Wow it's been a long time since I posted. I'm so sorry everyone, life just got super busy, and writer's block was kicking my ass and that combo did not work well. I'm going to try and be more consistent with my updates again so for anyone who is just seeing this welcome! And for any of you returning thanks for sticking with this and I am going to do my very best not to leave you guys on such a long hiatus again!
Lily woke up to the sound of an owl fluttering by her window. She smiled and turned to Marlene who let out an annoyed huff, albeit smiling to show she didn't mean it, before falling back into a deep slumber. Lily opened the note that had become a part of her morning routine these last few months dating George.
It read: "If the plan doesn't work, change the plan. But never the goal."
-Anonymous
Lily smiled a bit at that, knowing that George was referring to their recent dead end in their werewolf cure research. She had been trying to find a way to brew a potion which would essentially reverse engineer aconite into a cure, but so far had made no progress with that route. George had told her not to lose faith, but she was having a hard time keeping up her courage after so many hours spent coming up with nothing.
With a shrug Lily put the note down on her nightstand, stretching her arms above her head with a satisfied groan, before heading to the shower. She glanced at Alice's bed, shaking her head when she noticed it was empty as usual. Alice was the only person she knew who woke up earlier than George, if only slightly.
After her shower Lily made her way down the stairs where she met up with George in the Great Hall, greeting him with a kiss.
"George,"
"Good morning darling."
"Thank you…for the note." Lily said sheepishly, looking down at George's knowing smile.
"I figured you could use a little perking up. We'll get there. Rome wasn't built in a day, you know?"
She nodded as he tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.
"Now, let's get some breakfast yeah?"
Lily nodded, following George to the Ravenclaw table, greeting Remus with a smile and small wave on her way. He returned the smile before turning back to an uncharacteristically serious conversation with James and Sirius.
"You're kidding me, how could you not be invited?" James asked.
Remus shrugged, picking at his eggs in answer.
"I thought you were at the first couple meetings this term?" Sirius said through a mouthful of sausage.
Remus wrinkled his nose at Sirius' lack of manners but chose not to comment.
"Yeah, well, that was before Slughorn put two and two together." He replied in nearly a whisper, avoiding his friends' eyes.
"What's with the long faces?" Peter, who had gotten a late start that morning had just arrived, and he took the seat next to Remus immediately picking up on the strange mood, before helping himself to some eggs and toast.
"Nothing, just forget it." Remus said
"Moony." James said, indicating that he had heard Remus' whispered comment.
"Alright so last month when I asked about it, he might have mentioned something about my…" He glanced around, lowering his voice a little, "furry little problem, and that he hoped I had a good afternoon."
"You're joking?" Sirius asked, mouth wide open.
"It's not a big deal." Remus tried to argue, but James cut him off.
"Not a big deal? It's blatant prejudice!"
"We have to do something about this." Sirius jumped in.
"Come on guys you'll just make it worse. I really don't mind it."
"Nonsense, we're not letting this stand." Sirius said, looking at Remus sternly than back to James. "What are you thinking?"
James took a moment to gather his thoughts before responding in a frustrated tone.
"I don't know. We've got to do something to knock them down a peg. Merlin knows they've been asking for it."
The boys paused for a moment, thinking quietly while ignoring the large amount of chatter surrounding them from the morning breakfast rush.
The silence was finally broken by Peter, an uncharacteristic hint of mischief in his tone. "Well…they do call themselves the slug club, don't they?" He said, looking anxiously at the other boys in the hopes of gaining their approval.
"Are you suggesting the charm I think you're suggesting?" James asked already smirking at the idea.
Peter shrugged, as Sirius practically leaped across the table to ruffle his hair.
"Wormy, that is the most brilliant idea you've had all year, all of school come to think of it."
Peter beamed under the praise, and Remus smiled at him, not particularly caring that they were doing this in his defense but at least Peter was finally getting some credit. The boys began chattering excitedly about their newfound plan, Remus having to talk down some of Sirius' more unsavory ideas. Meanwhile, George was checking his watch over at the Ravenclaw table, turning to Lily who had finished with her oatmeal.
"We should be going,"
George said, offering Lily a hand up from the bench, which she took linking her fingers with his as they made their way out of the Great Hall together just as Marlene was making her way in. She and Lily exchanged a quick hello before the two of them exited the noisy hustle and bustle of the hall into the relative silence of the corridors. George glanced at his watch one more time before seeming to make a decision, turning to Lily and saying:
"Come on, I'll walk you to class before mine."
"This wouldn't have anything to do with wanting to talk to Slughorn before tomorrow night, would it?" Lily asked, smirking at the guilty look that overtook George's expression.
"No, of course not," His voice rose nearly an octave with the poor attempt at a lie and Lily's smirk only grew.
"Oh, come on Lily, there's nothing wrong with wanting to get some insight from the most brilliant professor Hogwarts has had since Dumbledore still taught."
"I don't know, I think McGonagall could give him a run for his money." Lily replied.
He rolled his eyes at that, separating the link of their hands as he moved ahead of Lily like an anxious puppy, all the while looking back as if begging her to hurry up so he wouldn't miss a spare second with the professor.
"Don't be so impatient." Lily said, laughing, and moving now with exaggerated slowness which caused George even more distress.
"Come on Lily, I just want to run something by him without an audience, and I don't have class with him until after the dinner."
"Alright, I'm coming." Lily said, making a point of moving quicker, but still struggling to keep pace with George's long and eager strides.
When they finally made it to the classroom, Professor Slughorn was utterly focused, carefully stirring a pinkish potion in a cauldron which Lily couldn't help but notice had an awfully familiar smell to it, although she couldn't put her finger on it.
"Lily Evans, excited for tomorrow, are we?"
"Ecstatic, it should be delightful. Thanks so much again for the invitation professor."
"But of course, it's only fitting for my best students to be there. And George, I understand you have some job offers coming up."
"Nothing's set in stone yet Professor, but yes there have been some exciting prospects. And I just wanted to thank you for that recommendation, and actually wanted to ask about our discussion from the other day."
"Ah, yes of course, Miss Evans if you could grab me some more moonstone, I seem to have left it in the back cabinet."
"Yes, of course professor."
Lily made her way to the back of the room, as George and Slughorn spoke in muted whispers about what, Lily couldn't say. What could George be asking Slughorn about that he didn't feel comfortable telling her? She shouldn't assume the worst, if George thought she needed to know, he would have told her. But still, she was supposed to be someone that he could rely on, and she couldn't help the sting in her heart at feeling as though he was her person when she wasn't his. She approached the two men with the moonstone, standing by awkwardly as they finished up the tail end of their conversation.
"Thank you, Professor." George said, shaking Slughorn's hand.
"Not at all, my boy, you have great things ahead of you. I'm sure of it."
George nodded, turning with a pleasant smile to Lily as a handful of Hufflepuffs began to file in.
"Well, I've got to be going Lily. Have a good class. See you tomorrow Professor."
The Hufflepuffs were followed by Alice, whose nose was in her alchemy book in preparation for their exam the next day. Lily approached her, tapping on her shoulder to which she jumped.
"Oh, Lily, you startled me."
"Well, I figured you'd want to know you reached your destination. I thought you weren't going to read in the corridors anymore," Lily said, lightly scolding her friend.
"I sorted it out. Shield charm in the hallways makes for safe reading."
Lily chuckled. "I guess that's fair, but you already know all there is to know about alchemy. I'm surprised you haven't come up with a second Philosopher's Stone at this point."
"A work in progress, I assure you." Alice said, laughing back as she took her seat next to Lily.
Without Marlene Lily worried she would feel lonely in potions, but she actually found that she liked the change in pace. She and Alice were free to have more intellectual conversations when Marlene wasn't constantly teasing them, and it made for an interesting class, especially when Susan engaged with them ignoring the nerves which often held her back in other areas.
The Marauders entered after Susan, nearly missing the bell, still engrossed in their conversation from earlier it seemed, though the light of mischief was in their eyes and Lily couldn't help but lean over when James flopped down in the seat behind hers:
"What are you guys up to?"
"Don't worry about it." He replied with a smirk.
"Alright everyone please take your seats and open your textbooks to page 92."
James motioned for Lily to turn around, and she huffed in frustration, looking over Alice's shoulder to get the page number which she hadn't heard while focused on James.
Potions was a lot more boring than normal, being a strictly textbook lesson rather than practical. But Lily returned Slughorn's smile when he made his old jokes, and she tried to at least feign attention while her mind wandered. Her focus on what George was hiding from her and a particular smell that kept wafting from that pesky cauldron stewing at the front of the room which she still couldn't place.
Transfiguration wasn't much more interesting. Being close to the final exams before the holidays, classes had started to wind down, with teachers choosing to review old material rather than teach anything new. At least McGonagall had them practicing spellwork from earlier in the year in preparation for their exam rather than going over technicalities like Slughorn. James and Sirius spent transfiguration discussing their plans for Slughorn's party, finding Peter's idea promising, but needing to do something more.
"You think he'd help?"
"Prongs, it's you and me. How could he not?"
James shrugged.
"Alright, it's worth a shot." He said.
A clearing of a throat interrupted their conversation and they turned to see McGonagall staring at them with pursed lips.
"Mr. Potter, I trust that your practical teacup transfiguration has been perfected and you and Mr. Black are now discussing the theoretical part of the exam."
"That's exactly correct Professor," James replied with his easy-going smile as Lily and Marlene snickered in the corner.
"Well please then Mr. Potter demonstrate for the class the precise technique that has allowed you to achieve perfection in the same amount of time that the rest of your classmates have failed to do so."
James nodded, turning to the teacup in front of him and said the spell without hesitation:
"Poculum Verto."
He smirked as a passable looking gerbil began scurrying around the table. The smirk disappeared, however, when McGonagall brought the creature to a stop with a wave of her wand, bringing it up to eye level where she revealed that at the gerbil's back, where a tail should be, was the handle of a teacup.
"Keep practicing boys, and in the future please refrain from discussing your weekend plans in my class, or I shall have no choice but to take away even more points. And Gryffindor really can't afford to lose anymore from the two of you."
James and Sirius at least had the decency to murmur a couple of sheepish "Yes Professors" before turning back to the task at hand, Remus trying to stifle his laughter.
"Oh, shut up Moony." James said, examining the handle attached firmly to his gerbil's backside.
After class James and Sirius told Remus and Peter to go on to dinner without them, making their way down the winding path from the castle towards the hut in which Hagrid lived. James got there first thanks to his long legs and knocked loudly on the door. The door swung open, and he was met with a beaming, hairy, face on the other side.
"Hello Hagrid!" James and Sirius said in unison, the friendly half-giant looking surprised but not unhappy to see them.
"Boys, I thought I wouldn't see you again until after the holiday."
He said, standing aside to invite them in. They smiled as they squeezed their way inside the small house, taking a seat at Hagrid's oversized table, the warmth of the fire melting the fallen snow from their cloaks.
"You really thought we'd forget Hagrid?" James asked, taking a seat, faux innocence standing out like a sore thumb on James' face always so laced with trouble.
"Yes, how could we forget about our favorite gamekeeper?" Sirius replied, James shooting an elbow into his ribs.
Hagrid raised an eyebrow.
"Alright, what do you want? You've got the scent of trouble on you."
Sirius shot him an innocent smile.
"Can't we visit an old friend without wanting something?"
Hagrid chuckled at that, offering the boys tea which they gratefully accepted after even a short walk in the biting cold.
"If it were Remus or even Peter, sure, but seeing as they already came down to see me yesterday, I don't think that's what you're here for."
"So we have a favor to ask, doesn't mean we don't enjoy having a cup of tea with you." James said, but Hagrid was just looking at him sternly, albeit with a slight twinkle in his eye reminiscent of Dumbledore. "Alright, so, you know how you have a certain…skill when it comes to magical creatures." He began.
"I don't like the sound of this." Hagrid's frown deepened as he took a seat on his bed large enough for a small family, the entire hut shaking with the force of it.
"Just hear us out, we have a proposition for you." Sirius said, his enthusiasm drawing a reluctant Hagrid in.
"Alright, what do you need?" He asked, sounding resigned and already exhausted.
The boys smile between each other, knowing they've got his attention.
Lily made her way towards the dormitory with a yawn. She had been studying for the past two hours in preparation for the final alchemy exam of the semester and was utterly exhausted. She turned the corner before the staircase which would lead her to the portrait of the Fat Lady when she ran into what felt like a wall in the middle of the corridor, scattering her papers up and down the hall.
"Ow, what the hell?" She shouted, looking up to see a furiously blushing James Potter gathering up the papers on the floor, his invisibility cloak crumpled in a heap next to him.
"I'm so sorry Evans, I was in a rush, I swear I wasn't trying to bump into you."
She was surprised to hear how apologetic he sounded and immediately turned off her defensive feelings.
"It's alright Potter, what's your hurry?"
"Just some planning for…tomorrow." He finished before he considered who he was talking to.
"What's happening tomorrow?"
He shrugged her question off, adjusting his glasses onto his nose, as he tried to change the subject.
"Nothing at all."
Lily paused for a second before growing slightly cross.
"James Potter if you are planning on ruining a perfectly lovely evening for a laugh, I really suggest you back off."
James ruffled the back of his hair as he said, "When have I ever been known to do a little thing like that? Trust me Evans, tomorrow is going to go off without a hitch, honest."
Lily looked suspicious, as James hadn't specified what would be going off without a hitch. But she sighed, knowing there wasn't much she could do to stop him at this point, and moved aside. James made to rush off, throwing his cloak over his shoulders as he went. But before he disappeared completely from view he turned back around.
"Just a bit of advice for tomorrow, stay away from the dessert." James whispered in her ear before backing up and offering a slight wink, throwing the hood of his cloak over his head, and slinking off into the dark corridor.
Lily looked skeptical but shrugged, continuing to the Gryffindor dormitory.
The next morning was the Alchemy exam. Lily was pretty sure she had aced it, especially after comparing notes with Remus and Alice. She heard the other students in the class groaning as they overheard their answers. She couldn't help but glance over at Severus, noticing his eyes were firmly glued to his textbook, as he muttered to himself. She figured he was going over the test answers as he always did following an exam, double checking each of his answers. Whenever he got a number of them wrong he would always get into one of his moods, brooding in the library for hours in an attempt to relearn the material which he had failed to understand on the exam. She shook him out of her head though, it was time for lunch, and then Defense Against the Dark Arts (regrettably again with Severus) and then finally…the Slug Club Christmas party. It had been an exhausting week, but this party was something that she was really looking forward to. An evening with her boyfriend and a number of her friends, rubbing shoulders with some of Hogwarts' best and brightest. It was just what she needed after so many dealings with the Marauders over the past several weeks.
They had an exam in Defense Against the Dark Arts as well, but it was far easier than Alchemy so the sixth years hadn't been nearly as concerned. Professor Carraway hadn't been too interested in giving out an extremely difficult exam right before the holidays, so instead she assigned oral reports to be given in pairs on a dark creature of the students' choosing from their studies. Lily and Marlene had given theirs the week prior, and now it was time for the last group of the semester, James and Remus. Professor Carraway had insisted on splitting James and Sirius up after their last report on Red Caps ended with Snape being attacked by one of the creatures. The two boys claimed to have been "completely unaware" to Snape's most recent string of nosebleeds, as well as school policy against bringing in the creatures without explicit permission from the headmaster. As a result, after a quick game of rock, paper, scissors, Peter got stuck with Sirius, or vice versa depending on how you look at it. Their report had gone as well as one could expect with Sirius insisting using as much magic as possible to "enhance" the presentation while Peter watched helplessly from the side. Long story short, a couple of singed eyebrows later, and they managed to scrape by with middle of the road marks. And now it was James and Remus' turn. Miss Carraway seemed more relaxed, evidently expecting Remus to keep James from pulling any of his usual stunts. She seemed completely unaware of Remus' evident anxiety as the two boys approached the front of the classroom.
"So, as you can see, our report is on werewolves."
Sirius let out a howl from the back.
"Mr. Black, please control yourself."
Sirius shrugged shooting a wink Remus' way. He smiled back at his friend, turning to the blackboard where he and James had hung up a number of photos and diagrams of werewolf transformations.
"Now the werewolf has a number of symptoms which affect his or her everyday life. These include enhancement of the senses, a strong craving for rare meats, and of course an uncontrollable monthly transformation that can be quite painful."
Remus turned to James who began his part.
"Now, we've catalogued the days of the full moon, and as it says on our chart here, we will be having one tonight."
"So, a great number of wizards and witches will be suffering these effects, likely holed up in caves or forests, or cellars if they're lucky. They'll be locked away, forced to go through this painful transformation on their own."
Remus stared off into space, having lost his train of thought. James quickly picked up where he left off, trying to shoot Remus a reassuring glance.
"And that's why we wanted to do our report on these creatures, you might call them. We want to try and bring awareness to those good witches and wizards who suffer from this curse. Any one of us could be affected. In fact, there could be a werewolf right in our midst!"
Suddenly, a loud scream erupted from the back of the classroom. The entire class jumped, turning their heads to Sirius who was lying on the ground, clutching his head in pain.
"I can't take it anymore! It shouldn't be happening now, it's too early!"
He turned to Lily, who stared at him in horror.
"Please, you have to help me."
Before Lily could react, he fell back again. Fur erupted from under his robes, and the class watched in horror as a number of wolflike features came over Sirius' face. His eyes glowed a bright yellow and he let out a horrific howl while the class screamed, half of them racing to get away, while the rest stayed frozen in horror. Sirius let out a loud growl, diving at James who fell back, great gushes of blood bursting from his neck, seemingly from Sirius' teeth. Sirius sat up, howling over his feast as James lay back, trying very hard to contain his laughter. Sirius looked down at his friend with a wide grin as James began to chuckle and then outright laugh. The class slowly began to catch on, watching as Sirius stood up, wiped the blood from his mouth, and gave an exaggerated bow.
Remus was eerily calm during the entire display, fiddling with his tie, and glancing nervously at Peter who was engrossed in his classmates' terror, anger, and eventual laughter. Lily looked quite annoyed at first, but even she was struggling to hide her laughter. Professor Carraway, on the other hand, was completely unamused.
Even those who had run screaming from the classroom could hear the boys being chewed out following the class.
"Of all the irresponsible ridiculous displays you four have pulled over this term, this takes the cake. 50 points from Gryffindor and you better pray I don't take more! Try one more time anything like this in my classroom and I promise you that hourglass will be drained faster than you can say quidditch, understood?"
"Yes Professor." The boys said, Remus muttering his answer, with a deep frown etched into his scarred face.
"And detention for all four of you to be served tomorrow evening with Mr. Filch. Now get out of my classroom."
"Understood." James nodded, leading his group into the hallway and towards the Great Hall where dinner awaited those students not invited to Slughorn's party, all the while laughing and reenacting their latest joke. The boys didn't notice how Remus stared off into space throughout dinner, choosing to head to the library afterward instead of back to the common room with them. They were too elated, as usual, by their cleverness already talking about their newest plans which were set to go off without a hitch that evening.
Meanwhile, Lily Evans was nervously fiddling with her dress robes in the Gryffindor dormitory. They were a dark green color to match her eyes, and she wore a brooch in the shape of a rose inherited from her grandmother in the middle. Alice approached her from behind, dressed in pale pink robes, her dark hair framing her face in loose curls which Marlene had likely coaxed out of her normally pin straight locks. Marlene was a master stylist, and the girls constantly suggested she take it on as a job after graduation.
"You ready to go?" Alice asked, smiling at herself in the mirror.
She was never the most confident, so Lily was glad that she was finally beginning to embrace her beauty.
"Yup," Lily said, breaking out of her thoughts to follow Alice downstairs saying a quick goodbye to Marlene and Mary who were sitting on Mary's bed playing a game of exploding snap. They just nodded, focused intently on their game.
"Where's Susan?"
Lily asked Alice as they made their way downstairs.
"Oh, she's in the library with Lucas." Alice said, emphasizing the name with a suggestive tone.
"Well, we will be talking about that tomorrow."
The girls broke into a fit of giggles as they made their way out of the portrait hole and down the corridor, running into Remus on the way.
"Remus, are you alright?" Lily asked, noticing his forlorn look, and remembering James and Sirius' stunt from earlier that day.
"Yeah, I'm fine Lily. Enjoy the party." He said offering her a slight smile as he walked past her.
She made a note to talk to him about it the next day, taking Alice's arm as they continued on their way.
When she arrived at the party George immediately caught her attention, calling her over to a conversation he was having with Slughorn. The old professor had clearly already had a couple of glasses of brandy, and didn't hesitate to begin talking to her about her future.
"Now everything in life is about connections, even for someone of your…well…background Miss Evans. There are plenty of applications for your talents, plenty, a healer perhaps? Have you considered it?"
"Maybe, I was actually leaning towards auror training, maybe fight against…well…" Lily began, but George cut her off.
"Actually, I think Lily would be wonderful in the healing arena."
"George," Lily blushes but he continued.
"Oh, don't be modest Lils, after all you're already breaking into that field and you're still a year and a half out from graduating."
"Breaking into the field, intriguing, in what way Mr. Fisher?" Slughorn asked, accepting another glass of brandy from one of the students hoping to be invited to the Slug Club the next year.
"Lily and I have actually been working on a little side project."
George said, a prideful smile crossing his handsome features.
"George," Lily whispered, a little more sternly this time.
Slughorn raises an eyebrow, intrigued.
"Oh, do tell Mr. Fisher I'd love to hear about anything the two of you are attempting together."
"Well, it's just a working theory, but we have been trying to find a way to actually lessen the effects of the full moon on lycanthropy patients. It's just in the early stages of course…"
George continued to divulge most of their research to Slughorn while Lily tuned out. She wasn't sure why, but she had thought that their research was something special between the two of them and wasn't quite ready to share it with the world just yet. The night droned on, and Lily found herself growing more bored by the minute. She was on the verge of going for her fourth bathroom break of the night just to get some time to herself for a minute when Slughorn announced dessert was ready. She sighed, taking a seat next to George with the rest of the group, and was about to dig into her ice cream when she remembered something James had said to her the day before. It was about five minutes into talk over ice cream when George began to turn a pronounced green color. She turned to him, concern lacing her face.
"George, are you alright?"
Lily jumped back when in lieu of an answer George vomited a pile of slugs all over the floor right where Lily's shoes had been.
She is torn between being furious and laughing because in all honesty watching everyone around her vomiting up slugs onto their desserts was a lot more entertaining than hearing about Barny Cuffe's plans to transform the Daily Prophet into the best newspaper in all of Europe. Only her and Alice (who was lactose intolerant) were spared the gruesome fate. Snape took the worst of it, great purple boils erupting on his face as well as the slugs, and Lily heard a slight snickering by her ear which sounded familiar. However, by the time she turned around to try and reach out for a familiar shimmery fabric, the laughter was gone, leaving her to wonder if she had just imagined it. Everyone was finally starting to relax, Slughorn passing out buckets and beginning to whip up a potion to cure the boils on Snape's face when people began screaming through the slugs. A number of strange platypus-like creatures had begun scuttling in and out of peoples' pockets, gathering a shockingly large amount of money for a small scale school event. They also began grasping at the forks and spoons, stuffing them into their pockets while Slughorn shouted in alarm, ranting about them being real sterling silver, a gift from the minister for magic himself. All in all, the party finished off with a bang, and although George was furiously complaining to Lily, telling her how he would get that Potter and his thugs if it was the last thing he did, she couldn't help but feel a strong sense of amusement at the ridiculousness of the whole situation. After all, no one was seriously harmed, everyone go their money back, it was all sorted out. In Lily's opinion very little harm had actually been done, but she just couldn't understand why James, who she knew had just lost fifty more points for Gryffindor on top of the points lost from the last quidditch match, had taken such a massive risk. Maybe that's what led her to ask around that evening once she had returned to Gryffindor tower. And maybe the answers she received were what drew her to the quidditch pitch the next morning where James and Marlene were hard at work getting their new beater up to scratch after having to replace Peter in the middle of the season.
Noticing Lily on the field below, James blew his whistle signaling the end of practice. He landed gracefully in front of her, the windswept look to his hair annoying her a lot less when it was natural and not put on.
"I know it was you." She said, cutting right to the chase.
"I've no idea what you're talking about." James said, making his way past her towards the locker rooms in an attempt to avoid the conversation.
She followed after him, speaking as they walked.
"People were saying…it was because Slughorn didn't give Remus an invitation."
James shrugged, not denying it, slowing to a stop as it became clear that Lily had more to say, but not yet facing her.
"Why would you risk that? You could get in serious trouble for poisoning everyone there." She said.
"I'd hardly call it poison." He turned towards her, a stoic look in his usually playful eyes. "I warned you, didn't I? And yet I still saw Georgie boy vomiting up slugs, didn't tell him did we?"
"I wasn't sure I believed you." Lily said, but James saw through the lie.
"Yeah, well, I don't make a habit of making people vomit up slugs who don't deserve it." James said, laying his broom over his shoulders.
"Oh, and George deserved it?" Lily asked, growing suddenly defensive for the boy who she thought she might love.
"Him and everyone else in that bloody club. They're bottomfeeders, the lot of them, just trying to scrape their way to the top by making stupid connections." James shook his head, glancing back at Marlene who was standing off to the side awkwardly, not sure if she needed to intervene.
"And I'm what? An exception?" Lily asked, shooting a glance at Marlene that told her to stay out of it.
"You're not like them. You have honor. That's something that can't be said about most people, but then again you're a Gryffindor so I shouldn't be surprised."
Lily paused at the compliment, not sure how to respond. James shrugged, tossing his snitch in the air and catching it before continuing on his way to the changing rooms. As he left Lily catches a whiff of his cologne and blanches at the memory of the same smell wafting from the potion in Slughorn's office on Thursday morning.
He paused at the door, turning towards her one last time, the mischief alighting his eyes once more. "See you around Evans."
"I'll see you around." She choked out, before turning on her heel and making her way back up through the deep troughs of snow towards the castle she called home.