Their Seventh Year

Chapter 6- Meetings

James looked in the mirror and tried to flatten down his hair, despite the fact that he knew this was a losing battle. When Sirius said in a mocking voice "Oh James, you’re so dreamy" he realized it was not terribly masculine to be preening in the mirror, and straightened up.

"Where are you going?" The other boys were in various states of undress, but James's uniform was still intact, his tie neatly knotted, his robes perfectly pressed.

"I'm meeting Lily." He picked up his bag and turned to see three very shocked expressions. "Not like that! I mean, we’re going to talk to Dumbledore."

They had all thought his defense club was a brilliant idea. Remus thought it sounded very educational and useful, Peter thought it might be good for him to learn a few defensive spells, and Sirius hoped for an excuse to hex some Slytherins.

"Um Prongs? What time are you supposed to meet her?"

"Eight. Why?"

"It’s five past."

He bolted from the room, ignoring the snickering of his best friends and a loud, false cough from Sirius that sounded a lot like "whipped". Of course she was waiting in the common room, looking very impatient.

"Good evening Lily." Score! I remembered to call her Lily! "Sorry I'm late. I was studying."

She looked a little taken aback. "Okay. Well, let's go."

They climbed out the portrait hole together, with a warning from the fat lady to be back by curfew time, which they ignored, a luxury given only to the head boy and girl. Lily had bravely made her way to the head table during dinner and asked Dumbledore if they might have a meeting with him later, so she knew the password, which was "licorice wand". They were both silent as the steps carried them to his office, and then Lily knocked softly. James had been in the headmaster's office before, but it never failed to awe him. As they stepped in, he could tell by Lily's wide-eyed wonder that she had never seen it before. He watched, enchanted, as she took in the vast circular room and all its interesting little instruments and ancient but still graceful furniture. Her eyes finally came to rest on Fawkes, sitting on his golden perch, and her brilliant green eyes grew even wider at the lovely bird with his scarlet and gold plumage. "Is that-?"

"A ." James confirmed, reaching out and stroking Fawkes, eliciting a gasp from Lily. "Hullo Fawkes. That's his name." He added knowingly.

"Mr. Potter, Miss Evans." Dumbledore greeted them. "To what do I owe this pleasure?"

"Oh well Sir, we wanted to ask your permission to start a new sort of club." He glanced to Lily, inviting her to continue. She did.

"You see Sir, all the students are so worried, after everything that has happened this week. And even though we have Defense Against the Dark Arts classes, and Professor Macenas is very knowledgeable, James was thinking-" She caught herself "- that is, we were thinking, that we might start a sort of club for students to practice defense skills, and dueling and things. All closely supervised and based on things we're learning in class of course. We just thought maybe it might make them feel a little more… prepared. In case…you know…something else…bad…happens?" She finished a trifle uncertainly under the Headmaster's bright blue gaze.

"I see." Dumbledore folded his hands on his desk. "You both show wisdom beyond your years in understanding that this is not the last tragedy Hogwart's will see. And in understanding that such a thing will give the students a feeling of power over these uncertain times. You have my permission to form a defense club."

They looked at each other, and grinned. "Thank you Sir."

"We were wondering if maybe you could ask if any of the teachers would be willing to supervise?" James continued.

The old Headmaster raised his eyebrows. "I would think our head boy and girl would be able to supervise sufficiently."

********

"I never thought he'd let us do it without a teacher, I mean...how will we know what to do?" Lily was talking excitedly. James had never seen her act so natural around him before.

"Well, I mean, we're both in NEWT level Defense, right? So we probably know as much as anyone in the school. Except the teachers I mean, but so there's no reason we can't help the younger kids, right? And with the other people in our year, we can just practice on each other."

"Practice on each other?" She grinned as they came back to the Gryffindor common room. "I look forward to hexing you Potter."

"Well, I will have to defend myself, you know." He grinned back. "Why don't we get together tomorrow evening, say in the library, and start up a plan for everything?"

She nodded. "Okay. Good night James."

He stared after her as she went up the stairs to the girls' dormitories. She had just called him James. Had she ever done that before? He couldn't remember her ever calling him anything but "Potter" and even then in an annoyed voice that suggested he was wasting her time. But tonight she had called him James, in a natural and pleasant voice. He was in seventh heaven, and his friends wondered why they couldn't get an intelligent word out of him the rest of the night.

********

It was only , so Lily wasn't sure why she skipped the pleasant companionable atmosphere of the common room and went upstairs to work on her homework, but she was glad to find the room empty. She took out her charms homework and figured she could comfortably get it finished that night, since it was her favorite class and the one she was best in.

But she wasn't getting much done, she realized after a few minutes, she kept starting off into space. It was so odd, James Potter had actually been normal, and nice for an entire hour. He had not gone on about quidditch or his stellar grades or hinted broadly at how many girls fancied him. In fact, he had hardly talked about himself at all, and she had thought that was the only thing he was interested in. He'd been like a different person, nothing of the arrogant, bullying boy she thought she knew. And he was certainly taking a serious and active interest in his head boy duties. She'd been afraid he would be so busy with his quidditch and his gaggle of female admirers that she's be left doing everything.

She drew her book closer, wondering why she was wasting her time thinking about James Potter when she had so much homework to do.

********

It was after eleven when Lupin left the library. Technically, they were supposed to be in their common rooms before that, but he didn't think the prefects or any of the teachers would hassle him between the library and . Luckily he didn't run into Filch on the way.

When he stepped into the common room it was nearly empty, except for a slightly panicked looking fifth year boy with all of his books spread over the table. He forced down a smile, remembering their fifth year and the pressure of OWLS. NEWTS didn't seem so bad, maybe just because you only took them in the classes you were good at. Of course, Remus was good at most classes.

"Hey, Lupin!" Someone said his name and turned to find Flora, who he had not seen since she'd been curled up in one of the armchairs near the fire. "Come here, I've been meaning to talk to you about something."

He couldn't imagine what, he knew Flora well enough, they were in the same house and had had seven years worth of classes together, but they weren't exactly friends.

"Alice and I want to get Lily and James together." She said frankly, without any introduction. "And we need some help from you and Black, you're the only people he'll listen to. Are you in?"

He grinned. That was what they were trying to do already, it could only be easier if Lily's friends helped too. "What's the plan?"

********

Sirius Black felt like he had wasted quite enough of his life in school, and he was determined not to waste this last year with anything as dull as studying. While all his friends were buried in their books and moaning about NEWTS, he was planning to have a good time. The sort of good time that one could have in the astronomy tower, and Sirius did not mean stargazing, although that was the euphemism some Hogwart's students used. Unfortunately, Filch had made it his personal mission to see that Sirius didn't have a good time, and that damn cat was tailing him everywhere. He'd taken to using James's cloak even for something as simple as sneaking food from the kitchens, which was hardly a challenge since he'd been doing it since first year.

He came around a corner and saw Mrs. Norris, and gave a grin at his own cleverness. Unfortunately, he was not paying attention to where he was going and run full into a girl standing with her wand pointed at the cat. He ran into her so hard in fact, that he had to grab her around the waist to keep them both from falling over. As he tried to right himself he saw Mrs. Norris dart away to get Filch. The girl, meanwhile, had screamed when she was grabbed by someone invisible and was thrashing against him wildly, shrieking "Let go of me! Let me go!" She stomped down hard on his foot.

"Will you shut up!" He hissed. "You'll get us both detention!"

He could hear footsteps coming- Filch! He dragged the girl with him into an empty classroom and backed up against the wall, pulling the cloak over both of them. She was tiny, probably a third or fourth year. "Now be quiet!" He hissed, as Filch came into the room. They waited in breathless silence as he checked every corner of the classroom, and then skulked away, disappointed that he had found no one to give detention to.

Sirius drew the cloak off both of them and glared at her.

"Nice job, almost getting us both detention."

"You're the one ran into me!" She cried back.

"You're a Slytherin." He said disgustedly, noting her green and silver tie for the first time.

"Ooh, good, nothing gets by you Black."

A Slytherin with a smart mouth, he thought.

"I can do without smart-ass comments from a third year." he snapped back, expecting her to be scared. Instead, she narrowed her eyes.

"It just so happens I am in sixth year. I'm only one year behind you and if you weren't so arrogant and superior and self-centered, you'd know it!"

With that, she turned and walked away, leaving him staring, without so much as a "thanks" for keeping her out of detention.