Title: Contractual Courtship
Chapter: 01 – New Romantics
Author: Killaurey
Rating: T
Word Count: 7,015
Summary: Being called a Mudblood is absolutely the last straw with Snape. She's not done with Slytherins in general, though, and with help from her girlfriends, Lily embarks on an attempt to court one. She's not expecting to find true love but, if it happens, she's not going to complain.
Disclaimer: I don't own HP. It's probs better that way but wouldn't it be fun?
"I'm so glad you've dropped Snape, honestly, Lily, finally," Marlene says.
It's not the first time Marlene's said this or something like it tonight. It really doesn't help, either, the way that Dorcas and Mary chime in or nod. They're trying to be supportive, ranged around her like protective lionesses, keeping arseholes like Potter from saying anything.
Everyone heard what Snape said. Everyone heard her break ties with him.
And, yes, it had been coming for a while, she knows that, but part of her still feels like she's carrying around shards of broken glass in her bare hands and she's bleeding.
If it was just insults towards Sev, though, she'd have been able to bear it. Part of her agrees with all of that, no matter how long they'd known one another, and she's in the mood to hear him be torn down.
The problem is the way the casual insults towards Slytherin are tossed about too, like all Slytherins are evil, like they all deserve to be insulted because a stupid, stupid boy called her an ugly, old fashioned slur.
It's just House pride and she gets that, most of them don't mean anything malicious about it, but it grates.
And, a secret:
The Hat wanted me for Slytherin.
Five years later, Lily is still never quite sure if she made the right choice by going for Gryffindor instead. It's certainly not Gryffindor bravery that has her sitting in her red-and-gold Common Room and quietly seething over every insult when she doesn't want to explain why they upset her.
Sev had been a convenient excuse for that much. She could defend Slytherin under the guise of defending Sev. At the start it hadn't even been pretend...
Now, though...
There's nothing wrong with ambition. Or tradition. Or cunning. Or pride, for all that Gryffindor claims that one too.
There's a lot wrong with the old-fashioned creepy blood purist propaganda and murdering Muggles and all of that shite that was apparently really bad before Minister Riddle took over twenty some years ago but that's—not the same thing.
And I've never liked people conflating them. There's no tradition about murdering people. There's no cunning in turning away new blood. Anyone who parrots these things these days is out of touch with the modern world.
"Evans!" Potter says, with a grin. "Does this mean you'll go out with me?"
"Not even in your dreams," she snaps.
Sirius Black laughs, long and loud, and outside the moon is rising to fullness. She thinks nothing of it. It doesn't matter to her.
Instead, much later, once everyone in the girl's dorm is asleep and she's cried her grief and her frustrations out and is lounging on her bed feeling hazy, the thought occurs to her, the way it never had with Sev around:
I should find a Slytherin to date. I don't have to be careful of Sev's feelings any longer, and I was never into him. The thing is, if I want one, I think I'm going to have to approach it from the head, not the heart.
Which.
Maybe it's just the time of night. The moon hanging in the sky. The way the world seems quiet, hushed, expectant. Her heart feels like it's asleep while the rest of her chugs along. Free to ponder Hogwarts' most cryptic House.
It doesn't sound like a bad idea, finding one to date.
There's got to be one I can stand for a month or two or three or six. It doesn't have to last for forever. I just—I'll figure it out in daylight. It's not like dating someone in green and silver is going to change that I chose red and gold. It can't.
But Lily thinks about how she's always looked better in green than in red, how it takes the cunning and self-control of a Slytherin to keep her mouth shut sometimes in Gryffindor, when flying off the handle would be, yes, House-appropriate, but also death to her social life.
And…
She giggles, a sleepy edge to it–some of the Slytherin boys are very fit. She wouldn't mind that at all.
Then she closes her eyes and they stay shut until morning, her breathing going slow and even.
She's not a morning person, and it comes way too fast, but it's hard to be grumpy about it with only a handful of days left and then they're free for the summer.
O.W.L.S. are done, their fates are to be decided by the examiners, and she drowsily bobs her head in agreement as Mary goes on about something her on-again, off-again boyfriend in Ravenclaw did.
Derek's an idiot. She's been saying so for years.
Lily is pretty sure they're off-yet-again but isn't sure why; she's just making supportive noises and that seems to be all Mary needs right now which is great because she needs at least two cups of tea before she's up to giving anything else.
Possibly three, because Sev is staring across the Great Hall at her with burning eyes and she's going to have to figure out how she wants to deal with that too.
She ignores him. Mary's more important and Lily is so over dealing with him.
By the time tea has been consumed, Beth's popped in and then with hugs and kisses popped right back out again because she's leaving early for the summer. Marlene and Dorcas have also joined her and Mary, and Lily is feeling almost human and like she didn't stay up crying half the night after they'd all gone to sleep.
It's also around the end of cup two that she realizes there's a terrible, terrible flaw in her 'date a Slytherin' plan:
They're all going home for summer hols. Like. Right away.
Swallowing a piece of toast, Lily decides that, you know what, she's not going to let it leave her flustered. In fact, she decides, it's probably for the best—now she'll have all summer to plan her approach and, more importantly, decide who she ought to approach.
I need to make a list. Toss out all the ones that are absolute no-gos from the start, then figure out what I know about the ones that remain. This could be kind of fun, actually, since I'm not crushing on anyone in particular.
"You know what we should do," Lily says, as Potter and his pals-sans-Lupin come in, which means breakfast is nearly over, and she notes that they look godawful but then she forgets about it because, well, they're basically wastes of space. It's better if she doesn't know what's up with them.
"We need to plan our hols. That will keep your mind off of Derek's stupidity, Mary."
Mary gives her a watery smile.
"And it'll keep you from brooding about Snape," Marlene crows. "Excellent, I'm in. But we're planning outside—we're not staying in here."
"By the lake?" Dorcas suggests and it's unanimously deemed a great idea. They don't even need to fetch anything from upstairs. They've all got their bags, out of force of habit, and they're fifth years. They can conjure their own damn blankets to sit on.
They leave the Great Hall in a chattering clump, ignoring whatever drama is going on amongst the suffering fools that masquerade as boys—and there is some drama, especially as Potter isn't sitting with Black, who is pale and furious, even from a distance, and Pettigrew looks like he wants to die, and Sev just stares and stares and stares-and Lily tucks the thought about what Marlene had said about not brooding about Sev in the back of her head.
Because, you know what, she's not. It's going to suck at home, when they're living so close to one another, but she'll figure that out later.
And I'll just brood about what Slytherin boy I'd like to date instead and determine the best way to get him to pay attention to me, Lily decides, feeling almost... content. If there's anything she's good at, she's good at getting her way eventually.
It's probably a character flaw. Tuney would say it is, anyway.
But since when do I listen to Tuney? This is more productive than I could be otherwise.
First, though, they need to figure out plans for the hols, which turns out to be pretty easy, especially once Bettina, from Ravenclaw, and Anise, from Hufflepuff join them. For most of the morning, they pour over calendars, comparing travel times, likely parental objections, and other social obligations.
It's tragic that Beth's not available but, like, the Canada opportunity had been too good for her to pass up.
"I've got a wedding to go to in Italy in August," Marlene says, gloomy at the realization that she'll be missing out on when the rest of them can go to Diagon Alley.
"Oh, poor you," Lily retorts, and they all laugh. "I think Italy makes up for it."
By the time lunch rolls around, they have tentative plans for the entire summer, though everything is subject to change.
As they head inside, Lily falls into place by Marlene.
"What are magical weddings like, anyway?" she asks curiously.
At sixteen, she's not planning on getting married yet, but she wonders how they differ from the weddings she's gone to, in Muggle churches.
"That depends a lot on the families involved," Marlene says, and that's one thing Lily has always liked about Marlene—she's never made Lily feel small for not knowing something nor like she should be grateful for Marlene giving her charity by answering. "Some have more traditions than others. Some keep it simple, some don't."
"Is there a book or something about common traditions?" Lily wonders.
Marlene considers that. "I've never really looked for a book," she admits. "It's sort of the thing that you just absorb growing up, isn't it? But want to check, after lunch? And if we can't find anything, you can always ask my grandmother when you come visit in July. Granny will love talking about all the weddings she's been to."
The Hogwarts library has a few books that look promising but there's not a lot of time to read them and they're not allowed to take them home over the summer, so Lily checks one out, figuring she can read it before they leave, and writes down the rest of the titles so she'll remember to look into them in September.
Time, though, time slips away and she doesn't get around to reading the one book, so Lily also writes that title down as she returns it to the library, and before she knows it, they've run out of time entirely and their trunks are packed, and they're back on the Hogwarts Express.
Lupin, her counterpart for the 5th Gryffindor Prefects, looks gloomy, peaky, and vaguely relieved as they reach the Prefects' compartment at approximately the same time.
"You alright?" she asks, in a low voice, as they take their seats next to the Hufflepuff Prefects in their year.
His smile isn't convincing and something about him suggests that he knows that. "I'll live," he says, rather morosely.
"Just remember, it could always be worse," Lily says bracingly, but doesn't pry further. She's really not interested in whatever drama is going on amongst the boys. If their companionship is a hot mess, she isn't getting involved.
She can only imagine the biting comments Black would have and the way Potter would take it as if she's into him—which, gross—and Pettigrew isn't bad, when he's alone, but he's annoying as shite when he's with the others.
For some reason, her comment makes him laugh.
It's the first and last time she hears him laugh the entire journey back to London.
Tragically, Lily is more concerned with the fact that getting home is… going to be a problem. It's tradition that she and Sev are driven back by her parents and-
And there's no getting around it, she realizes, sighing heavily. Oh, joys, it's going to be absolutely dreadful.
It is, too, as her mum carries on conversation all by herself, with stilted contributions from Sev, and her dad, always the more perceptive one, keeps his mouth shut and focuses on the road.
Lily studiously ignores that Sev is literally a foot away from her in the backseat of her dad's car, pretends that she doesn't notice how often Sev looks at her, and instead devotes herself to staring out the window, pretending to be deeply and thoroughly engrossed by the little birds that flit by now and then.
Perfectly awful, all around. Dull, too, to just make it worse.
Even Mum, by the time they get to Cokeworth, has lapsed into awkward silence.
They drop Sev off first and, once he's gone from the car, she heaves a sigh, feeling a little bit lighter already.
"Rough times?" her dad asks.
"I don't want to talk about it," Lily says, and her mum makes a soothing sort of noise.
They clearly think it's some sort of—of—lover's spat. Lily thinks of trying to explain magical slurs and out-dated blood tensions and decides she doesn't want to blemish the joy her parents take in knowing that magic is real.
There's no need to bother them with the reality of it, that it's amazing and terrible and that people are people no matter if they have fabulous powers or not.
"Oh," Petunia says, as she walks in the door. "It's you."
"Why, welcome home, Lily," Lily says sarcastically. "Did you have a good time at school? I missed you soooo much!"
Petunia sneers at her and flounces up the stairs. Then, like clockwork, Petunia's bedroom door slams shut.
Welcome home, Lily, she thinks, and grimaces.
"I'll get supper started," Mum says, her face pinched the way it always is when she and Petunia argue. There's a reason her dad is lingering in the drive, smoking a cigar, rather than following them in right away. "Why don't you get unpacked, sweetheart?"
"Sure." She forces a smile. "Love you, Mum."
Two days into summer hols and Lily is damn glad that she is fleeing everything Cokeworth has to offer by the end of the week.
If it wasn't for that light at the end of the tunnel, in the form of crashing at Mary's place for a few days, then she'd probably have just started screaming and maybe never stopped.
Tuney is dreadful, like always, and Sev (Snape, she reminds herself, though that's going to be a habit that's hard to break) keeps coming 'round to try and talk to her and, to her dismay, her mum keeps letting him in under the guise of 'it'd be good for them to talk things out'.
(Despite her attempts, Mum still thinks they've had a lover's spat. Lily contemplates murder for the way Snape doesn't say anything to the contrary to her mum.)
Added to both of those things is the fact that a heat wave has rolled in and it's, frankly, too hot to sleep and she's not seventeen yet so she can't use one of the many, many, many charms she knows to make herself more comfortable.
Instead she's stuck trying not to melt, her hair plastered to the back of her neck, sweat beading down her sides, between her breasts, leaving her hot and sticky and gross and Tuney and Se-Snape.
The only good thing is that I've managed to hide on the roof enough to complete a preliminary list of Slytherin guys, she thinks.
She's not supposed to be on the roof at all but, like, it's not as if Tuney can see her when Tuney is stomping around downstairs because Lily dared to exist and it's not like Mum is going to climb up after her.
Sometimes Snape spots her but she ignores him and pretends she hasn't situated herself where there's no way to climb up except through her window on purpose.
Actually, ignoring Sev is a great way to get a lot of work done on her list while he skulks below and tries not to look like a totally desperate creep (he fails, miserably, and she feels strangely guilty but also vindicated when Tuney comes out to shriek at him for being a creep).
It's not like Tuney and her are on anything like good terms but, somehow, it still makes her smile.
Lily ties her hair back in a messy, sweat-soaked bun and nibbles on the end of her biro and considers names of boys who'd, probably, be horrified to know she's doing this in a Muggle workbook.
But, really, parchment would be eye-catching and ridiculous to use outside in a Muggle neighbourhood. Even they'd have to admit that, right?
She wonders how many of them have ever been to a muggle neighbourhood.
She crosses off Tavers (he's cruel to the animals in Care of Magical Creatures), Evan Rosier (who has never not glared at her for existing), and Sallow (hygiene issues). Lance Pucey stays-he's pleasant, quiet, and clean. She doesn't know enough about him to get rid of him.
She mulls over the next few names, making little notes as to what she remembers, but Lily doesn't have a ton of experience with the guys not in her grade, so those the year above and the year below (which is as low as she's willing to date-anything younger than that and she thinks it gets... weird... and, oh, that's definitely a thing to cross a few guys on her list off for) are her only options.
By the time she's called in for supper-having missed lunch entirely-even her creaky floors feel cool under her bare feet. The wood of them is soft and worn, as cozy as a silk scarf.
She surveys herself in the bathroom with dismay.
Okay, so maybe she's going to have to spend a day with her potions and getting the sunblock one made, which she probably should've done earlier, but it had completely slipped her mind-
Which now, now I'm paying for. I'm going to hurt so bad tomorrow.
Already her face and shoulders are a deep, dark pink. A bad sign, she knows, from past experience.
At least it's cooler at night, slightly, and the burn-soothe potion is an easy one to make. I'll do that after I eat.
All told, she's glad when, at the end of the week, she can leave the uncertain footing of her home (between Tuney and Snape, she's not having a great time, and the heat is oppressive and it makes even her Dad's usually even mood waspish) for the cool, magical relief of Mary's home.
Mary's home, the Swansong, is a cluster of houses nestled on a tiny Unplottable island in the middle of a lake she's never heard the name of. She's not sure if it has a name, since everyone in Mary's family just calls it 'the lake' as if there's no other one in the world.
They welcome her with open arms and, on their property, she's allowed to use her wand. Lily understands all the reasons she can't when she's at her home but, still, the unfairness of it all grates sometimes.
"You're so lucky," she tells Mary, and Mary just laughs and tugs her up to her bedroom.
Mary's bedroom is pretty, pink, and soft. Lily loves it more than a little and says so.
"You say that every time," Mary says.
"And it's never anything but true," Lily retorts. "You-oh! Is that a new quilt?"
It is and, it turns out, Mary's grandmother made it for her. Each square has a different set of flowers embroidered on it.
They spend some time pouring over the quilt, Mary quite happy to tell Lily about the flowers she doesn't recognize, and before they know it, they're giggling and wrapped up in it, and rather than flowers they're pouring over Lily's notebook.
"Are you really sure about this, though?" Mary asks as she reads what Lily's already written. "It's not going to be easy."
"I know," she says, "but I don't need it to be easy, so long as it's worth it."
Mary taps her finger on Archibald Merrow, a seventh year she only knows exists because he sometimes studies in the library when she does. "Get rid of him. His family already had to bribe Aurors to keep him from being charged with crimes."
"What crimes?" Lily demands, even as she fishes out her biro and obligingly crosses out his name. If he's that bad, she doesn't want him.
Mary wiggles one hand back and forth. "I'm scarce on the details, since Mum and Dad don't talk Auror-talk with me around but, even so, I hear things and his name definitely came up. They were quite angry at the Aurors who let him off."
"Definitely not the sort I want then," Lily decides. "Okay, what do you know about Perseus here?"
Perseus passes Mary's muster, but three more fail and are summarily rejected.
"What exactly are you looking for?" Mary asks. "A love story or just something for fun?"
Lily hesitates.
"You can tell me anything, Lily," Mary says earnestly.
"Fun," she says slowly, "but I wouldn't say no if it was really a love story, just in disguise. But I don't think I quite dare to go for the love story outright."
Mary hums thoughtfully but further conversation is halted as Mary's mum calls them down.
"I should warn you," Mary says as they rattle down the stairs like coins in a can. "Mum's got an overabundance of cheese she's trying to get through. Choose your dishes wisely."
"Why does she have so much cheese?" Lily whispers. "Don't tell me she's back into extreme couponing again."
Mary lets out a wicked cackle, nodding furiously.
"Oh no," Lily murmurs, giggling, and they're both still laughing as they reach the ground floor and the dining room.
"Lily, darling!" Mary's mum says, smiling. "Come over here and give me a hug!"
Then, of course, she has to hug Mary's dad, and they both exclaim over how much more grown up she looks, and only after that do they settle down to eat. There is, in fact, a lot of cheese in almost every dish, but Lily can't stop beaming.
She loves Mary's family. It's so effortlessly easy to be nice and have people be nice in return.
Everyone in the house genuinely likes each other, in addition to loving each other, and Lily ignores the niggling little thought that maybe, just maybe, that's part of the problem in her home, with her own family.
She loves all of them, of course, but liking all of them... that's a more complicated question, which she chooses to ignore.
There's no point in ruining her hols with something like that. It's not like she's spending much of her hols with them anyway.
After dinner, they head back up with a plate of fruit for dessert (and, yes, yet more cheese) and Lily sighs happily as they collapse back on Mary's bed.
"Too much cheese," she says, "but I'll die happy anyway."
Mary laughs. "No dying. Imagine your tombstone. 'Defeated by cheese'."
"That's too basic," Lily says, giggling. "What about something like 'brie-d to death'?"
Mary throws an apple slice at her, which Lily catches with her mouth, and they spend a few moments nibbling at the fruit. Mary eats most of the grapes, while Lily takes the apple slices (which, while basic, are still her fav) and then Mary says:
"About your list, I think you should consider more if you want something serious or not."
Lily cringes a little, mostly because Mary sounds so very serious about that.
"Why?" she asks. "It's just supposed to be fun! Is that what you were going to say before dinner?"
Mary grimaces, which is something like an apology. "I was, then I thought I shouldn't say anything, and then I decided that, no, if you're going to do this, you should probably have all the facts."
Lily wipes her fingers on a cloth napkin and reaches for her workbook. She bumps Mary's shoulder companionably.
"Well," she says, "I suppose all the facts are important for a girl to have."
Mary looks relieved.
"Okay," Lily says, looking at the names left. There's a lot of them, still, but she's pleased with the progress already made in whittling them down. "Tell me why I should revisit the 'real love versus just a fun time' question a little more thoroughly?"
"It's one of those things that I don't think anyone would expect you to know," Mary says, "because you're Muggleborn, but if you're going to go after a Slytherin boy, then you're going to need to know it. Do you know what the average age for marriage is in the Wizarding World?"
Lily frowns, thinking of the books she never got a chance to read, and has to admit that... "Well, no," she says. "I don't know anyone even getting married, aside from the fact Marlene's going to a wedding this summer."
"That's what I thought," Mary says matter-of-factly. "And, in Gryffindor, it doesn't really matter because we're more of a fun group anyway. Fun is fun and if love happens, then it happens, right? Exactly what you were planning."
Lily flushes a little. "And you're saying that approach won't work for Slytherin boys?"
"Not as well," Mary says, "and some of the best of Slytherin boys aren't going to even look at you if you aren't ostensibly into it for more than fun. They look for real matches over playing the game."
"But we're all still pretty young," she says, "we're only rising Sixth years, there are still two whole years of school left."
Mary bites her lower lip.
Lily narrows her eyes. "What is the average age of marriage in the Wizarding World?"
"Young," Mary says. "A load of people get married right out of school. I'd say that at least half, maybe three-quarters of our classmates will probably be married within three years of leaving Hogwarts."
"... I'm... what?" Lily says, staring at her. "But that means everyone's, like, under twenty! Or just over! My parents didn't get married until my mom was almost twenty-five! My dad was even older!"
"That's why I thought it should be mentioned," Mary says. "It's not, it's not just the Slytherins that get married young, it's most of the population. It's just that the Slytherins formalize it more. Those who play around in Slytherin aren't generally seen as, ah... loose."
"So if I found a Slytherin boy to play with, everyone would think I'm a slag," Lily says, "but if I played around with a Ravenclaw or a Hufflepuff or a Gryffindor, it's totally normal and age-appropriate."
"Well, only with some of the Ravenclaws," Mary says thoughtfully. "Some are just as set on tradition as the Slytherins."
Lily buries her head in Mary's quilt. "What's a fancy word for finding a corner and hiding in it?"
"Latibulate," Mary says, after a moment.
Lily pauses. Peeks up at Mary. "There's really a word for that?"
"Yes," Mary says.
"I'm so glad you're not in Ravenclaw," Lily sighs. "You make my life so much better by being in Gryffindor with me."
Mary tangles her fingers in Lily's hair and Lily allows it, pondering the new things she's just been told.
"Oh my god," Lily says, horrified. "Snape."
She can feel the full-body cringe from Mary.
"I was, ah, hoping you wouldn't think of that one," Mary admits.
Lily raises her head slightly.
"Excuse me?" she says, in a voice that is tightly controlled. At least, to start with. "You were hoping I wouldn't realize that why? So I could blithely have the entire school think I was his girl? So I'd wind up being serenaded by angels at the wedding everyone apparently thought was a done deal?! So I'd-"
"Lily, no!" Mary says, looking distressed. "Please calm down! It wasn't like that!"
"Then what was it like?" Lily demands, knowing her face is flushed from the way her skin feels too hot to be stuck inside. Like she's trapped.
Just like-
Shite. Shite. Shite.
"And that creepy arsehole has been stalking me at home!" she erupts, over whatever Mary was trying to say. "Mum and Dad think we've fought and we need to make up, my mum even thinks it is a lover's spat! Oh my God, Mary! What the fuck!"
Mary cringes and looks at her bedroom door.
There's no sound from the other side but, just the reminder, is enough for Lily to force her temper back, wrestle it down until it's something like controlled, if only barely.
Mary murmurs a few spells and presses a cold glass of water into her hands. There's ice cubes floating in it. Lily is alarmed when she sees the way they start melting as she holds the cup. It's only then that she realizes the quilt has been snatched off the bed, lobbed in a far corner.
"Please, Lily," Mary says, "just-calm down. Breathe. Don't set my house on fire. Or break any of the windows. I'll explain, I swear I will. Just. You need to calm down first. Shite. It's been ages since you've lost your temper that badly. Shite, sorry. I'm sorry, okay?"
She's soaked through with sweat. She's far too warm and that candle, the one on Mary's nightstand, is melting.
Lily closes her eyes, takes a deep breath, and counts to one hundred. Then, she counts to one hundred again. As she counts, she can hear Mary casting spells.
"Sorry," Lily mutters, after her third one hundred. "I didn't mean-is everything alright? I'll, I'll replace it, if it's not."
"Everything's fine," Mary says, patting her on the back. "Come on, let's get you cooled off. I'm going to cast a spell on you, okay? It'll help bring your body temperature back down to normal. You'll feel better then."
Lily closes her eyes again and nods.
"I feel like I'm in some horrible Friday the 13th disaster scenario," she croaks and, even as Mary casts her spell, Lily makes herself drink the rest of the water she'd been handed.
It helps.
The spell helps more, cutting through the awful burning, heat and taking away the worst of her headache.
"What's so special about Friday the 13th?" Mary asks curiously.
"It's, ah, Muggles consider it to be a day of bad luck and superstition," Lily says. "Like there's a curse or a jinx on the day itself. There's all sorts of stories about it. A lot don't believe but a lot do believe and say they don't."
"I wonder how that got started," Mary says, but Lily just shrugs and peels open her eyes.
Mary's room is almost approaching normal temperatures by now and she feels if not good, then at least she feels human. Lily decides that's good enough.
"Is there anything I can help you with putting back?" she asks, her eyes falling on the sad pile of melted wax that had been a candle. "I really am sorry."
"No," Mary says. "I should've-there were better ways to approach that conversation. Lying, even by omission, is something that usually goes badly. It's my fault. How about you go shower and then we'll have the full conversation, okay?"
Lily nods but, as she gets off the bed, she feels a bit forlorn. "None of you told me," she says miserably.
"No," Mary says. "And I'm sorry for that. Go shower, okay?"
Lily, feeling very sorry for herself, gathers the towels and a change of clothes that Mary hands her, and heads off to the shower. If she cries in it, well, it's not like anyone else has to know, and she does feel a little better after it, wrapped in clean clothes, her hair bundled up in a towel.
Mary has gotten her room back in order, right down to the quilt being back on the bed and Lily's notebook right where they'd been giggling over it. Mary's gotten them butterbeers, chilled, and the fruit and cheese is gone-for the first time, she wonders what happened to that when she'd heated things up without meaning to.
"How are you feeling?" Mary asks.
"Better," Lily says slowly, thinking about it as she shuts the door behind her. She wonders if she ought to lock it. Mary's bedroom is still a little warmer than the hallway had been but not so noticeable that it would cause comment. "But not great. Is there a word for that?"
"Awvish," Mary says promptly. "It's a word for when you're not sick but you're not feeling well anyway."
"Sign me up for a million days of awvishiness then," Lily says and that, of all things, gets Mary to hug her.
"It's not all that bad," Mary says as she buries her face against Mary's shoulder. "You'll see."
"Please tell me the entire school doesn't think I'm going to marry Snape," she begs. "Please tell me that they don't think that."
"They don't think that," Mary says, and Lily heaves an enormous sigh of relief. "Though it helps that you were very public about breaking your friendship with him."
"But there's still going to be problems?" she asks. "Why?"
"Because you were friends for so long, so publicly, and because he does nothing to dissuade the rumours that you two are interested in one another," Mary says. "You've, just as obviously, have been fighting that narrative as long as he's been spinning it, though, so while there's rumours..."
"We can still salvage it," Lily says. She rests her face against Mary's reassuring shoulder for another moment before she pulls away. "Alright. Will it negatively impact me if I do go after a Slytherin boy for real?"
While she asks that, she crawls back onto the bed Mary joins her, wrapping them both back up in the quilt. This time, they pull it up over their heads and, using the very softest of lumos, it feels almost like they're the only two who exist in the whole world.
With a wave of her wand, Mary extinguishes all other lights, which only makes the effect more pronounced.
"Honestly?" Mary says. "No. Oh, you'll get some naysayers but everyone knows you're brilliant and ambitious. You winding up with someone who is also brilliant and ambitious won't be a surprise to people. The biggest problem is going to be the ones you've already got."
"Snape," Lily says, then frowns. "I have several problems?"
"Potter?" Mary says pointedly.
Lily frowns at her. "Is he really a problem? He's just annoyingly persistent and doesn't take no for an answer, which is a level of desperation that's incredibly off-putting."
Mary's smile is slightly rueful.
"It could be a problem," she says, "because whomever you go for is going to have to be able to deal with the temper tantrums Snape and Potter are liable to have. You know how Potter went after Snape with his gang. Some of that was Snape, sure, but some of that was probably also because you kept paying attention to Snape instead of Potter. And Snape..."
Mary trails off there but Lily doesn't need her to go on.
She knows good and well how much of a creepy, vindictive, absolute arsehole Snape can be.
(It's funny how much easier it is to call him that when she thinks about the way he'd made it seem like they were eventually going to be married to a lot of the school, to her own parents, and never cleared that with her.)
"Right," Lily says. "I think that's taking a few off the list."
Mary grins at her. "Not going to take a tentative approach about it, are you?"
Lily reaches for her notebook, nudging Mary with her elbow gently. "From what you've said, I don't think I can afford to. If I really want a Slytherin boy, I'm going to have to go at this like I mean it, and I'm going to have to be prepared."
"Sounds about right," Mary agrees. "Unless you decide you don't want to go for a Slytherin boy. You and I could always forget this fit of madness, if you change your mind."
Lily considers that thoughtfully. "No," she says, slightly regretfully. "We both know I can't go for anyone in Gryffindor–Potter will murder them–and that I've always been kind of..."
"Cut under the red and we'd see green?" Mary suggests.
Lily flushes. "I admit to nothing," she says. "Miss Blue Underneath."
"Yes, yes," Mary says. "Okay, so if we're really going to do this, are you in for marriage or-?"
"I mean, I still think that's absolutely nuts to be planning at this age," Lily grumbles. "What if it doesn't work out? Is there a way to gracefully back out of something like this if it turns out we're just not-not suited, even if we both approach it seriously?"
"Yes, actually," Mary says. "Of course there is. You could draw up a short term contract laying out your expectations, wishes, and intentions, and if it doesn't work out, well, that's why the contract is short."
Lily hums. "I could do that," she says. "How short is short?"
"I don't think any go shorter than three or six months," Mary says slowly. "Though we'd have to check the library on that one, but six months is generally as short as is polite. Three months is more 'our parents are making us do this for the sake of appearances so we will grit our teeth and smile for ninety days straight and then never speak of this again'. Six months is considered a good faith effort at getting to know someone."
"And would these six months be spent openly dating?" Lily asks. "Or would it be, I don't know, more like furtive scuttling?"
Mary giggles. "What use would furtive scuttling be if the goal was to make a match that will last for a lifetime? Some courtships are more private than others, of course, depending on the personalities of those involved, but they're still open. People know. You're dating someone, Lily, not keeping them a dirty little secret."
Lily sighs, relieved. "Okay, good," she says. "Because I don't mind keeping a relationship on the down-low for, like, a date or two to see if we're completely incompatible or not but I wouldn't want to be anyone's secret like that."
Snatching the notebook from Lily's hands, Mary waves it. "So we'll have to go through this, see who you could tolerate for at least six months, if not a lifetime, and who can stand up to both Potter and Snape."
"There's not going to be many, I don't think," Lily says. "That's an ugly combination of personalities to deal with on my behalf."
They wiggle around on the bed until they're both flat on their stomachs, propped up by their elbows, with the lumos situated so they can clearly read what's in the notebook.
"It's not the greatest," Mary agrees. "But, you know, you've also got your friends. If there's someone here that I approve, the others will too. We've never liked Snape-"
"I know," Lily says dryly.
"-and Potter might be obsessed with you but, well, you've never liked him," Mary says. "So finding someone to date who you actually like, who we also like, is going to be great."
Lily considers that. "Should we get the other girls in on it?"
Mary stares at the notebook. "I think we should narrow it down first," she says. "Otherwise we could spend a decade arguing about the boys and never getting anywhere for sure. We don't all want the same thing in a guy."
"Is there a guy you want, Mary?" Lily asks.
"We can worry about me after we settle you."
"Don't give me that," Lily says. "Aren't you and Derek a sometimes thing?"
Mary wrinkles her nose. "He's going to stay an off-thing, I think. For good this time."
Lily hums her agreement, raising her eyebrows skeptically as she does so.
"I mean it," Mary insists. "Anyway, there's plenty of time for us to figure out what to do about me once I'm less 'oh, gross, boys' and more a vengeful 'oh, ignore me for Miss Madelaine Burbage while on a date with me, will you?'"
"He didn't," Lily says, aghast.
"Oh yes he did," Mary says darkly. "But I don't want to talk about it now. When I hit vengeful goddess mode, I will let you know."
"You'd better, Miss Macdonald," Lily says. "And now that, if and when you need my help, it'll come so cheaply it'll be a steal."
"If I help you get a Slytherin boy to keep, I expect your help to come for free," Mary informs her. "Now, where were we…"
It winds up taking them all summer, two notebooks, and basically starting from scratch once they rope the rest of the girls into the matter and let them know what's what, but eventually, eventually, they settle on someone who Lily thinks she could date for six months but also potentially fall in love with, for real—
"Because to do otherwise is just, like, not done," Bettina says sagely. "It'd be a false pretense, especially under a contract."
-and manage to draft up a contract that passes muster—
"It can't look too polished," Marlene says. "You're Muggleborn. You show up with a perfectly drafted contract and they're all going to be so suspicious of who is controlling you—"
"Controlling me?!" Lily objects.
"—you know, backing you, who is sponsoring you, that sort of thing. You do not want that. You want them to pay attention to you, not looking for strings that don't exist."
-and then, as if summer slipped by in a dream, it's the first of September and she's got a plan to put into action.