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Format: Novella
Chapters: 18
Word Count: 30,546
Status: WIP
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Strong Language, Mild Violence, Scenes of a Mild Sexual Nature, Substance Use or Abuse, Sensitive Topic/Issue/Theme, Contains Spoilers
Genres: General, Romance, Young Adult
Characters: Lupin, Snape, Sirius, A. Longbottom, Lily, James, Regulus, Pettigrew, OC, OtherCanon
Pairings: James/Lily, Lily/OC, OC/OC, Sirius/OC, Other Pairing
First Published: 01/18/2007
Last Chapter: 08/29/2008
Last Updated: 07/07/2012
Summary:
Lily and James are at Hogwarts together for their seventh and final year. They and their friends suffer through heartbreak and find new love as they come to grips with the danger that's waiting for them when they leave the safety of Hogwarts and enter the real world.
Wonderful banner by Ophelia Weasley
A/N: I’m giving this story a major rewrite. I haven’t looked at it in years, but I want to finish it because it was my first ever story. To see what chapters have been rewritten, just check the chapter summaries (plus they'll all have an A/N at the top and a number chapter title). I'm planning on posting new chapters every week. As always, reviews are welcome!
Disclaimer: Nope, not JKR. She owns it all.
Chapter One
Lily was walking toward Platform 9 and ¾ when she spotted Amelia, Alice, and Frank, her two best friends and Alice’s boyfriend. She stood there with a smile on her face, waiting for them to notice her. It took a moment, but Alice and Amelia both shrieked and dropped their trunks when they saw her.
“I haven’t seen you guys in ages!” Lily exclaimed after her two friends finally gave her room to breathe.
Alice nodded. “I know it seems like forever.”
“What was your summer like?” Amelia asked. “Was Petunia a right old cow?”
Lily gave her friend a soft smack on the arm, but couldn’t help giggling. They couldn’t have any idea of Petunia’s new awful boyfriend, a large unfriendly bloke named Vernon. She couldn’t wait to tell them all about him, but Frank convinced them to put their reunion on hold long enough to board the Hogwarts Express.
The girls gathered their trunks and levitated them onto the train easily, as all three of them were seventeen and of age. As they were doing so, Lily remembered the piece of news she’d been so excited about before seeing all of her friends made her forget. “I forgot to tell you guys, I’m Head Girl!”
This led to more squealing and eye rolling from Frank, but Lily barely noticed in her excitement. “Lily! That’s so awesome!” Alice gave her another hug.
“Who’s Head Boy?” Amelia asked, straight and to the point.
Lily shrugged. “I dunno.” Dumbledore hadn’t mentioned it in the letter, but she assumed it was going to be someone who was already a prefect, so she wasn’t too worried about it. “I really hope it’s Remus,” she confided. Remus Lupin was a marauder, which meant he was friends with some of the worst boys in her year, but Lily had always liked him in spite of that. He was quieter and more studious. In fifth year she’d even had a bit of a crush on him.
“That would be the obvious choice,” Alice agreed. “But do you really think Dumbledore will pick two Gryffindors to be Heads? Isn’t that a little biased?”
“Guess we’ll find out,” Lily said as they walked into an empty compartment with her friends. “I’m supposed to meet with the Head Boy now for our prefect meeting.”
After saying goodbye to her friends, Lily walked down the Heads’ compartment. The whole way she played guessing games in her head. There were four sixth year prefects the year before, Remus, Brendan Hefford, Brian Lumpkin, and Silas Milegnor in Slytherin. Lily didn’t think Dumbledore would pair her with Milegnor who was notorious for his dislike of muggleborns.
She was still deep in thought when she opened the door. A chipper voice greeted her before she saw who was there. “Hi Lily Flower!”
A scowl arranged itself on her face when Lily saw who it was. James Potter, co-leader of the marauders, Quidditch captain, and prank master extraordinaire was sitting there proudly with the Head Boy badge pinned on his chest. “What the hell are you doing here, Potter?” Lily snapped, annoyed to see him.
“Well you see, Lily Flower, when a man and a woman love each other very much-”
Lily groaned. James was one of the most annoying boys in her year, the only other contender being his best friend, Sirius Black. “Not here in the world, here in this compartment!”
James smirked at her. “Well that’s a much less interesting story, Lily Flower. When I opened up my Hogwarts letter this year out fell a Head Boy’s badge. Imagine my shock that Dumbledore thought I was the best man for the job.”
Finally Lily saw the humor in this. It was a ridiculous claim, James Potter as Head Boy. Even Dumbledore wasn’t mad enough to make that decision. Clearly he was playing a prank on her. “Yeah right,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Go give Remus back his badge and stop calling me Lily Flower.”
“Whatever you say, Lily Flower,” James replied with a smirk.
“I’m not joking, Potter!” She shouted, incensed that he would interfere with Remus’s duties as Head Boy. If this went on all year she was going to have to involve Dumbledore. “Give Remus the badge.”
James didn’t move, just sat back in his seat and relaxed. “Well that would be such a pity since Dumbledore picked me to be Head Boy. Don’t think the old chap wanted Remus as anything more than a prefect.”
Lily was about to respond when the compartment door opened and Remus came in. He was wearing a badge, the same one he’d worn since fifth year with a bright shiny P on it. Lily turned back to James. “I can’t believe Dumbledore made you Head Boy! He must have finally lost his marbles for good!”
She probably would have said more, but the Prefects had begun to trickle in after Remus and Lily didn’t want to yell at James in front of them.
The meeting went exactly as she had thought it would, with James contributing next to nothing. He just sat there the entire time looking very pleased with himself.
When Lily finally concluded the meeting, Amelia and the rest of the marauders joined them in the Heads’ compartment. Alice, as Amelia had explained, was off snogging Frank in their compartment.
“Well that took forever,” Amelia complained as the last prefect left. “I’ve been waiting right outside since Alice and Frank took over the compartment with their snogging. Ugh, disgusting.”
“If you’re looking for a way to make snogging less disgusting you could always try it with me. Girls have told me my lips are like angels,” Sirius Black said, somehow managing to keep a straight face. Lily couldn’t tell if he was serious or not, which was pretty sad.
Amelia rolled her eyes. “Bite me, Black.”
“So you like it rough, then?” He asked, his smirk widening. “I can work with that.”
“Oh sod off. I would never lower myself so far as to actually snog you. I have standards,” Amelia said as she glared at Sirius. “Let’s leave, Lily. I’d rather watch Alice snog Frank than sit here with these prats for one more second.”
Sirius didn’t seem at all bothered by this and was already back to chatting with Remus. James waved at the two girls. “Bye Lily Flower! Oh and will-”
“No.”
“Alright then,” James said, not at all deterred by Lily’s refusal. “Someday soon in the future you’ll change your mind.”
Lily shook her head adamantly. “Only in your dreams, Potter.”
“Oh sweet, innocent Lily Flower. In my dreams we have moved well beyond a simple acceptance. We’ve been sha-”
Lily waved her wand at him and Potter’s voice stopped abruptly, but his mouth kept moving. She had mastered most nonverbal spells over the summer and was the first in her year to do so. It would take him longer to figure out the counter curse if he didn’t know which spell she had used.
They spent the rest of the train ride teasing Alice for being the only one in a relationship. When they finally reached Hogwarts, Lily and Amelia were joking around when they heard a familiar voice making a loud announcement.
“-it’s Lily! Deep down inside she loves me, she just won’t admit it to herself.” James was bragging to his friends and Lily wanted nothing more than to wipe that stupid grin off his face.
“Shut up Potter! Get it through your thick skull, I don’t love you! You are insufferable,” she cried and ran off with her friends into a carriage.
Lily groaned as she climbed into the carriage. “I can’t believe I have to put up with that- with that arrogant, thickheaded toe-rag for the rest of this year!”
Alice put a comforting arm around Lily’s shoulders. “Just think, next year you’ll be training to be a Healer and won’t ever have to see him again. Isn’t that a nice thought?” Lily nodded.
A life without James Potter was exactly what she wanted, but she didn’t want to wait a whole year for that to happen.
A/N: Here's edit number two. Let me know how you like it.
Chapter Two
Lily was sitting at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall one morning weeks later, her eyes red from crying. Alice and Amelia were sitting on either side of her trying to be comforting.
James swaggered over to her with a broad grin on his face. Clearly the new day had given him a new resolve to ask Lily out. “My dear Lilykins, have you come to your senses and decided to go out with me on this fine morning?”
“Shove it up your fat arse, Potter,” Lily snapped, her voice thick. Rarely did she ever swear at even him, but on this morning she couldn’t deal with any more of his stupid taunts.
Potter didn’t seem to notice she was upset because he kept talking. “Are you sure, Lilykins? There’s a Hogsmeade weekend coming up in just a few weeks and since we’re Head Boy and Girl it would be perfect for us to go together.”
Lily glared at him as fiercely as she could. It was lucky she hadn’t brought her wand down to breakfast or she would have cursed him with the worst spell she could think of. “Can’t you just leave me alone for one day? I hate you! There, you happy now? I hate you!” The Great Hall was quiet, but Lily was too upset to be embarrassed.
She sank down into her seat and put her head in her hands. Sirius slapped James on the back and began walking away from the girls. “It could’ve been worse. At least she didn’t hex you this time.”
“Yeah, remember when she tried to make me disappear in third year?” James responded, his grin starting to return. “My arm didn’t come back for a week.”
Amelia stared at the boys in shock. “And you wonder why she doesn’t like you, Potter? Didn’t you notice how upset she is?” Both boys glanced at Lily and shook their heads. Amelia scowled at them. “Get lost. I’ve got to take care of my friend.”
“Did I miss something?” James asked Sirius as he glanced at Lily.
Sirius shrugged. “No idea, mate. Let’s get some breakfast.”
Amelia glared at the boys one last time for good measure before putting her arms around Lily. “Come on, let’s go back up to the common room. I bet McGonagall will give you the morning off.”
Lily nodded tearfully and let her friends guide her out of the Great Hall. Once they were in the Head’s common room, Amelia had Lily sit on the sofa. “It’s okay to cry and let it out,” Alice said as she rubbed her friend’s back.
Lily nodded again, but still didn’t cry. Instead she stared at the crumpled newspaper in her fist. The Daily Prophet rarely had any good news in it anymore. Lily could remember back in her first year all of the boring stories about cauldron bottoms that she had been fascinated by.
Now it just told of murders, disappearances, and He Who Must Not Be Named. It was all because of the way he worked. He Who Must Not Be Named didn’t stage battles or fights that lasted hours. Sometimes his Death Eaters would go after a street of muggles, but mostly he stuck to quiet murders in the middle of the night.
Lily always checked the Daily Prophet first thing in the morning to make sure everyone she knew was safe. Usually the names were meaningless, people she’d never heard of or the occasional Ministry official.
This was different. There was a short bit in the paper on the disappearance of a teenage girl, Marisa Clay. She was nineteen and had been the Head Girl at Hogwarts two years before.
She had also been Lily’s friend during her first year as a prefect.
“ What would he want with Marisa?” Lily asked tearfully. “She was barely of age!” Neither Alice nor Amelia questioned Lily’s use of past tense. No one who disappeared ever came back.
“There’s no reason for anything You Know Who does,” Alice said. “He’s evil.”
Lily nodded, but she wasn’t entirely convinced. All those years ago when she first learned about the wizarding world magic seemed so wonderful. Now she wasn’t at all sure she wanted to be a part of it. Evil was just waiting for them the second they graduated and left the safe haven of Hogwarts.
Amelia and Alice eventually went to class and left Lily alone in the rooms she shared with Potter. She spent the day thinking about Marisa. It was stupid of her to get so upset. They hadn’t been all that close and hadn’t kept in touch after Marisa graduated.
By the time dinner began Lily felt up to going down for it. She ran cool water over her face, but it was still blotchy and red. Realizing there was probably nothing that could help it, she joined her friends in the Great Hall.
“Feeling better?” Amelia asked. Lily nodded, but her friends weren’t convinced.
“It’s just, it’s all real. Death Eaters, the murders, You Know Who. They’re out there, waiting for us.” From the looks her two friends gave each other, Lily could tell they didn’t understand. “Never mind,” she mumbled, filling her plate with as much food as she could stomach.
Alice leaned in close as though she was telling her a secret. “Well if you’re not feeling better, I know just the thing to cheer you up. How does Potter with a bloody nose sound?”
Despite herself, Lily couldn’t help but crack a small smile. The idea of sweet little Alice punching anyone was funny. She couldn’t harm a fly even if she wanted to. “Rain check?” Lily asked, knowing she’d never take her friend up on it.
“Just give me the word,” Alice promised. Lily nodded, keeping the smile planted on her face. Her friends meant well, but everything would be better if they just left her alone. She wanted to mourn for her friend alone.
So Lily guided the topic back to classes to find out what she’d missed that day.
Later that night, Lily was curled up in front of the window in the astronomy tower, the highest tower in the school. It was technically out of bounds to students except for Divination classes, but she was Head Girl. Patrolling took her up there some when she was a prefect and the view was breathtaking. The astronomy tower had become her place for solitude.
Footsteps coming up the steps startled her. For a moment Lily crouched on the floor, but decided that was stupid. There was no need to hide since she was Head Girl. She would just give the other person a detention.
She quickly wiped away the tears that glistened on her cheeks and stood tall, prepared for the student. When the door opened, Lily was surprised to see the familiar messy hair of James Potter. His rounds must have brought him up.
Lily fixed him with a scowl, though she knew it was weak. She couldn’t summon the will power it took to be angry with him.
“Lily?” He asked, sounding very confused. “What are you doing up here? Are you okay?”
“Leave me alone,” she muttered turning away from him.
“What’s wrong?”
Even if she had felt like spilling her guts, Potter would not have been her top pick. He wouldn’t have even been on the list at all. “I’m not in the mood to deal with you.”
He shut the door behind him and walked up beside Lily. “I promise I won’t ask you out. Just talk to me.”
“Potter!” Lily groaned. The astronomy tower was her quiet place where she could think and he was ruining it.
“Come on Lily, please?”
Something in his voice sounded sincere and although Lily was inclined to think the worst of him at all times, she couldn’t help but let down her guard. He really seemed like he cared. “Did you read the Prophet this morning?” She asked, her voice thick with emotion.
“No. I never read the Prophet. There’s nothing in it but news of You Know Who and the Death Eaters.” He sounded serious, but Lily couldn’t believe he would choose to be ignorant of the outside world. Hogwarts wouldn’t be around for them forever.
“A girl disappeared. She was only two years older than us.” James’s expression turned to concern. “Marisa was the Head Girl when I first started as a prefect. She helped me for the whole year.”
“She was in Ravenclaw, right?” James asked, as though he was trying to remember her. “I’m sorry, Lily. I didn’t know you two were that close.”
Lily shook her head as tears began to run down her cheeks. “We weren’t. We haven’t been in touch for a while now, it just- he’s out there, you know? He’s out there, waiting for us. How are we supposed to be safe? We’re just kids and he’s got powers and curses and-” She broke down into sobs and James was a bit taken aback. He’d never seen Lily this upset before.
“Shh, you’ll be okay. Everything will be fine.” He sat on the cold stone floor beside Lily and put his arm around her.
Lily shook her head, her face obscured by her hands. “But we won’t. That’s the point, James. No one knows who’s going to be alive tomorrow.” James stroked her hair softly and let her cry until her sobs slowly ceased.
She still didn’t lift her face from James’s robes so he lifted up her chin to look into her eyes. “We’ve got all our friends. As long as they have our backs we’ll be safe.”
In the next instant they found themselves closing the gap between their lips and kissed each other softly. Surprisingly, Lily didn’t pull away at first. Instead she kissed him back.
Then her eyes flew open and she pulled away, holding a hand to her lips in shock. “I-I- thank you,” she said as she backed away.
“Lily-” James started, but she shook her head and raced down the steps away from the Astronomy Tower.
A/N: Update numero three! Don't forget to review!
Chapter Three
The next night Lily lay in Alice’s bed in Gryffindor tower, thinking about James. Her heart still panged from Marisa’s disappearance, but she had accepted it. They weren’t even friends, not really.
Lily preferred to think about James. She told herself it was because he was the more immediate problem, but she knew the real reason was that she wanted a distraction from Marisa’s disappearance.
James was a conundrum for her. She was attracted to him, but everything he did seemed so childish and immature. He spent his time playing pranks on those he considered lesser, whether it was due to age or the House they were in. Lily couldn’t stand it when he did things like that. He was also one of the only people who could make her lose her temper.
Amelia hopped on the bed beside Lily. “What’s up? You’re rarely this quiet.”
“Just thinking,” Lily responded, not really wanting to go into detail. She still hadn’t told her friends about kissing James.
“About what?” Amelia asked.
“Stuff,” Lily said. She loved Amelia to death, but sometimes she couldn’t take a hint.
“Ooh, I like stuff! Is this boy stuff or school stuff or family stuff or-”
“I’m just trying to think, Lia,” Lily said, feeling quite annoyed with her best friend. “Could you please just leave me alone?”
Amelia pouted at her friend. “Fine. Be that way. I’ll go bother Alice.”
When she left, Lily went back to thinking about James. Nothing between them would ever work. She and James weren’t right for a relationship. No, she thought to herself, I’ll just pretend like nothing happened and everything would go back to normal.
A shriek came from downstairs followed shortly by, “Lia!”
Lily smiled. She was on damage control duty, again. Everything was already going back to normal.
~*~
James lay in his bed, thinking. He didn’t understand why Lily had run away from him like that. He’d been nice to her, sensitive even. And he hadn’t asked her out or mentioned Hogsmeade, not once!
The only thing that had happened was that kiss, but it was just a simple kiss. Or was it? A little voice asked inside his head.
“What the hell!” He shouted.
“Uh, is something wrong, Prongs?” Remus asked.
“No!” James said defensively. No way did Remus know about Lily. It simply wasn’t possible. “Why would you say something stupid like that?”
Remus rolled his eyes. “Well it might be because you were lying there all peaceful and then suddenly jumped up and yelled ‘what the hell’. No, of course that’s perfectly normal.”
“Oh,” James said. That made a lot more sense than Remus reading his mind. “Sorry, there was just this little voice in my head telling me things.”
“That would be your conscience,” Remus said drily.
“My what?”
“His what?” Sirius asked. He had been trying different jinxes on the sleeping Peter, but paused when the conversation got interesting.
“Conscience,” Remus rattled off. “Noun. An inner voice viewed as acting as a guide to the rightness or wrongness of one’s behavior.”
James stared at his friend in surprise. “Wow.”
“It’s just a word. It’s not even that long of a word,” Remus said.
“Actually Moony, I think he was referring to how disturbing it was that you knew the definition verbatim. Creepy.” Sirius shuddered visibly.
James laughed at his friends and pulled his favorite snitch from his drawer. The whole Lily situation was out of his control anyway. All he could do was wait for her to talk to him sometime. She couldn’t ignore him forever. After all he was the Head Boy.
~*~
The three Marauders left the Head’s common room late that morning. They had been up all night yelling and joking and just generally having fun. Peter had left around midnight, half delusional and going on about beauty sleep. They had found him curled up behind the sofa, snoring and drooling.
Sirius groaned at the sight of him. “Let’s leave him here. Uh, no need to disturb him,” he said after a pause, trying to think of a good reason to leave him.
James and Remus both agreed and had turned to leave when a sleepy voice muttered, “Padfoot…”
After jumping in shock, James and Sirius both burst out laughing. “Never knew Peter leaned that way,” Remus said, grinning.
“Never knew Peter leaned any way,” James replied through fits of laughter.
Sirius growled and chased them both down to the Great Hall. While sprinting down the length of the Gryffindor table, James noticed Lily sitting with her friends. He slowed down to talk to her, but she turned her head away. “Lily?”
“She wants you to go away, Potter,” Amelia said with a scowl.
James’s feelings were hurt, but he hid them behind a casual smirk. “See you in class, Lily Flower!” He skipped down to his friends’ spot at the table in an attempt to look utterly joyful.
Sirius surveyed him with a raised eyebrow. “Are you playing for the same team as Pete, now?” He asked. James stopped skipping instantly and plopped in the seat beside his friends.
“Oh Siri, don’t be so silly!” A girl named Ellie said, giggling loudly. She planted a kiss on James’s cheek. “We all know James could have as many girls as you if he stopped going after that Evans girl. Isn’t that right?”
Ellie and her friends tried to sit with them every day, although most of the time the marauders sat on their own. Personally, James thought she had a horribly grating voice and an incredibly annoying giggle, but he could put up with her some days. On bad days he couldn’t figure out how the sixth year Gryffindors got to be so stupid.
“Do you have a date for the first Hogsmeade trip yet, Sirius?” Melinda asked. She had deep brown hair and chocolate brown eyes, and probably would have been pretty if she didn’t wear so much makeup.
“Yes I do, Mindy,” Sirius said in a joking tone. “Do you have a date for the first Hogsmeade trip yet?” She blushed and shook her head. “What about you, James?” Sirius continued, looking pointedly at his friend.
“Huh?” James asked. “Oh, er I dunno yet.” He stole a look across the table to where Lily was animatedly talking with her friends. She didn’t so much as glance up and an idea came suddenly to him. “You want to go to Hogsmeade with me, Ellie?” He asked.
The girl squealed excitedly. “Ooh! Yes! I would love to!” James nodded, looking slightly over her head at Lily. The redhead was smiling easily at her friends and ducked her head, likely in embarrassment. James wondered what they could have said to make her embarrassed.
When he managed to bring his thoughts back to his own group of friends, Sirius raised an eyebrow at him. “You’re not doing this to get over Lily, are you?” He asked drily.
James shook his head excitedly. “No, when Lily sees me with Ellie she’s going to be overcome by jealousy and will realize that she’s always been completely in love with me.”
Sirius rolled his eyes. “You do realize this is never going to work, right? Lily’s smarter than that.” James pulled out his wand and levitated the goblet of pumpkin juice into the air. Sirius’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t!” He gasped, but it was too late. James had already turned the goblet upside down and dumped the contents on his friend’s head.
With a shriek, Sirius sprinted off to the common room to presumably clean his hair. James made eye contact with Remus and both boys burst out laughing. Sometimes Sirius could be such a girl.
At the opposite end of the table, Lily was nibbling on a piece of toast and half listening to Alice discuss career options for after graduation. Since she knew she was going to be a Healer, Lily didn’t spend much time contemplating careers. “Frank’s going to be an Auror, did I tell you?”
“You may have mentioned it a few times,” Lily said tiredly.
“A few dozen times,” Amelia amended as she slid in beside her two friends. “Let’s change the subject. I have major news from the gossip mill.” Lily groaned, but Amelia elbowed her sharply in the side. “Shut up, this concerns you. James Potter asked Ellie Mindallin to go to Hogsmeade with him.”
Amelia looked between her two friends, clearly waiting for some kind of response. “So?” Lily asked, carefully keeping her expression placid. “I don’t see how anything Potter does concerns me.”
“Well maybe he’s finally getting over you. You know, moving on so you can finally date guys without him getting crazy overprotective?” Amelia rolled her eyes. “Fine, pretend you don’t care. I know you’re faking it.”
Lily smacked her friend on her arm. “I’ve got better things to do than keep track of Potter’s love life. Besides, I have to owl a letter to my parents. I haven’t sent them anything since school started.”
“You’re not as clever as you think you are!” Amelia shouted after her as she left the Great Hall. “I can see right through you!”
As it was a beautiful October morning, Lily wasn’t surprised when there was no one in the owlery. She hadn’t exactly lied to Amelia because she did have a letter to send to her parents, but that wasn’t the sole reason she wanted to leave the conversation.
Talking about James Potter confused her. One day he would act like a complete jerk and then in the next he would be sensitive and caring and kiss her. And then he’d ask out Ellie Mindallin. Nothing made sense anymore, except that she was glad she hadn’t acted on her feelings.
“Is this space occupied?” Asked someone with a deep voice. Lily glanced up into the very blue eyes of Brian Lumpkin, the seventh year Hufflepuff Prefect.
“Oh, hi! Um no, I was just- I’m done,” Lily stammered, her face turning as red as her hair. She hadn’t expected to run into anyone, especially not Brian Lumpkin.
“I really don’t wish to intrude.”
“No, please, intrude away.” Lily couldn’t remember ever being so embarrassed. It wasn’t as though Brian could possibly know she’d been up there thinking about James Potter. For all he knew she was mailing off a letter, a perfectly reasonable excuse.”
“I thought everyone would be outside on such a nice day. Figured I’d have the whole owlery to myself.” He looked sheepish and Lily couldn’t help but smile back.
“That’s what I thought.” She tied her letter to an outstretched leg on one of the school owl’s legs. Brian had his quill out, quickly scrawling on a sheet of parchment. “Well, I guess I’ll see you around,” Lily said with a wave.
She started to leave, but Brian called her back. “Wait, Lily! Would you like to erm, go to Hogsmeade with me next week? I mean, if you haven’t got plans or anything.”
Lily smiled at him. He was a nice bloke, and an attractive one as well. “Sure, that would be fun.”
Brian beamed down at her. “Great! I’ll meet you in the Great Hall that morning.”
“Yeah. See you,” Lily murmured as she walked out the door. James Potter could do whatever he wanted, she decided. She was completely and totally over him.
A/N: Hello my lovelies! Here with another update!
Chapter Four
“Prongs!” Sirius shrieked as he entered the Head’s common room.
“Padfoot!” James replied, just as excitedly.
Sirius flopped on the chair directly across from him and sighed dramatically. “You know, Prongs, you are a failure. A failure as a man, a failure as a Head Boy, a failure as a lov-”
“Get to the point,” James said, rolling his eyes.
“Well you know that plan you came up with to get Evans to realize her feelings for you because of jealousy?” James nodded. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure it didn’t work. While you were off asking Ellie to Hogsmeade, she got a date of her own. Brian Lumpkin asked her to Hogsmeade yesterday.”
“What?” James shouted, jumping off the chair. “Lumpkin? That dumb bloke who plays chaser for Hufflepuff? She’s going to Hogsmeade with Lumpkin?” His face started to turn red with anger. Everyone in the school knew that Lily was his. Brian Lumpkin was a prefect, he should have known better than others.
James stormed out, passing Remus outside the portrait hole and proceeded to search the castle for Lumpkin. He didn’t know where the Hufflepuff common room was or if Lumpkin had a free period then. Try as he might James couldn’t even begin to come up with a place where he might find Lumpkin.
He asked a Hufflepuff third year who, though looking quite terrified, did mention she’d seen a Hufflepuff prefect in the library. She couldn’t give James a name, being only a third year, but that was good enough for him. He was convinced that the boy in the library would be Lumpkin and then they could have a wonderful little chat.
Lumpkin was in a corridor walking down to the Great Hall when James ran into him, literally. “Watch where you’re going, Potter,” Lumpkin said, as he turned to leave.
“Why did you ask Lily out?” James asked with a scowl. “You know she’s mine.”
“Why should I care what you think is yours? Lily is up for grabs for anyone who wants her,” Lumpkin said, rolling his eyes. “Besides, you’ve already got a date for next weekend. Lily’s just another girl.”
“Don’t talk about Lily like that!” James shouted, although he did feel a small twinge of guilt. After all, he was treating Ellie the same way. He pushed the thought from his head, knowing that the two situations were entirely different.
“I’m the one with the date, Potter. I can talk about her any way I want. You’d better accept that fact and move on.” James’s mouth dropped open. No one had ever talked to him like that before because he was, after all, James Potter. Most people just moved out of his way and let him do whatever he wanted.
“Tell her it’s over,” James said through gritted teeth.
“What? You’ve gone mad!”
“Tell her you don’t want to be with her anymore!” James clenched his fist and brought it up threateningly. He didn’t actually intend to use it since he was Head Boy after all, but blokes like Lumpkin scared easy.
“What the hell is your problem? Lily isn’t ever going to think of you as any more than another arrogant Gryffindor.” With the last word, James lost what little bit of his temper he had left and his fist landed with a satisfying crunch right in the center of Brian Lumpkin’s nose.
A gasp broke the silence of the corridor and James looked up, surprised to see anyone besides himself and Lumpkin. “Potter! What did you do that for?” Brian was bent over, blood covering his face and nose. It didn’t look as though his nose was ever going to look quite the same.
James cringed as he made eye contact with Alice. Lily was going to get the full story of what had happened. “I was trying to teach him a lesson,” he said somewhat sheepishly. “I didn’t mean-”
“You teach with words, not your fists!” Alice glared at him. “Petrificus Totalus!” James was so surprised by the spell that he didn’t bring out his wand in time to block it and fell over like a stiff board. “I expect someone will be along to find you soon. Come on, Brian.”
~*~
Lily hurried to the Hospital Wing. She had heard from several people that Brian had gotten into an altercation, although no one had any idea of the details. When she finally reached her destination, Brian was sitting up on a bed with a few dark stains on his face.
“Is that blood?” She asked, horrified.
Brian scowled as he brought the damp towel back up to his face to wipe it off. “Yes,” he muttered.
“What happened?” Lily asked, rushing to his side.
“Your boyfriend, that’s who. He apparently took offense to our going to Hogsmeade together and decided to show it in some violent ways.” Lily cringed, but she could disrepute the fact that James oftentimes did react badly to boys asking her out. It had happened before, but he had a date of his own for Hogsmeade so she thought it would have been different this time.
“I’m so sorry! I don’t know why he does things.” Brian just shook his head, still looking angry.
“He likes you. Maybe it’d be best for me to just bow out.” Lily stared at him, hoping that he was joking, but Brian looked completely serious. “I mean it, Lily. I just want to focus on school and having fun, not get wrapped up in the drama surrounding the two of you.”
Lily flushed red with shame and anger. James always did manage to screw things up for her. He’d done it back in sixth year with Luke Brownwell and she should have known to head him off early. “Brian, I’ll take care of him, I promise. He won’t bother you again.”
“I don’t know. When exes stick around it’s usually because you aren’t sending the message that it’s over. I don’t want to get involved if that’s what it is.”
Her face burned even redder with embarrassment. “We were never together, but I assure you that particular message has been sent many times. If there’s a problem, it’s with him not me.”
Brian didn’t look convinced, but he nodded. “If you’re sure.”
“I am.” Lily took the towel from his hand and began dabbing at the dried blood on his face. “Doesn’t Madame Pomfrey have spells that could clean this up for you?” She asked.
“A couple of fourth years blew up a cauldron,” Brian said, gesturing toward the back of the room where a boy was lying on a bed unconscious. “She had to treat two of them for burns and the third still hasn’t woken up yet. I’ve got to stay in here until she can check my nose again.”
Lily stayed with him for a while, but eventually dinner threatened to end before Brian got checked again. When she made a comment about that he smiled. “Go on down to dinner. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She thanked him profusely and headed down to the Great Hall. Dinner was only half the reason she wanted to leave. The other half rhymed with Shames Shotter. He was sitting exactly where he always did with his friends, directly in the center of the Gryffindor table.
Lily stalked over to where they were sitting and stood there seething until he noticed her. James paled noticeably when he saw Lily glaring at him with her hands on her hips. He’d known it was coming, but just the sight of her fiery emerald eyes left him shaking in his boots.
“Fancy seeing you here, Lily Flower.”
“‘Fancy seeing me’, Potter? What is that supposed to mean?” Her tone was icy cold and James unconsciously pushed himself back against the table.
“Er nothing, I was just noticing that you er, don’t often come to talk to me. At dinner, I mean.” He stumbled over is words, unable to create a complete coherent thought.
“So I heard an interesting story from Brian earlier. You were in it.”
“Er, really now?” James asked uneasily. Lily’s tone was cold and they both knew where she was going, so James decided to head her off early. “I’m sorry-”
“You put my boyfriend in the Hospital Wing!” Lily shouted, her face turning the same color as her hair. “He had a broken nose. You’re supposed to be the Head Boy, for Merlin’s sake! McGonagall will be hearing about this and you better hope your marks are good enough that she doesn’t expel you.”
Lily stalked off and James put his fork back on his plate, no longer hungry. Sirius smirked at him. “You don’t reckon she’d really expel you?” He asked.
“You’re still here and you’ve done much worse than giving Lumpkin a broken nose.” The color began to return to his face and a small smile even crept back. “Besides, I’m captain of the Quidditch team, not to mention the star. McGonagall wouldn’t dare destroy our chances at the Cup this year.”
But that wasn’t the whole reason James was worried. He didn’t like it when Lily was angry with him, even though it happened quite frequently. He’d be lucky if she even spoke to him for a week, let alone in a normal tone of voice. “Cheer up mate,” Sirius said with a smirk. “You’ve still got your date with Ellie next week.”
It was hard to let something as annoying as that cheer him up, but James did let out a good natured groan. It was going to be an interesting weekend, that was for sure.
A/N: Here’s the next chappie!
Chapter Five
The morning of the Hogsmeade trip began with an announcement from Dumbledore about the upcoming Halloween ball. “And remember, only fourth through seventh years will be admitted. For the younger students there is always next year.”
Lily grinned at the thought of the ball. She had almost forgotten all about it, even though the Heads were in charge of some of the planning.
“I can’t believe it’s almost time for the ball again!” Amelia squealed. “I might actually have a date this year.”
“Who?” inquired Alice. “Tell us!”
“Not until I know for sure. Besides, I don’t think you would approve.” Amelia smiled off into space as she thought off him and unwillingly her eyes searched the Great Hall for him.
Lily grinned at her friend, glad to see her happy about a bloke for once. She didn’t think she’d ever seen her act so happy and so in love. But she was distracted by Brian waving at her from across the Great Hall. “I better go. I’ll see you two tonight, okay? You’re telling us everything, Lia.”
Lia rolled her eyes. “Sure, sure.”
She ran off to meet Brian, but James was watching her from the Gryffindor table. “Prongs, Earth to Prongs.” Remus gave him a smack on the arm to get his attention. James raised an eyebrow at him. “Do you know where Padfoot went? He just disappeared.”
“He’s avoiding you. Remember how much Honeyduke’s chocolate he owes you? He’s probably just trying to get out of paying up.” With that, James turned back to where Lily had been, but she already disappeared with that Lumpkin bloke. “How much do you value our friendship?” James asked nonchalantly.
Remus shook his head. “Not enough to do whatever it is you’re thinking of.”
“Please?” James begged. “Just follow them around a bit, get Padfoot to help you when you find him. I’d do it myself, but-” He broke off and shot a glance at Ellie.
“I’m not spying on her for you!”
James thought for a moment, trying to come up with a reason for Remus to agree with him on some moral high ground. He came up with nothing. Bribery was a distant second, but it was the best he could do. “I will personally make sure you get all the chocolate that is owed to you if you do this one tiny miniscule thing.”
With a sigh Remus nodded. “Fine, but I’m not interfering in their date and I’m not being creepy.”
James could have leapt for joy, but he stuck to a wide grin. Ellie was nearby and he still felt guilty about using her, especially since his plan wasn’t even working.
~*~
“I’m having such a great time, Brian,” Lily said with a smile. He had taken her to a cute café she’d never been to before and they’d had a lovely time. She hadn’t dated much, but in the few she’d been on this ranked very near the top.
“Yeah, I am too,” Brian said. He looked a little uneasy, but Lily didn’t ask him what was wrong. “Do you feel like someone- er, never mind.”
“What?” She asked curiously.
He glanced behind them. “Do you ever feel like someone is watching you? I’ve been getting kind of a weird vibe for a while now.” Lily looked around too, but shook her head. She hadn’t noticed anyone watching, although they had come across James and Ellie on their date at the Three Broomsticks.
“Never mind, I must be going out of my mind. Let’s go up to the Shrieking Shack.” Looking around once more he put his arm around Lily and escorted her up the hill.
Remus cursed silently under the invisibility cloak. He was keeping enough of a distance that they couldn’t hear him much and they definitely couldn’t see him. He would have to hope Lumpkin didn’t try to summon the cloak or something along those lines.
He was a bit grateful there wasn’t a second body under the cloak, but at the same time he was pissed that Sirius had never shown up. Wherever he was, Remus sincerely hoped he was having a horrible time.
On the other side of Hogsmeade behind a quiet alley, Amelia waited. He was late, almost twenty minutes and her stomach turned. She knew him well enough by now to know he wouldn’t just stand her up, but something could have happened.
“Lia.” She spun around when she heard her voice and saw him.
“You’re late,” she said in her sternest voice.
“I know, I’m sorry. I had to dodge quite a few people on the way. Certain friends wouldn’t be pleased if they knew I was meeting you.” Amelia knew all of these things, but she couldn’t help but feel relieved when he said them aloud.
She leaned into him for a quick kiss and smiled. “It’s okay.” They couldn’t afford for people to see them together just yet which meant their time together was limited. “What do you think about the ball?” Amelia asked suddenly.
He smiled down at her and ran his fingers through his dark hair. “You want to go with me?” He asked easily in response.
“Of course I want to go with you, but what about, you know, everyone else?”
There was a long silence between the two and finally he spoke. “At some point we have to admit we’re together. Our friends are already asking questions, at least mine are. People will find out eventually. Better to do it on our own terms, right?”
It took Amelia a moment to realize what he was saying and a broad grin broke out across her face. “Well in that case I better find a dress to where.” He bent down to kiss her and they settled into the shadows, perfectly content with each other.
James took another sip of his butterbeer as he watched Ellie flirt with some older blokes in the Three Broomsticks. They claimed to be dragontamers, but the lack of scars and burns on their arms seemed to be contradictory to their claims, but the discrepancies didn’t seem to bother Ellie at all.
She was completely ignoring him and for the moment James forgot that he’d spent the earlier part of their date thinking about Lily and how happy she looked with Brian. He had been wondering what Remus was up to when Ellie began flirting with the fake dragon tamers.
Finally James stood up. He wasn’t going to take this anymore. He was a star seeker, he had a plaque in the trophy room for Merlin’s sake. He wasn’t about to be outshined by a couple of losers just out of school.
“Let’s go, Ellie,” he said as he grabbed her by the arm. One of the blokes protested, but allowed James to drag Ellie outside. “Did you forget you were supposed to be on a date with me?”
“Whatever. I was just trying to have some fun.” She glared at him for a moment, then her face brightened. “What d’you we have some fun ourselves?”
James eyed her carefully. Her words could really only be interpreted one way, especially with the sultry smile on her lips. She hooked her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. “You remember how to have fun, right Jamie?”
She slid her hands under his shirt before James fully processed what she said. He pushed her away roughly. “Don’t call me Jamie.” That was what his mother had called him as kid. Whatever mood had been building until that point was ruined.
James ran his fingers through his hair, giving it a windswept look. He chanced a look at his watch and groaned. “Shit. We’re gonna miss the carriages back to the castle. McGonagall’s going to go ballistic.”
“We’ve got plenty of time, Jamie.” James sent her a scathing look and took off for the carriages with Ellie trailing along behind him. As it turned out they didn’t have plenty of time as there were only two left.
Remus was waiting for James when they got there with an annoyed look on his face. “What were you two doing? You almost missed the carriages! McGonagall would strip you of your Head Boy badge for sure this time. You’re already on thin ice with her!”
“Calm down, I got here on time. What did you-” James cut off as he realized Ellie was still standing beside him. “You can go now,” he said condescendingly. “Remus and I have adult things to discuss.”
Ellie looked offended and hurt as she hurried off to the carriage that was about to leave. Remus and James got into the last one and Remus frowned at his friend. “That wasn’t very nice, you know. She likes you.”
“You didn’t have to spend the day with her. She called me Jamie while we were snogging.” James shuddered. “It was like snogging my Mum.”
Remus smacked him in the arm and groaned. “Do you have any idea how disturbing that sounded?”
“Forget Ellie, tell me what happened with Lily? And where’s Padfoot? I thought he was going to join you.”
There was a long pause while Remus perfected his glare. “Padfoot never showed. I spent all afternoon under your damned invisibility cloak alone tailing a girl I consider a friend and have no interest whatsoever in dating. And you didn’t even remember to buy my chocolate. My day was absolutely wonderful, thanks for asking.”
James stared at Remus silently for a moment. He was usually the calm one who told them nothing was important enough to go mad over. “Er- sorry about the chocolate, mate.” It was all he could think to say with a slight shrug. “But what did they do?”
With a world weary sigh, Remus ran his hand across his face. “I don’t know. They spent a lot of time talking, I heard them mention Marisa a few times so that couldn’t have been too cheery and then they went to the Shrieking Shack.”
“The Shrieking Shack?” It was common for the older students to go out there when they wanted to snog their significant other. James had never seen the appeal, but Sirius mentioned it frequently.
Remus nodded. “And then I left because I didn’t want to see whatever they did next. When am I going to get my chocolate?”
“Huh?” James was distracted by the thought of Lily and Lumpkin together, snogging. He tried to focus on Remus’s question, but was failing miserably. “Uh, soon.”
“You alright?”
“Wha-? Yeah, sure. I’m fine.”
Remus raised an eyebrow, unconvinced. “Really?” James nodded enthusiastically. “You’re an awful liar.”
“The only thing I’m thinking about now is where Padfoot is,” James said, although that wasn’t even close to the truth. “He was supposed to be with you, not off shagging his latest girl of the week.”
“Give Padfoot some credit. They usually last a bit longer than a week,” Remus said, attempting to defend his friend.
“Him and his stupid bints always getting in everyone’s way,” James muttered sullenly.
“Are you going to be like this all night?” Remus asked, annoyed.
“Like what?”
“Bitter and malicious.” Remus said. “There’s more to life than Lily Evans, you know.”
James didn’t respond verbally, but rolled his eyes. Easy for him to say, he thought to himself. Remus wasn’t the one in love with her.
Chapter Five
The morning of the Hogsmeade trip began with an announcement from Dumbledore about the upcoming Halloween ball. “And remember, only fourth through seventh years will be admitted. For the younger students there is always next year.”
Lily grinned at the thought of the ball. She had almost forgotten all about it, even though the Heads were in charge of some of the planning.
“I can’t believe it’s almost time for the ball again!” Amelia squealed. “I might actually have a date this year.”
“Who?” inquired Alice. “Tell us!”
“Not until I know for sure. Besides, I don’t think you would approve.” Amelia smiled off into space as she thought off him and unwillingly her eyes searched the Great Hall for him.
Lily grinned at her friend, glad to see her happy about a bloke for once. She didn’t think she’d ever seen her act so happy and so in love. But she was distracted by Brian waving at her from across the Great Hall. “I better go. I’ll see you two tonight, okay? You’re telling us everything, Lia.”
Lia rolled her eyes. “Sure, sure.”
She ran off to meet Brian, but James was watching her from the Gryffindor table. “Prongs, Earth to Prongs.” Remus gave him a smack on the arm to get his attention. James raised an eyebrow at him. “Do you know where Padfoot went? He just disappeared.”
“He’s avoiding you. Remember how much Honeyduke’s chocolate he owes you? He’s probably just trying to get out of paying up.” With that, James turned back to where Lily had been, but she already disappeared with that Lumpkin bloke. “How much do you value our friendship?” James asked nonchalantly.
Remus shook his head. “Not enough to do whatever it is you’re thinking of.”
“Please?” James begged. “Just follow them around a bit, get Padfoot to help you when you find him. I’d do it myself, but-” He broke off and shot a glance at Ellie.
“I’m not spying on her for you!”
James thought for a moment, trying to come up with a reason for Remus to agree with him on some moral high ground. He came up with nothing. Bribery was a distant second, but it was the best he could do. “I will personally make sure you get all the chocolate that is owed to you if you do this one tiny miniscule thing.”
With a sigh Remus nodded. “Fine, but I’m not interfering in their date and I’m not being creepy.”
James could have leapt for joy, but he stuck to a wide grin. Ellie was nearby and he still felt guilty about using her, especially since his plan wasn’t even working.
~*~
“I’m having such a great time, Brian,” Lily said with a smile. He had taken her to a cute café she’d never been to before and they’d had a lovely time. She hadn’t dated much, but in the few she’d been on this ranked very near the top.
“Yeah, I am too,” Brian said. He looked a little uneasy, but Lily didn’t ask him what was wrong. “Do you feel like someone- er, never mind.”
“What?” She asked curiously.
He glanced behind them. “Do you ever feel like someone is watching you? I’ve been getting kind of a weird vibe for a while now.” Lily looked around too, but shook her head. She hadn’t noticed anyone watching, although they had come across James and Ellie on their date at the Three Broomsticks.
“Never mind, I must be going out of my mind. Let’s go up to the Shrieking Shack.” Looking around once more he put his arm around Lily and escorted her up the hill.
Remus cursed silently under the invisibility cloak. He was keeping enough of a distance that they couldn’t hear him much and they definitely couldn’t see him. He would have to hope Lumpkin didn’t try to summon the cloak or something along those lines.
He was a bit grateful there wasn’t a second body under the cloak, but at the same time he was pissed that Sirius had never shown up. Wherever he was, Remus sincerely hoped he was having a horrible time.
On the other side of Hogsmeade behind a quiet alley, Amelia waited. He was late, almost twenty minutes and her stomach turned. She knew him well enough by now to know he wouldn’t just stand her up, but something could have happened.
“Lia.” She spun around when she heard her voice and saw him.
“You’re late,” she said in her sternest voice.
“I know, I’m sorry. I had to dodge quite a few people on the way. Certain friends wouldn’t be pleased if they knew I was meeting you.” Amelia knew all of these things, but she couldn’t help but feel relieved when he said them aloud.
She leaned into him for a quick kiss and smiled. “It’s okay.” They couldn’t afford for people to see them together just yet which meant their time together was limited. “What do you think about the ball?” Amelia asked suddenly.
He smiled down at her and ran his fingers through his dark hair. “You want to go with me?” He asked easily in response.
“Of course I want to go with you, but what about, you know, everyone else?”
There was a long silence between the two and finally he spoke. “At some point we have to admit we’re together. Our friends are already asking questions, at least mine are. People will find out eventually. Better to do it on our own terms, right?”
It took Amelia a moment to realize what he was saying and a broad grin broke out across her face. “Well in that case I better find a dress to where.” He bent down to kiss her and they settled into the shadows, perfectly content with each other.
James took another sip of his butterbeer as he watched Ellie flirt with some older blokes in the Three Broomsticks. They claimed to be dragontamers, but the lack of scars and burns on their arms seemed to be contradictory to their claims, but the discrepancies didn’t seem to bother Ellie at all.
She was completely ignoring him and for the moment James forgot that he’d spent the earlier part of their date thinking about Lily and how happy she looked with Brian. He had been wondering what Remus was up to when Ellie began flirting with the fake dragon tamers.
Finally James stood up. He wasn’t going to take this anymore. He was a star seeker, he had a plaque in the trophy room for Merlin’s sake. He wasn’t about to be outshined by a couple of losers just out of school.
“Let’s go, Ellie,” he said as he grabbed her by the arm. One of the blokes protested, but allowed James to drag Ellie outside. “Did you forget you were supposed to be on a date with me?”
“Whatever. I was just trying to have some fun.” She glared at him for a moment, then her face brightened. “What d’you we have some fun ourselves?”
James eyed her carefully. Her words could really only be interpreted one way, especially with the sultry smile on her lips. She hooked her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. “You remember how to have fun, right Jamie?”
She slid her hands under his shirt before James fully processed what she said. He pushed her away roughly. “Don’t call me Jamie.” That was what his mother had called him as kid. Whatever mood had been building until that point was ruined.
James ran his fingers through his hair, giving it a windswept look. He chanced a look at his watch and groaned. “Shit. We’re gonna miss the carriages back to the castle. McGonagall’s going to go ballistic.”
“We’ve got plenty of time, Jamie.” James sent her a scathing look and took off for the carriages with Ellie trailing along behind him. As it turned out they didn’t have plenty of time as there were only two left.
Remus was waiting for James when they got there with an annoyed look on his face. “What were you two doing? You almost missed the carriages! McGonagall would strip you of your Head Boy badge for sure this time. You’re already on thin ice with her!”
“Calm down, I got here on time. What did you-” James cut off as he realized Ellie was still standing beside him. “You can go now,” he said condescendingly. “Remus and I have adult things to discuss.”
Ellie looked offended and hurt as she hurried off to the carriage that was about to leave. Remus and James got into the last one and Remus frowned at his friend. “That wasn’t very nice, you know. She likes you.”
“You didn’t have to spend the day with her. She called me Jamie while we were snogging.” James shuddered. “It was like snogging my Mum.”
Remus smacked him in the arm and groaned. “Do you have any idea how disturbing that sounded?”
“Forget Ellie, tell me what happened with Lily? And where’s Padfoot? I thought he was going to join you.”
There was a long pause while Remus perfected his glare. “Padfoot never showed. I spent all afternoon under your damned invisibility cloak alone tailing a girl I consider a friend and have no interest whatsoever in dating. And you didn’t even remember to buy my chocolate. My day was absolutely wonderful, thanks for asking.”
James stared at Remus silently for a moment. He was usually the calm one who told them nothing was important enough to go mad over. “Er- sorry about the chocolate, mate.” It was all he could think to say with a slight shrug. “But what did they do?”
With a world weary sigh, Remus ran his hand across his face. “I don’t know. They spent a lot of time talking, I heard them mention Marisa a few times so that couldn’t have been too cheery and then they went to the Shrieking Shack.”
“The Shrieking Shack?” It was common for the older students to go out there when they wanted to snog their significant other. James had never seen the appeal, but Sirius mentioned it frequently.
Remus nodded. “And then I left because I didn’t want to see whatever they did next. When am I going to get my chocolate?”
“Huh?” James was distracted by the thought of Lily and Lumpkin together, snogging. He tried to focus on Remus’s question, but was failing miserably. “Uh, soon.”
“You alright?”
“Wha-? Yeah, sure. I’m fine.”
Remus raised an eyebrow, unconvinced. “Really?” James nodded enthusiastically. “You’re an awful liar.”
“The only thing I’m thinking about now is where Padfoot is,” James said, although that wasn’t even close to the truth. “He was supposed to be with you, not off shagging his latest girl of the week.”
“Give Padfoot some credit. They usually last a bit longer than a week,” Remus said, attempting to defend his friend.
“Him and his stupid bints always getting in everyone’s way,” James muttered sullenly.
“Are you going to be like this all night?” Remus asked, annoyed.
“Like what?”
“Bitter and malicious.” Remus said. “There’s more to life than Lily Evans, you know.”
James didn’t respond verbally, but rolled his eyes. Easy for him to say, he thought to himself. Remus wasn’t the one in love with her.
A/N: Hey guys! Thanks so much for reading and reviewing!
Chapter Six
Lily met up with Alice in the Head’s Common Room early the next morning. She was beaming at her friend, unable to conceal her happiness. “Hogsmeade was wonderful! How was Frank?” She desperately wanted to talk about her own date, but Lily didn’t want to make her friend feel out of place.
Alice blushed deeply, her face turning completely red. “Not much. Just boring same old Frank. You’re the one with the new bloke. Tell me all about him.”
“Well,” Lily drew out the syllable trying to decide what to say. “We went to this little café and had butterbeers and then we went into some shops because I needed more ink and then we went up to the Shrieking Shack and spent some time talking. We had a lovely time.”
Alice’s eyes widened at her friend. “The Shrieking Shack? Did you-?”
“Alice! Not like that!” It was Lily’s turn to blush. “Brian and I barely know each yet. We just talked, nothing more.”
“You say that now,” Alice teased, but when Lily’s face burned even redder she changed the subject. “What’s the deal with Amelia? I haven’t seen her around much. I was asleep before she got back to the dormitory.”
“Out with her mystery man again, I suppose? We’ll have to torture his name out of her. Who could possibly be so awful that she wouldn’t tell us?” Alice opened her mouth to answer, but was cut off when the door opened. Amelia stared at her two friends suspiciously.
“Were you just talking about me?” She asked with a frown.
Alice and Lily exchanged a look. “No,” they answered simultaneously.
“If you’re going to lie at least do it well,” Amelia said as she rolled her eyes. “I’m not telling you who my boyfriend is, but I will say that you’ll know soon.”
Alice tucked a stray strand of blonde hair behind her ear. “Define soon,” Lily said, but Amelia’s mouth had dropped open.
“What the hell was that?” She asked. Alice blushed deeply and tucked her hand in the pocket of her robes.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Amelia marched over to her friend and pulled out her left hand. Sparkling on her ring finger was a small diamond. Lily stared openmouthed, unable to form coherent thoughts. “When did this happen?” Amelia demanded.
“In Hogsmeade,” Alice responded sheepishly. “Frank asked and I said yes.”
“Aren’t you a bit young?” Lily asked. “You’ve still got months to go before you graduate!”
“We’re both of age,” Alice said defensively. “We’re both adults and we’ve been together in a committed relationship for a long time. I thought you’d be happy for me.” She drew in a shaky breath looking near to tears and Lily regretted saying anything.
“I am! I mean, you and Frank are wonderful together. I’m over the moon about this! You are going to be a gorgeous bride.” Lily had a few doubts about getting engaged so young, but she decided it was best to keep them to herself, at least for now. She didn’t want to upset her friend.
Alice sat down on the bed and laughed. “You think so?”
“I know so.”
The girls were still talking about the engagement when James entered the common room. Alice sent her friends panicked looks and they all closed their mouths immediately. “Er, hi,” James said awkwardly. It was quite clear to him that he had interrupted a conversation, probably about Lily and Lumpkin’s date in Hogsmeade.
Amelia muttered some sort of unintelligible greeting back and all three girls scurried back into Lily’s bedroom. They burst into giggles once the door was securely shut.
James nearly entered his own room to get his books, but the laughter intrigued him. He put an ear up to the door to listen.
“So when’s the wedding going to be?” One of the them asked, Amelia James thought. His mouth dropped open. There was going to be a wedding?
“Well after we graduate, obviously,” said Lily.
“This is so amazing!” Amelia again. “Just think of how adorable the kids will be!”
“Lia!” James’s mind was racing. Lily was engaged? To Lumpkin? None of it made sense.
“Oh bugger, I forgot to charm the door.”
The sound from inside the room cut off abruptly, but James had heard enough. He sprinted down the corridor to the Gryffindor Common Room. “Padfoot!” There was only one reason James could think of to cause Lily to get engaged. She must be pregnant.
When he found Sirius in the seventh year boys’ dormitory and told him the whole story, his mouth dropped open in shock. “Are you sure? That doesn’t sound like Lily at all. She wouldn’t shag the bloke on her first date.”
“I’m only telling you what I heard. There’s no other explanation for it.” James ran his fingers through his with a deep sigh. “I can’t believe I’ve finally lost her for good.”
“Cheer up, mate,” Sirius said with a smirk. “You’ve still got Ellie.” James rolled his eyes and whipped a pillow across the room at Sirius’s head.
Outside the door, Ellie smiled maliciously. She knew exactly how to get back at James Potter and Lily Evans for toying with her emotions. She’d planned on asking him to take her back to throw it in Evan’s face, but this idea was so much better.
She hurried down to the Great Hall where breakfast had just begun and whispered what she’d heard to her friends at different tables. “Lily Evans- the Head Girl- is pregnant and engaged!”
It only took minutes for the news to get around. Ellie had also just happened to mention that this news came directly from James Potter himself, just to ruin any chance at a relationship he and Lily Evans may have had.
Lily and her friends entered the Great Hall at precisely the same time as James and Sirius. Most people quieted for a moment as they took in her presence, then the Great Hall erupted in whispers and giggles. “What’s going on?” Alice asked.
Lily shrugged and sat down at the Gryffindor table near a sixth year she was friends with. “What’s the deal?”
Madelyn glanced around nervously, unsure if she wanted to be seen with the person who was the center of the rumors. “James Potter told Ellie Minthallin who told Melinda-”
“What they were told is the key here, not the list of insipid popular people involved,” Amelia said harshly, but Lily had already turned away to glare at James. She should have known he’d have something to do with this.
Lily walked down the table and stood in front of James with a dangerous glare. “What the hell is wrong with you, Potter? I cannot believe you did that. Spreading rumors about me is low, even for you.”
James’s mouth opened and closed like a fish, but Lily had already turned to leave. As she walked down the Gryffindor table, the sixth year girls giggled. “Is something funny to you lot?” She hissed through clenched teeth. “Because right now I really feel like taking points and giving a week’s worth of detentions to the next person who so much as speaks to me.”
Ellie hid her smirk behind her goblet of pumpkin juice.
The rest of the morning was rough for Lily. She heard whispers everywhere around her and sometimes people were loud enough that she could hear what they said.
“Pregnant, did you here?”
“Engaged to Lumpkin!”
“I heard she’s dropping out of school.”
“Well I heard she’s running away to America to live as a muggle.”
“Mudblood slut.”
Tears pricked at Lily’s eyes as she heard the last statement. It had come from a young Slytherin, but it still hurt. “Detention Malvinik, for vulgar language.” He sneered at her.
“Er, hullo Lily.” Lily wiped at her tears and smiled up at Brian. “Could we talk somewhere private?”
“Of course.” They walked down the corridor together. “I know there’s an empty classroom down here somewhere.” When they finally found the classroom, Lily looked at her boyfriend. “What did you want to talk to me about?”
“Er- I’m sorry. I really am, but this whole thing doesn’t involve me at all. It’s this big drama between you and Potter and it hasn’t got anything to do with me.” He looked embarrassed and what he was saying began to dawn on Lily.
“Oh,” she said, feeling very small.
“Maybe it’s best if we ended this before it got too far. You’re a really nice girl, but I don’t want to get involved in other people’s drama. I’m really sorry, Lily, it’s just not going to work out.”
Her eyes welled up and Lily tilted her head down. “Oh,” she said again.
“Are you alright?” He reached out to put a hand on her arm, but Lily drew away.
“Yes- I’m fine.” She wiped the tears from her cheeks where they had begun to spill over. “I better go. Homework and all that, you know.” She left the classroom quickly and about broke into a run once she was around the corner.
The day had started so wonderfully, but now everything was in ruins. Lily covered her face and cried.
A/N: Hello my lovely readers! You’re all looking especially dashing on this beautiful day.
Chapter Seven
Lily was hiding in her room later that afternoon. She’d tried to study in the library, but the whispers had gotten under her skin and she wasn’t looking forward to telling her friends that Brian had broken up with her. Some alone time was just what she needed.
Coincidentally she heard a ruckus directly outside of the portrait hole. “Lily! Lily, let me in!” A small smile darted across her lips. During lunch when James was busy in the Great Hall, she’d convinced the portrait to change the password without the Head Boy’s approval.
He had no way to get into his own rooms. “Lily! Just tell me the new password! I need to talk to you!”
The smile disappeared in an instant and Lily opened the closest textbook, adamant to ignore James’s requests. She wanted to talk to him about as much as she wanted Bubotuber pus in her eyes.
“Please? Just let me in!” Lily considered silencing the door so she couldn’t hear his pleas, but she couldn’t help but derive a bit of pleasure from his desperation. “What if I get Alice and Amelia? Will you let them in?”
“No,” Lily replied instantly.
James thought for a long moment. “What if Dumbledore comes? Would you let him in?”
This time there was a slight pause before Lily responded. “No.” She didn’t sound as sure either.
“But what about rounds?” James kept pressing, trying to get her to finally admit defeat. “How will you patrol if you’re locked up in there?”
Lily frowned. There was no way for her to win this argument. “I won’t patrol,” she muttered defiantly, trying desperately to stick to her resolve.
“But Lily, Dumbledore might revoke your privileges as Head Girl if you don’t patrol! You’ve got to do rounds with me tonight.”
Lily scowled and slammed her Transfiguration book shut. James could almost see her inner debate. She didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of winning the argument, but he did have some pretty good points. “Fine, but you had better not talk to me.”
“Yes!” James grinned in triumph. “Now will you let me in?”
“No.”
Sighing, James decided to give up. There was really nothing more he could do to convince Lily to let him in. In defeat he walked up to the Gryffindor common room.
Sirius was lounging on the sofa while Peter was asleep in the chair across from him. He was watching the pudgy boy with interest, which confused James. “How’d it go with Lily? She curse you? You don’t look cursed.” Sirius jumped from his Peter watching position to pull James onto the couch.
“I’m not.” James was frowning as he said this. “What are you doing?”
“He tends to talk in his sleep. His favorite topics are cheese, McGonagall, and his precious Mummy.”
James howled with laughter until Sirius shushed him. Peter was mumbling incoherently and the boys attempted to listen for a moment, but Sirius shook his head. “So what happened with Evans?”
“She changed the password to the Heads’ rooms so now I can’t get in and she refuses to come out.” James sighed heavily.
“That doesn’t sound like her,” Sirius said. “Are you sure she didn’t hex you or hit you or harm you in any way, shape, or form?”
“Of course I’m sure. I wouldn’t lie to you.” James grinned suddenly, “Well, I might, but trust me on this. Lily didn’t lay a wand on me.”
“Mad-Eye says we shouldn’t trust people who tell us to trust them,” Peter murmured sleepily from the chair as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes.
Yeah, well tell Mad-Eye to stuff it up his arse.” Sirius had a low opinion of Aurors, especially Mad-Eye, since he’d come to school to talk to all of those interested in becoming Aurors and told Sirius he didn’t have the grades. “That’s where all his paranoid Auror stuff belongs.”
“Padfoot! Mad-Eye is one of the most respected Aurors at the Ministry! You can’t just go around saying things like that!” James was horrified with his friend. His own parents had always taught him to respect Aurors, if no one else.
“Whatever.” Sirius glared at Peter. “Thanks for waking up, there goes our entertainment for the afternoon.” Peter’s face turned a deep red out of embarrassment and he scurried up the steps as fast as he could.
“You could be nicer to him, you know,” James suggested, although he knew it would fall on deaf ears.
Sirius shrugged and looked around. “Where’s Remus?” He asked, as though noticing for the first time that his studious friend was nowhere to be found.
“He’s avoiding you in the library,” James aid, rolling his eyes. He knew sometimes Sirius could be a little thick, but this was ridiculous. “He’s pissed that you never met up with him in Hogsmeade.”
Sirius’s eyes widened in shock. “I completely forgot about that! Is he that mad?”
“Where were you? No one saw you anywhere all day.”
“I had a meeting with a friend,” Sirius said vaguely. He knew that wasn’t going to cut it with his friends for long, but he couldn’t tell them much more, at least not yet. “I’ll talk to you later.”
He hurried down to the library, but paused outside the doors. He wasn’t sure if he should enter. He’d been thrown out in third year and then officially banned in his fifth. Sirius hadn’t found it particularly limiting as he rarely had a reason to go to the library. He made up his mind and scanned the library for Madam Pince.
When she was nowhere to be found, he hurried between a few dark shelves to the very back where Remus preferred to read. He saw his friend working on an essay at a desk and whispered, “Moony! It’s me!”
Remus jumped and spilled his inkwell over his parchment. “What are you doing here?” He hissed back. “Didn’t you get banned?”
“Yeah, so it’s probably best if we leave. Quickly.” Remus took his sweet time packing up his parchment and quills.
A shrill voice interrupted them just as they had started to leave. “Mr. Black! I warned you to stay out of my library!” Madam Pince appeared from behind the shelf, brandishing her wand.
“Come on!” Sirius grabbed his friend’s arm and yanked him from the desk. The two sprinted out of the library and down the corridor until Madam Pince could no longer see them.
By the time they stopped, both boys were panting heavily. “Now you’ve probably gotten me banned as well,” Remus complained.
“You can thank me later,” Sirius said. “What did you want me for again?”
“You came to find me in the library, not the other way around.”
Sirius stared at him for a moment before grinning. “That’s right! I came to find you and tell you what a lovely friend you are and how unbelievably sorry I am for abandoning you in Hogsmeade for the whole day.”
“Padfoot-” Remus started. He wasn’t in the mood for any of Sirius’s games. A simple apology wasn’t going to get him off the hook this time.
“I had this other obligation and it wasn’t supposed to last all day, but girls can talk forever, you know?” He said this all in one breath, trying to get it out before he forgot it.
Remus stared at him, trying to piece together the vague clues Sirius was giving him. “You were on a date?”
“No!” Sirius protested. “It wasn’t like that.”
“Then tell me.”
“Moony, come on.” He was desperate for his friend’s forgiveness, but there were certain pieces of information he couldn’t divulge. “I promised her I wouldn’t tell anyone. If someone finds out she could be in a lot of trouble.”
Remus looked him over carefully. He knew Sirius kept his promises, even if he was a bit thick sometimes. He didn’t have a problem with pranking people, but breaking promises was another matter.
He nodded. “Fine, but at least tell me it was something important.”
Sirius let out a bark of laughter. “Oh it was definitely important. You can count on that.”
His words did little to instill a sense of confidence in Remus, but Sirius didn’t notice. He was just glad not to be in the doghouse anymore.
~*~
Alice and Amelia were outside the Heads’ rooms, thoroughly frustrated with their stubborn friend. “Lily! Open up now! We need to talk to you!”
“Is Potter with you?” Lily asked.
Amelia and Alice exchanged a look, wondering if they should tell her the truth. Finally Amelia said, “No, he’s not. It’s just us. Give us the password Lily.”
Alice frowned at her dishonesty, but didn’t say anything allowed. “It’s ‘Hogwarts’,” Lily said, her voice muffled.
“How original,” Amelia said rolling her eyes. James grinned at her, thrilled to have a chance to talk to Lily.
When the three entered Lily scowled at them. “I thought you said Potter wasn’t with you!”
Amelia shrugged. “We lied.”
Alice elbowed her in the side. “We just want what’s best for you and you should really talk to him. He’s an arse, sorry James, but you are, but he’s kind of a sweet arse.”
Lily looked between her friends and screamed in frustration. “I am not, now or ever, going to speak to James Potter! I will live in this room, I will die in this room, but I will never listen to anything he has to say!”
Lily slammed the door to her bedroom shut and James cringed. “She’s er- going to relax, right?” He asked.
“Sure,” Amelia said sarcastically. “And You Know Who is going to fall in love with a muggle and live happily ever after.” Alice nodded in agreement. Lily could be one of the sweetest people she knew, but she was stubborn to a fault. Once she decided something nothing would change her opinion.
“Fantastic,” James muttered under her breath. “I thought your goal was to help me, not ruin any chance I had.”
“I still think you’re an arrogant toerag,” Amelia said with a glare.
“Our goal was to help Lily, and ourselves of course. When your fights start to meddle in our lives, that’s where we draw the line,” Alice amended.
“Your lives?” James asked, confused.
Alice lifted up her left hand to show off the glistening diamond. “I’m the one engaged, not her.” James’s mouth dropped open in shock. Once he’d realized the rumor wasn’t true he hadn’t bothered to question why the girls had been talking about an engagement.
“I’m- That’s-” He stumbled over his words, trying to think of something appropriate to say. “Congrats?”
Alice shrugged. “Well the whole school already knows so I figured you should too.”
The meaning behind her words dawned on him. “It was supposed to be a secret,” he said, slamming a palm to his forehead. “Oh Merlin, I’m so sorry.”
Alice shrugged again, although she smiled a bit this time. “It’s alright. We’d have to tell people anyway. Now they just all found out at once.”
James still felt guilty for ruining her secret. He swore to himself not to report rumors anymore unless he was absolutely sure they were true, forgetting, of course, that he had been absolutely sure Lily was engaged.
As the week went on Lily continued to remain angry with her friends and refused to speak to James. Alice and Amelia were growing tired of it. Two nights before the Halloween Ball, Amelia dragged Alice into the Room of Requirement.
“I have a master plan to get Lily and James together,” she said excitedly.
Alice rolled her eyes. Amelia’s master plans were notoriously awful. “Why is everything in here green?” Amelia blushed and looked away, but Alice noticed it in an instant. “What are you hiding from me?”
“Nothing! Just let me tell you my master plan.” Alice gestured for her continued, so she did. “Okay, first we insist that Lily goes to the ball. Then we force Black to insist that James goes to the ball.” Alice nodded, so far the plan sounded decent. In fact, she’d already been thinking something along those lines. “Then James goes with Minthallin and Lily gets insanely jealous and boom! They fall in love. What do you think?”
“What do I think?” Alice asked slowly, ensuring that it wasn’t a trick question. “I think that is possibly the worst plan I’ve ever heard. In what universe do people just boom! Fall in love?”
Amelia shrugged. “Have you got a better one, then?”
“Well,” Alice said, drawing out the word as she thought. “How about we just get them to go together?”
“Lily will never agree to go with James.”
Alice gave her friend a small smile. “Yes, but she would if she didn’t know it was him.”
A/N: Hey all! Here’s another update!
Chapter Eight
Lily still wasn’t sure she wanted to go to the ball, but Amelia and Alice had both seemed quite adamant. She wore one of Alice’s old dresses, a simple olive green strapless that flowed around her knees. In her opinion it had looked better on Alice than her, but she was willing to wear it for a night.
Amelia on the other hand was having a nervous breakdown. She had taken off her dress twice already and was eyeing herself in the mirror critically. “This dress makes me look fat.”
“Of course it doesn’t, Lia. You look wonderful.” Lily charmed her hair into a bun and slid on her mask, an olive green that matched her dress perfectly. “So why do I have to go on this blind date again?”
“We thought it might help you get over Potter,” Alice said slyly.
“I don’t need to get over Potter,” Lily said with a roll of her eyes. “How many times do I have to tell you I’m not into him?”
“Until it’s the truth.” Alice finished the final touches of her makeup and sent a glare towards Amelia. “Isn’t that right, Lia?”
“I had nothing to do with this.” She replied. “Nothing at all.”
“Coward.” Alice turned back to Lily and smiled. “You’ll have so much fun! The bloke we got to go with you is really nice and funny.”
Lia sent a pointed look at her friends. “Some people think Black is really nice and funny.”
“Oh shut it, you,” Alice said. “You still haven’t told us who you’re going with. Is he ugly? Are you too ashamed to tell us that he’s a fifth year Ravenclaw?”
Amelia stuck her tongue out at Alice. “He’s not a fifth year! He’s of age.”
Alice exchanged a look with Lily at this new information. “Someone sounds a bit defensive there. A sixth year, perhaps?”
Amelia turned bright red. She’d never been a spectacular liar and it was harder when the thing she was lying about was so close to the forefront of her mind. “Shut up. Our dates are going to be waiting.”
The other two girls glanced at the clock and realized Amelia was right. They grabbed their wands and headed towards the Great Hall.
~*~
“Why do I even have to go to this ball?” James glared at Sirius and Remus. “I don’t even have a date.”
“Well actually, you er- sort of do. I kind of set you up on a blind date with a nice girl I found and I thought it might help you get over Evans.” Sirius cowered from James on the opposite side of the room. “It seemed like a good idea when we first came up with it, didn’t it Moony?” He looked to Remus for help.
“I had absolutely nothing to do with this.”
“Coward,” Sirius muttered.
“No, just smart.”
James stared at his friends in shock. “I have a date?”
“Er- yes,” Sirius said rather awkwardly. “With a girl.”
“Who’s not Lily?”
“Er- no.”
James ran his fingers through his hair in an annoyed gesture. “What would possess you to get a date for me?”
Sirius exchanged a look with Remus. “Mate, you’ve been a bit under the weather ever since Lily started ignoring. We thought-” Sirius glanced at Remus and amended himself hastily. “Okay, well I thought it might be a good idea for you to get out a bit more. Go on a date.”
“And what if I say no?” James asked with a scowl. “I could, you know.”
“You wouldn’t dare,” Remus said. “There’s a girl standing outside the Great Hall waiting for her date all alone. You wouldn’t stand her up.”
James wanted to argue, but he knew his friends were right. Even if Lily was the only girl for him he couldn’t leave this poor girl alone all night. He wasn’t that cruel. “Fine, but this won’t turn into anything serious. It’s just one date and I’ll make sure she knows that.”
Sirius and Remus both sighed in relief. Despite their arguments, they had worried quite a bit that he would refuse to go.
Down in the front hall, Lily was growing worried. A masked boy she didn’t recognize had already swept Amelia away and Frank had come by for Alice, although both of them were still waiting with her. “Maybe he’s not going to come,” Lily said, a bit sad despite her conviction that she didn’t want a date to the ball.
“Oh he’s coming. He’s coming if I have to drag him down here myself,” Alice muttered.
At that moment a bloke in black dress robes turned the corner and started walking towards them. A smile darted across Alice’s face as she gave Lily a quick hug. “Just relax and have fun tonight, okay?”
Lily nodded, but she was sure the night was going to be awful. Since it was a blind date it was sure to be full of stiff, awkward conversation.
“Hullo,” the masked boy said with a crooked smile. “You must be my lovely date.”
“Well everyone else is down at the ball so that seems like a correct assumption,” Lily said with a hint of annoyance in her voice.
“I er- apologize for being late. My friends didn’t see fit to inform me that I had a date until just a few minutes ago.” He laughed awkwardly and Lily couldn’t help but grin at him. At least he didn’t look quite as desperate as she had expected.
“Shall we go in?” The boy nodded and he and Lily walked into the Great Hall together. It had been decorated in the Halloween theme, but the stars twinkled above them as they always did. Tables with alternating bowls of punch and candy lined the outsides of the room.
A few of the younger fourth years were throwing candy corn at each other and Lily smiled as Professor Flitwick calmed them down. “I remember being that young and stupid,” the boy said. “Now I’m just stupid. Haven’t got much of an excuse anymore.”
Lily laughed in surprise. Whatever she had expected from her date, that wasn’t it.
“Would you like to dance?” He asked politely. Lily nodded and let him take her hand onto the dance floor.
Amelia and Alice were watching from the corner of the room together. “It’s working! I can’t believe it’s actually working!” Alice said excitedly.
“And to think this all stemmed from my idea,” Amelia said. “When their kids grow up I’ll have such a story to tell them.”
Alice rolled her eyes and was about to make a retort when Amelia’s masked date tapped her on the shoulder. “Would you care for a dance, milady?” He asked with a slight bow. Amelia giggled and allowed him to sweep her off to the dance floor.
Alice smiled as they left and adjusted her mask. She couldn’t figure out who he was for the life of her. She felt as though he seemed rather familiar, but she couldn’t put her finger on what it was exactly.
“How did someone as beautiful as you get left all alone in the corner?”
“Hi Frank,” Alice said with a smile, turning away from Amelia and her mystery date.
“How’s it going with the Lily and James thing?” He asked. Alice scanned the room, but they had disappeared.
“Pretty good. I think they’re dancing now, meaning of course she has no idea who he is.” Alice looked through the crowd of dancers once more and still didn’t see her redheaded friend.
Frank took her by the shoulders and began steering her towards the dance floor. “You think you can take the time from your match making to spare me a dance?” In response, Alice slid her arms around Frank’s neck and began swaying to the music with him.
As the night went on Lily found herself quite taken with the boy in the mask. She put it down to the fact that she didn’t know who he was. His mask covered his entire face and his dark hair was slicked back. Something seemed familiar about him, but she couldn’t recognize him from the way he spoke or his personality.
“Who are you?” She asked after he had brought her outside.
“You know we aren’t allowed to tell until midnight when everyone takes off their masks.” The boy then casually smiled and said, “But Dumbledore never said we couldn’t give each other hints.”
“Alright,” Lily said, searching her mind for a question to ask. “What’s your favorite sport?” It was already out of her mouth by the time she realized how stupid it was.
“Quidditch of course, but football isn’t too bad either. Muggles go absolutely mad for it.” He saw the look of surprise on her face and shrugged. “What? Just because I’m a wizard doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate muggle sports. I didn’t grow up around a lot of other wizards. If I wanted friends I had to act the part of a muggle.”
Lily stared at him. She didn’t think she’d ever met another person quite like him before. “Anyway,” he said, changing the subject. “What’s your favorite color?”
“Green,” she said. “You?”
“Green? You aren’t in Slytherin, are you?”
Lily frowned for what must have been the first time that evening. “Not everyone in Slytherin is a blood purist. Some of them are actually quite nice.” She had always argued in favor of the Slytherins, even when so many seemed exactly like the stereotype.
“Alright, alright. I’m sorry,” he said, lifting his hands in surrender. Before that James thought the date had been going well. They hadn’t had one argument and he hadn’t thought of Lily once- until just then.
“Oh Merlin,” James said, a realization striking him as he looked at his date.
“What?” She asked, her emerald eyes flashing green.
He couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed before. He had been avoiding the topic of Lily so ferociously in his own head that he hadn’t stopped to consider that his date might actually- “Oh Merlin,” he said again.
The clock struck midnight just then and James reached up to take off his mask. His date did the same. When they brought them away from their faces, James sighed. “Lily,” he said, confirming what he had just realized.
“James?!”
Disclaimer: I own nothing. *sob*
Sirius smiled as he walked down to the Room of Requirement. Everything was perfect. Lily and James were together. Amelia was happy enough that she wasn’t cursing anybody. Alice and Frank were acting like an old married couple. Out loud he spoke, “Everything is perfect.” He spoke a moment too soon. Walking back and forth three times, a door appeared. Behind that door, he heard crying. Opening the door, he saw Anna. She was sitting on the floor, crying her eyes out. “Anna! What’s wrong?”
Slowly she shook her head. “N-nothing’s wrong.”
“I don’t believe you.” He said as though he was stating a fact, which of course he was. “There’s something wrong and I’m gonna sit here until you tell me what it is.”
“There’s nothing wrong.”
Sirius sighed and slowly shook his head. “Pity, you were always the one with no secrets.”
“Just leave me alone.” She said it with so much force that Sirius looked up at her with confusion on his face.
“Are you an imposter? Cause you sure aren’t acting like the Andromeda I know.”
“Would you just bloody leave me alone?! I’m tired of having to explain my every move to you! Why can’t you leave ME ALONE?! I HATE YOU!” Anna ran out of the Room of Requirement. She kept running until she reached Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom. “Get away from me! Why don’t you go jump in the lake?”
“You’ll turn out like the rest of them! I may be a ghost, but at least I never betrayed my friends.” Myrtle was screaming hysterically.
“I won’t.” Myrtle had left the bathroom. “I won’t betray them.” She took the knife out of her pocket and laid it lightly against her skin. Anna applied pressure until a small stream of blood was on her wrist. There was so much pain that she wanted to stop, but she couldn’t. More blood collected. It was the deepest cut yet, then the pressure stopped. Her grip relaxed. The blood flow stopped and Anna walked out of the bathroom.
~*~
Sirius sat dumb founded in the Room of Requirement. Anna had never cursed, especially not at him. When did life get so confusing, he asked himself. Walking towards the Gryffindor common room, he looked for James. “Prongs! You-hoo, Proooonngs! Where arrrrrre you?”
“Padfoot, what d’you want?”
Sirius grinned sheepishly at him. James was sitting on the sofa, his arms around Lily. “Have you two been snogging?”
James glared at him. “What do you want?”
“I had a question about a certain person who did a certain something. Sorry Lily, I need to talk to him privately.” James gave Lily a last kiss and followed Sirius. “It’s Anna. I found her crying in the Room of Requirement. When I asked her what was wrong, she said something about bloody leaving her alone. She’s never cursed at me before, Prongs. I’m worried about her. What do I do?”
James frowned. Sirius and Anna were closer than any two cousins he had ever seen before. They were both outcasts in their family and practically lived with each other over the summer. “Are you sure it wasn’t just a dream or something?”
“It’s not! I swear! It was real!” Sirius glared at James really hard. If looks could kill, James would have been 6 feet under.
“I know mate, I believe you.”
“You’d better. I wouldn’t make something up about Anna.” At that moment Anna tore through the common room. “Anna! I’m sorry! Please, Anna, give me a chance to explain!”
“Leave me alone, Black! Why can’t you understand stand that I hate you!” Anna was furious at him and Sirius knew it.
“Please, Anna, what did I do?”
“Get out of my life, Black!”
“No! Anna! What’s wrong? I’ll do anything- OWW!” Anna had slapped him across the face. Bringing his hands away, Lily gasped. There was a red handprint on his face. He looked around for Anna, but realized she had walked off after slapping him.
“Sirius, what’s wrong with Anna?” Lily was confused about her.
“Oh gee, I know everything about Anna- not! Didn’t you just see me ask her what was wrong?” Sirius was practically screaming at her.
“Hey! Don’t take it out on Lily! It’s not her fault you screwed things up with Anna! She’s just an innocent bystander! You leave her alone!”
“You have no right to tell me what to do, James Potter! I did not screw things up with Anna! She probably just wants to go back to her sisters!”
“I don’t care what’s going on with her! Just lay off my girlfriend!”
“SHUT UP! BOTH OF YOU!” Both boys stepped back and stared at Lily. “James, I can stick up for myself. Sirius, when I asked what was wrong with Anna, I meant why was she holding her arm?” Lily had calmed down a tad.
“I don’t know, maybe cause she slapped me so hard she hurt herself?” He glared at Lily.
James opened his mouth to say something, but Lily kicked him. “She was holding her arm before she slapped you. Were you to busy interfering with her life to notice?” Sirius opened his mouth, but Lily cut him off. “Yes, I mean interfering. She could have been crying over a guy or because of something that telling you would have been to embarrassing.”
Sirius turned very red in the face, but the handprint was still seeable. “I never thought of that.”
“I thought as much, but why would she be holding her- no.” Lily turned pale.
“What?” Sirius asked when she didn’t go on. “What’s the matter?”
“Oh, um nothing. Nothing’s the matter at all.” Lily went upstairs to her bedroom, leaving Sirius and James pondering what she had been talking about.
~*~
“I’m sorry Anna! Why won’t you forgive me? I won’t meddle in your life anymore. I promise!” Sirius was begging Anna to forgive him.
“Liar.”
“What did you call me?!”
“A liar. That’s what you are.”
“I’ll do anything you want! I’ll believe anything you say! I will! I promise!”
“That’s a lie! You wouldn’t believe me if I told you!” Anna was screaming at him at the top of her lungs. “That’s why I hate you! You always lie to me!”
“Anna, please, I’ll believe you. You know I will.”
“YOU WON’T!” She was sobbing and running out of the Great Hall. All eyes were on Sirius, wondering what he would do next.
“Mate…” He shook off James and followed Anna.
“ANNA!” She may have been quick, but Sirius had longer legs. “Come back!”
She had known it was time to cut, so she ran. With Sirius behind her, she couldn’t cut. She wouldn’t. Moaning Myrtle’s words came back to her. You’ll turn out like the rest of them! I may be a ghost, but I never betrayed my friends! “NO!” She curled up on the floor of the girls’ bathroom and pulled out her knife.
“Anna? What are you- NO!” Sirius grabbed for the knife, but she was faster. Her sleeve was down, but Sirius knew what he needed to. “Pull down you sleeve. NOW ANNA! This isn’t funny!”
She cowered in the corner. For the first time in her life, she was scared of Sirius. She spoke, but her voice came out small and tinny. “no.”
“NO? NO?! DON’T YOU SAY NO TO ME! YOU HAVE NO RIGHT, ABSOLUTELY NO RIGHT…” He trailed off. “How long?”
“Since the ball.” She hated his look of pity mixed with horror and disgust.
“You cut yourself because Bellatrix and Narcissa disowned you?” He looked at her with surprise. “I didn’t know you cared about them so much.”
“I don’t. I h-h-have to.” Tears were rolling down her face.
“Oh Anna, of course you don’t have to.” He held her head to his chest.
“But I do, the spell-“
“WHAT SPELL?”
Anna shrank back again. Here’s the scary Sirius again. “The one Bellatrix put on me. Lamontian or something.”
“Go to classes Anna. I’ve got some business.”
“But Siri, the classes don’t start for another twenty minutes.”
“I don’t care. Get there early. Do homework, extra credit, something! Just don’t be anywhere near the Great Hall.”
“Ok Siri.”
Sirius left the bathroom quickly and nearly ran to the Great Hall. “Padfoot? What’s the matter?”
“WHAT’S THE MATTER? WHAT’S THE MATTER? I’LL TELL YOU WHAT’S THE MATTER! THAT NO GOOD LITTLE BITCH IS WHAT’S THE MATTER!”
“Um, which little bitch?”
“BELLATRIX BLACK! YOU TELL ME THAT COUNTER CURSE THIS SECOND OR I WILL CURSE YOU SO BAD YOU’D WISH THAT YOU HAD STAYED CLEAR OF ANNA!”
“Manners, cousin. Didn’t Aunt Winnie ever teach you manners?” Bellatrix was calm, but she had paled a bit when Sirius had started yelling at her.
“YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO SPEAK TO ME UNLESS IT’S THE COUNTER CURSE!”
“Like I would ever tell you the counter curse.”
Sirius ran over to the Slytherin table and grabbed Bellatrix by the back of her shirt. “You tell me now, or I will kill you.” His voice was a low hiss, which scared her more than his yelling had.
“Fine. It’s the curse backwards.” Sirius hit her so hard that she blacked out.
“Mr. Black! 50 points from Gryffindor for hitting a girl. A week of detentions. Mr. Black!”
Sirius had run out of the room. He headed towards charms, Anna’s first class. “Anna! I got the counter curse!” He pointed his wand at her and spoke. “Naitnomal.”
Anna smiled up at him. “Thank you Siri. I love you.” Sirius smiled and leaned down and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
“Try to stay away from Bellatrix, would you? I don’t want her pulling another stunt like that.” Anna agreed and Sirius smiled at her as he went to his classes.
~*~
“Padfoot! What was that all about this morning? When Bellatrix came to, she was shaking so bad. I think you scarred her for life. It was great!” James was bubbling with excitement. “I can’t believe you hit her so hard she blacked out! I mean, you only hit her once!”
“I know, Prongs. You’ve only told me 23 times. She cursed Anna at the ball to make her cut herself. I got the counter curse, Anna’s cured. The whole ordeal is over. Now can we please go to lunch?”
“Jamsie-Poo! You cheated on me! How could you cheat on me?” Eloise Mindallin had come up to the three boys while they were eating lunch.
“Um, Prongs?” Remus questioned. “Is there a reason why Mindallin is crying on your shoulder?”
“Get away from me!” James pushed Eloise off his shoulder. “You’re disgusting!”
“You cheated on me!” She was wailing in his ear. “I don’t know how you can live with yourself!”
“Maybe I can live with myself because I broke up with you! I broke up with you before the ball. That’s why I didn’t ask you, cause we were broken up!” James was exasperated. This was the third day in a row that Eloise had come crying to him.
“If you meet me at the Room of Requirements at seven tonight, I’ll forgive you.” She gave him a would-be seductive smile that nearly made James throw up.
“Ugh. I think I’ll-” James began.
“Good, see you there. Bye Jamsie-Poo!” She swung her hips from side to side, making sure James could see her thong under her triple-x mini skirt.
“That is absolutely revolting! Every time I see her, I want to throw up. Why is she the only girl that has that power over me?” James began to bang his head on the table, but missed and hit his bowl of oatmeal.
“What girl has what power over you, James?” Lily sat down beside him.
“Eloise Mindallin. The power to make me barf every time I see her. Scougify.” His faced cleaned itself of oatmeal and he gave Lily a kiss. “She tried to make me go to the Room of Requirement with her again today.” He shuddered.
Lily frowned. “I would feel better if she stopped trying to throw herself at you. What if you accidentally meet her somewhere and she rapes you?”
Sirius let out his bark-like laugh. “That’s exactly what I said when he went to Hogsmeade with her!” He explained when Lily looked questioningly at him. “Great minds think alike!”
“Um, no. Great minds sometimes go crazy and think like insane minds.” Sirius glared at her and she started to laugh. “You three have a bad influence on me.”
“Hey!”
“Well maybe not you so much Remus, but you two definitely.”
“Thank you.” Remus grinned at Lily. He had been friends with her since first year when they sat with Severus on the train.
“Love you James.” Lily stood up to go.
“Hey! Where are you going?”
“To the library of course. Duh.” James stared at her with raised eyebrows. “For the NEWTs. I don’t wanna fail them.”
“Um, Lily, NEWTs are more than six months away.” He spoke slowly as though Lily didn’t know it was November.
“Ohmigod! It’s November! NEWTs are in almost half a year! I have so little time!” Lily sprinted to the Library.
“She’s right, you know. We don’t have that much time until NEWTs.” Remus was reading his potions book.
“We haven’t had a bad influence on her, she’s had a bad influence on us! Look what she did to poor Moony here. Reading his textbook during lunch. It’s so sad.” Sirius looked as though he was about to go reprimand Lily for the effect she was having on them.
“Uh, Padfoot? Moony has always read his textbook during lunch. He’s weird like that.”
“Shush. I was trying to make an excuse for it. Reading at the table looks bad for the Marauders. If we blame it on Lily, then nobody really cares.” James just shook his head. “Glad you agree with me. Now let’s do something crazy, some prank on the Slytherins or something.
“Not Snivellus, we owe Malfoy.”
“What’d he do to us? I can’t remember.”
“Well, first he was born, then he came to Hogwarts, then he annoyed me, then, um, he didn’t kill himself.”
“Perfect, we owe him big time!” Sirius and James went on to discuss what they should do to Lucius Malfoy.
Dinner came and went, Remus stared at his two friends. “Didn’t you do some prank on Malfoy?”
“Just wait. This may just be our best prank yet.” Remus raised his eyebrows, but didn’t say anything. He knew better than to ask what the prank was.
The next morning, everyone went down to breakfast. Lucius Malfoy was a little bit late, so everybody was in the Great Hall by the time he got down. He was wearing a hot pink miniskirt, a tube top, and stilettos. His hair was probably the most noticeable. It had grown about a foot longer and had pink highlights. Bangs were brushed to the side and he shook out his hair. “Hey y’all. What’s up?” As he spoke, everyone burst out laughing. Even his friends were laughing at his clothes, hair, and voice. “I asked y’all what was up?”
Apparently the fun was not over yet. Malfoy walked up to the teachers’ table. “Oh Minnie, how do I love thee, let me count the ways! You were named for the goddess of wisdom and you are so wise! Will you marry me, Minnie?” As soon as he spoke, Malfoy fainted on the ground. Slowly, his tube top, miniskirt, and stilettos vanished. He was lying on the floor in his boxers!
Many of the girls and guys looked away, but many of the Slytherin girls kept watching him for the five seconds he was out. “AHHH! WHAT HAPPENED?!” Malfoy ran out of the room, and Sirius and James were lying on the floor howling with laughter.
“That…W-was…The b-b-best prank…ever!” Sirius exclaimed through laughs. “I can’t believe he proposed to Minnie!”
“Isn’t that what you charmed him to do?” Remus was always the intelligent one.
“Well, technically yes.” Remus opened his mouth. “We charmed him to propose to his favorite teacher, I thought it was gonna be Slughorn. It was even better that it was Minnie though.”
“I still wished he had proposed to Slughorn. That was the part I was looking forward to the most.” James had a mock sadness look on his face.
“Oh cheer up Prongsie! We’ll do it again another time. Then we’ll get to see him propose to Slughorn.” The two boys started laughing again.
“Mr. Black, Mr. Potter, and Mr. Lupin, Please come to my office so I can speak with you.” McGonagall had stood up and was sending the Marauders to her office, most likely for detention or something worse.
“But Professor, I didn’t do it! I swear! It was the two of them! I had absolutely nothing to do with this!”
McGonagall surveyed the boys. “Is this true?”
“Yup, never said a truer word in my life!”
“Sadly, I don’t doubt that at all Mr. Black.” McGonagall sighed and ushered the two boys into her office.
A/N: Wow. This is a really long chapter. Almost 12 pages. ☺ Please R&R, people. Does it really take to much time to leave a review? And I know this story is not the best story. It’s not even good, but I’m only in 8th grade so give me a break. I have about 10 more chapters left! That’s more than I ever thought I would get!
Disclaimer: I'm not JKR. I got over that fact a long time ago.
“Two weeks of detention? How can she give us two weeks of detention?” James was furious. “The first game of Quidditch is in one week! I won’t have enough time to practice!”
“You mean enslave people on the Quidditch pitch.” Sirius muttered under his breath. He was all too familiar with James being the Quidditch captain.
“What was that, Padfoot? Didn’t quite hear you.” James was glaring at Sirius so he quickly mumbled nothing and walked off. “She bloody gave me two weeks of detention!”
“We heard, Prongs. Personally, I think McGonagall let you off rather easy. I mean, let’s face it. You put Lucius Malfoy in a tube top, miniskirt, and stilettos. Then you made him propose to McGonagall. What do you think she’s gonna do, laugh?” Remus grinned at James, but he was to busy thinking about the prank to notice.
“Well it might have helped.”
“I was kidding.” Remus was too exasperated with James to even bother talking to him anymore. “Whatever, I have a date with Lily.”
James eyes’ bugged out. “LILY! As in MY Lily?”
“No, well yeah, but it’s different- Not like you mean- Studying- Not a date- NEWTs is soon- Quizzing each other-” Remus couldn’t even form coherent sentences.
“It’s alright. I was making a joke. Wanted to see how much you would believe me.” James grinned. “Apparently a lot. Who will listen to me complain about McGonagall?”
“I don’t think anybody would want to listen to you complain. Why don’t you go find ___”
“I really hate you sometimes. Why doesn’t anybody want to listen to me rant about Quidditch and McGonagall and detention and-” James was cut off, rudely in his opinion, by Remus.
“-And I really don’t care. Go find what’s-her-face Amelia.”
“You mean the one that’s dating Padfoot’s brother? Ok.” James trotted off to complain to Lia. Remus snickered and left to find Lily.
“Person-who’s-dating-Padfoot’s-brother! Wait up!” James saw Lia walking down the hall. He grabbed her arm and pulled her onto a moving staircase.
“I have a name, Potter. Call me Lia, or I will hurt you so bad you’d wish you’d never been born.” Her growl was so scary that James backed off.
“Ok, fine, LIA, don’t you think it’s so unfair that McGonagall gave me two weeks of detention right before the first Quidditch game? I mean, I never did anything wrong, but no, she must belong to the We Hate James Potter Club.”
“She gave you two weeks of detention?! What the Hell?” Lia was incredulous. “That’s so unfair!”
“I know, two whole weeks, it’s a horror that no one should have to live through. And does she want to lose the first game? She knows you guys can’t do anything without me.” James was talking and talking and talking, on and on and on.
“She was way too light on you Potter! If it had been anyone else but you, she would have given a month! That is sooo unfair. I could take this to Dumbledore, and sue Hogwarts, and McG sacked, and completely ruin the balance of the system.” She looked up for the first time since she began her rant. “Isn’t it great?”
“Wha- hunh? Sorry, I kind of zoned out for a minute there.” James had sheepish grin on his face.
“Whatever Potter. I really don’t care. All I want to do is meet Reg. now can you please leave me alone? Yeah, you can’t come to Quidditch practices, I don’t care! I’m second in command. That means I’m captain if you’re not there. Good-bye Potter.”
James stood open-mouthed as Lia left him on the moving staircase. “Why is everybody busy?” A portrait saw what his problem was and smirked. “Oh shut up!”
“I never said anything. Nothing at all.” This earned the portrait another glare from James.
“Anna!” He saw Anna walking swiftly down the hallway. “You wanna hang out with me some?”
“Sorry Jamie, I’m meeting Ted in the Room of Requirement in about two minutes. I’ll talk later if I’m not doing homework.” She ran down the hallway.
James sighed and kept walking. Looking outside, he saw Snivellus under a tree. “Perfect.” He quickly turned around and ran outside. “Snivellus! How are you, old chap? Life been treating you good? Levicorpus!” Severus flew into the air and was dangling by his ankle.
“Put me down, Potter!” Severus was struggling to reach for his wand, but James saw what he was doing.
“Expelliarmus!” Severus’ wand flew straight to James. “Not so quick with the reflexes, are we Snivelly?”
“What’s the matter, Potter? Can’t bully someone unless they don’t have their wand? You disgust me Potter. I don’t know what Lily sees in you.”
Lily and Remus were pouring over books in the library. Remus happened to look out the window when he saw James and Severus going at it. “Crap!”
“What is it? Did something happen?” Remus didn’t say anything, just directed Lily’s gaze out the window. “I told James that I would break up with him if he ever bullied Sev again! Apparently he doesn’t care enough about me to do this one little thing.” Lily sighed. “You can stay here. I have to go do something about this.”
“You go. He’s my friend and although he’s doing something wrong, I can’t just take sides against him. I owe Prongs that much.” Remus sighed. When had life gotten that difficult?
Lily walked out of the library and into the bright sun. “James Potter! You put him down this instant!” James turned around to see her. “He hasn’t done anything to you!”
“Aww, come on Lily! He hasn’t done anything good to me either. Plus he was just begging for it.” James added the little detail in hopes that Lily would be more inclined to forgive him.
“Last time I checked, Potter, reading a book under a tree is not ‘begging for it’.” Severus sneered at James.
“Lily, you have to believe me.” James said it as though he knew she would believe him. “You love me, not him.”
“You disgust me, Potter. “She spat out his name like it was a bad word. “You come out here and pick on people for no reason at all. I wouldn’t be surprised if you started bullying first years.” Lily glared at him for a moment. “Come on Sev. Let’s talk.” Shooting one last look at James, she freed Severus from the spell, letting him down slow. As soon as he was down, he followed her up to the castle.
James hadn’t moved a muscle since Lily had yelled at him. He was in shock. Lily hadn’t broken up with him, but she as good had. “Why must I face all the hardships in life?” A little third year raised her eyebrows at James. He glared at her and stalked back into the castle. He saw Remus in the library. “Remus! Why the hell did Lily break up with me?”
“She broke up with you? It looked ugly, but I couldn’t hear a word. She walked back up to the castle with Snape.” Remus frowned at James. “She did tell you she was going to break up with you if you bullied him again.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t know she was serious. She and him had some big fight right?” Remus nodded at him, unsure of what was going to happen next. “Then shouldn’t she be glad that I turned him upside down?”
“That’s not the way Lily thinks. In her opinion, you started bullying a defenseless person for no reason at all.”
“Well that’s dumb! I was defending her honor, so she breaks up with me.” Remus rolled his eyes. “What?”
“Nothing, nothing at all.”
James eyed Remus. “Fine. Do you know where Lily went?”
Shaking his head, Remus said, “No. We were studying until you so rudely interrupted.” James glared at him and turned to leave. “Wait. If you want Lily to forgive you, try apologizing. Don’t say that you were just having fun or whatever, just apologize.”
James nodded curtly and left the library. Walking randomly, he saw Alice. “Hey! Person-who’s-friends-with-Lily! Do you know where Lily went?”
Alice turned and glared at him. “I heard about what you did to her, Potter. You will leave Lily alone.” James stared at her open mouthed. “I mean it Potter. If you get within four feet of her, your life will be a misery…” Alice trailed off and spun around.
James stared after her. All he had done was turn Snivellus upside down. What was the harm in that? He sighed, and wandered up to the owlery, giving up on finding Lily. His angers about detention and Quidditch were forgotten. He was concerned with getting Lily back.
He watched his owl fly in through the window, carrying a letter on its leg. “Hey boy. Come on.” The owl flew down to James and stretched out its leg. Carefully untying the letter, James let the owl fly back up to the lofts. He opened the letter and smiled. It was from his Mum.
James,
You were supposed to be owling me at least once a month. Instead, I have to hear from Sirius that you were dating Lily Evans. Invite her to come over to our house for winter break. I’ll see you in a few weeks.
Love, Mummy
James sighed. Now he was gonna have to tell his Mum that Lily had broken up with him. Then his Mum would ask why, and he would have to tell her because he turned Snape upside down. Then his Mum would scold him and blame him for Lily breaking up with him, just like everybody else.
Walking downstairs, he wandered into the Heads’ rooms. “I’m really sorry, Sev. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“It was my fault. I shouldn’t have kissed you in the first place.” James stiffened. That was Snivellus and Lily.
“Come on Sev! You’re my best friend. I didn’t wanna lose you.” Lily seemed extremely happy.
“I know. I don’t wanna lose you either, but I’ve got something to show you.” There was rustling of clothing as James tried to think of what Snivellus would show Lily.
“Oh my god!” Lily was loud, but not happy. “Why Sev? Why did you have to?”
“I don’t know. It was one decision, then all of a sudden I realize what I was doing and it was too late to back out. I’m sorry Lily, really sorry.” There was the sound of Lily softly crying.
“Are you gonna be ok?”
“I get this-this- thing and all you can worry about is if I’ll be ok? What about all the people he’ll make me kill?”
“I want you safe, Sev. I know he’ll make you kill people, but I want you safe. Go see Dumbledore. Tell him everything you told me and anything you know. He’ll help you get out of it, I know he will.”
“Thanks for not hating me Lily. You’re the best friend a guy could ask for.”
James turned around and left. He had heard more than enough. Lily cared more about Snivellus than she did him. Best friends. He had known they were friends, but best friends?
“Prongs!” James ignored him. “Prongs!” James kept ignoring him. He’ll go away if I do, he thought to himself. “PRONGS! Are you going bloody deaf? Didn’t you here me calling for you? Anyway, I heard what happened with Lily. It wasn’t your fault.”
James lit up. “Really? Everybody’s been telling me that it’s completely my fault. You don’t think it is?”
“Course not. She’ll come crying back to you eventually. Trust me.” Sirius grinned at him. “Dinner. Let’s go. I’m so starved.” At James’ questioning look he explained. “Amelia is worse than you are as captain. She completely killed us out there. Three hours straight.”
James laughed and the two boys went down to dinner. Thank god Sirius is oblivious, James thought. Remus would have seen through that fake laugh in a second.
~*~
“And welcome to the first Quidditch game of the season! We have Slytherin, verses Gryffindor!” The crowd cheered. Gryffindor colors took up most of the stands.
“Now I want a nice clean game.” Madame Hooch looked at the two captains. “Shake hands.”
James cringed and reached over to shake Lucius Malfoy’s hand. Madame Hooch blew her whistle, and they were off. The game was very fast paced, even more so than most games. “And quaffle is possessed by- no- no- Gryffindor scores!” The crowd erupted. The tiny first year that was commentating couldn’t keep up with the game, so she settled for screaming out when anyone scored.
“James POTTER! GET YOUR BLOODY HEAD IN THE GAME AND STOP GLARING AT MALFOY!” The tiny first year began to scream at James.
“Miss Tonks, now really. Do you want me to take the commentating job from you?” McGonagall was reprimanding Tonks who had begun to scream at James.
“Sorry, Professor.” Tonks looked sheepish as she apologized to her Head of House. “AND LIA HAS THE QUAFFLE! SHE PASSES- NO THAT’S A FEINT! TAKE THAT YOU GREASY, DIMWITTED,-”
“Miss Tonks!”
“Sorry.” Lia had feinted, and then flown to score. “SHE SCORES! GRYFFINDOR 130, SLYTHERIN 10!” Gryffindor was squishing Slytherin. If only James could get the snitch.
“AND JAMES GOES INTO A DIVE!” James dove, with Lucius Malfoy on his heels. “IS HE GONNA GET THE SNITCH? COME ON JAMES! I’LL NEVER TALK TO YOU AGAIN IF YOU DON’T GET IT!” James reached out his arm, and just as he was about to hit the ground, he pulled out of the dive. Lucius Malfoy was not so lucky, as he hit the ground with full force. “HAHA! TAKE THAT YOU STUPID-”
“Miss Tonks! That was the last straw-” But even McGonagall started yelling at Lucius Malfoy when he pulled out his wand. “This is ludicrous! Magic is not to be used in Quidditch. 50 points from Slytherin for bad conduct!”
James dodged the curse that Malfoy sent and raced to the other side of the stadium as soon as he could. He stretched out his hand and closed his fingers around something gold. He flew around the pitch one last time in victory. He didn’t notice when Malfoy pointed his wand at him and muttered a curse.
James felt a force hit him, and he was pushed off of his broom. Looking down, he realized he had flown up higher than he had meant to. Then everything went black.
~*~
“How far did he fall?” James hadn’t opened his eyes, but heard a girl’s voice.
“About 50 feet. Dumbledore was so mad.” He couldn’t place the boy that said that. It was familiar, but he just couldn’t remember.
“You think? Malfoy cursed him during Quidditch. What’s Dumbledore gonna do, reward 10 points to Slytherin?”
Suddenly everything came back to him. “Did we win? How far ahead were we?” James was frantic to know about the game.
“Yes, you won. You won by over 200 points. Aren’t you gonna ask about your fall?” Lia smirked at him.
“Well, the game was a bit more important. So what happened? I find it hard to believe that I just fell off my broom.”
“You dove, it was a fake, Malfoy followed, he hit the ground, pulled out his wand, McGonagall took 50 points off Slytherin, you caught the snitch, Malfoy cursed you, you fell off your broom, hit the ground, Lily petrified Malfoy, uh, I think that’s it.” Lia looked at Sirius.
He nodded. “I believe you covered everything.”
“How high was I?”
“About 50 feet. You could have died if Regulus hadn’t put that padding on the ground.” Sirius looked up in horror. He hadn’t heard that part of the story yet. “Yes Sirius, your brother saved your best friend. He’s not as evil as you think he is.”
“My ‘brother’ as you call him, only cares about two things, Voldemort and his family.” Sirius glared at her. Her eyes welled up with tears. “No, Amelia, I didn’t mean-”
“Of course you didn’t, Black. Just leave me and Regulus alone, would you? He never did anything to you, but you hate him anyway.” Her voice lowered to a hiss. “You’re just as bad as the rest of your family. Regulus is the good one.” With that said, she glared at Sirius and left.
“I’m not, am I?” He looked to James for help. “Am I?”
James sighed. “You have to admit, Regulus hasn’t done anything to you, but you hate him anyway. You’re not as bad as they are, but you’re still pretty bad.”
“I’m gonna go find Anna. She seemed pretty crushed after you fell. She almost dropped off her broom.” Sirius turned and left, without waiting for a goodbye from James.
A/N: My second longest chapter! Again, thank you to the lovely BarbaraPotty! This chapter is dedicated to her! Thank you BarbaraPotty! R&R!
Disclaimer: If you haven’t gotten it by now, I OWN ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!
“Wow.”
“I know.” Lia and Lily were standing in front of the House points. Slytherin had fallen behind after the Quidditch game. Lucius Malfoy was the first person in Hogwarts history to single handedly lose over a hundred points in the same day. Slytherin was now at 237 points. “The so called Prince of Slytherin screwed their chances for the House Cup.”
“Lily!” The two girls turned around, but quickly turned back when they saw it was James. “Come on Lily, please talk to me.”
“Leave her alone, Potter. I believe Alice already told you that you would be hexed if you got within four feet of our dear little Lils again.” James, apparently not understanding that she would really hex him, kept walking. Suddenly there was a beeping noise.
“What?!”
“I told you not to get within four feet of her, Potter. Now you’ll have to face the consequences.” Lia smirked as boils began popping up on his body.
“What was that for?!” James was yelping as boils kept popping up. “You do know that it is against school rules to hurt other students.”
“And you do know that it is against my rules for you to get within four feet of Lily. Leave. I don’t wanna see your face for at least two hours.” James opened his mouth to argue. “LEAVE!”
“I was just gonna ask Lily if she wanted to come to my house with me over break.” Lia raised her eyebrows. “Not as my girlfriend, just as a friend. Please Lily?”
She shook her head. “Sorry James. Maybe another time, but not for a while.” Her voice was soft. He saw tears well up in her eyes.
“I did tell you I was sorry, right?” He looked at her questioningly.
“You’ve done enough damage for now. Leave.” Lia pointed towards the door, and James walked out. “You ok?” Lily nodded, blinking back her tears. Lia casually lead her out of the room, thinking of the many ways to kill James Potter.
~*~
“Peter, I told you. Don’t add the beetle juice until after the grabble guts.” Lily was tutoring Peter in remedial potions. Peter had no idea why he was in NEWT potions, but he was.
“I didn’t! I swear I didn’t!” Peter was sweating. He had added the beetle juice first.
Lily sighed and kept on working with him. “Listen Peter, you’re gonna have to learn these potions or you’re not gonna get a NEWT in potions.” Peter paled and worked harder. He had wanted to be an Auror all his life and you needed a NEWT level degree in potions. “PETER! NO!!”
Peter had accidentally dropped the grabble tails in the potion. There was an explosion and Lily was knocked down. She hit her head on the stone wall, and blacked out. Peter immediately grabbed her and carried her up the stairs. “Professor Slughorn! Lily got knocked out!”
Professor Slughorn ran out of his office. “Oh, what did you do now, Mr. Pettigrew?” He rubbed his hands and shivered. “Will Lily be alright?”
“I don’t know sir. She hit her head on the stone wall. I-I think I added the wrong ingredient in my potion.” Peter cringed as Slughorn turned on him.
“IT’S YOUR FAULT LILY’S LIKE THIS?” He roared at Peter who cringed away.
Horace, I’m sure you are not playing favorites.” Dumbledore gave Slughorn a light look. “Mr. Pettigrew, I think you’re done here. Let us take Miss Evans up to the Hospital Wing. Shall we?” Peter nodded and hurried up the steps. Slughorn sent one last glare at him before retreating to his office.
“I’m really sorry, Professor. I didn’t know the potion would blow up like that. I didn’t mean to, really. And I don’t know why Lily got hurt and not me. I’m so sorry, Professor. Please don’t expel me!” Peter was nervous. He didn’t want to be expelled from Hogwarts. He’d never be able to be an Auror.
“Quiet, Mr. Pettigrew. This is a Hospital Wing.” Peter looked up. He hadn’t even noticed that they had gotten there. “And I will not be considering expulsion.” Peter sank almost to the floor with relief. “I was merely hoping that you would apologize to Miss Evans when she wakes up.”
Peter nodded his head. “Yessir! Thank you sir. I will be apologizing most profusely to Lily, sir.” Dumbledore smiled at Peter.
“That is all I ask Mr. Pettigrew.”
Madame Pomfrey bustled around in the drawers next to the window. “Now where is it?” She pulled her wand out of the drawer and smiled. “Ah! There it is.” Walking over to Lily, she waved her wand. “Evanesco.”
Immediately, Lily opened her eyes. “Wha-what happened? Where am I?” She looked around in fear. “I wanna go home! I wanna see Pet!” She burst into tears.
Madame Pomfrey performed another spell and Lily fell asleep. “Would you go get Alice, Lia, and James, Peter? It would help a lot.” The boy nodded and ran up to the Gryffindor common room.
“James! Alice!” The two came down from their rooms, quickly followed by Lia. “Lily’s in the hospital wing and she can’t remember anything after the age of 10. Madame Pomfrey wanted me to get you.” James tore off, out of the common room.
“What’s his deal? Lily’s not gonna go anywhere. Come on, let’s go see her.” The three trooped out of the common room and down to the Hospital Wing. They his voice before they saw him.
“What d’you mean she doesn’t wanna see me?! She has to!” The girls snickered.
“I mean that the second she saw you, she started screaming hysterically. James, she doesn’t want to see you. Leave!” Madame Pomfrey sounded angry. James opened his mouth to argue more. “LEAVE!” He muttered some profanities under his breath and left. “Alice, Lia come in. Lily is over in the corner. Try not to scare her very much.”
Alice and Lia nodded, then walked over to Lily. “Lily? You ok?” Lily shrank away from them and nodded. “I’m Lia.”
“Ow!” The girls stared at Lily in horror, they thought they had hurt her. “What? I’m seventeen and magical and I have friends and Pet hates me!” Lily was saddened by the last part, but grinned at the rest of it. “And Potter came in.”
“You sent him away.” Alice grinned at her. “Smart even when you don’t remember past age ten.”
“So I guess we have to go now? Since you’re all better.” Lily looked a little sad at the thought of her friends leaving.
“Sorry, Lily.” Madame Pomfrey walked over. “You need rest and your friends need to leave.”
Lily rolled her eyes behind Madame Pomfrey’s back. “Ok, bye Alice, Lia. Bye Peter.” The two girls turned around. They had completely forgotten about Peter.
“Uh, Lily?” He sounded nervous. “I’m really sorry. You know, about the whole potion mess and all. I didn’t mean to put the grabble tails in the potion. Well I did, but I didn’t know they would explode and hurt you and all that.” He looked down and began biting his lip.
“It’s ok, Peter.” Lily smiled at him. “I know it was an accident. You wouldn’t have hurt me on purpose.” Now get, all of you. Madame Pomfrey wouldn’t be too happy to find you still in here.”
Peter, Lia, and Alice walked out of the Hospital Wing. “Bye Peter. We had homework to do, so I guess we’ll see you at dinner?” Alice posed it as a question, though Peter knew it was a statement.
“Yeah, see you at dinner.” Peter walked off down the corridor. He knew he didn’t have very many friends. He had always had the Marauders, but now they just used him as a joke. He was entertainment to them. The only reason he was with them was because Snivellus had gotten cursed in first year and they thought Peter had done it. “Stupid Marauders.”
“Did Peter Pettigrew just curse the Marauders? Let me go check to see if hell has frozen over.”
“Shuddup Malfoy.” Peter glared at Lucius Malfoy as he walked up.
“Still angry that the Dark Lord made you hurt poor little mudblood? You shouldn’t be. He says that next time he may have one for you to kill. I hope he provides me one too.” Lucius Malfoy smirked as Peter began to pale. “And don’t forget your orders to make up with your little Marauder friends. The Dark Lord would be most angry if you do not follow his orders.”
“Quit following me around Malfoy!” Peter began shaking. He knew that Lucius was much more skilled with a wand than he was.
“You know, I don’t think I will.” He twirled his wand and advanced on Peter. “I think I may have a little fun with you. Tantallegra!”
“Protego!” Peter was instantly shielded from the dancing curse. “Leave him alone, Malfoy. I think you’ve done enough here.” Malfoy sent a last glare at Peter, then left. “You ok, Wormtail buddy?”
“Yeah, thanks.” Peter was wondering how much of the conversation James had heard.
“So why was he talking to you? Were you just some innocent victim for you to bully? That’s the way he operates.”
“Yeah. It was just random.” Peter breathed a sigh of relief. So James hadn’t heard anything. That was good. And now he could become friends with them again, though maybe not Sirius.
~*~ Breakfast
“Lily! My Mum owled and she wanted to know if you could come visit!” James was exactly four feet and one inch away from Lily.
“She is no longer your girlfriend, Potter. That means she does not act like your girlfriend.” Lia was pissed at James for opening Lily’s wounds that had just begun to heal.
“Not as my girlfriend, just as a friend. Please Lily?” James was really desperate. It was the last breakfast at Hogwarts and James had really wanted Lily to come to his house. “Just give me a call. I’ll do anything, really.”
“Sorry James. It’s too soon. Maybe another time.” Lily looked at him through her hair. She had let it fall over her face.
James stood their a moment too long, watching Lily. “Move along Potter! She isn’t a zoo animal.” James took one last look at Lily before sitting down. “He won’t bother you again, Lily. I promise.”
“Wha-What if I want him to?” Lily’s voice was soft, so soft that Lia had to strain to hear it.
“Do you?” Lia looked at her questioningly.
“I don’t know. This is all so confusing. I don’t know anything anymore.”
A/N: I would to thank phoenixfire46 for reviewing and giving me ideas. This chapter is dedicated to her. Thank you phoenixfire46! Now the rest of you all need to review! I have a ton of reads on this story, but not very many reviews. It would make my day if you reviewed. I’ll love you forever and always if you do!
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Blah, blah, blah…
“Lily! Get over here!” Lily turned toward Alice’s shout.
“What?” Lily had to scream back, there was so much noise on Platform 9 and 3 quarters. She was immediately engulfed in a hug.
“Can’t a girl say good bye to her best friend?” Lily laughed and gave Alice a questioning look. Alice, interpreting the look correctly answered, “Lia’s off saying bye to her boyfriend. They have to hide from his parents. They don’t want their precious son affiliating himself with muggleborns.”
“Well, this is good-bye, I guess. See you after break.” Lily gave a smile to Alice before turning towards the corner. She was going to apparate home.
“Lily! Wait!” James ran up behind her. “I know you hate me for the Sniv- Snape thing.” He corrected himself before Lily got angry. “But I was really hoping you could visit sometime over break. You hate me, but just in case.” He handed her a slip of paper. “My address.” He explained, then ran off.
Lily smiled and stuffed the paper in her pocket before apparating home. “LILY!” She heard a scream and something catapulted into her.
“Abby. Hi. How are you?” Lily grinned at her littlest sister. “Anything important happening around here?”
“Tuna’s getting married, but she says I can’t come to the wedding. I want to come.” Abby’s face screwed up like she was going to cry. “Tuna’s being mean.”
“It’s ok Abby. If Pet doesn’t want you at her wedding, I won’t go either. Ok?” Abby sniffled and nodded.
“Lily! Darling, how are you?” Lily smiled and gave her mother a hug.
“I’m fine Mum, how’re you?”
“We’re absolutely wonderful, Darling. Have you seen Sarah yet? She has some exciting news.” Lily shook her head. “No? Well go upstairs. Everyone else is up there.”
Lily grabbed Abby’s hand and pulled her up the steps. “Sarah?”
“Lily! You’re home!” Her fourteen-year-old sister jumped up from the bed. “Guess what?”
“What?”
“The football (A/N: Soccer.) team that I tried out for accepted me! They said I might even be a starter!” Sarah jumped up and down on the bed.
“That’s great! How’re the rest of you?” Lily looked around and the siblings caught up with what they had all been doing. “Has Abby shown any magical signs?”
Isaac nodded. “Didn’t she tell you how Tuna hates her now?”
“No. And do you have to call her that? You never did before.”
“Well that was when she was only being mean to you. You were 11. Abby’s only ten.” He sighed. “It’s not right for her to be so mean.”
“That’s horrible! I can’t believe she’s so mean to little Abby.” Abby smiled at Lily, knowing she would defend her. Suddenly there was a scream from downstairs.
“Lily?” Sarah looked up. “What’s happening?” She had a terrified look on her face.
“I don’t know, but I think it may be…” Lily trailed off before she said his name. There was a thump on the floor.
“Avada Kedavera.” A second thump.
Lily opened her trunk and pulled out her broom and her wand. “Three of you get on the broom. The rest of you jump out the window and run. It’s your only hope.” Lily gave her orders quickly and quietly.
“What about you?” Isaac posed his question before Lily sent him a glare.
“I’ll hold him off the best I can. You just leave!” She screamed the last part as there were footsteps running up the steps. “GET OUT!” Lily shrieked as the door flew open.
“Not trying to escape, are we?” The cold voice filled the room. Abby burst into tears and hid on the other side of the bed.
“Stay away from my family.” Lily’s voice was quiet and deadly.
“You know what? I don’t think I will.” Voldemort laughed. And sent a jet of purple light at Sarah. She let out a piercing scream as her body flew at the walls.
“I said stay away from my family! Take me! Kill me! But don’t hurt them!” Lily screamed at Voldemort, trying to get his attention.
“Why should I listen to a seventeen year old who isn’t even out of Hogwarts?” He smirked at her. “I am so much more powerful than you could ever hope to be.”
“Lily!” She heard her Christopher’s scream, and turned around quick enough to see him hit by a green light. Turning forward, she saw the life leave Sarah’s eyes.
“Save Abby…” Sarah closed her eyes and died.
“NO!” Lily began to sob, before thinking about Sarah’s last words. Save Abby… The only thing left to do, save as many people as possible.
“Reducto.” Voldemort stayed calm as a wall exploded, killing Josh and Isaac. Laughing, he sent another curse. “Crucio!”
A piercing scream filled the air. “ABBY! YOU LEAVE HER ALONE, BASTARD!” Lily sent curse after curse at Voldemort. Though she couldn’t stop him, it was enough to take his mind off Abby.
“Avada-”
“STUPEFY!”
The curse hit him right in the chest, but he finished his own curse.
“-Kedavera” Lily watched as Sally fell to the floor, dead. Her curse on Voldemort was too weak, and Voldemort was too strong. It only knocked him to the ground. “Bitch!”
Lily ran before Voldemort could get up to follow. She grabbed Abby and jumped out of her window onto her waiting broom. Lily didn’t even look back at her burning house as she tried to calm Abby down. “It’s ok, it’s all gonna be ok.” Lily tried to force a smile to make Abby believe her, but she knew it would be close to impossible.
“Where’s Mummy and Daddy? I want Mummy and Daddy!” Abby began to howl into Lily’s shirt.
“Mummy and Daddy had to leave, ok? They’re off on a vacation somewhere.” Lily held Abby close and patted her on the back.
“When are they comin’ back?” Abby had stopped howling by now, though she still held Lily’s shirt in her hands.
“They’re not coming back. They aren’t ever coming back.” Lily’s voice was filled with grief even though she tried to hide it. “You’ll-you’ll be stayin with me for a while.”
Abby nodded and smiled for a moment, then she frowned. “Who’ll take care of me?”
Lily sighed. Her mum and dad were dead, and all Abby could think about was who would take care of her. “I will.” Lily knew she should keep talking, but she was too full of grief to even try.
Where to go? She didn’t know where Lia lived, and Alice was staying with Frank over the holidays. She stuffed one of her hands in her pocket to warm it up a little and felt the paper James had given her. “Of course. We’ll go to James’ house.”
She landed on the road and pulled out her wand. Almost instantly the Knight Bus appeared. “Bit late fer a trip, innit?” Lily looked up at Ernie’s face.
“We were given no choice. Will you take us or not?” Lily kept up her cold attitude, too tired for anything else. They had flown for hours before she had thought of something to do.
“O’ course. Where’ll it be?”
Lily read the paper James had given her. “Godric’s Hollow.” She walked on the bus and sat down. Abby automatically sat on her lap and started sucking her thumb.
After what felt like hours, but was only a couple of minutes, Lily felt the Knight Bus creep to a stop. “Godric’s Hollow.”
“Thank you, Ernie.” Lily stood up and picked up Abby. She walked off the bus and stopped to stare at the giant house. It had to be the biggest house she had ever seen in her life. She walked up and rang the doorbell. Looking at her watch, Lily realized it was two in the morning.
“Lily?”
Lily looked up and saw James standing in the doorway. “James, I’m sorry but-”
He cut her off. “Come in. What’re you doing here at two in the morning?” James yawned as he said it.
“I’m really sorry for waking you up, but I didn’t have anywhere else to go. He attacked my house.” She said the last part quietly, as though she didn’t want him to hear.
James seemed to instantly wake up as she said it. “I’ll get my parents. You stay here with her.” He gestured towards Abby and ran up the steps. “Mum! Dad! Attack!”
Two people ran back down the steps. They saw Lily and stopped. “You are?”
“Lily Evans. You-Know-Who attacked my house in Chesterfield.” Mr. and Mrs. Potter disapparated instantly. “James?”
“St. Mungos now. Did she sustain any injuries?” James picked up Abby out of Lily’s arms as they went to Floo to the wizarding hospital.
“Crucio, but only for a couple seconds.” James gave her the Floo powder and both teens flooed to St. Mungos.
The kind healer took Abby into a small room. “The two of you can wait here. I don’t want anyone in the room with her at the same time.”
James and Lily sat in two chairs outside the door. “So who is she? And what happened? You never said except that there was an attack.”
Lily sighed. She had known that James would ask. “He attacked and- and” Lily stopped and started crying. H-h-he k-killed them a-all. It’s j-just me and A-Abby.” She began sobbing into James’ chest.
“Sshh. Calm down. Abby’s gonna come out in a minute and you don’t want her to see you all hysterical, do you?” Lily shook her head and wiped her eyes. “Then you need to calm down.” James wasn’t telling her it was going to be ok which Lily liked, because it definitely wasn’t going to be ok. “Do you want to finish?”
Lily nodded and went on. “A-after he k-killed them, I t-tried to s-stun him. It only kn-knocked him over and I g-grabbed Abby and j-jumped out the window.” Lily started crying again. “W-w-we flew f-for a long t-t-time and then I c-called the Knight B-bus.”
James held Lily close and patted her on the back. “Excuse me.” The kind Healer was back. “Abby’s fine. She fell asleep as I was healing her cuts and bruises.”
Lily wiped her eyes and reached out to take her. James was closer though, and Abby got handed to him. “You’re asleep on your feet. I refuse to let you take her.” Lily sighed and grudgingly agreed. “Come on.”
They walked down to the fireplace and flooed back to Godric’s Hollow. James and Lily walked up the steps and James led them to a guest bedroom. “Abby can stay in here.”
The room was spacious with everything Abby would need. After he laid her in the bed, Lily tucked her in. “Good night.”
“G’night Mummy.” Abby rolled over and Lily felt tears in her eyes.
James dragged Lily out before she really started crying. “Sh-she called me Mummy. What if she’s forgotten Mum and Dad and Isaac and- and” Lily started sobbing.
“She hasn’t forgotten them, she was just asleep. She’ll remember everything in the morning.”
“I know, it’s just, one day they’re there and fine and the next they’re dead and gone. I hate magic! I hate it, I hate it, I hate it.” She started sobbing on James’ shoulder. After a few minutes she wiped her eyes. “I’m- I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s ok.” James smiled at her. “This is your room.” He opened the door to a beautiful room that had white lilies painted on the walls.
“Thanks James. I don’t deserve it, just showing up in the middle of the night and waking you up.” Lily looked at James and he noticed that her eyes had tears in them.
Without thinking, he pulled her closer to him and kissed her. Lily had had too much grief that day and kissed back. Suddenly they both pulled back. “Lily, I-”
“No, I’m sorry.” She shook her head and closed the door. Slowly, she walked over to her bed and laid down. She was almost instantly asleep, but she had one thought: It was a mistake. And she wasn’t thinking about the kiss either.
A/N: This is the third time I’ve had to write this chapter author’s note! It’s driving me insane! Please R&R.
Disclaimer: I own Harry Potter! Ok, fine. I own Sirius? Fine. I own nothing, happy now?
Lily opened her eyes. The sun was high in the sky, meaning it must be about noon. She immediately collapsed back on her bed when she recalled the events of the previous day. It hit her that all of the people she had grown up with were dead.
Tears were rolling down her face and she curled up in the pillow and slept.
Later, there was a rap on the door. Lily woke up and cowered in her bed. “Lily? You didn’t come down for lunch, so I thought I would bring you a tray.” Her body relaxed and the door opened. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were still asleep.”
Lily shook her head as James sat the tray down on a table by her bed.
“I thought you might get hungry since you haven’t eaten anything since, Christ, it must have been on the train yesterday. Unless you ate before- before it happened.”
Lily’s body shook with silent sobs. Her parents. Sarah. Christopher. Josh. Sally. Isaac. They were all dead. Gone from the world. She curled up in her bed and cried, not noticing James had walked out.
The food sat untouched on the tray. Lily ignored it and fell back asleep.
When she woke up later, the tray had been replaced with other food. She had no interest in food. There was a lump in her throat whenever she thought about the previous day. Lily swallowed heavily and started coughing.
The door opened almost instantly. “Lily! Are you alright? I heard you coughing and wanted to make sure everything was ok.” James was talking quickly and looking and Lily with a concerned look on his face.
Lily just shook her head miserably. James sighed and looked at where he had placed the tray of food.
“Do you not like the food I brought you? I can bring something else. What do you want?” James asked Lily quickly. “I can make you something, and if I can’t make it, Kart can.”
Lily just shook her head and looked down at the floor.
“Anything at all?” James tried again, but Lily was unresponsive. She didn’t even shake her head. “Well, if you don’t want anything I’ll just leave,” He looked at Lily nervously, then left the room.
Lily curled up in her bed. The day before had been too quick. She didn’t know what had happened. One moment Sarah had been laughing, the next she was dead. Abby had been crucioed.
Abby. Lily felt a pang of guilt. She felt horrible about not getting up to see her, but not enough so to face the world. To face James. Lily wasn’t sure if she would ever be ready to face people again.
She began to cry and fell back asleep.
~*~ Downstairs
“I’m starting to get worried about her, Sirius,” James was talking quietly to his best friend. “I don’t know what to do. She hasn’t eaten or spoken since last night.”
“Oh come one,” Sirius scoffed. “I don’t know what you’re so worried about. She’ll be fine in a day or two. Trust me.”
James looked at him worriedly. “The last time you said that, I got a week and a half worth of detentions.”
Sirius let out his bark-like laugh before wandering up stairs. “AHH!” Two voices screamed out at the same time.
“Who are you?!” Sirius yelled at the little girl. “PRONGS! WHAT THE HELL IS THIS GIRL DOING IN YOUR HOUSE?” Abby started crying and James ran up the steps.
“Padfoot! She’s a little kid, don’t curse in front of her.” James gave Sirius a reprimanding look before soothing Abby, who promptly gave Sirius a glare. “Why don’t you two keep each other company?” James smirked and left to go do homework.
“So I have to stay with a little kid?” Sirius glared at the wall. “This sucks.”
Abby glared at Sirius for moment before laughing. “Sirius?”
“Yeah?”
“Why’s your hair turning pink?” Sirius looked in the mirror and shrieked. His hair was turning pink. Abby doubled over in laughter.
A/N: Ok, this is an amazingly short chapter. I don’t know why I wrote such a short chapter, but I did. It’s kind of just a filler to show Lily’s thoughts and feelings and to start Abby’s relationship with Sirius. I might change this chapter completely, but I can promise the next one will be longer.
One more note: I don't like Kart's name. Kart is their house elf. If you have a better name and leave it in a review, I will dedicate a chapter to you. Thanks!
Disclaimer: The only thing I own is the word kaboomed. Which I don't think I put in this story. Not Harry Potter.
She was running. There were rooms all around her, but the laughing followed her. “You can never escape,” the voice was all around her, “Everyone you touch will die…”
Lily looked up and saw the red eyes of the man who killed her parents, brothers, sisters, and in a way, her. “Please, let them go!” Her voice was puny and weak, pathetic, even to her.
She froze and couldn’t move. Voldemort laughed again and she saw Alice in front of her. The girl screamed as she was hit time and time again with the Cruciatus Curse.
“Let her go! Leave her alone!” Alice died and was replaced Lia who had marks appearing on her from beatings. Her image quickly faded to one of Sirius, then Remus, then Regulus. Lily was screaming and crying to let them free.
Abby appeared in the place of Regulus and Lily was forced to watch her die. After what felt like hours, James replaced Abby and was stabbed repeatedly in the chest. “No! Leave him alone!”
Lily unfroze and fell over James’ body. She curled into a ball and was screaming at the top of her lungs, screaming and screaming and-
“Lily!” Someone was shaking her. “Lily, wake up!”
She opened her eyes and looked into hazel ones. “J-J-James?” Her voice cracked, as she had not used it in several days.
“Are you ok? I heard screaming and I thought that you were hurt, or that there were Death Eaters in here,” James paused. “You are ok, aren’t you?”
Lily nodded and sighed. “Care to tell me about your dream?”
Lily stiffened for a moment, then began. “It was- it was horrible.” She paused and James realized she didn’t want to tell him anymore.
“It’s alright, you really don’t have to.” Lily looked at him with a grateful look in her eyes. James interpreted the look right, and held her close. “It’ll be ok Lily, everything will be ok.
Lily nodded, but she still recalled the words from the dream.
“Everyone you touch will die.”
~*~
“Siri!” Sirius groaned and rolled over in his bed. “Siri! You’re supposed to be watching me!”
“That could be taken more than one way…” He mumbled under his breath.
“What was that Siri?” Abby said in an angelic voice that Sirius had come to recognize as her devil voice.
“Nothin,” He pulled his pillow over hid head and didn’t hear anymore from Abby until-
“Siri?”
“Yeah?”
“What’s PlayWizard?”
“WHAT?!” Sirius shot out of bed and grabbed the magazine out of Abby’s hands. Abby promptly burst into ‘tears’. “Pretty Pretty Pony?”
James ran into the room. “What’s wrong?”
“Siri stole my magazine!” She holwed again and James glared at Sirius.
“Padfoot! I thought you were smarter than that. Give her back her magazine and apologize.” Sirius groaned, but didn’t move. “Now!”
“But she said it was PlayWizard!” Sirius argued.
“How would a ten-year-old muggle girl know what PlayWizard is? And you don’t even have PlayWizard anymore. Remus burned all of your copies in sixth year.” James smirked at Sirius who mumbled an apology to Abby. “What was that?”
“I’m sorry Abby. I didn’t mean to make you cry.” Abby nodded at him.
“Now if everyone’s happy, I’m going back to talk to Lily.”
Abby kept ‘crying’ until she was sure that James was gone. “I can’t believe you really did have PlayWizard! I mean, I thought you did, but I wasn’t sure.”
“…”
“What’s wrong?” Sirius groaned and laid back down on his bed. “You can’t go to sleep now! I’m bored!”
“What day is it?”
Abby frowned. “Wednesday. Why?”
“Remus is coming Saturday. You’ll have much more fun with him than with me.”
“Is he as easily scared as you?” There was a pause and Abby looked up. “Is he as easily scared as you?” She repeated her question.
Sirius scuffed his feet and looked down at the floor. “No, but he-”
“Don’t care. When I meet him I’ll decide whether he’s cooler than you.” Sirius smirked, but Abby spoke before he could. “He probably is, because it would be hard for someone to be less cool than you.”
“Hey!” Sirius was quite indignant about his so-called ‘coolness’. “I’m cooler than you are!”
“Says you. Now come on! Let’s go play Quidditch!
“But you were up almost all night! You can’t have that much energy.” Sirius’ mouth dropped open when Abby grabbed his broom and jumped out the window. “Abby!” He sighed and started the long trek out to the Quidditch pitch. One day that girl will run out of energy, he thought to himself. That will be the next time I sleep.
A/N: I have decided that for most of the chapters, I will split them into to two parts. One about Lily and one about Abby. If I end up writing a sequel, then it will be about Abby… If she survives. Review and tell me if there’s something you want to see in this story. There is a good chance that I might add it in.
Disclaimer: If you think I own Harry Potter, then you’re thicker than Ronald Bilius Weasley. And that’s saying something.
Disclaimer: I also do not own the condoms joke. The oh-so-wonderful (cough) silver_lion thought of it. Just giving her the credit where she deserves it.
For the first time in several days, Lily ate the food that was on the tray James brought her. She felt better, but really just wanted to do something to rebel. Lily didn’t know what she wanted to do, but it certainly wasn’t school work.
“Feeling better?” Lily jumped when she heard James’ voice and saw him standing beside her. “Sorry about scaring you. Didn’t realize you were concentrating so hard.”
“It’s ok. I was just thinking.” James and Lily sat in silence for a moment, before Lily said, “Are any parties planned for when we get back to school?”
“What? You want to party?!” James was surprised. He also thought that describing him as surprised was an understatement. “You never even wanted to hang out with me and have a butterbeer!”
Lily thought about it and realized that partying was what she wanted to do. “Things change,” She told James curtly. “Now I want to party.”
“Well, there’s the annual back to school party after winter break. You might not want to go because there’s gonna be some firewhiskey.” Lily shrugged her shoulders and curled up into a ball.
“That’s fine with me.”
“Lily!” James sounded kind of horrified. “You can’t just drink away your life.”
Lily looked up and sent him a horrible glare. “Just because I want some firewhiskey doesn’t automatically mean that I’m gonna drink for the rest of my life.” James shivered at the glare she had placed on him. “And I’d feel better if you would leave.”
“Lils, I’m sorry. It’s just-”
Lily cut him off, “I just want to sleep. Please, just leave me alone.” James sighed and exited the room. Lily had gotten a little better, but in doing so got worse. Now she wanted alcohol. As far as James knew, she didn’t even have butterbeer very often.
“Bye Lily. I hop-” His voice cracked. “I hope you feel better.” Lily didn’t make any notion that she had heard and James continued down the hall.
Lily looked up from her bed and sighed. She glared at James’ back and flipped over in her bed. She would prove him wrong. She would prove him wrong if it killed her.
~*~
“Siri, let’s not play Quidditch anymore,” Sirius sighed as Abby jumped all around him. “I’m hungry. Can we order pizza?” Sirius threw himself down on the sofa. “Please, Siri? Please, please, please?”
“Fine. I’ll go order pizza while you stay here and don’t move a muscle.” Abby gave Sirius an angelic look and he groaned. “Don’t move. I’ll be back in two minutes tops.”
“Ok Siri. Whatever you say Siri.” Abby watched Sirius leave the room, then ran up to his bedroom.
Sirius wandered back into the room saying, “I forgot to ask, what kind of pizza do you want?” When no one answered, he looked up from dialing the numbers. “Abby? Abby! Where are you?!”
Abby heard Sirius’ yell and immediately started searching through his trunk looking for something, anything. “Abby! Thank god you’re in here. I thought I’d lost you or- What’s wrong?”
Abby had a very odd look on her face. “Sirius?”
“No, I don’t have PlayWizard, my hair’s not turning pink, and I’m not gay.” He hurriedly looked in the mirror to make sure that his hair wasn’t turning any colors. “What is it now?”
“Why do you have condoms in your trunk?”
Sirius’ face went from white to red to purple. “WHAT?! YOU WEREN’T SUPPOSE TO SEE THOSE!” Abby screamed and ran down the hallway. Sirius ran after her.
“JAMES! Get your fucking arse out here and get that little-”
James walked out into the hallway from his room. He looked tired and his eyes were half closed. “What d’you want, Padfoot?”
“That kid was going through my bags and pulled out a pack of condoms!” Sirius was fuming and didn’t take any notice of James’ disheveled appearance.
“What d’you want me to do about it?” James asked Sirius tiredly. “I can make her give you back the condoms.”
“I have the condoms and I want you to punish her!” Sirius called out for Abby to come into the hallway. Abby crept from her room and hid behind James. “Well, go on!”
“Abby, it was wrong of you to go through Sirius’ trunk and take things out. Don’t do it again.” James gave Sirius a Look. “Happy now?”
“No. I want you to get her in trouble. Ground her or something.”
“First, I’m not my parents. I don’t ground people. Second, what would I ground her from? All she does is hang out with you all day and that’ll change when Moony gets here.” Sirius looked up at James who gave him another Look. “Tomorrow’s Saturday. We go back to Hogwarts a week from Monday.”
“Moony’s coming tomorrow?” Sirius gaped at James. “But- but-”
“But nothing. He’s coming tomorrow. You’re going to be happy. I’m going to sleep.” James eyed the two before adding, “And don’t kill yourselves until Moony gets here.”
A/N: Someone told me that Abby seemed to be taking her family’s deaths like it happened everyday. I just wanted to say that when something worries Abby or when she’s upset, she focuses. For example, she’s currently focusing on annoying Sirius. I just wanted to clear that up.
If you have any questions, comments, concerns, feel free to leave a review or ask me a question on my meet the author page. I would love any feedback whatsoever on this story.
Disclaimer: I own no part of the Harry Potter world. JKR owns it all.
RRIINGG! No, that wasn’t an alarm clock. Or a toaster. It was the doorbell. And Sirius was half glad. The ringing of the doorbell mean that Remus was there. But Sirius was also half sad. He and Abby had created a treaty and called for peace. He had quit yelling at her and she had quit scaring him. Life was good.
RRIINGG! Sirius sighed. He had forgotten over the school year how shrill and loud the Potters’ doorbell was. Especially when you had a splitting headache. “I’m coming! I’m coming! Just don’t ring it again!”
Sirius raced for the door and pulled it open. “Padfoot!”
“Moony!” Sirius paused for a moment, then got Sirius. No, not that Sirius. Serious. “How was the full moon?” There had been a full moon just four days before, which was why Remus hadn’t been there when Lily and Abby arrived.
“As good as can be expected. How’re you?” Remus didn’t know why they were going through all of these polite questions. Sirius had never bothered himself with them before.
“Worn thin. With a major migraine.” He smiled sadly at Remus. “And you’re next, I’m afraid.” Remus was about to ask why, when Sirius bellowed, “ABBY!” up the stairs.
Abby jumped up from her bed where she had been relaxing (for probably the first time in her life), raced down the steps, and grinned at Remus. “So you’re Moony! Siri’s been talking about you an awful lot. I can’t wait to play with you!”
Sirius smirked at Remus. “Just to let you know, Abby doesn’t play with you. She works you half to death.” He gave one last look at the two, Abby bouncing up and down and grinning, and Remus looking slightly worried. “Have fun!” Sirius gave a cheery wave with his hand and ran up stairs.
“So, your name’s Abby?” Remus looked at Abby who had zoned out. She blinked her eyes, looked at him with an evil grin, and nodded. Remus was now more than slightly scared. “How are you related to James Potter?” Sirius had forgotten to tell him who Abby was, why she was there, and what James was doing.
“Related? To James Potter?” Abby asked him with a disgusted look on her face. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Do I look like James Potter?” Remus had to admit that she didn’t, but with her gold hair and green eyes, he didn’t know who she could be related to. “I’m definitely Lily’s sister. Duh.”
“Lily’s sister! I thought her sister was fifteen or something.” Remus was very confused. Although now he recognized the eyes.
“You mean Sarah.” Abby’s eyes fell downcast. Now that Sirius was gone, she didn’t know how to change her focus that had been on him for the past week, practically. Tears filled up her dry eyes. Abby hadn’t cried since she was two years old. She had a resistance to crying, but now she let loose. Abby burst into tears.
“What’s wrong Abby? Are you alright?” Remus was very worried. He wasn’t used to having ten-year-olds suddenly begin crying when all he did was ask about their age.
“I-I want Sa-sa-sarah!” Abby spoke in between sobs. “And Is-aac! And Chri-Chri-stopher! And Josh! And Mummy! And Daddy! I want them to come back!” Abby threw herself on the ground and began howling.
Remus didn’t know how to calm the hysterical girl, so he quickly ran upstairs and brought Sirius down. “-And she threw herself down on the floor! She’s completely insane!”
“What did you do to her?” Sirius was very angry. Angrier than Remus had ever seen him be. “Abby! Calm down, baby, calm down.” He held Abby and rocked her in his arms. “Don’t ever do that to her again or I will kill you,” Sirius kissed through his teeth.
“I’m sorry, all I did was ask about her age, then she said something about a Sarah. Then she just starting howling about Isaac or Josh or something.” Remus saw Sirius’ look and misinterpreted it. “That’s all, honest.”
“No, Voldemort attacked her house. He killed everyone but her and Lily.” Sirius’ voice broke and Remus looked at him in surprise. Usually he wasn’t very emotional at all, especially when it was about people that he had just met.
“I’m really sorry, Padfoot. I didn’t know, honest.”
“It’s all right,” Sirius told him gruffly. “I know you didn’t know. Why don’t you go unpack your stuff and I’ll stay here with Abby.” He nodded at the girl who was still shaking in his lap. Remus nodded quickly and left.
The two sat on the floor for a while longer until Abby was almost asleep. “Siri?” He nodded to let her know he’d heard. “I love you.” And she drifted off to sleep, still in his arms.
Sirius carried her into her room and laid her down to sleep. She didn’t know it, but her words had affect him more than she could imagine.
~*~
Lily opened her window softly. She didn’t want anyone to know that she was sneaking out. It was nearly ten at night, so she knew she was good for going to a club. She wanted to party. Lily wanted to forget everything that had happened the previous week.
The window slid up and she climbed out. Her window wasn’t on the first floor, but there was a tree that she could climb down.
A while after she left, James walked into her room. “Lily? Are you ok?” He turned on the light and nearly screamed. Lily was gone. And he didn’t know where.
A/N: Fine, another short chapter. The next chapter will be very exciting. And long. I think. Anyways, I hoped you liked this chapter and for the first time… A sneak peek of the next one!
“Uh oh. That’s all you can say. Uh oh. You were out all night! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?” James roared at her. “Remus and I were looking for you half the night! You could have been hurt or-” James sniffed the air and almost gagged. “How much did you drink?” He whispered.
Disclaimer: I wished on a star that I owned Harry Potter. I hate stars.
James had fallen asleep in the chair in Lily’s room. It was nearly noon when Lily tried to sneak back in through the window. She landed with a thump and turned around the James’ angry eyes.
“Uh oh.” That was all Lily could think to say. She had been out all night drinking beer, firewhiskey, anything to get her smashed, and danced with a ton of guys. Now she had a pounding headache.
“Uh oh. That’s all you can say. Uh oh. You were out all night! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?” James roared at her. “Remus and I were looking for you half the night! You could have been hurt or-” James sniffed the air and almost gagged. “How much did you drink?” He whispered.
Lily shrugged. “Several glasses of firewhiskey, plus some muggle alcohol. And I was thinking,” She added coldly, “That you weren’t my mother. Because my mother is dead.”
Her words stung James sharply. Yes, he wasn’t her mother, but he cared about her just as much. “I didn’t mean it like that Lily, I know I’m not your mother, but I care about you.”
“If you care about me so much, why can’t you let me live my own life?” She glared at him. “Just let me live. If you think I’m making mistakes, let me. I want to do this. I’m eighteen, legally an adult in wizarding and muggle world. You can’t control what I do.”
James sighed and stood up. He knew why he couldn’t let her make her own mistakes, because he had seen that happen before. He had seen it with his cousin. She had been drinking and clubbing every night. One morning they had found her dead on the street. James couldn’t let that happen to Lily.
“I’ll charm the window, then.” James knew this wasn’t the best idea, but ti was all he could think of.
“Fine. I’ll just curse it off. I’m a better witch than you are James, and you know it.” James did know it.
“Leave.” With that one word, she broke James’ heart and it might never heal.
~*~
“I don’t believe it! You know that club we go to sometimes, Padfoot? The one that’s near here?” Sirius nodded slowly, not sure what James was looking for. “She went there! She was out all night and she was drunk! Completely wasted!” James paced up and down the room. Abby watched the two boys with a look of interest on her face.
“Lily? Drunk?” Sirius was astounded. Lily wouldn’t even drink very much butterbeer. “You must have made it up.”
“You didn’t smell her breath. It had so much alcohol in it I’m surprised she got through the window.” James sneered at the memory. “She’s gonna die! She’ll get herself killed!” His voice got really quiet when he added, “just like Gina.”
Sirius knew Gina’s story. Her boyfriend had broken up with her and she was in love with him. She began drinking and was found dead soon after. “It could have suicide. Lily wouldn’t kill herself, you know she wouldn’t.”
James snorted. “I don’t know Lily anymore. She’s not Lily.” Sirius opened his mouth to answer James’ statement. “Don’t bother. I know I’m right and you know it too.”
Sirius shrugged. He didn’t believe James. He believed him about the drinking part, but not about her not being Lily. Lily would always be Lily. “Padfoot! Lily wouldn’t drink at all! Now she’s completely and totally smashed. Lily would never get smashed.”
Sirius shrugged again and James glared at him. “What d’you want me to say? That she’s not herself? Was I not me in fifth year when I ran away from home?” James blinked at him. He hadn’t thought about that. “When I was drinking and completely screwed over?”
“That was different,” James tried to keep arguing his point. “You had just lost your family and your little brother and you were a little like that all the time.” Sirius gave James a look. One of those looks when you know the person is skeptical.
“Lily lost her mother, her father, and four siblings. I lost a family that I didn’t like that much in the first place. As for the drinking thing, I hadn’t drunk more than a bottle of firewhiskey all together before that year.” James glared at him.
“It’s not the same thing and you know it!”
“Because she’s your girlfriend? Because you want to protect her? Because you care about her more than me?” Sirius laid all these accusations on James without a blink of the eyes.
“Because it’s like Gina!” James glared at Sirius. “You were before Gina and I didn’t think it could happen. You know very well that that’s the reason I wasn’t worried about you!”
Sirius shrugged. He didn’t really have much to add to the conversation. “Lily was just like Gina was before she fell apart! And she’s just like Gina after she fell apart. This is the first day of drinking so I expect we’ll find her dead on the street in four or five days. What are you gonna do then? Shrug? That seems to be your answer for everything.”
Sirius shrugged again. He knew James would burn himself out in another minute or two. It was what James always did. “So if I started drinking and sneaking out at night you wouldn’t worry at all. You didn’t worry with Gina, you said she’d burn herself out. Well she did. She burned out her life. Now she’s dead because I listened to you not to help her.” James was practically gasping for breath. It had been a very longwinded speech.
“She’s nothing like Gina. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to go make sure Moony isn’t making Abby upset.” He started up the steps and looked at James. “She’s not gonna turn out like Gina.” He headed up the stairs once more, not waiting for James to respond.
“I wanna do something interesting! Not sit around here listening to you talk.” Sirius heard Abby’s voice before he saw her or Remus. “I want Siri!”
“Well here I am!” Sirius grinned at her and she threw herself at him shouting ‘Siri! Siri!’.
“Hey squirt. Wanna go do something fun like Quidditch?” Abby shook her head. “Wanna play a joke on Remus?”
“I’m sitting right here, you know!” Abby smirked at him, then shook her head again. “You wanna play would you rather?”
Sirius almost choked on the air he had just sucked into his mouth. He shook his head frantically, trying to tell Remus to take it back, but Abby saw him.
“Yes! Can we please play that? Pretty, pretty please with a cherry on top?” Sirius closed his eyes and shook his head. Abby perfected her puppy dog pout and poked Sirius in the side. “Please?”
He opened his eyes and saw her face. Sirius groaned, but nodded. “Fine. But only if Moony plays too.” Remus nodded and they sat on the floor to play an intense game of would you rather.
A/N: I feel terrible about the short chapter. I’m finding it hard to write this story, but it will be over in roughly 10 chapters. I'll miss my first ever HPFF fic when it's time has gone. *sniff*
Happy Cinco de Mayo! (That’s when I wrote this.)
Disclaimer: I don’t own HP. Trust me on this one.
Sirius jogged through the house muttering under his breath. Where was James? Not in the kitchen, or his room, or Lily’s room, or Abby’s room. In fact, Sirius hadn’t seen James since their argument.
But now Sirius needed him. He needed help and James was the only one who could give it to him. “JAMES LESLIE POTTER! STOP HIDING FROM ME THIS INSTANT AND COME OUT!” Sirius had realized that the only reason he couldn’t find James was because he had the invisibility cloak.
Sure enough, James appeared in front of him almost instantly. “What do you want, Padfoot? I was busy.” James glared at his best friend and Sirius glared back.
“Busy hiding from me,” Sirius scoffed. James opened his mouth to retaliate, but Sirius cut him off. “We don’t have time for that. Hogwarts starts tomorrow.”
James looked at him like he had three heads. “Yeah, so?”
Sirius rolled his eyes and said, “Abby.” James frowned and shrugged. “She can’t stay here. We’re off and who knows when your parents will get back.”
“She’s your problem. You were the one that wanted to spend all of your time with her.” Sirius groaned and turned towards the fireplace.
“I know you’re busy with Lily and her newly found drinking habits, but can you please watch Abby?” There was a pause. “It’ll only be for a few hours,” Sirius added hastily when he saw James’ face.
“Fine.” James turned around to leave but Sirius called out to him.
“Prongs-”
“Don’t call me that! You lost the right to call me Prongs when you…” He trailed off.
“When I what? Told you that Lily was still Lily? That she’s not Gina? Give me a break, Prongs. If you really want to stop her, you can’t lock her up in the house. Don’t force her to quit. Tell her everything that happened with Gina. It might work.”
Sirius pulled out a handful of floo powder and threw it in the fire. “Hogwarts, Headmaster’s office!” The fire turned green and he stepped in. James watched as his best friend disappeared into the fire.
Sirius fell out of the fire at the other end covered in soot and ashes. He casually brushed off his shirt and looked up into the eyes of Headmaster Albus Dumbledore. “This is a nice surprise, Mr. Black. What brings you here?”
Sirius grinned at him. “Someone told you about Lily’s situation?” He sounded formal and twitched. He hated being formal.
“Miss Evans is being taken care of, if that’s what you mean.” The Headmaster smiled at Sirius who cringed. He was so formal and polite that it gave him the creeps.
“Well, it’s not her I’m worried about. Well I mean, I am worried about her, but I’m focused on her sister right now. Cause James’ parents are still away doing who knows what, who knows where so Abby can’t stay at the Potters’.” Sirius took a deep breath. “Where’s Abby gonna go?”
Dumbledore smiled at Sirius for a moment and Sirius glanced towards the exits. “You are the one who stays with her the most, am I correct?”
“Umm, yeah, I guess.” Sirius didn’t know what Dumbledore was getting at.
“Then I see no reason why she shouldn’t stay with you.” Sirius froze and stared at Dumbledore for a moment. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Is there something wrong?”
“You’re gonna make me stay at the Potter’s for the rest of the school year to baby-sit a ten year old?”
Dumbledore frowned. “Of course not! I merely meant that she could come to Hogwarts with you.”
“Oh,” Sirius nodded. “Ok then, I’ll head home now.” He turned around and waited for Dumbledore to say something else. When he didn’t, Sirius threw floo powder into the fire and yelled “Potter Mansion!” The flames turned green and he jumped in.
Sirius fell out of the fireplace and heard a surprised laugh. “Siri fell out of the fireplace!” There was another laugh that sounded an awful lot like Remus and another that sounded like Abby.
“It’s not funny!” Sirius exclaimed as he jumped up. Abby was rolling on the ground clutching her sides. “It’s not, I swear!” Abby just smirked at him and got up off the floor.
Remus walked over and patted Sirius on the back. “It’s ok, Padfoot. We’ll still be friends with you even if you do fall when you’re flooing!” Remus started laughing again and Sirius glared at him.
“Well, if you don’t stop laughing at me, I’m not gonna tell you that Dumbledore said Abby was going to Hogwarts with us.” He paused, then said, “Oh crap.”
“I’m going to HOGWARTS! Oh my Merlin this is so cool!” Abby squealed. “Now I can sneak into your dorm and jump on you to wake you up Siri! And you too Remus! And—oh wow! When I go to Hogwarts, we are so having a Would you Rather Tournament!”
Remus and Sirius looked at each other.
“Nice going Padfoot,” Remus mumbled.
“Shut the hell up before I kill you,” Sirius mumbled back. “Shit. I so did not mean to tell her.”
“Well good thing you have a short term memory!” Abby said, boinging up and down. “Yay yay yay!”
Remus and Sirius stared at the ten-year-old with looks of horror on their faces. “When we get to Hogwarts,” Remus told Sirius. “You are going to be so dead.” Sirius didn’t acknowledge him at all and began to back away slowly from Abby.
“Breathe, Abby, breathe.” Abby was still running around and shouting ‘Yay!’ at the top of her lungs. “You’ll disturb Lily.”
Abby quit screaming yay and turned on Sirius. “I don’t care if precious Lily gets disturbed. She hasn’t bothered to even see me in a week. As far as I’m concerned, Lily Evans doesn’t exist.” She glared at Sirius for a moment and ran up the steps into her room.
Sirius and Remus stood there, dumbfounded. “You look kind of… shell shocked.” Remus was the first to break the ice. “I’m guessing that’s the first time she’s ever gotten mad at you?” Sirius nodded and walked up the steps to Abby’s room.
“Abby? Are you ok?” He whispered into the door and listened. There was no response, but he could here Abby crying. “Can I come in?” Sirius almost didn’t want to ask the question, but he knew someone had to talk to her.
“Not unless your name is Lily,” Abby shot back to him. Sirius sighed. He knew that Lily was having some other problems, but it wasn’t right that she had just pretended Abby didn’t exist.
“I’ll talk to her.”
“NO!” Sirius jumped as Abby screamed. “I want her to come on her own, not because you made her.” There was another silence and Sirius walked away. Abby had told him not to talk to Lily, but that was the only way Lily would talk to her.
Sirius walked down the hall to Lily’s room. He knocked on the door and waited for an answer. “Go away, James. I don’t want another lecture.” Sirius cringed at the cold in her voice. It was enough to give anyone the chills.
He opened the door and walked in. “I’m not James.” Lily looked up at him and jumped. She hadn’t really expected Sirius to come talk to her.
“Let me guess, James told you to come lecture me about drinking.” It was more of a statement than a question.
“No. I just want you to talk to Abby.” Lily’s eyes flashed and Sirius immediately knew he’s said the wrong thing. “She’s your family and you’ve been ignoring her for a week.”
“Why does she get to live when Sarah couldn’t? She should’ve died with the rest of them.” Sirius gaped at her. If Abby heard that.. He shook his head. He didn’t want to know what Abby would do.
“Remember when I spent the whole Hogsmeade trip to convince Anna to stand up to Bellatrix and Narcissa? That was hard for her, really hard.” Sirius groaned inside. He’d never given someone a life lesson before and he hoped never to again. “You have to get over what happened.”
Lily jumped out of her bed. “I’m not forgetting them! I spent seventeen years of my life loving them and I’m not about to stop!” Sirius sighed. Giving life lessons was hard.
“Don’t forget them, I don’t think you could forget them if you wanted to. I’m talking about moving on. Don’t spend your whole life worrying about why it happened, you might never know.” Lily was crying really hard Sirius walked over to where she was standing and put his arm around her shoulders. “You have to live your life. Abby hasn’t forgotten about them, but she’s moved on.”
Lily nodded. “But it’s hard! I want them back. Magic can do everything except bring back people from the dead. Why can’t it bring them back?” Lily leaned her head on Sirius’ shoulder and cried.
“It’s magic, not a miracle. And don’t make me give you another life lesson, ok?” Lily laughed through her tears.
She wiped her eyes and looked up into his grey ones. “I think I’m falling in love.”
Sirius’ eyes widened. “You are? That’s great! I always knew you and James were meant to be.” He smiled at her, knowing too much excitement would make her feel worse.
“I think I’m falling in love,” She repeated. “With you.”
A/N: This chapter is a little longer. The next one will be at least ten pages, and that’s a promise! Don’t forget, the little review box feels empty and lonely like my heart… Not really. My heart is warm and happy, almost a hundred reviews! You rock people!!
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