This is what happens when I procrastinate college papers. I write my chapters! The next chapter of ATTWN to come tomorrow or later tonight.

Hope everyone saw and enjoyed MTV's Legally Blonde the Musical. (If you didn't, there's information for you at the end of the chapter.)

Enjoy.

The bitter cold of February came rushing in quickly. It had been only a few months since Lily had joined the Order but she felt as if she had been doing this forever.

It had been four months since Caradoc had broken up with her. Four months since she had started this whole thing with the Order. Four months since she had her first lesson with James. And four months since she realized that James wasn't such a bad guy.

Lily didn't pay attention to any of this. The assignment had taken hold of Lily's life and was made first priority.

Caradoc didn't matter.

Dorcas didn't matter (but why would she?).

James didn't even matter.

It was an awful thing, Lily realized, letting something take over her whole life. But she didn't care. She threw herself into it.

And people were starting to notice.

"Lily?"

Lily scribbled furiously on her parchment. She had to finish this Transfiguration essay before the meeting tonight.

"Li-ly?"

She had to ignore the voice.

"Lily Evans!"

Jumping slightly at the raise in the voice, she looked up to see Marlene standing in front of her, arms crossed.

"Yes?" Lily finally answered, the annoyance that she was interrupted evident in her voice.

Marlene frowned at her. "You've been working all Saturday. Come on, it's an hour until the meeting and I want to go down to dinner."

Lily hesitated and then shook her head. "I'm not done with this essay. I have to-"

Marlene cut her off abruptly. "That essay isn't due until next week."

Giving Marlene a look, Lily replied, "It's not a crime to do it now."

Sighing loudly, Marlene reached out and grabbed the person walking by, making him spin around to face them.

"Whoa, what's going on?" James asked as soon as Marlene let him go and he came to a stop next to her.

"Your friend," Marlene paused, emphasizing the word 'friend'. "-won't stop studying."

Lily laughed, not even looking up from her parchment. "Thanks Marlene," she exclaimed sarcastically.

James paused before saying, "It's not uncommon to see her studying."

Frustrated, Marlene retorted, "She's been doing this non-stop. She hasn't done anything else except study."

Lily looked up briefly. "I just have to finish this essay."

"And I think you should get something to eat," Marlene said.

James looked at the two. "Well – umm...maybe you should eat?" he tried, not sure on exactly what to say.

Lily frowned, finishing a sentence. "Busy."

Marlene sighed loudly again and looked over to see another person that she could use, resulting in him being grabbed by the arm and pulled in.

"Hey," Sirius greeted Marlene with a grin as he came to a stop just inches from her face. He didn't even bother to take a step back or wrench himself out of her grasp.

As if she had just realized, Marlene promptly let go of him and took a step back, muttering a soft "hey" in response.

Sirius looked amused as he asked, "What's this little get-together for?"

James and Marlene both looked at Lily. Sirius followed their gaze. "She's been doing that for awhile, right?"

There was an awkward silence.

"What?" Sirius finally responded to the looks they were giving him. "She's predictable."

"I am not," Lily argued, finally looked up from her essay. "I just want to finish an essay. Really, is that so bad?"

Marlene nodded. "It is when that's all you do."

"And you need some 'you time'"," James added.

"You just need to enjoy life," Sirius concluded.

Lily actually laughed, dropping her quill to look up into their confused faces. "You guys are hopeless, you know that?" She rolled up her parchment and stood up from her seat. "All right, let's go."

The four of them started to make their way down to the Great Hall, joining up with Peter and Remus along the way.

"You know, Lily-" James suddenly spoke up, leaning close to her. "Even with all this studying, it's better than you gushing over Caradoc all the time."

Lily raised an eyebrow, not sure whether or not to take that as a compliment. "I guess, thank you?" she asked him as a question.

James laughed. "Maybe you really do have that chip on your shoulder."

Sirius suddenly cut in with a grin on his face. "You have a chip on your shoulder? Good ol' James here has one too. You're practically soul mates."

Marlene gave Sirius a warning glance, complete with a smack on the shoulder, as Lily instinctively took a step away from James.

Soul mates.

What a scary word. You only had one soul mate. There would never be another one. She couldn't be soul mates with James – it would be too awkward. He was just a friend.

Marlene's voice from a couple nights ago rang in her head. An almost exact conversation had been played out. Marlene's answer had been "well, if he's your friend, Icould use a friend like that".

Lily wrung her hands nervously. Why did Sirius have to bring that up? Now she was nervous again. She wasn't before – she was fine before. He had to go and ruin it.

Making a mental note to get back at Marlene for that friend comment, she calmly turned to the group. "A lot of people have chips on their shoulders," she explained. "It's very common."

Sirius just grinned. "Whatever you say, Evans." He was being sarcastic. She hated that.

Lily quickly glanced over at James to see him looking straight ahead as if he couldn't hear any of it.

In an awkward silence, they made their way into the Great Hall, finding seats in a empty section at the Gryffindor table.

"I wonder what tonight's meeting will be about," Sirius broke the silence, before he started to shove food into his mouth.

The girls watched him in a gross amazement, as they had never seen someone eat that fast. "Well, I guess we'll talk some more," Marlene finally answered his question. "And work on the assignments."

She stopped quickly as her eyes widened at a figure behind her.

Lily followed Marlene's gaze and saw the person she'd least expected to be standing in front of her.

Dorcas Meadowes.

"Dorcas?" Lily questioned, her eyebrows raised. "What are you doing here?"

Dorcas took a deep breath before saying, "I've been thinking..."

Lily cringed, expecting an insult.

"And, well, maybe we should start helping each other with the assignment." Dorcas looked at Lily with a hopeful expression.

There was complete silence.

Dorcas was actually being nice to her? What was going on? Lily just watched Dorcas stand there with wide eyes, not even believing this to be true.

"I mean-" Dorcas added, looking a bit nervous. "We are on the same team and we are fighting for the same thing..so..."

Lily blinked. Wouldn't Dorcas be afraid that she was going to steal her boyfriend back or something?

When no one said anything, Dorcas hastily said, "And I know you don't care about Caradoc anymore now that you have James."

There was an instant response.

Sirius choked on his food while Marlene accidentally slammed her goblet of pumpkin juice on the table. Remus and Peter exchanged wide-eyed glances while James coughed uncomfortably.

Lily, instead, immediately started. "Oh, he's – umm – not, I mean, we're not --"

James actually took this moment to look over at her with a questioning expression.

"We're not together," Lily kept on. "We're friends, you know. Like – friends?"

Dorcas looked confused. "I could have sworn that-- well, no matter. I'll see you all later tonight." And with a semi-smile, she left the table.

"Well, that was interesting," Sirius said with a grin.

James gave him a look. Lily watched everyone with a nervous expression. Slowly, they all went back to eating, and when everyone was distracted, Marlene leaned over and whispered, "You know, if he's your friend, I could use a friend like that."
Lily frowned at the use of the familiar joke and turned to Marlene. "Go be friends with Sirius then," she retorted in a quick whisper.

Lily smirked as her comment quickly shut Marlene up.

"And that concludes tonight's meeting. We will continue next Saturday." There was the scurry of everyone getting their things together.

Dorcas said a quick goodbye to the group and left immediately. She had worked with them since Caradoc went on the Hogmeade trip with his friends and stayed the whole day.

As soon as she left, Lily turned to Marlene. "I have a problem."

Marlene didn't even hesitate before saying, "You always do."

Lily rolled her eyes and exclaimed, "No, I mean --- I have Head's duties to work on. And ---"

"You have to work with James," Marlene finished with a grin.

"After what Dorcas said..." Lily mused, trailing off.

"It's going to be awkward," Marlene once again ended her sentence.

Lily nodded solemnly. "I don't know if I should work tonight. Maybe I should forget the whole thing."

Marlene chuckled. "You cannot give up on your duties because of Dorcas's honesty."

Lily almost let it slide but she caught it at the last minute. "What did you say?"

Marlene just grinned. "Nothing, nothing, now go talk to James. He's leaving." She gently pushed Lily in the direction of the door, where James was talking casually to just Sirius. Lily looked around for Remus and Peter and found only Remus talking to the Headmaster.

Taking a few steps back, she whispered to Marlene hurriedly. "I can't talk to him around Sirius. He'll just make fun of the incident at supper."

Marlene just looked at her in exasperation. "That's your excuse? That can be easily remedied."

"What-?" Lily started to ask, but Marlene had already walked up to the two.

She could only hear a few choice words, including, 'meeting', 'fine', and...'weather'? Was Marlene seriously trying to distract Sirius by talking about the weather? It worked though, as they both walked to the opposite side of the room.

That left James looking after them in amusement. Lily took her chance, walking up to him as confidently as she could. "What happened?" she asked him lightly.

He grinned before turning to Lily. "I think Sirius and Marlene are having a very in depth conversation about...weather."

Lily laughed (probably to calm her nerves) and said, as calmly as she could, "Listen, you know...umm...we should check on the Prefects and see how they are doing."

Either James didn't notice her anxiousness or he decided not to comment on it, but he nodded in response. "Yeah, we should. It's been awhile since we did that."

They made our way down the staircase to the Gryffindor common room to check on the Gryffindor prefects.

The first one they spotted was Alex Carpenter, a 6th year. He was writing something down on parchment which looked suspiciously like song lyrics.

"Hullo, James, Lily," Alex greeted them as they walked up.

"What are you writing?" Lily asked curiously.

Alex shrugged. "Just some lyrics."

James sat down in the chair across from him while Lily sat on the couch. "How have patrols been going?" James asked.

"Fine. I haven't had any trouble recently. It's been going well, I think," Alex replied, and then his eyes lit up. He grabbed a piece of parchment and began writing, mouthing the words "looking for trouble".

"That's good to hear," Lily said after a bit of pause. "Do you know where Patty is?"
Alex looked up and pointed to the opposite corner of the room. "Right over there."

James and Lily got up and said their goodbyes to Alex. "I like him." Lily said brightly, trying to make conversation.

James looked at her with a small smile. "Hey, we're soul mates. You're not allowed to like anyone else."

It relieved her that James was still able to make a joke out of the awkward situation they had earlier that day. Shaking her head, she laughed and said, "You wish."

About fifteen minutes later, Lily and James made their way to the Portrait hole, planning to search for the other Prefects. They were stopped, however, as the Portrait opened and two people came inside hurriedly.

"Sirius? Marlene?" Lily questioned, a confused look on her face. They couldn't -- "What were you two doing for the past – oh, I don't know – half hour?"

James opened his mouth to add something but stopped when he saw the looks on their faces. "What's wrong?" he asked suddenly.

Marlene stared at Lily, shaking her head slightly, her mouth open in shock.

"Marlene, what happened?" Lily asked worriedly, taking a step toward the shaking girl.

The look in Sirius's eyes were that of pure fear. "Sirius, are you okay?" James asked him.

Lily's heart began to race just looking at the two visibly shaken teenagers. She braced herself for the horrible news that was to come but nothing could have prepared her for this.

"Caradoc's gone missing."

On my profile, there is a link to my LiveJournal, and then there is an update on my LiveJournal called 'Serious'. There you can read my outline with the Legally Blonde songs included and some video of it from MTV.

Thanks for reading. Leave a review telling me what you thought. I will update as soon as I can.