James Potter had never been a total prat, not really. As much as it would have pained a past Lily to admit it, she quite liked him, now. Sure she didn't necessarily agree with all of the antics of him and his band of 'marauders,' but she appreciated how they brought some joy to the students of Hogwarts in an increasingly difficult time. She had even become rather good friends with the likes of Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and even James Potter throughout the course of their sixth year at Hogwarts. Peter Pettigrew, while sweet enough, was not a source of much interesting conversation, Lily found. All this to say that Lily was quite looking forward to returning for her final year at Hogwarts as August came to an end.

As she packed her belongings into her trunk two days before the Hogwarts Express was set to leave the station, she noticed an owl by her window. She rushed to let it in, and it deposited a letter on her bed before flying back out the window. Curious, she opened the envelope to find a letter in a vaguely familiar handwriting.

Lily,

I figured it'd be best to send you a letter before I spooked you on the first day. When I got my letter this year, the envelope was a little thicker than usual, but I figured it was just quidditch things, but it turns out someone must have confunded Dumbledore, because I've been made head boy. Remus told me you'd been made head girl (not that there was any other choice, really) and I wanted to give you a heads up in case you were expecting someone else. I know I was. Anyways, I reckon we'll make a pretty good team. Looking forward to hearing all about your summer holidays.

Yours,

James

Lily found herself very pleased to hear this news, more pleased than she would have thought. Perhaps that was because she had been worried that Dumbledore would have gone with a certain Slytherin prefect. This year might be shaping up to be even better than she thought.

September first came along quickly, and Lily was thrilled to see what her final year at Hogwarts had in store. Waving goodbye to her parents- Petunia had refused the invitation to send Lily off- Lily boarded to Hogwarts Express and looked for her friends' compartment. She came across her friend Mary first. Mary was sat with a couple of Hufflepuff girls from their year that Lily recognized. After saying a quick hello, Lily realized that as head girl, she should probably head to the prefect's carriage. When she arrived, she found that only Remus Lupin and James Potter had managed to beat her there. Both boys looked up from their conversation when she arrived.

They greeted each other and made small talk about their holidays as everyone else trickled in after greeting their friends. Among the last to arrive was Severus Snape, who sat in the back of the room and stared daggers at James as he spoke to Lily up at the front.

When Lily noticed that everyone had arrived, she started the spiel she had prepared about how they were in for a great year as well as some rules and was surprised at how often James jumped in with more things to note; many things were such that she never would have thought of them herself.

As everyone filed out, Lily stopped James. "You did a great job. For what it's worth, I think Dumbledore definitely made the right choice."

James moved to run his hand through his hair in the way that had once annoyed Lily to no end. "You have no idea how good that is to hear. I've been so nervous about screwing it up ever since that bloody letter arrived."

The two made their way to the compartment James and his friends had claimed. As they walked, two slytherin boys, Avery and Mulciber, shoved by Lily, muttering about mudbloods. James had his wand out in seconds, ready to hex them into oblivion but Lily put a hand on his arm.

"It's not worth it," she said "nothing to cause a scene over, I'm used to it by now."

James, who was still visibly angry, obeyed her wishes, though he clearly wanted to chase after them and give them a piece of his mind. "No one should be able to call you that. Next time, I'm not -"

Lily blushed. "Thank you, really."

The pair moved along, finding the compartment occupied by Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, and Marlene McKinnon. Lily moved to sit next to Marlene and the girls caught up on their summers, which consisted mostly of Marlene describing in detail the guy she met on her family trip to Greece. "His accent, Lily!"

When they arrived at Hogwarts, Lily thought that she would never get used to the wonder of stepping into the great hall for the welcome feast. She sat between Remus and James and enjoyed pleasant conversation.

The first few weeks of the term passed without much fanfare. The Daily Prophet had more and more obituaries of muggleborns each day. Lily spent her time studying, working on the schedules for prefect rounds with James, and hanging out and playing exploding snap in the common room.

The more time she spent with James, the more she started to notice things like the way he would loosen his tie after about twenty minutes of wearing it or how good he looked when he rolled his sleeves up to his elbows. She also noticed how kind he was. One day, she saw him sit in the library with a nervous first year for hours, helping with a transfiguration essay. This isn't to say that all of his old antics stopped completely, but all of the pranks were good natured. For the first time, Lily realized how thoughtful this boy could be. If he saw her studying in the common room late at night, he would sneak down to the kitchens and get her a snack because "the house elves love me, Evans."

One afternoon in October, Lily sat reading a book by the fire when Sirius sat down next to her on the couch and plucked the book from her hands. "Hey, Red, what's the deal with you and prongs?"

Lily felt a blush rising on her cheeks. "I have no clue what you're talking about, Black."

"Oh, come on Lils," he nudged her, "you know. My friend, the one with the glasses. The one who's been madly in love with you for years now."

"We're friends."

"Then could you tell me why the poor boy's even more lovestruck than ever? Every night, he plops down on his bed and sighs. Sighs, Lily. It's getting rather annoying really. Do think about putting the poor boy out of his misery before I find alternative methods of shutting him up." At that, Sirius swept out of the common room.

Lily thought about the way her chest did feel a bit funny when he smiled at her lately. She realized that she might just fancy James Potter. The realization wasn't shocking. It had been coming on for a while now, she figured. And she knew for sure that he still fancied her, judging by the conversation she just had with his best friend. Lily and James were set to work on prefect schedules in the library that evening. Armed with this new information, Lily made her way to the library, unsure of how to go about this.

Turns out, her strategy was to say nothing. Nice, Evans. They had a very normal evening of scheduling with the exception of the fact that her stomach found itself in knots each time he so much as looked at her. It's not as though anything had been different the day before but somehow, she felt as if everything had changed, as though the air was composed of something completely different.

A few weeks later, James and Lily were patrolling the corridors, looking out for any issues on the eve of the halloween feast. Lily thought back to an article she had seen in the Daily Prophet that morning. "James," at his name he turned to her and they both stopped walking, "do you think that this war will last?"

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "I don't know." He took a contemplative pause before continuing, "But what I do know is that I'm ready to fight. I never really knew what I wanted to do after Hogwarts anyways. I mean, I thought about professional quidditch, but I couldn't justify doing that with all of this going on. And my family's pretty well off so I figure I can live off of that and help the resistance all I can."

At that, Lily felt a surge of something. She didn't know what it was, but it propelled her forward and she kissed him. Hard. At first he seemed surprised, but his hands quickly made their way to her lower back and he kissed her back like his life depended on it. Her heart was racing, and everything felt right.

When they broke apart, he was the first to speak. "Merlin, Lils."

"Sorry, I just couldn't take it any longer"

"Believe me," he said, "there is no need to be sorry."

That night, James fell back onto his bed with a sigh. "Lily kissed me." He sounded as awestruck as he felt.

The first to react was Sirius. "About time, mate. You two have been dancing around each other all year."

"What are you going to do now?" prompted Remus as he put his book down on his bedside table. "Are you two officially together?"

"Yeah, I suppose we are. We'll have to talk about it- we didn't get to much talking tonight- but I assume we're on the same page there."

The next night at the Halloween feast, Lily made it rather official by kissing her new boyfriend hello when she sat down, leaving him beaming like a fool for the whole meal.