From the hospital wing to High hopes James Potter and Lily Evans are as in love as ever on this rollcoaster ride into adulthood...! Bee!

By Wednesday, he was allowed to return to the Gryffindor tower, he walked slowly through the corridors, it was the middle of the day and the castle was quite as the rest of the school were in lessons. He pulled The Marauder's Map from his back pocket and pulled his wand from his cloak pocket. He checked over his shoulder before muttering, "I solemnly swear I'm up to no good." The map unfolded at his words and the dots of the thousands of students appeared. James peered at it searching for his friend's names. "Where are you?" He muttered searching for their names. Then he spotted Remus's footprints hurrying along a corridor, a corridor adjacent to this one. "Moony," He muttered to himself.

"Mischief managed." He said automatically, tucking wand and map into his bag.

He hurried up the corridor and when he turned the corner he saw Remus looking flustered carrying a large stack of books. "Moony!" He grinned.

"Oh, James," He said slightly surprised. "Good to see you out of bed."

"That's not what Lily says." Sirius said cheekily, appearing out of thin air beside James.

"Merlin!" James shouted shocked. "I never saw you on the map!"

Sirius sniggered and threw James's invisibility cloak at him. "I burrowed this while you were on bed rest, hope that's not a problem."
"Course not." James said folding it up and tugging it onto the strap of his shoulder bag. "What did you use it for anyway?"

"Oh," Sirius hesitated and shot a nervous look at Remus. "Nothing," James frowned at him and he gave a shrug and pulled an expression as if to say 'Later'. James nodded briefly and then looked between his best friends. "Aren't you both meant to be in class?"

Remus answered for them. "Slughorn's ill today, potions was cancelled with no work set."

"Oh good, got loads to catch up on as it is." James said and they began to walk towards the Gryffindor Tower. "Either of you seen Lily? And where's Peter?" James wondered.

"Pete's in the library he had a free anyway, he was catching up with some late work. Not sure about Lily," Sirius said fiddling with something in his hand.

"What's that?" James asked curious; Sirius opened his fist to show a training Quidditch snitch. James grabbed it in glee, grinning. "How did you get this?" he asked turning it over in his hands.

"Robbed it from one of the broom cupboards- a Slytherin one" Sirius grinned.

"Good one Padfoot." James threw the snitch back to him, he caught it easily.

"You could get in trouble for that." Remus said, nervously and when both Sirius and James gave him a puzzled look he asked "What?"exasperated.

"You need to lighten up Moony," Sirius explained. "You're in your final year and you're still worried about rule breaking."

"I'm a prefect. I've got to set the example."

"Example of what? How to be boring?" Sirius laughed.

"Oi," Remus said indignantly.

"James is Head Boy and he doesn't care." Sirius counter-argued.

Remus frowned. "On the contrary I believe," Remus looked at James. "I think he cares a lot more than he'd ever admit." He looked at James for confirmation, James shrugged and continued to walk beside his friends, content to listen to their bickering rather than join in.

Finally when the argument was getting extremely petty- and they'd reached the portrait hole- James turned to his friends and said "Both of you shut up. You fight like an old married couple." This silenced them, Sirius looked offended by this accusation and buffed out his chest to prove his manliness. He shot Remus a mischievous grin. "Well I'm obviously the man in our marriage Remus." He said in a matter of fact tone.

Remus laughed. "You, the bloke? Yeah right, remember who turns into a wolf!" He jabbed his thumb to his chest as though this ended the argument.

"Yeah," Sirius smirked. "Which means you have monthlies."

Remus didn't take this well. James turned to look at Sirius, while Remus rushed up to the portrait hole and into the Common Room. "That was below the belt." James told Sirius who did look slightly embarrassed at his actions. "You should apologise." James told him, Sirius didn't answer.

They entered the nearly empty Common Room, Remus was sat in the far corner with a book open on the table in front of him. James headed to his favourite seat beside the fire, Sirius went to follow him. "No," James hissed and pushed him in the general direction of Remus. "Go say sorry."

With that James turned his back on Sirius and went to sit down. Sirius stood for a moment looking faintly annoyed then went over to speak with Remus. James rolled his eyes at their childish behaviour and pulled the map and his wand from his bag once more, looking for Lily's where abouts.

An hour later Lily rushed into the Common Room, she threw her bag to the floor and wrapped her arms around James who'd stood up to greet her. "You're back. I went down to the Hospital Wing as soon as I got out of class and they said you'd been let out earlier! I'm so sorry I wasn't there." She said all in a rush. James smiled and put his arms around her he looked at her and smiled. "It's ok. I'm fine see,"

Lily nodded and leaned up and kissed his lips lightly. "I'm glad to see you better."

James rolled his eyes and looked sideways at Lily who, as always, looked eager and interested. The teacher droned on, the meeting was going on way longer than he'd expected and he had two essays to do and tonight was a full moon so he had to get the homework done before they went out later. He sighed and ran his hands through his hair; picked up his discarded quill and tipped it into the open ink pot, and began to doodle on the parchment in front of him absentmindedly.

"Right," Said Professor Dumbledore decisively, when the pervious teacher had finished speaking "That's all for this evening, I think."

There was a scarping and shuffling of chairs and ruffling of parchment as teachers all around them got up and left the table, Lily jerked at his arm and James looked up baffled. "Oh, sorry." He chuckled standing up quickly and shoving his things into his bag. "I zoned out."

"Yeah you did." Lily laughed quietly. "Did you listen at all?"

James shrugged. "I had stuff on my mind Lils."

"Lucky I took notes huh?" She asked.

James nodded "Lucky I have such a wonderful girlfriend," He said and put his arm around her as they walked along the corridor. "It's a full moon tonight see." He whispered low in her ear.

Lily nodded. "Yeah, I know."

"And I've got two long essays to do by tomorrow as well as going out with Remus."

"Ah," Lily said understanding.
"So now that meeting overrunning...Well it's a little more than inconvenient." James checked his watch hastily. "As soon as we get back to the Tower, I've got to dump my stuff and leave, we haven't got long. We have to get him down there at least an hour before yknow?"

"So your essays..?"

"Detention I guess." He shrugged.

Lily frowned "That's not good," Lily hated the idea of him getting more detentions but knew better than to suggest James miss a full moon outing, he'd never do that to Remus.

"Fancy doing them for me?"He winked. Lily frowned and James laughed and kissed her. "I'm joking."

"Good." She pouted. "Why didn't you do them yesterday?" She wondered.

"I had to cover McMillian, y'know the sixth year Slytherin prefect? Yeah his patrol duties cos he was sick then I had Quidditch. Things are really hectic at the moment aren't they?" He sighed.

Lily nodded. "Yeah, I've missed you, I mean I know we have our Sunday afternoons but still-," She looked at him longingly.

James smiled sadly as a way of agreement. "I know Dear,"

"So Christmas..." Lily wondered.

"I'm staying at Hogwarts," James said determinedly. "I mean- it's our last Christmas here." He hastened to explain.

"Then I'm staying too." Lily said. "Mum was just wondering, but I said we'd properly stay here."

"Well if you want us to go to yours...?"

"No, I wanted to stay here too really...but Mum asked anyway." She shrugged and James dropped his arm from around her and she took his hand. "Can you believe it's almost our last Christmas here?" She said quietly, swinging their joined hands.

James glanced at her his eyes were watering just thinking about it. He gulped and nodded. "Yeah," He glanced around the corridor they were walking up. "I'm going to miss this place like hell."

"Me too," She softly, "I mean this is the only wizarding place I know."

James squeezed her hand reassuringly. "I'll show you all the places in the world."

Lily grinned mischievously at him "Really?" She breathed, inspired by this idea.

"Yeah," He bit his lip smiling at her, he paused. "There is kind of a Wizarding Tradition- that erm-," He hesitated awkwardly, nervously. "Where, wizards and witches, take a yearlong tour of the world, seeing the sights etc straight after they finish school..." He looked at her nervously.

"You mean..?" She said quietly.

"Would you like to go together?" James said his heart hammering, it had been something that had been bugging him for a while now and he was glad to finally ask her. He looked at her, her face broke into a wide smile and she threw her arms around him, crushing her lips against his. The force in which she threw herself at him made him stumble and his back pressed against the wall. James kissed her back eagerly, his hands groping at her waist. When they finally broke apart, red cheeked and short of breathe James pressed his forehead against hers "Can I take that for a yes?" He chuckled.

Lily nodded, watery eyed. "I would love to. But money-,"

"I have savings. Don't worry about it." James tutted and kissed her once more. He pulled away and sighed. "I don't want to leave...but," He breathed. "I'm going to be really late for the lads." He kissed her hungrily again.

Lily nodded understandingly and pushed away from him slightly. "Yeah, I get it." She pecked him once more. "Come on." She stood up straighter and took his hand again, they walked up the corridor. She kept throwing him covert glances as they walked, blushing, happy. James knew he'd shocked her with his plans, but he knew she was happy and he himself was delighted by the idea of being with her, travelling with her next year, living together and the rest of their future that, right now, as they walked, still flushed cheeked and in love, looked very bright...

Still light with happiness about his future with Lily, James ran out into the grounds that evening with his friends; joy in his heart and a smile on his face. Their moonlit antics were as crazed as ever: Sirius as Padfoot, chased him as he leapt and bound, as free as a bird with his heart full with ideas and dreams of his future. And when Moony lashed out, overcome by the werewolf instincts, James hardly felt the graze, didn't notice as Sirius growled and leapt at Remus pushing him to the ground and Wormtail running up and down as a distraction. He leapt back to his feet and helped his friends and slowly as the wintery morning sun filled the sky and their friend came back to himself, to them, James was filled with confidence that their future's would be rich, full with everything they'd ever dreamt of, despite the ongoing worries about the war and the dark forces, things could and would be good for them.