Author's Note: Hi everybody! This story is written for the second round of the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition. Please enjoy! Team: Montrose Magpies Position: Chaser One Words: 1,597 Prompts: Notebook, Picture Frame, and "But would you have it any other way?" Song: This Heart by Mary Lambert
Fifteen-year-old Lily Evans sat at a table in the middle of the almost empty Gryffindor common room. She was busy writing in her notebook about her latest encounter with Severus Snape. How dare he call her a mudblood! Lily would sure show him. From someone who had been her best friend for five years, Severus had certainly not treated her like a friend.
Though the clock above Lily's head chimed eleven o'clock, Lily wrote on, and soon tears began to spill down her cheeks. The other fifth year Gryffindor girls had gone to bed long ago, and now the common room was empty except for her. Lily sighed after a while, placing her quill down on the table and rubbing her temples, trying to stop herself from crying.
Suddenly, with a loud bang the portrait hole opened, and in walked four equally ecstatic fifteen-year-old boys. Lily sighed as her least favorite group of troublemakers- dubbed the Marauders- traipsed into the room, whooping loudly.
The arrogant head of the group, James Potter, was the loudest of them all. He had a broken picture frame clasped in his hand for some reason, and was speaking animatedly to his comrades, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew. None of the boys had noticed Lily, and she was quite content to eavesdrop for the time being.
"Did you see the look on Filch's face when the paint can fell on him? It was his first day on the job, too!" Sirius Black exclaimed, howling with laughter. Peter hooted alongside his friend, seeming to follow the other boy's every lead on instructions for how to act and "be cool".
James smirked before saying, "Yeah, that was great. But how about his face when Mrs. Norris got paint dropped on her?" Sirius and Peter laughed alongside their friend, while Remus only chuckled and shook his head good-naturedly. That was why, Lily reflected, he was her favorite Marauder if she had to pick one.
Peter smirked. "By far our best prank all year, guys. I can't wait till the school wakes up to see it!" He raised his hand for a high-five, though only Remus was kind enough to return it, seeing as James and Sirius thought themselves above such childish behaviors as high-fives, or so Lily guessed. Based on Peter's crestfallen expression, the memo on the out-dated high-five had clearly not reached everyone in their group.
Remus smiled, trying to ease the tension. "Yeah, it'll be neat to see how Dumbledore reacts to a big one like this. The third-floor corridor is going to be flooded for weeks!" At this point, all boys cracked a smile and jumped into a strange sort of dance that Lily could only explain as a secret handshake of some sort before jumping apart once more.
"Hopefully Dumbledore doesn't ruin this excellent prank by cleaning it up in two seconds like we know he can. Although, if he has any heart he'll let us have our fun. We are his favorites, you know," James said, winking at his friends and smiling mischievously.
"How do you know? I mean, it makes no sense. We cause the most trouble, have the most cheek, and earn the most detentions. Somehow, those traits don't equal favorite students on my calculator," Remus said, frowning slightly.
"What's a calculator?" Sirius asked curiously.
"Never mind. We learned about them in Muggle Studies," Remus answered, turning to James for an answer to his previous question.
"I just know we're his favorites, okay? His eyes always twinkle whenever we tell jokes or pull pranks, and he's usually easy with the punishments when he catches us as opposed to him catching other students doing something wrong or another teacher catching us. We're totally his favorites," James answered haughtily.
Finally, the foursome noticed Lily. She hastily began to wipe away her eyes, for there were still some tears, but the boys noticed before she could succeed. To Lily's horror, all four of them walked over to her at once. "Evans, are you alright?" Sirius asked, concerned, and Lily quickly nodded her head. However, James saw right through her strong exterior.
"Mates, I'll meet you up in the room soon," he whispered to his friends. Sirius opened his mouth to argue, but James said, "I'm serious, Padfoot. This is something I need to take care of by myself, please."
Lily could hardly believe her ears. This was the first time she'd ever heard James Bloody Potter say please. It could only mean one thing- that he really wanted to talk to her. Lily was filled with a sudden dread at this prospect. Quickly, the other three boys filed out of the room, and James grabbed a seat opposite Lily at the same table. He set the broken picture frame down on the table between them.
"What gives, Lily?" he asked, concern lighting his hazel eyes.
Lily's own green ones found the tabletop quite fascinating after this question was asked, and she answered with a whispered, "Nothing." Her hands shook as she said this because she was not used to lying. James gently reached his hand under Lily's chin and lifted it so that her eyes would meet his.
"I know you're lying to me, Lily. I know what all of this is about. You're upset over the fight you and Snape had by the Whomping Willow yesterday. I was there. I heard what he said. And let me tell you, Lily- you don't need to be hanging around with Death Eater trash like him any longer."
Lily opened her mouth at once to defend her ex-friend, saying, "How do you know-"
"That Snape wants to join Voldemort and his band of jolly Death Eaters? Because Sirius and I overheard him and Dolohov talking about it weeks ago!"
"Why'd you even ask me why I was upset, then, if you already knew?" Lily asked the boy, extremely disgruntled now.
James looked very sheepish, and Lily thought she could see a hint of a blush rising on his cheeks. He mumbled something, but Lily couldn't hear, so she asked him to repeat himself quite harshly. "I wanted an excuse to talk to you," James whispered, not meeting Lily's eyes.
"Why?" Lily asked, confused as to how the conversation had shifted in a matter of moments.
"I wanted to apologize for embarrassing Snape in front of the entire student body and indirectly causing him to call you that horrible word... and I wanted to propose a truce."
Lily raised her eyebrows. "Oh? What kind of a truce?"
James grinned. "I stop constantly asking you out... and you agree to just be friends. No strings attached, no catches, no nothing, just friends. I promise."
Lily frowned. She was debating on whether to give up her soul to the devil in order to avoid annoying invitations to Hogsmeade or any other form of a date or gently turn him down when an answer sprung from her lips, surprising even Lily. "Sure."
Lily frowned. Did she really just say what she thought she'd said? She wasn't seriously going down this road again, was she? All of the boys Lily had befriended so far had ended up stabbing her in the back, and it just went to show her that boys were untrustworthy. However, Lily supposed she couldn't back out now having already said yes to James, so she decided to plow valiantly forward.
James' grin stretched from ear to ear, and he seemed to be content on looking at Lily forever until she snapped him out of it. "Now that we're friends, no more staring at me and drooling. Also, you can tell me what the picture frame is about."
James seemed to snap back to reality and smirked when he was questioned about the picture frame. "Well, the Marauders and I planned a prank. It involved some painted arrows and a whole lot of water- I won't give you all the details, you'll see soon enough for yourself what exactly we accomplished. But the main idea was to store hundreds of thousands of gallons of water behind a magical picture frame and have many arrows leading toward it, so one unlucky person would pull the trigger and set the whole thing in motion. It's sort of like a wizard's version of a scavenger hunt.
"To make a long story short, the four of us located a perfect portrait to replace and had to cut the picture frame off the picture and put the magical picture frame overtop of the original picture so no one would think anything was off. We're hoping to trick a first year into starting the thing because they're the most gullible anyways. Well, that being said, we're sure to have McGonagall knocking at our door at six o'clock in the morning," he said, sighing as if being as much of a genius as he was quite the burden to bear.
"But would you have it any other way?" Lily asked wryly, shooting James a glance.
James laughed, his hazel eyes twinkling with mirth. "I suppose you're right, Lily. I wouldn't have it any other way. Have a good night. I'm off to bed." With that, James gave her a quick goodnight hug before walking nimbly up to the fifth year boys' dormitories.
Lily was left sitting at the table, her mind completely blank as she tried to process what had just occurred. Only one thought was going through her mind as she gathered up the notebook and began walking back to her room: I can't be starting to like James Potter! Can I?