Saturday, 24th September 1977
Sirius woke with a start and looked out the window of James' bedroom, seeing the sun just starting to peek over the treetops of the Forbidden Forest. Patting his robe pocket frantically, he felt the small beaded bag belonging to the mystery girl, sighing with relief that he hadn't somehow lost it. Glancing at James' face, relaxed with sleep, he slipped out of the room and ran full speed towards the Gryffindor Tower, eager to get everyone together to brainstorm - and snoop through the bag, of course.
Amidst quiet cursing and grumbling, Remus and Peter stumbled blearily after Sirius, not bothering to ask what was so important at sunrise on a Saturday morning. By the time they reached James and Lily's quarters, Sirius was almost hopping with impatience, and Peter was ready to drink an entire pot of coffee by himself.
"Sirius, what's going on?" asked Remus through a yawn, scrubbing at his face.
"Just a sec Moony, let me get Prongs," he started, pausing outside the bedroom door to add, "can you wake up Evans? I don't want to have to fill her in later."
As he slipped through the door to jump on the bed, Remus and Peter shared a dubious look, playing a quick round of fire, parchment, stone to determine which of them would be stuck waking up the feisty Head Girl. Just as Remus lost the round, looking dejectedly down at his flaming parchment, James and Sirius emerged from the bedroom, the former heading towards Lily's bedroom to knock politely on the door.
Minutes later, the four boys and Lily sat around the small common room on transfigured cushions, sipping steaming coffee as Sirius pulled the beaded bag from his pocket, cancelling the disillusionment charm as he did.
Ignoring Moony and Wormtail's questioning looks and Lily's shout of protest, Sirius waved his wand over the bag, quickly cancelling the undetectable extension charm. What he didn't expect, was for the contents to come spewing out of the bag, quickly burying him under all sorts of strange items as the other teenagers sprung away, wands out in surprise.
"Holy crap!" yelled Sirius, shoving the now empty purse away from him and scrambling to his feet. Lily, who was now standing in her bedroom doorway, looked incredulously at the boys, too surprised to berate Sirius for cancelling the charm without knowing what the bag contained.
"Well that was surprising," laughed James.
"Yeah, you can say that again mate," replied Remus, wide eyed and breathing heavily, looking at the spot he'd been sitting, and seeing a pile of huge fangs burning holes in what looked like a pair of old jeans. He cast a quick containment charm around them, levitating them off to the side where nobody would accidentally touch them.
Peter, who had been watching Remus move the fangs with a worried look, suggested that they all keep their wands out and cast some revealing charms - just in case - before they kept looking through the items now in front of them. Agreeing, the teens began casting, creating small pathways from the edges of the room into the centre, where they sat again as James, Lily and Sirius explained what had happened the night before.
Peter looked more and more concerned for the stranger as the story progressed, where Remus just looked suspicious. Those weird fangs weren't something a harmless girl would carry in her purse!
"I don't know you guys, I don't think we should be going through this stuff now," said Peter, looking around them warily. "It feels wrong somehow."
"No, if anything, I think we should investigate Pete", Remus objected, "This strange girl turns up out of nowhere, apparently from the future, is hurt from dark magic and is carrying what looks like her entire house in this tiny bag... I mean, there's half a tent behind Lily for Merlin's sake!"
All five of them turned to look at what was, indeed, part of a tent.
"I agree with Remus," said Lily primly, straightening her shoulders and summoning some parchment, quills and empty boxes. "We need to take an inventory. There's no way I'm trying to shove all of this back into that tiny bag." She left out the fact that they'd not covered that particular spell in their charms classes yet, not willing to admit that she wouldn't be able to re-charm the bag properly.
Sirius scrambled to his feet, snatching up a piece of parchment and turning eagerly towards the stack of clothes nearest to him, hoping to find some knickers or something.
After two coffee refills, some pastries from the kitchens and a visit from the seventh-year prefects who were chaperoning that days Hogsmeade trip, the group finally took a break to compare their lists.
"Tent poles, empty jam jars, wild mushrooms, four half-eaten apples under stasis, a bunch of newspapers that look old but are dated from 1998, a ridiculous amount of books ranging from textbooks to children's stories to dark magic, a muggle photo album, some empty phials..." Lily charmed her list to float in front of her, while she moved the corresponding items into different boxes, holding them up to show the boys as she did.
"There's just so much stuff," she shook her head in disbelief.
Sirius, picking up his pile, started sorting more things into Lily's boxes, starting a few categories of his own as he did.
"There's a heap of clothes - looks like boys and girls stuff. Things like jeans, underwear, some sunglasses, blankets and pillows, a camp chair, a burnt frying pan and teapot, other household kind of items - pretty much everything but the kitchen sin-"
"Nope, the kitchen sink is there, Padfoot", said Peter, turning to point behind him. "There's also a bunch of wands - some broken, some not - and those fangs that Moony found earlier. There's also these", he said, laying down a copy of The life and lies of Albus Dumbledore by Rita Skeeter, and some magical photographs of what looked like a younger James Potter standing with the mystery girl and a redheaded boy who was obviously a Weasley.
"And this," added Remus, holding up what looked like an old Gryffindor quidditch jersey, except the design was slightly different to the current uniforms, and this one had POTTER emblazoned across the back. The other four had been shocked at the book, not to mention the photos, but it was Lily who squeaked in surprise at the jersey, blushing prettily as James smirked at her. Clearing his throat, Remus continued, "So I guess this girl knows us, or at least you,James."
James just nodded, not knowing what to say or do in this kind of situation.
"Wait! What if she's your wife or something Prongs!?" exclaimed Sirius.
Lily opened her mouth to retort, but snapped it shut audibly when she realised James was looking at her out of the corner of his eye. As the boys bickered over the fact that James couldn't - wouldn't - possibly be married to someone that young ("She's from the future, and she looks about our age now for Merlin's sake"), James turned to Lily, apologising for their first date being ruined.
"I'm sorry Lily."
"I know, James. It's fine. Honest."
"I - I just was looking forward to it, is all."
"I know," she huffed a laugh, blushing again, "so was I actually. But - I mean, we can - that is, if you -"
"Take a rain-check?"
Lily nodded her head eagerly, resting her hand on his shoulder for balance as she leaned forward and kissed his cheek.
"Thanks," she whispered in his ear, their equally flushed cheeks brushing as James stammered.
"Not-", he cleared his throat, running a hand through his already messy hair, "Not a problem. Thanks, Lils."
"Awwwww," cooed Sirius, standing between Remus and Peter with his arms thrown around the two laughing boys.
James snorted a laugh, picking up a nearby cushion and throwing it at his friends.
"Come on you lot, let's keep sorting this stuff and then we can meet with Dumbledore and find out what's going on," said Lily, trying to look unaffected by her moment with James.
"Yeah, yeah," laughed Sirius, lifting his wand to levitate more items into the different boxes, as the others followed suit.
Over an hour later they finally stopped, looking at the boxes stacked neatly on the coffee table, each labelled with a category. In the end, there were two large boxes of clothing (an eclectic mix of male and female, magical and muggle), five boxes of books, one small box of sentimental items like photos and jewellery, one broomstick (that looked really fast, to the boys' delight), a magical tent, one box of household items (including a pathetically small pile of food that took up less than one corner of the box), a box of old musty linens and pillows, and those creepy fangs that were still under a containment charm.
The five teenagers looked at each other warily, each grabbing their inventory lists as they trudged silently out of the dormitory and back towards the hospital wing, making sure to secure the room with extra wards as they went.