The Next Great Adventure (A Marauders Fan Fic)

Chapter Thirty Four

And hey, if you were to end up together... Well would that really be that bad? He's good looking, kind, funny, clever, stupidly talented at Quidditch and annoyingly charming; we've refused to acknowledge it for years but there is a reason everyone at school loves him and he really has grown up recently... Besides you'd really piss some of his groupies off and their faces would surely be a good enough reason anyway...! (Did you see that girl he kicked out of the Quidditch after-party last year?!) Plus we could totally double on Hogsmeade visits... although considering that that would put Sirius and James together maybe it'd be a bad idea... they seem to attract trouble without even trying.

Okay I actually am going now... Anyway I'll see you in Diagon Alley I guess. I'll send you an owl when we get home on Thursday.

Lots of love,

Cassie

A sigh escaped Lily's lips as she finished reading her friend's letter; it was filled with exactly what she had suspected it might be filled with and yet somehow Cassie's letter seemed to lift her spirits slightly; of course it would be fine having James as a Head Boy, it would be good. People respected him so their job would be easier and Cassie was right, he had somehow managed to get rid of a lot of his more unsavoury qualities; she hadn't seen him hex anyone in months and he seemed generally kinder in the common room. Cassie had been right in the letter; Lily would be kind and civil to him because there was absolutely no reason why they couldn't have a professional relationship. It wasn't like anyone had ever said that they had to be best friends, and they didn't have to spend every waking moment together, all they had to do was co-operate, control people and help Dumbledore; all of those were easy jobs and aside from that Lily's life could remain absolutely the same. There should be very little disruption to her daily life and her relationship with him.

Of course one thing she refused to think about was how kind he had been to her when he had found her in the Room of Requirement crying over Petunia's letter; Petunia hadn't been home all summer and so she hadn't had to face it. In response to the shock which her mind had experienced after seeing James be so attentive, it had locked that memory away and refused to confront it. He had probably, she had rationalised the night that it had happened – the only time that she had thought about it – just been looking for her because he wanted help with homework or something and hadn't known what to do when he had found her; as she had lain in bed that night Lily had flushed as red as the hangings which she was staring at – how embarrassing, to be found crying over a silly letter from her pathetic sister by James Potter, of all people. Still she couldn't deny the fact that he had been incredibly kind to her and it had shaken Lily's view of him more than it had already been disrupted over the past year. She didn't want him to be kind because it was so much easier to dislike him, and not to want anything to do with him, when his thoughtfulness and compassion had been hidden under his smirking superiority and conceit. In truth she wasn't sure where they had gone but she missed them; they had made her life so much easier. Now that she knew he was actually a decent person she couldn't escape the knowledge and she recoiled from the eagerness with which she wanted to talk to him and be friends with him. Lily was ashamed of her traitorous heart – she had disliked him for so long surely it could have managed just a year longer? Then she would have been safe from his frustrating magnetism, safe to find someone who had never inspired an infuriating combination of anger and amusement, someone she had never, out of the corner of her eye, seen look at her like she was the answer to an unknown question.

With a shake of her head Lily stopped her train of thought and banished it to the back of her mind; she had nearly a month before she had to worry about James Potter and she was going to make the most of her period away from the cluttered thoughts of her time at school. She left the letter on the kitchen table and ran upstairs to grab the book which she had started before her growling stomach had forced her to emerge from her bed; it wasn't the most intellectual thing she had read but she was enjoying it so far and she tucked it under one arm before heading out to sit in the sun and read.