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"Everything is funny as long as it is happening to somebody else."
-Will Rogers

Chapter 4: Lily's Payback

James awoke the next morning to the smell of a fire that had recently been burnt out. That warm crisp air caused him to become aware of his surroundings quicker than he normally would, so he could tell that he had fallen asleep in the head's study room. (Although he did not have his glasses on, which he did not recall taking off, the furniture was made of a softer less durable fabric; James guessed that Dumbledore believed the head students were better behaved then the rest of the students.) The last thing he remembered from the night before was he was seated in front of the fire, waiting for Lily to come in so he could have a good talk with her since their last discussion did not go in the direction he wished it to go. Still, before he could do anything, he had to find his glasses and since he did not know where they were, he started feeling around for them. But when he tried to move his arms they wouldn't. Now that he realized it, his legs could not move either.

"Great," James said out loud in a grown. 'It's the first day of classes,' James thought, 'and I am going to be late. I'm Head Boy too, some good that will put on Dumbledore's record.'

Just when he was about to loose hope, he heard footsteps coming down the stairs.

"Lily!" James yelled.

"Potter, have you finally woken up. Since you obviously can't get up," Lily said, being very amused at James' state.

"You did this?"

"Of course I did, who else has access to this room. You don't think a professor would do this?" Lily said smiling.

"Ok Lily, you've had your laugh, now let me out." James said.

"No, I don't think I will." Lily said.

"Why the hell not?" James said, starting to get angry.

"You never let any of your prank victims off easy, so I am not giving you any courtesy." Lily said, as she sat next to him on the couch.

"What about classes Lily, if I am missing and a professor finds me here then you'll be blamed." James said trying to reason with her.

"Why would a professor go looking for you? They will probably just think you over slept. Which is typical Potter behavior I believe." Lily said getting up from her seat and moving to the door.

"Lily, please." James said being as sincere as Lily had every heard him be.

At this comment Lily started to feel sorry for him. Maybe she was being too harsh. Not only would he get in trouble by the professors but if she got caught as the perpetrator then she would be in trouble too. But Lily had to do something to make him change. If she got him to hex her in the hallway or anyone else, then the bet would be off. And one detention on her record was worth a year without Potter breathing down her neck.

"Sorry, no can do Potter," Lily said and left the room.

Lily walked down to the Great Hall and found her two friends already there.

"Hey Lily, did you find your book?" Cora asked as Lily sat down at the table.

"Yeah, I guess I left it in there when I ha that meeting with Potter yesterday." Lily said as she started buttering her toast, she had told her friends she had left a book in the Heads Common Room in order to have a good excuse to see if her prank had worked.

"Well once you warm up to James I am sure you won't have to bring a book to keep you occupied anymore." Kyra said.

"I am going to ignore that comment and pretend you never said it." Lily said with a smile.

"Ok, why are you in such a good mood?" Cora asked.

"No reason." Lily said, still smiling.

"Come on Lily. I know that smile, that smile means you are up to something. What did you do?" Kyra asked.

"Nothing I swear." Lily said putting up her hands in defense.

"You were never good at lying Lily." Kyra said.

"Classes are going to start soon, we should head off." Lily said looking at her watch and getting up from the table.

"You are ignoring the question which proves even more that you did something." Kyra said, following her with Cora trailing behind them.

Lily just ignored them; she just kept walking in front of the two.

"Yup, she is definitely guilty of whatever she did." Cora said with a smile to Kyra.

Just as they were about to leave the Hall someone caught Lily's arm.

"Have you seen James this morning?" Sirius asked Lily.

"Can't say I have. Maybe he is off doing a prank or something." Lily said, releasing her arm from his grip.

"First of all, James would never do a prank without my knowledge and he wouldn't be able to pull it off without my help," Sirius said proudly, "Second, he wouldn't do a prank or anything else to jeopardize the bet you two had."

"Don't be too sure of yourself." Lily said walking away from him.

The three walked out of the Hall but Sirius, Remus, and Peter were right on their tail.

"Did he fall asleep in your common room because we don't remember him coming back last night from your meeting?" Remus asked when the three caught up with Lily and her friends.

"I don't know." Lily hesitantly said, out of the marauders she hated lying to Remus the most, but, he was still one of them, "But why are you asking me? You four can break into anything and you guys know almost all the passwords for every door in this school. So why don't you three just go in there yourselves and find out." Lily said, stopping her pace and facing the three.

"We don't know that password yet, James wouldn't tell us." Sirius said.

"That's a surprise, I would have expected that to be the first thing to come out of his mouth. Right behind asking me out for about the hundred time," Lily said.

"But he hasn't has he?" Remus asked Lily.

"Hasn't what?" Lily asked back.

"He hasn't asked you out this year so far has he?" Remus asked looking straight into her eyes.

"Not yet, but I am sure he will do it soon enough." Lily said trying to cover up the truth.

"He has changed Lily, whether you choose to see it or not." Remus said as the two groups spilt up.

"Why is it that everything that comes out of his mouth sounds so scholarly?" Kyra asked, once the boys were out of earshot.

"It's Remus, he always has a way of saying things. He can even make a false belief seem true." Lily said as the three continued walking.

"But he is right you know, James has changed," Cora said.

"James…James that's it. You did something to James didn't you." Kyra said as she stood in front of Lily, which caused the other two to stop walking.

"So what if I did, he deserves it." Lily said walking around her friend.

"Depends on what you did." Kyra said.

"Lily, what did you do?" Cora asked.

"Nothing major, I just made him stick to the couch and I stole something from him while he was sleeping." Lily said.

"What did you take?" Cora asked.

"These," Lily said smiling, taking James' glasses from her pocket.

"Oh my God, no you didn't." Kyra said grinning and taking them from her hand.

"You bet I did." Lily said starting to laugh.

"That's great Lily, but…" Kyra said.

"But what?" Lily asked as she stopped laughing.

"You really should give them back. I mean leaving him stuck in a place is one thing but leaving him unable to see straight." Kyra said giving the glasses back to Lily.

"You're not actually feeling sorry for him are you?" Lily asked, not believing that her friends would side with him. After all he had done to them and the rest of the student body, they had the nerve to feel bad for him when he was finally the one getting pranked.

"Well, part of me thinks this is funny. But the other part is telling me that you should have done this on a weekend so he wouldn't get in trouble for it from the professors." Kyra said.

"That's how I feel too, part thrilled, part pity." Cora said.

"He'll be fine. How blind can he be without his glasses anyways?" Lily said as the three walked into their first class.

"How did they beat us here?" Kyra said looking at the Peter and Remus.

The three sat behind the two.

"Where is Sirius?" Cora asked Remus.

"He is out looking for James."

"Why didn't he just come to class? If James is late that is his fault." Lily said, her attitude from the morning still in her voice.

"You think that Lily because you don't really know Sirius. Him and James were best mates even before Hogwarts. Sirius wants to make sure nothing happened to him." Remus said.

"We would be out their looking too, but Sirius said it would look less suspicious if me and Remus were to go to class." Peter said. Peter was never one to say much; he was the quiet type. But that never bothered any of the guys.

At that point the bell rang which signaled the start of class.

The bell rang, but Sirius didn't care. He stood outside of the Head's common room and tried to think of the most logical password. It would have been so much easier if James had just told him the password. The Marauder's Map was useless, except that it verified with what Sirius already knew. Sirius knew James was in the Head's room, but since the password wasn't logged in to the Map, it didn't really help him. Luckily most teachers were teaching a class, so the thought of a teacher catching him was slight.

"This is hopeless," Sirius said to himself.

He knew the only way to get into the locked room in front of him was to get Dumbledore to tell him the password, but with his reputation that would never happen. Sirius didn't know how long he was standing their saying words and phrases that just came to his head, when he noticed the dot, which said 'James Potter' started moving. The dot moved straight to the door, which Sirius was standing in front of, but then it slowly backed away from the door.

"Prongs," Sirius yelled inside.

But there was no answer.

"Must be a sound proof door," Sirius said to himself. "This is driving my nuts. One morning spent worrying about James and the next minute I am talking to myself."

At that moment the bell rang.

'Great," Sirius thought.

"Sirius get out of the way," Lily said pushing him away and running up to the door. She said the password in a whisper, but Sirius' dog like ears picked up every syllable, it was Animagi.

Sirius tensed up. How could he have been so stupid, that word should have been one of the first to come out of his lips.

The two, Sirius and Lily, ran into the room.

"How did you get yourself out Potter?" Lily asked as she ran to give him his glasses.

"Being friends with me would teach him a lot more then how to escape from a tight situation." Sirius said going back to his usual carefree self.

"Lily, why the fuck did you do that to me?" James said going right up to Lily. The two's faces were so close that if they would have been lovers instead of enemies they would have kissed each other.

"It was a prank. Just like the many you have done to others over the years." Lily said yelling back.

"It was stupid Lily, what are you planning to get out of this?" Sirius asked.

"You stay out of this Sirius, this is none of your business." Lily said raising her finger to him.

"This is my business you little bitch. When my best mate goes missing without a trace, it is my business!" Sirius said yelling at her.

"Don't you dare call me a little bitch, at least I have a family who cares for me!" Lily yelled.

"You know if you weren't a girl, I would let you have it right now." Sirius said in a cold whisper.

"Is that the only thing stopping you?" Lily said in a taunting voice.

"That's enough!" James yelled.

The two people just looked at him as if they forgot he had anything to do with this argument.

"Lily I don't know why in the world you stuck me to the couch, took my glasses, and locked the door from the inside, but what ever the reason I am going to over look it. And Sirius, I can fight my own battles." James said walking out of the room.

Lily and Sirius just watched James leave the room.

"We should get to class," Lily said in her normal tone and left the room.

"Yea, I guess," Sirius said following after her.

"I'll see you guys later, I've got to meet McGonagall for detention." James said to his three friends in the Gryffindor common room later that night

"I thought you got out of that since Lily confessed to the whole thing." Remus said picking up his head from the book he was reading.

"Well apparently every teacher in this school loves to give me detentions. She just gave me one, so I am free if you guys want to do something tomorrow night." James said walking to the door.

"Bye," the three guys said as James left the room.

"I hope they are not in the same room tonight," Remus said.

"Yea, they might kill each other off if they are," Sirius said, "That show down would make a lot of money on tickets."

Remus laughed, "At least Prongs only got one detention, Lily got two."

"How come only two?" Peter asked.

"Yea, if it were me I would have gotten a week, maybe more!" Sirius said, obviously upset that Lily got out of this situation pretty much without punishment.

"First offense," Remus said turning a page of his book.

"And being McGonagall's favorite student gives her an edge as well." Sirius said taking out James' old snitch and playing with it.

"Probably," Remus said.

"At least he made it through the whole ordeal. I blew up at Lily today for what she did and I wasn't even the one caged up." Sirius said.

"I guess James has more control then he lets on." Remus said.

"Power to him then, because if Lily did that on only the second day, what is the rest of the week going to be like." Sirius said.

"I don't even want to fathom it Padfoot." Remus said with a smile, though he did not take his eyes off his book.

A/N: there you go chapter 4! PLEASE REVIEW!

Kudos to everyone that did review:

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