Disclaimer: Any characters, places, ideas, or things that you recognize aren't mine.

Dedication: To Sing-Your-Heart-Out for suggesting that I write this and for reviewing every single one of my stories. Thanks!

Author's Note: IMPORTANT! This is a sequel to Missed Chance. You don't have to read that for this to make sense, but it helps.

Second Chances

Prologue

Henri looked down at her sleeping friend. She held two envelopes in her hand, one addressed to her and one to her friend. After a few moments consideration she decided that it was time for her friend to get up. She bet down and started to poke her.

The other girl's eyes opened as she shrieked with laughter. When she was satisfied that her friend was really awake she straightened up. "It's nearly ten! Get up lazybones!"

"Why should I?" asked the other girl, her voice tinged with annoyance, "It isn't like school has started. Please Henri. I don't want to get up! I bet that you don't even have one good reason."

"I do."

"Oh, yeah? Then what is it?" asked the other girl, her voice skeptical.

"Because," stated Henri, "I have your Hogwarts letter. And it's Seventh year."

The other girl squeaked and jumped up. She reached for her letter eagerly.

"Not yet," cried Henri, standing on tiptoe so that her friend couldn't reach the letter. "First you have to promise that you won't go back to bed. Then you can have the letter." As she spoke Henri was grinning. She knew that her friend was hoping to be Head Girl, and that it must be driving her crazy to be able to see the envelope that held the answer to her questions, but to be unable to reach it.

"I promise, I promise! Now give it!"

Having gotten her letter the other girl sat down on the bed, hands shaking. Slowly she opened the envelope and reached inside.

"YES! I got it," she jumped up, grabbed Henri, and started spinning around the room with her.

Finally disentangling herself from her friend's grasp Henri went over to the forgotten envelope and looked inside. She removed first the usual letter and supplies list, then another sheet of paper. She started to read.

"Dear Miss Lily Evans,

I am pleased to inform you that you have been chosen as Head Girl. Your first duties are to speak to the other prefects on the Hogwarts express. You will tell them the passwords to the four houses as well as instructing them in their first duties. As Head Girl you are expected to set an example for all students. Personal feelings must not compromise your performance as Head Girl, or you will lose the position. You are asked to attend a meeting with Professor Dumbledore and the Head Boy after the welcome feast. You are to go to the door to the headmaster's office to wait for him to let you in. Good luck.

Sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall.

P.S. I feel that I must inform you of the Head Boy's identity so that you may be prepared. The head boy is James Potter.

Lily stared at her friend for a minute then began to laugh. "For a minute there I actually thought that you were serious! Potter as Head Boy! That's a good one." She broke down once more, laughing uncontrollably.

Henri waited for Lily to stop then took her friend's hand and sat her down. "Lily, I wasn't joking. Potter is Head Boy. And Dumbledore is officially crazy and stupid. Sort of like Potter!"

Lily looked at her with disbelieving horror. Then she snatched the letter. As she scanned it her eyes widened. "Could this be any worse? I get my dream of being Head Girl. There's just one teensy-weesnsy, little complication. The other Head is POTTER!" By now she was weeping and yelling. Henri simply sat there, holding her friend as she cried when the anger had dissipated and the pain and fright and frustration kicked in.

There was a simple reason that the girls hated James Potter. He had done things to them that were infuriating and rude and mean. When they were younger he had seemed to be somewhat mischievous. He pulled pranks, but they were generally harmless.

In third year that had started to change. Lily had a crush on James. She and her friends were playing Zap, and Lily ended up having to ask James out. He said yes, then a week later told her that it was all a joke. He didn't even think that he'd done anything wrong.

He also started to play pranks that were crueler. He never permanently injured anyone's body, but their dignity or self-esteem was another matter. As far as he was concerned all Slytherins were evil. They weren't truly human, so they deserved to be attacked. He once explained just that to Lily. This was after she yelled at him for- you guessed it- hexing Slytherins.

He had also decided shortly after the Zap fiasco that he liked her. And, being Potter, this meant that he had to ask her out. And then do it again, and again, and again.

But, as far as Lily (or Henri for that matter) was concerned, he was a lying, cheating, idiotic, stupid, evil toerag. And that was putting it mildly.

So you can imagine how unhappy Lily was to discover that he would be Head Boy.

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After she had calmed down a bit Lily began to attempt to convince herself that it wasn't that bad. Through the whole thing Henri sat silently, listening to her.

"I mean, Dumbledore is crazy, but he doesn't do things without a reason, does he?" asked Lily almost frantically. When there was no reply she asked again, her voice going up an octave. "Does he? Does he?"

"Not usually, then again this is the most brilliant wizard of our age… Who is obsessed with sherbet lemons. Who knows what he's thinking?"

"NOT helping Henri! I need some support here!"

"Oh. Right. I'm sure that it'll all turn out fine. Maybe the idiot has changed! Look, I know that I wasn't being totally serious there, but I truly think that Dumbledore has to have had a reason for choosing him. After all, he isn't stupid," Henri looked at her friend encouragingly.

"Right. Not stupid, not stupid, not stupid, not stupid, not stu-" her voice was getting more and more frantic as she tried to convince herself/

"Lily! Calm down. It isn't the end of the world. That won't come until, oh, I don't know, you agree to go out with him or something!"

Lily looked at Henri miserably, "What am I going to do? He won't do any work and he'll spend all of his time asking me out!"

"Lily, you don't know that! Give him a chance. Look, what you need to do is contact him before the meeting on the train. Send him an owl telling him to meet you at King's cross early. You two can have a meeting then. You're going with me, and now that we've passed our apparition tests we can do that. There's a special spot at the station for people who are apparating in. Tell James to meet you there. He'll know where it is. You can sort things out then, okay?"

"Yes ma'am," Lily stood and got some parchment and a quill out of her trunk. "You know, I'm almost out of parchment and ink. We'll have to go to Diagon alley soon for school supplies."

She set her quill on the paper wrote Dear, and then stopped ad looked up. "What do I write?"

"I'll tell you, and you write what I say, alright?" She looked up, saw her friend nod and started to speak.

"Dear James Potter,

I was recently informed of your new position as Head Boy. I as I am aware that you were not previously a prefect, I feel that it would be best if we went over the duties of the Head Boy and Girl before meeting with the prefects. I would like to ask that you meet me at the apparition point at King's Cross at 9:00 on September first. At that time we can discuss your duties and the conduct expected of the Heads.

Sincerely,

Lily Evans."

The girls nodded to each other, as if agreeing that this was what they wanted to say, and then they tied the letter to the leg of Henri's owl, Ilana, and watched as she flew off into the sky.