Disclaimer: Characters and settings are property of J.K. Rowling. What you don't recognize is mine. And I wish I owned the Marauders (specifically Sirius and Remus) but most unfortunately, I do not. L

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"Potter. Black." Damien's eyes were cold as he glared at them both, but he said nothing of that afternoon's incident. "We're planning on having the celebration party for the Quidditch match tonight."

Sirius's jaw dropped. "But Remus isn't here!"

"Yes, I know. He's visiting his sick mother." The boy shrugged. "We've put it off long enough. If you want, we can have some 'Coming-Back' party for him when gets back from home." But home isn't where he is… thought James frantically. He searched for another excuse. A party wasn't a party unless all the Marauders were present, and they were planning on being with Remus that night.

"It's a school night!"

"I'm aware of that, thanks." Damien was giving him shifty looks – Oh, great. This whole asking-Moony-out-because-I-thought-he-was-Lily thing is going to follow me for the rest of my life. "And anyway, I already talked about it with Fabian. I'm not waiting for next weekend to come around – so its tonight. But Fabian made me swear that the Quidditch team will stay behind when it's over and help clean up." He shrugged. "We probably won't be up past midnight, anyway."

"Damien, I need my beauty sleep!" whined Jen from nearby – the girls had been listening.

"Not that it's helping," added Sirius in a loud voice. Jen scowled at him and threw a book at him. She missed, but then, she wasn't trying very hard.

"I'm putting you boys in charge of getting the food and drink. Party starts at eight," he added. "You girls-" He pointed to Jen and Janine. "Music and decorations. We'll have it in the common room. All right?" Without waiting for a response, he disappeared.

Sirius, Peter, and James exchanged significant looks. This is bad, thought James. Moony's going to hate us for bailing out on him – and we can't without looking suspicious!

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"I understand." Remus sighed. "It's not a big deal, guys. So I'm missing one party. So what? There'll be others."

"Yeah, but…" Sirius, Peter, and James exchanged looks. "I mean, don't you want us to stay with you tonight? You know, transform and-"

"Shut up!" hissed Remus, and then he lay back against the pillows, looking exhausted. "I don't want everyone to hear, you idiot. And anyway, I made it for plenty of years without you. I still can."

"But-"

"No buts." Remus flapped his hands, waving them away. "Go. Shoo. Enjoy the party. And make my excuses to Alyssa, would you?" he added wistfully. "Say I wrote you guys from home and told her to have a good time without me, or something."

They nodded; James clapped Remus on the shoulder. "I am sorry, mate." Remus shoved him lightly.

"Forget it. Have a nice time."

"Yeah. Okay." Sirius and Peter had already left. James waved, still feeling guilty for having to leave Remus alone. It would be a lonely night for him…

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Lily sat on a windowsill by herself, surveying the party to ensure it didn't get too out of hand. She took a sip of her butterbeer, and then stared at it in surprise. How many bottles had she had in the last hour? She couldn't remember.

All of her friends were busy dancing to the Wizarding Wireless (currently blasting the newest hit from Celestina Warbeck – just what did people find in her music, anyway? Lily personally didn't see it).

She felt a light tap on her shoulder, and whirled, to find herself staring into the hazel eyes of James Potter. She shrugged his hand off of her shoulder. "What do you want, Potter?"

"Relax, Evans." His voice was slow, and slurred – was he drunk? No, he looked sober… was she drunk? Surely not… "Dance with me?"

Ten seconds later, James was leading her out into a group of people as the song ended, and another one started up. Well, that clinches it, thought Lily in bewilderment. I am drunk.

Lily felt a little surprised to hear the salsa music (did wizards listen to salsa? She had no idea), but then she promptly forgot everything as James took one of her much smaller hands in his own, placing the other on her waist. Automatically, it seemed, she placed her free hand on his shoulder. Lily wasn't a very good dancer, but even she knew the basic form for dancing.

Then James pulled her hips up closer to his and they danced. He was leading.

Lily felt certain that all eyes were on her – but they weren't. In fact, nobody was paying attention to them at all. Janine had disappeared somewhere, Alyssa was dancing with Sirius, and Jen was with a boy who was probably a seventh-year and definitely not from their house. Marlene, to her astonishment, was dancing with Fabian Prewett. I thought he was dating Janine, she marveled. Did they break up? But they were dating this morning… and Janine would have told me if they'd broken up…

James took his hand off of her waist, putting it under her chin and forcing her to look at him. "Look at me," he told her with a smile. "Right in my eyes." So she looked into them.

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"Are you okay?" asked Janine quietly, still trying to peer into Snape's face anxiously. "Black doesn't pull his punches for anybody – believe me, I know."

"Are you referring to this afternoon's fight?" She winced. "Yes, I heard about that. It's going around school that it's the reason you and Prewett broke up."

"The fight isn't, but we did break up." Snape's eyebrows rose. "He said he was sick of my incessant flirting," she clarified. "And I told him if he didn't want a flirty girlfriend, he never should have asked me out to begin with."

"Ah."

"And as for how I know Black doesn't pull his punches, it's because we got in a fistfight in fourth year where I broke his nose and he broke my jaw."

"Oh."

She shrugged. "Madam Pomfrey drugged me, so the pain wasn't so bad. And you can't even tell" She leaned over his cauldron, wrinkling her nose. "When I asked that third-year where you were, I hardly expected to find you in the Potions classroom, making potions in your spare time."

"Call it an after school project. And don't lean over the cauldron like that."

"Why? What is it?"

"Draught of Living Death." Janine squeaked and yanked back. Snape's coal black eyes were amused. "I did tell you not to lean over the cauldron." She stuck her tongue out at him. "Aren't you supposed to be at your little victory party upstairs?"

"Technically speaking, yes. But I don't really want to see Fabian and Marlene acting all sweet around one another. I don't know where he got off thinking he could go with my best friend behind my back. First of all, I'm too practiced at it myself to not notice all the signs, and second of all, she spilled everything to me last night in an attack of the guilty conscience."

"You don't care much, do you?"

"Not particularly, no." She shrugged. "I was never serious about him. I'm surprised it took him two and a half months to notice."

Snape's eyes swept over her. "I can't help but noting that you'd probably make a very good Slytherin."

She shrugged. "I probably would."

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"Why aren't you always this nice to me?" James whispered in her ear. Lily spent more time concentrating on her dancing, swaying her hips in time with his.

"Because you're a prat the rest of the time," she whispered back. Lily's nerves were fizzing pleasantly and her fingers and palms tingled where they touched James.

James frowned and pulled back from her, his hazel eyes widening. "Oh – you're drunk," he realized, disappointed.

She made a face at him. "I am not drunk. I'm having a pleasant dance with you. Or I was. And now you ruined it." She made an even more grotesque face. "Why'd you ruin it?"

James sighed, and stepped back from her and pulled out his wand, pointing it at her. "Sobrius," he whispered softly.

Almost at once, Lily moaned and put a hand to her head. "Oh, man. I must have had a lot of butterbeers… what time is it?" She saw James staring at her and snapped, "What?"

"It's ten-thirty," he told her, very quietly. "And we've been dancing for the last half an hour."

"What, you and me?" Lily laughed bitterly. "As if that would ever…" Memories came rushing back to her. She made a face. "Bloody hell, we have been dancing for the last half an hour. I must have been drunk."

"You were enjoying it then!" pointed out James, wounded.

"I was drunk!" she snapped back. "And if it's ten-thirty, we're half an hour over. Party was supposed to end at ten." She pushed her way through the crowd of dancing people and yanked Sirius away from his current partner (a sweet fifth-year girl whom Lily had spoken to once or twice.) She smiled and waved as Lily dragged Sirius away.

"Hey!" he complained. "I had something good going there."

"Shut up, Black," she snapped peevishly. "And lift me onto the table." He raised his eyebrows. "My head hurts and I don't want to fall!" she added irritably.

Apparently knowing better than to make fun of her (she'd probably bite his head off), Sirius very easily lifted her onto a table. Lily stomped her foot several times until the people closest to her had turned. "All right! That's it!" she shouted. "Come on now, it's a school night! Off to bed! All of you!" Several people scowled at her; she glowered so vehemently back that they quailed and slunk off. "And every single one of you – all you Quidditch players – you're going to stay behind and clean up this mess!" She looked at Sirius, who was subtly trying to sneak a peek up her skirt. "Don't even think about it, Black." He made a face at her but nonetheless helped her down.

She brushed off her skirt and looked around. "Now. Where's Janine? She has to help, too…"

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Janine glanced at her watch. "It's ten-thirty," she noted aloud, with some amusement in her voice. "I was supposed to be upstairs to help clean half an hour ago."

"Then I suppose you should go, shouldn't you?"

"You make it sound like you want me to leave."

"Maybe I do want you to leave."

"Maybe I don't want to leave." He stared at her, and she stared straight back. Finally, she hopped off the table she had perched on, dusting invisible dust off of her skirt. "But if you want me to leave…"

"I didn't say that."

"Yes, you did. You said-"

"I said 'maybe.'"

Janine scowled, placing her fists on her hips. "Tell me straight out! Do you want me to leave, or not?"

Snape smirked at her. "Frustrated, are you?"

"Urgh!" She plopped into a seat with an expression to rival that of an angry hippogriff. "You're despicable."

Snape was briefly amused. "So I've been told."

They sat like that in silence for several moments, until Janine stood up. "You're a prat, Snape," she told him, although her eyes were smirking. "I'll see you in Potions class."

"Of course." He watched her walk out. "Potions class. Right." He waited until two minutes after she was gone, and then began to pack up his ingredients. His potion would have to wait.

He had an appointment at the Whomping Willow.

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"Where've you been?" asked Jen as Janine seemingly materialized at her side, bending to help pick up the empty butterbeer bottles. "Snogging Evan Rosier? Tut, tut. Traitor."

"Be quiet, you. Marlene and Fabian hit it off?"

"They spent a lot of time being shy around each other," said James, from somewhere near her elbow. "What do you see in Rosier, anyway?"

"Something that I don't see in you," replied Janine with a wry grin. She flicked her wand, and the streamers hanging from the ceiling disappeared. "And anyway, that wasn't where I was."

"Where were you, then?"

Janine's face was wiped blank of anything. "Wandering around the school aimlessly," she replied, bending low again. Over her back, James and Jen exchanged looks. Both knew a lie when they heard it. Janine was a good liar, but she wasn't making an attempt to hide, and they knew it.

"Oh. Okay, then," James said at last. "I asked Ev- Lily, to dance," he said slowly, watching her for a reaction.

"Shot you down again, did she?" She didn't look up.

"No, actually. She said yes. But she was drunk."

Janine straightened up, confused. "What are you talking about? We served Butterbeer. I know Lily doesn't have a very high tolerance for alcohol, but…"

"Sirius added a bit of Firewhisky to the bottles," cut in Jen. "He told Alyssa, who told me. I don't think Lily knows, though."

"Yet," added Janine under her breath.

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Lily pulled on her nightgown, enjoying the feel of the white silky cloth against her skin. Marlene had disappeared off somewhere (presumably with Fabian Prewett), and Alyssa was the only other one in the room.

Lily glanced out the window, enjoying the night sky and the twinkling stars, when a shadow crossed her vision. Frowning, she pushed the window, leaning out and gasping as the cold air hit her skin. She frowned. Somebody was hurrying across the grounds.

No, that was silly – it was just Madam Pomfrey. Perhaps Hagrid, the groundskeeper, was sick, and she was visiting him? Yes, that must be it.

But then there was another person hurrying across the grounds – a slightly hunched someone, whose lank hair was falling into his face, rather as though he were trying to melt into the shadows, to hide from any watching eyes…

In fact, if she hadn't known better…

Lily's hand snapped up her cloak and hastily pulled it around her form. Alyssa, who was already in bed and reading, stared at her. "Where are you going?"

Lily didn't answer. Settling her fiery curls, she stormed irritably out the dormitory door. Hastily, Alyssa jumped out of bed and followed her.

When she burst into the common room, the entire Quidditch team looked up and stared at her. At another time, Lily would have been embarrassed by the way the boys were staring at her (she was in her nightgown, after all). As it was, a faint tinge rose in her cheeks at the way James's eyes traveled up her form and then down again.

"Lily! What are you doing?" asked Jen, her eyes wide.

"Someone's out on the grounds," she said in response. "I'm going to go drag them in. It's bad enough there are students creeping all over the halls at this time of night-" here, she glowered at the two Marauders in the room and Janine, "-but I can't allow a student out on the grounds. I'll be back." She stormed out the portrait hole.

There was a very tense silence in the room. "Takes her job seriously, doesn't she?" asked Sirius with a grin, but James cut him off, saying abruptly, "Did she say she was going out on the grounds?"

Janine's eyes met James's across the room. Then they flicked to Sirius, who had a look of dawning comprehension on his face, and then to Jen, whose face was paler than ordinary. Then they looked to Alyssa, who was looking faintly puzzled. "Full moon," hissed Jen softly. And James realized.

They know.

"So what?" asked Alyssa in confusion. "There aren't any werewolves at Hogwarts…"

But she doesn't.

But James didn't have much time to think. He had to catch up with Lily before she encountered Remus in his werewolf form. He started to run, until he heard Sirius demand, "Did she say she saw somebody out there?" Somebody must have nodded, because he heard Sirius swear from behind him. "Motherfu- Snape. Shit. Snape."

James whirled. "What d'you mean, Snape?"

Sirius looked down. "We were going to get him back. Teach him a lesson. I thought-"

James didn't let him finish. He raced out the portrait hole, ignoring the Fat Lady, who shrieked after him, "Dear, you're not a prefect! Come back inside!"

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Important A/N: Right, so there's the next chapter. I hope you enjoy it, but I have something important to say. This is going to be the last update for a while. I'm having some family difficulties, and I'm finding it a bit difficult to write at the moment. I already had this chapter finished, so it's up. But don't expect many more for a little while – I'll try to get back on track as soon as I can.

As always, reviews are immensely appreciated. Maybe, the more reviews I get, the sooner I'll update… Peaches