“I don’t understand why he wasn’t concerned about you. I mean, the other prats “ not including Peter and, well, Remus isn’t a prat “ looked worried. They never look worried,” Lily babbled, hoping SamLin would say something.
No such luck. SamLin silently flipped through her book and just looked up at Lily.
Sticking to her promise, Lily had arrived at the dorm once her free period started. She had found SamLin sitting on the bed, staring out one of the windows. Since then, Lily was trying to get SamLin to open up and say something.
“I don’t understand “” Lily said again, but this time, SamLin actually cut her off.
“Look, Lily.” Her stare was hard as she gestured toward the letter on the nightstand. “Read it; I don’t mind.”
Lily was cautious as she reached for the letter and smoothed out the crinkles, reading aloud:
“Dear SamLin,
“I find our relationship changing. You seem distant. So I write this letter telling you that I must break it off.
“Do not take it personally. Lately, I have been under a lot of pressure to stop messing around and actually become a real man. I have no more time for fun and games anymore.
“We did have fun times, really.
“Sirius.”
Lily looked at SamLin, who was now picking at her bed sheets, with a look of horror on her face.
Lily said the first words that came to mind. “He’s an idiot.”
SamLin looked nervous. “Don’t judge him like that, Lil “”
“SamLin!” Lily yelled in disbelief. “He just broke it off with you! For no good reason! And all you can do is moon over him?” Her last sentence was a question, which gave SamLin a chance to defend herself.
She remained quiet for a while.
“Lily.” SamLin’s eyes were streaked with tears. “He said, ‘I have no more time for fun and games anymore.’ That means he thinks I’m not important “”
Lily took her by the shoulders, a motherly gesture that SamLin used to comfort Lily. “SamLin Andrea Anderson! Of course he thought you were important!”
SamLin looked down. “It is more likely he never ever liked me...”
“He liked you.” Lily looked straight into SamLin’s blue celestial eyes. “Or, more likely, he probably loved you. No, I shouldn’t say ‘loved.’ He must still love you.”
SamLin looked down again. “Love is a big thing, Lil. It seems almost foolish “”
“It’s not foolish,” Lily said quietly. “We’re just all fools in when we’re in love. I mean, look at Alice!”
SamLin avoided Lily’s gaze. “I should’ve never taken the chance with our relationship,” she heard SamLin mutter.
Lily got up; SamLin looked confused. “I’m going to talk to Sirius,” Lily clarified, and she saw the look of dismay on SamLin’s face. “And I’m going knock some sense into that stupid little brain of his.”
And she left.
*
“Oy! Black!”
Sirius Black was lounging on one of the couches in the common room, still with Peter and Potter. Remus and Frank were nowhere in sight.
He turned around, facing Lily.
“What do you want?” he asked irritably. Lily remained silent. “Aren’t you going to say something?” Sirius asked, thoroughly irritated now.
“Bastard,” Lily said. She was surprised at her boldness to even swear.
“Look, Evans,” Sirius said, flushed. He stood up. “I “”
“You didn’t have enough bloody Gryffindor courage to face her yourself?” Lily spat, disgusted. She had kept most of her anger inside when she was with SamLin. Now she was unleashing it.
Sirius looked down.
“Honestly, Black, what is all that ‘I am under pressure’ stuff?” Lily yelled. “Do you think anyone in their right minds would believe that?”
He looked at her and said quietly, “I am under pressure.”
“But you’re Sirius Black, and you rebelled against your mother!” Lily shouted. People were in the common room looked at them. “Don’t you think love comes first?!”
He stuck his hands in his pockets. “I still do love her,” he said, making Lily backtrack.
“Then why would you break her heart if she’s more important than the others?” Lily asked softly. ‘Others’ were Sirius’ past girlfriends, many in number.
“Bella threatened me,” Sirius said, even quieter than before.
“Then why “” Lily started to say, but Sirius cut her off.
“No!” he said angrily, looking at her. “She’s different than my mother! My cousin doesn’t make idle threats! I used to be on her good side, but now things have changed.” He paused, and then whispered, “She threatened to torture SamLin.”
Lily gasped, bringing her hands up to her mouth. She always knew there was something wrong with Bellatrix Black.
Lily now understood, but she had one more question. “How come you didn’t say so in your letter?”
He started to walk away, but paused, and said over his shoulder, “Because that would scare her. And if she knew, Bella might’ve found it amusing to torture her. And...” he said, sniffling a bit, “...I wanted to protect her from that. From me and my horrid family.”
Lily could feel tears come down her face, and if she wasn’t mistaken, she saw some on Sirius’ face, too. Sirius Black never cried.
*
Lily didn’t know what to do.
Sirius had told her his secret, and that somehow conveyed that he didn’t want her to go off telling SamLin (it wouldn’t help), Emily (And have the entire school know?), Alice (probably would just beat up Bellatrix or Sirius, depending on her mood), or even Katie (who probably wouldn’t do anything but just might tell SamLin).
But Lily couldn’t help but feel that Sirius was keeping some of the truth away from her.
She knew Sirius had probably had his reasons, but she really wanted to know the other half. Maybe he just made the Bellatrix story up? Lily wanted to be sure.
But who would know the real, whole truth?
Probably the Marauders or even Frank Longbottom.
Yet how was she going to get the truth out of them? Lily considered her options. Veritaserum would be difficult to make, but Lily knew she would be expelled if caught pouring some in Black’s pumpkin juice. She could try Polyjuice Potion, but Sirius would be too suspicious if she transformed into one of the Marauders and started randomly asking him questions.
No, no, no. She needed to think of something else.
Unfortunately, she didn’t have time. Her free period was up and she had to grab her schoolbag and rush to Potions.
As she ran down the hallways, she caught up with Katie and Alice.
“How’d it go?” they both asked.
“With SamLin or with Sirius?” Lily asked back.
Alice looked at Katie and she said, “SamLin first.”
“Okay,” Lily started. “Well, she let me read the letter. Black had dumped her.”
“What?!” Katie asked. “But he’s totally smitten with her!”
“That’s what I thought,” Lily said, gritting her teeth. “And SamLin’s still miserable about it. I tried to convince her that if he wants to break it off with her so abruptly that he’s not worth it. But she’s still wallowing in self pity; she’s sure that it is her fault.”
“And what did Black say?” Alice inquired.
“He “” Lily paused. What was she going to tell her friends? “He didn’t really say anything. He said, ‘I have my reasons’ after I yelled at him for a while, but when questioned, didn’t say anything more.”
“Wonder what those reasons are?” Katie mused wistfully.
You have no idea, Carroll.
While Katie and Alice continued speculating what had happened, Lily remained silent, holding her books up against her chest. She too was wondering what exactly Sirius’ intentions were or were not, but didn’t voice her thoughts out loud.
They entered the classroom and took their seats. Lily sat next to Katie, who was now quiet too.
“Hello, everyone!” a cheery voice suddenly piped up. Lily looked up. There was Emily.
“Hey, Emily,” Alice said dully.
“What’s wrong with all of you?” Emily asked perkily.
“No, what’s wrong with you?” Lily demanded. “You always act so...giddy these days. What “”
“Good morning, everyone!” a deep, also cheery voice, boomed. Soon, a fat man with a head full of straw-like hair emerged through a door to greet the class.
“Good morning, Professor Slughorn,” the entire class recited.
“Morning!” Professor Slughorn repeated. Lily rolled her eyes. He may be the teacher of one of her favorite subjects, but he could be quite an annoyance sometimes.
“I know in the beginning of the year you all...erm...” Professor Slughorn seemed to be searched for the right word. “...attempted to make the Draught of Living Death.” Lily thought back to the day, with purple smoke filling up the classroom and Frank Longbottom spilling his potion all over their Potions Master when he passed by. “But now I feel that you are all capable of at least making a...decent potion. Still, I do not really expect you all to make perfect potions” “ his eyes landed on Longbottom, the worst Potions maker ever “ “but I think everyone will be better than on the first day. To be on the safe side, however, I am pairing you up randomly.”
There were groans.
“Now, now!” Professor Slughorn said, waving his arms around. “I expect you all to be good about it. Let’s see...Carroll and Swith. Pettigrew and Black. Bennett and Diggory. Pettigrew and Longbottom. Lupin and Evans.” Slughorn continued thinking of pairs as Lily moved over to where Remus Lupin was sitting. It was just her friends’ luck to get each other as partners while she was stuck with a Marauder. Even Emily got paired with her boyfriend (Was it her boyfriend? Lily had to wonder). She was glad she was paired up with Lupin, though, instead of someone insufferable like Pettigrew, who seemed like he could barely pass Potions without a ‘Dreadful’.
“Hi,” Remus said.
“Hi,” Lily said back.
“Get started!” Slughorn bellowed.
“I’ll get the stuff,” Lily volunteered, and Remus nodded.
After that, they both worked in silence, once in awhile consulting their books and muttering the instructions. Lily was silent not just because she didn’t enjoy tons of noise around when she worked, but because Remus was a good friend of Sirius’. Maybe he even had a hand in helping Sirius dump SamLin!
So she continued to chop her Sopophorus Bean, humming a little to herself. Just as she was pouring the juice from the bean into their potion, Remus spoke up.
“He’s not really that bad.”
“Huh?” Lily asked, scrunching her nose as the potion sizzled.
“James.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that James isn’t really that bad,” Remus replied, looking at her.
“Speak for yourself,” Lily said. “He’s not going to redeem himself by passing messages through you.”
Remus continued to stare, ignoring their potion. “Really, Lily.”
“But “” Lily started, but Remus continued talking over her.
“He may be loyal to a fault at times, but he’s always there for you. Even when you don’t want him to be there.”
“Exactly my point!” Lily yelled. Everyone in the classroom looked at her. “Sorry!” she said to everyone, and they all shrugged, going back to mixing.
“Lily, I mean that he’s there always because you do need him always.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Lily said angrily. “And you’re supposedly to stir counterclockwise.”
“Sorry,” he apologized. “But, really. James is a nice guy.”
“Remus, you’re really bad at this,” a voice said. Lily whirled around. Behind her sat Peter Pettigrew, aimlessly throwing in a bezoar to his potion. “I mean, if you want to convince her like James asked you too, you have to be a little less subtle.”
Lily swore she heard Remus mutter, “Like you are” before saying, “Peter, you’re not helping.”
“Yes I am!” Peter objected loudly. “Give examples! If you want to say James is a loyal friend, then you should tell her about this week when James helped “”
“Tell me what?” Lily demanded, intrigued. Peter did say rather stupid things sometimes, but this piece of information seemed more like fact than fiction. She was also surprised to see Remus flashing Peter looks which clearly meant ‘shut-your-bloody-trap’.
“Nothing,” Remus interrupted quickly, smiling. “Peter “”
“Peter.” Lily wanted to know badly. She even abandoned her potion, letting Remus take over.
If Peter had seen any of Remus’ looks, he obviously wasn’t paying attention to them. Instead, he said blithely, “James just helped one of us get out of a dying relationship.”
“What one? Who did he help?” Lily was dying.
Peter was now sloppily stirring his potion has Remus kept throwing him ‘no-no-no’ looks. He wasn’t even looking at Lily as he said, “Sirius.”
It took a moment for Lily to register it. Suddenly, her eyes became wide. James had told Sirius to dump SamLin and break her heart?!
“What was wrong with the friend?” she demanded. Remus was hitting his head on the table, muttering something.
Peter still seemed oblivious to all of this, only happy that someone was actually paying attention to him. “He believed the girl was cheated on him, because she remained distant most of the time.”
“That’s rubbish!” Lily yelled, not caring if anyone was staring at her.
“Time’s up!” Professor Slughorn’s voice rang across the classroom. “Let me see what your results are!”
Once Slughorn was finished inspecting everyone’s potions (most of which he rated ‘Acceptable’ and giving her and Remus’ an ‘Exceeds Expectations’, but Peter and Frank getting a ‘Dreadful’), Lily quickly packed up her copy of Advanced Potion Making and stuck it in her bag. She didn’t even wait for Katie or Alice. All she did was run away, trying to run from that dreadful truth even though it slapped her in the face and was not going away.
Is it Pride or Prejudice? by Stormbringer
Chapter Notes: Evil truths and secrets come to haunt Lily through letters and explanations.