"Alright, spill it already. Something is bother you and I can tell." Ngila finally sighed at her best friend. They were both sitting on the couch in the common room reading their respective books.
"Nothing is wrong. Why in the world would you think that something was wrong?" Lily hurriedly let out.
"Well, maybe it's the fact that ever since Sirius made that comment about James'-"Ngila started but was stopped short by Lily.
"Aurora! We've been waiting for you. Ngila and I wanted to know if you wanted to jam or something. She wants to play for the Yule Ball this year." Lily exclaimed, thankful that Aurora's arrival saved her from her friend's comment.
"Wicked! I've always wanted to play for the Yule Ball. Come on, we can go up know and I can set up my drums. I still haven't found time to unpack them." The tall black girl exclaimed. She smiled and bounded up the stairs.
"Lily-"Ngila started again.
"Not right now Ngila, Aurora is waiting for us." Lily saved herself quickly and ran up the stairs after Aurora as she heard Ngila give a grunt and ran up the stairs too.
"It's going to take a while for me to set up so why don't you guys tune and practice a little bit." Aurora told them as she began setting up in the corner where her drums were usually settled.
"That sounds great. Ngila grab your guitar and come here." Lily commanded.
"Sir, yes, sir." Ngila replied while standing pin straight and saluting to Lily.
Lily walked over to where her guitars resided. She had one acoustic and one *electric which were both like children to her. The acoustic used to be her grandmother's before she passed on and the electric was gift from her parents. Of course they weren't as great as Ngila's actual Gibson acoustic/electric guitar, but she loved them all the same.
"Where's the tuner, babe?" Ngila asked when she appeared at on Lily's bed.
"On the nightstand next to the lamp. What am I using tonight: acoustic or electric?" Lily asked looking from guitar to guitar. Both were in their stands next to the nightstand. They were easy access from her bed so just in case she needed them, they were there.
"I'll do acoustic tonight, so you grab your electric." Ngila answered as she began to tune her guitar.
"Hold that out, I'm going to tune mine as well." Lily spoke as Ngila held out her E. She plugged the guitar's cord into the amp and began to tune and warm up with scales and stupid little songs she had learned years ago.
"Hey, Lils, while we're waiting for Aurora why don't we go put on a show for the common room? It'll give us some practice with an audience." Ngila spoke while winking at Lily, whose face turned a sort of eggshell white color.
"Are you crazy?! We haven't practiced together in like a month. It's not safe. What if we make complete asses of ourselves?" Lily asked her quickly now worrying insanely.
"Don't worry so much Lils. We will be absolutely fabulous. It's not like we're going to practice a new song down there. It will be a completely safe oldie. Now breathe, you need air." Ngila said while smiling and plucking at the strings on her guitar.
"How can you be so bloody calm? Oh, right, because you are fucking perfect!" Lily said in the breath that she had been holding in during Ngila's speech.
"Watch, Lily, you have a sailor's mouth, did you know that?" Ngila scolded.
"We are not going down there. I will not make a fool of myself." Lily exclaimed while shaking her head vigorously.
"Anthem, Pretend to be Nice, or Don't be Shallow?" Ngila asked.
"Pretend to be Nice, do you know what they'll say after we play?"
"What will they say? Both of us playing or just you?"
"Just me so you can focus on the words, they'll tell us we're horrible and throw shit at us."
"How many times have I told you to watch your mouth? Acoustic or Electric?"
"Acoustic, I'm sorry but I'm worried. We are not going down there!" Lily finished, unaware that she had just planned out their whole performance in the common room.
"Grab your acoustic guitar, the music for Pretend to be Nice (if you need it), and your pick because we are going down to the common room now!" Ngila shouted while bounding down the stairs and singing arpeggios.
"Go after her, Lily, you know you want to." Aurora called out from behind her bass drum.
"I'll be back soon, Aura, don't worry." Lily yelled back at her and ran down the stairs holding her guitar and pick.
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"Ngila, this is stupid!" Lily whispered fiercely as Ngila got comfortable on the couch and Lily sat herself on the coffee table in front of it.
"It's not stupid because we are bastante fantastico. Just calm down and take deep breaths. You are an excruciatingly good guitarist and you will shock the skivvies off the people in this common room." Ngila assured her.
"I don't want to "shock the skivvies" off anyone! I want to go back upstairs, put a silencing charm on the curtains of my bed, and play my heart out where no one can hear me."
"Where would that get you? You have to share your talent with the rest of the world so they worship the ground you walk on!"
"Maybe I don't want that." Lily pouted at this.
"I can tell that you do, and I want that to happen to me too so stop pouting and play your damn guitar."
Ngila immediately pulled out her wand and silencio-ed Lily's mouth silent. Lily finally sighed and began to play the intro to the song while people turned around to see where the noise was coming from. Ngila soon began to sing and most everyone in the common room turned around.
Pretend to be Nice:
Well, he looks at me with those innocent eyes,
And says it looks like you're wearing some kind of disguise,
Because your hair sticks up, your shoes are untied,
i hope that you got that shirt at half price,
And every word I say falls flat on the floor,
I try to tell a joke, he's heard it before,
And I don't think that I can take it no more,
Cause he's driving me right out of my front door
Why do you do what you do to me baby?
Shaking my confidence, driving me crazy
You know if I could I'd do anything for you,
Please don't ignore me 'cause you know I adore you
Can't you just pretend to be nice?
Can you at least pretend to be nice?
If you could just pretend to be nice,
Well, everything in my life would be alright
Oooh wee....
Oooh wee....
And I try so hard just to figure him out,
But he won't tell me what he's been thinking about,
And then he falls asleep on the living room couch,
With his sunglasses on and his tongue hanging out,
And then he disappears for a week at a time,
And then he shows up just like everything's fine,
And I don't get what goes on in his mind,
But I'm tired of hearing the same stupid lines
Why do you do what you do to me baby?
Shaking my confidence, driving me crazy
You know if I could I'd do anything for you,
Please don't ignore me cuz you know I adore you
Can't you just pretend to be nice?
Can you at least pretend to be nice?
If you could just pretend to be nice,
Everything in my life would be alright,
Oooh wee....
Oooh wee....
(Guitar)
Why do you do what you do to me baby?
Shaking my confidence, driving me crazy
You know if I could I'd do anything for you,
I don't mean to bore you 'cause you know I adore you.
Can't you just pretend to be nice?
Can you at least pretend to be nice?
If you could just pretend to be nice,
Everything in my life would be alright
The whole common room burst into applause as Ngila took the charm off of Lily and stood up to take a bow. Lily followed in suit while she turned bright red and hid a smile. Ngila was definitely living up the excitement of the common room.
"What's the name of your band?" Some unknown voice called from around them.
"It's called Lenin and the Bolsheviks. I thought it was creative." Ngila screamed out.
"Lenin and the Bolsheviks?" Another voice called out.
"Hey, it was either that or Stud Muffins of the Century. We didn't have much of a choice, did we Aura?" Lily asked the brown eyed girl that was standing at the top of the steps holding her drumsticks.
"That's what we get for not being creative, Lils." Aurora called back from her spot while people turned back to look at her.
"Can we go back up the room now and practice by ourselves for a little while." Lily asked Ngila who was just about to answer before being swept up into somebody's arms. Lily looked shocked until another person did the same to her.
"Sirius, what the hell do you think your doing?" Ngila screamed at him. Her legs were now wrapped around his waist and her arms around his neck as he spun her around.
"It's our way of congratulating you for being such good musicians and also torture for not telling us." Sirius replied while James nodded. Lily was strewn over his shoulder.
"James Potter let be down right now before I pinch you." Lily screamed at while trying not to laugh. She had a perfect view of James' backside from her position. `Wait,' she thought, `this is James Potter! He can not have a nice ass!'
"Why don't you pinch me and then I'll let you down?" James replied and Lily could tell there was a smirk on his face when he said it. Lily raised her arm so it laid flat against her side and pinched the pressure point on the back of his neck.
"I'm pinching you, now let me down." She said while feeling him squirm,
"Okay, okay, just stop." He said while lowering her gently of his shoulder. Lily let go as soon as her feet touched the ground.
"That's your way of congratulating a girl?" Lily asked while smirking at the boy in front of her.
"The other option was to snog you senseless, but I knew you girls wouldn't like me or Sirius doing that to you." James told her innocently.
"Well, than I guess I should be glad."
"Now, onto the real question, how come you never told me that you play guitar you bloody bird?!"
"You can say that but as soon as I swear once I get called a sailor."
"You do tend to have a mouth like a sailor when you get worked up."
"Oh, shut your mouth, Potter. I didn't tell you because Ngila thought it would be funny to keep it secret. We let the secret out this year though because it's our last and we're supposed to do the things we wouldn't normally do."
"Ngila tell you that?"
"Yes, and I think its absolute bull."
"SAILOR!"
"I only said bull, not shit!"
"Oh, you said it!" James shouted while jumping up.
"Shut up, I'm going to bed. Thanks for the congratulations Jamesie and tell Ngila that I've gone up when she stops flirting with Black." Lily glared at him playfully and proceeded up the stairs with her guitar and pick. She put her stuff back where it belonged and noticed that Aurora was not there. Lily immediately thought that she was with Oma, of course. But Lily didn't really care right now because she had things to think about.
The redhead crawled into her bed after quickly changed into her bed clothes and closed all the curtains. She laid back to get comfortable before starting to think too much. There was one thing on her mind: James Potter. They obviously had a pretty horrendous history but last year and this year they were trying to resolve their differences and become "friends". Ngila got along famously with Sirius, Remus, and Peter and, of course, James. It always upset her when she saw Lily fighting with the self proclaimed Marauders so Lily was able to become good friends with three out of four of them. Despite their agreement Lily and James still had problems.
James fancied Lily. That much she had known since at least second year when Ngila had let it slip after Sirius let it slip to her after James told him privately. Ngila always did have a habit of letting things slip to Lily, no matter what it was. Sirius had the same problem when talking to Ngila. Anyway, from what Lily could gather all through the year he liked her since first during their prank war when he realized that she was a prankster on the inside and continued fancying her until this day. He had only let it be known during fifth year and that's when things began to get worse. The infamous Snape incident ruined things for them but when they had met up the summer before going into seventh year they shook hands and agreed to have some sort of relationship.
To be truthful Lily could not stop thinking about James Samuel Potter the summer before sixth year, all of sixth year, and the summer before seventh year. She rationalized it as severe dislike and put it aside intending to ignore until they had met up the pervious summer. When she realized that he was walking towards her, her heart rate most definitely increased and her stomach did a little bunny hop. Once again, she blamed it on the dislike until her sister, Petunia, explained something to her.
Lily and Petunia did not have the best sisterly relationship but sisters always tend to spend at least some of their time on Earth discussing girly things and such although they may hate each other (a/n: known fact because even though I hate my sister we still manage to have girly conversations once in a while). That year while Lily was away at school Petunia had fallen in love with a business man named Vernon whom she had been dating for two years which led to Lily hearing all about him. He, from what she heard, was very boring, but she had never been in love and wanted to know what it was like straight away.
"Tunia, how did you know you were in love?" Lily asked curiously one day when she was lying on her sister's bed watching her get ready for her date with Vernon.
"What do you mean?" Tunia replied questioningly while unrolling her blonde hair from the curlers.
"How did you know? Did you just look at him one day and know?" Lily asked, now sitting up cross legged.
"Oh, know I see what you mean. Well, I suppose it was in February of this year. We were celebrating Valentine's Day together in the park. We were just walking around holding hands when it began to rain and he took of one of his jackets and draped around me. Why he was wearing two? I'm not quite sure but when we reached a puddle at the curb he noticed that I was worried about getting my shoes wet so he took off his other jacket and draped it across the puddle for me to walk on. I just looked at him and he was standing their all wet, smiling at me, holding out his hand so he could help me across. My stomach flipped and my heart raced. Now, every time I see him I get that feeling in the pit of my stomach. It flips over and over and I fear my heart may just burst out of my chest." Petunia explained sincerely while applying her make up.
"Oh my god." Lily breathed and jumped off the bed and into her room with her older sister calling after her.
Lily had spent the whole night telling her that she could not love her enemy, James Potter. Of course, they had called somewhat of a truce but he was still an enemy. She couldn't possibly be in love with him.
That's the exact same thing she was doing tonight, after her little performance. She could not possibly be in love with James Potter if she hates him so incredibly much. But maybe she had confused love for hate, or the other way around. Whatever, she didn't care; she just wanted to know how she felt. She needed to talk to Ngila and fast.
________________
A/N: *The electric guitar works because it was purchased at Wizarding music store in Diagon Alley especially for students such as Ngila and Lily.
Secondly, I didn't mention this after the first chapter but you pronounce Ngila's name Nyla. I think it's an awesome name. Oh and when she was talking about her children's names, James is her middle name. Ngila James Kenoir. It's not that she fancies James or anything.
Thirdly, Lenin and the Bolsheviks is the name of my band because I'm obsessed with Russian Revolution so you are not welcome to steal it. Or Stud Muffins of the Century.
Lastly, the song is Pretend to be Nice by Letters to Cleo. They are a cool band and did a lot of songs for the newer Josie and the Pussycat's movie with Rachel Leigh Cook. Of course, it's not that new, but still an awesome band.
Well, those are all the notes. Please review more of I'll stop. Ok, so I probably won't, but I would appreciate reviews. Thank you.
-Bex