"Underneath it all" by marauderyears
Lily's POV
"Ready to go Lils?" Lena leaned against the window sill, while she chewed on her nails. Lena watched as Lily ran around her room looking for something. She hadn't quite figured out what.
"Yeah, yeah. I just need to find my-- aha! Here it is!" Lily held up a worn copy of A Defense Against the Dark Arts, Volume 6. Lily hastily shoved it into her book bag, and headed to the door. She realized Lena hadn't followed, so she turned back around and dragged her by her wrist out the door, much against the will of Lena.
They headed down some flights of stairs, up others, and they finally arrived at their destination. The Defense Against the Dark Arts room. They were running a little late because Lily couldn't find her Defense book.
Lena opened the door, and they both headed in just as the final bell rang. To their surprise, there was no teacher waiting at the front of the room for the class to quiet down. Lily and Lena headed to the back of the room, where the only seats left were in front of James Potter and Sirius Black. Lily inwardly groaned. Hopefully they wouldn't notice her.
As she sat down, Potter said, "Hey Evans." Lily ignored him as Black snickered in the background. Lena rolled her eyes at them. She was annoyed as much as Lily, but thought that Lily should give Potter a chance. Everyone did.
After a few minutes of waiting, (and for Black, flicking spit balls at the Slytherins), a teacher stormed into the room. It made Lily jump out of her chair in surprise. She heard Potter and Black trying to hold back a laugh. Lily turned around and gave them one of her famous ice-glares.
The teacher was in a long black cloak and had short, unruly hair. His eyes were really dark, almost black. He was a good 6 feet tall. Lily noticed many girls eyeing him hopefully. He was good-looking.
Lily was too busy trying to figure out where she had seen this man before to notice James gaping at the man in surprise.
"Good morning class. I have bad news and good news. The bad news is your regular teacher, Professor Gillian has retired. She mentioned something about being tired of severe burns, baldness, and skin coloring pranks...."
There were a few snickers from the Marauders. Lily rolled her eyes. They are so immature.....
"The good news is I will be your new teacher--"
"Don't you mean its good news that she left and bad news that your our sub--" Potter started to say but the teacher cut him off.
"No, Mr. Potter. 5 points from Gryffindor for your....cheek." That got Black and Lupin to stop laughing. No one asked how the teacher knew Potter's name.
"I am Professor....Brody. I will be your new teacher and I expect the same respect...." Brody cleared his throat and continued, "Anyways, I would like to pick up where Professor Gillian has left off about Unicorn's blood uses. A Unicorn is a beautiful, holy creature that is very rare and quite a big deal to be able to see one in the wild...."
The rest of the class went by slowly and very few interruptions were made, besides the occasional prank from the Marauders. When class was over, Lily met Lena outside the door.
"Was it just me or did that teacher seem familiar?" Lena asked, scratching her head.
"It isn't just you...." A voice from behind them said. They turned around to see Potter and his cronies with him.
Lily frowned, "I don't think I like him...."
"What?! You've got to be kidding, he is sooooo hot! How can you not like him?!" Lena exclaimed, quite surprised. Potter frowned at Lena, but she didn't seem to have noticed.
Lily laughed, "It's probably because I'm not shallow like you. Anyways Lena, come on we still have Care of Magical Creatures to go to...."
It wasn't until later that night, when Lily was lying in her bed that she realized that was the first time she had been in the presence of James Potter and not been yelling at him. Coincidently, James was thinking that same thing...
The next morning was Saturday. It was also a beautiful, sunny day. Lily woke up, got ready and decided she didn't want to be stuck indoors on such a pretty day. The whole school seemed to agree with her, the halls were empty.
Lily went by the lake, and stretched out to tan. She knew it was a pointless thing to do seeing as she was always going to be pale do to her redhead skin.
She was very close to dozing off, when a voice startled her.
"Catching some sun, I see?" Lily jumped up and looked around frantically. She saw Potter leaning against a tree right behind her. Potter appeared to be holding back a laugh.
"Jeeze, do you like to see me scared?" Lily said breathlessly as she clutched her chest.
Potter sat down next to her and he appeared to get a serious expression on his face, "No..."
There was a short silence where they both admired that sunlight bouncing off of the lake.
Lily let out a long sigh. Potter glanced at her nervously. He cleared his throat.
"So....what do you think of that new teacher we have in Defense?" James said, sounding rather nervous.
Lily looked into his eyes, which made him shiver, "Well, he's alright I guess. But he seems as though he's hiding something. I dunno. What do you think?"
James scowled at the ground, "I don't like him."
Lily mouth twitched into a grin. "That wouldn't be because he took points from you by any chance, would it?"
James noticed she was almost laughing so he grinned, "Nah, not at all. What would class be like if I didn't get points taken away for either pranking or back talking?"
Lily sighed, "I guess the world will never know."
James looked back into her startling green eyes. "So do you think he's 'cute' like the other girls in our class?"
Lily frowned up at him, "I'm not shallow like those ditzes. Looks aren't everything. You have to look underneath it all." She stood up. She hated shallow people. Even her best friend Lena, was a little shallow. And of course so was Potter.
"Ummm....Evans, you want to go with me to the ball?" He knew at once he had said the wrong thing. She exploded.
"You're so shallow! All you can think of are people's looks. I almost thought you had changed. Get over yourself. Because I sure have." She turned around and stormed off to the castle, not noticing the very hurt look that was on James' face.
James POV
"What's wrong Prongs?" Sirius asked as James walked over to the Quidditch Pitch, where his fellow Marauders were sitting. Sirius, being James' best friend since he could remember, could always tell when something was up.
"Lily problems." Remus said without looking up from his book.
"Aw, of course. And you really like her, but don't know how to show her you like her." Sirius said to James.
James sat down next to them. Peter was quietly watching him. James nodded.
"Well," Remus started, "I'm going to be brutally honest with you Prongs. She thinks you're arrogant. Now she's noticing you've changed and that you're not quite as conceited. And that scares her. So now to make herself feel better, she yells at you for any little thing you do."
There was a long silence broken by Sirius.
"You need to write a book translating stupid things girls do so boys can understand them."
Remus shook his head, "Nah, it's obvious. She's starting to like you Prongs, you just can't spoil or rush it."
James' eyes got big, "What?! She likes me?!" He looked as though all his dreams had come true.
Remus put his hands up, "Wait, I said she's 'starting' to like you.Well more like tolerate her. If you just watch what you say and do around her...."
James couldn't hold back a big toothy grin, "This is great.....Maybe she'll go with me to the ball...."
Remus shook his head, "Nah, you need to give her space and only talk to her when she talks to you. People only realize how much they like someone when they're not there. It's common knowledge."
"I can't leave Evans! I lo-like her. A lot. I'll pretend to not be there, but I always will be...." James turned a little red, realizing what he had just said.
Sirius frowned, "Evans is extremely hot and all, but she's got one hell of a temper. I can't believe you still like her after all those things she's said to you."
James grinned, "That's one thing I like about her. Her temper. And if I wasn't positive that she doesn't mean those things, I would stop trying so hard...." That was only half true. Something about her drew him to her. No one would ever understand how head-over-heels he was for Evans. There is something about Lily Evans.
"Hate to interrupt your daydreaming about Miss Evans, but remember you have Quidditch practice in 5 minutes--" Remus started to say.
James jumped up, "Oh shit..." He ran off to the Locker Rooms to get changed.
Ten minutes later James was out on the Quidditch Pitch in his uniform with his broomstick. His team was standing ready for his orders.
"Alright team, give me 20 laps around this field......Now would be nice!" James exclaimed when the team didn't move. The team groaned and mounted their brooms and took off. James let the snitch and one bludger go, and was soon in front of every other team member around the field.
After a grueling work out, the dirty, sweaty team headed back to the showers. A game was coming up and James was working them harder than ever. He really wanted the Quidditch Cup. And maybe it'd impress Lily....No, it wouldn't.... Unlike most girls, things like that didn't impress her. She was NOT shallow like that.
Back in the Common Room
"Did you practically kill your team in practice with work outs?" Sirius asked James when after he had cleaned up and eaten dinner.
"No, we did the normal routine, but a little more rigorous. We have to win this year." James exclaimed.
"Yeah, but we've won every year since you became captain of the team." Peter said.
"That doesn't mean we can let up the competitiveness! I've gotten word that the Slytherins have devised a really good play plan. Luckily I've had all summer to devise us a brand new one." James replied.
"Yeah we know, that's all I've heard about all summer...." Sirius smirked.
"This is important! I could take our team to the Championships and play professionally if we win for the fourth year in a row with me as the Captain....."
"Prongs, you've been on the list to play professionally since those scouts came last year. I doubt they would take you off the list with all those awesome moves you pull off." Sirius said. Remus and Peter nodded in agreement.
"Yeah...." James said, sounding far away.
"Anyways, I can't believe that Brody is teaching here after....well what he did...." Sirius exclaimed angrily.
James' daydreaming immediately disappeared, replaced with disgust. Peter looked a little scared at the look on James' face.
"How dare he show his face here. And to think that he thinks he can teach Defense Against the Dark Arts?! When is has no qualities of a true Auror. Dumbledore must have been desperate to appoint that deserter as a D.A.D.A teacher...." James said, furiously.
Peter looked confused. "What happened?"
"Well my dad and him were Aurors together and they were assigned a job to watch a pub at night. They Ministry had received intelligence that there would be a group of supporters called, 'Death Eaters' that were organizing to support the new Dark Lord, Voldemort. The Death Eaters heard about this job and cornered my dad, Brody, and two other Aurors. They were hugely outnumbered. My dad got the other two Aurors to safety, but then a Death Eater hit him with a spell, almost killing him. Instead of helping my dad, Brody deserted him, fleeing for his life. My dad barely got out alive."
Peter looked taken aback. There was an eerie silence.
"Who knows how he got to be an Auror. He was almost fired for being disloyal." Sirius finished. Remus nodded, quietly.
James sighed. "And the worst part is.....he's my uncle."
A/N: Thank you to my new reviewers. You're the reason I've updated:
jasminee: I will keep it up.
LiLy MaLfOy13: Thank you. I didn't think it'd be very good. I'm surprised.
MonkeyGurl1: Thanks for reviewing!
Zayne: I totally agree, and I'm sorry. I'll update it more often. I'll try for almost everyday. I hate it when people update slowly....I also have zero patience.
SecretlyBeautiful: Yes, he is! I wish I was Lily, lol. She's lucky.
Keep reviewing! I'll update more often now. Reviews help speed my updates....hint hint