CHAPTER FOUR
"What do I say?" I ask Bertha.
"Just start a conversation, and if you think it feels right, just say it," Bertha says.
Courtney is busily prodding people and trying to annoy them by telling them about her fabulous night with James.
"Just go," Bertha insists, "We'll be right here for you."
"A good lot of use that'll be," I reply bluntly.
I stand up and take a breath. Ok, it can't be that hard to make conversation with a really popular guy, can it?
"Good luck," Martin whispers, and purposely knocks his glass of juice over to distract Courtney from my absence. Good, now he'll have a nice orange stain to go with the white milk stain.
I walk over to James, and tap him on the back.
~*~*~*~*~*
I'm trying to ignore the fact that Lily, what you might call my former crush, is walking in my general direction.
"Don't worry," says Remus, "We don't know that she's heading for us."
"Yes we do," mutters Sirius as Lily taps me on the shoulder.
"Hi guys," she says, well, brightly I guess.
"Hey," says Sirius giving her a wink, "How's it going?"
"Oh, yeah, fine," Lily smiles.
I try to glance discreetly in Courtney's direction again. Bertha is mopping up what looks like juice, and Courtney is freaking over her robes.
"Um, can I talk to you?" Lily says.
"Me?" I say.
"Yeah you," Lily replies.
Ok… this is weird. Lily hates me. She's friends with Sirius and Remus, but me? She thinks I'm like, well, I don't know what she thinks, but I think I'm probably as good as a dead slug to her.
"Ok," I say, standing up.
"Catcha round," grins Sirius.
"Bye," Remus adds lamely.
"C'ya," Lily says before leading me out of the hall.
"So… how was the dance with Courtney?" Lily asks after we're about 100 metres from the hall.
"It was," I pick my words carefully, "Good," I finish.
"So, um, here's the three galleons I owe you," Lily holds out the money.
"Um, no, it's alright, I was only kidding about the money thing," I say.
"Look, it was a deal, so take it," Lily insists, giving me a piercing look with her green eyes.
"No, I'm not going to," I insist, "I just want to thank you for making me take Courtney to the dance. I mean, before that, I never noticed her, but now you've made me realize there a lots of, um, nice people out there."
"Well, she's happy too," Lily adds uncertainly.
"I just, well thanks, she's a nice girl," I say, pausing, before adding, "And tell her it was a nice dress."
Lily glares at me for a moment, and I turn away to escape her eyes.
"I just wanted to say thanks for doing me this favour," Lily says in a forced sort of voice, "And that, um, I guess you're not so bad after all. I mean, you're still too cool for yourself sometimes, but it was nice to do this for me. Friends?"
"Friends," I look at Lily again. Her eyes have stopped blazing.
"Um, tell Courtney that it was a nice dress," I say.
Lily goes red in the face, and her eyes give me a cold look.
"It was my dress! She doesn't even have any dresses, so I had to prepare her! I did everything! I paid you! And what do you do? You kiss her!" Lily shouts at me.
A sudden movement distracts me, and I see Courtney, in tears, running away from behind a pillar. Lily turns too, goes even redder in the face walks away, head held high.
~*~*~*~*~*
Lily's diary
My life is almost over. Courtney heard me talking to James, and now she won't talk to me. It's been a week, and I can't concentrate on anything. Everywhere I go I see Courtney and James. James just throws me a look and Courtney pretends I'm invisible. What do I do? My life is so confusing. When I came to Hogwarts, I swore that these trivial love games would never distract me, and now I am caught in a tangle of friendship troubles. I think Bertha was right, I am jealous. Ok, that's just freaky. I think, oh, I don't know. I need to talk to someone about it. I know, I'll go talk to Martin. Or maybe Sirius or Remus.
~*~*~*~*~*
"Hey Martin."
"Yep," Martin turns around. He's in the middle of attempting to wipe off the stains on his robes.
"Um, do you have time to talk?" I say.
"Sure. It's not like wiping stains off huge embarrassing stains is important," he grins. Very cute.
I start telling him about how I asked James out to the dance for Courtney.
Martin frowns, rubbing hard at his robes.
"Give me that," I say, grabbing the cloth. I pull out my wand and make some soap. I pull, Martin a little closer and start rubbing at his robes. I tell him the whole story and somehow end up in tears. By the end of one hour, I'm crying into him with the cloth limply in my hand and Martin's arm around me.
"It's alright. Ok, it's not, but it will be. James is just, well, a dickhead," Martin murmurs.
"Yeah," I sniff, "That just about sums it up."
Martin pulls me off his shoulder, now wet with tears. "It's late, you should get some sleep," he says.
"Yeah, sorry," I say.
"S'alright," he grins, and walks me to the dormitory stairs.
"Thanks," I say weakly.
"What are friends for," Martin gives me a hug, "Night."
"Night," I say, and turn round and walk up the stairs feeling much better.