Spilt Milk
Chapter two: A good thrashing
"Psst! Lily!" Lily Evans looked up from her charms assignment, one of the girls from her dorm room was leaning over and gesturing to her. Lily leaned forward with a quick glance at the turned back of professor Flitwick.
"What is it, Emily?"
"Don't look now – but someone's making eyes at you!" her friend said with a tiny giggle as she moved back and pretended to be working. Lily's bright green eyes flickered over to James. He was busy working. It was almost automatic, the fact that her gaze was draw to him – even if he was an arrogant prat he did flirt with her the most and she was used to his advances. In fact she was a little bit hurt that it wasn't him who was staring. It was the Pettigrew boy.
Peter looked away instantly, it was a guilty movement but he had never really been good at this sort of thing. Lily was beautiful though, long rich, auburn hair with a slight curl to it and such startling emerald eyes. Peter had liked Lily for a long time, even longer than James had. But he had never had a girlfriend, and he was far to shy to actually approach her or anything.
"Wormtail – hey!" Sirius hissed, interrupting Peter's thoughts. "Do you have a piece of parchment I can borrow?"
Peter handed it to him wordlessly and watched as Sirius created some sort of bird out of the folded paper. He then proceeded to tap it with his wand and send it flying over to James. Everyone knew that Sirius has runaway from home that summer, he was kind of living with the Potters and he didn't have that much money so he didn't have all the supplies he needed. He was far too proud to ask for help – he just borrowed everything he needed.
"Hello there Lily flower! Having a good day?" Sirius asked, draping one arm around Lily's shoulders and grinning idiotically – which was actually quite charming. James came up on her other side followed closely by Peter and Remus.
"I was…" Lily replied teasingly as she peeled Sirius's arm off her.
"So let's go out on Friday? Sneak into Hodsmeade for a romantic mug of butter beer…" James said placing his arm around her shoulders in Sirius's place. Lily ducked under it and shook her head,
"I don't think I could fit in a room with you and your big head, James." And she turned into the library.
"Face it mate, she's never going to go out with you." Sirius said as the passed a group of giggling fifth years. James chose not to reply to this light hearted comment, it was closer to the truth than he liked to admit.
"Is she going out with anyone?" Peter asked casually.
"No, I don't think so…" James answered.
"Actually, she's just started dating that Spinnet boy in Ravenclaw, the seventh year." Remus murmured, his nose stuck in a book about space travel. James and Peter stopped dead in their tracks and it took a moment for Remus to notice. "What? Emily Brown told me in muggle studies this morning."
"Spinnet, eh?" James said, starting up again and pretending like he didn't care. "What's he like then? Another bookie prefect type? Or just a plain smart kid?"
Peter finally caught up to them, "Is he good looking?"
"He's really smart, hardly has to study at all – and he's a real gentlemen from what I hear. Maybe a bit too on the proud side, but he'd never act that way in front of Lily or any girl for that matter." Remus continued, the majority of his attention back in the book.
"Ugh…" James said, lacing his fingers together behind his head.
"And I thought I was girl crazy!" Sirius muttered, "At least I never get involved with their boyfriends too! Expelliarmus!"
Nearby, Severus Snape, a greasy haired sixth year Slytherin lost his wand as it soared into the air and towards Sirius, who caught it. The other boy scowled, his upper lip curling unpleasantly.
"Trying to curse us unawares, eh you ugly git?" Sirius snapped, well aware of the fact that other students in the halls were slowing and watching the confrontation.
"Give me back my wand Black!" Snape hissed.
"Hah, why should I?" Sirius toyed with the wand, a lazy expression on his face – only his eyes were alert and hateful. "Maybe we should just drop it off this balcony… let you run down to the dungeons and get it."
Remus and Peter were quite still as they watched, James on the other hand stepped up beside his best friend. Snape was practically snarling now.
"The ickle grease monkey has no wand… well, doesn't that suck?" James said with a laugh. Snape made a very rude comment about what James could suck and Sirius lunged forward, tossing his and Snape's wands back to Remus, he used his body weight to slam the Slytherin in to the stone wall.
"I'm going to thrash you like a dog!" Sirius said grinning menacingly, the irony was not lost on him – though perhaps on Snape – the Gryffindor punched him in the gut until he doubled over. James shoved him down onto the stone floor.
"JAMES POTTER!" a shrill voice called out. Everyone turned, the crowd had disappeared at the first signs of a serious fight. Lily Evans, clutching her books to her chest, was running towards them. "Oh, god…" She murmured, dropping her things and falling to Snape's side. Remus and Peter stayed back, staring rather uncertainly at Lily. James looked thoroughly embarrassed and a little worried – not about Snape of course, but about his chances with the Evans girl. Sirius on the other hand, didn't look in the least guilty, in fact he looked a touch annoyed.
"I cannot believe you!" Lily shouted, as Snape sat up and swatted her hand away, her green eyes livid. The Gryffindor prefect jumped to her feet and jabbed her finger in James's chest, making him take a few stumbling steps backwards. "You are an awful person and you haven't a shred of decency in you! I can't believe I ever thought I might like you! You're a just an arrogant, stuck up, selfish bully! I want nothing more to do with you!"
James had become very pale, and his dark eyes were wide behind his glasses. He seemed to be at a complete loss for words. Lily, it seemed, didn't expect or want a response. She turned to give the other boys an equally fierce look before literally dragging Severus off and snatching his wand from Remus. The four Gryffindor boys stood dumbstruck in silence. Finally Sirius spoke,
"I reckon we shouldn't have let her catch us…" His eyes were on James. No one said anything, James was staring hard at the floor. After a while he just sort of walked off. Sirius made to go after him but Remus caught him by the sleeve and shook his head. Sure, James Potter was a joker and a laugh, but he also seemed pretty serious about Lily.
"I'm going to go return these…" Peter said softly, he was holding all of Lily's discarded books. He took turned and left Sirius and Remus standing alone in the deserted hallway. After a while Sirius said,
"Come on, let's go down to the hall and eat. Lunch won't be over for another twenty minutes…"
AN: Oooh look! It's continued! I love writing this… it's so fun! Ah, but it's always fun to write about these guys… Anyway, we'll see what happens now won't we? I guess I better figure that out as I'm writing this… O.o;;
Disclaimer: don't own anything.
