James stood outside the compartment door, waiting. For the past ten or so minutes he had been regularly glancing quickly through the screen of glass just in front of him. He ran his hand over his hair for around the thirtieth time and leant slightly forward, unconsciously biting his thumbnail. Lily was curled up on the one side of the compartment steadily reading through a large pack of parchment. Her eyes ran down the current sheet in her hands as she drummed her fingers silently onto the small desk beside her.

The Heads compartment was not that different from every other compartment: it was slightly larger than most and was set out differently, with included desks and extra scattered seats. James pulled back onto the wall. He sighed and gave his fringe one more hurried sweep before standing up straight and turning to march ruggedly into the compartment.

James froze as something cool and smooth pressed roughly against the side of his neck. His hand automatically went into his pocket, grappling for his wand. The pressure on the side of his neck became heavier as a voice spoke out from the shadows behind him.

"Don't even think about it Potter. If you move for your wand, this wand moves across to the base of your jugular."

James clenched his jaw; a vein pulsed in his neck in anger as he twisted, trying to look at his attacker. A second shadow joined James' on the passageway floor and Severus Snape came into James line of view. A hateful sneer played on Snape's lips. He moved to whisper in James's ear and James started to struggle harder against his tightening grip.

"Isn't this something new: the amazing Potter, the infamous tormenter… now the tormented." He whispered scathingly.

His liquid black eyes fiercely bored deep into James's dilated pupils, black on Brown. James spat forcefully into his face.

"Ha! Like it would have been this way if you weren't such a coward, as if you had actually had the courage to approach in my line of view, you would have still come out on top."

A loud bang echoed from the darkness of the passageway ahead and Snape looked up. James rolled out from under Snape's wand and delved for his own, training it on Snape's face. Snape sized up the situation, his mind calculating behind his cold eyes.

James's chest heaved as he surveyed Snape with the deepest contempt, yet also humour etched onto his face. "Like I was saying… in this fight, I'll always come out on top."

Blazing heat grazed the side of James cheek and he lunged sideways, narrowly avoiding the quick succession of spells sent at him. He sent a range of spells back at Snape from his position on the floor; Snape raged as one found its mark and lifted his wand again.

"Protego!"

James glared confusedly at Snape, who had his gaze trained on someone off to the side. James rolled over and saw Lily standing in the open door of her compartment. Her face was livid. Her hair had partly escaped from her loose bun, and hung down past her face.

"Stop it!" she cried.

James jumped up and brushed himself down, keeping his focus on Snape. Lily swept her hair impatiently out of her eyes and silently put up her hands in a calming manner and held the silence for a moment, looking at each of the boys in turn.

"Why can't you two just get on?" She asked tiredly.

Snape thrust his wand back into his cloak and turned on his heel, marching away from them. James kept a tight hold on his wand until Snape had walked out of sight, before cautiously returning his wand to his pocket. He looked around and found that Lily had disappeared.

He walked over to the compartment and sat down in the seat closest to the door. Lily had returned to reading her notes, only in a more hurried and distracted fashion than before. He coughed and she raised her head to give him a death stare before returning to the pages. The pack seemed familiar. He shuffled down his seat until he was directly in front of Lily. He read the heading of the page upside down.

"Be a team leader, not a team mate."

Underneath it was a bulleted list of various instructions relating to the title. He ran his hand down his stubbly cheek, thinking back. His thoughts didn't really amount to much and curiosity taking hold, reached out his hand to catch the front page.

"Why is this so familiar? I just can't-" he broke off as Lily impatiently hit his hand away and flipped back the pages of parchment to reveal the cover title: "HOW TO BE A HEAD."

"Oh that's why", mused James as he relaxed back into the seat behind him, propping his head up on his hands. He yawned and rotated his head to the window, watching the scenery pass by. Lily tapped her foot irritably against the floor, while raptly watching James over the top of her parchment. A smile curled up onto James's face, aware of her attention and carried on looking out of the window, purposefully ignoring her efforts of trying to stare holes into the side of his face.

"Yes Evans?" James asked inquiringly. Lily carried on tapping her foot impatiently, while constantly filling the air with loud 'Harrumphs'. James got up and bent over Lily, placing his hands solidly on her shoulders.

"It would be of great help if you could actually tell me why you are so pissed off, and then we can resolve this a lot faster." He said placing more of his weight onto Lily, resulting in her sliding down her chair a few inches. She tried to struggle away from his strong grip for a few minutes, before finally accepting the impossibility of getting free while separated from her wand which was lying on the far side of the compartment in her coat pocket. James smirked and pushed down harder on her shoulders.

"Until I find out what's wrong Evans, you are not going anywhere, so the sooner you tell me what I did to rub you up the wrong way, the sooner you can once again be free of my face hanging over you." He said patronisingly.

Lily glared pointedly at a point just below his eyes. "You're terrible." She snarled in agitation.

James laughed, itching his chin against his shirt. "Yes I am, but I often think that that is more frequently a good thing than not."

Lily sighed. "You can't go for more than an hour in the vicinity of a weaker victim before you give in to your hexing temptations. It's despicable." She said stonily.

James released her shoulders and fell back into the chair behind him. He grabbed an elongated toffee from a small pile across his seat and interestedly took a bite.

"That-" James said pointing the remaining toffee in his hand at her. "-Is not true."

Lily let out a noise of exasperation and moved to pick up the rest of the toffees before James took anymore.

"Please. As soon as you see Severus you have to attack him, or humiliate him, or…do some other equally awful thing to him." She finished in frustration.

She stowed away the toffees as James shoved the last bite of his into his mouth and crumpled up the wrapper.

"I will never touch another person – smaller or larger than me, unless they provoke me first. I stopped hexing everybody for the fun of it two years ago. Snivellus just happens to be a special case."

Lily crossed her arms, her expression now more apprehensive than angry. "Yes, but in the passageway-"

"In the passageway I was with Snape - who, like I said, is a special case - and anyway, I only hexed him because he hexed me first – it was completely within my rules." He said matter of factly.

Lily raised her eyebrows "Severus attacked you." She stated blandly. "I'm sure. Like that has happened so often in the past." She added sceptically.

James folded his arms. "Yes it has actually."

Lily got up and crossed her arms. "Like when?" she asked, slightly inclining her head. James peered down at her, at about a foot taller than Lily; his shadow cast from the incoming sun completely covered her. James also crossed his arms and stepped closer, so that only a slight gap remained between them.

"Like about five minutes ago… it's odd, I could have sworn you were there – I guess it must have been a hallucination. Although that shield charm seemed quite real…" He trailed off looking down at Lily whose lip was twitching slightly.

He bent down further so that their noses were nearly touching. "Now, have we resolved the matter? You're not going to be tapping your foot annoyingly against the floor and glaring at me anymore?" he asked, cocking his head to the side innocently.

Lily glared at him, not moving. It was an infamous Lily – James stand off. She raised her right eyebrow and swung around in quick succession. Her hair hit James on the side of the face and he was blasted by a smell that he couldn't quite identify, but liked a lot. Lily marched over to a seat and sat down, taking out a quill and scribbling something down in the margin of a piece of parchment. She glanced up at James who was still in the position she left him, swaying slightly.

"James?"

James snapped back to reality and shook his head to clear it. "Hmmm?"

"We need to go over what we're going to say to the prefects." Lily said, still focusing on the notes that she was writing. James stretched and fell back limply into a random pouffe chair. He studied it while getting comfortable, "I like this chair, I wonder if I could get one of these for my room…?" he questioned wonderingly.

Lily sat watching him interestedly, but her annoyance with him got the better of her.

"James!" she said again, "Prefects. Duties. We need to discuss this."

James continued studying his chair face pressed against the soft material "Man, this even smells good!" he exclaimed amazed.

Lily looked at him expectantly as he ran his tongue over his teeth.

"Yes, prefects, I know… we can just tell them what they're told every year, you know not to piss off Peeves, not to abuse their power, respect the rules, blah, blah, blah. See, easy."

Lily put down the quill and started drumming her fingers on the wood of the desk. "We need some kind of structure James."

James lay back against his pouffe which seemed to stretch and enlarge to support his entire body. "You don't need structure for everything Evans, live a little. I dare you to." He scoffed.

Lily threw him a dirty look. "I live more than you would dare to live Potter. Don't flatter yourself into thinking that you're the only daredevil in this room."

James grinned and tried to get up off the pouffe. "Okay fine, Miss Daredevil, if it is so incredibly important to have structure, you can start off by talking through each of your points-"

Lily made to interrupt, but James cut her off with a look. "Don't say that you don't have any points; I have been watching you scribble away on that piece of parchment for a good half hour… back to what I was saying: you can talk through each of the points, I'll ad lib through them and then if you eventually find that you've run out of things to say then we'll say that the meetings over – simple."

He clapped his hands together as he finally managed to pull himself up out of the pouffe.

"Right, when are they getting here?"

Lily smiled subtly at James enthusiasm. "Around two, I told them." She answered, reading over her notes and placing her quill back into the inkpot. There was silence while each of them pretended to be interested in one thing or another to avoid talking. James broke the silence as he reached up onto the bag rack to check something. "I see you got over your initial shock form earlier on." He stated, a smirk coming through his voice.

Lily furrowed her brow in confusion, distractedly played with a stray piece of hair. She vaguely remembered their conversation earlier on the train and realised that that was what he was referring to.

"Oh, that… it actually made sense – after the initial shock I could kind of understand the logic behind Dumbledore's choice…"

James brought his mouth up in a half smile "oh?" he murmured, his head still amongst the various articles on the bag rack.

Lily went on distractedly "Mmm, I mean you make a good leader - well, besides from some organisational issues and the whole arrogant toerag thing - but otherwise you're mostly a compelling person. Charismatic, charming, popular, kind – well sometimes, protective, likeable, handsome…" she trailed off absent-mindedly, focusing on the scenery flashing by and twirling the same lock of her hair around her fingers.

James stopped rummaging and glanced back over his shoulder at her like she was going mad. He jumped down onto the compartment floor and made his way over to Lily. He moved the desk off to the side and bent down in front of her.

"Lily." The sound of her name made her refocus her attention on James.

"Yes?"

James put his hands on her knees and rubbed small circles into them. "Are you… okay?" he asked slowly.

Lily put out her hand and brushed him lightly with the back of her hand before withdrawing it. "Yes James I'm fine, why?" she asked distantly.

James smiled, covering his increasing anxiety; he couldn't let her see it: if she did, she would know that he actually cared.

"It was just as you started listing all my good attributes, I started to become suspicious… but by the time you said I was handsome, I started to believe that you were actually an intruder, dosed up on polyjuice potion."

Lily grinned and shoved him playfully "Stop."

James rolled back on his heels before clambering up onto the seat next to Lily. "No, I'm serious. I was about to start searching the train to make sure someone hadn't stuffed you in a cupboard somewhere while they were out busy impersonating you." He grinned over at her.

She giggled softly, shaking her head as she peeked up at him through her thick hair. James chuckled along with her and reached out to sweep back a couple of random curls from her face. His hand lingered on her cheek, thoughts travelling back to the dream he had woken from earlier in the day. He leant in closer, his breath warming the tip of her nose.

Lily turned her face to the side and removed herself from James who had unconsciously wrapped his empty arm around her. She ran her eyes around the room, her mouth partly open, searching for something to say.

"I wanted to make sure you had snapped back to yourself after the whole…compliment episode." He cut across her cautiously before she could find the words. James swallowed and seemed to recover himself as he grinned over at her. "…And I wanted to see how close I could get before you started freaking out… which as it turns out is pretty close. You just might have a daredevil in you after all Evans."

Lily touched on every aspect of the compartment before settling on James face and smiling back somewhat unconvincingly. "You see, I told you so and to think that I was about to pull out my wand, thinking that you were the imposter."

James snorted "'Believe me Evans when I say that I doubt any guy would go to the lengths of impersonation just to get close to you."

"Ho - ho, so says the guy who barely a minute ago was staring down my throat."

James let out an impatient breath. "Don't flatter yourself, it was an experiment, remember?"

Lily smiled slightly. "Right… an experiment."

She pretended to examine an empty wrapper on the floor before looking straight over at James, from her bent down position. "Were you watching me on the platform?" She asked casually.

James was noticeably thrown off guard and turned sharply to look at her. "No. Why would I be watching you? Really you're not that interesting - I assure you that I had better things to do at the time."

Lily nodded, a secretive smile playing amusingly on her face.

James studied her. "Why?" he asked.

Lily shrugged nonchalantly, scrunching up the wrapper and searching around her for something else. "No reason. Petunia just happened to mention in passing something about one of my freaky messy haired friends staring over at us, and you were the only one I could think of fitting the description."

"Freak friends?" questioned James, a hurt edge to his voice.

"It's how she deals with the whole not being a witch thing; if she can't be a part of our world, she'll make it out as the most unattractive world to be in."

Lily caught James' irked expression as she got up from the floor, clutching a chocolate frog card. "Don't take it personally, it's just who she is, how she deals. There's no use getting angry about it – believe me I learnt it a long time ago." She said lightly.

James ruffled his hair roughly, his jaw starting to clench again.

"I got Nicholas Flammel, he hasn't be seen on a chocolate frog card in ages." Lily said, smiling, and threw the serene figure on top of a pile of various odd objects alongside her shoulder bag.

James ran his hand down his thigh agitatedly. "Don't your parents try to say anything to your sister?" he asked, avoiding looking at her.

She tied her hair back in a ponytail haphazardly, running her hand over it to smooth out the bumps. "Of course, but there's only so much that they can say, or do… I mean, she's also their daughter and if anything, it's my doing for somehow being a witch in the first place."

James stood up looking scandalised. "You shouldn't say that. You can't use your talents to cover her flaws. You should be proud of being a witch and shouldn't try to make yourself anything less just because your sister is insecure at the fact that she can never be one and has to settle instead for a 'normal' life."

"I don't – Of course I'm proud – insulting my – don't you try to understand my family dynamics Potter, you don't anything about me, never mind the rest of my family!"

"I'm not -"

"Don't even say it Potter."

"I didn't mean-"

"Don't!"

Colour rose up into James face, his eyes blacking over, confused at her sharp change of demeanour. "Listen to me! For the sake of Merlin, no wonder I hardly speak to you – you're so frickin' hard to talk to! I made one comment on your sister and you flew off the handle completely like it was an intentional attack on you!" he snarled heavily, tugging impatiently at his hair.

Lily's face became dangerously calm. "Well next time keep your comments to yourself."

James snorted. "Believe me I don't need much persuasion on the topic."

They each stood brooding opposite each other. Lily closed her eyes, calming herself.

"Look, I'm sorry for having a go at you like that, but I already have enough to deal with – without my family problems being brought up."

James curtly nodded his head, his mood softening and unfroze from his tense stance. "Look at us – not even a few hours into our new positions and we're already at each others throats." He scoffed.

Lily smiled slightly, rubbing her neck ruefully. "Well we never have been able to keep away from each other – unfortunately it's never for the like of each others company; more for the promise of the fight that comes with it."

He bent down and ran his fingers against the grain of the carpet. "Yup, we're each other's punching bag… throwing words as blows instead of our fists. We save the anger we accumulate from our lives until we find a chance to hack it away on one another." He scratched his nose. "This has been one heavy train ride; I won't be able to wait to get off if things keep on happening at this rate."

Lily looked at him quizzically and he proceeded to tell her about what had happened earlier on the train – only making a vague reference to what he and Sirius were talking about. The sun had dropped lower in the sky as their conversation carried them into the afternoon and Lily looked up with a start when a knock came from the door. She had become so engrossed in what they were talking about that she had completely forgotten about the meeting. Prefects from mixed houses stood together, peering in at them through the glass. They were all in their robes, and it only dawned on her that she wasn't in hers when she realised that she was still wearing pants. She hurriedly tidied aside some of her notes and other random articles lying about the carriage, cheeks a flustered pink as she made her way across to greet the prefects. James lounged back as they trooped in, grinning confidently at the new recruits. After a few raised eyebrows courtesy of the group, James stood up. "Sorry we're not in our robes guys. We got so caught up in discussing things that we didn't see the time."

The girls in the compartment threw dirty glances over at Lily while emitting disgruntled vibes. The picture of Lily and James talking so intensely that they forgot everything around them didn't appear to sit well with them. James laughed lightly into the room at large. "Don't worry girls, it was only talk about some head business."

The girls visibly relaxed and once again became as amiable towards Lily as though she had proposed giving them a bucket of galleons each.

Lily could have sworn she saw the shadow of a wink at her from James, but thought better of it as he draped his arms around the girls near him, flirting as he led the way into the room. She reasoned that it must have been a trick of the light.

"Okay girls…and boys, let's get down to business." James announced, rubbing his hands together. The girls around him simpered and pushed their chests out a little further than was natural. Lily rolled her eyes.

"Oh for goodness' sake," she muttered under her breath. She was surprised that the other boys in the room hadn't shown hostility at the way the girls fawned over James, but a second look revealed that their mouths were also hanging open in puppy dog admiration: they were as happy to be in his presence as the girls were.

James smiled affably as he addressed the prefects. "Welcome everyone to the New Year. As your new heads we feel it is our duty to convey a few details of your new position to all you wonderful people." He sprang up from his crowd of admirers and looked expectantly at Lily, who had lost concentration somewhere between the other girls flirting and flattery and was immersed in braiding her hair. She tied a hair tie around the loose end of it and turned to meet the sea of faces upturned towards her.

"Let's get started then shall we. So after seeing what the other prefects have done over the years I'm sure you have a general knowledge about your position, but I – err, we just wanted to go over some points that were raised at the end of last year by the past prefects and teachers and we also want to quickly run over the general fundamentals that you may not have picked up."

James smiled encouragingly and she brought herself up to her full height.

"Firstly I wanted to remind you of your duties, which I have a list of here. You can't forget them and if you can't be on duty then always find another prefect to take your place. Secondly I wanted to discuss your prefect privileges. As you know you now get your own bathroom which can only be accessed through a password."

The prefects murmured excitedly. "Yes, it's great, but I want to emphasize the fact that it is a luxury to be able to use it – not a right. Last year some prefects decided to ignore this fact and gave the password to all their friends, which eventually wound up to the bathroom always being occupied by none-prefects and the actual prefects could never get in to make use of it. So please for your sake keep the password to yourselves."

James sat up a little, "Yeah and can I add that if you are stupid enough to actually allow that to happen, do not come knocking on our door, because there is no way you are using our bathroom… unless I invite you to be in there with me in which case-"

Lily smirked humorously "- In which case be sure to do so when I am out, and to use his towel because I prefer mine dry and free of somebody else's body scum."

Lily had forgotten about their shared quarters, which now brought up was partly plaguing her mind. James seemed to be contemplating the same thing as he locked eyes with Lily before looking hurriedly back to the crowd at large.

One of the prefects coughed and Lily tried to remember what she had wanted to say next. "Err…your position…" something in what she said jogged her mind and she continued confidently. "Your position as prefect should not be used to your advantage over the rules; you are still students and so the rules apply to you as well and when it comes to enforcing the rules we need to actually stick to the rules that actually exist." A few people gave her a puzzled look.

"I'm referring to the giving out of detentions and such to your mates, or rather your enemies. You have not been placed in a higher position to be able to hand out punishments to get revenge on people, and if you can contemplate doing that do that then you're being a coward – by hiding behind your power and relying on it to solve your issues with everyone for you."

James looked impressed but didn't interrupt. He had caught on to the fact that Lily lost her train of thought whenever there were unannounced interruptions. Lily swung her braid over her shoulder and confidently continued.

"Finally, Professor McGonagall has asked me to stress to you that Peeves has never showed any inclination to obey rules or authority, so if you see him up to something bad then tell one of the teachers…or the Bloody Baron because if you try to stop him chances are you'll get a first hand experience of whatever he's planning to do, or already doing."

James put his hands into his pocket. "So that's it?" he half asked, half stated to Lily, his focus on the prefects. Lily nodded "Yes, that's it. Except for passwords and duties, oh and any questions you may have – I nearly forgot. Just come over to me to get everything and then you're free to go and wreak havoc on the rest of the train."

The prefects laughed and James looked over at her admiringly while she dished out passwords to everybody and answered their various questions. He propped his shoulder against the wall, changing his mouth into different positions of entertainment. As the last person left with a last look over their shoulder at James, Lily spun around. "Well that's that" she said relieved.

"You know, you're a good leader Evans. You know how to keep an audience's focus and have patience – a good leadership attribute."

Lily leant her hand on one of the desks "Is that a compliment?" she asked. James pushed himself back off the wall and stood before her once more.

"It may have been." He replied secretly. "You'll never know."

Lily chuckled, "I can live with that. In the mean time we need to get dressed. We'll be pulling into the station soon."

She strolled over to the luggage rack and started pulling out her robes. James found his voice after staring openly at her movements for a while.

"Yeah, I better go do the same." He said, and turned to leave.

"Don't go getting into anymore fights." Lily called after him teasingly. James chuckled and waved a hand behind him to show that he heard as he walked out, brushing past Mary McDonald as she walked in, throwing him curious looks.