James' owl, Flutterby (name courtesy of Sirius Black), came into the hall and neatly dropped the Newspaper down onto the table in front of him, narrowly missing his orange juice. He picked it up quickly and scanned the headlines, trying to find something about Voldemort. When he found nothing, he dropped the paper back down on the table, ignoring curious eyes that watched him worriedly.
Remus and Sirius walked into the hall and sat down either side of James. "Good morning Jamsey-boy," Sirius said cheerily.
"Don't call me Jamsey-boy," James said, concentrating hard on his cereal.
"Sure thing Pot-head," chirped in Remus.
"Don't call me Pot-head."
Sirius picked up the newspaper. "So… anything interesting happening in the witchy world?"
"No."
Remus and Sirius' attempts to get James talking failed. They kept trying, but nothing worked much to their disappointment.
James stood up. So did Sirius and Remus. "Where you going, Jamsey-boy?" Sirius asked.
"Don't call me Jamsey-boy. It's Saturday, I'm gonna go down to Hogsmede."
"Ok, Pot-head, we'll come with you."
James sighed. He wasn't a two-year-old, he could look after himself. "Don't call me Pot-head. I don't mind going on my own…"
"Shush. We're coming with you. Besides, I need to stock up on my jokes. Zonkos calls us!"
So, reluctantly, James headed down to Hogsmede with Sirius and Remus. When they were in Zonkos, James realised something. "Hey, where's Wormtail?"
Sirius shrugged. "Dunno."
"He'd already gone when we were up. We assumed he'd come down for breakfast."
James nodded. "I'm gonna wait outside ok?" Sirius and Remus nodded and James made his way outside. He looked up at the sky. It was quite dark. It was nearly February but it was still snowing. He held his hand out and caught a flake. He stared at the flake for a while and then blew it off his hand. He sighed and put his hands in his pockets. He looked down at the ground and frowned. "Found an interesting spot?" sounded a familiar voice.
James' heart leapt and he slowly lifted his head up. "Hey Lily," he breathed, staring at the familiar redhead who stood before him. Even more beautiful in James' eyes, Lily stared awkwardly at him.
"Lily, are you..." James stopped. He couldn't just ask her if she was ok. Not after what he'd done. "So how's..." No. He couldn't exactly ask how Freddie was, could he? They'd most probably broken up. James laughed aloud. "This is hard."
"Good." Lily was smirking. "James - was it totally stupid that we broke up?"
James narrowed his eyes and looked away. "No."
Lily's smile faded. "So you're still pretending to yourself that you don't love me, huh?"
James closed his eyes painfully. Yes. Yes. Yes...
"No problem," Lily said shakily. "Maybe when you come to your senses and realise that I'm the one thing that's missing from your miserable little life, it will seem stupid and pointless."
James opened his eyes to see Lily turning away. He grabbed her hand instinctively and pulled her round, kissing her firmly on the lips. It was a short kiss, but when he moved away and looked into Lily's eyes, he could see the passion and sadness in her eyes. "James - what..."
"Lily, there's something I should probably tell you..."
"What is it"? Lily said, still shaky from the kiss, a reminder of how miserable she was without James.
"I…" James faltered. No, he was weakening. He'd already promised himself never to put this massive fear onto Lily's shoulders. He looked away from her, which was always the most painful thing he ever had to do. Look away from the one person he loved most in the whole world, and the one person he couldn't be with.
James looked up again and took one step towards Lily, reaching out a hand to touch her cheek. Lily flinched away, not looking at him. Ouch. James took a step back. "I'm sorry," he said.
Lily looked back into his eyes. "What did you have to tell me?"
James sighed. No, resist, resist… One of the seven deadly sins – never give in to temptation. But then again, thought James, this isn't exactly a very godly setting we're in right now, is it? A dark lord wanting my death in the middle of a magic-learning world. After fighting with himself for a bit, James gave in, and moved so swiftly towards Lily that she didn't have time to back away before his mouth softly met hers, their lips entwining together in a soft dance. Lily tried to stop it, but her mind didn't want to. She wrapped her arms around James' neck, playing her fingers around his messy hair. She had forgotten how good this felt. Though, usually, James' kisses felt more fiery, more furious and playful, as if he knew he'd have her forever and wanted to enjoy it. This kiss felt more like a heartbreaking goodbye.
James pulled back gently, touching his forehead against Lily's. "I'm sorry…I'm sorry that I told you I didn't love you, I'm sorry I lied to you, I'm sorry I left you, I'm sorry I handled it badly, I'm sorry I let Freddie find out, I'm sorry…"
"Don't be sorry," Lily said urgently. "You don't need to be sorry. Just let me be with you again."
At this James stepped back, putting a finger to his eye, brushing away what appeared to be a tear. "And I'm sorry that I can't tell you why I have to leave now."
Lily bit her lip, and slowly moved away. James watched her go, knowing that that would truly be the last time he would ever kiss her. Lily Evans, his love. James turned to see Remus and Sirius standing at the sorr of Zonkos, apparently extremely interested in what they'd just bought. James smiled. He knew that they'd just seen everything. Remus and Sirius looked up and smiled. It looked like a smile of sympathy, although of course it was supposed to look like a happy, mischievous smile. "You ready to go?" James asked, trying his hardest not to look miserable.
"Wanna see what I got?" asked Remus excitedly, and James was reminded of a few years ago when they all used to be so young and naïve; blowing up toilets, pranking enemies, laughing at people – just for the joy of having fun. James hadn't had that kind of fun for a long time now. He walked over to Remus and looked into his hands, seeing some deep-purple marbles glinting in his hands.
"What are they?" James asked, pretending to be really interested.
"They're marbles," Remus answered innocently.
Sirius laughed. "Yeah. They're just marbles. Really."
James raised an eyebrow and picked up a marble from Remus' hand, examining it carefully. After a few moments he grinned. "Yeah. I got it. You roll them along the ground like ordinary marbles, and when they hit another one they explode and flour blows up out of them." He chucked the marble back into Remus' hand. "Am I right?"
Remus laughed. "Never could fool our Prongs could you?"
The boys laughed together and headed towards the Three Broomsticks. Suddenly James had an idea –
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Severus Snape and Lucius Malfoy were sitting in their common room, staring at each other.
"Don't think you'll defeat me, Severus," Lucius said dangerously, eyes narrowed and unblinking.
Severus laughed shortly, and said, somewhat less deviously, "Are you kidding me, Lucius? I haven't lost a single staring contest for five years."
"Well, that is all about to change…"
The two seventh-year boys continued to stare at each other for quite some time; neither would give up unless something made them. It was in their Slytherin blood to not give up and to succeed. But it was just a staring contest for Merlin's sake!
Keel and Raven entered the room and walked over to where Lucius and Severus were sitting. "Hey guy," said Keel. When no response came from the two starers, Keel and Raven exchanged amused glances. "You're not having another one of your little staring contests are you?"
After a short hesitation of not wanting to answer, Severus said, "They're not little. This is serious."
"Oh Salazar… What are you betting this time?" asked Keel.
"A fortnight's homework," Lucius answered.
Raven laughed. "Yeah, well that's ok for you, Lucius, but I think having you do Severus' homework isn't going to get him very good marks!"
"If I lose, I have to get him at least a B in his grades or he'll kill me."
"And how the hell are you going to get him at least a B?" asked Keel laughing.
"…Be quiet."
Raven bent forward and gave Severus a light kiss on his cheek. "See you later Sev," she said, walking away to her dormitory. Keel sat down somewhere between his two best friends so that he could keep an eye on them but so that he wouldn't get in the way of their match. Keel heard something. It sounded like a cough. "Hey, did you hear…"
"Shush! I must maintain absolute concentration!" said Lucius firmly.
"Wow – your vocabulary's been extended. What did you do Lucius – read a book?" Severus sniggered.
Keel shrugged away his feeling of unease and picked up a book which he had earlier left on the table. He began to read it, unaware that there was anyone else in the room besides him and Lucius and Severus.
A marble rolled along the floor and stopped at exactly the point right in between where Severus and Lucius were sitting. At exactly the same time, the two boys looked down, breaking their current match. After a pause, Severus said, "Where the hell did that come from?"
Keel leaned forward with his eyes narrowed. Out of the top of his eye, he saw another marble appear from nowhere and roll towards them. It slowly came towards the other marble and hit it. "What the…" A huge puff of flour came bursting out of the two marbles; a puff much larger than the human eye would have thought possible for two tiny marbles.
The three Slytherin Boys stood in horror. "What the hell is all this stuff?!" demanded the boys, none of whom had ever been in a muggle kitchen. Raven descended down the stairs to find three white figures standing where her friends had previously been. "…What happened here, then?"
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Remus, Sirius and James burst through the portrait hole, their sides splitting. Everyone in the common room turned to stare at them. "Oh, that was absolutely hilarious!" shouted James
"Did you see the looks on their faces!" laughed Sirius.
"I can't believe they don't know what flour is, dumb Slytherins…"
"What have you three been up to now?" The boys turned to the direction the voice had come from. Lyndsay smiled. "You should've let me come."
The four of them sat down around the fire while Remus told her what they did. "It was so funny," he finished, "-they just looked so stupid, standing there with flour all over them!"
After a few minutes when the hysterical laughter had subsided, Sirius said, "I'm hungry."
"You're always hungry."
"What time is it?"
"Dinner time. Let's go."
Lyndsay bit her lip and purposely avoided looking at James. "Um, yeah – you three go on, I'll see you down there."
"Why?" asked James. "What are you doing now?"
Lyndsay looked at Sirius while she answered. "Lily's having a little nap in her bedroom. She – asked me to wake her when it was time for dinner."
James nodded softly. "Ok," he said quietly. "So – so we'll see you down there then? With – with Lily."
Lyndsay nodded and turned around as quick as lightning, running up the stairs to the girls dormitory. James turned around and followed Remus and Sirius out of the common room.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
a/n: sorry it's taken me soooooo long to write + upload this – I hope people are still actually reading this!!!! Review please : )
