Harry Potter, I’ll Be Goddabbed

Title: I’ll Be Goddabbed [Lily]
Rating/Warnings: PG-13 for some muffled swearing.
Summary: Lily’s put up with more than any reasonable woman should have to.
A/N: Written for a creative writing class where I had to answer one-line prompts, and I decided it would be before for all if I just treated them like fic prompts.

I’ll Be Goddabbed

In the middle of my mother’s eulogy, I started to think about calling off the wedding.

I felt that I had been holding up remarkably well all things considered, done my English duty to keep my chin up and look straight ahead. It was me who had to keep her head and make all the arrangements, had to order the caskets and organize food for the viewing and give directions to relatives and make sure nobody broke into the wine for the wake early.

But the fistfight between my fiancé and my sister had been the last straw.

One minute they were standing civilly in the lobby of the little church my parents had been members of, James a bit sulky after I snapped at him for asking “What’s that for? What’s that for?” about every fixture and flower stand in the place, and then all hell broke loose while I left for thirty seconds to escort Aunt Margery to her seat so she wouldn’t take a spill down the three stairs leading to the pews and break her hip.

Even the whole way down the aisle of the church, I stiffened when I heard the shriek, the same shriek my sister used to give when we’d wrestled as children and I was winning, and I hoped as I turned my head that I wasn’t going to see what I was sure I was going to see.

James was shouting and my sister was screaming, so I couldn’t make out what either of them was saying, although I certainly could have guessed, James had three long scratches down the side of his face and my sister’s hair had come loose from her fashionable bun and was sticking up in all directions. She was trying to pound and scratch at James’ chest, but he had her by the wrists, and twist as she might, my sister couldn’t get her hands free.

I was running up the aisle at this point, I wanted to shout for them to stop, but I couldn’t get the words out of my throat, I just kept thinking of my mother pleading please don’t fight with your sister, dear, please… All of the sudden, one of my sister’s screams rang out through the whole church with crystal clarity.

“…IT’S HER FAULT, IT’S ALL THAT FREAK’S FAULT!”

The crack of James’ palm connecting with my sister’s face reverberated through the silence that followed, nearly as loud as the scream.

Even from several yards away, I could see all the blood drain out of my sister’s face, could see her nostrils flare like a horse, and there was nothing I could do but watch as my sister pulled back the fist that James had let go to slap her as far as she could manage, and James was glaring at her, staring right in her eyes, and he never saw it coming, and she got in a magnificent clean hit.

She broke his nose.

Her husband took her home right afterwards, she was wailing like she’d sustained permanent damage, the red mark in the shape of James’ hand still covering her left cheek. I should’ve been upset that she didn’t see our parent’s funeral after all, but what I was really angry about was that she’d promised to stay and help clean up afterwards and now I was going to have to do everything myself, just like I’d been doing everything myself the whole time.

“I can’t believe you slapped my sister at my parents’ funeral,” I hissed at James while some woman my mother had played Canasta with for thirty years stood at the lectern and sobbed out some story about bean dip recipes.

“She’s dot cobink to the weddink,” James snarled back around the handkerchief he was pressing against his nose. “I’ll be goddabbed if dat bint is goink to call you dames at your own weddink.”

“Then maybe we shouldn’t HAVE a wedding!”

That shut James up at least. It shut everybody up because I shouted it.

“Jus’ keeb goink!” James snapped at the wide-eyed bean dip woman. “She’s habink a rub week ib you coudden tell!”

I thought about taking off my engagement ring and stabbing the business end through James’ eye, but I settled for clenching my fists until my fingernails cut into my palms.

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