A/N

In response to a question, I did say that Alice was Head Girl. I'm really not going for perfect accuracy here. I don't even know if she's in the same year as Lily or not, but I don't like making up new characters, they never fit in with the real ones. And as you can see, I've completely left Peter out of this. I really don't like Peter.

Also, I really appreciate any and all of the constructive feedback I can get, and I'll always answer any questions that are posed to me.

Lily was late to Herbology. But when she walked into the second greenhouse, she didn't rush or stumble. Instead, she held her head high and almost strolled by the rest of her house, taking her usual position on Professor Sprout's left side. "Sorry I'm late Professor." She said simply, and left it at that. Excuses weren't Lily Evans' style.

Instead of deducting points or demanding where her student had been, Professor Sprout nodded and went on with her lesson. "So as you can see, although you all learned about the Devil's Snare in your first years at Hogwarts, it will most likely be a reoccurring theme on you N.E.W.T.'s. It is a simple, yet very dangerous plant, but if one forgets how to deal with it, it can and will have very deadly consequences."

Lily looked gravely at the plant sitting innocently in the pot before her. She focused on it, taking in the shape of the leaves and the strange way that the stems remained motionless, hiding. One corner of her mind registered that a question was being posed to the class, but strangely, she felt no need to pay attention or to try to answer.

She took out her wand and prodded one of the leaves curiously. It sprang into action, and Lily jerked her wand away with a sharp gasp, just soon enough to keep it out of the malicious grasp of the plant.

Alice looked at her, frowning. She whispered, "Lily, you shouldn't."

The redhead bowed her head slightly, and continued to stare at the plant. She remembered the lessons they'd had so many years before on Devil's Snare. It was a tricky plant, which would entwine anything within its strong vines, and tighten aggressively when it sensed resistance. When it sensed resistance, Lily thought to herself. I wonder…

With a slow breath, she reached her hand out and stroked a leaf. Instantly, a vine whipped out and circled her wrist, tightly cutting into her skin. Next to her, Alice let out a small shriek, startling the rest of the class, but Lily sat quietly.

James stood up suddenly, but both Sirius and Remus grabbed hold of his robes, keeping him in place. "Sit down James!" Sirius hissed at him. He sat down reluctantly, worry written all over his face.

"Miss Evans!" Professor Sprout cried, shocked at her behavior.

But Lily didn't move. The sharp pain she'd first felt was dwindling. She took careful breaths, and eventually the vine loosened its hold. She looked up, and saw several surprised faces looking back at her. "It's okay, see?" She said calmly, and pulled her arm away mere centimeters at a time. And the vine let her go, curling back into itself.

"Miss Evans, what was that all about?" Professor Sprout asked sharply, not used to one of her quietest students doing something so blatantly against her rules.

"Oh, Professor, I was just thinking of the lesson you gave us back in first year. And I remember that part of the plants power comes from the resistance of the thing that touches it. I wanted to see if it would let me go if I didn't resist." Lily said sheepishly.

"Not one of your best ideas, Evans." Sirius piped up from across the greenhouse, giving her a wide smile that contradicted his words. Obviously, he had thought it was brilliant. It didn't escape Lily's attention that James elbowed him fiercely in the ribs, but she pretended it had.

"For once, Mr. Black, I agree with you." Professor Sprout said in good humor. Then she leaned closer to inspect Lily's wrist. "Young lady, you should probably escort yourself to the Hospital Wing and get that cleaned up."

"Oh!" Lily said in surprise as she looked down at her wrist and saw a thin line of blood circling around it. "I didn't realize it was so strong." She stood up and quickly picked up her things and walked out, still looking at her arm with faint interest.

Alice caught up with Lily while she was on her way to Potions later that morning. She looked at her friend carefully. She seemed fine, her wrist was lightly bandaged, but she moved with a newfound spring in her step that Alice hadn't expected to see. "Pepper-up potion?" She asked.

"What?" Lily asked. "Oh, no. It was just nice to leave class early. And it was really cool to play with that plant."

"It's not just a plant Lily, it's the Devil's Snare. You should be more careful." Alice said responsibly.

"Sprout was right next to me. What's the worst that could have happened?" Lily reasoned.

"Well, you're lucky it let you go. Anyway, how's your wrist?"

Lily held up her arm and they both examined it closely. "Madame Pomfrey just shook her head and sighed when I told her what happened. Then she wrapped it up and sent me on my way. She didn't even look worried."

"Only worried for your sanity, Evans." A boisterous voice cut in.

Lily rolled her eyes. "Yes Black, because compared to attempting to transfigure your mates into furniture or giving yourself a Shrinking Solution is much more sane than touching a Devils Snare."

"We had to shrink ourselves, Evans, how else would we have been able to infiltrate the ranks of the house elves?" Sirius explained jovially.

"Oh of course, that makes perfect sense." Lily said snidely.

"Why did you need to transfigure each other?" Alice asked curiously, trying to settle the tension.

But this caused Sirius' smile to freeze on his face, and his eyes darted to James and Remus. Remus gave a jerk, and dropped his bag on the floor. James forced a smile onto his face. "No comment, Alice."

The three boys steered themselves away after Remus had finished picking up his books off the floor. Alice raised her eyebrow at Lily. "Well, that was odd."

"At least they never tried to transfigure either of us into armchairs." Lily pointed out with a laugh.

Alice laughed too. "That would have been less than amusing. All right, lets go to class. I hope Slughorn has something interesting today." And they trailed after the boys.

Sirius and Remus took their seats in the middle of the potions classroom. Sirius muttered something along the lines of "… that old codger Slughorn…" as he sat down. He'd always had a bit of a good-natured grudge against the head of Slytherin House.

James stood awkwardly, glancing at the door until Lily and Alice walked through. As they sat down, he hefted his bag with a deep breath and took a step in their direction.

"James." Remus spoke quietly, stopping him. "Do you really want to do this now?"

James looked back at him, looking grave. "Rather sooner than later." And he kept going.

Remus shook his head. "Any time has got to be better that while Slughorn is teaching us about antidotes."

Sirius nodded. "This should be interesting."

James could hear his friends talking as he walked towards Lily and Alice, but he couldn't stop himself. He sat down at the desk behind them, and noticed when the redhead stiffened in her seat. James slowly took out his copy of Advanced Potion Making, a scrap of parchment and a quill.

Professor Slughorn moved to the front of the class in his usual manner, beginning his lesson at once. James scribbled some of the things the man said on his parchment, but it was sporadic and mostly useless information. Lily, on the other hand, he noticed, was devotedly taking notes. Her hand was clenched so tightly around her quill that her knuckles were white.

It didn't take long before James stopped trying to take notes at all. He put down his quill and sat back in his chair decidedly. To anyone else in the classroom it looked as if the teenage boy had given up and was staring blankly into space. But James carefully took in Lily's movements. When she stopped writing, she opened and closed her right hand rapidly, stretching out the muscles that had to be cramping up by now.

His eyes followed her hand as it pushed her hair back, tucking it behind her ear so that it wouldn't fall in her face. Her fingertips occasionally drummed the surface of the worn wooden desk, giving off a muffled tapping sound so light that he might not have heard it if he wasn't watching so closely.

He remembered how she'd looked this morning. Instead of looking put together, with her hair, as it was now, bangs carefully pinned back and hair combed, it had been wild and messy. Instead of her wrinkle free school robes and newly polished shoes, she'd been wearing an oversized sweater and mismatching socks.

Those socks. James thought with a smile. He hadn't been able to give them a close examination, what with their frazzled conversation, but he distinctly remembered his surprise when he saw she hadn't noticed or cared that they were different. While he pictured them in his mind, his smile grew, and it finally caught Slughorn's attention that one of his students was obviously not paying the slightest attention to his lesson.

"Mr. Potter, are you paying attention?" He reprimanded sharply, shuffling over to where James sat alone at a table.

"Yes sir?" James blurted out on instinct. Then he paused and took a second to absorb what the professor had just said. "I mean, of course I'm paying attention."

"Let me see your notes." Slughorn said with dry humor.

"Right. My notes. Well, you see Professor-" James started, but was cut off.

"Just as I thought. Ten points from Gryffindor, Mr. Potter, and if you'd like to keep it at ten, I'd advise you to pick up your quill." Slughorn gave him a small smile. "And do try to focus on what I'm saying."

"Yes sir." James said, and picked up his quill. Slughorn, satisfied, moved back to the front of the room and continued lecturing on antidotes. James wrote down a few of the things he said. A bezoar is an antidote against most poison, he thought slowly as he drew the letters. As he was drawing a goat next to this on the parchment, his attention was stolen away again. Lily sneezed.

"Bless you Evans." He whispered, against his better judgment. He could almost hear Sirius berating him in his head.

Lily spun around in her seat furiously. "Shove it Potter." She warned, and turned back around just as fast.

Alice put a hand on her shoulder and murmured something to Lily that he couldn't hear, and James felt frustration sweep over him. A bloke can't even say 'bless you' around here. Slughorn glanced over and James shrugged at him. "Ten more points, Mr. Potter. Please pay attention."

I just can't win, James thought, and spent the rest of the double period writing a letter home to his mum. She was always writing him, and every time he got a letter he felt a little guiltier that he never wrote back. And seeing how it was going to be impossible to pay attention or speak to Lily, he might as well look like he was busy.