Chapter 5 - ThE rEaL LiLy EvAnS

"Yes, I still love you Lily" James answered in the words I had wished him too. He leant in closer to me and I felt his soft lips brush against mine. We broke apart and I hugged James. I couldn't really believe I was doing all this. A few weeks ago I would have died if I knew this was happening.

"I'm sorry for everything James, I really am," I whispered. James laughed. "I don't find that funny," I scowled.

"Of course you don't. It's just I know you're telling the truth, literally!" James smiled. I blushed. I had forgotten about the veritaserum. I think that might be a bad thing.

"Do you want to take me to the hospital wing now?" I tried to get up. James pondered.

"Well there is more I want to ask you....." He looked away. He knew that it would kill me to tell him more. I have already told him a lot. Just more details he wanted I guess.

"I promise you that after the veritaserum is gone, I'll tell you everything," I put my hands on James's face and moved his face to look at mine. James's black wire-framed glasses were slipping down his nose. His brown eyes devoured my green ones. His lips sat there, soft. I wanted to kiss him again but James moved away and pulled me off the desk.

"Ok," He answered and led me out of the classroom. We walked in silence down the hall and I walked first into the wing.

"Can I ask you something?" I whispered to James before I got the nurse. James nodded, "That you'll always be there for me. No matter what,"

"I promise," James whispered back. He let go of my hand and walked backwards towards the door of the hospital wing. His eyes didn't leave mine until he shut the door and walked away.

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It has been two weeks since I first came to the hospital wing for the veritaserum to wear off. Right now I was waiting for the nurse to come back so I could leave. I got all my homework given to me by either Torah or James and they didn't ask me anything. James did kiss me again. It was a little more passionate than our first. It might have been better if Madam Potts hadn't of come back and we had to stop before we got caught.

I heard the door open to the wing. I saw Madam Potts come in. She was very grumpy for a nurse. Always muttering to herself. She was old, about 50 or so. Gray hair, gray eyes. I felt sorry for her, imagine the only company she has had for the past two weeks is a girl you can't talk to properly.

"Right Miss Evans. Time to test you to see if you won't stop talking truths," Madam Potts growled. I sat up on my bed.

"How many houses are there in Hogwarts' School?" She asked, holding her quill to a piece of parchment. All the questions she had to ask me.

"Four," I answered. Uh oh, that's the RIGHT answer! "Five! Five!" I quickly tried to lie. Madam Potts gave me a weird look.

"Question two. What is your name?" She looked up.

"James Potter," I smiled. Successful.

It didn't take long to lie to all the questions. All went well except that first mess up. I had finally gotten rid of the veritaserum.

I skipped down the halls, holding my clothes, books and any other possessions that I had acquired during my stay in the hospital. I noticed it must be a Hogsmede weekend by the lack of noise around. I finally made it to the Ravenclaw tower.

"Grape Juice," I chirped to the Suit of Armour. It didn't move.

"That was the password two weeks ago," The Armour replied.

"Thanks for nothing," I sighed and sat on the floor. I could be waiting here all day!

"What you doing sitting on the floor Evans?" I heard a voice ask me from behind. I turned my head to see Sirius Black standing behind me. He smiled at me. I jumped up and hugged him.

"It's great to see you again!" I laughed. Then I jumped away like he stung me. What was I doing? Hugging Sirius Black? Sirius looked at me strangely.

"I didn't know you missed me that much!" He laughed. I forced a laugh. I felt so stupid. Sirius still thought I was the fake Lily. I promised James I'd tell him the truth when I was better and I'm going to keep it. I have to make myself my own person.

"Hogsmede," Sirius said to the Suit of Armour and it slowly moved asie to reveal the enterance to the Ravenclaw tower. I looked at Sirius.

"How do you know our password?" I asked as we entered the common room. Like I expected, only first and second years were here, except two seven years who obviously are tired of Hogsmede weekends.

"Well," He started, grinning from ear to ear "Torah and I were 'talking' in the common room (I laughed at this stage) and Professor McGonagall caught us. So now we 'talk' here", Sirius laughed at the memory.

"Where is everyone?" I asked. I couldn't see or hear any of our friends.

"Waiting for you of course. They sent me to check up here. So you going to put your stuff away so we can go?" Sirius asked, smoothing his black hair. I ran up to my dormitory room and dumped my belongings on my bed. I quickly checked myself in the mirror to see if I look alright. I had a thick layer of make-up still on.

"I'm sure he won't mind if I take a second longer," I whispered to my reflection and ran to the bathroom.

I turned on a tap and filled my cupped hands up with water. I closed my eyes and lent forward into the sink, splashing my face with water. I rubbed my face with my hands, trying to remove all the make-up. With my eyes still closed, I groped around trying to find a face-towel. I found it and brought it up to my face, drying it. I opened my eyes and looked at my reflection. It was foundation free but I had mascara and eyeliner running everywhere around my eyes. I rubbed it away and looked again.

"Goodbye Petunia. Hello Lily!"

I quickly brushed my hair and looked at my reflection for the last time. I didn't feel any anger come upon me. What I saw back in the mirror was me. Lily Evans. The Lily Evans with blood-red hair and green eyes. No make-up. Just pure me.

I left my dorm and walked down the stairs. Sirius had his arms folded across his chest, staring at two first years playing a game of exploding snap.

"Come on now Sirius! Where is everyone else?" I asked. Sirius turned and when he saw me, his mouth dropped.

"Lily? Is that you?" He asked jokingly. I walked over to him and punched him on the arm. Sirius tried to punch back but I was already walking towards the door.

"Yes this is me. Where is James and Torah?" I asked as we walked out of the common room. Sirius was still ogling at me.

"Torah finally got you to take off that make-up? You look really-" I cut Sirius off.

"No, it was James. James got me to stop," I corrected him. Sirius coughed.

"James? I don't understand how he'd do that. Oh here we are," Sirius stopped in front of a statue of a humpbacked, one-eyed witch. I stopped in my tracks. I didn't even noticed how far we had walked. Sirius took out his wand and tapped the witch's back.

"Dissendium" Sirius said proudly and statue's back opened into a small passage way. Sirius bowed towards me, "After you Madam"

I crawled into the hole of the statue and slid down until I felt the floor. I stood up to hear Sirius saying quietly, 'Weee'. I laughed when I heard a thump beside me. It was pitch black down here.

"Lumos," Sirius said and held his wand up. I could see we were in a secret passage. I took my own wand out and whispered 'lumos' as well. Sirius and I started to walk along. I had no idea where we were going.

"What are we doing?" I asked after about an hour of walking. The ground started to be rising.

"Meeting James, Torah, Remus and Peter of course," Sirius replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"And where is that exactly?" I asked. I could see stairs ahead. Sirius turned and smiled wickedly at me.

"The Three Broomsticks," Sirius laughed. I sighed.

"Why couldn't we go the normal way?" We started to climb the stairs. I looked up but all I could see were stairs leading away somewhere above me.

"Filch. He closed the gates. Can only get through if you're coming from Hogsmede not Hogwarts. Besides, I'm running low on chocolate frogs," Sirius kept climbing. Now I was very confused.

"What has chocolate frogs got to do with this passage-" Sirius covered my mouth with his hand. I looked at him and he whispered 'Shh' to me. He pointed above his head and I saw a trapdoor. I listened as well. I could hear someone shuffling above me.

"We've run out of cockroach clusters dear!" The footsteps moved away. Sirius opened the trap door an inch and we saw feet moving up another set of stairs. Sirius jumped out, pulled me up and closed the trapdoor. I noticed we seemed to be in a cellar. All around me were crates and boxes full of-

"Sweets!" Sirius smiled. He piled chocolate frogs, peppermint creams, toffees, jelly slugs and more into the pockets of his robes and uniform, "Come on Lily! Take some!" He smiled at me deviously as he threw a chocolate frog at me.

"Isn't this stealing?" I questioned but Sirius ignored me and continued to throw sweets and chocolates in my direction, "Fine!" I sighed and filled my pockets up too. I found a block of my favorite chocolate. Honeydukes' best.

"Are we in Honeydukes?" I asked. Sirius laughed.

"Yep! Now we need to go to The Three Broomsticks!" Sirius took my hand and we sneak up the stairs that led to the shop. We could hear a cash register closing.

"Dear, could you see what that boy is doing near the Unusual Tastes section?" We heard someone say.

Sirius opened the door a fraction. We could see an old man walking down near the front and an old woman bending over near the cash register. We sneaked around the back of the counter and out of the store. My heart was thumping from adrenaline. When Sirius and I left the store, we laughed uncontrollably.

"That was so fun! Let's go find the others! At least we can eat something with them now!" Sirius walked down the street of Hogsmede. I grinned. I was having so much fun. More fun than I ever had when my face was smothered with make-up and I loved to do homework. I couldn't believe being me was this exciting.

We were still laughing when we pushed open the doors to The Three Broomsticks.

"There you are!" We heard someone say. Near the window at a table sat James, Torah, Remus and Peter. Sirius and I walked over. James's mouth dropped when I sat down. I blushed and looked at Sirius. He was giggling and started to pull out sweets upon sweets from his pockets. I copied. Our friends' faces were shocked.

"Where did you get all the money for this?" Torah whispered in awe. Sirius's face cracked into a wicked grin.

"We didn't have any" I replied. Torah's mouth dropped further than James's had.

"Are you saying you stole-" She started. James covered her mouth.

"Shhhh" He said. By the expression on the boys' faces, they must already know about the passage way to the Honeydukes cellar. I opened up a peppermint cream and chewed on it slowly. Suddenly Torah noticed.

"Lily! You're not wearing make-up!" She squealed. I blushed. Now everybody was staring.

"You looked great," Remus said. I smiled at him.

"You're skin looks really healthy," Peter commented. I smiled at thank you to him as well, and passed him a chocolate frog.

"She's looks gorgeous," James said. Everybody looked at him. My stomach did a flip, but it could have been the peppermint cream hopping in there. James didn't look to bad himself; his hair was messy as usual, his skin seemed fine and his chocolate brown eyes were full of warmth. I felt like melting into them.

"Well I'm not so shabby either," Sirius laughed, drawing the attention away from James. Madam Rosemerta came over with a tray holding 6 tankards of butterbeer.

"Here are your drinks. Seems like you have a feast here!" She laughed and whisked away back towards the bar. I pulled my tankard to my lips and drank deeply. I could feel the warmth of the butterbeer go into every part of my body. It felt almost tingling. James stood with his butterbeer and walked around to me.

"Can we talk?" He asked. I nodded and took my tankard and a few chocolate frogs and followed him. We sat down at a two person table at the back of the pub and sipped our butterbeer. James looked at me.

"What did you want to talk to me about?" I asked. I had a feeling I knew what was about to come out of his mouth.

"You"