Chapter 11- We All Have Secrets
I sat and watched our little goup of friends and noticed how it seemed everyone had paired up with someone and now had their own conversations going on. Remus was talking to Ashley, I couldn't help smirking at them. Sirius was in an animated conversation with Tiffany as he was waving his arms making wierd gestures causing her to laugh. Charlie was talking to Leah and I was sitting by myself watching all of them, my usual partner in these private conversation situations had always been James. I decided to go and look for him because we still had a good deal of time before classes began.
I got up from the table and I don't think anyone even noticed. I shook my head and walked out of the great hall in search for James. I wasn't sure where to begin looking, so I just started walking toward the DADA class room. I passed several Ravenclaws that were heading down to breakfast and it made me wonder if their common room was somewhere near by. I shrugged at the thought when I approached the DADA room and heard voices coming out of it. I looked around the hall to find it completely empty, other than myself of course. There was definatley a male voice and a load of giggles from some girl. My stomach tightened, could it be James in there? I couldn't make out any words and I was debating on edging closer to the closed door. Then, it got quiet. It was sickly quiet, I knew something was happening. I think the people inside were snogging and I had this strange feeling of regret and sadness. I had the urge to open the door, but what if James was on the other side all over some other girl? I don't know if I could handle that. I had the feeling that James was mad because I wouldn't let him go as far as he wanted last night, but would he really just move on from me because of that? I took a deep breath and threw the door open. Shock began to take over as I took in the scene before me.
"Lily! What are you doing here?" Sarah asked.
"Er..." I muttered.
I lost my balance from the shock and had to lean into the door.
"This isn't what it looks like I swear!" Sarah said taking a few steps toward me.
I didn't know what to do or say, so I quickly ran out and slammed the door shut. I stood looking at the closed door for a couple of seconds trying to comprehend what I had just witnessed.
"Lily?" I heard a familiar voice from behind me.
I turned around and looked at the end of the hall to see James walking toward me. I ran to him and hugged him with so much force that he stumbled backwards.
"James! You have no idea how happy I am to see you. I'm so sorry I doubted you." I said still gripping him tightly.
"Er, it's good to see you too Lils. But what are you talking about?" James asked.
I pulled away and looked at his confused face. I couldn't tell him what I had seen could I? I mean, wouldn't that be betrayal to Sarah? I'm pretty sure she doesn't want anyone to know what I saw.
"Uh, listen James, I wanted to check and see if you were ok." I said.
"Oh." James said slowly.
"Talk to me James. Are you mad about last night? Because I asked you to stop?" I whispered.
"What? Mad because... Merlin Lily!" James said.
"Well what's wrong then? I thought that because, well, you just left last night and then this morning you just walked out of the great hall. You need to tell me something James because I don't know what to think." I said.
James got a strange nervous-like look on his face and I really wanted to use occlumency on him to find out what he was thinking... but I told myself a long time ago I wouldn't do that to people.
"Lils..." James sighed and ran a hand through his hair.
A loud bell rang through the halls.
"I'll talk to you later. I've got to get my books, class is about to start." James said quickly before walking away.
Students started to fill the halls as I watched James until he turned a corner at the end of the hall and I could no longer see him. I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned around to see a very nervous Sarah looking down at her feet.
"Sarah?" I said.
She slowly looked up.
"Lily, please don't say anything to any of the others. I know it looks imprudent, but, I think I love him. And really, love is a rare thing you know? So we decided not to let age stand in the way of our love. I know it's not allowed, but you won't report it will you?" Sarah said quickly.
"If someone found out about this and realized I knew and didn't report it, my badge could be taken away." I said.
Sarah's head dropped toward the ground again.
"I suppose a little rebellion against authority isn't always that bad though. Besides what kind of girlfriend would I be to one of Hogwarts greatest rule breakers if I didn't even break a few rules myself. What kind of friend would I be if I wouldn't even take a fall?" I said.
Sarah's head snapped up and her tearstained face broke into a huge grin as she hugged me tightly.
"Thank you Lily. This means a lot to me, I know what's on the line by you doing this for me." Sarah said.
I smiled.
"Well, it's just not right to stand in the way of love 'eh?" I said.
Sarah blushed a little because of her earlier outburst.
"Shall we all be calling you Mrs. Stigma any time soon?" I asked.
Sarah's face turned a darker shade of red as I laughed. Sitting in DADA will never be the same again. Especially after seeing Stigma or 'John' snogging one of my best friends.
"Hey Remus." I said sitting down across from Remus.
"Hello Lily." Remus said.
"You haven't seen James anywhere around here have you?" I asked.
"In the library?" He asked incredulously.
"I suppose you have a point." I said.
I opened my bag and pulled out the poetry book I had borrowed from Remus.
"I finished reading this." I said setting the book on the table.
"Oh, did you like it?" Remus asked shutting his own book and looking at me.
"I found it intriguing. I read 'everything' in the book." I said smiling.
"Why are you smiling like that?" Remus asked.
"Like what?" I asked innocently.
"Like your up to something. It's a bit unnerving." Remus said.
"Oh really?" I asked.
"Yes, would you stop it now?" Remus asked.
"Nope." I said still smiling and shaking my head.
"What are you up to?" Remus asked me with a scrutinizing look.
"Page one hundred and twelve." I said pushing the poetry book toward him without removing my eyes from him.
Remus kept his eyes on me as he grabbed the book. He slowly looked down and turned to the page I had instructed. He pulled out the old parchment and unfolded it. He slowly read it and the color drained from his face. He put the parchment back in the book and slowly closed it.
"Well?" I said.
"Well what?" He asked.
"What have you to say?" I asked.
"Nothing." He said.
"What do you mean nothing? When did you write that? What does that imply? Why didn't you give it to her?" I said quickly.
Remus just stared at me.
"Oh you don't know?" He asked sarcastically.
I rolled my eyes.
"Well of course I put some thought to it and I have my own conclusion, but I want you to tell me the story." I said.
"O.k. A long time ago, there was this far away castle called Hogwarts. But it wasn't just a normal castle, it was magical! Many witches and wizards lived there. The castle was ruled by a psychotic man named Dumbledore..."Remus said.
"Remus, you know what I mean." I said.
"Well, it's obvious isn't it? I used to like Ashley that's all. It was something I wrote for her but I never gave it to her because I decided it would never work between us." Remus said.
"Oh you used to like her? What's this about it would never work?" I asked him.
"Lily, it doesn't matter anymore." Remus said.
"Remus, don't sell your self short. Why wouldn't Ashley care about you? I know why your scared. Yes, you are scared don't even try to deny it. But Remus, Ashley will love you for who you are and she won't judge you for what you can't help." I said.
"It's too late though." He said.
"No, it's not. You have to make the gesture though. Tell her how you feel." I said.
"What? Are you insane? I can't just say something like that." Remus said.
"Why not? What's the big deal?" I asked.
"I dunno, ever heard of a thing called fear of rejection?" He said.
"Remus, you don't have anything to fear. Trust me. I don't even have to use myLegillimency to figure this out." I said.
Remus laughed.
"As Sirius would say, 'My work here is done'." I said standing up.
"How did you find out about..." Remus began.
"Oh you mean how Sirius says that after every prank you guys pull?" I asked.
I leaned in toward Remus.
"Now that was Legillimency." I said.
He smiled as I waved goodbye.
"Ta ta love!" I said.
I walked out of the library and made my way to the Head common room. I had quidditch practice tonight, so I didn't plan on talking to James unitl afterwards. When I walked in through the portrait hole, where the password is still 'James Potter is the sexiest wizard to walk the planet', I was surprised to see James sitting on the couch waiting for me.
"James? What are you doing in here? We have quidditch practice in twenty minutes and you usually go down early to fly." I said walking towards James.
"I wanted to talk to you- wait, how did you know I went down early to fly?" James said.
"I know how you feel about flying, and I might have seen you several times." I said.
"Oh, so you're stalking me now 'eh?" James asked.
"Oh yes. As the founder of the James Potter club, I love just following you around and always wondering how such magnificence could possibly exist. Oh please James, take me to Hogsmeade and snog me senseless!" I acted out dramatically throwing myself at him.
"There's a James Potter club?" James asked.
I rolled my eyes.
"So you wanted to talk to me about something?" I asked sitting on the couch and pulling him down next to me.
"Er, I wanted to say I'm sorry." James said.
"Sorry? For what?" I asked.
"The way I was acting. I didn't mean for you to think that you did anything wrong, or that I expected anything from you. I was just, I should have asked you if it was ok, and then it made you uncomfortable. I was embarassed and nervous. Then I seen you talking with Crawsden and I was so jealous." James said.
I was quiet, thinking about what James said.
"Thanks for telling me, and its ok. I forgive you." I said.
I leaned in and kissed him on the nose.
"So you were jealous of Crawsden? That's so cute." I said.
James made a funny strangled sort of noise before he tackled me on the couch and started tickling me until we both realized we were going to be late for practice.
James gave us a long speech before we evem began to practice. We went over the Quidditch standings thus far. We had only played one game against Ravenclaw and had two hundred and seventy points. Since then Hufflepuff and Slytherin had played, with the score twenty to two hundred Slytherin. So we played Hufflepuff on saturday, winner advances to the final match. If we won this saturday then we would play the winner of Slytherin vs. Ravenclaw for the Quidditch cup. James had been drilling us on the typical Hufflepuff moves he had picked up when we watched them play Slytherin, if we knew their moves, we could anticipate them and therefore have an advantage. Not that I'm too worried about the match, I saw Hufflepuff play and unless they've been granted a miracle, there was no way they would beat us. But I would never tell James this, he'd think I wasn't taking our opponent seriously. That I would drop my guard or something because of it. I will not attempt to assess the mind of a quidditch fanatic. It's dangerous for one's health, as Sirius warned. I'll trust his word for it. James is severly passionate about quidditch, its attractive sometimes, but today it was just downright scary.
"Ok people, what do you think you're doing? That's not the play I said to run! I'm not quidditch captain for nothing you know! That means when I say run a two pass flank roll and reverse, I want to see a two pass flank roll and reverse! Now everyone get down and run a lap around the pitch so we can try this again." James shouted at all of us chasers.
"James we've already ran five laps!" Tiffany said.
"That's captain Potter to you Harpor, and you can make that two laps, now get going. I don't care if it takes twenty laps, you follow my commands." James yelled.
Tiffany, as headstrong as she was, flew down to the field below without another word of protest. James was sitting on his broom when a bludger, hit by Sirius, flew just in front of his face and missed him by mere inches. I glanced at Lisa before following her down to the ground. We dropped our brooms in the grass and started running. From the ground we could hear James shouting at the beaters, namely Sirius. Matt was blocking quaffles that kept flying toward diffferent hoops from a spell that James had found.
"McKinnon you call that blocking? Stop being lazy and missing shots like that, fly down and join the girls!" James said.
"What? You want me to run laps? Are you crazy?" Matt shouted back as quaffles soared past him.
"Are you questioning me?" James asked.
"No, I'm telling you I won't do it. You're pushing us too hard Potter." Matt said.
"Is that so? Well, if that's the way you feel McKinnon then you can leave. If you can't handle it, I don't want you on my team." James yelled.
Sirius and Joe had stopped practicing and were watching what was going on. The girls and I had stopped running at this point to watch as well.
Matt stared at James for a couple of seonds before he flew to the ground. He landed and then began to slowly walk to the end of the pitch.
"Oh, this is just great." Tiffany said.
"Now how are we going to win without a keeper? We don't even have a trained reserve." Lisa said.
I knew that Gryffindor needed Matt on the team, but boys and their stupid pride.
"What are you doing standing around? Finish your laps!" James shouted at us.
Tiffany and Lisa started running again, but I stood where I was. I knew James was looking at me, but I turned around and started running in the opposite direction toward Matt.
"Matt! Wait! What are you doing?" I asked catching up to him.
He turned around and shouldered his broom.
"You're stupid boyfriend has lost his mind!" Matt yelled throwing his arms up.
From where I was positioned, I could see James sitting up on his broom watching us.
"Come on, you know how he gets before a match. I know he didn't mean it." I said.
"Yeah, well I don't have to put up with his bullshit and you shouldn't either." Matt said.
"Matt, you need to calm down. I understand how you feel, don't you think I'm frustrated too? But I'm not about to quit over it. I'm just going to suck it up and go on playing." I said.
"We've been practicing for almost four and a half hours!" Matt yelled.
"Yeah, and it's not so bad for the chance to play. But if you want to quit, nobody can stop you." I said.
"Why the hell wouldn't all of you quit?" Matt asked, like we were being stupid for sticking around.
"Why? Because I love to play, and more importantly I play for the Gryffindor team. I'm not going to let everyone down by just leaving because I don't think things are fair. That's why we're still here, because we owe it to each other to not let anyone down. Everyone is depending on everyone else. We need you Matt, but we can't stop you from leaving. I know James is harsh, but he knows what he's doing. Besides this is nothing like the daily practices at Drumstrang. You think they were all born with natural unbelievable talent?" I said.
Matt considered my words.
"Why don't you just run the lap with me and then just start practicing again. Just don't say anything to James. You know how he is, and he knows he crossed the line giving you that ultimatum." I said.
"Well, I can't very well leave you here with that derranged lunatic now can I?" Matt said.
Smiling, I ran my last lap before I flew back into the air where James was practicing with the chasers in my spot.
"Now, try that two pass flank roll and reverse and let's see if we can't nail it this time." James said a bit nicer.
I seen him glance over to the hoops where Matt was practicing again. Tiffany, Lisa, and I positioned ourselves and when James blew the whistle, we did a two pass flank roll and reverse flawlessly. James blew his whistle ten minutes later and ended practice. Everyone landed and started making their way to the changing rooms, or to the castle.
"Lily!" I heard James call.
I turned around and stopped in the middle of the pitch so that he could catch up. The rest of the team was already off the pitch by the time he reached me.
"You needed something captain Potter?" I asked.
James frowned.
"Uh, yeah, about that, you don't have to call me that. I can get a bit carried away, especially before games. I, er, thanks for talking to McKinnon." James said.
"Yeah, I know how you are. But really, I'm not the one you need to apologize to right now. You were pretty harsh yelling like that today. I mean, we're all your friends you know? And you really need to channel your nerves into something that won't hurt peoples feelings so much." I said.
James started laughing.
"What's so funny?" I asked.
"I was yelling at you too, and trying to apologize. But all you can say is that I hurt other people's feelings. Your so selfless sometimes." James said smiling.
"Selfless? Yeah right, you didn't really think I was going to let you get away with yelling at me like that did you? Oh no, I'm going to punish you severely." I said.
"Oh, really?" James asked.
"Yes I am." I said.
"Well then my dear, you can punish me until the end of the world as long as you promise not to ever kiss me again." James said.
"Well, I'm sorry to tell you, but that's just what I was going to punish you with." I said smiling.
"Oh, how could you?" James cried dramatically.
"I've an iron fist James. Now get over here so I can start to punish you straight away." I said.
"There is no escape, I fear I must obey. Oh the horrors!" James sighed.
I started laughing as James pulled me into a kiss. We are completely stupid sometimes, but its fun. Not everything has to be serious hot steamy passion that makes you want to rip your clothes off. Not that its ever been hot steamy passion that made us rip our clothes off. Just saying.
A couple of days later Charlie was dragging me down the hallways. He said he wanted to show me something.
"So what's this all about Charlie?" I asked.
"Well, when Sirius gave me a tour of the castle he showed me the kitchens." Charlie said.
"What about them? I've seen them before." I said.
"Yes, but I have a surprise for you, so come on." Charlie said.
We finally reached the kitchens and Charlie tickled the pear on the portrait guarding the entrance. It opened and inside, Charlie had prepared lunch for two.
"I thought we could spend lunch together, to celebrate our birthday." Charlie said.
Lunch was rather enjoyable, but cut short because we had one class to go before we could fully enjoy the weekend. Have you ever noticed how the last class is always the longest?
After class, Leah told me and Charlie that she wanted to give us our presents, but that she had accidently left it in her dorm in Gryffindor tower. So, once again I was pulled along, all the way to the Gryffindor common room.
Charlie and I followed behind Leah into the common room and as soon as we entered,
"SURPRISE!"
I jumped and ended up tripping into Charlie. It was a set up. The common room was decorated with 'Happy Birthday Charlie and Lily' banners and there was about fifty or more people gathered around a big, very very big, birthday cake. All of our friends rushed forward and pulled us to the cake and into the crowd of people.
Everyone was in good spirits, the party was great. James had apologized to the rest of the team and they had decided not to dismember him after his apology and some hefty persuasion. So I was glad to be sitting with him on one of the many couches in the Gryffindor common room, listening as he talked about all of the parties he's ever thrown.
"Gryffindor team, don't have too much fun now! We have a game tomorrow! I want you in bed by eight!" James yelled over the music.
The team glared at him and James backed down a bit.
"Oh alright, I guess you can stay up until ten. But that's as late as I'm allowing!" James said.
The team rolled their eyes as people around laughed.
A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed last chapter.
