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Say It Again


“I doubt Care of Magical Creatures will ever be impressive again,” bemoaned Remus as they walked back across the grounds toward the castle from Professor Kettleburn’s lecture. He stared at his notes, the list of creatures Kettleburn had tried to impress them all with the promise off and all Remus could think of was how none of the things he was describing could hold a candle to the Charkorais birds. He missed Burt and Ernie.

Peter shook his head, jealously, “I still can’t believe you got to see all that with Mr. Scamander. I’d love to do something so adventurous as all of that!”

“Makes real life boring, though,” complained Remus.

“Says the werewolf,” muttered Sirius, smirking and slipped his hand through Remus’s, knotting their fingers together.

Remus smiled.

“Yeahh,” James laughed, “I dunno if your life’s ever been boring, mate,” he said.

“And if it was, I don’t reckon it will be again now you’ve us in it,” Peter said, waving at himself, James, and Sirius with a smirk.

Remus felt warm and furry all over - and not in a full moon sort of way.

Lily suddenly broke between James and Remus and stepped before James, walking backwards, looking up at him, hugging her school books. “Potter,” she said, her tone all business-like, “I’ve got a matter to raise with you… On the topic of the flying training sessions for the firsties. Might I borrow you a moment?”

James said, “I’m listening.” Remus’s grip tightened ‘round Sisus’s fingers and he pulled Sirius on ahead and Peter followed as James came to a stop to talk to Lily Evans. “What do you want?”

Lily replied, “Well, Madam Hooch says she can’t do our original Saturday afternoon time, soI’ve got to book the pitch for us for alternates - I’ve got two options… Thursday afternoons or Saturday mornings. Which’ll be better for you?”

“Saturday morning? Are you mental? Saturday morning doesn’t exist. Saturday mornings are for having lie-ins, not dealing with teaching the little seagulls to fly.”

“The little seagulls?” Lily asked, looking amused but perplexed as she stared up at him.

“Sure,” James said, “They never shut up, do they, that lot? And all those whiny little squeaky voices of theirs…”

“You were squeaky and whiny once,” Lily pointed out.

“Squeaky, sure, but I’ve never been whiny… have I?” he whined the words.

Lily laughed.

James looked wholly surprised and a smile trembled across his lips, hanging up on his tooth as it did, and he wished he had something else witty to say, something else to keep LIly Evans laughing… He’d expected a bugger off Potter as a reply to that, but she was actually laughing at a joke he’d told! His heart had doubled it’s thumping in his chest and just stood there grinning like an idiot at her, his brain racing to think of something great to say… until he realized he didn’t have anything and blimey grinning at her like this is getting awkward isn’t it? and he looked down, a slight flush rising over his nose.

Lily stared at him… and there were a lot of funny thoughts going about her own head… like James Potter just made a self deprecating joke. He didn’t say something prideful! She’d expected him to answer the squeaky and whiny comment with something about her having noticed it and make some joke about her liking him (never, Potter, she had had the answer ready to go)... but no. Instead, this incredibly egotistical boy had made fun of himself. Then blushed. James Potter -- blushing! What in the world? Lily couldn’t help but stair because suddenly standing before her was no longer James Potter, the most annoying boy in the school, but this… boy… this boy that suddenly seemed incredibly insecure as he stared down at his trainers, his mouth moving helplessly, forming words to sentences he couldn’t quite spit out.

Was James Potter’s egotistical act just that? An act?

Lily tilted her head.

He looked up. “So, flying lessons.”

“Yes,” she said. She’d been holding her breath, she realized, so that the word came out… breathless… and sort of quivery. She drew in a deep one. “Thursday evening. See you then.”

“Well. I’ll see you before then,” James said. “Loads of times. We have to be together. In classes. We have classes together. I mean. There’s… eating. Loads of eating. Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. We have those together, too. Apart. But together. You and I.”

Lily laughed. “Potter, you’re not --”

“Hey there are the faggots!” came a voice suddenly, yelling across the grounds and they both looked up to see Walden McNair and a couple other seventh year Slytherin boys, pointing and laughing in the direction of Sirius and Remus, whose hands were still entwined - but otherwise just walking and talking, minding their own business, Peter running after them.

James pulled his wand.

But not before Lily had.

Lily shoved James aside, “WALDEN MCNAIR! There will be no name calling on the grounds of Hogwarts. We do not tolerate bullying! Detention, tomorrow night.”

Walden looked at Lily with a wide grin of amusement, his face trembling with unshed laughter. The boys around him laughed even harder. “Ain’t that the Mudblood Snape fancies?” one of them hooted, pointing.

“Figures the filthy Mudblood would stick up for a couple faggots. Fitting!” snorted another.

“Don’t call me that. And detention for both of you, too - Avery, Carrow,” Lily said, pointing at them each in turn - without thinking, with her wand hand.

“Oi. Aimin’ yer wand at a pureblood, threatenin’ us, are you, you little Mudblood Bitch?” demanded McNair.

“I wasn’t threatening you, I was --” Lily started, but James cut in front of her.

He had his arm raised, “Go on. Say it again,” he snarled, getting right into Walden McNair’s face, his wand pressed to the older boy’s throat. McNair was older, sure, but he was of a frailer form than James Potter, his shoulders narrow and a good deal skinnier. James had an athletic build and broad shoulders - muscular arms from years of Quidditch training and broom handling - and he easily towered McNair’s short height. “I bloody dare you to call her that again.”

Germaine Avery had seen James transfigure Evan Rosier just the day before, of course, and he wasn’t about to end up a cockroach himself, so he turned tail and Amycus Carrow went with him. “Your bleedin’ little coward wingmen just left you here to suffer the consequences of your big stupid mouths,” James snarled, “You have anything you wanna say to Lily Evans?”

Lily stared, wide eyed.

Walden McNair stared up at James, his lips twisted into a snarl. “Sorry.” But he said it in the least sorry voice he could possibly have done.

James backed off, lowering his wand from McNair’s throat, but not lowering it completely. “Now get the hell away from her. Leave her and my friends alone. I hear you say another word about either of ‘em and you’ll actually be sorry.”

Walden McNair rubbed the spot where James’s wand had pressed into his neck, glaring at James. “Watch your back, Potter. You’re a marked man.” He turned and walked away.

James watched him go.

Lily Evans did, too. Her jaw set firmly until he’d gone ‘round the corner and through the gates by the Green Houses. Then she looked up at James.

He stowed his wand in his pocket. “Are you alright, then?” he asked, concerned.

Lily nodded.

“Very well.” He looked up at the sky, which was turning grey as clouds rolled across the sky. “Let’s get inside, seems like it’s about to rain...”

She nodded again.

They turned and rushed across the grounds, and were nearly ot the steps of the school when the rain started, thick and instant, and Lily shrieked and James, being a gentleman, hastened to pull his wand from his pocket and said, “Guardichuva,” and the tip of his wand exploded into a big black umbrella that he held out at arm’s length so that she was covered, leaving his own head exposed and getting soaked so that by the time they go to the Great Hall, she was dry, but his own hair hung in strings and clumps on his head as rain fell across his forehead in great rivers and his glasses were fogged up. He shook his wand-umbrella out, soaking the floor.. “Well, Filch ought to be right pissed over that,” he laughed, “Finite,” he said and the umbrella collapsed and disappeared.

Lily stared at the wand, “That was really good magic. What was the spell again?”

“Guardichuva,” James said.

“I’ll have to remember that one.”

James answered, “Right handy.”

He took his glasses frames off and squinted at them, wiping them with his oxford shirt tails that were sticking out beneath his Gryffindor sweater vest. He put them back on, able to see again, and smiled at Lily again - again with the tooth. He opened his mouth to say something, then stopped. His eyes had travelled over her shoulder into the Great Hall… where the Hufflepuff house table was… and Maryrose was there, just a few seats along, talking to her friends, her hair brilliant jade. He looked back at Lily. “Well,” he said, “It was nice conquering the bad guys with you.” He winked at her.

She had a sudden flashback of her very first day at Hogwarts… sitting at the Gryffindor table beside Remus Lupin… James sitting on the stool at the front of the room, about to have the Sorting Hat dropped upon his head… He’d grinned like this and winked then, too, and she felt a shiver go down her spine.

“See you about then, Evans,” James said, and he stepped around her… going into the Great Hall, still all dripping wet, wringing out his robes as he walked over to the Hufflepuff table and nudged Maryrose, who smiled and turned about on the Hufflepuff bench. Lily watched as Maryrose laughed and ran her hands over his messy, wet hair, and her mouth moved as she commented on it, shrieking playfully as he shook his head like a dog to spray her with the rain droplets…

Lily’s heart ached. Though she didn’t know why. She couldn’t understand what about it made her want to cry.

“Are you okay?”

She turned. “Severus, hello. Yes, I’m okay.”

“You’re sure?” he asked, concern in his voice. Severus Snape had just come up from the dungeons, he stood there, holding the edges of his cloak, arms crossed over himself, looking a bit like a resting bat. He stared at her.

Lily nodded, “Absolutely.”

“You look like you’re crying.”

“Raining outside, that’s all. Something in my eye.” She shook her head.

Severus nodded slowly.

“How have you been, Sev?” she asked, “I - I didn’t see you at all this summer. I walked down by our pond but --”

“I wasn’t at home much. Not allowed to stay by myself.” His voice was cold.

Lily flushed. She’d forgotten. How, she didn’t know. But she had. Of course Snape wouldn’t have been staying alone at Spinner’s End, not now that his mum had died. She felt horribly embarrassed. “Where were you staying?” she asked, trying to be friendly despite the chill to his voice that had suddenly risen up.

“The Malfoy’s,” he answered, his voice thawing out.

“Oh,” Lily tried to think of something to say. “Is… is it nice there?”

“It’s… alright.” Severus shrugged.

“Hey. Snape.” They both looked up to see Germaine Avery had arrived, coming from down the hallway with Walden McNair and Amycus Carrow, who both gave Lily a wide berth as they passed, ducking into the Great Hall to the Slytherin table. Avery was motioning for Severus to join them.

Severus nodded, then glanced at Lily. “See you about?” he asked hopefully, “Soon, perhaps?”

“Yeah. About.” Lily nodded and watched as he turned to follow Avery… glancing back over his shoulder as he went into the Great Hall.

Lily looked back to see James - but he’d gone, him and Maryrose both were gone.

Lily suddenly didn’t feel very hungry for dinner at all, and she turned and went upstairs to go to her dormitory instead.