Disclaimer: I don't own any of the stuff you recognize, Raincoast and Bloomsbury and Scholastic and J.K. Rowling and I guess Warner Bros. Owns most of it, so yeah. Please don't sue me.

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Lily Evans returned in sixth year determined to show the general male population at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry that she was not indeed just a "flat-chested, shapeless prude of a bookworm," as a certain big-headed idiot put it. (who for the purpose of this story will be referred to, by Lily, as "that boy" or "the idiot" or possibly just "the stupid arse faced nothing who used to call himself my best friend but who can now go fuck himself up the ass for all I care." My, my, someone's a little testy isn't she?)

Not only had she cut her hair, because everyone knows short is the new long (a pity seeing as how it used to be so long and slightly wavy and the most gorgeous shade of red, although she insists on calling it auburn), but she had also turned in her "billowing boyish outfits" for more revealing tanks and T-shirts and a few pairs of rather gorgeous form-fitting, low rise, bell bottomed jeans that she felt showed off her rather shapely hips and cute butt. She had also turned in her thick-framed owlish reading glasses for more flattering small oval rims. And, she had ventured into the world of makeup, a land where some venture but few are actually successful. But, our dear Lily is a perfectionist, so what else would you expect from her?

She actually accomplished her transformation quite well, if I do say so myself. When she stepped through the barrier separating platforms 9 and 10 at King's Cross station, quite a few heads turned her way, few actually registering the fact that this was the prudish perfectionist prefect they had ignored the previous year.

Lily knew she looked gorgeous, the fact that she had finally had her first kiss this summer after going to the drive in with her friends sporting one of her new outfits, (and then she had had her second and third kisses with two completely different boys) attested to this fact, but she wasn't quite used to the fact that boys watched her.

Which is why when three boys offered to help her load her trunk onto the train encountered a rather friendly but still somewhat icy reply that she could do it herself. People didn't normally offer to help her do things. She was in fact a very independent young woman and she had learned to live without the aid of others when accomplishing simple tasks such as putting her trunk on the train.

So, not thirty minutes from the time she stepped onto the platform she had already acquired the title of "ice queen" in the eyes of some. Not that she really cared. Or noticed for that matter. At heart she was kind but really rather shy. A wallflower. She treated everyone with the same sort of courteous respect she had learned from her mother.

She knew no other way. Well, she had witnessed other ways. Her very own sister, Petunia, who used to love her and was the best sister anyone could hope for, returned from her first year at boarding school with a group of snobby stuck up friends who cared for little other than appearances and who had passed on their ideals and way of life to Petunia. Sad to say (and to put it bluntly) Petunia had turned into a bitch.

Lily didn't stand for any of that appearances are everything mumbo jumbo (which probably isn't so apparent after the introduction we've just given her, but which will surface later), and she could see right through Petunia's need to fit in and belong. She felt sorry for her. And for anyone who changed their nature's to fit in with the popular people. For Lily was popular in her own right, but because of her quiet kindness. She had earned respect. She treated everyone the same, whether they were dirty, mean, conniving Slytherins or poor scared first years trying to fit in and find friends. She didn't liken herself in any way to Petunia, preferring to, as I mentioned earlier, treat everyone with the quiet dignity she had learned from her mother. She liked the results it produced much better.

But, alas, I am getting ahead of myself. Lily was supposed to be meeting her friends on the train by now. And I suppose I've portrayed her in a rather contrary and confusing manner here, so we'll get on with the story and let you decide for yourself what kind of character she is.

ooo

"Dahling dearest! I missed you so! How have you been? Why didn't you owl me? I almost forgot what you looked like having been away from you for so long!" Aria, Lily's best friend in the whole wide world pounced on Lily as soon as she found her compartment.

"Ar, honey bunches, I saw you two days ago," Lily laughed and pushed the sprightly girl off of her onto the bench. "Let me say hi to my other friend, the one who deserted us all summer, to go off to India to study monkeys instead of staying here with us. And then, deigned to write us each all of three owls!" Lily jumped into Michelle's lap and smooshed her. "I am so mad at you I've decided to shun you into oblivion! Tell me every thing."

"I fell in love," she said rather dreamily, "But Lily, what happened to you! You're wearing makeup, and tight clothes!"

"You knew I was going to get back at that smarmy asshole who can go fuck himself up the bum," Lily replied rather scathingly, "But tell me about your love!"

"Lily, don't swear, it's unladylike," Aria sat down across from them and propped her feet on Lily's lap.

"I'm allowed to swear in certain circumstances and that great big-headed bastard warrants a little swearing." She wiggled her bum on Michelle's lap trying to rearrange Aria's legs and Michelle yelped.

"Gosh Lily, you're bum bones are sharp why do I always have to remind you not to wiggle!" And with that she gave Lily a big shove and sent her rolling on to the floor

where she promptly burst into a fit of laughter. Which got them all started. Which was when James walked in.

ooo

I am about to interrupt the story to inform you of some things that need informing about. Well, maybe not. I just like the tableau that's been created. So I feel it's an opportune moment to talk about why Lily is so mad at James. In case you were wondering, James Potter is the "big-headed idiot" among other things. Yes, I know, it's James Potter, how could any one possibly hate him? Well, Lily does.

You see, James Potter really liked Lily. He had since sometime near the beginning of 5th year in fact. He didn't know why or when he started liking her. After all she was (was being the past tense) one of his best friends since first year. She was no longer his best friend.

So James didn't know why he liked Lily. He wasn't sure exactly why their perfectly platonic friendship turned into strange flutterings in James' stomach every time he saw her. He supposed it may have had something to do with the time they had sat beside the lake in early fall, dangling their feet into the lake and he had asked her what she wanted most in all of the world, and she said she wanted to fall in love. Then she proceeded to tell him in great detail, the story of Cinderella. Which he knew, of course.

Or maybe it was the time, later that winter, when they had been hiding in a broom closet, breathless from running away from Filch after being out for a midnight snack. When she fell asleep in his lap with her glorious long hair shoved up his nose. It had smelled like lavender, and cinnamon. Or maybe it was the time when he stumbled across her talking to her girlfriends about Stuart Trenchell, a seventh year Ravenclaw, who she definitely thought she'd like to marry, and the way James' heart twanged rather unpleasantly at that.

In any case, James became slowly more infatuated with he as the year progressed. He couldn't stop staring at her in class. He followed her like a puppy practically wherever she went and did whatever she asked of him. It probably wasn't the best way to win a girl's heart, but James, normally able to get girls putty-like in the palm of his hand in minutes, couldn't do that to Lily.

Needless to say, their perfectly happy platonic relationship was ruined. Lily started getting annoyed with James more and more, and his jokes about wanting to go out with her started grating seriously on her nerves. She started hanging out with her girlfriends more and more and with the annoyingly clingy James less and less.

Their relationship came to a head sometime in the middle of their O.W.L.'s. Lily, sick and tired of James' new way of treating h, and crazed with the strain of the ever important O.W.L.'s, snapped at him. It wasn't supposed to start out mean, it was just an I'm-tired-and-stressed-and-I'm-going-to-fail-if-you-don't-get-away-from-my-Transfiguration-book-this-instant kind of snap. James, though, decided to take it personally (he was rather stressed out by the fact that he was completely enamored with one of his best friends).

Some nasty things were said. James' prolific tendencies and general ego were at the forefront, but his hair was attacked also, along with the way he slurped his soup and hardly ever did his homework. Lily's general perfection was molested, along with the fact that, if not for her long hair, she would look exactly like a boy, because she never wore makeup and her general prudishness. James touched a nerve when he remarked that, as a result of all that, she'd never had a boyfriend, and that maybe, if she got in a good snog every once in a while she wouldn't be so uptight.

This all resulted in Lily sobbing in her dorm and James stewing in the gasp library, somewhere in the back… around the astronomy section?

Somehow they managed to pass their O.W.L.'s anyways, with Lily beating James not by her usual two points, but this time only one.

Their friendship was in tatters and after a summer of not writing and lots of thinking, they came back to school, the remains of their friendship only a few threads lying in a heap somewhere in Northern Egypt.

ooo

With that in mind, I'll bring you back to the tableau where we left our two favourite people. Lily lying on the floor tears streaming down her face and laughing like a hyena, surrounded by her friends in similar states of looniness and James at the door of the compartment.

At first James just stood there and nobody noticed him. Michelle saw him first. She stopped laughing almost immediately. The other two, noticing the absence of her loud guffawing laughter stopped also, wiping their eyes, looking up to see what the matter was. Aria and Michelle were looking at Lily. Lily's face turned hard. For a moment when she saw James it had threatened to break into a smile, like she used to, but then, after a split second, her brain caught up to her subconscious and she glared.

Lily Evans is a good prefect for several reasons. One of them being her glare. When she chose to turn that look on someone she was scarier than Professor McGonagall. James had never been on the receiving end of one of those famous looks. He had avoided her at all costs and this was actually the first time he had been face to face with her since the fight.

"I…I w-was … I was just l-looking for Remus, sorry, I guess he's not here." He muttered very quickly, looking down at his shoes, not wanting to see Lily's wrath in those pretty green eyes. He turned and fled, slamming the door behind him.

Michelle and Aria waited for Lily. She sat for a moment, staring almost longingly after him and then shook her head and turned around.

"So!" she jumped up again and smooshed herself next to Michelle, "You fell in love?"

The other girls took their cue from her and pretended like the encounter hadn't happened. They put on a show of being happy, but Lily wasn't as eager as when she had first come in. The rest of the train ride passed in a rather more subdued manner than usual.

ooooooooo

A/N: Hello. I just wanted to say that this is just something I'm playing with. I know it's rather short, but I had a couple scenes in my journal that I rather liked so I sort of arranged them in here. I don't exactly know what's going to happen, or whether or not I'm going to finish it, although I was having fun with the narrative. It's a bit different isn't it? I was just playing around. Let me know what you think about it and whether or not I should continue. I'm warning you though, I'm really bad at finishing things I've started.