Potter's New Year's party was more than Lily expected. Marlene and Sirius broke up after Christmas, and Benjy is not discreet about liking Marlene. Mary and Caradoc seem to hit it off at the party as well, and of course James doesn't forget about Lily's deal. At midnight, they kissed, and again, it was more than she expected.

Back to Square One

"Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans."

John Lennon

Lily got home in the early morning the next day. She could see the sun was already rising out of her bedroom window. Eager to get to sleep, she changed quickly, jumped into her bed and fell asleep promptly.

She woke up the next morning to a pecking at her window. Half asleep, she opened the window. She recognized the owl to be James Potter's. She untied the letter and placed it on her desk. The owl flew out the window without even waiting for a treat.

Lily went back to her desk and opened the letter. She immediately saw the chicken scratch she recognized as James. As her eyes scanned down the letter, Lily felt the strangest emotion.

A smile appeared on her face that refused to disappear, but a feeling of dread as came upon her. When she finished the letter, she sighed to herself. Lily put the letter back on her desk and landed face first onto her bed.

It was much too early to answer a letter, right?

.:.

Lily looked out the window at a snowy King's Cross. Christmas Break had ended, and it was time to get back to Hogwarts… and reality. She spent days just sleeping in, reading her favorite books with a cup of tea and curled up in a blanket.

And mostly she didn't answer the letter that James sent her after the New Year's party. She was not looking forward to answering him in person in less than an hour, but she just couldn't find the right words to say when she tried to put her quill to parchment.

Her parents stopped in front of Platform 9 ¾ as always and bid their good-bye's. She ran through the platform and saw the familiar scarlet train. Climbing aboard, she navigated the crowded hallway to her usual compartment. Inside, everyone was sitting there except the person she was still dreading to see – James.

"Lily!" her friends greeted her as she opened the door.

"Lily, I need to talk to you," Mary jumped up out of her seat.

Without even waiting for her to answer, Mary pushed her out of the compartment and down the train.

"What on earth is this about, Mary?" Lily asked.

"Okay, I can't think of a way of phrasing this nicely, so I'm just going to come out and say it," Mary said taking a breath. "I kissed Caradoc at midnight at the Potter's party. I know you like him, and I feel horrible about it!"

Lily held up her hand to stop Mary, "Mary, it is fine. I don't think he's interested too much in me anymore, and to be honest, I never really had too much interest in him."

"Really?" Mary said.

Lily laughed, "Yes, it's completely fine if you fancy him too."

"Oh Lily," Mary said hugging her, "I thought you'd be so mad."

There was a moment of brief silence before Mary smiled, "So you and James? Huh?"

Lily rolled her eyes, "I was drunk, Mary."

"Well, drunk or not, how was it?" Mary prodded her.

"Mary!" Lily said, "I told you I was drunk!"

James spoke up behind them, "So that's your only thought about it?"

Mary looked like a deer in headlights, "I'll leave you two." She hurried back to their compartment.

Lily turned to face James, "Well, there's no denying it."

"I was too," James replied, "but that leaves no reason for not answering my letter I sent you."

Lily sighed, "Look, your party was fun, but I think it would be best if we just forget about it."

She felt she had no control of the words coming out of her mouth. Lily didn't really want to forget about it; she actually wanted to do it again. Whenever she glanced at his lips, it made her lips tingle in memory.

"I've wanted to kiss you since I met you on this train six years ago, and now that we finally did, you want me to just forget about it?" James said with his eyes raging.

Lily ran her fingers through her hair, "I don't know what to tell you."

"You could tell me that the kiss actually meant something to you," James said quietly as he stared at a spot behind Lily's head.

She sighed again and looked down at the ground. When she didn't answer, James stormed down the corridor and into the compartment.

Before James entered the compartment though, he looked at Lily one more time, "If you didn't feel the same, you could have at least told me before I made a fool of myself."

Lily looked back down at her feet in embarrassment. She slowly made her way back to her friends, and as she opened the door, she was surprised to see James was just fine – already playing exploding snap with Peter and Sirius. She sat back down and felt the eyes of her friend's on her.

"So Marlene, did you get an answer about your aunt?" Lily asked tried to break the tension.

"Oh, no, not yet. International owls take awhile," Marlene said.

The small talk continued for the rest of train ride and through dinner when they arrived at Hogwarts. Lily knew her friends wanted to know what was going on, but they were kind enough to wait until they were in their dormitory.

Well kind would be an overstatement. Alice slammed the door closed, "Spill the beans, Evans."

Lily rolled her eyes, "Well you all saw. James and I kissed on midnight. We were both drunk, like you all were."

"And he wrote a letter?" Mary said jumping onto her bed.

Lily looked at her friends in surprise, "You all heard that?"

"I think everyone on the train heard it," Alice said.

"Yeah…" Lily said putting her trunk in front of her bed.

"What did it say, Lily?" Dorcas said as if she was talking to a five year old.

"Dorcas, even you're interested?" Lily smiled.

"This has been going on for six years. Everyone is interested by now," Dorcas said crossing her arms across her chest. "What did the letter say?"

Lily sighed. There was no way to get out of it. She rummaged through her trunk and pulled it out, "Read it yourselves, my nosy friends."

They looked ridiculous while they all tried to peer to the parchment at the same time. Mary was the first one to finish, and she looked up at Lily with surprise, "And you didn't answer him? You're terrible, Lily."

"I didn't know what to say!" she protested.

"Was he that bad of a kisser?" Alice said incredulously.

She blushed, "No!"

"I think a simple thank-you would have been better than nothing, Lils," Dorcas said again.

"Oh don't be so harsh on her," Marlene said placing her arms around Lily's shoulders. "I think our Lily-dear is developing a crush on James Potter, but she's in denial."

"I do not have a crush on James Potter!" Lily said adamantly.

"Because you definitely didn't kiss him three times on New Year's versus once," Dorcas said cheekily.

The rest of the group looked at Lily in surprise.

"What?" Alice voiced.

Lily tried to control the blush across her face but failed, "I was drunk!" That excuse was really falling on deaf ears now.

"I think you should go talk to him," Marlene said softly.

"But I don't fancy him," Lily said pointlessly.

It was the best thing to do though. She felt terrible for what she was doing to him. Not answering his letter and ignoring him on the train… Not to mention it wasn't even what she really felt…

"Go talk to him still. You shouldn't leave the conversation like that," Dorcas said.

Everyone turned and looked at Dorcas.

"What?" she said defensively.

"When did you get so girly and in touch with feelings?" Alice said blatantly.

Dorcas glared at her, "It's my new year resolution."

"What? Being feminine?" Mary said.

Dorcas glared at Mary now, "I'm trying it out. I think I gave some pretty good advice."

Marlene spoke up, "That's true, but I really think Lily needs to take it inside of just hiding in here."

Her friends' eyes were all on her, and Lily stood from her bed, "Fine, I'll go talk to him."

Lily walked down the stairs slowly and looked in the common room for the familiar raven hair sticking out in a million directions. There was only a few younger years sitting on the couches in front of the fire. She slowly made her way up the boy's dormitory stairs.

When she reached the sixth year's room, she raised her hand to knock on the door. Before she could knock though, she heard voices from inside.

"I'm serious! I'm done chasing her!" James's voice came muffled through the door.

"No, I'm Sirius!" Sirius said.

There was a sound of something heavy being thrown and hitting the target. "Ouch," Lily heard Sirius say.

"So if Evans came up to you and demanded that you snog her right then and there, you would say no?" Peter said.

"Of course I would say yes. Do you see how fit she is?" James replied.

Lily dropped her hand. So that was what James saw in her. She hurried back down the stairs, her feelings hurt, and now she was more confused than ever.

Unfortunately, she missed the end of the conversation when Remus said, "You're not over her, Prongs."

He sighed, "No, I figure I'm not."

.:.

Professor Slughorn walked into the dungeon classroom late like usual. "Hello class," his voice boomed across the room, "this potion is something we discussed earlier in the year but didn't brew."

He gestured to the potion with a purple shine sitting in front of the classroom, "Yes, hiccupping solution. I usually don't let sixth years brew it, but I'm experimenting with you. Besides, I'm lucky enough to have such talented pupils in this year." Professor Slughorn smiled at Lily.

"For this particular potion, I will be switching your usual partners to ensure everyone's safety." He rambled off a list of partners and Lily listened for her name.

"Lily Evans and Remus Lupin! Oh that pair is so talented; it will put the others to shame!" Slughorn smiled again at Lily.

Remus moved his books next to Lily, "Hello Lily."

Lily smiled, "How's it going Remus?"

"Oh it's been fine. I'll go get the ingredients. Could you prepare the cauldron?" he asked.

"Sure thing," Lily said. She lit the fire under the cauldron and lowered it to a suitable size.

Remus returned quickly with the ingredients and carefully placed them on the table.

"Oh, thank you, Remus," Lily said. She began to slice while Remus started to crush some beetle eyes finely.

"Lily, may I ask you a question?" he said as he continued crushing.

Lily bit her lip, "I guess."

"Why is it that you have cut off James completely since New Years?" he asked nonchalantly as he dumped the fine powder into the cauldron.

Lily looked at him in surprise, "Well, I'm assuming you know what happened at midnight."

Remus nodded, "And about the letter he sent."

Damn letter, she thought to herself. She cleared her throat, "Okay Remus, I'm going to just to tell you the truth. Just try to not to judge me."

Remus laughed, "I promise I will not judge you."

Lily smiled, "Thank you. Well I felt terrible about what happened. When I talked to the girls, they made me feel worse. I regretted not saying anything on the train too, so I went to go talk to him. I was about to knock on your dormitory door when I overheard… an interesting conversation."

Remus looked at her in surprise, "Oh, Lily! It wasn't like that. What did you hear?"

"I hear him say, 'Do you see how fit she is?' before I left," Lily said adding more ingredients.

"Oh Lily," Remus repeated. "It wasn't like that at all. He was just mad."

Lily shrugged, "He sounded pretty sincere to me."

Remus sighed, "You of all people should know that James says things when he's mad."

Lily sighed and didn't answer.

"Okay, how about we talk about something else and finish this potion?" Remus resigned.

Lily added the crushed roots to the cauldron, "I agree. How about those Cannons?"

Remus laughed, "You're skilled in small talk, Lily."

Lily laughed too, "And you know how to make a girl feel special, Remus."

.:.

Later that same day, Lily was walking back from library after finishing a tedious Transfiguration essay. It had taken hours, and Lily struggled with the concepts more than she enjoyed. She was just looking forward to taking a long hot shower and going right to sleep.

"Hey, Evans!" James's voice came from behind. "Wait up!"

She stopped walking and sighed. This wasn't going to go well.

"I talked to Remus today," he said when he caught up with her.

"That's good. Remus is a fun person to talk to," she said trying to delay the conversation.

"What?" he looked at her in confusion. "Well anyways, he told me why you've been avoiding me like the plague, and I think we need to talk."

She inhaled slowly, "I'm listening."

He glared her for a second before continuing, "I didn't want for you to hear that. I was just mad and ranting."

"Well it showed me that I don't want to be around a guy like you!" Lily glared at him.

"Bloody hell, Lily! You can't trust me because I rant? Isn't that calling the kettle black a little bit?" James said not standing down.

"God, James! It's like every time I try and trust you, you give me a reason to not to!" Lily snapped at him.

"You hearing something you weren't supposed to shouldn't be a reason not to trust me!" he snapped right back.

"So what you're saying is that I should trust someone who says things behind my back?" Lily placed her hands on hip angrily. Her glare was daring him to contradict him.

"You know what? You wouldn't have been there if you didn't feel something on New Year's!" he fired back, taking Lily by surprise.

"Because we had one good kiss while drunk doesn't mean I felt anything!" she answered.

James smirked, "So you think it was a good kiss?"

All Lily wanted to do was wipe the grin off his face, "Peter would've been a good kisser with that much alcohol in my system!"

His smirk refused to disappear, "Do you want me to prove it wasn't because we were drunk?"

"Are you kidding me right now?" Lily practically screamed.

"You can't deny that you felt something," James responded coolly.

"Really? Because I'll tell you right now: it was nothing!" Lily tried to reply in an equally cool tone.

"If it was nothing, then you wouldn't mind doing it again?" he continued to smirk. "Then it'll prove me wrong."

Lily started walking away, "I'm not kissing you, you prat."

James followed her, "Fine." He muttered to himself, "But eventually we will."

Lily kept storming ahead, "Not happening, Potter! Not now, not ever!"

She approached the Fat Lady portrait who spoke up, "You tell him, dearie."

I actually got through this chapter faster than I thought. Special thanks to my brilliant beta – dementorskiss xoxo!
Thanks to jg13145 for reviewing, St Walker for all 20 reviews and all of you who favorited/subscribed!

Happy New Year! And don't forget to leave a review :)