FIRST DAY BACK
After they all finished eating, the third-year Gryffindors went to their first class, Charms. "Welcome back, class. Oh, yes. I see our new student is in this class. Mr. Potter, my name is Professor Flickwit." the tiny teacher said from his pile of books. "Now class, today we are going to learn a new charm. It's the Summoning Charm. Usually, it is taught in fourth year, but this class is especially advanced. Mr. Potter, if you are in need of assistance, just ask Miss. Evans over here." Professor Flickwit said, magically distributing various items around the class. "Now class, the charm is 'Accio'. Repeat after me. Accio" Flickwit said.
"Accio" the class mimicked. The lesson went by pretty smoothly. The only people who could actually summon the objects were Sirius and Lily. Most of the class's items lost heart halfway. Summer Starsty from Hufflepuff couldn't even lift her eraser up. Soon, Charms was over for the day. Then Gryffindors went off to Transfiguration. Professor McGonagall taught Transfiguration. She was also Head of Gryffindor House, and Deputy Headmistress.
"Good morning class. Ah, I see that Mr. Potter is here. Welcome to Hogwarts, James. Your Transfigurations teacher at Salem told me that you are rather gifted in this art." Professor McGonagall said. She was a rather stern-looking witch, but if you behaved, she was pleasant.
"I do pretty good, I guess." James said modestly. He was aware of all the eyes on him and he felt rather embarrassed.
"Would you kindly perform some form of Transfiguration to show me where you stand." McGonagall said.
James got up. He took a deep, steadying breath and pulled out his wand. "Fereverto" he said. The parakeet in front of him smoothly changed into a blue and yellow water goblet.
"Very good, Mr. Potter. This is pretty advanced; I only teach it to 5th years." The Transfigurations class at Salem must be incredibly advanced." McGonagall said as the class "Uuh" ed and "Ahh" ed.
"Well, actually, I had some extra help during free time, since all of the stuff we did last year in Transfiguration was so easy. Professor McQueen helped me with some 5th year Transfigurations." James explained.
"Well then. I would like you to help me today. Would you kindly assist any person who is having trouble today?" McGonagall asked. She was rather impressed with James; he was a great student and modest too. James agreed. For the rest of the time, he walked around, helping the people who needed it. Lily was one of these people. When she tried to transfigure her mouse into a pair of mittens, they stayed fuzzy and had wiggling tails.
Soon, it was time for lunch. The four boys ran straight for the Great Hall, claiming that they were starving. The girls meanwhile went up to their dormitories and waited for Bridget to come up with their food. Bridget soon arrived with a wagon full of doughnuts, macaroni & cheese, pizza, burgers, fries, and lots of other good food. The four girls laughed and talked about everything and anything.
"So, Lily. What do you think of James?" Emily asked, grinning.
"Well. I think he's a great friend. He's nice, sweet, funny, and smart. But I don't know why you guys love him so much." Lily said, taking a helping of macaroni & cheese.
"Just that he's adorable, sweet, nice, smart, and not a total jerk." Jen said. She sat back against some pillows and sighed.
"Most guys are jerks." Bridget added, getting more water.
"Ross isn't. He's really sweet." Lily said quickly. Then she blushed.
"Of course you would say that." Jen said and the others agreed.
"So, what did he say that was so sweet?" Emily asked. She was a hopeless romantic. It was actually her that set Lily and Ross up.
"Okay, well on the first day of summer break, I was in my room, listening to Nelly. Well, I hear Petunia yelling that someone's on the phone for me. So I pick it up. Ross was the one who called He said 'So, how's your summer?' Isn't that totally adorable?" Lily gushed. She saw the others smile; they all loved Ross. He was sweet, charming, cute, smart, and one hell of a Beater.
"That is sweet." Jen agreed, smiling.
Soon, lunch was over. The four girls got their bags out and filled them for their afternoon classes.
"So, what class do you have next?" Emily asked the others.
Well, me and Jen have Care of Magical Creatures with you." Lily said. She took her books and walked down to the Entrance Hall. Care of Magical Creatures was held outside, near the Forbidden Forest. Standing near a small hut was a middle-aged woman who Lily guessed was their Care of Magical Creatures teacher.
"Welcome class, to Care of Magical Creatures. Now, my name is Professor Sage. All of you are here because you want to learn how to care for the magical creatures in this world." Professor Sage paused and looked at her class. It was a mix of Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. Unfortunately, that meant that Karen was in this class. Lily guessed that the only reason that she chose this class was because Sirius, Remus, Ross, and other cute guys were taking it. Another reason was that she wanted to annoy the three girls during class.
"Umm, Professor? I was just wondering if we are going to get dirty, because I don't have time to take a shower in between classes." Karen said, raising her hand. This caused James, Sirius, and Ross to laugh silently. Remus and the three girls had to stuff their hands in their mouths to keep from laughing.
"Well, not too dirty. But maybe a little from handling the animals. You should of thought about it before signing up." Professor Sage said, hiding a smile. "Now, for our first lesson, we will learn about magical creatures that are considered mythical in the Muggle world. Many Muggle fairytales have this creature in them. Can anyone guess what animal this is?" Professor Sage said, leading the class to a paddock. A few people raised their hands. Jen was one of the first ones. "Jenny?" she said.
"I think that you are talking about the unicorn." Jen said. "And I prefer to be called Jen." She added.
"Well, Jen. You are right. Unicorns are probably the most well known creatures, but little is known about them. The reason is that since they are so shy, most people don't see them and we don't get to study them. Here we are" Professor Sage said. Tied up to a tree was a beautiful, snowy white unicorn.
"Oooh! It's soooooooo pretty!" breathed all the girls.
"Yes. This is a male unicorn. Males have a large pointed horn like this. It has magical properties. Some of the potions made in your class use powdered unicorn horn. The tail also is magical. It is the core of some of your wands." Professor Sage said.
"Doesn't that hurt the unicorn, to get part of his horn?" Jenny asked, not wanting the beautiful creature to be hurt.
"Well, if Muggles tried to do it, the unicorn would probably be hurt, if not killed. By using some simple spells, we can take off some of the horn without hurting the unicorn." Professor Sage explained. "You can all take a sugar cube and feed it to him." She added.
"But if we take off some of the horn, doesn't that help the unicorn?" Lily asked, petting the animal. "Because, I know that other animals, like deer and moose, have to rub against trees to take off some of it's antlers."
"Very good, Lily. Yes, it is a fact that removing some, only some of the horn does help the unicorn. Sometimes, wizards even walk around in the woods in the fall and look for shavings of unicorn horn." That is all for today's lesson. For homework, kindly find out about the magical properties of unicorns and write an essay. It should be one roll of parchment long. It is due on Monday. Class dismissed." Professor Sage said, releasing the class.
Next, they had Double Potions. All of them were groaning when they looked at their schedules.
"What's wrong with Potions?" James asked. Lily had noticed that whispers of "He's so cute" and "Look at his hair; it makes him look soooo hot!" James, however, was blissfully unaware of the whispers following him.
"Oh, god. Don't even get me started! The teacher is Professor Walgner. He's horrible! Walgner is Head of Slytherin. We have Potions with them. He also favors the Slytherin House and he hates all Gryffindors. Fun, huh?" Bridget said, groaning. They had almost reached the dungeons where Potions was held. When they got there, the Gryffindors found a bunch of Slytherins leaning against the cold stone and laughing softly. Lily groaned; Severus Snape had seen her and was making his way over to her.
"What's wrong?" James asked Lily as he saw her groan.
"Snape. That greasy-haired kid is obsessed with me! He won't leave me alone." Lily sighed, trying to hide behind James, but Snape had already spotted her.
"Well, Lillian how was your summer? I tried to owl you, but you never wrote back. Oh, yes. I found out that there is a Hogsmeade weekend in two weeks. Would you give me the pleasure of taking you? On a date?" Snape said, sickly, ignoring the others as if they were part of the wall.
"Oh, Severus! I'm soooo sorry. I had already promised someone else that I would go with them." Lily said sweetly, but her tone had a hint of coolness.
"Like who? Come on my sweet angel." Snape whispered, putting his hand to her cheek.
Lily snapped. She grabbed his hand and twisted it down, making Snape groan with pain. "Oh, I don't know. My boyfriend. Whom I see is coming right now." Lily said, dropping Snape's hand as if it were a poisonous spider.
Snape stalked away as the rest of the Gryffindors came into view. The dungeon door opened and a sour-looking wizard with short brown hair that was carefully trimmed came out.
"Come on! Hurry up! Anyone who is out of their seats when the bell rings will be getting a detention." The wizard barked and all the Gryffindors hurried in to the dungeon and found seats. Lily sat with the girls at two tables while James sat with his friends at another two.
Potions was mostly the same as the other classes, but less cheerful. Professor Walgner was the first teacher that day to fail to recognize a new student in his class. He did, however, smirk in James' direction. One difference between this and the other classes was the several nasty remarks about Gryffindor from the Slytherins and several from Walgner. James decided from that day on that he didn't like Walgner one bit.
Lily and her friends hurried up to Gryffindor Tower to drop off their books. Then they ran back down and joined the rest of the school for dinner. For Lily, dinner went by fast. The boys were talking about their first days back.
Lily looked up from her conversation about summer break when she heard James say, ".And Walgner looked at me like he hated me. I didn't even do anything in class. Yet." He added evilly. Lily turned towards him.
"See, we told you that Walgner hates Gryffindors more than any other house. But he did seem to hate you most of all. I wonder why?" Lily mused. "Oh well. Bye you guys. I have to do some homework." She said and departed quickly for the common room.
"She wasn't serious, was she?" James asked, looking at Lily's friends. "It's Friday for the love of Quidditch!"
"I don't know for sure. Sometimes she can be kind of weird." Sirius said. James' last comments changed the boys' subject to Quidditch.
"Bye you guys; we'll see you in the common room." Jen said, standing up with Emily and Bridget.
When James, Sirius and Remus arrived in the common room, they saw all the girls doing various things. Bridget and Emily were making a castle out of magical cards. Jen was experimenting with her hair, turning it different colors. Presently it was a deep red like Lily's but with her own blonde streaks running through it. Lily, James noted, was by the fire, writing out the essay, and checking facts in her Care of Magical Creatures book once in a while.
"Lily, why are you doing homework; it's Friday night!" James exclaimed, taking Lily's book from her hand.
"James, give me back my book!" Lily said, grabbing for her book. James just held it above his head and out of her reach.
"Just tell me why you are doing homework on a Friday night." James repeated.
"Fine." Lily responded, sitting back down. "I'm doing homework because I have nothing better to do. I also have cheerleading tryouts on Saturday and practice on Sunday. Anyways, if I finish it now, I'll have the weekend free." Lily said. "Now give me my book back." And James reluctantly handed it back to her. Then James wandered around the common room, trying to find something to do. Eventually, he headed up to his dorm to get out the homework that was assigned that day.
After they all finished eating, the third-year Gryffindors went to their first class, Charms. "Welcome back, class. Oh, yes. I see our new student is in this class. Mr. Potter, my name is Professor Flickwit." the tiny teacher said from his pile of books. "Now class, today we are going to learn a new charm. It's the Summoning Charm. Usually, it is taught in fourth year, but this class is especially advanced. Mr. Potter, if you are in need of assistance, just ask Miss. Evans over here." Professor Flickwit said, magically distributing various items around the class. "Now class, the charm is 'Accio'. Repeat after me. Accio" Flickwit said.
"Accio" the class mimicked. The lesson went by pretty smoothly. The only people who could actually summon the objects were Sirius and Lily. Most of the class's items lost heart halfway. Summer Starsty from Hufflepuff couldn't even lift her eraser up. Soon, Charms was over for the day. Then Gryffindors went off to Transfiguration. Professor McGonagall taught Transfiguration. She was also Head of Gryffindor House, and Deputy Headmistress.
"Good morning class. Ah, I see that Mr. Potter is here. Welcome to Hogwarts, James. Your Transfigurations teacher at Salem told me that you are rather gifted in this art." Professor McGonagall said. She was a rather stern-looking witch, but if you behaved, she was pleasant.
"I do pretty good, I guess." James said modestly. He was aware of all the eyes on him and he felt rather embarrassed.
"Would you kindly perform some form of Transfiguration to show me where you stand." McGonagall said.
James got up. He took a deep, steadying breath and pulled out his wand. "Fereverto" he said. The parakeet in front of him smoothly changed into a blue and yellow water goblet.
"Very good, Mr. Potter. This is pretty advanced; I only teach it to 5th years." The Transfigurations class at Salem must be incredibly advanced." McGonagall said as the class "Uuh" ed and "Ahh" ed.
"Well, actually, I had some extra help during free time, since all of the stuff we did last year in Transfiguration was so easy. Professor McQueen helped me with some 5th year Transfigurations." James explained.
"Well then. I would like you to help me today. Would you kindly assist any person who is having trouble today?" McGonagall asked. She was rather impressed with James; he was a great student and modest too. James agreed. For the rest of the time, he walked around, helping the people who needed it. Lily was one of these people. When she tried to transfigure her mouse into a pair of mittens, they stayed fuzzy and had wiggling tails.
Soon, it was time for lunch. The four boys ran straight for the Great Hall, claiming that they were starving. The girls meanwhile went up to their dormitories and waited for Bridget to come up with their food. Bridget soon arrived with a wagon full of doughnuts, macaroni & cheese, pizza, burgers, fries, and lots of other good food. The four girls laughed and talked about everything and anything.
"So, Lily. What do you think of James?" Emily asked, grinning.
"Well. I think he's a great friend. He's nice, sweet, funny, and smart. But I don't know why you guys love him so much." Lily said, taking a helping of macaroni & cheese.
"Just that he's adorable, sweet, nice, smart, and not a total jerk." Jen said. She sat back against some pillows and sighed.
"Most guys are jerks." Bridget added, getting more water.
"Ross isn't. He's really sweet." Lily said quickly. Then she blushed.
"Of course you would say that." Jen said and the others agreed.
"So, what did he say that was so sweet?" Emily asked. She was a hopeless romantic. It was actually her that set Lily and Ross up.
"Okay, well on the first day of summer break, I was in my room, listening to Nelly. Well, I hear Petunia yelling that someone's on the phone for me. So I pick it up. Ross was the one who called He said 'So, how's your summer?' Isn't that totally adorable?" Lily gushed. She saw the others smile; they all loved Ross. He was sweet, charming, cute, smart, and one hell of a Beater.
"That is sweet." Jen agreed, smiling.
Soon, lunch was over. The four girls got their bags out and filled them for their afternoon classes.
"So, what class do you have next?" Emily asked the others.
Well, me and Jen have Care of Magical Creatures with you." Lily said. She took her books and walked down to the Entrance Hall. Care of Magical Creatures was held outside, near the Forbidden Forest. Standing near a small hut was a middle-aged woman who Lily guessed was their Care of Magical Creatures teacher.
"Welcome class, to Care of Magical Creatures. Now, my name is Professor Sage. All of you are here because you want to learn how to care for the magical creatures in this world." Professor Sage paused and looked at her class. It was a mix of Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. Unfortunately, that meant that Karen was in this class. Lily guessed that the only reason that she chose this class was because Sirius, Remus, Ross, and other cute guys were taking it. Another reason was that she wanted to annoy the three girls during class.
"Umm, Professor? I was just wondering if we are going to get dirty, because I don't have time to take a shower in between classes." Karen said, raising her hand. This caused James, Sirius, and Ross to laugh silently. Remus and the three girls had to stuff their hands in their mouths to keep from laughing.
"Well, not too dirty. But maybe a little from handling the animals. You should of thought about it before signing up." Professor Sage said, hiding a smile. "Now, for our first lesson, we will learn about magical creatures that are considered mythical in the Muggle world. Many Muggle fairytales have this creature in them. Can anyone guess what animal this is?" Professor Sage said, leading the class to a paddock. A few people raised their hands. Jen was one of the first ones. "Jenny?" she said.
"I think that you are talking about the unicorn." Jen said. "And I prefer to be called Jen." She added.
"Well, Jen. You are right. Unicorns are probably the most well known creatures, but little is known about them. The reason is that since they are so shy, most people don't see them and we don't get to study them. Here we are" Professor Sage said. Tied up to a tree was a beautiful, snowy white unicorn.
"Oooh! It's soooooooo pretty!" breathed all the girls.
"Yes. This is a male unicorn. Males have a large pointed horn like this. It has magical properties. Some of the potions made in your class use powdered unicorn horn. The tail also is magical. It is the core of some of your wands." Professor Sage said.
"Doesn't that hurt the unicorn, to get part of his horn?" Jenny asked, not wanting the beautiful creature to be hurt.
"Well, if Muggles tried to do it, the unicorn would probably be hurt, if not killed. By using some simple spells, we can take off some of the horn without hurting the unicorn." Professor Sage explained. "You can all take a sugar cube and feed it to him." She added.
"But if we take off some of the horn, doesn't that help the unicorn?" Lily asked, petting the animal. "Because, I know that other animals, like deer and moose, have to rub against trees to take off some of it's antlers."
"Very good, Lily. Yes, it is a fact that removing some, only some of the horn does help the unicorn. Sometimes, wizards even walk around in the woods in the fall and look for shavings of unicorn horn." That is all for today's lesson. For homework, kindly find out about the magical properties of unicorns and write an essay. It should be one roll of parchment long. It is due on Monday. Class dismissed." Professor Sage said, releasing the class.
Next, they had Double Potions. All of them were groaning when they looked at their schedules.
"What's wrong with Potions?" James asked. Lily had noticed that whispers of "He's so cute" and "Look at his hair; it makes him look soooo hot!" James, however, was blissfully unaware of the whispers following him.
"Oh, god. Don't even get me started! The teacher is Professor Walgner. He's horrible! Walgner is Head of Slytherin. We have Potions with them. He also favors the Slytherin House and he hates all Gryffindors. Fun, huh?" Bridget said, groaning. They had almost reached the dungeons where Potions was held. When they got there, the Gryffindors found a bunch of Slytherins leaning against the cold stone and laughing softly. Lily groaned; Severus Snape had seen her and was making his way over to her.
"What's wrong?" James asked Lily as he saw her groan.
"Snape. That greasy-haired kid is obsessed with me! He won't leave me alone." Lily sighed, trying to hide behind James, but Snape had already spotted her.
"Well, Lillian how was your summer? I tried to owl you, but you never wrote back. Oh, yes. I found out that there is a Hogsmeade weekend in two weeks. Would you give me the pleasure of taking you? On a date?" Snape said, sickly, ignoring the others as if they were part of the wall.
"Oh, Severus! I'm soooo sorry. I had already promised someone else that I would go with them." Lily said sweetly, but her tone had a hint of coolness.
"Like who? Come on my sweet angel." Snape whispered, putting his hand to her cheek.
Lily snapped. She grabbed his hand and twisted it down, making Snape groan with pain. "Oh, I don't know. My boyfriend. Whom I see is coming right now." Lily said, dropping Snape's hand as if it were a poisonous spider.
Snape stalked away as the rest of the Gryffindors came into view. The dungeon door opened and a sour-looking wizard with short brown hair that was carefully trimmed came out.
"Come on! Hurry up! Anyone who is out of their seats when the bell rings will be getting a detention." The wizard barked and all the Gryffindors hurried in to the dungeon and found seats. Lily sat with the girls at two tables while James sat with his friends at another two.
Potions was mostly the same as the other classes, but less cheerful. Professor Walgner was the first teacher that day to fail to recognize a new student in his class. He did, however, smirk in James' direction. One difference between this and the other classes was the several nasty remarks about Gryffindor from the Slytherins and several from Walgner. James decided from that day on that he didn't like Walgner one bit.
Lily and her friends hurried up to Gryffindor Tower to drop off their books. Then they ran back down and joined the rest of the school for dinner. For Lily, dinner went by fast. The boys were talking about their first days back.
Lily looked up from her conversation about summer break when she heard James say, ".And Walgner looked at me like he hated me. I didn't even do anything in class. Yet." He added evilly. Lily turned towards him.
"See, we told you that Walgner hates Gryffindors more than any other house. But he did seem to hate you most of all. I wonder why?" Lily mused. "Oh well. Bye you guys. I have to do some homework." She said and departed quickly for the common room.
"She wasn't serious, was she?" James asked, looking at Lily's friends. "It's Friday for the love of Quidditch!"
"I don't know for sure. Sometimes she can be kind of weird." Sirius said. James' last comments changed the boys' subject to Quidditch.
"Bye you guys; we'll see you in the common room." Jen said, standing up with Emily and Bridget.
When James, Sirius and Remus arrived in the common room, they saw all the girls doing various things. Bridget and Emily were making a castle out of magical cards. Jen was experimenting with her hair, turning it different colors. Presently it was a deep red like Lily's but with her own blonde streaks running through it. Lily, James noted, was by the fire, writing out the essay, and checking facts in her Care of Magical Creatures book once in a while.
"Lily, why are you doing homework; it's Friday night!" James exclaimed, taking Lily's book from her hand.
"James, give me back my book!" Lily said, grabbing for her book. James just held it above his head and out of her reach.
"Just tell me why you are doing homework on a Friday night." James repeated.
"Fine." Lily responded, sitting back down. "I'm doing homework because I have nothing better to do. I also have cheerleading tryouts on Saturday and practice on Sunday. Anyways, if I finish it now, I'll have the weekend free." Lily said. "Now give me my book back." And James reluctantly handed it back to her. Then James wandered around the common room, trying to find something to do. Eventually, he headed up to his dorm to get out the homework that was assigned that day.