Lily was getting slightly annoyed. It was Sirius's turn to watch her. She knew that the boys were planning something, she just didn't know what. It was either a major prank or their outing. She certainly hoped it was their outing, since she didn't like to see people being the victims of the pranks, mostly because, even though the victim, so to speak, may or may not be a person she'd particularly LIKE, she still was rather irked by it, as she could always see herself in the victim, be the victim Malfoy, Snape or Lestrange.
For Sirius to 'watch' Lily, he mostly got on her nerves so bad that she usually wanted to hex him into next week. Even though she knew he meant well and all, that they ALL meant well trying to watch out for her, but all he was doing was asking her stupid questions and attracting attention to her. She didn't like attention. She mostly preferred to blend into the background...not that she'd had much of a chance to do that since the Marauders were recently constantly hovering around her like mother hens. Painting was another thing that, due to the Marauders constant presence, she had been unable to spend much time on. The only painting she could do was during school and class time, which wasn't much. She smiled softly. It was nice having people around sometimes though, even though it annoyed her once in awhile.
One of the only good things she could see from Sirius being her 'bodyguard' or 'watchdog' for this shift was the amount of information she could get out of him about their full moon outings, the location and the dates were easily gotten from Sirius's non-stop yapping. It was, as she suspected, in the next few days, and they were going to the Shrieking Shack. She was still of two minds of whether to sneak in and watch the transformation or just wait till they get out and join them.
Suddenly, she realized that she was spacing out in Professor Flitwick's class. Her favorite class, even though he wasn't her favorite professor, that was reserved for Professor McGonagall. She started furiously taking notes, not that she needed to, but from the look on Sirius face, he'd need to borrow them later, along with the homework assignment, as he was busy drawing little pictures of animals on the parchment.
James and Remus were at the other corner of the class, busy working out the logistics for the prank. Sirius was usually not very helpful for this part, since his mentality was not suited for all the small details, but the things on a grander scale. They were working out what the timing of the spells should be, the suitability of the various spells, which spell was most effective and all those sort of things. At the same time they were planning the itinerary of their monthly trips out.
James was not fully concentrating on his 'work' but was more focused on the way the redhead in the front row was nibbling on the end of the quill, and the way she was putting in her mouth and twirling it around. It was driving him mad, and was making him very uncomfortable as well. He groaned out loud. She was gorgeous and it maddened him to realize that he'd never noticed her before this year. He was an idiot. She was staring into space again. She suddenly smiled and he had a burning desire to know what put that smile on her face. HE wanted to be the one who made her smile like that, to be the recipient of her affections.
Remus on the other hand was very amused with his partner's fixation on his Lady Lily. He liked Lily; she was a good match for James. Hopefully, he would be able to heal and remove the scars from her heart, soul and mind. He knew better than most people that scars take a long time to heal. Some never do. The pain that some of the scars are evidence of, hurt the heart a lot more that the damage that the body receives. As a werewolf, he felt his scar, the bite, every day. The curse that he carried daily, took its toil on his body and his mind. It made him more vulnerable to the dark than most Gryffindors usually were, but it also strengthened his resolve to never turn, to never lose himself to the dark side. To Voldermort.
He smiled. The professor was talking about the various charms required for their upcoming N.E.W.T.S (Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Tests). Thankfully for their perchance for pranks, they had mastered all the advanced charms, potions, transfigurations and spells for their N.E.W.T.S, so he didn't really have to pay attention to Flitwick, except for the homework assignments. Hearing James groan, he looked at him with a wondering look on his face, however, upon seeing the reason for his groan, Remus was hard pressed not to burst out in fits of laughter.
Sirius thought that the drawings he did of the Marauders were very good, almost lifelike in fact. He was very proud of himself. He didn't really need to pay attention to the class, as he already knew everything that the teacher was teaching anyways. He glanced at Lily and he noticed her furiously scribbling down on the paper.
People thought that he was an exuberant idiot, but that was just a mask, as was everything else. If people thought he was an idiot, that meant that less reports to his mother, less beatings, less punishments. From the time in the hospital, he had noticed scars on Lily, old scars. They were obviously not self-inflicted. That meant that someone, someone that Lily saw regularly had to be giving her these scars. He knew what it was like to be abused. He had to face it daily for many years, he finally escaped to James's house, but the years had taken it's toll on him. He couldn't stand seeing other people being bullied or abused. It made him think of the painful past, and he felt that Lily knew what he went through, but she was still going through it, all the pain, the suffering. They were helping, but in the end, she was still the one that would have to face her fears.
He looked up and saw a Ravenclaw wink at him. He grinned, and winked back. Well, he'd be busy tonight.
Lily decided to stop by the dorm before going to Arithmancy, she had to get her calculator which was something she'd always liked to have for that class. Stopping outside her own common area between the head dorms, she found that the idiots had left their plans for the outing in two day's time right outside in the open. Just lying out there on the table. She looked at it and took note. They were going into the forbidden forest to 'play' as they call it. Well...this had saved her a lot of work. She grinned.
Grabbing her calculator, she went to class. Professor Vector was teaching about the gaming theory. It was rather fun. These few modules had been on muggle math recently and she found them rather intriguing.
The boys had a free period since they didn't dropped Divination as the new professor, Trelawney was an absolute fake. They had no idea what in the world possessed Professor Dumbledore to hire her. They were in the head common room where they were planning their various stunts, just back from the kitchens as Sirius wanted a snack and all of them were a bit hungry anyway from the lectures Filtwick issued.
Sirius was not happy. He really wanted to tell his buddies about the fact that Lily was being abused at home...at least he suspected it was at her home. They didn't know much about her family background apart from the fact that she was muggleborn.
Remus was wondering about the right time to tell them about Lily being a famous artist, but was wondering if they even knew who Jordan was. He was also pondering on how to break to his friends that Lily knew their secret, the one about them being Animagi and the one that she knew that Remus was a werewolf.
James was just hoping that he didn't mess up too badly when Lily was around. He desperately wanted to ask her out on the next Hogsmead weekend, but he didn't know how to ask and whether she saw him more than a friend, or worse...a stalker.
Fangboy: WOO HOO!!! Another chapter.... .
I'm sure you're all happy I got another one out....
I had been busy with life...I'm still busy with it, but I'll try to get another chapter out.
I still have writers block....