Title: Of Renegade Owls and Parseltongued Towels

Author Name: Lindsay Leigh

Rating: PG for now, although I really couldn't say where it's going...

Chapter: 1/? The Incident with the Animals

Spoilers: All four books (mostly PoA)

Summary: A Lily/James fic beginning with...the beginning! Why is Marge Dursley acting like a poodle? What is Cornelius Fudge doing visiting Lily Evans' house? And where on earth does Petunia come up with her magic reversal techniques? Please R&R!

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Author's Note: A Lily/James fic... my favorite kind. :) The title does have a meaning--it's deep. So deep that even I haven't quite finished interpreting its symbolic implications yet... :) Except for a couple of random ideas I don't really have any idea where I'm going with this fic, although it's bound to be (hopefully) original and somewhat random--all of my stories are.... I'm hoping to do all seven years of Lily's and the Marauders' adventures at Hogwarts. If anyone has any good plot ideas let me know! Otherwise, read and review--Thanks!

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Petunia Evans and her best friend Margery Dursley were in somewhat of a quandary. Although strange things did tend to happen to the pair when they were engaging in their favorite activity of tormenting Petunia's younger--eleven year old--sister Lily, nothing quite like this had never occurred.

It wasn't as if anything terribly out of the ordinary had been happening; Margery was sitting on Lily, gingerly this time so as not to break any more of Lily's ribs with her enormous bulk as this tended to upset Mr. and Mrs. Evans, while Petunia examined the contents of her school bags and administered occasional kicks in the head to her furious sister. Everything had been going according to plan at first. Lily was pinned to the ground, brilliant green eyes blazing, unable even to call for help as Margery was cutting off her air supply, and Petunia was gleefully going through Lily's school bag. Despite its cluttered contents (Petunia had wrinkled her nose in disgust as she kept her own things spotless at all times) she managed to shred several important looking homework assignments and was just beginning to read a promising looking note from one of Lily's school friends when it happened. Margery disappeared and sitting on Lily's back in her place was a rather yappy miniature poodle. Lily took a deep breath (more than one actually as she hadn't had any oxygen in several minutes,) before she jumped to her feet, throwing the poodle several feet across the lawn in the process, grabbed her bag from a dumb-struck Petunia, and tore off in the direction of the house, with her fiery-red hair streaming out behind her.

Petunia had screamed in rage and dismay, the poodle yapped and choked in its fury, and the paper-boy who had been nervously watching gaped and fainted. Now Petunia sat pondering her current dilemma wondering who she could turn to for help. Her horse-like face was squinched up in thought as she craned her over-long neck to look around her as if searching for answers. Petunia certainly couldn't go to her parents; even if they were persuaded to believe that Lily had turned Marge into a poodle (which was unlikely) the events leading up to the present situation would be sure to be revealed, leaving Petunia in a lot of hot water. She doubted that her parents would be able to change Marge back in any case. She couldn't ask the Dursleys, Marge's family, for help either. That family prided itself on representing the epitome of normalcy and would be furious with Petunia if she insinuated that their daughter had been somehow turned into an animal. A poodle no less! Marge hated poodles--she preferred the ferocious brand of bull-dogs that her relatives bred. Mr. and Mrs. Dursley might forbid Petunia from seeing Marge, and Marge's older brother Vernon would never be interested in her. Not that he paid her much attention now, Petunia thought. He seemed more interested in television, and candy, and tools that made loud noises and caused a lot of destruction.... Petunia shuddered and turned her mind back to the situation at hand.

This wasn't the first time that something had gone wrong when Petunia and Marge had tried to ambush Lily--several times Lily had mysteriously disappeared from underneath Marge ending up on some neighborhood roof almost as perplexed to find herself there as her sister was to see her disappearing while Marge clawed at the dirt beneath her in confusion. Other times Marge or Petunia had suddenly begun hiccuping bubbles, burping slugs, or dancing with wild abandonment while Lily unobtrusively escaped. However, terrible as these situations may have seemed at the time, they always ended on their own with no permanent damage done to anyone. This was the first time that Petunia could recall being seriously worried that she might end up being best friends with a poodle for the rest of her life.

Just as Petunia was wondering what would happen if she tried to turn Marge inside out by pulling very hard on her tongue a short man in a black cloak and an uncomfortable looking pointy hat popped out of the air in front of her. Petunia shrieked and dashed madly away from the man to her home where she locked and bolted the front door leaving Marge the poodle to fend for herself with the strange looking man.

This man (whose name happened to be Cornelius Fudge) sighed and adjusted his hat. It really was very uncomfortable, and it made it difficult to see. It was part of the uniform where he worked as a junior officer in the Department for the Reversal of Accidental Magic at the Ministry of Magic, however, so there wasn't a lot he could do about it. Appeals to change the dress-code had been in for years, (Cornelius thought bowler hats might be pleasant) but, they just weren't going anywhere. Sighing with dismay the man was finally successful at tugging the hat completely off of his head after several grunting efforts. He opened his eyes just in time to see Marge the Poodle attempting an escape into the shrubbery in front of the Evans household.

"There you are, little dog!" exclaimed Fudge happily. He pulled a long wooden stick that looked suspiciously like a magic wand out of one of the pockets of his cloak, pointed it at the quivering poodle and called, "Stupefy!" The poodle, who had been in the middle of leaping over the bushes froze suddenly in midair and fell straight down into one of the (very unluckily for her) prickly rose bushes. Cornelius Fudge lifted the dog gingerly out of the bushes before muttering several more words under his breath towards the dog while keeping his stick (wand?) trained onto it. "Finite Incantatum," he told the poodle, who immediately became once again the red-faced, round, mustached, Miss Margery Dursley. The portly man frowned and shook his wand. "Finite Incantatum!" he repeated more forcefully. Nothing happened, Marge remained her regular unconscious yet human self. Fudge blinked several times, before shrugging. Perhaps she was meant to look like that--she was a muggle after all. He continued with his commands. "Obliviate! Ennervate!"

Marge slowly awoke, much to the relief of Petunia who was attempting to crane her neck through the crack in the door without removing its chain-lock. Marge blinked several times then screamed hoarsely at the sight of the strange man in the cloak holding a magic wand and extremely uncomfortable looking hat.

"No need to thank me, my dear!" Fudge exclaimed joyfully seeming to forget the memory charm he had performed only seconds earlier. "I'm only doing my job." He whistled happily as he started down the street, waved merrily from the corner at the paper-boy who had just woken up, and disappeared. The paper-boy waved back cheerfully before gaping and fainting once again.

"Margy, oh Marge! Are you okay?" The thirteen year-old was in her element as she ran dramatically towards her friend the former-dog. Marge looked at her in confusion. Hadn't she just been sitting on top of Lily? She shook her head and blinked.

"Now, now, Petunia," she started weakly, "there's no need to fuss. Your weakling little sister certainly can't hurt me, though she may have been able to escape this once--despite my very firm grip." She finished her little speech in her regular booming tones as she regained her confidence.

"But, but Marge! Marge, you were, well, a poodle!"

"Nonsense!" Marge boomed. You must have dozed off; I think I might have had a bit of a rest myself for just a moment...."

"But--"

"Petunia. We both know that it's just not normal for you to think that I was a poodle." She shuddered. "A poodle of all things! So I suggest you just keep your strange dream to yourself. Now!" She licked her lips greedily. "What do you have in your refrigerator today?"

Petunia wiped the flecks of spit that had flown from Marge's exuberant mouth off of her face and allowed herself to be led through her front door and into the kitchen.

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Incidentally, Lily was having a bit of a dilemma of her own on the floor above her priggish sister and her sister's piggish friend.

The blasted owl was refusing to leave.

After Lily's narrow escape from being crushed to death, she had immediately raced to her room, and not being one to miss out on any action, poked her head outside the window to watch the events unfolding below. Just as she had observed the paper boy passing out for the second time that day, (at least the second time she had seen--the paper boy did have a rather fragile disposition and fainted surprisingly easily considering the number of unexpected events that paper boys should expect to see,) an overlarge tawny owl had zoomed straight into her forehead, knocking her forcefully backwards into the room. An instant later Lily found herself laying on the ground with an animal sitting on top of her for the second time that day.

Wincing, she shook her head to clear it and blinked several times before standing in an attempt to throw the owl off of her. It worked, but the owl wasn't hurt as its wings generally protected it from falls. It used those wings to fly to Lily's bed where it sat hooting indignantly and rather loudly. Lily approached the bed slowly so as not to startle the owl, then without warning she grabbed it, hauled it to the window and threw it outside.

The owl screeched and immediately zoomed directly back into Lily's window losing several feathers and very nearly its head as Lily slammed her window shut in an attempt to dissuade the owl from reentering. The owl, however, managed to enter the room successfully, though it was obviously more than a little distraught due to its near-death experience.

Lily found it impossible to reopen the window as the owl was now circling her head madly, hooting like an owl possessed. Lily briefly considered running for the door, but shook that idea away, knowing that Petunia would never let her forget it if she saw her being chased around the house by a mad owl. Instead she ducked abruptly and crawled underneath her desk as fast as her legs would allow, pulling the chair up to the desk in front of her. The owl could no longer reach her, but Lily was effectively trapped under her own desk as the owl fluttered down to the floor to watch her every move.

Several hours and a short nap later nothing had changed, although Lily was beginning to worry that her cramped muscles would never work again. The owl showed no signs of tiring and continued to glare at her in a way that made Lily wonder why she'd never recognized how deadly owls could be before. It turned its beady eyes on her, making her shiver. Maybe if she just asked it politely it would leave her alone.

"Er... Owl?" she began. "Could you, maybe, um, move?" The owl didn't budge. She shook her head. If she wanted the owl to listen to her, she had better be more respectful. "Mr. Owl, Sir...or Ma'am, I would be most obliged if you would...er...just, depart. Please." The owl inclined its head at her as if considering her request, but instead of moving it began doing something very strange. Lily stared. She certainly had no idea what had possessed the owl to dance, but dancing it was, and rather vigorously too. Suddenly the door banged open.

"Lily!" It was her mother. "I've been calling you for ages! It's time for dinn..." Her voice trailed off. "Lily, why is there an owl in your room, and what is that tied to its leg?"

Lily blinked. "It's leg?" She looked more closely at the owl. It hadn't, as she suspected, been dancing, but rather trying to thrust its leg towards her in an effort to bring her attention to the envelope tied to its leg. Her mother, who was after all a very practical woman, marched up to the owl, picked it up, removed the letter from it's leg, and tossed it out the window in one fluid movement.

Sighing with relief, Lily pushed the chair back from the desk and crawled out of the small space to stretch her aching limbs. Her mother looked at the envelope. "It's addressed to you, Lily dear." She handed the envelope to her daughter. "You can read it after dinner. We're not waiting for you any longer."

With a groan, Lily pocketed the letter and followed her mother down the stairs hoping Marge hadn't already eaten her family's dinner.

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So... will the owl return to seek its vengeance on Lily? Has the paper boy come to terms with his so-called hallucinations? Will Cornelius Fudge get his new dress-code ideas approved? Will Petunia ever get her man? Find out this and more in the next installment of "Of Renegade Owls and Parsletongued Towels"!

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