A/N-I'm accustomed to writing Lily and James "love only" fics so this is my first shot at some love and action. The thing that I really like about this story is that it is not going to immediately start out with Lily hating James and then suddenly loving him. Anyway, I hope you like this and don't be afraid to tell me what you really think. The first chapters aren't going to have James in them and it may not seem like an L/J at first, but stick with me and you will see it developing. Thank you and enjoy!
Oh yeah, and the rating is really for later chapters...there will be some violence/abuse and sexual situations although those will not be graphic. This is by no means a porno. So if you're not really into that stuff and just want James and Lily to have perfect and easy lives, this isn't the story for you.
Chapter One: Meeting Mr. Purcell
Lily could be found lying on her bed upside down, her feet propped up on the wall in her tennis skirt and swimsuit top practically every afternoon. Her window was open and a breeze was ruffling the curtains yet she was still sweating. The sun was beating down on the large house in the London countryside and had not been interrupted by a passing cloud all day.
Lily hated the heat more than anything. She didn't like being sweaty and it gave her a headache. The whole week she'd been trying to do things to keep her mind off of how hot she always was, but so far nothing had worked. She always ended up staring up at the ceiling and dreaming of Christmas time.
After she turned seventeen in July, Lily had used a temporary sticking charm to put her calendar up on the ceiling. Every morning she would grab her wand from her nightstand, take aim, and blast an "X" over the previous day. She could not remember a time when she had longed to return to Hogwarts more than she did at this exact moment. It wasn't that she was having a bad time, she was just ready for life to return to normal.
Her parents had died the previous summer and she had come here to live with her best friend and her family. Graci Davis was spectacular, as were her parents Abigail and Samson. When Lily had found out about her parents' death she had shown up one night on Graci's front porch with her trunk and a sleeping bag. Abigail had instantly opened her house to Lily, giving her the guestroom and taking her on as a second daughter. Lily was truly grateful for all that the Davises had done for her. She did not know how she would have survived last summer without them.
Her parents' death had been kept a huge secret from her. The night she found out, she and Petunia had been arguing about the terrible dinner her sister had cooked when the phone rang. Petunia picked it up. Lily knew something terrible had happened when her sister began crying. Once the phone call was over Petunia told Lily that their parents had been hit by a drunk driver and killed. Lily didn't believe it though. It was six o' clock when they received the call and how many drunk drivers are on the road before then? Lily became obsessed with finding out the truth and sent letter after letter and owl after owl to the Ministry. No response ever came. The Davises ran a popular night club, The "W" Factor, so they didn't have much pull in the Ministry but had managed to at least find out through the owners of the club that it was indeed a magical murder and her parents weren't the only ones killed.
The previous summer she had dreaded going back because she knew that somehow people would know about her loss and then everyone would feel sorry for her and try to help her when really all she wanted to do was ignore it and pretend that it hadn't happened. She just wanted everything to seem normal so that she could believe it was. Lily had always hated it whenever people felt sorry for her or pitied her.
She assumed that this year the reason she wanted to go back so badly was because it was the one place that she could feel truly at home. The Davis house was very nice and she felt comfortable there, but it wasn't home. The castle, with its many turrets and towers made her feel at ease and safe, something she rarely felt outside of school. That was because of Voldemort though, it had nothing to do with where she was living.
As her thoughts drifted to the Dark Lord and worry began gripping her insides a large barn owl soared into her room and screeched loudly, dropping two very heavy parchment envelopes on her bed. Both were sealed with the Hogwarts crest. She began to peel open the first letter when the barn owl screeched loudly again. She looked at it confused before her eyes fell upon a tiny canvas bag hanging from its left talon.
"What, I have to pay you now?" Lily grumbled as she searched her drawer for a Knut. She slipped it into the pouch and the owl screeched again. "It's all I have!" Lily argued. "Do you think I'm made of money?" The owl snapped its beak warningly but then soared out of her window once again.
Lily was now in a very sour mood and grumbled slightly when she saw the long list of books that she would need for her advanced N.E.W.T. classes. She thought of her ever-emptying vault in the Gringotts Bank and groaned a little more audibly as she thought of how empty her potions kit was and how tight her robes had been fitting at the end of the previous year. She would have enough money to cover her this year but she knew that getting a decent paying job would be her number one priority as soon as her seventh year was over.
She eyed the second envelope wearily, praying that there wouldn't be another list of things that she needed to buy in it. She slid the top flap open and out fell a shiny silver badge with the Hogwarts coat of arms etched into it along with the letters "HG." Lily let out a squeal of glee, her bad mood deserting her. She smiled widely at it before placing it carefully on her pillow and pulling out the sheet of parchment still inside the envelope.
"Dear Ms. Evans,
Congratulations on being named Head Girl for the upcoming school year. Professor Dumbledore, along with the rest of the staff believes that you are well suited for the job. Normally we would not divulge the name of the Head Boy in this letter, but under the circumstance feel that it is necessary. The Head Boy that you will be working with throughout the year is Mr. James Potter."
Lily's bad mood returned just as quickly as it had gone.
"We are looking forward to seeing you on September 1. Have a good rest of the summer.
Yours Sincerely,
Professor M McGonagall."
Lily shot a dirty look at the Head Girl badge and threw her letters onto the ground, as if taking out her anger on inanimate objects would help. It didn't.
No, Lily continued to huff and groan until Graci entered the room holding her own Hogwarts letter.
"Did you have to pay that bloody owl? Since when are the students being charged to get their book lists?" came a loud and girlish voice as her best friend walked through Lily's room and sat at the head of the bead, where Lily's feet were residing at the moment.
Graci was beautiful, there was absolutely no argument otherwise. She had long, soft blonde hair and brilliantly blue eyes. She was tall and extremely thin and her parents often said that she would make a fantastic model. She had a creamy white complexion and Lily would swear up and down that she had never seen the likes of a blemish on her face. Her teeth were straight and white and she had the cutest button nose. Boys at school practically fell over her, always asking her out and starting fights over her.
That's not to say that Lily wasn't pretty. She was very pretty in fact with her long auburn hair and slender body. She wasn't as tall as Graci or as flawless (she did have the occasional pimple) but she had more of a classic beauty. People often overlooked this simply because she was always with Graci. On the few times that Lily had said something like this to her friend she would always simply retort, "James Potter thinks you're beautiful." That would always shut her up…or send her into a mad rant going on for hours about how much she hated him.
Graci always said that she had to be beautiful or else her parents wouldn't notice her. This statement, although quite harsh, was true. Abigail and Samson were completely engrossed in their nightclub. Whether they were investing all of their money or all of their time in the "W" Factor, Graci never seemed to be enough to keep them occupied. They loved her a lot they just didn't know how to show it. They tended to be a bit self-absorbed, a trait that Graci inherited but always denied having.
"Yeah, it screeched at me until I paid it, and then it was mad because I only had one Knut. I guess it wanted more for delivering two letters," Lily said monotonously, clearly not interested at all in the subject.
"Two?" Graci mouthed as she looked around in search of the second. Lily pointed dully at her pillow, and much in the same way Lily had minutes earlier, she squealed shrilly. "What the hell is wrong with you?" Graci demanded as she playfully hit Lily on the arm. "This is all you talked about on the train home…whether or not you would get the Head Girl badge." Graci looked at it hungrily as it glinted in the sunlight.
"There's more," breathed Lily picking up the letter from McGonagall and handing it to the blonde. Graci took it from her hand and began to read and when she read "James Potter" she began giggling madly. Lily glared at her as she stood up and did a little dance while chanting,
"You have to work with Potter! You have to work with Potter!" Lily's scowl broke momentarily as she reached for her pillow and hurled it at Graci. She easily dodged it though and continued her chant. When Lily went back to scowling at the ceiling, Graci sat down again.
"You know you're excited despite the fact that Potter is Head Boy," Graci said matter-of-factly as she sat down and ran her fingers through her hair. She had an odd habit of messing with her blonde locks while she spoke. Sometimes she braided it and sometimes she twisted it around her index finger, but it was like she was unable to function properly if her hair was lying still.
"Well, with any luck he'll curse a 1st year in front of McGonagall and they'll give the badge to somebody else," Lily said, a glimmer of hope in her voice.
"Normally I would be jealous that you got the badge and would have the academic limelight once again but you couldn't pay me to work with Potter for a whole year!" Graci stated, her face contorted into one of disgust when she uttered "Potter."
Lily let out a quiet laugh.
"What?" Graci said as she pulled a long strand of blonde hair down in front of her face. Her tongue was stuck out in concentration as she began braiding it.
"I was just remembering the time you told me that you hated James Potter more than I did." Lily sighed and Graci grinned as she looked at Lily.
"Oh yeah, and we got into that huge fight about which of us hated him more," Graci said.
"You won too. I could at least tolerate him when his friends, any female, Snape, and first years weren't around." Lily fell silent as she pondered something. "Why do you hate him so much anyway?"
Graci replied, without hesitation,
"He was talking bad about the "W" Factor in front of the entire common room." Lily squished up her face as she tried to remember when he had done that. She let a disbelieving laugh out as she remembered.
"Graci, that was in the 3rd year," Lily said in an almost amused tone.
"Well, nobody talks bad about my family…and that includes the club my parents run." Lily laughed inwardly at Graci's ability to hold a grudge against someone for nearly four years out of loyalty to a club.
Graci was very family oriented though. Her little brother had died when she was seven from an unknown illness. Graci's parents were her world. Everything she did was to please them: her looks, her grades (although they were never up to Lily's standard, they weren't terrible), she even took advanced Arithmancy so that she could help run the club once she graduated. Lily was Graci's best friend, but she knew that if Graci were forced to choose between Lily and her parents, she would be the one with the short end of the stick.
The girls sat in Lily's room for another few hours simply reliving the memories of last year and talking about how different things will be their seventh year. Before they knew it, Abigail was yelling up the stairs at them, telling them to wash up for dinner. Graci stubbed her toe on the way to the kitchen and was about to curse very loudly, when she was forced to keep silent.
The neighbors from down the street, the Purcells, were seated at their dinner table along with a very handsome boy about their age. His eyes flitted quickly over Graci and then settled on Lily but they did not move on as they had once they had surveyed Graci. They stayed fixed on her as she sat down and took a sip from her water.
"Lily, you've met Patrick and Karen Purcell," Abigail said as Lily smiled and nodded in their direction. She muttered a few polite hellos and then her eyes were drawn back to the boy sitting across from her. "This is their son, Alexander."
"Alex," he said as he reached across the food to shake her hand.
"Lily," she replied stupidly.
"Pleased to meet you," he said letting go of her hand. She almost said "ditto" but caught herself and just smiled at him. He had to tear his eyes away from her face as they said grace and began serving the food.
Alex was very good looking. He wasn't stunningly tall but he was probably about Graci's height, a good three inches taller than Lily. He had chocolate brown eyes and curly brown hair. She could see that he was very muscular because of the way his shirt fit around his chest and arms. He was tan and had very high cheekbones. His smile was debonair and the only flaw she saw on his body was a large scar on his right forearm. As Lily dwelled on this she realized that this scar might not even be perceived as a flaw by some girls, if you like that kind of thing, which Lily didn't.
He looked strangely familiar to her though. She knew she had never met him before, she would have remembered someone as good looking as him, but thought that she had seen his face sometime.
"Alex, have we met? I'm sorry to be so blunt, but you look very familiar to me," Lily inquired, attempting to sound polite and charming.
He smiled and she saw Graci practically melt and turn into goo next to her.
"I'm a seventh year at Hogwarts, or I will be in about a week. I'm in Ravenclaw though, that's probably why you don't know me." Lily smiled as she realized that she had seen him looking disgruntled in the crowd after Gryffindor won the Quidditch cup after slaughtering Ravenclaw. "I know who you are though," he continued, smile still perched on his face.
"Oh really," Lily said, still attempting to be charming.
"Mm hmm," he nodded and leaned back slightly in his seat so that he was gazing at her with a cocky grin on his face. "You're the girl who is always yelling at James Potter and Sirius Black." Lily's smile was replaced by a scowl as she looked at Graci who had started laughing again.
When the adults began discussing business the girls and Alex began talking about school.
"So, Lily, Graci, are you girls ready to go back to Hogwarts?" Alex asked, an edge of suave arrogance in his deep voice. He put a bite of baked chicken into his mouth and looked back and forth between the girls expectantly.
"Yes," Lily said simultaneously with Graci's "No."
Alex gave them both an amused look that clearly asked them to explain their answers.
"I'm just ready to be through with school," Graci admitted, tucking a strand of hair behind her left ear.
"And Lily?" Alex inquired, his eyes falling again to Lily. His gaze was penetrating and she could feel his eyes on her even when she was looking down at her plate. She couldn't shake the uneasy feeling it gave her but also wouldn't deny that she was a bit flattered that he was giving her more attention than he was giving her best friend.
"I don't really know why," she lied. She didn't feel like divulging all of the sappy details to this boy she'd never spoken to. "I just miss it, I suppose."
"And…what is it you miss?" Alex asked, clearly entertained with her basic answers. He had an arrogant air to his tone but it was not condescending, so Lily continued.
"Um…" She felt ridiculous for some reason and felt as if she was being interrogated for committing a crime. She looked over at Graci for help, but she had obviously grown bored and was staring down at her plate cross-eyed.
"You know, I miss the people, the teachers, even Quidditch."
"Quidditch?" Alex said laughing. Lily had to mentally slap her own hand for thinking about how pleasant his laugh was. It was more like a loud chuckle. His torso shook slightly and his eyes lit up.
"Yeah, it's nice to be in the house with the best team!" Lily smiled before realizing that she was flirting and quickly looked down and began mashing her peas.
As dinner progressed, Graci felt increasingly bored with every passing minute. Alex continued a seemingly endless conversation with Lily and every time Graci would jump in to say something, Alex would quickly get Lily's attention again. Graci didn't find this odd (as Lily did) but she did find it somewhat annoying. She wasn't used to being flat out ignored and wasn't sure that she liked it too much.
Finally, dinner ended with Alex inviting Lily and Graci to his house in two days time. They accepted and Lily headed upstairs. It was time to talk business. Graci was going to help her parents run the club once she graduated so she always got to listen to the meetings. She had no idea why Alex was still in the dining room but decided it didn't really matter.
The Purcells owned the "W" Factor and allowed the Davises to manage it. Patrick and Karen had never really been that interested in the club but knew that it was holding its own and so they never had a reason to shut it down before. All of that was about to change.
"Samson, Abigail," Patrick began once Lily's door had been closed, "as you know, Alexander here turned seventeen today." Abigail whispered a polite Happy Birthday and then looked back at Patrick. "We know how much the club means to you but we have no interest in it, at all."
"So, we decided to hand over the deed to Alex for his gift," Karen interjected. Samson's eyes widened and Abigail looked wordlessly in the young man's direction.
"Mr. and Mrs. Davis, I sincerely do not wish to crush all that you have worked so tirelessly to maintain for the past fifteen years," Alex began as relief swept over the faces of Graci's parents. "However, I do not believe that it is pulling its own weight. Profits are declining and I believe that it would be a smart move to close it down and open it as something more profitable such as a market or perhaps a clothing store." Abigail looked close to tears while Samson looked ready to explode.
"Now, see here young man," Samson boomed, "the "W" Factor has always carried its own weight. We always break even!" Samson was breathing very heavily but Alex's face was as calm as ever as the older man yelled at him.
"I understand, it is not costing us any money, that is very true. But Mr. Davis, a good business does not simply break even. It gains profit." He explained it to them as if explaining something very difficult to an extremely slow person. "I want my property to bring in money. If it does not do that, then it is of no use to me."
"Did you even consider what you were doing? This isn't just about money! That club is our life and we employ over 50 people, most of them poor teenagers who can't get other jobs and desperately need money. What about them? What are they supposed to do?" Samson roared. His face was red and he was standing up with his hands on the tabletop.
"Those people," Alex began with a cold edge in his voice, "are not my concern. What I care about is the gross income, not the lives it affects." Samson looked incredulously at this seventeen-year-old boy who was single-handedly tearing his world apart. His brown eyes no longer were glinting in warmth but had a steely look about them. His voice was no longer pleasant but powerful and cold. He stared Samson down and didn't say another word until he sat back down looking utterly defeated.
Tears had begun trickling down Abigail's cheeks now and Graci was bewildered. How could someone be so heartless? All she could do was watch as her future and her parents' present was being torn apart at the seams.
After a few moments of tense silence, Alex continued.
"I am willing, however, to invest some money into the club to bring in a bigger crowd thus bringing in greater profits…under one condition though." His parents looked over at them in a way that clearly told the Davises that he had not discussed this part of the deal with them. Alex didn't seem to care anymore as a hungry look infiltrated his eyes. For the first time that night he was showing signs of nervousness. His hands were twitching slightly as he continued to stare at Samson Davis.
"Anything, we'll do anything to keep the club. Just tell us what you want and we'll get it for you."
Alex smiled again but it was not the same one he had earlier. It was greedy as he cast his eyes downward to the fine oak tabletop.
"I want…Lily Evans."
A/N-What did you think? Too cheesy, too stupid, too predictable? Let me know, every little thing counts. I know this was a bit boring, but trust me there will be lots of action and love in the upcoming chapters. James as well should make an appearance soon. I missed writing him in this chapter.