Disclaimer: Harry Potter will never be mine. Only the occasional OC belongs to me, but they aren't nearly as cool. ;) Anyway, I hope you all enjoy this chapter as much as I did. :)


The next morning, Lily woke up early, ready for the first day of classes to begin. Excitement filled her stomach with butterflies. She always felt a bit different than most of the other students when it came to the first day of school. Unlike everyone else, Lily looked forward to all of her new classes; she enjoyed being challenged intellectually. She had no doubt that this year would be more difficult than all of her previous years of schooling combined. But, while the prospect was daunting, it didn't overwhelm her like she knew it did most other students. Not yet, at least.

Lily got out of bed and stood in the middle of her new dorm. She hadn't really gotten a chance to look at it last night, and she took a minute to admire it now. It was much nicer than she had expected. There was her large four-poster bed with a white feather blanket and pillows. Across from that was a mahogany dresser (which doubled as a writing desk), on top of which perched a large mirror in which you could see almost the entire room reflected. Next to her bed was a comfortable-looking armchair; Lily couldn't wait to spend a nice rainy afternoon in it. On the opposite wall next to her bed, there was a large window and window-seat facing the east. Lily made her way over to the window and sat down. From there she could see the quidditch pitch (which was surprisingly picturesque when not filled with hundreds of screaming spectators) and the Forbidden Forest a little ways beyond. Normally, she found the Forest a bit ominous, but that morning, with the sun shining bright and the birds flying cheerfully in the breeze, it didn't seem nearly as threatening.

Suddenly, Lily realized just how much time she was wasting. She still had to take a shower and go down for breakfast before classes started. Quickly, she grabbed her uniform and made her way to the bathroom. Without thinking, she opened the door, just in time to see James, freshly showered, wrapping a towel around himself.

"Oh!" Lily exclaimed. She instantly threw her hands over her eyes, dropping her clothes in the process. She could feel her face growing hotter as she said, "Sorry! I-I should have knocked." She uncovered her eyes, but made sure to keep them glued to the floor as she bent over and picked up her things. "Erm... I guess I'll just..." But she didn't know what she was trying to say. There was nothing really that she could do, nowhere she could go; she still had to take a shower.

"Relax, Evans," James said, giving her an amused look. "You can look up," he continued. "I assure you, I'm decent."

Lily didn't trust him, but she turned her eyes upward anyway.

She was right not to trust him. "You call this decent?" she demanded.

"What?" he said, looking down at himself. "What isn't decent about me?"

Lily looked at him in disbelief. "You're half-naked!"

He gave her a confused look. "And?"

Lily spluttered. "And... and there's nothing decent about that! Didn't you think to bring your clothes in here with you?"

"Well, obviously not," James replied. He gave her a grin then and said, "Does my being half-naked bother you?"

"Of course it bothers me, you... you..." She couldn't think of a strong enough insult.

James ignored her and stepped closer, making her forget what she was trying to say.

"Why?" he asked with a smirk on his face. "You like what you see?"

Before Lily could stop herself, her eyes moved down. She stared at the expanse of his muscular chest and trailed her eyes lower to his abs. She looked to his forearms, where the veins were slightly raised and up to his muscular biceps. Lily's eyes finally found their way back to his, trying to keep any kind of emotion from showing. She noticed how nice his eyes were, an amazing hazel color. The rest of his facial features weren't any worse, either. His nose was somewhat crooked, making it look as if it had been broken before, but it didn't mar his face. If anything, it added to it, giving him a nice rugged appearance. Lily's eyes flicked down to his full lips for only an instant before meeting his gaze again.

Taking care to give it as much bite as she could, she said, "What's there to like?"

The smirk that had slowly disappeared from James's face as he had watched Lily's eyes roam over his body returned, even broader than before.

"Whatever you say, Evans," he said simply, in return.

James took another step toward the door, where Lily was standing, and she turned sideways to let him through. Their eyes met again as he slipped by her, their bodies almost touching. And then, he was out of the doorway and making his way to his bedroom.

Flustered, Lily shut the door to the bathroom and went about taking her shower. She refused to let herself think about what had just happened; no good could come of it.

Thanks to that particular hold-up, though, Lily only had enough time to eat a small breakfast and scan through The Daily Prophet before it was time to pick up her schedule from McGonagall.

A few pages into her quick scan of the paper, though, she saw an article that caught her eye. The title read Three muggles found dead in Crawley. Ministry suspects "Death Eaters." Lily's eyes widened in shock as she read on.

Three muggles (Albert and Judy Fenton, age 36, and their son William, age 5) were found dead late last night in their home in Crawley, England. The Ministry suspects that these deaths are the work of so called "Death Eaters," or followers of You-Know-Who. Along with the tell-tale signs of the Killing Curse (no outward manifestations of physical harm, etc.), Ministry officials also found a symbol of a skull with a serpent tongue over the muggle family's home. This symbol is now being referred to as the Dark Mark, the mark associated with You-Know-Who and his followers. It is now believed that this mark is being used as a sort of signature or calling card that is conjured by dark wizards after committing such heinous acts. The muggle Prime Minister has been alerted and the Ministry of Magic is providing extra security as (continued on page 12).

Lily sat back and stared at the paper, feeling nauseated. Her breakfast lay forgotten on the table in front of her. She couldn't believe the cruelty of these wizards. To murder defenseless muggles was horrible enough, but to kill children? It was disgusting. She was also angry, though. Why hadn't this been on the front page? Everyone needed to know about this; did they not realize the danger that this kind of thing posed? Not only to muggles, but to muggle-born witches and wizards as well; perhaps to the entire wizarding world! How could they allow people to ignore this?

Lily was interrupted from her thoughts as students all around her began to make their way to the back of the Great Hall to where Professor McGonagall stood, ready to hand out their schedules. Lily slowly folded up her copy of the Prophet and took it with her as she made her way to where the rest of the students were now milling around.

"If you would all please form two straight lines!" Professor McGonagall said, over the din of the students. "This will go much faster if you all aren't scattered about."

Slowly, the great blob of students transformed into two somewhat crooked lines. Lily looked over to find herself standing next to her good friend Alice Hinton.

"Alice!" she exclaimed, happy to see her. Alice looked away from McGonagall and smiled wide when she saw Lily.

"Lily!" she said back, and came over to Lily's line, giving her a tight hug. "I feel like I haven't talked to you in forever! Why didn't you write me over the summer?" She gave Lily a reproachful look.

"Alice, you know I don't have an owl at home. My sister hates anything remotely magical," Lily explained.

"That's not a good reason at all, though, not to have an owl. You can't just keep it in your room? It's not like they spend too much time indoors, anyway."

"Well, I could," Lily joked, "but I'm afraid Petunia might sneak in there one night and off it."

Alice shook her head, but laughed. "I don't see why you do everything to please her. If I were you, I'd have told her to shove it by now."

They took a few steps forward as the line progressed, and Lily said, somewhat sheepishly, "Well, I don't like to make things any harder for her than they already are. I know that she's really just jealous of my powers, and I imagine I'd feel the same way if I were her." Lily shrugged.

"Yeah," Alice countered, "but you also would've gotten over it by now."

"Maybe," Lily conceded. She didn't much like talking about her sister with people. They almost always had something negative to say about her, and Lily always felt the need to defend her. She could understand where she was coming from, after all.

"Anyway," Lily said, wanting to change the subject, "how was your summer? I didn't get a chance to ask you since I didn't see you at the feast last night..."

"Oh," Alice said, looking away from Lily. "Right. Yeah, well, I had a bit of a fight with Frank on the train, so I sat away from him last night. We're alright now, though, we worked it out," Alice said, at Lily's concerned look. "But anyway, my summer was alright. Pretty boring for the most part, though. Yours?"

Lily wondered what Alice and Frank could possibly have been fighting about; they were normally a very happy couple. She could tell that Alice didn't want to talk about it, though, so she didn't press the matter. "Same," she answered.

They were silent a moment as the line moved up another few feet.

"So," Lily began, "did you see today's Prophet?" She wondered if her friend had seen the disturbing article, as well.

"Yes!" Alice replied, quickly. "Please tell me you saw that article about the muggle family that was killed last night."

"I did," Lily answered, glad she wasn't the only one. "Can you believe something like that wasn't on the front page?"

"I know, it's ridiculous! Honestly, I'm bloody furious about it. You can bet I'll be writing a letter to the editor about that. I mean," Alice continued, as the line moved forward yet again, "I would say that three murders—and one of them of a little boy, too- is pretty damn important!"

"I couldn't have said it better, myself," Lily said with a small smile, poking fun at Alice's word choice.

Alice rolled her eyes.

On a serious note, Lily continued, "All this stuff... it's scary. It makes me wonder whether any of us are as safe as we think we are. I'm worried."

Alice gave her a sad look. "I know, Lily. Me, too." She paused for a moment before continuing: "Actually, that's sort of what Frank and I were fighting about last night."

"Oh?" Lily asked, curious as to how the two things were connected.

Before Alice could respond, they reached the front of the line.

"Good morning, Miss Evans," Professor McGonagall greeted her. "Miss Hinton," she said, addressing Alice with a smile. She then flicked her wand and their two schedules came floating toward them from the many rolls of parchment on the table behind her.

"I look forward to seeing the both of you in Transfiguration this afternoon," she said, with another one of her small smiles, dismissing them and quickly moving on to the next pair of students.

The two looked at their schedules and saw that they both had Defense Against the Dark Arts (which they had with the Slytherins and a few Hufflepuffs who had managed to get NEWTs in the subject) in fifteen minutes.

As they made their way to the classroom, Alice continued what she had been saying. "Anyway, yes, that's sort of why Frank and I fought last night."

"What happened?" Lily asked her.

"Frank got into a fight with Mulciber and Avery on the train last night," Alice told her.

Oh no, Lily thought. She couldn't stand those two. They were... evil. There was no other word for it. They found joy in playing cruel "pranks" on others; they enjoyed watching people hurt. "What did they do this time?" she asked.

"They were..." Alice looked reluctant to finish what she was trying to say.

"What did they do?" Lily repeated, trying to prepare herself for whatever was to come.

"They were... torturing... a first year's cat." Alice cringed.

Lily, too, winced at the thought, although she couldn't say she was surprised. She was learning that she couldn't put anything past those two when it came to cruelty. The thought still made her eyes sting and her stomach churn, though.

"Okay," Lily said, not asking for anymore details about what they had done. "But how does that have anything to do with you and Frank fighting.?"

"Frank went and managed to stop them-"

"Good," Lily interjected.

"Yes..." Alice smiled sheepishly. "But he didn't just stop them. He ended up insulting them and getting into a fight right there in the hallway."

"Oh," Lily said. She didn't know quite what to say. Personally, she was glad Frank had stood up to them, and wasn't surprised that it had ended with a fight. She doubted one could simply reason with Mulciber and Avery to get them to cease any of their so-called jokes. Alice, though, didn't look like she felt the same.

Seeing the look on Lily's face, Alice said, "Don't think that I wasn't glad that Frank stopped them, I was. It's just... I hated seeing him fighting with them like that. Those two... they scare me. I can't help it. They're sick and sadistic, and I hate the thought of Frank being anywhere near them. I just..." Alice looked down, as they continued to walk. "I just love him so much, you know?"

Lily nodded. She knew very well how much Alice loved her boyfriend.

"And," she continued, "I worry about him. I worry that something terrible is going to happen to him, especially given everything that's already going on. And I don't trust either Mulciber or Avery to play fair; they'll hurt people any way they can. And the fact that Frank just jumped right into that... Well, I was upset, to say the least."

Finally, Lily understood what her friend was trying to say. She couldn't blame Alice for feeling the way she did. Personally, Lily didn't think that was anything to fight over, but she also didn't know what it was like to be in love. Maybe that changed things. She couldn't even imagine, really.

Lily put her arm around Alice's shoulders as they neared the classroom and gave her a gentle squeeze. "I understand," she said simply, and giving her as comforting a smile as she could muster. She knew that her smile wasn't as reassuring as it should have been, but Alice smiled back at her regardless.

They walked into the classroom together to see that most of the class was already there, and in their seats.

"Ah, so nice of you two to join us," said a man, not unkindly, who looked to be in his mid-thirties. He came up to them, saying, "Please, if you would give me your names so that I may direct you to your seats?"

Lily looked him over for a moment. He was young, for a professor, though his brown hair was already flecked with gray. Despite that, he was quite handsome, Lily noted. He had startlingly blue eyes, and a noticeably strong jaw. Lily glanced around the classroom to see that she wasn't the only girl to have noticed his appearance.

"I'm Lily Evans," she told him.

"And my name's Alice Hinton," Alice said from beside her. Lily saw that she was staring at the professor, and smiling prettily. Lily nudged her friend and tried not to laugh.

The man looked down at a piece of parchment in his hand and said, "Very good. Miss Evans, you will be sitting up front with Mr. Snape, and Miss Hinton, you will sit by Mr. Black in the back corner."

He then gave the two of them a bright smile, which was so handsome that, if he hadn't just said that she was sitting by Snape, she might have blushed a deep red. But as it was, she wanted to slap it right off of his face.

"I'm sorry, Professor," she said, as Alice made her way to her seat, casting back a sympathetic glance, "but that's... not possible. I can't sit next to him."

"Well," the man said, his smile fading a bit, "I'm afraid you're going to have to, Miss Evans."

"But sir-!" Lily said, before calming herself down. She didn't want to seem disrespectful. "Please sir," she continued carefully, "can I be assigned a different partner? I'm sorry, it's just that I know that I won't be able to get any work done with him."

He looked at her for a long moment, and Lily was afraid that he would say no for good. Just when she was about to give up, though, he spoke. "Alright, Miss Evans. Perhaps we can work something out. If you can make it through the rest of this week, I'll see what I can do."

The bubble of hope that had swelled in Lily's chest popped abruptly in disappointment. However, she knew that it was generous, if not exactly ideal. She was sure she could at least survive a few days of sitting by Snape.

"Yes, sir," she said, a bit dejectedly, and made her way over to her desk where Snape was sitting, looking awkward.

"Hi, Lily," he said, looking up at her with a cautious smile.

She did not return it. "Hello," she said, curtly, sitting down on the edge of her seat, as far away from him as she could get.

"Well, I suppose we can get started now," said the professor, rubbing his hands together and looking at the class. "First off, for those of you who don't know, I am Professor Bellamy, and I'm your new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher."

"Lily..." Snape said, trailing off.

Lily knew what he was trying to do: apologize. For about the hundredth time. It was the only thing he ever tried doing when they were within speaking distance of each other. Because of this, she always took great care not to be within that distance of him; she didn't want to hear it.

"Don't," she said, simply, making sure not to leave any room in her tone for argument.

"Lily, please," Snape continued, not paying attention to her or Professor Bellamy, "if you would just let me-"

"Mr. Snape," interrupted the Professor. "If you would kindly pay attention, we are trying to have class."

Snape shut his mouth and looked down at his textbook.

"Thank you," said Bellamy. "As I was saying..."

James stared at Lily from where he sat in the middle of the classroom. Or, more accurately, he stared at Snape. The stupid git couldn't keep his eyes off her, could he? James was normally much more attentive, especially in the DADA classes, but having Lily and Snape sit almost directly in front of him was proving to be surprisingly distracting. It really shouldn't bother him as much as it did, but he couldn't help it. He couldn't stand that twat Snivellus and how he mooned after Evans all the time, even now that it was obvious that she hated him (as she well should).

He watched as Snape kept stealing glances at Lily through the entire class period. He watched, too, as Lily seemed to grow more and more uncomfortable; he was sure she knew that Snape was watching her. Just as James knew that his partner, Amelia Bones, was watching him.

He made sure to glance over at her every now and then and smile, to make it less obvious that he was staring at the couple in front of him. It wasn't hard, either. He'd always found Amelia attractive, with her bright red hair and clear blue eyes. And she was nice, as well; she laughed at his jokes, and gave him the occasional compliment. She'd brush his arm when she spoke to him and play with her hair whenever he was around. He recognized all the signs: she was quite taken with him. And, honestly, he fancied her, as well. There wasn't much not to like. He made his mind up then to ask her out on a date soon; nothing too special, really. He knew she'd say yes to whatever he asked.

James looked back to the front, and saw that Lily was now practically half out of her seat, and Snape was staring at her blatantly, looking both pitiful and a bit irritated. James's jaw tensed up; he wanted to knock that look right off of Snivelly's face. He had no right to expect Lily to forgive him. Just as James's fingers were beginning to curl into fists, though, the bell rang and class was over. Probably for the best, he thought. He saw Lily jump out of her seat and heard Snape say, "Lily" for about the tenth time that class period. She ignored him like she had all the other times, though, and practically ran out of the classroom. James smiled a little at this, and grabbed up his things and said goodbye to Amelia, giving her a wink.

After that, most of the Gryffindors who had been in the DADA class headed to Transfiguration with McGonagall.

Lily was excited for this class. It was her best subject, by far, and McGonagall was probably her favorite of all the professors she had, including Slughorn. Lily appreciated the way she handled her students. Most people said she was strict, but Lily thought of it more as fair. McGonagall didn't really play favorites, unlike Slughorn (and most other professors, honestly). She was the one professor, above all others, that Lily most wanted to please.

She walked into the classroom with Alice, who was attempting to console her about Professor Bellamy's seating arrangement.

"Alice, honestly, I just want to forget about it now. If I can, that is." Lily shuddered lightly. All Snape had done the entire class period was stare at her with this pitiful look on his face. She couldn't stand it. He had no right to look miserable like that, to try and get her to feel sorry for him.

"Right," Alice said. "Sorry."

"No problem," Lily replied, as they went up to the front of the room to look at the seating chart McGonagall had put on her desk. When she found her name, though, she realized that, actually, there was a problem. A big one.

"You have got to be kidding me," Lily said, dryly.

"What?" asked Alice, looking down at the chart. A moment passed, and she said, "Oh..."

Suddenly, James came up behind her and leaned over her shoulder to look at the chart. He was uncomfortably close to her, and Lily tried to shrink away from him, but before she could, he threw his arm around her shoulders and said quite loudly, in that mocking way that he always spoke to her, "Well, what do you know?"

"Don't touch me," Lily said, ducking under his arm, and watching the smirk on his face broaden.

"Oh, come on now, Evans. After this morning, I thought we would be past this."

Lily could feel herself blushing. "Shut up," she said, forcefully.

"What's this he's talking about, Lily?" Alice asked, smiling over at James. She had always liked him, just like everyone else. She actually thought he was funny.

"Oh," said Potter, feigning surprise. "You mean, you didn't tell Alice that you saw me-?"

"I said, shut it, Potter," Lily interrupted, loudly, trying to cover up what he was about to say. Alice was laughing now, and Lily grabbed James's arm and pulled him to their desk on the other side of the room. She let go of him and stared up at him defiantly. "I would appreciate it," she said, as politely as she could, "if you would not broadcast what happened this morning to the entire school."

James crossed his arms in front of his chest and leaned against their desk, looking amused. "And what, exactly, did happen this morning?"

She narrowed her eyes at him, aggravated beyond belief. "Nothing," she said, firmly.

"Ah," he said. "Then it shouldn't matter who I tell, if nothing happened."

"Ugh!" Lily exclaimed. "Could you please act your age? Just this once? I think you got stuck somewhere around age four."

James looked at her seriously for a moment. Then, he said, "Fine, Evans. You're right. I promise, I won't tell anyone else about what happened this morning."

"Thank you," Lily said, surprised he had given in so easily. And then, she realized: "Wait, what do you mean, you won't tell anyone else-?"

At that moment, Professor McGonangall walked into the classroom saying, "Everyone, please take your seats, class is starting!"

James simply looked at Lily and smiled.


A/N: So, this is definitely a longer chapter (as I'm sure you noticed). Hahah. But the tension is starting to build (in more ways than one), so hopefully it wasn't too painful to read. ;) There's a lot of interesting stuff to come in this story, and I can't wait to get it all out! :) But first, you guys have to REVIEW! Pretty please? :D

Also, I know that I've gotten these first three chapters up really quickly, but I just want to let you guys know that it might take a little longer to get the next chapter up, seeing as how my classes start back up tomorrow. Not to worry, though, you will definitely have a new chapter this week! I'm just not sure exactly when. So, be looking out for that! :)