Cherish the Second Chances

Chapter 1 : Missed First Chances

This story is dedicated to lily512, a good friend of mine from school. I'll make this a two-shot, one being the current situation, and the next chapter being the 'second chance' (I'm sure you guys figured that there would be a second chance from the title, or else I'm afraid you're not quite bright enough to read my stories. Sorry.)

P.S. I really wish you'd just go forth and be with James, you silly Lily.

----

"Oi! Lily!" Alice called, rushing up to greet her friend as she came off of the train. She threw her arms quickly around her best friend, held her at arm's length, and smiled brightly. "How was your winter break?" she asked quickly, a bright smile adorning her pudgy face.

Lily was slightly shocked, even though by now, she really had gotten used to Alice. Her activeness, her hyperactivity, and especially her extreme forwardness around her friends often shocked Lily, just as it had now, for it was a big difference in comparison with her well-to-do Muggle family.

"Great!" Lily finally replied, deciding on an answer. Though, in truth, 'great' didn't summarize it. Not at all, not one bit… In fact, 'great' was far from the truth. She had been thinking about a particular messy-haired, bad mannered boy in her grade—thinking, of course, of James Potter. And, of course, she was tortured throughout the entire winter break by her sister, Petunia, and her parents were constantly asking questions about the magical world, more than half of which she couldn't answer by law.

"Really, now? James has been asking about you all break," Alice said with a wink and a nudge. "So, what are you going to do? I mean, you guys even went on that date…" Alice hinted with a small smirk. Lily sighed. Really, she wish she knew what to do, how to act. A good portion of her wanted to keep pushing James away—but another portion of her desperately wanted to just be swept up into his arms and carried away into the sunset, as dramatically cliché as it sounded.

"Enough about me," Lily said, turning the subject away from her and her 'love life'. Really, she didn't feel like she had much of one. After all, James often went out with girls on first dates, but rarely made it to the second date. In fact, that was another fact she was worried about. She often heard him and Sirius talk about a contest in which they competed over who could get farther with a girl on their first date (Sirius was winning, for he had once gone out with a very desperate girl, and… well, we'll just say they're lucky an abortion wasn't needed). "What about you? You've been alone with Frank all winter, after all…" Lily said, turning the subject on her best friend.

"Nothing happened. Just the usual hanging around, you know? We barely even kiss," Alice said with a shrug. 'Hypocrite. She tells me to move forward more quickly, but when it comes to her… She's been going out with him for months, and she still blushes madly when he kisses her cheek.'

"You know you're being very hypocritical, right?" Lily asked with a small grin, deciding that those were thoughts that needed to be voiced aloud.

"Yeah, yeah…" Alice said, waving it off. "So, how was your winter break?" Alice asked with a small sigh.

"You asked that already," Lily said, her grin turning very quickly into a frown.

"You lied. I know you better than that, Lily. You had to at least have been constantly tortured by Prune or whatever her name is," Alice said, making fun of Petunia's name purposely to force a smile out of Lily.

"Yeah. You know me too well," Lily said with a sigh.

----

"You know Lily's coming back today, right?" Remus asked from the couch as James and Sirius played a game of Wizard's Chess from in front of the fire, not bothering to look up from his Potions book.

"Yeah, I know…" James said, as he stared at the chessboard with a slight glare. He was losing badly, as he usually did, and he was trying his best to find out a good move.

"No use, James. The setup is perfect! No matter what move you do, on my next turn, you'll find yourself checkmated!" Sirius exclaimed.

"Yeah, you're right… Fine, you win," James decided, getting up and leaving the table, not bothering to move a piece.

"Oi! At least make it a real defeat!" he called after James. "Remus?" Sirius asked Remus with a hopeful look.

Remus sighed, setting his book aside, took James' spot, and quickly said, "Knight to E7."

The knight obliged, and Remus sighed. "Check," he announced, and leaned back in the chair, waiting for the dumb folded Sirius to move his next piece.

"Pawn to E7," Sirius commanded, and the small pawn shyly took its place at E7, knocked the knight down.

"Queen to E7, checkmate," Remus said before returning to his book and the couch.

"I'll beat you some day, damn it…" Sirius muttered as he put away the pieces.

----

Lily walked into the Great Hall and breathed in the sight, stopping for a few seconds to stare at the masses of students, from twelve years old to, some, eighteen, not to mention the professors and other members of the staff. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood, even the Slytherins—who were no doubt discussing the amazing parties their parents threw, or the magnificent dark art presents they received over break—were as cheerful as they could get.

Alice nudged her forward after she stood their for nearly ten seconds, giving her ample time to get reacquainted, but yet hurrying her forward because she was hungry. They took their seats, far away from James and the Marauders (Lily picked the seats) and began to eat, piling food upon their plates, no longer caring a bit about the strange looks they could get from the younger girls when they put on so much food.

"So, how do you feel about James?" Alice asked while she piled chicken onto her and Frank's plates.

"I… I don't know. I've been thinking about it, and… I can't tell. I just can't," Lily admitted, her tone obviously of exasperation, putting her head in her hands as she picked at her peas, suddenly feeling a loss of appetite.

"Sheesh, so, what are you going to do about it?" Alice asked, annoyed at her friend's refuse to make any sort of move on James.

"I'm going to wait until he asks me out again, and then I'll say yes, and then… And then I'll figure it out," Lily decided firmly. Alice shook her head at her friend's cowardice, but said nothing, and instead turned her attention to Frank.

Down the table, Sirius was nudging James underneath the table. "Lily's down there, and there is an empty seat right beside her…" he pointed out suggestively.

"No… she hasn't even given me a glance, even though we share the same Head's common room. She also didn't reply to any of my letters, nor send me anything, not even a quick, 'How are things?'" James pointed out before filling his mouth with mashed potatoes.

Sirius sighed. "You're a bloody idiot. Maybe she's shy!" Sirius pointed out.

"Lily? Shy? The girl who yelled at a first year for bumping into her in the middle of a crowded corridor? The girl who shouted at me in the middle of Dumbledore's speech for only asking her out… and making a few, er, jokes…? Yeah, right, she's shy. She doesn't want anything to do with me, Sirius. If she did, she'd make the move."

"Right. You know that only desperate girls ask a guy out. She's playing hard-to-get, you git!" Sirius shouted.

"Lily? She has more sense than to play weird mind games, you know," James said, shaking his head softly at his friends suggestions. Really, sometimes he was so out of it…

----

"A Hogsmeade trip, eh?" Lily asked, glancing at the board in her Head Common Room.

"Looks like it," James replied. 'Come on, Lily, ask me anything… Give me a hint that you're not going with anyone… Come on!' James shouted at Lily inside his mind.

"Yeah…" Lily responded to his response. 'You idiot, ask me! Now! Just go, "Hey, Lily, after that great first date, you mind going on a second?' Even something idiotic like that is fine, as long as it's anything!' Lily screamed inside her mind. She finally found the will to go up the stairs, giving up on James asking right away.

She walked up the stairs to her room, when James called out, "Hey, wait, Lily!"

She froze, certain he was about to ask her out.

"Isn't… isn't that your bag over there?" James asked pointing to the bag by the couch.

"Oh… yeah…" the disappointment was definitely apparent in her voice, and she waited on that fifth step as James retrieved it for her. He handed it to her, and as he did so, he shocked her from the static picked up as he walked across the carpeted floor.

They stared at each other, right into each other's eyes. At that moment, in most movies, would be the moment that the boy and the girl confessed their undying love for each other, and how they always wanted to be together, and how they'd always stay together, no matter what.

"Goodnight," Lily said simply before turning to her door and hurrying up the stairs. She slammed the door behind her and leaned against the door, clasping her bag to her chest, breathing in and out heavily, constantly reprimanding herself for being a coward and an idiot.

James was standing still frozen at the bottom of the stairs, staring shell-shocked at the spot where Lily was just standing and at the door she had just slammed.

"Stupid! Stupid stupid stupid stupid!" he cried out, hitting himself repeatedly on the head with each 'stupid'.

----

"You're tagging along as the third wheel, huh?" Alice asked with a deep frown set on her face.

"Yeah. Sorry if I'm getting in the way of you and Frank," Lily said with a small wink.

"Yeah, right. Don't worry, we're sort of used to it. We were going to go to the Three Broomsticks for butterbeer first, and then we were going to hike over to the Shrieking Shack. Sound okay?" Alice asked.

"Yeah, perfect. I could do with a walk," Lily said with a hurried nod.

"So… why aren't you going with James?" Alice asked with a small smirk. Another look flashed just behind her eyes, but Lily couldn't place what exactly it was.

"Because… well, frankly, I'm an idiot," Lily agreed upon.

"Ah. That excuse. That's what I use when my parents ask me about Potions marks," Alice said jokingly, and Lily smirked knowingly, for it was something that could possibly happen.

----

"Milady," Frank said in a courteous manner, pulling a chair out for Lily. He smirked at her, and she smiled back kindly, giving him the same look an older sister would give a little brother.

Frank did the same for Alice, though it didn't seem as exaggerated. Lily sat in silence, staring at her butterbeer, thinking about James, when she finally realized how quiet the other two were being.

She looked up from her butterbeer to see them both staring at her with strange expressions. Frank's she couldn't place, for, though she had known him her entire time at Hogwarts, she didn't know him well at all. As for Alice, she could tell it was sadness and jealousy, mixed in two, but why she should be feeling that towards Lily, she had no clue. Alice had a boyfriend, after all, and her life was overly much better, though Lily made better marks.

"What?" she asked nervously, to the both of them.

"Uh, nothing…" the both stated suddenly, looking down at their own drinks.

BOOM

"What the…?" Lily asked as she turned around, only to see a tree falling. She heard screams of various pitches and volumes, and she jumped to her feet, wand out. Then, as if it was a stampede of students, students from their Third year to their Seventh ran past the window, along with many other patrons and shopkeepers, followed soon after by cloaked figures.

Lily, with Alice and Frank in tow, ran outside, her wand raised. A few older students were fighting the cloaked men, including James, Sirius, and Remus. Lily looked away from them, knowing they had that group handled and turned to another bigger group, where professors and another smaller set of older students were fighting. Lily ran to that group, who seemed to be struggling with the more skilled Death Eaters, and began to throw a flurry of spells at them, throwing the spells no matter how useless they could be in a fight(she swore she had even thrown scourgify).

She heard a deep scream from her right, and glanced, still throwing spells, to see that Frank was curled up on the ground, crying out in pain. Alice was more worried about him than her own safety, and would have dropped her wand had she thought about it. She leaned over Frank, and Lily knew she couldn't help them at the moment, but as long as it wasn't the Avada Kedavra…

At the same instant she thought this, as if laughing at her, a green burst of light hit her in the back and she could feel herself slipping in a deep, cold darkness…

----

Death wasn't at all like Lily had expected. In fact, it was quite the opposite of what she expected. She expected to be surrounded by fluffy clouds and to stand in front of gates to be judged, and then allowed into Heaven.

But she could feel herself floating in oblivion, all silent around her. She looked around curiously, wondering what was going on, and why death wasn't working the way she thought it should.

'Come on, she's perfectly nice…' a high-pitched voice sounded from behind her. Lily opened her mouth to somehow protest, to ask what was going on, but her vocal cords weren't working.

"'Nice' doesn't cut it. We only have one chance a year to do something like this, and well, is she really worth it?" a deeper pitched voice sounded, more hoarse than the other, but still feminine.

"Of course she is! She's a big part in the fight against Voldemort! If she doesn't live, the world will fall to darkness!"

"And? That concerns us why?"

"May I suggest a compromise?" a much different voice sounded, this one calmer than the other two.

"You're going to, anyways…" the deeper voice muttered.

"Indeed. The thing that concerns you is that this girl is self-centered and much too shy and cowardly to grasp the future she has, or rather, will be dealt. Perhaps we should send her back, about the time she gets off of the train, and as payment, have her take away the self-centeredness and cowardice?"

"Deal," the two other voice agreed, and in a flash of green light, not unlike the one that had put her there, Lily was stepping off of the train again…