Tie Game
Chapter 3- Hogsmeade and Chess
"Password?" demanded the Fat Lady.
"Blubbering Bowtruckles." Replied Sirius, clambering through the portrait hole, and everyone followed suit. Lily was last to enter. As she pulled herself through, into the common room, she heard Sirius exclaim, "Oi, mates! Hogsmeade next weekend!"
"Brilliant!" replied James, "I need to stock up on some Dr. Filibuster's."
"Me too," agreed Sirius, "I'm fresh out from when we set them off in Minnie's class." They both grinned and laughed in reminiscence.
"Minnie?" inquired Mirena.
"McGonagall." Sirius told her, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. When she still looked dubious he said, "Minnie, like Minerva…"
"Oh, I get it. You have nicknames for the teachers too?" she asked a little unnerved by it.
"Of course I do Love." He said, then kissed her and she forgot his oddness. "Anyways, are you accompanying me to Hogsmeade next weekend?" he asked.
"Of course I am." She said and kissed him back.
This gave James an idea. It was something he hadn't done all year and he thought he might possibly be going into withdrawal. Lily was halfway up to the girls' dormitory, but James called, "Hey, Evans, wait!" Anticipating what was coming next, Lily prepared herself to reject him once again. She looked up at him expectantly. "Are you planning on going to Hogsmeade?" he asked her.
"Yes Potter," she told him, "But not with you. I'm going with Catherine and Mirena.
But James had also anticipated this response, "Ah yes, but you see with Mirena dating Sirius, and Catherine and Remus being completely in love with each other but too shy to do anything about it, your friends, will be spending a considerable amount of time with my friends, therefore forcing the two of us together. So I thought to myself: Why not make it official? Not like a date or anything. It'll just be a big group thing. Just as friends." He finished, giving her his most charming grin.
She considered him for a moment, pursing her lips. He had been acting a bit more civil lately, and then there was the inescapable truth that it was pretty much inevitable they would be spending the duration of the day together anyways. "Alright Potter," she gave in, but added firmly, "But just as friends!"
"Just as friends." James assured her, then skipped off to go tell his friends.
The morning of the Hogsmeade trip came quickly and Lily war regretting her decision to go with James. On the way down to breakfast, she voiced her concerns to Catherine and Mirena. "Why did I agree to go with him? I'm such an idiot." She said as they waited for the staircase to stop moving. "Oh, Lily you're not an idiot." Consoled Catherine.
"Yeah," said Mirena, "You've just become mere mortal like the rest of us and become susceptible to the Potter charm."
Lily gave her a scorching look. Catherine interjected, "Didn't you two agree you were going as just friends?" She reminded her.
"Yeah, but we all know it's not going to end up that way. James's mind just doesn't work that way." Said Lily.
"She's got a point you know," added Mirena, "What with Sirius and I dating and Catherine and Remus practically dating-" Catherine blushed, and turned around to stare at something non-existent, "It'll just be you and James."
"And don't forget Pettigrew," sighed Lily, "The giant, ever-present seventh wheel…"
"Don't worry, it won't be that bad," Catherine reassured her, "And if it is, we'll be there to save you." With this encouraging thought in her mind, Lily quickly finished her bowl of cereal and hurried out of the castle to where the horseless carriages stood ready to take them to Hogsmeade.
The Marauders were already there waiting for them. As they drew level with the boys, Sirius slipped his arm around Mirena's shoulders and even Remus and Catherine clasped hands. James looked at Lily hopefully, his arm halfway there. "Don't even think about it Potter." She warned, and with a last despairing look at her friends she climbed into a carriage with James and was soon joined by Peter. When the carriage stopped moving, they got out and joined the rest of the friends.
"Where to first?" asked James to no one in particular.
"Honeydukes!" suggested Peter eagerly. No one said anything to the contrary so they entered the already packed sweet shop.
They loaded their arms with plenty of Drooble's Best Blowing Gum, Licorice Wands, Pepper Imps, Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, Jelly Slugs, Chocolate Frogs, and Sugar Quills, and dumped them on the counter. They paid for them and left hurriedly. When the last of the group had finally squeezed through the door, they set off down the street to Zonko's.
As Zonko's was nearly at the other end of the village, they munched on some candy on the way. James and Lily were sharing a bag on Every Flavour Beans, Lily bit into a grayish bean that turned out to be Toe Jam. "Mmmm!" she said enthusiastically, "James, I think this one is marshmallow. You have to try it!"
"Oh yeah?" said James. He backed up a few steps and opened his mouth, "Throw it!" he called.
She took aim and threw it perfectly into his mouth, "Ten points!" she cried.
"Blargh!" James choked, "That wasn't marshmallow! I'll get you for that Evans!" he threatened playfully. He began pelting beans at her. Lily ran shrieking down the street. She bent double from laughter, and hid behind Catherine.
A bean aimed at her hit Remus in the forehead, "Hey!" he said, grabbing a handful of his own bag of Every Flavour Beans. But he missed too, instead he hit Mirena. By that time, everyone had joined in a full-fledged war of bean pelting.
When they finally reached Zonko's, the Marauders stocked up on pranking supplies, and even Mirena, Catherine and Lily bought a few Dungbombs apiece. They visited a few more shops along the main street, and had a drink in The Three Broomsticks.
On their way to the carriages to take them back to Hogwarts, it began to rain. They put on the hoods of their cloaks and ran to the carriages. They were soaking wet when they got back to Hogwarts. They headed to the common room so they could return to their dormitories and change into warm, dry clothes. On the way up a staircase Lily asked James, "Do you want to play chess when we get back?"
Normally he would have sighed and tried to postpone it as chess was not one of his favourite games, but he had had a lot of fun with Lily today, and was eager for the "date" to continue. "Sure." He replied, "Just as long as I can get changed out of these." He indicated his sodden clothes. Lily nodded.
They went straight to their dormitories to change and retrieve their chess sets. Lily and James both returned dressed in their pajamas: a white tank top and some grey sweat pants for Lily, and plaid pajama bottoms and an old blue shirt for James. Mirena, Catherine, Remus, Wormtail, and Sirius were all dressed in similar attire; it had been a long day and they wanted to be comfortable. James and Lily lay down on the hearth rug with the chess board between them. The others spread themselves out around the room in the various armchairs, either reading, doing homework, watching James and Lily play, or talking amongst themselves.
"White goes first." Said James nodding towards Lily's white men.
"I know," she said in a slow, pensive voice, "I'm just deciding what strategy would work best on you. I've seen you play with Remus a couple times so I know a lot about your style."
"You pay way too much attention to these kinds of things. I could never do that, it's too much work." he said.
"That's surprising considering you've been doing something similar ever since you met me." She said coyly. She moved her knight.
"Have I?" asked James. He had no earthly idea what she was talking about. He too moved his knight. Lily was deep in thought and did not respond right away, they played in silence for quite a long time until James repeated, "Have I?"
Lily shook her head and came out of her reverie. "Of course you have. You've played careful attention to a certain someone's habits and style."
A light turned on in James's head, "Oh," he thought, "She's talking about me paying attention to her all these years." They made a few more moves each.
"And your objective has always been the same." Lily continued smirking. She could tell by the look on his face that James had understood this time.
James thought to himself, "Your objective has always been the same…she had said, I guess she's referring to the fact that trying to get her to go on a date with me constantly, is like in chess when your objective is to check the other person's king."
Lily took down a fair amount of James's men, before he realized he kept making the same mistake and she was taking advantage of it. He corrected himself and began to change his approach a bit. Lily grinned, "You play chess just like you live your life. You tried the same move over and over, but when it finally got through to you that it wasn't working, you changed your strategy and now… it's working."
It took James a moment to process this information, "Ok, so the whole same move over and over thing, was the asking her out constantly," he thought to himself, "Then the changing my strategy was when I stopped asking her out and tried to be nicer, and less arrogant. "And now… it's working." What does that mean? Does it mean what I think it means? Could Lily Evans possibly like me, even just a little bit, or was she just referring to her agreeing to go out with me to Hogsmeade." James was not paying much attention to the game at this point and made a few careless errors.
Lily smiled triumphantly and moved her queen three spaces to the right, "Checkmate." She said, "You were close there James. Good game. Maybe next time. I'm tired, I'm going to go to bed now, see you tomorrow."
"Uh thanks. G'night." Said James. Now he was really confused. He thought, ""You were close there James. Good game. Maybe next time." What did that mean? Was she really just referring to the game or did she mean life as well? Was it possible to be close to liking someone?" His brain hurt, it was too late to be analyzing things like this. He said goodnight to his friends and retreated to his dormitory to ponder why girls had to be so cryptic about their feelings.