Remus the Romantic
Chapter 3: Classroom Disruption
Disclaimer: The characters are not mine.
AN: Hey all. Sorry this took so long…but you liked the ficlets, didn't you? If you haven't read them, please go check them out. For now, hopefully you'll find this chapter entertaining…After you're finished, please leave a review containing constructive criticism. Also thanks to orangepenguin, Laughing Dragoness, PEF, Erica, MySite, sncaggie, dee, and Heaven's Flying Fish for your reviews last time!
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Lily's chin rested in her palm as she took notes during History of Magic, engaged in the monotonous process of looking up, looking down and copying the writing on board, and looking up again to see the next point. The room nearly screamed with the silence of sheer boredom alongside Professor Binns as he droned and fulfilled his self-proclaimed duty to enlighten the current younger generation on events of the past. Lily glanced outside at the darkened sky and falling rain, wishing to be elsewhere. Listening to the raindrops hit the glass windows was proving to be much more enthralling. Perhaps the subject would be interesting if taught by another teacher, but when taught by Binns it was as dull as the dreary weather outside that day.
A row down to the side Sirius and James were speaking in low voices, and Peter was watching them, looking amused. James smirked and twirled his wand expertly around his fingers. His gaze flickered once or twice up toward Lily as he and Sirius discussed their next plan of action. Remus looked as bored as anyone while he took his own notes. He glanced at James and Sirius, catching snippets of their conversation.
Lily suddenly bent her head to sneeze. Bringing her head back up, she heard a chuckle in James's and Sirius's direction, but when she looked over at them they were taking notes as well. She squinted at them for a moment with her usual disgruntle, then turned back to her notes. A moment later she again sneezed and recovered. Another sneeze immediately took place, and after that another one.
"Are you alright?" Alice asked her. Lily tried to say "Fine," but still the sneezes came, and with unfailing force. After about five more sneezes, the fit finally ended. Lily regained her composure then looked down to see James and Sirius overcome with silent laughter. Remus combed a hand through his hair and Lily caught him pointing secretively at James, who had a hand hidden. She glared at him fiercely.
"Ignore them," Alice told Lily, fixing on the troublemakers a stern look of her own. This, as might be expected, did not help. James and Sirius still looked obviously pleased with themselves. Peter was laughing as well.
Still cutting her eyes at the juvenile group, Lily growled, "I don't know why they don't just grow up," At the same time, she envied their skill in jinxing. What she wouldn't give to be able to get back at them.
Lily chewed her lip in thought as she turned back to Professor Binns' notes, realizing it wasn't skill that she lacked. She knew plenty of jinxes and hexes that would terrify James Potter and Sirius Black into Disapparating to Pluto to escape her. What she didn't have was the nerve.
Since first year at Hogwarts, Lily had had the reputation of a rulekeeper. Almost all the teachers adored her for her obedience and hard work. They praised her, and some students begrudged her for finding favor with them. Most teachers, like McGonagall, strove for impartiality, but even she found it difficult to not wish that students like James, Sirius, and Peter were more like Lily.
Lily took pride in the fact that the teachers respected her, and she worked hard to excel in her classes. She enjoyed most of the subjects, being material that was fictitious and unavailable in the Muggle World, so it wasn't much of a task to study. Others saw her excellence as a gift that they wished for. Lily Evans was a person that other ambitious students admired.
Thinning her lips, Lily realized that if she took the route she wanted, that would change.
After Transfiguration began later that day, Professor McGonagall checked their progress on turning saucers into tin boxes and then passed out candles for the class to turn into long quills. She had exercised some of her usual good judgment by pairing Sirius with Peter and James with Remus.
While James and Remus were concentrating on the candle, Lily whispered "Rictusempra!" and pointed her wand at James.
James gave a little twitch and a giggle, and Lily could not resist a quiet one herself. She saw Remus give him a bewildered look and had to fight to keep from bursting out in laughter. Never had Remus looked so caught off-guard.
With a satisfied smirk Lily turned her attention to the candle, and while she did Sirius caught James's eye and nodded back at Lily with a grin. James followed the nod, found Lily, and looked back at Sirius with a grin of his own and a twinkle showing in his eye.
"So that's how it's going to be," James murmured.
Remus looked up from the candle. "What?" he asked, following his gaze and spotting Lily. "Oh, no," he groaned, sitting up. James was about to lift his wand when Professor McGonagall came to their table.
"Potter!" McGonagall barked, making him turn around quickly. "Attention here." She gestured toward the candle. "Let's see your progress." James managed to turn the candle into a quill with a wick at the end.
"Quality work," McGonagall muttered, looking it over in approval. "I expect a full transfiguration by the end of class from both of you," she told Remus and James. Looking over, she barked, "Black, what are you looking at?"
Sirius turned back sharply (he had been getting ready for a trick of his own) and replied, "Nothing, Professor," a little too innocently.
"Is that so? Let's see what you and Pettigrew have come up with." McGonagall strode over to them. James turned back to Lily purposefully.
"James, don't. You'll get us both detention," Remus told him.
"You won't get detention, Remus," James answered, turning back with an eyeroll. "But she will."
Remus looked at James hopelessly. "This is how you're handling it?" he whispered, keeping an eye on McGonagall when she came close.
"Why not?" James whispered back. He quickly turned to the incomplete quill to look like he was working.
"You want to make her mad, don't you?" Remus glanced at James in disapproval. James's lack of skill in communicating with females was beginning to get irritating.
"Just a little—she really should have helped us out," James grumbled. A hard look came over Remus's face.
"James, don't. She was right—"
"You're defending her?"
"Well, she was. We shouldn't be doing it." Remus looked away and focused on the candle.
"Come off it. You know you want to do it, it'll be so much better with us around." Remus just had to develop a conscience every once in a while, James thought. It was a good thing that it didn't apply to homework though.
"There's too much that can go wrong, and what if the Ministry finds out?"
"Oh, pooh—they won't."
"James…seriously! What are you laughing at?"
"Hee, heh-hee heehee," James giggled while he twitched and pointed at Lily, who was sporting an amused look with her wand up. She desisted, and James stopped laughing. He looked at her furiously and raised his wand.
"James, no!" Remus hissed as he tried to grab James's wrist, but James quickly moved it to wave his wand as he murmured, "Ceruleo!"
Lily and Alice gasped and Lily grabbed at her hair quickly. It had changed from a natural red to a shockingly bright blue. Remus, Sirius, and Peter stared with open mouths first at her, then quickly glanced at McGonagall to make sure she hadn't seen.
Lily turned around in anger to the back, but Professor McGonagall's back was turned while she was talking to students in the back, who were smothering their laughter while trying to not draw the professor's attention to their classmate. Lily whirled, her face red with fury; it contrasted nicely with her blue hair. She raised her wand just as Professor McGonagall turned back to the front to see what the class was goggling at. The professor's eyes widened instantly at the sight, but before she could say anything Lily said through gritted teeth, "Magentium!"
"EVANS!"
James's hair was suddenly a bright pink, and the class was suddenly overcome with hysterical laughter at both his hair and Lily's. Lily turned back to Professor McGonagall nervously, but still looking angry. James's hands flew to his pink hair.
"Professor! Will you look at this!" he exclaimed almost hysterically.
"I can see it clearly, Potter! It stands out quite nicely!" Professor McGonagall snapped. The class bit back their laughter in fear of her anger. "Wands away, both of you! And Pettigrew, wipe that smile off your face!" James and Lily begrudgingly put their wands away and sat down, stewing. "I'll speak to you both after class. Everyone else, back to work—and if you're so interested in Evans's and Potter's hair colors, I can do the same to yours!" This was met with silence as everyone returned to work.
Lily glared furiously at the back of James's pink head, but after a moment tried to console herself with the belief that James was hating his hair more than she was hating her own. Lily could sense Alice's eyes on her, but she looked down at the table so that she wouldn't have to communicate with anyone. Thoughts of torturing and embarrassing James whirled in her head, and she took a nasty pleasure in each and every one of them.
James looked murderously at the quill that Remus had just transfigured. He felt quite irritated that he was unable to do any magic; it seemed now that rather than let a major spell out of his system James's hand had developed an attachment to his wand. He fancied adding a few more colors to Lily's head.
Professor McGonagall kept a fierce eye on them while she wasn't checking students' work. After the bell rang the students filed out, some glancing at Lily and James with amused looks. Alice, Sirius, Peter, and Remus lingered.
"Out!" Professor McGonagall ordered them, and none of them hesitated. She waited until the door was closed then turned to the two culprits with her hands on her hips. "I don't care who started what, but both of you know better than to throw out unassigned spells in class! Unacceptable!"
Lily and James glowered at each other.
"That will be ten points from Gryffindor for each of you—" Lily looked less angry; she had expected more, "—and detention!" This increased the sulk present in both their faces. "Now!" Professor McGonagall waved her wand, and their normal hair colors were back. "I don't ever want to see a disruption like that again, understood? Even if it's not a dangerous spell! Just because you don't think it's dangerous doesn't mean unpleasant things can't come out of it!"
They both considered the former state of their hair unpleasant, but Lily and James only muttered, "Yes, ma'am."
"Good!" She marched to the door and jerked it open, revealing four guilty listeners outside. "To your next class!" she said vehemently, pointing out the door. Lily and James were only too happy to leave, and they wasted no time distancing themselves from each other. Lily and Alice quickly strode down the hall and James hung back with his friends.
"I don't want to hear it," James growled. Sirius and Peter tightened their lips to hide their smiles, but Remus stared ahead with a somewhat self-righteous look that said, "I knew that would happen."
…
Lily stabbed at her pork chop.
"Argh! I hate James!"
Alice gave her a hug in sympathy and said, "That was excellent though, I wish his hair could have stayed like that." Lily grunted.
"We almost had the lead." Lily looked at the four hours glasses mournfully. Gryffindor's looked slightly less full than it had at lunch. Right now Ravenclaw was leading, and Gryffindor was under Slytherin. "Twenty points made more of a difference than I thought it would." She sighed, resting her chin on a palm. "Just how McGonagall can take points from her own house, I'll never know."
"We can get those points back, it's alright," Alice said consolingly. Lily grunted again. "What do you have to do for detention?"
"Don't know yet. Guess we'll get a note later. Blimey, this is my first detention ever," Lily said miserably.
"I'll bet it's James's hundredth one," Alice remarked. Lily gave a half-smile.
"Great, I've joined the class clowns," she said unenthusiastically.
Several seats down, James listened to his friends talking about Transfiguration. He would never admit it, but having Lily Evans retaliate so was humiliating. He had honestly not expected her to respond with such nerve. Usually she was the model student and would never sink to battling it out in the classroom.
Not that it was really sinking…but it certainly did put things into a new perspective. It had always seemed that Lily Evans could do no wrong in the eyes of a teacher. No one would have ever guessed it though, with McGonagall's reaction. James had a feeling that the episode would have been dealt with more unequally had it occurred in Potions with Slughorn.
"That was brilliant, that hair color was," Sirius complimented James.
"My hair was pink!" James snapped.
"Calm down, I was talking about what you did to Evans."
James sulked and kept from looking anyone in the eye.
"You looked simply dashing though," Sirius said with a smirk, ignoring the scowl.
"Shut up."
They proceeded to talk about other things and when dinner was over went back to the common room. Lily's and James's eyes met once or twice on the way, but in quick response they glared and looked away.
…
"We've got to mop all this?" Lily asked, sounding slightly hysterical.
She, James, and Argus Filch the caretaker of nearly ten years stood facing one of the long corridors. James, apparently used to tasks such as these, merely scowled. Filch stood behind them, glaring.
"That's right. But if I had my way, it wouldn't be simple chores for you. No one uses real punishments anymore…" Filch's grumbling trailed off.
"Simple chores? This will take forever without magic! And what are we supposed to do if someone comes walking through here?"
"Welcome to my life," said Filch shortly.
Lily looked quite sour.
James was quiet while he mopped, except to coldly order Lily to step aside when he mopped past her. She felt that angered her more than it should, but making her livid was a talent that unfortunately James possessed. Filch stood a way behind them, supervising.
Almost half an hour later Filch had to leave, summoned to clean up an atrocious mess Peeves had made that included bubble gum and trophies. Filch stomped away in outrage after he strictly ordered James and Lily to not to anything but mop (without magic) and to not even think of leaving until he returned.
"Now that will take forever without magic," muttered James, running the mop across the floor.
"Then why doesn't he just use magic?" Lily asked smartly.
"He can't," James replied, sounding well informed. "He's a Squib."
Lily remembered hearing the term amongst gossip shared in Gryffindor. "Oh," she said, feeling a little indignant that James knew something she didn't.
"It's the opposite of Muggle-born," James went on, appearing to mistake her response as a sign of ignorance.
"Yes, I know," Lily snapped. When she was speaking with someone like James, being Muggle-born was a touchy subject for her. It might have been because he was so conceited, or that he was pureblood. He did not, however, parade around the fact that he was pureblood like some of the Slytherins did. She gave him that.
"How do you know he's a Squib?" asked Lily, not bothering to keep her curiosity in check.
"When he takes you to his office as much as he does me and Sirius, you learn a few things." James sounded somewhat impressed with himself. Lily turned to look at him in disgust, and was unpleasantly surprised to find the mop moving by itself and James leaning against the wall with his arms folded and wand out.
"What—we aren't supposed to use magic!" Lily exclaimed.
"Filch isn't here," replied James carelessly.
"So? What if you—?"
"He won't be back for a while. Bubble gum is a messy thing."
"Honestly, what is it with you always breaking the rules?"
"What's with you and being so perfect?"
Anger boiled in Lily once more. "I'm not perfect," she told James indignantly. "If I was I wouldn't even be here."
"So you turned my hair pink. What a record."
"That's not what I'm saying, Potter." She spat out the name with utter contempt. "And who wants to be as much of a troublemaker as you anyways?"
"Anyone who cares about things other than being perfect," James mocked, making a face.
"Ugh!" Lily turned around in a fury and tried to maintain what little dignity she had left as she mopped the floor angrily. Unfortunately she slipped on the wet part and fell, so that attempt failed.
Filch returned about an hour later to find the hall floor completely mopped. He dismissed them with just a hint of irritation and they went back to the Gryffindor common room.
…
That night, Lily still had not gotten over her anger. It somehow infuriated her that James insisted on calling her perfect. Lily thought it seemed so wrong for him to use that word, when she was quite as imperfect as the next person.
Twirling a lock of her red hair around a finger, Lily scowled in thought. Why was it that James made her so angry? He was on her mind all the time, but not in a good way. Mostly she thought of ways she would like to get back at him for mocking her, and Sirius as well. Also Peter, just because he stood in the background snickering at James's and Sirius's pranks.
Remus Lupin seemed like the only gentleman in the world. He was kind to most people, and much of the time he acted more mature than James, Sirius, and Peter. His politeness also brought him a step above the rest. But then, why was he such good friends with the others? Why couldn't he find someone decent to associate with?
Lily rolled over, trying to empty her mind of all thought of both James and Remus. It seemed to work, until she remembered detention earlier that way. After that, she tried to think of something that didn't make her so angry. The first thought that came to mind was seeing Remus in the library, and she smiled at the memory of talking with him. The smile left Lily's face as she thought of something.
Lily stared up at the ceiling, realizing that she felt a certain sort of fondness for Remus Lupin.