Part one of two chapters. The time jumps forward to sometime in September of everyone's sixth year. Hope you enjoy...I've worked hard on this chapter and it STILL isn't any good.

"So then you take this brown thingy...and then you add this shriveled thingy...and, oh dear," Lily said.

"What's a matter Lils?" asked Lily's friend, Lucy Hill (called Lulu by most. Atleast the most who she allowed to call her that, the rest were usually found weeks later stuffed in a closet)

"I think I did something wrong."

"What makes you say that?"

"Mmm. Well, I don't suppose the potion's supposed to be purple."

"No. Definitely not."

"Oh. Well, what is it supposed to look like?"

"Some type of greeny shade." Lily sighed and looked over at Lucy's cauldron. Her potion was a deep green and shimmering.

"What in the world is THAT supposed to be?" asked a boy, coming over to look at Lily's potion.

"That happens to be my potion, Snapey," Lily said calmly.

"Why is it purple?"

"Ah. I think the real question here is, why not?"

"It's not supposed to be purple."

"Yes, I know. Do you have a point?"

"Yes."

"And that would be...?" Lily asked.

Snape blinked at her. Once. Twice. Three times.

"Well?"

"It's not supposed to be purple." Lily groaned and pushed Snape out of the way as she made her way towards the professor's desk after scooping a bit of her potion into a flask.

"Professor Carlson?" Lily said.

"Yes?"

"Um, how many points would one lose if one's potion had turned out to be a bit on the purplish side?"

"One would lose quite a lot of points as one's potion was supposed to be green and it was supposed to shimmer."

"What if it sparks flew out of it instead?"

"Miss Evans, which potion is yours?" Professor Carlson asked, scratching his practically completely bald head and rearranging his glasses on his nose. He was a round, happy, cheery guy. So why he chose to hold his classes in the dungeons was beyond any of them.

But back to the story now.

"This one," Lily said, pointing to hers. Professor Carlson waved his wand and a little red X appeared on the flask.

"What does that mean?" Lily asked nervously.

"It means that I shouldn't drink your awakening potion. Or whatever it is now, I've never really heard of a potion that is purple and sparks." Lily beamed.

"So I made up a new potion?"

"Possibly," the professor said with a sigh.

"Cool! Okay. Bye professor!"

Lily walked out of the room and was joined by her friends.

"And what was that about?" Ari Figg asked her.

"I've created a new potion!"

"Really, what does it do?" asked Gia Barnes.

"Oh, well, I don't really know. But it could possibly be dangerous. Think I should slip James some?" Ari rolled her eyes.

"Lily, this fight between you two has got to stop. We're sixteen. We're mature adults now."

"Actually I'm still fifteen."

"Alright, everyone except Gia is sixteen."

"I'm fifteen too, my birthday's not until April."

"Okay. Everyone except Gia and Lulu are sixteen."

"I'm not sixteen either Ari. You know my birthday's in October," Lily said.

"Then as the oldest and the wisest and the maturest-"

"Is that a word?" Gia wondered out loud.

"-of the group, I say that we all start acting more mature."

"How about instead we go to charms and turn people funny colors?"

"Okay!"

The four girls went to charms class together, arms linked and skipping. When they reached charms they took their usual seats in the third row. Professor Flitwick entered moments later.

"Today we will begin working on the remembrance charm. It's quite simple really. Just wave your wand and say 'Remembrero.' Pair up now and practice on each other!"

Lily turned to Ari.

"Okay so how do we do this?" Ari asked.

"Um...Have you forgotten anything?"

"I'm not sure. I forgot."

"Remembrero."

"Mmm...I just remembered how crap school is."

"Anything else?"

"I'm wearing my last pair of clean socks."

"Good job Miss Evans! Twenty points to Gryffindor! Miss Figg and you have no homework tonight."

"I knew there was a reason I was friends with you," Ari said playfully.

"Shh. I'm concentrating." Lily had her wand pointed at the back of James Potter's head. She whispered a few well chosen words and James was suddenly sporting very blonde hair.

"Now Lily, that's not very mature."

"Pity none of us are mature."

"I am mature."

"No you are not."

"Still, we should do the mature thing."

"Or instead we could do the fun thing." Lucy pointed her wand at the back of Sirius Black's head. When Sirius opened his mouth to tell his friend about his new blonde locks, Lucy whispered "Silencio" and no sound was able to come out of his mouth.

"Hmm. That IS fun."

Charms ended a little while later, with Lucy grumbling about how she had to write a twenty-four inch report on the importance of not mixing the remembrance charm up with the cheering charm.

But as Lily reminded her, "You are good in potions. You are not good in charms. That is the natural order of things. If you were good in both the world would be strange and un-balanced and crazy things would happen. Also, I would be yellow with envy because I am not good at potions."

"The term is green with envy."

"Ah, but green is not my best color so I would charm myself to turn yellow."

"Ah."

As charms was their last class of the day, the quartet headed off to dinner. They took their seat at the Gryffindor table and sat there, chatting and giggling. They were having quite a good time doing this when James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew arrived and sat across from them.

Unfortunately, James's hair was back to its dark color and Sirius could talk again.

"So ladies, how was your day?" James asked.

"Fantabulous. Yours?" Lily asked.

"Not so fantabulous. Apparently I wondered around the halls of our dear school with blonde hair."

"Oh. So do blondes have more fun then?"

"This blonde didn't."

"Oh, did you get laughed at?"

"Yes."

"A lot?"

"Yes."

"Did people point at you?"

"Er, yes."

"James Potter, you just made my day."

"Very funny. I'll get you back, you know."

"Actually, according to the rules of er, pranking, you are not allowed to get her back because she got you back for transfiguring all of her shoes into little piglets," Gia stated.

"Well that simply won't do, now will it Sirius?" James asked his best friend. Sirius shrugged.

"James, will you stop already? This has been going on for how long?" Remus asked.

"Six years," Gia answered.

"Thank you," Remus said to the girl.

"What was your point again?"

"My point was that this has to stop."

"Oh."

After dinner, Lily and Ari left the great hall together, discussing various topics.

When they entered the Gryffindor common room, they found James and Sirius arm wrestling and surrounded by a bunch of giggling girls, each cheering for a different marauder.

'What in the name of all that is holy are you two doing?" Lily asked, marching right up to them.

"Sirius bet me that I couldn't beat him."

"You two are such...boys!" Lily cried.

"Really, then what's Remus?"

"Remus isn't a boy."

"I'm not?" Remus asked with some surprise. He had been sitting next to James and Sirius reading silently and occasionally looking up to watch the fight.

"No, he's, well he's a Remus." Remus sighed. He 'secretly' had a crush on Lily.

Great. I'm not a boy to her. I'm a Remus.

"How did you three beat us up here?"

"We have our ways." Lily sighed loudly with frustration and walked away. James looked up to watch her and Sirius took advantage.

"Ha! I win! What did we bet, ten galleons?" Sirius asked with glee. James handed his friend the money.

"Well, I'm off to bed. G'night Sirius, Remus." James walked up to the boy's dormitories and disappeared behind a door that read 'SIXTH YEAR BOYS.'

"So Ari, what with all this money I have now I could afford to take you out to Hogsmead," Sirius said, turning his attention to her.

'And why didn't you ask me before?" Ari questioned.

"Well, I didn't have any money then. I couldn't take you anywhere nice."

"Sirius Black! You are the DUMBEST person I have ever met!" Ari stormed away and up the staircase that led to her dormitory. Sirius watched in shock as Ari left him sitting there alone.

"What was that about?" he asked Remus.

"Beats the hell out of me," Remus said, closing the book he had been reading. "Anyway. I think I'm going to go to bed too. Night."

"Nighty night."

Ari slammed the door behind her and threw herself down on to her bed.

"What's a matter Ari?" Lily asked from her own bed. Ari looked over to her friend. She was standing on top of her bed, doing what Ari supposed was to be a tap dance.

"Nothing Lily," Ari said with a sigh.

"Oh, are you sure?"

"Mm-hmm."

"Oh. Okay then. If there's anything you want to talk about though, lemme know."

Ari would have loved to gush about all her problems to her friend for the next, oh say million years, but she had more important things to worry about at the time.

"Ari, what would you do if I was a tomato?"

Like her friend's sanity.

"Lily, I think James has done something to your brain."

"Mmm. Maybe. Do you know what time it is?"

"It's still early."

"Hmm. Want to have a party?" Lily asked.

"A party? And invite who?"

"Everybody? Well, everybody that we like. It could be fun."

"When do you want to have the party?"

"Well I was thinking right now."

Ari sat up on her bed.

"Now? But what about food? And where would we have it?" Lily waved her hands around and sat down on her bed.

"Food is easy. We could ask James and Sirius if they could nip off and get us some. They know where the kitchens are. And for a place I was thinking the common room."

Ari wrinkled her nose. Talking to Sirius didn't sound like a very appealing thought right then.

"Okay. I'll invite people and you ask them to get the food," Ari said.

"Sounds like a plan to me!" Lily said.

Gia entered a few moments later with Lucy behind her.

"What's up guys?" Gia asked.

"We're having a party!" Ari said excitedly.

"Ooh...When?"

"Right now!

"Now? As in, NOW now?"

"Si!"

"Who's invited?"

"All of Gryffindor! So why don't you guys go and start inviting people."

Gia nodded her head and exited the door she had entered just seconds before.

"Right then. I'll go talk to James," Lily said, standing up from her bed and crossing over to her door. Ari just nodded at her friend's back. Lily left the room, leaving behind a very confused, frustrated, depressed, and somewhat hungry Ari.

Ari sighed and reached her arm towards her pillows. She grabbed at things blindly until her hand found what it was looking for. She pulled the small pink teddy bear up to her chest and cradled him as she would a baby. She lay back against her pillow as she hugged the bear at the same time and started to cry.

Part one is done! Woo!! And now to write part two...Oh the joy...

Some things I will tell you---

Chapter two will take longer to write (but hopefully not MUCH longer, we do have a weekend coming up after all) because the prologue was already written has was about three-quarters of this chapter.

Yes, Ari is feeling depressed. Nothing too serious, she's just feeling alone right now. It's not that Lily isn't a good friend, it's just that...well you'll see. But don't worry about our little Ari friend, her depression won't last long.

There is no three, I just thought that only telling you two things seemed a little unfair.

If you are nice to me and review I will give you gold, money, and cake! Just kidding. If I had any of the following I wouldn't be sharing. Even if you DID review. Now where was I before I rudely interrupted myself? Oh yes. If you DO review I will reward you with a new chapter and then maybe even ANOTHER chapter!! (That is, if I don't run out of ideas. Because that is the funny thing about brains, they give you this really great idea and you act on impulse and write it all out and then your brain says "No more! I'm done!" And you're all, "But I have all these reviewers and I don't want to disappoint them! Come on brain!" But it doesn't look like I'll be running out of ideas for any time in the near future.) So, moral of the story is REVIEW!!!! Even if you think it's awful then TELL ME. This may surprise you, but I LIKE hearing about it when people tell me what I write is absolute crap. Because it makes me think and it makes me write better. So, REVIEW.

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