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:) James-RoxMySox: i know the chappie was a little sad...but, it was necessary. i think you'll like this chapter. im glad you think the grief and stuff was realistic...i've never gone through anything like that before, so i was trying to make it as real as possible. you are an awesom reviewer, thanks so much! ::hands over a strawberry lollipop::

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Chapter 3: A Little Comfort

Twenty minutes before curfew and Lily could still be found in the library, waiting until the last possible moment to return to her dorm... Sighing, she gathered all of her things and returned the books back to their shelves. As she trudged back to the Head Dorms, she couldn't help but wish that James was already in his own dorm, asleep. That way, she wouldn't be bothering him and whatever he was dealing with...okay, well, maybe it was also so he didn't ask her any questions, but so what? She hated seeing him like this... especially when there was nothing she could do to fix it...

Slowly, she trudged through the corridors and stopped in front of a portrait of a rather large man in a deep green nightgown. "Password?" he asked sleepily. "Tinsel Lights" Lily shouted up at him. The potrait door swung open and Lily stepped inside, only to see James, Sirius, and Remus all sitting in various places in the Common Room, unmoving. Sirius sitting on the floor, his head on a couch cushion, staring blankly at the ceiling. Remus was slumped in a chair, a piece of parchment crumpled at his feet, his head in his hands. James...

James was sitting in the chair Lily had seen him in that morning, his eyes empty and lifeless, staring dead into the fire. It seemed as if they hadn't moved in hours. None of them had seen her yet. She silently made her way to her dorm, pausing only for a glance back at the three boys...no, not boys... at the three bodies. There was no life left in them, and this scared Lily to the very bone... three boys who couldn't be more full of life, now empty...and why? Because Voldemont had decided to intervene.

Lily couldn't sleep... all she could think about was Voldermont and the havoc he's reeked... He'd only come to power recently, started off small and people were only starting to see him as a real threat... But soon, Lily knew, he'd cause more pain than any wizard in history...and why? Who knows... but whatever it was, it turned him into some psycho-killer-maniac person with more power than he should have... Another Hitler, but this one has magic. Same mission, same plan: kill all the "impure" ones....all the people who weren't good enough to join their cult. Hilter persecuted the Jewish race (even though he was half Jewish himself) and Voldermont hates the muggleborn wizards and witches (even though he is half-muggleborn himself)...sick, sick men.....

If you could even call them men. Her only hope was Voldermont did not die the same way Hitler did: suicide. She wanted to get her hands around his puny little neck before he had the chance to Avada Kedavra himself. She tossed and turned for another few hours and around one in the morning, she found herself walking out of her dorm with three blankets in hand.

Just as she had thought, the boys had all fallen into a restless sleep... She draped a blanket over Sirius and another over James. Remus, who was hunched over and leaning against his hands, lifted his head sleepily and looked over to Lily, who was currently covering James lovingly with a blanket. Then, to his surprise, she leaned over and kissed James' forehead. She looked over at Remus, who was staring at her, and smiled a small, sad smile. Wordlessly, she handed a blanket to Remus and walked back into her dorm, where she too fell into a restless sleep.

Lily slept late, which was unusual for her, and ended up waking up around 11 AM. Exhausted, she attempted to fall back asleep, but her efforts were pointless. Dragging herself out of bed, Lily looked over at her clock. 11:27 am. It felt earlier to Lily... more like 1:27 am. But how can you argue with a clock? She sleepily began to get ready for the day. By noon, the girl was finally awake enough to realize she was starving and rushed out of her dorm, fully intent on getting to lunch early...

When she entered the Common Room, she noticed that only James was left, covered in the blanket and sleeping on the couch...if you could call it sleeping... he kept twitching and moaning in his sleep, almost crying outloud... Lily knew he must be having a nightmare and she couldn't just leave him when he looked so miserable. She walked over to him and shook him gently to wake him up... He stirred slightly but didn't wake up.

She shook him a little less gently and it seemed to do the trick. He opened his blurry eyes to see Lily Evans watching him worriedly... Confused, he looked around, why wasn't he in his dorm? Stifling a sob, James put his head in his hands. Lily cautiously put her arm around him, trying to comfort him, but unsure how. He leaned into her hold and Lily pulled him into a protective hug. He sobbed into her shoulder, but she didn't mind. Since he had first gotten that letter, Lily felt a connection with him that she hadn't felt with anyone for a long time. It wasn't just pity, but compassion and understanding and... something else that she just couldn't identify. Lily held him through it all, crying a few tears of her own, while he relived the memories he had of his beloved sister...

Sirius and Remus entered the Common Room quietly, each with food in a napkin. They stopped dead in their tracks at the scene in front of them. James, it seemed, was weeping into Lily's shoulder while she held him and did her best to soothe him, talking into his ear and wiping her own tears from the corners of her eyes. Remus walked over to a nearby table and put down the food he had brought in for James silently, motioning for Sirius to do the same.

Then, the two of them quietly left the Head Common Room, sure that neither James nor Lily had seen them. James had never been one to let people know how he's feeling, preferring to hide it behind his "pretty face" and his arrogant attitude... Sirius could only remember two times he had seen James cry in the past seven years... when his grandmother had died and when, just the day before, he got the news about Rosa... But for him to cry in front of anyone else? James was always the strong one, the one who never showed his emotions...

Remus couldn't help but wonder what Lily's part in all of this was... first, the "crypic" warning she had given them the morning before, she seemed to know what had happened and he was fairly sure that James hadn't told her. Then, there was the whole comfort-kiss-thing from the night before, when she had brought in the blankets for the three of them. Now, she was in there, comforting him and stuff while he was crying... Maybe it was easier for him to cry in front of her because she was a girl?

Or maybe... maybe she has gone through the same thing... Who knew? Lily was a loner kind of person... he didn't know that much about her, except that she studied REALLY hard and ...well... that was about all she did... Her life seemed to kind of circle around her studies... Maybe... maybe there was a reason she worked so hard... Well, now that he's thought of all these questions, Remus (being the intellectual person that he is) needed the answers...

The two of them went back to their own dorm and took their time preparing for what was left of the day, unsure on how to approach the whole James-grieving thing. Do they go back to the Head dorms and see whats going on? Or do they just wait it out until James comes to find them? The latter wasn't likely, but neither of the boys wanted to interfere with whatever healing was going on...obviously, Lily helped James deal with his grief better than they did.

They had been there for a few hours at least and Lily didn't know what to do. She couldn't help but feel his pain. A few more tears than she'd care to admit escaped her and she furiously wiped them away before anyone could notice. Should she just sit here until he was done, or should she try to talk to him [aside from the occasional whisper to calm him], and try to help him?

By now, he was no longer sobbing but crying silently... her heart went out to him...she remembered her first few days after she got that letter... how alone and vulenerable she felt, how empty... it was horrible... She didn't want James to have to go through that... to have to feel that pain. Since he had first gotten that letter, Lily felt a connection with him that she hadn't felt with anyone for a long time. It wasn't just pity, but compassion and understanding and... something else that she just couldn't identify.

It isn't fair! she thought angrily, Why should anyone have to feel this much pain? ... There wasn't a reason... it was someone else's hatred that caused this pain... ooh... how she wished she could just face him once... even if she just got in one good hex before she died...at least she'd have gotten him once...proved that he isn't "all powerful"...

James had stopped crying and he was just staring up at her... his hazel eyes sad and soulful. Lily was just thrilled to see life in them...she didn't know if she could stand to see those beautiful eyes of his dead any longer. She couldn't look away from his eyes... for those few moments, no one could ever understand her better than him...it was like he knew everything about her and she felt safer than ever... She leaned in as he did and closed the distance between them. For a few moments it was bliss... no thoughts, no worries, no fears. Just the feeling that THIS was what life should be about...not revenge... not hatred... not Voldermont... But it didn't last....

As soon as she realized what she was doing, Lily pulled back, her eyes wide. She stood up quickly, knocking down a table near by, sending food flying... Her mind was in shock... her default setting: to run. And that's what she did. She rushed straight out the common room and just kept running until there were 4 floors and 12 flights of stairs between James and herself. She found herself near an empty classroom that looked as if it hadn't been touched in years and walked shakily inside.

Leaning against a wall, Lily took a few deep breaths to calm herself... all she succeeded in doing was causing herself to hyperventailate. She slid to the floor and curled up, her arms wrapped around her knees and her head resting on top... Her "inner peace" was gone... whatever she felt during that kiss was pushed to the back of her mind... She felt alone and scared...unsure of what to do next... there were only one thing she knew she had to do: stay as far away as possible from James Potter.

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