A/N: I am so, extremely, sorry for the long wait. Partly it was because I can't get online as much, even less than usual, because of a higher force that ISN'T God, but actually known as Parents. And because to get online, I have to do school work first, but not for school— just like study work. I had this guild, on Neopets, and I always worked my butt off to get an hour online just so I could go on Neopets and do more work that sometimes seemed horribly unappreciated for the guild, and people plagiarized my material and it just seriously sucked. So, I quit the guild, and I'm back to the way things were before, again, I apologize, and I hope I can make a few chapters worth PART of the wait you guys had.

Disclaimer: Harry Potter, as much as I hate to say it, just doesn't belong to me. Sue if you want, but there'll be no case. xP

Time Turner

EilayAdnayVolieay

Chapter Eight: Flying Lessons

Finally, the day was over. Although it had been a long day, and tiring, Lily was almost sad that the classes were over. She had never dreamed that they would be so... enjoyable!

In Charms class, they had Professor Flitwick teaching them, with the Ravenclaws. They had learned the levitating spell, one which Lily had performed exceptionally well and earned 10 house points for. Lily also got points in Potions, for being the first to correctly concoct the potion they had tried— Professor Slughorn believed in a potion at the first day of school to test the students to see what knowledge they already had, what talents they had. Although Lily was unaware of it, he wanted to see who did exceptionally well to invite for tea... the "Slug Club" he called it.

Then, the Gryffindor's had Transfiguration, which was actually with the Slytherin's. Lily hadn't done quite so well at changing her toothpick into a needle, but she had completed it successfully on her third try and gotten points for answering some questions right. James, to Lily's dismay, had completed the task first. It seemed he was rather good at Transfiguration, but Lily knew she shouldn't be feeling upset about that— after all, he was in her house and still earning Gryffindor points. She was just... although she would never admit it to herself... jealous that someone was actually better than her at something, other than sports, for a change.

"So, Lily, excited about tomorrow? We have broomstick lessons!" Lexi cried out excitedly. "I already know how to ride one, but still— we actually get to play a small game of Quidditch, only to see of course how to play and what the rules are. After we get a bit better at it, it's the end of the flying lessons and we have just free time until our next class." Lily heard the sound of silverware clanging against glass and jerked her head at the direction the sound had come from. She saw Remus, looking deathly afraid, pick up his fork slowly and begin eating again. She smiled, seeing that he had clearly made friends with James and Sirius, for he was sitting with them. Once Lily was done eating, she got up and stood behind Remus, tapping him on the shoulder.

"Don't worry," she whispered, "you'll do fine tomorrow." James looked at her, having heard what she said, confused. What on earth was she talking about?

"Remus, what was Lily talking about, 'you'll do fine tomorrow'?" Sirius asked, although it was hard for Remus to understand because his mouth was full of food. Once he finally realized at least enough of what Sirius said to answer, he replied, "Oh... we have flying lessons tomorrow, and I er, I've never flown before. Just a little nervous," Remus added weakly. He felt like such an idiot admitting this, and he had no idea why he was— he was lucky that these boys even wanted to be friends with him! If they knew the truth about him... Remus shook that thought out of his head, but he knew then that it would be a recurring thought that would haunt him until the truth came out. And if it never did, the thought would never let him live with his deception of his new friends.

–Breakfast–

Lily smiled at Remus, hoping that he still wasn't nervous. He had no reason to be, really. Madame Hooch would be there along the way, and would never allow anything to happen to them. At least not anything life-threatening. He still looked nervous, but at that moment there was a loud sound from above. Owls, thousands of them, began to fly into the school from the high windows, dropping letters, newspapers, magazines and packages at the students. Lily looked questioningly at Erin.

"Mail's here. It only comes usually once a week, at least in the mornings. Of course we get our own mail separately sometimes when we're in the common room, but it comes here as well with the papers. Ah, the Daily Prophet! Hmm... someone tried to break into Gringotts, got caught though. Lucky, really." Erin replied. Lily looked at her and grabbed the paper from her, reading the front page.

"What do you mean, lucky? I mean, for the person the safe belonged to, yes, but you insinuated that it was lucky for the person attempting to break into the safe." Lily pointed out.

"Of course it was lucky for the person attempting to break in, otherwise they would have been left inside the safe until someone checked it, wouldn't they?" Lexi said, reaching across the table for the pumpkin juice. Lily looked surprised.

"Would they?"

"Oh, I keep forgetting that you're a muggle-born. Sorry, Lily, sometimes the fact that you're the top student in our year when it comes to spells makes me forget that. I know that blood has nothing to do with it," Erin added hastily, seeing the look that Lily gave her, "but I mean you just come so naturally into your powers that I forget that there are certain things in the wizarding world that... don't...come naturally." Lily seemed satisfied with that answer, and didn't push the topic anymore.

"Anyways, there are traps on the doors. Anyone who attempts to get in, other than a goblin, can't, even with the key, because there's an enchantment on it that causes the person attempting to get in to get stuck inside of the safe, and until someone checks it, they'll be stuck there. Sometimes, its years before anyone checks, because the safe is used to guard dangerous or highly valuable items or papers. Sometimes, only a few hours, or days. It really depends on what's inside the safe. Although they can't say for sure, from what the Goblins did say when asked what was in the safe, it seems as if it was just a lot of valuable items, jewels, perhaps, or sentimental family heirlooms. In the wizarding world, we can unlock doors with a flick of our wand and a muttered incantation, so people don't always trust their own homes to protect their valuables." Lexi explained. Lily handed the paper back to Erin and poked at her breakfast. Although she didn't want to admit it, she was almost as nervous as Remus was about their flying lessons.

Finally, the time had come. The first years were called up to go outside, splitting into two groups. They usually went as one, but there was a larger amount of first year students this year, and Madame Hooch thought their first lesson would be more successful if there were less people in each lesson.

"Welcome to Flying Lessons. I will be your teacher, Madame Hooch. I am also the referee for all Quidditch games, so for those of you thinking you don't need lessons or a reminder of the rules of Quidditch—" Madame Hooch said pointedly to James, who was smirking and whispering to Sirius, "you best listen. This is not a class to slack off in," Madame Hooch added sternly, "and any of you who think it is may leave now." Nobody left.

"Now, I want you to grab a broomstick from over there, and say "up". Allow it to float up into your hands. If it doesn't, try saying it again." Madame Hooch instructed. The class walked over to the shed and grabbed the brooms, placing them on the ground. Lily looked at it, bewildered at how such a common word could bring the broom into her hand. Everything else had some strange word, like for Charms to do the levitating spell, it was Wingardium Leviosa, but Up was a common, short, English word.

"Up!" she cried out. She was quite happy to see that the broom flew into her hand. She saw James, Sirius, and some other boys in her class had already had success with the brooms for a few minutes. Even Lexi had, and despite what she had said about James being angry at her, they seemed to be having quite a conversation. Lily would later learn that James and Lexi always put aside their differences when it came to discussing important things— such as Quidditch.

"I can't wait until next year when we're allowed to join the team! I'm thinking about trying out for the Chaser position," Lexi replied. James smirked.

"As if you could even be a chaser. I thought about trying out for Seeker, but the current teams Seeker won't be done school until our fifth year, so I'll probably try out for chaser as well." Lily looked around and saw some students still having trouble getting their brooms to fly up into their hands. She was happy to see that Remus had success, even if only on the third attempt. He seemed rather shocked at this himself but he didn't have much time to think of this however because Madame Hooch moved on to the next set of instructions.

"Now that everyone has succeeded in getting their broom to fly up to them," she said, ignoring Peter Pettigrew who was still having difficulties getting his broom to fly up to him, "on my whistle, you will kick off the ground, fly up to my height and then touch back down." She mounted her broom and flew up into the air at a small height. "Mount your brooms!" she shouted. Everyone did so immediately, afraid of what she would do if they didn't, and when she blew the whistle they kicked off the ground. Lily immediately grew panicky as she rose into the air, because she was then very aware that the only thing holding her up in the air was a broom, something thinner than her arm. James, Sirius, Lexi, and some other students in the class that Lily didn't recognize all smoothly landed on the ground first before anyone. She seemed to be having some difficulties with her broom, because when she tried to make it go one way, it would go another way completely. Finally she didn't have to do anything, it was out of her control. She didn't know what was wrong with it, but she knew she had to get off while she could, even if they were a fair ways up in the sky. She muttered an incantation as she jumped off the broom, and it slowed her fall down so she could land on her feet.

"Excellent, Ms Evans. There was one defective broom, and it was actually a test to see how well a student could handle the situation if the broom was in fact going out of control as yours just did. Ten points to Gryffindor, for showing knowledge of spells not taught yet in class, and for passing the test by touching ground safely." Madame Hooch showed them a few more basic things and then sent them off to lunch. They would not have potions that day, which most students were glad of. Lily however, was slightly disappointed. Professor Slughorn had told them they would be brewing up a rather interesting potion, but would not tell them what it was. It was rather discouraging. Lily ran to catch up with Erin and Lexi, among some other girls in their dorm, and they headed off to lunch.

The first few weeks past, and soon, Halloween was fast approaching. Remus had become much better friends with James and Sirius, and so had Peter. Unfortunately, because Remus was friends with James and Sirius, he didn't stay with Lily very long because he knew that his friends hated each other. James and Sirius had been know to pull pranks, and Remus, although the more reasonable one out of the bunch, was so happy to have friends that he never ratted them out and because a lot of those pranks were pulled on Lily, she wasn't quite happy with them.

"Ooh that Potter is just so... so... infuriating!" Lily replied at breakfast that morning, throwing a glare in James' direction. Lexi and Erin sighed... this had become a regular discussion with Lily, and sometimes they drowned her out but other times they just dealt with her and tried to see from her point of view. After all, so far in the year (and its was only the 27th of October) James had turned Lily's hair bubblegum pink, turned her hair into snakes, changed her skin colour so it was green, and even made her grow elf-life ears. How he knew these spells, she didn't know. She wasn't even sure if she wanted to know, for fear that the spell would either be one he had merely created on his own and was untested, or that it would be a spell that wasn't to be used

"So when are we going to pull this prank, Sirius," James whispered. "I was thinking about on Halloween, when it's a full moon... really freak people out, with all the fur. Make them think some blood-thirsty werewolf is on the rampage," he added. Remus, who was sitting next to James, dropped his fork and left the Great Hall. James looked in his direction confused.

"What's gotten into him?" Sirius asked.

A/N: A bit short but I want to get a few chapters out first for everyone. Don't forget to review, tell me what you think, and sorry again for the delay in updating.