Author's Note: All I can say is: I'm sorry. I know that doesn't cover making you wait a year! But after a rather (ridiculously) lengthy hiatus, it was nice to still be receiving minor threats to continue this story... That really made me cheerful, and sort of got me back into the spirit. Feels kind of good to be back (though it's sad that I had to re-read just about the whole story to even remember what happened...) And this isn't even one of my better ones. And absolutely nothing happens! Enjoy being back to school soon! (cough)
-K
Recap:
James and Lily agree to tutor Enid's sister, Jess, in Charms; Jess seems to have other ideas. Lydia and Sirius have only recently begun to communicate like humans again. Lydia is moving to America after the school year finishes. Christine witnesses more drama between Lucius and Narcissa. Remus tries to skip class, which culminates in Lily and Remus discussing Marella's sex-life with Dumbledore... They both severely regret that. And we left off with Lily asleep in the boys' dormitory...
"Uhhh Remus?" "Yes James?"
"..."
Chapter 25 - Body Issues, Meet Sore Faces
"Isn't it obvious, Prongs? Moony clearly seduced her into coming back to the room, and he didn't want to rumple his perfectly-made bed by utilizing it with a girl, so they snogged on YOUR bed instead."
"WHAAAT?!"
"It was a joke, Prongs, a JOKE," Sirius snorted, jumping onto his bed to avoid the attempt at kicking him in the shins that followed.
"Oh." James said, relaxing slightly.
"... Unless Remus really did seduce her...?"
"What?! NO!" Remus chucked a pillow at Sirius' head. An awkward silence fell, in which a completely unfazed Sirius kicked off both of his shoes and started to loosen his tie.
"...so what is she doing here?" Peter asked tentatively, sitting down on his own bed and flinching involuntarily, in case a pillow was aimed at his head too.
"We talked to Dumbledore, and then she just... fell asleep."
"Here?"
"Yes."
"On my bed."
"I think she thought it was mine. But yes."
"I see."
"Indeed."
...
"So what should we... do? With her, I mean," James glanced back at the pretty redhead snoring softly on his bed.
Sirius opened his mouth with a small grin, so James hastily redirected the question, "-Remus?"
"Not sure."
"Well," Peter started thoughtfully, "if she didn't wake up when you yelled, I think it's fairly safe to say that she's a heavy sleeper. Probably not gonna move until she wants to wake up."
"Right."
James looked at Lily again, and smiled as she wiggled a little in her sleep. "I guess I should just leave her there then."
"Probably," Sirius agreed, starting to unbutton his rumpled school shirt.
"Wait, what are you doing?"
"Erm, what, do you need a play-by-play, or...?" Sirius gave James a funny look, and Remus raised an eyebrow. At least he could always count on his friends to create hijinx or uncomfort that would take his mind of the previous events of any day.
"No!"
"Okay good. Gotta say, mate, I was a little worried there," Sirius shrugged and recommenced his undressing.
...
James reconsidered, "It's just-"
"For Merlin's sake, Prongs, what is your problem? Why will you not let me go to bed?"
Shifting uncomfortably, James continued in a voice that was barely audible; "It's just... What if she wakes up?"
Both Remus and Sirius (and Peter from behind his four-poster's closed curtains, where he was changing for bed) looked at James like he was crazy.
"Then she'll be awake, James. Are you feeling alright?"
"You know, I did think Moony would crack first, what with his girlfriend doing his teacher and all that..."
"Thanks Sirius."
"Don't mention it."
Ignoring their banter, James coughed and said "No, I mean what if she wakes up while you're changing, and sees you, you know... changing. And you'll be, well... changing."
"I think we've established that he'll be changing, James. Go on..." Remus said hesitantly. Sirius shook his head and muttered "Mad as a March Hare...", eying his friend concernedly.
"I'm not crazy!" James cried defensively, picking up one of Sirius' discarded shoes and lobbing in his general direction. Remus and Sirius raised their eyebrows simultaneously. "Really, I'm not! It's just, what if she sees you-"
"If you say 'changing' one more time, Prongs, I swear to Merlin that I will hex your nose off!"
"...-r... body? And..."
"And?"
"And she ..." James' voice trailed off to completely inaudible, and he scuffed his shoes on the floor, his cheeks tingeing pink.
"What did you say?" Sirius asked, trying to stifle a snort of laughter, and proceeding to choke on his phlegm.
"Yes James, what did you say?" Remus repeated, reaching over and hitting Sirius on the back.
James' whole face was roughly the same shade as a cherry at this point, and he grimaced as he repeated his question. "What if she... likes it. Better than mine."
"Well I can't say I'd blame her;" Sirius cracked, unable to control his laughter "I am a dazzling specimen!"
Peter chose this moment to stick his head out of the curtains and say "You can't argue with him there" in agreement. Sirius nodded appreciatively. Remus rolled his eyes and turned back to James, who was still red and embarrassed.
"Don't laugh! I mean it Sirius! Can't you just... not change in here tonight? Or go into the bathroom or something?"
"Merlin James! You're not really trying to tell me you have body issues?" Sirius asked, incredulous. "I expect that from Peter; not you!"
"Hey!" Peter frowned down at his stripy pajamas. "I don't have body issues."
Remus kicked Sirius swiftly on the shin before he could respond, and took advantage of Sirius' momentary lack of a voice to say sympathetically to James
"James, I really don't think you have anything to worry about with Lily. I'm sure she's not like that."
"But Moony, everyone knows all the girls here think that Sirius is a God-"
"Again, I can't blame them," Sirius winked at his reflection in their rusted mirror. "But you're being a tad ridiculous Prongs. You've never been self-conscious before. Why now?"
James looked at Lily again, and then caught his friend's eye. "It's just, different with her. I don't want to take any chances."
"And you're more worried about her potentially -but more likely not- waking up and seeing Sirius changing and comparing your bodies, than about any of the potentially much more likely naked escapades she potentially gets up to with her actual BOYFRIEND?"
"MOONY!" James looked affronted. Sirius kicked Remus on the shin this time.
Remus sighed. "Sorry James. I just subconsciously wanted someone to have as miserable a love life as me for a minute... I'm back to my consciousness now."
Sirius rolled his eyes. "So you seriously want to make me walk all the way to that nasty bathroom just to get changed? Am I still allowed to sleep in here, or are you worried she'll find my snoring more attractive than yours?"
James smiled slightly, but looked very relieved. "Thanks Padfoot; I owe you one."
Sirius grumbled something about St. Mungo's, but grudgingly stood up and turned to the door. "And remember to wear clothes to bed this time!" James called after him. Sirius grabbed a pair of boxers of the lampshade beside the door and gave James the finger on his way out.
James breathed a sigh of relief and turned to face the sleeping girl on his bed. He walked towards her and very gently lifted her up, trying to take care to place her softly with her head on the pillow, and turning down the duvet at the same time. Unfortunately, he miscalculated his ability to multitask with a person in his arms, and ended up dropping her heavily onto the bed. "Bollocks." When she didn't wake, he guessed Peter had been right about her being a heavy sleeper, and he was grateful for it. He then pulled the cover up to her chin, smoothed the hair away from her face, and kissed her softly on the forehead. She drooled a little in her sleep, and he smiled. Weird, what some people find attractive.
Remus, who had been watching this scene with a small smirk, coughed, and James whipped around.
"If you tell Sirius I tucked her in, I'll kill you."
Remus shook his head, laughed, and climbed into his own bed. "Goodnight, James."
" 'Night Moony."
Sirius chose that moment to reenter the room, in Gryffindor boxer shorts with lions on them, and lay down on his bed.
"Happy now?"
"Yes."
...
"Would you mind just-"
"I'm putting on a t-shirt right now, Prongs."
"Thanks Padfoot. You're swell."
"Bloody Merlin. I don't know why I'm friends with someone as strange as you, you tosser."
" 'Night."
"Uh huh."
James sat down on the floor beside his bed, pulled his schoolbag towards him, and covered himself in a set of his school robes, using the bag as a pillow. Then he listened to Lily breathe for a while, and eventually drifted into a peaceful sleep.
The dormitory was not as quiet as usual when Lily awoke, at about 5 o'clock in the morning. She had never before heard her roommates snore like that. Nor had she ever noticed how her blanket smelled faintly like chocolate frogs and singed cotton (from exploding snap gone awry). And now that she had, she was kind of wishing she hadn't.
But then as she stifled a yawn with her right hand, and reached for her bedside table to pick up her watch with the other, she was surprised to find that she couldn't reach it. Her fingertips could barely graze the edge of the table, which was usually placed at the perfect arm's length away from each student's bed by the house elves. Odd.
So Lily started to sit up in bed and noticed grubbily that she could see the whole window from where she sat, and that she was fully dressed - except for her shoes, which she seriously hoped she had removed herself. In her own dorm, Lydia slept beside the window, so where on earth was she? She tried to remember clearly the events of the past evening: Remus skipping class, talking to Dumbledore... Talking to Remus... Falling asleep... And there it was. She could not remember ever going back to her own room to get ready for bed. Oh dear.
She squinted in the darkness and was rather horrified to see Remus snoring away in the bed opposite hers. Was there a chance that Remus had taken one of his friend's beds, and that Potter and his other cronies had not yet returned for the night from one of their little illegal excursions? Sure, why not. Either way, Lily decided, she still had to leave. Maybe that way she could convince her friends that she had come up to bed after them, and been in her dorm the rest of the night? That they had just not noticed her come in? Plus, what if Potter came back from wherever he was and saw her there? That would be awkward. Especially if he was naked.
Lily paused on that thought for a second, a slight smile creeping up the corner of her lips, before coming to her senses and shaking her head frantically. Apparently her need to leave this messy dormitory was greater than she had first imagined.
Unfortunately, there was barely a moon that night, and Lily's eyes had not quite adjusted to the lack of light in the room, and so prepared to guess her way blindly in what she assumed was the general direction of the door. She quietly swung her feet over the edge of the bed and stood up quickly, shrieking when her bare feet connected not with the floor, but with a squishy surface right beside the bed, sliding out from under her, greeted with a yell of pain. She braced herself for a hard landing on the floor, but instead was cushioned by the squishy surface.
James, on the other hand, was clutching his face, which she had stepped on quite hard, and trying to catch his breath from where Lily had landed on his chest, winding him severely.
A streak of bright light illuminated the scene suddenly, and Sirius groaned very loudly when he saw the two teens on the floor. "Merlin, can't you two keep it down?" He put out his wand's light and stamped back to his bed, still grumbling. "It's okay Moony" he addressed Remus, who was reaching for his glasses, "No one's being attacked. James is just putting his own personal needs before his friends' desires to be sleeping at 5 in the morning."
"What?!" Lily shrieked again, scrambling off the boy on the floor as fast as she could. "Shut up!"
"ARGH! For the love of Merlin, STOP STEPPING ON MY FACE!"
"What was your face even doing there, you perverted weirdo?" she screamed, kicking James' side angrily.
"OUCH!"
"Shut the ruddy hell UP!" Sirius yelled over from his corner.
"Yes, I don't think our neighbours will be too pleased if you continue to feud at such high decimals," Remus sighed, rolling over in his bed and covering his ears with his pillow.
"How do you even come up with words like that at 5 in the morning, Moony?"
Remus uncovered an ear. "It comes easily with having a total vocabulary larger than that of a gnome, Sirius."
"OI! MAN IN PAIN HERE!" James yelled indignantly, staggering to his feet.
"Well that's what you get for being a perverted weirdo with no sense of personal space," Lily fumed, giving him a shove and storming towards the door, which she could kind of see now, thanks to Sirius blinding them with light from his wand. Unfortunately, her dramatic exit was somewhat interrupted by her tripping not-so-gracefully over the trunk at the end of James' bed.
"Argh, my foot!"
"Are 'ou ookey?" James asked, pinching his nose to stop the bleeding from where Lily had accidentally stepped on his face.
"DON'T talk to me, Potter!" Was the response, followed by a slamming door.
"Have you quite finished now, Prongs?" Sirius asked James with a grumpy sigh, and absolutely no concern for his friend's wellbeing.
"Urgh." James let himself fall backwards onto his bed, massaging his chest.
Silence followed, but James sighed at the hopelessness of it all but smiled to himself anyway as his head touched his pillow. As Sirius hard as he tried to ignore him and get back to sleep, he could practically hear James smiling.
"Why the hell are you smiling?"
James rolled onto his side. "I'b dever washig dis pillow."
"You are a sick man, Prongs."
The next morning, Lily was sitting at the Gryffindor House table, discussing the upcoming Quidditch Cup final in which Gryffindor and Slytherin were supposed to be taking part tomorrow, with Enid. Fortunately, her friends had not been woken by the screaming match in the boys' dormitory that morning, unlike many of the now sleep-deprived co-inhabitants of the boys' dorms, and so they had not asked her any probing questions about what she was doing, with Potter, in the boys' dorm, and 5 in the morning. Yet. She was also not wearing any shoes, which she hoped no one would notice.
It was then that an embarrassed looking James approached her warily from the large door at the other end of the hall. His nose was tinged purple behind the clean white hospital wing bandage that covered it, and Lily felt a twinge of guilt in the pit of her stomach when she caught sight of this as he came nearer.
"What d'you think happened to Potter's nose?" Christine leaned over Enid to ask.
Lily blanched. "What, I don't know! Why would I know? It's not like I talk to him or anything. It's not like I did it."
Before her friends had a chance to raise their eyebrows, James had reached them, and he tentatively held out Lily's black school shoes. She stood up and took them quickly, looking down at the bench. James turned to go, not saying anything, but stopped with his back to her when she started to speak. "I'm sorry I broke your nose," she blurted quickly.
He knew that she would be embarrassed if he responded, so he just paused to let her know that he had heard her.
She exhaled and sat down again, slipping on her shoes, and ignoring the doubly raised eyebrows of her friends.
James walked down to the other end of the table and pulled a scone towards him with a silly smile plastered onto his face. Perhaps things weren't quite so completely hopeless after all.