Chapter 10

It was no joke when Ron told Harry that the whole school would know about what happened at their Flying lessons by the end of the week. The whole Gryffindor common room was buzzing about it by the end of the day and apparently, it only took the school two days for the news to fully go around. There was not a single student who did not know the story of the first-year student named "Harry Potter" becoming the youngest Seeker ever in over a century.

There were a few alterations to the story, however. It wouldn't be a rumor if there weren't any differences from the original tale. One said something about Harry jumping off of the broom from over a hundred feet and catching the Remembrall. The broomstick then caught him and he lowered himself on the ground victoriously. Unbelievable. Another one had him flying circles all around Malfoy and going up three stories before diving for the Remembrall.

But then, those were just the mild ones. The wilder stories involved dragons. How they got involved, Harry had no idea.

Harry was not sure if his becoming seeker was a good thing or not. It would be fun to play the sport but... everything just gave him more publicity. He just wanted to lie low because of his apparent resemblance to the late Harry Potter of the Wizarding World but with this Quidditch buzz going around, more people started to suspect him of being the Potters' child again.

According to the students, James Potter was a star Quidditch player in his time. He was even appointed as the team captain. His trophy was still sitting in the depths of the trophy room, collecting dust, but still there.

Lily Potter was not in a good mood.

She had many papers to grade and hand out to the students by next week and she still had two more classes for the afternoon. Those two classes involved Slytherins and every professor in Hogwarts (except Snape) knew how having Slytherins in your class could make your day uneventful. She had to prepare the tests for the monthly exams. She had to tutor a few students. She had a meeting with the prefects of Ravenclaw. She had to watch the students who got detention. She had to go to the Ministry to retrieve some documents Sirius filed wrongly before leaving for his week-long mission.

But for now, she was angrily searching the entire castle for her husband who pulled a prank on her this morning. He tried to turn her hair green and her skin purple. If that wasn't enough, he high-pitched her voice and got her to wear some sort of silly outfit. She spent hours trying to get rid of the enchantments James placed on her and another hour until the potion for changing her voice back to normal was ready.

She missed an entire morning of work and in all that time, she had seen neither hide nor hair of James. If she wasn't pranked endlessly by James during their school years, she would've been stuck like that for possibly a week. Thankfully, she knew him a bit better and she got most of the tricks figured out.

Unfortunately, the knowledge wasn't enough. Even at age thirty-one, she still fell for his tricks.

"I swear, when I find him..." she muttered angrily to herself.

The corridors were mostly deserted, as most of the students were in class. But not all of them though. Some unfortunate ones who happened to get in her way, tasted her fury. She yelled at about 15 different students to get out of her way by the time she reached the charms corridor.

Just as she rounded the corner, however, she hit something small yet solid and she stumbled back.

Lily was angry. She didn't want anyone to disturb her. She needed to find James and kill him as soon as possible! Who could possibly be the idiot who chose to stop her?

As Lily looked up to see the cause of her anger, her eyes widened when she saw Harry Potter looking at her fearfully.

"I'm sorry! I'm really sorry Professor. I didn't see you and-" Harry tried to explain.

"No. No, it's fine. It's alright." Lily said as gently as she could, her bad mood dissipating bit by bit.

Harry sighed at that. "Thank goodness."

Lily smiled. He said it so quickly like he was very afraid of being punished. "Harry, we've got to stop meeting like this." she said jokingly, referring to the incident that led them to each other at Diagon Alley.

Harry smiled at her too. "Yeah, I don't think I can survive another bumping incident." he playfully shot back.

The students around them went back to their previous activities after that playful exchange. It might have been interesting to see a first-year getting scolded in the corridor but seeing as nothing like that was happening...

Harry's awkward relationship with the Potters had long since disappeared. Everyday lessons taught him, and by extension, the Potters, that there was nothing to fear. They found out that they had this sort of connection with each other, as crazy as that may sound.

Harry had been nervous at participating during lessons at first but he soon found out that the Potters were easy to talk to. They, in turn, would usually ask him during their classes. That led to Harry often staying behind after their classes ended just so he could talk to them a bit.

He was comfortable with James after that incident on the first day of classes. It was Lily that he had to get used to. She would always look at him with those eyes that held some unknown emotion that he would usually just stay clear of her. Lily did an activity in one of her classes one day and she told her students to partner up. Harry was about to partner up with Ron when he got snatched away by a Hufflepuff girl who seemed to have an eye for him. As a result, he ended up with no one and worse, he got Lily as his partner.

The activity was about finding some keywords that would link to the definition or effects of a certain charm. It was a simple activity that he remembered doing in the muggle world. He understood the reason behind this way of teaching, as Lily was muggleborn. It was kind of nice actually, for him to see something from the muggle world, especially when his life has been filled with magic and other things that he thought only existed in fairy tales.

Lily was their teacher so she mostly stayed quiet while Harry worked. She would give him tips now and then but nothing other than that.

Maybe it just seemed too awkward at that time, but Harry started a conversation, just to keep everything at ease. The both of them didn't quite get what happened but they were soon talking about personal things. Things like family, school, friends, likes, dislikes, things like that. After that talk, the both of them worked on their relationship and now, they were friendly.

"Professor, what brings you to the Charms Corridor?" Harry said politely as he shifted his shoulder bag to another position.

"...Er... actually, I was looking for my stupid-I mean, I was looking for my husband." Lily looked at Harry. "... never mind. It's not important. Er, were you doing something before we bumped into each other?"

"Hm? Oh, nothing. I was just about to head back to the dorms. Ron got snatched away by his brothers, so..." Harry told her.

Lily thought about it for a while. "Then... can you come with me? I need to talk to you about something."

"Er..." Harry had no idea what to say. But then again, he had nothing else to do at the moment so, why not? "I... I guess I could come."

Lily gave him a bright smile. "Perfect! How about we head to my office?"

"Geez, Professor. That sounds like you're gonna scold me or something." Harry joked.

Lily closed the door to her office gently and led Harry towards a nearby chair. Harry sat down and waited until Lily reached her chair on the other side of the desk.

"Would you like some tea, Harry?" Lily asked him as she pushed herself closer to the desk.

"Er... no thanks, Professor." Harry answered. He looked at his Professor's office for a while. Despite being friendly with her, this was actually the first time he stepped inside Lily Potter's office. He didn't expect the office to be normal-looking. He had been to McGonagall's office, Snape's office (like, three times since term started, and yes, they were horrible experiences), Hooch's office (after the flying incident), Sprout's, Flitwick's, and James'. All of them were strange.

Lily Potter's office, however, almost resembled a modern work office, minus the electronics. It was neat, proper, and had an "office-y" feeling to it.

She never ceased to amaze Harry. She would constantly bring back memories of the Muggle World. It was something that the both of them could relate to.

"So, Harry... how are your classes progressing?" Lily asked.

Harry forced himself to look away from Lily's book collection, obviously from the muggle world, and turned to his teacher. "Lessons? They're... fine. Nothing much ever happens really."

"Nothing? I heard some strange rumors about a certain flying lesson a few days back." Lily said, smiling at the end of her sentence.

Harry gulped. 'Even SHE heard about it?' "You... you don't believe them... do you, Professor?"

Lily made a 'hmm' sound as she twirled a fountain pen between her fingers. "I didn't at first. I mean, no one would. But then, they started spreading, y'know? And then there were proofs... and honestly, it was beginning to annoy me everytime the class would burst into whispered conversations about it."

Harry gave her an apologetic look. He didn't expect his actions would have this much effect.

"So, I confirmed it with McGonagall. You're Gryffindor's Seeker now, aren't you, Harry?"

Harry scratched the back of his head. "Well... more or less..."

Lily sighed. "Have you started training?"

"Wood said he'd meet me next week. I guess that would count." Harry answered her.

Lily nodded at him. There was an awkward silence after that though. Lily was desperately wracking her brains for another topic for a conversation while Harry had taken to observing the office once again. His eyes strayed to the pictures on the Professor's desk. Unlike the pictures that he'd somewhat gotten used to since he came to the Wizarding World, the pictures on the desk were not moving.

His eyes scanned each picture and he felt a smile tug at his lips as he saw picture after picture of Lily and James smiling happily next to each other. As he moved on to the next picture, his eyes widened at what he saw.

He saw a young woman, obviously Lily standing in front of a small house. It wasn't the young version of Lily that caught his attention however, but the tall, blonde woman who was standing beside her. She had a very long neck and a rather thin structure. But even so... he can't help but feel that this woman was familiar.

Lily noticed Harry squinting his eyes at the picture of her and her sister when they were teenagers. To her, Harry seemed as if he was having an awfully hard time.

"Er... Harry? What's wrong?"

Harry kept focusing on the woman beside Professor Potter. He knew he had seen her somewhere before. He just knew it!

"What is it Harry? Is it the picture?" Lily asked, taking the picture from it's place. Harry kept focusing at the picture. "Do you want to see it?"

Without even considering, Harry nodded. He felt desperate. It was like he needed to know about the woman. It was just at the tip of his tongue. Why can't he remember. He could feel a headache coming on as he tried his best to remember.

"I'm sorry, Professor, but may I borrow that picture for a while?" Harry asked.

"I don't really mind..." Lily said, confused, as she handed the it to Harry. "But why would you...?"

Harry accepted the picture and stared intensely at the woman's face. Why can't he just remember?! He was really sure that he had seen her somewhere before! His vision was starting to become foggy. His head was pounding and he felt like passing out but he continued to look at the picture as though his life depended on it.

'Fry the bacon and don't you DARE burn anything'

'Up! Get up! Now!'

'Why did I ever let you into this house?'

'Your parents are dead! Died in a car crash!'

"Harry? Are you okay?" Lily asked worriedly.

Harry took deep shaky breaths. This was just like what he experienced when he was with James. "P-Professor... w-who is the woman beside you?"

Lily blinked. "Her? That's my sister. Petunia."

Harry's eyes widened.

Something inside him clicked.

His headache became excruciatingly worse.

"Aunt... Petunia..."

Harry clutched his head and screamed. It hurts! My head feels like it's about to split open!

Harry fell to the floor, screaming. He could feel Lily beside him. She was panicking.

He couldn't do anything. He lost his grip on his consciousness and he fainted.

A/N: Okay, I'm officially the worst! Mwahahaha! HAHAHAHAHA...ha? Alright! ALRIGHT! I'M SOOOOOOORRRRRYYYY! I KNOW I WON'T GET AWAY WITH EXCUSES! If I said it was because of school and other stuff, I would seem like a whiny person who hates school... wait... ALL of us hate school. But really, PLEASE! I'm REALLY SOOOORRRRYYY!

-now please excuse me, as I run away while you prepare your torches and pitchforks.

(HEEEEEEEELLLLPPPP!)

News Update: December 23, 2013

Hi guys! I've gone over the reviews and oh my gosh! It just reached 200! And yeah, sorry for not updating yet. I was gonna put this message on the next chapter but from what I've read in the reviews, it won't be long before you turn violent as you wait for the next update.

As you guys know, I live in the Philippines. Particularly in Visayas, in a province called Leyte. Now, Leyte is just a few kilometers south of Tacloban, which was affected greatly by Typhoon Haiyan. We're just lucky that we got out of it alive. There were food and water shortages as well as a province-wide power outage. We haven't had electricity for more than a month and it just got back a few weeks ago. Internet connection is an entirely different story. We got it back a few days ago and I've only just made contact with it now that we've traveled to Cebu, another island in the Philippines, south of Leyte.

So, I have to ask you guys to be a bit more patient. I'm trying to put together Chapter 11 but in the meantime, enjoy Christmas.