I'll Take it Shaken, Not Stirred

Chapter 11- "In the Offices and What Happened After"

N/C: Chapter 11! Fun, and weird, and sort of awkward at some spots, but hopefully overall enjoyable. Reviews are lovely.

Origins: everything good you see here belongs to Rowling. Everything undercooked and lumpy is mine.

Recap of Last time: EL GASPE! Lily and James almost simultaneously grow suspicious of Professors Silth and Praedam (Lily of Silth, James of Praedam), and resolve to "keep an eye on them." Both Head Students are extremely stubborn and refuse to consider that the other may be right, because... well... that's how they are. But on Halloween, Herbology teacher, Grossman- who is somehow connected to Silth's mystery- goes missing, and Lily asks James to help her out...

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"Action is eloquence..." –William Shakespeare

Lily resisted the very strong urge to throw her face in the mashed potatoes in front of her. Holy snap. Why did she want to do this? Why did she want to pull a prank? With Potter? She was very confused...

And yet, oddly, she simultaneously did and did not know what she was doing.

Lily's eyes bounced nervously about the excited Great Hall. Students were celebrating the Halloween Feast, completely oblivious to Professor Grossman's absence. Even those who did know that she had failed to come to her Herbology classes that day assumed (or, perhaps, hoped) that it was merely due to an illness.

The Head Girl's eyes flitted from the levitating jack-o-lanterns, up to the Staff table, where the teachers spoke very little, and looked decidedly grave. Alastar Moody had come in twice in the course of the meal so for, and whispered something in Dumbledore's ear, to which the Headmaster had merely nodded. Overall, however, the first half of the feast had been painfully uneventful, and therefore, for Lily, unnerving.

And where was Potter?

He hadn't shown up at all, which was indescribably odd, because his friends were all sitting at the Gryffindor table, joking as if he were not missing at all. Lily was extremely jumpy, but, due to the presence of her laid-back friends, did her very best to hide it.

"I wonder where Grossman is," Eden murmured to Lily, about fifteen minutes into the feast, as the blonde poured herself a glass of specially purchased butterbeer. Lily turned and looked at her friend, who bore an innocent expression.

"What makes you wonder?" Lily asked, hoping to sound casual.

"Nothing," Eden replied calmly; "only, it's odd that she's sick and not in the Infirmary, isn't it?"

"How do you know that she's not there?"

"I went up for some headache medicine at lunch, and there weren't any patients.

"Maybe she stayed in her quarters."

"Mmm... maybe..." agreed Eden, with a note of something that Lily feared to be skepticism in her voice. She said nothing, however, trying to pretend that Grossman's absence was of no concern to her.

She glanced nervously about the Hall again. Potter's unpunctuality was making her nervous... he'd said he'd tell her the plan at the Feast...

Finally, after almost ten more minutes, James made his entrance- "fashionably" late, as usual. He walked the length of the Gryffindor table toward where his fellow Marauders were sitting. However, as he passed Lily, he tripped and fell practically on top of her.