"Lily," then a banging sound "Lily, wake up!" Lily awoke with a start. It wasn't every dream that tells you to wake up. It wasn't a dream at all. She looked at the clock on the bedside table. It was 3:00 in the morning. Lily looked the other way out the window-doored balcony and saw someone on a broomstick. Brow furrowed, she marched through the doors so that she could see better, for it was dark except for the full moon outside. She nearly fell over when she saw who was on the broomstick. It was none other than Sirius Black.

"God, Sirius, you should wait until daylight, at least before waking a girl out of her beauty sleep." Lily scolded him groggily. "Sorry about that, but Lily, James…err James is in trouble!" Sirius spoke with severe urgency in his voice.

"What happened? Will he be alright?" Lily was beginning to panic. It wasn't that Lily was getting worried about James because she liked him or anything…this was James Potter we're talking about, but she was naturally scared for someone if his or her life was in danger.

"He went off to fly his feelings off…was getting pretty worried when you didn't reply to his message. He said he'd be back in half an hour, but it's been three times that long and he still hasn't come back." Sirius said.

"Why did you come to me then?" Lily asked suspiciously.

"Because you're the only person available. Remus is in Egypt on vacation, and Peter…I'm not sure where Peter is. He hasn't been very talkative this summer. So will you hop on and help me save James, or what?" Sirius was now getting visibly impatient.

"Oh, fine!" Lily said exasperatedly, "Just no crazy quidditch stunts. I'm not very used to the broomstick."

"Deal." Agreed Sirius, "Now hop on before James dies of age."

Lily rolled her eyes at his boyishness and mounted the broom behind Sirius. It felt weird, holding onto Sirius's waist, but Lily decided that maybe…maybe it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be, holding onto a boy's waist…being this close to him…

At that moment, Sirius took a surprising dip, making Lily scream. Sirius grinned (Lily couldn't see his face, but she could tell that he was smiling from his cute little dimples…) 'Wait a second…cute dimples? This is not normal. Not. Normal. Okay, what's Sirius jinxed this time…no he can't jinx anything, we're not in school yet. Then…that couldn't mean…' But it was true and Lily knew it. She had a crush on Sirius Black. At the same convenient time that James was in danger because she had never replied to his little love letter.

As Lily sat on the back of the broom, pondering, they had come to a sort of wood-y area. How were they supposed to find James in this? As if reading her mind…perhaps from her goggling eyes mixed with an expression of hopelessness on her face, Sirius said, "We're going down lower to look for him. Hold on." And they descended downward into the trees, so they could see James better. The sun was just coming up when he stopped the broom so they could take a break. This gave Lily time to ask Sirius a few questions.

"So," Lily said as they walked together around the small clearing they had stopped in, "Out of the total girlish curiosity that I have, how's James, besides the fact that he's been lost in the woods for several hours?" Sirius smiled at this. 'Awww,' Lily thought, 'His smile's even cuter from the front!'

"Your not a girl." Sirius said evenly. "Oh, right I forgot, I'm an alien life form." Lily said back, rolling her eyes. Sirius gave her a quizzical look, and she laughed. "I almost forgot, you're not muggle-born." Sirius continued to look confused, so she continued, "Muggle scientists think there is life up in space…you know, on the planets. An alien is what they call it." Sirius's look turned from confusion to amusement. "Have they had any luck?" he asked. Lily gave him a do-I-have-to-answer-that-question-because-its-seriously-obvious look and he answered with a smile and a shrug.

Lily was just about to ask him how James was again when they heard a moan. They looked up into the branch above them and saw James in it, his broomstick, she saw, had fallen into the crook of a branch, and besides a few scratches, it seemed okay to ride. James himself…he didn't look so good. He had scratches and bruises all over his visible body parts.

"Sirius…he can't go on the train like this!" Lily said. She was scared for James. She just was. He looked really banged up.

Sirius on the other hand called up to James, "Erm…James? What hurts?"

"Everything." He groaned.

Sirius looked at Lily, and for once in a lifetime, the mischievous glint had left his eye. He looked scared. He was looking to Lily for help. Lily gave her newfound crush a reassuring smile, and then called up to James, "Its okay James, we're going to get you down, and then see about getting you onto the train to Hogwarts."

At the sound of her voice, James lifted his head up an inch or so and said "Lily, what are you doing here?"

"Look James, just stay put, we're going to get you down, and…" Lily stopped mid sentence with a new thought that had her stumped. How were they to get back? James was by no means in a condition to ride a broomstick, so Sirius would have to take him passenger. But then that would leave her to ride James' broom.

Sirius had silently begun to carefully pull James from the tree, leaving Lily just standing there.

Lily started to help as well. She moved his arm around her shoulder, and Sirius had the other one around him.

"Sorry about this, James." Lily said before pulling forward, Sirius at her side, together they pulled a grumbling James off of the tree branch. Once off, he stood up with great difficulty.

"There we go, see, he's tough!" Sirius said, as though to say 'I was never really scared' But Lily could see right through the comment of reassurance (Although, he was probably trying to reassure himself more than anyone else…)

Lily, with no choice, now grabbed James' broom from where it had landed when they pulled James down. She mounted it. In front of her, the straw on the end of the broom was sticking out every which way. Behind her, in golden letters, Shooting Star 23 had been engraved.

To her right, Sirius was laughing hysterically, and even though it caused James obvious pain, he couldn't help but give a hearty chuckle.

"What is so funny?" Lily asked them, in that you-are-so-stupid voice that she had developed over the last couple of years. Although, she felt like the stupid one in this situation.

This, however, only had made it worse. Sirius was rolling on the ground laughing, with tears in his eyes, and James was doing the same, minus the rolling…he was leaning on a tree for support.

"Say James, looks like we need to give her a flying lesson…" Sirius said, wiping the tears from his eyes.

"Hey! She's not going anywhere on that broom, especially if she's the one controlling it." James replied quickly.

Lily now was confused. Why were they laughing at her? Had she something on the back of her pajama trousers? She brushed her hand behind her back in a loose careless way. Nope, all clear.

"Flying tip number one," James said, walking over to her and pulling his broom out from under her. For the first time, she noticed he had a slight limp. He must have twisted his ankle when he wrecked. When he saw Lily staring at it, he gave her an its-fine look and continued, smiling, "Mount the broomstick."

Lily still looked confused, and made sure he knew it. She had mounted the broomstick. Yeah. Hilarious. Whoopdeedoo.

James tried hard to conceal his laughter by continuing matter-of-factly "The least you can do is mount it the right way!" And they started laughing all over again.

The comment hit Lily like she had just ran headlong into a tree. Of course! Why had she forgotten that?

"Well…" Lily said. She had better not say anything about flying, or they would start laughing all over again, so she continued, "How else are we supposed to fly back?"

James was now looking at her with a combination of pity and amusement.

"Step away from the broom." He answered, not blinking, staring at her all the while.

She did as he said. Partly because he now had such a vicious look on his face that she was genuinely scared, and partly because it was rightfully his broom, so she sort of had to do it, didn't she?

He walked over to it, and mounted it.

"James," Sirius said, "Are you sure you can fly? I mean…you just wrecked into a tree, man. Ride with me, buddy," but James had already gone towards the house.

"Well!" Lily said, surprised. She had never, in her life seen anyone act like that…Except maybe the cheesy scary-movies that her parents watched sometimes. "What was that all about?"

"I personally would not like to find out." Sirius replied. He, too had never seen anyone (or at least James) behave that way before. He mounted his broom, (The right way) and gestured for Lily to get on behind him.

"My family will send my things, James knows that I'm taking you back, I guess. He'll be sure to tell my parents to send my trunk to school." Sirius said over the wind as they soared off into the depths of the early-morning sunrise.