Disclaimer: Same as before.

Stage Two

Part One

Lily stood with the rest of the first years as she waited, rather nervously, to be sorted. She expected to be sorted into Ravenclaw, seeing as how she'd always been one of the smarter kids in her class, but she supposed Gryffindor wouldn't be too terrible either.

"First years, follow me." With that, Professor McGonagall briskly led the line of first years into the Great Hall. Lily, wanting to prepare herself because she'd come from a Muggle family and was afraid that she was behind in the magical aspect of things, had read all about this magical dining hall.

The Sorting Hat, she hadn't read about and had been quite fascinated when it had started up with a cute little song. Now, she focused her attention on the beautiful enchanted ceiling as the students were called to sit upon the stool and placed a raggedy looking wizard's hat on top of their heads. She rather expected Achilles, Madeline to be swallowed whole, since the hat did fall past her nose.

"RAVENCLAW." The Ravenclaw table burst into applause.

Lily found herself thinking about what had happened on the train earlier. That stupid, black haired boy- James Potter his friend had called him, had intruded into her compartment, where she had been sitting by herself, reading a book. They hadn't even noticed her when they had barged into the compartment, but rather, the two of them had been pressed against the window, looking at something or another down the hall.

"What's so interesting?" she'd asked them. Politely, of course. Lily was brought up to be polite.

The black haired boy had jumped up in surprise, and loftily replied, "None of your business."

One of his friends had eyed her in a way that was inappropriate for first-years, in Lily's opinion at least, and had said, "Why, pleased to meet such a pretty lady. On the first day, nonetheless! I'm Sirius Black, and this boy, here, is James. James Potter."

"Yeah, whatever. Sirius, they're gone! Let's go." And he disappeared out the door. His friend, with an apologetic smile, had followed. Lily thought that Potter definitely qualified as one of the rudest people she had met in her life.

The friends she'd made later on, on the train ride, had been much more pleasant. Halley Brown and Paris Sabinal were first years as well. They had been wandering around and accidentally opened up Lily's compartment instead of their own. They quickly introduced themselves and explained that some James Potter had stolen Halley's Quidditch Minibook, a book that when opened up, gave any piece of information you wanted to have, in the form of a small slip of paper. "It's really quite useful," Halley had said. "I really detest watching Quidditch, and having the book makes it a lot easier to understand the games!"

Both girls had been quite shocked to discover that Lily had no idea what Quidditch was, and they had stayed with Lily in her compartment, bonding over how much they hated James Potter and the novelties of the Magic and Muggle world, which Lily was happy to introduce the two girls to. Halley and Paris had grown up as next-door-neighbors, but they were happy to let another girl into the close fold of their friendship.

Now, as they were standing at the front of the Great Hall, Halley stood on one side of her as Paris stood on the other. "Brown, Halley," Professor McGonagall called. Lily snapped out of her stupor. Halley gave a nervous grin at Lily and Paris, muttered something under her breath, and quickly walked over to the Sorting Hat.

After half a minute of silence, the hat shouted, "GRYFFINDOR."

Paris looked at Lily. "Hope we're all in the same house!"

There were only a couple more students before Lily. After "Ebony, Esther" was declared a Hufflepuff, Professor McGonagall called, "Evans, Lily." Lily hurried over to the hat, put it lightly on her head, and waited to be sorted.

She didn't need to wait long, for in less than two seconds, the hat shouted, "GRYFFINDOR."

Lily grinned, and hurried over to sit next to Halley, who was waving at her to an empty seat on her side. "Nice! Now we just have to wait for Paris!"

"I didn't expect to be in Gryffindor at all! Expected to be in Ravenclaw, definitely- I mean-"

Lily was cut off by a voice from her other side. "So your name's Lily Evans, aye?" She looked over and saw the playful face of Sirius Black.

"Oh. You again." She muttered quietly.

Halley glanced up at Sirius as well. "OH! You! You're the one who's got that stupid friend who stole my Quidditch Minibook! Give it back! I cannot believe what a load of impeccable owl poop you and your friend are!"

Sirius simply laughed. "Owl poop? Who says that? And I haven't got your book, James has it."

"Well, you better get it from him as soon as you can, or you better watch out, because, or else-" But they never heard what she would do, because the boy they were speaking of, James Potter, had bounded over to sit next to Sirius.

"Nicely done, mate!" Sirius reached up to give James a high-five.

"Heard Gryffindor's common-room's in a tower. How far do you reckon that is from the kitchens?"

"OY! POTTER!" they were interrupted by Halley. "GIVE ME MY BOOK BACK."

"Pull your stockings down. You can have it. It's a stupid book anyway." James Potter pulled something out of the inside of his robe and tossed it at Halley.

"Stupid book? THAT'S ONLY BECAUSE IT'S A STUPID GAME. Maybe I wouldn't NEED this stupid book if it wasn't for the fact that STUPID people play this STUPID game and force me to watch it."

"Yeah? Well who WANTS you to watch it ANYWAY? And it's NOT stupid game, it's the BEST RUDDY GAME IN THE BLOODY WORLD." By this time, their voices had caught the prefect's attention.

"Oy, quite down, you lot!"

Halley and James gave the prefect an angry look and continued on is whispered voices. "Says who it's the best game in the world? ---"

Thankfully, in Lily's opinion, they were interrupted when Paris was called up to the stool. Halley glanced over at James, and muttered, "Shut up so I can watch my best friend get sorted."

James looked as if he was about to say something along the lines of "Make me." When he caught the glare of the same prefect looking down at them.

"GRYFFINDOR." Paris ran over to join her friends at the table.

"Wow! Can't believe we're all in the same house, right?"

"Unfortunately." Muttered James under his breath. No one except Lily heard him.

Albus Dumbledore stood up at the front of the hall. "Let's feast!"

With that, food appeared on all the plates. James and Sirius' eyes pooped out of their sockets. "FOOD!" Lily fainted heard Sirius yell over the ruckus of the hall.

The rest of the night was slightly a blur, due to all the feasting, but the first years had followed the prefects up to the Gryffindor tower. Lily, Paris, and Halley had gotten beds next to each other, and all three of them decided that night, that boys were stupid, rotten, good-for-nothing imbeciles.