Chapter 3: Mary MacDonald

"And all I did was open it up and there she comes," James jumped of the bed mimicking Lily Evans for the umpteenth time. He had relayed the story to Peter that evening and now Remus and Frank wanted to hear about it too. "screaming like a harpy- you'd think I killed her cat or something. I swear I barely looked in it, and it was just a pair of socks. Plain old socks." He flopped back on the bed, moodily.

Remus cocked his head. "Are you sure it was socks? Why would Lily Evan's scream at you over socks? I'm sure she has much more important things to worry about than a pair old socks."

Frank winked. "Are you sure it was just socks, maybe it was some other girl stuff?"

"It was socks!" James protested throwing a pillow at Frank who was making odd suggestions about what it could have been instead.

"Now, now let's not get violent boys." Sirius said strolling into the dorm calmly with Peter at his side. James stood up and made a beeline towards Sirius. "YOU! WHERE ARE MY CHOCOLATE FROG CARDS?" James pointed accusingly at the boy, after all he was the reason he had been caught digging through Lily Evan's drawers at all.

Sirius gulped as James pinned him to the wall. "I take it you had a nice chat with Evans?"

Peter yelped and moved behind Remus who covered him protectively.

"NICE?" James growled. "GIVE US THE CARDS SIRIUS!"

Frank stood up and cracked his knuckles. Remus shook his head as Peter whimpered behind him.

"All right, all right." Sirius grinned easily pointing to his bed. "Second drawer on the right. You win Jamesie."

Frank opened the drawer and nodded to James who released Sirius and stepped back.

"There's no Grindelwald." Frank told James who promptly turned moody again. He always got what he wanted. This was so unfair. He had even gone as far as to break into the girl's dorms, and he'd gotten humiliated in front of the demon Lily Evans...all for nothing. He didn't get the Grindelwald card in the end.

"James?" Remus asked looking at him with a concerned expression.

"I'm going to class." James said flatly picking up his bag and stowing his wand in his robes.

"James." Remus called out again more insistently.

"WHAT?" James yelled getting more annoyed with Remus.

"It's Saturday."

"So?" James asked turning to face Remus.

"There's no class on...Saturday." Frank added setting the cards on the bed.

"I'm going to the library."

"Jam-" James shut the door and stormed down the stairs angrily. He didn't want to talk to anyone. They were all just going to tell him it was okay when nothing was really okay. He did everything and he still didn't get what he wanted. And James Potter was used to getting what he wanted.

"NO STOMPING!"

James looked up at the angry lady who spoke. She was dressed in all black from her dark pointy shoes to her feathered top hat. If the feathers on her hat weren't enough, the feathered boa she wore around her shoulders were enough to make her resemble a raven. Some tiny part in James's head wondered if she secretly had wings that she covered with that boa or if they were actually wings- when suddenly she swooped down at his eye level and glared him in the eye.

"NO. STOMPING. IN. MY. LIBRARY." She repeated

James nodded slowly. Her nose was literally an inch away from his face and he didn't want to know if her wings sprouted if she got angry, nor did he want to find out.

"Now that's a harpy." James muttered walking away quickly. He snuck a look back to see the bird lady still watching him. He wondered if she had heard him. Daring to look back he saw she had settled back at her desk in the front inspecting a thick blue book.

Finding an empty table, he dropped his bag and pulled out the withering leather book he always carried with him. He stroked the engraved letters carefully. Fleamont Potter. His father had given it to him on his 5th birthday. He opened the book up carefully where it proudly presented his chocolate frog collection. He had been collecting them ever since he was old enough to eat chocolate frogs. He had almost all the famous witch and wizards imaginable...except Grindelwald. Just yesterday he had even gotten a limited edition Celestina Warbeck card with Frank and the day before Peter had offered him one of his six Newt Scamander cards.

But the Grindelwald card was still missing.

Stupid Sirius. Stupid Lily. Stupid chocolate frog cards. In a fit of anger, he picked up the book and threw it as far as he could. It made a loud sound as it hit the floor- or so he thought.

He looked towards the Harpy lady instinctively but she was preoccupied with a Ravenclaw who was checking out books.

"Rude much?" a girl with dark chestnut hair bent down and picked up his book that had hit her squarely in the back. "What did the book ever do to you? Honestly- oh my god wait- are these all-chocolate frog cards? This is amazing!"

He looked up at her, amazed that she wasn't angry at him. Her robes showed the Gryffindor lion like his, so he figured she was a first year as well.

She looked at him quizzically. "You're names not Fleamont is it? I mean no offense it sounds sort of old-not that that's a bad thing-"

"No," James shook his head quickly to explain. "That's my dad. I'm James."

"Oh, so you're James Potter" She said her name with a frown, and he wondered why. People usually fawned over the Potter name.

"Yeah." James muttered quietly. He was too annoyed to ask her why she didn't look happy after hearing his name. "That's me."

"I'm Mary." She grinned and started looking over the chocolate frog cards. James was taken aback at her forwardness and that she had proceeded to take a seat next to him fawning over his chocolate frog collection.

"Oh my god tell me that's not a limited edition Gwenog Jones card! I've been looking everywhere for her! My collection isn't nearly as big as yours of course but I do collect a few that I like. How did you ever get one?"

She said all this very fast and had taken out the card from its plastic casing to inspect it further- careful not to damage it though. James blinked and let out a small smile. At least she wasn't mad at him for throwing the book at her.

"Frank and I collect them." James grinned; his anger quite evaporated now. He pulled the book towards him and looked at the card with a new fascination. "I actually have two of her. There's actually a very funny story about how we got her- but Frank would kill me if I told you." James laughed fondly at the memory of Frank soaking in toilet water. "What I really want is a Grindelwald card though. They're super rare but worth it.

"Gellert Grindelwald?" Mary repeated. Her eyed widened suddenly and she pulled out her bag and promptly began throwing things out.

James looked at her curiously as she pulled out a battered copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, a couple of sugar quills, chocolate frog wrappers, A large purple book with what seemed to be fairytales, a round dream catcher looking thing and a pair of purple glasses.

"You wear glasses?" He asked incredulously. He thought he was the only one in his year to wear the horrid things.

The girl nodded, embarrassed. "Yeah. I don't like them much, but my mum says if I don't wear them, I'll never be able to see."

She put them on quickly and peered into her bag before tuning it upside down and letting the rest of the contents fall. James was amazed at the amount of candy wrappers that it held when suddenly in the midst he saw something better.

He snatched up the Grindelwald card and gasped. "No way!"

Mary nodded. "I got it yesterday. You can probably tell by all the wrappers. I eat a lot."

James was still looking at the card in amazement.

"It's yours if you want."

He looked up at her and cocked his head. "Really?"

She nodded. "Yeah. I don't want him anyway. But" he looked up surprised. "But?"

"You have to tell me why you made Lily mad."

"Lily Evans?" He asked. "How do you know her?"

"She's my best friend." Mary responded. "And for some reason you made her very very angry and sad- it's confusing and she won't tell me why and I just need to know why you did whatever it is you did."

"I-" James started at loss for words. Of all the people to bump into at the library it had to be Lily Evan's best friend.

"Here," James flipped through the pages urgently and found the Gwenog Jones card he was looking for. "You can have it. But please don't ask me anything else."

Mary grinned and took the card. "You're really giving me this? Are you sure?" he nodded.

With that she kissed the card, stuffed everything back into bag, wrappers and all, and gave him a breathless thank you before skipping out of the library humming to herself.

Needless to say, when James arrived at the Great Hall that evening for dinner, he was in very high spirits.

"You're happy." Frank pointed out through a mouthful of shepherds pie.

"Am I?" James pulled the buttered rolls to him. "Maybe it's because I got...this!"

He pulled out the Grindelwald card with a flourish and showed Frank who dropping his spoon and whispered. "How?

"Some girl gave it to me. Mar- ah forget it." James shook his head and looked at Frank. "Frank, we're almost there. We just need to find the Diggle card and-"

"First let's get the Orun the Orblock card, I think Louis might have one but he wants the Silver Knight card in return, so I don't know. If we go through it we'd have all the silver edition cards minus four. Do you think it's too much?"

"Ta da!" Remus interrupted taking a seat next to James. "Look what I just got from Loius!"

"But Remus," Frank insisted eyes wide "The Silver Knight card is rare! It's not worth it for Orun the Orblock! James and I were about to try to get it another way!"

"Relax." Remus grinned pocketing the card carefully in his shabby robes. "I can drive a hard bargain. I gave him a Adalfbert Wiggle and a Bertie Bott card instead."

"Let me see!" Remus carefully took out the card and handed it to Frank who whooped with glee. "James take a look at this, it's even better in real life. Mate, did you see that? It winked- it definitely did. Remus-did you see it? James?"

But James wasn't looking at it. He was looking across the table where Lily Evans was crying. The box he had opened in her room was sitting on the table in front of her and she was looking at it with red rimmed eyes.

She looked towards him angrily before picking up the box and storming out of the Great Hall. James felt bad all of a sudden as he looked down at his new chocolate frog card. He had gotten his card, but Lily Evan's was still mad at him. And for some reason that bothered him.