On the ride in the horseless carriages, Lily's dear and caring friends made sure she had to sit next to James. Lily pointedly looked nowhere but at her feet. James kept staring at her, and it was sort of freaking her out. She imagined all the painful, horrible things she was going to do to her friends first chance she got.

"Would now be a good chance to mention that I'm sorry?" James asked. Lily gave him a look that would have made the happiest sunflower wither. Sirius laughed.

"You're just saying that because now you have to share a common room with her and you're afraid of what she'll do to you!"

"So? She can be evil!"

"And she is getting off this carriage!" Lily shouted, as they had made it to Hogwarts. Lily was saved. Or so she thought.

The feast flew by and soon, Dumbledore was telling the students to report to a prefect to hear their passwords. He asked the new Heads to follow him to the common room they would be sharing. They were lead to a huge painting of Godric Gryffindor on the back of a Hipogriff (sp?).

"Password?" Lily thought for a moment.

"Make it golden Gryffies slaughter snakes," she told it.

"Yes, of course," replied Godric. James raised an eyebrow at her.

"Golden Gryffies slaughter snakes?"

"You have a better one?"

"Well, no," he admitted. Dumbledore just smiled and lead them in.

Lily looked around with her mouth open. The common room was bigger than the Gryffindor common room. It was all gold and red, with squishy couches, a huge fireplace, a bookcase, and even a small kitchen. A staircase lead upward, and the three followed it. At the top, there was a door directly in front of the staircase. Lily opened it to find a marble bathroom. It had two showers, two sinks, a jacuzzi tub, and a separate room for a toilet. On the right and left of the door were short hallways with a door at each end. Lily turned right, to find her room. It was perfect. Deep yellow walls, a bed with a maroon comforter and golden silk sheets, a scarlet couch, a golden rug, and everything else she could possibly need in her bedroom. Dumbledore left with a last word, and Lily fell onto her bed, completely content. Then she remembered who was at the other end of the hall.

"Why does he have to ruin freaking everything?" she muttered to herself. Of course, she didn't have an answer, so she closed her door, locked it, and changed for bed. She lay in bed, thinking about how perfect this would be if she shared it with anyone except James Potter. Well, actually, he has been acting civil. Besides, another guy might get the wrong idea and try to take advantage of the fact that we share the same quarters. The worst James'll do is hex me. Then she remembered what he had done to her the night before. Did I say civil? I meant egotistical prick.

Lily had nightmares the rest of the night. At one point, her screaming brought James out of bed, running to her room. He saw she was still sleeping and slunk out the door. She'd have a fit if she found him in her room in the middle of the night.

Lily woke the next morning at five a.m., drenched in sweat. She felt like she hadn't gotten any rest. Her night had been full of horrific nightmares. The kind where you feel this irrepressible danger, and evil makes the air heavy. Someone you love is separated from you, and you think they've been killed. You start screaming for them, then you're falling. Just falling. With no one to catch you because they're dead. Then you wake up. Terrified out of your wits, soaked in sweat, and completely awake, with the sour taste of fear in your mouth.

It was useless to try to sleep, so Lily got up and took a shower. Her hands were shaking uncontrollably, and she kept dropping things, making the process take longer than usual. She finally turned off the scalding water. Using a drying charm on her hair, she tried to remember her dream. She couldn't. She just knew something was wrong. By the time she was dressed and had makeup on, she heard sounds of James stirring in his room.

James shuffled out of his room as Lily left the bathroom. He looked at her oddly.

"Bad dreams last night?"

"What makes you say that?" she asked defensively.

"Because you were screaming all night long. What was it about?"

"Nothing," she told him shortly, fleeing to the common room to read. (A/N: I'm not going to go on about the rest of the day, because you know how it'll go. Lots of boring teachers telling lots of bored students about the importance of their N.E.W.Ts, and assigning long, tedious essays. Just the thought makes me yawn, so I'm going to get to the part I've been waiting to write for a while, but couldn't because I've had all this other stuff to write. I'm going to stop ranting now. Toodles!)

At dinner that night, Lily sat playing with her tomato soup as the mail was delivered. A letter fell in front of her, and she very narrowly saved it from taking a tomato-ey bath. The flowing script on the envelope was blood red. Lily thought the color seemed ominous. The red seal marked it as a letter from the ministry.

Lily, laughing at one of Missy's jokes, opened she envelope and red the letter.

Dear Miss Lily Evans,

I regret to inform you that your parents were killed last night in a muggle attack by the Lord Voldemort. Your possessions will be held safe for you until you see it fit to acquire them.

My deepest sympathies,

Soop Campbell

Minister of Magic

"Oh God, please no," Lily whispered, tears sliding down her cheeks. "NO!"

Missy looked up, startled. "What's wrong?"

Lily jumped up, falling over the bench in her haste to get away, red hair whipping out behind her as she sprinted through the doors at the front of the hall.

James saw the Head Girl leave, red hair whipping behind her like some silken pennant of war. Between her sudden departure, the loud sobs echoing through the hall, and her dreams last night, James decided to make sure she was all right. (A/N: good thing, too…) He stealthily crept after her running form, trying to guess where she was going.

He saw her dash across the courtyard and had to run to keep up with her. He saw a crumpled letter in her hand. He could tell she was running blindly because she was sobbing so hard, but he could also tell she knew where she was going. She tripped over the hem of her robes and fell to the ground. James stayed back so he wouldn't be seen. Lily pushed herself up, red hair clinging to her tear-stained face.

He saw now that she was heading to the astronomy tower. Probably for the peace. They climbed the stairs, James an invisible shadow to the distraught Lily. She opened the door at the top, and he slipped out onto the platform. It was a cloudy, windy day, not the best for being up so high. Lily stumbled over to the waist-high railing and stood on it, bracing herself against a pillar.

"Why?" she screamed into the wind. "I'll tell you why! It's my fault! He doesn't believe muggle-borns should do magic! He was looking for me, but I'd already left for school, so he killed them! They didn't ever do anything to him, but they're dead, and nothing will change that! All this magic I've learned, this magic that was supposed to be so wonderful, it can't save them! It killed them! So I'm giving it up." James realized what she was saying. Then he realized why Lily was up here. He lunged for her half a second to late.

Lily let herself fall over the railing. James's fingers brushed her robes. He threw himself over the railing, hooking his feet on it, and caught her ankle. Thank God. But it wasn't as easy as it should have been. Lily was fighting him, struggling against the hold of his white-knuckled hands on her ankle.

"LET ME GO!"

"NO, DAMMIT, STOP FIGHTING ME!" Lily recognized the voice of her savior/captor and stopped struggling, if only because she was too shocked to move. James Potter had just risked his life to save hers. Now that was screwed up.

James used his strong Quidditch muscles to haul Lily back onto solid rock. She was still sobbing hysterically. He sat down and pulled her close to his body, just letting her cry. She was too far gone to care that it was James Potter who was comforting her.

After a few minutes, she looked up from his wet shirt with hectic, red-rimmed eyes. "You saved my life," she whispered. "Why?"

"We can't very well have Hogwarts's Head Girl jumping off buildings, now can we?" That got a pathetic non-smile out of her.

"Voldemort killed them," she said softly into his chest, dissolving once more into a red-haired puddle.

"Shh, it's going to be okay. I know it doesn't seem like it now, but eventually the pain will lessen."

"How do you know?" she spat at him. "My freaking parents are dead! There will be now going home for the holidays for me! I was planning on staying with them for a while after I finished school, but they won't be waiting there for me, smiling and congratulating me! They're dead, James, and even your wonderful magic won't bring them back!"

"Lily," he said. "Two years ago, my little sister was murdered. It was going to be her first year at Hogwarts. She was so excited," he remembered, tears rolling down his own face. "Had her wand and everything. Never set it down. Holly. 13 ¼ inches. Long for someone so small. Swishy. Dragon heartstrings. Good for Transfiguration." Lily looked at him, amazed by the fact that James Potter could cry. And was crying in her presence. But the tears rolling down his face were no less than the ones on hers. "Then one night, just before school started, I was supposed to be watching her, and three men freaking apparated into our house. They were going to rob us or something, but Aimee didn't know they were there. So she comes trotting down the stairs, wand out so she could show me how she had already taught herself something. They didn't realize she was eleven freaking years old, and figured she was trying to kill them. Yeah, right. So one of those bastards used the Avada curse on my little sister. All three of them dropped dead without me touching my wand, but it was too late. I was supposed to be watching her!"

Lily just cried more at his story, and he cried, and they sat together crying for hours, murmuring comforts to someone who understood the pain they were going through. Lily had never known she could cry so much, but she obviously could. The tears kept coming, and she didn't try to stop them. Eventually James locked his pain away, as he had been doing for the last two years, and he let Lily cry out all the pain and anger and sense of betrayal. He knew how she felt. And she knew how he felt. She'd eventually learn how to deal with the pain, tone it down a little so it wasn't so overwhelming. But that didn't have to happen tonight. Tonight she could let it go.

Eventually, she fell into a restless sleep in James's arms. She was twitching and muttering incoherently. James picked her up as if she weighed no more than a doll. Considering she was eleven inches shorter than him, who knows how many pounds less, and he played Quidditch, it's a probable theory. He carried her carefully down the stairs and across the courtyard. The entrance doors were shut, and he couldn't open them without setting Lily down, as his wand was in his room. And he certainly wasn't going to set Lily down.

The door opened, and out came Missy and Sirius.

"What'd you do to her?" was their instantaneous, bellowed reaction.

"Shh!" James said, glaring at them. "You'll wake her up, and she certainly doesn't need that right now." His voice was a whisper.

"Uh, Prongs, are you all right?" whispered Sirius, seeing his friend's puff, red-rimmed eyes.

"I'm fine, she's not, now if I could get her into her bed, where she belongs?"

"James, what's wrong with Lily?" Missy also whispered.

"She'll tell you when she wants to. Which will probably when she wakes up, because she'll need friends then," he paused. Her breathing wasn't as regular as it had been. "And you two lunatics have woken her up. Congratulations. I'm putting her to bed now, see you later."

Missy and Sirius stood together, shocked as James carried Lily up to their dormitory.

"Did you put him up to this?" Missy asked her boyfriend.

"Me?" he asked innocently.

"I'm serious!"

"Wait, you can't be Sirius, I'm Sirius!"

"SIRIUS!"

"Fine. No, I didn't put him up to it. I really think James is in love with Lils."

"Wow."

"Yeah, funny thing, love. If you don't look for it, you won't find it, but if you look too hard, you can't see it. You just have to follow your heart."

"Wow, Sirius, that's deep."

"Yeah. That dear Abbey sure knows what she's talking about." Missy rolled her eyes at her boyfriend. Figures.

"You're such a goofball."

"But I'm a hot goofball, right?"

"Real sexy," Missy told him as he tripped over a fallen branch. "Graceful, too."

"Can I ask you a question Missy?"

"Shoot."

"How come you never turn down a date proposed on Monday night?" Missy glared at him.

"Either you were my stalker before we started going out, or you've been talking to Lily. I'm voting for the latter."

"You're forever correct. So, why?"

Missy sighed. "I think it's because Mondays suck. I'm always a little down on Mondays, and being asked out makes me feel, I don't know. Happy and special, I guess. And turning down a date makes me feel even worse, especially on Mondays."

Sirius looked downcast. "Would you have still gone out with me if I hadn't asked you out on Monday?"

"Yes," she replied promptly. "If only because you're a hot goofball," she teased him.

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Ha ha," he said dryly.

"I'm serious."

"Oh come on! Do we have to go through this again? For the millionth time, you are NOT Sirius, I am Sirius! Get it through your head!"

"You are so weird," Missy told her boyfriend.

"But you love me."

"I do, don't I?"

Sirius pulled Missy into a heated kiss, so I'm leaving them to snog in peace. Back to Lily and James! Woohoo!

(A/N: Um, this is like Lily's dream or something. Okay, yeah, well, I know it's her dream, but… you know, whatever, I don't even know why I'm putting an author's note here, my alter ego is confusing me. Now she's telling me not to blame her, YOU ARE SUCH A BITCH, YOU BITCH! Uh, that was directed at her not you… We're leaving now, bye.)

I was in a dungeon, completely alone. A small group of cloaked figures came in. They reverently parted for a being with a bone white face, and red eyes. Just seeing it terrified me.

"Join with me, and know power beyond your imagination," it hissed.

"I will never join with your evil, I work with the light!" I spat at it.

It looked annoyed. "Join with me and become a dark princess, my heiress, even though you are a mudblood."

"Don't you DARE call me that foul name!" I screamed at it.

It walked over and put its fingers under my chin, lifting my face up. "I am Voldemort, and I will do whatever I so please." The fingers were icy and hot at the same time, but it was the name that sent shivers down my spine.

"You killed my parents, you bastard!" And I spat on him. Literally. Brilliant, huh?

"You have too much power for me to let you return. You WILL become a dark witch. I WILL control your power. It's just a matter of molding you to my will. Crucio!"

I fell to the damp floor, writhing. It felt as if every particle of my being was flying in different directions, as if my skin were being burned off, frozen off. I bit my lip until it bled, until my teeth met through it. But I wouldn't scream. I wouldn't beg for mercy. I wouldn't go to the dark side. He could torture me, kill me, but I wouldn't give him satisfaction.

The pain was unbearable. I felt as if I had no options left. I had to go with him, or give into the pain and die. Then the pain stopped.

Lily sat up, gasping, sobbing, screaming. James came rushing to her side, murmuring comforting things. Lily cried into his shoulder, her body still throbbing from the pain. But it wasn't real, she told herself. So why do I hurt so badly?

"Shh, what was the dream about, you can tell me." Lily just shook her head. Whether in denial of the offer, or just with sobs, James couldn't tell, but he held her and stroked her back until she was peacefully asleep once more. Well, okay, not peacefully, since she was still twitching, but whatever. James fell asleep next to her, exhausted from so little sleep the night before, saving Lily's life, and carrying her back to the dorm.

A/N: Omg, six pages, on this one little, okay big, thing! That idea's been cooking in my head for like a month. I mean, you read stories where Lily attempts to console James when he loses his parents, and he tries to commit suicide, yatta yatta yatta. I don't know about you, but I've never read an L/J where Lily's the suicidal one. Therefore I implemented the plan. The fun thing about writing L/Js is that you can't get ppl telling you that you completely screwed up the character's personality b/c no one really knows their personalities. I love the power, mwuahahahahahaha! Okay, I went a little far on breaking Lily's by-the-book, goody two shoes identity with the Animagus thing, but I'm the author and get to do whatever the hell I want! Mwuahahahahahahaha!