A/N: SO, its been like five years since I updated? six? If there is anyone still alive and reading out there, please let me know!
I mainly got frustrated when updating because I got favorited a TON but then I got ZERO reviews! Very annoying! But ah well, I love writing, so I am doing it for that sake now. Screw it!
Hope y'all enjoy, even if you don't review. Jerks! ;)
Lily's P.O.V.
So, Potter wanted to be 'civil' with me, eh? Well if by 'civil' he meant 'my boyfriend', that would be just fine. But that most definitely wasn't the case. Damn it.
"Lil, are you alright?" A male voice snapped me out of my thoughts.
I looked up to see Sirius leaning over me at the breakfast table. I frowned up at him, wondering why he was talking to me at all. I knew he was friends with Faye, but for the past few years he'd been way to cool to talk to me.
When I didn't answer, he just plopped down next to me. I really didn't need the distraction. I'd rushed to breakfast very early this morning to work on my ideas for the winter project to be alone.
Drew even threw her pillow at me because I was making too much noise while I brushed my hair. She wasn't much of a morning person.
"You look like you want to strangle something." He gestured at my hands. I looked down, and my left hand was cramped into a fist, while the other scribbled away.
"I'm beginning to want to strangle you."
Sirius laughed, his face warming up. For a split second I could see what all the girls in our year saw in him. "Am I interrupting something?"
I sighed, dropping my quill onto the parchment. "I've been trying to put together some ideas for my meeting with Potter before our joint meeting with Slughorn. I'm having a little trouble."
"Oh right." He grabbed the teapot that sat in front of me and started to pour himself a cup of earl grey. "Yeah, he did some work last night. I didn't even see him go to bed."
Immediately, my mind went to an uncomfortable place. Where would anyone be that late? I wondered which girl he might've been with.
"Are you alright?"
It must've shown on my face, but I snatched the teapot back from him. "I'm fine. Just a little surprised that Potter did any work at all last night."
"He is capable of work." He shrugged. "He did make prefect in fifth year."
"Mmhmm." I nodded, wishing he would just leave.
I let my eyes drift over to the doorway at precisely the wrong moment. Harold waltzed in with Charlotte, one arm around her. He pulled her in by the neck to give her a sweet kiss on the cheek while she blushed.
"Bollocks." I muttered.
"What's wrong, doll?"
I turned fully to face him with suspicion, my emotions getting the better of me. "What do you want from me?"
"Can't I get to know a friend?" He gave me a little smile.
"No. We are not friends. What do you want?" I narrowed my eyes at him.
"Nothing." He laughed. "I just have this feeling that I should be getting to know you."
"I didn't know you were so gifted at divination." I rolled my eyes, and he snickered.
"Do you realize how much I hate you right now?" Drew's voice came up from behind, blathering away. "You got me up a full hour earlier than I normally get up and I wasn't able to go back to sleep! I am a foul mood now, and it is all your fault."
Sirius and I shared a look while she sat down, still talking.
After a moment of silence while she took a sip of coffee, she looked at Sirius, then at me. "What is he doing here?"
I laughed. "My thoughts exactly."
SIrius pretended to look accosted and I nudged him with my elbow.
"Well, I should be off." He pushed down on the table to stand. "Good luck with your meetings, love."
We watched him strut away, and I saw a few fourth years going googly eyes at him as he passed, unaware (or possible completely aware and ignoring) of their presence.
"What, are you two besties now?" Drew started to butter a piece of toast, trying exceedingly hard to keep her tone light.
"I'm just as surprised as you are."
She grumbled before shoving the bread into her mouth.
James P.O.V.
"Just talked to your girlfriend, prongsie."
"Excuse me?" I looked up from my parchment in the common room. What the hell was Sirius doing up so early?
"Lily." He pulled out his wand and started to use it to ruffle my hair around.
"Oy! Bugger off."
"She's hard at work for your presentation to Slughorn." He jumped up onto the couch I occupied, his rear on the very top of the back.
"Enough with the hair, Sirius." I tried not to get too irritated. I still had so much work to do to prepare for our meeting. I wanted to be serious about so that she wouldn't hate me too much.
"Are you nervous about spending some alone time with her Jamesie?" Sirius teased me, moving from ruffling my hair to drawing lude photos in the middle of the air. A female and male where doing-the unspeakable.
"What in the world-" A female voice came from the stairs to the girls dormitory.
"Sirius!" I grabbed his wand and chucked it across the room as soon as I saw that it was one of Lily's friends. The blonde one. She gave us a look as she passed, Sirius' drawing probably burned into her mind.
"You're no fun when you're stressed, mate." Sirius shook his head and went after the wand.
Lily's P.O.V.
"What is with you today?" Seph nudged me in the middle of Charms. "You've been scribbling in that notebook all class."
"I'm busy."
"I can see that." She looked around the room for help. "I'm going to have to get a new partner in a minute since you wont help me."
"Alright." I flipped the journal closed and turned to her. "What do you need help with?"
"Everything." Her face looked so innocent that I couldn't say no.
"Right, well we can start from the beginning then-"
"Lily, you're needed at the front." A voice behind me prodded.
I swiveled around to see Professor Anders standing at my chair. He motioned at the front of the room where I saw James standing, a roll of parchment in his grip.
Ignoring what felt like a million stared from my classmates, I tapped up to the front. Stop blushing, you idiot.
"What are you doing here?" I asked, trying not to sound irritated.
"D'you mind stepping outside for a moment?" He kept a normal face on. It was odd to see him without the usual mischievious glint in his eye. He looked...normal.
I nodded and followed him out of the classroom, still aware of everyone's eyes on us, including Gregory Davies. He might've been an interest of mine if I hadn't royally screwed up the other night. I wondered briefly if I could change his mind, until James brushed a hand against my forearm, shooting goosebumps all over my body. I stepped back a moment.
"What is it?" I folded my arms across my chest.
"Sorry to pull you out, Slughorn moved our meeting up two hours."
"He did?" I sighed, the anxiety building in my chest. What was I supposed to do now? I had some ideas, but not enough to present on, especially if these things were going to presented by us together? I could barely look at Potter, never mind work on a project with him. What was I supposed to-
"Don't stress." He held out his parchment. "It's why I'm here. To give you my ideas so you can look them over. After this period we'll have about fifteen minutes to meet up before the meeting."
"Oh." I shook my head. "Wow, thank you."
He smirked at me, folding his arms across his chest as he leaned against the wall. "You surprised, Evans?"
"No." I pursed my lips as I took his parchment.
He raised an eyebrow.
"Alright, a little surprised, I guess."
Then I saw it-a smile. "Well, I trust your ideas, whatever they are, I just wanted to give you a complete screening of mine so you can veto whatever you like before the meeting."
"Thank you." I stared at the parchment, wondering what to do with myself in the empty hallway.
"You alright?"
I looked up to see the smile remaining. "Yes. Perfectly so. I really, um, appreciate the thought you put into this. Thank you."
"You've already thanked me, Ev." He pushed himself off the wall and winked at me. Winking? Really? What did he think, that I was one of his conquests? How dare he? "See you in an hour. We'll have fifteen minutes at lunch."
Then he was off, and I was alone at the door. The bastard was taking the wrong route to my friendship.
The problem was that I kind of liked it.
Drew's P.O.V.
I watched Lily walk back into the room with pink tinging her cheeks. What was Potter on about in the hallway? Why couldn't he just leave my best friend alone?
A thick roll of parchment lay on the desk in front of her, and she stared at it with her chin on her palm.
Giggling erupted behind me and I turned around, frowning.
Bethany Dotson laughed behind her hands with two other sour witches. All three pairs of eyes blinked down at their shared desk and then back up at me.
"Oy, what have you there?" I nodded at them, against my better judgement.
"Nothing." Bethany grabbed at the parchment I eyed on the desk.
Lily's P.O.V.
"You can't think about those things."
"Don't let it bother you."
"She's a troll."
Faye, Seph and I were all trying to talk Drew down from the ledge, (so to speak) as we walked through the castle on the way to lunch. Butterflies weighed down my stomach about my short meeting with Potter in precisely two minutes, but helping Drew was distracting enough for the time being.
"I didn't see what they had, but I'm more than certain that it was about me." She sighed. "I don't know why she bothers me so much."
"Yeah, if you got upset about every girl that hated you here," Seph started to laugh, "You'd be in a permanent state of-"
"Shush." I placed my palm on Seph's shoulder. "Not appropriate." I whispered.
I watched Drew's narrowed eyes soften at Seph's uncomfortable face.
"Sorry."
We made it to the entrance to the Great Hall together, still huddled around Drew. It was extra crowded in the hall for lunch, and we were temporarily halted at the doorway to get inside.
Moving through, I rubbed arms with someone on my left, making their way over to the Ravenclaw table.
"Sorry, love."
"You're alright." I looked over and saw that the flesh belonged to my ex boyfriend Harold. Jumping away, I looped my arm through Drew's and pushed my group toward the Gryffindor table. Faye gave me a look until she saw who was steadily walking in the opposite direction.
"Move, move, move." I whispered as I pushed.
"Again? Really, I thought this school was bigger." Drew watched me push us away from him.
I let out a big uncomfortable breath. "Not when you've royally screwed up your past relationship and any possible future ones."
"That's the spirit, Lil." Drew winked.
"We'll be old maids together, then." I said, and she, Faye and Seph laughed. I was glad to make Drew smile a bit.
"Well, Drew, we might be the only ones ending up alone." Seph said, gesturing to the spot we normally occupied on the benches.
James Potter sat at the table alone, waiting patiently.
For me.
Naked.
Just kidding, I wish.
"He's...early." I thought aloud.
All three girls stared at me I slowly approached the table.
"What?" I asked, when they wouldn't stop. They started to pretend to make out with each other the closer we got to Potter. I turned around and pushed them backwards. "Get away from me, you loons."
"We'll just be going." Drew gave a me a huge wink.
Ignoring the people I unfortunately called my friends, I walked over to him and sat down across the table.
"Hi." I dropped parchment on the wood, narrowly missing a floating candle.
James looked up at me and smiled. "Hey, Evans. You ready?"
Why was he being so-un prattish? It made me uncomfortable to see him smile at me. That is, without pretending to ask me out or plan some kind of prank. Or ask out some slutty girl. Or-
"So what did you think of my ideas?" He sat up straight, toying with his tea cup with his right hand. He pushed his hair around with his left while I searched through the parchment. Was he nervous or something? It was adorable to watch him watching me with acute trepidation on his face.
"They're good." I gave him a little smile of my own and then looked back down. "Most of them. I wasn't one hundred percent thrilled with 'Sliming Slytherins'."
I didn't even want to finish reading what that idea entailed.
He gave me a lop-sided smile. "I threw that one in for you. Knew you'd hate it."
I tried not to smile at the fact that he'd thought of me when he wrote this. Keep it together, Lil.
"Well, thank you for that. But in all honesty, I really liked the idea of having a carnival with all types of booths put on by different houses and years. That's creative, and it sounds fun."
James nodded, a little pink creeping up his neck. "So how do you-"
"Jaaames." A voice whined from above our heads. "Where've you been all day? I've been looking for you."
I whipped my head up to see a pretty girl standing up next to James. It was Amelia, the girl I'd seen him snogging the other night in Hogsmeade. I didn't know they were going out. I turned my my eyes back down to the table, not before catching James' eye for a split second. He looked panicked.
Before either of them was able to say anything I gathered out parchment and stood up, nodding at Amelia. "I'll just give you two a moment." Then I looked at James. "I'll, uh, wait for you outside."
"Bye bye." Amelia smiled and took my spot in front of James as I stalked out of the Hall.
How could I be so stupid. Of course he was dating around...maybe I had royally screwed everything up by kissing Remus. By turning James down one too many times...
He was obviously over me. Something in my chest clenched a little as I walked. But Remus insisted that he was still interested in me...maybe he was wrong.
The sadness I felt drummed around the base of my belly, making my whole core sink. But I couldn't show James that I was upset. Upset that he didn't want me anymore. So I did what had always helped me mask my sadness about him before.
I got annoyed.
James' P.O.V.
"Padfoot, you could've kept her away from me!"
"I tried, mate!" Sirius looked just as disappointed as I felt. "What was she even doing here?"
"I don't know, I thought I made it pretty clear in Hogsmeade that I wasn't interested." And then she had to go ahead and harass me while I was with Lily.
I dropped my head into my hands. I'd really been tying to show Lily that I'd changed. I'd been having some bad luck lately.
"You'll be alright Jamesie." Sirius pat my back with a sigh of his own. "She'll come round."
I groaned aloud and lifted my head. Lily stood at the entrance to the hall with her hands on her hips. She stared at me, daggers in her eyes. I stood slowly, grabbing my books off the table. When I looked back at her, she beckoned me impatiently, looking annoyed.
Well, back to square one.