Zoo's got a boyfriend?
I heard it's a really ugly guy...probably the best she could get.
Hitzig probably just paid him off.
"I was tormented and made a fool of, but I still forgive you," Zoe nodded, "I can take a joke."
Sirius looked at her awestruck. He'd always been punched or told off by people he'd played a cruel prank on. Why was she forgiving him?
He looked at her suspiciously, "All right...ahem, where have those two gone to?"
"HEY! OVER HERE!" James motioned to them on the other side of the store.
Lily seemed to be hiding something behind her back, her eyes were flashing with glee.
"I snatched these two right under Narcissa's fake nose!" she whispered, loud enough for Zoe and the guys to hear.
Sirius looked around the store and glared towards the spot where a very thin blonde woman was standing. She matched the whiteness of the walls, "She must be here with Lucius."
"Well let me see them!" Zoe chirped.
Lily first brought forth a very sparkly green dress. It resembled a toga except that the top had green jewels and the bottom was very flowy with a slit.
"It's beautiful! Oh Lily the emerald green will bring out your eyes like mad!" Zoe squealed.
James and Sirius looked at each other and eased their way towards the men's section.
"And this one's for you!" Lily brought out the other one.
"Well...it's...different?" Zoe looked at the ugly maroon dress Lily was holding, her smile fading.
"What's wrong with it?" Lily sighed, she had noticed the look of disgust on Zoe's face start to form.
"First off," Zoe grabbed the dress and put it in front of her, "It's about ten sizes too big. I kind of lack the...you know...hoohoo's. It looks like it used to be red but it was in some sort of horrible washing accident. Don't even get me started on the ruffles!"
"OKAY OKAY! I get it! To be honest, your arse would fit in it perfectly," Lily mumbled the last part.
"Narcissa wouldn't have picked this, who was she with...," she looked towards Narcissa and saw a pudgy girl of their age talking to her, "Ugh you were giving me a dress that Penelope Parkinson wanted to wear?"
Lily laughed nervously, "I didn't see who it was..."
They burst out laughing and continued the search for a dress, not paying attention to what James and Sirius were doing.
"Oy! Look who's out there!" Sirius prodded James on the shoulder and pointed outside the shop's window.
A greasy haired boy was walking rather shadily towards Knockturn Alley.
"Should we...?" Sirius was interrupted.
"No way, mate. Lily would murder me," James looked around the store, "She'd think I got bored and never hear the end of it."
Sirius scoffed, "What would he be doing in Knockturn Alley?"
"We'll never know, now come on," James pulled Sirius away from the window, "We have some choosing to do."
"Where has your sense of adventure gone?" Sirius looked at the racks of clothing around and pulled a black suit out along with some pants, "I'm done."
"What are you going to wear underneath? Your Weird Sisters t-shirt?"
"It's not that difficult to find a shirt," Sirius pulled a red dress shirt from another rack, "See?"
"Red? Thought you'd be more of a black shirt kinda man," James picked out his dress clothes the same way Sirius had.
"Are you sure it's not too much? I don't want to look like more of a weirdo," Zoe's voice grew closer.
The girls were approaching them with bags in their hands.
Lily looked at the clothes James was holding, "That looks really good, James!"
Sirius and James chuckled and made their way to the registers.
"What did Sirius want with you?" Lily asked.
"Oh he just wanted to apologize for last year's posters."
"Soooo...are you ever going to tell me who he caught you snogging? Or how he caught you? I'm your best friend and that entitles me to every piece of embarrassing information you have about yourself!"
Zoe looked around, "I'll tell you when we get back to your house. Don't want any eavesdroppers."
Sirius and James came back with their shopping bags.
"What's next?" James grabbed ahold of Lily's hand.
"Flourish and Blotts. We only need a couple of books from there," replied Lily.
They walked to the bookstore through the crowds, every once in a while stopping to greet someone they knew. Once in the store, Lily and James went their own way while Sirius stood next to Zoe reading aloud their lists, comparing them.
"Aha, well I'll just follow you then, Hitzig. Turns out most our classes are the same...except Advanced Transfiguration...why are you taking that class anyway?" Sirius looked away from the lists, Zoe had started to walk away.
He followed, "Aren't you a metamorpha...thingy?"
Zoe snatched her list from his hand, "Metamorphmagus. And it makes it that much easier."
She turned her long hair short as Sirius shook his head, "You're an underachiever."
"Ahem, underachiever? I got straight O's, Mr. Black. You?" she waited for an answer.
"Well I got loads of those during my summer break..." Sirius muttered.
"You're a pig!" Zoe smacked him away.
Sirius blocked her, "I'm sorry, you weren't meant to hear that."
"Ugh, you're so...so..." Zoe stammered trying to not laugh.
"So amazingly divine? Amusing? Dare I say," Sirius winked at her, "Handsome?"
"So frustrating! Why are you following me anyway? Go seek your own books!" she smiled, she couldn't help it. Sirius was looking at her with puppy dog eyes. Usually she wouldn't go for it, but it was nice to be annoyed by him after all the drama that had occured with her family.
Sirius put an arm over her and took her list again, "First order of business, The Standard Book of Spells Grade 7!...Well what are you waiting for? Lead the way!"
It wasn't easy to find the books, not because the books were hard to find, but because Sirius would veer them away to a different path when he would see an ex-girlfriend nearby.
"This would be so much easier if you left things on good terms you know?" Zoe peeked from behind a bookshelf to see if one of the exes was still there, "All gone."
"Nah, I decided it was nicer to just never speak to them again. What?" Sirius looked at Zoe's face of revulsion, "I wasn't going to be like 'Hey, Flora I find you incredibly boring and uninteresting. It's over. By the way, let's still be pals,' I chose to be a gentleman."
Zoe chuckled, "Did she have a sister named Fauna?"
"No, why?"
"Just checking. Aha here's the last one," She held up a book titled How to make your Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Tests not as Nasty.
Sirius scoffed, "That's not even on the list. Now you're becoming an overachiever. Are you trying to impress me?"
It was Zoe's turn to scoff, "Get over yourself, Black."
He ignored her, "Cause you've already impressed me. You actually managed to kiss someone as repulsive as-"
A book found its way to Sirius' face with a loud smack.
"Shut up! I haven't told Lily yet!" Zoe was a deep shade of pink. She looked around to see if anyone had been close enough to hear.
Sirius rubbed his nose, "THAT was shocking. Didn't even see it coming."
They paid for their books and went outside the store. They had seen James and Lily not too behind in line so they decided to wait for them.
"Don't worry, I haven't told a soul. Wouldn't help your reputation much," Sirius smiled.
"What reputation is that?" Zoe scowled.
"The silent bookworm who spends all her time in the library. Only time you appear is during meals. And even then you disappear right after. People think you're plotting to get rid of half bloods."
"I'm nothing like my parents and my best friend is Lily. People are dumb if they think that I'm trying to keep the school 'pure'," Zoe's scowl faded, "In addition to that, I find your stalking flattering, Padfoot, but you're not my type."
"Padfoot?" Sirius' brows furrowed.
Zoe was about to say something when James and Lily bustled out of the store.
"Honestly! People are too pushy for their own good!" Lily muttered under her breath.
They didn't do much more shopping since they already had most of their supplies from their previous years. Sirius had become rather quiet after the conversation in front of Flourish and Blotts. Before parting ways, James and Lily went into Sugarplum's Sweet Shop to get some treats.
Zoe leaned on the wall of the shop and rummaged through her purse, "I believe these are yours."
She handed him a wand, a wallet, and a piece of parchment.
"How did you get this?" Sirius looked over his possessions.
"You trusted me too easily. Putting your arm over me and such," she smiled mischievously.
Sirius let out what seemed to be a mixture of a laugh and cough, "You took advantage of my innocence."
He tapped his head with the wand when suddenly a loud pop came from it. A strange pink mist encircled his head.
"Oh so sorry," Zoe pretended to look innocent, "I must have given you the wrong one. Here's yours."
She took out his real wand and put it in his free hand.
Sirius didn't know what to say so he just muttered, "Thanks."
Zoe gave him a small curtsy, "My pleasure."
The mist settled and Sirius' hair was now bright pink. A group of people passed by pointing and whispering amongst each other.
"When will it go away?" He tried looking at one of his long strands of hair to see the damage.
Before she could answer, James came out of the shop and dropped a bag of chocolates as he saw the pink hair on SIrius' head. Lily wasn't paying attention and walked into his back.
"James!" Lily picked up his dropped bag, "What's going on?"
Her mouth dropped open. They both started laughing hysterically.
"It's a good color on you, Sirius. Brings out the pink on your cheeks," James said.
"Oh don't worry," Zoe walked towards him and patted his head, "It's not permanent. It's like disappearing ink. Except that it takes less than a month to wear off."
"You got me good, Hitzig," Sirius said in a whisper so only she could hear, "Now I am rather impressed."
Zoe shook her head, "Consider ourselves even. Shall we get going then?"
Mrs. Evans was waiting for them by the entrance of The Leaky Cauldron. James and Lily pecked each other on the cheek. Zoe and Lily waved goodbye to the two guys and got into the car.
"Well, that boy is...different," Mrs. Evans commented on SIrius.
"That's James' best friend, mum," Lily said.
"Oh well, maybe next time we see James he'll have blue hair to match," she chuckled.
They picked up Petunia from school and arrived at home where Lily's dad was mowing the lawn. As soon as Mrs. Evans parked the car, Petunia walked as fast as she could to her room. Mr. Evans stopped what he was doing and greeted them.
"Claire, that daughter of ours needs to learn some manners," he said to his wife as he hugged her.
"Oh Harold, if you only knew what she did this morning," Mrs. Evans replied.
They were a very handsome couple. Mrs. Evans hair was strawberry blonde, she wasn't thin but she wasn't big, and she was short. Mr. Evans was tall, blonde, and had very kind green eyes.
He went on to hug Zoe, "It's a pleasure having you in our home, Zoe. Try to get yourselves into mischief while you're here. I'm afraid that the books you two are always reading are going to swallow you whole one day."
"I'll try to make trouble our middle names, Mr. Evans."
"Go on and get inside, girls. I'm going to help your father do this. I've left some snacks on the kitchen counter."
Lily and Zoe went inside and into the basement first.
"Accio trunk!" Zoe motioned her wand to her nearby trunk and stuffed her purchases inside.
"Is that really necessary? It was just a few inches away."
"I'm able to use magic now outside of school so," she stuck her tongue out at Lily.
"We're home and you said you'd tell me," Lily sat down on the bed while Zoe took a seat on top of her trunk.
Zoe sighed, "You've got to promise to let me finish the story though okay? No interruptions."
Lily put both her hands up, "Promise!"
Zoe took another breath and began, "Last year was the year James and you started dating. And as you know I don't have many friends so I kind of felt alone because you spent all your time with James. There was someone else who was feeling the same way I did. That person was...uh...Severus."
Lily gasped and opened her mouth to say something.
"You promised!" Zoe pointed at her and Lily nodded, looking a bit angry.
"I know what he called you," she continued, "But he regretted it and since YOU were HIS only friend he felt alone as well. While you and James would go to Hogsmeade with the rest of the 'Marauders', Severus and I would spend time in the Great Hall talking about how horrible our families were. We'd also practice spells, curses, and hexes in classrooms every now and then. So one night while we were practicing, we kind of...you know...got a little carried away and we...made out."
She paused and looked down onto the floor, "That was when Sirius popped out of nowhere with a camera. After the flash, I practically threw Severus off of me. He ran for it, I don't blame him though. If he'd stayed, Sirius would have tormented him further. I don't know how he did it but he managed to get the posters to the common room before me."
To Zoe's surprise Lily was laughing and holding her sides.
"You...and...Snape..." she said through laughs.
"Not my best moment," Zoe fell back onto her trunk and covered her face.
There was a thud. Zoe got back up and saw Lily was now on the floor.
"You've lost your mind!" Zoe started laughing along.
After they had settled down, Lily wiped some tears from her face.
"I admit, it's a bit weird but I understand. It's like during our 4th year when you and what's his name...Jeffrey were dating. I had no study partner!"
Zoe smirked, "It was Jack. And again...not my best moment. Did I ever tell you that we only kissed once? That one time it felt like he was trying to eat my face."
Lily slowly stopped laughing, "Just a thought, how'd Sirius find out?"
"I have no clue. But then again Sirius and Severus seem to always know what the other is doing. It's eerie," Zoe heard a knock upstairs.
"I'm not expecting anyone," Lily looked towards the stairs.
They ran up and didn't see anyone near the front door. Mr. and Mrs. Evans were raking the grass into heaps on the lawn. They looked towards the living room window and saw a reddish brown owl tapping on a window with its beak. The owl resembled a cat with wings and had been Zoe's companion ever since she had entered Hogwarts.
"Seto!" Zoe let her owl in and it perched itself on her shoulder.
"He's got a note on him," she approached the owl and untied the piece of parchment, "It's from Craig."
"Give it here," Zoe grabbed for the note and read it aloud, "Forgot someone? He screeched bloody murder after the fight. Told him where you were going, damn smart bird you have. Anyways, just wanted to let you know that I'm okay. Mum's stopped crying. blah blah blah and dad...well you know dad... Just gotta say a couple 'Hail the Dark Lord' to get them off my case. Once you start school, I'll send the rest of your stuff. Seto seemed to just want to see you and wouldn't take anything with him. Well, hope all is well. Send me a letter when you can. To my apartment, not to the house. Love you, Craig."
Seto nibbled on Zoe's ear, "You adorable creature, you!"
"So how you feeling?" Lily watched as Zoe folded up the letter and put it in her jeans.
"Relieved. He's okay and that's all that really matters. Found out my mum has feelings after all," Zoe said coolly.
"I have a spare cage for Seto if you'd like."
"I'll let him go out for a hunt. Would you like that, Seto?" the owl gave a loud hoot and flew back out the window, "I'll set up the cage later."
"Let's go see what mum made," Lily shut the window and followed Zoe into the kitchen. There were sandwiches on a platter.
They finished eating most of them and went to Lily's room. There were pictures of James and her on the walls and pictures of the family. Zoe looked through them all and noticed that Petunia kept to the background. Zoe felt a little hint of jealousy. She didn't hate her parents, she only thought that they had made the wrong choices. Her parents had been brainwashed as kids to believe that purebloods were better than anyone. They hadn't stood a chance.
She remembered the day she first found out about the family's involvement with the Dark Arts. She had barely turned 8.
"Don't go downstairs," Craig came into her room pale faced, "Put on your headphones and don't take them off until I say so. I'll come get you...after...well...just listen to the whole CD. Don't go out there okay?"
"What's going on?" Zoe stared at him.
"Just put them on, Zoo," he grabbed the headphones and put them over her ears. He put the volume to the loudest setting and left the room in a hurry.
'Send us a blindfold, send us a blade
Tell the survivors help is on the way
I was a blindfold, never complained
All the survivors singing in the rain
I was the one with the world at my feet
Got us a battle, lea-'
The battery died. Zoe looked around for batteries but didn't find any. She got off of her bed and crept out of her room.
"Craig," she whispered, "Craig, my batteries are dead."
"CRUCIO!" A woman's voice yelled from the floor below.
All that followed were screams of pain and laughter. Zoe slowly and silently walked down the stairs and peeked into the living room. There was someone on the floor twitching and contorting into very awkward angles. Her eyes widened. There stood her mother with her wand out and pointed at the twitching body. She suddenly felt herself being lifted from behind. She was being taken back to her bedroom but she didn't bother looking at who was carrying her, her eyes were staring at her mother.
"I told you to stay in here," a familiar voice echoed in her ears, "Just stay here, I'll be right back with some warm milk for you okay? Don't know why I didn't do this in the first place..."
After drinking the glass of milk, she fell asleep immediately. Craig had refused to say anything about that night until she had turned 16. He explained to her what her parents did and how they became supporters of Lord Voldemort as he rose to power.
"Hey, I'm talking to you!" a hand was snapping its fingers in front of Zoe's face.
"Oh sorry Lily...I was just looking at your pictures," she shook her head and turned to face Lily, "What were you saying?"
Lily looked at the pictures and then back at Zoe,"You're part of the Evans family also, Zoo. See?"
She pointed to some photos on her mirror. One showed Zoe and Lily jumping around with their O.W.L. test results. The Zoe in the picture seemed to be very clumsy. She had tripped over her own feet while Lily kept dancing around. There was another one taken during Lily's 16th birthday. It showed Mr. and Mrs. Evans, Petunia, Lily, and Zoe gathered around a tall delicious looking chocolate cake.
"There's still a couple more I haven't put up yet. Lack of tape," Lily sighed and sat down on her desk chair.
"Heh," Zoe walked to the bed and laid on it, "So what were you saying before I entered my daze?"
"Remus decided to stay in school after all. Remember how he missed so many classes last year? He told me during the beginning of summer that this year he won't miss as much."
"He couldn't have failed anyways. Dumbledore made sure that he wasn't expelled because of...his condition. I reckon we should tell Toony about him haha," Zoe imagined the look of horror Petunia would make if she found out they were acquainted with a werewolf.
"You know, I've been thinking," Lily squinted at Zoe, "We should go do something out of the ordinary before we go back to Hogwarts. I mean we've already studied enough for our future tests. It's our last year in school!"
Zoe gasped and her eyes widened, "LIly Evans! We are both honorary members of the Slug Club, amazingly gifted in magic, incredibly attractive, and highly intellegent!"
Lily looked at her, confused, "Aaaaand your point is?"
"My point is I don't think we have any idea how to do something out of the ordinary and fun," Zoe sighed.
"I know someone who knows exactly what to do!" Lily squealed.
"Let me guess..."
"JAMES!" They said at the same time.
"Saw that coming, but I say we look for our own fun though. If you ask James you'll either change your mind or he'll talk you out of it."
Lily nodded in agreement, "You're right. So what do we do?"
"I've got it!" Zoe sat up straight, "I'll send a letter to Craig when Seto comes back and ask him if he knows any places we can go to. He's been everywhere so he should have a good idea."
"Let me run it by my mum and dad first," Lily said, "We may want to be rebellious but we don't want them up all night worrying."
Zoe saluted her, "Aye aye cap'n!"
The night came and went. Zoe had written her letter to Craig and he'd replied the next morning with a list of places.
"The Gnarly Broom sounds pretty interesting," Zoe and Lily were sitting in the living room couch reading the list.
"Hm, I don't know about going to a Wizard's bar or lounge or whatever."
"True, how about this?" Zoe pointed to the name 'The Demon's Door'. That sounds promising don't you think?"
"Is it just a door?" Lily joked.
"Good thing you're not studying to be a comedianne," Zoe chuckled, "I vote for the door!"
"Me too!"
"Great! We should get makeovers before friday while we're at it!" Zoe made a face that looked like she'd eaten something sour and her hair grew long, black, and curly.
"What about me?" Lily tugged lightly on one of her strands of hair, "This'll take ageeees to grow!"
"We're witches," Zoe pointed towards a spell book on Lily's desk, "Why are you Head Girl?"
Lily threw a pencil at her.
"In all honesty, I think you should let your hair be. We'll just curl it and find some very good hair spray," Zoe got up and played with Lily's hair, "There's only one thing I can't morph onto my face. Make up."
The sound of someone clearing their throat startled them.
"Ahem," Petunia said, "This just came for you, Lily."
She set down a black envelope on the desk and glared at it then walked back to her room.
Lily opened the envelope and read over it first before saying aloud, "It's an invitation from James to the both of us."
"To what?" Zoe looked at the invitation, " A masquerade? Is he kidding?"
"It's actually very thoughtful. I told him how I wanted to go out and do something crazy before going back to school. Oh but we won't be able to go to The Door. It's this friday!"
"The Demon's Door, Lily, and I actually don't mind going to this thing! It sounds really cool!" Zoe imagined herself with a black mask, "Nobody would know who I am! Your boyfriend though scares me a bit. He might be a seer."
Lily rolled her eyes, "Oh come off it."
Zoe mimicked their Divination teacher, "Heeeeee possesseeeeees theeeee giiiiiiift ooooooof seeeeeeeeing theeeeeeee fuuuutuuuuure. ooooooooo!"
"That would be a really long class if she did those noises with every word she spoke," Lily playfully shoved Zoe away.
"It would be a more bothersome class also," Zoe chuckled, "We've already got our dresses for the party so no worries."
Lily looked at her in surprise, "We are not going to wear the same dress twice, Zoe Hitzig."
"It's not our wedding, Lily Evans," Zoe made the same face as Lily.
"We're going shopping first thing tomorrow morning!"
"Oh come ooooon! We already finished shopping yesterday! You have an unhealthy addiction to mornings. I suggest I set up a meeting with one of my vampire cousins to help you with that."
"TOMORROW MORNING! I'll provide coffee. Deal?
"Uggggh deal," Zoe groaned, "That means morning cartoons are cancelled then?"
Another pencil found its way onto Zoe's face.
"Why 'wood' you do that?" Zoe laughed at her own joke, "Wood as in you know...what your desk is made of."
"I'm going to go write back to James. Can I borrow Seto?"
"Your sense of humor needs some tuning. Sure thing, he's in the basement perched somewhere. He's not too fond of cages."
"Thank you, I won't be long so turn on the radio or television. Be right back!"
Zoe looked around and turned on the radio. She turned knobs and switches trying to find something good to listen to when she came across a Wizard radio station that sounded interesting. It was a man telling a scary story about trolls and undead armies. She sat down again on Lily's bed and listened intently.
CRACK!
Someone had apparated behind her. She felt a wand poke the back of her head.
"Don't...move..." the voice seemed to come from a man. It was low, cool, and calm.
"Who-" the man cut her off.
"Don't speak."