Chapter 6: First game of the season
The first Quidditch game of the year was approaching. And as the weather got colder so did the atmosphere in the Gryffindor Common Room. Marlene refused to speak to Sirius and so James was left in an awkward position as team captain. Having a beater and chaser not talking made things uncomfortable for the rest of the team. It also meant that Lily had a reason to avoid talking to him which upset James a lot more than he let on. The two groups avoided each other like the plague. The Gryffindor team was training three times a week for their first game against Slytherin. The anticipation between the two houses naturally got higher and higher. James used this to siphon off his frustration about his lack of progress with Lily to hex and prank Snape within an inch of his life.
It started with small things like trip jinxes in the corridors and hair changing colours but then Snape started retaliating with darker curses. This causes Sirius to elevate the level of curses he used as well. Snape ended up having his hair jinxed off and James got stuck with antlers for ears. It came to a head when Snape used Sectumsempra on Sirius causing him to bleed from gashes all over his chest. McGonagall gave him detention until christmas for that and deducted 200 points from Slytherin. However Sirius was very popular in Gryffindor and so Snape found himself on the end of a different jinx almost every hour. There were so many suspects that the teachers found it almost impossible to find the perpetrators.
"We are going to slaughter Slytherin tomorrow." James grinned as they came in from the final practise before the game. The whole team looked rather pleased except Sirius and Marlene who were scowling and not looking at each other. The Marauders all moved up to their dorm.
"Mate, you're going to have to learn to work with Marlene." James frowned at his best mate.
"It's not that easy. She won't talk to me."
"Maybe you shouldn't have snogged Felicity in front of her then." Remus interjected. Sirius glared at him. "Just saying." Remus held his hands up.
"Moony has a point." Peter said nervously. Sirius just sighed deeply and buried himself face down in his pillow. The others all knew to leave him alone. Each of them slowly drew the curtains around their four post beds.
The morning of the game dawned bright but frosty. James woke up at first light in a mixture of excitement and anticipation. Looking out the window he assessed the conditions and deemed them rather good for the time of year. At least there was no rain yet. He knew nobody else would be up yet, Sirius slept like the dead and it wasn't worth his life to wake Remus up this close to a full moon. He headed down to the common room only to find someone asleep in a comfy chair by the fire. The red hair shone in the streaks of sunlight coming through the window. James knew that Lily would be upset if he woke her up and he was trying very hard not to upset her at the moment. He crept over and saw she must have fallen asleep while studying as her potions book was lying open beside her and her head was resting on a piece of parchment that appeared to be her essay. He quietly conjured a pillow and gently tried to place in under her head without waking her. Then moved the essay to a safer place, rolling it up and placing it in her bag. Lily didn't even stir while he did this, so rather than pushing his luck, he headed down to breakfast.
Lily woke up to someone shaking her shoulder. Looking around blearily, she spotted Marlene frowning and trying to wake her up.
"What?" Lily snapped. Not appreciating the early wakeup call.
"You fell asleep in the common room." Marlene explained. Sitting up, Lily saw that she was indeed in an armchair by the now empty fire. Surprisingly there was a pillow under her head. She looked around at Marlene, confused.
"Did you give me the pillow?"
"No. You were sleeping on it when I got down here. That's weird. Maybe Alice did on her way down. She went to breakfast already, with Frank." Lily stretched and got up.
"Where is my essay?" She frowned, looking all around. Her book was still lying open on the table but the essay she had been working on was nowhere in sight. "Don't tell me someone stole it." She sighed in frustration.
"No idea. Check your bag?" Marlene suggested. Lily found it rolled up neatly.
"But I'm sure I fell asleep while writing it. How did it get in my bag?"
"Maybe Alice decided to protect it when she put the pillow under you."
"Maybe. Let me just go get ready quickly then we can go to breakfast." She rushed up to their dormitory and got ready as quickly as possible. Now that she was awake she was hungry. Together, she and Marlene made their way down to the Great Hall. Not many people were down yet. They spotted Alice and Frank sitting about halfway down the Gryffindor table opposite Potter who was strangely not surrounded by his friends or admirers. Lily sighed before taking the seat next to Alice while Marlene sat next to Potter. She didn't particularly want a confrontation with him this early but it was usually unavoidable as he started acting like even more of an ass when she was around.
"Hey Alice. Did you put a pillow under my head this morning?" Lily asked as she slid into the seat.
"Morning Lils. No, it was already there when I came down." Alice replied, grabbing some more bacon. Lily frowned. Nobody else was up yet. Except Potter. Not wanting to explore that train of thought she didn't pursue the conversation. However, she did notice a faint flush of red on Potter's cheek. This itself was unusual. Potter never blushed. Ever. Well, very rarely and never for something this trivial. Nor did he do anything nice for no reason. This had to be a set up. Lily kept sneaking suspicious glances at him throughout breakfast. Wondering whether he would slip something into her food or prank her some other way as he usually did.
"I know I'm good looking, Evans. You can openly stare at me instead of sneaking glances every other minute." Potter finally said, having caught her eye for the third time as she looked across the table at his smirk.
"Dream on Potter." She mumbled. Marlene looked at her in confusion. Lily knew it was because her retort didn't have nearly as much bite in it as it should have. Her embarrassment at being caught looking at him had taken the sting out of her usual reply. But to admit that would be to admit she'd been staring at him. Not a conversation she wanted with Marlene who would immediately jump to the conclusion she liked Potter. Which was absolutely ridiculous. She hated his guts. The pillow must just be his new absurd way of getting her to go out with him. She wished he would just stop, it got tiresome after fourth year let alone by sixth. Soon the rest of Potter's gang arrived and Marlene's expression turned frosty before she stood up.
"I'll see you in the changing rooms Captain." She said before making her escape. Sirius frowned at her retreating back before taking her seat next to Potter. Remus sat next to him looking tired and occasionally throwing disapproving looks at Sirius. Lily always had like Remus the best out of the four nuisances. Having to do prefect rounds together meant they spent a fair amount of time together and she had realised he was actually quite similar to her. They both enjoyed studying and had similar interests in subjects except his favourite was Magical Creatures and hers was Charms. She sent him a small smile and then turned to Alice but she was in conversation with Frank and Potter about the match. Lily wasn't particularly a fan of flying or of Quidditch. She did turn up to the matches if only to support her House but since Marlene was on the team she definitely had to make an appearance.
"Right team, let's get moving." James announced once he saw the last member of his team finish eating. The six of them stood up and followed James to the changing room where Marlene was already waiting. Everyone got changed and then looked expectantly at James.
"Right team. First match of the season we need a good performance. A solid base to build on and all that. Plus it's slimy Slytherin, we definitely cannot lose to them. Now, I don't care what disagreements you have off the pitch, we need to work together." He looked pointedly at Marlene and Sirius. "Argue all you want off the pitch but as soon as you get on those brooms you are teammates first. Got it?" Everyone nodded. "Let's go then. You've all worked incredibly hard and I'm proud of you. Let's go win!" He finished with a shout. They all cheered and followed him onto the pitch. A loud roar from three quarters of the crowd greeted their appearance.
"And here come Gryffindor!" The commentator, a fourth year Gryffindor called Jordan Long, cheered. "Potter, Davis, McKinnon, Longbottom, Black, Wood and Moon." Each name was accompanied by another loud cheer from the crowd. The Slytherin team was now approaching from the other side in their green robes.
"And here come Slytherin." He cried in a much more subdued tone. "At least they don't need to worry about the bludgers, won't do much damage."
"Long!" Professor McGonagall's voice echoed around the stadium to much cheering and applause from the Gryffindors for Jordan's comment.
"Sorry Professor." He said, not sounding sorry at all. "I give you Slytherin. Pucey, Nott, Griffiths, Chambers, Montague, Bletchley and Black." Cheers now came from the green section of the crowd. James strode forwards to shake the hand of Henry Pucey, the team captain and also a chaser. James scowled over at Regulus Black who was the Slytherin seeker as he shook the captain's hand. He felt the familiar pressure of Pucey trying to crush his hand but James simply squeezed back just as hard. Pucey scowled.
"Now, I want a nice clean game." Madam Hooch said, glaring at them all sternly. James snorted inwardly, she always said that and it never was. Finally, she picked the Quaffle up out of the box and the players mounted their brooms. Taking off, James felt the familiar adrenaline rush that accompanied a flight. Nothing could beat flying, except maybe Lily Evans. He grinned to himself and then returned his attention to the big red ball in Hooch's arms.
Madam Hooch threw the ball up into the air and blew her whistle. James dived to the side knowing Marlene was going for the Quaffle. Sure enough she emerged from the group that had lunged for it with the ball tucked under her arm as she dodged a clumsy tackle from Pucey. James was now unmarked to the left side of the pitch and Marlene threw the Quaffle over. He caught it neatly and pelted straight towards the hoops. Glancing to his right he saw a bludger on its way towards him so he rolled right over and it flew passed him, missing by inches. This slowed him just enough for Griffiths to catch up and attempt to knock the Quaffle from under his arm. James clung on by his fingertips, managing to throw it over towards Davis. As he let go he was rammed from behind by Nott and flew forwards, barely stopping himself flying off the end of his broom.
"Foul!" Went up the call from the stands. The whistle sounded and James flew over to take the penalty. He eyed the right hoop and noticed how the Slytherin keeper drifted that way slightly. As the whistle sounded again he flew forwards and flicked his eyes to the left before firing at the right hoop. The keeper had spotted the quick eye movement and turned hard in that direction before his eyes widened comically as the ball flew past his ear and into the right hoop.
"Go Potter! 10-0 Gryffindor." Jordan called over the megaphone. He grinned smugly as he flew back into formation, getting high fives from his fellow chasers. Pucey was glaring at him which made him smile wider. Bletchley started the game again by passing the ball out to Nott. Nott then flew straight down the pitch. A slick reverse pass saw the Quaffle bypass Davis and fall straight into Pucey's hands who then took a quick shot at Wood's goal. A cheer went up as Wood saved it with a triumphant grin before quickly flicking it out to Marlene.
"Drop and cover." James called with a grin. Davis flew below Marlene while James flew off to her left drawing the attention of Griffiths. This allowed Marlene to nicely loop around Nott and then drop the ball to Davis below avoiding Pucey giving him a free shot on the hoops which Bletchley saved to the boos of the red section of the crowd which drowned out the green.
The game carried on in a similar fashion. Half an hour in it was 70-20 to Gryffindor. The Slytherin team were getting more enraged by the second, especially when Sirius managed to hit his brother in the side with a nicely placed bludger as he chased the snitch, almost putting him out of the game but he ended up being only winded. As the Slytherins got more and more dirty Jordan got more and more biased in his commentating. As the score reached 100-30 courtesy of another two penalties and a superb reverse shot from Marlene, there was a yell of excitement as the snitch was spotted. James took the opportunity as the Slytherin chasers got distracted watching Regulus to score one more goal before Moon's hand closed upon the snitch. It had been much nearer to her and no matter that Regulus had the superior broom, he just wasn't close enough to stand a chance. With the game ending 260-30 James was on cloud nine. As was Sirius, but mostly his high was from being able to hit Regulus with a bludger. That made his month as far as he was concerned.
"Congratulations guys. Party in the common room." Remus informed them.
"Righto. Let's go and grab some snacks." James beamed. He and Sirius snuck down the humped back witch's tunnel to Honeydukes while Remus and Peter went down to the kitchens. It was an hour and a half later that they all returned to the common room to admiring looks at the food they had brought.
