A/N: My Hikari is complaining because I have thus far only posted chapters with a James center. Therefore, this one is centered on Lily. Maybe that will make her happy.

Disclaimer: I own nothing…my candy is gone. My chips are gone. I am utterly alone. (Reggie's note: Are not!)

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Lily stood silently for a moment. She had been just outside the classroom as Sirius and Regulus had their… 'brotherly moment' and now she was trying to figure out how to respond. A part of her very much just wanted to go and slap Regulus and tell him how much he didn't deserve James. But in a way, she understood what he was going through.

She had never known what it was like to be a pureblood, but she did know what it was like growing up as the only witch in a family. Everyone expected her to have suddenly become unfaultable and to be able to fix all their problems. Sometimes the pressure just built up.

Lily shook her head. The last thing she wanted to be doing right now was sympathizing with the boy who had stolen James heart. Especially when it seemed that his only plan for it was to ignore it and break it.

Lily walked to the library and sat down with Sirius. "This royally stinks."

"You're telling me," Sirius's voice was cracked, as if he hadn't used it in ages and Lily had to wonder if he was holding back tears. "S'pose James talked to you too, then?"

"Yeah. Wasn't exactly my fantasy of the morning after our first kiss," Lily sighed. "Why does he love that git?"

"I…" Sirius shook his head. "I'd like to say I didn't know. Because Regulus has been nothing more than an evil prat to me for years. But now…"

"You wonder if James has been the one to see the real him all along?" Lily said softly. It hurt to say it, because that would say so much about James. It was just one more thing that Lily could love about him, but he would never love her back.

"I don't want him to have been right," Sirius growled. "I should have been right about him. He's my brother. I should know him! I can't have been wrong! I can't have been the one to turn him into this."

Lily closed her eyes, "I don't really want to see him as anything other than an evil prat either. I just want to think of him as a future Death Eater, because then I could hate him. Hate him for his ideals. Hate him for fooling James. Hate him because James loves him and not me."

Lily bit her lip hard enough to taste coppery blood in her mouth. Why couldn't she just continue hating him? "But James is smart. He wouldn't be so easily fooled. And maybe…maybe we all helped turn Regulus into what he is. Because that's exactly what we want him to be. We want him to be someone we can hate."

"You are not helping here, Evans," Sirius growled.

Lily knew that he didn't want to hear this. Hell, she didn't want to be saying this, but it had to be said. She loved James, and she wouldn't let him lose everything. She couldn't make Regulus grow a spine and love James back, but she could make damn sure that Sirius didn't hate James for loving the coward.

"You think I want to say this? You think I want to sympathize with that bastard? I don't! But James deserves our understanding. He deserves…"

"He used you for years! What do you care what he does and doesn't deserve!" Sirius stood and began pacing.

Bile rose in Lily's throat, but she refused to let Sirius see the effect of his words. She hated what James had done to her. She just wanted to stop loving him, but love was a spell that was not easily broken. Her dad used to tell her that when someone hurts you, you hate the action, not the man. If you went around hating everyone who hurt you once, you would never be happy.

"I know what he did," Lily whispered. "I know better than anyone what he did. But I can't stop loving him. Just like you can't stop being his friend just because he sees something in your brother that you don't want to see."

Sirius stopped his pacing to glare at Lily, "You honestly think I don't want you see it? You think I didn't spend years looking for some kind of goodness in him? You think I WANT my brother to be a Death Eater?"

"Maybe!" Lily yelled back. "Because then you can feel all noble. Then you can excuse that you left him when you ran away. Then you can feel like you are truly the only Black worth a damn!"

Lily had stood up before she realized what she was doing and was now standing an inch away from Sirius.

"Shhh," Madam Pince had made her way over, and was now shoving the two Gryffindors out of the library.

Lily looked back to yell at the librarian, but something caught her eye. Standing by a shelf, staring at the two, was Severus Snape. Lily shivered. She had a feeling that Snape was already a Death Eater, and she prayed that she hadn't just given him enough information to get Regulus killed. Maybe it was a good idea to take this conversation else where.

Grabbing Sirius's arm, Lily dragged the resisting boy up to Gryffindor Tower and pushed him down onto a couch. "Listen, I'm not any happier about this then you are, trust me. In fact, I think that I am more upset about this than you are. But the fact remains that James is your best mate, and he deserves more understanding."

"I don't care about what you think he deserves," Sirius looked away, "I deserve a friend who I can trust. And I don't want all those things you said. I don't want Regulus to be a Death Eater so that I can justify anything, or feel like a noble Black, or any of that. It is just who Regulus is. Regulus is a prat."

"Maybe he is," Lily said quietly, "but how could you ever know without letting him get close to you again. Maybe everything you thought is true…but maybe Regulus wasn't lying when he talked to you. Maybe he wants more than the life he's living."

Why did she have to be the one to do this? Why did she have to be the one to understand? She wanted James to love her, wanted Regulus to disappear; but she knew how he must feel, and she couldn't walk away now. She had to try and make Sirius at least consider the possibility that Regulus was more than he seemed.

"And you know you can trust James. It's not like he chose to love Regulus," Lily let out a defeated sigh. "He didn't want this any more than either of us."

"I know. I just wanted him to love you," Sirius looked up. "You know, I'm the one who pushed him to kissing you. To pursuing you at all."

Lily looked at the fire. That hurt. She knew it should make her feel better, because it meant that James wasn't to blame for using her…but it also meant that he hadn't picked her. She had kind of hoped that James, although he didn't love her, had seen something in her that made him choose her. She shook her head, James didn't see anything in her at all, and she would just have to live with that.

"Just let him back. Don't hate him for something he can't help," Lily met Sirius's eyes, "and give your brother a chance. He may just surprise us all."

With that said, Lily walked up the stairs to the girls' dorm. She hated that she understood them. She hated that none of them seemed to understand her.