She woke up to a crow of a rooster. Way too early, she taught. She felt a bit hangover from the night before, when she tried to connect with her sister once more. It did not go very well. Does it ever?

Her sister despised her ever since they found out Lily was different. Whether it was from sheer jealousy or rather from the fear of unknown, she never figured out.

But every summer, when Lily got back from her school, they tried doing something together. This year, it didn't help, that Petunia brought her boyfriend with her – the event was a catastrophe. He considered himself a proper person, did not drink much, did not talk much and wasn't exactly funny – taking Petunia with him and making Lily unable to express her funny side.

Vernon Drusley was, well, a person, 21 years of age, not really tall, but not short, with inexplicably short neck and quite a strong hairs over his upper lip, to which he referred to as 'his magnificent moustache'. To Lilys opinion, it mostly made him look like a walrus, especially combined with his overweightness.

Turning to the other side in her bed, Lily started felling the hangover headache and the soreness in her eyes. She forgot to count the shots of whiskey the night before and crying herself to sleep in the evening (or was it morning already?) didn't exactly help.

She had been crying a lot lately – she had some friends at Hogwarts, but the best friend she ever had, had abandoned her that spring. They were both aware of their differences since the day they first started the School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, but they only enhanced up until that nice and sunny day by the lake, when her fellow Gryffindor James Potter, again, for no special reason other than boredom, attacked Severus. As always, Lily tried to help. Not only because it was her duty as a school perfect, but also because she didn't like public shaming of the first magical friend she met.

»I don't need help from a filthy mudblood like her!«, Severus' shout while hanging upside down rang in her head ever since, when she woke up in the morning, when she ate lunch with her family, when she was taking her neighbour's dog for a walk, when she cried herself to sleep in the evening. At that moment back then, she made a face of stone and pretended it didn't matter – but it hurt like a thousands of red-hot knives pierced right through her soul; not the words themselves (she heard those a lot) but merely it was that her best friend who said them. For five years they defended each other from the poisonous tongues of their classmates and now, it had been over. Friendship that helped her to keep her head up when her sister started to hate her, friendship, that made her happy for more than five years, friendship, that was always there, when she was sad or happy, even when she couldn't take a break from studying for the finals.

The Potter boy, whom she always found extremely arrogant, self-absorbed and in every way possible full of himself, was mad at Severus first time since she could remember. Really properly mad. Maybe he was just trying to win over her affection, or maybe it was his standard belief, or just a really good act to make her fall for him, she was having none of it. She despised the boy from the second school year on – when he started hitting on her. Always attacking innocent passers-by, ruffling his hair and making stupid remarks, all supposedly to get her to like him. The effect, to his and – everyone else's annoyance, was quite the opposite.

Lily slowly got up, looking away from the full length mirror on the wall opposing her bed. She'd lost weight since May and she knew it wasn't healthy, but she kept on avoiding food. It tasted all the same anyway. The clock on the staircase read 6.03 as she headed downstairs to get a glass of water and the smell of bacon and eggs hit her.

»Good morning, beautiful,« said her father pulling her into a bear hug. »Care to eat with me?«

»'K« was the only response she could manage.

»What's wrong with you lately, sweetie?«

»It's nothing, just tired..«

»Are you ill?«

»No, daddy, I'm fine, really.«

»Did a boy hurt you?«

»I told you I never had a boyfriend. Even if someone was interested in me, he was shied away by that Potter boy long ago.«

»So you want to have a boy, but you can't? Is that bugging you, honey? You know you can tell me anything.«

»It's… Well… It seems I have lost a best friend.«

»Who? That Snape boy from down the road? Did he die? He did always seem sickly.«

»Nawh, it's just, we're not friends anymore.«

»But Lily, honey, you can always get a new friend.«

»Oh, dad, you know it won't be the same.«

Knowing she was right, the father only set a plate in front of her and they ate in silence. After that, he left for work and she did the dishes and went back to her room quietly, careful not to wake up her mother or her sister.

She waited for the library to open up at nine and then went out until lunch. Maybe, if I'm lucky, Marlene, Mary or Alice will come over this week, to get my moods up.

In a mansion, far away from London, a boy woke up. Sun had just started to shine in his eyes through a window, which he forgot to veil the thick red curtains over last night. He didn't mind. Cloudless days were rare exceptions in his area and the morning sun promised a great conditions to play quiddich.

Opening both of his hazel eyes, he jumped out of bed like a small boy, leaving the cushions all over the floor and ran to the next room to wake up his dear brother. He wasn't really a brother as much as a distant cousin, but he lived with the Potters for more than a year and Charlus and Dorea Potter took him as theirs, so Sirius Black might just as well be James' brother.

»Get up Padfood! It's quiddich time!«

A low growling came from under the covers.

»Come on Padfood, you'll sleep when you're dead!«

Sirius turned in his bed.

»Romy the house elf is making waffles with maple syrup?« James more asked than exclaimed, but it worked much better than the previous tries. Nothing ever woke Padfood better than food or a nice bird waiting for him in the common room or an adventure, promising to break rules.

After the said breakfast, the boys mostly played quiddich on a pitch behind the house, enchanted to be invisible to the muggle eye. Which was lucky, as both of them preformed tricks that would send each and every grandmother from the village (AND also James' mother) fainting in horror. As many teenagers, they, too, hoped to be professional sports players after school. For the sole purpose of training, James nicked a golden snitch from one of the broom cupboards in the school. It was also very useful if you wanted to attract attention from mostly every young witch that passed by.

The one he was aiming for (and frankly, everyone in 'probably the entire wizarding world or whatever' knew it was Lily Evans) was absolutely cold. Only responses he ever got from her were an occasional snort, and if he was really really lucky a shoutdown. She second usually consisted of her screaming at him something about what a lousy bullying git he was and of him, smiling goofily and ruffling his hair. Because although he was raised to be confident and had no reason to be shy or ashamed of himself, he somehow always found himself at lack of the words in moments like that. It wasn't talking to a girl that shut him up (because he was an often 'shoulder to cry on' for the birds Sirius went through and he did not have any trouble talking to any of them), but probably the thing that he got turned down every single time he asked her out. They were thought through turn-downs, too, like she would rather date a Giant Squid or adopt a Norwegian Ridgeback and sometimes they hurt, but never enough to make him stop trying to get her attention.

»Oye, mate, focus on the game!« Sirius threw a common muggle ball at James, who didn't even realise his mind drifted of away from the game. »You lost that snitch! What is up with you today.«

»Been thinking.«

»What about? That Evans bird again?« Sirius shoved all of his pearly teeth with a smile. »You're one stubborn bastard, you know? Half the school is at your feet, nearly begging to be snogged, and you are just looking away.«

»It's not as if i hadn't ever had a girlfriend before, Sirius, it's just…. It doesn't feel right…«

»She might take interest now you got Snivelus out of the way.«

James grinned. He didn't really hate the boy, he just teased him because he got to be near Lily, and James didn't.

»I think someone came home…«

Both the boys went to the kitchen, surprised to see that dinner was already served – they probably lost track of time playing quiddich again.

Charlus looked up over the Daily Prophet from under his eyebrows, trying to look fierce or angry or something in-between.

»Look at you two boys, have you been rolling in the mud?«

Truth is, the grounds were still wet and muddy from the showers of previous day, and James and Sirius weren't in anyway different. »We'll go wash up, dad.«

»I have the bathroom first!« shouted Sirius and ran towards the stairs.

»But you always use all the hot water!« James run after him.

Charlus couldn't help but laugh. He loved his son, and he loved Sirius as much as he were his own, but he knew the troublemakers they were, since he was no different at their age. Now, at nearly 60 years old, he missed the wickedness, but he and his wife tried very hard to bring the boys up to be gentlemen. They had no way of knowing, but those wishes were getting through – only slowly and unconsciously.

So here's the first chapter. It would be great if you told me whether you like it or not. It's probable I will be rewriting the first chapters later on. English is not my first language, so I'm sorry for any kind of mistakes I made. Next chapters will be more dialogues, less describing, I promise. ;)