| -=Lily's Seventh Year; Chapter Five=- |
 |
 |
| Before anyone knew anything at all, it was Christmastime, and most of the students had left Hogwarts. The Marauders were staying, as was Lily, however, practically all the rest of the student population was going home. Severus was leaving, Lucius was going on a vacation with his parents to Denmark, Eva and Vanessa were going to the wedding of their cousin’s in Australia, Amanda was simply going home, Lora was going with the Doylens’, naturally… It was only on the morning of the first day of the Christmas holidays, when Lily entered the common room, that she found out that Elspeth and Serena had stayed behind, too. It was a beautiful morning; Lily had woken to see patches of blue and gold shining through swirling bits of white outside the large window in the dormitory. She swung her feet into a pair of dark slippers and threw on a midnight-blue dressing gown she had been able to wear in her first year; however, it took hardly any time to lengthen it. It was a little tight around the waist, but Lily didn’t mind especially. She slipped her hand underneath A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen and practically flew down the marble stairs. Serena met her eyes when she appeared at the bottom of the stairwell, her hand resting on the banister. She was the only one that had seen or heard Lily; with a distinct, superior toss of her head, she turned back to the chess game between Elspeth and James that she was watching. Somehow, Lily felt inferior to her in some way—it was something she couldn’t quite place her finger on. A bit pink, she turned to an armchair near the fire and drew her book close to her, pulling her plait over her shoulder to hide her face. It wasn’t any use, though. Sirius spotted her and came over to her seat. “’Lo, Lily! Merry Christmas!” She had to laugh. “It isn’t Christmas yet!” “No, but it’s the holidays. Come on over—sit with us.” “No thanks,” Lily declined, “I’d rather not. I’d better go down to breakfast, anyway—“ “I’ll go with you. Come on, let’s go.” He picked her up and set her on her feet, heading for the portrait hole. “Sirius—I’m not dressed,” she hissed, gesturing at the dressing gown covering the white nightgown and the flimsy, though warm, slippers. He grinned at her. “You’ll be all right. You look nice. Come on, I’m in pajamas, too. You’ll live.” She gave in with a smile. “Sure. I suppose so, then.” “Good.” They climbed out of the portrait hole into the slightly colder passageway; Lily noticed with a grin that the Fat Lady had drawn a large, elaborate shawl around her shoulders. Breakfast went quietly; only two owls flew inside at the usual time the mail was delivered; one with Lily’s Daily Prophet, and one with a letter for a Ravenclaw boy that had stayed behind. There was nothing new inside it today, which was a relief, but she caught Sirius eyeing her warily as he saw her checking the paper with an almost frenzied interest. He didn’t mention anything, which was reassuring, but she did her best to keep the conversation on the reason that Sirius liked motorcycles so much. It kept him busy for a good while, and when that was exhausted, the plates were clearing, and they were leaving for the common room. There was quite a bit of homework for the students to do; the teachers were cutting one of the seventh years’ optional classes and sticking in one that taught them how to Apparate. It only lasted for half a term, and it was required to get an Apparition licence. They could take their test anytime afterwards, but the class itself involved lots of studying, as they were warned by the teachers. Still, it wasn’t an optional class, so they couldn’t exactly have exempted it. One of their assignments before the class started was to write an essay on the inventors of the Apparition and Disapparition methods and the way they went about their experiments. Lily was looking up Ferdinand Frogdard in an encyclopedia that afternoon when she received an invitation from the other side of the common room. “Hey, Lily! Up for a game of chess?” It was Sirius that had called to her, and she shut her book as she stood up. “You’re sure I won’t be in the way?” “Nah,” he called back to her, “what put that into your head? Come on—here, play James. He’s been bragging about how good he is. Get over here and prove him wrong, why don’t you?” She smiled as she sat down at one end of the chessboard, wondering vaguely why James’ cheeks were a bit pink… “What color you want, Lily?” Sirius was setting up the board. “Oh—black, of course!” Sirius grinned at her. “What else? Go ahead, James, wake up, it’s your move.” James started. “What’s my color?” Sirius rolled his eyes. “White.” Lily beat James, hands down; he was acting too distracted to really be able to pay attention to anything. She had tried to find out exactly what was bothering him, but he only mumbled something about what he wasn’t sure about after Hogwarts, and it took her a good while just to decipher that. She gave up after she checkmated him in four moves, something he had never let happen before, since he knew those four moves. In fact, he usually used them when he was playing against Peter, who never really learned that he shouldn’t copy James’ every move; that would lead to his downfall. Still, Lily was glad that he wasn’t paying attention; she would have lost otherwise. On her part, she was a bit disconcerted by the fact that he kept staring at her and then looking down at the board when she met his gaze, and then pushed in between the small bit of information that Serena kept her hand on his shoulder through the entire game… She was confused. She stayed confused. She was not enlightened. Christmas morning dawned beautifully. The snow was packed loosely, in flowing drifts, and the sky was free of clouds; a pale zircon blue streaked with shafts of pink and watered gold, it spread itself over the castle like a freshly-washed sheet flung over a mattress. Lily was the first in her dormitory to wake up, and she threw on her dressing gown instantly, ignoring the pile of presents at her feet and flitting over to the window, which she threw open, breathing in the soft blasts of cool air that flowed around her face and tousled her hair. Lily watched the sun rise over the Forbidden Forest , and she stayed at the window, sitting on the sill, until it threw goldenrod beams in her eyes and one of the girls stirred in her bed behind Lily, who sighed softly and closed the window, then turning back to her bed and the pile of presents. A mischievous grin spread over her face as she looked at them and at her watch, which currently read six o’clock. Before she could conjure up a bucket of ice, however, the four Marauders stormed into the dormitory, each carrying large caretaker’s pails filled with bits of broken ice from the lake and snowballs, which they started throwing at Serena, Lily, and Elspeth. Serena and Elspeth shrieked and tried to bury their heads underneath their pillows after getting hit in the face (courtesy of Sirius), but Lily started scraping snow from the windowsill and throwing it back at them. They only stopped when they ran out of frozen material, and even then Lily had to be forcefully stopped by Sirius from conjuring up a large, cold waterfall over Serena and James’ heads. He didn’t accept the excuse “What’s Christmas without practical jokes?” The boys had left their presents outside the door, and after drying off the dormitory with a quick spell, they tore into theirs, all piling on to either Elspeth’s or Lily’s bed, since those two were next to each other. The first one that lay at the foot of Lily’s four-poster was from Eva, who had sent her a selection of differently colored socks she said she had bought in the Muggle department store section entitled For the Woman who has Everything. Of course, Lily didn’t have everything, but it was nice to get something other than Zonko’s joke supplies or the everlasting Chocolate Frogs that Peter had sent her. Lora gave her a book that told her about how to find out if her jewelry really contained true emeralds and rubies or if the stones were just paste, which was an interesting read. Hey, Lily thought, if all else fails, I can give an expert opinion on the authenticity of precious stones for a living. Remus had given her a set of Donald Duck cartoon books, each about five hundred pages thick, and all in German. Actually, he hadn’t given her the whole set, since there were about a hundred of the books, but he did give her ten of them. Lily laughed out loud when she opened it, and Remus flashed her a most werewolf-like grin when he saw that she had opened his present. Sirius had given her a pair of slippers, since he had noticed that hers were growing too small. They were very nice; black brocade with the face of a cat embroidered in silver near the toes, they made absolutely no sound when she moved. He got a rather sheepish look on his face when she thanked him, which didn’t suit him at all, but she suspected she didn’t look any different when he unearthed a model of Professor Trelawney in one of his presents, with a card attached that read: Whenever you want to laugh, just look at her for a long time. You will find her glasses to become horribly funny. She picked up a package wrapped in gold paper; scanning the card, she flipped it over. To Lily Evans, care of Mr. Evans, until it can be sent to her. From Richard Walden. Lily frowned. She actually felt rather guilty about not having remembered him since she returned to Hogwarts; curious, she slit the gold paper open. Before she could open it, however, Serena snatched it out of her hands. “Oh, looky here! Who’s this from?” ”No one,” Lily mumbled, “and give it back to me.” “Hey now,” Serena taunted, “do we know a Richard Walden? James, looky here—someone’s got a secret correspondent!” Lily crossed her arms. “Hand it over. He is not a secret correspondent. I met him at one of my father’s business parties. Give it to me.” ”No, no, now!” Serena was waving it around in the air, just out of her reach, and Lily wasn’t going to stoop to stretching for it. “Let’s just see what this contains, shall we?” Taking Lily’s glare for an assent, she pulled the gold paper off of it. Lily was sitting on her hands, mumbling something Remus could decipher as meaning: “Hitting people is bad. Do not hit people. People don’t like being hit. Hitting people hurts your hands. Hitting people is bad. Do not hit people. People don’t like being hit…” “Aww, now, wasn’t that sweet?” Serena, still laughing playfully, had uncovered a small dark blue box. Everyone seemed to think this was one gigantic joke, and only Remus was frowning a bit. On opening it, Serena and Elspeth simply looked at each other, then started to laugh. They hadn’t shown anyone else what was in the box, and they obviously hadn’t an idea that Christmas presents that weren’t addressed to them, well, didn’t belong to them. "Excuse me,” Lily interrupted frostily. Serena stopped her giggling, and the group swerved around to see the standing redhead, one eyebrow arched and her mouth set. “I believe that isn’t yours.” Serena frowned. “What; we were just having fun!” Lily tapped her finger impatiently against her arm. “If you don’t hand that over immediately, I will have some fun, and it will involve my wand and lots of Latin words.” “Oh, okay, okay!” Serena threw it over to Lily, whispering to James, “Can’t she just take a joke?” Lily whipped her hand out and snatched the box, coolly opening it and sitting down next to the window. Her face didn’t portray her surprise at all, so the boys, who, naturally, were extremely curious, couldn’t deduce anything from her features. “Oh, come on, Lily!” James grumbled. “We let you see our presents!” She didn’t answer, simply slipped a small, golden ring onto her hand. Suddenly, as if someone had pushed a button, the boys started climbing practically all over each other to see the ring; it took much of overturning boxes and upsetting trunks and tables before they managed to get to her, though; they were in such a hurry. It wasn’t anything special; a gold band with a small diamond set in the center of it, and there had been no note attached to the box, but everyone in the room jumped to a hurried conclusion. “Lily!” You’re getting married!” “Don’t be stupid, you prat, she wouldn’t get married at sixteen! That’s an engagement ring, isn’t it?” “Is that guy a Muggle?” “Yeah, is he, Lily?” “Come on—she wouldn’t marry a Muggle, would she?” “I wouldn’t put it past her! Lily, why’re you doing this? Are you giving up your wand and everything?” “Lily, come on, even Peter here should be better than this Richard pillock! There’s still time to change your mind!” “You’ve got a Muggle boyfriend?” “You’ve got a boyfriend?” That last was from Serena, and it earned her several dirty looks, but Lily ignored all of this, though she was rather amused by the next few comments. “Why didn’t you tell us, Lily, we’re your friends, for Pete’s sake!” “No, we’re not!” “Peter, that was in third year and stuff. This is seventh.” ”Oh. But—“ “Peter, shut up!” “Lily, can’t you marry one of us instead of some Muggle idiot! Hey—we’d at least allow you to use magic, for Pete’s sake!” “Sirius, who’d you have in mind for her to marry?” “I dunno,” Sirius shrugged, “anyone! Lily, pleeeease!” “You’re only sixteen!” “But she’ll be seventeen when she sees him again—wait! ARE YOU DROPPING OUT, YOUNG LADY?” “Oh, you genius! She wouldn’t do that, she’d just take her exams early. Hey, could you tell us what’s on them when you finish?” “Yeah, Lily, wouldja? Then we wouldn’t have to study!” “Lily, please!” ”What are we pleasing for this time?” “We want the questions on the test, honestly, Peter, haven’t you been listening! Lily, please!!” This came from all four of them at once. “PLEASE?!” Lily couldn’t help it; she started to laugh. “I see you’ve got my whole future planned out for me?” ”Well—er—“ The boys, who had been tugging at the hem of her nightgown and her feet, looked suddenly embarrassed. “We just deduced…” “Never start a detective firm.” She smirked. “This isn’t an engagement ring, for one thing, I’m not marrying anytime soon, I’m not taking my exams early, I have no intention of leaving school and giving up my wand, and you’re meddling with my business!” she snapped. Every face, well, every face except two looked embarrassed and relieved at her words, and they quickly started getting wrapping paper off of the floor, when suddenly Peter looked around. “Where’s James?” “Nowhere,” a smooth voice came in from the doorway. “I’m right here.” Peter frowned. “But—-you were—-gone…” He wrinkled his brow. “Was,” James corrected. “I only left for a while. Hey, Serena—-“ he added, moving to the disapproving blonde, “come on—let’s get some breakfast; you look hungry—-well, and I know I am—“ They left the room amidst several stares; mostly incomprehending stares. “Er,” Sirius cleared his throat, “well, that was odd.” Instead of the ice being broken, all heads swiveled towards him, and he flung out his hands. “What? I’m no standup comic; don’t ask me to get you guys talking!” “I beg to differ,” Lily said dryly, and the room erupted with laughter. They joined the couple at breakfast a few minutes later; since it was the holidays and only they and a few others were staying behind, they didn’t bother to change out of their pajamas and nightgowns, as usual. The Great Hall looked magnificent; twelve giant Christmas trees were set up at carefully measured intervals around the room, glittering, real snowflakes were falling from the ceiling, snowflakes that disappeared moments before they landed on anything, students included; the House banners were new ones, with the background silver and the animal for each House in its regular color; the Slytherin banner looked especially beautiful, with the dark green snake against the silver background. Lily personally didn’t quite see the point of this, as there were hardly any students there to appreciate it, but she didn’t mind in the least. It was one of the most amusing things in the world to see Sirius and James try to make snowballs and failing to catch the snow that disappeared before they could get to it. It was a game of ‘How to Keep an Idiot Busy,’ and it was quite entertaining. After breakfast, most of the students left the Great Hall for the common room, planning a snowball fight for later on in the day, when the sun was shining the brightest. Lily declined the invitation to a chess tournament, so, after getting dressed and flinging her black cloak around her shoulders, she left the castle for the grounds, carrying several sheets of paper and a pencil. It was a practically perfect winter morning; the sun glittered gently on the soft snow covering the ground and the trees; there were absolutely no footprints on the snow, as it had been snowing that night, the Forbidden Forest duskily groomed itself before her in a friendly manner, and the lake was filled with icy briars etched into the lake, almost as if fairies had been gliding on it, and the touch of their feet had cracked the ice that covered the water. Lily took in the winter air with a sigh, a heartfelt longing for the day and the time never to change. She felt at home, here, with the cold wind rustling through her lungs and filling her mouth, and with the small, soft snowflakes landing on her hair and eyelashes, staying there, not melting, and for a moment the world around her was perfect in her eyes. Smiling dreamily, she let herself sink into the snow with her back against a tree, facing the lake, the snow-and-ice covered castle. Pulling out her pencil, she let it glide over the page, entranced; she stared into the spires of the castle’s towers. | Lily was pulled out of her dream what seemed like five seconds later; actually, it was almost two hours after she had left the castle. The six other Gryffindors had launched themselves onto the new-fallen snow, packing it together in their mittened paws, and throwing it while almost falling down laughing. Lily smiled, and, as a precaution, folded her drawings and tucked them away inside her robes, replacing the space in her hand with her wand. Clumping her own bit of snow into a ball, she muttered something under her breath, and for the next five minutes, she and everyone else was laughing madly at Peter trying to figure out why there was a stubborn mass of snow that he wasn’t able to break and that kept launching itself at his head. Finally, everyone sank to their knees or onto their backs on the ground; they were all exhausted. Lily rolled over so that her chin rested on her folded hands. James was lying merely feet from her. “Having fun?” ”You bet,” he laughed. “Don’t I always?” “Well,” she grinned, “if you enjoy dancing madly in your seat because you can’t reach snowflakes, I’d say you do.” ”Hey!” he protested. “That was entertainment, provided and planned beforehand by me!” “Entertainment, yes. Provided, yes. Planned beforehand?” ”Okay, so it wasn’t,” he admitted. Grinning, she pulled her hair out of her face, and his eyes were suddenly latched onto something on her hand. “What’s that?” “What’s what?” She was confused. “Oh, you mean this?” The ring Richard had given her had caught the sunlight. “It’s from someone I met at one of my father’s business parties.” ”I see,” he nodded. “So—what’s going on between you two?” Lily raised an eyebrow. “Haven’t I already been through this?” ”You have?” he asked, for once honestly confused. “I have. I explained, as plainly as I could, that he wasn’t my fiancé, that I wasn’t leaving school early, and that I wasn’t going to take exams early in the case I did leave school early and definitely not give you and your friends the answers to the questions. I am under a distinct impression I did say that.” “Oh.” James frowned. “I see…I guess I didn’t hear that—I thought you were engaged, or something.” The next minute, Lily did something that startled him almost out of his snowdrift. She rolled over on her back, laughing loudly and almost maniacally, gasping between laughs, “You thought I was getting married? You thought I was—oh, good God!” He maintained a stiff façade. “I don’t see what’s so funny about it!” “The idea—the idea!—of me getting married—I can understand the others, besides, they weren’t really serious—but you know me better than they, and you actually expect me to marry someone and settle down? To follow behind him the rest of my life? You’ve got more than a few screws loose, my friend.” “Oh,” he said again. “I see. But—well, under what conditions would you get married?” His question had the effect of quieting Lily down immediately; rolling back over, she raised herself up on her elbows. “I don’t know, but I do know that I’m not getting married unless I know that I honestly love someone. I don’t think I will fall in love—in fact, I highly doubt it, since that happens hardly once a century—and I’ve got to like the person too, not just love him…Why’re you asking?” ”No reason,” he blushed. “It’s just that you don’t look the type of person ever to get married, that’s all.” “I see,” she said skeptically, arching an eyebrow. Lily let herself be persuaded to play everyone else in chess; so far, no one had beat her in it yet, not even James, who usually was one of the best players for corridors around. Remus had insisted for a few minutes that the chess set she used was enchanted, but he had to give up that theory when he lost half of his pieces in less than five minutes, using his own pieces, and while someone else held Lily’s wand. James and Peter had left the common room to get drinks, they said, and they were met with heartfelt applause when they returned with seven mugs and two steaming pitchers of hot chocolate, which conveniently didn’t run out, as that kind of charm was one of Sirius’ specialities. Lily didn’t wonder at that; the amount of food Sirius managed to put away during meals made her wonder if he really didn’t weigh over three hundred pounds or if his size was an optical illusion on everyone else’s part. No one had any idea where he put all of his food, and he could eat anything. He had eaten part of a rat once, when James had dared him to, and Sirius didn’t back down from dares. They spent the rest of the day curled up in the common room, comfortably chatting with each other and listening to the fire flicker. Lily was too good-natured that evening to get bothered about Serena’s presence, and Serena seemed to feel the same way; at least, they were friendly with each other. It was close to four o’clock when Sirius let himself fall down onto the couch next to Lily and stretched his arms over the back of the sofa. “Hullo.” He yawned. Lily smiled. “Merry Christmas.” Sirius grinned back. “Likewise.” They said nothing for a few minutes; then Sirius flexed his knuckles lazily. “What’s that I heard you and James talking about?” ”Talking about when?” Lily asked. “Outside, this afternoon. Something about marriage.” “Oh…right—he asked me under what conditions I would.” “Would what?” ”Marry someone.” ”But you’re not, are you?” Sirius asked, suddenly extremely worried. “I mean—you’re barely sixteen and a half, you’re too independent for that—well, you’re not, are you?” Lily laughed. “You make it sound like a plague. No, and I don’t think I ever will. I don’t much like the idea of it.” ”Oh.” He sounded relieved, which confused Lily a bit. “Good.” “Good?” “Well—yeah,” he improvised. “Yeah.” Lily laughed. “I see.” James leaned over the back of the couch, between Sirius and Lily. “So, what’s going on over here?” ”I dunno,” Sirius shrugged, “but she had me royally confused there for a minute.” James leaned down to whisper in Lily’s ear, “Do I want to know?” ”No,” Lily wickedly grinned, “it’d be safer if you didn’t.” That evening’s feast was wonderful; wizard crackers were popping apart every few seconds, and white mice and dancing miniature poultry had the run of the tables, while many sets of Gobstones and Exploding Snap cards and wizard checkers and chess were piling up on the one table—everyone was seated at the teacher’s table, since there were only about ten or so students there. The snowflakes from that morning were still falling, but the boys had given up on trying to catch them, thankfully, since they would almost certainly have upset the masterpiece of a glittering, white pudding and cake that was the centerpiece. Lily smiled into her pillow as she fell asleep that night, wrapped loosely in her blanket—it had been a wonderful day—beautiful and peaceful, friendly and interesting, besides amusing. For the New Year, Remus and Peter had simply sneaked into Hogsmeade and returned with a few flasks of butterbeer while the other two kept the girls busy, with their attention away from the fact that the other two boys were missing, so it was a surprise for all the girls when Remus and Peter showed up, laden down with bottles of warm, brownish-butter-pecan coloured liquid, and they didn’t waste an instant in relieving them of their load. |