A/N: Here's my disclaimer for the entire story: The Wizarding World is J.K. Rowling's and I'm merely playing in her sandbox. This story is intended to be relatively canon, though I have used creative license in some aspects, particularly with timelines. Please bear with me, be kind and happy reading!
It was all James Potter's fault. He wasn't stupid, she knew that. But that sure as hell didn't stop him from doing stupid things. Who would ever think stunning a Professor, shoving him in a broom closet and polyjuicing into him to run the class would be a good idea? Granted, it was the Divination Professor and if she was being honest, there was a very short list of people who could do a worse job than him – but Potter had secured his spot on that list with his antics at the end of last year.
Did he think he wouldn't be caught? Eyebrows started to rise when the 'Professor' began cracking vulgar jokes and cancelling all homework deadlines. He gave himself away when he gave her a crystal ball reading in front of the class and loudly predicted she'd marry a 'devilishly sexy man by the name of James Potter' and they'd 'live happily ever after'. Hilariously funny – for everyone except her, apparently. And, she silently fumed, she'd bet her wand that if it were anybody else who tried that prank, they'd be out of Hogwarts faster than a niffler after treasure. Ponce.
So he'd gone and landed himself in detention, and – surprise, surprise – he couldn't even do that properly. Professor McGonagall had said 'Well, if you want to be a teacher that badly, I've just the job for you,' with a sly smirk. All he'd had to do was help a third-year student who was struggling in class with his homework and somehow, the simple task had snowballed into an operation that involved enlisting the help of his friends Remus Lupin and Frank Longbottom; the former of which was particularly good at Defence Against the Dark Arts and the latter had a penchant for Herbology. James handled his favourite subject, Transfiguration, himself and tried to wheedle Lily into assisting with the remedial Charms and Potions, but she was perfectly sure he was capable of doing the entire third-year curriculum in his sleep, and hence refused to indulge his laziness. Then Dumbledore caught wind of the situation and, in the blink of an eye, decided the prefects could run study groups in each subject for the younger students.
That's how Lily Evans, sixth year Gryffindor prefect and Flitwick's favourite student, found herself mentoring students in an unused classroom on a Saturday morning.
"That's it guys; Colloportus, make the por nice and long." Lily absentmindedly reached up to her forehead to tuck a stray auburn curl behind her ear.
'It'll be a good leadership initiative,' the Head Boy had said at the last prefect meeting. Lily scowled. Leadership initiative, my arse. She'd normally be enthusiastic the new responsibility and Merlin knew she loved working with the younger students but knowing James Potter set this into motion irritated her. Her only consolation was that Potter was probably kicking himself for accidentally improving the school's educational system. Knowing Dumbledore, that was probably his main reason for suggesting they use the idea. Sly bastard.
The prefects had roughly outlined how these sessions were going to work:
1, All students from fifth to seventh year could help out in an area of their choosing, preferably one that they excelled in,
2, Every student was encouraged to help at least three times over the course of the year but times of which were flexible,
3, At least one prefect had to be supervising each week and
4, OWL and NEWT students were given least priority when it came to exam time. That meant sixth year students bore the brunt of the mentoring responsibilities. Lily sighed. When she had signed up to help with Charms, she'd been in the 'get it over and done with' mindset. Now, she was hosting the first study session after the holidays, the only students enthusiastic enough to come were the wide-eyed first years and she was having second thoughts.
To be fair, the first-years weren't so bad. They listened because they were excited to learn. But they knew next to nothing. I mean, it could be worse, she admitted. She glanced across the classroom at Marlene McKinnon, who was wrestling with her little brother who'd stolen her wand and sniggered. Glad that's not me. Marly, the loyal best friend that she was, had been the only one willing to give up her first sleep-in of sixth-year to accompany Lily.
A triumphant screech came from the other side of the room. "RIGHT! Jeremy, you can go sit in that corner and practice the charm by yourself."
He whined. "But Marly, I've already mastered the locking charm!"
"Then you can go lock yourself in a box for all I care." Marlene sniffed haughtily. "And that's Professor McKinnon to you." Lily watched their exchange with a tinge of sorrow. Her best friend, she knew, had been ridiculously excited for her little brother to start at Hogwarts, no matter how much he drove her crazy sometimes. Thoughts of her own sister flitted into her mind, but she pushed them away. Petunia had made it clear she hated Lily – and in this case, she meant it.
She made her way around the classroom, pausing to watch as a young girl with bright pink eyebrows furrowed in concentration. She watched as the girl twisted her wrist half a turn clockwise and then a quarter turn counter-clockwise. The lid of the chest she was aiming at swung a little, but stayed wide open. Lily leant over and helped to guide her movement.
"Here, you want to create more of a rectangular shape…" A moment later the chest slammed shut, lock clicking loudly. The girl's face lit up. Lily glanced at her and let go of her hand with a chuckle. "Sweetie, I don't know how you managed to pronounce Colovaria instead of Colloportus but you've given yourself hot pink eyebrows!" At the girl's befuddled expression, Lily clarified what she had assumed had gone wrong. "Colovaria is the colour-changing charm, not the locking one!" The girl's face cleared with understanding and she giggled. Then she scrunched up her face and suddenly, her eyebrows were blue. Lily blinked hard and they were back to a light brown. The younger girl leaned forward and lowered her voice.
"I'm a metamorphmagus," the girl whispered into her ear, all the while grinning cheekily. "Brown's not my natural colour – I must've let myself slip for a second 'coz I was concentrating so hard." She let her eyebrows glimmer pink again for a second. 'Haven't told anyone at Hogwarts yet, 'cept I think Professor Dumbledore probably knows. You can know too, Miss Evans, since you were nice to me.' The girl declared decisively. That took Lily aback. Metamorphmagi were rare – Lily only vaguely remembered reading about them in her fourth year Care of Magical Creatures class, and hadn't realised there were any in magical Britain. But then again, they would be able to hide themselves, wouldn't they? Lily recovered from her shock and found herself warming to this eager first-year.
"Call me Lily," she offered, cracking her first genuine smile of the day. The girl beamed back at her and, in a surprisingly muggle gesture, stuck out her hand to shake. "My name's Tonks. Don't call me Nymphadora and we'll be happy as pigs in mud." Lily clasped her hand amusedly. Maybe this mentoring gig wouldn't be so bad after all.
"So what did wise Professor Evans teach the minions this morning?"
Lily glared at her tawny-haired roommate over lunch. "Please, I didn't make them call me Professor Evans, that makes me sound ancient!"
Mary Macdonald snorted. "That's not what I heard from Marly this morning. Or should I say, Professor McKinnon."
Lily laughed at that. She opened her mouth to reply but was interrupted by the very subject of their conversation plonking herself on the bench next to Lily and stealing a potato off her plate. Lily raised her eyebrows. "Speak of the devil."
"Mwff-hmpm whm wehfb – " Marly's attempt at conversation was cut off by Lily placing a finger on her lips to shut her up. She blinked, chewed and swallowed before speaking.
"Mary, why weren't you in your bed at 5 this morning?" Her eyes glinted as she dug for dirty gossip. "Or should I have checked a certain Diggory's bed instead?"
To Mary's credit, she held up under Marly's narrowed eyes, only flushing slighty pink at the insinuation. "If you must know, I was not in Amos' bed." She paused. "I was in Ryan Jones'." Lily's head shot up so hard she cricked her neck and Marlene gaped. "WHAT?"
Mary burst out laughing. "Gotcha!" she gasped, tears beginning to stream down her face. "Oh, your faces are priceless!" Marlene's shock melted off her face and morphed into a pained expression as if she didn't know whether to laugh or yell. Lily simply scowled and rubbed her neck. "Not funny Mary," she mumbled.
"Yes it was," Mary hiccoughed. Winking at Lily, she added. "I could've just as easily been in James Potter's bed." Rolling her eyes, Lily decided to ignore Mary and turned to Marlene to ask her why she'd been up at 5 anyway, when Marly absentmindedly told Mary, "No you couldn't, he was with me."
For the second time during lunch that day, Lily turned her head so fast she cricked her neck again. "Ow!" Grumbling, she glared at her best friend. "You have three seconds to explain yourself," she snapped.
Marlene, looking sorry she had said anything at all, reluctantly lowered her voice. "You two are not to tell anyone, but James' parents have been quite sick over the holidays." She paused, swallowing hard. "I mean, you know that my parents are his godparents and his are mine but I guess it had never really occurred to me that he might- that he might have to- because that would mean- " Her face crumpled and she visibly struggled to fight off tears. Lily drew her best friend into a hug and Mary reached across the table to squeeze her hand. "Shhh, it's okay," she soothed, and Marlene closed her eyes for a few seconds as she composed herself. Lily's heart clenched to see her boldest friend so vulnerable. Marlene and James had known each other since they could talk, and it usually amused Marly to no end that her two closest friends hated each other's guts. She maintained that it was unresolved sexual tension and, to Lily's chagrin, tried to set them up at every possible opportunity. But regardless of Lily's mixed feelings towards a certain messy-haired, hazel-eyed boy, she knew without a doubt that she would be here for Marlene come hell or high water. And if that meant giving James less of a hard time, she would. Ugh, but he could be so infuriating.
"Tell you what Marly," Mary began softly, "let's have a girls night in our dorm tonight. I'll hunt down Alice and she can grab some ice-cream, cookies and butterbeer off that uncle of hers, Mr Fortescue, and we'll gossip and giggle like the old times."
There was no immediate response from the blonde mass of hair pressed against Lily, but after a while Marlene took a shaky breath and straightened herself. "That sounds great Mary. Thanks." Lily's arm tightened across her shoulders. "I'm fine, promise." Giving herself a shake, she added cheekily, "I still haven't told you girls about my summer fling disaster!"
"…it was awful, honestly, if I wanted that much slime on my lips I would've snogged the giant squid. His hands were just as grabby too." Marlene shuddered as the girls in the dorm squealed with laughter. "So no, I think it's safe to say that was the end of that wanker," she wrinkled her nose.
Lily leant over to pluck the bottle of butterbeer from the middle of the room and poured herself another glass before raising it aloft with a smirk. "I'd toast to our dear Marly's newfound singleness, but let's be real - this one is for the next poor sod she sinks her fangs into." That sent the others into another round of cackles and after a mock affronted look, Lily's best friend joined in.
"I don't have fangs, thank you very much!" she gasped, clutching her sides as she laughed.
"Sweetie, with that sharp tongue of yours, you might as well." Alice piped up, brushing biscuit crumbs off her light blue pyjama pants. Mary giggled from where she was lying on her stomach on the fourth bed in the room. "I'll drink to that. Marly, your stunning looks and stinging words are absolute murder for any boy that crosses your path."
Marly lifted her chin in part defiance and part pride. "I can't help that they all have the backbones of a puffskein." Narrowing her eyes, she looked over the top of her tumbler at Lily. "Speaking of poor sods, when are you going to put James out of his misery? That many years of suppressed sexual tension cannot be healthy!"
"Potter needs to grow up." Lily bit back, making a face. "How you and Ally can stand such an arrogant prick is beyond me." Suddenly remembering what Marlene had told her and Mary at lunch, she amended her words. "Okay so he's gotten better these past two years, but Merlin, can the boy not take a hint? I'm not interested."
Marlene shot a look at her that said I'll drop this for now but it's not the last you'll hear of it. Lily childishly stuck her tongue out in response.
On the other side of the room, Mary threw a chocolate at Alice. "You might not be interested in Potter, Lily, but we all know who Ally's interested in!"
Alice blushed and held her hands up in surrender under the onslaught of three pairs of eyes turned on her. "Frank and I are just peachy, thanks. We saw each other over the holidays, we're seeing each other now we're back at school, and you three drama queens can go find somebody else to hound, 'cos you won't find anything here." She blurted all of this out at top speed, with practiced efficiency. Then, confident she had satisfied the masses, she began unwrapping the chocolate thrown at her by Mary. She popped it in her mouth and looked up to see three exasperated faces.
"What?" she mumbled around a mouthful of chocolate. Marlene flopped over onto her back as Lily sighed wistfully. "If only finding everyone's soulmate was as easy as yours, Alice." Mary grumbled, but there was no venom to it. Alice simply smiled.
A/N: Guess who's back? After a brief two-year hiatus, we are back in business with a new and revised fic. To those who were here the first time round – you guys are the bomb diggity. You should recognise a lot of the stuff in the earlier chapters; I just went back and polished a lot of it and now I've got a bit more focus with the storyline. I've got at least ten chapters pre-written and lined up, ready to go, but honestly, we're slow-cooking over here so I can't promise too much. I am in it for the long haul though, as I hate giving up on a story. Rest assured if you start this story, you will get an ending, I just can't guarantee when.
And for those truly nutty Potterheads (of which I am definitely one, guilty as charged), I will just say now that I have taken a few liberties with canon, most notable of which are Tonks and Charlie's ages. I couldn't resist having Lily take a tiny, pink-haired Tonks under her wing at Hogwarts and exploring her friendship with Charlie whilst also developing the relationship between the Marauders and their schoolmates. I aim to back up most of my authorial choices with canon-derived reasoning, so I'll be adding in little tidbits here and there in the form of author notes – if these annoy you, feel free to ignore for I like to think of them as 'the salad on the side'. Please make any criticism you may have constructive; this is a real learning process for me and definitely a work in progress. Of course, thank you for reading/favouriting/following/commenting because it genuinely makes my day! And that's all I can think of for now, so ta-ta!
[11.4.19]