Nichole's Note: WARNING: Some LilyxSev but ultimately JamesxLily. I hope you like it. I think it's quite adorable. Review please?
disclaimed: so do not own Harry Potter.
Inside, I was dying.
There was nothing worse than being referred to as a mudblood, especially when the person calling you a mudblood was the man you liked.
The one that's been in your mind, taking up your thoughts, since you were a little girl.
And yet, there he was. Calling me a mudblood. Because that's the type of thing he did now-a-days. Ever since Severus had begun hanging out with those… blood purists in Slytherin, he had been changing. I had expected change, I really had, but the amount of change he was experiencing was insane. It felt like he never had time for me anymore, and it hurt. It hurt a lot.
"I'm sorry!" His voice was high and strained.
"I'm not interested." My own was hard and cruel, and I almost felt bad for it.
"I'm sorry!" he repeated.
I glared at him. "Save your breath. I only came because Mary told me you were threatening to sleep here." Lie. It was a total lie. I wanted to hear him apologize.
But I did not want to forgive him.
"I was. I would have done. I never meant to call you Mudblood, it just-"
"Slipped out?" I interrupted, staying strong. "It's too late. I've made excuses for you for years. None of my friends can understand why I even talk to you. You and your precious little Death Eater friends- You see, you don't even deny it! You don't even deny that's what you're all aiming to be! You just can't wait to join You-Know-Who, can you?" I didn't even give him a chance to respond before I continued to cut him down. "I can't pretend anymore. You've chosen your way, I've chosen mine."
"No… listen, I didn't mean-"
"To call me Mublood? But you call everyone of my birth Mudblood, Severus. Why should I be any different?"
I wanted him to say something. Tell me that the reason I was different was because he loved me. I wanted him to say something, anything. But right when he opened his mouth, I decided that I needed to stick with my words, and I gave him one last glare before I left. I saw his face fall, and my heart ached.
I walked into the common room, and found it curiously empty. Mary sat in a chair, her eyes wide with curiosity, and I knew the question she was begging to ask.
"Yes, I told him off, Mary. He won't be bothering me again. I hope."
Mary nodded sympathetically. "Well, are you coming to bed?"
"Not yet… I'm going to stay down here for a bit, and maybe read. I'm too angry to go to bed." Or too broken. But she didn't need to know that.
She smiled. "Well, goodnight, Lily. See you in the morning."
"Yeah, see you in the morning," I said, my voice hardly able to stay calm as she ascended to the dormitory. As soon as I heard the door close, I let the first tear fall.
And another trailed after it. Soon, I had pulled my knees to my chest and I began to cry. It wasn't fair. It just wasn't fair. He had been my friend for so long, and yet he had to go and ruin it! What were those boys thinking, changing him so much that he was a different person to me, his best friend in the whole world?
All of the broken heartedness I felt after watching Severus take our friendship and tear it to pieces came spilling out. What had I done to deserve this! The first boy I liked, the very first boy that had ever meant more to me than just a friend, had broken my heart in one word.
This wouldn't have happened if I had just dropped him when my other friends had first told me to. If I had begun to distance myself as soon as he began hanging out with those little Death Eater friends of his. But I wanted to be with him. I still enjoyed his company.
He still treated me as a human, not as a "Mudblood".
Well, up until just a very few hours ago.
I sniffled, the tears still coming as fast and as plentiful as they had been before. I was crying so hard that I missed the sound of someone coming in from the outside. I wasn't even aware of his presence behind me until he decided to speak.
"Evans?"
My heart filled with dread at the sound of his voice. The last person in the world I wanted to see was James.
"Hey, Evans, are you okay?"
I turned to look at him, my eyes probably puffy from crying, tears still streaming down my cheeks.
"Do I look okay?" I asked harshly.
His face, usually so cocky and confident, was showing a very unusual emotion. Worry.
"No, you don't," he said, coming closer to me. "What's wrong?"
I turned away from him, placing my forehead on my knees. "Everything. Everything is wrong, that's what." I hated having him see me like this, at my weakest point. I hated letting him get to see me cry. He might think, after this little chat, we had a connection. And God knows that's the last thing I need.
"Well, I think you can survive. You're an amazing girl. I can't think of one thing you wouldn't be able to handle perfectly, Lily."
My eyes widened in shock. This was not what I was expecting from him. I was expecting something along the lines of "If you went out with me, you'd never cry," or some other ridiculous pick up line. But he didn't even bother. I heard his footsteps as he left the common room and walked up to his own dorm.
I got up off the chair, and stared up after him. Once I heard the door close, I decided it was time for me to go to bed, also, and I walked up the marble steps. I pulled the covers up to my chin, and rested my head upon the pillow. "Who knew he could be so sweet?" I asked myself.
I slowly drifted into a heavy sleep, Severus Snape the furthest thing from my mind.
I didn't realize until much, much later that that night was the first time I had dreamed of James.