Author's note: See guys I'm starting to get regular with my updates now, who would have thought. I would have updated sooner but we have been having our performances (A Midsummer Night's Dream) all this week. The competition is next week so we've been rehearsing and performing like crazy! So I hope you guys like the next few chapters they're going to be really S/N oriented, but don't worry there will be quite a bit of R/J and J/L. So enjoy and please review!

Disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing, which somehow makes me question how I'm ever going to get into university.

Chapter 16: Let the games begin!

Remus sat bent over his meal, his gaze never leaving his toast and kippers and his hands never once rose to grip the fork and knife that lay before him, the silver finish would have glowed with the reflection of the sun but the clouds had covered it engulfing the school in a constant state of darkness. His meal remained untouched. He was worried about his friend.

Sirius took a swig of his pumpkin juice allowing it to trickle down his throat before he placed it unnecessarily hard against the wood of the Gryffindor table. His hand clutching his fork tightly in his grasp as he raised it almost ceremoniously before he jabbed it rather harshly into his kippers. Shoving them into his mouth and withdrawing his fork, he chewed with a somber, passive look on his face, betraying what he was really feeling.

There was a thick unsettling tension at the end of the Gryffindor table as the two marauders who were in such close proximity couldn't bring themselves to speak of last nights events no matter how bad one of them wanted to. And how bad the other wanted to forget it ever happened.

Remus's eyes roamed upon the figure of his friend who had yet to show any emotions other then his miniature battle with his kippers. He had not even been awake when his friend had left for breakfast or even when he had left the solitude of the washroom. Though Remus doubted he had, his friends anguished yell still echoed in the back of his mind. Yet another curious thought tugged at his mind. He had yet to see James in the dormitory or at breakfast, now that he thought of it he hadn't even seen his friend since his walk with Lily, and he still hadn't seen any of the girls show up for breakfast yet. He hoped Jenny was having more luck with her friend then he was having communicating with Sirius.

Jenny tentatively got dressed behind the curtains of her four-poster; she didn't want to disturb her friend who had spent the latter half of the night replacing her sorrow with anger. Jenny had no idea when her friend was about to blow up.

"Where's Lily when you need her?" Jenny muttered to herself she had felt quite uneasy when her friend hadn't shown up the previous night and to be honest she was quite upset at not having her friend's help in finding out what the hell was wrong with Nikki. Slowly she began to open the hangings around her four-poster, however she was saved the trouble of finishing when they were nearly ripped off for her by an overly exuberant Nikki.

Exasperated that her friend had only just gotten her clothes on she asked "Were you planning on coming down to breakfast at any point this morning?"

Jenny was caught off guard by her friend's sunny mood when she asked "why are we so happy today? Last night you were about to blow a hole in the dormitory!"

"Why shouldn't I be?" Nikki asked stressing the shouldn't. Obviously she was attempting to forget the other night. So Jenny decided she was more then willing to humor her over eccentric friend. "No reason" she replied innocently casting around for a change of subject she asked, "have you seen Lily at all?"

"No, I haven't" replied Nikki as she cast her gaze around their dorm as if doing so would make her magically appear.

"May as well go down to breakfast, she's probably there with James" Nikki said dismissing her disappearance.

"Okay" said Jenny hesitantly.

"Besides I really want to know what's for breakfast" said Nikki smiling and tugging at her friends robes.

"What's up with you and your new found love of breakfast?" Questioned Jenny eyeing her friend suspiciously.

"Well" replied Nikki exasperatedly as if trying to explain something very simple to someone younger then herself "breakfast is the most important meal of the day."

"Oh please" said jenny trying hard but failing to suppress her laughter "you barely ever eat it!"

"Well" said Nikki as she applied a coat of mascara to her eyes "I'm eating it now."

"We may as well head down now then," said Jenny as she grabbed her book bag and slung it over her shoulder.

"That's the spirit!" Nikki exclaimed clapping her friend on the back as they began their decent to the Gryffindor common room but stopped when they collided with the very harassed looking figure of one lily Evans in a very compromising position.

The sun began to rise and would have cast a warming glow on the lake had it not been for the immense cloud coverage. The sun not being able to shine did very little to warm the grounds. A cool autumn breeze blew along the trees of the grounds and the Whomping Willow flung its' branches wildly at the dancing leaves. Had it not been for the grayness of the sky it would have been beautiful. Anyone who would be waking up would look out the tower onto a peaceful and quite school grounds. But even that was impossible for when the majority of the school had already ventured down to breakfast one girls scream could have been heard throughout the grounds and probably into the next muggle town.

Lily Evans shivered as she felt a cool breeze tug at her body instinctively she shifted her head to bury it into her pillow it was warm and she clung tighter to it, but was surprised when she felt it moving. She let her eyes slowly flutter open adjusting themselves to the light (or the lack there of). She stretched her arms and did a double take when she raised her head. She was staring at the lake! She rubbed her eyes and looked again, nope it wasn't a dream, her eyes fell on the sleeping figure beside her. Then it dawned on her what must have happened. "Shit!" She cursed to herself as she reached out and began to shake James. When he didn't stir she began to call his name.

"James you idiot wake up!" still he would not move, so she took out her wand and aimed it at his face as she muttered a charm underneath her breath. Water began to spout from the tip of her wand.

"What the hell!" shouted James as he bolted upright and ran his hands across his face attempting to wipe away the remnants of water. "What was that for?" He asked still barely awake when it dawned on him.

"We didn't."

"Yeah we sure as hell did!" yelled Lily standing up and brushing off her jumper she rounded on James and cried, "I can not believe you let this happen!"

"Me!" Said James as her got to his feet, "I don't recall you exactly in a rush to get back to the common room!"

"Yeah well you were the one who wanted to come out here in the first place." Yelled Lily running a hand through her hair, god she must have looked awful.

"Look, lets not fight okay we still have" James glanced at his watch and looking up at Lily hesitantly mumbled "fifteen minutes."

"Fifteen minutes!" Lily nearly screeched "we aren't even changed yet!" Forgetting about their previous squabble she grabbed his hand and ran back towards the castle praying that nobody would see them.

Remus looked up from his breakfast surprised when he saw James run into the great hall his robes practically falling off of his shoulders. He nearly burst out laughing at his appearance. His tie was hanging loosely around his neck and his book bag was falling around his waist as he muttered a drying charm on his sopping-wet hair. Remus could only imagine how that had happened. James sat down out of breath next to Sirius and across from Remus who was still eyeing him with a mixture of pity and laughter in his eyes. James tucked into his meal ravenously. Remus imagined he hadn't eaten anything since his walk with Lily earlier the other day. Taking a stab at conversation he asked, "how did your walk with Lily go?"

"sfiasgreastf" James answered showering both his friends with bits of egg and toast. Remus gave James a disgusted look and brushed crumbs of toast off of his robes. James took a rather large swig of pumpkin juice and exhaling loudly repeated himself, "it was great…for the most part."

"You and Lily went for a walk?" Sirius asked looking up from his untouched breakfast smiling. "You're getting soft on me mate, you're going to start giving me a bad rap with the ladies." Sirius finished a serious expression on his face before he burst out laughing.

Remus was totally caught off guard by his friend's sudden urge to joke around, but he wasn't about to miss the opportunity to take his mind off of whatever had happened to him last night.

"Don't worry mate," said James after he too had finished laughing "I don't think anything could ruin your rep with the ladies, I mean after all you are just so" there James paused and leaned into his friend batting his eyelashes flirtashishly and rubbing his arm "you're just so dashing."

Sirius replied by stroking James's cheek and answering "maybe I don't want a good rep with the ladies."

"Oh god mate, I was kidding!" yelled James inching away down the table eyeing his friend suspiciously. Sirius just laughed and turned back to his meal. But Remus knew his friend was only trying to avoid the issue. He would have to talk about it sometime but he would give his friend some time to escape his problems although he knew it would hurt even more when he had to confront him about it.

"There you are!" cried Jenny as she threw her arms around Lily's neck and letting her go asked "are you okay?"

Before Lily could answer Nikki asked "why are you wearing the same clothes as yesterday for?"

"I know the answer to that" Jenny replied smiling "she went out for a walk with James last night."

"Really?" Asked Nikki leaning in closer to her friend and draping an arm loosely around her shoulder "and you're just getting in now?" Lily nodded her head and attempted to make her way back to the dormitories but was followed by her friends.

"Now Lily" continued Nikki sounding annoyingly like her parents "I do hope you were being safe and-

"Shut up Nikki" Lily said blushing as she bent over her trunk searching for a clean pair of robes "nothing happened."

"Sure" replied Nikki "so are we going to go down to breakfast or what." Lily looked upon at her friend as she pulled her arms through her sweater "since when are you in such a hurry to get to breakfast?"

Nikki just rolled her eyes "why do you guys find it so hard to believe that I'm hungry!"

"Because you never are," replied Lily as she dragged a comb through her hair and grabbed her books to the Nikki's muttered "finally."

"See," said Jenny "the breakfast is still here we haven't missed it."

"I know" replied Nikki as they strode into the great hall and towards the Gryffindor table, Jenny and Lily began to make their way over to the Marauder's direction when Nikki turned at the last second and made her way to the other end of the table amidst the seventh years. James looked questioningly at Lily as she walked with her friends in the opposite direction she shrugged and mouthed sorry before turning with Jenny and Nikki. James turned to his friends with questioning looks and asked, "uh, why are the girls not sitting here?"

"Change of surroundings?" Remus offered but as he raised his head he could clearly read the skeptical look on James's face and the mixture of anger and resentment on Sirius's but it was quickly replaced with a smile as he began talking about the upcoming quidditch match against the Ravenclaws.

"Nikki?" called Lily as she attempted to catch the gaze of her friend who seemed to be preoccupied, "do you want to tell us why we're sitting about as far as possible from James."

"And Remus" chimed Jenny as they both regarded their friend questioningly.

"Well" said Nikki breaking her focus from whatever she was looking at and turning to her friends "just because two of you are going out with them doesn't mean that I want to be there every meal of the day!"

"You could change that you know," said Jenny as a smile broke out across her face "you could just go out with Sirius and save us all the trouble of having to pass notes along the table to communicate with our boyfriends."

"Yeah" added Lily "you two could have some really good looking kids." At that point they both burst out laughing. But stopped when they saw that Nikki wasn't sharing in their laughter, on the contrary they had never seen her look more serious.

"Nikki" said Jenny as she tapped her friend on the shoulder "we were only kidding, what's wrong?"

"Nothing" replied Nikki with a smile on her face "just thinking about potions with the Slytherins."

"That's enough to put a frown on anybody's face" said Lily smiling as she put butter on her toast, though she doubted her friend could even hear her. She was again preoccupied with something that seemed to be in the direction of the Ravenclaw table.

"But seriously though" said Jenny eyeing her friend "besides Remus and James who else could better looking or better for you then Sirius, I mean you both came into the common room last night in the bitterest of moods, it's as if you're almost programmed the same." At her last comment Nikki laughed along with her friends.

"Actually" started Nikki with a smile over her shoulder "I think there is someone."

"Someone what?" Asked Lily watching her friend's sly smile as she stood up.

"Better looking then Sirius" Nikki mouthed as a pair of lean arms that belonged to an equally gorgeous body wrapped themselves around her shoulders.

Lily gave Nikki a questioning look as the Ravenclaw boy sat down and reached out his hand to both Lily and Jenny in turn "I'm Brandon Kershaw" he smiled as he introduced himself.

"We both have the same Muggle studies class" explained Nikki Being the only pure blood out of their group muggles and their way of living had always fascinated her, Jenny having a witch as a mother and a muggle as a father never saw the point in taking the course. Lily being Muggle born never bothered to either. Brandon easily engaged the girls in conversation and they found out he was actually quite smart and looking into ministry work after Hogwarts, Brandon was pleasant enough and easily won over the girls who were glad to see Nikki with somebody who seemed so kind and intelligent. Though they doubted how long it would last but they didn't mention that, they were happy to see their friend smiling and for now that was enough.

"No I'm serious!" Cried James "I'm so close to having enough galleons to buy the new Comet 360."

"That's got to be the best model they pit out yet!" Replied Sirius naming off all of its features but stopping suddenly as his gaze caught on something that caused his stomach to tighten. James noticed the change in his friend's demeanor and asked with his mouth half full of egg "swrong Padfoot?"

Sirius ignored the question and continued to watch as a very handsome very fit Ravenclaw wrapped his arms around Nikki and seat himself beside her. James and Remus watched as his hands tightened around his fork and knife. Remus was surprised that they hadn't shattered in his hands, James was totally in the dark and kept sending questioning glances in Remus's direction which he in turn ignored and standing up said "may as well get to transfiguration or McGonagal will land us all in detention." At his last word Sirius stood up and muttered "yeah" slinging his book bag over his shoulder. But the girls must have been thinking the same thing for they too stood up and just as Sirius glanced over his shoulder he saw something that made the tightness in his stomach double. As Nikki had picked up her books and had began to make her way out of the entrance hall Brandon had caught her arms and pulled her into his embrace giving her a quick kiss on the cheek. Even though it was only on the cheek then thought of him touching her made him feel and unbelievable amount of emotions course through this veins. Feelings of resentment, anger, sorrow, regret, sadness, pain. But what made him the most upset was that he was letting his emotions be controlled by somebody who obviously had no interest in being with him. So he let his anger override his other emotions, if she was going to be like that then he was going to make her feel what was coursing through him at that moment. He knew she couldn't actually be interested in that guy, but if she wanted to play that game he was going to make sure he would win.

Author's note: Okay so what did you guys think? I'd love to hear from you guys, please make sure you review and tell me if you loved it or you hated it. I'm definitely going to make the next few chapters very umm, interesting. So hope you guys keep reading I'l try to update later this week. Hugsnkisses jamesnlily4ever