James Potter's glasses were ridiculous. Not only were they small and circular, and almost constantly dirty, but they balanced precariously on the end of his nose no matter how many times he pushed them up his face.
Lily pondered this as she sat in the common room. A textbook she was meant to be reading was sat open on her lap, but she ignored it. Instead, she glared broodingly at the Marauders sitting on the other side of the room. The four of them were sprawled across a collection of plush furniture, in prime place in front of the fire, as if they owned the place. Lily hated them for it.
Well, she didn't hate Remus. Remus was, in fact, a good friend of hers. The two of them had spent many an hour as prefects together, and she liked the way he took time to think about what he was going to say before he said it. As a result, it was almost unfailingly interesting.
She didn't hate Sirius, either. He had an excellent taste in music, and made Lily laugh during Quidditch matches with his harsh, but accurate, descriptions of the players.
And it was almost impossible to hate Peter. The mousy boy faded into the background when he was with his friends, but Lily liked his earnestness, and enjoyed a conversation with someone who understood the Muggle world.
But James had outrageous hair. He tousled it so often that it had become a habit of his. Sirius once told her that it was so he would always look like he had come straight off a Quidditch pitch, and Lily didn't doubt it for a moment. It stuck up at odd ends, and yet looked as if it had been carefully manufactured. He looked as though he had stepped right out of an advert for a broomstick.
And she couldn't stand the way he spoke. He had a mouth-full-of-marbles, aristocratic accent, and Lily, as a matter of principle, hated Posh People, especially those who sounded as though they were in Just William. Marlene didn't count, of course, because she was Lily's best friend. Neither did Sirius, since he wasn't technically an aristocrat any longer. James, on the other hand, was neither Lily's best friend nor disowned; therefore, his having a fortune was an unforgivable crime.
Even if his pranks were sometimes amusing, Lily assumed that it wasn't him, but the others that came up with the good parts. And if sometimes when he smirked crookedly at Lily, her stomach somersaulted and her heart jumped into her throat, well, she would just put it down to a dodgy sweet Marlene found under her bed.
Lily Evans' sense of fashion was horrible. Who wore pleated skirts and Alice bands anymore? She looked terrible in her baby blue V-Neck and white tights. The blue absolutely clashed with her hair.
James thought about her hair as he surreptitiously watched her from the corner of her eye in the common room. Sirius was describing an encounter with Filch, but James' attention had long ago wandered elsewhere.
He had never seen hair like it. She honestly looked as though fire was tumbling down her back, streaked with a much bloodier red. Briefly, James entertained the thought that she dyed it, before deciding that no hair dye, even magic hair dye, could capture that colour.
Sitting there with her legs curled up underneath her, drinking in the words of her textbook, James thought she looked like a nerd. Who worked on a Saturday evening, for Christ's sake? And who looked happy when they read a book about the Goblin Wars of the sixteenth century?
James gave a deep sigh, and wondered how they'd had such bad luck with Gryffindor girls. Although, he supposed, as Marlene tossed a sheet of blonde hair over her shoulder and muttered something to Dorcas, making Dorcas snort, that those two weren't so bad. They could be a laugh at times, even. It was just Lily who was a bore.
His attention was brought back to Sirius when he was hit on the head with a quill. Remus gave a huff of indignation, and asked for his quill back, and Sirius laughed both at James' dazed expression and at the ink that had spilled down the side of his face, but all James could think was I definitely don't like bores. Even ones like Lily Evans.