Lily and James were both in the Head common room again, studying at their desks. It was quiet and the rain was pounding on the windows so thickly that nothing could be seen outside.
James wheeled around to face Lily's back and whined, "Lily, I'm bored."
Lily rolled her eyes and turned around, "Well, what do you want to do then, play a game?"
James smiled and jumped up from his chair, "What shall we play?"
Lily turned around in an exasperated sort of fashion, "I was being sarcastic."
James slumped back onto the chair, put out. Lily could tell without need to look that he was pouting.
All of a sudden, with a burst of energy, James jumped up from his chair and lifted his desk, with his wand, into the middle of the room.
"James, what are you doing?" Lily was annoyed by now.
"Redecorating," he said without shame.
"But why?" she asked him.
"The wall is so … ominous…. There's nothing too look at except for the wall. I don't like it. It makes me feel claustrophobic." He was sitting now, at his desk, newly positioned in the middle of the room, with Lily's back facing to his front. "I like this view much better."
"Well I don't," she asserted, "This is uncomfortable. I don't like you staring at my back."
"So, why don't you flip your desk around to face mine? It's got to be better than just the wall, staring at you all the time," James pointed out hoping that she would move her desk to face his, "looming over you all the time….". He had a hopeful smile on his face. "Plus, the lighting is so much better over here."
Lily knew what he was doing, so she weighed her choices. Sit and face James and pacify him (she knew he wouldn't stop until she did move her desk around) or sit facing the bleak and lifeless wall with only her dancing shadow for company.
She pulled out her wand, flicked it, and the desks sat face to face with each other. Lily turned her chair around to see an extremely happy James sitting right in front of her, his hands clasped together, and an insanely wide grin on his face.
"You know, if you don't stop smiling like that, I'm going to put this desk back in the corner," she told him. The smile grew bigger. Lily looked away and began her work, trying to ignore James's watching gaze as he leaned back on the two hind legs of his chair.
"Prongs!" someone was hissing. Lily looked up, and James reached into his robes.
"What's up Padfoot?" James asked Sirius's image through the mirror.
"Nothing. Are you alone?" he asked.
"Nah, Lily is here," he shook his head.
"Where are you? You're late!" he told him, and disappeared. Lily didn't understand the significance of this question, but from what it looked like James had, because he scoffed, "No I'm not," and looked down at watch on his wrist and let out a yelp as if someone had stung him. He jumped up and, in his hurry, threw the mirror down on top of some spare parchment in the middle of his desk as he raced to the door.
Lily shook her head, wondering what that could have been about when something glinted out of the corner of her eye. It was coming from James's desk. She tried to ignore it, but her curiosity overpowered her in the end and she got up to investigate the source.
She took the seat over to where James's desk was facing hers and sat down gingerly in his chair. She looked around. There were so many pictures on his desk. There were mostly pictures of the Marauders laughing about some long forgotten joke. There was a souvenir ticket from when he went to the Quidditch world cup standing next to a picture of some man with a broomstick smiling happily up at her, he looked exactly like James except his eyes were bright blue. She thought it might have been some close relative of his. There was the snitch that Lily had seen him playing with two years ago by the lake. But there, in the middle of the desk, was the mirror. The firelight was dancing on it, causing it to sparkle and shimmer.
She picked it up and looked at it. Her dark red hair and bright green eyes stared back at her.
'James could talk to people through this. He could talk to Sirius,' she thought.
'Maybe…?' a voice inside her head began, Lily shook her head, but the thought still kept resurfacing.
'James would be furious,' she reasoned, 'Sirius too.'
'So, they don't have to know,' it said back.
'That's stupid, Lily, of course they'll find out. If I want to talk to Sirius they'd know.'
'So then don't talk to Sirius.'
'It's stealing!' she screamed in her head.
'You're going to give it back, you just want to see how it works,' the voice reasoned.
Lily placed the mirror down, but then almost in the same movement, picked it back up. She couldn't explain why the mirror intrigued her so much. It just did.
The whole time her mind was stuck on how James would react when he realized the mirror was missing. Then she even had a mental image of what Sirius's reaction would be like in comparison to James's. They would both know she was in the room when it was taken. They might ask her about it.
She would lie and say she didn't touch it and it was sitting on the desk when she left the room that evening.
She spoke out loud this time, "Maybe… I mean… he won't have to know I took it…. I'll give it back after a little bit."
Her whole mind was screaming in protest as she pocketed the mirror, but there was something odd about how comfortable she felt with taking the mirror. It was almost as if she was supposed to. She packed her bag up and walked out of the Heads common room and back to Gryffindor tower.
so yeah! happy time! it's short, but important. the next chapter is longer... i think... actually it might not be. but this is pretty much the climaz of Part Uno:D