Disclaimer: JKR owns all characters, plots, etc. that you recognize.

Summary: It seems love just isn't what's in store for Lily Evans and James Potter. After two years in a relationship, they couldn't see why they were still together. Now they try to convince themselves and everyone around them that breaking up really was for the best, even though deep down they are heartbroken. They struggle to find some sort of happiness, sort through confusion, and end up realizing that they were meant for each other. Then all they have to do is put aside their pride and tell each other the truth. Eventually LJ! R&R Please!

Chapter 11

I did not recognize the woman that stood before me. The woman that stood in the reflection of the glass window of a café had a chocolate brown bob hair cut with brown eyes to match. She was also much taller and curvier than myself. She did not have freckles like me, nor did she have the same nose as me.

Who was she? Where did she come from? Why was she here in Paris? What was she like? These questions, plus more were running through my head as I stared into the window.

"Hello, darling," a voice said semi-loudly, while the owner of this voice came up behind me and kissed my cheek. "Great disguise," the voice whispered in my ear, before pulling away.

I turned around, but once again I was faced with someone I did not recognize. This guy had a bulky build, short blond hair, and blue eyes. Although this person was the complete opposite of Sirius, I knew it was him standing before me.

"You're late," I said simply, turning away.

"I know. I'm sorry," he replied. "Let's go."

Sirius offered me his arm, which I took, before we began our walk. The two of us had decided it would be best to wear disguises, just in case any death eaters recognized us.

Tonight, we were pretending to be a couple that wanted to go out for a romantic walk around Paris.

"Where shall we go first, my dear?"

I couldn't help but laugh.

"Let's go this way," I said, tightening my trench coat around me.

I huddled close to Sirius in an effort to stay somewhat warm. It wasn't very surprising for the weather to be very cold and windy on this late November night. I found it a bit weird that it hadn't started snowing yet.

"So," he began, cocking his head to the side, "want to tell me about earlier?"

"No, not really. But I guess I should. You'll just keep bothering me about it until I tell you," I sighed.

"Damn straight," he grinned.

So I told him about how my mother had called wanting to have lunch with James and I, how I hadn't told her about the breakup, and how the lunch had gone.

"You're right about what you said earlier," I admitted.

"What'd I say earlier?"

I rolled my eyes, replying, "About trying to block out the reality of the situation. I just know that when I do tell my mother, she'll blame me."

There was a moment of silence, as we continued walking, before I quietly asked, "Do you think it's my fault why we broke up?"

"I think both of you could have tried harder to make it work," he said, not fully answering my question. His answer was actually something I would have expected to hear from Remus.

"Did James ever say if I did something to cause him to want to break up with me?"

"Lily…please don't put me in this position."

"Just answer my question. Please."

"No, he didn't." Somehow, I didn't believe him.

"Now can we stop talking about this?"

"Sure," I sighed. "You know, I've never been to Paris."

"Really? Well then, my dear, I shall have to take you to the Eiffel Tower. You'll love it," he steered us in the opposite direction, apparently towards the Eiffel Tower.

"Whatever you say," I smiled.

We fell into another silence, though this one was much more comfortable than the previous, until the tower was in full view.

"You're right. It is beautiful."

"That it is. You know, my family and I used to come out here a lot when I was younger."

I looked at him, waiting for him to continue.

"Those days weren't so bad. I actually got along with Regulus back then, if you can believe it. Anyway, let's go this way."

I didn't know what to say. I felt sadness rush through me. I mean, I knew of his family issues, but he had never mentioned them around me before.

I squeezed his arm, looking up at him. In return, he briefly smiled down at me, before looking ahead once more.

"Sirius, what do you think of Isabel?"

He raised his eyebrows, "I thought we weren't going to talk about you and James anymore."

"We're not. I asked about Isabel. James has nothing to do with it."

"She's nice enough I suppose."

"Sirius, be honest. What do you think of her?"

"I am. Like I said, she's nice, fun to be around, very down to earth. I think she's a good girl to be in a relationship with."

He looked at me before adding, "Not that I don't still think you and James should be together."

"How well does James know her?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"It's nothing. I was just curious."

"It's not nothing when you ask something like that."

"Fine, I'll tell you. Before we left today, Isabel hugged me--"

"Like I said, she's nice."

"Before you interrupted, I was saying that she hugged me and said something to me."

"What'd she say?"

"She basically told me to stay away from James, that he was her's. And she called me a bitch."

"That doesn't sound like Isabel. Are you sure that she said that," Sirius asked. I could already tell that he didn't believe me.

"I heard it with my own ears. She even shot me dirty looks," I exclaimed.

"Lily, I was there when we left too and I never saw Isabel throw you dirty looks, nor did I hear her say anything to you besides goodbye."

Great. I knew I shouldn't have brought it up. No one would believe me about sweet Isabel.

"You know what, never mind. You're probably right. Maybe I did hear her wrong," I lied.

I felt a little angry with Sirius for not believing me; he was the one person I thought would have believed me. I guess I was wrong.

"Let's just go back to the inn--" I was interrupted by a scream.

Sirius and I looked to each other before running in the direction the scream came from.

As we turned the corner, I could see four death eaters torturing a young woman. They had placed the Cruciatus Curse on her. The woman's body withered and curled up on the ground, and her screams were piercing. Though I couldn't physically feel her pain, it sent chills down to the bones in my body.

Sirius had pulled me into the shadows of the alley. Why wasn't he letting us save this poor woman? Deep down I knew that it was because we had to keep ourselves safe as well. We needed to form a plan instead of going out there blindly, so to speak.

I followed my heart instead of my brain.

Stupid, stupid, Lily.

I pulled my wand out and charged, shouting out hexes. Unfortunately, my hexes only hit one of the death eaters. The other three stopped torturing the woman, but began to advance on me. I backed up, startled.

It felt as if all the training I had received had disappeared. I had been prepared, but as they came closer with their wands trained on me, I wasn't as prepared as I had thought.

I felt Sirius take his place next to me. But even in his presence, I did not feel safe. Why weren't they attacking yet?

Again, I made another stupid move. I looked away from my attackers to Sirius.

I didn't even have time to react. An orange light connected with my chest; it was a curse I had never heard of before. I was knocked to the ground, all breath escaped my body. I sat there, willing my body to breathe again; as I watched different colored lights brighten up the dark alley.

Sirius was battling three death eaters on his own, before I finally stood up weakly. I began shooting of hexes off left and right.

Sirius was hit with a curse that split his arm wide open, while I had managed to hit one of the death eaters with a stunning spell. Just a suddenly as the hexes began, they stopped. The two death eaters still standing, grabbed the other two before apparating away.

"Are you okay, Sirius?"

He gritted his teeth together before responding that he was in fact okay.

We both moved over to were the woman was lying unconscious. I looked to Sirius and told him to meet me at the hospital in Paris. I grabbed the woman's hand before disapparating.

I arrived at the hospital about ten minutes after Sirius did.

"What took you so long," Sirius asked, rushing up to me.

I let go of the woman's hand, nearly falling over from exhaustion. I had tried to do side-along apparation, but it was very tiresome. I ended up apparating to three different places because I could travel very far at one time. Sirius kept talking to me, but I did not hear one word he said. I was too busy looking for a chair to sit in.

Five healers rushed over to the unconscious woman and whisked her away. I sighed in relief that we had saved one innocent life tonight. I didn't even want to think about what could have happened to that woman.

A healer came over to where we were sitting.

"Are you two alright?"

"I'm fine, but he needs his arm healed," I replied, pointing to Sirius.

"Follow me please," the healer said.

"Are you sure you're alright, Lily?" His eyes showed concern.

"I'm fine."

Sirius turned back to the nurse, asking, "Can you check her out also?"

"Really that's ok. I'm fine," I waved my arm, gesturing him to follow the healer.

I felt extremely weak, but thought that I just needed rest. I closed my eyes trying to breathe in deeply.

Ten minutes went by, before Sirius came back. I had fallen asleep, only to be shaken awake.

"Wha," I asked groggily.

"Let's go back to the inn."

"I'm too tired to go anywhere. Can't we just stay here and sleep for a bit?"

"No, we have to get back to the others and alert Moody. Are you sure your fine," Sirius looked into my eyes as if the answer would be revealed.

To avoid any more questioning, I used all my strength to hoist myself up.

"Fine, let's go. I'm going straight to bed when we get there."

I walked ahead of Sirius, feeling disappointed in myself. If only I hadn't been so impatient, Sirius wouldn't have gotten hurt and we could have caught those death eaters.

Then maybe we'd be able to find Griffins and Rowell. Moody's not going to be happy I let them get away.

A/N: so I know I told you I'd update on the 6th but things obviously came up. I ended up going to my friend's grandparent's house for the 4th and stayed until the 5th. Then she stayed at my house that night and I've been a bit lazy.

It seems that my ADD. has really kicked in, because I've had such a hard time focusing on just writing. I'd write a bit, and then I'd get distracted with playing solitaire or websudoku. : )

Anyway, I'm on my way to class again, and I'm taking my comp. again to start the next chapter. Hope you enjoyed this chapter, even if it is a bit shorter than the last. The next will be longer, I promise.

--jenn.

Ps. sorry if this chapter is crappy; I'm too lazy to read over for mistakes. Thanks to everyone who reviewed, and I'm really sorry that elisgrey didn't like the last chapter. But if you'd read the summary, it clearly says LJ eventually. Anyway, mucho love : )