“Well, well, well, why don’t you just look at that?” Sirius slid into the seat next to me in Charms class.
“What?” I muttered, not looking up from my textbook.
“That, on our right,” Sirius jutted his chin to my right. I saw James and Carly walk in and take seats diagonally right, in front of us. I wrinkled my nose, why was James still with the Carly person? Okay, fine. I was a bit jealous but there was no logical reason that someone should date another person when he himself had admitted that he liked someone else.
“I know, James is a complete git for still wanting to date her,” Remus said from the seat behind us, I could hear an odd under tone to the comment.
“Agreed,” Sirius sneered at the couple.
“Why?” I arched and eyebrow. “I thought you used to like her.”
“Well, after you came in the picture, Carly’s changed. A lot,” Sirius sniffed. “And I don’t like it.”
“Care to elaborate?”
“She’s still as smart and funny but she’s changed for some reason…most likely because she probably noticed James acting weird because of you,” Remus shrugged.
“Damn it, she’s so bloody intense with James now,” Sirius spat. “She’s too…what’s that word?”
Slutty?
“Available. All the time.”
Slutty.
“She just latches on to him these days, and I’m like, whoa there, lady. Retract those man-gripping claws. Evans, it’s unimaginable. I’m telling you this in the hopes you’ll be sensitive and try to understand, because I need some sort of confidant. Have pity on me, I beg of you. It may just make you feel sorry for me. Who knows? The only thing I know is that SHE HAS GOT TO GO.” Sirius emphasizes the last five words and makes the airplane ‘take off’ gesture with his hands.
“And what’s more important is our sanity,” Remus growled suddenly behind me. “James is driving us all mad again. One moment he’s all over you and the next moment he’s having dinner with Carly. For once, it’s stupid and Prongs is probably blind to it all.”
“So I’ve heard,” I mumbled, eyeing the couple. I noticed something was wrong. Carly was chatting with James but James was studying his notes. He didn’t even seem to be listening to her. I tried to read the expression on his face. His eyes were bored and frustrated and his jaw was taut, like he was ridiculously annoyed and was on the brink of giving up.
“Besides that, she just craves attention now. She always winks at James in the halls, snogs whenever she gets the chance and stuff like that. I’d just about pull her hair if I saw her crawling all over him in front of me... AGAIN! And she always tries to enter our mischievous conversations for world domination! Always sticking her nose in our boy talk. I want to trip her down the stairs when she does that. On top of all that snooping, she puts on way too much make up and does too much to her appearance now. It’s a huge problem for me. Well, maybe not for some guys, but most can tell when someone’s trying to look cute and trying to look trashy,” Sirius was getting heated now.
“So you’re saying she’s a tart?”
“Duh!” Sirius mocks rather loudly. “What’s in that noggin of yours? Pumpkin juice? Of course she’s a tart.”
I nod my head. “Okay… I mean, at least be thankful she’s not one of those bitchy types straight off the bat like other girls. At least she tries to be nice.” Maybe if I show him the positive, he won’t completely hate her. I’ll be honest, I’m glad he doesn’t like her at all, but I don’t want him detesting her completely. Makes me feel like more of a bitch than I secretly am.
“I actually do appreciate that about her,” Remus adds. “But she forces her kindness to get her way sometimes. Not cool. We’ve all had our fair share of girls like this, but James hasn’t been with anyone in a while. Let alone someone how wants to go to Madame Puddifoot’s every time we go to Hogsmeade. Honestly, it really hard to compare the former Carly Carrington to the one we see so often now.”
“Oh?”
Sirius begins again, “Well, kinda. Not like one hundred percent, but we agree that she’s too much. She brings high maintenance to a whole new level. And we can see it in Prongs, too. It’s like he’s pretending it doesn’t bother him, but the group knows it does. Everyone knows, except Carly herself. I just don’t get it…”
“Don’t get what?” I furrow my eyebrows.
“I don’t get why he’s dating her,” Sirius says, more to himself than to me, as he stares at his desk in thought. I couldn’t have asked the question better myself.
“Is there a reason you haven’t eaten a thing in the past fifteen minutes since dinner’s started?” Amy startles me out of my trance. Tucking away the hair in my face, I sit up straight and realize how loud it is in the Great Hall. All I heard before was a buzzing, but the voices are reaching my ears now. The sound is coming back to me gradually.
“You’re not hungry?” Amy questions, sitting across from Mary and I.
“No, it’s not that. I’m definitely hungry.” I nibble on my chicken in an idle fashion.
Mary leans in closer to me. “Well, what is it then?”
Amy sets down her fork and thinks for a minute what she wants to say.
“Is it school?”
“What’s school?” I’m confused.
“Is it school that’s making you go a little loopy?”
Mary scoffs. “Psh, it’s either that or some hardcore medication she nicked from Madame Pomfrey.”
“Am I loopy?” I ask, out of the question. “I didn’t notice.”
She throws me a look. “Mary and I have been seeing you walk with no emotion in your face for the past several days. We don’t really know what’s up with you. You can’t possibly be thinking that much, that you can’t even touch your food when you’re obviously hungry.”
Amy looks so thoroughly concerned, that I feel guilty for being so distant.
“I don’t know,” I shrug my shoulders. “It’s not like something is up with me, I guess I just might need some time to myself. Maybe a little longer? I’m not sure. It’s just that I’m at a state of mind where I kind of can’t move forward and can’t move back.”
“Is it stress?”
“Kind of,” I respond, looking down at my plate.
Mary loops her arm through mine in a sisterly way. “Are you mad about something?”
“Yes,” I concur after a while. “But I’m not so sure what I’m mad about…”
“Do you feel bad about yourself, like is it a self hate thing?”
Is it? I can’t tell.
“Uh…No? I can’t describe it. It’s not like I don’t like myself, more of like how I handled the situation. Like a self-blaming thing. But at the same time, I know it’s not my fault. What ever it is…”
“Oh,” Mary chirps. “At least that’s something. I mean Ames and I had no idea at all what you were going through, or if you were going through something. But at least now, we kind of get you.”
“Yeah, we wanted to say something to you, Lily, but we weren’t sure if you felt like talking,” Amy tells me honestly, looking reluctant.
“I’m sorry,” I apologize. “I really didn’t realize my problems made you guys feel like you couldn’t be around me. I can’t explain this feeling, but lately, I have just been feeling helpless. I don’t know what it is, but it’s causing me to think about EVERYTHING in my life.”
“Lily, do you miss him?” Amy whispers.
The thought makes me choke on my own spit.
No, literally. I just choked on my own spit.
“Get her a glass of water!” Amy almost screams, slapping my back nonstop. Thus, I choke on my own damn salivary glands even more. I’d love to explain to Mary McDonald that slapping someone’s back when their choking does not help (in fact, it makes it worse), but I can’t breathe enough to mumble that information to her.
By the time Amy stops freaking out enough to pour me a cup of water, my forehead is bruised because of the number of times Mary slammed my face on the table.
“T-t-thanks, Mares,” I croaked. “But I think I want to keep my brain.”
“Good, you’re fine,” Mary relaxed and returned to eating her roasted beef. But I didn’t feel like eating mine’s.
“You know what, I think I want to just walk,” I sighed and got up. Amy joined me, “Sorry Ames, I wanted to go alone.” Amy stared at me for a moment and nodded, “I understand.”
“Hey, Lils?” Mary called me back after I turned around, catching my hand. “If this is about James, I want you to know that last night, during Prefect rounds, James was really quiet. Too quiet, if you ask me even when he was Hogwarts’ most legible bachelor, he never shut up. He was always talking, that boy. Now, he’s almost…thinking, before he speaks,” she shudders. “Something’s definitely up.”
“Nothing’s up,” I assure her. “Trust me, the only thing that’s gone up is his ego. He’s back to his old ways. So be it.” I shrug. “If he’s going to go back and ignore everything that’s happened, I can’t change that. I can’t change him. He wants to run away from his problems? Fine. As long as he’s a man about it.”
Mary gives me a suspicious look. “You know, you’ve really changed in the past two weeks. You were never this open or- I don’t know…certified, in the things you spoke about. You got a big boost of self-motivation, or more confidence, yeah? I’d say so. Because the Lily Evans I knew never felt comfortable enough to express herself.”
“Hey, I expressed myself just fine,” I defend. She has her ‘wtf’ face on now. “It’s just that… Things are really clearing up in my mind now. I feel like I want to be able to figure things out. I have a need to make sense! It’s liberating,” I exclaim, looking off into the distance.
Mares chuckled. “Yeah, well, I gotta say. I like this side of you. What ever caused this little confidence spurt- I hope it never goes away. Because I’m loving this new and improved Lily Evans who doesn’t have a problem with putting things in perspective for herself. Even if things are emotionally unsettling, and condescending, and don’t make sense, and are kind of shitty.”
I smiled, “Thanks, Mares.” And turned to walk out of the Great Hall.
“Well, if it isn’t my favorite redhead,” a smooth and rugged voice says out of nowhere in the darkly lit hallway.
I squint in the darkness, and in the moonlight, out comes James Potter from the shadows. The moon’s white light is illuminating him, as he’s walking by the window. I halt, my feet squeaking against the marble, as I swallow nervously. He’s looking so tantalizingly good-
FUCK!
Let’s halt, right now. My brain did not just think that.
“James.”
He smirks, walking closer to me. “Lily.”
“What are you doing here?”
James has a very poised face. Almost as if he hasn’t smiled in a while. That kind of face that doesn’t show emotion. What is happening to him?
“I was in the neighborhood,” he replies.
“I’m sure you were.” I cross my arms.
“I was actually planning on talking to you tomorrow.”
I raise my eyebrow skeptically.
“But since I’ve already found you…”
“What do you want?” I say, getting to the point.
“Not a damn thing,” he says a bit too normally.
“So why are you talking to me?”
“Am I not permitted to talk to you? Last time I checked, that was still legal,” he answers, annoyed.
“No, it’s just that you disappear on me, again, and then you come at me in the dark.”
He snorts. “Come at you in the dark? Makes it sound like I’m trying to mug you.”
“Actually, it’s more like a pounce,” I say in acknowledgment. I bite my cheek. Man, I have to remember whom I’m talking to sometimes.
“I don’t pounce.”
“…Then you frolic,” I counter.
“Yes, I frolic,” he tells me, entertained. There’s this glimmer in his eyes. He gives me a devious smile and I can’t help but know what inside joke he’s laughing about in his head.
“Like a woodland animal,” I add on in a childish manner. I’m just going to keep accumulating things until he stops playing along.
James laughs out loud. While scratching the back of his head, he says, “Right on.”
Huffing, I look at him in agitation. First I try to insult him and it backfires. Now, he’s laughing at my expense. Does anything ever go my way?
“Look, if it isn’t important, I’m just going to go back to the common room, James.”
“Oh-ho, look at that. You said my first name twice, out loud!” He mocks. I bite my lip and give him a strong look.
“What’s with you lately?” The soft-spoken words come out all on their own.
James walks closer to me, and before I can even catch guard, I’m backed up into a corner. His face has completely altered from his mocking face to his smoldering face. He’s so hard to read. I say one thing and the whole world stops for this guy; talk about PMS, for real. He’s more sensitive to words than Mary is during her time of the month.
“Oh, nothing, really. Just been battling some internal demons.”
Where have I heard that before?
“Why did you want to talk to me?”
He smiles. But not the genuine type of smile.
“I wanted to let you in on some changes around here that I thought you’d like to know about,” James tells me with full eye contact. My mind focuses on only one word: Change. How many times do we have to go through them? Every damn day is a challenge and every damn thing I know is disappearing. Change? I hate it. I can’t stand it. The effect of the word itself has turned my life into an inferno of drama, deceit, and lies. Why can’t things just stay as they are?
“I don’t like change. I don’t react well with…change,” I say slowly, completely off topic. His face falters for a moment, wondering why out of all that he’s just said, that one word is the only thing that’s caught my attention. James recovers instantly and arches his shoulders forward, so he’s leaning over me. Merlin, he has to stop doing this to me. Back against the wall, he completes the human box trap with putting his arm nonchalantly next to my head.
“Well,” he whispers, “You know what? Things are going to change whether you like it or not, Evans.” He leans in close and I can feel his breath tickle my face. I feel his eyes burning through me. Hesitantly, I look down, but the second I do I feel like I’ve broken a law. Because he somehow manages to make me pull my eyes back up to him.
How does he do it?
“Not if I can help it,” I said defiantly.
He chuckles blackly, “Always the stubborn one.”
I’m afraid to turn my head because I don’t want him to think I’m trying to escape. Nor do I want him taunting me for looking away from him because someone might see us. He leans in dangerously close before so much as a clear thought or decision to do anything enters my mind.
“Anyway, I just wanted to let you know, I’m back.”
I stare at him long and hard. “What?” I feel like someone’s knocked the wind out of me. Please don’t let it mean what I think it means.
“Forget the party- all the crap…just erase all that rubbish. It’s gone. Dead to me. None of that ever happened. It’s time to start new, on a clean slate.” James is speaking tauntingly, and at the same time, it’s like he’s trying to convince himself. Even I’m trying to convince myself that what he’s just said is a part of reality.
“But how is that possible? What does that even mean?” I rush out.
“James Potter: Hogwarts Resident bad boy is back, baby. New and improved,” he smirks, his face looking Marauder-devilishly handsome-ish. Oh, no. It’s that spark… The spark is back in his life. The James Potter Hell-raiser Spark.
“And you haven’t seen anything yet.”
“Sirius has told me all about it, Mary knows it as well,” Amy cornered me in the common room on the night after James told me he was ‘back from vacation’.
“And then?” I eyed her suspiciously.
“You’re jealous,” Amy smirked.
“Am not,” I muttered. But was I?
“Cut the crap, Lily,” Amy said forcefully. “Just tell him.”
“That’s right,” I explained. “Maybe I should tell the prat about my feelings with him and Carly.”
“I think you should tell him how much you hate him as well, then,” she said to me almost snidely. She knew I wanted to tell him something more. Damn her.
“Maybe I will,” I glare. “Humph.”
“Sirius and James are in the middle of Quidditch practice right now.” She looks at the clock. “We could walk down to the Pitch and see what’s going on over there. Maybe you’ll have a chance to tell James how much he ‘destroys’ your life,” she rolls her eyes.
“Very well then. I was actually planning on James dealing with his problems on his own, and I was also planning that he’d come up to me to apologize, because I was actually going to steer clear from him. But since you’re intimidating me to go down there and yell at him, I am now not going to back down from this challenge,” I huff, “until I come back to the castle with his newly chopped off head.”
Amy chewed the inside of her cheek with a worried expression. “Are you okay in the head?”
“Pfft. I’m fine. Ace as grapes, why?”
“You’re getting feisty. And after Lily Evans gets feisty she gets bitchy, and then the next level after that is VIOLENT. So I’m kind of worried about where you’re going with this.”
I rolled my eyes, like what I just said was no big deal. I shrugged and said, “So what, it’s just his head. He can get another one-”
“Merlin, Lily, shut up!” Amy grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the common room.
Amy and I sit in the stands and watch the boys and girls on the Gryffindor team pass the Quaffle and dodge the Bludgers and score goals for about twenty minutes.
“Hey,” he calls out to us from behind. Sirius flies back around again full circle and nudges James before flying towards us again. James locks eyes with me from all the way across the Pitch, and for a split second he’s caught off guard and doesn’t know what to expect, but his demeanor falls quickly, and is replaced with a smirk and an interesting wink. This makes me want to punch his eyes out, AND kick him in the groin. He should be used to it anyway, I know some girls that have beaten him up at least once.
And he plays Quidditch so…having a broomstick between his legs is so customary that he’d be used to the idea of being hit in that region. What, like you’ve never thought of that before? Oh, please.
I cross my arms and bite the inside of my check expectantly, responding to James with one of my bitchy expressions; eyebrow raised, lips set in a smirk, eyes fiery, arms crossed in a steel grip, foot tapping impatiently. And James Potter only seems to be intrigued, if not up to, the challenge of dealing with me after practice. He’d entertained by the idea of just having a bitchy Lily Evans to talk to when he gets off his broom, the prat. He smiles back at me almost immediately. Oh, boy… He does NOT know what’s coming to him. I’m going to prove Amy Bones wrong, alright. I’ll wring his neck if it’s the last thing I do.
James Potter is new and improved?
Well, so am I.
“Alright, team! Practice is over for today…good job guys. We’ll pick up where we left off next week!” James Potter, the Quidditch Captain, calls out to his team. Everyone is dismissed, and only James and Sirius are left on the field. Emma raises her eyebrows at me, expecting me to get up and give James ‘a piece of my mind’ right at this moment.
I get up and grab Amy as we make our way down the Pitch. James braces himself and turns back around again, completely ignoring me. Oh, he’s asking for it. Sirius begins collecting the Quidditch balls and kicks them towards the trunk where James is standing. He picks up the Quaffle with his feet and starts to freestyle some footie.
“Hey, look!” Sirius draws attention to his best friend, as the Quaffle is being kicked in the air back and forth. He then picks up the Snitch and starts trying to juggle both the Snitch and the Quaffle with his feet.
James looks at his best friend like one looks at an annoying child.
“Please, Sirius. In socially acceptable terms…please stop playing with my balls.”
“No! It’s fun!” Sirius whines, kicking them towards James. The Quidditch Captain is left with no other choice but to join in on the juggling.
I stomp across the grass with Amy in tow. Sirius catches sight of Mary walking towards us and leaves James hanging by himself. He gives Mary a big hug and she smiles back at him. I, on the other hand, look like a charging bull. James Potter’s profile is in my frontal vision and before I can stop myself I yell out at him.
“Let go of those balls before I kick yours in!”
He’s a bit taken aback by me, his head snapping in my direction. He purses his lips and drops the Quaffle and snitch on the ground. Facing me, he crosses his arms and stands up straight; feet apart and jaw set. I scowl.
“Oh, what is that? Your ‘terminator’ stance? Don’t look so dominant!”
He narrows his eyes. “Shut up, Evans.”
I grind my teeth and ignore his simple jab. “You have some explaining to do.”
He smirks, knowing full well what I’m talking about. “Oh?” He plays on innocently. “What about, love?”
I’m not your damn love, you crap-muffin. “Your girlfriend.”
“Ah, yes. The lovely Carly. She’s a fox, isn’t she?”
“I know you’re doing this just to spite me, James Potter. And just so you know… it isn’t affecting me at all. In fact, I kind of feel sorry for the poor girl that has to deal with you.”
“Really, now?” His face brightens up tauntingly as he takes a few steps forward. “I’m oh-so intrigued by this fact, Evans. Do continue with your statement.”
I look around, hoping to think of a good comeback. Uh…
Nope, I got nothin’. I cross my arms in haste. Wow, I’ve been doing that a lot lately. “I’m done,” I say bluntly.
“Finally,” he comments in monotone. I mentally poke him in the eye.
“What, no snappy comeback? No snarky comment? You have absolutely nothing to say for yourself?”
“Well, if I remember correctly, I did tell you I changed.” He wags a finger at me.
“Correction – You told me you changed again,” I clarify. I stick my nose in the air. “Obviously, you’re having some weird character-changing breakdowns and your acting like this just to prove me wrong. And it’s not working. So give it up, because you’re the last intimidation that could ever get on my last nerve.”
“Ouch,” he fakes, grabbing his heart. “Is Lily Evans getting bitchy on me?” He moves closer, and I can see his sweat from Quidditch dripping down his face. “I gotta say, you are kind of cute when you’re like this.” He smirks at my freaked out face.
“Give it up, James,” I tell him again, stronger this time. “I’m on to you. I know what you’re trying to pull. Just let it go now and we might be able to walk away from each other like civilized adults.”
He seethes a bit before regaining his posture. “I told you once, and I won’t tell you again,” he snaps, annoyed. “This is me now. Take it or leave it, babe. Because I guarantee that life from now on is going to be a lot more interesting than before. So unless you have issues with coming-to-terms and dealing with shit, I suggest you get over yourself. And stay out of my business.” James pushes past me and heads straight for the showers. Amy is looking at me, completely flabbergasted at his outburst. Sirius is wide-eyed at what his best friend’s just told me. None of us were expecting that.
“Well…DAMN!” I throw my hands in the air in anger.
“Er, calm down,” Amy begs, rushing to my side.
“No!” I push her away. “If he’s going to be a total prick and act up this whole ‘bad boy’ routines for real, then bring it on! I’m not going to quit until he backs down first, I promise you that. Bring it, James Potter. Bring. It. On.”
Sirius squints at me with one eye. “Fuck, everyone’s going nuts,” he says to himself. He shakes his head and turns around, following James’s retreating figure. “I am so not dealing with this right now. Why can’t people just work out their damn problems…my best friend’s gone mental…the women are getting more and more vicious each year…why do I even come back to this place…” he trails off, talking to himself with his hands.
Mary puts a hand on my shoulder and turns me around to face her. “Look, don’t stoop down to his level Lily. He’s just trying to pretend that what ever happened between you two never happened. He’s just running away-”
“I’m tired of him running away!” I burst. “The only way I can beat him to this game now, is to get him back. I have to fight fire with fire, Mares. I need to make things right. I’m going to get James back.”
“What do you mean GET JAMES BACK? This isn’t a game,” Mary shouts. “If you both keep this up, you’re going to destroy this place. When I meant giving James a piece of your mind, I didn’t mean challenging him to a duel of false façades! You’re going to get hurt. Both of you are going get hurt,” she ends softly.
I take a deep breath. We’re the only ones on the pitch now, and Lunch is going to start in a matter of minutes. I snake my arms through hers as we walk back into Hogwarts. “Trust me, this is going to be the only way to get James off his high horse. I’m sick and tired of this mess. He’s going to pretend nothing’s going on and date Carly and act like the ‘bad boy of Hogwarts’ again? Fine. I’m going to show him the new and improved Lily Evans he’s never seen before. James won’t know what to do with himself.”
“I still don’t think this is going to turn out well…” Amy frowns.
“Don’t worry,” I tell her. “This is strictly business – and revenge.”
“Someone’s feelings are bound to get hurt.”
I roll my eyes. “The only person who’s going to get hurt is James.”
“But hasn’t he been hurt enough?” Amy mumbles to herself, but I don’t hear her.
I thought Muggle Studies was bad enough way before this school week got started, but I stand corrected. This can get worse. Much worse. Normal, textbook approved lessons being replaced with feelings, and thoughts of the mind, and how one is affected my emotions- and- and- Merlin… hormones! Could you imagine? No, wrong question - Could you imagine yourself talking openly about teenage hormonal instabilities in a classroom filled with people that care more about their broomsticks than their wands?
That sounded highly suggestive.
“Good morning class,” our Muggle Studies professor, Professor Franklin, greets us cheerily the following morning. “I’m pleased to announce that our Psychology project is going to begin and in the weekend right before Easter, we’ll have our field trip and will have a Muggle camping trip in Hogsmeade…” After that sentence concerning the camping trip, I automatically tune her out.
“I’m kind of excited for this,” Mary says to me; look wide-awake and open for today’s lesson. I, on the completely different and lopsided other hand, look like I need an energy drink injection to my heart and ten pounds of coffee. I woke up today with the biggest headache, and I think I feel a cold coming on. Fabulous. Like it wasn’t bad enough that I was up all night doing extra credit homework for Biggins. That teacher is Satan on tiny legs.
And to top it all off? I get reminded that today is a new lesson day in Muggle Studies. On the one day I feel like crap in a brown bag set on fire, my class and I have to start discussing our ‘feelings’ about what we ‘go through’. Hell no. I’ve seen the televisions shows. I refuse to be left sitting in an awkwardly shaped chair to speak about why I hate my yeti-like hair and myself.
“Oh, yeah,” I spit out sarcastically, “I can’t wait to explain my feelings about my redheaded fro to Professor Franklin.”
“You look fine,” she assures me.
She’s a big fat liar. Have you seen my late night comb-over hair? No? Then you can’t agree with Mary. Because it looks horrible! Really. It looks like someone’s dragged me across the pavement backwards. And I say that melodramatically. I had no time to look decent or get myself ready this morning. To top it all off, I stumbled late into breakfast so the coffee was all gone. And I can’t survive without my coffee in the morning on days like this. It got me grumpier than my time of month.
“No, I do not look fine. And no, I do not want to do this!” It’s too early in the morning for a Dr. Phil session.
My best friend throws me one of her looks. “Lily, class hasn’t even started yet and you’re already yelling negativity in my zen. I’m trying to harbor my positivity before class so please keep your negative thoughts out of my mental garden.”
I throw her my WTF face. “Uh, what?”
Mares pretend that she hasn’t just said something completely unlike her. She looks around nervously before turning to me. “What?” she asks nonchalantly, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear.
I sigh and shook my head. I have nothing to say to her anymore. I just bite the inside of my cheek and gaze at her.
“It’s not a bad thing to try, anyways. I’m tired of being pissed off all the time. And I’m actually excited for this class! Can you believe it? Me- excited, for Muggle Studies? You know, I always liked Psychology…”
My mind goes off on its own and before I know it I start to see dancing sheep and leaping coyotes. Don’t judge me, I’m suffering from lack of sleep.
“Okay, students,” Professor Franklin says upon her arrival, “Pick up your quills and notepads.” She lifts off the sheet of names from her desk. “We are about to begin our first lesson of the day with your new partners.”
“Riley and Stevens, Marchin and Blimgt… Finelly and Clinsky, Black and Lupin…”
A high five is distributed in the middle of the classroom behind me. Two guess who they are.
“- Margham and Pettigrew, Potter and Evans, Micah and Oakland…”
Oh, fuck my life sideways!
After Professor Franklin is done calling out all the names from her list, everyone begins to move to their partners.
“Lily,” Mary warns me, “Get up.”
I curled my hands around the desk. “NO.”
I’m not talking about Psychology with James Potter. I could laugh out loud like a maniac right now. How ironic could this be? This is Dumbledore’s sick joke, isn’t it? Having a conference with the teachers and telling them to ruin me. I swear it’s happening.
Sirius and Remus somehow end up sitting in the two desks behind me.
“Hello there, mate!” Sirius Black greets, plopping down in his seat.
My elbows lock.
“Lily!”
“I’m not moving, Mary.”
“This is unhealthy, even for you-”
“Oh, where, oh, where, could my partner be?” The devil cites before stalking over.
I bite my lip. I give my best friend my pity glance: Save me from this nightmare, my facial features scream out.
Mary narrows her eyes at James in response. She may be in a positive state of mind, but I sure as hell know she‘s got my back when it comes to eye narrowing. Or ass kicking.
“Don’t act stupid, alright? She’s not in the mood today. She hasn’t had enough coffee to handle you yet. If I hear anything from across the room, I’ll be kicking you straight in the arse,” she advises him before walking all the way across the room to meet with her partner.
James gives me a wicked smile and winks. “Well. That was a welcomed greeting.” He turns his chair around and immediately starts chatting with his friends. Meanwhile, our Professor is trying to quiet everyone down to explain the directions for today’s activity. An activity I’m going to have to do with James Potter.
Stick a fork in my eye.
Do it.
DO IT. NOW.
“Settle down, everyone. Settle down.”
James is still hammering away, talking about some film he saw.
I do the rational thing and pinch his thigh. Hard.
“Ah!” he squeals, rubbing the spot. He’s looking caught off guard and offended.
“Woman!”
“Yes?” I ask with spite.
“No you may not!” He exclaims, not giving me permission to pinch him again.
“Oh, I may,” I tell him with a twitch in my eye. And it must look nice with my Chewbacca hair I have going on. A good over all mental view of my evil scorning-ness. Yep.
Professor Franklin coughs loudly to get everyone’s attention.
“Now, as you all may know, we will be moving on to psychology for our next Muggle Studies lesson. This month, we will be discussing emotions and how the mind truly works. You will be working with your partner for the most of this month’s lesson, so make sure you both are comfortable with working with each other.”
“I am not really sure how many of you have truly studied the art Psychology can truly be- there are many ways, I assure you, to study the works of the brain. But, we will be doing things a bit differently then some of you may think. Instead of the tradition Muggle texts on teaching, we will be working more on magical emotions caused by wizards and witches alike. More hands-on, in sense,” she informs us, walking towards her chalkboard. She waves her wand and notes appear.
“This is your assignment for this week, due on Friday. I decided to let you know ahead of time so you and your partner could discuss and prepare on how to complete the parts of this assignment. Today we will start out with just an introduction to perception, critical thinking, and the like. But before we delve into the matters that pertain to your assignment above, we will do a little exercise.”
Running out of this damn classroom is the only kind of exercise that’s coming to my mind right about now.
“Our knowledge of the mind will not just stop and how we see and perceive things, but also how we feel things as a whole, as a unit. A lot of individualism, you could say, will be broken apart and spread around for us to analyze. This exercise, for instance, will be very opinionated, but its all for the good of knowledge. It will help us learn that not everyone thinks the same as us. There is no right or wrong answer.”
“I like the sound of that,” James sniggers.
I hiss, my teeth barred out. He jolts and then tries to play it off as an electric shock.
“We will definitely be doing a lot of these throughout the next couple of weeks, but your results will be graded. For today’s exercise, it will be nothing but practice…except, I will be collecting your data after class, so make it good and spend all your time in a productive manner. Without opening your books, turn to your partners.”
It’s like an old western gun dual soundtrack has started playing. James looks at me, and I look at him. He raises his eyebrow, and I raise mine. He blows me a kiss, and I give him my middle finger.
“Make sure to turn your chairs around fully so you are facing each other. Okay, now on a piece of paper, write your answer to the question I’m going to ask you. The rules are, you cannot speak to your partners, and you cannot take your eyes off of each other. No wandering eyes and no looking around the room. This is a thinking drill to see if you can see your own reasoning while trying not to think about the person in front of you.”
“Ready to stare and get lost into my dreamy eyes, Evans?”
“Oh, were those your eyes? I thought they were gaping black holes of death residing in the middle of your face,” I say in monotone.
Remus and Sirius laugh out loud and Professor Franklin tells them to hush.
“As I was saying, no peaking around the classroom and do not look at what you write. Are we all ready for the question?”
The whole class says yes in unison.
Professor Franklin reads off her clipboard and asks us, “What makes the world go ‘round?”
What kind of question is that?
“You are allowed to discuss this topic with your partners, but you may not tell them what you are writing down,” our professor finishes off, before the classroom erupts into chatter.
“Well, this is going to be pretty easy,” my partner says cockily.
I narrow my eyes. “How so?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
I push him to continue.
“Quidditch!” he says.
I bite back a laugh. “Quidditch?”
“Yes.”
“Quidditch?”
“YES.”
“Hah, I don’t think so. I highly doubt Quidditch makes the world go ‘round.”
“Oh, really,” he wheedles sarcastically.
“Really,” I say again.
“And why the hell not?”
I roll my eyes. “Because, James I-am-a-sports-bigot Potter, the world itself doesn’t revolve around sports. Nor does it depend on that particular sport to keep going around and around again. Obviously she means something on an intellectual level.”
“Whatever,” he scoffs.
“Whatever,” I mimic in a gorilla voice.
“Really cute,” he comments.
“Shut up.”
We end up staring at each other boringly while everyone else is working. This goes on for about three full minutes. And then we resort to listening to other people’s conversations. Which turns out to be a bad idea, because we’re in the front of the classroom. And the other desks are placed farther away. They’re kind of scattered in to rows of two, but we’re just pushed up more. And what does that lead to?
“Oh, Remus, your eyes are so dreamy.”
It leads to THIS.
In our peripheral vision, we can basically see Remus and Sirius making flirty kissy sounds, pretending to be schoolgirls. What pricks? Even though we can’t turn our heads or look around, the effect is still the same. Although I’d love to see this full on for myself.
“Oh, Sirius, what a wonderful complexion you have,” Remus cries out in a girly voice.
Sirius pretends to bat his eyelashes. “Oh, but you are so much prettier.”
“OHHHHHHHH, you are soooooo sweet!”
I take offense to this. And not just the dialogue. All of it. Firstly girls do not talk like that. Ever. And second, we don’t talk to other girls about how pretty they are. If Remus and Sirius are both girls, then the whole ‘making fun of girls flirting with guys thing’ doesn’t work.
See? I have rational thinking skills.
“I knew it,” James feigns surprise. “All those late night tutoring sessions…they were all cover ups. I knew it all along, I did.”
“How could you not? He’s my type,” Sirius jokes.
“Of course! Why didn’t I think of that? You usually go for guys two inches shorter than you.”
“What can I say? I fell for his…wolfish manly features,” Sirius smirks. Now he’s just carrying it out too far.
Remus Lupin’s face instantly stiffens. Is it just me, or is he playfully glowering at Sirius?
“I mean, he practically animal pounced on me-”
Remus punches him in the arm, making Sirius respond with, “GAH!”
James bursts into laughter. I pinch his thigh again.
“Oi!”
“Focus!” I snap. “We have to get this done. Never mind them.”
“Ugh, fine. You think of something.”
“Me? Why me?” I spit out desperately. “I can’t do all the work. And besides, you have to write your own answer. You idiot, if you listened to Professor Franklin-”
“Wah-Wah, Wah-Wah...WAHHHHH.” He makes little figure puppets with his hands and insinuates to me that I talk too much and that I am boring him to tears.
“Oh,” I growl. “Do not get me started.”
“But I love rallying you up,” he says happily. I ignore him and focus on our assignment.
I sigh and calm myself down. “Okay, so we need to discuss what we think about the question and talk about what we personally think contributes to the world going ‘round. We can’t see our answers, so we’re going to have to talk about it without giving out too much information.”
“And?”
“And, what?”
“What is it going to do? Is she going to tell us if we are doing it correctly? Is there a certain way to do this - are you sure you are following everything right?”
I seethe. “Yes, you ignorant little panda. I am following everything perfectly. Now talk.” Before I hit you in the nads and turn you into a eunuch.
“I told you. I think Quidditch makes the world go ‘round,” he states simply.
“For heaven’s sake, come on.”
“Get off my back! I like Quidditch, and I’m biased. So be it. In my world, Quidditch and the world revolve around each other. Or me, rather.”
At least it sounds like him.
“Anything else, Mr. Big-Quidditch-fan?” I roll my eyes.
“Armani Exchange,” he smirks. “You know I love Armani Exchange, the new season is superb.”
“But that’s so shallow! You only care about clothes and sports! She’s looking for meaningful answers-”
“And how do you now? What if the purpose of this whole exercise is to find out what’s really important to a person, and to find out what they personally think controls their life?”
I open my mouth a crack to respond, but I’m stumped.
Oh my poop-y pants. What if he’s right?
“What if the whole point of the question is to see how many people have something in common? Say, my world revolves around Quidditch, and your world revolves around… Oh, I don’t know…ruining lives- what would that say-”
“Hey!”
“I’m sorry, did I say something offensive?”
“I do not ruin lives!” I inform him hotly. “And even if you are right about the exercise, we can’t be sure. It’s better to show a more intellectual side. Something deeper behind your first thought. Like tacos, for instance. Sirius Black’s world practically revolves around tacos. Maybe that means he wants to learn Spanish, or he likes Mexican food, or he’s having an affair with a Spanish woman-”
“I wish…” Sirius mumbles.
“Stay out of this,” I snap, not even breaking eye contact with James.
“Me too,” Remus says in a melancholy voice.
“Anyways,” I interrupt. “What I’m trying to say is that there has to be a motive behind what we think.”
James looks down in his lap for a split second and before I can yell at him about leaving my eye contact, he looks up at me with innocent eyes. “What about you?” He asks quietly.
I’m not ready for his softness, so I just stand there with my mouth agape, ready to speak, with my eyebrows raised and chest puffed with air. I exhale and swallow loudly. I blink a few more times.
“What do you mean?
“What makes your world go ‘round?”
Why am I sweating?
“Uh, I’m… not sure,” I make out after a while.
“Oh.”
I furrow my eyebrows in frustration and try to think. “I guess…I guess that family doesn’t really make the world go ‘round. Maybe other people’s families- well, uh, I don’t know. Happiness, maybe? Being with people that make you feel great.”
He nods his head in agreement. I think?
“Okay.”
“Okay,” I murmur.
Love.
That’s it.
That’s what it is.
That’s what makes the world go ‘round.
“Hey, James, do you think saying ‘a cucumber makes the world go ‘round’ signifies that men dominate existence in a sick, twisted, and completely sexual way?”
“Yep.”
“Thought so.”
“I like cucumbers though! You make it sound perverted,” Remus whines.
Sirius howls in laughter and holds his head in his hands. His shoulders shake as he stutters, “You- you, you like cucumbers…”
I can feel the heat of Remus Lupin’s cheeks from all the way over here. I don’t even have to look at him to know he’s flushed and embarrassed.
“You’re a bastard, Padfoot.”
“Teehee.”
Yes, he really did just laugh like that.
“You ruddy little pervert.”
“Whatever,” Sirius laughs, “you like cucumbers.”
“Boys,” I intervene. “Enough with the sexual innuendos.”
“Never!”
“Lily likes cucumbers,” James bursts into laughter. And so do his friends.
My eyes bug out of my head. OH MY GOSH!
“You ignoramus!” I burst. “I can speak for myself! And as for my vegetable preferences…they don’t involve you.”
“What she means to say, Prongs, is that it doesn’t involved your cucumber,” Sirius corrects and Remus is submerged with laughter.
Sweet biscuits! My mouth is just hanging open in shock right now! I cannot believe he just said that. James is red in the face and I look absolutely horrified. Shoot me down now.
“Sirius?” I said, trying to keep my temper under control.
“Yes, Gingerpie?”
“If it weren’t for Mary, I’d kick you in the mouth. Just saying.”
A siren starts ringing loudly in the classroom. I groan and grip my ears. Professor Franklin looks stricken for a moment and takes her wand out. She performs a silencing charm as quickly as she can.
“Er, sorry. A tad too loud?” she asks the class.
“Just a bit,” I hear Mary say across the classroom, sounding utterly pissed and disgruntled. So much for inner zen.
“That was the timer. Which means time is up. So please, everyone, write down your answer on your parchment without looking at your partner’s answer.”
“Don’t write Quidditch,” I warn him.
He just sticks his tongue out like a child and scribbles down on our parchment.
“Now before I go about collecting your answers, take a look for yourselves at what your partners have written,” she says, giving us permission to look. James and I switch papers.
I almost rip his in half. “BROOMSTICKS!?”
He shrugs, giving me a careless look. “It was the closest thing to Quidditch I could think of.”
I’ve been partnered with someone who knows his wood preferences better than his times tables.
“James, you dolt! Do you have any sensibility at all?”
“Shut’cho mouth! Broomsticks are a very valid answer to what was asked. So stop hating.”
“I’m not hating.”
He raises his eyebrow skeptically. “Sure. Just because my answer happens to be the best-”
“Don’t kid yourself for a second-”
“Besides, what did you write down that was so great?” He asks me, sticking his nose in the air. He takes my note and reads it.
“LOVE!?” James blurts out in an insulting manner.
I’m beginning to glare at him more and more as the day goes on.
“Yes,” I respond venomously. “Is there a problem with that?”
“You think love makes the world go ‘round?”
“Yes.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes,” I grit my teeth.
“Hah! Typical woman,” he scoffs. I snap my paper back.
“Love does make the world go round, you nincompoop. With out love people can not be….well, you know…”
“Conceived,” Sirius finishes off.
I turn my head to look at him. He waves his hand off, telling me to continue.
“Yes, if you put it that way. And if there is none of that, then there are no people. And without people, there is no human race. Then we’d all have to start over again from scratch.”
“It all started with that tiny little organism, swimming all by its lonesome self, in that shallow sea…” Remus props his chin up with his hand. He looks off and sighs. “The little engine that could,” he reminisces.
“Right,” I speak in plainly. “Because you were there.”
Before Remus can give me his rebuttal, Professor Franklin collects our work and gives us the rest of the period off. I’m left staring out the hazy window in silence. I lay my head on the desk and look outside. It’s starting to rain, and I get to see the first drops of water before anyone else. Everybody in class is either chatting or doing extra course work. Mary’s across the room making small talk with her Muggle Studies partner and James, Sirius, and Remus are babbling away as if the world depends it. Seriously, they see each other all the freaking time and they don’t get bored with each other at all.
My answer was right.
My answer was true.
Love. That’s all it takes to change this world.
Imagine, all the loss in the world and all the unfaithfulness going on, and there are still people that hope for a better tomorrow - in any sense. How can someone be happy without love? Love and happiness are the same thing, just in different forms. Those people, the ones that have nothing but believe in everything… I believe that they make the world go ‘round. If they didn’t have that happiness, that love, they’d be nothing. And there would be nothing. Nothing at all, to live for. I hate to ask the question, but I must ask myself: Am I happy?
I can’t say yes, and I can’t say no. My eyes get blurry.
I’m going back to that deep place in my mind again. Dear Merlin, help me. I don’t want to think about all the things I’ve lost. The only good things I have ever gained in my life were my best friends, Mary and Ames. Magic didn’t help much either. It made me lose my sister and things at Hogwarts just lead to more pain. Like Snape… So basically for my whole life, I had to just put up with it and hold up my head high.
I remember the days when love was enough. I wish it were still like that, in a way.
It starts to rain hard, and the drops hit the window with a tough tapping sound and I just concentrate on it. It’s funny how the universe sometimes knows what your thinking, and it does things - maybe it’s some sort of higher power we are too ignorant to understand - but it does things, to show you its there. It shows you that it’s there for you. It cares. And for some reason, I feel like the world is crying with me right now.
The muscles coming out of his school shirt basically call out to me. It’s as if we’re walking through a long tunnel, but in reality, I’m walking through a large hallway and he‘s at the opposite end. Everything is in slow motion. I haven’t been getting much sleep lately, so everything’s making me kind of fuzzy. But this, this is just torturous. He has his schoolbag across his shoulders with his collar loose but not unkempt. His tie is undone slightly and his shirtsleeves are rolled up lazily to his elbow.
Every step I take echoes in my ears; as if a large rock being thrown against a wall is accompanying my every step. My breathing isn’t necessarily picking up, but slowing down. I can feel it. Either something’s wrong with me because of my sleep deprivation, or James is doing something on purpose to get me to stare at him. I think it’s a combination of both.
It’s like a scene in a film where the guy and girl are walking at the opposite ends of the hallway. The only difference between what’s happening right now and what happens in the movies, is that the climax of the scene has not occurred yet: the meet in the middle, where the male probably sweeps the girl off her feet and pulls her into a passionate kiss. Yeah, that kind of chick flicks stuff.
I’ve only just seen him at the end of the hall, yet I see him as if he’s under a magnifying glass. And I can’t help but just look at him laugh and walk with his friends. He seems happy. But there’s something that doesn’t seem right. Mary and Amy are talking, just like Remus and Sirius are. And yet we’re both pretending to be in the conversation.
I’m walking emotionless with my friends like a zombie, and he’s trying to pretend he’s in on the joke his friends are talking about. I hope to heavens that he takes a right turn soon. I don’t know what’s come over me all of a sudden, but it’s not normal. Well, not normal for me, anyways. Should I be looking at him like this? Seems like I can’t take the heat. Because I feel like I should be sweating.
Awkwardly enough, I don’t mind it.
He bites his lip and he slows down his walk only slightly, to look at his feet as he walks. He doesn’t see me at the end of the hallway, nor does he know I’m watching him. I’m getting nearer, closer to him. It’s a long corridor, but the corridors of Hogwarts can only run for so long…
I hear his walking feet. James grazes his somewhat scruffy 3 o’clock shadow in a hazy manner before sighing, and looking up. I can only imagine what I look like. A combination of a ginger-haired garden gnome, maybe? Without the hat, of course. And the midget/elf height thing. I don’t remember the last time I wore makeup and I fell asleep with my hair wet last night, so it’s loose and tussled, basically wavy all around. Messy and a bit tangled, but manageable. I should have probably thought about dabbing concealer under my dark circles. I like to call them my baggy lady eyes. If it wasn’t for the uniform, people would think I was homeless.
I wish he didn’t look so…relaxed, poised, and well rested. I know that there’s a part of him that is unsettling. Like me. It’s just affecting me more. And all the while I keep going back and forth between thoughts of what he was to me and what I thought of him throughout the years, he doesn’t take his eyes off of me. The bag on my shoulder no longer feels like a thousand pounds. I don’t see any other students around to pester or annoy me with their shoving and yelling. I see him looking at me and I almost stop walking all together. He bites his lip as a reaction to me, probably my looks. Maybe he’s having a laugh? At the destruction he’s caused? Hell, I’d boast about it if I were him. Not going to lie.
Alas, he looks tired too, when I look at him. I know this because I’m closer to him now then I was two steps ago. I’m counting down the feet it’s going to take until it happens. Until we pass and meet each other half way. He’s looking me straight in the eyes now. What else is there to do? Do I look away and push through his shoulder, or do I keep looking at him as if nothing’s happened this year? It’s been a week since the last time I’ve talked to him. I feel as if something’s missing when I don’t see him, I hate to admit it.
His eyebrows shift slightly, and I can almost move my cheek to his, we’re so close. The meet in the middle. It’s happening in slow motion and I can’t handle it. Nanosecond by nanosecond is passing and we do nothing but stare at each other. It’s like a mix between hate, frustration, and awe. In other words, a very complicated look. It’s storming outside and we’re all headed to the last class of the day. Imagine how awake we still are from our early morning classes to have enough energy for these stupid looks! I can’t take my eyes off of James, though, and he can’t seem to care enough to say anything. I’m tired of initiating everything. It’s a hassle.
The fact that I want so badly to just talk to him is bizarre beyond anything. One second he’s the cocky Potter I know and hate. The next, he’s this strange boy who’s trying to figure me out and I do have to admit that I like it. I don’t get it. Eh. I just can’t fathom how I’ve been feeling lately.
We stare at each other for another three nanoseconds, and just as I’m about to turn my head away, I swear to Merlin, he looks down at my lips. I let out a little gasp and he notices; I turn around just in time to go completely red in the face and scurry off like Madam Pince when she catches two people snogging in the library.
Right at the end of my head turning away from him, he had looked back at me, square in the eyes. I saw it from the corner of my pupil.
Why did he do that? WHY? He has a girlfriend. James and I had a snog-so what? He has Carly Carrington. But I feel like I’ve lost something now. I’ve never had this feeling before…
I’d love to wake up one day without regretting what I did or didn’t do yesterday, you know? It’s like that feeling, repeatedly. I wish I knew how to fix or not fix what ever the hell is happening. I feel like we’re poker chips that were thrown in the air. Our velocity has changed to zero and we are not moving at all. As if we are dangling in mid-air, and we’re just waiting for the fall.
WTFDTAM.
Translation: What the fuck does this all mean?
“Kelly Ormandy’s got the Quaffle!”
I was at the first ever Hogwarts’ Quidditch match that was taking place on a Wednesday night. Dumbledore told us that it would be cooler in the evening since the April morning sun was a bit too much. Besides, I knew he had arranged it specifically tonight since we Sixth and Seventh years were having our Muggle Studies Hogsmeade Camping trip on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. And on Monday evening, we would be on the Express heading back to London.
“She’s going…going…going… STOPPED! Interception! By Brianna Foxtrot! What luck!” The announcer bellows, and for a second, I smack myself in the face for realizing what I had been missing.
Why didn’t I go to a single match this year? This may be the fourth match so far, but still! I forgot how wonderful they used to be. Maybe it was my way of pushing James away? Maybe...
I can't decipher why, honestly.
But whatever. All I can do now is just inhale the wind and the cold and the excitement, letting the happiness spread itself around. So that's what I'm going to do. And I’m here with my two good friends, Amy and Remus, which is the best part of it all.
“I’m quite glad I came down here tonight,” I smile at them. They both laugh and nodded.
I exhale quickly and try to keep watch of the players out in the field. Everyone in the stadium is shivering in excitement, their breaths turning into a white fog when it hit’s the cold night air. I think I’m kind of happy right now. I gaze at the Gryffindor Quidditch players in both awe and appreciation. I forgot the feeling of what going to a match felt like. The unity and the satisfying need to know that you’re a part of something. The matches used to be one of my favorite parts of Hogwarts when I was younger. Even if I avoided the celebrations in the common room and not party with the rest of the team, I still thought the matches were significant…or at least important, in my Hogwartian life.
I wonder what’s important to me now?
“Well, the night’s been going off splendidly, folks. Arthur Bell’s just blocked a goal from Mary McDonald and- WOW! BLUDGER TO THE HEAD! By Jon Peruvian, everyone, straight into Connor Elizabeth’s face! Connor’s been captain of the Ravenclaw team since Sixth Year, unlike our captain, who’s been the boss and running this place since Fourth Year.” You know, Samuel McLaggen is quite the entertaining sports announcer.
Speaking of James.
He looks like he’s at the top of his game, I hate to say. I see him make eye contact with Carly in the crowd and she blows him a kiss. But awkwardly enough, he turns away from her before she’s fully touched her hands to her mouth. Strange. James loves the attention he gets from people in the stands, especially the girls.
“We’ve got James Potter, captain of the Gryffie Clan, and number one captain in my position, playing for seeker. He’s looking brooding tonight, everyone. But let’s face it, all of us Gryffindor lads are quite dashing, I can’t lie about that. Event though I thoroughly appreciate the amount of females surrounding me at the moment…Ladies, close your jaws, this isn’t a boy scouting convention-” McLaggen gets cut off immediately by Professor McGonagall, and he returns to his mike with a sullen look on his face.
The players’ whiz passed the Gryffindor stands and everybody goes nuts.
“What I meant to say is that all the players on the team are all wonderful people. And that I am not biased, nor do I favor my House in this game whatsoever,” he says in strict robotic monotone, with an annoyed expression.
The roaring of the crowds send me into a small dose of euphoria as I chat with Ames and Remus as the game continues on. Suddenly though, in the most rare moment, I turn my head to look up and it just so happened to be the same moment that James eyes the snitch.
I’d be lying if I said I didn’t care James Potter has already sighted the snitch, but I was too satisfied with my result.
“McDonald’s got the ball and she’s going for it! SHE’S CLOSE, ALMOST THERE- SCORE! TEN POINTS FOR GRYFFINDOR!”
I actually get up and cheer for Gryffindor.
“Both Ravenclaw beaters are whacking the pigeon out of their bludgers! Beatrice Reynolds, Gryffindor’s prized possession chaser is practically in intensive care, thanks to those jerk-offs in Ravencl-”
“MISTER MCLAGGEN!”
Professor McGonagall stands up abruptly and shouts at Samuel McLaggen, hands flying around. Is it just me or did Professor just make a gesture to kill him? I turn my head for a better look.
Oh, no, she’s just reaching for his ear. Once she gets a hold of it, she yanks Samuel and drags him out of his seat. But not without him trying to rip the microphone away. Stunningly enough, McLaggen pulls a 10 Things I Hate About You maneuver and starts dancing on the bleachers, trying to get away from McGonagall. She chases him around hastily.
“Folks- FOLKS! It seems that”- intake of breath - “I am unfavorably being dismissed, but- BUT I HAVE TO ANNOUNCE- OH, MY! One of Ravenclaw’s beaters, Birch Berkley, has whacked off a huge bludger directed at…uh, oh!” He points off into the field and everyone stops what they're doing, even Minerva McGonagall.
On the pitch I see Sirius Black diving toward the bludger. I see James shift his head, and we actually lock eyes for the first time today. My mind is twisting in confusion and by the time I get it why Sirius is trying to collide with the bludger, it’s already too late.
To say that I heard the sickening crack would be an overstatement, but I felt it. I guess that’s a little strange, but it’s as if I felt the bludger hit me right in my back, too. James hadn’t looked at me at all until now, when he decided to look behind him and find me on his left side in the stands, and it had to happen like this. It’s as if I saw it happen in slow motion.
“JAMES POTTER'S BEEN HIT WITH A BLUDGER!”
A plunging in my stomach occurs and the most horrid feeling gushes over my body as I jump up, unable to scream, and just stare at James. Who has fallen off his broomstick because of the momentum of the hit. His limp body is quickly making its way to the ground.
Usually, when players get hit, there is a mix of emotions on the Pitch. But it’s different with James Potter. Out of all the ways he could have gotten hit, he had it the worse. It didn’t hit his face, but his back- square in his back. It rolled off his shoulder and out of his sight before Sirius even reached him. Everybody in the crowd is stunned. Even Samuel McLaggen’s stopped trying to get away from McGonagall. The crowds are 80% paralyzed, and the simmering down of conversation brings more awareness to the game. I gasp involuntarily, knowing I was the last thing James saw before the bludger hit him.
You know how sometimes you think of events that may happen, in your mind, and you try to decipher what you would do if it actually happened? Well I’m telling you now that that idea can go to shit. I thought up of a million different excuses for why I‘m here, and News Flash: it’s never like you expect it to be, and you’ll never know what you’ll do until it really does happen.
It’s kind of pathetic, how shocked I was when he got hit. I’m making it sound like he’s been infected with the plague; I know it sounds worse than it actually is - but I don’t care. It’s like I need to be here, in the hospital wing, with him. I need to see James Potter for myself. Call it mixed feelings, if you will. But it isn’t going to change my sense of direction anytime soon. My sense of direction is now in front of his bed, and that’s where it’s going to stay. I’m the first to arrive and I’ll probably be the last to leave. I left before the match ended, so I have no sense of time right now. It’s dark out, and that’s about all I know.
I see him in that bed and my mind wanders.
I feel my heartbeat slow down but start to quicken at the same time.
Do I know this person? Was he the same old James I knew six years ago? I shook my head. This was all so confusing.
Someone opens the doors to the Hospital Wing like a bat out of hell, but before I can turn around I hear “Oh, James!” in a voice of sheer panic. It’s Carly Carrington, clad in her cute mini-skirt like peacoat and 3 inch heels with no stockings. Carly rushes (perhaps waddled like a penguin would be a better way of explaining it) over to where James has been placed and gives me a once over. Her face is far too readable.
“Uh, hi,” she says, unrepentantly. Carly isn’t annoyed that I’m here, but is merely disinterested in the fact that I beat her to it. Being the first to come to James Potter’s bedside, that is.
“Hello, Carly,” I say to her calmly. Hello, James Potter’s girlfriend. Hello, girl that has changed him for the worse. Hello, tart-y little woman. Hello, imposter. Hello, you’re an excuse for him to act different. Hello, you’re not right for him.
She darts to the side of his bed immediately, and cradles his face in her hands. The small insignificant fact that James doesn’t have a shirt on bothers me. I feel like she shouldn’t have the right to be seeing him with no shirt on, half naked. I don’t like that.
She pouts at his dream-like face and I try not to scoff. “Baby, oh, you poor thing, I’ll promise that when you wake up we’ll-”
“He’s fine. Madame Pomfrey’s just doused him with a remedy that’s basically put him in some sort of deep sleep slash coma for a quicker recovery.”
She doesn’t say anything, but I sense my presence being no longer welcomed.
Hah.
“What happened? What did Madame Pomfrey say when he came in?”
“Well, the bludger hit him straight on the back. And I mean dead on. Gravity could not have been a bigger bitch,” I inform her, not caring about she views me anymore. She isn’t completely taken aback by my nonchalance, but she's looking at me differently.
“Poppy said that since the bludger rolled off his shoulder before flying off in the other direction, it prevented an even harsher bruise from appearing on his back. That’s the only upside. I haven’t seen it for myself, but he’s bruised all over. Not to mention the stitching work from the Bludger left small cuts, or so I was told. But anyways, all he can do is rest, and once the cuts close up and the bruises heal, he can go back to playing Quidditch. The hit just took a lot out of him.”
“Oh my gosh, does he have a circular bruise like the size of a planet on his back? Does it look like a black hole? Is it gonna be weird to look at?”
I question for a second if she’s serious or not.
“Not really,” I reply in a deadpan voice. I feel like my eyebrows are both in a straight line and my mouth are naturally frowning. But I can’t tell because I’ve been making that face for hours. This girl is sucking the intelligence right out of me. She’s an intelligence mosquito and I just want to squash her with my boot.
Gah, listen to me! I’m such a little snooty girlfriend-hater right now!
Why am I being so caddy?
Slash, I’m kind of enjoying this.
“How long have you been waiting here?” She asks me, dare I say, snobbishly.
I sigh in annoyance and she leans on one foot, cocking her hip to the side, in response (I’m such an intimidator, I love it); I notice that Carly’s crossed her arms. Her eyebrows are raised up into an expression that reads ‘Well?’.
Does that mean I should respond to her question then?
*sarcasm*
“I’ve been here since before the match ended,” I try not to snap. It’s none of her business how long I’ve been here. “As soon as he got called off by Madame Hooch, I left the stands. So, I guess I’ve been here for the remaining 40 minutes or so. Did the game just end?”
“Yes,” She responds pointedly. I have no idea why…
“Who won?” I thought that would be the obvious question accompanying what I said about the game ending. Perhaps I’m giving her too much credit, not all people can hypothetically carry on a conversation.
“Gryffindor,” she responds, making sure to expose her lack of wanting to talk further. She wants me to be the one to ask questions. What is she, his mother? This whole confusing front she’s putting on is making me question whether or not she’s got an ounce of sophistication in her.
“Did you enjoy the match?” I try, pretending like I care.
“Sure.”
One word answers? Really?
“Did anyone else get hurt?”
“Do you see anyone else here?”
My jaw moves to the side in slight agitation. “No. Guess not.”
As if I needed more reasons to not like her; this is definitely going on the top of the list. The List the Makes Lily Evans Angry.
“Damn it.” Oh my goodness, did I just say that OUT LOUD?
Carly rips her gaze off of her coma-induced boyfriend and turns to me, eyebrows knit. Her arms are still folded in an annoyed manner. Carly’s face asks me the obvious question: WTF was that?
“I… Have a hang nail,” I lie. “And I just,” what the fuck, I’m so bad at this, “Uh,” MAKE SOMETHING UP, “Realized?”
Carly grimaces. “Ew.” She then turns the other direction and stares out of the window.
Looking around the room for any more possible witnesses to this crapfest of all oddities, I timidly respond with a whispery, “Exactly. Hah.”
Hah? Did I just throw in a fake laugh?
Shish kabob me through my eyes, please?okaythanks.
“Prongsie, my beloved!”
“Hardly your beloved, Padfoot.”
“Tis my beloved, Wormtail. Stop hating, you’re just jealous.”
James Potter’s friends make their presence known in the Hospital Wing.
“Oh,” Remus Lupin lightly acknowledges the glorious scenery before him. Looking back from Carly to me, and than back again, his eyebrows and his growing chest start rising together on their own.
Sirius and Peter stop walking abruptly because of Remus, and stand on either side of him. Ah, the marauder stance. The straight-line formation, just that James isn’t there. Now that I think about it, they REALLY do look like a boy band.
“Well this is lovely,” Peter comments, trying to refresh the atmosphere in the room a bit. He ruffles his back-to-normal hair out of nervousness.
“Humph,” Carly pouts, nose raised, as she leans back in her chair and looks out of the window.
I’m getting more and more annoyed by the second. Please help me not hex her into oblivion.
“How long have you two been here?” Remus questions. He finds it weird that the one least likely girl to ever see his BFF in a sleep induced coma is here before he even got the chance to arrive. Understandable.
“I was the first to get here, I left the stands right after James got carried off the field. She’s just arrived,” I say, throwing my head in Carly’s direction.
Another little pipsqueak escapes her obviously displeased mouth, but no one comprehends it.
Sirius takes off his Quidditch gear hastily and lays it on the ground.
I’m beginning to wonder why he’s suddenly gone silent. Sirius hasn’t commented yet and something is wrong in the universe. He’s a machine gun when it comes to conversation. Bam, bam, bam - and now? Not so much.
He grabs an old wooden chair from the corner of the room and swings it around, so he’s sitting on it backwards. How rebellious of him.
His first attempt at conversation is, “Why is Prongs half naked? Or am I the only one thinking about that?”
Come to think of it, I didn’t mind his silence before. In fact, I welcome it back.
“He was sweating too much, his skin needed to breathe.”
“Or maybe you just like seeing him in all his shirtless glory, Evans?” Sirius jokes fruitfully. Carly huffs discretely, but obviously weren’t discreet enough because we all witness it.
Remus punches Sirius swiftly on the shoulder, reminding him that Carly is still in the room. Sirius Black’s joking demeanor dissolves quickly and he forcefully coughs, hiding his transition.
“So,” cough, “What did Poppy say?” More coughing.
Peter, who is still standing awkwardly with his hands in his pockets, leans over and slaps Sirius’s back… hard. Sirius freezes in pain instantly, and turns his head slightly in his friend’s direction. Peter, being the innocent one, seriously thought that Sirius was having a coughing fit. His face is etched in confusion while Sirius’s face is occupied by nothing but angry glares, all thrown in Peter’s direction. And then Peter gets it, staring at his shoes in apology.
“He should be fine, needs some rest is all. He was hit pretty hard and the bludger rolled off his shoulder. Not sure about the whole stitches scenario, but Pomfrey may have to stitch some cuts on his back if this sleeping draught doesn’t do the trick. It’s laced with a homeopathic remedy for bruises and pains, apparently.”
“Well, shit if I know what that means,” Sirius blatantly affirms, slapping his knees.
“If he gets better, I’ll let you know.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have said that. Remus and Peter both throw me a knowing look, but Sirius doesn’t. Because he knows I’m going to stay here until James wakes up. A part of me thinks Sirius understands, and another part of me thinks he’s just really chill about things.
Carly is just as unresponsive as ever, glancing out of the window. She steals glances once and while to us, but doesn’t speak. She’s acting like she doesn’t care about our conversation, but I know she’s listening to all of what we’re saying. I don’t know why she doesn’t include herself. I may have mixed feelings about her but that doesn’t mean she has to pretend like she’s better than us and not talk to us. Doesn’t she kind of have to be nice? I mean, this whole group is James Potter’s set of friends.
Maybe that’s why she only hangs out with James by himself now. His friends are distancing themselves from him, and she keeps stealing him away. James has GOT to know that his mates don’t like her! He has to! There’s no logical reason for James to date someone like her, except that whole tart thing. That’s the only logical point, but everything else doesn’t add up. He wouldn’t put his friends through something like this, no matter how small of an issue it may be. He cares too much about his brothers. James doesn’t have relationships with girls like this, when he knows his friends can’t stand her anymore.
Barnacles, every time I think about Carly, or look at her, the cycle starts again; I get pissed that she’s here, then I think about why she’s here in the first place, then I try to reason why James would even consider her, and then it just takes off into a whirlpool of thoughts and feelings. Absolutely out of my control. I can’t stop this cycle from re-occurring. Every thought leads to another thought.
It’s downright exhausting.
I have to stop doing this immediately. It’s the nerd in me, always over analyzing and trying to find reason. You know what? I have to stop looking for answers all the time. All it does is fuck me up.
I haven’t noticed this until now, but I’ve been gritting my teeth since Remus, Peter, and Sirius first walked in. The muscles in my mouth ache when I relax my jaw slowly. I turn my head around in circles for a bit.
“Gryffindor won,” Peter chirps, leaning against the bottom bed frame, next to James’s feet.
“I heard! What was the score again?” I lean my head back and massage my scalp a bit.
“Gryffindor got 180 but we would have reached 200 if it wasn’t for that lame arse of a call. That Quaffle definitely went in, and we should have gotten double the points! Beatrice did flips and all that crap! You’d think it was the World bloody Cup. But Ravenclaw only got 90 anyways,” Sirius shrugs. “It was a hell of a game, though, Evans! The only thing that really put me off was ol’ Prongsie here, got me all worried. I tried to block that bludger but I didn’t get there in time. We called in our replacement seeker, though, so it was all good.”
“Yeah, Peter and I were freaking out about Prongs, but only for a short bit. We knew he’d be fine in no time.”
“You missed my victory dance, Evans,” Sirius informs me.
“Oh, the torture of not seeing you shake your moneymaker,” I sarcastically reply. “How can I live with myself?”
He smiles foolishly. “It’s okay, I’ll just do it here.”
“NO.”
“But I insist-”
“I’m quite alright.”
“Maybe Carly wants to see the dance,” Peter laughs, acting like an idiot. He then realizes she’s fully capable of hearing. Peter Pettigrew receives imaginary arse kicks from each of us, when he looks at us and sees the narrowing of our eyes, all in his direction.
It’s like Peter tries to be cool but then says something stupid, and we’re all supposed to baby-sit him because of it. Or when he says an inappropriate joke, trying to be funny, and he just comes off looking like a moron.
Carly, in response to Peter, just turns to us quietly without a word, but the attitude in her face is screaming out to all of us. We all absentmindedly look at each other without a single thought in our brains. Then Carly Carrington gets up, adjusts her coat, and huffs, “I’m going to go get ready for tomorrow,” without even looking at us or saying goodnight.
When she closes the doors to the Hospital Wing behind her, Sirius is the first to speak.
“Well that wasn’t outlandish or redundant at all.”
Shock washes over me. “You know what those words mean?” I ask, arching my neck towards him. I cross my arms and throw him a poignant look.
He rolls his eyes and relaxes his face, welcoming the change in audience.
“Well," Remus says, "It wasn’t all outlandish until Peter decided to open his gob, inviting Carly to receive a lap dance from Padfoot,” he remarks, turning to his mate.
“Sorry,” Peter mutters.
“Shit happens,” I shrug.
All three boys turn to look at me, as if timed on point. They aren’t frowning at me per se, but they're looking at me funny. They must require some skill to all turn my way and look at me at the same time; Merlin, they have to be an undercover boy band.
“That’s very…free spirited of you,” Remus Lupin observes, speaking slowly.
“Um…sure?”
“Since when are you free spirited?”
“What is that supposed to mean?” I casually ask, even though the voice in my head is a tad sinister.
“You aren’t relaxed, ever. You’re always stressed, always thinking of something. Always moving. But all of a sudden you seem, dare I say it, sluggish. Chill. Easy Peasy Lemon Squeeze-y.”
“I’ve always been lemon squea¾”
“Please don’t try referring yourself to a piece of fruit,” he briefly interrupts. “You know what I mean. You don’t cross your arms and recline in a wooden chair, and stay in silence without an opinion in sight. We know how you are, Lily. Something’s up with you.”
“I have opinions! I just don’t say them.”
Sirius scoffs, I scowl. And then Sirius opens his mouth.
“Evans, come on. You are an opinionated person. Naïve? Yes. Loud? Yes. Sensitive? Yes. But you don’t say ‘shit happens’, alright? I SAY ‘shit happens’ but you do not. And now that Remus is mentioning it, you’ve been using a lot of smart arse remarks lately. Kind of reminds me of…well, me.”
My lips are now pursed. “You did not just relate me to your sense of being.” I say this like a bad taste has found its way in my mouth. Sirius relating me to him? That’s like relating a hippo to a penguin!
“I totes magotes did,” Sirius Black counters, sounding like a teenager girl.
“Um, I don’t think so Sha-nay-nay,” I inform. “Just because I decide that I can say whatever I want with out filtering it through my brain does not mean something is up with me. Maybe I just woke up one day and decided that I wasn’t going to give a shit anymore!”
“That’s not likely,” Peter says to me.
I look at him curiously. “And how would you know?”
“You can’t just wake up and decide to be carefree, you are either pushed to some harsh realizations or go through something that changes you.”
“Oh, really.”
Sirius stretches his grip on the chair handle. “Yeah, I agree with Wormtail. You don’t live your life on uncertainty, and every time I’ve seen you this week, you’ve seemed a tad too carefree for my liking.”
I take in a big breath and lean my back against the chair. My eyes veer off to James Potter lying in his bed, sound asleep. He looks so peaceful.
“I don’t know, guys. I’m just figuring myself out.”
I know that I’ve always been uptight, but I can’t disagree with them too much. Sure, I’ve changed a tad bit, but I would consider it more of an alteration. I don’t like change, I’ve already proven that. Change has fucked up some parts of my life, parts that I probably won’t change my opinions about. So I wouldn’t change over night like their suggesting. Maybe I’m just realizing what’s important in my life and what’s not?
Perhaps I’m realizing that my being uptight was a way of self-defense. It could have been, right?
“Is there any way that your change in actions or views on things- hell, even your attitude in general- could be the result of something between you and Prongs?” Remus asks me honestly. I’m sort of afraid to look at him, or all of them for that matter. All three are looking at me so intently, I’m afraid to tear my eyes away from James’s serene face. It’s so quiet, and I don’t want to see the expression on their faces. I think that if I turned my head at any given moment, their faces would make me feel guilty.
See, there’s this thing about Sirius, Remus, and Peter. When they’re worried or ever so curious, they can look the utmost genuine. I don’t want to say that they emotionally snag at my heartstrings, but they kind of do. Just don’t tell anyone or else I’ll slap you.
“Maybe,” I mumble, with little emotion. “I’m still figuring it out, okay?” My voice is so gentle that I feel breakable at any moment. But of course, I ignore it and tell them to go get ready for tomorrow.
Remus Lupin’s face relaxes and he nods, disconnected from the conversation. “Okay,” he inhales, eyebrows raised. “Well if you figure things out, let us know. It may help us with our own marauder’s dilemma.”
“I will.”
It soon becomes painfully quiet, as we’re looking around the room for something to look at besides an unmoving James Potter. I glance at the clock.
“It’s close to midnight! You guys should head back.”
Sirius cocks his head to the side. “Why? I’m not tired.”
“Padfoot,” Peter says in a deep voice, kicking his chair. I reckon I wasn’t supposed to hear that. He knows I want to be alone, and Sirius is being thick.
“You just played a three hour match. You’re nuts if you are going to stay up all night in the Hospital wing to prove to us that you aren’t tired.”
He shrugs. “I can manage.”
This time, it’s Remus that slowly growls Sirius Black’s name.
“Okay, okay,” he forfeits, looking off. “So I’m a little tired…”
You know, the fact that they realize I won’t be leaving for a while makes me see that in some twisted sense, they care. They know I’m going to stay here for much longer, but they aren’t going to say anything. And for that, I’m grateful. Because bringing that realization into words would create tension. At least for me.
“Come on, let’s get you in to the dormitory showers, mate. You smell like piss,” Remus says flatly.
“Um… it’s called the smell of success.”
“You mean excess,” Peter corrects.
“Or just plain piss,” Remus says again.
I laugh. “Go on, get, the lot of you, before Sirius’s body odor infiltrates my nostrils and sends me into an epileptic fit.”
He rises out of his chair and puts it back next to James’s bedside. “One day… one day you’ll miss my musty arse.”
“You’re getting musty confused with moldy.”
“Moldy!? I have a MOLDY arse?” Sirius asks to no one in particular, while Remus pushes him out of the room.
“Goodnight,” Peter calls. I say goodnight to him and turn my direction to the boy lying beside me.
This is all very complicated, yes? How can I care about this boy, could you tell me? To be so motivated to sit at the foot of his bed during the night? What is wrong with me?
I go over to him and put my hand on his own; not holding it, but simply just laying it on top. I think about our history. I think about change. I think about why I don’t like it. I wonder… can he hear me? Feel me? Is he unconscious or what? Because if he was to wake up and see me like this I’d have to knock him out myself. Don’t think I won’t whack him with my shoe just because a Bludger has hit him.
My curiosity takes the best of me and I lean over him. Just leaning, mind you. We’re not touching except for our hands. I stare at his face. He looks like he’s sleeping but I don’t see him breathing that heavy. I guess he is unconscious. I should probably feel guilty for taking the advantage of seeing him this close up, but I don’t. It’s irrational, yes. But I don’t think it’s wrong.
I move my hand up his bare arms. I trace the little (and big) veins he has on his arm and neck. He is unbelievably warm.
I don’t even know why I’m touching him, but I feel like I have to. I have to check if it’s really him. If it’s the same James Potter I knew way back when.
I put both my hands on his shoulders lightly. I remember when James would take a firm grasp of my shoulders and shake them violently when we were in first year. He would get excited about something, and he would basically give me a body-shake every time.
I softly chuckle at the memory.
James was just… he was just something else. In fact, he reminded me of myself a little bit, although I never told him that. He did get seriously intense about things like I did but his preferences were usually pranks, food, Quidditch, the new collection of Armani Exchange…
My gaze falls on his chest and I catch my breath.
On his perfectly smooth and muscled chest was a cobweb of thin, white and long scars that shone sliver in the candlelight. I flinched at the memory of him screaming in pain, his shirt drenched with his own blood… In fact, he was on the very same bed when Slughorn had brought him to the Hospital Wing after Snape had cursed him.
Almost unconsciously, I traced the long scars, following them in this direction and that. They didn’t seem to stop and were all intertwined with each other.
My hands brushed over his neck but I don’t touch his face. I’m scared to; so I move my hands back down his arms and turn over one of his hands. As I’m holding it, his hand starts to sweat and I look at him to see if he’s having heart palpitations or if something is going wrong. It’s not good when someone starts sweating in their sleep, right?
“James?” I whisper.
He doesn’t answer. I guess it’s nothing.
With my left hand, I turn his hand over so the palm is facing up. With my right hand, I trace some of the lines on his fingers. I feel like I should slap him and hug him at the same time. It pisses me off that I’m here, witness his sleeping drought induced coma, worrying about his well-being, when he told me just two days ago that the new bad boy Potter was back in town and off from vacation.
Who is he? I debate whether or not to squeeze his hand, or move it to my face. Just to see if he recognizes me. Another second passes by, and I decide I’m being indifferent AND indecisive.
I drop his hand promptly.
And I sit on the chair next to his bed again, crossing my legs.
I don’t know anything anymore.
P.S. I changed quite a lot on my blog design. I just wanted to start on a fresh new page and this thought just lead me to get the background with the picture of cold, new snow which, to me, symbolizes 'starting over'. And this new attitude that I have right now is because of this very Fanfiction. James and Lily are going through loads of changes and I guess they helped me wake up as well. Thank you.
And just a heads-up, if you see a post called 'Not Just You' on this blog, you know James and Lily are...well, in a very, very sticky situation.
And just a heads-up, if you see a post called 'Not Just You' on this blog, you know James and Lily are...well, in a very, very sticky situation.
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