A/N: I would like to thank my wonderful reviewers so far! You five have inspired me to get this story cranked out ASAP, and lit a small flame of hope in my heart about my writing! I will update as quickly as possible...for you guys!
Miska: I offer the deepest thanks to you for being my first, best, and kindest reviewer (especially on my Lord of the Rings story). I'm happy you melted into a puddle of mush while reading the letter!
xLynex: Makes sense to me what you say...thanks for the great compliments!
passionflower24: This is the seventh year, Lucius is Head Boy and Lily Head Girl, and the only reason I made James a Seeker was to add an extra link/bond between him and Harry...thanks for pointing it out, though!
smellyokellyo: Again, thank you for the praise...you don't know how much it means to me!
fairybells3: I agree, James definitely isn't perfect (except perhaps perfectly handsome) I will try to update ASAP!
Again, I love you guys to pieces for your encouraging, great reviews
James Potter waltzed into the Marauder's compartment in the best of moods. "Prongs!" Sirius cried out overdramatically. "Where have you been, my boy?" He embraced James like a brother, pretending to wipe tears away from his dancing dark brown eyes. With elegant thick black hair that for some reason always seemed to behave better than James's, an adorable, mischievous grin, and high spirits and intelligence that never seemed to dim, the charming Sirius Black, along with James, created quite a stir among the female population of Hogwarts.
"It's wonderful to see you, James," came the soft voice of Remus Lupin. Definitely the most levelheaded and reserved member of the group, he tried to invoke some common sense into the other three, but with no avail. Though he was a Prefect (appointed by Dumbledore in the hopes that he could exercise some control over his friends), Remus could rarely resist joining in the outlandish jokes, pranks, and schemes Sirius and James—the masterminds—formulated. James's spirits lessened slightly as he noticed Remus was looking more than a little bit peaky. His normally golden-blonde hair was pale and lifeless, and skin almost translucent. "It must near the full moon," he sighed. Remus, having been bitten by a werewolf as a young child when there was no cure turned into a full-fledged werewolf once a month. James shivered as he imagined how horrible it must be to have a terrible monster raging inside of you; one that you have absolutely no control over when its fury is unleashed once a month. He was reminded, though, of what the remaining Marauders had done to help make the transformation easier for their friend when he caught sight of a rather plump, ugly rat sitting on the seat beside Remus.
"Hello, Wormtail," he spoke to the rodent, who slowly morphed into the short, awkward figure of Peter Pettigrew. Peter, who was not the sharpest pencil in the box, obviously did not share the others' popularity or intelligence. Watery-eyed, with a rather twitchy, nervous personality, the timid 17-year old hero-worshipped Sirius and James; especially the latter's talent on the Quidditch field. His admiration was probably the only reason the remaining Marauders allowed him to hang out with them, for frankly, there was little other use for the weak young man. His lack of intelligence had hindered them many times, especially when they were working on becoming unregistered Animagi.
Remus had tried desperately to hide his terrible secret from the other three ever since they had bonded on their first journey on the Hogwarts Express, but eventually James and Sirius, being two of the cleverest students at Hogwarts, put the pieces of the puzzle together. Instead of dropping Remus like a dead fly, they did what only loyal friends would do: became Animagi. It took the large part of three years, but with a good bit of brains and practice, Peter, Sirius, and James could each turn into an animal at will; Peter a rat, Sirius a huge black dog, and James a beautiful stag. Every full moon they would roam the grounds of Hogwarts with the transformed Remus, having exciting adventure after adventure.
"So, mate, why were you so late?" Sirius asked, giving him a sly grin. "I assume it has something to do with Lillian for your face resembles a tomato. Quite an ugly tomato at that." He clapped him hard on the shoulder. "Spill it out, Prongs...what happened?"
James sighed good-naturedly, defeated, knowing that he could never keep anything from his inquisitive best friend. "Er-she...she... she held my hand."
"Our little Prongsie is turning into quite the young man," Sirius sobbed dramatically, clutching onto Remus for support. James rolled his eyes and grumbled, "Cut the theatrics, Padfoot. She only grabbed my hand to drag me onto the train."
"Ah, but you wished for much more," Sirius wiggled his black eyebrows suggestively, dodging the blow thrown his way by James.
"Porcutisi," James mumbled, pointing his wand directly at his friend's nose, which immediately metamorphisized into a pig's snout. "The look's rather becoming to you, mate," he chortled. Sirius could only oink most angrily in response.
Lily sprinted into the Prefect's Compartment, clutching her side and gasping desperately for air. "Sor-ry I'm la-te," she managed to get out, before collapsing into one of the red squishy armchairs nearby.
"Evans, as Head Girl I would think you would be more responsible," Lucius sneered. "Don't you own a wristwatch? The meeting started five minutes ago—without you."
Drawing herself up to her full height of 5 feet 6 inches, Lily angrily rose from the chair and stormed over to where the Head Boy stood, until their faces where mere centimeters apart.
"I will not take any more crap from you this year," Lily hissed. "I swear Malfoy, one more insulting remark and we start using wands."
Lucius, though he had lost some of his aloof demeanor when he remembered that Lily was an excellent dueler, chose to ignore her words and leering at her said, "Evans, Evans, Evans...don't think I don't know why your mouth is in such close proximity to mine...you want me to kiss you. Well, I'm terrible sorry, but I only kiss redheads on Thursdays, and filthy Mudbloods, never. So, if you want to improve your chance with me ... first find new parents, and then I can...A flash of bright purple light suddenly illuminated the compartment, cutting off his next words. Within seconds, Lucius Malfoy was flat on his back, sporting hundreds of huge, painful boils. One by one, they began to erupt, drenching his body in a foul-smelling green liquid that greatly irritated his skin. He moaned and crawled over to the door, scratching furiously at every inch of his body.
"And that, Prefects, it is a useful little spell used to silence stupid prats such as Lucius!" Lily said triumphantly. The incantation is 'boilus'...one you would do good to remember." The Prefects were all staring at her in a mixture of awe and fury (the anger, of course, emanating from the Slytherin Prefects who did not appreciate what had just happened to the Head Boy). "Now, to get down to business..." she continued, flicking her wand slightly to clean up the remaining green goo left on the ground. The meeting passed by quickly, some mouths still hanging open at the display they had just witnessed...Lily Evans...the perfect, good-goody, super-smart Lily Evans had just cursed the Head Boy! What a story this would be to tell!
"Tell me, "Head Girl," where does it state that the Heads are allowed the privilege to freely curse unprovoked whomever they please?" came a cold question from the corner. Lily whirled around, rattled at having been interrupted during her practiced speech, and gritted her teeth when she saw who had spoken.
"Unprovoked my buttocks," Lily retorted, casting a deadly glare in Severus Snape's direction. Severus Snape, (or Snivellus, as the Marauders liked to call him), was a cold, sly, greasy-haired wizard unpopular with most of Hogwarts, except his own house, which obviously was Slytherin. Being close friends with Lucius, he made it a habit to be as cruel as possible to both James and Lily and attempted to make their lives miserable. Attempt was the key word here. Many a time he found himself as the receiver of particularly nasty spells sent his way by James and the rest of the Marauders or flat on his back after a duel with James. Still he never gave up in his ruthless, cold-hearted insulting, but both Lily and James, though deeply angered by his words, had learned to not let the remarks get to them. Delving deep into the Dark Arts and potion making, Severus held truth to the belief that there was not one witch or wizard in Slytherin that did not go bad. It was even rumored that he was a Death Eater, one of Voldemort's followers. Voldemort. Just thinking the name gave Lily the shivers. Voldemort, an extremely evil and powerful dark wizard who had slowly risen to power over the last few years, hated Muggles, Mudbloods and Half-Bloods with a passion. He and his loyal Death Eaters tortured and murdered countless people; the newspapers were plagued daily with reports of attacks and the mounting death toll. And it had only just started. Dark times were upon the world of men...the end was coming.
As the students filed out of the compartment to begin their patrolling duties, Lily simply could not resist the urge to whisper, as Severus passed, "I won't be helping you this year, Snivellus." For the past six years, Lily had stopped James and his friends from torturing Snape with one spell or another numerous times, reprimanding them for their sometimes unprovoked actions. However, (she smiled sweetly at this thought) it was time for the new, rebellious Lily Evans to emerge—one who was not afraid to curse the heck out of certain wizards. Severus just gave her a scathing look as he brushed by, muttering out of the corner of his rather large mouth, "I'd watch out if I were you, Evans...the Dark Lord has a particular dislike for Mudbloods."
"Oh, I'm so scared," Lily retorted sarcastically, trying to control the wave of fear that was washing over her at his true words. Severus scratched his abnormally large, rather beaky nose and flounced out of the compartment without a backwards glance. Lily had just put one foot outside the door when she suddenly heard a whimper. "What a wimp," she muttered, performing the counter-curse and ridding Malfoy's body from the boils and goo.
In a compartment halfway across the train, there was a quite distressing situation occurring. "Oink oink oink oink oink!" Remus glanced over at Sirius and said rather calmly, "I think he is trying to tell you, Prongs, that he doesn't appreciate the fact that you refuse to perform the counter-curse to this spell."
"And also the fact that he looks like a pig," Peter piped in his high-pitched voice.
James, unconcerned, unwrapped a Chocolate Frog and used it to emphasize his points. "He was being an insufferable git about my love life...what was I supposed to do, mate?" Popping the frog into his mouth before it hopped away, he said through a mouth of milk chocolate, "Mim plejasjk aksle jkjaop!"
"Sorry, didn't catch that bit," Remus snickered.
"I said, "He's just jealous that I have a beautiful, intelligent redhead falling in love with me."
Lily stood shocked outside of the door at the words that had just exited his mouth. "Well, Potter, could you please repeat that? I could've sworn you said something to the extent that I am falling in love with you," she said coolly, walking into their midst. Lily had never seen anyone turn such a bright shade of red before...everything from James's ears to neck! "My, my, I didn't know the popular, handsome, conceited Gryffindor Seeker could blush so well," she cooed. It was then she noticed that all four occupants of the compartment were looking at her quite strangely...three wizards and a pig to be precise.
"You just said James is handsome," Remus said in a strangled voice.
"!&($#&"Lily swore under her breath. "Oh, I did?" she asked, feigning confusion but unable to stop the blush mirrored on her face. Nervously twirling a lock of curly hair around her pinky, she mumbled, "You're not hard on the eyes, James...I have to give you that."
"She's gone bloody mad!" stated an awed Remus in a stage whisper. "Not only did she say Prongs was good-looking, but she called him James!"
"So I did." Lily said defensively.
James was still staring at her like she had sprouted green spiky tentacles all over her creamy face. In a hoarse whisper, he said quietly, "You're actually being civil to me, Lily!"
A pig-snoutless Sirius, who had finally figured out the counter-curse on his wand, had to let his thoughts be known, as usual. He ran over to Lily, putting one slender hand on her forehead. "No fever...forehead normal to the touch...well mates, I'd say Lillian is in perfect health." He whispered slyly in her ear, "You can't pull that excuse." Lily glared at him scornfully and sidled over to James. Leaning over until her lips almost touched his face--"Cover your eyes, children...they're gonna kiss!"(Sirius)--she murmured in his ear, "If you value your life and want me to believe a word of what you wrote in those letters, I'd advise you to pretend this situation never happened." Lily's warm breath on his ear had sent James into a spiraling ecstasy, one where she and only she existed. Grinning most goofily, he answered, "As you wish."
"Aw, look, she's whispering sweet little nothings into his ear," Sirius sighed happily. As Lily hastily pulled away, she accidentally locked gazes James. Staring into his eyes, beautiful pools of hazel, the windows to his soul, the redhead felt herself begin to melt, until there nothing but of a puddle of Lily Evans on the plush, red carpet of the train. Heart beating furiously, she leaned closer and closer to the raven-haired man, until...
"Hate to break up the love-fest," Sirius sniggered, "but we have some company." Outside the door stood two girls; one, a tall, slim brunette often mistaken for a model and the other a pretty, petite blonde, both wearing identical expressions of anger that quickly faded to wide grins when they noticed how close Lily was standing to James. Lily, breaking out of her entrancement blinked as she remembered she had promised to meet her two best friends as soon as she could get off her duties, which would've been five minutes ago.
"Hey, beautiful," Sirius sauntered over to the brunette who immediately blushed and barely managed to flash a weak smile in return. Jenny Richards, though a very attractive young woman, was quite shy around guys and was unaware of her beauty and many admirers among the male population. Humble, loyal, and sweet Jenny; it was a huge surprise to her friends how she could be so wicked on the Quidditch pitch. Easily one of the most aggressive Chasers on the field, it was no secret that her skill and determination had ensured the victory of the Gryffindor team match after match. That, of course, in combination with James's phenomenal talent as a Seeker. (A/N: I know James was a Chaser, but bear with me. I like to have an extra connection/similarity between James and Harry.) It was also no secret that she fancied the suave, charming Sirius Black, though she would never admit it to his face.
Blonde, flirty Laura Ross, on the other hand, made her intentions towards Remus—or any guy, for that matter—quite clear. Giggly, witty, and always in the best of spirits, Laura was the equivalent of the golden sun piercing through the clouds on a cold, dreary day, brightening up the lives of those in her presence. Although she definitely had her faults (i.e., total obsession with guys, beauty, and fashion), Lily would never trade her ditzy, slightly plump friend for anything, especially since she was the only person at Hogwarts who could challenge Snape in the art of potion making.
"I missed you so much, Lils!" Laura yelped, hugging the redhead enthusiastically. "Come on, sista, we have a lot of catching up to do!" Showing an incredible amount of strength for someone of her short stature, Laura literally dragged Lily halfway out of the compartment, "Lils" throwing an apologetic smile at the Marauders—especially James—every step of the way.