::Midnight Lily::

PG

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter – it belongs to J.K. Rowling.

Chapter Three

Lily sat, the next day, at the Gryffindor table with bad feelings in her stomach. She wasn't really hungry, in fact, she felt like she was about to hurl at any moment. To make matters worst Charlie and Sabina kept going on about how easy the test of Comparable Species was going to be. Lily knew that both of them hadn't even studied at all. Lily however had spent most of last night memorizing the whole Comparable Species chapter.

That morning she had bags under her eyelids and she could barely keep her head up.

Lily kept opening her bag in a hurry to check up on figures and examples. She was so sure that she hadn't remembered them all. In the middle of scooping up her fried tomatoes she quickly set them aside to open her book once more.

"Lily!" Katie cried out. She accidentally dropped the sausage she had on her fork. "That is the umpteenth time you've opened that book! You're really starting to scare me."

"I know, I know," said Lily absentmindedly. She flipped through her pages and found the information she was looking for. "I just wasn't sure whether I had the rat and mouse thing sorted out yet. Do you think she'll ask for the difference between the two?"

"I think she'll just ask how it can go wrong," said Sabina distinctly. "Or what is the correct spell and how it would change?"

"That's practically the same thing!" said Lily frenziedly. She dropped her fork and took out her wand.

"Not doing anything dangerous with that, are you, Evans?" a drawling voice came from behind her.

Lily turned around and saw that the Marauders were behind her. "Of course not, Sirius," Lily said. "But I might have to if you keep sneaking up on us." Nevertheless, she placed her wand back into her front pocket, and continued flipping the pages of her Transfiguration book.

The Marauders laughed and sat beside them, in a flash they had taken bacon, eggs, ham, fried tomatoes, porridge and cereal, and had placed it on the plates in front of them.

"You guys certainly have an appetite," Sabina remarked, moving closer to her boyfriend, Sirius.

"Yep," said Peter digging into his ham and eggs.

"We spent all night practicing for today's Comparable Species test," Lupin informed them. "We're all ready."

"I didn't see you in the common room," said Amber suspiciously.

"Oh," said Sirius, his eye twinkling slyly. "We weren't in the common room." Lupin turned pale.

"Out in the middle of the night," said Charlie huffily as they watched the Marauders leave the table. "How did they manage it without getting caught? They do it all the time and never get caught!"

Lily shook her head. Sometimes she too wondered how they managed to walk out leisurely after dark. Last year Charlie and Katie had gone out after hours and they had been caught in an instant by the caretaker. Lily, of course, never broke a rule.

Her mind quickly turned back to the Comparable Species test. They had Transfiguration last, luckily, but she needed a miracle to pass this time. She knew that her results weren't going to be good, not even fair, she just knew. She had this sinking feeling in her stomach. She had pride.

After breakfast she quickly searched the Great Hall for the person she was looking for. He would have the answers. He could help her succeed. She was desperate; if she failed she knew she would just cry – she'd just have to do this carefully. Then she found him. Leaning against a classroom door casually and watching the students pass by. His name was Alex Watson.

Lily quickly told her friends to go off without her then she walked up to him. Alex Watson knew every back alley – he could have been part of the Marauders if he wanted to, but no. He was as sly as Sirius and as engaging as James. His last girlfriend was Ailsa Umbridge. He brushed away a lock of his dark brown hair and stared at her with his mischievously brown eyes. "Why, hello Lily!" He called out to her.

"Hi, Alex," said Lily. Then she dropped her voice, "I need to ask a favour from you."

Alex looked around suspiciously then opened the door behind him. "Step into my office." Lily followed after him, looking around her apprehensively, but no one noticed that she was with Alex. "My, my, my, Lily Evans! This is history – never thought I'd see you come up to me!"

Lily avoided his gaze.

Alex's face turned serious and he sat down at the teacher's table.

"What terrible deed do you wish to accomplish?"

Lily caught up with her friends as they made their way to the greenhouse. The sun was shining oddly brighter then usual and Lily had a faint suspicion that it knew exactly what she had talked about with Alex.

"Where were you?" asked Katie enquiringly. "We thought the Marauders had you." Lily grinned; a likely story.

They had Herbology with Professor Stebbins in Greenhouse Seven that day with the Slytherins. As Lily and her friends made their way to the greenhouse, they saw a huge crowd form in front of the door, and person was shouting very loudly. This could mean only one thing. "Potter!!" Lily stormed through the crowd to see that Sirius had his wand to Snape's throat.

"Sirius?" Lily gasped in shock.

James was standing, innocently enough, at the side but his face was full of hatred. He turned and saw that Lily was watching him. They stared at each other for a moment before turning back to see Sirius grab Snape by the throat. Why wasn't James breaking up the fight? He was Head Boy after all.

"Sirius, let go of him!" Remus shouted. "It's not worth it! Just let him go!"

"You wouldn't dare!" Snape wheezed. "You wouldn't dare kill me!"

Sirius's grip tightened its hold on Snape's throat. "Oh ya?" asked Sirius, anger running through his veins. "You want to bet your life on it?"

"What's going on?" Lily asked, breathing heavily.

James was the one to answer, "Severus was the one who started it! He called me a mudblood! Then he called Moony a filthy mutt! He knows the consequences! He knows what happens when he threatens the Marauders!" James's voice was beyond hatred. It was loathsome.

"Sirius!" Lily yelled to him. She slowly took out her wand. "You let go of him! You're knee-deep in trouble! If you don't let go now it's going to be much worst!"

Sirius eyed the wand in Lily's hand – then at his grip on Snape's throat. Slowly he let go of Snape's neck.

"Sure," Remus muttered. "Listen to her."

A group of Slytherins grabbed Snape by the shoulders and hauled him back. They muttered words of disgust towards Sirius, who glared back at them menacingly.

"Sirius," said Lily. "As much as I hate this, I'm going to have to take twenty points from Gryffindor."

James's eyes bulged. "TWENTY?"

Lily turned to him. "Yes." All the Gryffindors around them went into a tumult.

"I'll have a say in this, Evans," said a severe voice from behind the crowd. Professor Stebbins appeared and glared at Sirius irately. "Sirius, you'll be doing detention for two days and I'll have to take another twenty points from Gryffindor. Now come on, we've already delayed a lesson with your squabbling."

Slowly the crowd made their way into Greenhouse Seven.

"Everyone in," said Professor McGonagall sternly. "Let's not delay any time."

The group of Gryffindors made their way into the classroom and sat down. It was their last lesson for the day, Transfiguration, and everyone was tense about the Comparable Species test that they were about to take. But no one was nearly as tense about the test as Lily. She sat near the middle of the class with Amber. Charlie and Katie had decided to take front row seats. Lily's heart was beating so fast that she was surprised that no one else had heard it and told it to shut up.

"I'll hand out the papers," Professor McGonagall continued. "But you won't start until I say so. There will be no cheating whatsoever; no looking over your friend's paper, no spells to make the answers appear, no writing the answers on your hand and absolutely no books in the classroom – Mr. Pettigrew!"

Peter hurriedly placed his book back into his bag and took it to the front of the class.

"You will start NOW!"

Lily turned her test papers around and looked at the first question: 'What are the difficulties when it comes to Comparable Species charms? Give two examples.' Lily placed her quill onto the sheet of paper. She watched Professor McGonagall pace the room, once in a while catching people cheating and threatening them with a zero. Her breathing came quick and uneven.

"Oh my," she whispered softly to the paper.

Slowly the answer came in her handwriting for the first question. She read it and gave a short smile. She really had to thank Alex Watson for his genius work. He had said that whatever Professor McGonagall did to try and see if she had cheated, it wouldn't show. Lily completed the next question, and then the next. Each answer coming through with ease in her handwriting. She noticed that it stopped whenever Professor McGonagall was coming her way. At those points of time she would pretend to be thinking really hard on what to write next.

Finally after some time Professor McGonagall said loudly, "Quills down! – That means you Lupin!"

Everyone gave a sigh as the bell rang, signalling the end of class. Some of the students began to make their way out of the classroom after Professor McGonagall. Others like Lily and her friends stayed in the classroom to discuss on how the test was.

"I think I did alright," said Katie first. "I'm definite that I didn't fail but it would be a surprise to get full marks; I skipped two questions."

"Yep," said Amber uncertainly. "What about question sixteen though, huh? State the hardest Comparable Species and discuss why."

"Do you think you did alright Lily?" Sabina asked; her arm around Sirius's shoulder. "I did great."

Lily didn't say anything. She handed the quill back to Alex, thanking him a million times out loud and in her head.

Charlie smiled at Lily. "Bet you did better then the rest of us!" Charlie said loudly. "You would have full marks! Professor McGonagall would give you loads of points for Gryffindor because of you!" They slowly made their way out of the classroom.

"Coming Lily?" asked Amber when she saw that Lily wasn't following them.

"I'll be with you in a second!" said Lily. "My bag seems to have a hole in it, I'll just patch it up, don't wait for me!" Amber walked off as a bottle full of ink fell down and shattered. Glass and black ink flew across the floor, soaking the edges of Lily's robes. "Oh my, I just bought that two days ago."

"At Hogsmeade I bet," said James softly behind her.

Lily eyed him heatedly. "Yes." She took out her wand and made the hole disappear from her bag, and then with another flick of her wand, she made the ink and glass disappear. She saw that James was still looking at her. "What are you staring at Potter?"

"I know what you did," he said, leaning on the desk behind him. "I saw you."

"Saw what?" asked Lily crossly as she slung her bag over her shoulders. But her heart seemed to be racing at that particular moment. Had he seen her cheating? He was the second last person she wanted to have had seen her cheating in a test. Professor McGonagall being the first.

"I saw you using Watson's quill," he said tonelessly. "It's a masterpiece, isn't it? I've used it in a couple of occasions myself."

"Wonder why," said Lily sarcastically. Her heart seemed to be racing on for miles but she tried to keep cool. She could feel her face heating up and sweat beads starting at the top of her forehead. James walked up to her, grinning.

"You know I'll tell."

"Potter," Lily began. "Please, don't!"

"What," said James wrathfully. "After you publicly humiliate me? Pass up a better way to seek revenge?"

Lily looked at him. "I'll do anything," she said, her voice becoming desperate. "But please don't tell Professor McGonagall."

The look James gave her made Lily's skin crawl. "I don't know what you can do for me, Evans," he said desolately. "What would I want from a shoddy princess like you? I have to do the right thing, Evans." He gave her a bigger grin. "And the right thing would be to tell Professor McGonagall."

"You're just doing that because I snitched on Sirius!" Lily shouted feverishly. "I'll earn back the points if you don't tell!"

"Points that you took away in the first place?" James roared back.

"Professor Stebbins was going to take them away anyway!" Lily said frantically.

James looked at her with disgust. "I just don't believe you, Evans," he said, dangerously soft. "You above all people to cheat."

"James," Lily said softly. She sat down and looked at the ground. "Please, don't, I'll do anything, anything you want, please – just don't tell." She felt tears prick the inside of her eyes but she quickly blinked them away. What would James care if she cried? It would just make matters worst. "James, please."

"Well," he said slowly. Lily could hear pity in his voice. "Maybe there is one thing you could do for me..." Lily looked up and saw that James was giving her a smile. Lily stood up and looked him in the eye.

"Just name it."

James looked at Lily.

"As you know the Graduation Ball is coming soon and I want to ask Ailsa Umbridge to go with me. I know it sounds crazy but I really don't know how to ask her out. Maybe you could pose as my girlfriend? I've heard that Umbridge is a real suck up for romantic, genuine guys and all. But you know, by my records, that isn't really me. Just for a couple of weeks. Then I'll dump you and she'll be sure to ask me out."

Lily looked at him as if he was mad. A few weeks posing as James's girlfriend? Was she really that desperate to play the move?

"Fine."

A/N: A few weeks posing as James's girlfriend? Is she mad?! Please R/R!!