Lily ran to the library that morning, rushing past James with no more than a hurried hello. The library was empty this early in the morning, except for a few eager Ravenclaws that were poring over large books.
The Spells and Enchantments section was full of ancient, dusty volumes once you got past the schoolbooks and simple theory. Titles such as "The Origins of Magicke" and "Charms of Olde" dotted the shelves, and Lily pulled out a few books she hoped would explain this all away.
She arrived in front of the librarian with Advanced Magical Theory, Protective Anti-Dark Arts Spells, and Secrets of the Soul: What Our Spells Can Tell Us. While waiting for her name to be added to the list of students who'd borrowed books, Lily looked at her Muggle watch and groaned. She only had twenty minutes left before class, and a fierce growling was already fighting its way out of her stomach. She thanked the librarian, and shoved the books into her bag, running down towards the Great Hall, looking left and right hoping that no one would see the Head Girl acting so very unprofessionally.
The books weighed her down, and Lily was once again reminded of the night before. Patronuses were unique to each person, Lily knew, and they seemed to reflect the caster's personality. Did that mean that her personality had suddenly changed from one day to another? Lily remembered Snape's face staring into the hallway where she was hidden, and hoped that running for her life from the Slytherins hadn't changed who she was.
Lily sat next to her friends, looking glum, which had become her normal state these days. She'd have asked them for advice, but they couldn't produce Patronuses, and Lily would never have been that insensitive.
She said good morning to Marlene, Hestia, Dorcas, and Mary, before buttering her toast and trying to smile. "Lily," Marlene said anxiously. "I have a Muggles studies essay to write. You've got to explain this 'post office' thing to me."
"Well," Lily began. "It's like owl post, but there are Muggles who are paid to carry the mail and bring them to the houses."
"Muggles paid to be owls," Marlene muttered, adding to her notes. "But how do they know where an address is? What if they don't find it? Who do they ask? Is there someone in charge of that?"
Lily shrugged, overwhelmed with questions. "They just… know where things are, I dunno. And mail does get lost sometimes."
Marlene shook her head and scribbled some more onto her parchment. Lily bit her lip, remembering her own essay, due at the end of the week, that she hadn't started. She tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear and bit into her toast, chewing in an almost resigned manner.
James looked down just before Lily turned around, and he watched her out of the corner of his eye. Luckily, she seemed not to have noticed his intense staring, which was all the better. She seemed engrossed talking to Mary McDonald, so James turned towards the Marauders.
"Lily's been acting strange today," James said, and Sirius rolled his eyes.
"Thank you, Potter News, for our daily report on Lily Evans," he said sarcastically. James shot a well-aimed kick under the table, which landed squarely on Sirius' shin and caused Black to howl in pain.
"Don't be so dramatic," James sighed.
"What did she do that was weird?" Peter asked eagerly.
"Yesterday she said the Slytherins chased her down the halls and then she hugged me for a really long time, and this morning she rushed out and barely looked at me."
"Maybe it's that time of month—" Sirius suggested, and this time it was Remus who shot him a warning look. Sirius shot a careless smile at the pale, scarred boy, before turning on James, more serious now.
"What was the bit about the Slytherins, though?" Sirius asked, poking at his bacon.
James looked over at the quietest table of the Great Hall, where all the green-robed students seemed to be hunched over, plotting. Or maybe it was his paranoia.
He dropped his voice. "You know the girl who died? Snape did it. He showed me his poison that could kill someone in their sleep."
There was a delicate clink as Remus put his cup of tea down. "What?"
"He said he invented it. He was brewing it in Potions, but Slughorn didn't believe me."
"You told Professor Slughorn?"
"Actually," James said sheepishly, "I told all of the teachers, Dumbledore included." James waited for Remus to say that he was insane and shouldn't go around telling his crazy theories to the teachers.
"You shouldn't have done that, now Snape knows you're onto him," Remus said.
"You… you believe me?"
"'Course we do," said Sirius, who'd been listening. "Right, Pete?"
"Yeah!" Peter said. He would believe anything James said, and that thought hung heavy and unspoken over the Marauders for a moment.
"Well, what do we do now?" James said, breaking the tension.
"Find out what their endgame is—why kill a second-year Hufflepuff girl? What do they want out of this?" Remus said.
"Then we get in, take the poison, show it to Dumbledore, and servee justice for Felicia," Sirius said, banging a fist on the table, which turned out to be quite loud.
The seventh year girls who sat further down the table suddenly looked up at them, startled, and Sirius froze, his fist still in the air.
"Don't mind us," Sirius said, flashing a smile, and Marlene cocked an eyebrow that looked like it was meant just for him.
James thought he heard Lily say something about postmen's uniforms, though he was almost certain he must have heard wrong, and tore his mind away from the huge, blinking distraction that was Lily Evans.
"We'll need to plan more carefully if we want to do this," Remus said.
"Right," James nodded. "I can come over to the dormitory after our rounds."
Sirius smirked at the mention of 'their' rounds, and James had to fight the urge to kick him again.
! #$%^&*
Lily could barely meet James' eyes that night at rounds, but after what had just happened, she was adamant that they would do their rounds together. She nodded awkwardly at him, fumbling with the hem of her sweater, while James looked at her strangely. He wanted to ask what was wrong, but knowing Lily, he was afraid she would get angry.
"Right, let's do our rounds," James said, setting off down the hallway. Lily lit her wand and walked beside him, apparently lost in thought. James tried to think of things to say to her, but suddenly discomfort hung between them, as thick and heavy as pudding.
"Is everything all right?" James finally blurted out, and Lily stopped in her tracks next to him. He cursed mentally and called himself all sorts of names for doing the one thing he shouldn't have, all while eyeing Lily apprehensively.
"No, nothing is right!" she said, and it sounded like a wail, almost pitiful. "They're killing Muggles in London—they're killing Muggleborns in Hogwarts—and now the Slytherins are practically joining the Death Eaters, still in school, and—"
She stood there, breathing deeply, her arms hugged around herself. The last thing that was bothering her, she couldn't quite bring herself to say. James reached forward, ready to try his luck for a second hug in two days.
Lily seemed startled when she suddenly found herself in James' arms, but she let herself relax and breathe deeply. This wasn't anything. This was something friends did—all friends hugged in times of stress.
But somehow is seemed like much more than a perfunctory act. James smelled like cinnamon and wood and something she recognized from shops that sold Quidditch brooms in Diagon Alley, and she could feel herself melting into those smells.
She let go before her mind could keep spinning the way it had been, and stepped back, unsure about whether James would take this opportunity to ask her out for the two hundredth and seventy-sixth time, but his lips were pressed together in something Lily recognized as concern.
"Let's go," he said quietly, and Lily nodded.
They walked silently through empty hallways, feeling like they were gliding over the stone, or swimming through something solid that was filling the empty space all around them. Lily felt James' presence next to her like a tangible, pulsing feeling, like all the energy around them was concentrated into him, and it was all she could do to keep looking straight ahead.
He was an arrogant toerag—a tormentor and a bully—an empty-headed pretty boy who only cared about fun and Quidditch—but somehow, Lily didn't quite believe all her old assumptions about James. Which left her in a strange place, where she couldn't bring herself to hate him, and was now hugging him whenever she was upset.
Lily looked up and saw that they were back in the Gryffindor Tower. James had stopped in front of the Fat Lady, though they still had a few paces to go before they reached the Heads' Common Room.
"I'm spending the night here," James said, nodding his head towards the Gryffindor Common Room.
"Oh," Lily said dumbly, still not completely recovered from her internal reverie. She cleared her throat. The prospect of being in the tower by herself seemed like the least inviting thing in the world at the moment. "You know, I might just go as well. I've been meaning to visit."
James smiled at her and Lily wasn't sure what exactly she felt inside, something between dismay and elation that felt like she wasn't functioning anymore. She shook her head slightly—calm down, Lily, she thought.
James turned to the Fat Lady. "Head Boy and Girl," James said.
"Oh, all right," said the Fat Lady with a resigned sigh.
James placed his hand on the portrait, but stopped when he heard Lily call, "Wait."
She seemed to think through what she was going to tell him, and finally, she said, "I have a… a question. About Patronuses."
"Yeah?" James said, and Lily steadied herself—she couldn't have remembered it right from that evening, all she really knew was that it had four legs. It could've just as easily been a horse.
"What's yours?" she asked, dreading the answer.
"Oh, it's a stag," James said, pushing the portrait into the Gryffindor Common Room, while Lily stood frozen in the hallway.