She was never late. Ever. In fact, Lily Evans had an annoying habit of being on time, so much so that the one time she had found herself in a detention (which was definitely through no fault of her own) Professor Sprout actually rolled her eyes at the sight of the girl standing outside Greenhouse One at precisely 6pm. Yet here she was running and pushing through crowds of muggles who were taking their sodding time to move around Kings Cross Station. Honestly, she thought do they have to gather like lemmings in front of the train times? Thanking the gods from every religion that she had decided on a rucksack instead of her school trunk to take home for the Christmas holidays, she squeezed between a rather large man who reminded her of Vernon, her sisters fiancé, and what she presumed was his equally large wife, making it onto platforms 9 and 10 with just two minutes to spare. She barely battered an eye as she strolled through the barrier, vanishing from sight so rapidly a young girl passing by did a double take before shaking her head and running to catch with her mother. Lily materialised on the other side, rushing through the steam filled platform and past the waving parents, hopping through an open door just as the whistle blew and the train began to move. Taking a few deep breaths as she leant against the now closed door, Lily wiped a bead of sweat from her brow and pushed forward to find her friends. As it was the return from the Christmas holidays the train was no way near as packed as it was on September 1st but it still took Lily a good few minutes to locate the girls she was searching for.

"… and then just as we were leaving Cuthbert Macmillan was so drunk he climbed into the fire before he'd put the floo powder in." Marlene finished whilst both Mary and Dorcas laughed at the story.

"I'm so jealous I couldn't come, but mums just so ill I couldn't leave her." Dorcas Meadows, a short brown girl with wavy hair, looked wistfully out the window, probably imagining herself at the party that Marlene was describing so vividly.

"Me too, I'd love to experience at least one, but I have to admit seeing the ball drop never gets old." Mary sighed, lost for a moment in the memories of her own New Year celebrations. The inhabitants of the compartment all turned to see Lily slide in, drop her bag and begin to remove her coat and jumper.

"Lil, babes, we've told you about doing exercise, it really isn't your forte." Marlene joked as the girls took in Lily's red and shiny complexion. As Lily stuck up her middle finger at Marlene, Mary spoke up.

"We thought you were going to miss the train, what kept you?" she asked, moving over and picking up her cat to make room for Lily to sit down.

"My parents were out so Petunia had to drop me off at the station, which she made such a fuss over so we were late leaving. I swear she did it on purpose." Lily huffed and slid down into a slouching position on the chair, propping her feet up on the one opposite.

"So how was New Years at the Potter's for you Lily?" enquired Dorcas, unsuccessfully trying to swot the other girls hand away as she reached for a chocolate frog. Tossing aside her 5th Urg the Unclean card, Lily replied with a mouthful of chocolate.

"It was actually rather enjoyable, but nothing too major to report back." She reached for another piece of chocolate, this time from Marlene's stash but was unlucky as the girl managed to successfully defend her chocolate from Lily's thieving hands.

"Come off it Lily, nothing to report back my ass." She exclaimed loudly before turning to the others. "Lily and James were actually getting on, not only were they talking for the first time since fifth year, the little liar was giggling and flirting with him like a besotted third year!" Whilst the other girls grinned knowingly at each other Lily sat spluttering, pulling herself into more of a seated position as she tried to defend herself.

"I was not flirting with him like a besotted third year, how dare you imply such a thing" she cried indignantly looking thoroughly appalled at Marlene. Marlene stared at Lily with a pointed look before turning doe eyed and wrapping her arms around an imaginary person.

"Happy New Year Potter" she said in a sultry voice that Lily hoped would never come out of her own mouth. Dorcas and Mary laughed, egging on Marlene whilst Lily sat in the corner trying to control her temper.

"Come off it! You are twisting the situation; besides I doubt you are a reliable source, you were so drunk you could barely walk straight! Black had to hold back your hair whilst you threw up if I remember correctly." Lily finished triumphantly, watching Marlene scowl as the laughs turned on her.

"That I did, and I have to admit McKinnon, it wasn't your best look." The girls looked up at the newest arrival. Black leant against the entrance to the compartment a smirk dancing across his features and Lily hated to admit it but he did look rather handsome with his hair pulled back in a rough bun, the tip of his wand visible from where he had poked it through. Lily didn't miss the blush that spread across her friend's face, and she smugly relished in her discomfort. Behind Black, stood the rest of the gang, and Lily had to admit she felt rather awkward seeing Potter without the liquid courage of firewhisky. As he smiled at her it was Lily's turn to squirm in discomfort. Just because they had been civil towards one and other for a single night didn't make them friends, did it? Lily started to cringe at the memories of New Year that she had successfully placed in the back of her head until now, when she couldn't ignore them any longer. After she did not return his smile, Potter seemed to look rather put out, as he excused himself, Peter following in tow. Black watched them leave and with a roll of his eyes he bid the girls a safe journey and followed his friends. It was Remus who stayed, reminding Lily that they had promised to do the first patrol of the train ride. Reluctant to leave her friends to gossip without her, Lily stole one last chocolate frog, much to the displeasure of Dorcas, and followed the lanky boy out into the corridor. Now that she looked at him properly, she noticed that her friend didn't look very well. His skin was pale and there were small but noticeable bags forming under his eyes.

"Are you feeling alright Remus?" she asked as they set off to the far end of the train.

"I'm fine, nothing to worry about Lily, just a common cold, the alcohol from new year probably hasn't helped my immune system much." He joked, but avoided making eye contact as she stared up at him. Before Lily had much time to question him more on his failing health though he had changed the conversation with an air of finality that left Lily feeling confused. For the most part, their patrol went by smoothly and amicably, with the exception of the time that Remus, like Marlene tried to pry about Potter.

"If you won't tell me why you're really ill, I'm not going to discuss Potter." Was her smug response, and that was the end of that. It honestly baffled her how much they were all reading into things. And so, they continued, instead choosing to discuss whether or not McGonagall was trying to kill them through homework.

Lily's feet were aching and her stomach was starting to rumble as the end of patrols came in to sight. After passing the responsibility on to the next prefects, Remus and herself had bid each other goodbye and headed in separate directions back to their respective compartments. Yet as Lily fantasized about chocolate frogs and pumpkin pasties it seemed fate had other ideas in mind. The compartment she was about to pass had the door flung open so violently that Lily jumped back and pulled out her wand in shock. A boy no older than fourteen had been pushed out of the compartment and was now in a crumpled pile on the floor.

"So, I'll say it again, maybe you should go and suggest to dear young brother that he stops wasting his time on filthy mudbloods, perhaps remind him of the Sacred 28?" A voice stated menacingly from within the compartment and with that being said the boy scrambled off the floor and pushing past Lily as he hurried away.

"Did I Interrupt something?" She said with raised eyebrows. People often thought Lily Evans had more balls than brains, but those people didn't know her very well. It wasn't that she lacked the brains, it was that she was so confident in her abilities that she rarely shied away from altercations, especially if it involved bullying. The compartment she stood before held an odd selection of students, the majority of whom were Slytherin. Evan Rosier, a boy of large build with a menacing sneer that never seemed to leave his face, was standing at the forefront of the compartment, having clearly been the culprit who had just thrown the younger boy to the floor. Yet it was Fawley, an intimidating seventh year that had been doing the talking.

"Piss off Mudblood. It's nothing that concerns your dirty blood." He sneered at her, the other's in the compartment jeered along with him.

"Actually, as a prefect, the mistreatment of other students does concern me, so that'll be 10 points from Slytherin for that, and another 5 for foul language." She came across to anyone watching (and in true Hogwarts fashion, quite a small crowd had formed) cool and collected, her posture and defiant expression emitting authority. Most students would cower under the glare of Lily Evans, anyone who had seen James Potter end up on the wrong end of her wand knew she was a talented witch. But for the Slytherin's she was opposing, their narrow mindedness on what made a good witch or wizard gave them a false sense of entitlement. Fawley stood, pushing past Rosier, so that he was standing intimidatingly tall over Lily.

"If you think we care about house points, then you're more stupid than your dirty blood suggests. I'll say it again, Piss off."

"Now, Now, Fawley, that really is no way to talk to a lady. Perhaps you should wash out your mouth." Fawley turned to see the new arrivals, frowning as he stared into the tip of Potter's wand which was directed at his face. It seems that whilst one Gryffindor was no match for his company, a handful of them wasn't worth his time, so with nothing more to say Fawley slunk back into the compartment, shutting the door and blinds as he went.

"Alright you lot, clear off, surely there are more entertaining things you could be doing with your time." Black shouted, waving his hands at the lurking students. Potter lowered his wand and tucked it into his robe pocket, before rubbing a hand threw his hair. The action reminded Lily of the pairs interaction in his father's office, but she was quick to shake that from her mind as her temper flared.

"What was that?" She rounded on Potter, Blacks attempts to banish the crowd were rendering useless at the sign of a new quarrel. For many of the onlookers, it was the first time they had seen the pair interact since the infamous blow out by the lake the previous summer. Lily could feel the irritation she'd been holding onto for most of the morning spilling out, with very little she could do about it. After all it should be common knowledge to avoid angering a hungry girl. Potter looked thoroughly aghast at Lily's outburst but soon regained his usual composure.

"What do you mean, what was that? I was trying to help, I don't know if you realised but you were quite out numbered." Again, his hand was playing with his stupid hair, and she had the urge to stride up to him and rip it away.

"I was not! I was handling it perfectly fine on my own thank you very much, I don't need you and your pureblood status coming in to save the day." She knew when she said it that she'd crossed the line, but she was so fed up with being underestimated, it was the last straw having a fellow housemate be the condescending one. Potter stood spluttering over his words in apparent disbelief.

"What… I would never… How could you even… You know what you are completely insufferable sometimes Evans, you know that?" Was all he could seem to say. The pair glared at each other in silence, Lily stubbornly stood with her arms crossed whilst Potter's complexion was rather patchy as he tried to keep his anger under control. To the surprise of the onlookers, Lily walked right up to him and looked him dead in the eye before saying slowly.

"Get out of my way."

"Or what, are you going to dock points off me to?" It was a below the belt jibe, and the boy smirked at having got in the last word, for Lily had pushed past him and stalked off down the corridor. When she was out of sight though the smirk slid from his face as he let out an exasperated sigh. Sirius walked over to him and placed a hand on his friend's shoulder.

"What the fuck was that?" Sirius shook his head with a snort of laughter. James who was already cursing the lack of control he had over his temper, shrugged his friend's hand off his shoulder.

"On a scale of one to ten: ways to get into Evans' good books, that was a zero." Chipped in Peter, who had been standing watching from the side lines. As James strode off back to their compartment, Sirius gave Peter a shut the fuck up look and shove of a shoulder before they followed their friend in silence.

Over at the opposite end of the Hogwarts Express, the girls in the last compartment were enjoying an intense and rowdy game of exploding snap, when their friend came storming in for the second time that journey. In a much fouler mood than when she had left them earlier, Lily didn't wait for Mary to move her cat before she shoved it aside and plonked herself down. After Mary had consoled the hissing tabby, she faced Lily with a sympathetic;

"What happened?" The others, used to Lily's over dramatic, and easily flared bad temper, looked on expectantly. No one commented as Lily grabbed a pumpkin pasty from the selection of treats purchased from the trolley and sat nibbling it, looking less disgruntled with each bite.

"Potter" was all she said. Marlene rolled her eyes and lent back, whilst Dorcas let out a knowing sigh. It was Mary who gently pat Lily's leg in a consoling manor.

"What's the idiot done this time?" Dorcas pondered, and whilst the girls within the compartment were aware that it wasn't always James who started the fights, it was within their girl code to be on Lily's

side when possible. They sat patiently as Lily told retold the events of her patrols, rolling their eyes at her over dramatic description of her dying hunger, and acting appropriately outraged when she told them of her interaction with the Slytherin's. When she finished with her quarrel with Potter though, they all sat in an awkward silence. Lily looked at them expectantly, waiting for the shared outrage in his behaviour.

"Well…" Dorcas started looking at Marlene and then back to Lily. "I don't want put feelings on you, but it sounds like you were more annoyed at the Slytherin's and perhaps took it out on James?" She trailed off slightly at the look Lily gave her.

"Perhaps to start with, but were you not listening, he called me insufferable! And then continued on by undermining my authority… In front of younger students!" Lily was perplexed as to how her friends were not grasping the situation at hand, and was becoming increasingly grumpier each time they reprimanded her. They're meant to be my friends not Potter's she thought childishly to herself.

"He isn't entirely wrong, you can be quite stubborn Lily. And if you maybe tried to see it from his point of view, after the two of you got on fine at New Year, he probably didn't think you'd mind if he stepped in." Marlene tried to reason. "You know he'd do the same for any of us." Lily glowered at her friend for taking her cousin's side over hers, but like Marlene had a knack for doing, she'd managed to get through to Lily. As she slumped back and looked out the window at the passing countryside, she couldn't help feeling a little guilty at the way she acted. And Marlene was right, Potter would do the same for any of his friends, his loyalty, though she hated to admit it, was one of his best qualities. After a little while, when the conversation had flared up between the other's Lily whispered so quietly that the others thought they had imagined it

"Maybe you're right." Marlene and Dorcas shared a smirk whilst Mary had fully turned in her seat to face Lily looking taken aback.

"I'm sorry come again?" Marlene said with an even wider smirk.

"I said, maybe you're right" Lily said a little louder, avoiding eye contact with her friends who were laughing amongst themselves for it was a rare occasion that Lily admitted she was wrong.

"Right about what?" Marlene was milking the situation for what it was worth, giddily sliding to the end of her seat.

"About Potter, and bugger off Marlene I admitted I was wrong, don't make me take it back." Lily whined with a pout as her friends laughed at her. For the remainder of the journey, the topic of Slytherin's and Potter were left untouched as the girls gossiped and caught up with the rest of their Holiday stories.

The night was dark and the air bitterly cold as the students of Hogwarts exited the warmth of the train. Trudging their way down the snowy track towards the carriages that would lead them to the school, they bent their heads and pulled up their scarves at attempts to stay as warm as possible. Lily who was already dreaming of a nice yummy chicken pot pie was about to climb into the carriage after her friends before she was pushed to one side. Looking up at the culprit whilst she steadied herself from a fall, Lily was met with the smirk of Black as he pulled Remus into the carriage behind him.

"Sorry Evans, this one is full." He laughed as the carriage pulled away, heading off up the track. Glaring at the retreating carriage Lily spun around to climb into the next one along and with how badly her day had turned out so far, she wasn't even surprised to find Potter and Peter were the inhabitants. Torn between the desire to just get up to the school already, or to avoid Potter, Lily finally decided that risking missing out on the first choice of food wasn't worth waiting, regardless who her carriage companions were. Grumbling incoherently to herself, Lily pulled her way up into the carriage, choosing to slide across so that she was opposite Peter over Potter. She was aware of her own pettiness, but as she was feeling particularly hard done by and fed up, she couldn't bring herself to care. An awkward silence settled over the trio, broken by Peter once the carriage began to move.

"Actually, I've forgotten something" he said, the lie blatantly obvious, but before Lily could say or do anything Peter had jumped out of the moving carriage. Staring dumbstruck at the space the boy had vanished, Lily turned to face Potter who she had unwillingly been left alone with. The boy had the same confused shock written over his face and it was with a cautious glance that he met Lily's eyes.

"Well then…" was all he seemed to be able to come up with and Lily had the impression that whilst he looked just as awkward as she felt, he was definitely finding their situation more amusing than she was. He continued to stare at her, making Lil feel rather uncomfortable as he did. She shifted in her seat trying to avoid his gaze, choosing instead to look out at the snowflakes that had started to fall.

"I think their plan was for us to have to talk to each other" He spoke again, keeping his voice light hearted and she could tell he was trying to make light of the situation. Her eyes flicked back towards him, the tension of their argument on the train was still fresh for her and despite Marlene's words, she couldn't quite bring herself to say anything to him. As she resumed her stare at the nights sky Lily heard him sigh, take deep breath and then for the third time James Potter spoke.

"Look I've actually wanted to speak to you alone for a long time, so while your trapped with me I'm just going to say it." Lily continued to stare out the window, too nervous to face the boy.

"I'm sorry." He started. "I'm sorry about how I've acted in the past, and all the times I immaturely took my frustration out on those who didn't deserve it. But mostly I'm sorry for what happened last year, and I'm embarrassed by how I acted. I was stupid and arrogant, and I know you think I still am but that day has played on my mind so bloody much Evans and I've really been trying to be a better person. I'm not expecting you to forgive me but I had to let you know that I really, truly am sorry." Lily sat, awkwardly bringing her gaze down to look at her fiddling hands before looking back towards Potter. There was something about the look he was giving her, an unreadable but undeniably strong emotion burned in his eyes, his mouth pressed in a thin line, brows furrowed anxiously as he waited for her reply. As She stared at him, Lily lost herself in the feeling that she had felt in the aftermath of the fight. The anger with not just Potter but Severus as well, the grief of the inevitable split between the two friends and the self-doubt that followed. And whilst she had harboured onto her distaste for Potter in the months past, it dawned on Lily that perhaps just as she had done on the train, maybe, just maybe, she had used Potter as a scapegoat for her feelings, instead of confronting the real issue.

"I forgive you." She whispered, feeling a weight that she had been unware of lift off her shoulders. It felt good, she realised, to finally confront what had happened between the two of them and the look of relief that crossed Potters face made her smile.

"I owe you an apology too." Potter looked confused at her statement but before he could question it she continued. "I was wrong to argue with you on the train, and I'm sorry, especially for the blood status comment, that was low and quite frankly hypocritical. You were only trying to help." A blush crossed her cheeks at the smile he gave, which wasn't his usual cocky grin, but a warm and sincere one.

"I forgive you." he mimicked back at her and she gave a small laugh. She began to feel, in his company, as she had at the party, comfortable and light-hearted.

"Would it be bold of me" He began, as the lights of the castle spilled into their carriage. "To ask if we could be friends?"

Lily considered his playful grin.

"I don't think that would be too bold." Her grin matching his.

"So, friends?"

"Friends."