Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, but everytime I see a shooting star (which has been twice in my life), I wish to own it-telling you that is probably why it hasn't come true yet. :-)
Thanks to everyone who reviewed chapter 9! 55 reviews for chapter 9 alone!!
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Okay…I owe you all a HUGE apology for the delay on this chapter. School become chaotic and I was really stuck on how part of this chapter should go but I hope I got it right now. I did accidentally update my old chapter ten that I decided against using. I wasn't really happy with that version but without realizing it, I posted that one. So I'm sorry to those of you who read that awful chapter. Here's the real chapter ten….I'm MUCH happier with this one.
I hope you all enjoy this!!
Chapter 10 Tender Feelings
Lily and James stirred slightly at the sound and emerald green met chocolate brown as two pairs of eyes fluttered open. After two seconds, in which the newly arrived group simply stared, Lily opened her mouth and screamed.
Quickly, she tried scrambling up, but got tangled in the sheets with James. Still fever ridden, she had no idea what she was doing and rolled off the bed. Because James was caught in the sheets with her, and because he had tried to stop her from rolling off, he fell with her.
"Ugh!" rang two grunts. Aimie, Mimi, Remus and Sirius quickly picked up their jaws and ran to the side of the bed where their friends had fallen.
"HAHAHA!!" Sirius burst out laughing at the sight in front of him. On the floor, Lily and James were wrapped up together by the blanket in a cocoon like thing with Lily on top of James. James looked surprised but very contented with their position all the same.
"Shut up, Black!" Mimi elbowed the young man. It effectively shut him up. The black haired wizard wheezed and coughed and stayed quiet to watch the show.
Lightheaded, Lily had had her head on James' shoulder once they had fallen. Picking her head up, she looked into his eyes.
"Hi." He said simply. Lily swallowed.
"Hi." She replied, unable to say much more of anything else.
'Oh, Merlin! I'm lying on top of James Potter while only wearing my pajamas! What else is in store for me today?' she thought to herself. Turning her head, she saw the audience over her shoulder. She groaned.
"I wouldn't mind some help up." She hinted.
"Certainly." James answered from beneath her just as Remus, Aimie and Mimi were about to step forward to help Lily off of James.
"Huh?" Mimi and Aimie looked confused. Remus just sighed and Sirius grinned. If they knew their best friend, and they did, then this next event would be VERY entertaining.
Before Lily could do anything more to try and get off the Head Boy, the young man in question, with a move they had all missed, had flipped their positions so that Lily was underneath James. James straddled Lily and kept his weight off her by raising himself on his hands and knees. Getting off of her, he shook the blanket away, bent down and picked her up.
"There you go." He grinned, placing her on her feet. But he remained cautious and weary of her dizziness and kept an arm around her just in case. Lily's reaction, though, surprised everyone accounted for in the room. She just began laughing. Remus, Sirius, and James, who'd all been grinning, stopped short and stared in amazement. Lily was laughing at James' antics instead of reprimanding him. The six of them all laughed together before realizing one thing. They stared at each other in silence for a minute.
'It's like second year…' they thought back to the last time they had all laughed together.
'Lily's definitely still feverish.' Mimi thought.
After a moment, things returned to normal.
"Nice pajamas, Evans." Sirius grinned suggestively. Aimie and Remus sighed, resigned. Mimi and James sent glares his way and Lily's fists clenched at her sides.
"Go find a broom closet, Black." Lily retorted.
"Only if you come with me." He shot back charmingly. They both knew he didn't mean it. Just the same, James' arm briefly tightened the hold it had on Lily's waist. Mimi rolled her eyes and Aimie and Remus had begun to converse amongst themselves.
"Well then I guess Hell is your only option." Lily said back. Sirius' hand flew to his chest as though he'd been wounded.
"You stabbed me in the heart, Evans!" He played.
Remus laughed and then nudged Sirius towards the door. "Come on, guys, let's go, we've got to get to our next class." Mimi and Aimie waved good bye to Lily and turned to the door.
"Oh, before we go, Potter?" James looked over to Mimi and Aimie from his conversation with Remus and Sirius.
"Paulini." James said simply.
"You better take care of her!" Mimi said. James simply smiled.
"Take care mate," Sirius said, seeing Lily was losing consciousness and starting to slump against James.
"McGonagall said that you will have to make up the work you missed, James." Remus added before they disappeared through the door.
"Yeah, well…" James started as he lifted Lily up into his arms. "That's to be expected, isn't it?" he said, putting the unconscious Lily in her bed.
Lily slowly started to recover from her fever thanks to James diligence. Neither one brought it to attention, but thoughts about why James did this not only circulated in Lily's head, but James' own head as well. Usually he could figure out why he did something, why he felt some way…But this time, he came to a dead end no matter which way he turned.
Although to some, the answer was staring them in the face. James was in love with Lily.
While heading into Hogsmeade the Saturday after Lily had fallen sick, Sirius finally brought the question to the surface.
"Prongs, mate, what the devils were you thinking sticking around Evans for a few days? And while she was sick nonetheless?" Sirius said as the four went inside Zonkos.
"I don't know, Padfoot, Something about seeing her so ill that morning, I just couldn't leave her like that. She was so insisting about not going to the Hospital Wing and then she was trying to…" James trailed off, took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes and replaced his glasses on his head.
"Prongs, mate, it's called Love." Remus prompted. James' head snapped to his best friend.
"Don't be ridiculous, Moony. This is EVANS. I have better taste than to fall in love with a whore." James spat in contempt that he didn't really feel inside.
"She's not a whore, James!" Remus defended his friend reflexively.
"Yes, she is, Remus. You remember what Diggory said back in second year. All of his friends were talking…" James had to stop thinking about it. "Anyways, it's her word against ALL of theirs."
"And as her best friend you should have taken hers." Remus said strongly but quietly. James opened his mouth to retaliate but closed it quickly when he realized that Remus had a point.
"L-lets go get those s-supplies." Peter squeaked, somewhat scared to break the tension between the other three. Sirius nodded.
"Good call, Wormtail." He said, slapping the smaller boy on the back and leading the way down the isles of prank supplies.
James and Remus looked at each other and sighed. Putting the argument aside for now, they went and followed their friends.
Meanwhile, the redheaded witch in question was going around Hogsmeade with Aimie and Mimi. Because the fever hadn't completely left her body, the three girls were going around the town much slower than the Marauders. Having just left the Three Broomsticks and warmed up with butterbeers, they walked into Honeyduke's Sweet Shop.
"Lily, make sure you keep that scarf on, I know you said you were hot, but it's chilly outside and when you're feverish you don't realize that your body is actually colder than it seems." Aimie reminded her friend. Lily smiled.
"Don't worry, Ames. It's still on. Besides, I don't think Mimi here would allow me to get it off anyways." She laughed.
"Damn straight." Mimi said. "Lily?"
"Yeah?" Lily regarded her friend while getting a few Chocolate Frogs.
"Why didn't you just go to the Hospital Wing when you were so sick? I know you hate it, but when you think about the alternative…" Mimi finished the question with her eyes.
Lily bit her lip and shrugged. "I don't know. Potter really wasn't bad, surprisingly. He just kind of took it on himself to watch over me while I was sick. Maybe he's not as bad as-"
"Bite your tongue!" Mimi cut her off. Aimie shook her head and then laughed.
"C'mon, girls, let's go buy-"
"AAAHHHHHH!!" A shrill scream penetrated the joyous atmosphere. Customers dropped what they held and pedestrians ran every which way. Heads snapped to look out shop windows and saw small clusters of the dooming black robe and masked figures with their wands out.
"DEATHEATERS!" Screams and shouts resounded all over the town as the individuals in question raided, pillaged and plundered without a second thought.
Witches and wizards of all ages ran this way and that. Store windows were shattered and merchandise was broken as spells went AWOL.
The three seventh years ran out of the shop amongst the terrified screams with their wands at the ready. They ran to the center of the horror and met up with the Marauders who were also running in the same direction.
The seven Gryffindors came upon the center of Hogsmeade and found deatheaters apparating into a circle.
"Shit!" They whispered to themselves in unison. Peter was bent over at the knees from sprinting to keep up with his friends during the run. Lily was breathing harder than she usually would from the short run from Honeyduke's to the center of Hogsmeade.
The deatheaters looked at the new arrivals and then swarmed them. Suddenly, each Gryffindor found themselves dueling at least one, if not then two, deatheaters at a time.
Feeling a little sluggish, Lily faced her opponent.
"What do you want?" she demanded as she brandished her wand once more.
"Mudbloods like you, Evans, need to be taught a lesson. The same goes for blood traitors like Potter!" The deatheater said. "Crucio!" Lily just barely side stepped the curse, her reflexes slower than usual, and glared at her opponent.
"What do you want with Potter?" she asked in frustration. "Rictusempra!" The deatheater didn't even have to dodge the attack. She aimed it way out in left field. He laughed at her.
"This is why mudbloods don't deserve to learn magic. They can't do anything with it!" A malicious tone of voice came from her opponent that caused Lily to just barely contain a chill. "The Dark Lord has special plans for Potter."
"Special plans?" Lily stopped short. "Protego-UGH!!" she shouted the shield charm a second too late. Her opponent's curse hit her in the stomach and threw her into the air. Having been completely winded by the curse, Lily couldn't even find it in her to scream as she began to feel herself falling down again.
Out of the corner of his eye, Sirius saw the redhead flying through the air and cursed under his breath. "Duro!" Immediately, the deatheater Sirius was dueling turned to stone. Tightening his grip on his wand, Sirius ran over to the estimated place where Lily would fall and caught the redheaded witch just in time.
"Evans! Are you okay? Evans!" It was a stupid question to ask. Lily's face was clammy and pale, but Sirius needed to find out if she was still responsive. Lily nodded weakly and swallowed.
"Thanks, Black." She said sincerely as Sirius put her on her feet.
"Sirius, what happened?" James asked, having seen Sirius catch Lily.
"I saw her flying through the air and-Furnunculus!-when I caught her she looks like she's ready to pass out." Sirius said, as he dueled beside James against a few deatheaters.
James listened and pulled Lily out of the way of an oncoming curse. "Impedimenta!" he shouted. He dueled while pulling Lily along with him. "Evans, I know this is not the time but you should have stayed back from the Hogsmeade trip today. You're still feverish!"
"Finite Incantatem!" Lily shouted. "Thank you, Potter. Your timing is impeccable." She said but there was no hate behind her words.
"Ahhh!" Aimie's scream penetrated the air as she was put under the Cruciatus Curse.
"AIMIE!" Mimi shouted; her voice laced with worry and horror.
"EXPELLIARMUS! STUPIFY!" Remus shouted, disarming and stunning his and Aimie's opponents before running over to the fallen Gryffindor. When he got to her, she was rolled up in a ball, her face twisted with pain, on her side, with silent tears going down her face. He stopped short at the sight he saw.
"Aimie…!" he knelt down and, counting on his fellow Marauders to have his back while he did this, took her into his arms and began administering healing spells. "Episkey."
Suddenly, it seemed as though time had stopped and all movement had ceased.
A chill far colder than the wind and weather had become present and the humorless chuckle that resounded echoed in all of their ears.
Standing in the center point of Hogsmeade, was a tall, skinny, pale, barely surpassable man in jet black robes and a wand in his right hand.
Lord Voldemort had made his appearance.
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Hey everyone! Again, I'm SOO sorry for the delay. I feel terrible about it. I have reasons, but I won't bore you with them.
And also, everyone please congratulate my beta, she took part in her first musical and has been nominated for an award at school because of her performance! Way to go!!
Love always,
Lunar Artemis