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Truth in the Moon

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BrazilianPrincess

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Chapter 4

It was nearing nine o'clock and Lily sat in the common room, with a book on her lap. She was copying notes down on a piece of parchment. Since it was Friday night, many of the other students were still in the Common Room. Faith searched the crowd for her friend. She spotted a mess of red hair and made her way over to it.

"Mind if I have a seat?" she asked once she reached the couch. Without waiting for an answer, Faith knew would not come, she sat down next to the redhead.

For a few minutes, the two girls sat in near silence: Lily taking notes as if she were alone, and Faith humming a tune.

"You can't ignore me forever, Lily," Faith said finally.

However, Lily did just that. She continued to ignore her, and thirty seconds later, Faith stood from the couch, worried. Faith turned, her back facing Lily, and took two steps away from the couch. Lily sighed behind her.

"Wanna bet?"

Faith smiled and spun to face her best friend, knowing she had been forgiven. After a fight with Lily, those were the best two words in the dictionary, and vise versa; it was their little way of saying they forgave the other. That was how they ended their fights, ever since their third year. Faith had actually started the whole thing, unintentionally, of course. She and Lily had had a fight in which Faith stopped talking to Lily; one night, Lily tried talking to her, and said she couldn't ignore her forever. Faith, having forgotten that she wasn't supposed to talk to Lily, had said, "Wanna bet?" And just like that, the argument was over. During their next argument, it was Lily who was mad and the same thing happened. From that point on, that was how they knew the other forgave them. It was sort of their way of calling a truce. Looking back, Faith couldn't even remember about what the argument had been. What she did remember, however, was sitting up with Lily the rest of the night, talking.

Now, she stared down at the girl. Lily looked miserable, as if she was agreeing to something that she really did not want to do. Faith studied her curiously.

"I guess if I'm going to get through this, I'm going to need my best friend to talk to," Lily told her. "What I don't get, though, is why you agreed to this in the first place."

Faith shrugged and sat down.

"I only agreed to it after the whole thing had already started. I'm on your side, Lily. You have to believe that. Just because I agreed to help James doesn't mean I'm against you."

"I know, I guess I just felt like you were taking their side over mine. You of all people know how much I despise Potter, and I guess I just thought you would agree with me. I expected Remus to do something like this; he's James best friend, but you're supposed to be mine."

"But Remus is the reason I decided it wasn't a horrible idea. I know you've always respected Remus' opinion, and I figured that I could trust him as well. And he truly believes James has changed."

"Yeah, but James has always been kind to Remus. And just because he thinks James has changed, doesn't necessarily mean that he has. James has always been a good friend, to the Marauders, but I'm thinking about how he treats people who aren't his friend."

Faith sighed. "Maybe James has changed, maybe he hasn't, but the only way you're going to know for sure is if you give him a chance."

Lily didn't reply, instead, she picked up her quill. "I've got to get back to my homework."

Faith grinned triumphantly; Lily knew her friend had a point but was unwilling to admit it.

"Then, I'll get out of your hair and let you get to work." Faith stood from the couch and walked off to find Carmen.

The weekend passed quickly and before the group knew it, Monday came. Faith, Remus, James, Sirius, Peter, and Carmen were anxious to see how Lily would behave in Potions. That morning was like any other: Breakfast was still held in the Great Hall; Faith, Carmen, and Lily still had Double Muggle Studies and Herbology; and the three girls walked to their third class of the day. Potions. The Marauders were already sitting at their regular table. Slowly, the rest of the students made their way to the class. A few minutes later, the bell rang and Slughorn called for the class to settle down. After taking role, he turned to his students.

"Okay, class, get with your partners and continue working on your potion."

The sound of shuffling and chitchat filled the room as the students did as instructed. Everyone knew there was no chance of Lily walking over to James, so instead, he and Faith switched seats.

It was the longest forty-five minutes of James' life. Both he and Lily sat in silence, each taking their own notes. Finally, the bell rang and James stood to gather his things. He was shoving his books into his bag when he heard Lily speak.

"Meet me in the library at seven."

By the time James looked up, Lily was already heading for the door.

'Okay,' he thought to himself, 'This is my chance to prove myself to Lily.'

Slinging his bag over his shoulder, he filed out of the classroom with Remus, Sirius, and Peter, who had been waiting for him.

That evening at five to seven, Lily made her way down to the library. She opened the door to the room in which she had spent so much of her time. Many other students were there also, sitting at the round tables, books open in front of them, copying down notes. At some tables, there were only one or two students, at others, groups of four or five sat quizzing each other quietly. Lily glanced around for an empty table. There didn't seem to be one, but she continued looking anyway. During the search, something caught her eye. At a table, there was a boy sitting alone with books spread out on the table. His head was bent as he copied notes, and all Lily could see was messy black hair.

'Is that...' Lily wondered to herself.

She walked over to the table.

"James?"

The boy looked up and it was indeed James.

"Lily, have a seat."

Shocked, Lily pulled out the chair and sat down. She glanced at the various books scattered around the table. There were books on each potion.

'Is this really happening?' Lily asked herself. To say the least, she was mildly surprised, and, though she would never admit it, somewhat impressed that James had been there early and already working.

James' voice snapped Lily out of her small trance.

"I was thinking that we could do Veritaserum." Lily looked up at him as he continued. "Polyjuice Potion would probably be the easiest, but Veritaserum, while more complex, is quite interesting. Felix Felicis has some interesting ingredients used in it," he continued, glancing at his notes, "but I still think Veritaserum would be the best one to do, in terms of what we could learn. Nevertheless, which ever you want to do is fine with me."

It took Lily a second to realize that James was watching her patiently, waiting for an answer.

"Oh, um, we can do Veritaserum, that's fine."

"Okay," James said as he stood from the table. "I'll just put these books away, and I'll be right back."

He gathered the books on the table not pertaining to their potion and carried them away, leaving three books: The one he had been copying from and two others.

Lily took out parchment, a quill, and a bottle of ink, picked up one of the remaining books, and began copying notes. When James returned a minute later, he sat down and resumed taking notes. For the next two and a half hours, they wrote in silence. With her hand nearly cramping, Lily placed her quill on the table and began stretching her hand. Only realizing what time it was after glancing at the clock.

"We should probably call it a night," Lily said to James whose head was still bent over a book.

He looked up at her.

"Huh?" James glanced at his watch. "Oh, wow. I didn't realize it was that late. Time flies when you're having fun."

Lily nodded uncertainly as she closed her book and rolled up her parchment. After putting the books away, James walked back to the table. Lily was about to ask when they should get together next when James spoke.

"Hey, Lily, I have Quidditch practice for the next few days..."

'I knew this was too good to be true,' Lily told herself. 'It was typical James behavior and I should have seen it from the start: He figured he would work for three hours and then not have to do anymore.'

"So, I was wondering if maybe you would like to meet me during lunch on Wednesday."

"What?"

"I-"

"No, sorry. I heard what you said, I'm just..."

"Shocked because that's not something the normal James Potter would say?" he suggested.

"Well, yeah. Sort of."

James chuckled. "I understand. So, what do you say?"

"Oh, to Wednesday. Uh, sure."

"Okay, well, I've got to meet up with Sirius, so I'll see you tomorrow. All right?"

"Yeah."

The two walked out of the library together but then headed off in different directions.

Lily walked back to the Common Room, replaying the events of the past few hours. The Gryffindor Common Room was nearly empty with only a couple students sitting on the couch, talking. Lily went up to her room to find Faith and Carmen waiting for her.

"How'd it go?" asked Faith.

"Better than expected," Lily answered before going into detail.

"So, does this mean you've changed your thoughts about James?"

"Hardly," Lily scoffed. "I was pleasantly surprised, but I'm not giving him the benefit of the doubt just yet. It could've easily been an act. I mean, James has been an insufferable git for the past six years, and six years versus two and a half hours doesn't exactly balance out."

Faith sighed, but decided it best not to argue.