Lily was once again caught in the last minute rush to get onto the Hogwarts express. This year was her last year at Hogwarts and she was determined to make it her best. She was off to a good start; she'd been made head girl, a title she'd been working towards her whole Hogwarts life.
Lily squinted back at her parents through the pelting rain they were Muggles and even after seven years of dropping their daughter off at platform nine and three quarters they still weren't quite used to the magic buzzing in the air.
"Goodbye darling." Lily's mother sobbed as she swept her daughter into one last bone crushing hug.
"We'll miss you sweet heart." her father shouted over the wailing wind and excited chatter of Hogwarts students. Lily grinned up at him before embracing him in a large hug.
"I better get going, tell Tuney I said goodbye." Lily's parents smiled wistfully, wishing their elder daughter loved Lily as much as Lily loved her, but unfortunately Petunia hated Lily, it as as clear as ice.
Lily gave her parents a last kiss before dragging her suitcase towards the train. After heaving it into the Express Lily continued up the train peering into compartments searching for her friends.
Soon she found the compartment she was looking for; inside there were three girls. A girl with frizzy dirty blonde hair sat curled in the corner with a book which Lily recognised as the Muggle novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. This was Lucie. Beside Lucie sat Juliet, Juliet was the sort of girl every boy in the whole school wanted to go out with. She had light blonde hair which flowed just passed her shoulders and her grey-blue eyes could turn icy cold in a second. Juliet was the complete opposite of Lucie, she was not at all shy and would never read a book for fun. She and Lucie were best friends and, for some reason beyond Lily, it worked. Opposite Juliet was Summer. Summer was Lily's best friend and had been since second year, she was extremely pretty. With her slightly tanned skin, long, wavy, chocolate brown hair and deep brown eyes she never failed to make boys twist in their seats to get another glance at her she didn't have them drooling like Juliet did but she was quite close.
"Hi guys." Lily greeted as shoved her trunk in the overhead compartment.
"Lily!" Juliet squealed jumping up for a hug, Lily hadn't seen Juliet all summer as she'd been staying with her grandparents in France.
"Hey Julie, how was your summer?" she asked as she hugged Summer and Lucie in turn.
"Boring. My mum reckoned it'd be fun to go find out about the Veela side of the family. It. Was. Not." Lily laughed, if she'd been in Juliet's position she'd have found it fascinating and she was about to tell her so but Juliet was busy digging through her trunk to find the newest fashion magazine.
"How was everyone else's summer?" Lily asked the other girls. Summer shrugged, she'd seen Lily more than Lucie, and Lucie grinned.
"It was really good, I went to Devon with my dad for a week when he got time off, so that was really good. Other than that I didn't do much." her voice was soft and even but you hear the love behind it when she talked about her dad. When she was six Lucie's mum left, she was a Muggle and terrified at Lucie's outbursts of magic, even though her husband had warned her. Later that year she left and that was the last Lucie saw of her. Ever since Lucie has blamed herself for her mum leaving.
"That's great Luce. Guys I have to go, Head Girl, got to go to the meeting." Lily said hurriedly as she left the compartment, leaving the three girls staring after her mouths hanging.
"She...she...she's Head Girl." Summer stuttered.
"I told you she would be." Lucie replied in a sing-song voice.
"But Alice was the prefect." Juliet stammered.
"Yes, but she couldn't cope with the work load and Lily was always helping her, wasn't she?" Lucie chided. Juliet looked thoughtful for a minute before nodding and going back to her magazine.
**Mischief*Managed**
Lily smiled to herself as she walked up the train to the Head's Compartment. There was nobody there yet so Lily decided to sit and wait. Over the next five minutes all the prefects entered, everyone was here except the Head Boy, Lily decided to wait another five minutes for him; after all he might be sorting out trouble. Five minutes later still no show. Lily sighed and decided to start without him.
"Hi, I'm Lily Evans, the new Head Girl." Lily smiled warmly at the prefects, trying to diminish the nervousness in the air. "The Head Boy hasn't turned up yet, so we're going to have to start without him." then, as if on cue, a tall, well muscled boy tumbled into the room.
"Sorry I'm late, I got lost." he panted.
"It's-POTTER!" Lily, about to forgive the muscular body, finally looked up into the boy's face. It was James, prankster, Marauder, best in transfiguration, (and Lily's favourite nickname) arrogant toe rag, Potter.
"Evans!" James shouted gleefully. "I knew you'd miss me."
"Potter. Why. Are. You. Here?" Lily whispered, seething silently.
"I'm Head Boy." he grinned.
"Merlin no." Lily put her head in her hands.
"I'm sorry Evans, dearest, but Merlin says yes." James contradicted.
"We'll deal with this later." Lily hissed before turning back to the prefects and giving them their duties. After about an hour, where James had behaved extraordinarily well and even contributed to the speech Lily was giving, the prefects left.
"Potter, how on earth are you Head Boy?" Lily asked in disbelief.
"You know, that's what my mum said." James mused. "I dunno really. I just suppose Dumbledore had some sort of mental break down. I did send him a letter and asked if I needed to call St. Mungo's to check if his mental health was okay, he just replied saying he'd been asked that many times, and he knows he made the right choice."
"So you haven't body binded the real head boy somewhere?" Lily questioned hopefully.
"Nope." James smirked, then his eyes went wide with delight, realisation dawning on his face.
"What?" Lily snapped, then her eyes too went wide, but from horror. "Merlin no."
"Sorry Evans, but Merlin say YES!" James whooped.
**Always**
Lily stomped back into the compartment with her friends a scowl dominating her face.
"What's up Lils? Potter made Head Boy?" Summer teased. Lily screamed and fell face first onto the seat.
"Uh oh." Lucie commented, looking over the top of her book, Lily nodded in agreement.
"He's not!" Summer gasped.
"He is." Lily moaned mournfully, Juliet began to laugh uncontrollably, tears cascading down her cheeks. "SHUT UP!" Lily yelled, throwing a pillow at her.
"P-P-POTTER. I'm sorry it's just so funny!" she gasped between laughs, Lucie to was hiding her giggles behind her book. "And the best part is you have to share a dorm with him." Juliet laughed.
"I know!" Lily cried.
The rest of the journey passed with Juliet teasing Lily, Lucie reading her book and Summer, always the optimist, trying to find some light in what had become of Lily's dark seventh year.
**I Solemnly Swear I'm Up To No Good**
Lily sat as far away from James and the rest of the Marauders (Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew) as she could at the feast. She noticed James kept glancing her way as he ate but he made no move to come and sit nearer. Sirius, however, did.
"What do you want Black?" Lily growled menacingly.
"Whoa, clam down Evans." Sirius said raising his arms in surrender. "I came to say hello to Juliet. After all what's wrong with saying hello to my girlfriend?"
"Fine." Lily spat violently spearing her sausages, which then swerved out of the way of her fork. Lily's scowl deepened, "Very funny Black." Sirius just laughed.
"Sorry Lily flower, I was only thinking of the poor sausage."
"Don't call me that." she said shortly, and yet again she tried to get her sausage and yet again it swerved away. "Let me get my sausage!" she screamed at Sirius, who shrugged and flicked his wand at the frustrating food.
"A thank you would be nice." he muttered as Lily shoved the sausage in her mouth, she just glared at him.
"Ignore her, she's in a bad mood about James." Juliet told Sirius.
"Isn't she always?" he teased, Lily just grumbled incoherently.
At the end of the feast all of Hogwarts left to go to their dorms, that was all of Hogwarts except Lily and James who stood, waiting for direction to their dorms.
McGonagall lead them up to the fourth floor to a tapestry of the Knights of the Round Table with Merlin hovering in the corner.
"Miss Evans, Mr Potter, this is how you enter your tower. All you have to do is call Merlin over and tell him the password. I will let you choose that in your own time, please tell it to nobody. If you have guests Merlin will tell you. Tomorrow meet with the Headmaster at seven-thirty in the evenings for your duties. Goodnight." McGonagall said curtly with a nod before turning on her heel and walking away.
"So Evans, what's the password going to be?" James grinned.
"I don't know, something simple." she yawned.
"How about we do each of the Knights of the Round Table, just to tie the password in with the tapestry?" James suggested.
"Let's start with King Arthur." Lily agreed.
"Okay, Merlin." James called into the tapestry. All the knights looked up and gave them a friendly smile or wave.
"Welcome." Merlin smiled. "Congratulations, what is your choice of password?" he asked.
"King Arthur." James replied confidently. The King Arthur in the tapestry looked over and bowed his head in appreciation
"You have chosen well young man, now off to bed." Merlin waved his wand and the tapestry rolled up revealing a doorway. James stood aside and let Lily pass through the doorway first and then followed her through.
The common room was beautiful. Everything was red and gold, it was a replica of Gryffindor common room only with a large wooden table at the back in front of the wall sized French windows, which lead out onto a balcony. The balcony was decorated with a simple garden table and four chairs obviously meant for studying.
"Whoa." James whispered, running a hand through his messy raven black hair.
"Whoa." Lily agreed. After a few minutes of appreciating the common room they decided to go to bed, Lily going up the left spiral staircase and James going up the right.
Lily glanced around and seeing it was exactly the same as her dorm in Gryffindor tower, with the exception of there only being one bed, she fell, fully clothed, onto the bed and as her head hit the pillow she was asleep.