Chapter Eight
The Great Hall filled quickly for the Halloween feast. Students hurried in, chattering excitedly as they began one of the best feasts of the year. The candles that floated about the hall had been replaced with old-fashioned street lanterns and lit with eerie purple tapers. Orange and black streamers twisted and twirled around the walls, while above them flew bats of every shape and size.
The Hogwarts ghosts floated about the hall as well. Most were friendly, though the Bloody Baron hovered grimly in the corner and glowered around the hall. James nodded to Sir Nicholas before heading toward the Gryffindor table. Sirius and Peter had already arrived, and were trying to keep a straight face as James sat down.
"Did you finish the spell?" Peter asked, beginning to fill his plate. James poured himself some pumpkin juice and grinned. In spite of everything else that seemed to be going wrong that year, he had still been looking forward to the Halloween feast; they had a reputation to uphold, after all—even if things were going to be a bit tamer this year.
"I did. Did you get the music?" James asked. Peter nodded, and James glanced around as inconspicuously as he could. "Where's Remus? We need him."
"I'm here," muttered a quietly annoyed voice. Remus sat down next to Sirius. "Had to dock some third-years for dueling in the hallway."
Sirius snorted as he tucked into large piece of roast turkey. "And that's why I'm not a prefect. I'd just let them have a go at it and start taking wagers."
"No, you're not a prefect because you'd be the one dueling," said Remus, spearing a large roll.
"That too," Sirius laughed. "I remember some good ones fourth year. That one with Snape and the Tongue-Tying Curse…" He trailed off, clearly enjoying the memory.
"Are you ready then, Moony?" asked Peter, ignoring Sirius and glancing around the hall. "We've been waiting. This is our last one, you know."
"I'm ready," said Remus, wiping his mouth. "Let's see the spell."
James pulled a small piece of parchment from his pocket. He'd been working on the complex Transfiguration spell for days; he'd tried it over and over, until it had worked perfectly every time. Now he only hoped the others could manage it, so that the Great Hall received the full effect of their final Halloween prank. It wasn't quite as stunning as sixth-year, but then hopefully they wouldn't end up in detention for a month.
Sirius nodded, confident in his ability to cast the spell. Remus looked slightly skeptical, but Peter seemed completely bewildered. James was glad Peter had taken care of the music instead. He and Sirius had snuck in just before dinner and planted their enchanted conch shells in the corners.
When dessert appeared, James looked to the others. "Ready?" he asked. They nodded, Sirius grinning broadly, Remus with a straight face but a mischievous look in his eyes, and Peter concentrating. Wands raised beneath the table, they each murmured the incantation and waited. Slowly but surely the floating lanterns above them began to transform into large, grinning, glowing jack-o-lanterns. As the students looked up and began to point at the pumpkins, James nodded to Peter, who cast his own spell and began the music.
The strains of a popular Muggle Halloween song began to fill the hall. The students gasped at first, then began to laugh, and some even began to sing along. Grinning, James brought his hands back to the table and finished his pumpkin pudding. Sirius raised his glass in a toast, and together they enjoyed their last Halloween feast at Hogwarts as the jack-o-lanterns turned lazily above them and the strains of another ridiculous Muggle song filled the air.
James tried to catch Lily's eye, but she seemed to be pointedly ignoring him, especially after Sirius added a few impromptu fireworks that sent the hall screaming with glee. He wondered if she was silently disapproving, or if she would actually appreciate the simple nature of the prank.
All too soon it was time to leave, and the students began to drift from the hall back to their common rooms. Peter left with Susan, but James stayed a bit longer with Remus and Sirius, enjoying the last of their show. Professor Dumbledore came down from the staff table to join them, his eyes twinkling.
"An impressive bit of magic, Mr. Potter," he began. "Mr. Black, Mr. Lupin."
"Thank you, sir," replied Sirius, sitting up straighter. "Does that mean you won't be giving us detention this year? It is our last one."
"On the contrary, I quite like the effect," said Dumbledore, eyeing the pumpkins. "I think I might try it next year. Perhaps we'll have a new tradition."
"Excellent, sir," said Sirius, grinning. "Glad we could help, then."
Dumbledore turned to leave, but stopped and inclined his head. "What about the seeds?" he asked curiously. "Most Muggles scoop them out before they carve their jack-o-lanterns."
"What seeds?" asked James, frowning.
"Those seeds," said Dumbledore, and with a wave of his wand, thousands of seeds began to pour from the three pumpkins directly overhead, raining down on the Gryffindor table and quickly burying them up to their waist.
The few students left in the hall burst into cheers. James couldn't help it: it was a brilliant bit of magic, and he laughed heartily with Sirius and Remus, enjoying a rare moment of complete contentment. Dumbledore left the hall, and Remus Vanished the large pile of pumpkin seeds. Shaking the last few from his hair, James stood to leave with his friends.
They got several calls of goodwill and a spattering of applause as they left, and Sirius bowed, obviously enjoying the spotlight. He left them at the main staircase, however, telling them he would see them back in the dormitory later. Remus continued to walk with James, but left him at the third floor to head to the library for prefect duty.
James continued alone, wondering where Sirius had gone off to, and who he was seeing. He had refused to talk about it for weeks, but James was now fairly sure Remus was right, and that Sirius was seeing someone who wasn't a Gryffindor. He just wondered why his friend was so secretive about it.
He was glad he didn't have Halloween duty, because it was a night notorious for sneaking out, snogging, and pranks. He just wanted a quiet night in the common room…not that he had any choice. He seemed to be on his own more and more as his friends were all off with their girlfriends, and if he admitted it to himself, he was sort of tired of it. At times he even felt a bit lonely.
As he neared the portrait of the Fat Lady, James groaned to himself when he saw Lily in front of him, walking with Mark Whitby. They were holding hands, though he thought Lily seemed a bit stiff. Holding back any biting comments, he simply looked down and continued toward the portrait hole, where they had stopped for a rather chaste good night kiss.
"Excuse me, Evans," he said, his voice dry. "But I need to get in. Potions calls."
She broke apart from Mark, blushing furiously. Mark gave him a friendly smile—damn the affable Ravenclaw—and put his arm around Lily. "Good one this year, Potter. Especially nice bit of magic."
"Thanks, Whitby," James ground out. "If you don't mind?" He motioned them away so he could speak the password. Mark nodded and pulled Lily toward him. James was slightly surprised to see her resist his embrace.
"I'll be right in," she said. James frowned at her.
"Er, okay," he replied, confused. He shook his head and entered the common room. It was packed full of Gryffindors enjoying the night instead of studying, and he knew he wouldn't get anything done if he stayed. In fact, he was almost immediately pulled into a Quidditch conversation with Thomas Kirke and Ryan Sloper. They were analyzing the first match and making notes for the Gryffindor/Slytherin game in two weeks.
"You're doing that that now?" James asked. "Haven't you got anything better to do? It's Halloween and the game is still two weeks away."
"What are you up to, then?" asked Kirke, frowning. Quidditch was his obsession and ambition, and he probably sacrificed more than anyone on the team for it, including any semblance of a social life. "You've already hit the Great Hall." He paused. "You didn't get detention, did you? Because we need you for every practice."
"I've got another essay to write," James grumbled. He'd much rather hang out in the common room and talk Quidditch, but he just had too much work to do. "And no, Dumbledore loved it."
"Good. We'll come up with some notes for practice on Wednesday," said Kirke. "I've got a few ideas about the Slytherin defense this year, and we need to start thinking about Avery."
James glanced at him in surprise. "What about Avery?" he asked.
"He's been all over you off the pitch. Is he going to have a go at you in the match?" asked Kirke. "Because we need to plan for it if he does."
James hadn't even thought about his quarrels with Avery carrying over to the Quidditch pitch, given it'd been at least a week since they'd had words after Defense Against The Dark Arts, but as he thought about it, he nodded. It would certainly be in character for the Slytherin to try something underhanded after all his empty threats in the corridors.
"I'll keep it in mind," he said. "Look, I'd love to stay, but I just can't. See you later." James hurried toward the stairs, another worry added to the list of things he was already thinking about far too much, far too often: schoolwork, Head Boy duties, his dad, his friends, Evans, Harrison, and now the game and Dante Avery. Sometimes he wondered how he didn't explode from it.
He heard a voice call his name again and turned to find Lily coming toward him. She was tucking a few loose strands of hair into a clip and cleared her throat as she approached him.
"I'm sorry about that…out there," she mumbled, not looking him in the eye. He just stared at her, wondering why she was apologizing to him for snogging her boyfriend.
"No problem." He shrugged. "It's none of my business, remember? You were just in the way."
She looked up at him, and although he couldn't quite read her face, he thought she looked both confused and surprised, and as if she were hoping for him to say something else.
"Where are you going?" she asked. "Don't you have anything else planned for tonight?"
"No, not this year. Everyone else is out, and I have a date with Potions." He shrugged again to hide his disappointment, and she nodded ruefully.
"Me too," she said. "The Potions essay, that is. It's turning out a lot more difficult than I thought it would be."
James gazed at her, a dozen thoughts running through his head. For some reason, he picked the one he knew was the most likely to get him burned, but something compelled him to say it anyway. "Want to work on it together?" he asked.
To his surprise, Lily paled. She stared at him, wide-eyed. "I can't," she whispered. "I'm meeting—"
"—Whitby again," he finished for her. He waved off anything else she might say. "No problem. Good luck. Behave in the Restricted Section."
He turned and went up to his dormitory without another word, irrationally disappointed when she didn't call after him. What had possessed him to say that? He had known what the answer would be, he had just set himself up to get upset over it. Kicking at the inoffensive trunk at the foot of his bed, James swore, then took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down.
Whatever was going on with Lily was frustrating. They had seemed so close to something at the end of sixth year, and yet they had come back to nothing but harsh words for one another in September. He still struggled with his mother's death, because he thought about it almost every day; it had changed him in many ways. What he couldn't understand why she had changed so much, however—why she was usually both so defensive and antagonistic with. The rare moments when they actually got along were now eclipsed by the fact that she was with someone else, and he shouldn't let it bother him, but it did.
Settling on his bed, James dug out his Potions books and set to work. He wrote quickly and with focus, as if he were channeling his emotions into the parchment. When he finally glanced up, bleary-eyed, he was surprised to see that a steady rain had started to fall sometime during the two hours that had passed—and that the dormitory was still empty.
Deciding a short break was in order, he rolled off the bed and headed back to the common room. It was still quite crowded. Susan and Peter were sitting with Remus at a table, but Sirius was nowhere to be seen. James headed toward his friends, curious about their missing fourth member, but stopped when Cynthia Morris came crashing through the portrait hole, her eyes red from crying.
Everyone stopped and stared at her. She, in turn, looked mortified and ran right back out the portrait hole. James gave his friends a quick wave and hurried after her; he wanted to make sure she was all right, both as her friend and as Head Boy.
He caught up with her quickly and reached out for her hand. She didn't shake him off, but turned into him immediately. He wrapped his arms around her and stroked her hair, startled when a vision of red flashed before his eyes. When Cynthia had settled a bit, he gently asked her what had happened.
Another couple walked by, and she looked away without answering. "Not here," she murmured. "Can we talk somewhere else?"
He nodded and led her toward the fifth floor and the prefects' lounge. He just hoped Lily wasn't there, entwined with Whitby. He'd probably jinx them before running out, and then both he and Cynthia would be a right mess. For some reason the pathetic image of the two of them made him smile and shake his head.
Fortunately, when he spoke the password and poked his head in, the lounge was empty. He led Cynthia to the sofa and set her down, then conjured a handkerchief so she could dry her eyes. She smiled, which he thought was a good sign; he must be doing something right for once.
"So what's wrong?" he asked again, sitting next to her but not too close. She sighed and shook her head.
"I'm just disappointed, that's all. Disappointed and feeling completely stupid."
James frowned. "I can understand the disappointed part," he said, because he did. "But not stupid. I can't imagine you doing anything stupid."
She was quiet for a bit, as if gathering her thoughts and trying to decide what to tell him. "What the hell," she finally murmured. "It's Alan Diggory," she said, looking him straight in the eye.
"Alan Diggory?" he repeated. "Oh, the guy you—"
"—wouldn't tell you about, yes." She shook her head again. "I feel so stupid, James! I really like him. He was up in the library, and I finally worked up the nerve to ask him if he wanted to work together on Charms, but he said no."
"Oh," said James, at a complete loss how to respond, even though it had just happened to him with Lily.
"But that's not even the worst part," she continued. "Just as he said turned me down, Julie Higgins came up and took his hand. They're together! She looked at me like I was mental for even talking to him. It was so embarrassing!" Cynthia sniffed, and James just shook his head again.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I had no idea."
"What? That I liked him or that he was with Julie?" she asked.
"Neither," he said. "It's just…" He paused before smiling bitterly to himself. "It's just a bad night for both of us, I guess."
Cynthia looked up at him in surprise. Her blue eyes were still watery and her nose was red, but she was still quite pretty, and James couldn't help but think it was Diggory's loss that he had already had plans with Higgins.
"What happened?" she asked. "I'm sorry, I'm so wrapped up in my own problems, I didn't even think to ask what you'd been doing all night."
"Why would you?" he said. "Only I know exactly how you feel because the same thing happened to me tonight."
"Really?" she asked, sitting straighter and pushing the hair from her face. "Who?"
"A long shot," he replied shortly, falling back on the sofa. "Always a long shot."
She nodded as if she understood, and though he had never really talked with her about it, James had the distinct impression that Cynthia probably knew exactly who he was referring to. She leaned back next to him and put her head on his shoulder.
"We're a sorry pair, James," she murmured.
"Yes, we are," he answered. He turned his head to look down at her, only she had turned to glance up at him, and their eyes met, and whatever he was going to say next was lost as he looked at her, and she steadily gazed back, and their lips moved closer and closer together until at last they met, slowly and uncertainly.
It felt good…but wrong. He wasn't imagining Cynthia sitting beside him, but someone else, and he knew, deep down, that she was probably doing the same thing. It was comforting, though, and they continued only so long as they needed to before gently pulling apart and smiling sadly at one another.
"I'm sorry—" James started to say, but Cynthia put a finger to his lips and stopped him.
"Me too, but let's not let it ruin anything, okay?"
He simply nodded, feeling even more miserable than he had earlier. "Shall we head back before we muck it up even more?"
Cynthia laughed ruefully and stood, offering her hand to him. "Yes, and let's talk about something else. Did Kirke ever track you down? He had some thoughts about the match with Slytherin…"
They busied themselves with inane Quidditch talk all the way back to Gryffindor. Outside the rain continued to fall, a melancholy background to their forced normality. When they finally reached the portrait hole, James stopped her. "It's not going to be awkward now, is it?"
Cynthia gave the password and entered without replying. James followed her in, waiting for an answer. Finally she stopped at the stairway to the girls' dormitories and gave him a hug, as well as a small kiss on the cheek. "It might be, but not for long. We're still friends, right?"
"Absolutely," he said, nodding even though he was sure he had just ruined it. "All right, I'll see you tomorrow then. Good night."
Cynthia nodded and headed upstairs. James sighed and turned toward his own dormitory. He couldn't have imagined a worse Halloween, aside from running into Dante Avery and finally getting into a real fight with him. Really, he would have preferred a straightforward duel to the feeling of being pulled in a dozen different directions at once. Yet he had to keep going, no matter how difficult things got. His father had impressed that upon him over the summer. And while he sort of wanted to break into Sirius's secret stash of Firewhisky at the moment and just forget it all, he knew that certainly wasn't the answer.
At least, until he glanced up and saw Lily staring at him from the sofa, green eyes bright with anger. She stood and walked stiffly upstairs, ignoring him completely. He watched her go, his heart once again sinking.
End Notes:
Thank you once again to mugglegirlmarauder for looking this over and tweaking and for listening to me drone on about it all. And to my flist, whom I'm pretty sure I consulted on several things here (like the pumpkins.)
Thank you for all your reviews (and patience, lol!)