Previously: There's a Dementor Attack really close to Lily's home, so she asks Rawlings to teach her to repel them should they come near her house again. Rawlings agrees, and to teach her, Rawlings gives her a potion that they use on Auror Trainees to mimic the effects of a Dementor. The potion brings back memories of the night Stoughton died. Lily suddenly remembers Rawlings's argument with McGonagall, and she asks her who Shiloh is. Rawlings admits that Shiloh's her brother, but she refuses to elaborate further. Lily manages a few wisps of a Patronus.
Chapter 42: Valentines
It was Valentine's Day, and James found that he was enjoying himself immensely, far more than he had on any other Valentine's Day, and the reason for that was quite simple: girls.
Lots and lots of girls.
After making the Quidditch team last year, James had enjoyed some level of popularity, but for some reason after the confrontation with the Slytherins in Three Broomsticks, the small group of girls who had been sitting at the bar when James and the other Marauders were there had found them to be quite amusing and wasted no time in telling all their friends, who in turn had wasted no time in telling all of their friends, and so on. It was not long before James and Sirius found themselves at the center of attention from many female Hogwarts students, and just like Sirius was basking in the attention, James saw no reason to dissuade any of the girls who felt like keeping him company while he waited out in the corridor for class to start or at any other time.
Some girls had also tried to turn their affections to Remus, but he had politely declined every one of them, sending them away where they stayed and pouted until either James or Sirius happened upon them and recruited them to their little fan clubs with only a small amount of persuasion – poor Peter had no admirers save a couple of sketchy ones who had given many boys their attention in the past.
Needless to say, Valentine's Day held plenty of potential for both James and Sirius, and they barely had to descend the staircase to Entrance Hall before spotting a couple of giggly girls huddled in a group right next to the entrance to the Great Hall. Sirius elbowed James, waggling his eyebrows excitedly, and without even pausing, James's best friend quickly made his way over to where they grouped together, and James was not far behind.
"Well, aren't you looking lovely today?" said Sirius smoothly, leaning close to a tall girl with dirty blond hair that fell in waves to the middle of her back. "What's your name again? I try to make it my business to know every pretty lady's name around here."
The girl who Sirius addressed giggled and turned around, putting a flirtatious arm around his neck to draw him in closer.
"Ivy Brown. My, my, Sirius Black, those rumors haven't been kind enough to you."
Sirius gave her a playful wink.
"Well, how about we put it to the test … Ivy."
"You read my mind, Sirius," the girl named Ivy Brown giggled. She then leaned in close to Sirius and whispered something else into his ear that James could not quite catch, though judging from the look on Sirius's face, it was something to be excited about because without another word, his best friend swept his arm around Ivy's waist, and together, the two of them scurried down the corridor opposite where everybody else was enjoying breakfast, no doubt looking for something a little more private – like a broom cupboard for instance.
"Lucky me," said a sultry voice from behind James once the couple was out of earshot, "Looks like Ivy left me the better half."
James barely jumped – after all, where there was one giggling girl, another one plus the entourage was no doubt close by – and turned to face the newcomer, who was not too bad looking herself: black hair that hung around her face in a mass of curls, matching dark eyes the color of chocolate, and full lips that were pulled into a permanent pout. There was no misinterpreting her feelings in those glittery eyes, and head cocked slightly to the side, she slid closer to James, playfully trailing her fingers up his sleeve.
Scratch that: she was not just "not too bad looking" – she was drop-dead gorgeous.
"Hello, there," said James, giving her a winning grin. "What's your name?"
"Silvanah Vane," answered the girl, batting her eyelashes at him. "But if you're the one talking to me, you can call me anything you like, sugar."
James put on a mock thoughtful face, much to Silvanah's amusement. "Well, I might just take you up on that – Evans!"
Silvanah frowned at that.
"That's not exactly what I had in mind," she said, but James was hardly paying attention to her – he was instead focused on a certain redhead descending the grand staircase with Macdonald by her side.
"Can I help you, Potter?" said Lily's cool voice from across the Entrance Hall.
Silvanah, apparently noticing that James was not actually talking to her at all, turned around, frown deepening as Lily approached – but if Lily cared that she had annoyed anybody, she was doing a very good job at hiding it because she completely ignored Silvanah, instead focusing her scowl on James himself. However, despite the fact that she was frowning heavily at him, James could not help the little jolt in his stomach as the sunlight caught Lily's hair, casting a rich, deep golden halo over the coppery sheen of her dark red hair.
"I –" started James. He was momentarily lost for words, but a sharp shake of his head quickly brought him back to his senses. With a winning grin, he smoothly covered up his brief blunder with a, "Morning, Evans. Did you sleep well?"
Lily raised an eyebrow and retorted, "I hardly see why my sleeping habits are any of your business, Potter."
"C'mon, James," muttered Silvanah, pulling him towards the Great Hall. "Just forget about her."
James ignored her.
Instead, he said, "Got any plans today, Evans? It is Valentine's Day after all."
He did not see the need to tell her just yet that she would have at least something to do today after she received the Valentine that he had already given to Quaffles to give her in the morning when the morning mail arrived. At first, it had been a toss-up to decide if he should have even given her a Valentine in the first place, but since he still was not very close to asking her out to Hogsmeade the normal way, he had finally decided that sending her a card could not hurt his chances.
"If I did, I hardly see a reason why I should tell you," she countered. "Speaking of Valentine's Day, shouldn't you be somewhere else – like say … alone."
Though James had tried several more times after his first botched attempt to ask her out, she still clearly had not warmed to the idea, hence the added help of the Valentine's Day gift – but even if that did not work, he was still determined to get Evans on a date. The butterflies that also fluttered about inside him whenever she was around had showed no signs of stopping, and James was not quite sure he wanted them to stop. Even if ninety-nine percent of their exchanges in the past school year had mostly included a clever joke from James and a derisive reply from Lily, it was quickly proving one of the better moments of James's day.
However, James did not have much of a chance to respond to her comment because at that moment, she and Mary, who had been quiet for the entire exchange, simply left, walking right past him and into the Great Hall. While Lily did not look back at him once, Mary nervously glanced behind her and James could just hear her whisper, "Why does he keep acting like that around you?"
He could not hear Lily's response.
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"You do realize that you just have to make up some stuff, and Gammon will give you full credit anyways," said Marlene rather bluntly as she plopped down opposite Lily and Mary, both of whom were busy trying and failing to interpret some tea leaves they had "borrowed" from the breakfast table.
Lily rolled her eyes at her friend and muttered loud enough for everybody to hear, "Because that would help so much, Marlene."
The fact that it was Valentine's Day would have darkened Lily's day before it begun, but adding the little encounter with Potter before she could even eat breakfast had soured her mood even more than what it already was. She had hoped to get some of her Divination homework done while everybody else worried about who sent them Valentines and whatnot, but even that was proving fruitless as she and Mary, who figured that she might as well do her homework while Lily was doing it, could not decide on whether the tea leaves looked more like a bird or a dog – really, it could have looked like a tuba, and Lily would not have known the difference.
"Why are you even taking Divination anyways, Lily?" asked Marlene, popping some chocolate that had most likely been a gift from one of her many admirers into her mouth. She swallowed before adding, "I get why Mary's taking it – though I still think it's a waste of your time, Mary – but what's your reason?"
"Because I promised I would take the class with Mary – wait, why are you in such a good mood?" Lily wondered aloud, finally looking up from her homework. Her friend was unusually peppy this morning.
Marlene shrugged and popped another chocolate in her mouth before replying with a mysterious smile and a, "It's Valentine's Day. Why aren't you in a good mood?"
"You know I don't like Valentine's Day," said Lily, shaking her head and returning to the tea leaves in front of her, which proved to be just as frustrating because it did not take long for Lily push them away and growl, "Why does Gammon have to make this so difficult? Alice, can you look at these – Alice? Alice!"
Lily did not realize it at first since she was busy engaging in conversation with Marlene, but Alice had been spacing out for the entire exchange. Her attention instead had been focused on somebody else further down the Gryffindor table, a boy with light brown hair and a thin build who Lily had seen many times around Hogwarts – Alice's not-so-secret secret crush, Frank Longbottom.
"Alice! I'm talking to you," said Lily loudly, nudging her friend.
"What?" asked Alice, finally dragging her eyes away from Frank and resting them on Lily.
"I asked you what you thought it was," repeated Lily, holding the teacup up for her to see.
Curious, Alice accepted the teacup and peered into it. As she did, she deliberately raised her eyebrows and said in a slow voice, "It's a … blob."
Marlene snorted at that, and Lily groaned at her friend's complete lack of helpfulness before saying, "Yes, I can see that, but we're trying to figure out what the blob looks like. Please, can you look again?"
Alice sighed and looked back at the tea leaves, poking them around a little and mumbling something unintelligible under her breath. She tried squinting at them and turning the cup sideways, but that must not have helped because when she was done with her go, she looked back up to Lily, the same expression still clear on her face.
"A ... blobby blob?" she guessed.
Lily grumbled and quickly took back the tea leaves before Alice could poke them again, saying with an exasperated voice, "Well, that blobby blob is my homework, so don't mess it up."
"I can guess what it means," said Marlene, who was clearly enjoying herself. She popped another chocolate in her mouth for emphasis before adding, "It means that you won't be able to figure out what it means, and so you should stop trying to become a psychic and start eating."
Lily rolled her eyes and was about to respond to the unneeded sarcasm when she was interrupted by the usual arrival of hundreds of owls swooping into the Great Hall, cutting her off before she could even begin. Much to her annoyance, most of the owls were carrying packages that were either wrapped in red or pink paper, and there was an unusually large amount of squeals and whoops as the owls dropped their packages in front of the perspective owners. Some of the birds stayed to either accept food or payment, though a fair amount simply flew away just as quickly as they had come.
"Oh, goody," whispered Marlene happily as no less than eight different Valentines landed in front of her. A couple were in simple envelopes, though five of them also contained packages. Lily did not find herself surprised at the number of cards Marlene had already received. After all, Marlene was easily one of the prettiest girls in school – and she certainly used her charms to her advantage.
However, it did come as a surprise when several pink and white packages landed in front of Lily herself.
There was the usual letter from her parents of course, the Valentine's Day card that they called the Just-Because-We-Love-You Card to get around her dislike of the holiday, but several of them were definitely not from her family. Lily cautiously picked up the first one, a simple red envelope that had her name written in capital letters. She turned it over, expecting to see a name or something else that would indicate who it was from, but she could not find anything.
"Do you know who sent these?" Lily asked Alice, who had once again resumed staring at Frank.
"Huh?" wondered Alice, once again jerking her attention away from her crush, though this time, she was much more curious than when Lily had asked for her help on her Divination homework. When she spotted the letter, Alice just shrugged and mumbled, "I dunno."
"Open it," urged Marlene, who was in the midst of unwrapping her third card.
Lily did.
Inside was a white and pink card with decorative flowers covering it. A butterfly fluttered in between the flowers, lazily flapping its wings, and after a second that Lily had taken to admire the cover, she opened it to reveal the writing inside of it, unsure about what exactly she should expect to see. Though it was not anything fancy, the writer had obviously taken the time to try to print the words as neatly as possible.
You've enchanted my mind,
And stolen my heart.
I can't stop thinking of you
Even when we're miles apart.
There was no name under the poem.
"Well? Who's it from?" demanded Marlene, going so far as to lean over the table in an effort to see a name.
"It doesn't say who," answered Lily, calmly folding the card so it was back in its original position.
Marlene huffed once before going back to her own pile while Lily moved to the next card. Unlike the anonymous one that was unassuming and not meant to draw attention, this one flashed pink, red, and white so frequently that it was like watching sparkly glitter under strobe lights. Even her name had been charmed to switch between a dark red and white. Once she had managed to pull the letter from the envelope, Lily quickly stuffed the flamboyant paper under her bag so that she would not get a headache just from looking at it, but that did not help much since the letter was just as bad.
"Wow, somebody definitely went all out for you," observed Alice. The lights show had distracted not only her, but several of their classmates who were sitting in adjacent seats as well.
Lily did not answer, instead opening the card to see what was inside. When she did, she was initially relieved to see that there was no light show on the inside. However, what was on the inside gave her just as much of a headache as the flashy lights did.
It was James Potter's face with the words Hogsmeade, Evans? written under the picture in big, block letters.
She shut the card as quickly as she could, growling in annoyance. Involuntarily, she glanced up to see Potter gazing at her with hopeful eyes.
Lily let her glare answer for her.
