Chapter 9: Calculus
James and Sirius quickly got over what prejudices they still held...after lunch of course. Nothing could come between them and their stomachs. Sometimes Lily wondered what she saw in James. Then she would see Harry, slap her forehead, and think, "Oh, Yeah! That's what."
"At least you didn't inherit his table manners," Lily remarked to Harry. With perfect timing, Ron let out a loud belch.
"I think Ron is messy enough for both of us," Harry snorted before they both broke into small chuckles.
"Do you think if I starve him for a week, he'll get better manners?" she giggled. Harry shrugged nonchalantly, although Lily detected a small bit of discomfort, so she let the subject drop. He would tell her if he wanted to.
After lunch, they had a small break before the next class. James and Sirius headed to an obscure location along the lake shore that had enough underbrush to give privacy. Why they chose to hike all the way out here when there were plenty of closer places that were just as private was beyond Lily.
The reason became apparent when Sirius transformed and started sniffing around in the bushes. Now the why that was beyond Lily was why on earth Sirius was sniffing around the bushes.
"There are bathrooms in the castle, Sirius," joked Alex. The bushes shook indignantly and a growl came from between the leaves, causing everyone to laugh.
"Wait!" exclaimed Lily, "Should Sirius have done that in front of them?"
"Who's them?" asked James.
"Lis, Alex, and Ronan."
"Don't worry," Lis said with a mischievous grin, "We won't tell if you won't."
With that, she transformed into a red-tailed hawk and flittered over to perch on Alex's head, which was now the big, fuzzy head of a brown bear. Lily was impressed at their choices. A hawk has great eye sight to make up for the bear's horrible eye sight and the bear has a great sense of smell to make up for the hawk.
"That's another thing," Lily began, "I think we need to come up with group names for you guys."
"What do you mean?" asked Harry.
"I mean that it's a mouthful to say Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny whenever I want to refer to you. It would be easier if your group had a name, like the Marauders."
Remus looked thoughtful, "She does have a point."
"The Anti-Umbridge League," snorted Ginny.
"Or Spew," supplied Ron.
Hermione gritted her teeth, "It's S.P.E.W."
Seeing some eyebrows raise, Harry explained, "Hermione is trying to promote freeing house elves. She can't seem to understand that they don't want to be freed." Hermione shot Harry a dirty look.
Lily giggled, "Well, aren't you just the little rebels?"
"The Rebels..." Harry mused, "I like it." The others nodded in agreement.
"Then we'll be the Soldiers," Lis said.
"The Rebels and the Soldiers," Lily said with a satisfied smile, "Those seem very fitting."
Just then, the bushes shook and they heard a canine exclamation. A few seconds later, they heard a human exclamation and Sirius tumbled out of the bush. He hopped up and bounced excitedly over to Harry and Lis. His eyes twinkled with the curiosity one expects from small children, not a wizard of age.
"Talk to it," he said, shoving a small green snake in their faces. It looked irritated at Sirius for capturing it in such an undignified manner.
"Put me down, you bastard!"
Lily jumped before babbling, "I...I understood it." Then the words sunk in and she laughed, "How rude."
Lis shrugged, "It's probably a temporal side-effect."
Everyone gapped at her, some out of fear, others out of confusion. The poor snake wriggled around in Sirius' hand, trying to get someone's attention.
Sirius blinked at her, "What does that mean?"
Continuing on in a casual tone, Lis said, "I mean, it probably has something to do with Harry traveling back in time to when his parents were in school."
The ringing silence that followed was overwhelming. Even the snake had sensed the tension and held still. The Soldiers just stood there like Lis had said the most obvious thing in the world. Although, it was obvious, Lily realized with a start. At least to anyone who looked hard enough.
"Pardon me, but I could use some help here."
Harry shook his head and muttered, "Oh, sorry," to the snake and, "Please, don't tell," to the Soldiers.
"May I please bite this buffoon of a humanimal?"
"Are you poisonous?"
"No." Disappointment was clearly evident in the snake's voice.
"Go ahead, then. He deserves it."
The snake sunk his fangs into the soft tip of Sirius' thumb. With a yelp, Sirius dropped the snake. It quickly slithered away, muttering other colorful words.
"Serves you right for catching that poor thing," Lily scolded.
Once break was over, they all headed up to their next class, Transfiguration. McGonagall had been reviewing for the past couple of weeks. "It's never too early to study for NEWTs," she said. Today they were changing the color of their eyebrows.
"Maybe Ron will give himself a moustache, again," smirked Hermione. Ron replied by imitating Hermione whenever she answered a question.
"Oh, no," moaned Harry from where he and Lily were sitting. He was looking over at Hermione and Ron as if he were expecting them to have a row. But he relaxed when they both laughed.
"James!" cried Ronan. James had turned his hair bubble gum pink.
"He kind of looks like Tonks," Harry laughed.
"Who?" asked Sirius from behind them.
"Your cousin, the half-blood one."
"Oh, her. I met her once. My parents made sure it never happened again. Too bad, she was one of the few I liked."
Harry and Lily began concentrating on their eyebrows again. Lily's were both green and she was now helping Harry even though he was doing alright.
Ginny, however, was having more trouble. She had confided to Lis that she was really only a Sixth Year. The older girl looked surprised at first, but immediately agreed to help her. They chose a desk at a diagonal from Harry and Lily's desk, giving them a perfect view of the girls.
"Why did you break up with Ginny?" asked Lily, "It's obvious you both still care about each other."
He sighed, "I didn't want her to get hurt...because of me." Lily just squeezed his hand and smiled.
"They sure seem to be getting along well though," Lily said, trying to cheer Harry up.
"Yeah."
"They look similar, too."
"Yeah, except for their eyes."
Lily looked closer, "You're right. Lis' are green."
Harry smiled at Lily before looking back at Lis. Then, he did a double take. "That's not just any green..."
The derivative of Harry plus Ginny is the limit as Harry approaches Ginny of Harry over Ginny is Lis?
Now it was Lily's turn to do a double take, "She's not...?"
"It's possible."
"Are you sure...?"
"It makes sense." He turned to Lily, grinning mischievously, "This could be fun."
Harry went over to their desk. Ha had his back turned, so Lily couldn't hear him, but Ginny left and went to sit with Lily.
"What's going on? Why do you need to talk to me?" Ginny asked.
"Who said I wanted to talk to you?"
"Harry."
"Oh," Lily quickly leaned over and whispered something in Ginny's ear.
"Really?"
"Yes."
"And he's going to prank her?"
James immediately turned around, excitement lighting up his face, "Who's pranking who?"
"Harry is pranking Lis."
Everyone immediately began watching them while still looking like they were doing something. It seemed as if Harry was only getting help, but there was a subtle sensuality in his demeanor that Lily wouldn't have noticed if James hadn't been the same way with her. She had to screw up her eyes to keep from laughing.
At the end of class, everyone filed into the hallway. Harry sidled up to Lis and slipped an arm around her waist. She immediately grabbed his hand and spun around to face him.
"What are you doing?" she demanded, "I thought you liked Ginny."
"That was before I met you." He reached up and stoked her hair.
"Harry, no!" she cried, looking around wildly, "You're making a mistake. You're supposed to be with Ginny."
He dropped his act and replaced it with a playful one, "And just how do you know that?"
Lily couldn't stand it anymore. She fell to the floor, laughing.
Lis glared at Lily, then at Harry, "That was a dirty trick, Dad."
