Disclaimer: Really. Isn't mine. I'll even take Veritaserum if you want me to. Then you'll know I'm not lying.

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Chapter 16: Quidditch Tryouts

Saturday mornings were Jenna's favorite time of the entire week. On this day, there was no hurry to get out of bed, and so, Jenna could take her time waking up, often reading for an hour or so by the bright sunlight that would stream in through the large windows in the dormitory. Such were her plans for this particular Saturday in mid-September.

Jenna was just beginning to stir, feeling warm rays of light on her face and a cool breeze from the slightly opened window. The promise of a blissful morning spent exactly as she wished stretched before her. Until, that is, someone rudely interrupted her slow awakening.

BANG!

"Oh, what a beautiful moooorning!" Lily loved to sing. She could even sing well- when she wanted to. Now, however, her vocal powers were employed to show an overabundance of energy, rather than an appreciation for music. "Oh, what a beautiful daaaay!" She bounded across the dormitory and launched herself onto Jenna's bed. Jenna scowled. Lily didn't seem to notice. She finished her song with a theatrical flourish. "I've got a beautiful feeeeeeling, everything's going my WWAAAYYY!"

Jenna groaned. She'd had enough. Not a morning person to begin with, and then to have her peace ruined by someone who was! She shoved Lily off her bed, pulled the covers over her head, and, for all intents and purposes, went back to sleep.

"Oh, no you don't!" Lily jumped right back up and jerked the covers back and sat, beaming at Jenna until one of her eyes cracked open and she glared at the blurry outline of her friend. "Come on! Put your glasses on and get up!"

"Why?" Jenna moaned plaintively.

"Because it is morning, it's a beautiful day, and Quidditch trials have been announced!" Lily bounced several times in an expression of pure joy.

"So?" Jenna stopped trying to tug the covers out from under the exuberant redhead. "You don't have a broom."

"I'm going to use Sirius' broom."

"And if you both make it?" Jenna asked what should have been an obvious point. The fact that James was trying out went without saying.

"Don't be silly. There's only one spot open!"

Jenna opened her mouth to say something about this statement, but Lily interrupted her with "See you int the Great Hall!" and another outbreak of song and bounded out of the room.

The unfortunate Jenna rolled over, grumbling something about the (relatively) early hour, over-exuberant redheads and Quidditch tryouts. Deciding that any efforts to go back to sleep would be fruitless, Jenna fumbled on her nightstand for her glasses and sat up.

It wasn't worth the effort to get dressed. Jenna washed out her mouth and ran a brush through her long hair before leaving the dormitory. She meandered her way down to the Great Hall where Lily was sitting with the rest of the group, minus Sirius, who was absent for some unknown reason, talking animatedly about the coming tryouts. "And I heard that Sammy Hill is going to try."

"The third year?" James asked, listening intently to Lily's synopsis of the Gryffindor hopefuls. Jenna sat down across from the two.

"Welcome, Jenna. Have some breakfast." Jenna pushed a plate across to her. Jenna just glared. Lily turned back to James. "Yeah, the idiot can hardly stay on the broom. OW!" Jenna had kicked her under the table, as retaliation against being woken so early and for insinuating that only idiots had trouble flying. "Oh, oops, sorry Jenna."

Jenna snorted.

"Jenna! To what do we owe this great pleasure?" Sirius entered the Great Hall and plopped himself down next to Jenna. "It couldn't possibly be the tryouts!"

"No. Lily." The first words Jenna had said since coming down to breakfast.

"Ah. But I didn't think even she had the ability of waking you before noon. And here it is, eight o'clock!"

"Ugh, you have got to be kidding me." Jenna buried her head in her crossed arms.

"Oh, yep, you're right. It's eight-ten."

Jenna threw a roll at him. "How did I get a bunch of friends who are all morning people?" she moaned, lifting her head. "I think I should rethink that."

"Nah, you love us too much." James stopped listening to Lily's monologue for a minute.

Jenna blushed a little and put her head back down so James couldn't see. "That has yet to be decided."

"What's there to be decided?" Sirius exclaimed, as though offended. "We're fabulous...

"And brilliant..." James added.

"And dashingly handsome..."

"And amazingly talented..."

"And oh, so humble." Jenna remarked acerbically.

"Yep, that too."

The three were interrupted in their listing of James' and Sirius' many virtues by the arrival of the morning mail. A handsome golden brown owl landed on the table in front of Sirius' goblet of pumpkin juice. The sight of the owl caused Sirius go suddenly silent. He colored slightly as he reached for the envelope, on which his name was elegantly written. Without looking at the others, he ducked his head and stuffed it in the pocket of his robes. Jenna alone noticed Sirius' curious reaction, as James had returned to discussing Quidditch with Lily and Remus was absorbed in her bacon. He refused to meet her eye, though, so nothing was said on the topic. He remained gloomy for the rest of the meal.

With twenty minutes until the try-outs, Lily dragged the others outside to the Quidditch pitch, "to check the flying conditions." While Lily and James warmed up for the trials, Jenna and Remus, followed by Sirius, to Jenna's great surprise, went up to the stands.

"Why aren't you going out for the team?" Jenna asked Sirius as they sat.

"I'm no Seeker. I prefer Beater. You'd know that if you watched anyone other than James when we played." Sirius replied shortly.

Jenna immediately turned scarlet. "What? I don't..."

"Careful there, or you'll catch something on fire." Remus mussed her hair, sitting down just behind the other two. "And, yes, you do."

"I watch all of you!"

"No, you don't."

"I do!"

"So what kind of broom does James have?" Sirius asked.

"A Cleansweep." Jenna said, as though pointing out the obvious.

"And what kind do I have?" Remus questioned the poor girl.

"Um..." Jenna turned a deeper shade of red, if that was even possible, making a private resolution to pay more attention to the rest of her friends.

"See? I told you so." Sirius turned to watch their two friends among the other hopefuls.

"Does he know?" Jenna asked, quiet and embarrassed, turning to address Remus, as Sirius was now ignoring the conversation in favor of watching the trials.

"I don't think so," he answered. "I don't think he'd notice."

"Don't tell him?" Jenna pleaded.

"Of course not."

"Thanks." Remus then turned his full attention to the try-outs. Jenna acted as if she too were fully captivated by watching the players, but was really wondering how she had been so transparent that Sirius had noticed her crush on James and how many other people had figured it out.

An hour later, Remus went back up to the castle "to do some homework," and Sirius and Jenna had resorted to playing tic-tac-toe on a spare bit of parchment Jenna found in her pocket.

"There! I win again!" Sirius slashed a line diagonally across the game.

"Sirius?" Jenna asked, thoughtfully drawing another grid.

"Yeah?" Sirius replied distractedly. His attention had briefly returned to the try-outs.

"Um. What was in that letter?"

Sirius scowled, his grey eyes turning to steel. "Nothing important."

"It was important. You never get quiet like that."

Sirius sighed and was quiet for a minute before speaking. "It's just my mother, telling me off for being in Gryffindor and 'besmirching the family name' by hanging out with you guys. She's even gone so far as to say that I should befriend the Slytherins so I can be a better 'mentor' for Regalus when he comes to school. She sends them every couple weeks, when she's got nothing better to do on Friday nights."

"That's terrible. I can't imagine my mother saying anything like that."

"Yeah, well, that's my family. You're lucky."

"Yeah, I guess I am. But I've never seen you get any others."

"Course not. You're always in bed until noon on Saturday." Sirius smiled and met Jenna's eyes for the first time, a little of his usual playful banter coming back. "Oh, look, I guess they're done." He pointed out onto the pitch, where the team captain was calling everyone down. Though they were too far away to hear, the results of the try-outs were clear. Lily threw her broom on the ground, earning a shout of dismay from Sirius, and stomped off to the changing rooms, while the captain and many members of the team patted James on the back.

"Uh-oh." Jenna immediately stood and went as fast as she could down the stands to the changing room. Sirius went the less conventional way of over the seats down to the pitch to congratulate his best friend and to rescue his broomstick from the ground, where Lily had left it.

"Lily?" Jenna called as she opened the door to the changing room, but this was unnecessary. She located the red-head by the repeated slamming of a locker and yelling. Jenna went to the fuming girl, putting her hand on Lily's shoulder. She shrugged it off, turning away to pull a comb out of her bag. Running it roughly through her short red hair, Lily muttered, "Why? Why does he always do this to me? I will never be good enough, I will never be able to beat him!"

"Lily, why did you try out? You know James plays Seeker. You're..." Here Jenna was nearly stumped., until she remembered a well aimed Bludger one afternoon when James had once again gotten a better score than Lily. "You're a Beater."

"What difference does that make? I can fly just as well. And those glasses of his can't help him see much better."

"Lils, that's what glasses are for." Jenna adjusted her own.

"I meant glare from the sun! It would get in the way," Lily said almost self-righteously.

"My point is you play different positions. You do different things. You can't expect to beat James at his own position."

"Just because you're in love with him..."

"What?! That's not what this is about..."

"I don't see why you like him so much!"

"I can't see why you don't!" Jenna retorted. "How do you even know?!"

"Oh, I see. Now you're going to get mad because you should have told me ages ago!"

"Lily Evans, you're being stupid!"

"I am not! Why are you yelling at me when I just lost to the biggest idiot of the century?"

"Lily, no, it's not like that..." Jenna's quiet plea did nothing to calm Lily. She shoved her things into her bag and stomped out of the changing room, leaving Jenna to be surrounded by the Gryffindor team and Sirius, all of whom were talking and laughing, planning a party for that night in the common room. Jenna's quiet congratulations were nearly lost in the noise of celebration. Finally, upset by her argument with Lily and by being ignored, Jenna left and went up to Gryffindor Tower to finish a potions essay.

Up in the girls' dormitory, Jenna glanced at Lily's bed, which had the curtains pulled shut. She sighed, knowing better than to bother Lily when she was upset like this, and took her books down to the common room, where she set up shop at a table near a window, determined to make the most of the sunshine while it lasted. She knew from experience it wouldn't last long, and winter would soon be upon the school. Pulling her half finished essay on the correct method of increasing the amounts in potions to adjust the strength closer, she sighed again and set to work.

An hour later, Jenna was no longer even pretending to work. She had run into a wall forty-five minutes ago and was now staring aimlessly out the window, watching some people playing in the lake.

"There's actually only 10 grams of witchhazel, which, with this conversion, makes 17 milliliters of frog's blood, not 13." Lily pulled herself up on the table next to Jenna.

Jenna pulled her attention back into the room with a start.. "Oh. Which means all these others are wrong, too."

"Yeah."

"Ugh." Jenna pushed her essay away and put her head in her hands. "I don't want to redo it."

"Really? This is a historical moment. Jenna does not want to finish her homework."

"Mm. I'd smack you if I had the energy, but you see, someone woke me up too early this morning."

"Poor Jenna." Lily grinned, kicking her legs back and forth. A scuffle at the portrait hole brought both girls' attention to a boisterous group of people pouring into the common room. "Umm… I don't want to stay for the party. Come with me?"

"Where?"

"I don't know. Anywhere. Unless," Lily grinned. "Unless you want to stay and make eyes at James I'll just sit over there and laugh at you," she added, pointed to an armchair in a dark corner.

"Yeah, I'll come. Just a minute." While she was putting her books back in her bag, James and Sirius bounced over and up onto the table. Lily rolled her eyes.

"Hey, haven't seen you two all day!" Sirius hadn't noticed their less-than- enthusiastic greeting from Lily.

"Well, you won't be seeing us again. We were just leaving." Lily looked, blank-faced, at James.

"No, stay for the party." James pleaded.

On this plea, Jenna waivered and almost said she'd stay. But then she caught sight of Lily's face, a mixture of disappointment, anger and loneliness. She smiled at her best friend. "No, sorry, I promised Lily. It's a girl thing."

Lily smiled and the two girls left the common room together.

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Wow, I think that's my longest chapter yet. I'm so proud of myself! But I'm cursing MS Word 2007. Apparently it has a different ending... Anyway, sorry it's been so long. My creative juices have been dried up by school… So, sad indication of how long it's been… when I was writing the part about Lily talking about the try-outs, I almost wrote her saying that Snape was going to try out for the team… You know the cure for such lapses in rational thought? Lots and lots of reviews!!