Gummel- Ahh, the first-ever fanfic, a rite of passage for every budding writer and person wanting to kill time. Enjoy! And I know the title's crap. Rated T to be safe.
Disclaimers and whatnot abound; this isn't mine nor will it ever be. Alas.
Chapter the First
In which our saga starts…
Cast your minds back to a time before CDs, let alone fancy iPods, a simpler time when Star Wars was newly made, and Harry Potter was a mere twinkle in his father's eyes, a father who had a lot of work to do in order to upgrade the said twinkle…
Join us now as we follow his vain attempts, laugh with him, cry with him, steal food with him, prank with him, but not do some things teenaged boys do with him, and see his progress and eventual success from sixth year onwards…
The crisp September air blew around the waiting students on the platform in a decidedly cold way. New students were wandering about, looking lost and really rather scared- and it had to be said, really small. James Potter remarked as such to his best friend Sirius Black.
"Whatever, but man, am I freezing my balls off over here. God, but I can't wait to get on the train…"
James laughed and decided that, as an older, more mature (coughmaybenotcough) student, he really ought to go and help the younger students out and congratulate them on their acceptance into Hogwarts, but his well-minded plans were foiled by an unforgiving trunk that he happened to trip over, causing much hilarity for a passing group of Slytherins.
But James could care less…for just then, his very reason for being walked into his line of vision... Lily Evans. He loved everything about her, from her flame-red hair to her freckles, speckled across her nose, but most of all her eyes, deep green orbs that he could lose himself in, and had, on occasion, actually done so, trailing off in what little conversation they ever shared and had led her to believe he was slightly mentally impaired.
While he ruminated on the nature of her beauty and other such things, Lily was sparing him a derisive look then walking on her way, only just noticing that she had trod heavily on his outstretched hand.
"Oh... sorry about that, Potter, didn't notice you there." She muttered then carried on walking to the train.
"Wha'…she…addawubba…yeah…"
Sirius jogged up to him, having not noticed James' misfortune before due to the more pressing demands of flirting with a seventh-year Ravenclaw.
"Hey Prongs, need a little help?" pulling him upright, he said, "You might love that Evans, but seriously, I think fainting is not the answer."
"Shut up, Padfoot," he snarled, finally noticing a fair amount of people were sniggering at him, "it was an accident and you know it, you idiot…"
"Oh Jamesie, don't you love me anymore?"
"Ah, I could never resist your questionable charms, you know that. C'mon, let's find the others." Chuckling, they navigated the platform and reached the train without being attacked by murderous trunks.
They found their two best friends and other half of the Marauders in a compartment towards the back of the train. Peter Pettigrew was a small, slightly chubby boy with large front teeth and a long, rodent-like nose. Remus Lupin was an average-sized boy, with sandy-brown hair that was slightly messy, normal hazel eyes, not extraordinarily handsome but not ugly either, and all in all if you saw him in a crowded room you wouldn't spare him a second glance. Unless of course it was the full moon, in which case the room would a) not be crowded; and b) you wouldn't stay there long enough to even give him a thorough first glance. This was because he was a werewolf; had been so since he was a small child and was the reason the Marauders had struggled in the last year to become Animagi, to accompany him during his painful transformations safely.
Predictably, Remus was reading a book in peace and Peter was squirming in his seat, eagerly awaiting the arrival of his two other best friends, not having the concentration that Remus possessed to simply sit and quietly read one of their textbooks.
"Prongs, Padfoot! God, I thought you weren't goin' to turn up."
"Chill, Wormtail, we wouldn't abandon you- unless we were going to sell you into slavery- hey Moony, how much d'you reckon a healthy Wormtail would go for these days?" asked Sirius.
He looked up, a tired smile hovering in his eyes. "Oh, I don't know about healthy, he looked pretty sick with excitement when he saw you."
Shoving Sirius out of the way into the compartment, James took his seat saying,
"Well, he'd have to be wrong in the head not to be excited about our return, know what I mean? Anyway, how was your holiday, Wormtail, you went to Hogsmeade, right…?"
And bantering in a similar manner, sharing anecdotes from their holidays and discussing the year ahead, the four friends passed a good few hours with ease.
At about half past one, a female figure appeared through the frosted glass of the compartment door and knocked on it sharply, not waiting for a reply, but pulling the door open anyway. It was Lily Evans. Since the boys had just been debating the merits of James' latest plan to charm her into being his girlfriend (something about actually using a Love Charm), silence ensued in the small cabin.
James, plucking up his courage, spoke first. Unfortunately. "Ah, Evans! Come to admit your undying love for me? Knew this was my lucky year."
Alas, this was not the case, as proven by her rude gesture in his direction.
"In your dreams, Potter, I needed to tell Remus about the prefect meeting. Yeah, it's up in the prefects' compartment in half an hour, Guido just told me."
"Guido Elderthorn?" asked Remus. "Is he Head Boy this year, then?"
"Yeah, no surprises there…anyway, bye."
"Hold on a minute!" called James. "Isn't Elderthorn that Ravenclaw swot? How'd'you know him?"
Lily turned her eyes on James, distaste oozing from her every pore. "I just do, Potter, and it's none of your business who I'm friends with or not!" And with that, she turned on her heel and stalked out.
"Hey, I only asked a question," he said, with a look of such innocence that was so out of place his friends started giggling, "so what crawled up her robes and died?"
"James, m'boy," laughed Remus, "one day you will get our girl Lily. And on that day, I swear we will see a pig fly." Peter and Sirius started laughing too, and James was left sitting there, bewildered.
Lily Evans walked into her friend's compartment with a sour look on her face.
"Hey Lily, what's up?" asked Emmeline Vance, Lily's best friend since they started school. They had met on the train, and while Lily had been terrified because she had no idea what to do, Emmeline had been a bit more confident because her father had told her a lot about the school. "You look a bit annoyed… Slytherins giving you grief?"
"Ha, I wish, it was that Potter pestering me again. God, but he gets on my nerves. One day I am going to just snap and-" she made an angry, violent series of gestures that lasted about two minutes.
"Wow," chuckled Frank Longbottom, who currently had his arm draped around Alice Rington, another of Lily's year six friends. Frank had been going out with Alice since Easter of their second year. This meant Easter celebrations were always full of the pair sneaking off together for anniversarial shenanigans, and as such were rarely seen throughout that particular holiday. The rest of the time the couple were usually together, but not unbearable. "What did he do this time?"
"Must have been something bad to get you this annoyed, but then again I suppose anything James does gets to you." Catherine Gregson commented. She had become friends with Lily the night after the sorting when the Gryffindor girls had stayed up all night talking about the year ahead. She was completely confident about her time at Hogwarts and knew a great deal about the school because both her parents were magical. She played as chaser on the house Quidditch team.
Lily shrugged than slouched down on a vacant seat.
"Where's Helen gone? She was here before I went to check on the idiot club."
There was a loud crash and a fairly short figure fell backwards through the open door, flailing their arms madly then straightening up with a look of murderous rage.
"Right then, Malfoy! Muggle style, I take you down! THEN I'm goin' to find my wand and you are DEAD, matey boy!" With that she dived out again, connecting with something outside of the friends' lines of vision with loud sounds of violence and breaking things.
"Speak of the Devil," said Frank calmly, "looks like she's already sought out our favourite Slytherin wanker for a wee chat." He closed the door to shelter them from the disturbance.
"Ah, she never thinks the year's the same without her little rendezvous with him at the start…happy days, happy days." giggled Lily.
There was a high-pitched scream from outside and the friends winced but when it was accompanied by a male voice yelling, "Right in the nadgers, Buckshaw, you mudblood scum, you are going to pay for that!" they all smirked in satisfaction. Alice, not by nature one to relish the discomfort even of an enemy, shifted uncomfortably in her seat and started a half-hearted conversation with Frank and Catherine about who the new Quidditch captain was. At that moment, a body was bodily thrown against their door and held there, with the head being smacked against the glass with cries of protest issuing from the person in question. Then the person, undoubtedly Lucius Malfoy, judging from the blonde hair and robes, wriggled out from the grasp of the girl and drew his wand, shooting a jet of red light at her. She was knocked down the corridor.
"Hey!" shouted the girl, "I wasn't ready yet!" She drew her own wand and the pair started duelling.
"I swear each year, it gets more violent," said Lily, losing interest in the quiet conversation in the compartment and peering outside. "I'm surprised Dumbledore hasn't got security guards patrolling the train…"
"Huh, security guards…like they could stop Helen and Malfoy?" said Emmeline.
"Yeah, good point…eh up! Our Helen's won again…six-nil to her, I reckon," said Catherine. "Yup, here comes the victorious heroine, undefeated but not unscathed. Dunno what she'll do next year when he isn't here…"
Helen Buckshaw strutted in looking proud and just a little bit smug. She was generally acknowledged by most of Hogwarts' population, even the staff, as a bit of a nutter. She was muggle-born, hated by a fair amount of the Slytherin population, and she revelled in it. It gave her a perfect excuse to get into any number of fights without having started them and so never got into trouble for it. Currently she was sporting a large black eye and a bloody nose. She had been the first female beater on the Gryffindor house team for several decades, her skills on the pitch making up for her somewhat lazy spellwork.
Lily hurried over and quickly performed a few simple healing charms for her.
"Cheers, Lils, I was never any good at that healing-type spell stuff, more into the action part, know what I mean? Yeah…anyways, you off to your meetin' then?"
"Oh right, I almost forgot about that, thanks. Well, bye, then." And she hurried out of the compartment.
When she reached the Prefects' Compartment at the front of the train, she was greeted by what she considered an unpleasant surprise. For there, standing outside the door was James Potter, chatting to Remus Lupin, acting as though he had a right to be there.
He saw her and smirked. "Hey Evans! Don't think you expected me here, eh?"
"No, I certainly did not, Potter. What are you doing here?" she snapped at him.
"Ah, the privileges of rank, Evans." He was tapping a red and gold badge on his chest. Closer inspection afforded the information that it was a Quidditch Captain's badge.
"Oh great," groaned Lily, "Now I get to spend time with you. What did I do wrong?"
Smirking, he exaggeratedly offered her his arm to take him inside. Instead, she just pushed him inside where he tripped over the stocky figure of Guido Elderthorn.
"Hey there James, nice to see you could drop in," he said, helping him up, "thought that you might not remember, not many people realise being Captain isn't just about Quidditch. Anyway, take a seat, James, Remus…Lily! Nice to see you again."
Smiling, she said hello back then followed the two boys, looking a little pinker than normal.
"Huh, that Ravenclaw geek telling me what to do…who does he think he is?" muttered James, noting angrily Lily's faint blush
"Potter! He was very nice to you, especially after you barged him like that, and you didn't even say sorry!" accused Lily.
"Huh, just 'cause you can't get enough of him."
"And what is that supposed to mean, Potter? Honestly, you should show Guido and I some respect, as Captain you have responsibilities and-"
She carried on in this vein for some time until Elderthorn went to the centre of the compartment and began the meeting along with Rebecca Fullers, the Slytherin Head Girl.
They outlined in brief the responsibilities that came with the privileges of being prefect, and informed everyone that during their prefect rounds they would be partnered with the other prefect from their year and house again, and also informed the two new Quidditch captains- James and a tall girl from Hufflepuff in seventh year- they would be joining their house and year duty teams. Lily already knew this, which was partly why her heart had dropped like a stone when she discovered James was captain, but Remus had not, and was currently high-fiving his friend and beaming generally. Of course, his glee was nothing in comparison to James', who was grinning at Lily now, trying to get her attention and winking lewdly. Staring steadfastly ahead, she paid him no heed and listened to the Head Girl begin about the password to the Prefects' Bathroom ("Kelpie-Free Since 1968"). Until of course he was practically dry-humping her leg, when she decided to intervene and pushed him into Remus, who knocked into Severus Snape, who gave them a dirty look and muttered some choice language at them. Then James decided to stop and the rest of meeting passed without distraction.
But Lily's short-lived peace ended as soon as the prefects poured into the train corridor. Much to Lily's chagrin, her duty team had drawn the short straw and were on patrol just then. Which meant two more hours with her pal James. Joy.
"So, Evans," said James with a smile, "Have you done train duty before?"
"Yes, I have," she snarled, "As I recall, you tried to Vanish my robes then charm me to dance into your compartment. Thank goodness your friends were there to stop you!"
James muttered something under his breath that sounded like, "some friends they are" but then looked at Lily with a practised sincere gaze and said in mature voice, "Yeah, sorry about that. In fact, I want to apologise for all the times I've embarrassed you like that. I don't know what I was thinking, Lily."
Remus sniggered and said quietly, "I know what you were thinking, mate, you randy bugger…"
She stopped suddenly and looked at James, ignoring Remus.
"Really? Do you mean that?" she asked.
"But of course. After all, now I have responsibilities I should live up to them."
She gave him a suspicious look of appraisal, and then nodded to herself.
"And now I'm so mature, Lils, how about a date first Hogsmeade weekend?"
The look of wonderment at his transformation was replaced by an angry sneer.
"Huh, I knew you'd never change, Potter. You'll always be the same arrogant prat I met on the train in first year! How come you never grew up with the rest of us? For God's sake, even your Marauder friends have grown up more than you! You're pathetic and spoiled and I hope for your sake you never dare ask me out again for your whole Hogwarts career!"
It went without saying that they did not talk much throughout the rest of their patrol.
The start-of-term feast passed without incident, unless you counted Snape standing up and singing in a surprisingly fine tenor about his soul-consuming love for a house-elf who cleaned his dormitory, courtesy of one Peter Pettigrew, who was being congratulated thoroughly on his table. He had never looked prouder- he considered this his finest stunt ever. Unfortunately, Professor Dumbledore took pity on him after the sixth repetition of the chorus and cast a Silencing Charm on him.
"Very nice, Mr. Snape, but I am sure Ms. Tebby would rather hear of your love than us…" Dumbledore smiled, his eyes twinkling mysteriously, as they ALWAYS DO! WooooOOOOooooOOOOoooo!
The four Marauders retreated up to their dormitory as soon as they could, mainly because James was starting to be scared of the death-glares he was receiving from a certain sixth year Gryffindor prefect. Not Remus.
He flopped down on his bed with a tired sigh. He was not tired in the conventional sense, but rather he was tired of his "relationship" with Lily going nowhere. Over the summer holidays, he had found himself actually thinking about her over other things, so when his friends came round he was not his usual self and as Peter put it, would just "sit around there moping about anything remotely bad or anything, now stop it, before I hex you." This did not work, and Sirius decided the best, indeed, only solution was to put on a red wig and lipstick then dance around James. This didn't work either. Before, he had only obsessed about her in term-time, and at first he only did it because she was good-looking, and then it was a matter of pride, but when he found himself vigorously hexing anyone with whom Lily shared the slightest mutual affection last year, he knew there was a problem. More than that, Lily also hated him even more since people in the school she might have gone out with were afraid of what terrible retribution he might wreak upon them. More and more he felt there was nothing he could do as he spiralled into an unhealthy stalker-type state.
Sirius and Peter messed around for awhile, but gave up and went to bed when they realised that James wasn't in the mood, and nor particularly was Remus.
"James?" asked Remus quietly over his dorm-mates' snores. "What's wrong? You look a bit down, mate."
Now trying for the title of most depressed Marauder 1976, James gave another deep sigh and looked thoroughly upset.
"I dunno, Moony…its just this whole Lily thing is starting to get me down, I mean I've never had any trouble with the girls before, so why now?"
"Ahh, Prongs, all you have to remember is that sometimes you will get turned down, as weird as it seems to you. Just try to get over it and move on. All I can say is this is going to have to be your first failure- anyway, goodnight."
James stayed sitting up in bed as his friend's heavy breathing in his sleep mingled with everyone else's snores.
"But why did she have to be my failure?"
The Gryffindor girls (complete with token male Frank) were lounging around in the common room completely at their ease. Catherine, Helen and Frank were discussing how James Potter's captaincy would affect the Quidditch team and Alice, Emmeline and Lily also discussing the new captain only in a rather different way.
"Well, I suppose he is quite good-looking and a bit smart, but I get your point, Lily, when you say he's an arrogant, pig-headed, stubborn, immature…what else did you say?"
"The list goes on, Em, don't get her started on it, it's her new favourite topic of discuss-ow!"
"I do not go on about Potter, Alice, don't exaggerate or else I'll-I'll get Helen on you!" teased Lily.
"Ooh you wouldn't, Lil, she's scary…"
The three friends started sniggering at that point and then the conversation descended into a debate about who would win in a fight, Helen or a Welsh green dragon, and the general consensus was that she could, and would for a laugh.
Saying goodnight to Frank, the girls soon went upstairs to bed. They wanted to get as much sleep as they possibly could- the infamous Marauders had retired early and that suggested they would be rearing to go tomorrow, and no one would be safe.