Lily Evans was the cleverest witch in her year, no doubt about it.

At sixteen, her spell work was far beyond the standard of her classmates, and while such superiority would normally incite jealousy in her peers. It was the combination of the twinkle in her eye and her self-depreciating humour that made it extremely difficult to dislike Lily Evans.

She was not snobby, or exclusive. She made time for everyone; she was modest in her brilliance and never made anyone feel inadequate. She was a kind, generous girl, who would fiercely defend any of her friends. She was loyal to the last, a natural leader so it made sense she would become a prefect.

Everyone loved Lily Evans.

Of course, it didn't hurt that she was stunningly beautiful. Her long red hair cascaded down her back and curled delightfully at her shoulders, creating the infamous mane that was the desired effect of every other hairstyle of every other girl at Hogwarts. Her bright green eyes were enough for anyone to need to do a double-take. But it was her smile that had all the boys at Hogwarts pining after her. When those plump, pink lips pulled back to reveal the rows of white teeth, the room seemed to take on a slightly-dreamy quality. In fact, you wouldn't be out of place to compare Lily to a lion. Not unkindly of course, Lily retained all the qualities associated with the creature; it's fierceness, loyalty, bravery. It made her the perfect Gryffindor

Lily, as was her nature, never noticed the effect she had on boys, and almost never flirted. In fact, the only boy she ever felt a connection to was Severus Snape.

Sev was the one who told her she was a witch, when she was all of nine years old. They'd become best friends, but even then he'd had a dark undertone to his behaviour that she didn't like. But she ignored it, because she was a witch! And here she had a wizard best friend, who was going to take on the wizarding world with her.

She should have taken his cruel streak, the way her treated her sister, Petunia, as a hint, a warning, for what was to come.

You see, the reason Lily worked so hard in school, was because she was a Muggle-Born, and she would do anything to prove her worth at the school. The prejudice against her (mostly from Slytherins) was just a standard bullying all the Muggle-Born's at Hogwarts went through. But there was a war going on, and Lily's genealogy was the very subject of the war.

Lord Voldemort wanted to dominate the Muggles and Muggle-Born's, believing them to be the scum of the earth, and had a loyal following of people called "Death Eater's." It was widely known that there was a group of trainee Death Eater's at Hogwarts, who had every intention of joining the ranks once they left school. Unfortunately, Severus was part of this group, and at the end of the last school year, after she had been defending him all year to her friends- "He just hangs around with them for protection." or "He needs to have some friends in Slytherin." He'd turned around and called her a Mudblood. The worst thing he could have done, in Lily's book. She'd played it off at the time, but it had hurt her deeply. She knew he was no good, but she'd still lost her best friend, but she told herself, every time she'd seen him over that summer, that they were different. They'd chosen sides, or perhaps even pushed into them. They were not meant to be, and that was fine.

Because there was one other boy.

Though it was only recently she could admit it to herself, she had always held a candle for a certain James Potter. Although it was a small flame, continually flickering, becoming extinguished whenever he displayed his bullying behaviour, it was definitely there. In the dark of night, it warmed the pit of her stomach as she drifted to sleep.

Of course it was totally ridiculous; the boy was an arrogant, bullying, toe-rag. He was a hero on the Quidditch pitch, which gave him rather too high an opinion of himself. However, he also had a rather high opinion of Lily, and while his consistent efforts to impress her became rather tiresome, she was still flattered every time he asked her out.

While Lily was never short of male admirers, she never seemed to notice. Especially since most of them didn't have the gall to ask her out or even flirt with her. Instead they admired from afar, sure that the beautiful and talented Lily Evans would not consider them to be a viable romantic prospect, especially not with the equally beautiful and talented James Potter after her.

Lily could not deny her physical attraction to James, but then again neither could any other girl at Hogwarts. His shock of jet- black hair and lean physique meant he too had many admirers of the opposite sex (and of the same sex, if you are inclined to believe gossip about a certain Mr. Pettigrew).

So, Lily could not help her thoughts from drifting to him while on the Hogwarts Express, on her way to beginning her 6th year at Hogwarts. Lily was determined this year would be better than the last, but she was already feeling Severus' absence like a dead weight on her chest. Ordinarily, they would travel to Hogwarts in a compartment alone together, since neither of them seemed to be able to see eye to eye on their friends. But this year, Lily brushed past him, coldly, after the prefects meeting and settled into a compartment with her friends Mary, Marlene and Emmeline. For the first hour she joined in their excited chatter, sharing stories of her summer, but then she felt her concentration begin to wane.

"Lily?"

Marlene's voice snapped her out of her stupor, and she turned her attention away from the window.

"Are you alright? You keep drifting off?" She asked, her voice dripping with concern.

"Sorry, just got distracted." Lily mumbled in reply, and turned to join back into the conversation which had evolved to be about which subjects they were all taking this year. Lily was in the middle of telling the girls which ones she was planning on taking when the compartment door slid open.

She knew it was coming sooner or later, but she had desperately hoped for later, when she was much more prepared for the sight of him.