Chapter Six: Good Questions, Poor Arguments

"She knew that charming smiles and easy compliments from boys were meant to be enjoyed, not believed."

Song Inspo: Worst in Me by Unlike Pluto

While Lily went up to her dormitory for her cloak, Xander made his way to the footsteps of the Ravenclaw Tower and sent a neatly folded message to the boy's dormitory with a flick of his wand.

It was dinner time but Xander knew better than to try finding Andrew Rogers at the Great Hall. While Lily had held her high up during the whole ordeal, her eyes only barely flickering when they caught sight of the main header, "Lily Potter, Tales of a Naughty Princess," Andrew had had all his meals hidden in the corners of his common room. It was a cowardly way to wave out the scandal, but Xander didn't care about his lack of bravery; he just wanted to make sure nothing like this ever happened again.

"Vandenberg?"

Xander looked up to find Andrew coming down the steps of the tower, his hand on the stoned wall as if his own natural balance couldn't be trusted. There were dark circles under his eyes but his smile was a little too bright and too casual for Xander's liking. When he placed a hand on Xander's shoulder, there was a definite sway to his stance. He had been drinking. It was Thursday night, and the idiot was drunk. It was no wonder he was needing help keeping up with his homework.

Xander handed him the fifteen inch essay he had written the night before. "I've got your Transfiguration paper."

Doing other people's homework was not something new for Xander. He had been writing papers for other people ever since his second year when Louis Weasley, who was two years above, had offered him twenty-five galleons for each paper he wrote out for him. It wasn't an ethical business, per say, but Xander had realized that his intelligence had had monetary value, and Xander wasn't planning on relying on Harry's overflowing generosity for the rest of his life.

Andrew took out a bag of coins and then pulled it back just as Xander reached for it, his face suspicious. "It's a guaranteed 'O,' right? Just like always?"

"Certainly not," said Xander. "That would've been idiotic. The way you've been managing lately, we'll be lucky if they believe the 'A' this is going to get you."

He took the bag of coins then handed Andrew a receipt for him to sign. It had always been important for him to keep a record of his work, and he was glad for it now more than ever.

"I owe you one," Andrew admitted, using the wall as a surface with which to hold the paper while he signed. "I owe you several actually. I don't think I would have played at all last year if it wasn't for you. Here you go."

Xander looked down at Andrew's signature. His handwriting was faint, his letters connecting and disconnecting in no particular pattern. He had never been one to give graphology much credit but this seemed a rather accurate representation. He was still looking down at it when he said out loud, his voice quiet and measured, "You were behind that article they wrote on Lily."

It wasn't a question. Magazines never tired of printing lies about the Potters but there had been too many details, too many facts that added up, for this particular story to have been a mere fabrication. The only ones who could have provided such careful information had been the people involved, and Xander knew Lily well enough to know that for all her thirst for attention, she could have rather been caught dead than in the middle of a scandal of that sort.

"It was either you," Xander went on, "or Baird Kimble, but it was your fault either way."

Andrew straightened up, his face suddenly serious. "I don't think that's any of your business."

"You don't think enough, Rogers. That's sort of the issue here."

Andrew hands curled up into angry fists. "What's your fucking problem?"

"It's only that you could come to find that thinking as something useful to do," said Xander, as if he was truly just trying to give him some helpful advice. "For example, have you ever stopped to think what would happen if McGonagall were ever to find out that many of your past papers, particularly those who have earned you your highest scores, were not written at all by you?"

Andrew's face went pale. He was opening and closing his mouth like he couldn't quite believe what he was hearing. "You would be expelled just as quickly."

"I wouldn't give a shit," Xander assured him measuredly.

He half expected for Andrew to tell him off, or maybe even finally throw the punch he seemed to have been holding back, but to Xander's utter horror, Andrew's bottom lip began to quiver and his eyes began to fill. "I - I didn't mean for that to happen at all, honest, I was just pissed drunk, and fucking furious, we'd only just broken up, and she was already getting all chummy with Mason Fleet-"

"Rogers, I don't-"

"- and there were a bunch of us all drinking in the common room, and someone said wouldn't it be funny if we wrote to the tabloids, and it was only meant to be a joke. I never, ever thought we'd actually do it. I mean, I don't even know who actually sent the damn thing. I was just talking shit and someone was writing, I swear I don't remember saying half the things they printed- It's not even true. I mean, it's true Lily and I went down there to snog that day but-"

Xander waved his hands in front of him as if Andrew's rantings were tangible objects he could physically bring to a halt. "Skip the details. I didn't come down here for story time."

The tears had become sobs now. Xander could not understand how Lily, with all her impatience, had managed to stand him for so long. "I-I loved her." There was snot coming out of his nose. He looked like he was coming in to rest his head on his shoulder, and Xander gave him a glare that was hard enough to make him reconsider but not quite enough to make the crying stop. "I thought I'd m-marry her one day. I can't b-believe she got over me that quickly."

Xander hung his head back. "Fuck me," he muttered to whatever forces of the universe had landed him in this situation. Massaging his jaw, and knowing he would later regret not having ended the conversation earlier, he said, "Alright, Rogers, listen up."

His bloodshot eyes blinked as they tried to concentrate, and then he sniffled and nodded, his hands on his hips, and his face serious as he leaned in closer. "Okay."

"I'm going to take a wild guess and say there's been plenty of people telling you you have every right to feel angry, that you could do better than her, and that she deserves everything that's coming to her, but the truth is, it was generous of her to have dated you at all, and you should be feeling gratitude now, not resentment."

"I did everything for her," said Andrew, his temper raising again, "and she was never even a bit grateful for any of it. I'd give her the damn moon and she'd turn around and ask for the stars instead."

"You should have known better than to give her something that couldn't shine on its own merit," said Xander with simple sincerity. "You should have given her the sun and known even that was bound to bore her eventually."

He placed a hand on Andrew's shoulder. Andrew was looking so lost and confused, Xander almost felt sorry for him. "Quit drinking so much, Rogers. Get your shit together. I know you feel like the idiot who got dumped by his girlfriend, but you're the bloke who dated Lily Luna Potter. There still isn't a single prat out there who doesn't wish they were you."

Andrew shuffled his feet. He still looked rather upset but there was no more anger and no more sniffling, just sobered sadness. "Do you - Do you know if she's dating someone else already?"

Xander shrugged, "I don't give a fuck."

It was lucky nobody else was around - anyone sober would have recognized that last bit as a lie.

()()

The invisibility cloak had belonged to her father first.

Actually, if she were to believe Uncle Ron's stories, the cloak had belonged first to Ignotus Peverell, who had received it as a gift from Death itself. It had then been inherited first born to first born, son after son, all throughout the years. James Sirius Potter was its current rightful owner but he had lent it to his younger brother, Albus, during the latter's seventh year, and after Albus had graduated, James had folded it up and told his youngest sister she could have a year with it too, and she was submerging herself in the idea that her own father had once been her own age and hidden himself under this same piece of fabric.

"You weren't at dinner tonight," said a voice behind her, and Lily turned to find Nia and Sinaya coming into their dormitory, both wearing their skirts rolled up so that more of their thighs showed, the top two buttons of their school unbuttoned, and their ties loosened up to the middle of their chest. It was Nia who looked displeased though, and Lily knew she was the one who had spoken.

Lily tucked her cloak into a corner of her bed. "I got held up in Herbology. Miss out on anything?"

"Hannah cut her hair about this short." Syana's hand indicated the middle of her neck. "Nia nearly chopped her head off right at the mark," she added, covering the side of her mouth, as if her words were meant to be kept secret from Nia, who had obviously heard them and rolled her eyes. Syana pulled out a pair of towels from her trunk. "Gonna shower real quick."

Nia laid back on her bed, forearm over eyes. "You've seen her hair?"

"Mhm." Lily slipped into jeans and a green camisole. The fabric hung to her body in a way that gave away her lack of curves but it had a pretty lace trimming, and she rarely felt subconscious when she was wearing pretty things. The prettier the clothes, the less attention the people paid the body inside them. "What do you care about her hair anyways?"

Nia's arm came away from her face. "She looks like a boy. She didn't even ask about it before taking the plunge. It was bloody inconsiderate."

Lily didn't say anything. Nia and Hannah had been bickering more than usual. Lily and Syana knew better than to give their opinion anytime a new argument broke out. Nia had an inevitable mean streak, and Hannah didn't stand for bullies, but Lily couldn't side with Hannah as often as she was right; though nobody would have ever dared tell her so to her face, Nia was the more sensitive of the four girls.

Besides, Nia was Lily's best friend. They had known each other even before Hogwarts. Their mothers had served in the School Board of Governors together. Wherever one girl went, the other followed, even when they were wrong about something, and the two girls were both often wrong about a lot of things.

"Well I am not cutting my hair," said Nia, plopping up on her elbows, a determined look to her face. "I'd look fucking dumb with short hair. But she got these fringes sort of like this…" She picked her hair up over her hair to show Lily what they had looked like. "I suppose we could all do something similar to that so we can at least keep it in theme."

Lily was looking through her trunk for shoes. If she tried crossing the muddy grounds in her usual heeled options, Xander would tease her about it. "I need cuter trainers," she said, picking up a pair of plain white ones. Nia gave her a look like she wasn't listening. "Sorry, what about our hair?"

"Fringes," said Nia impatiently. "It should be our new thing. We always do our hair the same."

Lily felt too confused to respond, her foot half in the trainer and half out. Sometime at the end of their fifth year, she had started wearing oversized bows on the back of her long, red hair. They made her feel feminine and playful. Teen Weekly wrote an editorial titled "Lily Potter and The-Bows-Who-Wowed." Other girls at Hogwarts had started wearing bows too. She couldn't pinpoint the exact moment Nia, Syana, and Hannah had started doing the same, but, by then, the whole thing had become such a trend, it hadn't felt so much of a thing they did so much as something everyone did.

Lily laughed out loud now, realizing what it was that had upset Nia in the first place. "We don't all have to wear our hair the same way," she assured Nia good naturedly. "That would be dumb. I think Hannah's hair looks nice on her. She looks like a city girl."

Hurt splashed across Nia's face but it was gone before Lily had time to decide which part of her response merited the apology. "It's not only her hair," Nia went, pulling a pillow on top of her crossed legs and poking at it discontentedly. "Hannah hardly ever sits with us anymore. She's always with Hugo Weasley." She looked at Lily pointedly, as if there was a reaction she had been expecting and had not yet received. When Lily didn't say anything, her eyes went wide, and her nose wrinkled. "Do you think they're shagging? I wouldn't even be surprised. Hannah's standards have lowered so significantly, sometimes I can hardly see them from here."

"There's nothing wrong with Hugo," said Lily, her voice a low warning.

Nia pulled at her long, black hair, checking the tips. "He's not very popular. He could be, if he tried a little harder. He's a Weasley and a Seeker… You should help him, buy him new clothes, fix his hair."

She didn't sound mean about it exactly, only that Lily knew that with Nia, the line between harmless and vindictive was always a thin one and it took very little to cross it.

"Hugo's Hugo," said Lily matter of factly. "He's perfect just the way he is." There was a full body mirror in the space that had been cleared when Hannah's bed had been removed, and Lily sat on the floor in front of it, all their makeup, nail polish, jewelry, and hair things laying so messily, it was impossible what thing belonged to what girl. "Don't take whatever's going on with you and Hannah out on him. He's too good."

"Did you pitch her your hair idea?" Syana came back wearing one towel around her body and using another one to dry her hair.

"We're doing our hair however we like from now on," said Lily decidedly. From her window, a thick fog had set around the castle and it was hard not to think of the Thestral, to wonder if they were going to be late, but there was still some time to go, and Lily started braiding her hair, hoping for a distraction.

Nia knelt down besides Lily. Lily had expected her to be upset but she looked apologetic when she grabbed Lily's hair and started braiding it behind her. "You look cute, Lils," she told her, everything in her tone saying she was ready to be nice again. "Ballard showed us the gift he got for you. You're going to love it."

"Ballard?" Lily asked, and then her eyes went wide with recollection and she smacked her face, jumping up to her feet before her braid was anywhere near finished. She had told him she'd meet him at the Astrology tower after dinner. She couldn't believe she had forgotten. She felt awful about it too. "Syana, can I borrow Plum for a minute? I need to send Ballard a quick note."

Syana looked skeptical to share her owl but agreed. "As long as you're not sending her out of the castle. It's too foggy out there and her vision isn't as good as it used to be."

Lily's note asked for forgiveness and promised to meet him after she was finished with an emergency that had come up out of nowhere. She started tying the note up, hoping it found Edward before he left his dormitory to go searching for her.

"I shouldn't have said anything mean about your cousin," said Nia. Her voice had changed again, and Lily had no idea what she had done to lose the friendliness so quickly. "Honestly, Hugo isn't so bad at all, and I've been thinking I wouldn't mind having a go at his best mate."

Plum gave out a loud screech and Syana cried, "Lily, let her go!"

Lily looked down to find that she had squeezed the poor owl and its large, round eyes were all but popping out. "Not him, Nia," she stammered out, letting the owl go out the window. Xander was terrible with relationships, and Nia wasn't much better at all. She liked to kiss boys at parties, but she hadn't had a serious boyfriend since fifth year, a fact that would surely only appeal even more to Xander. "Not Xander."

Syana's eyes went to the side and then the rest of her head and body swung around that way too, like she had a feeling things were about to get ugly, and she wanted no part of it at all. She was in her bra and underwear now, taking extra consideration picking her pyjamas for the night.

Nia had jumped to her feet, looking furious. "What the actual hell? You absolutely lost it on me that one time I kissed Albus, but Hannah could shag your cousin, and you'd be okay with that?"

"Albus is my brother!"

"Well Vandenberg isn't, and if it had been Hannah who fancied him, you would have been completely fine with it. Why are you always taking her side? Why are you always preferring her over me?"

Lily shook her head wildly. She couldn't imagine Xander with Hannah anymore than she could imagine him with Nia. They were two separate worlds, both belonging to her but never to each other. "No, no, Nia. It's not like that at all. Xander's just a bloody tosser."

Nia's features changed slightly. She seemed to be considering the fact that it was Xander that Lily found faulty and not her. "Oh I don't know," she said, her voice relaxing. Lily knew she was being given a second chance to say the right thing but she had no idea how to pass this test. "I think it's sort of sexy, the whole bad boy vibe he has going on. There's something about a boy in a leather jacket, smoking a cigarette."

"Xander doesn't smoke." Lily would have laughed if the situation hadn't left her feeling so desperate. Nia had started smoking that summer. It was the reason she assumed it of others, but Lily would have noticed if Xander had picked up a habit of that sort. She was almost sure. "You have him all wrong. He's not cool or dangerous or anything like that. He's the opposite, actually.. He just hangs around reading books."

"He's fit." Syana yawned from under her covers. Lily hadn't even realized she had gone to bed. Her whole heart felt like it had been injected with caffeine, but Syana's eyes were closing sleepily. "He has the best arms in all of Hogwarts, and there must be something to being under those blue eyes, or I reckon there wouldn't be so many girls being able to tell the tale."

Nia stared after Syana's sleepy incorrehences thoughtfully, and Lily shook her head again, pleadingly. "Not him, Nia. You're one of my best friends."

Nia's eyes glittered with something Lily couldn't recognize. "You're mine, and I'm still having to find out about everything that goes in your life through a stupid gossip magazine. I can't believe you didn't tell me about everything that went down with Rogers that day."

Lily's head was spinning. She couldn't keep up. "What? Is this about that stupid article? None of that was true. I thought you would have known better than to think-"

"Some of it was true," said Nia defiantly. "Kimble told me. He told me he'd found you two down there." Lily's face fell with embarrassment. She was so desperate to explain but she had a feeling her explanation might not make things any better. "I bet Hannah knew all about it."

Lily had nothing to say to this. There was no easy way to explain that Hannah was the one that stayed sober when the rest of them got drunk, that while Nia was her best friend, Hannah had been the one who had noticed her missing and gone out looking to find her.

Her silence gave Nia the confirmation she had been looking for and her lips parted a sneer. "You've only just broken up with Rogers, and now you're already moving on to Ballard. You've got to be the sluttiest virgin I know. I say you let me have my fun with Vandenberg, and you just stick to balancing your own fucked up dating life."

Syana sat up in bed, fully awake and looking stunned. "Okay, okay, let's just calm down-"

"Not Xander," said Lily, for the last time. She was angry now, and anger always made her blunt. "You can have whatever other boy you want but if you go near him at all, you'll have to deal with me."

Nia looked hurt again, but Lily finished putting her hair up in a messy ponytail that gave as much of a damn as she did at the moment. When she walked out the door, she left her signature bow abandoned on her bed, like it was to blame for it all.

()()

When Lily finally found Xander, he was leaning against the gray stoned walls of the dungeons, one leg bent and both hands tucked into his worn-out black, leather jacket. His dark brown hair fell gracefully just above his forehead and his blue eyes were like clots of hard metal. A cigarette in between his fingers would have looked right. Maybe he did smoke. What did she know?

"You're late."

Lily jumped. They had played hide and seek as children. Lily would hide in the most creative of places, and Xander would find her every single time. And tonight, even though she was completely covered by the cloak, he was once again looking directly at her, and Lily didn't feel invisible again, at least not to him.

Xander slipped under the cloak with her. It made the cloak shift so high up, a good portion of her legs had become exposed. "Xander," she gasped, amazed.

He bent further down, trying his best to correct the issue. "What is it?"

"You're so much taller than me now."

He gave her a startled look. "Have you been drinking?"

Lily frowned back at him. She had known he had grown taller than her, of course. It had happened either last year or the year before that. Or had he already been taller than her at fourteen? Had it been before that? As they made their way out of the castle, Lily tried restepping her footsteps back throughout the years, trying to track down the moment Xander had outgrown her, trying to figure out how she hadn't realized it when she had seen the lipstick smeared down his jaw or the way girls looked whenever he looked at them.

She found no clear answers. She only knew that Xander Vandenberg was seventeen years old, not seven, and that for some reason that scared her more than anything else about that pitch black night.

()()

The neon light of the conjured cage shone brightly against the night sky but it still only barely leaked through the thick fog that had settled around them. In the distance, a wolf howled. The Forbidden Forest was only a short bit away, and its trees were the silhouettes of gigantic claws reachout infinitely towards the dark skies. It had all made Lily take a step backward, but Xander had gone forward, removed the cage, poured a sedation potion into the creature's thirty mouth, and set himself to work right away.

As Lily settled in by his side, she felt something wet soak through her jeans and thought the wet grass and mud were to blame but when she swiped at her bottom, there was red, and she realized that blood had soaked the grass around them. Xander watched her from the corner of his eyes, as if expecting her to be scared, but Lily only knelt closer and said, "I can help."

He hesitated for a second but then he passed some bandages he had brought along. "I will close her up and you can bind her up. The bandages rip easily because they've been charmed to fall off after a few days, so you'll have to be a little gentle."

He was giving her a look, like he didn't fully trust her. "I can be gentle!" Lily protested indignantly.

Xander only blinked and looked away, already forgetting all about her.

The truth was that she had always loved gentle things but had never really been very good at being that herself. She loved glass things but they always ended up broken, and flowers but always forgot to water them. She tried her best to be gentle now as she bandaged around the neck Xander had just finished working on. Flesh had been returned inside by his wand, but the leathered skin still looked red and raw.

Her wings were flawless though, not a single scratch on them. Lily longed to trace a finger on them, but she wouldn't touch the parts of her she didn't need fixing. "Why would anyone do this? She just wanted to be left wild."

She had only been thinking out loud but Xander said, "Their tears have recently been proven to have numerous healing properties. It's the sort of resource a potion company would want to monopolize."

Lily began to understand where Fabian Ballard fit into things. Edward's father owned the largest potions company in the entire country. "Mr. Ballard doesn't work within the Ministry though."

"The Ministry works for whoever has the most money - or power."

"Not my Aunt Hermione," said Lily. "Not my father."

Xander didn't disagree with this but he said, "There's a new Head of Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. Nicholas Boulstrode. His family has enough old money to not need a job for generations to come." There was a seventh year Slytherin girl with that last name. Lily thought she might have dated Xander at some point or another but she couldn't be quite sure and Xander didn't seem to be thinking of that at the moment. "If he's working there, it's probably to make favors like this accessible to his network of friends."

Xander had always sounded older, even when they had been children. That wasn't different about him. There was something else that was though.

The wind blew, she shivered, and Xander threw her the jacket he had been wearing with such carelessness, it almost toppled her backwards. "Don't be an idiot," he told her when Lily's nostrils flared, ready to tell him just what he could do with his stupid jacket. "You'll be sick for Teddy's wedding."

The idea of missing such a monumental event was enough for her to quickly slip her arms into the long tunnels that were the sleeves.

The Thestral whimpered, and Lily went back to caring for, trying not to think of the fact that Syana had been right earlier; now that his jacket was off, Lily could see that the sleeves of his t-shirt were tight around his biceps, that his muscles seemed flexed even when he wasn't moving much at all. From a purely objective observation point, his arms were even nicer than Andrew's. Xander's chest wasn't as broad as Edward's, but it was broad enough, his waist narrow… And his jacket smelled like leather and the pages of an old book, one that Lily probably wouldn't have read but would have gladly inhaled…

"Are you smelling my jacket?"

Realizing her face was half buried inside the collar of his jacket, Lily blushed. "My nose is cold. Hey," she added, remembering, "do you smoke?"

He eyed her with annoyance. "No, and you can't smoke around magical creatures either, Lily."

"I wasn't asking for one," said Lily, realizing this is what he had been thinking. "I don't smoke either. It's just… I am doing this survey for a class. We are, erm, trying to figure out the effects smoking may have on magical performance."

He smirked now. "Let the record show that my magical performance is as effective as they say."

There was a definite suggestive hint to the tone of his voice, and Lily made a grossed out face. "Xander, ew."

"Your nose always does this thing," said Xander, "like a twitch or a quiver, when you lie."

Lily's hand flew to cover her traitorous nose. Xander's smile usually made him look meaner but the one he was giving her made him look softer. "You don't have to make up lies about surveys and such. You can always just ask."

Lily gave him a look. "You said I asked too many questions!"

"You do ask too many questions," said Xander, like it was an undeniable fact. Lily only just shook her head, feeling done from all the needless arguments she had already had that day.

He leaned back, tired of his hunched over position and stretched out his arms, moving his wrists in a circular motion. He really did have nice arms. Lily wasn't sure how she hadn't noticed it before. She didn't think she had ever even seen him work out.

"Are your books very heavy?' she asked, thinking this the only logical explanation.

She couldn't even hold the puzzled look on his face against him. "Huh?"

"Those books you're always carrying around, how much would you say they weigh?"

Xander was frowning now. His face rested to the side, like she was a novelty trinket that had broken down and now he needed to find the reset button. "It depends on the - Lily, what does that even matter?"

"Forget it." She wasn't going to explain that Syana thought he had the nicest arms in all of Hogwarts. She wasn't going to say she agreed. "One more question though."

Xander's lips pressed together until they'd nearly disappeared, but she could tell it was because he was trying hard not to smile. She had no idea what she was saying to make him want to laugh. Usually she couldn't get him in a good mood for the life of her. "Shoot," he said.

She sat back down on her legs. "Are you a bad boy?"

In all the years she had known him, she had never seen him look more shocked. His face went far back like she had physically punched him, and then he choked out a laugh, "Merlin, Potter, if you're trying to talk dirty to me- Oi! Watch it!"

She had picked up the nearest rock and thrown it straight at his chest. "Don't be a prat. I didn't mean that…'' She searched for a better word choice. "Are you the rebellious type?"

Xander rubbed the spot she had hit ruefully but he was still chuckling and somehow that made her not angry at all. "I've never even had detention," he told her.

Lily's hands were stained with blood. Xander had been working much closer with the Thestral but his hands weren't dirty at all. "You're done with your part," he assured her when he saw her cleaning up her hands with her wand. "The sedation potion is wearing off soon too, so we're going to want to go back soon."

Lily stroked the Thestral's neck, whispering her good-byes. "You're so beautiful and brave," she told her. "You know, Xander," she added, looking up at him suddenly, "tonight was sort of rebellious of you."

He used to have a dimple when they were children. Grown ups would always cup his face in their hand, commenting on that and the beauty of his eyes, and Xander would always shy away from their touch, Ginny always behind him, telling whoever was touching him that Xander didn't like to be grabbed that way at all.

Lily thought he had lost that dimple out of willpower alone, but she saw now that he had it still, only that she hadn't seen him smile the way he was smiling at her now in a long time.

"Don't tell James or Freddie," he told her teasingly. "They'll think I've finally come along."

Lily's heart sank as a new thought arrived.

James and Freddie.

She had been so busy wondering what everyone at the castle was thinking about her, she had hardly had time to remember that the magazine was circulating outside of Hogwarts as well. What if everyone in her family had read it? What would Uncle Charlie think? And her father? Lily nearly cried then. All of the sudden, she didn't want to go home. She didn't want to go to Teddy's wedding. She wanted only to go back to her dormitory and live out her shame underneath her blanket.

"Hey, erm," she started out, carefully avoiding his eyes, "have you heard from my dad lately? He hasn't written to you, has he? Do you know if he knows… Well has he mentioned me at all?"

He didn't look at her when he answered, and for this Lily was grateful. "Harry has more important matters to mind than silly gossip articles, if that's what you're worried about."

Perhaps this was true. Her father's whole focus was always his career. There was that small glimmer of hope that he hadn't heard about the article, that he didn't know how deeply she had embarrassed them all. "And James or Albus…?"

Xander didn't say anything but the answer was in that.

Lily wanted to scream out a defense. She wanted to say, "It wasn't like that at all! We did go under the bleachers, and yes, his hand went up my shirt, but we didn't do more than that, and, it's true that Baird Kimble ended up down there too, but he didn't go to join along. He didn't touch me at all!"

But if the words came out, so would the tears, and Lily wouldn't, couldn't, allow some bloody middle-aged idiot writing out gossip columns from a forgotten cubicle bring her down like that.

"Lily, don't let that get to you," said Xander. He was standing up, dusting off his trousers. His eyes were still not on her, but there was something meaningful in his tone of voice. "They don't care if it's true or not. They only care that you're safe and that you're happy. So, you know," he gave a sort of casual shrug, "try to do that and ignore all the other bullshit. Come on. Let's go now. She'll be long gone before the Task comes looking for her again."

Lily looked up, surprised by his kindness and the fact that he was holding out a hand out to her. She took it, and he brought her up to him and then let her go like it was nothing.

It was nothing.

They went back into the castle in silence and were at the steps of the spiraling staircase, about to part ways, when they suddenly heard footsteps coming their way. "My cloak!" Lily gasped, only just realizing. "I left it out there!"

Xander cussed under his breath. Lily made a turn to go back outside but he held her back by the arm.

"Nevermind that. Come here."

He pulled her back into a broom closet Lily had never noticed before, and closed the door behind them, locking them in absolute darkness.

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It took Lily quite a few minutes before her eyes could adjust to the darkness well enough to take in her surroundings. Even for a cupboard, the place felt small, or perhaps it was only that Xander, who was having to keep his head bent to keep from hitting the slanted ceiling, was too much for it. She leaned back against the door behind her, suddenly aware that the lack of space between them seemed somehow inappropriate.

"Oh absolutely," said a familiar voice outside the door, "Reagan's bound to at least-"

"It's Molly-!"

Xander's hand went to cover her mouth, and Lily automatically kicked him hard on the shin. "Sorry, sorry," she said, trying not to laugh as he winced in pain while still casting a silencing charm around them. "It was a knee-jerk reaction."

He gave her an accusatory look. "Why are you laughing then?"

Lily covered her mouth. "I'm sorry," she said again, laughing still. "I laugh when I am nervous."

Xander didn't seem convinced. "Why would you be nervous?"

She shook her head soundlessly, not sure herself what had caused her heart to pick up speed. It felt warm now that they were inside the closet, and she slipped his jacket out and handed it back to him. "Thank you for letting me borrow it."

He took it back without looking at her at all but rather finding more interest in reading the ingredients on a box of cleaning powder on the top shelf. He seemed perfectly content to ride out the uncomfortable moment in silence but there was something Lily had been feeling guilty about all afternoon. "I am also sorry if I got you into trouble with your girlfriend earlier. I don't know why you and Albus are both so weird about bringing girls home, but I shouldn't have called you out on it in front of her either way. I was just embarrassed about Charms."

Xander nodded, accepting her apology. "Does it bother you?"

Lily's neck turned pink for some inexplicable reason. "I hardly consider your dating life my concern."

"I meant the fact that you're failing Charms," said Xander, moving his head back again, like he just couldn't get on track with her line of conversation at all.

"Oh," said Lily, "I am not really failing it, just close. It'll be fine by the time our first game comes along. I wouldn't let it get so bad that I ended up benched."

Xander looked like he was struggling not to roll his eyes. He was quiet for a bit and then he decided to add, "She's not my girlfriend. We aren't exclusive or anything. We're just having a bit of fun. Don't start giving me those judgy eyes either."

Lily blinked hard, trying to put them away, and Xander laughed like he hadn't meant to laugh at all. He turned quiet for a bit, and then his face got serious, and he said, "Are you dating Edward Ballard?"

"Ballard!" Lily cried, having forgotten him again. She turned around to push the door open, but Molly's voice spoke again, and she hit her forehead on the door. "I was supposed to go meet him at the Astrology Tower. Ugh, I'm such a rotten person."

He was standing behind her but she could feel the shift in his mood without looking at him. "You were going to do what?"

"He wants to give me my birthday gift," Lily explained. Her birthday was usually a big event at Hogwarts, but this year it landed on the night before Teddy's wedding, and she wouldn't be here for it at all. It had been really sweet of Edward to remember it without her telling him.

"He had all bloody day to give you your birthday gift," said Xander maliciously. "I reckon there's something else he wants to give you instead, and you're just too thick to see it."

Lily spun around, redness spreading by the insinuation in his words. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

Xander's entire jaw was hard. "I just don't think you should be sneaking off with the likes of him."

"Hmm okay," said Lily sarcastically, "and I'll just pin that thought of yours for when I actually give a shit."

This one was all James' fault. James was the one that had practically ingrained it in Xander not to let Lily near boys with bad reputations, and Edward Ballard had one of the worst reputations in all of Hogwarts. But Edward had always been kind to Lily, respectful even when he was being playful. Not that Lily was an idiot. She knew that charming smiles and easy compliments from boys were meant to be enjoyed, not believed. She had grown up with James Sirius Potter, after all.

"You don't want to be another girl he shags and leaves," Xander told her flatly. "You couldn't handle a relationship like that."

Her temper was a rocket he always knew how to light, and it was now bursting in the sky. "Are you bloody kidding me? You get more shagged and left than anyone I know!"

Everything about the way he was looking down at her was condescending, like she was some stupid little girl who didn't understand anything, and he was needing to break it down slowly for her. "It's not the same thing. I prefer relationships be kept that way. Besides, this isn't about me. This is about you."

"Look, you little-" Lily poked him hard on the chest. It ended up being a mistake because now she was hyper aware of the fact that he felt every bit as strong as he looked, that underneath his t-shirt there was the reason he never had any trouble finding pretty girls to shag and leave.

"What?" said Xander, forcing her to realize that she had gotten too distracted to even finish her initial response.

She hid her hands behind her back, like found escaped prisoners that could not be trusted and then took a deep breath in and out, trying to keep all one hundred of her emotions under control.

"I am not in the mood to fight, Xander. I know what you're thinking-" He scoffed, like he highly doubted that to be true, but Lily pressed on, determined to end this argument before they both killed each other in there, "-but you don't have to worry about me. Regardless of what James or Albus might've told you, I'm not some clueless little thing you need to keep an eye on. I know how to handle Edward Ballard."

Xander's face lowered closer to hers. "I don't want you to handle him at all. That's the problem."

Lily stared at him in disbelief. He was the most stubborn boy she'd ever known. "I reckon it's time you learn that not everything is always going to go your way."

"If everything were to go my way," said Xander with a hollow laugh, "you wouldn't sit with him in Herbology either. Believe it or not, this is me compromising."

She didn't even get the chance to ask what he meant by that. One moment she was still leaning back against the door, and then the next his hand had twisted on the doorknob and she had stumbled back and landed on the floor, Molly's indignant cries promising them both detention and no possible way to Edward Ballard.