Summary: 'King' follows the story of Lily and James coming together in their final year at school. The story also follows the stories of their closest friends, and rotates narration based on the story being told.

Rated M because of language and sexual content, nothing graphic, but not for young eyes.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything that you recognize from the Harry Potter series.

First, I'd like to say that I am not abandoning this story, I have a heavily course load during the school year but I am now on summer and I can go back to writing this. I planned the entire plot line out and wrote specific pieces to the story in advanced so I will definitely be making all this effort mean something. Also, I went through and edited my previous chapters for typos or things that logistically didn't make sense (albeit, some mistakes were rather embarrassing). If you guys come across typos or plot gaps when your reading, feel free to leave me a comment and let me know.

Thanks so much reading!

Chapter 9

REMUS

The weekend had passed rather uneventfully, after the loss of the Quidditch match, there was an overall glum atmosphere throughout the Gryffindor house. Remus prepared for his classes while noting that it was Tuesday and he needed to leave time to get to the library, though it wouldn't be too difficult since both James and Sirius would be at Quidditch practice for the majority of the evening.

"Oi, why are you always up so early for class?" Sirius began to stur in his bed.

"We have to be there in half an hour, I'm not that early," Remus knew that Sirius generally liked to wait until the last possible second to get out of bed, "besides, if you don't eat something first, we're all going to have to hear about your starvation for the rest of the day," Remus heard a grunt or two from Sirius as he sat up in his bed and began to acknowledge the day.

"Hey!" Sirius shouted as he tossed an old crumpled up homework assignment at Peter to wake him up, Remus shook his head and continued to pack his school bag, making sure not to miss anything.

In a matter of seconds, Sirius was dressed and ready at the door waiting to go grab something to eat. It always amazed Remus at how quickly Sirius could do anything, of course it helped that he cut corners and paid little attention to detail, but that was enough for his friend.

By the time the boys had arrived at class, James had joined them. The group had settled at their usual table towards the back of the classroom; close enough to the front for Remus to pay attention and close enough to the back for Sirius and James to slack off without being too easily noticed. However, Remus found himself being distracted from the lesson for reasons other than his rowdy group of friends. He was thinking about Rosie and the library that night. She was cute and sweet and from what he could gather, rather intelligent. Remus couldn't determine why he hadn't ever paid her much attention before, though he figured it probably had to do with her constantly being surrounded by all her friends. Remus looked over at Rosie as she sat in her chair. Her head was tilted to the side as she rotated between looking down at her notes and up to the lecturing professor.

Remus couldn't help but notice Julia sitting next to Rosie. The whole scenario with Sirius and Mary Lou was ridiculous to him. Remus knew that Julia was good person and rather interesting but the situation made him uneasy. Perhaps, she would be a fun date, besides he knew that she already liked him and he didn't really know where he stood with Rosie. He didn't actually know how he felt about her, but he couldn't help being pulled towards her.

Remus tried to shake these thoughts and pay attention to the class, he was never one to get caught up in crushes and chase girls. He was giving himself a headache and he didn't like the confusion that he was bringing upon himself.

JAMES

James found himself being very distracted throughout all his classes that day. He hadn't spoken to Lily since their rather productive meeting on Sunday morning, but he had high hopes for the direction of their relationship, especially considering her newly single lifestyle.

He knew he had to keep the line of communication open, it took him almost seven years to finally get a positive relationship with Lily and he wasn't about to lose it. Everything in James' life since his morning with Lily seemed quieter and less interesting. James couldn't help but feel like a sap, but he couldn't control it.

He had to get a meeting set up with the other three Quidditch captains to get things moving for the Winter Formal games. Getting a meeting together with four boys all from different houses was going to be difficult, if not miserable. James was not feeling up to the task of tracking down the Slytherin captain and having a civil conversation with him, he also did not feel like catching up Andrew Maldhorn anytime soon, although he would like to rub his new friendship with Lily in Andrew's face. Finding the time to see the Hufflepuff captain would not be difficult, James figured that perhaps he should start there after class.

"Mate, I want to get out of here," James whispered to Sirius who busy making eyes with a girl across the room.

"You think I want to be here?" Sirius responded.

"This is incredibly boring. What am I learning?" James muttered as he put his head in his hands.

"You're learning how to sleep with your eyes open," Sirius suggested, finally turning away from the pretty blond he'd been silently flirting with.

"We don't have anything due soon for this class right? I'd like to completely disengage from this without feeling guilty."

"Nope, not that I know of," Sirius responded.

"Excellent."

"We have an essay due next class," Remus piped in for two seconds to set his friends straight, "now shut up."

"Someone's feeling grumpy," Sirius teased Remus.

"I'm not, I'm fine, just trying very hard to focus and you two are making it harder."

"Alright, alright. You're lucky we like you so much, Mooney. Otherwise you can be quite the nerdy buzz kill."

"Thanks a lot, Padfoot."

After class, James temporarily separated from his group to try to catch Henry Bell, the Hufflepuff captain, before he left.

"Oi, Henry!" James gave a quick shout as he approached.

"Oh, James," Henry was a little surprised as he turned around to see James approaching, "what's up?"

"Well, I'm working on this Winter Formal stuff with Lily and the prefects. We want to do two small games Quidditch games in the morning before the dance followed by a feast," James began to explain.

"Oh, that sounds great," it was as easy to get Henry on board as James had anticipated.

"I'm glad you think so. I just need at the captains to agree to it."

"Oh, sure I'm on board," Henry gave his approval, "have you talked to anyone else?"

"Not yet, but I'm really pushing for this," James told him, "I just need to set up a short meeting sometime this week to hash out the details with all the captains."

"Oh, well I'm pretty much always free, except we have practice on Wednesday evenings and I can't miss that. So any other time I can arrange for."

"Good," James was relieved, "that was easy. I have a feeling it wont be so easy with everyone else," James was happy that Henry was so easy, but not so thankful that the easy part was over.

"Yeah," Henry gave a laugh, "have fun with that."

ROSIE

Remus was sitting across from her in the library. They were both silently focused on their assignments, but Rosie couldn't focus much with Remus sitting across from her. She also couldn't think of anything to say to strike up a conversation. She began to fidget in her seat as she stared down into her notes. She began to rub the sole of her black patent oxford shoe with the other when she felt her felt her left foot slip off the top of the right and slam into a hard object under the table. For a moment, Rosie flinched and prayed that she had kicked the table leg, but when she heard the audible gasp come from Remus, she knew that she had drilled her foot into his shin.

"I am so, so sorry," Rosie immediately apologized, with eyes wide with fear that he would be upset. To her relief, Remus let out a brief chuckle.

"It's fine, I imagine you didn't purposely do that."

"No, of course not!" Rosie smiled with relief, "I was fidgeting and I slipped," she explained.

"I understand," Remus said sitting back in his chair, "I'm getting a little restless sitting here for so long."

"Yeah, sometimes its tough sitting in silence for so long," Rosie replied, though she wanted to add that the only reason she was finding difficulty sitting still was Remus' presence across from her.

"Would you wanna take a break and go for a walk?" Rosie thought her whole body was going to melt when Remus asked her.

"Yeah, totally," Rosie was doing her best to suppress her excitement, as to not seem over eager.

The pair packed up their books and left the library.

"So, what were you studying for?" Remus asked her when they were out of the library and able to speak at normal volume.

"Well, I was doing the reading for Potions tomorrow. I feel like I can be a slow reader, or at least slow at pulling information out of reading so I like to be really prepped the night before so that I don't waste time in class," Rosie felt like she must sound incredibly boring.

"That makes sense," he offered.

"Yeah," Rosie couldn't think of much more to add, "what about you?"

"I was working on an essay. You were right though, about the library. I'm almost never able to get more than hour of work time when I'm outside of it."

"Well, I'm glad that it was a helpful suggestion."

"So what are your plans for the rest of the night?" Remus asked her. She was refreshed by his politeness and kindness. He was definitely not like most of the boys in her year, and from what she could tell he was much different than Sirius and James.

"Well, nothing," she responded, feeling almost lame, "I suppose I'm headed back to my room and see what the rest of the girls have gotten up to. You?"

"Well I might have a few more moments of silence, both James and Sirius are at Quidditch practice."

"Oh, that's good then."

"Yeah."

The two walked a little more in silence, Rosie began to over think the silence. What should she say? Should she wait for him to say something? Should she ask him about himself? Thankfully, Remus finally spoke up.

"Ya know, I don't think we've spoken much in the seven years we've been at Hogwarts together," Remus pointed out.

"I know, it seems we haven't overlapped too much. Which is odd because statistically, we probably should have by now," Rosie smiled at him.

"It's a shame, you seem much more grounded than most of the people in our year."

'Grounded?' Rosie thought to herself, 'Well, at least he thinks I'm a decent person. I'll take that as a compliment.'

"Yeah," Rosie could feel her cheeks get warm at his slight compliment, then the conversation went silent for a few more minutes. She looked over at Remus, he was looking down at his feet as he walked. She wondered if he was more similar to herself than she had thought.

"Yeah," Remus started talking again, "I think James and Sirius are going to be at practice again Thursday night, if you want to join me in the library again."

"Of course," Rosie worried for a moment if she had answered too quickly, but she almost didn't care. Remus Lupin had asked her for a third study evening sitting across from her in silence in the library. As sad as it seemed, this was the furthest an interaction between Rosie and a boy had gone in all seventeen years of her existence.

"Great, I'll see you Thursday then," Remus said to her as they neared the portrait entrance to the dormitories.

"Well, I'll see you in class Wednesday too," Rosie gave a small giggle, "but yes, definitely Thursday night too."

"Sounds good."

Rosie practically floated up to the girls' dormitories. She wanted to gush over Remus, but she worried about seeming over eager, technically nothing too special had actually happened. She wondered what her friends would say. Mary Lou would probably be enthusiastic that Rosie finally showed interest in dating or sex at the slightest, Angelica would probably just smile and nod along with Angelica and Julia- oh, Rosie felt her heart drop into her stomach. Julia. Hadn't Julia just admitted to having a crush on Remus? Yes. No. What awful timing. Rosie emotional high was crushed as she opened the door to the girl's dormitories. She couldn't say a thing about her evening with Remus.

I hope you guys liked it. Not so much Lily and James in this chapter because the story centers around them and their friends, hopefully you enjoyed it and will review.