chapter 7

The next morning, James woke up earlier than usual. The other Marauders were all still fast asleep. Their deep, calm breathings had a very relaxing effect, so he didn't move for a few minutes, and laid in his bed, listening to his friends. Then, he became restless and decided that he didn't want to lie in his bed anymore.

He got up slowly and gathered his clothes, which were lying everywhere but on their place. He yawned, and stumbled into the bathroom, to get a long hot shower. He let the water run and searched for his grapefruit-shampooing. He smiled as he stepped in the rain of hot, clean water and shut everything out but the sound of running water. Nothing as relaxing as a nice shower.

When he got out, his friends were still sleeping like babies. Noisy, snoring babies. James took a look at his watch and saw it was near 6 in the morning. He decided to let his friends sleep for another hour or so, and grab some breakfast at the Great Hall alone.

The Great Hall was, as expected, nearly empty. There was a bunch of Ravenclaws, going over some schoolwork, three Slytherins, all eating alone, a handful of Huffelpuffs, talking quietly, and some Gryffindors, including Lily.

James suddenly had a megawatt smile on his face and walked up to her and Caroline, who was writing a long letter. Lily seemed to be giving her some directions every now and then.

"Look who's here," Caroline snarled when she saw him, "The great James Potter."

"Leave us alone, Potter," Lily sighed.

"Why are you up so early?" James asked, ignoring Lily's and Caroline's obvious tries to get him to leave.

"We're always up this early," Lily snapped and decided that ignoring him would maybe do the trick to get James to leave.

"Yuk," James laughed and he started filling his plate. Lily and Caroline glared at him and Caroline grabbed her letter and put it in her bag.

"So, Tannys, who's the love letter for?" James asked around a mouthful of food. Lily looked disgusted and Caroline shocked.

"L-love letter?" she spluttered, "Why would you thinks it's a love letter."

"If it had been a letter to your parents, you wouldn't have tried to hide it," James grinned.

"Well," Caroline snapped, "You're mistaken. It's a letter to… a friend of mine."

"Sure it is, Tannys," James said soothingly, "So, Evans, are you free tonight?"

"Ah!" Lily squealed, "Why don't you just leave us the hell alone, Potter? How many times do you want me to tell you I'm not interested? No! I'm not free for you tonight! And NO, I do not want to go on a bloody date with you! Geez, are you retarded, or what?"

James gulped and looked at the raging girl he'd love to marry one day. He thought of the promise he'd made to himself. One more time.

He sighed. He guessed she was really not interested in him, then. Goodbye, Lily Evans.

"Well," James said silently, realizing the weight of all the eyes in the Great Hall staring at them, "I guess I'll get going, then… Bye Evans… Tannys…"

He stood up and went to sit on the other end of the table. There, he dropped his face in his hands and stared at his food instead of eating it. He felt miserable. James closed his eyes. He felt like digging a hole and dying in there.

"Hi James," came a soft, high voice. James looked up to see Marley looking at him, "Care if I join you?"

He guessed she'd missed the spectacle. He shrugged. And smiled at her.

"Where are your friends?" she asked, grabbing some eggs.

"Asleep," James answered, "Yours?"

"Same," she said, "So… are they really asleep or did you hit Sirius into the hospital wing?"

James gasped and stared at Marley in shock, before he started laughing, "They're really asleep. Sirius was already asleep when I came in yesterday evening, so I didn't have a lot of chances to fight with him."

"Oh," Marley said.

"Yeah… Oh…" James answered. They looked at each other and burst out laughing.

"Marley," James said, "It was fun talking to you, but I got to go wake the other Marauders."

"Sure!" Marley smiled, "Denise is walking in anyway, so no problem captain."

"Ciao!" James grinned. Marley was cool. A lot of people underestimated her. He probably would have as well, if they weren't on the team together. He walked to the Gryffindor common room and actually smiled. Marley was a good girl. She made him forget about Lily.

Lily…

Merlin, he had to stop thinking of her. He'd blown his last chance to ask her out, so he had to forget about her now. It would be so hard to forget about the one girl he actually loved. The one girl he wanted to share the rest of his life with. The one girl who had turned him down. Again.

"Prongs!" Remus' very pissed off voice sounded when he walked in, "Where the hell have you been? Your bed is empty, there's no note,... I was worried sick! … Merlin, my head aches…"

"Oh great," James softly groaned, "Is it that time of the month again?"

"Yes. It. Is," came the annoyed werewolf's answer.

"Great," James said again, and he went to wake up Sirius, whom looked about as happy as Remus did, before he disappeared into the bathroom for an hour or so.

"You weren't really worried, were you?" James asked, "You were just annoyed that things didn't go as you scheduled them, isn't it?"

"Shut up, Prongs," Remus said. He dropped on his bed and looked at his friends, "I feel horrible."

"I know, mate," James smiled, "One night, then you're over with it for another month."

"But after that one comes another and another and another and another and…"

"I get the point," James assured him. The two friends looked at each other and gave one another a small smile.

"You had breakfast yet?" Remus asked. James nodded, remembering the horrible empty feeling Lily had left inside of him: his heart ripped out and shredded in small pieces. And falling. Or more like being sucked into a pool of black water. Black water of pain and loneliness. Merlin, he felt like a loser.

"Yeah," he breathed, trying to put on a brave face and make Remus not notice the inner pain he was in. Life sucked when you were in love with a perfect girl. A perfect Head Girl even.

Shit.

Didn't the two of them have rounds tonight? He was pretty certain they did.

He went with his hand through his hair out of fear for tonight, and ran to the calendar he'd hung above his bed. Yep. They did have rounds and he had a full moon to attend. How could he have been so stupid as to let Lily plan rounds on the same evening as a full moon?

"-ongs? James?" Remus voice said.

"Huh?" James looked bewildered, having slightly forgotten his friends.

"I was asking if you came down with us," Remus repeated.

"I… No," James shook his head, "No, you guys go eat. I'll see you in DADA."

"Sure," Remus turned around and knocked on the bathroom door, "Padfoot, get your ass out of the shower, we're going down for breakfast."

Sirius grumbled something in response that Remus' ears caught but James' didn't.

"Five more minutes, maximum," Remus yelled back, "And then I break the door down and drag you to breakfast by your hair."

"What a nice mood he is in," Peter mumbled to James while walking past him to grab his shoes. James grinned. They all knew that Remus got terrible headaches when it was his time of the month. They also knew that those headaches got him in a terrible mood.

Sirius came out of the bathroom drama queen style. The door flew open and hit the wall with a loud crash, steam curled around his body – he liked his showers really hot – and he looked at his friends with an annoyed and haughty look that only Blacks could give you.

Then, he sighed and grinned. Three of the Marauders went down for breakfast, and the fourth one stayed behind, thinking over his last failure with Lily. Why couldn't she just love him? Why did she have to go and hurt him every time they saw each other? For once, he really wasn't looking forward to rounds.

Usually, he didn't really feel like doing rounds, but the prospective of being alone with Lily always made him kind of like it. Now, the prospective of being alone with Lily scared him. In fact, he never wanted to see her again, to be spared of the pain of being around her.

But he had no choice. If didn't meet her tonight, she'd not only kill him, she'd also tell McGonagall. And McGonagall would tell his parents. His parents would be so disappointed in him. They'd been so proud when he got his Head Boy's badge. He'd really seen them shine with proud, for the first time in years. Sure, they loved him and they didn't really mind all the trouble he got in. But they were never really proud of him before. Now, they were. And he'd let them down if he didn't take his Head Boy responsibility.

James sighed and sat on his bed. He swallowed and sighed again. Then he looked up and stared through the window. Clouds ran by slowly and it promised to be a cold yet sunny day.

He grabbed a small, leather-bound book from under his bed and opened it. His sketchbook. On the first page, it had a drawing of Sirius and him in the train, on their way to Hogwarts 7 years ago. Further in the book, it had a lot of drawings of Lily.

He liked one in particular: Lily, sitting in the grass, picking at flowers while talking to Laura. Her hair was loose and blew in the wind. The sun lighted up her eyes and the lake behind her. They both looked relaxed and happy. He'd drawn them last June, without their knowing – of course.

"Oh Lily," he whispered, "How I wish I could just forget you."

He grabbed his pencil and started drawing the scene they'd made this morning.

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