Chapter Two: At Diagon Alley Part I

Summary: Lily and James' story of growing up with their beginning friendship to their rivalry with each other, then back to their story of love. This story starts from their first year of Hogwarts to their marriage cause I can't bear to write unhappy endings. . .

James

One week later

"Hurry up James, dear!" his mother called for the 9th time. James had just gotten out of bed and gotten dressed groggily, appearing from the long hallway leading to his room. He slid down the grand stairwell's hand rail, leapt off smoothly, grabbed three gigantic and delicious-looking muffins from another house-elf named Goldie, crammed them into his mouth, mumbling, "Thanks," and skid to a halt in front of his mother who was wearing a pretty muggle halter dress with floral prints, and saluted her- all in one fluid motion.

"A' ye suhvice," James burbled through a mouthful of muffin. James' mum sighed, unimpressed, and grasped his arm to drag him to where Melanie was waiting just outside the Floo Room. This was the room the Potters used exclusively for flooing. The room itself was small, but it had a six-foot tall, four-foot wide fireplace. Placed opposite of it were two overstuffed armchairs designed for comfort on could easily fall asleep in, and a magical bookshelf that currently had the top 50 books in the wizarding world that the Potters had in their collection in their humongous library upstairs, which consisted of more than 50,000 books, wizarding and muggle alike. The bottom shelf in the Floo Room was empty for whomever wanted a certain book. If you thought of the name of the book, if the Potters had it (which they most likely did,) it would appear on that bottom shelf.

Melanie, James and their mum each took a handful of floo powder, cast it into the fireplace, and shouted, "Diagon Alley," clearly with the tone of ease one had if they used the Floo Network often.

The Potters stepped out into Diagon Alley, and immediately, more than a few people waved their hand in greeting; Mr. John Potter, head of the Auror Department at the Ministry of Magic, and the rest of his family were in photographs in the Daily Prophet all the time. The Potters smiled back at them.

The first place they stopped at was Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. Madam Malkin came bustling up to them, a squat and cheerful looking witch. "Hogwarts, dear?" James nodded, already bored. He hated shopping, unlike his mother and sister who had already disappeared within the racks of clothing. Madam Malkin led him to the back of the shop where another boy around his age with black hair and chocolate brown eyes was being fitted up by another witch on a stool.

"Hullo," the other boy said. "Are you going to Hogwarts too?" James nodded for the second time that day. "Me too! My name's Sirius Black, what's yours?"

James recognized that surname and visibly stiffened. His father had talked about it at dinner often. "Those Blacks!" he would growl in frustration and pound his fists on the table. "Everybody knows that it's them, but we can't find any evidence at all! Not one bloody shred of proof!" James became very alert, wary that the name Black associated with the Dart Arts. He would have to be careful around this boy.

"James Potter," he replied coolly. Sirius saw James stiffen when he heard his name.

"I know that you're probably thinking that I'm going to do some stupid Dark Arts thing to you, but I hate the Dart Arts. Unfortunately, my parents," he said the word with disgust and jerked his thumb towards a vicious-looking couple, "are absolutely obsessed with it. They've been trying to teach it to me for the past six years, and I've always refused." He smiled bitterly, but still said with light-hearted carelessness, "Honestly, they need to get a life. All they do is stay in their evil lair in the cellar and fool around with Dark Arts stuff. Oh well, their funeral. Now they hate me, and are working on Regulus, my younger brother. He's only 9 and he's already in love with the Dark Arts too. I told him to marry them yesterday. But he was really mad at me just because I pulled a tiny little prank on him. . ." James could tell that this wasn't just a "tiny little prank" just by looking at Sirius' grin. He was liking him more and more. James leaned forward eagerly.

"Really? What'd you do?"

Sirius glanced quickly at his parents who were sending him glares, which he then promptly ignored. "I charmed his toilet to glue his buttocks to the seat, then had the toilet try to swallow him whole. Too bad my parents heard him screaming and rescued him before it did anything major." He sighed with regret. "But then, they gave me this hour long lecture. . .don't ask me what it was about, because I have no idea. I stopped listening after the first 30 seconds."

James burst out laughing. "I just pulled a prank a week ago. I transfigured all the toothbrushes in our house into garter snakes 5 seconds after they touch your teeth. Melanie's practically deathly afraid of snakes, so when she was brushing her teeth, it turned into one that she thought was deadly. You have no idea how loud she screamed. She actually took hair cutting scissors from the medicinal cabinet, and stabbed the snake at least 10 times. The entire time she was screaming bloody murder, and was still screaming that loudly after she chopped up the snake and ran out. My parents gave me a lecture too, but I don't really remember what it was about either. I think I fell asleep. . ."

This time, Sirius broke out laughing. "Wait, who's Melanie?"

James answered that it was his sister right when Melanie walked into view with John and Alanna. James guessed he had apparated here. "That's her," James pointed at the dark-haired beauty.

Sirius's jaw dropped. "That's your sister?"

James called out, "Melanie! This is my new friend Sirius Black!" Sirius hopped down from his stool just as his fitter was finishing and sauntered over to Melanie. He took her hand and kissed it gently.

"My most beautiful lady," Sirius began in his most charming manner. Alanna looked pleasantly surprised, Melanie found this adorable, John looked alarmed, and James was doubled over laughing, but Mr. and Mrs. Black had already been walking briskly towards the scene their older son was making.

Sirius did not get to say his next sentence completely, which was no doubt going to be as alluring as the first, because his mum snapped in a high, girly voice, "We're going. . NOW!" Her voice was much too high for a broad-shouldered woman, more handsome than beautiful, and it just didn't fit. Sirius glared at his parents, and kept going.

"You, my dear- hey! Geroff me!" Mr. Black had seized Sirius' collar, thrown a few galleons at the shocked Madam Malkins, literally dragged Sirius towards the door, turned and shouted to Alanna, "Get your bloody husband to stop investigating me!" Then, to Mr. Potter, with an even more malicious glare, yelled, "You will never find anything!" He slammed the font door shut shut, but not before Sirius got out, "See you on the train, James!" All the while Mr. Black was dragging Sirius towards the front of the shop, his wife was scurrying behind, scolding Sirius, "Don't mix with Mudblood-lovers like them," she turned and sneered at the stunned Potters. "They won't get you anywhere in life. But the Dark Arts will, oh yes, they will help you succeed in Slytherin. . . . . . ." the door had shut. However, a few seconds later, everyone in the shop and probably the whole street heard a thundering bellow, "MUM! GET IT THROUGHT THAT THICK SKULL OF YOUR THAT I'M NOT INTERESTED IN THE DARK ARTS, AND NEVER WILL BE! AND NO! I AM NOT GOING TO BE IN SLYTHERIN, AND THAT'S FINAL!" Silence.

James spoke up, "Wow. . .we're going to be best mates."

"Yeah. . .he's exactly like you," Melanie said wryly, referring to the scene Sirius had been making.

John looked thoughtful. "I had heard rumors that the older Black son was quite disobedient to his family's will, and often causes chaos in the Black Manor. He's quite the prankster." He chuckled. "And my sources say that the Blacks are afraid to hurt him because Dumbledore will find out, and take him, who they consider one of the most powerful wizards in the entire Black family line. But they still hate him even though they're still trying to drill the Dart Arts into his head. He hates them too, though he has to stay with them because he has nowhere else to live."

Melanie ruffled James' hair and smile wryly again. "Yup, sounds just like our James. Brilliant, one of the best wizards of our family, and a total prankster."

"Of course I'm brilliant," he said cockily. "And of course I'm the best wizard in the world," he added sarcastically.

Melanie sighed and told him, "No, you seriously are. Mum and Dad told me; you were able to fly a broomstick before you could walk-"

"But that just makes me a good Quidditch player!" James interrupted.

Alanna took Melanie's place, "And, when you were little, whenever you got mad, something near you would start smoking, or you would even start a small fire."

Melanie took over again. "You could also break things from a distance, like my bracelet. You were trying to get my attention, and I wouldn't pay attention to you. Then my bracelet started to move by itself, pulling itself free, and when I looked at you, you were staring at my bracelet, concentrating hard. Then when the bracelet finally snapped, you were wearing a smug little smirk on your cute baby face, just like the one you have on right now." She reached out and smacked his arm hard, which wiped the "smug little smirk" right off his face.

"Hey, that hurt," he complained.

"So did the bracelet snapping on my wrist," she retorted. James stuck his tongue at her and she grinned at him, and continued, "I only showed little signs when I was little- more than the average witch anyway. I guess I'm kinda strong. . ." she trailed off, unsure of herself.

James grabbed her shoulders and shook her. "You. are. a.powerful.witch. That's.why.you.are.a.prefect."

"But that just dependes on your person!"

"But if you weren't more powerful than the average wizard or witch, how do you tell them what to do, without them challenging you to a duel?" James pointed out. That shut her up.

John cleared his throat, "Well, as amusing as this conversation is, we really must get going." Alanna nodded her agreement, and they left.

They stopped at Flourish and Blotts to purchase the long list of books required. James also bought Curses and Countercurses, by Professor Vindictus Viridian. He thought that might become useful one day in Hogwarts; he'd heard that they would learn how to duel.

Afterwards, they each got a new cauldron, and the finest set of scales money could buy. As they were walking to the owl store, Eeylops Owl Emporium, Alanna noticed a mother and daughter looking quite confused and lost, dressed in casual Muggle's clothing. The mother had the same beautiful auburn hair as the child, though she had brown eyes instead of green, like her daughter's. The girl looked to be around James' age, and had an exceptionally lovely face. Alanna ushered her family to stop, and approached the two.

"Hello! I couldn't help but notice that you looked a bit lost."

The woman smiled with obvious relief, and as she was explaining how hectic everything had been lately, like the Hogwarts letter, the young girl stepped out from behind her mum. This was the first time James had noticed her, and was awestruck by her beauty. Her captivating emerald eyes sparkled as she glanced at him, and he suddenly got a strange feeling in his stomach; it was as if there were butterflies fluttering around in there, and when she looked away, he wished for her to have gazed at him longer, but at the same time, embarrassed that she had looked at him at all. He blinked, and the feeling was swept away. James had no idea what that feeling was, but it was definitely not good if it made him nervous like that. The girl's mum was still talking, ". . .and this is my daughter, Lily Evans."