“Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” ― George Bernard Shaw
Sophie - Elise Bouvier was taking in her surroundings. The 6th year Gryffindor dormitories were large and lit by candles. Lily had shown her where she could deposit her things in the bathroom and where she would be sleeping.
They seemed nice enough she had thought during dinner. Mary and Lily were okay and she was glad to be sharing her dormitory with them. She sighed as she entered the bathroom and proceeded to undo her hair. The events from the last days were going through her mind. The move, a new school, the journey to Hogwarts, saying goodbye to her parents.
Her hair cascaded on her back in chocolate curls. Annoyed she shook her head and entered the shower. Damn hair would never be this curly in the morning.
After her shower she curled up in her bed and for the first time today she felt tired. With images still swimming in her head she fell asleep.
---
"This is it my dear fellows, the 6th year of the great adventure we call Hogwarts!" James Potter yelled, as he jumped on his bed and smiled like a lunatic.
"I never thought you would be the one to be so excited about getting back into your education," Remus chuckled as he watched his friend bouncing up and down like an over energised bunny.
"Who said anything about classes, Moony old chap?" Sirius said, the twinkle in his eyes being a give away as to the mayhem he was already plotting. "Prongs over here is happy to be back so he can resume his courtship of the lovely Miss Evans."
"But I thought she said you were an arrogant toe-rag and she wouldn't go out with you if it was a choice between you and the giant squid." a fourth voice spoke up.
The atmosphere in the room changed abruptly, as James glared at Peter Pettigrew. "There was no need to bring up that little incident, Wormtail," he said flatly. Peter's face fell a little but he decided to not pursue this further.
"Bottom line is, this is a new year and anything can happen. So I will not abandon hope!" James concluded in an overly dramatic way, as he fell down on his bed and pulled the curtains around his bed. Sirius just rolled his eyes and started getting ready for bed.
Silence soon fell over the dormitory as one by one the boys got ready for the night.
---
"Mary, it's time to get up! UP! UP! UP!" Sophie - Elise opened her eyes to investigate what all the noise was about.
Lily Evans was pulling the covers from Mary's bed as she tried to stay asleep and was hiding her face under her pillow. She smiled at this image and lazily stretched her body as she tried to get out of bed.
"Bonjour!" she said with a small and shy smile. She wasn't sure quite yet about them, though they seemed nice enough.
"Finally somebody who gets up on their own!" Lily exclaimed as she started pulling on Mary's legs. "Good morning, love! You can go shower, we're the only ones left here. Those two always get up so early, I can't imagine how they get by on so little sleep." she continued, referring to the other two girls who shared the dorm.
She got up and entered the bathroom, getting into the shower and changing into her uniform. Twenty minutes later, after Mary was finally ready they made their way down to breakfast.
It was very noisy in the Great Hall, students were chatting, the Heads of Houses were passing timetables and students were eating as fast as they could so they wouldn't be late for their first lessons of the year.
The girls sat down at the Gryffindor table and helped themselves to eggs, bacon and rolls, eating while looking over their lesson plans.
"What classes are you taking, Elise?" Lily asked while gulping down orange juice.
"Well, I'm taking Charms, Transfiguration, Potions, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Ancient Runes, Herbology ... and I think that's about it." she replied while looking over her list.
"Oh good, we've got all the same classes. Isn't that lovely, Mary?" Mary merely nodded as she chewed her food with her eyes half closed. She wasn't a morning person. "Well then, we'd better get going soon, Transfiguration up first and McGonagall will have our butts in detention if we dare be late on the first day."
---
It didn't take Sophie - Elise too long to learn about the dynamics of life at Hogwarts. Lily was the brains of the 6th year dormitory. She was smart and very diligent in her schoolwork, she liked to answer questions in class and always took extra assignments. She was loud and sometimes bossy, but she had a good heart so Mary always let her bossy stride pass by.
Mary on the other hand was the funny one. She took life very lightly and always had a joke or a story to go with any situation. Her sense of humour was her defence mechanism, as it got her out of any sticky situation. She was smart yes, but she didn't like to burry herself in school work.
On the other side of this little group were the Marauders. The self-entitled group were loud, had no regard for rules and loved to be the centre of attention. As far as Sophie -Elise could tell, the leaders were James and Sirius, always on the front line. Remus was more quiet and a little shy, but it was clear that he was the logical mind behind the group, while Peter, the last Marauder, was the soldier. He had to make sure that the rest of them had all the supplies for whatever they were planning.
---
1996
"I have to tell you Harry, life at Hogwarts wasn't as exciting back then as yours is now." Remus said. They were both sitting on a conjured up bench in the Weasley's yard. Remus could see Harry hanging on his every word.
"I suspect nobody was trying to kill you every other day." he mumbled under his breath and pushed his glasses up. Remus looked at him with sad eyes. It was hard on him to be telling this story, but there wasn't another person left to tell the boy about his parents.
"No they didn't. Outside the walls of Hogwarts though, evil was building up it's forces. We heard rumours and whispers. Your grandfather, Mr. Potter, was an Auror with the Ministry of Magic so James would often get information on what was happening on the outside. But inside, we were all normal and happy 16 years old kids. We looked at girls, struggled with essays, had run-ins with the Slytherins. But apart from being a werewolf at school and sneaking out every month to transform, life was normal. Although from time to time, something would happen that would interrupt our normal, boarding school life..."
---
1976
"JAMES POTTER!"
The scream made Remus drop his book and and Sirius spill half a bottle of ink on the essay he was working on. James on the other hand had a smile tugging at his lips and was getting ready for what was to come.
"JAMES BLOODY POTTER! This is it! This was the straw that broke the camel's back! The drop that made the glass spill over! I have accepted all sorts of arrogant acts from you but this... this..."
Everybody was looking at Lily, who was standing in the middle of the common room, her hair falling from her bun and her eyes wide with anger. A vein was throbbing in her temple. Sophie - Elise made a move to calm her down, but Mary put a hand gently in front of her, signalling for them to let Lily and James sort this out.
She had found out soon enough that Lily had a deep dislike of James, because of his rule-breaking ways and his arrogance. James on the other hand, was smitten with her and made a fool out of himself everytime he wanted to get her attention. Smooth and charming James Potter was like a troll around her. This however, seemed to be the biggest fight they had had all year.
"What seems to be the problem?" he asked trying to be innocent.
"Why in the name of Merlin's undergarments would you hex him?" she asked, her voice now dangerously low.
"Because I thought he was being too close to you my Lily." he said and shrugged.
"You.. .You... You arrongant... Bullying... Immature... Did you stop and think for a second I wanted him to be close to me? Do you think that just because I won't go out with you I'll stay single forever? Get it through your thick skull Potter," she spat his name like it was something bitter on the tip of her tongue, "I do not like you, I do not want to go out with you, I do not want to see you if it can be helped. And so help me Merlin, the next time you do anything like this, I will curse you so bad Madam Pomfrey will have to go back to school to fix you up." she turned on her heel and walked out of the room.
The rest of the students turned back to their activities, now that the show was over.
"Should we go after Lily?" Sophie - Elise asked quietly.
"No," Mary answered shaking her head. "Not if you want to be the next person on the receiving end of THAT." she shook her head in James' direction. "She'll be back once she is calm enough to explain everything. It's always like that." she finished getting up. "I'm going to get my Charms book from upstairs. See you in a bit."
She was left alone at the small table and looked at the four boys. Life seemed to have gone on for them, each resuming their activities. But there was a change only a girl could notice. James wasn't sitting quite as straight as he used to and his eyes weren't following the page as they should have if he was reading. She closed her book and got up, approaching the boys.
"It's not all bad you know." she said making their heads jerk up.
"What do you mean? Did you not hear what I heard? I'm not even on the bottom of her list, I'm not even a footnote on her list." James said bitterly.
"Well, why don't you tell me what happened?" she said and sat down next to him. Her boldness surprised even herself, not to mention the boys, who were looking at her like she had grown tentacles out of her ears.
"Why do you care? It's not like you are on my side."
The girl tried not to let the words bother her as she pushed further.
"I've been here for two months. I'm on my side at best. Look, I get that you're a big manly man and you don't need my help, except that you do. From what I've seen, you only get on her bad side and I can't believe that there is no good side to you. I don't see any of these guys yelling at you like you've blown up the Great Hall every other day. So as far as I can tell, you have two options. You either tell me what you did so I can see if it can be fixed or you can sit here, pretend you're reading and not improve your situation at all."
James seemed to ponder this, but before he could speak, Sirius replied for him.
"The idiot hexed some 7th year Ravenclaw he saw speaking to her outside the greenhouse."
"Thanks Padfoot, it really puts the whole thing into perspective. It's not that simple. He was going to ask her out, I heard him last week in Defence. And if she's seeing someone else, well..."
"She'll never fall for you and you'd lose her forever right?" Sophie - Elise finished.
James seemed surprised at her reply "Something like that, yes," he sighed and ran a hand through his already messy hair.
"Well you're not the sharpest crayon in the box if that's your approach. and it's no wonder she has yet to accept your proposals." the boy opened his mouth to protest but she silenced him with a wave. "You can be insulted all you want after I finish talking. Look, it's none of my business, but if she really didn't have any feelings, she would just ignore you. You can't go around pretending you own her, it's offensive behaviour. Maybe if you would just be nice, stop bullying people and stopped feeling threatened by any male within 6 feet of her the situation would change. She might see some good in you if you just let her," and with that she got up and headed towards the dormitory, leaving the boys to ponder what she had just said.
"Blimey Prongs, that girl might be on to something mate." Sirius said at last, breaking the silence that fell over the group.
"It's not like you have anything to lose, James. Not after what the whole House heard coming out of her mouth." Peter said quietly.
"Be nice to people around her... But I am nice right?" James asked looking at his friends.
"Well, hexing people for talking to her, picking on her childhood friend and then asking her out, all the while showing off in front of her... not the text book definition of nice, James." Remus said from behind his book.
"I will never understand how you can read, listen to us and make conversation at the same time." James said, shaking his head. Remus just smiled at him.
"That's why I get to patrol the halls with Lily and you get to be yelled at." the conversation stopped as James lunged forwards to smack Remus and he threw his book and ran away accompanied by Sirius' loud laughs.
"You know Padfoot, the new kid might be onto something there..." James said when he returned to his seat.
"Who knows Prongsie," Sirius said jokingly, "maybe with her, your chance at ever being with Evans has come to Hogwarts."
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A/N: Over 100 reads in just two chapters! Whoohoo! I'm overwhelmed! Thank you so much for reading and for reviewing. It means a lot. This chapter sort of sets up the relationship between Sophie - Elise and the Marauders while James tries to win Lily over. The story will go back and forth between Marauder Era and Harry's time, so that we can see how Harry takes this story in.
I don't own anything you recognize. :D
Again thank you so much and hope that you will keep reading.
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