A/n: Dorcas is not an OC; she's mentioned briefly in the 5th book as a member of the Order of the Phoenix. I try not to use too many OCs :)

Chapter 2

"Bugger, bugger, bugger!"

It was about five weeks into the school year and James was already behind in his homework, his Head Boy duties, his pranks, and, at the this current moment, he was late to breakfast. If he didn't get his arse out the door now, he wouldn't even have time to inhale some pumpkin juice before he'd have to all but sprint to Advanced Charms. And he would never miss Advanced Charms for the life of him. It was the one class he shared with Lily and, although part of him had already given up on her, he still couldn't help himself from wanting to be near her.

So here he was, on a Wednesday morning, trying futilely to both pull his trousers up and shove his books into his bag. Finally managing to get dressed, he finished shoving a quill into the mix and slung his bag over his shoulder, rushing down the steps and through the Gryffindor common room towards the Great Hall.

Bursting through the doors, he squinted around for his mates. Spotting Remus, he rushed over, plopped himself on the bench, and began shoveling food onto his plate.

"Hey, mate, mind pouring me some pumpkin juice?" He asked Remus through a mouthful of eggs.

Remus obliged, pouring his friend a drink, and cleared his throat. Before he could begin, James interjected with what Remus supposed was meant to be a "Where are Peter and Sirius?" although it came out "Whurrarrpeeurnsurrus?"

Standing up and gathering his things together, Remus said, "They've already gone off to Divination. And now that I've made sure you're actually alive, I've got to be off to Potions. I hope you know that you only have about two minutes before Flitwick starts class."

James' eyes widened a bit, but he nodded, and took a big gulp of pumpkin juice and stood up next to Remus. "Thanks so much, mate. Don't know how I've let myself get so behind on everything… And I missed the Prefect's meeting last night. Lily's going to kill me." He groaned just thinking about it, and Remus clapped him on the back as they hurried out of the Great Hall.

"Don't worry too much about it. Right now, just concentrate on getting to Charms on time."

With those final words, the two boys parted ways and James hurried into the Charms classroom, taking his seat behind Lily. As he rummaged through his bag, he realized with a sinking feeling that he had forgotten parchment for the one class that he really needed to take notes in. He wasn't complete rubbish at Charms, mind you, but it certainly wasn't his strong subject.

Groaning inwardly, he tapped the redhead in front of him on the shoulder. She turned, her green eyes narrowing as she saw him.

"James," She hissed, "I am trying to pay attention, here, and you've already disrupted the class by coming in late. And I am not very happy with you for missing the meeting last night! What could you possibly want at this moment?"

His cheeks turned a bit pink; he knew she was in the right this time and had every right to be annoyed with him. "I'm really sorry about missing the meeting, Lily. And I woke up late cause I was up all night catching up with Potions homework so … err, anyway, I forgot parchment. Can I borrow some?"

Still glaring, she thrust a sheet of parchment at him and huffily turned around and began to take copious notes.

He still felt bad, though, and ripped off a bit of the parchment, writing Really am sorry, Lily, Heads Meeting tonight at 7? Library? on it before sending it to land right in front of her. He knew it was a long shot. He really didn't have a legitimate excuse to have missed the meeting last night. He, as Head Boy, should be responsible enough to get his own work done in a timely enough manner so that he had enough time for weekly meetings with the Prefects as well as biweekly meetings with Lily and patrols with various Prefects. He was asking a lot of her to go out of her way to meet with him tonight for an unscheduled meeting just so she could go over what he had missed last night.

After a few excruciatingly long moments during which he simply could not comprehend anything that Flitwick was saying, she sent the paper back with one grudging word on it. Fine.

He let out a sigh of relief and focused on Flitwick for the rest of the lesson.

Forty minutes later, the Charms professor finally finished. "So I guess that's it for today. Keep practicing and remember that your essay is due next week!"

As the students gathered up their things and lazily exited the room, James caught up with Lily.

"Hey," he said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

Looking up at him with an annoyed look on her face, she sighed wearily. "Hullo, James."

"Thanks, really, for putting up with me. I know I'm a pain in the arse and I've missed too many meetings lately, but I'll try to clean up my act, yeah?"

"I understand, James, that you have a lot of work. I do, too. Hell, we all do this year. And I'll cut you some slack for being late to classes. I just can't have you late to meetings or, Merlin forbid, missing them like you did last night! It's really unacceptable."

Lily looked tired, he noted, and suddenly felt even more terrible than before. Of course he knew that all the other Seventh years were getting loaded down with as much work as he was, but it hadn't really clicked in his mind that Lily was in the exact same boat as him: relentless essays, frequent exams, weekly meeting, patrols, dealing with the pesky – and, in his humble opinion, not even funny – pranks and hexes of First Years.

He grew serious as he responded. "Listen, I truly am sorry and I will fix it. I won't miss another meeting, I know I have responsibilities as Head Boy and I know I haven't been doing a great job so far. I'll fix it, though, Lily, I really will. I'm not just saying this, I mean it."

Lily watched him as he spoke and really hoped he meant it – he looked like he did – and she just wanted nothing more at that moment than for him to really and truly mean it. She was tired and worn out from juggling all of the duties of Head Boy and Girl by herself and it was only a little over a month into the term. She simply couldn't let herself burn out already but she knew she would if he didn't step up.

Nodding at him, she said quietly, "I'll see you at 7, then, in the library," and turned to go to her next class.

The day passed as a blur for Lily, who could barely concentrate in any of her classes. She'd slept barely a wink in the past week and a half and forgone breakfast that morning in order to finish up her Transfiguration essay which she was sure she'd get a bad mark on anyway. Even though she was a dedicated student, Transfiguration was her weakest subject and no matter how much effort she put into it she never quite accomplished as much as she would like.

Hours later, it was finally dinner time and she sluggishly moved from the dorm she shared with Dorcas, Marlene McKinnon, and Alice Sullivan and down the staircase to the common room, where she spotted Dorcas and Alice engaged in a game of chess.

"Hey, girls, dinner time?" She asked slowly, rubbing her eyes.

"Yeah, 'course, just a minute. Blimely, Lily, you really ought to get a good night's sleep, you look absolutely wretched." Dorcas looked up at her friend as she moved one of her pieces. Looking back to the board, she grinned in triumph. "Checkmate!" She declared.

Alice groaned in defeat and stood up. "Alright, dinner time. But, yeah, Lily, have you been sleeping at all lately? I heard you finally come up to bed at 4 am this morning."

Lily shot her friend a look. "What were you doing up at 4 am?"

Alice giggled as they left through the portrait hole. "I'd just gotten Frank's letter. His owl is a terrible navigator and managed to get lost. On the way to Hogwarts, where he only lived for the past seven years! What a daft animal." Alice's boyfriend, Frank Longbottom, had just graduated from Hogwarts the year before, but he and Alice were still going strong. Lily was willing to bet money that they'd be married shortly after Alice graduated in just a few long months.

"Back to the matter at hand, my darling Lily. When's the last time you slept for longer than three hours?"

"Just the other night!" Lily declared defensively. Upon receiving an accusing look for Dorcas, she relented. "Okay. I got four hours of sleep the other night, but still! That's more than three!"

"You're impossible, you know that?" Dorcas rolled her eyes but finally let the subject drop.

Alice, however, did not, and all through dinner relentlessly reminded Lily to go to bed at a decent hour tonight.

"Yes, Mum, I've got it, thanks." Lily glanced down at her watch. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go meet with James Potter in the library."

Alice raised her eyebrows. "What for? Didn't you just have a Prefect's meeting last night?"

Sighing, Lily nodded. "Yes. We did. And by we, I mean me and the Prefects. There was a distinct lack of Head Boy and now I have to go catch him up on the new patrols schedules and such."

"Hmm. I thought he'd gotten less pricky," Dorcas mused.

"He says he's gonna fix his act."

"Do you believe him?"

"I'd really like to." And with that, Lily stood up, waved goodbye to her friends, and tiredly made her way to the library.

As it was just 7 o'clock and many students were still at dinner, the library was practically empty and even though he sat at a table in the very back, it wasn't that difficult to locate James. He smiled up at her as she sat down next to him.

"Again, before we start, I'd just like to apologize for being a prick. Although, I must say, this time it was unintentional."

Lily smiled slightly at this but was much too tired to give an adequate response. She pulled out the new schedules from her bag and began explaining what they'd gone over at the meeting. About thirty minutes later, she started winding down her recap.

"…so yeah, that's pretty much it. Oh, and we had to switch up the patrolling partners, Moore and Breslow are both interested in the same bloke and can't be put in the same room together for five minutes before they completely explode. But we couldn't put Moore with Baker, they had a rather nasty break-up at the end of last year. So now Baker and Breslow, Moore and Phillips, and you and I are paired up. That alright with you?"

He snorted. "More than alright. I was getting quite sick of patrolling with Phillips, she won't stop trying to get me to snog her."

Lily grinned. "I know what you mean. Baker's skeevy, even for a fifth year, and keeps grabbing my arse when I'm not paying attention."

Laughing and sitting back, James slung an arm over the back of Lily's chair. "So who's the bloke that Moore and Breslow are both fawning over, eh? Anyone I know?"

Lily couldn't help but snort at the question. "Yeah, I'd say you were pretty familiar with him."

"Oh? Sirus, is it? These Sixth Years… obsessed with him."

"Actually," Lily said slyly, "It's Remus."

"Remus? Really? It's a shame they're both such slags, then."

"James!" Lily slapped his chest playfully but she was grinning. "You oughtn't say things like that! It's rude."

James just scoffed. "You know it's true, love. I think there's less fabric in their skirts than in a pair of drawers. I don't see how girls like them even get around to associating with a bloke like Remus."

"I think he's tutored them in Potions a few times." Lily wrinkled her nose. "Anyway, Remus is a nice bloke. I can see why a girl would like him."

James coughed awkwardly. He really hoped Lily wasn't trying to tell him something, wasn't implying that she had feelings for Remus. He was certainly a nice bloke and James thought quite highly of him. But, somehow, Lily falling in love with another would be even worse if that other man was one of James' best mates.

Shrugging off pessimistic thoughts, he looked over at Lily, who was leaning forward on the table, her hand propping up her head, as she scanned over the patrols schedule once more. He was struck by how worn-out she appeared and how dark the circles under her eyes were. He wanted desperately to reach forward and stroke her head, run his fingers through her hair and down her back in a soothing manner, but he knew how taboo that was. He was finally – finally! – Lily Evans' friend and he would never do anything intentional to screw that up.

So he withdrew his arm from the back of her chair and stood up. "You look really tired. Let's get you back to you dorm, yeah?"

Looking up at him through heavy lashes, she nodded slowly and yawned. "I guess that's a good idea. Alice keeps nagging at me to get a good rest, anyway."

James grabbed her bag before she could even stand up and she only protested slightly. "You sure… you don't mind?"

He just gave her a look. "Of course not, Lil, don't be silly. Now c'mon, off to bed for you."

She shook her head, laughing wearily. "I'm pathetic. It's not even 8 o'clock and I'm going to bed."

Leading her out of the library, James chuckled. "No, love, you're not pathetic. You're just overworking yourself and your friends care too much about you to let you keep doing it, so we're practically forcing you into bed."

They walked in amiable silence to the Gryffindor common room, where James finally handed Lily her bag. "Off to bed for you, now. Don't trip or anything up the stairs, I can't come help you, y'know."

He cracked a smile at her and she feebly attempted one in return. "Thanks, Ja-aaa-ames," she yawned before reaching out awkwardly to give him a hug. A little taken aback, it took him a moment to surprise and wrap his arms around her in turn. She, sleepy, sunk into him, inhaling his scent, a mix of soap and cologne. He, alert, rested his head on top of her hair, smelling her flowery shampoo.

Releasing him, she backed up, smiling, and mumbled an almost incoherent "Night, James," before turning around and heading up the stairs.

He watched her disappear, calling out a quiet, "Night, Lily."

I just realized that Lily being overly tired already seems to be a recurring theme. Perhaps it's my subconscious trying to tell ME to get a good night's sleep? Which actually sounds really nice right now...

anyway, review please? :) I'd like to have some idea of how this is being received. plus, if you review, you get my eternal love.