Chapter 33

The following evening, the eight pupils returned to the Gryffindor Common Room, laden with bags upon bags of food and gifts. Sirius and James had bought at least four bags of Zonko's products each. They were planning on giving them to one another for Christmas. Though, everyone knew that both Sirius and James would use them up as soon as they got home the next day.

Brittney's date with Jake had been a flop. Apparently, all he had spoken of was Quidditch, and ways that he intended to overcome the Marauders. Brittney had left Jake as quickly as possible and joined her friends at Three Broomsticks. Peter seemed especially glad that she had left Jake, but he gave no reason why.

Everyone was going home for Christmas. Sirius would be going home with James, and they also said that they would be making a stop at Remus'. It was going to be the full moon the day after Christmas. Sirius and James were planning on sneaking out of James' house and meeting Remus in a clearing behind his house. None of the girls knew of this plot however, since of course the girls did not know Remus was a werewolf.

Though the three boys invited Peter to come along as well, but Peter had argued several times that he was unable to come. Peter had told the three boys that his parents wanted to take him to the Americas, to meet one of his cousins. Though none of them had ever heard of such a cousin, they believed him.

Alyssa was also going to be traveling. She would be going to Italy to visit friends of the family. The wizards who lived in Rome, still followed a lot of the old ways of the Romans. From what Alyssa had told her friend, she was quite nervous about the old saying 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do."

At first, Lily had been worried. With Alyssa going to Rome, there was no visiting the Phoenixes during the break, and there was no way she was going to be going home. She thought that she would not be able to do anything for Christmas and would be all alone. However, Alaina had invited Lily to her house for the break. Lily had never stayed at the Rileys', so she was quite nervous.

Brittney was just going home with for Christmas. As per usual, she would be traveling to several family member's houses with her older sister, Alisha. It was nothing out of the ordinary for Brittany, but she would not have any peace and quiet to herself.

That following morning, the majority of Hogwarts was leaving for the holidays. Though the voice had not reappeared, several students were frightened of its mysterious doings. So students carried their knapsacks and bags out to the school carriages, where they would take them down to Hogesmeade station. The girls sat in one carriage while the boys sat in the other. They were planning on sitting separated on the train, and even though this slightly upset Sirius and Remus, they felt they needed the time with their close friends.

So after a quick kisses good-bye and promises to meet their boyfriends on the platform before they went home, Alaina and Alyssa followed Lily and Brittney to a compartment far away from the boys. They settled down in the compartment and Lily breathed a sigh of relief. For some reason, the air just felt so much free-er without James around.

The trip was one of the most relaxing trips Lily had ever had. She was fully happy and calm sitting with her three best friends and not having to worry about the Marauders jumping in on their private conversations. Surprisingly, they left the girls alone and never once appeared in the compartment. The girls strayed away from the

topic of the Marauders and instead stayed focused on other things. They played exploding snap and talked of other students. Lily felt extremely content as the train sped towards London.

As the train slowed to a stop, Lily yawned in the sleepy silence. Brittney was curled up in a ball in the corner and Alyssa had a small speckle of drool coming out of the corner of her mouth. Alaina had her head leaning on the back of the seat, and snores were erupting from her throat. Lily giggled as thought of what Sirius would say if he saw his girlfriend in that postion.

Lily gave her wand a slight flick and a spout of water hit each of her friends. They all woke up sputtering, and Brittney fell flat on her bottom as she slid off of the compartment seat. They all did not seem to know what had occurred but Lily could not stop laughing hysterically.

After Lily's hysterics had died down, and the three girls had finished yelling at her, they gathered their bags and walked slowly through the train. It was rather crowded, and students were shoving others out of the way to get home as quickly as they could. Lily almost fell twice, and both Alaina and Alyssa actually did.

"There's Jesse!" Alaina squealed in delight. Lily watched as a boy with straight brown hair strode forward and pulled Alaina into a tight hug. He was a broad man with dark, mystifying brown eyes. His smiled was absolutly contagious and he was known to be a great man.

"'Ello, sis!" Jesse said as he squeezed his little sister tightly. Ever since Casey had died, Jesse and Alaina had grown closer, though not many thought that was possible. "I hear you girls had quite a scare!" Alyssa swatted him gently on the arm.

"Nope. We handled it just fine, thank you!" Brittney said, with a slight air of mock arrogance. "Not that they helped at all." Lily groaned as she looked over to where Brittney was currently pointing. The Marauders had just gotten off of the train and were heading there way. Much to Lily's surprise, James bypassed her and walked straight to his parents, without a word. Though Lily felt her stomach churn, she chalked it up to not eating enough on the train, not that she was worried.

Worried? Ha! Why would she, Lily Evans, be worried about James Potter not talking to her?

Why?

They arrived at the Riley's house at about eight o'clock. It was not as nearly as grand as the Phoenix's but had a nice, quaint quality to it. It had a country, rustic style to it. The walls and floors of the house were made of polished oak wood, casting a smoky feel to the house. As soon as Lily opened the door, she found herself staring at a a set of stairs, leading up to a vast hallway. To her right, she could clearly see an open space where the kitchen and dining room where located. To her left, was a red carpeted living room, with low burning candles that threw soft dancing lights over the red furniture. Lily felt the extreme need to go throw herself down on the couch and wrap herself up in a blanket to take away her thoughts of James.

"Do you like?" Lily looked up and was surprised to see the handsome boy standing next to her. She nodded her head slowly and turned back towards the living room. She was surprised to feel the blush creep up her cheeks when Jesse spoke to her. She of course had once had a small crush on Jesse when he was still attending Hogwarts, but she had thought she had gotten over it. However, this was obviously not the case.

"Lils!" Alaina said and Lily spun around quickly and saw her stumbling in, carrying both her bag and Lily's. She rushed forward to take her bag from Alaina, but was a little bit more than surprised to see that Jesse had grabbed it first.

"There is no reason why some one as beautiful as you should be doing this kind of manual labor." Jesse whispered and a red tint occupied itself on Jesse's defined cheeks. He smiled shyly at Lily and went up the stairs to what Lily thought more than likely was Alaina's bedroom.

Lily turned slowly towards Alaina, slightly frightened about what she was to see. As she expected, Alaina was smirking at Lily with her hands on her hips. "You like him again, don't you, Lily?" She stated, knowingly. Instead of answering, Lily wandered of into the living to do as she wanted. She plopped herself down on the couch and wrapped her arms tightly around herself, wishing that it was Jesse's arms, instead.

"At least he could have taken my bag, too." Alaina mumbled, and she marched up the stairs, her bag in tow. Lily giggled and stood up off of the couch. She walked over to the book shelf and stared at the framed pictures. Many of them were off a fifteen year old, brown curly haired boy with loving brown eyes. Lily felt tears coming to her eyes as she looked upon the face of Casey Riley, Alaina's dead brother.

One picture caught her eye, and she smiled when she realized the three siblings were all in it together. It looked to be a Muggle barbeque, as there balloons everywhere and the they were eating hot dogs off of a paper plate. All three of them were waving merrily up at Lily. Alaina looked extremely happy snuggled between her younger brother and older brother. Casey was gobbling his hot dog as fast as he could, ketchup dripping down his chin. Jesse had is arm thrown haphazardly around her shoulders, and Lily could not help but envision that it was Lily in Alaina's place. She reached out and touched the cold, dusty glass with her fingertips. She gently touched Jesse's face, and he jumped in his picture, his lovely green eyes growing wide. Alaina and Casey were both smirking at Jesse.

A warm hand enclosed around Lily's and she jumped at the contact. She spun around quickly and saw that Jesse was standing there, a familiar smirk on his face. Jesse laced his callused fingers within Lily's and she loved the feeling of his rough, tan skin against her pale fingers. He leaned forward and pressed his lips close to her ear.

"Dinner's ready." He turned around and walked out of the room, leaving Lily gaping and wanting much more contact than she had just had with Alaina's brother.