Change of Heart
By Tempest Break

Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter. I'm reeeeally tired right now and don't feel like saying all the things I own...

Summary: James knows he's in love with Lily, and he's told her. Unfortunately, she likes Remus. Still, James has promised to give her his best shot and nothing less, unless she's officially Remus's girl. Meanwhile, they get closer and closer as friends, and don't the best of friends make the best of lovers? All James is waiting for is for Lily to have a change of heart.

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Chapter Sixteen: Gryffindor vs. Hufflepuff

James woke up early on Saturday to get ready for the Quidditch match. It had been Thursday night when Lily had followed Remus – or, as James preferred to remember it, when she had agreed to be his girlfriend. He smiled happily at the memory.

Lily, because of her cold, had been forced to miss classes on Friday, which she loathed, but James agreed to pick up notes for her as long as she stayed in bed and got better. Lily still was a few points above 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, but she had convinced Madam Pomfrey to let her out to see James's game.

James had happily informed Sirius, Remus, and Peter that Lily now called him her boyfriend. They were all glad for him. James hadn't told anyone what really happened that night, not even Remus. He and Lily had agreed not to.

For some reason unknown to James, Sirius and Colleen seemed closer than ever, after their detention, though Sirius was a bit unsettled, James thought. Sirius wouldn't tell him why, though.

"So, I heard about you and Lily," said Colleen in the locker room while pulling on her gloves. "Finally together, eh?"

"Yeah," said James with a grin.

"I was always rooting for you two," she said. "I fully approve. Just don't let her distract you during the game, Cap'n. Although, I don't expect Hufflepuff will put up much of a fight."

Almost purely out of habit, James launched into his "Don't underestimate the competition" speech. "Remember, they've got a new Chaser this year, that Martinez kid. I've heard he's fast," he warned. "Watch out for Rockwell, as usual, and Diggory's always exceptional."

Colleen rolled her eyes. "I know, I know. And I suppose Cobb has been beefing himself up all year just so he can swing the Beater stick like it's a toothpick." She smiled reassuringly at him. "Calm down, James. Ravenclaw is the team we gotta watch for, remember? The badgers of Hufflepuff were never meant to fly!"

The team assembled just behind the door to the field, waiting for Sirius to begin announcing. Small butterflies fluttered in James's stomach.

"Give it up for the Gryffindor team!" they heard Sirius shout from the pitch.

James turned to smile at his teammates, before pushing the door open. They jogged out onto the field with their brooms as Sirius introduced all of them to the audience again and the onlookers cheered. James briefly scanned a Gryffindor box for Lily's red hair. He found her and waved.

"And that was Potter down there waving to his new girlfriend, Lily Evans!" Sirius said, already giving a play-by-play. "Aren't they cute, folks?"

James turned towards the announcer's box and nodded proudly, prompting Sirius to laugh.

"And here's Hufflepuff in yellow and black," said Sirius, "coming from a defeat in their last game against Ravenclaw. There's Captain and Chaser, Chris Rockwell, followed by Sam Jordan and Rodrigo Martinez, the other Chasers. Rebecca Jacobson and Matthew Cobb next, the Beaters. Angelique Lamb, the Seeker. And last but not least, Amos Diggory, the Hufflepuff Keeper!" The Hufflepuff crowd burst into applause and cheers for Diggory. He was a fifth year, and a shoo-in for Captain next year when Rockwell left Hogwarts.

"Madam Hooch steps onto the field and gives her last words to the teams," said Sirius in a hush. "Potter and Rockwell shake hands. Madam Hooch throws the Quaffle in, and – it's caught by Rodrigo Martinez of Hufflepuff!"

Hufflepuff cheered loudly.

"But Colleen O'Brian of Gryffindor is hot on his tail," Sirius announced, "as is Jake Bell of the same team."

James wasn't too worried about Martinez catching the ball. They had practiced in case of just such an event, as Martinez was said to have a Spanish racing broom in place of a British all-purpose broom. Colleen and Jake were sticking right to the plan.

Lamb, the Hufflepuff Seeker, was hovering about one hundred feet away from James. He kept her in his sight at all times, watching her out of the corner of his eye while perusing the pitch for the Golden Snitch. He found no sight of it, so he tuned Sirius back in for a moment.

" – An excellent save by Liz Hamilton of Gryffindor!" shouted Sirius. "I thought for sure that was going in. Hamilton throws it in to Bell, and the Quaffle is off again towards the Hufflepuff goal."

James smiled. Liz hardly ever failed to stop a goal from being made; she and Diggory were Hogwarts's best Keepers. In years past, they'd had several zero-score games against Hufflepuff before one Seeker caught the Snitch.

After about ten minutes, the score was twenty to ten, in favor of Gryffindor. The immense speed of Martinez's racing broom had caught Liz off-guard once, and the Quaffle had gotten through, but she had recovered her full alertness and seemed extremely suspicious of Martinez. Jake and Cady had scored the goals for Gryffindor.

"And the ball is passed to Chris Rockwell of Hufflepuff," said Sirius, "as David Gilmore sends a Bludger straight at him! Ooh, that's gotta hurt... The ball is caught by O'Brian, and that girl is off like a rocket! Look at her go!"

James still hadn't found any trace of the Snitch. He stole a glance at Lamb, but she looked just as subdued as he. A flash of light caught James's eye, but as he turned, it turned out to only be a canary yellow Hufflepuff uniform.

"And neither Potter nor Lamb has caught sight of the Snitch yet," said Sirius almost incredulously, as the game lengthened to an hour. "The score is now forty to twenty, Gryffindor in the lead and in possession of the ball."

James chanced a look down at the field, and found that Colleen had the Quaffle and was making her way towards the Hufflepuff goal, but Martinez was going to catch her before she got there, James could see. He whipped his head around as he thought he saw the Snitch, but once again it turned out to be just a glare of the sun through his glasses.

"OY!" Sirius shouted, letting out a stream of curses. "Why that cheating little sack of – "

"Mr. Black!" McGonagall exclaimed. She paused, then said under her breath: "Although I can see what you mean…"

James turned to see what had happened, and saw to his extreme upset that Martinez had knocked Colleen from her broom and sent her hurtling towards the ground. Madam Hooch called for a time-out, and the Gryffindor team gathered around Colleen.

"Can someone get Pomfrey out here?" demanded Madam Hooch.

Colleen groaned. "Ugh, not Pomfrey," she said. "Lemme stay and finish up the game – "

"You're not getting back up on that broom until you're cleared by Madam Pomfrey," said Madam Hooch.

Colleen looked to James for help, but James shook his head. "I've got to agree with Madam Hooch on this one," he told her.

"Fine, then just let me stay until the game finishes, will you?" she asked. "I'll do commentary with Sirius or something. Just don't make me go to the Infirmary before it's over."

Madam Hooch frowned but nodded. "Fine. I'll take you up to the box." She turned to James. "Potter, do you have your reserve Chaser available?"

"Yeah," said James. "He's coming now." He nodded toward the fourth-year reserve Chaser that was jogging towards them.

"Good," said Hooch. "Now take a penalty for O'Brian and then get on with the game."

Cady took the penalty and made it, and they went back to the game with a new vigor.

"And now it seems as though Colleen O'Brian, the injured Gryffindor Chaser, will be commenting on the game with me," announced Sirius happily.

"Yep," said Colleen, her voice booming throughout the pitch. "This oughta be fun."

"Oh, yeah," said Sirius with a grin. "Now, the reserve Chaser, Benjamin Bates, has the Quaffle and is heading towards the Hufflepuff goal. He passes to Bell – but it's intercepted by Sam Jordan and he takes the Quaffle all the way down the field – "

"Doo-doo-doo!" interrupted Colleen, in an imitation of the Hogwarts bells. "Staff and students, please excuse this interruption. Just a quick reminder that everyone needs to give Colleen a Galleon. Thank you."

" – And another magnificent save by Hamilton!" continued Sirius.

James shook his head tolerantly at Colleen's antics and went back to searching for the Snitch.

A flash of gold – ! James took off after it, knowing that Lamb wouldn't be far behind. The Snitch hovered near to the ground, almost in the very center of the pitch. James dove towards the Snitch, forcing Jake to make a split-second turn to keep from hitting him.

"And Potter has seen the Snitch!" Sirius announced.

"Go James!" shouted Colleen.

"What the – ?"

James's fingers had just grazed the Snitch when someone rammed into him from the side, nearly making him fall from his broom. He caught himself just in time but turned to find that Lamb had caught the Snitch in the few seconds he had been off course.

"Who hit me?" James demanded of Jake, who had come to hover near James.

"Martinez," Jake answered sourly, his expression darkening as he glared at the Hufflepuff Chaser. "It's a foul. But I don't know what they're going to do about Lamb catching the Snitch."

Madam Hooch's whistle screeched. "Hold on, hold on," she said. "Just what's going on here? Mr. Martinez?"

The Spanish boy put on his most innocent face. "Nothing, señora. Potter just voló – er, flew – in my way."

"Not from where I was standing, señor," answered Hooch angrily. "That's a foul, and to the other team's Seeker."

"But Señorita Lamb caught the Snitch," argued Martinez.

Hooch studied them for a moment. "Potter would have caught it," she said finally. "But the on the other hand, Lamb did catch it. So I'll give ninety to Hufflepuff and sixty to Gryffindor."

Jake groaned. "That means we lost," he said. "One-thirty to one-twenty."

When Sirius was informed of the consequences, he had something to say. Unfortunately, none of it was appropriate for announcing on the Quidditch pitch, and Professor McGonagall dispelled the charm on Sirius's voice as soon as Madam Hooch told them the final scores. Colleen, however, did get some nice, colorful curses in. She was forced to apologize to the first years.

"Ugh, I'm gonna kill Martinez," muttered Lee as he and David stalked into the locker rooms. "I can't believe Hufflepuff won after that."

"Yeah," agreed David. "Besides that, he hurt Colleen. Do you know what happened to her? Did she finally go to the Infirmary?"

James nodded. "But don't worry about it, guys," he said. "We didn't lose by that much; we're still in the running for the Quidditch Cup."

"Yeah, but this is probably our last chance, eh?" put in Jake. "After you and Colleen leave, Gryffindor is going to suck."

"Speak for yourself, Bell," Lee said indignantly.

"Well, it's true, Lee," Jake retorted. "Let's face it."

Lee glared at him for a few seconds before sighing and shaking his head. "Yeah, you're right. We're going to suck."

James got dressed and walked out, meeting Lily, Remus, and Peter outside of the locker rooms. "Where's Sirius?" he asked.

"He went with Colleen," replied Remus.

"You did great, James," said Lily, and she hesitated embarrassedly before giving him a quick hug. "You should have won, though," she said when she stepped back. "I can't believe Martinez got away with that!"

"Pulling the old foreigner trick," Peter muttered.

"Just forgive and forget," said James airily – although he was certainly not going to do either of those. "I want to see Colleen and make sure she's okay. You want to come along?"

"Sure," agreed Lily. Remus and Peter nodded in consent as well, so they headed off the Quidditch Pitch toward the Infirmary.

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Tempest: Ach, I know that took wayy too long to get out. I'm really sorry. I have lots of excuses, er... One, I went to New Jersey and we have no computer there. Two, school has started. And three, I'm obsessed with X-Men: Evolution, or, more specifically, Kurt Wagner alias Nightcrawler. I know, it's really bad of me to make you guys suffer. So I'm going to try to continue this story, because I have the whole Sirius/Colleen thing mapped out and the same with Selena. So don't worry. I'll try to finish it up. I probably just won't get chapters out as quickly as I did during the summer. Please forgive me.

Er, in response to some reviews: I'm glad you guys appreciate Colleen's sentiments. To I think only one review: well, my friend on whom I based Colleen, first said, "Everybody loves a good penis joke," when we were watching Oprah of all shows at her house. I thought it was so funny that I put it up as Colleen. Since you didn't appreciate the penis jokes, you probably wouldn't like what she said when she read your review, which I also thought was funny. ; Toshadowed.phoenix: I'm so glad that you like Colleen! I know OCs aren't usually that great, so I'm really happy you like her. To Gypsy Lupin-Black: Yeah, I know. That was kinda shallow of Lily... But then again, I figure that she was pretty shaken-up by that. I also just meant that Lily wouldn't be able to love Remus because she's still a little scared of him, but she still wants to be his friend. ToLiLyeVaNsPoTTeR2 and Neko11: Hehe, so you want to see more S/C stuff, eh? Well, you just might. And of course, to Misha: How could you think I don't love you? That's just ridiculous. You're so insane, how could someone not love you? Haha.

Okay, see you all soon (hopefully). See ya! Review, review, review!!

8-04-07: This chapter has been revamped! Hope you enjoy it more than before.