The next week passed much too quickly for Lily's liking. Sure, she was having tons of fun with her friends and three-fourths of the Marauders, but she knew, in the back of her mind, that soon Remus was going to transform. She really didn't know what to expect. If this whole 'werewolf' thing was as harmless as James and Sirius claimed it was, then there would be nothing to worry about. But something told Lily that the werewolf Remus wouldn't be as gentle or kind as the real one.
Skiing helped to take her mind off of the full moon, but when she wasn't fretting about Remus, she was on the look-out for Death Eaters. She was scared there would be another encounter like the last time. Lily wasn't that afraid of being attacked herself, though. She was much more concerned with the welfare of her Muggle friends, who didn't even have wands to defend themselves. This was really turning into a much more stressful vacation than what she had planned.
It had been twelve days since they had gotten to the Christophe Brazier ski resort. Remus had come on day six. So, it had been six more days. Tomorrow, he was transforming.
Up until the day before, Remus had joined the others on the slopes, snowboarding like James and Sirius. Lily had actually been a bit shocked the first time she saw Remus getting ready to go with them. She had come to get James and Sirius, when she saw Remus all geared up. Under his scarf, though, he looked much too sick to go out on a mountain. But he was determined to have fun and it didn't seem like sickness was holding him back. He was laughing and joking as much as the other boys, which Lily was glad for. She had actually thought that he would be left back in the hotel room, by himself, slowly preparing for the full moon.
That was what he had to do today. With only a day left until his transformation, Remus was too frail to ski anymore. He told Cassie, Bess, and Jill that he must have caught some sort of food poisoning from the garlic soup he had had the night before. Jill was very disappointed (she rather fancied Remus, Lily suspected) and would occasionally wonder out loud how he was doing.
"Do you think he will feel better by the end of the week? I really hope he does," she said while they were all taking a lunch break at the bottom of the hill.
"He should be just fine," said James as he took a large bite from his turkey sandwich.
"I say that if today is... what is it today?" said Sirius.
"It's Thursday," responded Cassie.
"Thanks," said Sirius. "Well, if today is Thursday, then I reckon he'll be fine by Wednesday or even Tuesday if he's lucky."
"Really?" asked Lily. She wondered if that was how long it usually takes for Remus to recover. She thought back to last few years, trying to think of all the times Remus had been absent. It was quite a lot. Lily was amazed that he got such good grades, even though he missed so many classes.
"Yeah, that's about as long as it usually takes," said Sirius. He went back to devouring the massive ham, cheese, lettuce, tomato, bacon sandwich that he had made himself.
Today was much colder than the others, so the group ate quickly and mostly in silence. They had decided that, after lunch, they would just ski a few more runs before turning in for the day. At the girls' room, there was plenty of food, so they were going to cook up a dinner and maybe watch another movie. Sirius was the most excited about this. "I'm so taking Muggle Studies next year," he had told Lily, Remus, and James after they had watched "The Sound Of Music" a few nights ago.
The last few runs were painfully cold, and Lily couldn't manage to pull her scarf up far enough to cover her nose. She also felt like she was getting a nasty windburn. Although she complained internally about the temperature, she couldn't help but marvel over the beautiful scenery that surrounded her. There was hardly a single cloud in the bright blue sky. The white mountains contrasted nicely with the trees that littered its surface. Lily wished she could take a picture.
Even though she would've rather stared at the landscape around her, Lily turned her thoughts to the forrest they were skiing beside. It was the same one where she, James, and Sirius had met the Death Eater. She shivered, and not because of the cold. They hadn't seen any Death Eaters since they had tried to kidnap her at lunch, but Lily (and the boys as well) were constantly on the look out.
At the end of the run, the group decided to call it quits. As Lily looked around, she laughed upon seeing the bright red faces of her friends. It seemed like she wasn't the only one who was windburned.
Remus didn't join them for dinner. James told Lily that he needed to rest now and he couldn't be around anybody so soon before transforming. Sirius and James did have dinner with them, though, but they didn't stay too long.
"We should really go back to help him," James told her in an undertone.
Lily nodded and tried to hide her disappointment that he and Sirius were leaving. She hated herself for it, but she really did like their company. "Will you be skiing tomorrow, then?" she asked James before he left.
"We'll have to see," he sighed. "It really depends how old Remy's feeling in the morning."
"You sound like his mother," Lily pointed out.
James laughed and said goodbye after he pulled Sirius off the couch. Sirius had been very deep in conversation with Cassie, who was now blushing and looking rather smitten.
"Do you have to go?" she asked, sounding like a little child.
"We can continue this tomorrow," he said, winking at her flirtatiously.
Lily rolled her eyes and pushed him out the door, after James. "G'night, Black."
"Sweet dreams, Evans," he said before jogging down the hallway to catch up with James. She closed the door behind him and turned back to her friends.
"That Sirius Black is quite a looker," sighed Cassie and Lily plopped down on the couch next to her. Lily giggled at the dreamy-looking Cassie. There was a pang of sadness Lily felt as she realized how little time she got to spend with her old friends. She didn't know what any of them were like in school. Obviously, they had remained friends, but they were so distant. Lily had started noticing little inside jokes that Cassie, Bess, and Jill all shared. Funny handshakes and stories from their own school made Lily feel a little left out. Cassie continued talking, dragging Lily out of her trance. "Is he single?"
"Hm?" asked Lily. Admittingly, she hadn't been paying much attention to that friend that she missed so much.
"Sirius. Does he have a girlfriend back at your school?" asked Cassie, nervously.
"Not currently, I don't think," said Lily. This was true. Even though Sirius had had his fair share of girls the last few years, at this moment, he was a free man.
Cassie smiled. "I really like him."
"I can tell," said Lily.
She stared off into the distance, Cassie did, lost in thought.
Lily had never been at all attracted to Sirius, ever. He had always been the annoying Marauder who was mean to Sev. He was a bully. He and James would go strutting about the castle, expecting their fellow students to bow down at their feet. Arrogant, would be an appropriate word to describe the duo.
But they weren't arrogant now, were they? Lily had gone over this so many times in her own head that she was sick of even thinking about it. Whatever James and Sirius were now, was different from their usual pompous attitudes.
"Is he always this charming at school?" Cassie said.
"Sirius?" asked Lily and Cassie nodded. "You could say that." She decided not to mention the bullying side of Sirius. It was unnecessary to bring up.
"You said that you hated them," said Cassie, "when we first saw James and Sirius in the elevator."
"Yeah," said Lily. She paused, waiting to see where this was going, though she already had a pretty good idea.
"Well, you don't really seem to hate them," said Cassie.
"Yeah," repeated Lily mechanically.
"So... what changed?" said Cassie, getting a little annoyed now. "Were they really that bad?"
"Look," said Lily, thinking her words over very carefully, "the last few years, Sirius, James, Remus, and their friend, Peter, have been causing chaos at school. They pranked people, teased people, and I can't even tell you how many detentions they've gotten themselves into the last few years."
"They're a bit to rowdy for perfect Miss Lily, eh?" said Cassie.
"Hey!" said Lily defensively.
"Oh, come on, Lily. Even when we were little, you were always the kid who coloured inside the lines."
Lily though about this. She had always been a bit of a goody two shoes. But she wasn't really, was she? She had talked back to that young Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher in fourth year when he was being a jerk to that Hufflepuff. She had once snuck a firewhisky from the Hog's Head. And there was that time when she hooked up with Nathaniel Hopkins in the broom closet last year. That counted for something, didn't it?
"Anyway," said Cassie as she stood up and fixed her hair, "they seem like really nice guys to me. Maybe you need to loosen up a little." That would have sounded harsh coming from anybody else, but Lily could tell that Cassie just wanted to help. "Plus," she added before leaving the room, "everyone can tell that James fancies you. Maybe if you opened up a little bit...." She wiggled her eyebrows and laughed as she left Lily sitting by herself on the couch.
Everyone can tell that James facies you, continued to ring in Lily's head, even while she sat alone in the living room. But she knew that. James had made it very clear and very public that he wanted a date out of her. He had bloody screamed it in the middle of Herbology last year!
Lily huffed and shoved her head in her hands. She did not want to deal with this. She did not want to think about stupid James Potter or especially how she felt towards that stupid James Potter. She really wanted to enjoy the rest of her vacation without worrying about James making a move.
I have been leading him on though, haven't I, Lily thought, remembering back to that night he had kissed her at the hot chocolate social. She hadn't exactly resisted... And then there was the night that James got that letter and she had kissed him on the cheek...
Lily quickly stood up, determined that she was going to simply climb into bed and forget all of it. The kisses, the laughs, the frequent glances in his direction. But hard as she tried, she couldn't shake James from her mind. As she tried, desperately, to fall asleep, all she could think of was what James had told her in the Lobby the day after the Hot Chocolate Social, "You've fallen in love with me!"
Lily heard the door creak ever so softly the next morning. But she didn't stir. She just slightly opened her eyes to see the reason for her door being opened. It was James.
She didn't move, not a bit. Keeping her eyes just barely opened, Lily just watched as James snuck into her room.
It was bright in the bedroom, so it had to be morning, but Lily was still confused and a little concerned about why James was coming in. She watched as he snuck in and quietly closed the door behind him and then paused. Lily had expected him to at least wake her up, but instead, he just watched her. That was borderline creepy.
Luckily, it didn't last too long and soon James walked all the way over to the bed and tapped her arm.
"Lily?" he whispered. "Lily, come on, you have to wake up now."
She moved around a little, pretending to just wake up. Opening her eyes all the way, she could see that James was bent down next to her bed, his face only a foot away from her own.
"It's nearly eleven thirty," said James, smiling. His hand shot to his hair to ruffle it when Lily stared at him.
"Eleven thirty?" Lily asked, a little panicked. Had the others left to go ski without her?
"Yeah," said James, "there was a huge snowstorm last night. It's actually really bad... the resort can't even get the chair lifts to run."
Lily sat straight up, and stared James down.
"Um, sorry, but what's with the death-glare?" said James nervously.
"You stopped them from working, didn't you? You and Sirius didn't want to have any Muggles in the way for the full moon tonight, isn't that right? You know you can't interfere with technology like that! The Ministry is going to come and they are going to--"
James quickly sat down on the bed next to Lily and held both her shoulders. "Evans," he said, "if you could stop you ranting for two seconds, that'd be lovely."
"But you can't used magic out of school, you and Sirius know that!" protested Lily as she tried to wriggle out of James' grasp. She felt quite flustered with his hands on her bare shoulders. She had only worn a spaghetti strapped shirt to bed.
"Stop fussing," James said, holding Lily still. "It wasn't us. Sure, it would be best if there weren't any Muggle's on the hill when Remus transforms, but we wouldn't go this far with it. So stop worrying so much." Then he sort of chuckled at himself like he had just told a joke or something. He was still holding onto Lily's shoulders and she couldn't stop herself from gazing into his eyes. She hated this. She just wanted it to stop. She tried to tell herself that it was simply her dumb teenage hormones acting up and that she needed to stop it from going any farther. Lucky for her, that was when Sirius burst into the room yelling, "Snooowww dayyyy!"
For a moment, Sirius just stared at Lily and James on the bed. Then, he found his voice. "Well, this is awkward. Sorry I interrupted your little snog-fest," he said, winking.
"No problem," said James, not protesting as Lily threw his hands off her shoulders, "we were almost done anyway." He looked back to Lily, who was scowling at him. "I'm going to go have a snack. How about one more snog before I go?" he asked, leaning in.
"Shove off, Potter," said Lily, pushing him back. She quickly tried scratching her nose to cover up the blush that was now spreading across her cheeks. Oh, curse her pale skin.
"How about for me?" asked Sirius, grinning.
"Shut it," Lily warned. Both boys just laughed at her as they left, each blowing kisses to her on the way out.
Lily shoved her head into her pillow and let out a nice scream. After she finished letting out her bottled up anger, Lily quickly changed into sweatpants and a jumper and joined the others in the kitchen.
"What are we going to do today?" Cassie was asking the others when Lily came in.
"I vote we watch more movies," said Sirius. He really was a fan of the television.
"But we've already watched all the ones that I brought with me," said Jill, shrugging her shoulders. "By the way, how is Remus today?"
"He's still pretty sick," said James, "but I think he'll be getting better soon."
Lily tensed. Today was the day. Remus was going to transform tonight and there was nothing she could do to help. It was crazy that she actually trusted that James and Sirius were going to be able to control the werewolf on the mountains. She shuddered just thinking about them running through the forrest that may, or may not, be filled with Death Eaters.
"So what's the plan?" asked Lily, trying to shove the awful thoughts of poor Remus being torn apart into a monster into the back of her mind.
"Well," said Bess, who had just finished eating her toast, "we can't ski, obviously. We have to say inside."
"Thanks for pointing that out," said Jill, her comment dripping with sarcasm.
"Do you have any ideas?" said Bess, clearly annoyed at Jill.
"Come on guys," said Lily, stepping in, "let's just think of something, okay?"
Everyone just sat in silence for a while. Lily waited for somebody else to suggest something, but nobody did. James just looked around at the others, clearly all out of ideas, while Sirius did even hide the fact that he had nothing to say. The second boy clucked his tongue in a rather obnoxious fashion and tapped his foot until Cassie finally spoke. She was never one for silences.
"Look, why don't we just relax?" she said. It was, sadly, the best idea anyone had had. Everyone nodded in agreement and headed over to the living room, where they proceeded to sit down.
But then there was more silence.
Had they really used up all their conversation? It had only been a couple weeks since they had all been there and Lily couldn't remember any other time where anyone had any trouble with thinking up something to say. Lily turned her attention to the boys. It was clear that they were restless for the full moon tonight. James was twiddling his thumbs at a rapid pace and Sirius' feet were tapping rapidly.
All of the sudden, Jill jumped out of her chair. "I brought cards! Let's play cards!"
They all cheered as she ran to her room to grab her deck and some poker chips. Everything sort of picked up from there. They were laughing at James' horrible poker face and at Cassie, who kept accidentally showing her cards to everybody. Lily was surprisingly good at Blackjack. She won almost every time and when she went to the kitchen to get a glass of water, James even followed her in to ask if she had been using magic.
"Of course I haven't!" she said, not sure whether to be offended that he would think her a cheater or flattered that he thought she was that good.
"Well, you're awfully good, then," he said laughing and grabbing a glass from the cabinet. Lily was about to leave when he spoke again. "Your friends were thinking of having a sleepover..."
"They were now?" asked Lily. She heard Cassie's delighted cheers coming from the other room and SIrius' protests.
"Yup," continued James, "and guess who's invited?"
"Not you?" said Lily nervously.
James nodded his head. Lily thought everything over. What would a sleep over include? Pillow fights? Popcorn? Not movies, they had watched them all... Maybe spin the bottle? For a moment, Lily lost her breath. She didn't want to play spin the bottle with James and Sirius!
"Well then," said Lily, at last, "where will we all be sleeping?"
James smiled, probably glad that she hadn't turned down the idea. "Jill said that we could all sleep on the couches in your living room. We have a bunch of our pillows we could bring over from our rooms, too," he said, still smiling.
"Sounds like fun," said Lily calmly. Look who's outgoing now, Cassie.
But then Lily was reminded of the half werewolf a couple floors down. "What about Remus?" asked Lily and James' smily faded.
"I was just thinking about that, too," he said. "But I have a plan!" Lily rolled her eyes at him, but let him keep talking. "Sirius and I will just wake up at around twelve thirty and go meet Remus. He's already gone to one of the abandoned warming huts this morning."
"He's out there, sick, in the cold?!" asked Lily. Shocked. That's all she was. She had seen Remus, briefly, yesterday and he looked close to dead.
"Hold on," said James, trying to calm Lily, "don't worry. That's always what he does."
"He waits in the cold all day?" said Lily, completely flabbergasted.
"Yeah, just when we're at Hogwarts, he goes to the Shrieking Shack."
Lily thought this over. Maybe it made sense, but every part of her brain was yelling that it was wrong to let a sick boy on a mountain.
"Fine," she finally agreed and quickly walked back to the living room to join the game.
That night, the boys grabbed all the pillows in their rooms and brought them to the girls'. They did have a pillow fight, which was a lot of fun. They eventually stopped because Sirius had nearly broken an expensive looking lamp. After that, they played some more cards. It was more exciting then Lily thought it was going to be, but that was probably because she was just so good at it.
Once Lily had a fair share of poker chips, Cassie had another suggestion. Lily wasn't sure if it was much better than spin the bottle. "How about we play Truth or Dare?" Cassie asked and everyone was enthusiastic. Except Lily. She smiled, she really did, but on the inside, she was squirming like mad.
Truth or Dare... Truth or Dare... Lily thought back to every time she had actually played that game. Sometimes, she had played with Mary and some of the other Gryffindor girls, but they were much more laid back than her Muggle friends. The truths were little things like, "Who do you have a crush on?" or, "What did you really get on that last Potions paper?" And the dares weren't much to worry about, either. Mostly, they were petty, like, "Go run out in the cold without your traveling coat," or "I dare you to put a hex on that annoying third year Ravenclaw." Lily honestly didn't know what playing with Cassie, Jill, and Bess would be like. Not to mention James and Sirius.
She held her breath as they sat in a circle and Cassie looked around for her first victim. Something told Lily that Cassie wouldn't go easy on anybody.
"Sirius," said Cassie abruptly, "truth or dare?"
"Dare," said Sirius confidently. He didn't even flinch.
"I dare you to play the rest of the game with your shirt off," Cassie said with a smirk.
Before Lily could blink, Sirius ripped his shirt off and tossed it aside. Oh, Merlin, thought Lily, I did not need to see that...
"Done," said Sirius. "Me next?" Cassie nodded and Sirius turned to the others. Lily was sure that he would pick James, so he was surprised when he chose Bess.
"Alright, Bessy, truth or dare?"
"First off, please don't call me Bessy. And truth, I guess," said Bess. She looked about as nervous as Lily felt.
"Where was your first kiss?" asked Sirius. Lily thought that that was an odd question, coming from Sirius. She thought he would ask something much less personal.
Bess had turned a light pink colour. "It was in the school car park," she said, giggling.
"Not bad," said Sirius, clearly itching to tell his own story.
"What about you, mate?" asked James to Sirius. It seemed like Lily wasn't the only one who noticed Sirius' longing.
"It was the end of first year, in a broom closet." This earned some oohs from the girls.
"With who?" asked Lily, actually very curious.
"Mary MacDonald," said Sirius.
If Lily had been eating anything at the time, she would have choked. "Mary?" she asked, appalled. "You snogged Mary?!"
"Has she not told you?" asked Sirius. He was grinning at her.
"No she has not! I will have to have a word with her..." Lily wanted, very badly, to write a letter to Mary right then, but restrained herself.
They moved on, Bess picked Jill, which wasn't surprising. "Dunk your head in freezing water," Bess said after Jill picked dare.
After Jill filled up a pot and dunked her head (which, to Lily, looked awful) Lily expected to be called on next. But Jill picked James, instead.
It seemed, after that last cringe-worthy dare, that everyone was starting to find truths a bit more attractive. Even the mighty James Potter.
"Definitely truth. There's no way I'm sticking my head in anything that isn't, at least, room temperature," said James.
"Alright, then," said Jill, thinking over her question. "Here's one. Do you fancy anyone?"
"Yup," said James, with a little smile.
Lily could actually hear her own heart start to beat louder. She wished it would stop, but she was dead terrified of what James would say.
"Who is it, then?" asked Jill, not hiding her excitement. She had really perked up in her seat.
"Lily."
Everyone turned to look at her. Lily turned the colour of her hair. This was embarrassing. And sort of awkward.
But if she hated it so much, why did she have to try so hard to stop herself from smiling?
"But you knew that already, of course," said James, ruffling his hair. Lily noticed that his cheeks were a little pinkish, too.
"Yeah, I did," was all she could think to say.
Lily's friends were all staring at her with equally stupid, open-mouthed expressions. Before any of the girls could speak, though, Sirius piped up.
"Well, I'm tired. Shall we go to sleep?" he asked as he turned off the lights.
Everyone blindly made their way to their designated sleeping spots and Lily found herself rather close to James. In fact, next to him. She gulped, something that sounded much louder in the darkness, and waited for him to speak first.
"Sorry that was... awkward for you," he whispered after a moment of complete silence.
She turned over to look at him. James had taken his glasses off, which was strange. Lily couldn't remember ever seeing him without his round lenses, now that she thought about it. It was weird, but definitely not a bad kind of weird. Then she remembered that he had spoken.
"No, it's fine," she said as quietly as possible.
"I'm sure you expected it," James said. He was half smiling and Lily desperately wanted to know what was going on inside his mind.
"Sort of," she responded and she didn't look him in the eye.
They laid there for a while. Lily felt uncomfortable falling asleep, but she knew that, soon enough, James and Sirius would be out running around the mountains, chasing around a werewolf. This made it even more difficult to fall asleep.
After some time of listening to everyone else's steady breathing, Lily found herself about to drift off when the voice beside her woke her up.
"Lily?" said James. He was barely audible, but it was enough to get Lily's full attention.
"What is it?" she whispered back.
"I think we're going to leave now," he said and slowly sat up. Lily wasn't sure why, but she found herself sitting up beside him.
"Are you scared?" she asked. She knew that she was.
"Naw, we've done it before," James said. He slipped his glasses back on and straightened them out on the bridge of his nose. Lily watched him as he slowly arranged his pillows and she could sense that, despite his attempts to cover it up, he was nervous. He just wouldn't stop fiddling with his pillow.
When he was about to get up to leave, Lily grabbed his arm and pulled him back to the ground. "Please be careful," she said, trying to stall. She didn't want him to leave. She didn't want him to get hurt.
"Of course," he told her, smiling more confidently for her sake. Again, he was about to stand when he turned back to her. "You never got a truth or dare."
"Well, this is hardly the time for it," said Lily.
"Oh, come on. Truth or dare?" he asked.
Lily thought this over very carefully. If she chose truth, she would have to answer right then. If she chose dare, maybe there would be a possibility of waiting to do it in the morning.
"Dare," she finally decided.
"How about a good luck kiss, eh?" asked James, grinning.
He probably couldn't see well in the dark, but Lily rolled her eyes at him despite it. "Truth, then," she said and he laughed.
"Fine," he said and he paused to think of a question. "What is your biggest fear?"
"Right now," said Lily, "it's one of you getting hurt. What if you or Sirius get eaten by Remus?"
It was a legitimate question, but James could hardly contain his laughter. "Don't worry, he wont eat us. But wow, I never thought I'd see the day where you, Lily Evans, would ever care about my health. Was it fourth year when you told me that you hoped I would get struck by lightning during our Quidditch match?"
"That was last year, actually," she said as she chuckled. "But I was mad at you for charming legs onto all my ink bottles. They were running everywhere, remember?"
"How could I forget?"
"I was chasing them all over the Transfiguration room for the rest of class," said Lily, sighing. She had been very angry at the time, but, looking back, it seemed pretty funny.
James checked the clock and exhaled slowly. "We should go, then."
"Don't die," said Lily quickly.
"I'll try my best," said James, a smirk playing across his face.
"Promise?"
"I promise."
And with that, James left, pulling a groggy Sirius behind him, out the door. Lily had expected to stay up for possibly a few more hours, worrying about the boys, but as soon as her head hit her pillow, she was out like a light.
It was only a couple hours later, when she woke up to go to the bathroom, to find a completely empty room. Her friends were gone.
Snowflakes by The_Dream_Team
Chapter Notes: Here we are with chapter fifteen! I hope you guys like this one :)
Chapter Endnotes: Thanks so much for reading! And, yikes, another cliffhanger... the first one in a while, I think! What do you think happened to Cassie, Bess, and Jill? How about James, Sirius, and Remus? Comments are, of course, always appreciated =) Oh, and I have finals coming up very soon, so chapter sixteen may take a little longer... Sorry!