As the train whistle blew, Lily looked up to watch the train arrive. Platform 9 ¾ was always crowded, but at this time, there were but a few people. Usually, Lily wasn't the first one there, but her sister Petunia had a birthday party to go to, and since they were already going out, they decided to drop Lily off early. She sighed and sat down on a nearby bench. They wouldn't let anyone on the train yet, first they had to go through all of the compartments, checking for stowaways – or, even worse, Death Eaters. Plus engine checks, cleaning debris from the wheels, etc...
She crossed her arms over her stomach and closed her eyes. It really wouldn't take all that long, with the use of magic, of course. But... It was still a bit boring. Nothing to do, no one to talk to. Absolutely, nothing.
About half an hour passed, and there was a crowd gathering, and the train whistle blew again, signaling that people could start getting on the train. Lily stood and uncrossed her arms. Before she could even move towards her luggage, three different pairs of hands reached down and grabbed her stuff for her. She looked up and frowned. James and Sirius were grinning, and Remus was shaking his head apologetically, as if they had ganged up on him to make him help them with all this nonsense.
"Hey, Evans, how was your summer?" This came from James, who was still grinning, holding her stuff. Her eyes flicked from James to Sirius and finally landed on Remus. She smiled at Remus, and stepped over to give him a friendly hug.
"Remus! How have you been? Why did you pick up my bags? I can get them myself." And with saying that, she reached down and grabbed her luggage out of Remus's hands.
He frowned and let go of her bags, without resistance, which earned him a glare from James. Both Remus and Lily ignored it. "So," Remus began, "You're a prefect this year, right?"
Lily nodded. "Yeah, so are you, am I right?"
"I guess. So we'll be working together often." He shrugged. "At least we know each other. We won't be as distant as the Slytherin's prefects are."
"Yeah, but all Slytherins are all that unsocial." She sighed.
Glancing over at James for a second, she noticed him narrowing his eyes at something behind her. She turned her head, and seeing who was behind her, grinned. Severus Snape, one of her best friends, was standing right behind her, one of his eyebrows raised.
"What about Slytherins now?" Severus had frown on his face, but his voice held laughter.
Lily turned all the way around, and mock frowned. "Oh, come on, Sev! Both you and I know you're unsocial. There's no use hiding it."
Severus shook his head and smiled at her, a boyish smile. "Yeah, but so what? There are plenty of unsocial Gryffindors."
Lily scoffed. "Like who?" Severus opened his mouth then closed it, shaking his head. "Hah! You can't think of a one can you?"
James's gaze bore into Lily's back, trying to drill it's way through to Severus. Well, yeah. Good luck. They were both ignoring him. Out of the corner of his eye, James spotted some Slytrherins coming their way, headed towards Severus. James frowned, and shoved Lily's suitcase into Remus's arms, then stalked over to Lily. Gripping her by the upper arm, he began dragging her away from Severus.
"Come on now, let's let the big bad snake play with its friends." James said.
Lily was bristling. How rude of him! Just dragging her away like that. Digging her heels into the ground, she yanked away from James. They were near the train now. "What is your problem, you ugly git?!" Remus and Sirius, who were following them, promptly stopped at her angry voice. Yeah, Lily was scary when she was angry.
"Well, I thought it was a good time to get you away from that Snivellus. Reinforcements were on their way." She narrowed her eyes at him, and he grinned. "Hey, do you wanna go out with me?"
The sudden change of subject threw the three of them off guard. Remus was the first one to recover, and he shook his head. "James..." He sighed. Lily and Sirius were the next ones to recover.
"Why would I go out with an arrogant wizard who knows nothing of sensitivity?" She shook her head.
James frowned slightly, giving her "the puppy dog face." "Oh, come on Evans, you know you like me."
"Oh yes, I am completely and utterly in love with you. Forgive me for the error of my ways." And with that, she stormed off, one suitcase in her hand, towards the train and got on.
James frowned after her. "Was she being sarcastic there?" He muttered.
Remus and Sirius said, in complete unison, "Not at all."
Before James could say anything back, Remus asked, "James, do you have a death wish?" James looked – glared – at him and shook his head.
Sirius sighed, and asked, "How many times has she said no to you now?" James murmured something incoherent. "What was that?" Sirius asked.
James glared at him and answered, "Thirty-eight."
When they entered, they were flooded by a wave of conversation. They weaved their way through the tables, and found an open spot on the Gryffindor table's benches. "So," James said, "Back to the issue at hand." Sirius looked at him in confusion.
"And which issue may that be? There's so many of them!" James just looked at him, and Sirius grinned. "Oh, that issue."
James sighed. "Any ideas on what to do to him?"
Sirius jumped up and said, loudly, "We could dump him in the lake!" The entire great hall got quiet. Everyone turned to look at them. James felt like punching him, but resorted to throwing a cupcake in his face instead, frosting side up.
"You idiot."
Severus was sinking into his chair, obviously knowing who they were talking about. Lily wasn't even there to scold the two Marauders. Damn.
The conversation had gone on in the Great Hall, everyone knowing that the Marauders always did this kind of thing, and they decided to ignore it. No one wanted attention junkies.
"How are we gonna get him down there, though?" Sirius asked in a quieter tone while he wiped frosting off of his face.
"Well, we could send him a letter from Evans, but of course he would realize the difference in handwriting. We could have Evans walk down to the lake, and he would follow her..." Sirius kept quiet. It wasn't a good idea to interrupt James' ramblings. He would get... angry. "I got it!" He even snapped his fingers! "We could back him into a corner and petrify him!" Sirius nodded. Hah, he would never see it coming.
James stood up, and headed out to the door with Sirius trailing behind him. If they were lucky Severus would walk out alone, to seek solitude in the Slytherin common room. If only so he wouldn't be dumped the lake.
And just like the good little Slytherin he was, he came out alone and headed toward the Slytherin common room. Hearing a sound behind him, he began to turn around while at the same time pulling out his wand. But, alas, he wasn't fast enough.
"Pertrificus Totalus!"
He had the split second to register the voice as Sirius's, when all his joints locked up, and he couldn't move his muscles. Well... crap. No there was no way of getting out of the idiotic prank. He then felt some kind of cloth drape over him. They started dragging him in one direction, and before he knew it the were out near the forest by the Black Lake.
"Levicorpus!"
Severus levitated in the air, while still petrified, and, at the same time over the lake, He was dropped and unpetrified. There was a big splash as he went under the water. He surfaced, and took a deep breath, eyeing the shore. James and Sirius were laughing at him and his soaked self. They stopped laughing and looked over their shoulders, gave each other one look, and split, each running in a different direction. Severus sighed, and debated whether he should shout something obscene after them, but before he made up his mind, something wrapped around his ankle, and dragged him towards the shore. His head went under for a few seconds, and he couldn't breath. The thing around his ankle loosened its grip on him, and Severus surfaced coughing and sputtering. He looked up and he was sitting in shallow water.
He heard a sigh from the side of him, and looked over.
"Having a nice swim, Mr. Snape?"
It was the potion's master, and the Slytherin's Head of House, Professor Slughorn.
Back in the Gryffindor common room, Sirius, Remus, and James were sitting next to the fire. Sirius and James were laughing at their little prank on Severus. Remus was shaking his head, and mentally calling the two idiots.
"Sure." Sirius said, "Today has been pretty weird, but I do know one good thing that came out of the day." They all looked at him. Sirius grinned "I got a girl."