A/N: Okay, thanks a lot to everyone who reviewed. I know that last chapter was boring and pretty stupid but I was trying to do it in a hurry so I could update. I'm really sorry about that and I'll try and make up for it here. Anyway, Lily is 17 and Amos is 19, and yes I know they're a bit young to be thinking about marriage. But I know lots of people who are married at that age and I was going to say something about that anyway. Anyway, something really IMPORTANT: my friend who was writing this fic said she was done with it because things were going to get really busy. So I volunteered to write it for her, and so now I'm writing it. I'm going to use some of her ideas and change some things. I've also revised the other chapter's mistakes. Anyway, hope you like it.


Shadows

"Oh Jamesie-poo!" Sirius' voice rang throughout the dormitory.

"I'm sleeping," James muttered, tossing in his bed.

"It's time to get up," Sirius replied jumping around the room.

"What time is it?" James said sleepily.

"Seven," Remus sounded as if he was still trying to get some sleep.

"It's Sunday, Padfoot," James groaned, "Go back to bed."

Sirius didn't seem to be listening to their groans as he began singing loudly at the top of his voice. He jumped onto his bed and began to jump vigorously, still singing unfortunately for his roommates.

"Shut-up," James said tossing a pillow in Sirius' direction.

"James, you're aim is rubbish," Sirius said as he watched the pillow sail some five feet away from him, "Anyway, let's go, get up."

"Since when do you get up at seven on a Sunday?" Remus asked.

"Oh come on, Moony," Sirius said running and jumping on Remus' bed, "You're the one who always want to get up early."

"I am not," Remus muttered, but Sirius wasn't listening and instead he was rambling on about some song he could play on his guitar.

James groaned inwardly. Sirius had bought a guitar and a bunch of Muggle records during the summer. Thankfully, Sirius usually didn't like playing in front of people after James told him he was horrible the first day he'd gotten it. In fact, James hadn't heard him play anything since this summer.

"You didn't bring that thing here, did you?" James asked rubbing his eyes.

"Of course I did," Sirius said happily, "And I'm loads better at it now than I was."

"I haven't heard you practice anything," Remus said getting out of bed.

"Well, if James hadn't of been such a lousy listener, I would have more confidence and I would play in front of you guys."

"If you weren't such a horrible guitar player, I wouldn't have had so many nightmares, " James muttered.

"I practice in the Room of Requirement," Sirius said completely ignoring James, "It's really good place, I've found all kinds of interesting music in there."

"I'll bet you have," Remus said looking through the pile of clothes for his shirt.

"Muggles definitely have better tastes in music than us, " Sirius said going on, "I'm especially keen on Lynryd Sknryd (A/N: an American rock guy). He's got some great stuff. And the Beatles are pretty good too, but Led Zeppelin, whoa, I'm in heaven with his first record."

James and Remus wore the same expressions of skeptism on their faces. They had absolutely no idea what Sirius was talking about. James was trying to figure out where an insect, the beetle, fit into this conversation. Remus, having listened to some of Sirius' records when Sirius had been over during the summer, was wondering how he'd gotten his record player to work here.

"Sirius, stop for just a second," Remus said slowly, "How does your record player work?"

"It runs on batteries," Sirius said excitedly, "Professor Garfunkel, Muggle Studies, keeps my stock up since I'm his favorite student."

"Great," James said so only Remus could hear him, "Now the muggle-obsessed boy is getting batteries from a muggle-obsessed man."

"But muggles things don't work around here," Remus argued, "It says so in Hogwarts, A History."

"I know, but we fixed it so it did," Sirius said impatiently, "Now then, I was thinking about making a club for people to get in touch with muggle music…"

James wasn't listening to a thing Sirius was saying. That's were Sirius kept running off to all those times he said he was going out with some girl. James couldn't believe that he hadn't realized it sooner that Sirius was lying about where he went when he was gone for hours at a time. And, thinking back on it, Sirius had a pretty good voice when he actually sang for real, but that was only when he was in the shower. Sirius had something against singing and playing his guitar in front of people, but James had a plan to fix that.

"Padsie," James said slowly as Sirius stopped in mid sentence and looked at him, "Why don't you play at the Halloween Ball?"

"WHAT?" Sirius said rather loudly, "Sorry, anyway, I couldn't play at the ball, didn't you guys already hook the group, 'Wizard Wails'?"

"Yeah," James said grinning, "But you could play like one or two songs, couldn't you?"

"I thought you said I was horrible," Sirius said confused.

"That was a long time ago," James said shrugging, "Just think, we could put 'Special Performance by Sirius Black,' on the fliers. Tons of people would come to see you."

"That's what worries me," Sirius said turning to Remus for help, "This is lame, isn't it?"

"I think it's a good idea," Remus said smiling, "The girls will love it."

Sirius looked doubtful for a moment, but he said, "I guess I could try it."

"That's the spirit, mate," James replied winking at him, "Holly might even like it."

Sirius grinned hugely, "There's nothing between us."

"You're the worst liar there is, Padfoot," James said laughing, "But it's about time you two hooked up."

"We're not hooking up," Sirius said who looked as if Christmas had come early.

"Sure you're not, we believe you," Remus grinned at James, "Our little Sirius has finally gotten the girl he's been smitten with. He's growing up so quickly!"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Sirius said giggling as if he was five years old again.


Holly hurried up one of the many staircases in the castle. She'd promised Lily that she'd help with her transfiguration essay tonight, but researching something for potions had taken longer than she'd expected. Now she was going to be late, and that would make Lily angry. Why couldn't there be more time in a day?

Quite unexpectedly a hand closed around Holly's mouth, "Don't make a sound," a soft voice said.

Holly brushed the hand away, "You know, it's not nice to scare people."

"I don't like playing nice," The man said wrapping his arms around her waist.

Holly grinned and turned to see her attacker. There stood Sirius Black with a triumphant grin on his face. Holly felt a flutter in her stomach; he looked incredibly handsome standing halfway in the shadows. He leaned down and kissed her forehead.

"Sirius, stop," Holly said giggling, "Somebody's bound to see us."

"I haven't done anything yet," Sirius protested, "Besides, who cares if they see?"

Holly slipped her hand into his and pulled him so the shadows veiled them both. "They mustn't see, remember? We have to act normal so Lily and James don't suspect that we're setting them up."

"But we are setting them up," Sirius pointed out.

"Yes, but if Lily finds out that we're going out, then she'll never ask James to the ball," Holly sighed, "Then everything will be ruined."

"Not everything," Sirius grinned, "We'll still be together."

"That is the oldest line in the book," Holly mockingly.

"You know what they say, 'oldies but goodies'," Sirius replied.

"You are hopeless," Holly said laughing.

"What?" Sirius asked confused.

"This romance stuff. I'd have thought you'd be some guy who thought everything was above him," Holly said.

"Am I doing something wrong?" Sirius asked seriously concerned.

"No, not at all, I just mean, you've gone out with tons girls, right?" Sirius looked a little ashamed, "And they all worshiped the ground you walked so you never had to be romantic, at least that's what I thought. But here you are trying to be a big romantic and you sound like the gorgeous guy on the chick flicks that they always fall for."

"Is that a bad thing?" Sirius said absolutely clueless on what a chick-flick was.

"Nah, I think it's cute," Holly said laughing, "You and your cheesy romantic lines."

Sirius grinned slyly, "Of course it's cute, it's coming from me."

Holly groaned and punched him lightly on the arm, "You are too much."

"That hurt," Sirius said rubbing his arm.

"Poor baby," Holly said without any sympathy, "Oh crud, I completely forgot! I was supposed to help Lily with her transfiguration. She's going to kill me."

"Don't worry," Sirius said, "She's always got Prongs to help her."

"Yeah, hopefully they haven't completely ripped apart the common room trying to help each other," Holly said, "I'll see you later Sirius."

Sirius watched as Holly's shimmering black hair flipped this way and that as she ran up the steps. She was so beautiful he could hardly breathe every time he looked at her. He hoped ol' James could help him with his hopeless romantics, maybe even Remus. As girls go, Remus was smarter than James and Sirius put together. They'd always gotten girls by their good looks, but Sirius really wanted something special for Holly. Who knows, maybe they could last longer than a month…


"HOLLY SHORT!" a voice rang out as soon as Holly entered the common room, "WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?"

"Potions took a lot longer than I expected Lily," Holly said calmly.

"I had to stoop to getting help from POTTER!" Lily said lowering her voice only a little.

"Well it wouldn't have gone so bad if—" James shut-up at the look Lily gave him.

"You were supposed to be here over an hour ago," Lily said rounding again on Holly.

"It's not my fault you can't do your own homework," Holly said, somehow still calm.

"I can do it," Lily said furiously, her shouts had caused a silence in the common room.

"Then do it," Holly said impatiently, "Or have James help you, but I have to finish my arithmancy."

"I've already got it done," Lily said smugly.

"Good for you Evans," James said laughing, "I've got it done too, so I could help you with Transfiguration."

Lily looked as if she was going to say something else, but she restrained herself, "Fine, you've already helped me with half of it, so why don't you just smash it in my face more?"

"Evans," James groaned, "When I said that being good at Transfiguration means that you're also logical, I didn't mean people who aren't very good at it are stupid."

"Just shut-up, Potter, and help me," Lily said taking her quill and parchment up.

James grinned and shook his head. He probably shouldn't have joked about Lily being bad at Transfiguration, she hated having her weaknesses rubbed in. The rest of the night, Lily shot furious looks at Holly, but James saw her whispering to her animatedly when they headed up for bed. Girls sure did act funny, get all upset about the stupidest things, and then they act like everything's fine. It was all too confusing for him.


"Lily, have you asked James yet?" Holly asked as politely as she could.

"And I was supposed to get that conversation in when? While he was making fun of me or when I was yelling at him?" Lily said bitterly.

"Lily, look, I'm going to lay it all out for you," Holy replied, "James Potter is one of the greatest guys in the whole world, and he happens to in love with you. But you are being an idiot and going out with one of the stupidest guys in the whole world who doesn't love you."

"Of course Amos loves me," Lily said her breath catching in her throat.

"He loves what you put out, yes," Holly corrected her, "It would look really good if a young guy got married to the brightest witch at Hogwarts who was a muggle and Head Girl. It would show some guts in times like this. But James, James loves the way you talk with your hands, the way your eyes sparkle when you're happy, the way your hair bounces around your face. Sirius said he could go on forever about you. That's love."

Lily stopped rustling around in her bed and looked thoughtful for a moment. She sat down on her bed and held her head between her hands. Holly thought maybe she'd gone a bit too far in saying all those things about Amos, but when Lily looked up, she wasn't crying. She just looked sad and forgotten.

"James doesn't love me anymore," She whispered it so quietly Holly wasn't sure if she'd really said or if she'd imagined it. Lily just turned and closed her bed hanging, evidently wanting to go to sleep. Holly noticed that even hours later, Lily's breath wasn't slow and steady like when she slept. Her best friend was obviously thinking about something that bothered her very much.


A/N: Was it good? I know it was a little boring, but I'm trying to get the feel for things since I'm new to this. Please review, it doesn't take long! Thanks a lot for reading.