Chapter Three – The Price of a Clean Floor
A/N – AHHH! My third chapter already! I only wrote the second one yesterday so I'm hoping I can get this out today. I'm actually meant to be learning drama pieces but hey! Oh and the Hogwarts 'Student Council' is made up of the prefects, Head Boy and Head Girl. This chapter is less funny but is working towards the plot... Wait, plot? What plot?
Disclaimer – As if, mate!
Lily Evans was not in a good mood. It had been three days since the incident in History of Magic and Snape was still acting like she had flushed his favourite goldfish down the toilet. He had taken every opportunity possible to insult her and had even on one occasion tripped her. She savagely attacked her toast, earning worried glances from Sarah and Meg. Blowing her hair out of her face, she raised her mutilated piece of jam-covered toast to her mouth...
When a letter landed right on top of it. She unstuck the letter from the jam and opened it to find details of her detention.
8 o'clock in the History of Magic classroom. You will be washing the blackboard and floor without the use of magic. Please be prompt.
Your Head of House,
Professor McGonagall.
P.S. Miss Evans, I expected better from you. Please report to me after Transfiguration today.
Lily grumbled, staring at the piece of parchment in front of her. Sirius lunged across the table and grabbed the parchment from her. After deeming it unimportant, he ripped in into small pieces and threw it into the air, crying, 'Happy Hanukah!'
She looked down once again to her measly looking piece of toast. The jam was missing from where the letter had landed and it now had pieces of parchment sticking to it.
"Lily! Lily... Oi, Evans!" James yelled, waving his hands in front of Lily's face trying to get her attention.
She looked up dazedly, finally focussing on James' worried face. He looked so cute when he was worried. She almost blushed with embarrassment. James? Cute? Nu-uh.
"Are you alright, Lil?" James asked with a seriousness rarely shown by him.
She quickly composed herself.
"Yeah, I've just got detention tonight."
"What about the Student Council meeting tonight?" he asked, apprehension written all over his face.
Lily wryly smiled.
"I'm sure you can take care of that, James. You are after all, Head Boy."
James gulped. He needed help. He needed...
The Marauders.
Lily walked towards the History of Magic classroom. She was still in a bad mood from McGonagall's lecture after Transfiguration.
"I'm very disappointed in you, Miss Evans. The Head Girl serving detention in her first week! A detention she received in her first CLASS! Needless to say, I am expecting that this will never happen again. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, Professor."
She felt so guilty. She was meant to set an example! But set against Snape, she just couldn't help herself.
Insufferable git, she thought to herself.
She walked into the History of Magic classroom to find the insufferable git sneering at her. Lily ignored him, instead picking up a sponge and water filled bucket from the desk at the front of the room.
She swiftly moved to the blackboard and, taking off her robe and placing it on a desk nearby, start attacking the blackboard with the same amount of vigour she had used upon her toast that morning. She was a quarter of the way done when she couldn't take it anymore. Lily turned on her heel to stare at Snape. The entire time he had just stood there watching.
"Either get your arse into gear or I will report you to the Headmaster," she said fiercely, a hand on her hip.
Snape looked up at her with something that looked like amusement. Then he stalked over to the desk that had the other bucket and sponge, and after collecting both, he walked over to the opposite end of the blackboard and started washing. Not surprisingly, Snape worked quicker than Lily due to his height. Lily had to jump up and down madly every couple of steps trying to reach the top of the blackboard. Despite this, she was still surprised when they met at the middle of the blackboard. She automatically started jumping trying to reach the top of the blackboard. But a large hand stopped her. She blinked at the sight of Snape's hand over her own. Lily looked over at him, his dark eyes looking at her once more with amusement.
"How about I finish this part off?"
His silky voice broke the silence that had hung over them while they worked.
She nodded and walked off to start on the floor. She had gotten through a substantial part of the work by the time Snape joined her. Once again he started work opposite her. They worked steadily in silence until they both reached the middle. That was when they realised the situation they had gotten themselves in. They were standing in the middle of the room, surrounded by wet floor.
"Well done, Evans. I thought you were supposed to be smart," Snape sneered, his low voice echoing through the room.
"You did half the work, Snape, so you get half the blame," she retorted.
"Well I guess there's nothing else to do now but..."
Snape pulled out his wand from his back pocket and was about to mutter an incantation when Lily clipped him up the side of his head.
"No magic, remember?"
"Damn it, Evans! That hurt," Snape cried, holding a hand to his head.
His black eyes bore into Lily's green ones and he was surprised to find it was he that broke the connection this time.
"Well, I had to do something to stop you."
"Stupid Mudblood, of course you would resort to something so childish," he muttered.
"Why do you speak to people like that?" she asked, fiercely.
"Like what?"
"Like THAT! Like you don't care if you hurt people, as long as you're satisfied."
Snape scowled.
"I suppose you're also referring to the argument that got us here in the first place."
Lily nodded slightly.
"Well, Evans, it's quite simple. If people don't like what I think, they can bloody well just bugger off."
Lily looked up at Snape uncertainly. For once she felt sorry for him.
"What made you like this?"
Snape's scowl deepened, if that was even possible.
"Like what?"
"So angry. So hateful. What happened to you, Severus?"
Snape started at the use of his given name. He refused to look at her, refused to see the pity in her eyes.
Instead he muttered,
"The floor's dried."
And with that, he walked out of the classroom, determined to get as much space between the two of them as possible.
"Err... welcome to the first Student Council meeting of the year," James said uncertainly.
He looked around at the faces of the unimpressed prefects.
"I'm James Potter... your Head Boy... and Lily Evans is your Head Girl..."
"Where's she?" a rat-faced Ravenclaw girl asked.
"She's in detention," said a boy with dark features from Slytherin.
The room broke out in whispers.
"Detention?"
"Lily EVANS?"
"I'm hungry."
"How did she get detention?"
"Some Head Girl we have this year."
"MY MONKEY EATS HAGGUS!" Sirius yelled.
Silence greeted this statement as all faces turned to look at a triumphant Sirius.
"Got their attention didn't it?" Sirius said to a confused James.
"And who are they?" the rat-faced girl said looking at Sirius, Remus and Peter.
"They are... well you see... they..." James stuttered.
"We're his advisors," Remus said smoothly, looking pointedly at James.
James smiled gratefully at Remus.
"So, first on the agenda is..."
(An hour later)
Sirius woke up and stared confusedly at his surroundings.
Gah, how much did I drink this time?
Then he saw James dismissing the prefects in front of him and he smiled.
"Excellent meeting, Prongs," he said, patting James on the back.
"How would you know? You were asleep the entire time," Remus said, a smirk on his face.
Sirius shrugged and followed Peter out of the room. They walked towards the Gryffindor common room, joking as they went. Then James saw Lily looked downtrodden, a bucket of water in one hand.
"Hey, Lil, how did the detention go?" he asked brightly.
Lily shrugged.
"It was alright considering I had to do it with Snape."
Remus groaned in sympathy.
"How was the meeting?" Lily asked.
James smiled confidently.
But it was Sirius who spoke first.
"A better Student Council you couldn't ask for. They have intelligence, with all the democratic influence of the Greeks, the ambition of the Romans, the intuitiveness of the Japanese, the..."
"I have no idea what you're talking about Sirius, but I'll take it that it all went well," Lily said, putting up a hand to halt Sirius.
James nodded, shoving his hands in his pockets.
"So, where are you off to?" James asked, now running a hand through his hair to mess it up.
"I have to go empty this in the girls bathroom," she replied, gesturing to the bucket of dirty water.
"I'll come," James said eagerly.
The sly looks on his friends' faces told him that he had said it a little too eagerly.
"Ok," Lily replied, a smile forming on her face.
He walked off with Lily, ignoring the suggestive gestures Sirius was making and the looks of pure glee on Remus and Peter's faces.
They walked in silence until they got to the closest girls bathroom.
"Oh no, Moaning Myrtle flooded the bathroom again," Lily groaned, looking at the water that was spilling into the corridor.
"The ghost who lives in a toilet? I thought she was just a rumour!"
Lily shook her head.
"Unfortunately not."
She looked back at James who was once again messing up his hair.
"I think I can take it from here."
"Yeah, yeah, of course," he said, nervously.
"Night," she said softly.
"Night, Lil."
She turned on her heel but quickly lost her balance on the slippery floor. She slipped in the water, the arm with the bucket shooting up. The water splattered all over her... and all over a certain black-haired boy standing right behind her.
James gasped as the cold water hit him but quickly recovered to help Lily up.
She blushed with embarrassment as James brushed her red hair off her face. They were so close that Lily could smell his cologne. And she couldn't help thinking that he looked so good when he was wet. Water dripped off his long black spikes and she longed to brush off the water drop running down his chin. But instead she took a step backwards.
"We'd better be getting back," she said softly.
He nodded slowly and once again in silence, they walked back to the Gryffindor common room.
A/N – You know what? I think I would have preferred if Sirius had been the one getting wet... Mmm... wet teenage Sirius... sigh... in a white Bonds singlet... drool...