Lily Evans hadn’t gotten a wink’s worth of sleep in over a week, and no one was more frustrated about that than her - except maybe her best friend Alice Bristow, who was currently nodding off in bed next to a chattering and seemingly wide awake Lily, her straight light brown hair falling gently in her face as her chin bobbed against her chest.
“I just don’t understand why I can’t sleep anymore! I’ve never had this problem before. Normally at about ten or eleven o’ clock, I am so tired, I could sleep through about anything,” Lily was saying as the two girls were sitting propped up against the pillows on Lily’s bed.
“Lily?” The muffled and groggy voice of Aimee Holcombe came wafting from the bed next to Lily’s.
“Yes?”
“It’s one in the morning. Shut up.”
Lily frowned and turned to Alice for support only to find her best friend fast asleep on her shoulder. Sighing, she realized she would have to accept defeat.
“Sorry, Aimee,” Lily said, “I just…can’t fall asleep. Again.”
“Try,” Aimee suggested. “Or I’m going to use that new spell we learned in Defense Against the Dark Arts against you.”
“Yeah, Lils, I love you but I’m so tired,” Alice said, blinking through her haze and removing herself gently from Lily’s shoulder. “I’m going to bed. Try to figure out what’s been keeping you from sleeping and then maybe you can fix it.”
“Okay,” Lily agreed reluctantly, allowing Alice to slip out from under the covers and head back to her own four-poster bed. “Thanks for trying to stay up with me.”
Alice murmured something unintelligible and flopped down on her sheets without even changing into her nightclothes. A few moments later, Lily distinctly heard the telltale signs of Alice’s light snores.
“Oh this just gets better and better,” Aimee groaned again, and Lily saw her begrudgingly remove the pillow from under her brilliantly blond head and cover her ears with it.
Glancing up at the ceiling above her head, Lily fanned out her red hair over her pillow and placed her hands on her stomach, breathing in and out to the rhythm of Alice’s snores and feeling her hands rise and fall with her chest.
She had been trying for five consecutive days to figure out why she was having such enormous insomnia issues, but to no avail. No matter how much she tried to wrack her brains for an answer, Lily could think of no reason.
And then almost immediately, Lily felt like smacking herself. She knew exactly why she couldn’t sleep, but she was simply refusing to let herself see it. She would not harp on it, would not think about it, would not even give it a second thought. The idea was absolutely ridiculous to feel guilty about something like this. And yet…
Lily felt her eyelids grow heavy as sleep finally welcomed itself. Taking a deep breath, Lily felt a slight smile spread across her features, and she turned over on her side to snuggle deeper under her plush covers. As her eyelids fluttered over her eyes teasingly, Lily slowly felt herself slip into subconscious. A curious scene appeared before her dark eyelids “ one she had caught herself reminiscing about ever since she had first lost her best friend.
“I don’t want to talk about her,” a young Lily Evans said uncomfortably, scuffing her shoe absently against the stone of the castle. “She’s still mad at me.”
“You didn’t do anything,” Severus Snape assured her, his dark eyes earnest. “She was the one who was being -”
“Don’t,” Lily said, screwing her eyes shut and holding up her hand in protest. “I don’t want to hear it. Let’s just talk about something else.”
A chorus of laughter reached their ears, and Lily and Severus turned around to see a group of four boys cantering towards the castle. Lily’s brilliant green eyes narrowed in dislike as she recognized two of them from the train at the beginning of the year. Severus turned to see whom Lily was glaring at, and his expression hardened.
“Hey, Evans,” the black-haired one with glasses said happily as they passed. “How are you?”
“Peachy,” Lily spat, as she flipped her fiery red hair over her shoulder and turned her back on him. The boy named James Potter looked surprised.
“You’re not still mad at us, are you?” the dark-haired boy next to him asked. Lily turned around and folded her arms across her chest.
“Yes, I am,” she confirmed for the boy she remembered as Sirius Black.
“Why?” James asked, his hazel eyes round in innocence. Lily eyed him with distaste.
“You two were bullies,” she reminded them coldly. She turned to the greasy-haired boy next to her. “Come on, Severus, let’s go.”
“You’d rather hang out with that slimeball?” Black yelped, as the mousy kid behind him started sniggering.
“He’s my friend,” Lily said proudly over her shoulder as she and Severus walked away. A couple yards away, Severus turned to Lily hesitantly.
“We’re friends?” he asked quietly. Lily turned to him, her green eyes sparkling. She smiled.
“Aren’t we?” she wondered. Severus look troubled, and Lily’s smile faded. “Fine,” Lily snapped as she began to walk away. “We’re not. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go do my Charms -”
“No, no,” Severus suddenly yelled, running after her, his robes flying out behind him. “We are. We are friends! Sorry, I just…” Snape panted as he tried to catch his breath. “We are.”
Lily woke up the next morning with tears in her eyes, and she wasn’t able to shake the feeling for the rest of the day. She wasn’t able to concentrate in any of her courses, which was unfortunate, as Lily couldn’t afford to do any worse in her Transfiguration class. By the time she met up with James for their evening rounds, Lily was feeling positively miserable. Her bubbling substance had exploded in Professor Slughorn’s face during Potions, she had transformed her raven into an even angrier raven in Transfiguration, and she had successfully fallen over her feet in Charms…three consecutive times.
Even Alice looked worried when she said her goodbyes to Lily and walked back in the direction of the Gryffindor common room. She exchanged a significant look with James that seemed to portray her wishes of good luck and then scurried away as fast as she could. That she didn’t even take a second look back confirmed Lily’s assumption that Alice was a little overwhelmed by her friend’s lack of grace that day. Lily couldn’t blame her. She had accidentally spilled some of the bubbling substance on her in Potions, set her robes on fire in Transfiguration, and repeatedly stepped on her toes in Charms. Lily would have felt downright horrible about it all if she hadn’t still been so obsessed with her dream the previous night.
“Are you okay?” James asked casually after they had been walking in silence for a few minutes. “You’re unusually quiet.”
“I’m okay,” Lily echoed softly, her eyes looking vaguely into the distance.
“Regretting our decision to walk these nights together?” James asked, slipping his hands into his pockets. “We could always go back to our other arrangement. McGonagall probably wouldn’t be happy, but -”
“No, that’s not it,” Lily interrupted. “I’m just distracted.”
James glanced at Lily’s disconnected expression and just nodded in response. His friendship with Lily, if he could even call it that, was still relatively new “ new enough that he had no right to pry into her personal life. Still, even he could tell that something was on her mind, but for her sake he pretended not to notice when she snuck a peek in his direction.
“Stop it! Stop it, you two,” Lily said firmly as she rushed forward and pulled the two bodies apart. Turning to a flushed Severus, Lily struggled to keep him from leaping onto the man in front of him.
“What are you doing?” she demanded. Snape’s black eyes still held fire as he panted, readjusting his robes and grabbing one of the hallway walls for support. His eyes were fixed on someone behind Lily, and she looked back to find James Potter readjusting his robes as well, his hair tousled gently and a pile of girls giggling and pointing right behind him. He was holding Severus’ gaze dangerously.
“You,” Lily snapped angrily. “I should have known.”
James looked at Lily and raised his eyebrows.
“For your information, this prick started it,” James said, and Lily felt Snape try to leap over Lily with a roar to get to James.
“No,” Lily yelled, pushing Severus away again. “Stop it, Sev. He’s not worth it.”
“Sev?” Black mocked, appearing behind James and smirking.
“I have a nickname for him as well,” the mousy haired boy said, appearing on the other side of James.
“What’s that?” Sirius asked, his eyes alight in excitement.
“Snivellus,” Peter scoffed. Around her, Lily heard titters of laughter. She glared at everyone surrounding them and then walked over to Severus, who was brushing the hair out of his eyes.
“Let’s go,” she said, pushing him away and following Severus out of the crowd into a relatively empty hallway. When she was quite sure they were alone, she asked, “What were you thinking, Sev?”
“He was making fun of me,” Severus said weakly, looking furious.
“Of course he was,” Lily said, rolling her eyes, “he’s James Potter. He has to find entertainment in the most degrading ways, but that doesn’t mean you should stoop that low, too!”
“He disgusts me,” Severus spat.
“But you still can’t just go around picking fights in the halls! You can’t afford to get another detention!”
“I know,” Severus grumbled, sparks flying out of his dangerously dark eyes. “As long as he stays away from me, I’ll be fine.”
“Evans?”
Lily blinked quickly and looked around at her surroundings. She was sitting on the ground, slumped against a cold stonewall in a position she could only assume she had fallen asleep in. Reaching up, she realized her hair was a complete mess.
“Have a nice nap?” James asked from beside her. He was leaning against the wall, twirling his wand in his hand. Lily blinked at him foggily. “You fell asleep.”
“Sorry,” Lily said, sitting up straighter and pulling her hair out from her hair band so she could comb her fingers through it. “I haven’t been getting much sleep lately.”
“Why?” James asked, absently watching her for a second before realizing what he was doing and facing forward again. He cleared his throat and ran one hand through his own perfectly-tousled hair.
“If only I knew,” Lily said quietly. She finished her hair and turned to look at James. “What time is it?”
“Our shift’s almost over,” he assured her. He glanced back at her and noticed she looked tired. “You have bags under your eyes.”
“That’s what happens when you don’t get much sleep, Potter,” Lily snapped before she could help herself.
James paused. “And looks like we’re back.”
“What?”
“You‘re treating me like some sort of idiot again,” James said, wearing an expression that resembled Alice when she was handing Lily off to him. Lily just stared up at him and then quickly followed his lead and stood up.
“No, sorry,” she said, disappointed in herself for letting the memories of her past dictate the way she treated the man before her. He had changed, Lily reminded herself sternly. The evidence was right in front of her eyes. “There’s been so much on my mind lately, I’m just snapping at everything.”
James just nodded, unsure if he wanted to try and attempt any deeper conversation. With the lines of their relationship so blurred these days, he still wasn’t sure what was appropriate and what wasn’t.
“I’ve been there,” James said finally, “especially recently. Quidditch really calms me down.”
“I haven’t found anything that has helped yet,” Lily admitted. “Studying and homework normally do, but lately…they just seems to make it worse.”
“Maybe you should try Quidditch,” James joked with a grin. Even Lily couldn’t hold back a laugh as the two of them began to walk back towards the common room.
“That’d be a great distraction,” Lily said, rolling her eyes, “but only because I’d spend more time worrying about my broken limbs than anything else.”
“Can’t say it wouldn’t be effective, though,” James said. Lily caught herself doing a double take as she smiled at this response. Something about the way James had flashed his smile had made Lily forget for a moment what they were talking about. She struggled to stay involved in the current conversation. “I was actually speaking more in an audience kind of way,” James was saying. He glanced at her again with a slight sparkle in his eye this time.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you’re welcome to sit in on any Quidditch practices,” James said, shrugging as he tried to keep the invitation neutral. “I know that sounds stupid, but Alice sometimes comes to watch and it would probably take your mind off whatever it is that’s bothering you.”
“Wait,” Lily said, returning from her reverie, “Alice? Alice Bristow?”
“Yeah.”
“You let Alice Bristow watch your practices?”
“Yeah, Gryffindors are always allowed to watch,” James said, shrugging. “She normally makes a few appearances before our game days.”
“Oh Potter,” Lily said, laughing to herself as she lightly rested her forehead in the palm of her hand for a few seconds. “You do know who Alice is dating, don’t you?”
“Er, no,” James responded as they approached the Fat Lady. “I didn’t know she was seeing anyone.”
“She’s dating Frank,” Lily said, looking up at James and gauging his reaction. There was a slight twinkle in her eye. James just blinked, frowning in confusion.
“Frank Longbottom,” Lily clarified, and just as she had suspected, James face turned shockingly pale. He gaped at her, his hazel eyes wide and a look of absolute self-loathing spreading across his features.
“Frank Longbottom?” he asked, freezing in his tracks and lifting both of his hands to the sides of his head. Lily nodded, muffling what would have been an extremely girly laugh.
“Bloody hell,” James erupted, throwing his head back and letting out a roar of frustration. “The captain of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team? No wonder they beat us every game last year!”
“Well why did you think she was coming to watch you practice?” Lily asked as her eyebrows floated toward her hairline. “Oh, and ‘Remus is dung’.”
The Fat Lady swung forward obligingly albeit with a roll of her eyes, and Lily and James walked into the common room still engrossed in their current conversation.
“I was under the apparently misguided conception that she was trying to give support to Leela!” James said, looking suddenly like he wanted to smash a Bludger at someone. Lily couldn’t help but be amused at James’ horrorstruck response, but was also anxious to cash in on the sleep she had discovered she was battling during her evening walk. Lily headed toward the Girls Dormitories and waved goodbye to her fellow Head Boy.
“Well now you know,” she said. Her gaze lingered on the empty common room, realizing it was so late that they were probably the only Gryffindors still up. “Goodnight, Potter.”
“Night, Evans,” James responded absently, still shaking his head over the new information he had received. His eyes followed Lily’s tiny figure up the staircase before he pulled his gaze away and focused on his own trip up his own set of stairs. As he climbed towards his dormitory, he couldn’t help but vaguely remember how she looked when she had smiled over her shoulder to wave goodnight.
“I like Lily Evans,” a much younger James had once declared in the dormitory room. “There’s something about her.”
“Yes there is. She’s rude,” Sirius offered, screwing up his nose.
“She knows what she wants,” James said, shrugging.
“She’s eleven.”
“So?” James said defiantly, crossing his arms. “I think she likes me, too.”
Sirius’ eyes narrowed. “What would make you think that?”
“She was staring at me today,” James said importantly, strutting around the dormitory room with his chest held high.
“Was she sending you a death wish?” Sirius asked, and Peter guffawed as he smacked Sirius on the shoulder in appreciation. James looked over and glared at Peter through narrowed eyes, which promptly shut him up. Sirius laughed and clapped Peter on the back.
“Funny,” James snapped. “Real witty. You’ll see. I’ll have her eating out of the palm of my hand.”
“I’ll bet you an entire Galleon that doesn’t happen,” Sirius said, rolling his eyes.
“You don’t even have a Galleon,” James pointed out.
“Of course I do,” Sirius said, looking offended. “Clearly you know nothing about the noble house of Black.”
“Clearly,” Peter said importantly. James once again shot him a look.
“You’ll see,” he just repeated. “I’ll get Evans to fall for me.”
“You know,” Remus Lupin said quietly from his bed, looking up from Hogwarts, A History. “She’s actually quite nice...”