Cool, I love all the reviews! Sorry about the delay, the dumb website wouldn't let me log in. So, here's chapter two, hope you like it!
Disclaimer: I unfortunately do not own Harry Potter. That would be J.K. Rowling.
Chapter Two
I piled the last of the patched-up, hand-me-down items into the worn trunk. Finally, a chance to be normal, a chance to go to an actual school! Professor McGonagall had written back the next day, saying that they would be very pleased to let me into Hogwarts and that I would be sorted into a House before the feast started.
"Lily!" I heard a shrill voice call. "It's time to go! We can't miss the train!" I sighed contentedly. This is what I had been dreaming about for so long-being able to jump onto the Hogwarts Express with Petunia and speed off towards a school that didn't have a maniac father that could hurt me.
I obliged with Alison's request, lugging my trunk downstairs, though with some difficulty, because my father didn't heal the wounds I had completely, so I would still have to suffer slightly. That was okay, though- once I got to Hogwarts, I could magically knit my bones back together without the Ministry coming to our door and demanding a hearing because I broke section twelve in the decree of Underage Magic or something like that.
I got downstairs with three glaring pairs of eyes boring into my face.
"Hurry up, or else we'll miss the train," Petunia snapped. I just shrugged and followed her out that door and into the car that we owned, shoving my trunk into the backseat.
The entire way to the train station, Petunia mostly just talked about how talented she was and how her friends were probably just dying to see her.
Yeah, I thought, smirking, I'd probably be dying if I had to see Petunia's face soon, too.
The rest of the car paid no attention to me whatsoever, and that suited me just fine. Mostly, if anyone ever talked to me at all, it was either to order me to make one of their meals or to tell me to get my lazy ass down to the first floor so my father could beat me up some more.
Finally, we reached King's Cross. I marveled at all the amount of people that were there when I got out. And the trains- they were so big! Much bigger than the ones that were depicted in Muggle books.
I wasn't sure where to go, as I'd never been anywhere even near the train station, so I just followed Petunia, Jon, and Alison to the stone pillar that was in between platforms nine and ten.
Odd, I thought as I studied my ticket properly for the first time, it says Platform Nine and Three Quarters…I don't see a Platform Nine and Three Quarters anywhere around here…
Petunia gave my father and Alison a quick peck on the cheek, threw me a dirty look, and ran at the pillar. I was prepared to laugh when she toppled over, but Petunia didn't crash into it- she went through it.
I gaped at where her jogging form had disappeared, my eyes wide with shock. They did that? With Muggles everywhere?
I still had my mouth open when my father shoved me forward, growling, "Go, you lazy ass, or someone will notice us." I clamped my jaws shut, grasped the handlebar of my trunks, and ran forwards, flinching slightly when I went through the magical barrier, even though I knew it couldn't hurt me.
Gasping slightly from my throbbing ribs, I glanced around Platform Nine and Three Quarters. Parents and students, some in Muggle clothes, others already in their school uniforms, were milling around, saying their last goodbyes to their families and boarding the train. I spotted a large group of people about my age and just followed them, as I had nobody that would want to even acknowledge I existed.
The bright red Hogwarts Express had many compartments, some large, and others rather small. Most of them were already occupied by other students, but eventually, I found one that was completely devoid of other children.
Mostly, I was left in peace, but about two minutes before the train started to chug away from the station, a group of four kids made their way into my compartment.
"Can we sit here? The rest of the train's full," one black-haired girl said. I nodded silently and scooted over as much as I could towards the window so that everyone had enough room to relax comfortably.
For the better part of an hour, I just stared out the window, observing the slowly changing landscape. Later, though, one of the boys seemed to just notice I was there, and he asked, "Hey, who're you?"
"Um…Lily. My name's Lily. I'm going into fifth year," I clarified.
"Lily…I didn't know we had a Lily in our year," mused one of the girls.
"I'm new," I explained. "My dad's homeschooled me up until now." For some reason, this made the children's' eyes narrow slightly.
"What's your last name?" questioned the first boy, his voice now remarkably cooler.
"Evans. Lily Evans," I told him, confused. Why did they start acting all weird when I told them about me?
Abruptly, the black-haired girl stood up. "Let's go find another compartment, everyone. I don't want to sit here anymore," she proclaimed icily. The others nodded and left in her wake, leaving Lily upset and confused.
Why don't they like me? She wondered. They don't even know me. She pondered over the incident for a couple more moments, but then shrugged it off.
Hey, she thought, it's not my problem if they don't want to be my friends. With that thought, I A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot out of my bag and started off where I left at home, chapter thirty seven, The Witch Hunts at Salem. After a while, though, sleep deprivation from the previous night got to me, so I laid my book bag down and slipped into a thankfully dreamless, peaceful sleep.
Nothing disturbed me for three more hours. After those one hundred eighty minutes, though, muffled whispering shook me back into consciousness.
Four boys' curious faces greeted me as my eyes cracked open. There was a short, pudgy little student that looked remarkably like a rat; a tall, lean one that had sandy hair and sharp, bruise-like bags under his eyes; one had black, shaggy mane that fell just above his shoulders, his eyes very nearly the color of coal, and the final one had hazel eyes, with a mop of unruly dark hair sitting atop his head. Somewhat dazed, I stared at them openly. Why would they want to come talk to me?
"Um…hi," I breathed, a little winded. Not because of rat boy, of course, but because of the other three, who were all handsome in their own personal way. None of them had the raw good-looks of the shaggy-haired one, but mystery for the one who seemed extremely tired and a sort of mischievous devil sort of sense for messed-up hair dude defiantly was working for the other two.
"Hey," hazel-eyes said, smiling. My breath caught in my throat. "So…you're Lily Evans, right?"
"W- Yeah," I replied, a little puzzled. How did they know my name? "And who are you?"
"Oh, sorry. Over there, that's Peter Pettigrew," he gestured towards the pudgy one, who smiled in an almost fan-like way, "Remus Lupin," the sandy-haired one waved, "Sirius Black," the boy with long hair grinned at me, wiggling his eyebrows, "and I'm James Potter," he finished, pointing at himself with another smile.
Nobody said anything for a moment, but after a while, Sirius blurted out, "So is it true?"
I was thoroughly bewildered now. "Is what true?" I questioned.
James smacked Sirius on the shoulder. "Way to be subtle, dunderhead," he hissed. Sirius just rolled his eyes and continued to answer me.
"Do you have a…you know… a criminal record?" he asked bluntly. Again, James smacked him.
"Do you even know the meaning of the word subtlety?" he said in exasperation.
Meanwhile, I was in shock. Do I have a criminal record? Why the hell would they think that?
"Um…I- you- why?" I didn't actually get a coherent sentence out, but James seemed to understand, because he continued to study me while leaning back towards the others, muttering, "See, I told you it wasn't true."
Now that the shock was wearing off, I was beginning to get mad. "So who the hell told you this?" I asked hotly, my eyes narrowing as I backed away from them. James put his hands up in a gesture of surrender.
"Well, see, it's kind of like…" but I didn't hear anymore. The position his hands were in, a gesture of surrender or not, was what Jon did to me when he beat me up. Reflexively, my body curled up into a ball, and I whimpered quietly. Not quietly enough, though, because James stopped his explanation at once and stared at me, dropping his arms.
"Mate, what do you do when a hot girl has a nervous breakdown?" Sirius asked in a hushed tone, sounding a little nervous. This time, Remus was the one who connected his hand with Sirius's back.
"Shut up, you prat," he said, though there was no venom in his voice, so it sounded as if the phrase was greatly worn and overused.
"I'm not sure," James replied, who seemed to have taken Sirius's question seriously. "Here, let me try this…"
He leaned over towards me and lifted up his hands. I shrank back even farther, so now I was totally pressed up against the scarlet seats. James didn't give up, though; he reached towards me more, and when his skin touched mine, he rubbed soothing circles on my arm.
He did this for a couple of seconds; when he felt me relax, he moved in closer and sat next to me, now massaging my back. I sighed- his hands were amazingly gentle and warm, so they felt good against my sore muscles.
I let my eyes slide close and allowed my head to lean over the back of the seat. I wasn't asleep, but apparently, the boys thought I was, because a few minutes after I had done this, they began to talk about me in whispers.
"So…she doesn't have a criminal record, and that means that she never randomly attacked helpless Muggles for no reason. I feel kind of bad for her- she's going to have a really hard time convincing the rest of the school that," James said. "I mean, I believe her- don't you?"
"Of course," Sirius answered at once. "For one thing, she's way too hot to be a criminal-" this was followed by a smacking noise and an 'Ouch!", but then he continued, "and she seems trustworthy. Besides, wouldn't she have gotten her wand snapped if she did that? And she didn't, because it's right there, hanging out of her pocket." Seconds later, Remus agreed, and so did Peter, but it seemed like he would say anything to please any of the boys, particularly James and Sirius.
After they had concluded that I wasn't a criminal, they started to talk about Quidditch. I didn't know much about the sport- all I knew was that there were four balls and seven players who rode around on broomsticks.
During this entire little conversation, I had been a little tensed up- for a second there, I really thought that Petunia had told them my secret. But apparently, she didn't want the shame of everybody knowing there was one of them in the family. Well, I didn't really care about her reasons, all I was concerned about was that my secret was safe.
Soon, I became bored, just sitting there, listening to their conversation on a subject I had almost no knowledge about. So, I decided the best solution to this was that it was time to 'wake up'.
Imitating a yawn, I let my eyelids flutter for a second before stretching and peeling my eyes open.
All of the other people in the compartment were looking at me. I blushed and looked down. Nobody said anything for a moment, then James announced," So…we believe you're not a criminal." I pretended to look thankful and hugged each of them. Sirius and James seemed to enjoy it a little more than they probably should.
"So, Evans-" Now that my little incident was over, James seemed to get as cheeky and confident as Sirius was. "Wait, can I call you Evans?"
I shrugged. Honestly, I didn't care too much, so I replied, "Only if I can call you Potter."
He grinned roguishly and winked. I rolled my eyes. "So, get on with it," I sighed.
"Want to go out?" It seemed like he already knew the answer, but wanted me to say it anyways.
"Not really, no. I don't really want a relationship right now, thanks." James didn't look put out one bit. On the contrary, he seemed excited for some reason unknown to me.
"Don't worry, Evans, I'll make you want one really soon…" he laughed with Sirius, Remus, and Peter, Peter a little too energetically.
"We'll see about that," I snorted. Inwardly, though, I was rolling my eyes and sighing. It seemed like I was going to get a lot of requests to go out this year from James Potter.
"'Bye, Evans, see you later!" Sirius said in a singsong voice, exiting the compartment first. Oh, so now I was Evans to him, too?
"Whatever, Black."
"Evans, my little flower, how I miss you already-" James started, practically shouting the words. My face turned crimson and I felt like I was burning from embarrassment, because everyone that could hear popped their head out from their carriage to stare at the little show we were putting on.
"SHUT UP!" I yelled, slamming the door and locking it, so no one else could come in. Before I did, though, I swear I heard a little chuckle in the direction James disappeared in.
So….how do you like it? I know, you're all like, OMG, what's her secret? If you have any ideas, please PM me, and don' t ruin it for others, please. By the way, you'll learn what her secret is within the next three or so chapters. They'll arrive at school in the next chapter, but it'll be in James's point of view. Next chapter should be up in two days minimum, four days maximum. Probably two days. Anyways….review, please!