That was back in… fourth year, did I say? Yeah, maybe fourth. Well, the begs for dates went on for the next couple of years but not so loud and abusive as it had been. Evans and I stopped the continual arguments and grudgingly got along for a while. Mostly towards the end of sixth year because bloody Sirius decided he wanted to hook in with Evans' best friend. Well, if Susan Gutteridge wanted to kiss a guy with dog breath (literally) then fine by me, but I dug my heels in when it came to welcoming Evans and her other friend, Bianca Walsh, into the Marauders. Remus was quite happy to be the gentleman, apologizing for mine and Sirius' either absences or rude behavior. Mind you, I wouldn't really call exposing Snape's underwear (again) to the school 'rude behavior', more a lesson on why to keep your underwear clean.

But, in time, it became clear that neither Sirius nor Remus had any plan on staying single. So it was just Peter and I and, quite frankly, I generally prefer not to be in a minority with Peter. He tends to be the worse off. Remus set to work on wooing Bianca while Sirius practiced snogging Susan. Disgusting display, it was. Have you ever seen a dog licking an icecream cone? Looks strangely a lot like that. Like I said, feral. Even Remus said it: 'Man, I have seen several disturbing things in my time but that… that's just twisted what's left of my mind.'

Yep. Yuk.

The bad thing in this year was the more letters that came filtering through every morning. Once a week someone in the Great Hall would burst into tears after being the lucky recipient of a black envelope. Lord Voldemort was on a spree. Family members were dying everywhere. I was lucky. My father was an Auror and my mother was a journalist for the Daily Prophet. Probably one of the most well known ones, although the one she's training is more of a stick beak liar than a journalist. My mum loves to find out the truth in things, but Rita (who's two years older than me) just loves gossip. Mum was the one pumping out all the stories about where Voldemort was last seen, the followers he's gathered… and most of this stuff she got from my father. Some stuff she knew, but would never write about. My mum has good sense.

Considering that, both my parents went into hiding after the first attack on our house. I was at Hogwarts and, despite the violent letter I sent them, they insisted I stay in the castle. Mum writes from the hideout whatever she discovers about what's happening in the outside world, and Dad goes out to 'fight the good fight'.

And left me sitting in the common room, watching Sirius play tonsil hockey with Susan Gutteridge. Urgh.

I turned my eyes disgustedly back down to the parchment spread out in front of me. Biting thoughtfully on the end of my quill, I scanned the book that was lying open on the table. Another quill appeared in my vision.

'Try that paragraph. Practically answers the entire essay.'

I blinked up at Evans, stunned. 'Huh?' I asked, stupidly.

'That paragraph.' She nodded in the general direction of the book and I dropped my eyes to the page. 'It has the essay question in there, "What economic, political and social problems did England suffer after the fifth goblin rebellion, and how do you think these affected the Muggle world?" See? And then it's got the pointers in that paragraph.'

'How do they expect us to write a foot and three inches on a paragraph?' I sat back, mortified.

Evans pushed her half filled parchment towards me.

'Merlin!'

'No, Lily Evans, but thanks for the compliment. See what I've done? Most of it is just rambling rubbish. In the essay question it asks what we think it did.' She shrugged and grinned. 'So I just bullshitted.'

I raised my eyebrows, impressed. Thinking hard, I thought up some rubbish about what pain a Muggle family must have gone through with no goblins around to bow to their every whim (HA!), and started scribbling.

Pausing halfway through a sentence, I raised my eyes from under my still bowed head and stared at Evans. Ok. She offered some help. Wonder who dragged that silver spoon from out of her-?