When new friends and acquaintances ask us how we came to be together James usually dives into a story of an epic scale to rival that of Romeo and Juliet in proportion. I usually smile and laugh lightly at all his jokes and nod every time he says, "Isn't that right darling?" It doesn't matter whether it is actually right or not, my husband likes to tell a story and who am I to quash his creativity?

He would have you and everyone else for that matter, believing he was a brave heroic knight sent to slay a dragon! I haven't the heart to recount it from my point of view, well, not to him, anyway.

You see, I didn't fall in love with James in the beginning…I fell in love with his friends. James just sort of came along with them, they're a package deal you see…get one, get them all. There might have been a time when I could have seen myself ending up with anyone of them…but it was always meant to be James in the end, of that I'm sure…he was sure too, and I suppose the guys were as well.

Each of his best friends entered my life at intervals. It's true I couldn't stand them to start with, but they either grew on me slowly or BAM, hit me like a car crash.

-

Remus was first. He was the creeper. Not that he's a creep; more like he crept slowly, quietly into my affections, like the friendly house cat would rub softly against your ankles, and curl up at your feet, only to brave the arm of the chair the next night, eventually making its way onto your lap, purring as you rub its ear as though you'd always been doing it, from the beginning.

We would often end up with each other in the library having shushed conversations about our studies, debates on homework and help with tricky spells. We had a kind of understanding there. I didn't approve of his friends and he didn't approve of mine. But we never mentioned any of them when it was just us, alone in those dimly lit stacks.

I must have been only fourteen when I began to look at him with any sort of sexual attraction. Remus didn't often look very well but when he was on form, so to speak, he cut quite a tall and handsome figure for a fourteen year old. He'd grown taller than almost anyone in the year and his shoulders were broad, even if he still did look a little gangly.

At one point I found myself spending more time than necessary in amongst the dusty old books in the sheer hope that he would be there, studying something I wasn't allowed to ask about, or needing help with some charms theory he couldn't get his head around. I was, at that time, very aware of James Potter's fancies toward me, as he made apparent quite a good few times. Remus never mentioned it, though I knew he held back because of it. If it hadn't have been for his best friends misguided affections I could put money on the fact that me and Remus would have slowly but surely made our way towards some sort of formal relationship, and I'm convinced it would have been something awfully sweet.

Sometimes even now I really look at him and wonder whether we might have made it through the final years of Hogwarts together, and left still very much in love with one another. I like to think we would. I still have a lot of time for Remus. If he wants to discuss some sort of important topic I'll listen and debate till he decides we've been grown up enough. If all he wants to do is drink tea and watch the world and his wife go by outside a café in London then I'm also game.

Yes, Remus crept slowly but surely, and I love him in a way James may never understand. Remus my friend who didn't ask too many questions in return for the same and who wasn't afraid to show me the side he kept mainly to himself; the sweet, slightly dusty Remus who blossomed in the shaded corners of the Hogwarts library and study halls.

-

Sirius was next and boy did he come at me like a bat out of hell!

He had developed an intense dislike of me, had dear old Sirius Black. Two things really got his back up about me; my friendship with Severus Snape and the fact that his best friend seemed to forget he existed whenever I walked past. Now I'm not going to go into Sirius's insecurities when it comes to the affections of his best friend but the whole Severus thing was the major sticking point. And I never really knew why…until the night we ended up almost drunkenly brawling out by the quidditch pitch at three in the morning having opened up a little too much of our souls to one another.

Yeah.

It had been the beginning of our sixth year and I had parted ways with my best friend the summer previous. I was still very protective of my reasons for putting up with his duplicity for so long but I had finally seen the light, so to speak, and cut ties completely. Its safe to say though, that with Severus having been my best friend since I was ten, I was a little messed up over it; to the point of aimlessly wandering about the grounds past midnight.

Sirius, it seems, was fond of the freezing cold wind and shimmer of the half moon too. I'd stumbled across him in the stands of the quidditch pitch and knowing I'd be in trouble for being out of school at that hour knew not to call him up on it…and he had a bottle of firewhisky too, just what I'd needed. He was reluctant to let me share it, but really, what choice did he have? If I was going down, he was coming down with me; I really didn't care.

After he'd had a rant about my ex-best friend and how he couldn't understand how I could ever think about being friends with a greasy underhanded dark so'n'so blah, blah… I don't really remember the speech now but I got on my high horse once he'd finished and blurted everything out to him. I'd kind of been bottling it all up over summer anyway, no one wanted to hear why I was so cut up about it, they were just all so happy I'd finally dropped him, so Sirius bore the brunt of it.

Once I'd finished I not only found myself feeling a little lighter but also a little angrier at Sirius, remembering that in fact, Sirius and his friends were possibly the guys who had pushed Severus to breaking point. I'm pretty sure I demanded to know why he was such a shit. I'm pretty sure I did actually yell "Sirius Black, why do you have to be such a shit?!"

Well Sirius being Sirius had a smart guarded answer, as he does to everything, so I got madder and insisted he tell me why he hated Severus so bloody much. I wasn't bargaining on getting the entire Black family history too but I suppose Sirius might have been bottling his angst up a little longer than me…

By the time he was done, we were out of firewhisky, I think I may have cried once at the very least, and my voice was hoarse from sleep deprivation, the harsh liquor and yelling sporadically. I may have almost fallen from his broom when he insisted on flying us back up to the castle, in through the open window where he usually made his re-entrance. I'm certain I quite un-elegantly toppled off the broom when attempting a dismount and ended up sprawled on the dusty floor as Sirius laughed his arse off and ended up on the floor next to me clutching his sides and calling me a crazy mare.

Sirius turned out to be the guy I could let go with. That first night may not have been duplicated exactly, but whenever either of us needed to vent in confidence, we were there for one another, and we still are. Even if there's no angst involved, and we just want to kick back and have a little unsupervised fun.

Its better for all involved that James knows very little of these crazy alcohol fuelled nights. He can get a little overprotective, not even mentioning the jealous tendencies he can get. As far as he's concerned, me and Sirius were only just on friendly speaking terms when he and I began to date…

-

Now Peter Pettigrew is an odd fish…and I mean that in the nicest way imaginable.

I was pretty sure he knew about the friendship I'd forged with Remus over the years and I know for a fact he'd stumbled across me and Sirius planning our next night of drunken frivolousness at one point. I never understood why he never ratted us out to James though, as I had fully expected him to. He was the guy who did the running. He was the guy who would do the leg work to stay in favour. I often felt bad for him, and angry at the others for treating him like a lapdog but Remus insisted that Peter preferred it that way and in the end it was apparent to me that he did.

I suppose I may have befriended him a little because I felt sorry for him, and that sounds awful but it's kind of true. I felt bad that he felt the need to be whatever James, Sirius and Remus required him to be, instead of being himself. I made an internal vow to discover the real Peter Pettigrew and if I'm going to be brutally honest I still don't believe I'm right to the core. He's baffling and complex and it's quite unnerving, as he seems so outwardly simple.

My shortcomings as a personality detective aside, I actually found myself liking spending time with Peter as we made our way through our sixth year. If he was with Remus in the library I'd not divert myself and sit elsewhere. If he said he was on his way to the kitchens to grab something for himself and the guys to eat I'd ask if I could tag along too. Our friendship was tentative but I found him to be surprisingly very funny and always willing to do anything to please. I should feel bad that I was doing exactly what his friends had been doing for so long, using his light hearted nature and willingness to pass the time and make me smile, but then again, isn't that what friendship is about?

Even now Pete will pop over while I'm making dinner and help with the stirring of the gravy. Whenever he comes here there seems to always be gravy to stir and taste and he proclaims to be the best in the world at doing it. Its little things like that, that put a smile on my face and make me thankful we all have him to bring a little bit of light heartedness into our gloomy lives.

-

And so that leaves James Potter.

I'd like to point out that up until my friendship with Pete, James had grown quiet in his oh-so-public adoration, but had not become anymore interesting to me. Sometimes the others would try and push the point of him being a really nice guy, loyal friend, all around stand up gent but I wasn't biting. Sirius thought it humorous and would bark a laugh before changing the subject, Remus would make an apologetic face silently telling me he'd been put up to it and Peter would carry on unabashedly bigging-up his best friend like he'd obviously promised he would.

Maybe I just became used to having James around.

Like I said at the beginning, it was probably always meant to be me and James Potter in the end…but I'm sticking by the way I got there. I love Remus, Sirius and Peter in their own right, not as James's friends but as mine. I would be lying if I said all I needed to survive would be James. He is a wonderful husband, don't get me wrong, and I love him with everything I have, but he is only one side to the square. I may share my bed with him but I can't share my drunken rants, or most farfetched theories on the girl who just walked past with her shirt tucked into her knickers, or the merits of my gravy for Merlin's sake. No, I need all four of them. And I may go as far as to surmise that they may all need me, in their own personal ways.

-

It has been so long since I wrote anything in this fandom! So, so long! It's like revisiting old good friends who I wish I'd not neglected. I know this is just a little rambling drabble but I like the premise of Lily's friendship growing with the other Marauders first, before she let James anywhere near her.

ANYWAY…please take the time to review, I really would appreciate it. thank you very much for reading x