Once Upon a Miserable Girl's Plight...
Disclaimer: Read this and weep, for I am not J.K. Rowling and thus have no secrets to give you about anything concerning Harry Potter. The plot is mere speculation on my part and the characters most definitely do not belong to me.
Chapter Three: Meet You at St. Mungo's
April, Fourth Year
I must say, I hate mornings with a deep rooted passion.
Especially at Hogwarts too, where they expect you to wake up at insanely early hours to start class. True, I don't have to get up for breakfast if I don't choose to but technically speaking I don't choose to wake up so early.
Marlene, whose bed is strategically placed next to mine, always insists upon being so bloody loud when she gets up in the morning.
Take for example this morning; I was trying to keep the wonderful dream I was having (about my mother's death being a hoax and she shows up at Hogwarts, looking for me) and she insisted on throwing her clothes about the room when she couldn't find something absolutely perfect for Sirius Black to see her in. Just like (practically) every other female at Hogwarts, she devotes a good chunk of her time to getting him to notice her. A bit of time wasted, if you ask me. If a boy isn't going to notice you in the first place it's not like he's going to notice you after you've made yourself over. And if he does, then he's not worth it because that shows he's just a shallow, stupid boy with an agenda.
I've had a lot of time to think, all right?
Anyway, half of Marlene's clothes are piled on my bed and then she decides it would be a good idea to wake me up. I believe I've told her sweetly (as I am as nice as can be, I suppose) a million times that I cannot stand mornings but she still hasn't seemed to grasp the concept.
Morning, sunrise, irritable Lily...
Night, sunset, less irritable Lily...
It's not so hard, is it?
"Lily...come 'on... Wake up, Lily, I need your help," she said as she pulled her clothes off of my bed covers. "Besides, you can come with to breakfast early and get the sausages that you claim disappear before you get a chance to eat them."
Bloody hell, like sausages are going to make up for interrupting the perfectly wonderful dream I was having before she shook me awake?
Sometimes I wish I could sleep all day. In dreams, my mother is alive and well; in life, well... everything is so screwed up.
"Someone better be dying in the Common room is all I have to say," I mumbled and pushed my covers off of me and sat up.
"Well... not exactly," she giggled perkily. She giggled. Perkily. At six-thirty in the morning! I could just hex her at the moment but my mind was too groggy to think of any good curses. She went on, "I was just wondering how I should go down to the Great Hall. Should I wear my school uniform? How should I do my hair? Up or down?"
Well, if I'm awake and not going back to bed anytime soon (which judging by the looks of indecision on her face, I wasn't) I might as well answer her question. After all, I don't want to be known as the class prat for being mean.
"Umm...," I scratched my head, desperately wanting to go back to sleep, "Wear your uniform, since you hate to change after breakfast and put your hair up."
I collapsed back down onto my bed and closed my eyes.
5...4...3...2...
"So how are you going down to breakfast?"
The follow-up question to keep the conversation going; it was classic Marlene.
"Like this," I answered, sitting back up.
"In your pajamas?" She asked with a shocked look on her face as she pinned her curls up on the back of her head.
"Why not?" I mumbled getting out of bed. Sleep was lost on me now. I knew that any minute Marlene would want be to go down to breakfast with her. You know that whole, 'Girls travel in pairs' thing. So true and so utterly stupid. Although there is strength in numbers, sometimes you just have to do things by yourself and be a big girl about it. Sadly enough, it is one of the very few things I learned from Petunia, as she was no support to me when I went to muggle school. In fact, she refused to acknowledge me as her sister in primary school. I, likewise, refuse to acknowledge her now, at all.
"Don't you care what people will think?"
I smiled brazenly at her and glanced at my fleece sweater and muggle pajama bottoms. "Not particularly."
She finished pinning up the last curl and turning to me, said, "So are you ready then?"
Am I ready?
I'm the one that jumped out of bed to go to breakfast with her at her request while she got herself all tidied up for some boy and she's wondering if I'm ready?
I found a pair of flat shoes and socks, slipped them on quickly and replied, "Nearly."
Quickly, I glanced in the mirror at my reflection and decided that my hair was no use. It would look exactly the same, even if I brushed it, since it's curly.
As soon as I had my shoes on, I followed her down the staircase and into the Common room. I was just eager to get down to breakfast and find something to eat. Enduring hunger was never a strong suit of mine.
Once we had reached the Great Hall doors, Marlene had informed me of how her whole family was doing and who her crush of the week was. Of course, if you couldn't already guess, it was Sirius Black. "He has such perfect hair," she informed me as a dreamy look crept onto her face, "And his eyes, he has got the most gorgeous grey eyes. Like a cross between silver and a stormy blue."
Yeah, but what about his personality? I thought and was very tempted to ask. There is much more to a person (one can only hope) than how good they look in a school uniform.
Quite suddenly, when we sat down at the Gryffindor table, Sirius Black came into view. Once I thought about it, it made sense what location Marlene had chosen to sit at. Our plates at the table were only a few plates over and across from Sirius and his friends.
And the toast I wanted was right in between Sirius and James Potter. Marlene blushed and let out a giggle as she helped herself to some eggs and then passed them to me.
"Their looking this way," she whispered to me and let a big smile escape from her lips.
"Yes and I glance in their general direction every now and then too, but that doesn't mean I'm looking at them," I responded, feeling irritable again. I mean, it wasn't like they had proclaimed their love for her; they were just resting their eyes in random places. No offense to my gender, but girls can make something out of nothing sometimes.
"I forgot you're not a morning person," Marlene laughed, "Well, once you get some food, you'll feel better."
"Yeah, I will," I said, smiling back slightly. Then I looked over at Sirius and James. "Hey," I said, trying to get their attention, "Excuse me, but could you pass the toast?"
"Sure," Sirius said with a grin and grabbed the plate. But instead of just passing the plate across the table, he felt inclined to get up and walk all the way down to the end of the table and then back up my side to literally hand me the toast.
"Thank you," I said and turned around to greet him, somewhat flattered, I suppose, "But that wasn't necessary."
"Oh, but it was," he countered grinning at me, "It was worth it to see you two young ladies looking so ravishing this morning."
Marlene giggled while I rolled my eyes.
"So you don't have eyes when you sit across the table?"
"Yes, I do, but I also have a message for you," he answered still with a smile that graced his features quite well.
I was surprised, to say the least. I don't normally talk to Sirius or his friends all that often. "And that would be...?"
Sirius shared a grin with James and then looked back at me. "Well," he started, "We were going to ask you this in History of Magic, but since, it seems we have you here for conversation... James was wondering if you'd fancy coming with him on the next Hogsmeade trip. You know, to the Three Broomsticks."
He shot me a wink as James laughed in the background.
The nerve of him, I must say, to ask me this in the Great Hall, of all places and then wink at me. Like I'm supposed to bow down to him and bestow a crown upon him while Marlene rolls out the red carpet... Are you joking me?
"Well, messenger, you can tell James that I think I'll say no this time," I answered smoothly and politely as possible, "Although, it has been wonderful talking to you, I hope it was worth the walk, and thank you very much for the toast."
And with that, I spun around in my seat to help myself to some toast and saw James' face falter for a second, but then recover smiling.
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Later that Day
"He just asked her out, just like that?" Alice inquired of Marlene as Marlene giggled incessantly.
"Basically," she said, as we walked down the corridors to our History of Magic classroom.
I had now heard this story so many times I could recite the way Marlene told it, word for word. It wasn't such a big deal. They had just asked me out as a joke anyway. It wasn't like they really meant it. But somehow, Marlene didn't get that point.
Alice turned to me. "Lily, you should have said yes. You know every girl is dying to date those boys."
"Everyone except me," I mumbled and shifted my backpack to my other shoulder, "Besides, I don't want to go out with anyone at the moment. Schoolwork and stuff has got me busy enough."
That wasn't exactly a straight answer. I just didn't want to date anyone. Yeah, I thought guys were cute but I also found them to be an incredible waste of time. Boys my age weren't the kind of guys I wanted to have relationships with (immature would sum it up in one word) and ever since I found out it the circumstances of my mom's disappearance, I didn't really trust them. They caused problems and heartache and never batted an eyelash at what they had done. So for now, I was going to steer clear of them. I was only fourteen, it wasn't like I needed a boy to 'complete me.'
We had arrived at the door of the classroom, so I rushed in quietly while they continued talking about how I couldn't see the amazing something in Sirius' eyes and sat down with some Hufflepuffs.
"Did you see the creature Hagrid has now?" Davy Gudgeon, who was in front of me, asked the girl next to me excitedly.
I willing joined into the conversion. Anything that had nothing to do with James Potter and Sirius Black suited me at the moment.
Once everyone had filed into the room and had taken seats, it was only a matter of waiting for the Professor to show up. It was quite odd, actually, because Professor Binns was rarely late to class. He usually was sitting at the front of the classroom, waiting for it to come to order while he wrote out the lesson plan for the day.
Well, he did show up eventually. The only thing was when he did, not all of him showed up. The ghost of him glided through the chalkboard and into the room... but the rest of him, the rest of him seemed to be missing.
We all just sort of sat there in shock while Binns started murmuring on about the history of goblins. Finally, James, of all people, came to his senses as he said, "Well, shouldn't someone go find Dumbledore?" When no one volunteered, he excused himself to the restroom through Binns and dashed into the hallway.
Binns just droned on like nothing had happened.
I didn't know I had suddenly transferred into St. Mungo's. I swear, things at this school just keep getting weirder and weirder. Even by Hogwarts standards.