Lily tried to act casual in response. "I don't like it," she fibbed. Nicole found this hard to believe; the knife was beautiful in decoration. "It's too fancy!" she said, reading Nicole's thoughts.
"It looks really expensive."
"Yeah…" Lily agreed, admiring the knife from afar.
"I can't have it," Nicole decided, sliding the knife down the desk in front of Lily again. "If you hadn't noticed already, your initial 'L' is on the handle." She tapped it. "Mine's 'N', remember?"
Lily was desperate by now. "So? There's an 'L' in your name!" she said lamely. Holding out the knife for Nicole to receive, she said, "Take it."
Her eyes wandered uneasily from the potions knife to Lily's face. "I don't think-"
"Just take it," Lily pleaded.
Nicole was a little apprehensive, but if taking the knife would calm her friend down then she would do it. She grasped the end of the knife, expecting Lily to let go of it.
She didn't.
"Lily?" Nicole gave a tug on her side of the knife, watching her friend's eyes gaze on the instrument while her grip was unusually tight around her end of it. "If you're going to give it to me, you're going to have to let go."
It was a few seconds until Lily got out of her trance by shaking her head, and released the knife quickly, stumbling back. "Sorry," she apologized, reddening. Her actions made it seem as if she had wanted to keep the Prince's present…
"You'd tell me if something was, you know, going on?" Nicole asked, after a few minutes of uncomfortable silence.
On the rules of friendship, it was only compulsory for Lily to answer with a yes.
Somehow she found herself answering, "It depends what it was."
Nicole looked a little hurt but accepted her answer. "You'd at least tell James wouldn't you?" she asked hopefully.
Lily decided a yes was expected here, enough to calm her friend's worry. "Of course," she said, feigning a smile.
"My orange peel!"
Lily rolled her eyes at such a pet name. James was extremely cheerful after sharing a bed with her last night and had now adopted a new phase of nicknaming Lily after any being or object that was red or orange. She was a little annoyed at the fact that the colour red or orange would always be associated with herself because of her vibrant hair.
At first she thought it was cute. The occasional 'Strawberry' or 'Carrot top' she had tolerated. But after running out of cute objects to be named after, Lily had crossed the line at being described after menstrual blood.
"I'm not going to snog you in the middle of class, James," Lily told him from the other side of the classroom.
"I did not call you for a snogging invitation," he said, though a rather disappointed look was shone upon his face. "Can I borrow your Potions book?"
"What's wrong with your own?" Lily asked.
Using his wand, James made his Potions book float in front of his face - you could still see him because of the large hole through the book with scorned edges which was presently emitting smoke. He tried to shoo away the black clouds. "Sirius burnt a hole through mine," he accused.
Sirius shrieked, "Mendacious, that's what you are! Mendacious!"
"Wasn't that yesterday's Moony's-word-of-the-day," Peter pointed out thoughtfully.
YGMHP~ Chapter 8- Weird Balloons...
Start from the beginning
