"Girl Got Game"
By: Liebling
Updated On: 31 December 2010
Epilogue
"Prince Charming Didn't Own a Nimbus"

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There was a thump and the sound of a puff of smoke from the fireplace.

In the library of Number Twelve Grimauld place, The Boy Who Lived looked up from a particularly aged copy of Quidditch Through the Ages.

"Somebody's in the fireplace!" Harry called over towards a flight of stairs.

"Just tell them we're in the kitchen!" One of the 'grown ups' yelled back. Harry fought the great urge to roll his eyes, annoyed by the fact that they were once again isolating the kids from the meetings.

"Hi there," said a young gentleman coming into the doorway coming from the entrance hall.

"Hey," said Harry, "Everyone's down the hall in the kitchen. Third door on your right."

The man who had brown hair and a charmingly youthful look about him smiled gratefully. "Thanks," he said sincerely, patting the soot off his muggle-style shirt. "You must be Harry," he said, grinning a little more.

"Yeah," he said, fighting the hormonal urge to just be antagonising to all adults.

"I'm Jordan McClain," he said in a kind voice, approaching Harry with an extended hand, "I was a friend of your parents,"

Harry nodded, shaking his hand. He was used to most people in the Order introducing themselves that way. It was polite, but it always inadvertently set a level of expectation for him. "Really? How did you know them?"

Jordan laughed, "We all played Quidditch together, of course!"

Harry's brow furrowed. "Wait…I thought women weren't allowed to play on the house teams when my parents were there?"

Jordan's smile slipped right off his face in shock. He didn't say anything, but just stared at him.

"What?" Harry asked, a little offended.

"You never—?" he started and then tried again. "You don't know?"

"Know what?" he demanded.

"You don't know how your parents met?"

Behind them, two plates belonging to a godfather and an ex-professor exiting the kitchen slipped from their hands and fell to the polished floor.

The sound had been deafening.

Cheering, chanting, screaming…all coming from to stands…all directed towards us.

Dumbledore was positively beaming as he handed the trophy to Sirius who might have been crying a little bit. (I wasn't about to tease him because my face was wet too). He took one look at James and me who had been floating around on the shoulders of fellow Gryffindors', and practically chucked it at us.

Together, James and I took hold of either side of the cup and hoisted it above our heads.

"Sirius? Remus?" said Harry as he turned around and saw his ashen faced older friends in the doorway. "How did my parents meet?"

Sirius didn't say anything.

"Ah, we came in here to tell you that we were taking a break and thought you might like some snacks," Remus said faintly as if he hadn't heard him.

"Okay," said Harry slowly, "But—"

"Well since it looks like our break is over, we'll just be going back to the kitchen! Come along little Jordan!" Sirius grabbed both Remus' and Jordan's shirts and dragged them along as they tripped over the broken snack plates on the way to the kitchen.

Jordan shot him an apologetic look as he disappeared around the corner.

If possible, the cheering only grew louder. Someone had turned on a magic radio and amplified the music so that they echoed on top of the noise of the stands. People were dancing on the pitch and throwing scarlet ribbons into the air. Someone set off a round of firecrackers. Uncle John and Trixie were a part of the group carrying the team and Charlie was jumping up and down, holding my broom over her head. Danny waved to me and James, holding up a scarlet and gold banner, and Nymphadora was already attaching herself to Remus leg while her mother went on cheering with everyone else.

"Yes, yes, all right, now put them—put them down." McGonagall was pushing her way through the crows with a giant camera in her arms. With the help of Dumbledore, she was able to prop it up on the grass and prepare it to take a picture.

"What do I—how the—where is the button..."

I looked at James and said (well, shouted) seriously, "We're pretty fantastic, aren't we?"

"Lily," he said (bellowed), "You are in your own class of amazing."

Harry stormed up to his old professor and his godfather as they were seated in kitchen, surrounded by Order members in the middle of a meeting, and demanded, "How did my parents meet and how did they end up together?"

Remus stopped chewing on his waffles and Sirius started to choke on his eggs (they had an affinity for breakfast foods at odd hours as it was nearly three o'clock in the afternoon). They exchanged nervous looks.

"Woah, woah, woah, what a second," said a tough looking man with short hair and thick arms crossed across his chest at the end of the table, "Who never told Harry how Lily and James got together?"

"Quiet, Joe!" snipped Sirius.

"He knows too?" demanded Harry, angry.

"Um," said Sirius.

"Well you see..." trailed Remus.

"Uuh..."

"Oh, yes, Molly, I would love some more biscuits, thank you!" A strategic change of subject, the ex-professor thought.

"YES! ME TOO!" Sirius agreed immediately, practically lunging across the table with his plate. "Let's go eat in the drawing room, Moony!" he suggested once the food was piling off is plate.

Knocking over his chair as Remus stood, he quickly agreed.

Harry stood painfully aware of how out of place he was in the room, silently glowering as he watched them leave the room. He looked at the man called Joseph Daniels and opened his mouth to ask—

"No way, kid," he cut him off, "I am not going to be responsible for emotionally scarring the Boy Who Lived. Go ask those goons," he motioned towards the vacated doorway.

Emotionally scarred? Harry thought. Who the hell was he kidding?

McGonagall positioned us against a Gryffindor banner hanging from one of the stands. Joe lifted Jordan onto his shoulders as he kept waving the snitch and Sirius roped in Remus with an arm and spun him around while Nymphadora held onto his ankles. Maud ran towards us with a fat smile on his face. He had a long trail of white bandages attached to his head that were waving in the wind like a banner behind him as Pompfrey chased after him. He jumped on Victor, sending him to the ground where he was too busy laughing to get up again so Maud also kept laughing like he had been given too much medication by Pompfrey and hugging the trophy like it was his best friend. James tangled all his fingers in all of mine once more and kissed me soundly on the lips.

There were smiles and flash and then another set of new smiles.

I had to ask McGonagall to make sure that I got a copy eventually.

Sometime later that evening, after an emergency There-is-a-Mystery-to-be-Solved meeting with Ron and Hermione, Harry attempted to employ a different approach. He heard them whispering and shushing each other as they passed the library where he, Ron, and Hermione were waiting for them to do precisely that. Harry leapt out of his chair and caught them before they continued back into the kitchen. They tensed immediately as they saw him.

"Hey Remus, Sirius," said Harry cordially, as if nothing had happened. The professor and godfather relaxed slightly. "I've got a quick question for you."

"Sure thing," said Remus.

"How did my parents meet?"

Remus and Sirius visibly swallowed.

"They met through Quidditch…?" Remus tried.

"But women weren't allowed to play on the house teams when you were at school," Harry reiterated.

The retired Marauders froze and glanced at each other until another body moved into the room.

"Molly! Biscuits! Thank you!"

She yanked the tray away from them, "These are for the children! You're going to ruin your appetites!"

"We're grown men! We make our own decisions!" Sirius stuck out a tongue and yanked the tray away from the adult woman and took off.

Harry glared at their retreating backs until Jordan suddenly approached him.

"I shouldn't be the one to tell you," he said quietly, "But here," he pulled out a thick piece of glossy parchment from his pocket and offered it to Harry. There was a date on the back. Harry unfolded it and stared at it only to have more questions than answers.

I only sent him a short letter months later when summer holidays rolled around. The note read simply:

I'm sorry.

Best,
Lily.

I don't know what I was apologising to Snape for, but it felt right.

Harry wordlessly sat next to them in the dining room before dinner started...

"Sirius. Remus." said Harry with a more tired and defeated tone of voice as he carefully unfolded the rather peculiar and unexplainable picture from Jordan of the 1976 Hogwarts Quidditch Championship in his hand, "How exactly did my parents meet?" his tone was more than suspicious now as he laid it down on the table, aware that Jordan's shoulders were shaking with supressed laughter. "You both know more than anybody that I deserve to know."

Remus Lupin and Sirius Black, who sat across from their youthful charge in the kitchen, leaned over to look at photo book and cringed slightly.

Mrs. Weasley was nowhere in sight and neither was her cooking.

They were trapped.

"Erm, well, Harry," Remus scratched his head sitting back, defeated, "It's a rather long—"

"—twisted," Sirius added.

"—complicated story,"

"That involves a lot of chocolate,"

Harry grimaced, "This isn't anything potentially embarrassing or awkward that I really don't want to hear…is it?"

"Oh, you have no idea," said Remus.

"So a chocolate fountain, eh?" I said, smiling devilishly at James.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN MY MOTHER WAS A CROSSDRESSER?"

Apparently the girls' dorms were exactly the same as the boys.

Just much cleaner.

I could actually see the floor; I had been wondering what colour it was for quite some time, actually.

There was some scattering of footfalls coming up the stairs.

"Hey superstar!" said Emma, bounding into the room. Marla and Jo were not far behind. They jumped on my bed.

I groaned, "Be careful. I drank too much butterbeer and I just might explode if you poke me."

Jo poked my stomach out of morbid curiosity and my stomach made strange noise in protest.

"Well that was interesting," said Marla, staring at my stomach, bemused.

Emma shimmied some more space and smiled widely. "So don't you think you should be getting ready for your date with James?" she asked.

I gestured to my desk chair where a pair of jeans and a jumper were lying.

"It'll take me two minutes to get dressed and put on shoes," I said.

"Are those—? Lily! You are not wearing those muddy trainers!" cried Marla. "Emma, get me your red heels. And a skirt. And a top! Lily, this thing has a hole in it!"

"Lies," I muttered into my pillow.

"I have a butterbeer cork necklace if you would like to wear it," Jo offered kindly.

"This is your first real date EVER," Emma said, "And I'll be damned if we don't do it right!"

"We?" I laughed.

"Lily," she looked at me as she hooked her hand on her waist, "You need us to make up for the lack of female-ness you've been through this year."

"True," I sat up, mindful of my stuffed stomach. "If I ever have kids," I started, laughing, "I don't think I am ever going to tell them about all this."

"But if you do, be sure to tell them which one of us dressed you for your first official date with James Potter," Marla told her primly, fanning out a black skirt on the bed.

"So that's how women came to be allowed to play on the house teams?" Harry said tiredly, emotionally beaten.

Over the past hour, people had slowly started to return to the kitchen to listen as Sirius and Remus tried to explain to Harry and the younger generation how Lily met James and how Lily's endeavors had allowed women to play on the house teams at Hogwarts. Those who already knew the story pointedly avoided looking at Harry out of embarrassment or guilt from withholding this information from him.

"Wow Harry," said Ginny, her eyebrows still raised in approval, "You're mum was cool."

"That's awesome, mate," said Ron, his shoulders shaking in laughter.

"I'm pretty sure if you give your Gringott's vault a thorough look, you'll find the quaffle that she threw that game in there. She kind of stole that from the school," Sirius chuckled.

"If Mr. McClain and Mr. Daniels are both in the Order," Hermione motioned to them down the table, "What happened to the rest of the team?" she asked curiously.

Remus thought for a moment but Jordan answered from his seat. "Victor married a Russian woman and lives there with her and their children and Maud works at St. Mungo's. He was able to set up a secret ward to treat members of the Order. You might see him sometime."

"We should have a reunion," Sirius mused, "Gryffindor Quidditch champion team two years in a row."

"Marla was an Unspeakable before she was killed in the first war," said the woman sitting across from Joe. "I'm Emma, by the way," she smiled beautifully at Harry.

"What happened to Charlie?" Fred asked. (George added under his breath to his brother, "She sounds like a bird I'd like to know,")

Ron's face was turning red with contained laughter, "I'm still on 'Harry's mother was a cross-dresser' bit,"

Harry kicked him under the table, but it only made Ron laugh harder.

"Charlie and I dated for a while," Sirius sighed, "But then she went on to become a model and last I heard she was in Brazil."

"A Brazilian model," the twins sighed together.

"She dumped you?" Harry said, shocked.

Sirius nodded solemnly. "Yes, it was really unexpected—"

"You were cheating on her!" Remus erupted suddenly.

"There was that too," relented Sirius, "But don't think I didn't see you two at the 1980 Christmas party," he said, raising a brow that exuded its own implication.

Now if Remus looked uncomfortable, Harry was decidedly uncomfortable as well.

"So...this is the happily ever after?" I said.

James shrugged, "I dunno, are you happy?"

"Yeah, I think so," I answered, contemplatively. There was silence between us as we both enjoyed the feeling of the end of the exams and the first warning signs of summer. The willow tree by the lake would quiver in the warm winds occasionally but otherwise stood as a strong form of unyielding support. "If this is the happy ending, it's rather dull, don't you think?" I said, cutting into the silence.

He looked at me funnily. Not implying that he was funny looking, of course, I happened to find that he was rather attractive, "Well," said James, "We've already won the cup, your femininity has been exposed, we're Gryffindor heroes, everyone loves us, and we get to hang out over spring break...most stories usually end right about there,"

"We didn't go riding off into the sunset or whatever," I told him only to receive another 'Are you being serious?' look from James. "And no offence, but you're not exactly a Prince Charming, knight in shining armour, sitting his fat arse on a stunningly white horse-type of person,"

"That's because Prince Charming didn't own a Nimbus," he said seriously, "He had a silly white horse that couldn't go from zero to eighty in under four seconds,"

"This is true," I agreed.

James stared at me for another moment. "So what about if we grab our brooms and go riding off into the Quidditch pitch instead?"

I brightened at the idea, "Yeah, sounds good."

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-:FIN:-