"I can't wait for this day to be over," Mary said as she entered the Potions classroom, Lily close on her heels. September had been unseasonably warm this year, and even within the castle's thick stone walls the sticky heat of summer lingered, making classes feel longer and more tiresome. The student body as a whole had taken on a uniformly disheveled appearance - borne of sheer exhaustion from the heat - showcasing undone ties, half-unbuttoned shirts, and even the professors had the good sense not to force anyone to wear their heavy-knit robes.

"At least this is our last class," Lily responded as the duo slid into their usual seats. She pulled her hair free from its ponytail only to retie it more securely in place, trying in vain to get the wisps against her neck to join the bulk. "Then we'll have the whole weekend to relax."

"Unless Slughorn assigns us another essay. He's done that the past two Fridays!"

Lily shook her head and pointed to the assortment of ingredients on Slughorn's desk. The vials and jars were arranged neatly, if not with any discernable order, along the lip of the desk and their classes' cauldrons were brought out from their usual place behind the textbook storage. "I don't think so; it looks like it's a project day."

"Oh, perfect," Mary said as she shoved her parchment and quill back into her bag. The rest of the class seemed to be thinking along the same lines, as most were huddled together making conversation rather than preparing for a lecture. Some even had their feet propped up on their desks, or were openly trying in vain to sleep for even the briefest of seconds. "Good thing I've got the best partner in the class," Mary remarked with a smile.

"Sorry ladies, but I believe I'm the only one who can claim that," Sirius said as he slid into his seat a few rows behind them. Lily heard two small thunks, and knew that the number of students treating their desk like a wooden recliner had just increased by one.

"Yes, yes," Mary replied with an eye roll, the pair of them turning to face the boy in question, Sure enough, his feet were on the desk. "We all know how you feel about James."

Lily felt an arm drape across her shoulder, and she didn't have to look to know who it was - wherever there was one, there was the other. "He's obsessed with me. I've tried telling him we'll never work out, but it's no use. I'm just too charming," James Potter said from his new perch beside Lily.

Lily rolled her eyes. "Something like that," she quipped. James grinned. He seemed unbothered by the heat, and every breath she took in was tinted with the smell of him - with pine and dirt and open air and boy - and not one of those breathes carried even the faintest stench of sweat. She suspected he was arrogant enough to focus his energy on maintaining a cooling charm rather than just giving up and looking a mess like everyone else. She felt suddenly insecure about the beads of sweat no doubt dotting her face just as frequently as freckles..

Sirius laughed from his seat as Lily shifted under the weight of James' arm. It was a nice weight, of course it was - having an arm around you is a comforting thing, so long as the owner of the arm isn't entirely repulsive. And James wasn't repulsive. Cocky, stubborn, annoying-as-all-get-out, sure, but not repulsive. So Lily felt no shame in admitting - silently, to herself - that it was a pleasant feeling to have his arm around her shoulders.

She shrugged him off, anyhow.

James took his seat beside Sirius just as Slughorn bounded through the door, and the girls turned to face the front as he began explaining their assignment.

"Good afternoon, good afternoon! It is quite a day, isn't it?" he boomed, dabbing at his shining face with a handkerchief. "I thought we'd have a bit of a reprieve today. You'll have to stand over a boiling cauldron, yes, but the end result!" He stuck a stubby finger in the air, drawing out his silence, presumably for suspense. The class blinked back at him, unfazed. "The result," he continued imperiously, either ignoring or not noticing the air of disinterest in the room, "will keep you cool all weekend.

"Cooling potions!" he said, like a punchline. "All the ingredients you'll need are here. You may pick your own partners today. Begin!"

Mary gathered their cauldrons as Lily collected the ingredients. When they met back at their table they began diligently trimming, dicing, and measuring out what they needed. The potion was simple - beneath NEWT levels, surely - and they worked lazily. Behind them, Lily heard several small, muffled explosions, and when Lily turned to investigate she saw that they were coming from a rather subdued game of exploding snap that Sirius and James were doing a rather good job of hiding. She shook her head and returned to the potion. Mary grinned beside her.

"What?"

"Nothing," she said, still grinning. "I'm sure you're very annoyed with him right now."

Lily wasn't sure which "him" Mary was talking about, but responded anyway. "As per usual."

"Mhmm," Mary said, her grin growing wider. "Is that why you blushed so badly when he put his arm around you?"

Lily faltered, and as she did she accidently dumped an entire vial of minced starthistle into the potion, rather than the measured amount sitting on the table.

"Damn," she said, as thick grey smoke began to pour from the cauldron.

"What did you do?" Mary asked, backing away. By now half the class had noticed that something had gone wrong at their station, though Slughorn was still deep in conversation with Brandon Buchard on the other side of the room. Lily stood frozen, trying to think as the smoke turned black, her mind whirring as she tried to come up with a solution.

"Lily, I think you'd better move," Mary called from behind her.

"Woah, what's that?" she heard Sirius call out, and by now the entire room was focused on her. Slughorn looked confused, gaping like a fish rather than taking control of the situation.

"Hey, Evans-" she heard James start, but she interrupted him.

"Thyme! Thyme can counteract the explosive properties of the excessive starthistle mixing with the newt spleen!" She dove into her bag, tearing it apart in search of the herb as a small whistling noise starting coming from her potion. "Adding that much powder alongside the spleen caused an adverse effect," she went on, speaking to no one but her own nerves, "which caused the hellebore syrup to congeal. A-ha!" She pulled the vial of thyme out of her bag, victorious. The cauldron began to shake.

"Lily, I really think-"

"I just need one sec-"

With a deafening bang, the potion exploded, and Lily was knocked backward. Her head hit the wall with a sickening thunk, and everything slipped slowly into darkness.

Lily woke slowly, blearily wiping sleep from her eyes. She was surprised at how little her head seemed to be pounding, and assumed she must have been in the hospital wing for a few days, at least. She stretched out and her hand met a mess of hair, and she quickly retracted her arm, worried that she was invading the personal space of another patient. It didn't occur to her that the head of hair (and the body attached to it) was in the same bed as her, however, until she felt an arm snake around her waist.

Her eyes shot open.

She was definitely not in the hospital wing. In fact, she was fairly certain she wasn't in Hogwarts at all. She was in a spacious bedroom with large, airy windows and beautiful crown moulding (in fact, the room was so similar to her tastes that Lily thought she might as well have designed it herself). She could hear birds chirping and the smell of freshly cut grass wafted in from the windows, and she assumed it must be spring (how long was I unconscious?! she thought). But the biggest surprise came when she turned to face the person next to her.

"Morning," James said sleepily as he snuggled in closer.

"Potter," Lily said, frozen. Her heart pounded as she realized how close he was (pinedirtopenairboy-), how little she was wearing (pajamas? Did Mary bring them for her?), and how this might be the first time she's ever seen him without his glasses.

"Hmmm?" The sound vibrated against the skin on her arm, which he was currently nuzzling. Lily closed her eyes, taking a deep breath and counting to ten. When she opened her eyes, James was still there. (Not a dream, then.)

"Potter. James. Hey," she said, sounding increasingly panicked.

"Hm?" he repeated.

"Wake up."

"Did you just call me Potter?"

"What?"

James was awake now, sitting up and squinting at her from across the bed. "You haven't called me Potter since we were in Hogwarts."

"What?" Lily shook her head, and decided to address the most confusing thing first. "What are you doing in bed with me?"

"Actually you have called me Potter a few times since then, but not since you were Evans, so it's still a bit-"

"Potter!"

He stopped talking, and seemed to look at her clearly for the first time. He grabbed his glasses and slipped them on with one hand. "Hey, are you feeling all right? How's your head?"

Lily faltered. "Fine. A little sore. I reckon I hit it pretty hard."

"Pretty hard? We almost had to take you to Mungo's." He squinted, and ran a hand through her hair, his fingers tracing what must have been a bump on her scalp from the fall. "Actually, maybe we should have."

Lily swatted his hand away. "Stop that. Will you answer me?"

"Why am I in bed with you?" Lily nodded. James blinked, then repeated, more slowly this time, "Why am I in bed with my wife?"

Lily paused. "Did you hit your head?" James looked confused. "I am not your wife. That isn't even legal."

James pushed the covers off of the both of them, and Lily saw exactly what she was wearing for the first time. She immediately tugged the comforter back over herself, covering her thin nightgown (that she knew wasn't hers). "What's going on? Where are we? What...what-"

"Hey, hey, Lil, calm down," James caught her face in his hands, an embrace that she quickly backed out of.

"Sirius!" James suddenly yelled.

"What?" Lily asked, just as the wizard in question bounded through the door, Remus and Peter trailing shortly behind. Though James and Peter looked more or less the same, Lily noticed differences in Remus and Sirius. Remus' hair was longer, greyer, and pulled back into a ponytail, and he had scars on his faces that Lily was sure weren't there before. Sirius looked almost like someone she would refer to as "mature", which was maybe the most shocking change of them all.

"What's wrong?" Sirius asked as Lily tugged the comforter up to her chin at the intrusion.

"It's her head," James said as Lily looked around the room. "I knew we should've taken her to Mungo's." Lily looked around and spotted a robe laid out over a chair about two feet to her left.

"For the record, that was my suggestion last night. My repeated suggestion," she heard Remus add as she planned her escape from the bed.

"Yes, yes, yes, from now on we should listen to you and only you, yadda yadda-" Sirius said as Lily darted out from under the covers and wrapped herself in the robe as quickly as she could.

"Hey! Could we focus on Lily for a second?" James boomed. And they did, all turning to look at her as she stood, draped in a robe with her arms securely folded over her chest, staring at them like a fish out of water. And in the silence that settled, Lily made a decision. Pushing past the trio in the doorway, she bounded down the stairs, out the front door, and away, with no idea where she was headed.