Disclaimer: All the good stuff belongs to JK Rowling
Lily watched the little hand on her watch tick closer to eleven , soon she would be heading to Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry and she was more than nervous . She fingered the silver heart necklace Petunia had given her for her eleventh birthday and remembered the day when that letter came...
'Lily Lily wake up! It's your birthday and I want to give you your gift ' Petunia sqealed excitedly
' shh Tuney you'll wake mum I'm getting up ' said Lily while rubbing the sleep out her eyes
'oh and this came for you ' whispered Petunia handing over a letter with her name and adress written elegantly on the front in emerald ink. she was intrigued as to who had sent the letter for it was too thick to be a birthday card however she forced herself to ignore the mysterious letter and turn to Petunia who was clearly bursting to give Lily her present .
' I hope you like it Lil I searched for ages to find it' whispered Petunia handing over a small box with a green ribbon tied round it , unable to contain herself Lily ripped the decorative ribbon off and opened the box . Inside nestled inside a bed of tissue paper was a delicate silver heart on a silver chain
' oh Tuney I love it !' Lily exclaimed leaning across the bed to hug her sister
'open your letter now Lil maybe it's from aunt Annabel in Austrailia ' exclaimed Petunia excitedly , carefully Lily broke the red wax seal on the back of the parchment slowly she read the letter while Petunia tried in vain to read the letter over her shoulder . Hogwarts ! Thought Lily but she thought Sev was only winding her up
Suddenly Lily was interupted from her thoughts by a quiet tapping on the door
" excuse me is it okay if I join you ? Only all the other compartments with space have older students and I didn't want to sit there, I tried to find my friend frank he's in second year but I can't find him" said a girl rather nervously ,
" of course " said Lily glad to have someone to talk to on the journey .
The girl thanked her and took a seat opposite Lily , she had chocolate coloured hair which fell in slight waves to just past her shoulders and big warm brown eyes
" I'm Alice Caroll nice to meet you " said the girl with a smile
"I'm Lily Evans " replied Lily
"are you in first year too ?"
"yes I'm so excited I can't believe we are finally going to Hogwarts ",
"finally? It's only been weeks since our letters came" said Lily a confused expression spreading across her pale face
"oh are you muggleborn?"enquired Alice , Lily was getting more embarrassed by the second especially as Alice began to talk about her parents as muggles whatever that meant .
Alice noticed that Lily didn't understand most of what she was saying and carefully explained about magical and non-magical people and how they co existed . After Lily understood she begun asking Alice about Hogwarts and the wizarding world so far Lilys only experience of the wizarding world was the trip to Diagon Alley with her mum in July and she was eager to learn more about the world she had just discovered she belonged to , the two girls were so immersed in their conversation that they didn't notice the train pulling out of the station and they only stopped their discussion on Hogwarts subjects when a kind elderly witch asked them if they wanted anything from the lunch trolley
"umm I'll have a Dairy Milk please " said Lily politely while searching for money
" the lunch trolley only sells wizard sweets dear would you like something else?" said the woman kindly
"no thank you " said Lily she could feel her cheeks burning now Alice would think she was stupid but Alice generously bought enough sweets so that they could share between them .
After several hours and a funny incident involving Lilys jumper and an escape artist of a chocolate frog a tall boy with black Hogwarts robes and a little blue prefect badge entered the compartment to tell them that they were almost there and that they should change into their Hogwarts robes . The girls changed hurriedly into their plain black robes Alice had already told Lily that when they were sorted into houses the badge on the robes would change to the crest of their house and Lily couldn't wait to be sorted personally she thought Gryffindor and Ravenclaw would be the best houses to be put in but she was just hoping to be chosen she had a dread of failing whatever test sorted the first years and being sent home . Suddenly Lily noticed that she was wearing her favourite red converse under her robes she didn't have time to sort through her trunk to find her school shoes as at that moment the train was pulling into a quaint little station filled with baskets of flowers .
"Its time to go Lily we leave our trunks and things on the train and they take them to the castle " said Alice as she got up to leave the compartment , the girls were pulled along by the crowd onto the lantern lit platform . All the older students seemed to be moving along the platform to where lots of seemingly abandoned carriages were Lily didn't understand why the older students were getting into the carriages as there was no horses to pull them but all the first years looked uncertain where they were supposed to go that is until they heard a loud booming voice
"firs years over here firs years" the voice belonged to the largest man Lily had ever seen he was even bigger than the giant in the pantomime she had seen last Christmas . The huge man directed them to the edge of a wide lake where lots of little wooden boats bobbed by the shore he instructed them to get into the boats with four in each
Lily and Alice were joined in there boat by two black haired boys who both had a mischievous glint in their eye , the giant man who had now introduced himself as Hagrid waved what looked like a flowery umbrella and the little boats set off across the lake .
As soon as they were moving the two boys in Lilys boat started to lean over the edge they appeared to have saved some of the sandwiches from their lunch and were now dropping little pieces over the side of the boat into the lake , suddenly a purple slimy tentacle emerged and grabbed the pieces . At the sight of the tentacle Alice screamed in fright but the boys assured her that it was the giant squid who lived in the lake and that it wouldn't do them any harm however at that precise moment the tentacle shot out again and tried to grab the remaining sandwiches from on of the boys hand this caused there little boat to tip to one side precariously .
Both Lily and Alice were glad to be back on dry land and looked awestruck at the sight of the castle which they hadn't noticed on the way across the lake as they were trying not to fall in . Hogwarts was magnificent with four tall towers and turrets just like in a fairytale. Hagrid led the first years up to the main entrance where they were met by a severe looking woman with a thistle on her hat .
"Welcome first years I am professor Mcgonagall and I teach transfiguration here at Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry , when I say so we shall procede to the Great hall where the sorting ceremony will take place ". Immdiately Lily turned to Alice
"you mean we get sorted infront of the whole school ? What if I can't do it I haven't learned magic yet " said Lily panicked , the boy with messy black hair and Hazel eyes joined their conversation at this point to tell them that they only had to try on a hat . Lily wasn't sure whether she should believe the boy as he seemed like a joker plus trying on a hat seemed too easy . However the boy turned out to be right when Lily entered the great hall her eyes were immidately drawn to the tattered wide brimmed wizards hat which was perched on a rickety stool at the top of the hall . The students had to sit on the stool and wear the hat which would tell them which house they were in . They were sorted in alphabetical order so Lily watched as Victoria Agneau was made a Ravenclaw , Amir Ashkan was made a Hufflepuff and so on however barely any students had been sorted when they're was a commotion in the hall a boy called Sirius Black who had shared the boat with Lily and Alice walked or rather swaggered up to be sorted and the hat announced he was I'm Gryffindor after little consideration Lily didn't know what the problem was but the whole hall went silent until it was the silence was broken by jeers from the Slytherins .
Lily had little time to puzzle over the mysterious sorting of Sirius Black as Alice was next to be sorted Lily hoped that they would be in the same house as she would like them to be friends , Alice sat nervously on the stool and put the old hat on her head after a short amount of time the wide brim of the hat opened to announce the word Gryffindor to the hall Alice looked relieved and hopped of the school and went to join the Gryffindor table which was cheering for her . Nervously Lily watched as Eversham Aria was sorted into gryffindor as she had to be soon . ' Evans Lily ' called Mcgonagall and Lily approached the stool all the while trying to hide her red shoes under her robes , what if she wasn't picked at all she panicked what if no house wanted her, her thoughts were interrupted by the voice of the hat
" clever one here yes a good brain and a willingness to learn Ravenclaw perhaps but there us courage and loyalty here and a strong sense of friendship I think " Lily waited with baited breath
"Gryffindor !" the hat announced to the hall .
Lily had never been so happy she slipped off the stool and went to join Sirius and Alice at the cheering table . The sorting ended with Zander Zabini becoming a Slytherin and Professor Mcgonagall removed the sorting hat and stool with a wave of her wand . All eyes turned to the staff table as the headmaster Dumbledore stood to make a speech Lily expected a speech of rules and encouragemnts to behave and do well however Dumbledore gave the weirdest speech Lily had ever heard , she wondered how he managed to get the word buttock into the speech so many times but she was distracted my mountains of food appearing on the golden plates .
Lily Alice and Sirius had been joined at the table by James Potter who had been in the boat with Lily and
Alice , Remus Lupin who was pale and sickly looking but Lily thought he had kind eyes , Peter Pettigrew who was rather short for his age and had watery eyes and the girls Lily suspected she would be sharing a room with however she couldn't remember their names . By the end of the feast Lily was full to burst with roast chicken , potatoes , coq au vin and suprisingly sherbet lemons .
When it was time to leave a curly haired prefect started to gather the first years around him assisted hesitantly by the other Gryffindor prefect to show them towards Gryffindor tower . As they passed by portraits of witches and wizards waved to them which gave Lily a fright in the muggle world pictures were still . They arrived at a large portrait of an overweight lady in a pink frilly dress which reminded Lily of the dress Petunia had worn to their cousin Mabels wedding ,
'aardvark' said the curly haired prefect and the portrait swung open to reveal a large cosy room with a crackling fire and squashy armchairs it was decorated in red and gold which Lily now knew to be Gryffindors colours . The girl prefect took the first year girls and directed them to their dormitory .
The girls all walked up the spiral stone staircase until they came upon a wooden door with a gold plaque reading first years , a girl with soft honey blond curls stepped forward and pushed open the door . They were met by a large circular room with five beds and a large window with a Windowseat , Lily loved the Windowseat on sight and could imagine curling up there with a good book . There trunks were at the bottom of the beds and Lily circled the room looking for the trunk with her initials , situated between A.C and A.E was L.E and Lily sat down on the gold embroidered cover .
" Hello everyone my name is Sapphire what about everyone else ? " smiled a tall girl with long dark hair and big dark blue eyes ,
"I'm Aria Eversham " said the girl with honey blond curls and cornflower blue eyes who was perched on the edge of the bed to Lilys left ,
" hello I'm Ruby and obviously I'm Sapphires twin"' lisped an almost identical version of Sapphire from across the room , Alice seemed reluctant to introduce herself so Lily piped up
" I'm Lily nice to meet you all" everyone looked expectantly towards Alice but she kept her mouth shut so the girls gave up . " why don't we have a pyjama party tommorow night it's a Friday ?" suggested Sapphire who was midway through putting on her pyjamas the rest of the girls nodded their agreement and wished each other goodnight it had been an eventful day and everyone was exhausted soon Lily was the only one left awake and as she gazed at the stars from the bed she thought about just how lucky she was .
The next morning Lily was first to wake up and took the opportunity to have a quick shower when she emerged Sapphire was also awake and was plaiting her hair in a intricate pattern ,
" I love your hair Sapphire " whispered Lily as she didn't want to wake up her sleeping roomates
"thanks Lily want me to plait yours ?" she asked with a smile " yes please" said Lily pulling up her knee length socks . By the time anyone else had risen Lily and Sapphire were already fully dressed and ready so they decided to wait for the others in the common room , they were the only ones there and so sat in the comfiest armchairs by the now extinguished fire .
" so Lily where are you from ?"asked Sapphire as they listened to the birds singing outside the window
"Surrey" replied Lily
"oh in the wizarding village there ?"
" um no my parents are muggles you see I didnt know I was a witch until I got my letter " said Lily blushing
" where are you from ?" she asked Sapphire
" London" smiled Sapphire
"but my family travel a lot my dad is the lead singer of The Phoenixs which is a really popular wizard band so we used to go on tour with him when we were kids "
" that must have been an exciting childhood is that why you and your sister are named after jewels cause your dads a rockstar?" giggled Lily
" yeah and to make things worse our second name is Phoenix like the band so me and Ruby are called Ruby and Sapphire Phoenix try growing up with that name " said Sapphire also now giggling
"have you got any other siblings besides Ruby?" asked Lily interestedly
"yeah our big sister Jade is in fifth year she's Gryffindor too and our little sister Amber is one what about you any brothers or sisters ?"
"my sister Petunia is a couple of years older we used to be very close but we've fallen out because I'm a witch which she hates "
" aww that's too bad she will probaly come round sometime I mean your her sister " said Sapphire sympathetically
" Lily can you do me a favour?" Asked Sapphire hopefully
" yeah sure what is it" replied Lily
" don't mention Ruby's lisp she's really self conscious about it "
" of course I won't"
"Thanks a lot" smiled Sapphire
. Voices could be heard coming down the boys stairs and Remus James Sirius and Peter emerged they greeted the girls and then headed off through the portrait hole soon after Aria , Sapphire and Alice appeared from the girls stairs and the five set off to breakfast .
The girls clearly remembered the journey from the great hall to the tower last night however the castle seemed to have rearranged itself overnight and the girls found themselves wandering a deserted corridor which only had a picture of a lady in a wedding dress .
The girls were finally rescued from the portraits speech about bridesmaid shoes by Arias brother Jude who was in second year and he led them to the great hall . Although the girls had been one of the first to get up by the time the finally got to breakfast nearly everyone had arrived , they quickly took seats at the Gryffindor table between some burly sixth years and a pair of third year girls .
Lily was just tucking in to her bacon when Proffesor McGonagall began handing out timetables to all the students .
"charms first then herbology" Alice began to read out but she was interrupted by a loud shriek from the Hufflepuff table .
Everyone turned in their seats to look at the plump mousy brown haired girl who was emitting the noise , her black school robes appeared to be glowing and suddenly morphed into a giant yellow banana costume which was playing a cheesy pop song , the girls legs started to move but it was clear from her face that the movement was involuntary suddenly she leapt onto the table narrowly avoiding a plate of scrambled egg and started doing the a weird dance . By this point everyone in the great hall was staring and most were laughing in particular James Potter who has tears of laughter rolling down his face as he watched the poor girl run from the hall . Alice Aria and Lily were some of the few not laughing and Lily felt sorry for the girl who had been so humiliated on her first day , from his smirk it was obvious who was responsible . That was the day she began to hate James Potter .
And sixth year was the year she started to love him...