Chapter 14

The Job and the Fight

          The next day, Lily woke up early in order to see Professor Dumbledore.  The morning was over cast, and a soft rumble from the sky interrupted the otherwise peaceful castle.

          She walked quickly through the hallways, her footsteps echoing heavily around her.  Before long, the stone gargoyle came into view.

          Uh-oh, what was the password?  "Chocolate frogs...no…sugar quills?"  The gargoyle stared at Lily sullenly.  "Ok, honeydukes chocolate?"

          Suddenly, a voice from behind spoke out.  "No, I'm afraid the password is simply 'fudge'" Dumbledore smiled.

          "Oh, I didn't know you were standing there!" Lily exclaimed, clutching her chest. 

          The headmaster chuckled and after opening the passageway, led Lily into his office.  "Now, Miss Evans, what can I help you with?"

          "Well, you know that job that the ministry offered?  Considering my, um, pregnancy, do you think it would still be ok to take it?"

          Dumbledore folded his hands on the wood desk.  "I suppose it would be fine.  You see, it's mostly desk labour, and you could even work at home."

          Lily nodded slowly.  "Ok…that sounds good."  She stood up.  "Thank you very much.  I better head to the Great Hall now."

          She got up and left the office.  It felt better to know that, despite this hardship, she would still be able to avenge her family's death.

          Taking a deep breath and a step into the dining hall, Lily found herself in a war zone.

          "Sirius, why can't you fucking grow up?!?"  Alisa screamed as she stormed past Lily.

          He looked at her with shocked eyes.  "What did I do?" 

          Alisa lowered her voice.  "I've heard from…well, that doesn't matter, I heard that you've been cheating on me."  Her voice trembled with anger.  "I won't be used liked that Sirius Black.

          Lily approached the table slowly.  "What's going on here?" 

          Alisa turned sharply on her heel.  "That scumbag," she spat, "was sleeping with another girl."

          Sirius slammed his fist on the table.  "I was not!  Damn it, who told you that?  I'm going to beat the shit out of them."

          Lizzie and Remus got to their feet and stared cautiously at their friends.  An ominous silence filled the hall as a thunder clap roared above them.

          Looking wildly around the room, Alisa threw up her hands.  "What the FUCK are you all looking at?"

          At that, Professor McGonagall rushed to the scene.  "Miss McBride, please watch your mouth.  Now, is there a problem here?"

          There was a tense moment before Alisa picked up her bag.  "No.  No problem, I was just leaving."

          No one said a word as she marched out of the dining hall, but as soon as she was out of earshot, the entire room exploded with noise.

          Lizzie and Remus sat back down, whispering softly to each other.  Lily simply touched her fingers to her eyebrow. 

          "Sirius…"  She began. 

          He grabbed her wrist.  "You don't believe her do you?  I would never do anything like that."

          Lily closed her eyes in exasperation, "I don't know what to believe, at the beginning of the year it would have been totally possible."

          "Come on Lily, don't be like that!  I've changed!"  Sirius begged.

          "Ok, ok!  The first thing you need to do to sort this all out is find out who started this rumor.  I'm going to talk to Alisa."

          Sirius nodded and Lily walked towards the Gryffindor tower.  Muttering the password to the fat lady, she entered the common room.  In front of the fireplace, Alisa was curled up crying. 

          "Ok, what exactly happened to make you blow up at Sirius like that?"  She asked quietly, walking over to the cushy, red chair.

          Alisa looked at her friend broodingly, "Are you deaf?  I would think that the whole school could have figured it out by now."

          Lily re-thought her question.  "Alright, who told you that Sirius was cheating on you?"

          "Oh no, no you don't!  You are so not getting that out of me!"  Alisa muttered, holding her hands in front of her face.  "The first thing you will do is go and tell Sirius."

          "Don't you think he has a right to know?  I mean, he wants to fix things with you.  Right now, he is out there trying to figure out who this person is…Sirius really likes you and he swears that he has changed."

          There were a few minutes of silence until finally; Alisa wiped a couple of tears from her eyes.  "I don't know, Lily…I do not want to lose him, you know?  And this may sound crazy, but I think…I think I might…love him."

          Lily listened sympathetically.  "Well, why aren't you trying to make things better?  Why are you…just letting him go?"

          Alisa shrugged as tears welled up again.  "Fine, I'll talk to him.  I'll tell Sirius who said he was cheating on me."  She nodded resolutely.  "I just don't think he'll like the answer."

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          That day in Potions class, Lily sat with her friends listening to the grim Professor MacLeod.  She was one that everyone could agree was indeed a good teacher, but put one toe out of line…

          "Now students, please stir the brew in a clock-wise motion.  After precisely two and a half minutes, it will turn a bright, acid green.  When this happens, you may add the hyena's fu…may I help you?"

A small, nervous 3rd year boy entered the room.  "Yes Professor, the headmaster would like to see Lily Evans, Sirius Black, and Remus Lupin immediately."

Startled, the three of them jumped from their seats.  "Is that ok, Professor MacLeod?"

The teacher nodded, "Just study this potion and write a two foot essay on its effects."

Lily, Sirius, Remus followed the younger student out of the room and down the hall. 

"Do you know the way?  And the password?  I've got a lot of other stuff to do…can you make it by yourselves?"  Asked the boy.

Lily nodded and led the others to the stone gargoyle.  Muttering, "fudge," she ushered them on to the revolving staircase and entered the glamorous office.

Seated in front of Dumbledore were Mundangus Fletcher, Arabella Figg, and a mysterious young woman clothed in a black suit/dress.  Her dark hair was pulled into a tight bun and her face looked older with worry than she really was.

Dumbledore stood and motioning towards the three students now entering introduced them to the lady.  "Ms Claymore, this is Sirius Black, Lily Evans, and Remus Lupin.  They are the others who lost their parents to Voldermort."

She smiled gravely, "Nice to meet you, you can call me Marie.  Is this all?"  She asked Dumbledore, he nodded and Marie continued.  "I work for the ministry and would like to talk to you about the job you were offered earlier in the year.  If you choose to accept it, you will be asked to look at riddles and prophecies that have been collected about this present situation.  Once you have figured out the meaning, it will be given to either a special unit of the ministry or an auror depending on the connotation.  You can do your job either in the office or at home, whatever suits you best.  The pay will be generous at about ₤100,000 a year along with the knowledge that you are saving countless muggle and wizard lives."

The students looked thoughtful.  Lily was excited, she had always been good at solving riddles and so the job would be perfect.

Marie opened her black leather briefcase and pulled out several pieces of paper.  "If you are interested in taking the job, take one of these forms and fill it out, then, return in it to Professor Dumbledore who will give it to me.  Any questions?"

Everyone shook their heads, "no" as the young ministry worker handed out the documents.  "Ok, one more thing before I leave, you must hand these in by the day after tomorrow!  See you all soon."

Dumbledore stood up from behind his desk.  "You are excused to lunch.  Thank you very much."

The five students exited the office.  Sirius, Lily, and Remus walking side by side.

"I don't know about you two, but I am defiantly going to take this job."  Spoke Remus.  "But, I think I'm also going to go to school to become a teacher and that salary sure will help."

Lily and Sirius nodded. 

"I don't know, this would be nice, but I wanted to be an auror as well.  It would be so groovy to be out in the field actually seeing the effects of your actions."  Sirius mused.

Lily smiled.  "I know I'm going to accept the offer.  It's perfect for me, something I love to do, with good pay, and considering my condition, well, you know.  Everything just works."

The two boys glanced quickly at the floor, because, after all, they were James's best friends and he was to blame for the baby.

          Remus went off to the infirmary from there since a full moon was approaching and he was already feeling queasy, leaving Sirius and Lily alone to walk to lunch.

          "Hey, did Alisa ever talk to you?"  She asked, now that they could talk privately.

          Sirius's eyes flashed with anger as he clenched and unclenched his fists.  "Yes and I am going to kill him, at lunch, today."

          "Who was it?  She never actually told me anything, just that she would talk to you and stuff."  Lily asked, truly curious.

          They turned the corner into the Great Hall and bumped into a boy with messy brown hair and glasses causing all four students to crash to the floor.

          Sirius glared at his best friend and growled, "James."

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Tee hee hee!  Kind of left a cliff hanger!  Well, not really but yeah!  Well, sorry I haven't written in a LONG time, I just couldn't get into the story for a while and since I'm out of school, my writing skills have gone kapooee and so probably 80% of this chapter really, really sucked!

Anywhoo, thank you all so much for the reviews!  I appreciate them so much!  You all are the greatest and for that, you may pick out a cookie.  Yay for you!

Also, if you can't tell, I lowered the rating because as far as I can see, I just don't write 'R' rated stuff, you know?  But things may heat up later, after school ends…who knows?  I sure as hell don't and I'm the one writing the story!

Buh-bye!  Ta!

---DoOdLeS