Snuffles

A dog was following her.

Lily Evans glanced over her shoulder again to see the black, scary looking hound only five meters from herself. Quickly looking forward again, Lily took a deep breath in and focused her gaze on the ground – after all, she didn't want to trip over a rock and sprain her ankle just because she had some delusions about a dog stalking her.

No, that just wouldn't do.

Shifting the bag over her shoulder, Lily breathed in deeply once more in an attempt to calm herself. The dog, despite being very large and having peculiarly sharp teeth, had been harmless so far. In fact, it was probably just a pet of a student who had smuggled it in to Hogwarts somehow. Her Head Girl instincts kicked in, and a slight frown played on the redheads face at the idea of a troublemaking child importing a dog into Hogwarts, despite the very clear rules that they were not allowed. Harrumphing slightly to herself in a very dissatisfied way, Lily quickened her pace and tried to distract herself by thinking about the Herbology project that was due that next week – the exact reason she had extracted herself from the comfortable position on the most favoured chair directly in front of the common room fire and trudged her way down seven flights of moving stairs – why on earth did stairs have to move?- and brave the bitter cold of a Thursday night.

And now a dog was stalking her.

She really should have just stayed inside.

Despite the mantra of it's just a dog, it's just a dog Lily was pleased when she reached the greenhouses. Sparing one last glance at the animal, Lily darted inside to check on her project.

Fifteen minutes and a battle with a ravenous plant later, Lily exited the green house, tired, annoyed and smelling faintly of cheese. (Why the plant had amazingly managed to discover its bloody liquid-sprayer and test it on her, Lily would forever be clueless.) It was common knowledge that, despite Lily Evans' many other talents, Herbology just wasn't one of them.

So, it wasn't really her fault when, at around halfway up the hill back to the castle, she was so distracted in trying to sleep with her eyes open that she slammed straight into James Potter, who it appeared had been talking quietly to the big black dog that had been stalking her previously.

There was a painful sounding thud as they collided.

"Gah!" Lily cried, stumbling back. "What the bloody-"

James' eyes widened in surprise. "Evans!" He greeted cheerfully, cutting off her exclamation of astonishment. A grin tugged at his lips as he observed her silently for a moment as she attempted to get back her breath. When Lily had finally calmed down enough to reply to his attempts at conversation, James asked politely, "What are you doing down here?"

His polite question was promptly ignored and instead Lily focused on narrowing her eyes at the dog who was looking up at her innocently. Irrationally, she knew, she was blaming everything on the bloody beast.

It cocked its head to the side.

Firmly, Lily Evans decided right there that she hated it.

"Is...That yours, Potter?" She snapped finally, pointing a finger at the mutt.

James followed her gaze and appraised the dog carefully. "Yes. His name's S-Snuffles."

"Snuffles?"

James nodded, grinning slightly to some unapparent inside joke. "Yes, Snuffles." He cocked an eyebrow at the still fuming girl standing in front of him. "Er, may I ask why you're currently glaring at my rather adorable and cute dog."

Snuffles growled, baring his teeth at his owner. James merely rolled his eyes.

"That mongrel, Potter is the furthest thing from cute and adorable. It bloody well stalked me!"

James looked down at the dog and raised an eyebrow. "Did you?" He asked, addressing the dog. Lily was not so surprised; she had known that her co-head was mentally unstable since their first year. Talking to dogs as if they could reply was just another thing that James Potter had done that provided evidence of his nonexistent sanity.

Her eyes narrowing, Lily huffed at the complete nonchalance that James was expressing. "Yes. And I'm not bloody delusional and the plants did not mess with my brains." At this, James had the audacity to laugh. "It stalked me from the castle to the Herbology labs. And I will not stand for it!" Lily finished her passionate rant with a fist pump in the air. A multitude of hexes were looking very appealing just then, and Lily went to go for her wand before she was restrained by very warm, firm hands on her upper arms.

"C'mon Evans; it's Snuffles!" James whined, looking at the dog apologetically.

"It's a stupid bloody mongrel with a ridiculous name!"

Snuffles barked, jumping to its feet and growling at her, teeth bared. On a rather stupid impulse, Lily hid behind the closest solid thing available to her: James Potter.

Darting behind the Quidditch captain, Lily gripped at his forearms as Snuffles began to move forward once more...

...before plopping down beside James' feet and looking up at her with the most mischievous expression Lily had ever seen on a dogs face.

It made complete sense to Lily that James Potter's dog was an absolute git. In fact, it was fitting even.

James chuckled and Lily quickly dropped his arms – which, she couldn't help but notice, really were quite nice and firm. Shaking herself of the thought, Lily cowered behind James once more (making sure not to touch him, of course.) When James shot her an odd look, Lily replied with a raise of her eyebrows which clearly transmitted the thought that if the dog was going to have a sudden burst of violence and launch himself at the nearest thing, it certainly was not going to be her.

"It's evil," she declared, rocking forward to peer over James' shoulder and glaring at the dog. It whined back at her as if protesting at her statement.

Lily mentally slapped herself. Dog's could not understand English, even evil demonic ones like Snuffles. It was probably just whining because it was thirsty for blood and didn't want to attack its owner, Lily assured herself, poking her tongue out at Snuffles over James' shoulder.

James rubbed the back of his neck, looking over his shoulder at Lily who quickly sucked her tongue back in before James could notice her display of immaturity. "That's rather harsh."

Snuffles rolled onto his back and as Lily began to spit out her protests and point out the evilness of the dog, James suddenly plopped down on the floor and began idly scratching Snuffle's stomach. His face was intense with thought and it took two minutes of solid venting for Lily to realise that he wasn't paying any attention to her at all.

"James," Lily sighed wearily, looking down at her co-head in exasperation. "That rant took a lot of energy out of me and it'd be nice if you appreciated my efforts."

James blinked up at her before shrugging. "Sorry, Lily. I'm sure it was a marvellous rant."

"It was, thank you."

"But really, Evans," James continued, looking between her and Snuffles and turning his palms upwards in a sign of defeat. "I don't see what Si-Snuffles did to offend you, Evans," James admitted. Lily didn't notice the slip up. "He didn't attack you, he didn't molest you –"

Lily frowned. "Can dogs molest people?"

"This dog can."

"That's...not so surprising."

"Why?" James asked, as Snuffles wormed around on the floor on his back, looking mightily pleased with himself at the accusation of being able to molest people. Lily had to, once again, reassure herself that the dog could not understand what they were saying and that the plants actually had addled with her brain. James hopped up quickly, running a hand through his hair anxiously.

"It's your dog."

The dog barked and Lily glanced at it suspiciously; it sounded like it was laughing.

Dogs could not laugh.

That was it, enough was enough.

Glancing at James and then back at the dog, Lily cocked an eyebrow. "Is your dog half-human or something?"

Oddly, James blanched. "No!" He protested with a touch too much vehemence.

The violent reaction increased Lily's suspicion and warily –suspicion outweighing fear - Lily leaned down and stared Snuffle's right in the eye, hands placed firmly on her hips. Quickly, Snuffles placed his paws over his eyes, whining piteously.

"You do realize that you're not supposed to have dogs, right Potter?" Lily asked, still peering intently at Snuffles, quite rudely ignoring his whine. There was something unmistakeably familiar about him...something she couldn't put her finger on.

Behind her she could hear James shuffling anxiously and could picture him very clearly scraping a hand through his hair. Clearing his voice, he muttered something incomprehensible under his breath which Lily promptly ignored.

"McGonagall wouldn't have let you bring a dog to school...neither would Filch...and they wouldn't be so stupid to miss a rather large dog wandering around the school - so unless it's a stray then it's a person—" Lily mused out loud, her thoughts whirring in her head.

The following events happened very, very quickly.

Before she could reach a conclusion (and at that point all conclusions equalled James with enough detentions to last him till the end of school and more) James had tugged her up and slammed her into his chest before kissing her very roughly – and so unexpectedly – that Lily quickly lost her train of thought. Without consciously recognizing what she was doing, Lily hands clutched at the nape of James' neck and let her lips worked furiously against his, allowing his tongue access into his mouth.

It was a very long time – or so it felt to Lily who had instantaneously lost all reasonable thoughts as soon as James' lips were on her own – when they finally pulled away for air, both looking rumpled, red faced and completely and utterly embarrassed.

For a moment neither Head's said anything.

Before:

"Dear God Potter –"

"I'm so –"

James and Lily stopped and stared at each other. "Go on," James offered courteously, bowing his head slightly as he waited for the onslaught of abuse.

For a fraction of a second, Lily hesitated. She had planned to scream at him and rage and possibly send him to the hospital wing for the rest of his schooling career but something made her stop.

"Want to go to Hogesmead with me?"

James' head snapped up and he stared at the redhead in front of him with the amount of shock he would give to McGonagall if she announced that she wanted to have an illicit relationship with him filled with hot, passionate sex.

Lily – who appeared to be equally, if not more, surprised than him – resembled a dying goldfish and despite the fact that anybody else would think that she looked rather unattractive with her face pinched up and mouth opening and closing James thought she looked rather pretty.

"I mean –"

"Sure, Lily!"

There was another awkward silence as they stared at each other once again; each of them praying the other would talk first.

This time, it was Lily's turn to break the silence. "I mean...that is...That was an accident, you see," she offered James weakly as she stared at the ground. Shuffling her feet beneath her she fought the temptation to look up at him and observe his reaction.

James, who was in the middle of raising a hand to muse his hair, was completely still, an odd expression crossing his face. They were in their last year of school and only had three months or so left and then he would never see Lily ever again...and although he had kissed her (and as amazing as that was) it wasn't enough.

So, dropping his hand to his side, he let out a rather large gusty sigh. "Unfortunately, Evans, you can't just kiss a bloke and get away with it."

A small, very cute crease between Lily's eyebrows showed her confusion. And she was confused. "Pardon me, Potter?"

James grinned back at her and her lips tingled in an odd sort of way as he continued on in a lofty voice, "Do you want people to know you as the girl that randomly kisses people?"

"You kissed me!"

"Dare I say, people may begin to call you...The Kisser."

It was the most ludicrous thing that Lily had heard in a long time and she stared at the clearly mentally unbalanced boy in front of her incredulously. "Potter are you naturally this weird or did something happen to you when you were a child."

"Mum suspects Dad's genes," James admitted casually, "But I reckon it was because she dropped me on my head when I was a baby. Careless woman, she is. An absolute disgrace to mothers everywhere."

"I honestly pity that woman," Lily said, sighing.

"Hush, The Kisser. No one asked for your opinion."

Because of the red head genes that Lily had inherited a blush was slowly but surely making its way up her cheeks. The nickname was ridiculously stupid and that was all. Lily wondered why exactly James was calling her 'The Kisser' – it was idiotic, pointless and only embarrassed her to no ends.

And then it hit her.

"Really Potter?" Lily asked scathingly.

"Really what, my dear?"

"Don't call me my dear and I'm not going on a date with you, even if you do call me The Kisser."

James grinned at her, looking rather proud. "I'm glad you figured it out, Lily. I knew there was a reason I fancied you."

It was the first time that James had mentioned fancying Lily since school had started and the pink of her cheeks were slowly giving way to a deep red.

"It won't work."

"Wanna bet?"

Groaning in frustration, Lily placed her hands firmly on her hips. "I'm not going on a date with you, Pott—hey where's your bloody dog?"

Snuffles had mysteriously disappeared from where he was lying not just a few minutes ago and, although immensely relieved, Lily could not help but be extremely suspicious.

"Dunno," James answered her question with an unconcerned shrug. "He does that."

"You've got a weird dog, Potter."

James was beginning to look rather shifty eyed.

"Almost...human like."

"Lily, please. Stop asking about Snuffles."

"No. If it's a student and you've –"

"It's not! I promise." Looking immensely desperate, James placed his hands on Lily's shoulders and stared solemnly into her eyes. "This is all just a dream."

"That's not going to work. I'm not that stupid."

"Fine," James acknowledged, pulling back and running a hand through his hair. "I'm being serious here, Lily, I need you to forget about him."

There was such sincerity and desperateness that Lily could hardly say no, so after a moment's pause, she gave a reluctant nod.

James almost sagged with relief.

"I would tell you, Lily," he said genuinely. "But it's not really up to me..."

Her Head Girl instincts kicking in, Lily jabbed James sharply in the chest. "James Potter, if it's just a prank on an innocent, defenceless first year or something –"

"It's not!"

"—then you will die a slow, painful death at my mercy."

James' Adam's apple bobbed up and down as he gulped. "Yes, ma'am."

"Good." Lily wondered why she was putting so much trust into James' word but more important matters were breached when James placed a hand on her waist tentatively.

What was he doing?

"Ja..." Her voice trailed off as he stepped closer to her, their bodies nearly touching. Her heart race increasing, Lily could feel James' breath on her cheek and nearly melted when she stared up in his eyes.

"Want to go out with me, Lily?"

She supposed this could be classified as seduction and it would be advisable for her to slap him or something along those lines, but at that particular moment she didn't care about that. In fact she didn't care about much at all. All thoughts of Snuffles, Herbology and any other trivial matter were pushed aside.

"I don't think I should," she muttered, feeling rather dizzy under the intensity of his gaze.

James grinned down at her. "I think you should, The Kisser."

The romance was effectively killed as Lily began laughing hysterically, completely disregarding the closeness that they held. She was no longer dizzy, yet, even with her mind completely clear, and her thoughts on a reasonable track Lily rather anticlimactically realized that she didn't hate James.

In fact, she rather liked James.

James was appropriately astounded when Lily flung her arms around his neck and snogged him thoroughly, but quickly reciprocated the sentiment, wrapping his arms even more firmly around her waist.

Somewhere up the hill, resting against a rock, Remus Lupin raised his eyebrows at the show of passion. A large, black dog rested at his feet, head resting on its paws and looking surprisingly unconcerned with the large rat that was sitting alert on the top of his head.

The only human among the lot, Remus shook his head in disbelief. "I can't believe it worked," he said, not to himself, but to the dog.

Snuffles merely gave a bark of laughter, causing the rat to scuttle off his head in fright. So quickly, that if you blinked you would have missed it, the black dog transformed into an insufferably smug looking Sirius Black, whose actions were soon followed by short, pudgy Peter Pettigrew.

"Yeah," Sirius grinned. "I'm a genius. I know. Save your thanks. We better get out of here before James sees and hexes our asses to next Wednesday."

Although the Marauders minus one followed Sirius' advice, they needn't have bothered. James was not concerned in anything but Lily for the rest of the afternoon.

A/N: Pointless yes, please don't blame me for the outcome. :(