Strange Benefits (James Potter)

thirty four

note: long overdue, im sorry! Buuuut thank you for the 45k reads! this is unreal!
also: a bit of jily in here.

Lily Evans was a smart girl, and an even brighter witch. She's on top of all her classes, she's otherworldly kind, she does most of her school works weeks in advance, she's very pretty, and although they would deny it, she was one of the most favourite students in Hogwarts. She was almost perfect. Almost. She just has this one small flaw.

"What do we have here?" A seventh year Slytherin snarled when she walked passed their group one afternoon.  "The mudblood thinks she could strut around like she owns the place."

She was muggle-born.

Not all witches and wizards despise her kind, don't get her wrong. Some are more than welcoming, never treating her differently and never letting her blood status stand in the way of her achievements. But there are always others, particularly from a certain house, that would make it their mission to make her feel like she doesn't belong, that she was an intruder, a slave amongst royalty.

She wished she could be like Milla or the other muggle-borns who would just shrug off their comments with an eye-roll or just downright ignore them, but she's not. Lily was against violence but she also wasn't a fan of being made fun of and bullying. She knew that fighting back could only cause more trouble, but if she won't defend herself then who will?

Still, she had to think rationally. And so with a deep breath, she continued walking as if she hadn't heard a thing.

But they weren't backing down.

The one who commented rudely grabbed a fistful of her red hair just as she started to walk away, making the prefect yelp in both shock and pain.

"Who do you think you are, turning your back on me?" The brown-haired Slytherin hissed, still having a painful grip on her locks.

Trying to fight tears of humiliation and anger, Lily struggled to free herself, grunting with effort. "Let. me. go."

"Can't handle a little cat fight, can you, Evans?" She emphasized her question with another tug of her hair. Finally having had enough, Lily found strength to dig her nails onto the girl's wrist and causing her to let go.

She walked backwards to distance herself while clutching the back of her head which stung from the hair-pulling with one hand, and quickly getting her wand out, pointing it to the girl's faces. Her other friends (minions would be a better term) all watched with horrified expressions, as if it was such a crime for a mudblood like herself to pull a wand on a pureblood. "Do not test me," she managed to growl out before hastily turning around and jogging away.

While her feet moved, her eyes finally let the tears she desperately held back to fall, grazing her cheeks and making her face flush rather unattractively. Too distracted while swallowing down her sobs, she didn't notice a figure ahead of her until she ran head first into him, recoiling with the force.