Chapter 11

In a little bit of time it won't hurt so bad

I've got a secret for the mad:

In a little bit of time it won't hurt so bad.

And I get, that I don't get it.

But you will burn right now,

But then you won't regret it.

Secret For The Mad, dodie

Going back to school was a welcome change for James. Despite claiming to dislike school, he enjoyed it for the most part. Obviously there were parts he didn't like- namely homework- but magic never wore off on him. He always found learning magic to be interesting, with the exception of possibly History of Magic. He like the topic, and found his textbook to be very interesting, but the sound of Professor Binn's droll voice sent him to sleep more often then he would like to admit.

NEWTs were around the corner, as his teachers often reminded him, which meant that the work would be piling on. It wasn't even a month in to school and James felt like he may never see the sun again with the amount of homework he had to do each night.

"Do they not realise that the NEWTs aren't until next year?" Sirius groaned, about an hour and a half into his homework.

James raised bleary eyes from his Transfiguration textbook. "I don't think I'll get around to the potions essay today."

Sirius made a sound at the back of his throat. "That's not due until next week. I wasn't planning on starting it until the day before it's to be in for."

Remus rolled his eyes. "I don't think any of us are surprised by that Padfoot."

"Like you're much better," Sirius scoffed. "You're always leaving your homework until the last minute; teachers just don't think you do because you're a Prefect."

Remus shrugged, keeping his face innocent. "I'm sure I don't what you mean."

With a pronounced sigh Peter, who was also working on Transfiguration, threw his book down. "If I have to read one more sentence about human transfiguration, I will scream."

"I think we deserve a break," Sirius announced. "Think we should get some butterbeers from The Three Broomsticks. Anyone else?"

"I'm game," Remus said immediately.

"Anything to not do this essay," Peter agreed.

They turned to James. "Bring me back a butterbeer, yeah?" he asked with fake nonchalance.

"What?" Sirius asked. "You're not coming?"

"I'm not sure I can," James replied, glancing down at his leg, which had been more sore than usual.

Immediately, Sirius looked guilty. "I wasn't thinking-"

"So nothing new," Remus interrupted.

"I wasn't thinking," Sirius repeated, ignoring Remus. "Nevermind."

James laughed. "Don't be ridiculous. Go on without me. I might actually be able to get some work done without you lot here annoying."

The other three let out an offended "hey!", but James could tell that they were excited at the prospect of going to Hogsmeade.

"Are you sure?" Sirius asked, though he was already half off the Common Room couch.

James made a shooing motion with his hands, and went back to his Transfiguration textbook. He was sitting on the floor in front of the couch, with his essay and quill on the little coffee table in front of the fire. Every so often, he would write a line or two on his essay, before going back to study the book. Finally, he put his quill and the book down, satisfied that he had finished the essay. He had planned on at least starting the potions essay, but he felt way too exhausted to even consider it.

The day's Daily Prophet sat on the table in front of him, so he picked it up and scanned it. His hopes weren't up, but he was still disappointed to find no mention of Diagon Alley reported. His mother had informed him in a letter that morning that they had arrested two more people in relation to the attack, but other than that, hadn't made much gains.

"No mention of Diagon Alley," he muttered, throwing the newspaper onto the table and flopping back against the bottom of the couch.

"What is it with you and Diagon Alley?" a voice from above him asked.

James looked up to find Lily Evans was after plonking herself onto the couch that Sirius had been sitting on and James was leaning against. "Where are the girls Evans?"

"What? Am I not allowed to talk to you for no reason?" she asked teasingly.

"Second best, remember?" he joked back.

Her lips curved up into a grin. "They're up in the dorm; said they couldn't do any more work or they'd collapse."

"The lads are the same," James replied, gesturing to the empty chairs and discarded books.

Lily laughed. "Glad to know I'm not alone." There was a pause. "So what is it about Diagon Alley?"

James hesitated, staring up at her. "I- I'm not sure if I can say."

Lily shrugged. "Alright."

James continued to stare. "You can't say this to anyone," he said finally.

"I won't if you don't want me to," she replied.

James sighed. And waited. But eventually he opened his mouth. "There was an attack at Diagon Alley. The Ministry is kind of forcing everyone to downplay it as a small incident."

"Oh wow. What sort of attack?"

"Death Eaters," James swallowed. "Death Eaters swarmed the main street."

Lily gaped at him; James noticed that that seemed to be happening a lot. She seemed to be constantly surprised by everything he told her. "Did your mom tell you this?" she asked after a moment.

"Uh, no. Sirius, Remus and I were there."

Lily gaped some more. "Merlin." And then "what was it like?" she asked softer.

James swallowed again. "Scary. Exhausting. Surreal. I mean, one second we're eating ice-cream at Florean's, and the next, we're out on the street fighting Death Eaters."

Lily did a double take. "Wait- you fought them?"

"Well, yeah," James shrugged, suddenly embarrassed, though he didn't know why.

"I guess, when you said you were there, I just assumed you saw it all happen," Lily explained. "I didn't think you meant that you were fighting."

There was a heavy pause, and James took a deep breath. "We were in Florean's, just eating ice-cream, and then we heard a loud noise. We ran out onto the street and followed the noise, and there was just Death Eaters everywhere." He looked down at his hands, which were shaking slightly on his lap. "And there were people fighting them, and people running away, and little kids-" he broke up, knotting his hands in order to quell the shaking.

"Were many people hurt?" Lily asked quietly, seemingly afraid of the answer.

"17 dead," James replied, still not looking up at her. He heard an intake of breath from Lily, but continued staring at his hands. "And I just wish I could've done more."

"Dwelling on those sort of things don't help," Lily said. "As hard as it is to hear, you can't go back and do more or change what you did, so there's no point in thinking of the 'what ifs'."

"That's the thing, I know that," James said, "but I just think about the Ministry and, and timeturners, and..." he trailed off, staring at the fireplace, frowning.

"You did all you can," Lily said firmly. "If the Ministry is going about this in the completely wrong way, that's not you fault, and continuously thinking about it isn't going to help."

James finally looked up at her. "Thanks," he said, with a small smile.

"You're welcome." She paused, before changing topic altogether. "Have you started the potions essay?"

"Nah," James replied, leaning back against the couch. "I finished the Transfig one, but haven't so much as looked at potions."

"Want to work on it together?"

"Yeah?" James asked, looking up at her hopefully.

"Yeah," she replied with a smile. "The girls have given up, and I was really hoping to get it started."

"Brilliant," James said, pulling his bag closer to him in order to grab his potions book and more parchment. Lily left the couch to pick her stuff off the table her and the girls had been working on, before coming back to couch and dropping her bag on the ground. Instead of sitting on the couch again, she sat on the floor next to James and arranged her stuff on the coffee table.

They worked in silence for the most part, occasionally asking each other questions, but it was nice to do the work with someone next to you. James got a good chunk of the homework done, which, considering he had been thinking of leaving it to tomorrow, was a good thing.

After a while, the rest of the Marauders stumbled into the Common Room, not drunk on alcohol, but on sneaking out and having fun. The made their way over to the couch, not realising that Lily was sitting next to James.

"Here you go Sir Prongs," Sirius presented the bottle of butterbeer with flourish.

"Thank you kind sir," James replied with equal dramatics.

"Where did you get that?" Lily asked, eyes narrowed.

The other Marauders were too stunned to reply, so it's James that answers. "Ah, a true Marauder never reveals his secrets," he replies, tapping his nose smugly.

"Evans!" Sirius said loudly, getting over his original shock. "You joined us!"

Lily wrinkled her nose. "I joined Potter in doing potions homework," she reminds him. Sirius doesn't look fazed.

"Exactly!" Sirius replied jubilantly.

When Lily looked confused, Remus elaborated. "We're a package deal."

Lily laughed at that. "But seriously, where did you get the butterbeer?"

"There's no fun in knowing," Peter replied with a grin, clearly having fun with knowing.

"Besides, Moony is a prefect as well," James pointed out. "He wouldn't be involved in something that's against the rules."

Lily stared at Remus, who schooled his face into an innocent expression, but his eyes were twinkling too much for it to be plausible."Well," she began slowly, "since I can't prove how you acquired the butterbeer, there's nothing I can do about it. For all I know, you have a butterbeer supply stashed underneath one of your beds."

"That's the spirit Evans," Sirius said, ruffling her hair. She immediately scowled and ran her hand through her hair a few times to fix it.

"How's the homework going?" Peter asked.

"I'm a good way into the essay," James replied, pushing his glasses up onto his head so he could rub at his tired eyes. When he's finished, the glasses fall back onto the end of his nose, so he swiftly pushed them back up the bridge. "What about you Evans?"

"I'm almost finished, I'd say," Lily answered, double checking her essay. "I'll probably head up to bed now, or I'll collapse of exhaustion. I'll see you guys tomorrow, yeah?" she continued, gathering up her stuff and rising from the floor.

"Night," James said, giving her a tired smile. The rest of the Marauders give similar sentiments, and no one really says anything until Lily has gone up the staircase. Then, the group practically explodes with noise.

"Look at you and Evans getting all cosy," Sirius said proudly, grinning like a loon.

James doesn't reply and rubs at his eyes some more.

"Just homework, eh?" Peter asked, his voice full of implication.

"Do you think I'd have this much of the essay done if we'd been doing anything other than homework?" James replied, too tired to be embarrassed by their teasing.

"My little boy is all grown up," Remus said, wiping fake tears from his cheek. James chucked a pillow at him. It hits Remus right in the face, but he doesn't seem to mind much, laughing too hard at James to care.

"I'm going to bed," James grumbled.

"We love you Prongsie," Sirius said in a sing-song voice.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," James replied, packing up his bag. "See you tomorrow." James swung his bag over his shoulder, hauling himself off the floor, using the coffee table for support.

The Marauders were still grinning at him when he paused at the bottom of the stairs to glance back at them. James climbed the staircase slowly, both from fatigue and the pain in his leg. It had been nice though, he remembered with a smile, to talk to Lily without an argument being involved. He dropped his bag on the floor at the end of his bed, before flopping into bed. It was a nuisance to have to drag himself out of bed again in order to change out of his uniform, but when he was ready, he collapsed back into bed, and rested his exhausted eyes.

It had been nice.