Butterfly Seasons, Chapter 1 - Fight at the Station (HP L/J)
Title: Butterfly Seasons
Author: dancinggoldfish (Laliath/Lady Irelynne)
Rating: M (R?- language, thematic elements later on)
Timeframe: MWPP
Summary: Lily Evans is a prefect who happens to have a lot on her plate: her sister's getting married to a jerk, James Potter won't leave her alone, and there are way too many rumors going around. Just one of those would be bad enough, two would be hell, but three is unimaginable torture. Good thing she's capable of holding her own, and perhaps things will turn out to not be as bad as she thinks.
Disclaimer: All recognizable characters, objects, spells, places, etc. belong to JKR. I just happen to be playing in her sandbox.
Note: Multi-chapter fic. The lovely aseret789 did a fantastic job beta-ing. Many thanks and hugs!
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6
Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12
Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | TBA
*~*~*~*~*
It was a sweltering day, even for the unusually hot summer, and newscasters all over Britain were continuing to proclaim it a day made specifically for iced lemonade- or freezing spells, depending on which part of Lily Evans’s world the newscasters inhabited. She didn’t know exactly what the wizarding reporters were saying about the heat, but she figured her imagination had a pretty good handle on it.
A freezing spell would be nice, she mused as she sat on the front step of her home and rubbed an ice cube across her forehead. Even dressed in a light cotton skirt that matched the pale blue sky above and a light yellow tank top, she was hot enough to wish that she dared perform the spell.
But she didn’t. For all that she was a witch, and privy to the often awe-inspiring power that went along with it, there were rules and regulations that governed her use of that power. Including, she thought crossly, the law about underage magic. She dug another ice cube out of the cup next to her sneakered foot to console her, after which she was perfectly happy to simply sit on the porch and watch the dried grass and dust blow away in the wind.
“-see why I have to!” her sister’s irritating whine slipped through the holes in the screened door and Lily winced. Her sister had not taken kindly to the suggestion that she accompany their parents to the train station to see Lily off; Petunia would much rather go to some cultured event with Vernon Dursley, her boyfriend who may or may not be her fiancé. “-not fair! I hate you! I hate her!”
The redhead winced again. At least she was going back to Hogwarts, she tried to reassure herself. No need to deal with Petunia for a whole year. But on the flip side, you have to deal with Potter for a whole year, some small corner of her mind whispered.
“I don’t want to think about him,” she muttered rebelliously under her breath, kicking her foot out and creating a small dust cloud that quickly drifted away. She sighed and rested her elbows on her knees. When she got to Hogwarts it would be hard to find days like this, days to just be lazy and not have a care in the world. She rose and stepped out onto the front lawn. It was brown, just like all the other lawns on the street, for the unusually hot summer had caused the Muggle government to impose water use restrictions. The dead grass crinkled under her sneakers as she walked towards the big tree in the middle of the yard and flopped down under it.
Clouds floated by, high above her head, and she smiled. I wonder what it’s like to be up so high that you feel like you’re living on a cl-
The screen door slammed, and her sister’s irate tone shattered the gentle silence that Lily had enjoyed. “Lily Evans, you come here right now!”
“Coming,” Lily called with a sigh as she slowly got to her feet and trudged towards her sister. “What do you want?”
Petunia sniffed loudly. It was a habit she’d picked up at the beginning of the summer, as if she had smelled something foul and was trying to discover what it was. When it failed to get a rise out of her little sister, the older Evans girl informed the redhead, “We’re leaving now.”
“Now? I don’t have to be at the station for another two hours!” Lily protested.
“Not my problem. I have to meet Vernon in a couple of hours, and this is the only way I can see the little princess off to her freak school and still go with him,” Petunia informed her coldly.
Standing side by side, the two sisters’ discrepancies of appearance couldn’t be more apparent. Their only common trait was their height, which they had both inherited from their father. But Lily had his bright red hair, while Petunia had received their mum’s dark brown hair, which she had always worn long, but had recently gotten chopped to her shoulders- Vernon’s wishes, she told her family. Petunia had brown eyes to Lily’s bright green ones; when she was little, she told eight-year-old Lily that she always felt like a shadow next to Lily’s sunshine. Such compliments had long since shriveled up and died over the past five years, ever since Lily received the letter inviting her to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
“Scat, brat,” Petunia’s harsh voice interrupted Lily’s thoughts. She turned away from her little sister, drew a slim white cigarette from a case in her jacket, and lit up.
“That’ll kill you, you know,” Lily offered, coming to a hesitant stop next to her.
“Why do you give a shit, freak? You’re a witch, you can fix anything you want to,” Petunia retorted, blowing a breath of smoke into the redhead’s face.
Lily coughed and waved it away, retorting, “You’re the brat, Tunie.” She hurried into the house before her sister could add anything nasty to the already disagreeable conversation.
“Are you sure you don’t need any more sweaters or teacups, dear?” Lily’s mum asked her, standing at the top of the stairs with a stack of clothing in her arms.
“I’m quite sure, Mum. Five is more than enough. What’s going on?” Lily replied, climbing up the stairs to her mother and taking the stack of red and green sweaters from her hands.
“We’re dropping you off early so Petunia can still spend time with her boyfriend, Lily. Now, be a good girl and run down to your father and tell him that we’re ready to go.” Her mother patted her on the head and wandered down the hall to the master bedroom.
The drive to the train station was beyond awkward, for no one in the car was sure of what to say to each other. Lily accepted the bare minimum of help when it came to hauling her trunk out of the boot, and then she hugged her parents goodbye, promising to write fantastically long letters about everything she did at Hogwarts. She stood in front of Petunia for a long minute, until her older sister sniffed and got back in the car with a muttered, “Bye, brat.”
“Lily! Lily! Over here, you silly girl! Turn and look at me!”
The sentence spilled out so quickly that it was impossible to discern what word was what or any meaning that could possibly be meant by the chaotic puzzle of sounds. Lily grinned widely, bidding her family a hasty goodbye before yanking her trolley and running to hug her friend.
“Meg! It’s brilliant to see you! How are you? When did you get here? Where is everyone? Oh, it’s just so wonderful to see you again!” The redhead appeared to be afflicted with the same misfortune as her friend, one that caused her words to trip over themselves as they darted out of her mouth and into the air around the two embracing girls.
“Same, same. I’m brilliant, you obviously are too. I haven’t seen anyone but you and Potter, and I just got here, and oh, you silly goose, you could have come to see me any time during the summer. I told you that!” Meg squealed a couple of times, and after she let go of her friend, she danced in the middle of the crowded train station. “It is so awesome to see you again. I can not tell you how happy I am to be out of that stupid house. It was so awful. I would have even preferred rooming with Tunie.”
Lily laughed. “Oh, no, you wouldn’t. She started smoking at the beginning of the summer, and anyone who makes her mad gets a lungful of it. And her room smells like something died in there; it’s awful.”
Meg wrinkled her nose. “Definitely not then. But I could always stay in your bathtub or something. Or are you trying to tell me you have no room in your house for your poor, depressed friend?”
The redhead laughed, swinging an easy arm about her friend’s shoulders. “I’m sure I can find a broom closet or something for you to sleep in. Would that satisfy your royal requirements?”
“I suppose, in a pinch, that would do. But I would expect you to find me better quarters right quick, ones more fitting for someone like me,” her friend retorted, trying to keep her nose in the air but failing miserably as she snorted with laughter.
“I see. What would milady prefer to view when she glances out from her bower through the window: a garden that brimeth over with color and beauty, or a stately oak that has represented the royal family ever since their founding?”
“The garden that brimeth,” Meg answered promptly. “But make sure that nothing less than silk covers the bed and that I have fresh roses every day to fill the room with their sweet, wonderful scent that puts me in the mind of my ever-dearest, wonderful-”
“What in Fate’s name are you scallywags up to?” a bright voice asked from behind them, cutting off Meg’s speech. “I can’t believe they let you out of the rubber box.”
“Rubber room,” Lily corrected with a wide grin. Her friend, Alice Crockford, was a pureblooded witch with an obsession for using Muggle terminology. Like most members of the wizarding world, she garbled the Muggle words, sometimes with very interesting results.
“What you said,” Alice waved it off, pushing her braid of light brown hair over one shoulder. “So how are you two? You didn’t come down with any sort of dastardly ills since your last letters, did you?”
Lily exchanged a look with Meg. “Well, now that you mention it, I did discover a green and purple rash between my toes, and last night I set my sheets on fire when I sneezed. Apparently, some sparks had come out of my nose. All I know is that it was a great bother, and my nose hurt something awful.”
Alice clapped a hand over her mouth in shock, reached forward and pressed her other hand to Lily’s forehead. “That sounds like dragon pox! Lily, are you sure you’re al-” She broke off as the two other girls snorted with laughter, and a flush rose in her cheeks. “That isn’t funny, Lily.”
“Oh, come on, Alice, you’ve got to admit it is,” Meg retorted. “You were acting like she was going to die. And then when you realized that Lily was joking-” She went off into whoops of laughter again.
“Oh, shut up,” Alice muttered, flushing darker. “I’m going to go to our platform, away from you babies.” She turned on her heel and started striding towards the barrier.
Lily and Meg exchanged a look, then hurried after their friend. “Sheesh, Alice, if I’d known you were going to take the news of my being illness-free so hard, I would have tried-” They went through the concrete barrier that separated not only Platforms Nine and Ten from each other, but also the Muggle world from the magical one. “-harder to come down with some awful affliction over the summer. But I’ll tell you what: the instant I see sparks come out of my nose or I start molting, you’ll be the first to know, okay?”
Alice’s lips twitched. “Shut up.”
“And if I see any sort of rash on my body, especially those in the shapes of stars or hearts, I’ll let you escort me to see Madame Pomfrey,” Meg added, nudging Alice’s shoulder with her own. “You can’t still be mad at me with an offer like that, can you?”
This time, the round-faced brunette couldn’t keep the smile from crossing her face, and she grinned at the two idiots she found herself friends with. “You lot are by far two of the most annoying people I have ever met.”
“Well, that’s good. It means you fit right in with us,” Lily teased.
“I’m really going to have to see about investing in some gag tape to shut you up,” Alice informed her friend. Then she grinned, waving her hand wildly. “Hey, Potter! Potter, get over here! Lily has something to tell you!”
“Alice Crockford, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Lily demanded, appalled. “No, no, no, please tell me I’m hallucinating.”
A group of boys approached them at that moment, James Potter several paces ahead of the others in his eagerness to hear what Lily had to say. Perhaps because they didn’t go punch drunk on love the second Lily offered to speak to them, the three other members of the quartet hung back- hoping, most likely, that they would be out of range of the blood splatter.
“You are dead meat, Crockford,” Lily hissed under her breath, not caring that Potter could hear every word that she spat.
His bright smile faltered slightly, and he hesitated for a moment before forging ahead, coming to a stop a mere foot in front of her. “You wanted to tell me something, Lily?”
“It’s Evans to you, Potter,” Lily retorted, not caring when his smile disappeared entirely. “And I have nothing to say to you.”
“Did someone spit in your coffee or something this morning, Evans?” Sirius Black retorted, stepping forward to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with his friend. “Because I didn’t know you liked picking on guys who can’t fight back.”
“Pic- defenseless?” Lily sputtered, green eyes flashing. “Huh, that’s funny coming from you, one of the biggest bullies this school has ever seen.”
“At least I’ve got you up there on that lofty cloud with me,” Sirius retorted. “Honestly, why don’t you go pick on someone who will at least defend themselves?”
Lily lost her temper at his words. Not caring about her prefect’s badge or her responsibilities, she hauled back and slugged Sirius, yelling a ferocious war cry as her fist cracked against his right cheek, just barely missing his eye. “Why don’t you go fuck off, Black?”
“What is going on here?” a loud voice demanded as the Head Boy arrived on the scene.
No one said anything, just remained frozen in position, Alice and Meg trying to hold Lily back from attacking Black, and Potter standing protectively in front of him, Lupin and Pettigrew trying to pull their friend away. Finally, Alice spoke up, “Lily and Black were having a friendly disagreement, Frank. That’s all.”
“Alice!”
“Crockford!”
The air was filled with shocked protests, and then silence as Frank Longbottom demanded, “Shut up. Friendly disagreement, Alice? Sirius has already got a bruise forming on his face.”
She nodded vigorously, refusing to make eye contact with anyone or anything but the floor.
“You’re full of shit, Crockford,” Black spat. “Evans was being a bitc-” he caught sight of the storm gathering on Frank’s face and hastened to choose a different word “-bully, and didn’t like it when I called her on it, so she threw a hissy fit and tried to kill me.”
Lily wrestled with her captors as she hissed, “Tried to kill you? Black, if I tried to kill you, you would be dead. Clear?”
“Lily, that’s not helping your case here, so shut up. And Black, try to at least be polite when you’re disagreeing with someone,” Frank interrupted. “Twenty points from Gryffindor, ten each for fighting. Lily, I want a written apology to Black, the Headmaster, and Professor McGonagall for your behavior here. You’re a prefect. You are expected to set an example, not tear them down. Are we all clear here?”
“Perfectly,” Lily grumbled, fixing both Potter and Black with a hot-tempered glare.
“Crystal,” Black added, returning her look with an obnoxiously bright smile of his own. Potter just ignored her, tugging his friends away.
Lily frowned, watched the four boys leave. Something felt off, and she wrinkled her forehead as she tried to figure out what it was.
“Lily.”
She turned to see Frank giving her a quizzical look, and she flashed him a bright grin. “What do you want, Frank?”
“For you to get along with Potter and his friends, not to pick fights with them. A Comet 250. The Malfoy fortu-”
“I get the point,” she interrupted hastily. “Is there something realistic that you want?”
“How about getting on the train and not getting into any more fights until we get to Hogwarts?” he suggested.
She stuck her tongue out at him. “Prat.”
“Brat.”
She punched him playfully in the shoulder, then darted onto the train, waggling her tongue at him before escaping.
*~*~*
Please read and review!
Author: dancinggoldfish (Laliath/Lady Irelynne)
Rating: M (R?- language, thematic elements later on)
Timeframe: MWPP
Summary: Lily Evans is a prefect who happens to have a lot on her plate: her sister's getting married to a jerk, James Potter won't leave her alone, and there are way too many rumors going around. Just one of those would be bad enough, two would be hell, but three is unimaginable torture. Good thing she's capable of holding her own, and perhaps things will turn out to not be as bad as she thinks.
Disclaimer: All recognizable characters, objects, spells, places, etc. belong to JKR. I just happen to be playing in her sandbox.
Note: Multi-chapter fic. The lovely aseret789 did a fantastic job beta-ing. Many thanks and hugs!
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6
Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12
Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | TBA
*~*~*~*~*
It was a sweltering day, even for the unusually hot summer, and newscasters all over Britain were continuing to proclaim it a day made specifically for iced lemonade- or freezing spells, depending on which part of Lily Evans’s world the newscasters inhabited. She didn’t know exactly what the wizarding reporters were saying about the heat, but she figured her imagination had a pretty good handle on it.
A freezing spell would be nice, she mused as she sat on the front step of her home and rubbed an ice cube across her forehead. Even dressed in a light cotton skirt that matched the pale blue sky above and a light yellow tank top, she was hot enough to wish that she dared perform the spell.
But she didn’t. For all that she was a witch, and privy to the often awe-inspiring power that went along with it, there were rules and regulations that governed her use of that power. Including, she thought crossly, the law about underage magic. She dug another ice cube out of the cup next to her sneakered foot to console her, after which she was perfectly happy to simply sit on the porch and watch the dried grass and dust blow away in the wind.
“-see why I have to!” her sister’s irritating whine slipped through the holes in the screened door and Lily winced. Her sister had not taken kindly to the suggestion that she accompany their parents to the train station to see Lily off; Petunia would much rather go to some cultured event with Vernon Dursley, her boyfriend who may or may not be her fiancé. “-not fair! I hate you! I hate her!”
The redhead winced again. At least she was going back to Hogwarts, she tried to reassure herself. No need to deal with Petunia for a whole year. But on the flip side, you have to deal with Potter for a whole year, some small corner of her mind whispered.
“I don’t want to think about him,” she muttered rebelliously under her breath, kicking her foot out and creating a small dust cloud that quickly drifted away. She sighed and rested her elbows on her knees. When she got to Hogwarts it would be hard to find days like this, days to just be lazy and not have a care in the world. She rose and stepped out onto the front lawn. It was brown, just like all the other lawns on the street, for the unusually hot summer had caused the Muggle government to impose water use restrictions. The dead grass crinkled under her sneakers as she walked towards the big tree in the middle of the yard and flopped down under it.
Clouds floated by, high above her head, and she smiled. I wonder what it’s like to be up so high that you feel like you’re living on a cl-
The screen door slammed, and her sister’s irate tone shattered the gentle silence that Lily had enjoyed. “Lily Evans, you come here right now!”
“Coming,” Lily called with a sigh as she slowly got to her feet and trudged towards her sister. “What do you want?”
Petunia sniffed loudly. It was a habit she’d picked up at the beginning of the summer, as if she had smelled something foul and was trying to discover what it was. When it failed to get a rise out of her little sister, the older Evans girl informed the redhead, “We’re leaving now.”
“Now? I don’t have to be at the station for another two hours!” Lily protested.
“Not my problem. I have to meet Vernon in a couple of hours, and this is the only way I can see the little princess off to her freak school and still go with him,” Petunia informed her coldly.
Standing side by side, the two sisters’ discrepancies of appearance couldn’t be more apparent. Their only common trait was their height, which they had both inherited from their father. But Lily had his bright red hair, while Petunia had received their mum’s dark brown hair, which she had always worn long, but had recently gotten chopped to her shoulders- Vernon’s wishes, she told her family. Petunia had brown eyes to Lily’s bright green ones; when she was little, she told eight-year-old Lily that she always felt like a shadow next to Lily’s sunshine. Such compliments had long since shriveled up and died over the past five years, ever since Lily received the letter inviting her to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
“Scat, brat,” Petunia’s harsh voice interrupted Lily’s thoughts. She turned away from her little sister, drew a slim white cigarette from a case in her jacket, and lit up.
“That’ll kill you, you know,” Lily offered, coming to a hesitant stop next to her.
“Why do you give a shit, freak? You’re a witch, you can fix anything you want to,” Petunia retorted, blowing a breath of smoke into the redhead’s face.
Lily coughed and waved it away, retorting, “You’re the brat, Tunie.” She hurried into the house before her sister could add anything nasty to the already disagreeable conversation.
“Are you sure you don’t need any more sweaters or teacups, dear?” Lily’s mum asked her, standing at the top of the stairs with a stack of clothing in her arms.
“I’m quite sure, Mum. Five is more than enough. What’s going on?” Lily replied, climbing up the stairs to her mother and taking the stack of red and green sweaters from her hands.
“We’re dropping you off early so Petunia can still spend time with her boyfriend, Lily. Now, be a good girl and run down to your father and tell him that we’re ready to go.” Her mother patted her on the head and wandered down the hall to the master bedroom.
The drive to the train station was beyond awkward, for no one in the car was sure of what to say to each other. Lily accepted the bare minimum of help when it came to hauling her trunk out of the boot, and then she hugged her parents goodbye, promising to write fantastically long letters about everything she did at Hogwarts. She stood in front of Petunia for a long minute, until her older sister sniffed and got back in the car with a muttered, “Bye, brat.”
“Lily! Lily! Over here, you silly girl! Turn and look at me!”
The sentence spilled out so quickly that it was impossible to discern what word was what or any meaning that could possibly be meant by the chaotic puzzle of sounds. Lily grinned widely, bidding her family a hasty goodbye before yanking her trolley and running to hug her friend.
“Meg! It’s brilliant to see you! How are you? When did you get here? Where is everyone? Oh, it’s just so wonderful to see you again!” The redhead appeared to be afflicted with the same misfortune as her friend, one that caused her words to trip over themselves as they darted out of her mouth and into the air around the two embracing girls.
“Same, same. I’m brilliant, you obviously are too. I haven’t seen anyone but you and Potter, and I just got here, and oh, you silly goose, you could have come to see me any time during the summer. I told you that!” Meg squealed a couple of times, and after she let go of her friend, she danced in the middle of the crowded train station. “It is so awesome to see you again. I can not tell you how happy I am to be out of that stupid house. It was so awful. I would have even preferred rooming with Tunie.”
Lily laughed. “Oh, no, you wouldn’t. She started smoking at the beginning of the summer, and anyone who makes her mad gets a lungful of it. And her room smells like something died in there; it’s awful.”
Meg wrinkled her nose. “Definitely not then. But I could always stay in your bathtub or something. Or are you trying to tell me you have no room in your house for your poor, depressed friend?”
The redhead laughed, swinging an easy arm about her friend’s shoulders. “I’m sure I can find a broom closet or something for you to sleep in. Would that satisfy your royal requirements?”
“I suppose, in a pinch, that would do. But I would expect you to find me better quarters right quick, ones more fitting for someone like me,” her friend retorted, trying to keep her nose in the air but failing miserably as she snorted with laughter.
“I see. What would milady prefer to view when she glances out from her bower through the window: a garden that brimeth over with color and beauty, or a stately oak that has represented the royal family ever since their founding?”
“The garden that brimeth,” Meg answered promptly. “But make sure that nothing less than silk covers the bed and that I have fresh roses every day to fill the room with their sweet, wonderful scent that puts me in the mind of my ever-dearest, wonderful-”
“What in Fate’s name are you scallywags up to?” a bright voice asked from behind them, cutting off Meg’s speech. “I can’t believe they let you out of the rubber box.”
“Rubber room,” Lily corrected with a wide grin. Her friend, Alice Crockford, was a pureblooded witch with an obsession for using Muggle terminology. Like most members of the wizarding world, she garbled the Muggle words, sometimes with very interesting results.
“What you said,” Alice waved it off, pushing her braid of light brown hair over one shoulder. “So how are you two? You didn’t come down with any sort of dastardly ills since your last letters, did you?”
Lily exchanged a look with Meg. “Well, now that you mention it, I did discover a green and purple rash between my toes, and last night I set my sheets on fire when I sneezed. Apparently, some sparks had come out of my nose. All I know is that it was a great bother, and my nose hurt something awful.”
Alice clapped a hand over her mouth in shock, reached forward and pressed her other hand to Lily’s forehead. “That sounds like dragon pox! Lily, are you sure you’re al-” She broke off as the two other girls snorted with laughter, and a flush rose in her cheeks. “That isn’t funny, Lily.”
“Oh, come on, Alice, you’ve got to admit it is,” Meg retorted. “You were acting like she was going to die. And then when you realized that Lily was joking-” She went off into whoops of laughter again.
“Oh, shut up,” Alice muttered, flushing darker. “I’m going to go to our platform, away from you babies.” She turned on her heel and started striding towards the barrier.
Lily and Meg exchanged a look, then hurried after their friend. “Sheesh, Alice, if I’d known you were going to take the news of my being illness-free so hard, I would have tried-” They went through the concrete barrier that separated not only Platforms Nine and Ten from each other, but also the Muggle world from the magical one. “-harder to come down with some awful affliction over the summer. But I’ll tell you what: the instant I see sparks come out of my nose or I start molting, you’ll be the first to know, okay?”
Alice’s lips twitched. “Shut up.”
“And if I see any sort of rash on my body, especially those in the shapes of stars or hearts, I’ll let you escort me to see Madame Pomfrey,” Meg added, nudging Alice’s shoulder with her own. “You can’t still be mad at me with an offer like that, can you?”
This time, the round-faced brunette couldn’t keep the smile from crossing her face, and she grinned at the two idiots she found herself friends with. “You lot are by far two of the most annoying people I have ever met.”
“Well, that’s good. It means you fit right in with us,” Lily teased.
“I’m really going to have to see about investing in some gag tape to shut you up,” Alice informed her friend. Then she grinned, waving her hand wildly. “Hey, Potter! Potter, get over here! Lily has something to tell you!”
“Alice Crockford, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Lily demanded, appalled. “No, no, no, please tell me I’m hallucinating.”
A group of boys approached them at that moment, James Potter several paces ahead of the others in his eagerness to hear what Lily had to say. Perhaps because they didn’t go punch drunk on love the second Lily offered to speak to them, the three other members of the quartet hung back- hoping, most likely, that they would be out of range of the blood splatter.
“You are dead meat, Crockford,” Lily hissed under her breath, not caring that Potter could hear every word that she spat.
His bright smile faltered slightly, and he hesitated for a moment before forging ahead, coming to a stop a mere foot in front of her. “You wanted to tell me something, Lily?”
“It’s Evans to you, Potter,” Lily retorted, not caring when his smile disappeared entirely. “And I have nothing to say to you.”
“Did someone spit in your coffee or something this morning, Evans?” Sirius Black retorted, stepping forward to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with his friend. “Because I didn’t know you liked picking on guys who can’t fight back.”
“Pic- defenseless?” Lily sputtered, green eyes flashing. “Huh, that’s funny coming from you, one of the biggest bullies this school has ever seen.”
“At least I’ve got you up there on that lofty cloud with me,” Sirius retorted. “Honestly, why don’t you go pick on someone who will at least defend themselves?”
Lily lost her temper at his words. Not caring about her prefect’s badge or her responsibilities, she hauled back and slugged Sirius, yelling a ferocious war cry as her fist cracked against his right cheek, just barely missing his eye. “Why don’t you go fuck off, Black?”
“What is going on here?” a loud voice demanded as the Head Boy arrived on the scene.
No one said anything, just remained frozen in position, Alice and Meg trying to hold Lily back from attacking Black, and Potter standing protectively in front of him, Lupin and Pettigrew trying to pull their friend away. Finally, Alice spoke up, “Lily and Black were having a friendly disagreement, Frank. That’s all.”
“Alice!”
“Crockford!”
The air was filled with shocked protests, and then silence as Frank Longbottom demanded, “Shut up. Friendly disagreement, Alice? Sirius has already got a bruise forming on his face.”
She nodded vigorously, refusing to make eye contact with anyone or anything but the floor.
“You’re full of shit, Crockford,” Black spat. “Evans was being a bitc-” he caught sight of the storm gathering on Frank’s face and hastened to choose a different word “-bully, and didn’t like it when I called her on it, so she threw a hissy fit and tried to kill me.”
Lily wrestled with her captors as she hissed, “Tried to kill you? Black, if I tried to kill you, you would be dead. Clear?”
“Lily, that’s not helping your case here, so shut up. And Black, try to at least be polite when you’re disagreeing with someone,” Frank interrupted. “Twenty points from Gryffindor, ten each for fighting. Lily, I want a written apology to Black, the Headmaster, and Professor McGonagall for your behavior here. You’re a prefect. You are expected to set an example, not tear them down. Are we all clear here?”
“Perfectly,” Lily grumbled, fixing both Potter and Black with a hot-tempered glare.
“Crystal,” Black added, returning her look with an obnoxiously bright smile of his own. Potter just ignored her, tugging his friends away.
Lily frowned, watched the four boys leave. Something felt off, and she wrinkled her forehead as she tried to figure out what it was.
“Lily.”
She turned to see Frank giving her a quizzical look, and she flashed him a bright grin. “What do you want, Frank?”
“For you to get along with Potter and his friends, not to pick fights with them. A Comet 250. The Malfoy fortu-”
“I get the point,” she interrupted hastily. “Is there something realistic that you want?”
“How about getting on the train and not getting into any more fights until we get to Hogwarts?” he suggested.
She stuck her tongue out at him. “Prat.”
“Brat.”
She punched him playfully in the shoulder, then darted onto the train, waggling her tongue at him before escaping.
*~*~*
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