The rest of February and early March continued on without many mishaps.
The seventh years continued to do homework and study together in either common room. James and Sirius got help on their essays, but not because Lily outright gave it to them. They found that when she explained things to one of the other girls, they could easily listen along and take notes. Lily must’ve known, but she didn’t complain. (In truth, she enjoyed the feeling of teaching her peers just as much as she enjoyed seeing James and Sirius actually taking notes.)
Laila Albright stayed away from James, due both to the fact that he always sat right next to Lily, and that she was rather consumed with her own young man. From what the sevenths years had seen, he was the perfect guy for her; heartbreakingly handsome, slightly arrogant, and quite willing to be the center of Laila’s attention. Lily did notice that despite his arrogance, he made Laila smile and laugh, and spent as much time talking to her in a quiet corner of the common room as he did kissing her. Lily figured herself to be an expert on that type of relationship, which is why she was happy to sit it forming. She hoped (and honestly believed) that whatever hurt Lauryn had seen in Laila was being healed. (Lauryn was quite ecstatic with her new boyfriend; Lily hadn’t seen without a grin on her face yet.)
Classes got much more difficult for the seventh years, as teachers were beginning to emphasize the importance of their NEWT exams. (Sirius glared at every person who even mentioned “life beyond Hogwarts”.)
For all that the workload became a bit heavier, the days passed happily. That is, if you pass over the fact that each member of the Marauders and Co. received at least one detention. (Frank and Alice were alone in their lack of detentions. They gloated just a bit.)
Sirius and Nikeia were the first to receive detention. They were caught in Sirius’s favorite window seat in the far corner of the library. They claimed to have been studying for their Transfiguration test the nest day. The open books and sloppily written notes made that a valid argument.
The snogging invalidated it.
If they had been caught by old Mistress Spellman, the Runes teacher who liked to walk through the library in an attempt to find hidden messages in the old books by moonlight, rather than Professor McGonagall, they might have gotten away with only one night of detention. Mistress Spellman was going blind; she had actually passed over them completely, thinking they were two very affectionate ghosts prone to wishful thinking. Nikeia and Sirius had then figured she would be the only teacher walking through the library that night. They were wrong, of course.
McGonagall had actually only given them two detentions each. However, as soon as Sirius deemed it the right moment to open his mouth and comment on McGonagall’s dressing gown and ask what she was doing at night in the library, they received a total of four detentions.
Peter was the next to get a detention. He had apparently been out after curfew one night. When he got to the portrait hole into Gryffindor Tower, the Fat Lady wouldn’t let him in. She said that it was due to the fact that the Marauders had gotten by too many times; she was putting her painted slipper down. So, she refused to open. The two Hufflepuff prefects who had patrol duty that night found him outside the door, arguing with the Fat Lady.
One detention was his price. He later told James that if it had been James, Sirius or Remus, the Fat Lady would’ve swung open”and winked at them”right after they said the password. James didn’t deny it, though he did look down at his pumpkin juice sheepishly.
Remus had the honor of being the fourth to receive detention. He had been found by Slughorn (who had apparently needed a book for his own research) in the back of library one night. It was the night after the full moon, so Remus had a reason to be tired. Unfortunately, that reason was not one that he could tell the Potions master. Remus had gone to catch up on some studying and had fallen asleep on top of the history book. He claimed that he couldn’t help it; he was already tired and the boring text didn’t help him wake up. The others”even Lily”couldn’t blame him.
Due to a rash of misbehavior from the rest of the students, Remus didn’t serve his detention for almost two weeks. When it was finally scheduled, James and Sirius teased him rather mercilessly, for it had been set for his birthday. It took Lily hexing James’s and Sirius’s mouths shut for them to stop bothering Remus. Not that they had a choice. When Remus came back from his detention (helping Slughorn organize and restock the potions store), he was blindfolded and dragged through the hallway to the Head’s common room, where a nice little party was set up.
Josey and Antoine served two nights of detentions with Professor Spacey, the Divination teacher. She had been making her monthly raids of the kitchen’s beverage stores when she came across the couple in a broom closet. She had been disappointed in them and promptly assigned them detentions dusting the vast collection of teacups that had amasses over the years and many teachers, even though she had admitted to her own youthful acts of romance with her old beau. Josey and Antoine couldn’t help giggling when they told of Spacey’s wistful sigh to the others.
James and Lily received their own detentions, of course. Lily pouted (adorably, in James’s opinion) that her record had been ruined by him. And yet, she had not once said “I wish I never met you!” If she started to, James’s lips probably would have stopped her before “wish”.
Their first detention was received when they argued too loudly… in front of McGonagall’s rooms. They had been arguing so passionately over a wand movement that they hadn’t noticed where their feet had taken them.
“James, I’m telling you. It requires three vertical movements of the wand!”
James sighed exasperatedly. “Lily. It’s five. You speak the words as you move the wand: Each syllable represents a time when you stop the wand and reverse it.”
“Which explains why there are three syllables in the incantation; not five!” Lily retorted.
(This was merely a snippet of their argument. It had started with some other comment that had long been forgotten. They had been arguing over it for the better part of half an hour. A previous quarter hour had been spent arguing about the odds of that Laila girl’s heritage.)
James opened his mouth to say something, but he froze suddenly, counting syllables. Lily smiled triumphantly.
James flapped his hands, and asserted forcefully: “Lily… There are five wand movements. I know it!”
Lily groaned and the sound was nearly drowned out by the sound of a large stone door opening. A gap opened in the stone to James’s right and suddenly, there stood McGonagall, her tartan dressing gown wrapped securely around her. Her hair was down on her shoulders and she looked angry, but that might’ve been an understatement.
“What is the meaning of this?!” she whispered harshly.
“Sorry, Professor,” muttered Lily sheepishly. “James and I started arguing and we lost track of where we were.”
“And how loud you were,” reproved McGonagall. “I suggest that you get back to your dormitory. It’s past the time you’re supposed to be out of the hallways. Detention for both of you. Tomorrow, right after dinner. My office.”
The two seventh years sighed and turned around.
“Potter, Evans,” McGonagall called after them. “The incantation requires a precise number of vertical wand movements. That number is…”
“Three?”
“Five?”
“Three-” (Lily smiled cockily at James) “-and one half.” With that, and what they were sure was a smirk, the professor retreated back into her apartments.
Lily was standing with her mouth open, staring at McGonagall’s door. James chuckled.
“Oh, shut up!” Lily said, rather loudly. “I was closer to the correct answer then you were, so you have nothing to laugh about!”
“POTTER! EVANS!” shouted McGonagall from inside. The two Heads jumped and ran down the hall.
Laughing.
Not one day after that, James received another detention. His cauldron exploded in Potions, splattering the people around him with the bright green concoction.
At once, all those hit started laughing hysterically. Slughorn got them settled with a quick antidote, then turned to James. “Potter… get your head together. These potions of yours have been rather lax lately. I don’t like it. I would accept”and expect it”from Mr. Black, but not from you!” Nikeia snorted in laughter. Sirius’ mouth dropped open, and he glanced quickly back and forth between Nikeia, James and Slughorn. The latter didn’t notice.
However, James and the rest of the class were surprised at how serious Slughorn sounded. James nodded meekly, even though he blamed Lily for the outcome of this potion. She had finished her potion early (of course) and sat next to him, playing with the hair at the nape of his neck. It was greatly distracting. He figured she must’ve known it (and proved it with that little Smirk of hers), but she didn’t let on.
It was a few days later, when Lily was writing a Defense paper that she noticed the four Marauders were sitting with their heads together. Lily raised an eyebrow in suspicion. Nikeia noticed the look, and followed Lily’s gaze.
“Uh oh… that doesn’t look good,” she stated simply. Both young women sighed and returned to their Potions essays.
Nikeia was right. It wasn’t. That would be proven the next day during a passing period.
Lily was walking next to James, like always, with her hand in his. The majority of their group were all on their way to Defense Against the Dark Arts; all but Josey, who was rather miserable at Defense, and Peter, who was fair, but not good enough to make NEWTs level. At one point, Lily noticed a group of Slytherins turn the corner. She glanced up at James and noticed, with dismay, a smirk on his face.
“James… what are you planning?” she asked angrily. He smiled down at her, and his hand moved toward his hip… where his wand was.
“Good day, Slytherins!” called out Sirius jovially. The Slytherins looked at him and sneered. Lily noticed Sirius’s younger brother, Regulus, in the group. “Where are you lot off to?”
“Why should you care, Black?” sneered the leader, Rovin.
“I’m just trying to be nice. Are you always so suspicious of me?” asked Sirius, a hand on his chest as if hurt. Lily heard Nikeia snort softly at the gesture.
“Suspicious? Of you? Now, dear Black, why should we ever be suspicious of you?” asked Rovin sarcastically. Sirius smirked arrogantly.
It all happened so suddenly: James and Sirius whipped out their wands and pointed them at the ceiling. Everyone who had stopped in the hallway to watch the events looked up. Hanging from the ceiling, and starting to tip over, was a large object. From below, in looked like a canoe. To the Slytherins… it was a trouble. A boat load of trouble.
Inside was a whole lot of a bright, neon pink goop that fell mostly onto the Slytherins.
Through Lily’s shock-widened eyes, she saw Remus lift his wand and gesture toward the ceiling. Feathers started floating down and covering the Slytherins. Screams and shouting filled the hall. And laughter; always laughter around the Marauders.
“POTTER! BLACK!” shouted Lily angrily. She pulled out her own wand to help clean off the Slytherins, but then a new voice entered the scene. McGonagall’s.
“EVANS! I’m completely shocked!”
“What?!” asked Lily surprised. She looked back at the Marauders and she found out what was wrong. They had their wands… in their pockets. And Lily had hers out and pointing at the Slytherins.
Oh, this doesn’t look suspicious at all, Lily thought, inwardly rolling her eyes and sighing at the Marauders.
“Detention, Evans!” called McGonagall before cleaning the Slytherins off with her wand.
Lily was angry”though not surprised”that no one came to her defense. In fact, as soon as McGonagall turned around, everyone who wasn’t involved ran toward their classrooms. The Marauders were biting back their laughter. Lily was incensed that McGonagall had called her out.
“I’ll see you tonight, Miss Evans,” the professor shouted over her shoulder. “Get to your classrooms. Now!”
The Marauders didn’t need telling twice. They quickly turned and ran. Frank glanced at the girls, and then took off after the other boys.
“POTTER!” cried Lily after her boyfriend. He merely laughed and waved a hand over his head.
“Let it go, Lily. They’ll get their comeuppance eventually,” said Nikeia, putting a hand on Lily’s shoulder.
“They’re just so… so… AGH!”
Alice laughed. “We know what you mean. McGonagall will get back at them during Transfiguration.”
Lily sighed, knowing that McGonagall would. The wise professor was smart enough to know who really pulled the prank.
“But we really should hurry,” said Nikeia, pulling at Lily’s hand.
The bell rang as they were running. Lucky for them, their Defense teacher was not present when they ran into the classroom; he showed up three seconds later.
Lily quickly took her seat next to James, pretending not to be angry at him. James smiled at her hesitantly, to which she beamed back. James didn’t find anything suspicious.
It was half way through the class when James cried out loudly and suddenly.
The Defense teacher, Professor Gog, turned slowly around and glared at James. With a raised eyebrow he asked, “What was that, Mr. Potter?”
“Um, nothing sir. I… uh… kicked the table accidentally,” James said, reaching down to rub his leg. Professor Gog raised his eyebrow further and then said gravely, “Five points from Gryffindor. Don’t let it happen again.”
When his back was turned, James turned fiercely toward Lily and glared at her. She smiled cheekily, her nose wrinkling. Nikeia snickered behind the two.
“You did that on purpose,” accused James.
Lily rolled her eyes. “Of course I did, you idiot!”
Remus snorted back his laugh as James’ eyes widened.
Again, Nikeia was quite right about the Marauders; McGonagall took twenty points from Gryffindor before class even started. She said the Marauders looked sloppy.
Lily, Alice and Nikeia stifled their giggles behind their hands. Their boys, in fact, looked quite neat and put together, though James’s shirt was a bit untucked and peaking out from under his vest, and Sirius’s tie was undone.
McGonagall looked at the three girls, who immediately straightened and dropped their hands. Instead of reprimanding them, her lips twitched.
By the end of the class, each of them had a Detention; there was a stub of a tail on James’s footstool (James blamed Lily for just being close to him”he couldn’t concentrate) and Sirius’s rocking chair had a distinctly furry feeling to it. She took five points off in Peter’s name, citing that she knew he’d be sleeping through his Muggle Studies class
Remus was given a detention: “Just because”, McGonagall said. She couldn’t give detention to three and not four. Remus sighed, but nodded good naturedly. It had happened before. Anyway, he felt he deserved it because he had actually been a part of the prank.
As they were packing up to leave, the three Marauders would swear they heard McGonagall mutter, “Pink slime and feathers. How lovely.”
It would be lovely to say that the rest of the detentions were pleasant, simple and served without pain. That, however, would denote that they did not receive that which they deserved.
Sirius and Nikeia spent their detentions helping Madam Pince in the library; organizing books, making sure they were free of students’ marks, scraping various unidentified substances from the bottoms of the desks and chairs, and polishing the ancient windows, lantern shades and glass doors of the very restricted books.
Peter only had to help the caretaker Filch polish some of the older frames of the pictures hanging around the school, but doing anything in the presence of Filch made it ten times worse. He was quite ragged when he stumbled into the common room afterwards. Professor Gog made James work on other frames with Filch, due to the fact that he was too lazy to want to bother with detentions. James admitted to Lily when he returned to their common room that he wanted to kick three things at that moment: Filch, Gog, and Mrs. Norris, Filch’s mangy cat, and in no particular order.
Remus nursed several burns and sores from the potion ingredients, which Alice tended to with a few well-chosen plants.
Josey and Antoine returned from their detentions with severe cases of the sniffles and sneezes due to the dust, mold, and other unidentified magical dusts, and Lily made them suffer for a few minutes while she pretended to look up the incantation. James noticed and he teased her later for her very Marauderette action. She kissed him in response.
The detention that Remus, James and Sirius served jointly under McGonagall was tedious and tiring, and involved them separating garden worms and bone needles after an extensive study of the method in her second year class. The tendency of the needles to stab the worms made the job rather slimy. There were also a lot of worms. Remus was given the easier task of washing the needles and sticking them in the pincushions since he hadn’t actually deserved a detention, only having dropped the feathers.
Lily’s detention with Professor McGonagall proved to be quite unexpected, and oddly delightful.
When Lily entered McGonagall’s room, she saw the professor sitting at her desk with a mound of parchment in front of her. She gestured to the seat before her, and Lily took it.
“I do hope you understand that I had to give you this detention. Your situation was gravely suspicious; standing in the middle of hallway with your wand drawn. You should know better than that.” McGonagall gave her a not unkind look, and pushed a tartan-patterned tin forward.
Lily took a biscuit, surprised at the gesture. “I understand, Professor. If you hadn’t, others would use it as an excuse to get away with other stuff.”
“I’m glad. I always knew you were a smart one,” stated McGonagall with a chuckle.
“Thank you.”
“I hear that Potter caused a disruption in Defense Against the Dark Arts today? Is this true?”
Lily giggled, remembering James’s pained look.
“It is true then. What happened?”
“He kicked the desk, and shouted out.”
McGonagall pinned her with a look. “And was that action provoked?”
Lily’s smile spread across her face before she could stifle it. “I pinched him. I had to get back at him somehow. I wasn’t expecting Gog, the sour catfish-” Lily stopped suddenly and glanced at McGonagall. She knew it was unwise to insult any teacher in the Transfiguration professor’s presence.
“I believe a more appropriate name would be ‘sour, arrogant catfish,’ Lily. Continue, please.”
Lily stared at McGonagall in shock.
“He is not my favorite colleague. I feel no remorse in calling him something that is true. And if anyone asks, you were the one who said it.”
“Oh… well, I wasn’t expecting him to actually dock points, but it was a bonus, I suppose.”
McGonagall smiled slightly.
“By the way, Professor,” started Lily. “Thank you. I, um, appreciate your giving the Marauders detentions.”
“I couldn’t let them go. I know who caused the prank. And I like punishing those who do something wrong.”
“I think everyone in the hall knew who had pulled the prank,” stated Lily with a sigh.
McGonagall nodded. “Indeed. Though, the Marauders are pranksters, and you can always trust pranksters to pull pranks. But, we do have to watch out for the good students, because we can never know if or when they might pull a prank.”
Lily chuckled. “That’s very true, Professor.”
“Although, I do not distrust you, Lily.”
Lily smiled as McGonagall looked down at her desk and sighed. “I must grade these papers. You are free to read any book that you’d like off that shelf.”
“But, Professor, this is a detention.”
“Miss Evans. I would have hoped that you would have realized that you are not being punished. At least, if you can call sitting with an old lady reading old books in an old, uncomfortable chair not being punished.”
“Oh, Professor. You’re not old, and I’m sure there’ll be some good book for me to read, and a quick transfiguring will make this chair comfortable.” Lily smiled, and was pleased when McGonagall smiled back again.
Lily make a quick order of transfiguring the chair into a stuffed chair of dark brown velvet, and then started to go through the books. Coming across a brown, well-worn leather-bound book with gold writing on the binding, Lily gasped.
It was a Muggle book that Lily had fallen in love with a few years back when she had raided her mother’s bookshelf for something to read during the summer. When she asked the Professor how it came to be on her shelf, McGonagall responded with the very logical statement that Muggles produced better works of romantic fiction than wizards.
Lily took her seat again and opened the book. She figured there was no harm in taking the “detention” to read a good book, especially this one that was so romantic, clever, and funny. Lily quite easily put herself and James in the roles of the two main characters.
“Miss Evans,” sighed McGonagall, breaking Lily’s happy thoughts. “While I know that the book is very good and delightfully romantic, I must ask you to control your sighing. That must’ve been the tenth one in the past hour. Please. Constrain yourself.”
Lily blushed. Had she really spent an hour daydreaming? She looked down at the book and saw that she hadn’t read very much. “I was just, um…” she began. “Just putting yourself in the heroine’s shoes? With a hazel-eyed and black haired man beside her?”
Lily’s blush became even redder. McGonagall nodded, then folded her arms atop her papers, and sighed.
“I remember reading that book, doing the same thing.”
Lily was surprised at the topic of conversation that seemed to be so unlike the elderly professor.
“Really?”
“Oh, yes. My hero was the strong, silent type. Always the strong, silent type.”
Lily knew it could get her in trouble, but she couldn’t resist. “Meaning he was a more physical man?”
“Yes, indeed.” McGonagall froze, having spoken without much thought. “Why, Miss Evans!” she cried, straightening.
Lily bit her lip and looked down at the tin of biscuits. When she heard McGonagall chuckle once, she looked up. McGonagall’s expression was amused, but trying not to be.
“Did he ever come true for you, Professor?” asked Lily tentatively, figuring that if one impertinent question was accepted, perhaps a second would be also.
When McGonagall remained silent, just playing with her quill, Lily had a feeling that she had just overstepped her boundary. When she was opening her mouth to apologize, McGonagall spoke.
“Yes. I did. Once. He was quite… quite wonderful.” She sighed, and suddenly became more herself. “And then he fell perfectly into the mold of all men and… proved that he couldn’t be trusted with a heart.”
“Oh, Professor,” Lily whispered, a bit of her heart breaking for her obviously once heart-broken professor.
McGonagall flapped a hand. “But I’ve learned; I’ve moved on. He’s just a memory. In fact, I saw the announcement in the Prophet of his marriage. He’s quite happy now.”
“All men can’t be like that,” murmured Lily, playing with some loose binding on the leather book.
“And there are many exceptions, Potter being one of them,” said McGonagall, kindly.
“I still think of how much I wanted to strangle him in previous years and how much I love to be held by him, and I’m amazed.”
McGonagall nodded. “I’m amazed at how much I’ve wanted to strangle him also.”
Lily laughed, rather surprised.
“Before I can spout any more bits of nonsense, I believe I should call it a night, Miss Evans.” The dismissal was not unkind.
“I don’t think its nonsense,” said Lily as she rose. McGonagall smiled kindly at her again, and nodded.
At the door of the professor’s office, Lily gasped and turned around. “Oh! Your book!”
“Keep it. It’s easily replaced.”
Lily thanked the professor again, holding the book to her chest.
She left the office, smiling at their conversation. If someone asked her who her favorite teacher was, at that moment, and perhaps the rest of her life, Lily would have said Professor Minerva McGonagall. Perhaps once she was out of Hogwarts, she could get to know the Professor a bit more. She never would have imagined that a woman like McGonagall would have had a lover, but then she admonished herself. Everyone has one at some point in their life.
She sighed, and then started walking a bit faster down the hallway. She reached through the collar of her blouse and touched James’s necklace. Some people just got lucky and found their 'someone special' early in life, she supposed. Lily was happy that she had found hers. She smiled, and started skipping, knowing that simple walking couldn't express her utter jubilation.
.