The Other War // James Potter & Lily Evans

the order of the phoenix;

James's eyes itched from his lack of sleep, every muscle in his body screamed for him to relax but he knew he couldn't. He knew that if he did, for sure, he would fall asleep and miss his meeting with Dumbledore and something in the back of his head was gripping tightly to the fact that that happening could be bad. He knew either way, he would be tired. He hadn't the slightest clue why Dumbledore would schedule such a late meeting on a Thursday. It probably would have made much more sense to set it for a Friday, or a sturday, perhaps, where he could sleep in the next morning. But nevertheless, he lay awake in his bed, lights off and shoes on, silently praying that Lily wouldn't still be awake doing homework when he had to leave. The arm clock on the wall across from him was slowly creeping closer and closer to eleven o'clock and James decided on a fair excuse to pull if he bumped into Lily: I need to fetch my transfiguration notes from Remus.

When watching the clock tick and tick and tick got too hypnotic, James slithered out of his bed and tip-toed down to the fire. Thankfully, Lily must have retired early because she wasn't kneeling before the fire with several scraps of parchment scattered before her. But when James stepped off the bottom step, he bumped into a fast moving blur of red. It was Lily.

She yelped as she tumbled backwards and caught herself on the ready sofa. "James," she said at the same time James said, "Lily." He noticed that she wasn't dressed in her night clothes. But then again, neither was he. "What are you doing here?" Her tome wasn't accusatory.

"Uh, well, I just realised that I need to gets Remus off my notes. Er-my notes off Remus." He stammered. So much for his excuse. But Lily didn't question him, she just laughed.

"Well if you're going to the Gryffindor common room, I'll come with. Marlene has my... My lucky quill." James decided on not arguing and he held out his hand to her.

"Yeah sure, you can come." He smoothed his hair back with is hands and Lily rolled her eyes, batting at the offending hand.

"You're such a git, you know that?"

"You love me."

"Yeah, I do."

-

They walked in a silence, almost smouldering. Their breaths, their footsteps barely made a sound. When they reached the fat lady's portrait, James faltered and turned to Lily.

"Uh, do you know the password?" He asked. Lily looked at him with an expression that told him that she didn't. "Well, we're screwed," James complained jokingly. Lily looked at him with a nonchalant expression and stepped forwards.

"Uh, Good evening," she said and the fat lady grumbled. "We need to get into the common room." She said. The fat lady grumbled again before woke up and eyeing James and Lily suspiciously.

"Password."

"Well, we are in Gryffindor, you see, but we're head boy and girl, so we don't know the password." The fat lady shook her head as if trying to work out if this were a dream or not and swung open, letting James and Lily into the common room.

They went in opposite directions, James heading to the left and Lily to the right. James knew by heart which dorm room belonged to his friends, because it was once his dorm too. He didn't even bother knocking but upon entering the room, he realised that if he did knock, he wouldn't have gotten an answer anyway because what greeted him was four empty beds.

In a slightly confused state, James clambered back down the stairs, hoping to just slip away to Dumbledore's office but he was interrupted by Lily again.

"Yeah," he said, rubbing his neck. "Remus was asleep," he lied. Lily nodded thoughtfully, although she looked as if she weren't fully convinced. "Order..." He said under his breath. It was quiet, but Lily's ears picked up on it immediately. Her head snapped up and she looked at him with curiosity.