A/N Guess what guys? It's my birthday today (for another 4 minutes) and because of that, it's Alice's birthday as well, enjoy!

What's taking you so bloody long?" Lily hissed to Mary, who was crawling under her bed.

"I can't find my gift," Mary replied, then, a moment later, "Got it. It was in my bag."

"Where you left it?" Marlene spat. Lily glared at her.:

"Let's go." Mary, ignoring the rude comment, stood up.

Thirty minutes later they returned. The tray Mary was carrying was filled with more food than they'd intended and Lily had no idea how they'd eat it all, but the house elves had kept offering them different types of cakes and it had seemed rude to say no. They snuck into the room again and Lily pressed the light switch next to the door while Mary carried the tray over to the side of Alice's bed. Lily had never even known students could come into the kitchen, nor that it was so easy to get food from the house elves, but Marlene had taken the lead.

"Happy birthday, sunshine," Marlene whispered, sitting down at the side of Alice's bed. Sunshine could not have been a more unfitting word. Alice looked anything but happy as she sat up in bed and rubbed her eyes.

"Good morning," she yawned.

"We brought you breakfast." Mary put the tray down on Alice's nightstand.

"You didn't have to…"

"There's coffee," Marlene said.

"Oh! I love you! Give me that." Alice reached for the cup.

"Better?" Marlene asked once Alice had finished the coffee.

"Much better."

"There are toffee muffins too."

"Oh!" Alice grabbed one from the tray and took a bite. "I've missed these."

"I've obviously missed something. What's with the toffee muffins?" Lily asked.

"Oh, they're amazing Lily. You have to try one." Alice gave her a muffin. Lily took it from her and bit off the corner.

"It's okay, I guess." She shrugged. "I've tasted better."

"Like what? Tell me, Lils, what have you tried that is better than this?"

"My mum's buns," Lily said. "They're amazing."

"Hey guys, can we stop arguing about muffins?" Mary asked. "Let Alice open her presents!" She

reached into her pocket and took out the small, wrapped package. All of them, even Alice, knew what was inside. It was a tradition tracing back to their first year. Mary, panicking about what to give Alice for her birthday, had simply found a stone on the Hogwarts grounds. The idea had stuck, and since then Mary had gotten Alice a stone for her birthday. Alice countered by giving Mary a single chess piece, despite Mary not even knowing how to play chess.

Alice had opened the gifts from Lily and Marlene as well when there was a knock on the window. Her mum's owl was hovering outside, a letter and wrapped box tied to its leg. Mary opened the window to let it in; it flew directly to Alice and sat down at the foot of her bed.

The letter was almost a full page filled with her mum's tidy handwriting, similar to Alice's.

My dear Alice,

Happy birthday. Sixteen years, I can't believe it's been so long. It feels like just yesterday I held you in my arms for the first time, and since you were crawling around the house in your small clothes. I still have those in the attic. She skimmed through the rest of the letter, most of it filled with her mother's wonders about where time had gone; she'd read it later.

Folding it and putting it behind the tray on her nightstand, she turned to the gift. Wrapped in brightly coloured paper, the large box looked out of place on the pale beige bedding. She unwrapped and opened the cardboard box with excitement. It contained a jar of her mother's cookies, a few of the magazines her mother had finished and, to Alice's amazement, three thick, leather-bound books. She lifted them out of the box one at a time. They were all from her father's bookshelf. She recognized them well from all the times she had stood there watching them with awe, and her father had told her she didn't need them since she would never have time to work before she got married either way.

As she lifted the last book out of the box, a small piece of parchment fell out from it. Alice picked it up and read it.

Dear Alice.

There are obviously no decent boys at Hogwarts nowadays, not that I have heard of. It was better in my time, my friends and I were true gentlemen. So while you're waiting for a gentleman to show up, I thought you could get these. I know how much you've always wanted to have a look at them. I expect great results on your O. .

Love, Dad.

Alice had figured her father would've co-signed her mum's card, he'd never been much of a gift buyer, so the thought of him going through the trouble of writing his own card seemed weird to her. Still, she couldn't help stifle a smile because it didn't seem like he'd be marrying her off just yet.

"What is it?" Lily asked.

"Nothing." Alice put the note inside one of the books. She didn't feel like sharing it just yet.

"Should we go down and eat some real food now?" Marlene suggested. Alice guessed she had a point. Cakes and sweets wasn't really good breakfast.

Alice got out of bed and pulled on a dress and cardigan before following the others, who were already dressed, down to breakfast.

Not long after they had sat down at the table a house elf approached Alice. She had never seen a house elf out of the kitchen during the day, or at all for that matter, so naturally she was surprised when it spoke to her.

"Are you Ms. Alice Fortescue?" it asked with a quite loud voice, making those closest to them turn.

"Yes…" Alice answered, dreading what was to come without knowing what it was.

"I was asked to give you this." The elf put a small package and a card on the table in front of Alice, and then it skipped down the hall and out the doors.

"What does it say?" Marlene asked.

"I haven't opened it yet."

"Well, come on! Do it."

Alice took the card from the table. As she read the few words written inside it confetti fell down the card and collected in a pile in front of her on the table.

Happy birthday, hope you're having a good day!

She passed the card along to her friends, who left every kind of tact behind and immediately started discussing who'd sent it.

Alice lifted the gift off the table and unwrapped the box to find a pack of Drooble's Best Blowing Gum and another smaller box. She lifted off the top and let out a gasp. On a bed of red velvet lay a small bracelet charm, shaped like a small flower.

"Is this from you guys?" Alice eyed her friends, who'd taken a break from their discussion to see what the present had contained.

"No…" Lily bent over the table and looked closer at the charm. "It's really nice."

"I told you it was from Frank," Mary said, leaving no room for discussion.

"We barely know each other." Alice found the room for discussion anyways.

"So? What's your explanation?" Marlene asked, she and Mary obviously having put their petty fight away for the sake of her very much non existent love life.

"I don't know…maybe it's another gift from my mother," Alice suggested.

"That she sent with a house elf?" Mary frowned. "It's from Frank."

Alice looked down the table, searching for Frank's profile in the rows of students. He was halfway down the table, talking to Arnold and eating a slice of bread. Perhaps it was all Alice's imagination, maybe some part of her wanted it to be like that, but she thought he looked over at her for a moment.

Then the moment passed and she returned her gaze to the charm, still in the box.

"Come on Al, put it on," Lily encouraged. Alice hesitated for a moment before taking it from the box and, holding it against the charm bracelet on her wrist, using her wand to attach it. The bracelet had been a gift from her parents before she went off to Hogwarts. It had started off with a single charm, shaped like an A. For the Christmases and birthdays that'd passed, relatives had given her charms for the bracelet, which now had seven charms hanging off it.

She kept scooping cereal into her mouth although her thoughts were elsewhere; on Frank further down the table, on the flower charm, on the words written on the card "hope you're having a nice day". They weren't much really, they could be from anyone. It couldn't be Frank, could it?

Alice had never been one for confrontation, or impulsive decisions in general, but when she saw Frank and Arnold starting to leave the hall she acted on nothing but impulse. She stood, leaving her half-finished breakfast, and hurried after them out through the doors. She was out in the Great Hall just in time to see the front doors close behind them. She caught up with them, very out of breath, just outside the castle doors. She beat herself up for not being in better shape.

"Hey, Frank, can I talk to you?" She tried to sound like she hadn't just left her unfinished breakfast to rush after him. "Between four eyes," she added, not feeling like having Arnold's eyes on her while she was trying to say what she wanted to. Arnold didn't seem to mind and stepped away looking like Christmas had come early.

"Okay," Frank followed Alice to the benches right next to the entrance doors.

"So…what do you want?" he asked.

"Was it you?" Alice asked, not seeming able to control her actions (although maybe that was for the best, her conscious clearly wasn't able to interact with Frank on a human level, maybe her subconscious was).

"Was it me what?"

She nodded towards the bracelet on her arm, where the new charm was clearly visible.

Frank looked down, fiddling with his hands in his lap.

"Well…yeah. I shouldn't have should I? It's just…you were talking about your charm bracelet the other week…in Hogsmeade. I just thought…it was stupid."

Alice couldn't even remember she'd told Frank about the charm bracelet.

"…no, no. I love it. I was just curious, that's all." Alice interrupted his attempts of explaining himself.

"You do?"

"Yes," Alice assured him.

He breathed a sigh of relief and his face relaxed.

Maybe, she thought, maybe it could work? Then her thoughts returned to her father's note. The one she'd tucked into the book back in the dorm. He, who had never thought she should become an Auror, had in a way allowed her to follow her dream by giving her the books, not that she wouldn't have done it either way. What if she got a boyfriend now? Would he still support her, or would he return to his beliefs that she should marry and have kids?

"So…what are you doing today?" Frank asked.

"Oh, I don't know." Alice shrugged. "I guess I'll be with the girls. I left them at breakfast."

"Why?"

"I don't know really." Alice laughed a little. "I was acting on impulse when I followed you out here," she admitted.

"I'm glad you did." Frank smiled. "I was going to put my name on the card, but I changed my mind."

"Why don't you give it to me in person next time?" she suggested.

"I'll try."

"Do it, Frank. I like you." She was surprised by her own words. It was the first time she had even come close to admitting to Frank, and herself, how she felt. She smiled and rose from the bench.

"Alice." She stopped on the steps up to the front door at the sound of Frank's voice. "I like you too."

She smiled to herself before continuing into the great hall, not knowing if he'd meant that the same way she did or if it was simply an "I like you" as you tell a friend.

"Where did you rush off to?" Mary asked as Alice sat down at the table again.

"Oh, I…I went and talked to Frank."

Marlene made an unsuccessful attempt at wolf whistling and Mary clapped her hands together.

"And…" Lily leaned towards her.

"It was him." Alice smiled.

"Told you so!" Mary shone up.

"But what did he say?"

"I asked if the present had been from him, he said it was, end of discussion."

"Come on, Al, give us the meat!"

"There's no 'meat'."

"So you're telling me you didn't snog behind the greenhouses?" Mary asked.

"Not everyone does that, you know," Marlene snapped at her.

"No. We didn't snog behind the greenhouses, or anywhere else for that matter."

"Not even a small kiss?" Mary bulged her lip. "That you might've…forgotten about."

"I think I'd remember."

"Fine."

"We really should go," Remus said when, twenty minutes before breakfast closed, they were all still in the dorm.

"Yeah, good luck waking sleepy over there." Sirius nodded towards the lump under the duvet that was James. At this point, it seemed like nothing could wake him. He'd slept through Sirius' one man play of the Lord of the Rings, Remus' karaoke session and Peter dancing through the dorm, including straight over James' duvet.

"There's only one solution to this." Sirius walked over to James' bedside and raised his wand. A ray of water shot out from it and hit James' face. He bolted upright.

"I'll kill you!" he roared and waved his arms around in a desperate try to hit some of them.

"Calm down Prongs." Sirius stopped the water pouring from the wand. "Nothing else would wake you. We tried."

"Wormtail danced a tango with your broom right over your bed," Remus informed him.

"Padfoot used your cloak in his retelling of the Lord of the Rings, which I actually think woke the boys next door," Peter said.

"No way. They knocked on the door because of Moony's karaoke of 'Life on Mars' with that artist he likes, David Brownie."

"It's David Bowie you idiot," Remus snapped. "And my singing was beautiful."

"You keep telling us that. And we keep disagreeing," Sirius said, and Peter nodded in agreement. "But breakfast closes in fifteen minutes so if you want any food we need to go. No, Prongs, you don't have time to change."

They walked out of the dorm, James still in his pyjamas. There were surprisingly many students still eating breakfast considering how late it was. Most of the plates were empty, however, and Peter had to scrape the last of the butter from the bowl.

"Tomorrow can we please eat earlier? How many times do we have to lick the others' plates before you agree to that?" Remus sighed and took the last sausage from the plate in front of him.

"I wake up at six on Saturdays for practise and we need to be in school all the other days, Sunday is the only day of the week I can actually sleep," James argued.

"We'll let you sleep then next time, and then you'll wake up at three in the afternoon wondering why everybody abandoned you," Sirius suggested.

"Oh believe me. I would be happy for you to abandon me if it means I can sleep," James snapped back and took a sip of the last tea he had poured out of the can. "Why is there no coffee left? I need caffeine." James turned the coffee can upside down but not a single drop of black coffee dripped out.

"I can't believe it's only two weeks 'til the game," Sirius said, changing the subject. "We've got practise tonight, right?"

James nodded. "Marrow is driving me crazy," he said. "He's insisting on practice every single day, not that I'm complaining, but with all the homework they're throwing on us I have no time left to do anything."

Peter wished it was that simple for him. He wished he could do his homework over lunch or between lessons, but that was simply impossible. He'd tried for a few years, of course, wishing so badly to fit in.

Then McGonagall had assigned tutoring, because he was about to fail Transfiguration. After finishing his toast, he stood up and announced to the others he was meeting Lindsey in the library.

However, when he reached the library doors he was greeted by a boy who introduced himself as Patrick. The robes, which he was wearing despite it being the weekend, showed he was a Ravenclaw. Peter thought he'd seen him before, but he couldn't remember. There was something familiar in his face which Peter couldn't quite put his finger on.

"Who're you?" Peter asked, because he still wasn't sure who this bloke was.

"I'll be tutoring you," he said. "You're Peter Pettigrew, right?"

"Yeah, where's Lindsay?"

"She was busy, she asked me to take you instead," Patrick replied.

"Okay then," Peter said, not sure why no one had told him before.

Thirty minutes later Peter had made no progress on his Transfiguration homework other than managing to make the ink bottle fall over and spill a big puddle of ink over the parchment.

Patrick was driving him insane, and people didn't tend to drive him insane. He kept telling Peter it wasn't that hard, without really explaining the concept. The fact that Peter had found out he was only a fourth year and still acted like he knew everything so much better didn't make him feel any better.

Peter was dangerously close to banging his head on the table and start crying from frustration because he didn't get it, and everyone else did. James and Sirius would have written this without a problem over a plate of pasta and Remus would, after reading about the subject in a book he just happened to own, sit down and force himself to write it. It wasn't that Peter lacked self-discipline, he could force himself to do almost anything, his brain would simply not allow him to understand the information, especially in Transfiguration.

The only subject he really shone in was History of Magic, not that anyone noticed of course. For all Professor Binns knew he could just as well not have been in class at all, and none of the others gave a shit about the subject, therefore Peter's knowledge was all for nothing.

"You know," Patrick interrupted his thoughts. "I need to leave in ten minutes so if you won't benefit from me being here, which you don't seem to." He eyed Peter's empty parchment. "I'll be off now."

"Sure, you can go," Peter said, not looking up from his paper.

"Good." Patrick seemed just as relieved at being allowed to leave as Peter was about seeing him walk out the library doors.

"So we'll meet here again at six thirty." Marlene said, going through what they had planned once again. "Lily, you keep Alice away from here until it's time. Mary, you take this list…" She handed Mary the list of names they'd jotted down. "And go 'round trying to collect as many people on it as possible. While you do that, I will get some food from the kitchen and freshen up this place." She looked around at the dusty desks moved up towards the walls and the blackboard with a crack across it.

"You don't think we should've done this earlier? Like, yesterday? When I said we should do it." Mary stood leaned against the wall.

"No, now is good, off you go." Marlene tried to not be to curt (mostly to avoid the telling off look Lily would give her if she was).

As Lily and Mary left the empty classroom Marlene turned to face the room; she had no idea how she'd manage to get it all cleaned up. After trying a few spells, which did nothing but spread the dust and sent her into a coughing fit, she gave up and went to get cleaning equipment from the broom closet further down the corridor.

As she was walking down the corridor towards the classroom she heard Peeves' high voice, and she knew the classroom would be in an even worse state when she returned.

She was right. Peeves zoomed around the room, destroying everything in his path and singing loudly.

"Peeves! Out!" Marlene ordered, but her words drowned in Peeves' loud singing. "Peeves!" She tried again, this time louder.

For a second Peeves looked like he might actually stop and leave her alone. Then he dove into a cabinet at the back of the room and found a package of rubbers, which he started throwing at her. Hands over her head, Marlene rushed out of the room. The rubbers Peeves managed to hit her with before she shut the door hurt, and she knew they'd leave red marks. A few more rubbers bounced against the other side of the door before Peeves started singing again and, from the sound of it, causing the blackboard to fall to the floor.

Carefully, she creaked the door open again; Peeves was still busy making a mess and didn't notice her. Marlene raised her wand, hoping her plan would work.

"Levicorpus," she whispered. Peeves yelped as an invisible rope hung him upside down.

"Let me down you filthy girl!" He struggled to get free.

"Get out of here." She walked towards him.

She lifted the hex and Peeves zoomed above her head and out the door, mumbling curse words as he went.

The room truly was a mess. Apart from the dust and spiderwebs, half the desks were turned over, the blackboard had fallen to the floor and the contents of every cabinet were spread across the floor. Her mum would've fixed it in a moment, a simple swing of her wand and the room would look perfect, but Marlene had never bothered to learn even the most basic housework spells. Grabbing the broom from where she'd leaned it across the wall, she set about working.

As they were heading down the entrance stairs, Peter made an excuse about an unreturned book and slipped away from the others. He had a good idea of where the Ravenclaw tower was located based on all the times they'd examined the Marauder's Map. Still, he got lost more times than he thought possible searching for the right place. Once he reached the platform with the door leading into the common room, it hit him that he had no plan as to what to do now. Normally he just followed along as the others told him what to do. He'd have to be his own person now. Scanning the very small platform he thought it would be best to wait there; it was dinner soon and she was bound to show up then.

He waited as people came and went. No one seemed to care about or even notice him. After almost fifteen minutes a passing girl asked if she could help him with something.

"Can you check if Lindsey Hughes is in there?" he asked, thankful someone had finally stretched out a helping hand.

Five minutes and thirteen passing Ravenclaws later, Lindsey showed up.

"Hi, Peter." She smiled.

"Hi."

"You asked for me."

"Yeah, I was just wondering why you didn't make it to tutoring today."

Lindsay looked surprised. "Didn't Patrick show up?"

"Yeah, he did. I was just wondering why you couldn't make it."

"I could."

"Then why didn't you?"

"Pat offered to take it instead. He said you knew each other."

"Well, we don't, and now I have to finish my homework by myself tonight instead." He didn't mean to sound so accusing.

"I'm sorry," Lindsey said. "I really thought I was helping you out."

"It's not your fault," Peter sighed.

"So…"

"Well, I need to go."

"Are you okay, Wormtail?" Remus asked when Peter sat down next to them in the Great Hall.

He wasn't fine. Someone was lying to him, and it made him feel uncomfortable.

"Yeah, just a little tired," he said.

"Okay."

Peter didn't know if they were naive enough to swallow the lie or if they didn't care enough to dig deeper.

"So, are we stopping by the so called 'party' later?" Sirius asked.

"I'll need to go by the Prefects' office first, but then I'm in," Remus said.

"Absolutely," James agreed. Peter knew he'd better go to the common room and force himself to finish the Transfiguration homework, but if the others were going he couldn't just leave.

No sooner had Peter finished his dinner than he was dragged out from the hall by the others. Instead of heading up the stairs, they went into a small corridor in the entrance hall and through a wooden door. In the minute it took for Remus to write something down in a notebook and tell them they could leave, James had found something interesting.

"Sirius…" he said at length, looking at a photo on the wall. "You don't happen to know about a Celine Black, do you?"

"No," Sirius replied. "What's with her?"

James nodded at the photo and Sirius went over.

"Blood traitor," he said. "That's why my mother never mentioned her. She could talk herself sick about family members, though."

"She's quite old now," Remus noted, also coming over. "It's from 1909." He pointed to the year engraved in the golden sign on the frame.

"If she betrayed my family, chances are she is long dead now," Sirius said dryly and started towards the door. The others followed him.

James and Sirius took the lead as usual while Remus and Peter walked a bit behind them.

"Do you think we can just walk in?" Peter asked Remus. "I don't suppose it'll be like when we host a party.

"The two of us, perhaps," Remus replied. "But all four? There's no chance Lily will let those two through the door."

There were more people in the room than Lily had expected. The list they'd given to Mary had been relatively short; still, half of Hogwarts seemed to have showed up somehow so it took a while before any of them spotted the disaster waiting to happen. A disaster with brown hair and blue eyes. A disaster named Cody.

Lily and Alice were standing by the table of food, looking out over the room when Lily spotted him across the room, talking to his friend.

"What is Cody doing here?" she asked Alice in a whisper.

"Who?"

"Cody. Mary's boyfriend, sort of."

"Is he here?"

Lily nodded towards the entrance, where Cody stood leaned against the door frame.

Alice sighed. "Marlene will freak out. We need to get him out of here. Where's Mary?" Alice's eyes flickered around the room.

"Calm down, Al," Lily put a hand on her shoulder. "I'll handle it. You just stay here and eat a biscuit."

She hurried away, keeping her eyes open for Mary. She found her towards the back of the room, talking to a blond Hufflepuff.

"Mary, what is Cody doing here?" She tried to keep calm, but it was hard when she knew the party was a ticking bomb.

"He wanted to come so I invited him." Mary shrugged. "Is there a problem?"

"Yes there's a problem, Mary. You know Marlene will make a scene when she finds out."

"Well, that's her problem, not mine."

"If you two start fighting, again, we all have a problem." Lily sighed. "You two were getting along this morning, what happened?"

"Ask her?" Mary shrugged again.

"You have to ask him to leave, now. We might be able to turn this around. I'll go find Marls." She rushed away, praying Mary understood the importance.

"Hey, Marls." She found her friend by the drink table, dangerously close to Cody. "We're out of biscuits, can you go get some more?" They didn't really need biscuits, but they needed time, and biscuits would get them time.

"Okay," Marlene went for the door and she'd gotten too far before Lily realised the huge flaw in the plan. Marlene turned and hurried back over to Lily.

"What is he doing here?" she yelped. "She invited him, didn't she?"

"Well…"

"That's it. I'm killing her, I'm killing both of them," Marlene stormed off.

"No, Marls. Wait!" It was useless. Lily could just as well have called for the bird outside the window for the impact it made. Lily returned to Alice.

"Did you fix it?" she asked.

"Not really," Lily admitted. "You see…" She didn't make it any longer before she was cut off by Marlene.

"You think you can just come here and invite your precious little boyfriend who you know very well how I feel about and not even have the guts to tell me?" she screamed. "I will tell you one thing. If your boyfriend wants to keep that pretty face of his, he'd better leave right this second."

The room had gone very quiet and all eyes seemed to be on Marlene and Mary.

"You wouldn't dare touch him!" Mary stepped forward. "I only did it because you're a bitch who wants everyone to obey your every wish, and you know that! You know that you're a bitch."

"Oh. I'm the bitch? You're the one who's eavesdropping and gossiping about everything. It's a miracle half of the people in this room don't hate you."

"You better stop talking like that about my girl. I will fight you." Cody stepped up behind Mary's back.

"Oh I'm so scared." Marlene rolled her eyes.

"You better be." He raised his wand.

"Oh no. I wouldn't think so!" Someone exclaimed from somewhere and a moment later James and Sirius came spilling out from the crowd.

"If you're fighting Marlene you're getting the two of us as part of the deal."

"Oh isn't this cute?" Mary put her head to one side. "Marlene needs two big boys to protect her."

Lily could've retold what happened next even before it did. Marlene bolted forward and pushed Mary backwards into the crowd. Cody flicked his wand, causing Marlene to fall backwards. Just as James and Sirius both got ready to cast a spell Lily dove forward into the gap between Marlene and Mary, who had now recovered.

"No! Everyone stop it!" she yelled, picking the wands from James and Sirius with one motion. "You'd better go." She turned to Cody.

"But them…" Cody started and pointed to James and Sirius.

"I will deal with them, thank you very much."

Some wolf-whistled in the background as Cody left the room, muttering.

"Potter, Black." She turned to the two. "I'll give these back," she waved their wands in front of them. "But you can't hex anyone, okay."

They nodded and she pushed the wands back into their hands.

"And you two, you come with me." She grabbed Mary and Marlene by the wrists and dragged them into the classroom next door.

"It's Alice's birthday, and you two decide to go start a fight?"

"I didn't…" Mary began.

"Shut up. If you weren't my best friends I would report you straight to McGonagall, but since you are, I will only take away points." None of them protested. "Good. Now you have two options. You can go back in there and be nice and smile or you can go somewhere else. I don't care where. Understood?"

They nodded.

"Now I'll go back in there, if you two don't mind." She slammed the door shut behind them.

"I'm so sorry, Alice. We should've just kept to how we usually do," Lily said for the millionth time when she, Alice and Dorcas had escaped the now very tense party. They were sitting on the thick branch of the crooked tree down by the lake.

"No, I would've loved it. If it wasn't for the fact that we right now have two people building teams on different sides of the room." Even if Marlene and Mary had kept to their promise of not starting another fight, people had started to divide in different groups, which hadn't eased the tension.

They sat quiet for another few minutes and then the front doors of the castle opened and two figures stepped out. They seemed to be heading towards the lake, and as they came closer Lily recognised them; Marlene and, beside her, Sirius.

Lily sighed. In the past week she'd managed to mostly forget the incident in Hogsmeade, but now it returned again. She was about to crack already, dealing with this wasn't what she needed. But no one else seemed to be dealing with ít, and someone had to. She told Alice and Dorcas she'd be back in a minute and climbed down from the tree.

"Hi, Lils!" Marlene exclaimed. "What're you doing here?" Then, turning to Sirius, she added, "James will be disappointed."

"The tension was too high, we needed to escape. What're you doing here?"

"Marls needed some air and I offered to follow her," Sirius explained.

"You're offering a whole lot of things to Marlene," Lily said. " As a friend, of course," she added.

Sirius looked at her, and Lily couldn't determine if he was smiling or frowning.

"What're you talking about, Evans?"

"I'm talking about Hogsmeade. The two of you, behind the Three Broomsticks."

Marlene and Sirius looked equally confused.

"Lily, you'll need to be more specific," Marlene said.

"I don't know, there was a lot of hugging and giggling." Lily gestured with her hands. "And faces a bit too close for 'friends'."

"Wait…Lils." Marlene frowned. "You think we kissed?"

"I know you did. I saw you."

"Then you were hallucinating. Because we didn't."

"You didn't?"

"Nope, our dear McKinnon here ruined all the fun by having detention to get to."

Both Marlene and Lily turned to him.

"All the fun?" Lily asked sharply.

"Cool down, Evans. I'm joking," he said, throwing his hands up in defence.

"You better be. You have no idea how James was talking about the two of you."

"James?" Sirius smiled.

"I meant Potter," Lily snapped. "Shut up, Black."

"You said James." Sirius teased her with a silly smile all over his face.

"If you tell him about that, I'll tell him about the two of you."

"What do you have on us?" Sirius asked.

"St. Mungo's," Lily told him pointedly.

"Okay, got it. Let's go, Marls, she's dangerous."

Lily heard Sirius dismiss Marlene's question about what happened at St. Mungo's before returning to Alice and Dorcas.

"Are you okay?" Dorcas asked.

"Yeah." Lily nodded.

The classroom was starting to empty. It was nearing curfew and most sensible people would not want to be caught out of the common room, however, Remus happened to be friends with people who were in no way sensible. James and Peter were still hunting around the now very empty room looking for Lily, and James seemed ignorant of the fact that she obviously wasn't there.

"Hi guys, no luck?" he asked.

"I think she left," James said. "Who leaves a party they're hosting?"

Peter shrugged.

"You know…" James began but trailed off as the door swung open and Lily entered.

"Oh, Potter, you're still here?" she sighed.

"You don't expect me to leave a party early, do you?" James laughed nervously.

"Of course not," Lily said. She went over to the food table and with a wand movement tried to vanish the food. Nothing happened.

"Let me help you!" James exclaimed and rushed forward, as usual failing miserably with acting "cool" as he put it. Lily glanced sideways at him as he places his hand around her right wrist and helped her with the wand movement once more.

"Thanks," she said, quite startled, as the food disappeared.

James stayed standing awkwardly next to her as she packed together the tablecloth and pushed the table back in its place.

"Can we help with anything else?" he asked.

"No, we've got it covered," she said. "You should get back to the common room, it's almost curfew."

James, who'd never cared about curfew before, nodded and turned to leave.

"Let's go," he said.

"I like you too." Alice hadn't quite managed to get the words out of her head all day. She tried, but they just wouldn't disappear. Was she reading too much into it? Probably. She normally wasn't the person to dwell on things like these, but when it was about Frank she wasn't herself. The fact that her friends wouldn't shut up about it didn't really help either.

The dorm door had barely closed behind them that night before Mary started going on and on about what a bitch Marlene was and how she'd always known and they'd never listened to her.

Marlene still hadn't returned, and Alice was starting to worry. Mary's attack was still fresh in her memory and she couldn't help but wonder if something like that had happened again. The rising war suddenly felt much closer once it'd managed to sneak inside the walls of the school.

"Does anyone know where Marls is?" Lily said, voicing Alice's thoughts.

"Who cares?" Mary mumbled.

"We do, Mary. And so do you for that matter."

Mary snorted and grabbed her hairbrush from the dresser. She started brushing through her hair and quite clearly wished to change the subject.

"She was with Black down by the lake, maybe she's in their dorm," Lily speculated.

"Oh, so she gets to sleep in their dorm, but the second I go on a date with a single guy there's something wrong with me." Mary complained to no one in particular.

"We've already had this discussion, Mary," Lily sighed.

"She better stay away from Frank though, but I guess you never know with her. She'll do whatever the fuck she feels like because she's Marlene McKinnon!" Mary yelped, not paying any attention to Lily.

"Seriously, stop it!" Alice yelled. Mary went quiet. "You won't benefit from whining to us. We are friends with both of you and your moaning won't change that."

Alice had learnt that raising her voice gave result. She'd never do it outside their group of friends, but it was useful to know.

"I'll go see if Marlene's with the boys," Alice said, standing. "Will you stay here?"

"If it means I don't have to have meet James 'I'm just going to stand here and try to be funny' Potter," Lily sighed.

Alice nodded and exited the dorm, not believing anyone could be so oblivious as to not see James Potter's love for Lily Evans.

She climbed the flight of stairs to the boys' dorm and knocked on the door before opening it ajar. A wave of noise hit her. They were all, based on what she saw through the crack in the door, in the middle of a pillow fight. She stood in the door for quite some time before anyone noticed her.

"Fortescue!" James exclaimed. "To what do we owe the pleasure?"

"Have you seen Marls?"

"She's still with Sirius, I guess. Why?"

"We just wanted to know she was okay, she's not in our dorm." Alice opened the door wider to see the room looked like a battlefield.

"I guess she is." James shrugged.

"Well, thanks. I'll go back to the dorm?"

"Why don't you stay here?" Arnold asked. "I mean, they're more likely to come here," he added.

"And we could use a referee," Peter put in. "Some people are quite obviously breaking the rules." He crossed his arms and glared at James.

"I don't know…"

"You're coming in." Arnold grabbed her arm and pulled her through the door.

Before Alice knew what happened she was seated on top of a very high pile of various stuff, mostly books and pillows. James and Arnold had explained the rules, which were way more complex then Alice thought necessary for a pillow fight. She'd lost track entirely when they got to "if you throw a Bertie Bott's Bean with coffee taste on someone else you get 2 points, 4 if it hits the face".

"The score is 12-10 in benefit of team pyjamas dancing," she announced five minutes into the game. She still didn't fully understand the rules.

"You're an unfair referee," James complained as Frank and Arnold cheered.

"Because your rules are stupid." Alice crossed her arms.

"You just judge to Frank's advantage because you fancy each other."

Alice was glad she'd reached down to adjust one of the pillows because she felt the blush rise in her face.

"Stop it," she heard Frank say and she looked up, relieved to see that he was blushing too.

"I'm just sayin'." James folded his arms in front of him. There was a moment of silence before the door flung open and Sirius announced himself part of the game. Marlene came in behind him.

"Alice?" she asked. "What're you doing here?"

"I was looking for you, and then they forced me to be referee in their pillow fight."

"A shitty referee," James added and Alice, not wanting him to repeat his speech from a few minutes ago, interrupted him.

"Are you coming with me back to the dorm, Marls?" Alice asked, climbing down from her place on top of a copy of 'Basics of Transfiguration'

"Is Mary there?"

"I guess…"

"Then I'm not coming." Marlene crossed her arms.

Part of her just wanted to tell everyone to stop acting like toddlers, but she didn't.

"Where will you go then?" she asked instead.

"I don't know." Marlene shrugged. "I might sleep in the common room."

"No you won't!" James exclaimed. "You can stay here. Right guys?"

The others shrugged.

"Well, I'll get back." Alice sighed. "Good luck with your pillow fight."