Lily Evans' Hit List

By Lily Orange

The first person I decided to put on my hit list – metaphorical, of course, I wasn't actually going to kill anybody on it as my profession is undoubtedly Gryffindor sixth year and not amateur Death Eater – was my best friend Alice. She deserved it, don't worry. She suggested, her brain obviously momentarily losing its ability to function properly, that we had a costume ball. A costume ball! In the Great Hall! Obviously I was the only one who saw this is potentially – well, not potentially, more like definitely – problematic and a completely rubbish and idiotic idea. However, when I voiced these ideas to dear Alice, she simply laughed and said there was no way I could stop her from taking this idea to Professors McGonagall and Dumbledore. I could probably hope that Professor McGonagall would think it was a silly idea, much like me, but Professor Dumbledore would probably think it an absolutely stupendous one and would immediately get a costume ball organised.

"Honestly, Lily, I don't see why you're getting so stressed about the possibility of attending a costume ball," Alice said exasperatedly as we were walking back to the common room for a free lesson after Charms.

"Because – well, there are numerous reasons why I'm stressed out about it!" I growled back, not quite able to muster any of those reasons up at that moment in time.

"OI, EVANS!" I was immediately reminded of one of the key reasons when I heard the inescapable James Potter calling my name from the other end of the corridor.

"He is the biggest one!" I hissed as she looked at me, amused, whilst James Potter ran up the hall to try and catch me up.

"Hey Lily," he said, his hazel eyes glinting mischievously and his dark hair as sexily messy as ever. Well, it wasn't sexily messy, per se, it was a little tousled, and it did look extremely attractive, well, not really, okay, I suppose it did, but why was I finding James Potter, the annoying, arrogant idiot attractive?

I tried to calm myself down by reminding myself that I had only complimented his hair, and in my mind at that. He couldn't hear what was going on in my deranged mind. Well, I hoped he couldn't.

"Hi James, do you mind – I have a Potions essay to go and finish," I said quickly. I heard Alice snort with laughter beside me – she knew I'd finished the essay I was currently telling James about the night before in the library.

"Lily, no you don't," he said, amused.

"I do," I shot back.

"Lily, I'm in your Potions class and, unless I'm mistaken, which I don't think I am, I saw you complete that essay in the library last night," he grinned. "And you were telling Alice about it whilst we were making the Draught of Living Death today, and I sit on your other side."

Oh Merlin, he had me. Why did he have to be so precise and 'in the know'? I decided right there and then that the second person to go on my hit list would be James Potter. And he, thanks to him annoying me for the whole of my school life, would be written in scarlet ink in capital letters and would be underlined at least three times. You know, for emphasis. Alice's name would be written in standard black ink. But his had to be set apart from the rest.

"Oh, er... right, um... how come you know everything about me?" I suddenly blurted out, and rather rudely, I thought afterwards.

He merely chuckled. "I make it my business, seeing as you're going to be my wife someday. Bye Lily – catch you later!" and he sped off, no doubt to go and find his friends.

"His wife? He is sooo dead..." I scowled, whilst Alice roared with laughter.

I turned to her and shot her a murderous glare.

"So, Lily... want to go and finish your Potions essay?" she said, suppressing much chortling, no doubt.

"Shut up," I retorted, and walked off in the direction of the common room. I was going to go and write my hit list now – albeit a metaphorical one. I wouldn't really want to kill them. I don't think. Azkaban wasn't nice at this time of year.

Or any, really.

When I was back in our room, I took out a piece of parchment and my inks, and, with my favourite peacock feather quill, I wrote, 'Lily Evans' Hit List' at the top and underlined it once. I think I had some form of obsessive underlining disorder as everything I did had to be pristine with underlines and perfect punctuation. Underneath my title, I put the number one in the margin and next to it wrote, 'Alice Smith – for suggesting the ridiculous idea of a costume ball meaning I would have to get dressed up and stop my studies for an evening.' That was quite satisfying, I suppose. Then, underneath that, I wrote the number two but then scrabbled about in my bag for my scarlet ink, which I proceeded to write in – 'JAMES POTTER' (underlined four times with dots around the edge of his name like it was on fire or being electrocuted or something. Not that I would set him on fire or electrocute him, that's just downright cruel) 'for stalking me and knowing stuff about me before even I do!'

"Lily?" I heard Alice call up the stairs. Knowing I had approximately ten seconds to hide my hit list before she entered our dorm, I promptly shoved it under my pillow, and lay against it so Alice would have no clue.

"Hey Alice!" I said happily as she entered the room. She grinned.

"You'll never guess – they've accepted the idea of a costume ball and its going to be held next Saturday! We have to go costume shopping in Hogsmeade at the weekend," she beamed at me.

"Ugh. What am I supposed to dress as?" I asked her, raising an eyebrow.

"How about – I know you love history – Elizabeth I?" Alice suggested.

"No. She painted white lead on her face! Ew – just, ew!" I squealed.

"I have the most perfect idea for you!" she suddenly shrieked, apparently a wave of inspiration just coming to her.

"Tell me, Oh Inspired One!" I smiled cheekily.

"The Little Mermaid!" she said, clapping her hands together ecstatically.

"Doesn't that mean I have to wander round in a bra and a tail-like thing?" I said doubtfully.

"Well, yes, you need a shell bra, but we can add lots of necklaces with shells and stuff on them, and we can actually transfigure your legs into a proper tail!" she said, her eyes wide with excitement.

"Just two thing amid this fountain of ideas, which are very good, may I add – though this may hinder them actually happening – if my legs are transfigured to be a tail, won't it mean I have to sit in water all the time, and, secondly, YOU ARE NOT TRANSFIGURING MY LEGS INTO A FISH TAIL!"

"Don't worry, Lily, I'll check a book out on it in the library. We'll just need to get you the shell bra and the jewellery then!" Alice cried happily.

"Fine, if I even survive long enough in case you cast the spell wrong, what are you going as?" I asked, intrigued.

"I was thinking Cleopatra," she answered. "I saw the outfit in the Hogsmeade costume shop last time, but we'll need to get there early if I want to get it before everyone else appears!"

"Yay," I said, somewhat unenthusiastically – she winked, and left. I decided that I would resume my list – I was adding the part about transfiguring my legs to Alice's name most definitely. So I lifted my pillow, retrieved the list – but then saw a picture of James Potter.

An actual photograph of James Potter, a moving wizard photo, with him smiling cheekily at the camera, that same sexy, audacious grin – hang on, why did I keep describing him as sexy? I needed to use more accurate vocabulary, such as annoying, and gorgeous, and attractive... no, I meant frustrating...

I picked up the offending item, and turned it over. Something was written on the back – however, it wasn't written in James' untidy scrawl. I read it; 'Hey Lily! This way, James will always be in your bed!'

I was actually maddened by this message – it definitely wasn't James' handwriting, as it was actually decipherable, and anyway, James wouldn't have written about himself in the third person. The handwriting was a very neat, loopy joined up affair that looked exactly like the writing of –

"SIRIUS BLACK! I AM GOING TO MURDER YOU!" I bellowed as I ran down the stairs to the common room, promising myself that Sirius would be the next person on my list, after James.

I hurtled into the common room, and saw Sirius sat with James, Remus and Peter by the fire, laughing about something. Well, he'd be laughing on the other side of his face in a minute.

"SIRIUS BLACK!" I hollered homicidally. He turned to look at me, with a hint of fear in his grey eyes.

"Yes, Lily, dear?" he said.

"Do not 'Lily, dear' me! Was this your doing, Sirius?" I said, shoving the picture in his face.

"I was going to put it in your knickers drawer, but I thought that would be too rude, suggestive and full of innuendo," he grinned, unabashed.

"THIS WAS RUDE, SUGGESTIVE AND FULL OF INNUENDO!" I roared. James looked surprised, and wrenched the picture out of his hand.

"Padfoot!" he said, shocked.

"Sorry – Moony and I had snuck out to Hogsmeade to get some Firewhiskey and I was slightly giddy..." he defended himself.

"Oh, go snog some randomer," was my annoyed response and I stomped off, hearing Sirius yell "GLADLY!" after me. He sickened me. So I added this to my hit list: 'Sirius Black – snogs random girls in broom cupboards and is very suggestive.'

The day of the costume ball dawned. Alice had decided that we should take the whole day to prepare. I was slightly worried actually – not only because of the vast time limit Alice had set aside to basically spend straightening her hair and applying large amounts of kohl around her eyes – but because Alice had only got the book about human transfiguration out of the library the night before and was swotting up on how to turn people's legs into tails.

"Alice," I said in a shaky voice after I came out of the shower, "I don't think this is the best idea."

"Of course it is. James will sweep you off your feet – literally, I'll have to enlist his help in carrying you to the Great Hall," she replied without worry.

"Yes, but have you solved the problem of where I am supposed to spend the evening seeing as I can't stand up?" I asked irritably.

"As a matter of fact, I have," she smiled mysteriously.

"How?" I asked suspiciously.

"Wait and see. Now, can I do your makeup?" she asked, casting the human transfiguration book aside and coming at me with a black mascara wand.

"I suppose," I said, combing my wet hair back, deciding I'd bother about it later – once Alice had finished doing her own makeup and had started on mine, there were only two hours to go before the ball.

Seriously, Alice is lethal with eyeliner. She managed to poke me in the eye twice before she actually got it right, but when she'd done my face, she sat back and smiled happily, like she was really proud.

"Look in the mirror, Lily," she said – I turned and observed my reflection.

"Oh my... Alice... wow..." I said breathlessly. She had made me look like an absolute goddess! I certainly didn't look like that every day, but she had made my skin look absolutely flawless and illuminated, but in a beautiful ivory way; my green eyes were surrounded by perfectly mascaraed eyelashes and a thin line of smudged grey eye pencil. My favourite part was my lips – she had painted them a soft, matte apricot colour which contrasted really nicely with the purple shells Alice had convinced me to wear on my top half – though I had negotiated (my method of negotiation is to scream loudly, then smile sweetly – well, when it concerns Alice wanting me to do something or the Marauders – otherwise I am a lot more reasonable) that instead of merely a shell bra, I had on a purple shell top – two shells for my chest, then smaller shells that came down to the bottom of my ribcage and then trailed off around my back, interspersed with these little pearls. I had found it in the costume shop we had visited, and had convinced Alice that this was way better and more mermaid-y.

"Okay – and now it's time for the leg change," she said confidently. I'm glad she was, I certainly wasn't – Cleopatra was about to turn me into a mermaid for five hours!

"It won't hurt me, will it?" I winced.

"No, not if I do it right," she said – Alice's words were hardly what you could call comforting – "now, sit still and I will do the spell for you."

I lay down, closed my eyes tightly, worried of what was to come. But when Alice said the spell, I felt a tingly sensation down my legs – and when I opened my eyes, they were a FISH TAIL! Lily Evans had a FISH TAIL!

"Well, that seems to have worked," Alice, or rather, Cleopatra, beamed at me. She was so off my hit list after this – she was an angel!

"Oh Alice, you're amazing! No wonder you're the best at transfiguration in the year!" I gushed, and she blushed at me.

"Don't worry about it," she said, as if all she'd done was pick my book up off the floor rather than transfigure my legs into a fish tail and do my makeup for a costume ball.

Whilst I was looking very mermaid-y, she was looking highly exotic and very attractive; Alice was wearing a floor-length white dress that was belted in the middle with a gold belt, with a large bejewelled necklace and bracelets, a matching headdress thing and gold sandals. She looked every inch the Egyptian ruler with the black kohl eyeliner she had painted around her large blue eyes.

"Yeah – so, did you say you were going to get James to carry me down?" I asked, trying to mask the hope in my voice.

"Oh yes, you've reminded me, I'll be back in a minute with a knight in shining armour!" she grinned roguishly and ran off down the stairs, leaving me lying on the bed, my hair now dry and thankfully looking quite good, having fallen into pretty, not the usual crazy, curls.

She reappeared about a minute later, with somebody actually dressed as a knight, to carry me.

"I'm sorry, it's Sirius – not quite the knight in shining armour we were expecting, but James is still getting ready, he'll meet us down there," she said, eyes twinkling.

"Hey Lily," Sirius grinned, "I'm sorry about earlier."

"It's okay," I replied, as he lifted me like a bride and proceeded to carry me down the staircase. I receive some admiring looks from others in the common room (whose costumes definitely weren't as good as mine) as Sirius the knight carried me through.

"I kind of made a little arrangement for you so you could actually attend the party as a mermaid," he said as he carried me through the corridors and down the stairs to the Great Hall – outside it had been decorated with fairy lights and candles.

"Really? What?" I asked, intrigued.

"Look inside," he smiled. I looked – and saw a massive fountain had been constructed in the middle of the Great Hall, deep enough for me to sit in and large enough for me to swim around in.

"You did this?" I asked incredulously.

"Don't look so surprised!" he snorted with laughter, setting me down inside the fountain. I mentally crossed him off my hit list, remembering that the only person left on it now was James.

"HEY LILY!" I heard a familiar voice shout – James himself, running towards me, his hair all sexily messy, er, I mean – well, there's no use trying to say exactly what I mean because that is exactly what I mean, if that makes sense. Which it probably doesn't, as I am practically turning insane.

He was wearing a loose white shirt and black trousers tucked into boots – oh Merlin, he was dressed as Mr Darcy!

"Alice told me how much you like Pride and Prejudice," he said, "and it gave me an idea of how I could spend the evening with you." And he jumped into the fountain, recreating the whole wet shirt moment.

I think I had died and gone to heaven, and all it had taken was me being sat in a fountain, with James Potter next to me in a wet shirt.

He was definitely, and permanently, crossed off my now non-existent hit list.

I hope you liked that! And, I know, they wouldn't have known about

:) x Lily Orange x (: