Lily was just about to go through the platform when someone grabbed her arm. It was her mother.
"Now just because your mad at your sister doesn't mean you need to be mad at me and your father." Lily's mother said in that Mother-ly way.
"I'm not mom, I'm sorry. It's just – "
"Your father didn't want to work today, but he said goodbye before he left. And your sister… well, petunia just…"
"Mom, I wish she could come to Hogwarts with me, I really do! She would love it so much, I know she would. I just don't know what I've done wrong. You would tell me if I've done something wrong right? Why does she have to be so mean?"
"She's just… confused that's all. She loves you, and you know it. I love you too, but you better get going! It's nearly time."
Lily gave her mom a hug and with that and a couple tears, she went through platform 9 and ¾ for her fifth year at Hogwarts- all the while her mothers voice ringing through her ears as what she had whispered to her as they gave their last hug: Not everything can be a fairy tale Lily, nobody is perfect.
The first person she saw as she stepped into the platform was him...
"Remus!" Said Lily with a big smile on her face. Look happy! Maybe it will start off good. " Evidentially, we are going to be Prefects together! I um, look forward to working with you!"
"And I you, Lily!" Remus replied, shaking her hand. "Do you wanna sit with us on the train?" he pointed back to a group of boys standing off to the side, apparently trying to make the steam coming from the engine look pink.
"Oh!" Actually she couldn't think of anything she would like to do less. "Um, thanks, but I'm supposed to meet up with some people."
"That's cool. See you later!" he touched his hand to his forehead captain style, which Lily took as a goodbye wave and she walked onto the train and down the hallway. Well, he wasn't so bad. Maybe it's just his friends who are the trouble makers. But I definitely don't want to spend my whole ride to Hogwarts in the same cabin as them… I might get hexed to death.
Lily found her friends, thankfully, in the first cabin she looked in. There was Alice Shortt and Jessica Vane, both her friends since her first year. To her surprise, the cabin was almost full with about five other giggling girls.
" OH MY GOD, LILY!" And then a loud screech followed. It came from Jessica. "I've missed you so much!"
"Sit down, how are you?" Alice said.
Lily was somewhat over whelmed, but still happy to see them. "I'm great, how are you, er… all?
"Oh, we're just fine," replied Alice and then introduced her to almost half a dozen girls who she immediately forgot the names of right afterwards. Lily took the seat next to the window on the left hand side. She was completely squished.
"Sooooo, anybody see any hot first years getting on the train?" said one of the girls while twirling her hair.
"Oh my god!" said another, "gross, they're little first years!"
"Doesn't mean they can't be hot!" Said Jessica. Apparently that was funny.
To make a long story short, the entire train ride went on this way. Lily couldn't remember a time when she had been around more giggling annoying girls than this.
"No way!" said one. "Sirius is WAY more good looking than James."
After about an hour of this Lily was about to pull her hair out. It wouldn't be so bad if the conversation lasted about 15 minutes. She could tolerate that. But an hour at least must have gone by, and they wouldn't stop talking about the same. Two. Boys.
"What do you think Lily?" said Alice.
"Oh me!" she said in obvious fake interest. " Is that what we've been doing? Sharing what we think? Oh, well in that case, I think none of us here really think at all, do we? I mean, considering the topic hasn't moved from discussing the opposite sex since we left the station."
There was a pause.
Lily had read somewhere that teenagers laugh when they are uncomfortable with a situation. That must have been the case, because for some reason the whole group thought her outburst was very amusing.
"Oh, Lily you're a laugh, you really are!"
"Really who do you think? Remus or James?"
" Oh, yes. Dooo tell!" said another feigning interest.
"I really couldn't say. I haven't met either of them." She replied. " from what I've heard, they are quite obnoxious…"
"Oh, well we must introduce you to them, shouldn't we? If you haven't met them before, that is."
" I look forward to it." Said lily in plain sarcasm.
Not everything can be as it seems, Don't part with your illusions,
Not everything can be as what are in your dreams.
Things are not always perfect, as much as we wish them to be.
But the only thing that matters is you, us and we.
But keep reality in sight.
Life comes but once, and things might not turn out as you will,
But if you believe, things will turn out right.
That was part of the sorting hats song- the part that stuck in Lily's head the most. How weird, She thought. When Lily was eleven and had got her invitation letter to Hogwarts, she believed, for a whole bright and shining afternoon, that everything was right in the world. That is, until Petunia came home. Once her sister heard the news, the household was nothing but chaos for the next week until Lily left - and possibly after. Petunia had locked herself in her room for days, refusing to eat or even speak until their parents told her that Lily couldn't go to ' that freak-ish witch school'. As you could imagine, this was hard on her parents, too. They wanted to congratulate their daughter on being accepted, but most of their attention had to go to trying to get their other daughter out of her room and actually eat something for the first time in two days. (Lily was convinced that she snuck down after dark to the kitchen, but had no way to prove it.)
For awhile, it look to Lily as if she would end up not going to Hogwarts. But she couldn't stop thinking about that one afternoon where everything was right in the world. It was so perfect…she thought. Can it ever be that way again…?
Lily's parents forced Petunia out of her room to escort her to the station the day she left. Throughout the whole car ride, Lily could hear her sister hissing to her: " Freak… witch freak!" just quiet enough so the parents couldn't hear. And finally, towards the end of the ride: " you know, I thought this whole thing was a bad idea, but now that I think about it… it means I get to be rid of you for a whole year!" Lily wanted to cry, but she stood strong.
" You're right!" she replied. " Its not so bad. I mean, now when I get back from school I can set spells off on you any time I want!"
She walked onto the platform with not so much as a wave from her sister. She was now in her fifth year, and Petunias meanness still affected her. She was living proof that life couldn't be a fairly tale.
"Lily must be day dreaming!" It came from Jessica.
"Ohhh, about who?" said Alice. And they giggled their way up from the table and down to the great hall.
This is going to be an interesting year, she thought. And got up to follow them.
The next morning was the first class- history of magic.
"Great first class of the year, dont you think?" sahe asked her Hufflepuff friend, Emily Bones.
"Well, at least we might get some sleep if we sit in the back..." she replied as they walked through the door into the class room. As soon as Lily entered she ran into a boy apparantly trying to catch a fanged frisbee.
"Excuse me, Madmoiselle!" He said as he bowed and stepped to the side with one arm out making the way for her to pass.
"HEY POTTER!" cried one of his friends. " how is it that you have perfect reflexes in the air on a broomstick , but not around the ladies...?"
"shut it, sirius!"
and they both made their way to thier seats as Professor Hobbs walked in. he started the class right away.
"Let's reveiw the summer reading shall we? The Giant Revolution. Two main groups fighting for rights over the 'lesser race'. Who can remember the names of those two groups?" started Hobbs.
"The idiots, and the sane people…?" Blurted Sirius. The class exploded.
"aha, yes!" said Hobbs, "But which were sane, and which were wrong? The revolutionaries were for Giant freedom… and the … anyone…? The Maurders –there's your second group- wanted control over the giants. But who was right? Lily?
She was lucky. This was a topic she felt strongly about.
"I think the Pro- freedom group was correct in their beliefs. The Mauders wanted the Giants as slaves, just because they thought they were less intelligent."
"Okay," replied Hobbs. "Do I hear a rebuttle?"
there was a silence in the room for a couple of moments, which let Lily believe that she had made a good point. But then, from the other side of the room she heard whispers.
"Do it!"
"Yeah, c'mon, James!"
"I disagree!" Cried the same boy rather confidentially she had just ran into while trying to get to her seat.
OH! So this was the famous duo! The two the girls were talking about on the train. She had seen them in the common room and sitting in the back of the classroom sometimes, but she didn't know that one was James Potter, the famous Seeker, and the other, Sirius Black, the infamous trouble maker. The same trouble makers that were friends with Remus. She didn't have time to dwell on these facts, Potter was already making his rebuttle.
"I think that the Maurders had every right to take over the Giants. It's clear that they are stupid. I mean, come on, they live in the mountains for Peet's sake!"
"Oh, yes" shot in Remus, "Awful living space I'm told!" The boy next to him nearly fell out of his chair.
"Mind you," Lily said. "They've only had to move to the mountains because the Maurders practically scared them away."
"And a good thing, too! Downright awful things to look at on a day- to- day basis!" Proclaimed Potter. The class exploded with laughter again. "Anyways, I cant see why we can't get free reign over a lesser race... Case closed then…"
"Not quite!" interrupted Lily. "We've forgot my closing statement! Just because someone thinks they are better than everybody else, doesn't mean they get free reign over everything. Just because people live differently than you do, or are in a different grade than you, Potter, doesn't mean you have the right to treat them like scum. The giant race and those first years you put hexes on in the hall have rights and feelings, too. But of course, everyone is inferior to you, isn't that right?" She was standing up by now and felt the weird high she got when she was engaged in battle.
"Wow!" potter replied. "Lily, is it? Don't hurt yourself, sweetie. We were generous enough to give you a closing statement, not a closing speech, okie dokie?" the class took off on this one, too.
"okay, that's enough of that!" interrupted Hobbs. "next review topic- the Levitation Proclamation…"
But Lily couldn't focus. There was still getting over the high she got when debating with someone. Apparently the Potter boy couldn't focus either. She felt his eyes on her back, but refused to turn around and see if she was right.
What seemed like a lifetime later Lily got up from her seat and as she made her way toward the door, she heard Sirius say: "So, whaddya say, Jamsie? She we refer to ourselves as The Mauder's from now on?… James!"
But he didn't answer.
No
Not
