A/n: I'm sorry. I really am. However, It's been a crazy two weeks, and will be another crazy two weeks, so I'm trying to write when I can. Trying.

"Now," said Sirius. "I know how you think that potions must be the most boring, useless subject on the face of this planet. However, it is really quite interesting, once you get to know it. I remember, I hated potions with a passion…but that was because I had a boring, crotchety old potions professor who didn't find it amusing when the walls of the Slytherin common room suddenly turned a flamingo coloured pink."

Harry and Hermione both snorted.

"I still can't see why…" said Sirius, half under his breath. "However, he did find it funny when he had to watch James, Remus and I scrape frog entrails off the ceiling of the potions laboratory, while we were serving detention."

Harry and Hermione snorted again.

"Frog…frog…" Harry gasped. He put his head on the desk in helpless laughter.

"How did they get on the ceiling in the first place?" Hermione wondered.

"We fed a filibuster firework to a frog to see what would happen," said Sirius looking dignified. "He didn't seem to find that very humorous, either."

Hermione burst into giggles.

"One of your more brilliant plans, I presume?" she asked.

"Em…you could call it that…" said Sirius.

"What was your worst plan?"

"That would be when we…emm…" Sirius went into a mumble.

"YOU WHAT???" Harry began laughing again.

"Mages," said Sirius. "They always have great hearing. Ugh."

"I can't believe even you would go hang the potions professor by his feet from the candles in the great hall, with a sign proclaiming: 'James, Sirius, Remus and Peter were here.'" Said Hermione

"You got all that?" Sirius looked confused.

"Loud and clear."

"Hmmm…right. Back to Potions."

~**~

"We're not going to work at magical combat yet," said James.

"Just Hand-to-hand combat, first," said Lily.

"So," said Sirius, "Lily better start teaching you the medical charms, because your each going to get your behinds kicked so hard…"

"Stop it, Sirius," said Lily. "There are wards that we put up, so you can't get hurt while you're practicing combative tactics."

"Right," said Hermione, looking pale.

"Alright," said Remus, "now, I want you to make a fist, like you're boxing…"

Harry and Hermione both half-heartedly stuck out their hands.

"God," said James, "we have a lot to do…."

~**~

"Lily," said Hermione. She was up on her bed feeling all together run down. She sat up. "Lily, do you and James even like each other?"

"Of course I do," said Lily. "I love James. Why else do you think I married him?"

"Well, you have a funny way of showing it, that's all."

Lily laughed.

"I suppose so, yes," she said ruefully. "But I guess, well, James and I really hated each other before 6th year. We argued all the time, and I suppose the habit is sort of hard to break. Then Voldemort killed my parents, and his. It was because we were mages, he was trying to get all mages on his side. He also seemed to know that we were going to get married someday and was determined to wear us down."

She paused for a moment, thinking.

"You know, I never really knew what happened. James and I decided that we would be stronger together than we would be apart. So we started talking. Just talking, and after awhile…I just fell in love with him."

"I was 16 when mum and dad died, right before the holidays. I was angry. Angry at the world, angry at having to go to Petunia and her husband's house over the summer. I was thinking about all of the rotten things I could manage to do to Petunia that I could get away with…when James walked into the compartment."

"He and I had been on friendlier terms, after his parents had died, and I knew Voldemort was after mine. So I wasn't all that mad at him when he sat down next to me and said real quietly, 'Lily, I'm really, really sorry about your parents. I really am.'"

"Then he looked at me for a moment, and I looked and him and I said,"

"What?" Hermione was sure they were on the brink of something very romantic.

"I said 'Voldemort is a balmy sadistic twat who didn't get enough love as a child.' James laughed. He laughed so hard he fell off his chair. And then he looked up at me from the ground and said quite cheerfully, 'Lily, I think I'm madly in love with you. Will you marry me?"

"And?" Hermione prompted.

"I looked straight at him and said, 'James Potter, you are a balmy twat who didn't get enough love as a child.'"

Hermione laughed.

"He laughed and said, 'And I'll continue not getting enough love with you around! But please. Will you think about it?'"

"I didn't need to think about it. I said 'yes, you balmy twat.' And that was the end of that."

"You were sixteen?" Hermione asked, slightly horrified.

"Yeah," said Lily, slightly dreamily. "I didn't need to think about it. James and I needed each other, loved each other. So…we got married right out of Hogwarts…you should have seen the look on Petunia's face when I walked up to her at the train station that day and said, 'I'm getting married, and I'm going over to my fiancée's house for the summer. Bye!' She nearly fainted."

"She deserved the shock," said Hermione firmly. "She deserved a lot more than that."

"Yes, I suppose she did," said Lily smugly, "Which is just what she got, when I went to go visit."

~**~

A/N: Sorry this is so short. I'll try to get the next chapter out quickly. In the mean time, read Miss (Mr) Congeniality by Up. To. No. Good. Wolfiegrl and I are writing it!