Tied my Heart to the Tail of a Kite by Gin_Drinka
Chapter Notes: A big thanks to Selina for betaing this for me. And anything you recognize belongs to JK...