My Ceiling is a thing of wonder. All those miniscule dents and bumps I never notice, I'm constantly tricked into the pretence of accepting my ceiling is smooth. Unquestioned. Well, I've been living a lie.
I'm thrown from my ceiling orientated ponderings by my mother's soft knock on my bedroom door, the handle turns in a jerk, she must have used her elbow. Good. That means tea. She enters cautiously yet my eye line does not waver. My eyes are too tired from my deep contemplation about the surface of my ceiling to focus on my mum. She comes to sit at the foot of my bed and hands me a mug of tea (win). I awkwardly shift in my bed, sitting up and resting my shoulders on the headboard whilst taking the mug in both hands. I have 3 hours until I need to be at the platform meaning plenty of time for tea, shower, last minute packing and goodbyes because mum no longer insists on driving me to King's Cross since I passed my apparition exam earlier this year.
Mum and me mainly sit in silence; only interrupted with the odd weather comment and exchanged tired smile. I try not to make it awkward, but well she's sort of just sitting there, how am I supposed to go about my busy morning with a zombified being on the end of my bed. She must understand the extent of her inappropriate presence as she rises with a pat of my duvet covered legs, with empty mugs in arms she vacates and leaves me to shower, dress and dry my garish red hair. I shove my school robes in my handbag but meticulously place my head girl badge in a corresponding pocket. There is no need to prove I was a disastrous choice for head girl by losing my badge before I even get to Hogwarts, I'd rather go out in a flare. At that I trudge downstairs hauling my trunk behind me as I go.
I deposit my trunk at the front door and make my way to the kitchen for our usual farewell breakfast but am sidestepped by the sound of a vicious giggle radiating from the closed door to the living room. An urgent "shh!"Immediately silences the snigger and I can tell it's the harsh tone of Tuney. I suppose she's made it illegal to laugh now, figures. She had a spa sleepover or something as similarly dull and stereotypical last night with her bitchy friends, where they forsake the beautiful art which is sleep for gossiping, scheming and plastering their faces in alarmingly strong smelling pastes which are obviously not going to moisturise their skin due to the sufficient absence of the vital moisturising ingredient, a four leaf clover. Muggles.
I munch on strips of bacon as Tuney and her friends join me and mum at the dining table; they frown at my apparently atrocious calorie intake but drop the frowning for sniggering soon enough, Tuney doesn't silence them this time. Standards. How is she supposed to dictate everyone's lives when she won't uphold her authority by reprimanding everyone into submission?
A nerve dulling conversation strikes up about the pros and cons of vertical stripes on clothes so I excuse myself to brush my teeth and hope that when I re-enter Tuney's friends will have been shoved in a vanishing cabinet. I store my toothbrush in my bag because I've never been able to transfigure one quite this sparkly, it cheers me up on a Monday morning, adding that touch of fabulous to my everyday Hogwarts routine… that doesn't make me as pathetic as Tuney's friends right? Ah shit.
I shuffle back to the kitchen fretting over the toothbrush trait I have only just come to question, I see Tuney at the counter preparing tea. The second I sit back down at the table I realise how late it is 8:40. I have 20 minutes till my train leaves, and who knows how long it will take to hustle through the morning commuters at King's Cross. I spring up and jostle my mother with my exclamation of "shit shit shit shit"
"I've raised a sailor", she utters with raised eyebrows.
"Crap, I mean shit, no not shit sorry, I meant sorry just. 8:40" I blurt as I push away from the table. I give mum a kiss on the cheek and a hug and turn for Tuney, she puts her hand up like she wants a formal high five- I consider this for a moment- "I've already made you tea. You might as well drink it" she says in her clipped annoyed voice she uses when talking to our little cousin Olly when he touches her things or drools (or looks at her).
I snatch the mug from her and gulp it down, it burns and I can't taste it, all I taste is hot. I think I see a wicked smile play across her friend's faces, I probably spilt some on my top or something, I give Tuney a nod, mum another wave and bustle out of the kitchen, grab my trunk and shoulder my bag and head for the side street where I apparate to the woman's restroom at the back of King's Cross.
I spend the next ten minutes or so jogging through the packed muggle London train station, knowing where I was going helped. As I jog however my head starts to spin and I feel dizzy, I must be really out of shape from a summer spent lounging about eating ice lollies. Oh well, I find myself thinking as I continue my jog, taking the new feelings of brain malfunctions in my stride. My nose pinches and I start to stumble frequently but I couldn't shake the feeling that it was all tremendous fun.
I reach platform 9 and race down the length of concrete, or do I skip? I stagger straight through the ¾ barrier and end up slamming into the glossy steam engine of the Hogwart's express. I look into my scarlet curved reflection and see that my nose is bleeding, I look so ridiculous I cant help but laugh, and then, well I think I just keep laughing.
I wake to darkness, and the soft sound of wind, its obvious I'm on a train by the rhythmic jostle the velvet-lined seats shake me with. I sit up and before realising that was an awful idea, my head pounds as if my brain is now a swelling rock playing with a sledge hammer. As my eyes adjust to the darkness I see a mirroring shape on the seats opposite me and a glint around where the shape's eyes should be, like glasses.
Shit.
"And the beast awakes" James Potter mutters to himself as he picks up his wand and flicks it at his makeshift curtains that evaporate into the air filling the carriage with a piercing light that further induces my already depleting state.
As I cower from the light in stunned silence attempting to support my boulder weighted skull with my hands Potter shuffles about some more closing and putting away a, what is it? A book? I didn't know he could read. My head lolls back and hits the headrest which gratefully cushions the blow as I let out a low moan or some other incoherent curse at my fortune, too confused to be angry, I close my eyes again so I don't have to look at that disgusting smirk which I'm sure is quickly spreading over the morons face.
"How are you?" I hear in a sincere tone that doesn't correlate to it's speaker and when I give another moan in response I hear him laugh, back to normal. I open my eyes so I can glare at his mocking but am surprised to see him hoisting a bag on his shoulder and making for the door. "Wait where are you going?" I manage to sputter, "what's going on?"
"I had a feeling you wouldn't remember" he sighs as he turns back round to look at me, "okay, I suppose you deserve a story" then he sits down and begins-
"You were totally out of it Evans, I got to the platform with Sirius and suddenly he's falling over himself laughing and pointing at the engine of the train, which you were trying to climb by the way, so I come over and ask what the fuck you were doing and you break down in fucking tears wailing that "it was being rude to you" and you that weren't trying to mount it, just beat it up. I ask you whats going on and boom the tears stop and your laughing like a maniac shouting, "The bitch spiked my tea" well I get the point after the 100th proclamation that you were in no fit state of any degree and I shove Sirius your bags and I try and guide you into the train but you demand to stop every other step so you can hug every new first year you see and welcome them to Hogwarts which is apparently an unquestionable duty as you're head girl, I hade to carry you from halfway down the platform when you said you were off to get a McDonalds…"
He breaks off looking embarrassed and he ruffles his hair as if to divert my attention from his reddening cheeks. Already mortified I don't know what the fuck could be coming up in this catastrophic story to make HIM look embarrassed.
He carries on, "because it was 8:59 by then. I wouldn't have carried you if it wasn't absolutely vital and you kept screaming at parents on the platform that I was about to rape you. You were really upset about not getting your egg mcmuffin, you dribble when you cry; did you know that? Anyway I couldn't find your mates anywhere so I left you in a compartment with the lads while I went to do the prefect meeting in the front tra-"
"HOLLY SHIT, THE PREFECT MEETING oh my bloody god fucking shit oh my merlin I missed it fucking ah!" I burst. The story had shocked me to silence until that point, I jump to my feet but fall back down when the blood rushes to my head.
"Whoa now, calm down Lily, I didn't know you had such a mouth on you, it really wasn't even important, just handing out carriage dutys"
"fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck…": I mumble with my bright red face shielded by my cupped hands, if Potter wasn't in the carriage with me I would have happily wept; but pride and a need of self preservation restrains me from doing so. I feel the seat tilt to my right as Potter sits next to me, what the bloody fuck is he doing so close to me, trying to further torment me the little fucker, I'm going to hook this little shit in the ear if he doesn't- Oh. Potters arm's wrap me in an embrace and when my face touches the soft fabric of his shirt I'm overcome with embarrassment, anger, disappointment and confusion and I sit there, legs sprawled across the seat with my head in the crook of his neck and his arms cloaking my back, crying my fucking eyes out.
James sits there in silence. Thank fuck. When I regain my composure the sun in setting over dark hills meaning the train has already reached the Scottish highlands, I wipe my face with the back of my hand and slump against the headrest.
As I am about to comment on the fact that he will be incarcerated if he tells anyone about my pathetic excuse for a day he shocks me yet again when he tucks a strand of my red hair behind my ear and softly says "none of this was your fault" he then stands, picks up this bag from the opposite seats and makes for the compartment doors, he slides it open and before he steps out he turns around with a happy smirk on his face and says "I'll leave the story of what you got up to for the first half of the train ride for another day".
"Fuck off Potter" I automatically respond, shocked by the fact that I don't actually mean it. With a final reassuring smile he leaves the carriage and slides the door closed behind him.
Finally alone I feel the urge to scream but can't be bothered, mentally drained before school has even started. What the fuck happened, had Tunney really spiked my tea, she knew how much trouble I could get into and the pressure of being head girl. But more confusingly, had Potter really been the one to keep me out of (too much) trouble and hold me while I cried? His compassion quite possibly saved me from expulsion and I didn't even know he had any.
Tired of thinking, I gaze at the speeding scenery from the window and re-enter my trance as if I had never left my bed this morning and was still staring at my bedroom ceiling. Happy to remain in this position for a few centuries, Hogwarts glides into view.