James and Lily: It Took A While

Chapter One: Six Years Later

Chapter One
Six Years Later
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This was it. The start of my seventh year.

I was ready.

Almost.

I was ready in all aspects, besides the fact that I had no Sev to help me through my final year at Hogwarts, and that I was already nervous for my NEWTs, and that I SO did not want to have any part of James Potter and his endless flirting!

Okay so I'm only ready in the sense that I'm prepared for another long year of studying. Other than that, I'm nervous about graduating. I'll have to start a life in the wizarding world! That was scary.

But I suppose one of the good things I'll get out of graduation is that I'll get to move out and leave Petunia behind! She was even more unbearable than usual this last summer, and I suppose it's because I'm of age and had been doing a bit of magic around the house for my parents. But I hadn't let her get to me, she was just really annoying.

I looked out the window of the car, watching the buildings and cars fly past. Almost there, almost there, almost there. Three blocks, two blocks, one block -yes! I opened the car door and spilled out into the parking lot. Finally some air. We'd had a bit of a drive to get to King's Cross, and I could barely spend two minutes with Petunia these days, let alone an hour. And with her sitting next to me, staring blankly out the window, not even attempting to make conversation, just made it worse. I already had my trunk pulled out of the back of our car by the time the rest of my family stepped into the parking lot.

Followed by my mum, dad, and Petunia, I entered the station and grabbed a trolley. I was struggling to hold the trolley still and lift my trunk onto it when, abruptly, the heavy load lightened and I suddenly found the trunk in the trolley and James Potter standing across from me. He smiled and waved his hand in greeting. Shocked, I frowned, and his smile melted off his face. He let his hand dropped before politely nodding his head at me and all but fleeing toward platform 9 3/4.

I felt ashamed about three seconds later when I saw the disappointed look on his face. I should've at least smiled or nodded my head, but the fact that James Potter had carried out a kind act without a single smart remark was simply unfathomable. It was probably another one of his pranks.

I walked slowly around the trolley, checking the side of the trunk James had boosted onto the trolley. I didn't see anything suspicious, not a single dung bomb, but I was still closely inspecting the trunk when my family arrived.

"What's wrong Lily?" my mother inquired.

"Nothing," I answered vaguely-I hadn't seen anything attached to the trolley or my trunk. "Let's go."

While Petunia waited next to the brick barrier, my parents and I ran through it. Petunia had refused to come onto the platform for the last five years, claiming she'd 'catch the freak disease.'

Pushing all thoughts of Petunia out of my head, I craned my neck above the crowd to look for one of my friends, either Elle, Catherine, or Remus. I only ever hung out with any of them one at a time, because Elle was a Gryffindor, Catherine was a Ravenclaw, and Remus and I's friendship was a secret one. We hung out, did homework together, as well as prefect duties, but we didn't publicize it. I had made an agreement with Remus that as long as we hung out we didn't tell James or one of the other members of their posse, because they could ruin those moments of peace Remus and I sometimes had together.

Nothing like a closer-than-friends relationship! Ever. We were just close friends. It's more like a brother-sister relationship.

"Lily!" I was able to hear a high pitched shriek over the sound of the crowd. I turned toward the voice and saw Elle running towards me. "Lily! Ohmygosh I have sooo much to tell you! Something really exciting happened this summer and-oh no," she broke off, standing on her tiptoes and looking towards someone I couldn't see. "Lil, I'll talk to you at dinner, my little brother needs me and I, sadly, promised I'd sit with him!" As quickly as she had popped up, she disappeared into the crowd.

I sighed. I'd be facing this, my last ride into Hogwarts, alone. When I faced myself with the truth, I really wasn't that popular, but not because people thought I was a nerd or anything (I mean, they did, they just didn't judge me for it), but I preferred it that way. I had a total of three friends I ever hung out with. I mean, I knew tons of other people, but we weren't really friends, just acquaintances. Elle, Catherine, and Remus were those three friends I could always talk to. But Remus has to sit with James and Sirius and Peter, and Catherine would no doubt be sitting with her Ravenclaw friends. I could go find Elle, but on second thought, I was almost at the end of my book... Maybe I could get a compartment to myself and finish it up... That sounded nice.

I said goodbye to my parents and promised I'd write, before heading down the length of the train until I found an empty compartment at the very end. Perfect, I thought to myself. Peace and quiet.