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Hi Journal. Remember that ridiculous girl that’s been writing in you for the past four weeks? Well, that girl’s gone. She took the evening train home. I’ll be filling in for her now.
My name is Lily Evans. I am Head Girl of Hogwarts, a Gryffindor and seventeen years old. I have had two best friends since my first days of Hogwarts: Rich Simon, and Sophie Stewart. And I have recently developed friendships with four other Gryffindor boys: Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, Sirius Black and James Potter.
Do you see, now, why a whole new introduction is needed? I am someone entirely different. One other piece of important information: Terry Caldwell is my ex-boyfriend.
I think it is safe to say that hell has most likely frozen over. I know for sure that’s what everyone in school has been thinking since yesterday, Sunday, March the fifteenth, when I sat down to breakfast right next to the man I claimed to have hated since first year, willingly, and smiled at him. And I know that they are all whispering behind our backs. Hogwarts hasn’t enjoyed a juicy piece of gossip like this since…Rita Skeeter, who had graduated the previous year, had faked a pregnancy. Thankfully though, the reasons behind mine and Terry’s break-up some how remained secret. I’ll probably have James to thank for that; I’ll have to add that to the list of things he’s done for me.
Anyway, if you haven’t completely given up on me for previously being such an oaf, you’ll be wondering how it is all of this has come to pass. Well, today is Monday the sixteenth of March, and here goes…
I cried the whole night on Friday. My roommates Alex, Tamara and Perfidy were very kind about it; they smuggled up chocolate from the kitchens for me, and lent me extra pillows. Apparently, a mysterious disembodied voice told them where to go to find the food. Why do I have a feeling there’s another thing I have to add to that list to thank James for?
Anyway, Saturday, I stayed in my room all day. Someone let Sophie in to the Gryffindor common room, and Rich levitated himself into the seventh year girl’s dorm, slipping on the window so that he nearly plummeted to his death, and they spent endless miserable hours with me. Goodness, how awful am I? I make a stupid selfish mistake, and then I let my wonderful friends feel sorry for me, when indeed they should hate me. When I told them so, though, they told me I was finally acquiring that lunatic’s illness I kept on ranting about. How could they go about hating someone like me? Oh, I love them! And curse them for making me cry.
When my roommates came in from dinner, they told me Terry hadn’t been there, and nobody had seen him. I didn’t ask about Kathy McKinnon. I didn’t want word getting around, and Perfidy, bless her for her feather pillows, wasn’t one to keep interesting information to herself. They also told me James Potter had asked about me an annoying amount of times. Funnily enough, that made me smile.
At about midnight, I got to feeling cramped, imprisoned. I felt so guilty, used and worthless just lying there miserably. How pathetic, for me to cry over him. I felt the need to do something.
Wrapped tightly in a coat and my nightgown, I recklessly set off down the halls in the middle of the night, not particularly aware of where I was headed. When I finally came to my senses again, I was at the Astronomy tower. It was frigid outside, but I didn’t leave. I slumped against the cold wall, and sat there, my eyes closed. It was actually sort of peaceful. I couldn’t hear a sound, and I found myself mercifully relaxing. That is, until someone’s shadow fell over me, and I fell back in almighty surprise, shouting unintelligible things.
“Shh! Lily, Merlin, relax!” whoever it was, was saying, as I tried to make my heart slow back down, then taking a good look at them.
“Potter,” I panted, “how on Earth did you find me here?”
He gave me a roguish smile, as he pulled me into a proper sitting position and placed himself next to me. “I have my ways.”
“Frightening ones,” I muttered quietly. Awkwardness and shame set upon me as I watched him rub his hands because of the cold.
“I’ve been told.” He looked at me kindly, smiling. I couldn’t bear it, and looked away, red as an apple.
“So, how are you?” he asked in a tentative tone.
“Fine,” I tried a little to sound defiant, but ended up sounding clogged and sad.
He sighed. “I feel awful. You’re going through this and it’s my entire fault…” he looked at his hands
I snorted, disbelievingly. “How do you figure that?”
“I knew all along, I should’ve just told you, I should’ve…should’ve found a way to show you, or forced him to tell you, or…” He threw his hands up helplessly. “Something.”
His reasonless, selfless guilt was making me feel, if possible, even worse. “No, James, it’s ,i>my fault and mine alone. I was the one who didn’t want to listen to you. And I was the one who wouldn’t have believed you if you’d straight out told me. I’m the one that thought Terry really liked me… and it’s my fault we’ve got all these detentions, I started that food fight.”
“Well, that’s the thing; you weren’t the one who lied to their relationship. It isn’t your fault, you’re a victim here!”
“Terry didn’t really lie to me. I was just the one who assumed things. And besides…I mean, he fell in love with someone else, and even though he was wrong to keep stringing me along, falling in love isn’t a crime.” Why did my voice have to break? Why, oh, why?
“Lily,” said James sympathetically, “Stop taking all the responsibility. Terry ““
“No, James! It’s my fault, okay? Stop trying to make me seem innocent!” I shouted, losing my patience. The second after I’d said it, I felt bad. “I’m sorry. I can’t believe I have the nerve to shout at you after everything you’ve done for me.”
James pursed his lips. “Tried to do, you mean? You should still hate me for that flower, you know.”
I snorted again, and wrapped my arms around myself even more tightly. I stifled a slight gasp when he wound his arm around me and pulled me in closer. I felt immediately warmer…if from the heat of his body, or from my suddenly fast heart beat and blush, I don’t know. All I know is that I just felt awfully confused…and content.
“Now that I think about it, I don’t really feel I should,” I mumbled, watching the ground.
It was something about his arm around me. It was acting as a guilt repellent. It made me feel a little lighter. And to think, mere weeks ago, I was dragging his bum into a pudding. How strange things were…
“So, did you come up with the poem?” I found myself asking.
I could feel him laughing. “Sadly, yes. It took me three hours.”
That made me chuckle in earnest. Glancing up, I noticed he still had the disastrous hair do I had given him the previous week. How was it that I hadn’t noticed before? It’s sort of hard to overlook, you see.
“Here,” I said, taking out my wand. “I’ll fix that for you.”
He scrunched his lips to one side, then the other, before saying, “Would it make you happy if I kept it?”
How could I have ever hated him? My, things certainly have changed.
This detention went by surprisingly fast. There are now only two minutes left, and I’ve just glanced over to grin at James. He winked at me. I swear McGonagall just wiped a tear from the corner of her eye.
Lily Evans
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Well, finally, there's been some progress, no? In December, it'll be a year since I started this story. Wow, how fast time goes by. I'd like to once again, thank my beta, harrypotterfangirl21 (Katie) for her great help. And thank you so much to those of you have stuck with this story all this time, and especially to those of you who review.
Didn't take so long this time, did it?
The Epic Tale of the Hogwarts Food-fight by Gin_Drinka
Chapter Notes: I don't own it. Don't sue me. Please.
Well, you know the drill, the note's at the end.