A/N: Hi guys. I'm posting. Yay, sorry for the wait…this chapter was ready a few days ago, but gosh. So much has gone on, and so much has happened. And I've been kind of down about it all…and then anytime I felt about posting or writing I'd just get down on myself. I'm usually not a dramatic person, and I usually avoid drama. But now it's just happening, and I can't do anything about it. And school started today. My AP teachers are nuts…needless to say, I'm going to be busy, but I'll try my best to keep posting regularly. Please enjoy the chapter, and review.

Chapter Five: The Results

"Lily, I think an owl is here for you." Charlotte said Friday morning of the following week from the kitchen table.

Lily rushed out of her bedroom, still in her pajamas.

"That's a Hogwarts owl!" she exclaimed as the owl dropped an envelope in her hand.

Lily held it up, mouth open and silent.

"Open it, Lily, it's not a Howler or anything." Charlotte said, laughing at her flatmate.

Lily moved her mouth without saying anything before words managed to escape.

"…It's my N.E.W.T scores…I just know it…" Lily muttered.

Charlotte grinned. "Well open it then, you haven't shut up about those scores in God knows how long!"

Lily smiled weakly and held the letter in both of her hands. "Well, here it goes."

She bit her lip and closed her eyes as she tore open the letter. Lily inhaled while opening her eyes and then scanned the letter before dropping it in shock.

Charlotte reached for the fallen letter. "Is it that bad?" she teased as she read her scores.

"Merlin, Lily…" Charlotte murmured in amazement. "Ten Outstandings…what the hell are you on?"

Lily grinned. "I can't believe it! I even did well in Transfiguration! I've got to owl James…can I borrow your owl? And Dumbledore, I have to write Dumbledore! Oh, and my parents! They'll be dying to know!" she exclaimed in an excited voice.

Charlotte laughed and nodded. "Yes, Ralph is in his cage in my room…probably sleeping, but go ahead, disturb him."

Lily smiled. "Thank you so much!"

She then proceeded to prance all the way back to her room.

Charlotte just shook her head and continued to eat her cereal.

Twenty minutes later, Lily appeared back in the kitchen.

"Well I think we need to celebrate! How about we have everyone over here tonight? Is that alright? I mean, this will be one of my last nights without having to work if the Ministry is given my N.E.W.T. scores on time and they still want to hire me…" Lily rambled excitedly.

Charlotte nodded. "Sure, everyone hasn't gotten together in a while. It might be nice, and plus, you haven't seen James in six days. You two might die if you wait any longer."

Lily stuck out her tongue childishly before grinning. "Oh come on, Charlotte. I know you're just dying to see Sirius."

Charlotte decided to turn a deaf ear and began eating her cereal again; Lily just smiled before heading back to her room to get dressed.

"I guess that means I'll be needing to borrow Ralph again when he returns, to send out invitations." she called out.

"Go ahead." Charlotte called back before clearing her place and heading to the shower.

At quarter to six, Lily walked through their flat while putting an earring on as the doorbell rang.

"I thought you told people to get here at six!" Charlotte called out from the bathroom.

"I did." Lily replied as she went to the door, wondering who would come this early.

She opened the door to see James grinning down at her with a bouquet of flowers.

"For mademoiselle." James offered, bowing in greeting.

Lily giggling, took the flowers. "Hello James, the party doesn't start till six, you know."

James smiled as he walked in and kissed her lips softly.

"I know." he replied. "But I wanted to be able to congratulate you personally before the others arrived." he kissed her again.

Charlotte walked in to the room to see the two and shook her head.

"I thought I heard James's horrible French accent."

The two, red faced and smiling broke apart and looked at Charlotte, who was wearing an elegant red dress that complimented her raven hair so well. Lily could have never worn anything like it, and was naturally impressed.

"You're early." Charlotte stated unnecessarily.

"Good evening, dear cousin. I was just dying to see you." he winked at her and Charlotte smiled and turned back to the kitchen.

"So how did you do on your scores?" Lily asked.

James grinned. "Ten Outstandings, of course."

"That's brilliant, James!"

James grinned at her, Lily was the type of person that could derive joy from others' success, it was one of the things he loved about her. And she looked so beautiful tonight, wearing a summer dress in a lavender shade. Her outfit contrasted drastically with Charlotte's, who had taken on a very sexy, mature approach to the evening, which fitted her personality perfectly. James, however, was content with Lily and her cute, friendly dress.

"I know, my parents were proud, and a letter from the Auror Academy should arrive any day. I wrote Dumbledore to confirm his invitation as well." James said as he strolled through the girls' apartment. "Care to give me a tour while we wait for your timely guests?"

Lily smiled excitedly. She hadn't had the chance to give a tour yet.

"Yes, follow me!" she said energetically as they walked out of the foyer area.

"This is the dining room, and if you follow this door you'll get to the kitchen." Lily said as she crossed the room to the kitchen, where she and James were now standing. "And we have sort of a bar type breakfast nook there." Lily pointed out before grabbing James's hand and walking out into the kitchen and into the hallway, where they then walked left into an open area complete with a couch, two comfortable-looking chairs, a coffee table, and a television. "This is the sitting room, where we sit." Lily continued before pulling James back down the corridor. "And Charlotte's room is to the left, she's got the master bedroom with the bath, but that's okay…and then to the right is the bathroom that I use…and then at the end is my room." Lily finished, James kept walking.

"Can I see your room?" he asked, grinning.

Lily nodded. "Well, I suppose it's only fair."

James grinned and walked into her room, where Lily's queen sized bed sat in the middle with her white fluffy comforter, a pine desk, a pine dresser complete with pictures and little collectables she had received as a child. Several tiny unicorns on the dresser top made James smile. To the left of Lily's bed was her bookshelf, which contained Lily's collection of books as well as the record player he had given her and her collection of records. And in the very far corner was Lola's cat bed that had Lola, who had grown a great deal since James had last seen her, balled up and sleeping. James walked over and bent down to pet her head, causing her to look up at him, almost smiling, despite the fact that she had been disrupted from one of her catnaps.

Lily walked over to him and smiled. "Yes, Lola likes it here…at home Walter went mad when he saw her, and he didn't like it here at all, so my mum is keeping him."

"Your place looks very comfortable." James commented. "When we get our own place I'll have to let you decorate. My flat looks completely disheveled and mismatching."

"That sounds like a plan. If I hadn't been a witch I might have considered interior design as a career." Lily smiled playfully and James was tempted to kiss her, he couldn't, however, as the door bell rang, announcing the other guests.

Lily and James entered the sitting area as Charlotte ushered their guests, Ellie, Jacob, and Allison into the room.

Lily grinned at her two best friends and went to talk with them. James smiled and then went to talk to Jacob.

"How were your N.E.W.T. scores?" Allison asked energetically. "I got four Outstandings and four Excellents, but I know you did ten times better!"

Lily grinned sheepishly. "Ten Outstandings. I couldn't believe it. Even in Transfiguration."

"Well it couldn't have hurt that you got your year's best Transfiguration student as your personal tutor." Ellie commented, smiling happily. Lily's cheeks turned only a slight shade of pink while Allison and Ellie just looked from her to James.

"Honestly, if you had told me this time last year that you would be engaged to James Potter, I would have turned myself into St. Mungo's and gotten you a referral." Allison said.

Lily laughed. "I wasn't that horrible to him." But even as she spoke her words, Lily knew that they weren't true.

"Oh yeah?" Ellie said. "Do we really need to go into detail, Lily?"

Lily smiled. "Well alright, I was terrible." she then gazed over at James, who was talking to Jacob in a serious manner. "But I'm so lucky now, aren't I?"

"You are." Allison said looking at Jacob. "We both are."

Ellie made a sound of disgust at her two lovesick friends.

The doorbell rang again and Charlotte answered, to greet Sirius, Peter, Remus, and Grace.

Lily, seeing that everyone was present, called everyone to order.

"Alright, everybody. Charlotte and I have slaved in the kitchen for hours today, so we'll all go grab a plate and then return here…seeing as our dining room isn't exactly the biggest room in the house."

Sirius jumped up at the prospect of food and found his way to the kitchen, being tailed closely by Peter as everyone else followed in after them.

James appeared by Lily on the couch minutes later, smiling happily.

"You made pork chops!" he exclaimed happily.

Lily grinned as she spooned her potato salad. "Well I figured if I'm marrying you I'm going to have to cook my mother's pork chops."

James smiled and then eyed the television. "Oh! I love those!"

Remus, Sirius, Allison, and Peter, who had never seen a television, stared at it in wonder. Sirius took the bold move to run up to it and began playing with the knobs.

"I think I've heard of these before! It's like mini people stuck inside a box and they act out for you. It's simply brilliant! I wonder how they shrink people like that. Crazy Muggles…"

Remus and Peter were now watching Sirius intently as he pressed a button and the screen clicked on, displaying a comical show where the wife was being scolded by her husband in a foreign language.

"Padfoot, you're an idiot." James said brightly. "They don't shrink the people, they shoot real life sized people with electricity rays and it creates their image."

Lily, Charlotte, and Grace, being raised in Muggle homes just shook their heads. Jacob and Ellie, coming from Muggle-born parents, naturally knew what a television was, even if they didn't have one in their home.

"Oh, I love this episode! It's the Vitametavegamin one!" Grace exclaimed, making her presence really known for the first time that night.

Lily and Charlotte giggled.

"I love this one too, Lucy gets drunk!" Charlotte added.

"I just love Lucy." Lily replied. "And Lucille Ball had red-hair."

"How can you tell?" asked James as he squinted at the screen. "It's in black and white."

"I've seen pictures of her." Lily commented wisely, sharing a smile with James.

The group was soon sucked in the show and hardly said anything throughout dinner.

After the show was over and everyone was done eating, Charlotte began taking everyone's plates, Sirius jumped at the chance to help her and followed her into the kitchen with his own stack of dishes.

"I'm really proud of you, you know?" James whispered to Lily as they sat together on the couch, squashed between Peter and Ellie.

Lily looked up at him, smiling. "I'm proud of you too."

James smiled and leant in and kissed her, around them, Allison asked what happened to the people once the show was cut off and Grace tried to answer her, which was followed by disbelieving laughter from Peter.

When they broke away, James grinned mischievously.

"And I'm so glad you didn't go completely mad for nothing." he said, in mock seriousness. "If you had gone completely off your rocker and gotten ten Trolls I would have been really worried."

Lily pushed him playfully and laughed. "Sod off, James."

James stuck out his tongue. "Didn't know I brought out such a mouth in you, what would your mother say?"

Lily made a face and then pushed him swiftly off the couch, making him land with a thud. The group, which had been previously occupied with the explanation of television sets and programs, turned and looked at James, sprawled on the floor, glasses tilted sideways, and Lily, smiling victoriously on the couch. James and Lily didn't notice them however, as they were in their own little world as usual. Not paying attention to his friends, James tugged on Lily's legs, and soon she was on top of him, hitting him, but laughing all the same.

Their friends just shook their heads with the same thought…those two were so hopeless.

REVIEW!

Much thanks to JamesLilyTrueLove, IAMSOAP, FullHouse247, scooter570, Kaean, anonymously morgan, chiki chiki, dreamergirl86, Emerald Lily Flowers, Zippy-Wings, sosirius'sgurl3248, X.Little.Black.Cat.X, myzteek, glowing-ice, maraudergirl89, and Forest Unicorn for being splendid and reviewing my story. Sorry for the wait. Please keep reading.

And of course, a special thanks to my beta, hcgolfinfool.