Lily Evans sat down in an empty compartment and sighed. Potter had asked her out, again.
"When will he understand?" she asked quietly.
"When will who understand?" Charlie asked, a little worry in her voice.
Lily knew Charlie thought she was crazy. On more than one occasion she had caught Lily talking to herself.
"Oh my God Charlie! Look at you!" Lily exclaimed, eager to get off the subject of Potter.
"I knew it, I knew you'd think I got fat! Summer is a bitch," Charlie said, her voice getting bitter.
"Shut up, Charlie. I was talking about your gorgeous tan! You look like you spent a week in Aruba!" Lily replied.
"I think you're getting too good at divination, Lily! That's exactly where I was! Well anyway, what did you do over the summer?"
"Oh you know, the usual. Petunia is really getting moody. She spent the entire summer break up in her room, except for meals. And don't say anything, but we got into a fight, and I might've cursed her a little. She looks like a horse!"
The girls giggled at the thought of Lily's sister as a horse. When their laughter had subsided, neither could think of what to say. Lily looked up at Charlie. She was beautiful. Her tan skin was perfectly even, her gorgeous black hair was tied up in a bun on the top of her head, her sea-green eyes were practically shining, and her body was as skinny as possible without being anorexic. Lily started to feel jealous. She realized then that she was staring and quickly looked out the window. It was five minutes before the train left and Taylor still wasn't there, but Taylor was always late.
Just a minute before the train left the station, Taylor climbed into the compartment, out of breath.
"Good thing I'm in shape!" she said, bubbly as ever.
Taylor pulled out her hair tie and let her sandy blonde hair fall. It was shorter than usual, and both Charlie and Lily noticed.
"Your hair!" the two girls exclaimed together.
"I know! What do you think? Do you think Remus will like it? Oh I hope he does. I spent twenty galleons on this! Some French witch did it. Merlin, was she a pain in the,"
Taylor stopped in mid-sentence. Her navy blue eyes darted between the other two girls.
"Lily, something is going on with you. I can tell. Otherwise, you would've gasped right before I said the word ass," Taylor said, her voice getting louder when she said the last word.
Lily gasped. "Taylor! Watch your mouth! For all we know, an innocent first year could be sitting outside listening to our conversation! You could've just taught that poor child a new word."
"Oh goodness, what ever shall we do?" Charlie said sarcastically, opening her mouth wide and covering it with her hand.
Lily just glared at her.
"I'm getting that glare more and more often these days," Charlie muttered.
"So anyway, girls, anything new happened lately?" Taylor asked, blatantly trying to change the subject
"I hear that Potter asked you out again Lily. Is it true?"
"Unfortunately, yes. But who wants to talk about smelly old Potter. Let's talk about something interesting. Something like…" Lily paused, trying to think of an ending to her sentence.
"Laundry detergent?" Charlie offered.
"Ha ha, very funny. But what I had in mind was who Charlie," she paused and stared at Charlie, "is planning to court this year. Who's the lucky guy?" Lily asked.
"Well, this year, I think I've decided to stay single for a while, you know, cool down. I had too many boyfriends to count last year, you know?"
"Wonder how long that'll last," Lily muttered.
"I heard that! And since when did you learn the art of sarcasm?" Charlie asked, suddenly interested.
Lily just ignored her. She was too busy thinking about how to avoid Potter and his crew this year. She knew he would try everything from sending her anonymous (yea right) love letters to asking her in front of everyone in the Great Hall to marry him. And yet… she knew she loved the attention. When she came to Hogwarts, she thought she would be considered a freak, with her crazy red hair and bold emerald eyes. But it was the opposite, and she knew that deep inside, she loved Potter and his insane form of devotion. But she just wasn't ready to embrace that part of her that was so deep inside.
She was brought back to Earth only by the smell of Taylor's bubble gum. She was practically obsessive compulsive with her gum, like her life depended on having something to chew on constantly. Personally, Lily didn't care. She just loved the smell of cinnamon and spice. She removed all of her previous thoughts from her head and looked out the compartment door. She caught Potter staring at her in the opposite compartment, and fake laughed, as though whatever Taylor was saying was the funniest thing in the world. When Potter turned around to talk to his friends, she relaxed her mouth, it was killing her from all that fake laughing.
Taylor and Charlie stared at her, apparently worried.
"Lily, I understand if you find tampons, umm, cool, but I don't see the reason for bursting out in laughter…" Taylor said, uneasily.
Lily just smiled and laughed (for real this time). She knew this was going to be a great year.