The Next Great Adventure (A Marauders Fan Fic)

Chapter Thirty Two

Chapter Thirty Two

The train pulled into the station and Lily felt the strange feeling in the pit of her stomach vanish, to be replaced with anticipation. Every summer she spent half of the train journey already missing Hogwarts and her friends had become used to the bereft feeling that they experienced as the Hogwarts Express pulled out of Hogsmeade Station; the other half of the journey was spent ignoring that sadness by talking as much as possible, avoiding the various Filibuster fireworks and hexes which were being flung from carriage to carriage and just generally existing in a state of excitement for the summer ahead.

The four girls hauled their trunks off the train, grabbed their menagerie of animals and leapt onto the platform. Various cries of 'Have a wonderful summer!' were echoing over the noisy crowd and everywhere she looked Lily could see friends grabbing each other for last minute hugs; the prospect of the summer holidays made them all over-affectionate and it was difficult to move more than ten metres without being seized by someone and told that they'd be missed. Lily felt her heart squeeze in happiness and an enormous smile split her face; not even the prospect of dealing with Petunia could extinguish her joy at being home.

"Cassie darling!" she heard Archie and Jasmine cry as they spotted their daughter and made a beeline for her. "Oh it's so wonderful to see you girls!" they beamed as they caught Cassie in iron hugs.

"Can't breathe Mum," she mumbled from under Jasmine's hair and arms.

Alice grabbed each of her friends quickly and squeezed them. "Just seen my Mum and Frank; got to go! I'll see you all sometime over the summer yeah?" She ran off, her trunk trailing behind her and knocking people out of the way. Lily and Mary, after chatting to the Joneses for a couple of minutes and hugging Cassie, headed away from the train to find their parents. Moments later Mary said goodbye to Lily and vanished into the crowd. As she was heading over to where she had spotted her parents standing she heard a voice behind her say, "All alone Evans?"

"Just finding my parents," she replied as she tried to push through the crowd. James grabbed one of the handles on her trunk and took it off her, striding in front of her and easily parting the people they came across. "You really don't have to do that," she said as she half-heartedly tried to tug her trunk back.

"Didn't your mother ever teach you to be grateful when people help you?" he joked as he refused to relinquish it. Lily gave up and settled for walking beside him; her trunk was extremely heavy and she was quite glad he had appeared to help her. As if he knew exactly what she was thinking he continued, "I have to say though Lil; I have no idea what you have in here. Are you taking the whole of the library back with you? This thing is bloody heavy."

"I have a lot of stuff," she replied as they reached her parents and he deposited it at her feet.

"Yeah, I know. I just carried it across the platform," James chuckled before spreading his arms slightly as if he was considering hugging her; without thinking Lily stepped forwards and embraced him, wrapping her arms around his waist. "Thanks James. Have a great summer."

His arms settled around her for a moment and he replied, "You too Lily." With that he let go of her, greeted her parents quickly before making his excuses and disappearing to 'Make sure that Sirius doesn't make too much trouble and that he brings home his trunk and not someone else's.'

"Who was that Lily?" her mother asked as they left the station. "He was... nice." Her husband chuckled at her understatement; the boy Lily had brought with her was more than nice, he knew his wife and he knew when she thought someone was handsome; Lily's friend most certainly qualified for that.

"Nobody," Lily replied as John hauled her trunk onto a trolley and they headed out through the barrier to King's Cross and back to the Muggle world, "he's just a boy in my house at school."