Catch Me If You Can
Chapter Fifteen ll Wizard Of Oz
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"Mum, can I please go to the movies?" Lily yelled as she thundered down the stairs.
Rose was chopping up cottage cheese and carrots whilst humming when her daughter walked in, "Mum?"
"Hmm?" Chop, chop, chop.
"Can I please go to the movies?" Lily asked again.
"Yes, sure you can, dear," Rose complied, scraping the diced carrot into a bowl, "Who are you going with?"
"I'm flying solo this time," the redhead said, stealing a piece of cheese from the cutting board.
"By yourself? That's never fun. Why don't you ask Pet to accompany you?"
"Because..." Lily sighed, as she chewed on the cheese, "She's with Rinatta."
"You know, I don't feel quite safe leaving Pet around with that girl anymore -- Rinatta has changed, you know--" Rose started to say.
"Mum, you chat with dad about these things," Lily interrupted impatiently.
"Oh, alright, alright. Why don't you cross over and invite James?"
Lily frowned, "Mum, you know how I feel about him--"
"--and I think it's a pity you two can't learn to get along," Rose cut in scathingly, emptying the carrot skins into the bin, "Now you march next door right at this moment and ask him."
"Yes, sir," Lily said, turning around and rolling her eyes.
"I saw that."
"No you didn't."
"True, but I knew you did it anyway," Rose called after her daughter, smiling.
Lily marched out of her house, down the front stops, down the path, across the pavement, up the Potter's driveway, and onto their porch.
She pushed their doorbell.
The door opened almost immediately and James' cautious face peered out.
"Inferno!"
Lily rolled her eyes, "I'm going to the movies, and my mum ordered me, yes, ordered me to invite you along."
James stared at her.
He blinked.
She blinked.
"Well?" she finally prompted.
"What's a movies?" he asked with the innocence and brain capacity-look of a three-year-old.
"It's quite cool," Lily said slowly, "And enjoyable. So are you in it?"
"In what?"
"Never mind," with a sigh, she turned on her heel and started down the driveway.
"Oi Inferno! Red Fire! Lily! Lily!" James yelled after her, "I'm coming to whatever it is!"
"Hurry up then! You'll need Muggle money. I'll meet you out here in five minutes," Lily yelled back, feeling strangely happy that he was coming along.
She turned around and caught his confused nod.
Six minutes later, the two were walking towards the mall. It was in considerable walking distance. James seemed confused, but he obviously didn't mind too much as there was LILY to guide him.
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When they finally reached the mall, Lily took charge. First things first.
Every soldier must crawl on their stomach.
Or something like that.
"Let's have lunch first," she advised, heading to the Food Court.
"Wait a second. Where are we?" asked the poor, lost James.
"This is where Muggles do their shopping," Lily explained slowly and clearly, "It's like Diagon Alley, except this is one big building."
"Oh. Pretty cool," James said, his eyes averting towards a vacuum shop, "Oooh... my... what's that?"
"Uhh, never mind," Lily grabbed his arm absently and started to drag him away.
When they found a table in the Food Court, they began to bicker away on what to eat.
"Look, we're both getting burgers and fries and there's nothing you can do about it!" Lily said finally.
"But I want ice cream," James whined.
"Fine! You'll get your bloody ice cream!"
"I don't want blood-flavoured ice cream," he replied contritely, "Make it vanilla with caramel sauce."
"Oh, shut up!" Lily shot back to a grinning James, "Stay here, alright?"
"Alr--"
"Lily? Lily!"
Lily whirled around and saw Kaitlin Munroe, a sort-of-friend of her's from primary school.
"Kaitlin? Wow, hi!" she said chirpily, genuinely pleased to see her.
"Hi Lily! It's really great to see you again," Kaitlin said with a beam. Her eyes slid sideways to James, "Who's this?"
"Oh, this is James. He goes to my -- uhh -- high school."
"Cool. Hi, I'm Kaitlin."
"James."
Lily looked from one to the other, feeling awkward.
"I've brought two of my high school friends here as well," Kaitlin suddenly said. As if right on cue, two girls walked over. One was tall and slim, with long straight black hair and blue eyes. She had a sort of sullen look to her, but had a nice smile. The other girl was Italian with brown hair and eyes, and olive skin.
"Claudia and Laura," Kaitlin introduced, "You two, this is Lily and her boyfriend, James."
Lily stared at her.
Then she looked at the two girls.
Then she looked at James.
He was staring at her oddly.
"He's not my dog," was all Lily could manage to say.
All three girls and James cried, "What?!" at the same time.
Lily shook her head, "I mean, he's not my boyfriend. He's just a friend. Or a mere accquataince."
"Oh, sorry," Kaitlin said with a giggle, "Ready for lunch?"
So Lily and James were joined by the three girls. James got his vanilla ice cream with caramel sauce, though at first he was afraid Lily was going to get him icky blood ice cream. She had certainly threatened to!
It became noticed by Lily that Kaitlin and Claudia were both flirting with James. It annoyed her in some ways. Laura was a nice girl, rather like Paige, and talked to Lily happily.
"Wow, your high school's actually a boarding school?" Laura asked, looking amazed.
"Yup. It's a really neat place," Lily said with a smile.
After eating, Kaitlin asked, "So what were you two planning to do after lunch?"
"Watch a movie," Lily said, slurping her milkshake in a way that would've been disgraceful to Petunia.
"Really? So were we," Claudia said at once.
Kaitlin smiled but Laura looked puzzled.
"I thought we were going to go shop--" she started to say, but was cut off by Kaitlin.
"What movie are you going to watch?"
"Ummm..." Lily glanced at James warily, "The Wizard of Oz, I suppose."
"Just like us!" Claudia said enthusiastically.
Laura glanced at her sideways, "You said you'd seen it and hated it."
"Did not."
"Quiet, you two," Kaitlin said loudly, "Let's go to the cinema!"
"Well, I'm not going," Laura said stubbornly, "Because I was under the impression that we were going to go shopping. Well, I am going shopping, and I hope you'll have an absolutely lovely time watching the movie you claimed you hated. Goodbye Lily and James, it was nice meeting you."
With that, the short girl turned on her heel and walked off briskly.
Lily and James stared after her. Kaitlin grabbed his arm imaptiently, "Don't mind her. We can have fun without her!"
"Errm -- yeah," James said distractedly, trying to pry her arm off his arm with his other hand. But that got grabbed by Claudia as well. The two girls dragged him towards the cinemas.
Lily sighed and followed.
"Okay, James and I will get the refreshments. Kaitlin, you and Lily get the tickets," Claudia requested -- no, ordered. Lily looked at her warily. What was with people ordering others today?
Claudia's head was laid on James' shoulder and she was hugging his arm pretty tightly. James caught Lily's eye and gave her a "help me" look.
Pity got the better of her. With a resigned sigh, she said, "Why don't you and Kaitlin get the tickets, and James and I will get the refreshments?"
James gave her a quick smile.
"Just friends, huh?" Claudia said nastily, glaring at the redhead down her nose, "Why don't we let James choose?"
Well, honestly, Lily had never felt more insulted in her life.
"Lily," the Potter boy said at once, devout relief shown on his face. He took her arm and steered her over to the refreshment counter.
"Thanks," he said breathlessly.
Lily hid a smile, "It's alright." Secretly, she was glad he had chosen her.
Ha! Lily -- one. Claudia -- zilch.
She bought some candy, two maxi boxes of popcorn and four Cokes. Reluctantly, they wandered back to Kaitlin and Claudia, who had the tickets. Claudia was still shooting Lily some pretty nasty looks.
They went into the cinema. Because Claudia insisted, she sat beside James. But because James also insisted he sat beside Lily. So it was like Lily, James, Claudia and Kaitlin.
Kaitlin wasn't happy with this arrangement, because, "I don't like sitting next to the aisle."
Too bad.
When the movie started, the general, quiet murmur disappeared and everyone paid attention to the screen. That is, everyone but James. With one glance at the huge-moving-thingy-that-had-pictures-on-it, he turned away and began to experiment with the Muggle candy.
Lily's green eyes were glued onto the screen as she absently passed the box of popcorn to James. He took it and looked at it warily. It was too dark so he couldn't make out what it was.
So he stuck his hand in and pulled out a handful of soft stuff. Curiously, James put some in his mouth and chewed on it cautiously.
Hmm... so Muggles actually have popcorn. Well that's one thing we have in common.
James handed the box back, then looked around in a bored manner. He tried watching the "movie thing", but it seemed utterly boring to him. His eyes got used to the darkness and fell onto the bottle of something in his cup holder.
Picking it up, he stared at it. He had the distinct feeling it was staring back.
A staring contest, ay? This -- means -- war!
Ten minutes later, Lily bestowed a cautious glance over to James, who had been staring very intently at his bottle of Coke for about fifteen minutes.
"Potter, what are you doing?" she whispered, taking a gummi bear and putting it in her mouth. She noticed Claudia shooting her a dirty look.
James snapped out of his contest at once, "Err -- nothing. What's this?"
"It's a Muggle drink called Coca Cola, but people call it Coke for short. It's fizzy and prone to make you burp, but it's still nice," Lily explained peaceably, giving her usual-odd-view of things. She settled back in her chair and lost herself in the movie.
James stared at her. Then he looked back at the "Coke". He put his hand on the cap and tried to unscrew it, but ended up dropping it on the floor instead. Panicking slightly, he leant forward and tried to see where it had gone. Through the darkness, he distinctly saw the outline of the bottle rolling... rolling...
Down the aisle!
James leapt up suddenly, causing Lily to yell as he shoved his elbow in the box of popcorn (which was sitting in her lap) and causing it to tip over.
"Sorry!" he whispered loudly, squeezing past her and tearing after his bottle, which was still rolling down the stairs to the front of the cinema.
When he finally retrieved it, he triumphantly straightened up and was bedazzled at the many rows of seats. Uncertainly, James began to climb back up the stairs, keeping an eye out for red hair. He saw Lily waving a few rows up, and made his way back.
"That was scary," he whimpered, sliding back into his seat. Claudia smiled at him and patted his arm.
"It's alright, you're safe now," she simpered, lying her head on his shoulder.
On the other side of him, Lily let out a snort of sarcastic laughter.
Shooting her a scathing look, James defiantly unscrewed the cap of the Coke.
You all know what happens to a bottle of Coke when it's been shaken up -- or has been violently tossed around.
"Uh oh," he murmured as the liquid started to dribble down the sides, "Uhhh -- Lily?"
"Shh! This part looks good."
"But--"
"SHH!"
James helplessly glanced around, feeling the fizzyness ooze down his hands.
"What's the matter?" Claudia asked, her voice full of concern. She rested her hand on James' leg, causing him to jump in his panic and shock, causing him to let go of his bottle of Coke, and causing that to come contact with Claudia's head.
Swearing loudly, Claudia screamed afterwards as the Coke splashed on her.
"SHHH!" several angry people hissed at her.
"Sorry," James said sheepishly. Lily was obviously trying not to laugh.
Kaitlin and Claudia left to the ladies' room, to James' somewhat relief.
"You know, that wasn't a really smart move," Lily tried to say with a straight face.
"Yeah right," James scoffed, "We both know it was an excellent move."
When the girls returned, James had already moved onto experimenting the candy. He reached for the first packet.
He held it up so that some light could shine on it. He made out the word, "Skittles".
Tearing the packet apart, he took one single little coloured ball and chewed on it contentedly.
And we get a thumbs up from Mr. Potter.
But still... no special effects. It was kind of boring.
Muggle candy... sure it tastes nice, but it's so BORING.
He had a try of the Hubba Bubba bubblegum, but it was definitely no match for Drooble's. The chocolate frogs were so... still and lifeless. The lollipops were alright, but awfully boring just like the Skittles-thingies. Something called gummi bears and jelly babies tasted properly awful to James. They reminded him of medicine.
After that, he tried holding a conversation with Lily but she shushed him every time he opened his mouth. Left to entertain himself, James pulled out his backpack and took out Chocolate Frogs (the REAL thing) and a package of Bertie Bott's Beans.
Lily didn't seem to notice.
When James had finished eating some good ol' Wizard candy, he offered a dirt- and bogie-flavoured bean to the unsuspecting Kaitlin and Claudia. They were about to accept them when--
"Potter!" Lily hollered in a whisper, grabbing his arm and inspecting the beans, "Don't you dare give them those!"
"They deserve a treat, Red Fire," James said sweetly.
"No Wizard candy, James," she said seriously. He knew it was rare for her to call him by his first name, so he reluctantly complied and put away the beans.
But ten minutes, James couldn't resist offering a Chocolate Frog to Claudia. Lily caught him in the act and grabbed his hand again, this time not letting go. This suited him perfectly fine.
When the movie finally ended, James couldn't have been happier. Spending about two hours cooped up in a dark place, sitting in the same spot and eating boring candy had now replaced James' idea of hell.
"Oh, that was a good movie," Lily said happily, as they filed out of the cinema.
"No it's not; it was boring."
"That's because you didn't even watch it," Lily said with a frosty sigh. James just smiled at her jerkily.
After a frosty, practical and a little too intimate goodbye with Kaitlin and Claudia, Lily and James left the mall and walked back home. Lily talked about how wonderful the movie was, and James listened just to keep her happy.
When they reached their houses, they had an awkward goodbye before returning to their families.
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---->A/N: Preeeeeeeetty cool! --MSQ.