Ok, so I do realise that I did make a mistake and Jily didn't happen until seventh year. I've decided just to go with it and it might still work out in the end with my plans – but probably not because I'm far too excited about them – but hope you can continue to read it despite this mistake and please review! – Chescaannie x

The next day Lily noticed that James and his friends all looked exceptionally tired and – although he looked much better and was now back in school and lessons – Remus still looked rather worse for wear. At break, she found them all laid by the tree by the lake, soaked in the rays of the late summer sun, fast asleep. Lily glanced at them for a moment before deciding that this could be a good chance to speak to James before she hopefully saw him that night. Lily approached and carefully shook his shoulder. James grumbled and opened his eyes and smiled when he saw Lily's green eyes looking at him. Silently the two of them rose and moved away from the sleeping boys. James surreptitiously took Lily's hand in his and guided her towards a small group of trees a little way a way where they could not be seen or overheard.

"What's up?" He asked in a hushed voice once they were under cover.

"Just wanted to know if we were still on for tonight?" James laughed at her. "What?"

"Just, never thought that Lily Evans would be worried that I might not meet her." He moved closer into her so that their faces were almost touching; Lily could feel his warm breath on her face and could feel her heart beating fast against her chest.

"I have astronomy at midnight, so if you feel like waiting up with me…" James smiled at her and nodded.

"Of course." He said and kissed her lightly, although neither moved more than an inch away from each other.

"James!" A voice called causing them both to jump apart. "James, we know you're in there." It was Sirius. Lily began frantically looking around for an escape. James placed a finger on her lips and a hand on her shoulder so that she became still.

"What do you want, Padfoot?" He shouted back.

"Come on. McGonagall is going to kill us if we're late. What are you doing in there anyway?" Lily breathed a sigh of relief – they would have mentioned her if they knew she was there. James raised a hand telling her to stay and pulled out a golden snitch with the other from his pocket.

"Snitch went too far." James quickly kissed Lily on her forehead and waved goodbye before turning and leaving the tree circle to re-join his friends.

Once their footsteps and voices faded away as they headed back to the school, she, too, emerged from the shelter of the trees into the dazzling sunlight. She checked her watch and saw that lessons started in about a minute – that was why it was so quiet and still out here. Lily did her best to stay a few steps behind the marauders as she followed them to lesson where she also sat next to James and pretended that it was just a coincidence that they were all slightly late.

"So. Why are you late, Evans?" James asked, unable to fully keep his smile or his little wink fully hidden but doing his best attempt regardless.

"Oh, I left my book upstairs and didn't realise until I was almost here so I had to go back." Lily said quickly, making up the story on the spot, and then turning away from him to concentrate on her book and notes from the last lesson which she had taken out of her bag.

The lesson seemed to pass quickly and Lily struggled to concentrate on Professor McGonagall as she kept meeting James' eyes in a sideways glance and the two of them would turn away. Lily wasn't ashamed of her liking of James and there was a large part of her that wanted to stand up and tell everyone that they were together. But there was another part of her that enjoyed the secret, it was as if she had something that no one else knew about and it meant that she didn't need to worry about what people thought about her blood status or anything else about her because she had James. Another reason for keeping it a secret, however, was her blood status. James was a pure blood and whilst she knew that he didn't judge her for being born a muggle, she knew that he could face ridicule off of many people if they did find out.

As soon as the lesson ended Lily sped off towards Gryffindor tower, noticing that the boys all headed off towards the entrance hall and probably the tree again. When she was almost there she noticed that a group of people were stood in her way, blocking the stairs. Looking at them she noticed they were all Slytherins of varying heights and ages and in amongst their ranks she spotted the long dark hair of her ex-best friend: Severus Snape.

"Excuse me." Lily said attempting to get past them without getting into a fight but none of them moved even an inch to let her past. She could feel her heart hammering against her chest and her breathing increased rapidly, but she straightened her face, and looked the thug straight in the eye. "Can you move please." She repeated but still no one moved.

"You think we're going to move for a mud blood like you. Do you know how much money our families put into this place, and here you are, acting like you own the place. The Blacks have been here for hundreds of generations. How long has your family been here, Evans? Don't think that's a name you'll find on any pure blood's family tree." The group laughed. Lily recognised the leader as Regulus Black – Sirius' younger brother.

"I have just as much of a right to be here as you – I got my letter when I was eleven, same as you. Just because I am not some elitist idiot – like some people – doesn't mean that I'm any less magical than you." Lily folded her arms and stared them down, ignoring the hammering in her chest and pretending she was as calm as can be. Regulus chuckled again and his followers formed a circle around Lily, who spotted Severus standing to her left, she stared at him, begging him to get his friends to leave her alone, but when he did nothing she turned back to Regulus with a cold stare.

"Don't worry. We'll leave you alone in a minute, just need to give you a little reminder of what you are." He raised his wand and Lily felt a searing pain in her arm – as if something was burning into her skin.

She fell to the floor clutching it, tears burning her eyes as she refused to cry or move until she heard footsteps receding down the stairs and she was quite certain she was alone. Then she stood, shook her head and walked straight up to her dormitory with her head held high, until she collapsed in tears on her bed, still clutching her arm. Upon closer inspection she noticed that it read the word 'mudblood'. She quickly pulled her sleeve down to cover it, picked up her bag and headed back downstairs towards the charms classroom.

She was ten minutes early when she took her seat at the front of the class and most of the class was still at lunch when Professor Flitwick entered and jumped at her presence.

"Everything ok, Miss Evans?" He asked but Lily merely nodded and continued looking through her notes.

Soon the rest of the class joined her and Dorca sat merrily beside her along with one of her friends whom she talked to happily for the majority of the lesson without turning to Lily, but Lily was happy about this as she didn't feel much like talking, even though the class was revising cheering charms on one another; nothing seemed to be able to cheer her up.

Lily's final lesson of the day (for now) was History of Magic and she found herself actually enthralled in the lesson, despite everyone else's lack of concentration, she found that concentrating on what Professor Binns was saying actually took her mind off of everything.

At the end of the day, Lily stood up and left for dinner in the Great Hall – missing lunch had left her rather hungry – but when she arrived, James was stood alone outside the door. He smiled as she approached and he inconspicuously gestured for her to follow him as he walked outside.

The sun was just setting, sending beautiful colours through the sky and onto the lake, which they sat beside in the shade of one of the trees. James put an arm around her and she leaned against his chest. It was strange how fast her loathing feelings towards James had changed to almost the opposite and now she felt perfectly at peace beside him. The two sat in comfortable silence for a few minutes before James finally spoke.

"So how was your day." He asked, fiddling with her hands in his.

"Ok." She shrugged. "How was your day?"

"Well, I enjoyed break but I missed someone at lunch who looked very down in Charms, despite the cheering charms." He moved so that he was looking into Lily's eyes but she looked away. "Tell me what happened."

"Nothing happened James, just was in a bit of a down mood and wasn't hungry. It happens sometimes." She shrugged again and was given away by her stomach rumbling loudly so that James laughed.

"Don't worry, I went to see the house elves and they gave me enough food for us to have a decent feast." He pulled open his school bag and revealed a box filled with bits of chicken and chips, another with Yorkshire puddings in, and a third with two rather large slices of chocolate cake in. The pair tucked in in silence, both too busy eating to say anything.

"Lily." James said and she looked up at him. "Pass me your arm." He held out his hand and Lily reached out so that he was holding her by the elbow. It wasn't until he had tight hold of her that she realised what was wrong. "What is this." He was shaking with rage as he pointed at the red words on her forearm.

"It's. It's nothing." She started, attempting to pull her arm away to cover it up but he kept hold, his face white with anger.

"That's not nothing Lily. Who was it? I'll kill them." But before Lily could answer James continued speaking. "Let me guess, your best friend Snivilus."

"Well, first of all, we aren't on speaking terms anymore, but yes. He was there." Lily looked away, she just wanted to run and be alone.

"So how many were there?"

"I don't know, eight, nine? I didn't pay that much attention, the only two I knew the names of were Severus and Regulus – Sirius' brother. But it's nothing I can't deal with James. In fact, I'd better get used to it if I want to live."

"No. Lily, you shouldn't have to cope with this. Go to Dumbledore."

"And what's he going to do? Defeat You-Know-Who? Make everyone change their views on muggle-borns? Because he's already trying to do both of those things, there's nothing more he can do. Anyway, my mother always told me that the best way to deal with bullies is to ignore them."

"Lil. I don't know what your definition is, but I would say that this is not bullying – it's racism. And you shouldn't have to put up with it. I swear, if I ever saw anyone doing anything like that to you…" James clenched his fists and turned away. "I'm going to fight him you know. I'm going to put an end to all this, as soon as I've finished Hogwarts I'm joining the Order and I swear you'll be safe." He took her hand and looked into Lily's green eyes but she just laughed.

"Not likely. If all goes to plan I'm going to be on the front line as well. You should have figured out I'm not the type to sit at home and worry. Two years and we'll be there, fighting him, together."

The rest of the evening passed in a blur of talking and walking around the grounds. They discovered just how much thy had in common despite Lily thinking they were so different for so long; it turned out they shared the same core ideals and had the same hopes of having a big happy family with a few children that they would love no matter their Hogwarts house (James begrudgingly agreed once Lily pointed out that any child raised by him couldn't be as bad as a lot of those in Slytherin and that they had produced some good witches and wizards – like Merlin who is easily one of the most famous).

Before long it was time for Lil to head off for her Astronomy lesson at the top of the North tower. It was just before curfew when they made it to the common room and Lily joined the students that were being taken up to the tower by Professor Sinstra to avoid being caught by Filch on their way to lesson. James waved goodbye and ducked into the common room.

The lesson had been long and it was only a little before two in the morning when Lily returned and collapsed into sleep on her bed only to wake up five and a half hours later as the other girls woke her from her deep slumber. She quickly dressed and went downstairs for breakfast which she shovelled down before heading off to her Defence Against The Dark Arts lesson with the new Professor Sinew. Based on first impressions alone, Professor Sinew seemed like he might be able to get them through their NEWTS, rather than just a year like the rest of their Defence teachers. He was tall and large – but muscular – and his gruff expression suggested that he was more than able to handle himself, instilling confidence in Lily as she sat down – believing she might at least learn something useful for her future life in the order with this teacher.

"Good morning class. I am Professor Sinew, your teacher for NEWT Defence Against The Dark Arts. I hope you have all had pleasant summer and am sure you will have a great term."

The lesson was fine, he taught them the basic wand movements and the theory behind a few simple spells as there was a high chance that the students could be tested on this in their exam in "only nineteen months", as he said this, the students that had been up all night and were used to falling asleep in the first lesson of the day after Astronomy woke suddenly and started scribbling down notes from the board at lightning speed. But then the bell rang, signalling to Lily that she only had two lessons left before lunch and there was break in between them.

Lily spent the next hour and a half (which was labelled on her timetable as "Free" but without the heart around it that would suggest James was also free) in the library researching potion remedies for Slughorn and writing them up in an essay which was supposed to be two feet long, although hers was currently three inches short. Then she felt someone clasp their hands around her eyes and shout "Guess who!". She knew instantly from the voice that it was James.

"Hmm. I don't know. Is it santa?" She asked, unable to keep her laughs completely back.

"Ho ho ho, no he won't be here for another three months."

"Just get off of me James!" Lily laughed, pulling his hands away from her eyes and looking up at an angry looking Madam Pince.

Before she could tell them to get out, Lily picked up her things and the pair ran for it, laughing all the way out the door. James led her down a deserted corridor where he pinned her against the wall and kissed her slowly. Lily found herself clutching his back and pulling him closer into her. The bell rang causing the pair to jump apart and laugh.

"Charms?" James asked, putting his arm out which Lily took, laughing. James kissed the top of Lily's head at the door of the classroom and the pair split up to take their separate seats for the lesson.

Thank you for reading. Please review! – Chescaannie x