october 28th, 1971

i've got a plan, you know, i've got it all worked out
and all you've got to do is pack your bags and check your doubts
you come around and you will see just what i am
a true love through the worst of times, a true love till the end

beginner's luck - eels

"Did you see, Lily? Today's St. Jude's Day."

"Saint what?"

"St. Jude's, Marlene. Patron Saint of Hope."

"What's a Patron Saint? Is it a Muggle tea brand?"

"Jolly, McKinnon, I can't believe you're a Half-blood sometimes."

A fit of giggles follows the five Gryffindor first-year girls as they make their way to the Charms classroom. Lily Evans still hasn't quite wrapped her head around the fact that she's now friends with people who are blissfully unaware of what daily life in the Muggle world feels like. One of her friends, Mary MacDonald, is a Muggle-born too, but the other three — Marlene McKinnon, Dorcas Meadowes and Emmeline Vance — were all brought up in wizarding households and are constantly pestering both of them with the most ridiculous questions, such as how Muggles get their laundry done — how do they do all that cleaning up without getting wet, though? — or what their schools are like, what do they learn and how on Earth do sports work without brooms. Granted, Lily does feel a little bit like the odd one out when her friends start discussing Quidditch teams and Wizarding bands that she's never heard about — but she does feel proud of her own heritage and the fact that, in spite of everything, she's landed herself at one of the most prestigious Wizarding schools in the world, if only because she accidentally broke her mother's new silverware in a fit of rage without even touching it back when she was nine.

"All right, so," she sighs, placing a hand on Marlene's shoulder. "You know Muggles believe in something called God, right? And that there's different kinds of interpretations on how this God fellow works his way around the world. There's Catholics, Muslims, Jews, the Anglican Church . . . which is my family's church, and also Mary's." Marlene nods slowly, timidly followed by Emmeline and Dorcas. "So, you might also know that God, at least for people who define themselves as Christian, had a son named Jesus. And Jesus had a small gang of friends who helped him get around and wrote down his achievements and predicaments, so when God died and they died too the Christian Church made them Saints, and also Patrons of certain aspects of life. St. Jude, for instance, is the Patron Saint of Hope, which means people pray to him when they feel lost or confused, whereas St. Peter is the Patron Saint of Fishermen, St. James is Patron Saint of Pilgrims and . . . "

"Oi, Evans, did you just call my name?"

Lily's brow furrows. She needn't turn around to recognize the voice that called out her surname a moment ago — its cheeky tone and the amused giggles that followed it are all that it takes for her to realize that James Potter has been eavesdropping on her and her friends for the past few minutes. James and Lily have only known each other for a few weeks, but she already has a very strong opinion on him — and it isn't a positive one, not at all. Even as an eleven-year-old, she finds his humour distasteful and his antics annoying — she hates how he and his friends lounge around the Gryffindor common room as though they owned the place when they are, in fact, the youngest students in it. He seems to have become best friends with a shaggy-haired boy by the name of Sirius Black, whose face usually turns up into a cheeky grin as soon as Lily and her friends catch sight of him, and a quieter boy called Remus Lupin, with whom Lily has a more cordial relationship ever since they were partnered up by Professor Slughorn and she discovered that, unlike his two friends, Remus was actually a quite sensible and thoughtful boy. They're usually followed around by a tiny, mousy-haired boy who never says much but seems to genuinely admire the other three boys — in all honestly, Lily has no reason to dislike him, but the fact that he had chosen to hang out with Potter and Black is enough for her to question his integrity.

"As a matter of fact, I did not, Potter," she shakes her head, her lips slightly pursed. "I was just talking to my friends and, apparently, you and your little gang just decided to eavesdrop on someone else's conversation. Don't you Pureblood children get taught any manners?"

"But I heard you say my name, Lily," he insists, a broad smile on his face. Lily notices how his hazel eyes seem to gleam a little brighter at the sight of her, which makes her feel even more irritated. "D'you wanna join our Exploding Snap game tonight? Is that it? Well, I for one would let you be my partner, if you insist. We could beat Sirius's arse, let me tell you."

"Like hell you would," chuckles Sirius, shaking his head and placing an arm around Remus's taller and lankier shoulders. "If you get Evans, I'm getting Lupin here to be my Exploding Snap mate. I'm chucking every single book out of his sight until we beat your arses. And let me tell you, we're the best Exploding Snap partners around here — aren't we, Rem?"

"Uh," Remus says uncomfortably, his eyes shifting at the sight of Dorcas Meadowes and Emmeline Vance giggling softly at the boys's playful attitude. "We're gonna be late to class, y'know."

"Yes," Lily says carefully, her expression still clearly unfriendly towards the three of them. "We're going to be late. We should — we should just go. And you three should listen to Remus here more often, I believe."

"All right, but you still haven't told me why you called my name a minute ago," James teases, the corners of his mouth crinkling into one of those grins that Lily absolutely loathes. "I'm just saying — you can hang out with us if you want, you don't have to be so secretive about it."

She snorts and shakes her head. "Could you please stop acting like the world revolves around you, Potter?" And with that, she tugs Mary MacDonald's robe and tilts her head. "Come on, let's go."

Mary, who isn't all too fond of their fellow Gryffindor first-years either, nods quietly and follows Lily. Marlene rolls her eyes and huffs at Sirius and Remus before following her friends, and so do Dorcas and Emmeline after flashing an apologetical smile at the boys. The four eleven-year-olds watch as the five girls strut into the Charms classroom together, and James can't help but smile when he notices how Mary flashes a glance back at him while Lily whispers something to her. They're probably just complaining about how annoying he is — but the truth is that James loves the idea of Lily Evans talking about him, even if it's only in annoyed groans and whispered complaints to her friends. He has always been one of those truly charming boys who could become friends with anyone he wanted, and he can't quite understand why Lily doesn't want to hang out with him and his friends . . . but he is determined to make her like them, sooner or later. She's already friendly with Remus — how had he managed such a feat was a mystery to both Sirius and James — and she just seems to ignore Peter, so he is quite confident that she will end up being his Exploding Snap partner by the end of the year. She better, he thought quietly, because he's tired of losing to Sirius and Peter all the time.

"We'd better go," Remus says finally, patting James's shoulder in a friendly manner. "She's really nice, James, and one of the smartest girls in our year. She just doesn't like loud people, I guess."

"Loud people," he echoes thoughtfully. He glances at Sirius and asks, "Are we loud?" When his friend shrugs, implying that he doesn't really care what Lily Evans thinks about them, James furrows his brow and eventually shrugs too. "I don't think we're loud. People just . . . like us, I guess."

"Of course they do," Peter's chuckle comes off as slightly annoying, but he quickly adds, "I mean, maybe Evans is just jealous because she isn't that popular. She only ever hangs out with those friends of her, the other Gryffindor girls, and they can't be that fun if all they do is study and read. For fun."

James just huffs and tilts his head towards the Charms classroom. "Come on, Remus is right. We should get going." He grins at Sirius's wince, knowing that he had been hoping to give Flitwick's class a miss and go have fun by the lake until lunch. "Don't worry, pal, we'll have loads of free time this afternoon."

And so the four boys head off to class, James still lost in thought about Lily Evans. He genuinely wants her to like him, not in a romantic way — that would have been disgusting to an eleven-year-old James, who only tolerated mild exhibitions of affection between his parents and still rolled his eyes when he saw couples hanging around the lake or shooting loving glances at each other across the Great Hall — but simply in a friendly, innocent way. Deep down, one could say it even hurt him to be unable to call Lily his friend. Call it pride, call it a consequence of having been pampered and spoiled by his liberal but still well-off parents — but the thing was that James Potter had never come across anything he could not have until he met Lily Evans and, after goofing around her for a bit, the girl decided that he was not worthy of her friendship. Sure, nearly everyone in Gryffindor and in their year likes him and his friends, and so do his teachers and their Quidditch trainer, who claims he has the potential of an exceptional Seeker . . . but is it worth it if the one girl he really and absolutely wants to be friends with cannot stand him?

And, of course, being the hothead that he is, James Potter feels absolutely determined to change Lily Evans's mind about him. Even if it takes a lot of pestering and being a little less loud, he guesses.

all right, so – this is a little experiment that i wanted to carry out, given that i haven't been publishing new stuff here for, like, ages now. i was watching one day the other day and idk why but i suddenly thought of how interesting it would be to write something similar to it with james and lily, spanning from their first year at hogwarts to, well, their untimely deaths. so yeah, i picked a day that seemed fitting — i'm not religious, so i just sort of had to look it up, oops — and found out that october 28th is st. jude's day, and he's the saint patron of hope, so yep, i just picked that one. my idea is to write a chapter set in october 28th of each year from 1971 to 1981 so as to explore how their relationship evolved from lily's dislike of james's attitude to a budding romance and the cute couple we all love and mourn and yaddah yaddah yaddah . . . so yes, that's pretty much it for now! hope you enjoyed it, please let me know what you think via review! chapter two should be up soon as i'm on spring break right now and i can't fathom anything better to spend my time on than writing more jily-related stuff.

-cluelessclown.