Lily watched the rain roll down the common room windows. She couldn’t help but think of the last time there was a stormy night. She had been home over Easter holidays and had made the mistake of bringing her new boyfriend, Miles, with her to meet her parents. They had only been going out a week, but he was Lily’s first so she was excited for her family to meet him. That was a very bad idea however, as she soon found out whey they arrived at the station.
As soon as they crossed through the barrier Lily could tell that her sister Petunia would not take this change very well at all. Petunia had always been rather envious of the attention Lily received for being the only witch in the family, and though she was the older of the two, it was clear to Lily that she often felt overlooked and unappreciated. From the moment her letter from Hogwarts arrived with the post Lily watched her sister change from being her best playmate (though somewhat bossy) to acting like her biggest adversary. Everything became a competition where Lily was put down regardless of whether she won or lost. Of course Lily was hurt for being treated badly by her sister, but she knew Petunia was only doing it because she didn’t feel as special as Lily for being invited to attend an exclusive school.
That’s why when an argument broke out over dinner, Lily was not surprised. Petunia had treated her coldly all day, barely acknowledging Miles except to sniff disapprovingly and edge away from him in her seat in the car. Now they were sitting around the tale eating their mum’s beef stew in an awkward silence save directions to pass the salt and the sound of the rain drumming against the windows. Lily had given Miles somewhat of a warning of how Petunia might act, and she figured he would use his Ravenclaw smarts to realize that attempting conversation would not be the best thing to do. Unfortunately, that was not what he assumed.
Lily winced as Miles turned to Petunia and said in an overly cheerful voice, “So where do you go to school Petunia? I bet you’re glad it’s not too long till summer holidays.”
Petunia glared at Lily, making it obvious that she was not going to respond to such a question. Clearing her throat and giving him a significant look that this was not a subject to be discussed, Lily replied, “Petunia’s finished with her schooling.”
“Oh, so do you work now?” Miles plowed on, oblivious of his girlfriend’s visibly displeased demeanor.
“I can’t believe you brought this up,” Petunia hissed at Lily through clenched teeth, completely ignoring Miles. “You can’t go one day without reminding us all of that freak school you go to, can you? Gloating about it like you’re some kind of relation of the Queen’s or something, like going to a magic school makes you better than the rest of us.”
“Petunia, you know that’s not what he meant. He was just trying to be conversational. The least you could do would be to acknowledge that he’s even there.” Lily replied, ignoring the jibes from her sister.
“Why? So you can parade around your new boyfriend and shove it in my face that I don’t have one yet?”
“No!” Lily exclaimed indignantly. “I wasn’t thinking about you, believe it or not, when I invited him to stay. I wanted him to meet mum and dad.”
“Please. I bet you had to put some sort of spell on him to get him to even follow you around,” scoffed Petunia.
Lily gasped in astonishment. “Petunia!” their mother intoned raising her eyes at her over her glass of wine. Miles looked quite shocked. Lily was fairly popular at Hogwarts and was usually never insulted in such a way except by the likes of Severus Snape and other notorious Slytherins.
In irritation Lily retorted, “You know, if you stopped turning up your nose at everyone around you and focused on others instead of yourself, people might actually like you.”
“Girls, that’s enough,” their father declared. But that wasn’t enough for Petunia. She kept on making snide comments, to which of course, Lily replied with just as much fervor, and soon enough things escalated into a shouting match that significantly drowned out the thunderstorm. Needless to say, the rest of the holiday was not very much fun as it was spent avoiding Petunia at all costs or being forced to sit in a highly tension-filled room. Miles hadn’t broken up with her over it thankfully, though things had been a bit shaky ever since they returned to Hogwarts.
Lily sighed and returned to the transfiguration essay she and the other sixth-year Gryffindor girls were working on.
“Looks like Quidditch practice is over,” Ginger Brown happily informed the table. She nodded towards the team filing into the common room looking drenched, irritable, and very tired. All except James Potter, who at that moment climbed through the portrait hole with his three friends Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew. Though all four of them were as equally wet and disheveled as the team, they wore relaxed smiles and laughed when James said, “Did you see when the bludger flew at him? Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Peter move that fast.”
Remus patted Peter on the back and replied, “I think we have our back up seeker should Stebbins ever come down with something.” Peter chuckled nervously, glancing around uncertainly at the others as if he wasn’t quite sure if the thought really appealed to him. Lily guessed that he was the sort of fellow that was afraid of heights.
Groaning and stretching, Sirius made for the stairs to the boys’ dormitory saying, “After watching such a grueling practice, I think I’m beat mates. I don’t know about you, but sleep sounds good to me.” The other boys followed him, but James, upon glancing around the common room, spotted Lily and thought better about heading up to bed just yet.
“Yeah, I’ll be up in a minute,” he called as he threaded his way towards the table of studying girls.
The moment James’ eyes had met Lily’s she had hastily bent down again towards her essay. She certainly didn’t want him to know that she had been watching him, however idly. Merlin knew he already thought too much of himself. That was the problem with James Potter, Lily thought. He couldn’t get down off his high horse and care about anyone but himself. Everything had to be for his amusement, no matter the feelings of others. She frowned as she stared at the parchment in front of her, mentally making a list of all the annoyingly bad qualities James Potter possessed. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him approaching and tried to look absorbed in her essay.
“All right, Evans?” he asked as he pulled up a nearby armchair and sat down. This caught the attention of every other girl at the table, all of which had absolutely no qualms about blatantly staring at the Quidditch chaser.
“Fine, Potter,” Lily replied evenly, side-glancing at his form.
A giggle erupted from Ginger who Lily gave a somewhat disgusted look to when she said, “Looks like that storm really took a beating on you, James.” Admittedly, he did look rather trampled on. Water still dripped from his robes which were so covered with mud at the bottom that the Gryffindor red looked like a dull brown, one of his sleeves was dangerously threatening to fall off, and his hair, half of which was sticking to his face, was even more wild than usual if that was possible.
“Er, yeah. Parks really wants us ready for the match against Ravenclaw for the Cup. Though, with practices like this one, I’m not sure we’ll even live to see the game,” James joked, giving them a winning smile. This produced even more giggles from the girls at the table and caused Lily to further attempt to engross herself in the methods of self-transfiguration.
“Oh, we all know you’ll score enough points on your own to flatten Ravenclaw,” May O’Brien gushed. Lily rolled her eyes and tried not to gag as the other girls tittered and James tried not to puff up his chest too much. For the life of her she could not understand why any girl would want to act like a complete idiot in front of boys. Normally May was a good and levelheaded girl, but increasingly she became as silly as a first year at the start of term feast anytime a boy entered the room.
Ginger gained back James’ attention as she waved her wand and performed a drought charm to dry him off. Looking down in surprise, he muttered his word of thanks and tried to brush off some of the dried dirt with the result that a lot of it landed on the floor, causing a nearby cat to sneeze repeatedly. Glancing back up with a hopeful look on his face he asked, “Are you coming to watch us at the match Evans?”
Lily continued writing a bit of her essay as she distractedly replied, “Well, Miles will be playing, so of course I’ll show up to support him.” Miles was the Ravenclaw keeper, so he’d been busy with practices since they’d returned from Easter holidays, yet another reason why Lily hadn’t spent a lot of time with her boyfriend as of late.
“Right,” said James grinning wryly and looking away. He should have seen that one coming. He hadn’t really believed Remus when he told him that Lily was going out with the seventh-year Ravenclaw. Miles didn’t really seem like Lily’s type, too hesitant and bookish. James had definitely seen Lily when she was in a fury, and though it was rather mesmerizing when her auburn hair almost stood on end and her green eyes flashed heatedly, it could also be rather frightening to be on the receiving end of such an outburst. James doubted if Miles could stand up to her and hold his own in the relationship. He’d just have to prove to Lily at the match that he was better suited for her temperament than Miles.
“Ooh, that looks like it hurt,” gasped Alice Fairfield, snapping James out of his reverie. Lily looked up and followed Alice’s finger pointing at James’ cheek where a large gash extended nearly all the way from his lip to his ear.
Fingering the cut and searching for an explanation James quickly said, “Yeah, um, collided with Stebbins during practice.” The truth was the previous night Remus had transformed into a werewolf and James, Sirius, and Peter changed into their Animagi forms to keep him occupied and away from the other students.
Lily narrowed her eyes and watched James carefully. Somehow she didn’t believe him despite his logical explanation.
“Yeah, Remus looked a little worse for the wear too,” she said quietly to herself. She had figured out that Remus was a werewolf in their fifth year but had kept this knowledge to herself because she knew others would treat him differently if they knew. Did that mean that James’ scar was from Remus? Would he be turning into a werewolf every full moon now too? Lily didn’t think he looked all that worried or changed, but then again how were you supposed to tell the difference when the person wasn’t transformed?
Catching the thoughtful look on Lily’s face, James shifted nervously and cleared his throat. “Well, I’ll let you ladies get back to your “er, it looks like your transfiguration essays,” he said glancing at their scrolls of parchment.
“How kind of you,” Lily dryly responded.
Backing up and ruffling his hair, James cracked a smile a said affectionately, “Awe, come on, Evans. You know you like the attention.”
“Does my head look that inflated, Potter?” Lily cried in a strangled voice. Ginger smirked as the other girls tried to hold their laughter in at the amusing pair’s antics.
“Well, ever since we tried those Bubble Head charms with Professor Flitwick…” James teased.
Lily gasped and threw her quill at him, nearly missing his arm as he ducked and headed for the dormitory stairs.
“One of these days, I swear…” Lily grumbled as she called her quill back.
“You’ll finally go out with James Potter?” Alice proffered cheekily. “You know it’s kind of cute the way he goes after you. Frank made a fool of himself too before he got up the nerve to ask me out.”
“Yes, but not all blokes turn out to be as sweet as Frank,” Lily replied sardonically. “And I hardly think accidentally falling down the stairs of the entrance hall as he asked you in front of the whole school compares with all the stunts Potter’s pulled.”
“She’s got a point,” said Ginger, who genuinely would not want to see James Potter snatched up by anyone other than herself.
Lily sighed and said, “Well, either way, it won’t help us finish our transfiguration essay by tomorrow.” And with that turned back to her three inches of parchment and refused to take part in any more discussion over James Potter.
Stronger Together by Pevensies_Pensieve
Chapter Notes: Introduction: Lily and James near the end of their 6th year