Lily and James the Prequel

"Hey, where did Lily go?" Remus asked,
"Who knows." James said,
"Really, you guys ought to be a bit more concerned, she's our friend." Remus continued.
"Actually, she's mostly your friend. She wants to kill me most of the time, she ignores Sirius, but you two hang around each other like Gilligan and Skipper." James pointed out.
"Who's Gilligan, but, Remus, you like Lily don't you?" Sirius said,
"Yes I like her, but she's only a friend. I actually try to be nice to her." Remus defended himself.
"Remus has got a crush on Lily." Sirius sang, and James joined in.
"Remus and Lily sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g, first comes love, then comes marr---"
"STOP! I DO NOT HAVE A CRUSH ON LILY! GOOD LORD, THE WAY YOUR ACTING YOU WOULD THINK YOU HAVE A CRUSH ON HER JAMES" Remus cut in.

"I most certainly do NOT have a crush on Lily Evans. You could find a prettier girl at a dog pound." James said to make his point.
"James, you really went too far there." Sirius said, and James turned around and saw Lily storming out of their compartment."Uh, I guess I probably ought to go talk to her, huh?" James asked.
"Yeah, especially if you don't want her to remain an enemy. I think she hates you more than Severus Snape. And she's a lot tougher." Sirius said.
"No joke, I'll go find her." James decided, and started walking through the compartments until he saw her sitting with Severus Snape"Lily, don't sit with them." James shouted,
"I don't see why I shouldn't, they don't insult me and call me names like you do." Lily told him.
"Listen, Lily, about that, I was just trying to make a point-"
"About me being uglier than any dog? Yeah, that's real flattering."
"He called you a dog?" Snape said indignantly.
"Same as, Severus. He is always mean to me. He never has anything nice to say."
"Nobody insults Lily and gets away with it." Severus said nastily, and pulled out his wand and put a jelly-legs curse on James, causing him to collapse.                              "Wow, Severus, that's neat. Can you teach me to do that?" Lily asked.
"He will not, because you are coming back to our compartment, and we are going to explain a few things to you." Sirius told her forcefully.
"And just who do you think you are? Maybe you ought to be concerned with taking care of James and leave me alone." Lily said angrily.
"No, listen to us Lily, we need to tell you something. Please come back to our compartment and let us tell you something." Remus asked her.
"Umm, okay Remus. See ya later Severus." Lily gave in.
"Don't count on it." Sirius grumbled.  Lily docilely followed Remus back to the compartment thinking, boy, he really is good looking. And nice. Extremely adorable. Too bad he has God-awful friends.  She sat down across from Remus, but wished she hadn't' when it turned out then she would be between Sirius and James. Lily adopted the stony stubborn look she got whenever she didn't want to do something. "What do you want?"
"Lily, Snape and his crowd aren't good people to hang around." Remus started to say calmly until James broke in.
"He's the slimiest creature you'll ever meet! You can tell he doesn't know what shampoo is just by looking at him. And he dishonest! He'll sneak up behind us and use some hex on us. He's done all kinds of tricky sly things." James almost yelled.
"It all started one time in Diagon Alley when he ran into us, then stepped on us. He didn't have the decency to help us up! Then twenty minutes later, he put something in our food to make us grow spots." Sirius picked up where James left off.           "Well, I don't know" Lily was still hesitant, so the boys kept telling her more stories about all of the dishonest and mean things he had done. There was no way they could make this much stuff up.
"Fine, you guys. I'm going to quit hanging around Severus, but I will NOT be mean to him."  About that time a lady with a huge candy cart came by and said, "Can I get you anything off of here?" and four boys were immediately swarming the cart. After they had bought everything except three bags of Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans and two cauldron cakes, so Lily bought these.
"You guys aren't really going to eat ALL of that are you?" Lily asked in disbelief.
"You better believe it. We'll be lucky if it lasts the train ride" Remus told her.
During the train ride James and Sirius and Remus got into a long discussion about quidditch.
Lily spoke up, "What is quidditch?"
"Oh, so Miss I Know Everything About Sports doesn't know about the greatest sport of all time?" James said.
"I've never heard of quidditch before smarty."
"Well it's a game played on broomsticks, where..." and Lily was soon very informed about the greatest sport of all time.
True to their word, they had just finished the last piece of food when the five-minute call was sounded, and Lily went to change into her Hogwarts uniform. There was a mass exodus as students were piling off the train. The first years were directed to the lake shore, where they were instructed by a huge man, Hagrid, to get into the boats, four each. Lily started walking to a different boat, because she thought that the four boys would want to sit together. She had just got sit down in the boat with James's sister and another girl who was named Adriana when Remus came running over to the boat and sat down next to Lily.
"Why aren't you sitting with them?" Lily asked, motioning to the boat James, Sirius, Peter, and now another boy was occupying.
"I didn't want you to have to sit by yourself." Remus explained, and the boats started sailing.  When all of the first years met in a room outside of the great hall Remus received several teasing looks from James and Sirius. They had already explained the houses to Lily, and Lily truly wanted to be put in Ravenclaw, but if she couldn't be in it, she wanted to be in Gryffindor. Sirius was the first one to be sorted, and he was put into Gryffindor. Lily was next. She tried on the hat and it was saying well, I can see you wish to be in Ravenclaw, you have a great mind. But you have immense bravery, and incredible ability.  Gryffindor is the only house that can develop these abilities.. Yes Gryffindor would be a good choice. Promising things will come from you in Gryffindor. "GRYFFINDOR!" the hat shouted out loud. Lily was a little disappointed, but she got her second choice.

As it turned out James and Remus both got in Gryffindor, but Lily almost fell out of her chair when Peter got in.
Professor Dumbledore said, "Hello students, I think you should know this year's new rules. In addition to all other rules, you are forbidden from the forest, as always, but there is a new addition to the forest. The whomping willow is a tree that will beat the living daylights out of you if you get near it. Quidditch tryouts will begin in one month. Now everybody enjoy the feast." and everybody was able to do follow that rule easily.

After everybody had received their schedules Lily found out their first class was flying lessons. Lily immediately asked James, "Will you please teach me to play quidditch after our lesson tomorrow. I would like to play on the house team." receiving surprised looks from them all. It was obvious they didn't think she could do it, and she promised herself she would. After the feast was over they followed the prefects to their common room. They were told that they needed to remember the password that would change weekly to gain entrance. This week's was "Hobgoblin". Lily went straight up to the first year girls' dormitory where she found her new roommates. When she walked in she saw four other girls there already and she said, "Hi, my name is Lily Evans."
"Hi, I'm Adriana Malcolm." the brunette with medium height said.
"You know me, Lily, but to everyone else, I'm Gina Potter." James's sister with his black hair introduced herself.
"I'm Renee Rinaldi" said a girl with short light brown hair, glasses, and freckles.
"I'm Amelia Rengutin." said a pretty blond girl that was about five inches taller than Lily. Amelia continued, "I saw you with James Potter, and I want you to introduce me. Now."
Lily started laughing, "Who do you think you are? I don't have to do anything besides go to sleep right now."
"Yes you do. My father is the second in command to the owner of Mentinen, the computer company.", Amelia said, she was muggle-born too.
"MY father is Logan Evans. Does that ring a bell? Well it should. He owns Mentinen. And its sister company Mocanting. That means my dad is your dad's boss." Lily said in an equally nasty tone, two could play that game.
"Well, I never." Amelia said fussily
"Well, I have." Lily mimicked, sending Amelia flouncing to her bed, drawing the curtains.
"That was great Lily, she's been like that ever since she got here."
"Anytime Renee. I'm going to sleep as well."   Lily woke up happy the next morning. She couldn't wait for that dummy Amelia to try to mess with her again. She was just like Petunia, so Lily knew it would be easy to put her in her place if needed. She dressed in the red Gryffindor flying uniform for flying lessons, their first class. She also braided red metallic ribbons in her hair, which she put in two French braids. She and Gina were ready at the same time, and they walked silently down the stairs together. Gina went off to breakfast on her own, and Lily went down with James, Sirius, and Remus.

They all quickly ate breakfast and went down to the quidditch field. The instructor was an eagle-eyed witch named Madame Hooch.
"First of all, everybody pick a broom. Good, now say UP!" the five friends had found brooms next to each other and they all shouted UP. James, Sirius, and Lily were the only ones in the class who got their brooms to come up on the first try. Remus got his on the second try, and Peter had to have Madame Hooch raise his broom for him.
"Good, now mount your broom, and on three, kick off. 1...2...3!"
and ten Gryffindors rose into the air.  Everybody except for Peter (big surprise) got off the ground and hovered as directed. The rest of the lesson was spent flying around, and Lily was having the time of her life. After the lesson Madame Hooch pulled Sirius, Remus, James, and Lily over to the side. She said, "Listen you four, you are all excellent flyers, and if you wish you may use the quidditch field in the evening to practice if you wish. If you would like to take advantage of this opportunity come to the field from 4-5 every night available."
"We'd love to." James said after getting confirmation nods from his friends.

Their day started out wonderfully, and it continued along that way. Their second class was transfiguration. It was hard, but fun. They even got to start transfiguring that day, a match into a needle. Then they had lunch. The Hogwarts food was impeccable, as they would come to find out, as usual. Their next class was divination. James thought he would fall asleep as soon as he got in there, it was suffocating. Sirius and James sat at the same table, and Remus and Lily shared another. Peter ended up sitting with a leftover Hufflepuff, who they were in the same class with. The insect resembling teacher came in and said in a light voice, "Ah, I am Professor Trelawney, I will be teaching the art of seeing. Not all of you will truly be able to predict the future. You! Miss Evans, trade seats with Mr. Black. Yes, that's it. You two have great powers together, nothing on your own, but everything when your together."

Sirius and Remus muffled their laughs, and Lily glared at James because she wanted to sit with Remus and gaze into his adorable chocolate brown eyes.  She could already tell this class was going to be a bunch of malarkey, so she let her mind wander. She was thinking about changing her appearance some how to make Remus like her back. She would have to consult some of the girls in her dorm about this.

"Okay class, the best way for you to learn this difficult art is just to jump in and give it a whirl. Everybody drink this cup of tea I will give you then have your partner read it."
James and Lily raced to see who could drink theirs the fastest, then passed the tea leaves. James felt something his the back of his head, and he reached for it and pulled away a tea leaf that Sirius had thrown at him. James threw it at Lily, who threw it back at James.
"That's it, you two. Detention! Nobody mocks the great art of Leaf reading! It will be served from 7-8 tonight. Be here!"

"Professor! You can't give us detention for that!" James said indignantly.
"I most certainly can, and if you don't watch it I'll take points from Gryffindor" effectively shutting James up. As soon as they left the classroom Lily slugged him with her book bag.
"Way to go James! You moron! You got us detention on our first day here!"
"Relax Lily, it won't be that bad. We will still get to practice quidditch tonight though."
"Well, isn't that just dandy. I had other plans besides quidditch tonight. I'll need all the time I can get. I don't need DETENTION!" Lily yelled at him.
"Well, exxcccuuuseee me. Blame Sirius, not me. He started it." and Lily turned her furious glare on Sirius.
"Remus threw it at me first."
"Remus, you dummy, its all your fault" Lily said, though she wasn't really mad at him.

Their next class was potions, and Lily wrangled her way between Peter and Remus. She could already tell that class would be a breeze, and then it was over. Immediately after they went down to the quidditch field.
James, Lily, and Remus were all going to try out for chasers. Sirius wanted to be a beater, so he hit bludgers at them, while they tossed the quaffle. They practiced for their hour, and then went to dinner. At 6:50 James and Lily dragged themselves away from the table to detention. They saw Professor Trelawney at the Head Table, so they stopped to talk to her.
"Are we supposed to go up to your room for detention?" Lily asked
"Yes, dear. It's too bad that you have detention; it's the friends you choose. But James must remain your friend, its important to us all. He will be your downfall." Trelawney said.
"So, you children already have detention? On your first day?" Professor Dumbledore asked
"Yes, sir. Throwing tea leaves." James answered.
"Ah" he said, with a slight smile. As they turned to leave with Professor Trelawney they saw Dumbledore say something to McGonagall. As it turned out, James and Lily spent thirty minutes washing teacups, then thirty minutes polishing crystal balls. They were finally released. Lily rushed up to her dorm room, glad to find all of the occupants there except Amelia. She rushed in and said, "Can you girls help me? As you can see, I'm nothing special to look at, and I was wondering if you could help me look, well, more girlie?"
"Sure Lily, who's the guy?" Gina asked.
"Uh, Remus." Lily said hesitantly.
"Oh, okay, as long as it's not my brother. I wouldn't wish that kind of torture on anyone."
Lily quickly took down her hair and said, "First, we should do something about this. Maybe cut it?"
"NO!" the three girls shouted simultaneously, staring at the long shining mass of dark red hair that reached her waist.

They all circled around her and Adriana said, "Maybe we should trim the ends, and try a loose perm. That would make it a couple inches shorter though."
"Yeah, that sounds good. Just make it into loose curls. It should be pretty low-maintenance if we do it right." Gina agreed
"And maybe trim up the front so she had a strand of hair on each side about four inches long that she could pull it back if she needed to, or curl to make a ponytail or braid look softer." Renee suggested.
"Excellent idea!" lets do it.

They spent three hours on her hair, and then went to bed, with the promise of make up instruction in the morning. Sure enough, they all got up, with the exception of Amelia a hour early. They decided to go with Lily's natural look, and only used a few strokes of mascara and some pink lip-gloss. After Lily got dressed, with her hair down for once, she looked like a new person. When Amelia got up, she was stunned. She knew she would have to revise her plot to win James now, but she didn't know Lily was after James's best friend, Remus.

Lily remembered that the boys were going to meet her at 8 o'clock to go down to breakfast, so she ran down the stairs, trying not to be late. They were sitting in the common room playing some game.
"Wow, what's that game? It looks cool." Lily commented.
"It's called exploding snap, whoa!" Remus exclaimed when he saw Lily.
James and Sirius looked up too, with equal expressions of awe on their faces.
"Amazing Lily. You look beautiful." Remus said, then as if realizing it turned a dark red.
"Thank you Remus." Lily said.

As they walked through the great hall, on their way to the Gryffindor table, they had to pass the Slytherin table. There they were met with wolf whistles from Severus Snape and his group. Remus turned a fierce look at them, effectively silencing Snape, mainly because he was the mildest one out of the group.

They were some of the first at the Gryffindor table, and as people started coming in, the guys gravitated to where Lily was sitting. Since she was sitting at the middle of the table, so were all of the guys, and Gryffindor's female population were giving Lily jealous looks. Lily wanted to disappear though. Things were going too far. She saw some guys who had to be seventh years sit in the crowd, and she felt very embarrassed, when they smiled, she thought they were laughing AT her. Remus who thought she looked very nice saw her eyes tear up, and he took her from the great hall, before she lost it.

She got to the common room before she started crying. Remus said, "Lily, its okay, tell me what's wrong."
"Its terrible! I just wanted to look nice, so I let the girls in my year fix my hair and make me look nice. I thought I did look nice! Everybody down there was staring at me and laughing at me."
"Lily, nobody was laughing at you. They were smiling at you because you looked nice. You truly do look wonderful." Remus tried to comfort her.
"Thank you Remus. Are you sure I don't look er...trashy?"
"I'm sure. You look stunning." Remus said, and was shocked when she hugged him.
"Come on, Remus, we have charms today."

Lily skipped out of the room, and went to charms. A bewildered Remus followed her. He really liked Lily.

A month later, on October 1st, quidditch tryouts were held.

The four first years were walking grimly out to the quidditch field. Lily's hair was pulled back now, a rare event. This was like a war flag. They all signed their name on the sheet, as well as the position they were trying out for. They saw Anthony Clark, also a Gryffindor first year was trying out for keeper. They were warming up with everybody else on the school brooms they had been practicing with, when the captain, Shane Maddox shouted, "Everybody outside of the field. The tryouts are private. The first years go first, then second, and so on." there were 25 people trying out for the 5 positions that needed filled, and most thought it comical five first years were trying out. They already had a seeker, Shane, and a beater, Caitlin Mentz.

They went in alphabetical order, so Sirius went first. He had to fly around, hitting the bludgers. Then Lily went, throwing quaffles back and forth, and tossing them through the goal. James and Remus did the same thing. The bulletin would be posted the next morning to see who would make the team in the common room.  When Lily woke up in the morning, she remembered the quidditch tryout results. She flew out of bed, and ran downstairs. As it turned out, all 24 people who tried out besides her were there already. She managed to squeeze through people to read the list.
Seeker-Shane Maddox-6th year-captain
Beater-Caitlin Mentz-5th year
Beater-Sirius Black-1st year
Chaser-James Potter-1st year
Chaser-Lily Evans-1st year
Chaser-Remus Lupin-1st year
Keeper-Matthew Moratsin-6th year
Practice tonight at 6 o'clock  Lily screamed and hugged the closest person to her, who just happened to be Remus. To her surprise though, he hugged her back.
"Congratulations Remus" Lily said
"Same to you, Lily."
"Awww, look at them, they're growing up so fast." James said in a girlish voice.
"Shove off, James" Remus told him
That night at practice, they all practiced their positions, then at 7:30, barely any light left, Shane announced. "I see you all are pretty out of shape. To win we need endurance. Every night the team will run five miles, and on weekends we will lift weights. Understood?" and everyone nodded mutely.
They were let off the running hook tonight, so they dragged in for supper. As the food appeared on the plates Dumbledore stood up to make an announcement. "Students, this year we will have a Halloween ball. We generally just have a feast, but we will give a ball a whirl this year, no pun intended. You will have thirty days to get a partner for the ball if you so choose, but none is required. It will be a formal dress ball, however, and all clothing to the ball must be black or orange. When you have decided on partners, write your names down on the register in your common room, or if you are going stag, just sign your name."  That night in the first year boys' dormitory....
"Who are you going to ask?" Anthony Clark asked in general
"Lily" Remus, Sirius, and James all said simultaneously.
"WHAT?" they all said again
"I'm going to ask Lily." Remus said.
"Well so am I" James told him
"Both of you must have forgotten the little detail that I'm asking her." Sirius told both of them.
"No you're not." James said, "And I'll settle this now, I'm going to go ask her.  He used a full body bind on them and went up and knocked on the girls' dormitory door.

Meanwhile in the first year girls' dormitory....
"Who do you want to go with Gina?" Adriana asked.
"I hope Anthony Clark asks me. And you?"
"Sirius Black. He is the best looking guy in our year. We know who Amelia and Lily wants. Amelia wants James and Lily wants Remus." Adriana told them all
"Thanks for the P.A. Renee, who do you want to go with?" Lily asked
"Well, I want that Ravenclaw, Luke McLain to ask me."
"Dream on Renee." Amelia said cruelly. Then there was a knock on the door.
"Who is it?" Lily shouted
"Its me, James. Lily, I want to ask you something."
"Shoot." Lily shouted back.
"Its private. Come out here."
Lily walked out and James automatically said, "Lily will you go to the ball with me?"
"James, I'm sorry, but I'm really hoping somebody else will ask me." Lily turned him down.
James couldn't breathe, he was too embarrassed. He turned around and walked back down the stairs, then up the stairs to his dorm and uncursed Sirius and Remus. Remus asked very calmly, "Did she say yes?"
"Nope"
"Petrifucus totalus!" Sirius shouted at Remus, and he was out of the room.
Lily went back in the dorm and was immediately asked by Renee, "Well?"
"James asked me to the ball."
"WHAT?" Amelia shouted.
"I told him no." Lily went on woodenly, then there was another knock at the door, and Sirius shouted, "Lily, I need to ask you something."
She walked out there with him and said, "What?"
"Will ya go to the ball with me?"
"I'm sorry, Sirius, I was hoping somebody else would ask me."
"Okay." and Sirius walked dejectedly down the same stairs James and just walked.
Lily went back in and said, "Can you believe Sirius just asked me too?"            Sirius found James had already uncursed Remus, and when he walked in Remus asked sadly, "She said yes, didn't she?"
"No"
"Great!" and Remus was off and running to Lily.
"I wonder who she is waiting for?" Sirius asked James.
"Who knows."
"I don't know what I'll wear, providing Remus asks me." Lily said, "Orange looks terrible on me, and black? I don't know about that. I'll write my mum though, maybe she can find me something."
KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK then Remus shouted, "Lily, will you PLEASE go to the ball with me?"