“Okay, everybody agree on the plan?” Nicole said looking around the room at the four people surrounding her. Everyone nodded their head except for Peter.
“What is it now, Peter,” Arielle asked annoyed.
“I don’t understand how we are going to get Lily to go out with James,” Peter whined.
“That’s the point, Peter,” Remus explained carefully, “We are not going to get them to go together. They will do that part by themselves.”
“But then how does this plan get Lily and James together?” he asked confused again.
“Because, Peter, a week from now we are going to Hogsmede. Once we are there, Arielle and I are going to go one way while Remus and Nicole will go the other way. You aren’t going so they can’t stay with you and will be forced to stay with each other!” Sirius said.
“Lily and James have a lot more friends than just us!” Peter said, apparently trying to find the flaw in every aspect of the plan.
“Yes, but if they really do like each other, they will want to be together. Get it?”
“What if they sit alone or something?” Peter asked.
“ENOUGH WITH THE QUESTIONS ALREADY!” Sirius yelled at him. Peter stared at him with large eyes and then nodded his head to agree. Sirius then calmly turned to the rest of the group and informed them that Peter agreed. Once that was said, the door appeared and the five left the room, ready with their plan waiting. But the five had never thought about the fact a week was too long…
~~~~~~~~~~~
“Arielle!” Lily yelled, “Hurry up in there!” Today was one of the days where Lily and James had to go patrolling around the corridors and she didn’t want to go looking like she did now: untamed hair, bags under her eyes, and no make-up on. Finishing all of her homework had left her tired and under groomed.
At long last, Arielle came out of the bathroom looking perfect. Sometimes Lily envied her friend. Her neat brown hair was streaked with lines of natural blonde highlights and her hazel eyes were always clear and friendly. Plus, she was the perfect height, unlike Lily who was always a little on the short side.
“What do you look so nice for?” Lily asked as she skipped into the bathroom to apply her make-up on.
“Nothing!” Arielle lied as she turned the same red as Lily’s hair. When Lily saw that Nicole wasn’t paying attention she said to Arielle, “Do you have a date with Sirius?”
“Not a date!” she whispered back, “Just two friends hanging out.”
“Right,” Lily said narrowing her eyes at her friend and giving her a look that said ‘I-know-what-you-are-up-to-but-I’ll-let-you-go-for-now’.
“And why, may I ask, do you need to look good tonight anyway?” Arielle asked suspiciously. “Don’t you have to go patrolling?”
Even though Lily didn’t want to admit it to anyone, even to herself, she had started to like being around James.
“Yeah, I thought you didn’t care how you looked around James!” Nicole teased as she saw that Lily had come out of the bathroom.
“I don’t!” she defended, “I just don’t want him making fun of me.” Nicole and Arielle shared a knowing look and walked away. Lily stood there confused as she combed her hair down.
‘That was odd, what was that look about. And since when do they care when I do and do not where make-up?’ Lily thought defensively to herself.
Suddenly, Julie came and said to Lily her newest pharse, “If you don’t trust your friends with your information, who can you trust?” Lily rolled her eyes and told that if there was any information to tell she wouldn’t tell Julie as she wasn’t a friend.
“Well, wish me luck,” Lily said about to leave the room.
“For… what?” Nicole asked just to annoy Lily since she knew what she was referring to.
Lily stared at her friend and replied with, “For patrolling with J”Potter.” Arielle smirked as she pretented to continue reading and saw Lily turning slightly pink.
“What?” she asked.
“Huh?” Arielle said looking up, “Oh, nothing. Good luck patrolling with J---Potter.” Lily glared at her laughing friends and left the room.
~~~~~~~~~~~
“Oy, Padfoot!” James said following Sirius around the room. Sirius turned and muttered a, “Wha--?”
“Never mind, Padfoot, I’ll ask Moony,” James said rolling his eyes at his friend. James had been trying to talk to Sirius the whole day and all he ever got were fragments of sentences that came out as intangible mutterings.
“Moony, what’s wrong with Padfoot?” James asked coming over to where Remus was help Peter with his homework.
“What do you mean?” he asked irritated. He was attempting to teach Peter how to do a proper transfiguration spell and he kept transfiguring Remus’s hand, instead of the quill in front of him, into a toaster.
“I wanted to know where I kept my shirt and he just muttered something about that Collins girl, Arielle. So I asked him where he though I left my head’s badge and he just murmured that I should shut up because he was getting ready to snog,” James said still mad that he couldn’t find his badge.
“Didn’t you know? He and Arielle are going out today,” he responded showing Peter once again how to the spell properly.
Seeing the look on James’s face he muttered Accio badge and saw him smile. He laughed and continued to help Peter who had now started to turn his own hand into a toaster.
“It’s not date!” Sirius yelled from the bathroom, “It’s just two friends hanging out.”
“Right,” James said narrowing his eyes at his friend and giving him a look that said ‘I-know-what-you-are-up-to-but-I’ll-let-you-go-for-now’.
~~~~~~~~~~~
“There you are Potter!” Lily cried.
“I know, I know, you can’t get enough of me, right,” he said cockily.
“Cute,” she said sarcastically.
“Yup, I sure am,” he replied smiling.
“Look, do you think you can go through an hour of being around me without being so arrogant?” Lily asked rolling her eyes as she started walking down the dimly lit hallways.
‘Lily wants me to stop being big-headed, stop hexing Snape, and stop messing up my hair. I can do this. It’s just one hour! ’ James thought while messing his hair up. He realized what he was doing and quickly pulled his hand out of his hair and hurried to catch up with Lily.
“So…” he said.
“So?” she responded looking at him with a blank look on her face.
James realized with a jolt that he couldn’t be like he was with other girls around Lily. She hated everything about him so he had to be someone completely different.
Suddenly, he remembered what Remus had said back in the common room while they were doing their homework.
~~~~~~~Flashback~~~~~~~
“You know that advice you gave me didn’t help, Moony,” James said to Remus as he finished his Potion’s essay.
Remus, who was still working on his essay, answered with, “What advice are you talking about?”
“I mean when you told me to be nice to Evans and start calling her Lily!” James said mad.
Remus sighed and looked up. He saw that James was struggling to keep his voice steady and calm so he decided to help him again.
“Okay, well just try being yourself.”
“But she doesn’t like me.”
“That’s because she doesn’t really know you,” Remus replied. He quickly jotted something down and then placed down his quill.
He smiled down proudly at his paper and started to pack up his bag.
“Wait!” James said, “What if she still doesn’t like me?”
“If she still doesn’t like you---,” Remus was suddenly cut off by Peter squeaking as he turned Remus’s paper into a toaster.
“Peter!” Remus yelled. He plopped down on the couch once more and decided to teach Peter the proper way to transfigure objects.
~~~~~~~Flashback~~~~~~~
“So, um, how are… things?” James asked trying not to irritate Lily but be himself at the same time.
“Good. Really, really great,” she replied. Even though Lily had grown older, she was still not good at starting conversations. The memory of her first day suddenly flashed in front her eyes and she shook her head trying to forget about the embarrassing incident.
“Classes going good?” he asked.
“Yeah, yeah; going good. Really, really great,” she said. James, without realizing it, started ruffling his hair again and started looking around awkwardly. Suddenly, Lily become conscious of the fact that James was nervous.
‘James is nervous!’ she thought about to start laughing when she realized she had called him James. ‘I meant Potter,’ she thought, glad that she hadn’t been speaking out loud. Desperate to stop the awkward silence, Lily said the first thing that came to her mind.
“Isn’t cute how Sirius and Arielle like each other but won’t admit it?” Lily said giggling.
“Yeah, you should have seen Padfoot today. I asked him anything and the answer would either begin or end with ‘Arielle’ or ‘Collins’,” James laughed.
“Yeah well, wait Padfoot?” Lily questioned.
James inwardly swore at himself and said, “Oh, it’s just an inside joke thing.” There was another awkward silence when neither of them could think of anything to say.
“Yup,” they said at the same time. They both laughed and Lily thought about he might actually have changed during the summer.
‘He certainly looks a lot hotter.’
‘Wait, what am I thinking. This is Potter that I am thinking about. I do not like Potter.’
Suddenly, James let out a short laugh for, apparently, no reason.
‘See, he’s crazy. And he’s still arrogant and he drives me insane.’
‘For the past few months, he hasn’t been hexing anyone for no reason, has ruffled his hair only a few times in your presence, and he hasn’t once pulled a prank of any kind on you,’ the annoying voice in her head once again reminded her.
“What are you laughing about?” Lily asked, concerned about his mental health.
“It’s just”oh, never mind,” he said suddenly looking afraid.
“No, come on. I want to know,” Lily said, chuckling to herself about how self-conscious he was acting.
“Well, it just looked like you were arguing with yourself,” James said, trying to stifle a laugh.
Lily involuntarily turned red, “What do you mean? Was I talking out loud or something?”
“No, but I was asking you a bunch of questions and you just nodded or shook your head to whatever I said… and then I asked you if wanted to snog Snape and you just nodded your head,” James said, starting to let his laughter out.
“Oh,” Lily said, still a very dark crimson. For the next few minutes, the two of them kept walking, immersed in their thoughts.
‘Is it really that obvious that I am thinking to myself?’ Lily questioned herself. She was suddenly horrified at her next thought , ‘What if he can hear what I am thinking?’ She forced herself to stop thinking and kept herself busy with twirling her hair around her fingers.
‘I wonder what Lily is thinking about,’ thought James looking at her, a horrified expression on her face as she thought something else. She noticed that he was staring at her although he couldn’t peel his eyes off. He was intrigued with watching her twirling her hair.
“Jam--- Potter?” Lily asked. James heart skipped a beat as he heard her struggling not to say his name.
“Yeah,” he responded casually although his heart was beating hard.
“Do you really like me or am I just a game to you?” she asked.
“No, I really do like you, a lot!” he responded stunned at the fact that she thought that she was just a game to him.
“Why?!” she yelled stopping in her tracks. James stared at her as though she were crazy.
‘Who wouldn’t like her,’ he thought to himself.
“You are smart, kind, talented, beautiful, you always---,” he could have gone on like this for hours but Lily abruptly stopped him.
“Woah, slow down, let me get this straight! First of all, I have never been nice to you, yet you think I am. You always get better grades than me and but you think that I’m smart. You think I am talented when I can’t even do half of the spells that you do. And, strangest of all, you think I am beautiful when in actuality, I am not.
“I think that you are all of those things and much, much more, and do you know why Lily?” James asked summing up all of his courage.
“Why?” she asked disbelief showing in her beautiful, bright green eyes. Even though she was trying hard to stay calm, she was on the verge of telling James that she liked him. But she could tell that what James was going to say was important so she kept quiet.
With a sudden burst of energy and bravery, James said what he had wanted to say for as long as he had known Lily. Since the very first day when he had been introduced to a smaller, shyer Lily. Since the moment when he saw her at Hogsmede laughing and joking around with her friends. Since the time when he had gotten into his first fight with her.
“I love you Lily!” he cried his words echoing in the empty halls, “I’ve loved you since I first saw you. Since then, I’ve promised myself that one day I would tell you and now I have. Please don’t turn me down.”
Lily was speechless. She wanted to yell out that she loved him too. That she was, in fact, one of the girls that ‘couldn’t get enough Potter’. That she too had promised herself that she would one day tell him her feelings. But it was too late now. She had lost her chance.
Eyes full of hurt and pain, James walked away from the love of his life and tried to move on.
Don't you just wanna hug James?
Please review people... I don't know how else to say it... how about::
Revise por favor, S'il vous plaît réexaminer, Bitte überprüfen Sie, Per favore di riesaminare, Herzie alstublieft, Por favor revise, or Behager anmeldelse
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Only two reviews? =(