Summary: I never really was a morning person. I mean, I get up when I have to for classes, but believe me, I'm never happy about it. Especially when I have to stay up until four thirty in the morning to finish an essay the night before. It brought me through the stages of insanity, and everyone was a witness.
Disclaimer: Trust me, if I did own Harry Potter and all that jazz, I would not be taking AP Physics right now. Therefore, it belongs to Jo.
Sleep is a Necessity

a Siriusly Klutzy story.

Mornings. I hate mornings. They're so useless. Why not sleep for as long as you can and then go to class in the afternoon? You'd be able to stay up later to do your long, stupid assignments, and you'd be able to actually pay attention the next day. But apparently professors don't believe in the concept of sleep, and they worship the concept of mornings.

Stupid, stupid professors.

They also don't understand that I need my sleep. I simply cannot function without a good night's sleep. I can hardly function with sleep. Without sleep I look like a complete mess. My hair decides that, because it's not well rested, it needs to stand approximately a meter off my head and then actually wants to fight me when I try to pull it back into something I loosely call manageable. My socks decide that they don't want to match. Three tries it took me to get a pair of matching socks. Twice I managed to put the wrong shoe on the wrong foot.

Generally, late nights plus early mornings lead to bad days.

But I had it all planned out. I would somehow manage to make it through Potions and Charms without falling asleep, but then, once I got seated in History of Magic, I would get comfortable on my desk, use my bag as a pillow, and drift peacefully off into the world of slumber. It was perfect. Fool proof.

I'd prepared for it in the morning once I realized how ridiculous it was to get up so early after staying up so late. I mean, sure, it was my fault that I was up so late but McGonagal didn't have to assign us that pointless, annoyingly long essay. So I'm giving her half of the blame.

And I had managed to stay awake through Potions and Charms. With the help of Alice, of course.

In Potions, my eyes drooped carefully until I saw the insides of my eyelids, a very nice sight when you're tired as all hell. I was just about to put my head down on my arm when Alice caught me.

"Lily!"

I jumped and looked at her. She was grabbing a cloth on the other side of the table.

"God, pay attention, will you?" she grumbled as she took a chunk of my hair, which I noticed at that point was dripping in orange potion, and wiped it off with the cloth.

"S-s-" I yawned. "Sorry." I took the cloth and picked the seeds out of my hair.

"Why are you so tired, anyway?" she asked, dumping unaccountable amounts of something yellow into her potion. I couldn't even tell what it was, but she didn't seem to mind.

I tried to remember what time I'd stayed up until that night, but managed a yawn instead. "Sorry. I had my Transfiguration essay to write last night, so I was up until... I think four thirty."

"That's unfortunate," Alice said, tossing in some feathers for the hell of it.

"What are you doing to that potion?" I asked, glancing over into her cauldron. "That's a mess."

She shrugged. I didn't feel too up to making her fix it, so I just tossed some stuff into mine (newt eyes, fluxweed, etcetera).

"Why'd you put the essay off for so long?" Alice asked, looking around the room. She saw Jerry McGuffy putting ginger roots into his potion. She added some as well.

"I don't know," I grumbled. In all honesty, I wasn't actually planning on doing the essay until McGonagal said it was the biggest essay we'd be writing this year. Go figure, eh? The one time I just don't plan on doing the work, and it turns out to be some huge, important, life changing thing. How often does that happen?

And of course, she conveniently didn't tell us this until the day before it was due, causing me to go to extremes (meaning actually skipping dinner) to work on the bleeding essay.

By Charms, I had gotten to the point of being so tired that I was acting kind of... loony. Laughing at everyone and everything, even if it wasn't funny. I was starting to annoy myself to be perfectly honest.

As Alice and I walked into the Charms classroom, I saw a first year walking out, and then walking right into Alice. She apologized and helped pick up the students books. Do you know what I did?

I laughed. Actually, I pointed and laughed. At the little girl, who at that point looked close to tears. That's not what the head girl is supposed to do! I should have been stripped of my title then and there. Special privileges taken away. I didn't deserve them.

"I'm really sorry," Alice called as the girl took off down the hallway, probably get away from the loon. Which was me. Then she started laughing. "Are you all right?"

I laughed loudly. "Of course I am!" I grabbed her shoulder and started steering her towards our seats. "Chipper! You can't find anyone who's more all right than I am!"

Alice laughed again. "I think you've officially gone mad. But Mad Lily is more entertaining than Normal Lily."

And do you know what she did? Well, I'll tell you what she didn't do. She didn't bring me back to the dorm, claiming that I had gone insane. She didn't offer to fake sick so that I could 'take her to the hospital wing' but really bring me to the Common Room so I could calm down. She did, however, let me sit through Charms giggling like a loon.

"Do you have a spare quill?" Thomas Walton asked as Professor Flitwick got today's lessons ready.

"Why yes, Thomas. I do have a spare quill," I said, grinning like the loon I currently was.

Thomas gave me a shifty look. "May I, erm, borrow it? Perhaps?"

"Why yes, yes you may." I dove into my bag and fished out a quill and some ink. "Have a lovely time with it. And do have it back before six. Curfew."

I gave my quill a curfew! MY QUILL! And do you know what Alice did? Because she's such a good friend? She shook her head and laughed!

"What?" I asked, looking at her like she was the mad one. "I need my quill back. It has a date with the parchment at seven."

This just caused her to laugh harder. I grinned and started to 'pay attention'. Actually, what I was doing was humming a Flying Ferns song. Yes, the Flying Ferns. Alice's parents listened to them while they were in Hogwarts. And I was humming it. Loudly. At least, loudly enough to attract everyone in a four person radius.

Alice, for once, did the thing a good friend would do, and told them all to mind their own business.

I used up most of my over-tired energy in Charms after effectively getting multiple Flying Ferns songs stuck in at least four people's heads. By the time I got to History of Magic, I was grumpy and completely ready for bed.

"Lily, the bags under your eyes are ridiculous," Alice said, taking my bag that was weighing me down. After seven years of lugging that thing around and much more, I couldn't make it down a flight of stairs and a hallway without almost crumbling. All because I only got two hours of sleep.

"You're telling me," I mumbled, leaning on her for support. My only motivation was being able to see the door in the middle of the hallway. It was kind of illuminated, probably from the sun shining through the window and out the door, but it looked like heaven nevertheless.

"Almost there, and then you can sleep all you want."

I mumbled something incoherent and continued making my venture to nap time.

We made it to the room without any problems. None what so ever. I prepared my bag for maximum comfort on my desk, took my shoes off, and was just about to lay down and shut my eyes when...

"Oi, Lily! Is there a Head's meeting tonight?"

James Potter.

"Herrggmmpphh," I grumbled into my bag.

"Pardon?"

I repeated myself.

And do you know what the fool did? He sat right in front of me. Doesn't he know that I can't concentrate on anything when he's around? Doesn't he?

"What was that?"

I lazily picked my head up from my bag, looking like death in a skirt.

"Yes, James," I said as sweetly as I could manage without the full control of my brain. "There is a Head's meeting tonight. We're talking to the prefects about tracking mud in."

"Huh," he said thoughtfully, staring off to the right for a moment. "Okay, then." And he turned to face the front of the classroom.

Of course, any normal student would have turned to face the front of the classroom, just as he had. But James Potter wasn't in his assigned seat. He was, in fact, in Remus Lupin's seat. James normally sits all the way on the other side of the room. In the back. With Sirius.

Remus Lupin didn't distract me. James Potter, however, did.

Obviously, you could see my problem.

"Potter," I hissed. He turned to face me, the innocence of an angel on his face.

"Yes?"

"What are you doing?" I moaned. Sleep, sleep, sleep. Why? Why couldn't I sleep? The world obviously hates me.

"Well, I was about to get a quill and my textbook out of my bag so that I could learn our history." He grinned. Grinned. While I was fighting a mental breakdown due to excessive tiredness, he was grinning.

"I meant why the hell are you in Remus's seat? You sit over there!" I pointed to his desk which was currently being filled by Remus Lupin. "Not over here! Not in front of me!"

"It's not distracting, is it?" James asked. He full well knew it was distracting as all hell. All I wanted to do was sleep. But I couldn't do that when James bloody Potter was sitting a mere wands length away from me. I could smell him for God's sake! And Merlin did he smell good.

"She's tired," Alice butted in quietly, once again trying to be a good friend. She was slowly redeeming herself.

But did you ever notice that when you're tired you can't quite control your mouth.

"Of course it's bloody distracting!" I said quite loudly, standing up and throwing my arms out to add to the ridiculousness of the situation. "You smell good! And you mess up your bleeding hair every five minutes!"

"Er, Lily-"

"You've got to move so that I can take my nap! I'm tired, Potter! I need to go to sleep! And I can't do that with you sitting in front of me, smelling good like you do!" I put my hands on my hips and started down at James who looked smug as a bug. "So if you don't mind, please switch back with Remus so that I can take my nap!"

James, Alice, and the rest of the classroom (minus Professor Binns because he was droning on about Merlin only knows what at this point) were all staring up at me. I must have looked completely mad. My hair was falling out of its tie and my cheeks were definitely flushed.

"Please!" I begged forcefully one more time.

James grinned. "I will if you'll go out with me."

"Fine! Fine. Whatever! Just please leave! I need my sleep! You don't understand!"

James gathered his books and stood up.

Before he left, he turned to Alice. "Will I be able to hold her accountable for that tomorrow?"

Alice looked at me quick, a curious look on her face. "Probably."

James grinned. "Good."


A/n: The moral of this story, ladies and gentlemen, is to make sure you do your homework before the night it's actually due, because being over tired makes you babble just as much as if you were drunk. This is because of stupid daylight savings threw me off and I've been tired all week. I, however, haven't gotten any dates out of it (unfortunately). Although, in History I fully intended on sleeping today but OF COURSE my teacher was being evaluated and OF COURSE the stupid guy sat right behind me, so I couldn't sleep. I 'spose if it was James Potter, it would have been better. Okay, it definitely would have been better.

Much love and enough sleep to get you through the day... or enough lack of sleep to get you a Marauder,

Siriusly Klutzy