emily thanx for reviewing. I did have a good time on vacation! Lots of shopping!

Zippy-Wings, I hope you get your hot weather soon. It is rather nice once you get used to it.


"You may begin," Professor McGonagall said, her stern voice echoing throughout the hall. The 7th years immediately bowed their heads over their papers, and got started on The Theory of Transfiguration NEWT exam. This was their last exam, and so far, twelve 7th years had cracked under the intense pressure. Peter Pettigrew was one of them. He'd only made it half way through the exam of the day before – the Potions exam – when he went into hysterics, blubbering about how he'd never learnt anything.

Other students understood what Peter was going through, as several other students from various houses had cracked as well, and laughter did not ring through the hall that day. James, in fact, looked worried.

"If he can crack, so can any of us," he'd said afterwards.

"Don't be ridiculous," Sirius said. "Lily and Remus have drilled everything so far into our brains that I can feel it pressing on my eyeballs! Besides, Wormtail's always been like that. Remember he had to retake his Potions OWL?"

"True enough," James said, but he didn't look completely convinced.

Now, sitting in front of Lily, Peter was shaking with fear. He'd recovered enough to do the exam. Lily looked at the first question ('State three common wand pattern mistakes made when performing Human Transformation'), and instantly got to work. She knew these by heart; she'd watch Peter make them all.


Finally exams were over. The Marauders spent time on the grounds; playing Quidditch, casting spells on each other, pulling pranks. They came up with a fantastic prank for the last day of school. It was Lily's job to put it into action.

At breakfast on the last day of school, Lily looked around to be sure that the Slytherin table was full. She waited until she saw that Severus was sitting at the Slytherin table, and she flicked her wand under the table at him. Frank Longbottom got in the way of her spell, and his hair turned bright pink. "Crap," she muttered, flicking her wand again. She hit Snape this time. His greasy black hair turned a brilliant shade of hot pink. A roar of laughter went up around the great hall as they noticed Severus and Frank's new hair colour.

At Lily's signal – Severus'pink hair– in bursts of 5 and 6, the Slytherin table slowly became a sea of pink atop green trimmed robes. The hall laughed even harder. Eventually, even some of the staff members were laughing. Lily looked up to see a twinkle in Dumbledore's eye, and his moustache twitching. He then stood up, and the laughter stopped abruptly. One wave of Dumbledore's wand and the Slytherin table, along with Frank, returned to their natural hair colour. One of the Slytherin girls had her friends all laugh at her; her hair was naturally bright red. She'd simply dyed it brown to hide what she thought as her hideous hair colour.

"Really," Lily muttered to Leala, fingering her own red locks, "What's wrong with red hair?"

Naturally, no one could figure out who had executed the prank. Dumbledore alone figured it out, and he stared down at the Gryffindor table, an almost unrecognizable twinkle in his eye. James saw it. Lily saw it. They knew Dumbledore didn't really care. But they'd probably be disciplined if any of the other teachers ever found out. Mind you, they were of age now, and this WAS the last day of school. If they could avoid teachers on this free day…

"So what are we going to do, my dear friends?" Sirius asked as the group exited the Great Hall. People were milling around the Entrance Hall, and Peter got stepped on a few times as he hurried along behind his friends. No one seemed to care he was there.

"Quidditch!" James said happily, dropping Lily's hand to punch the air. Lily groaned.
"Sounds like a plan," Sirius said. Rather reluctantly, Lily and Remus tailed the group that consisted of the animated James, Leala and Sirius trio, and Peter. Lily shook her head at the adoring look that Peter had on his face.

"That can't be healthy, looking up to someone THAT much," Lily said quietly to Remus.

"They don't seem to mind though, do they?" Remus mused, twirling his wand in his fingers. It was emitting pink sparks. Lily glanced between him and Leala's back, and realized with an amused expression what the pink sparks were all about.

"So do you and Leala have any plans?" she asked the distracted Remus.

He shook his head, bringing himself back to reality, "What? Oh, well, not really. We're just going to take it slow. We're not like you two;" he nodded towards James, "Getting married right out of school." They shared a chuckle.

Before Lily could say anything, James had run back to them with his broom over his shoulder. "Lily," he gasped breathlessly, "when was the last time you rode a broom?" he asked.

She thought about it. There was the time in 1st year when she'd stooped and picked up her broom when it didn't respond to her desperate cries of up. Then in her 3rd year, Leala begged Lily to try out for the team with her. Lily had fallen off the broom and broken her wrist. That was the last time she flew.

"3rd year."

"Well, come on, you're going to fly again now," he said, grabbing her hand and dragging her off towards the pitch. Ignoring Lily's protests, he stuck the broom between her legs, and mounted it behind her. Carefully wrapping one hand above her swollen stomach, he kicked of gently. She squealed, and grasped the broom desperately, even though they were barely hovering above the ground.

"Relax," James whispered in her ear.

"I can't!" she hissed. She peeked out one eye, and found that her toes were scarcely an inch off the ground. "Oh," she said, embarrassed. James urged his broom forwards slowly. The gentle wind tossed Lily's hair, and it got caught in James' mouth. He spluttered, and stopped the broom abruptly, nearly catapulting Lily off it head first.

"Good job, Prongs!" Sirius soared overhead, "Are you trying to kill your girlfriend?"

James scowled at his friend. Lily's heart was in her throat after that terrifying halt. "Do you want to try again?"

Against her better judgement, Lily nodded. She wanted to do this for James. She loved him, and wanted to like what he liked. Well, to a point; if it got too crazy, well… she could at least say she tried.

Once more, James pushed gently off the ground. She shut her eyes tight, and felt the broom rising gently through the air. "Open your eyes," James whispered in her ear.

Lily gasped. They were way up in the air, and the air was gently tossing her hair around and tenderly caressing her face. Big, fluffy clouds dotted the horizon and added depth to the infinite blue. She looked down, and grabbed the broom handle tightly. It was so far away!

"It's ok," James' voice whispered in her ear. Remus flew past them on a Silver Arrow; an old school broom. He was easily outstripped by Sirius on his top of the line Nimbus 1000. Wobbling slightly – he was not a very good flier – he pulled the broom around to fly alongside Lily and James.

"How do you like it?" he asked the white-knuckled Lily. Her palms were beginning to hurt from gripping the broom handle so hard.

"It's all right;" she said honestly, "the view is gorgeous though. I don't think I'm ever going to be a famous Quidditch player though. The height is a little too much for me."

"Do you want to go down?" James asked her as they turned slowly around the goalposts.

"Yeah, sure," Lily said, relaxing her grip slightly.

Remus followed them as James brought his Comet 240 into a shallow dive. Lily sat down thankfully on the ground. "I definitely prefer driving," Lily said faintly.

"This great sport is not for everyone!" James saluted the passing Sirius and rose to join him, leaving Remus and Lily on the ground. This was not unusual.

Sirius and James were performing great acrobatics. Peter clumsily tried to copy the pair, but just couldn't keep up. He finally gave up and hovered near one end of the stadium, watching them with a rapt expression.

"One of these days…" Remus said to Lily, shaking his head at Peter's pathetic antics.

As the group returned to the castle for dinner, they met Professor McGonagall in the Entrance Hall, along with the other heads of houses. She had a thick stack of envelopes in her hand. As she saw the approaching Gryffindors, she rifled through the stack and separated six envelopes. Curious, they strode up to her.

"Here," McGonagall said, distributing the envelopes. A hint of a smile played on her severe face. Their names were printed on them in emerald green ink. Lily's hand trembled as she opened the envelope.

"Are these…?"

"Yes, those are your NEWT results. We use a magical marking system especially for NEWTs, and are able to distribute them to you before you leave the school."

Lily skimmed her results – which was quite difficult, I will say, as her hands were trembling frightfully – and let out a squeal of joy. She'd received Outstanding placements in every exam.

"Lemme see!" James said, swapping papers with Lily. His jaw dropped in shock at all of her NEWTs. She glanced over his; Outstanding and Exceeds Expectations placements in everything except History of Magic. He'd fallen asleep halfway through the exam, and received a Dreadful placement in it. Sirius was roaring with laughter at this; he was peering over Lily's shoulder.

Everyone was pleased with their results. Everyone, that is, except Peter. Poor Pettigrew was biting his dirty nails, and slouching over his letter. "Accio letter!" James pointed his wand at Peter's letter, and it flew into his hand. Not one O was present on the paper. A few Acceptables and one Exceeds Expectations, along with several Poors graced his parchment. Potions had earned him a Troll standing. A shocked look passed over the faces of his friends, and he grabbed his paper from James' hand, running up the stairs towards the Gryffindor common room.

"Oops," James said, scuffing his toe on the floor. McGonagall had turned her back on the unfortunate situation.

"Professor," Remus ignored James, "will Peter have to repeat a year at Hogwarts?"

"No, he won't," she said sadly. "He has the option to retake the exams in a few weeks time. A percentage will be taken off for the retake, but other than that… I trust that you will help him." She looked pointedly at James. James went red.

The group headed off to prepare for the Leaving Feast. This was the end of their Hogwarts years. The dressed in their finest robes; dress robes of every colour. In the boys' dormitory, James, Sirius and Remus made a special effort to make Peter look good, despite the enormity of the task. They still felt bad about his NEWT results.

"Another year has passed!" Dumbledore stood, making his year end speech. I trust that you are all thankful that exams are over. Congratulations to our 7th years, who have done exceptionally well. You have achieved the highest average scoring in 115 years!"

A great applause and foot stamping greeted this, and Dumbledore smiled down at his students. "I pray that you have an excellent summer, and that all of you return next year," he paused, "With the exception of our 7th years; I hope none of you return!" he smiled. Scattered laughing ensued.

"Jeez, I hope he hurries up. I'm starved!" Leala prodded Lily. They talked in whispers for the rest of Dumbledore's speech. Lily felt like rebelling, and this was her last ditch effort.

"And finally, it is time to award the House Cup!" Dumbledore said loudly, and all whispered conversations came to an abrupt halt. "This year, the House Cup goes to Gryffindor, with 473 points!" he flicked his wand, and scarlet and gold hangings adorned the hall. Applause and screaming came to a deafening din. Gryffindors all up and down the hall were hugging and yelling happily. James grabbed Lily and kissed her full on the lips. Beside them, Remus and Leala were doing the same, although slightly more enthusiastically. Ok, more than slightly enthusiastically.

Sirius grabbed the nearest girl – who happened to be Amy Cottell, a fellow 7th year – and followed suit. He kissed her before really looking at who it was. When they broke apart, Sirius looked happy, and then he blushed. Amy went beet red, but looked rather pleased with herself. After all, she had just landed the hottest guy in their year!

The feast was excellent, as usual. Full and happy, the students packed their trunks before crawling into bed; the 7th years dreading the next day when they would be leaving forever.

Sorry that took me so long! I meant to have it up 2 days ago, but I got a little bit sidetracked with another idea for a fanfic. I'll have the new one up before long, so please look for it. Anyways, I hope you liked this chappie, as it is the last. Although I am considering writing a sequel… please press the little purple button! It all depends on you.

Maybelline