Ok, blackmailing would be brilliant, but right now she just wanted Potter out of her sight and mind. And house, and soon, because if he was still here when her parents came home they would throw a fit. Bleeding boys were not exactly their idea of a party.
Sighing, Lily considered who she could enlist to take Potter off her hands. Sirius Black would be more trouble then he was worth, and Peter Pettigrew was too much of a whiner to actually get anything done. However, Remus Lupin might be helpful . . . A fellow Prefect, he was the most serious of the infamous Marauders, though not as angelic as he often appeared to adults.
After hoisting Potter up onto the living room couch - a feat that contained much grunting and grumbling -, Lily fetched the portable phone and sat down in the easy chair facing him. While she, like everyone else at her school, usually used owl post, the phone would be quicker. Lily had no idea if Remus actually had a phone, since most wizard families did not, but she was willing to bet her Muggle-born friend Alexandra would know, as the two had dated each other over the last summer.
A few minutes later Lily hung up, not exactly surprised that Remus had no phone. Alexandra had given her his address though, and told her he had a fireplace in his room if she wanted to visit. (At that point she had made a few suggestive sounds, trying to determine exactly why Lily Evans, who was notorious for not getting along with the Marauders, wanted to talk to one of them.) Still, she had told her how to get to his house, which was why, five minutes later, Lily stuck her head into her own fireplace.
Why am I putting myself through this? Lily wondered, feeling the beginning of butterflies in her stomach. Exactly how was she supposed to explain this to Remus? Hi, your best friend is injured in my house and I want you to get rid of him now. Not that promising. And what if he wasn't there?
She didn't have to worry about the last question; Remus was reclining on a low, couch like bed in a room twice the size of Lily's when her head showed up in his fireplace. He choked on the handful of almonds he was eating and stared at Lily's nervous face with a cross between astonishment and utter dismay. "Lily Evans?" he managed, then walked over and kneeled in front of the fireplace, peering at her head as if he didn't believe what he saw.
"Erm," Lily started, wondering what had possessed her to do this. She had a sudden urge to pull her head back into the flames, out of Remus's sight. Maybe she could just . . . bury Potter. In the yard. Or put him in a crate and send him to Hogwarts. "See, actually, Potter's sorta at my house. Um. Unconscious."
Remus blinked, and then his mouth started to curve into a smirk. "Oh," he said in a knowing tone. "So that's how it is. Wondering when that would happen, actually."
Lily felt herself go red as the flames. "Not like that," she snapped. "I suppose you already know," she said disdainfully, "that he's an animagus." Then she wondered if he did. Because she certainly didn't want to explain that, too.
But of course Remus knew, and his look suddenly turned wary. "I do," he said, "What about it?"
"What about it?" Lily repeated, her voice cracking. "The pompous idiot got himself shot in that form, then had the nerve to show up, bleeding to death, on my doorstep. Or close enough," she amended. "So I sort of bound the wound, not having any idea who he was, until he turns back into his idiotic, selfish self again. Then, ten minutes, ago, he was stupid enough to try to get down the stairs without any help, which resulted in opening the wound again. Right now he's lying unconscious on my couch, and looks like he's going to die from blood loss. And," she finished, her voice going higher then usual, "I -want - him - out - of - my - house!"
Remus blinked.
"Well?" Lily demanded impatiently. She felt her rather dramatic angst deserved more response then a blink.
"Why was he shot?"
"Deer range?" Lily guessed wildly. "I don't know. Or care. But then he was crossing the street and almost got hit - he ought to be dead twice over!"
"Luckily, he's not," Remus said, still seeming amused. "A moment." He left through a side door.
"Can't have a moment," Lily muttered in protest. "My head is sitting in your fire. I am slightly uncomfortable with this. You can come back now. Anytime. Or," she continued darkly, "I can just leave my head here. Ow. My nose itches." A pause. "So does my ear. And my hands are back home and I can't itch."
"Sorry?" Remus asked, reentering.
"Nothing," she said quickly. "What's in that?"
Remus hoisted a big black bag. "Things to make James better?"
"Oh, you don't need things," Lily said hurriedly. "Just come over ad you can drag him through the fire and treat him over here."
Remus glared.
"Fine," Lily said. "See what I care," she muttered to herself, and pulled her head back out of the fire.
Remus appeared a second later, looking around with some curiosity. "Do you have a guest room or something you can put these in for a while?" he asked, not unkindly as he stepped out of her fireplace, handing Lily the bag. "We might be here a while."
Lily blinked. Hard. Thinks were moving a little too fast to follow. "Stay?" she forced out. "But you were just going to patch him up and go. You can't stay. . ."
Remus through a glance over his shoulder as he knelt to look at Potter. "Why not?" he asked. "We certainly can't move James by Floo powder until he's conscious - healthy."
"Why not? Unconscious people have traveled by Floo before."
Remus shook his head. "True, but James is too sensitive. He's never been good at traveling by fire."
"Isn't that convenient," Lily muttered under her breath.
"Actually, yes, it is," Remus agreed.
"He'll just have to deal. My parents would never let you stay." At Remus's confused look, she rolled her eyes. "You're guys," she said dryly. "They're not going to be happy if I have two guys stay over for several nights, especially if one of them looks like he does. Wounded," she added hurriedly. "Because he's all bloody and broken."
"Then your parents don't need to know," Remus said practically. He opened a bottle from his bag and poured some cream into his hand before spreading it onto James's leg. "Self-binding lotion," he explained at her quizzical look. "It will help heal the skin."
For the next several minutes, Lily stood there feeling useless as Remus wrapped and rewrapped his friend's wounds. Finished, Remus nodded to Lily. "You're best at charms. Would you mind floating him to the guestroom? It's best if we don't jostle him too much."
Lily looked at him in a mixture of surprise and alarm. "I've already done magic," she told him. "If I do any more, I might get kicked out!"
Remus stared at her blankly, before laughing. "That's right," he said, as if recalling something. "You're not yet seventeen?" He shook his head. "Don't worry - I can cover you. The authorities will never be able to tell."
"Remus," Lily whispered, as if someone was listening, "we're prefects. We're probably going to be head girl and boy! Don't you think breaking the M.O.M.'s rules is . . . wrong?"
Remus, who could be an entirely too irritating, considering he hung out with Potter and Black, was actually much more sensitive then the other two. For a moment he gave his complete attention to Lily.
"Lily," he said softly, ignoring her last words. "It's going to be all right. He's injured, but it won't kill him - there's no chance of that. It's just a bullet in the leg and some infections, and we cam fix those. There's a spell - I'm sure you know it - that will turn people away if they start to go into the room James is in - they'll lose interest, or remember something else they have to do. He'll be fine."
Lily swallowed hard. Remus had, as he usually did, seen straight to the heart of the matter. Lily was afraid James would be wounded, permanently so, and it would be because she wasn't fast enough, or smart enough, to save him.
"Thanks," she said quietly, and floated him up to the guestroom.
It was surprisingly easy to take care of Potter, Lily thought two days later as she slipped into the guestroom for lunch. The go-away-spell worked perfectly, though Lily still tensed and held her breath when anyone went upstairs. Petunia had, thank God, been silent, on account of Lily threatening her with her own blackmail. It Petunia told their parents about the half-dead guy she'd seen, Lily would tell them about the time Petunia had come home after partying with a guy six years older then her, completely drunk and smelling like cigarettes.
Petunia stayed silent.
Remus stayed with Potter for most of the day, and Lily was just down the hall if he needed help in the night. Not that he actually knew that - the fall down the stairs and loss of so much blood, plus the infections in the scratches all over his body had resulted in a high fever that had only just broken. Before that, he'd been mostly delusional when awake.
Lily shut the door behind her, initiating the spell she'd had to break for a moment to enter. "He'll be awake soon?" she asked Remus, who she had rarely seen despite the amount of time he'd been there.
Remus nodded seriously. "In an hour or so." They both turned to look at Potter, who was sleeping deeply. Lily was relieved to see that his sleep no longer looked as pained and uncomfortable as it used to.
"I'll see you soon," Remus said, picking up a bag Lily had failed to notice was packed. She gaped at him, her surprise clear. "You can take care of him perfectly," he assured her. "And I'll see you in just a few days."
"You are not going to leave me alone with a conscious, unfevored James Potter, are you?" Lily half-demanded, half-pleaded. "You can't. One of us will kill the other!"
"After all you've went through to keep him safe?" Remus said with a smile. "Think of it as practice for dealing with unruly kids at school."
"I can send him back through the fire as soon as he can walk!"
"Lily," Remus said seriously, 'He really doesn't like traveling by the Floo network. He's had a couple bad experiences. Of course, if you make him irritated enough, he might just give it another try." He grinned at her. "Good bye, Head Girl." He moved towards the door.
"Goodbye, Head Boy," she told him back, and they exchanged smiles only people with long-time confidence of achieving their goal had. He nodded, and while Lily was still trying to take in this turn of events, he had disappeared downstairs and hopped through her firecase, barely pausing to holler back, "King's Cross! I'll have Sirius bring his stuff!"
And he was gone.
"Doomed," Lily whispered to herself. "Doomed, doomed, doomed." She hadn't gotten around to asking Remus half the things she'd wanted to - about being an animagus, about avoiding detection when he used magic, about a hundred different things.
And now she had Potter. Unconscious Potter. Hated, despised Potter who was going to wake up in an hour and make her absolutely miserable until they reached school. She groaned. How was she supposed to explain to her parents that she had someone else to take to King's Cross?
For the next hour she wandered about her house, periodically checking on Potter and her trunk, which she unpacked and repacked at least three times to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything. Just a few more days until Hogwarts. At two fifteen she went upstairs again, armed with a sandwich and bag of potato chips, ready to wait for Potter to wake.
He wasn't there. She stared in astonishment, almost dropping her plate as she observed the neat guestroom. The bed was made, the bandage filled trash gone; it looked like she had imagined Potter being in her house.
She knew she hadn't; setting her food sharply down on the bedside table, she dashed into to her room, to find Potter - yet again - lounging on her bed like he belonged there.
Evans was almost cute when she was angry, James thought in a bemused sort of way, if she didn't look as if she was about to burst into flames. "Hello, Carrots," he said, smiling, feeling good will towards the world at large. His leg was healed, he would be back at Hogwarts in a few days, and Lily Evens was so angry her face was as red as her hair. All was right in James' world. "Finally decided to come see if I was still alive?"
"Finally?" she hissed. "Do you have any idea what I've done for you the past three nights? I probably saved your life! You were delusional, Potter. Delusional. Oh, and you know why? Because you were idiot enough to fall down the stairs and lose even more blood. You practically went into shock!" She sucked in a breath of air. "You're lucky you have such a good friend in Remus. I would have let you die," she said haughtily.
"Of course," James said, amused. He vaguely remembered Moonie being there, promising to make sure Padfoot brought all his things to King's Cross. He spared a thought towards Sirius's well being, before Lily Evans, most non-violent girl in Hogwarts, grabbed him by the collar and shoved him against the wall. "Have you done anything that violent since you punched me first year?" he asked, but she had managed to get his attention.
"Listen to me," she said, taking a step, then another, back from him. "My parents are not happy-go-lucky wizards. The whole boy-in-bedroom thing does not fly with them. So you are supposed to pretend you don't exist, understand? Don't ever come downstairs, or talk loudly, or walk loudly -"
"-or breathe loudly," James finished. He smiled at her. "What about love you loudly?" He fixed large, adoring eyes on her face, and glimpsed her hands clenching.
"I swear to God, Potter, if you try anything -"
"Oh give up, Carrots," James said. "I'm just riling you."
"And here I thought you were trying to charm."
"Of course not," he said blithely. "If I was being charming, you would be melting."
Evans made a sound surprisingly like a huff, and glared at him.
"Carrots, tell me the truth," he said in a patronizing, doctorly voice, then spoiled it by smiling widely, showing off his perfectly white, perfectly straight teeth. "Do I make you nervous, darling?"
"I am not your darling," Evans said, taking several more steps away. "Don't leave this room," she ordered, then turned and dashed from it. James watched her go, smiling. He dropped onto her bed, then watched as an owl darted into the room, dropping an envelope on his lap and then flying away. Still feeling abnormally happy, he casually tore it open and skimmed the first of three sheets. First: General Hogwarts letter. Second: 7th year supplies. Third: -
Bloody hell.
James would have sat down if he hadn't been already. As it was, he stared in absolute shock at the letter. "But this is Remus's," he murmured. "Everyone knows this is Remus's . . ." Head Boy? He, James Potter?
Responses
lilsakura - look, a familiar face! If by face, I mean penname . . . I really do mean to update OHAF . . . one of these days.
BRIdoubleP - Glad you like it. I'm going for the classic L/J thing, because it's just incredible fun.
Hazelocean - Look! I did.
Blvd - Happy you loved it! And I cried too, in HBP. For, um, fifty pages.
check6 - Glad you liked it, and I hope you're satisfied now - Remus never was Head Boy, Lily and he just assumed it.
PhoenixWings13 - Yay! Glad you like it.
Maylin-Chan - Thanks.
Irish Lady Knight - I love 'em too. And they're no fun if they aren't funny.
Coco-Pop - Thanks for the eye tip. I didn't catch that. But yeah, the Remus/Head boy was just a set up. Because honestly, who would have expected James to be Head boy?
the mouse that roared - Mouse, don't be non happy. Lily did NOT just fall for James because of his looks, or she would have fallen for him long ago, like when he liked her, as opposed to waiting for seventh year. Got you there! Oh, and Lily used magic the first time because she didn't think it through, and then the letter freaked her out. Therefore, no more magic for Lily.
k - lol. Thanks. It was just a set up for further chapters; I know Remus wasn't head boy.
J.E.A.R.K.Potter - You're right - Harry's mentors have to go away. And thank you for catching that Lily just thought Remus was head boy.
ZestyCruton - No, her parents weren't home, but at work. I think. When she screamed. God, I don't know. Let's say they were at work and I'll check it later.
Ashley - Doomed is a beautiful word. It should be used more often.
3musketteers - Thanks! I like writing fanfics where I can play with the characters.
Keliadry- You're sweet! (And I was always mad that Kel didn't get with anyone. Which is shallow of me. And I really hopes your name pertains to PotS, cause otherwise this is meaningless.)
I think JK Rowling has definitely stated this is her last HP book, though she might do an encyclopedia of the world for charity. But I agree that Harry and Ginny HAVE to get back together. And I think he should be an Auror. Well, considering it's what he wants. Or teach DATDAs, which would be funny.
Frecklednproud - Ugh, work. Who needs to go to that? And the blackmail comes up in the next chapter (I think) Only it doesn't work to well. Poor Lily.
Captain Oblivious - Oh, James. He makes me laugh. And I know what you mean about getting interest renewed - it's actually why I started posting this after the 6th book, instead of in limbo.
The Devil's Maiden - Whee! Next chapter. Glad you liked it.
The Brilliant Fool - Daniel Radcliff has long hair! Weird . . . but Krum. Oh - pretttttty. Makes me happpy. Yes, D is for D.A.S.H., silly. I still need to do that . . . I guess the secret's out, mine's for Amy, and I AM going to get it . . . honest . . . Blurb. I got a Princess Treasury which has tons of story ideas, or, um, stories, and the sequel to the Safe Keeper's Secret, and the last Girl Got Game! I'm so successful. But I missed Improv Boston to work. Sad. So, Ye Olde Country Store? Any news? God, I'm hungry. I had a cupcake and a yogurt for dinner. I think I'll go have more . . .
Preview:
"I just got myself invited to your congratulatory dinner," he said with a faint smirk, though his face seemed a little paler then usual - I hope he lost more blood, Lily thought vindictively. He leaned back against the wall, one hand in his pocket, the other holding an envelope she hadn't noticed before. "Incidentally, it's also my congratulatory dinner."
"What are you talking about?" Lily said scornfully, though a little less so then she normally would have been. She was still stunned at the speed in which Potter had charmed her mother and convinced her he and Lily were friends.
"Head Girl needs a Head Boy, doesn't she?"
"Yes - Remus."
"Actually - me."
