It was a Friday, the second of the school year. James was sitting at a table in the potions classroom, absentmindedly tapping his wand on the table, unaware of the sparks flying from the end of it. He was staring at the back of Lily Evans's head, which was shining even in the dim light of the dungeon. He scowled, still tapping his wand, as he saw her lean closer to the person who sat next to her, a skinny little grease ball named Severus Snape. Or, as James and Sirius liked to call him, Snivellus.
To the left of Lily were her two friends Alice and Mary, two Gryffindor girls that James liked quite well, but unfortunately they didn't like him any more than Lily did. It wasn't as if he had ever done anything to them, so James didn't know why they hated him, but they were talking facing away from Lily, so James could see their profiles. They kept casting strange glances at Snape and James could tell they didn't like him very much, either.
James kept watching Lily, and jumped a little when Sirius and Remus slid into the empty seats beside him, Sirius pushing Peter out of the way as Peter tried to squeeze in beside James. But Peter was overtaken by Sirius, who was a whole two heads taller than Peter. So Peter was left to the seat at the end of the table, next to Remus, who tried his best to cheer up Peter, who looked so crestfallen that he had once again lost a chance to sit next to his idol.
"Still mooning over her?" Sirius asked, casting a look at Lily. Remus gave a strangled sort of cough at the word "mooning."
"I'm not mooning," James retorted, his wand still tapping, and a spark flew over and caught on Peter's sleeve, causing him to fall out of his chair out of fright. The whole class turned around, almost all of the Slytherins snickering. So was Snape, James noticed, but even though Lily had turned around, her face was as still as a statue. He was glad she didn't laugh at his friend, and he smiled at her when he caught her eye.
She frowned again, her pretty little mouth pulling down at the corners. James sighed, and Sirius nodded. "Yup," he said, pulling out his potions book, "definitely mooning."
James placed down his wand just as the dungeon door opened and the teacher walked in. Despite their being at school two weeks now, it was still the Gryffindors' and Slytherins' first potions lesson. James wasn't sure if he liked the teacher when he first walked through the door. He looked cheerful enough, and had the beginnings of a potbelly, but he walked with a swagger in his step that caused James's mouth to set in a line.
"Good afternoon class!" the professor exclaimed in a happy voice, his tiny red lines smiling through his white beard.
"Good afternoon, Professor Slughorn!" the class chanted back, most referring to their schedules to remember his name. Professor Slughorn smiled again and picked up his role sheet, and began to call out names. Lily's name was called, and she straightened up, her hair quivering slightly, and raised her hand. Slughorn smiled at her, and then went on to calling names. Both Remus and Sirius lazily raised their hands, Remus's more from tiredness while Sirius was just trying to look cool.
Peter gave a squeak when Slughorn called his name. Once again, he almost fell out of his chair, earning a few more titters from the class. But Slughorn stopped just after calling James's name.
"Potter, James," he said, and gave a gasp. He smiled widely at James. "Well, students," he said, a bit pompously, "you may all have a little something to live up to in this class." James was confused, until Slughorn mentioned that he was the son of critically acclaimed potionist Jane Potter, James's mother.
"Oh, yes," James said, smiling, knowing Lily's eyes were on him. "I helped a bit, as well." James hoped that Lily would at least stop glaring at him so, now knowing that he had done something to make the life of another a little easier. Even though it was an accident.
"Oh ho," exclaimed Slughorn, putting his clipboard under his armpit, "really? Well, I hope you don't put the rest of these students to shame, Mr. Potter." And from there, Slughorn assigned the class a potion for removing pimples.
"Maybe Snivellus should try it first," Sirius had burst out at the word pimples. "There's a particularly nasty one on his nose that Snivellus is just itching to go away." Snape turned bright red at Sirius's words, for he had indeed been scratching his nose just as Sirius had spoken.
Lily was furious, and James could tell. Her face was tomato-like, and she gave Sirius a look quite reminding James of the one the four of them had gotten on the train. The entire class, however, had burst into laughter and even Slughorn gave a nervous smile.
"Oh, Mr. Black, you joker," he said. "But now, students, the cupboard is over there. Get to your potion-making!" And at these words, he had winked at James, who sighed. It wasn't the class that was going to have a lot to live up to. It was James himself.
James had wandered over to the cupboard, where he had accidentally grabbed onto the same jar of sea sponges that Lily was holding onto. He dropped it quickly, just as Lily did, and caused the live sponges to go flying to the floor. The shards of glass burst out over the floor, and James and Lily hastily dropped to their knees to pick up the sponges, which were trying to crawl away.
The first rule of a potioneer, James knew, was always to tell an authority if a mess had been second. Second, of course, was never to eat near a workspace. But when James made to call out Slughorn's name, he had looked up to see the teacher digging his hand in a jewel-encrusted box, and when the teacher drew his hand out of the box, James saw it was covered with the dust of yellow crystallized pineapple, a favorite of James's father.
James was still staring in horror at Slughorn when Lily asked him, "What are you staring at?" He looked at her, amazed she was talking to him, when Snape came over and tapped her shoulder.
"I'll clean up for you," he said, staring with a stony glare at James. Why did everyone hate him so? Lily nodded, and then got up and made her way back to her seat, pulling the chair in close to the table. James felt like he wanted to cry. Everything she did wanted to make James cry. He had only known her for two weeks, but he knew—he knew—he wanted to be with her forever.
Strong words for an eleven year old.
Snape's drawl broke into James's thoughts, making his heart jump wildly. He scowled as Snape began to talk, hating him. How in the world could Lily spend time with this idiot?
"Obviously, you don't know anything about potion-making, despite having a genius for a mother. You're always supposed to inform the nearest authority figure in your workspace when you have made a mess. Professor!" Snape called. James rolled his eyes. Of course he knew, he was just so disgusted that Slughorn was eating. James made to stand up, a handful of sponges in one palm and a nice little clump of broken glass in the other. "And listen," Snape said in a quieter voice as Slughorn stood up and cleaned his own hand of the pineapple crystals. "Stay away from Lily."
Snape got up, leaving James shocked. He wanted to throw down the sponges (and maybe give the glass a chuck in Snivellus's direction), and march over to Snape and slug him in the face. How dare he tell James to stay away from Lily! James could do whatever he wanted; he didn't need Severus Snape, of all people, telling him who not to talk to.
But James's mouth curved into a smile as Sirius walked up. "What's going on, mate?" Sirius asked, a little wary at the grin that was on James's face.
"Just wait, Snivellus," James muttered, so that Sirius had to strain to hear him. "We'll see who gets to talk to whom." And James walked away, leaving Sirius standing in a circle of broken glass with a look of surprise on his face.
And for the next two hours (as that day was double potions with the Slytherins), James related everything Snape had told him and everything he was feeling towards the slimeball to Remus and Sirius, inadvertently leaving Peter out of the mix. Peter, however, knew they were telling secrets and tried his best to catch what James was saying. In the end, Peter ended up catching his sleeve on fire again, much to the humor of Sirius and James.
Slughorn rang the bell for the class to stop just twenty minutes before the end of class. And to James's and Sirius's disappointment (and also delight, because it gave them a good chance to laugh at Peter) Slughorn chose Peter Pettigrew, instead of Snape, to test the finished potions. Peter had his fair share of acne across his forehead, and was deemed the perfect specimen.
Jonas Avery, one of Snape's classmates, had his potion tested first. To Peter's horror, Avery's potion caused Peter's whole face to be covered with acne, and the even reached down his neck. The entire class roared with laughter, at both Avery's stupidity and Peter's pimples, while Slughorn frowned, made a mark on the paper, and caused Peter's new pimples to vanish with a tap of his wand.
Soon, the majority of the class went, except for Remus, James, Lily, and Snape. Almost everyone had caused new spatterings of pimples to appear across Peter's forehead, and even Sirius had managed to bewitch his potion so that the pimples spelled the word, "RAT".
Remus was next, and James was pleasantly surprised to see that Remus's potion caused the entire phrase to disappear from Peter's face. Remus grinned widely, and Slughorn smiled. James was next, and he was positive his mother's potions talents had passed to him during the birthing process.
But to his dismay, James's potion was the worst in the class. Even worse than Avery's! James's supposed pimple-curing potion caused pimples to break out almost everywhere on Peter's body, and Peter's legs crossed, him doing that dance that James had first seen him do in Diagon Alley.
"Sorry, Peter," James said, meaning every word of it. Slughorn made a "tut, tut" noise, and James went to go sit back at his seat, his face red.
"Obviously, James was skipped over when the talent gene was passed down in his family," Snape said with a sneer, and James suddenly heard a chair scrape against the stone floor and Lily's scream. Before he knew what had happened, Sirius was across the room, a large fist around Snape's throat, who was steadily turning purpler.
"No, no, stop!" Lily screamed, tears pouring down her face. But even before Sirius could let go, a large bang was heard and Sirius was sent flying across the room. He knocked into a table of anxious-looking Gryffindors, and was hit on the head with one of their full cauldrons.
James looked at Snape, who was standing, with Lily at his side, with his wand pointed in front of him and at Sirius. James threw back his chair and lunged at Snape, breaking out of Remus's grasp. Snape dropped his wand out of shock, and James, amidst shouts from Slughorn and Lily, pounced on Snape, beating him repeatedly with his fists.
Snape tried to fight back, and James suddenly found himself pushed to the floor, and saw Remus standing in the middle of him and Snape. James smiled, and at a slight pain, reached up to find that his lip was bleeding severely. A black eye was forming on Snape, and Sirius was still dazed from the smack into the table, his whole body covered with pimples.
"You four!" bellowed Slughorn to Sirius, Snape, James, and Remus, picking Sirius up by the collar. "Detention, in my office, tomorrow night!" And from there, the class proceeded as normal—well, normal enough. "Miss Evans," Slughorn said, only his voice giving away the fact that he had just been frightened out of his mind, "please bring your potion." Lily came up to the front, avoiding the gaze of anyone who looked at her, and shyly handed her vial to Slughorn, who uncapped it and gave it to Sirius to drink.
Lily's potion was one of the very few that worked. In a moment, all of Sirius's pimples were gone, only a small amount of little spots that resembled freckles remaining. Lily grinned widely at Snape, who gave her a thumbs-up.
"Very, very well done, Miss Evans," said Slughorn with a smile. He marked his sheet of paper once more and Lily returned to her seat. Now only Snape remained. He handed his vial to Slughorn, who looked down on him thunderously and uncapped it. He handed it to Peter, who looked incredibly anxious, just wanting to get out of that classroom, pimple-free.
James let out a sigh of disappointment. The moment Peter swallowed the potion, every single one of Peter's acne was gone, even the strip across his forehead he had begun with. His skin was pristine, and Peter ran a hand over it, surprised to see that it felt just like a baby's bottom. Snape's face lit up, and Lily hugged him.
Just then, the bell rang. "You idiots!" Remus suddenly burst out, slamming his potions book closed. "Now we all have detention!" But James wasn't listening. Just as Snape walked by, both Sirius and James turned to face him. James's wand shot out sparks, and Snape grabbed Lily's hand and quickly pulled her out of the classroom.
"Yeah, Snivellus, you'd better run," called Sirius to Snape's back, but the picture of Lily's hand in Snape's was forever branded into James's mind.