academic curiosity

" ...And If I go to church on Sunday... Just to spend it all on Monday, it... Uh, isn´t nobody's business If I do. Ahem..."

"Thank you James, that was lovely!" Professor Tonks awarded the Gryffindor with one of her sporadic grins. Potter, who had been standing in front of the class, hands behind back in the pose of a reciting school boy, nodded and went back to his next to Sirius across the room from Lily. Remus Lupin was also seated with them, everyone had stared at him as he came in except Lily who had pointedly looked away, which is what she thought Remus would have preferred.

And as for their professor, Lily often sat and pondered about what her life was like when she wasn´t teaching. The Professor had a photograph of a waving man that looked to be about thirty, holding a small wriggling toddler. Maybe it was fear for them that kept her so subdued in class. Sometimes she was downright forlorn.

Lily was interrupted from her reverie by Professor Tonks a few herself a few moments after Potter had taken his seat.

"Miss Evans?" she called formally. Lily was secretly annoyed that Professor Tonks used first names with students like Potter, but with her only a surname. "Have you anything prepared for us today?"

"Of course, yes... I´ll come up, sorry."

"The only muggle born in the class and you never fail to turn in your work last Evans..."

Lily started, then decided to ignore what she considered a pointless statement and took a place in front of the room as everyone before her had done. Her work came in last simply because she had more responsibilities. She was a prefect and had Advanced Charms classes filling her schedule where other fifth years had free time.

A few snickers could be heard and Lily patiently let them die down before she began to recite from memory (everyone else had needed to read their chosen muggle author´s work off a parchment-Ha!) a part of 'Something Wicked This Way Comes'.

She finished and turned to Tonks.

"How morbid!" was her response and Lily understood this to be her grade on the assignment and walked back to her seat.

*     *     * * *

"She´s under a lot of stress," Alia offered Lily as they nearly trampled over a group of second years who were for some reason lying on the floor staring up at the ceiling above with mystified expressions. Both the fifth year girls didn´t have time to even be curious about this scene as they rushed on to be in time for Herbology in the Greenhouses.

"Yes," Lily agreed, holding her graded recitation out as if it were tainted, which it was. With a loud, red marked `P´ for Poor. "The woman clearly never has heard of Ray Bradbury, because if she had she would have automatically given me a E just for the author's name on the heading," Lily joked. "But she bought my love with that Zeppelin record she played at the beginning of term. So she´s not on my list of deadly enemies."

"Oh, whose on the list?" Alia inquired with an excited smile.

"Well..." Lily thought it out carefully. "I suppose Bellatrix Black is. And that Tomoko Satori can go down on the ledger as being a heinous foe. Oh and that tall, gangling bloke who stole my shoe a couple months ago-"

"Is Filch?"

"Oh, yes!"

The girls exchanged candidates for the list all throughout the lesson in the Greenhouse, they came up with over two hundred total.

Alia was making it two hundred and two when Lily began garnishing her bowl of oatmeal heavily with honey. This caused Alia to narrow her eyes, but Lily was oblivious.

Lily said with a faint smile of memory, "Oh! Did I tell you that Bernie was trying to arrange a date with me for his mate the other day?"

"Don´t recall anything of that nature being mentioned. When did this all happen?"

"Last week, he-"

"Last week? And you´re now just telling me? I´ve been bored to tears listening to you go on and on about some potion ingredients and your opinions on how the cushioning charm on brooms can be improved all weekend! And you had, all this time, something of real importance to tell?" Alia said with annoyance.

"You can say a lot in one breath you know," Lily imparted before she took a bite of the oatmeal. It wasn´t right. She searched the table for cinnamon or any brownish spice.

"I like that we can insult each other like this and not be put out... Your the only person who can do that. So, anyway, you were saying?"

Lily frowned as she spotted a small shaker of spice at the far end of the table. A first year knocked it over with his elbow and she removed her wand, eyes not leaving the shaker, as if she were swatting a fly.

She said, still eyeing the target, "Bernie came up to me and said a mate of his by the name of- GOT IT!" she hissed as the shaker came ambling over the many Gryffindor heads towards her outstretched hand. "Montac... The bloke´s name is Montac. Plays-"

"Chaser for the Ravenclaw Quidditch team!" Alia laughed. "Desmond Montac! Also known in the Ravenclaw common room as `Dreamboat Montac´!"

Lily looked up at Alia from her bowl of seasoned oatmeal and they both snorted laughter. "Yes. Anyhow, I´ve seen him play. He´s quite good and I think he´s handsome too. So I told Bernie that I was going out with Ralph now but that had Montac asked sooner I would have said yeah." She took another bite and then added thoughtfully, "Though, really, it´s not as if Montac had asked me himself anyway. That´s a bit of a let down but boys can often a disappointment," she said with a happy smile.

"You´re brilliant!" Alia hissed, not acknowledging this last bit of Lily´s speech as she slammed her pretty little hand on the table. "You´re an artist! I couldn´t have put it better... This doesn´t make it seem like you´re a floozy but also leaves it open in case you want to have the opportunity of being a floozy and what´s really-"

"Alia, people are starting to stare. Can you not bellow words like `floozy´ in my direction at sit down meals from now on?" said Lily.

"Yes, of course! I´m just filled with pride!" Alia cried, holding her hands to her heart.

"Well, then," Lily replied, a useful statement that her father used in answer to everything beyond his comprehension.

Lily examined a Daily Prophet that had been tossed aside. Many students had started taking out subscriptions with the paper since everyone´s family members started dying.

She saw that the Coney Island deaths had been quickly blamed by Scotland Yard on accidental drowning on the strand. To explain the rather larger than normal amount of drowning victims, the fact that the parties had been seen at a pub earlier was given, as if that completely explained everything. Lily shook her head. In the end, it didn´t matter what conclusion they had come up with. They couldn´t very well tell the victim´s families that a extremely evil wizard had ordered his minions out to their charming village to start a fight with magic wands.

* * * * *

As the coming weekend had approached Lily had given some thought to details like what she would wear on her date, where they she and Ralph should go and what she would do if it turned ugly (which her only other date, with Amos Diggory, had done). That things would go bad was highly unlikely. She and Ralph had spent hours and hours together, even alone, over Charm work at late hours. A few more in a dim bar would be nothing.

Early Saturday morning, Looking out the window, which was open a crack, she saw that it was even warmer this morning then it had been yesterday. They were coming upon early Spring and she was waiting for that smell of the new season. It usually snuck up on her.

She stuck her head out of the window but all she smelled was burning devil's snare coming from the hill by Hagrid´s cabin.

On her bedside table were a few things that she occasionally studied with fondness. A wrinkled flyer for a performance by an American wizard called Screamin' Jay Hawkins that she, Ada and Dale had seen on Halloween three years ago. A dusty quartz crystal that Ossie Hooten had given her just after Bellatrix and her Death Eater friends had attacked him two years ago. The prize of them all was the prefect badge, though she frequently forgot to wear it. She picked it up and roughly rubbed it on the hem of her pajama shirt and set it back down in favor of the small muggle photograph that Dale had sent to her through the Owls for her last birthday. It was a possibly handsome man in a dressy hat and a suit that was likely the height of gentlemen´s fashions in the early part of the century.

She stared at it for a minute, wondering again why Dale had thought of her when he found this random relic. It had appealed to her as soon as she saw it. It had a sense of narrative and she imagined that this person was someone who had not exactly been a likable human being but that they were possibly the type of person Lily would have found highly entertaining.

She propped it between the badge and a framed picture (muggle as well) of her parents and her at Fontainebleau Castle and stood before her trunk.

For her date with Ralph in Hogsmeade she decided to risk a short jumper (illegally short in Petunia´s opinion) and a long sleeved blouse. To protect her bare legs from chilly breezes she put on some knee high stockings. She grabbed a wool sweater from her trunk on the way out and saw that most everyone was up as well, eagerly anticipating their outing. Remus Lupin was laughing at something being said by Laurel Jones and her brother, the seeker for their Quidditch team, Robert.

Since they were also standing by the portrait hole Lily decided to join them.

"All right Lily," Remus greeted.

"Were reenacting the match against Hufflepuff last week," Laurel explained as she dropped her invisible beater bat from where it had been swinging wildly at her younger brother´s head.

Remus, obviously had missed it for his father´s funeral. His friends, Potter, Sirius and Peter had all gone after him for moral support. Lily´s theory of the port key had ended up being confirmed by a conversation she had, well, overheard between McGonagall and Slughorn in the teacher´s lounge. As for the match, it had been postponed a day. Why she and everyone else hadn´t thought of that, was beyond her. Sherlock Holmes she was not, unfortunately.

"Going to the Three Broomsticks?" Robert asked Lily conversationally, as soon as he saw he was safe from a physical attack.

"Maybe," she put.

"If you go, well see you there," Remus said with a dismal tone.

"Well, what time are you lot going to be in there? I´ll try and swing by," she replied.

"Later on," he said vaguely. He put a hand to his head and rubbed his eyes for a moment. The other three shifted uncomfortably.

"Headache..." he explained to them briefly with a small smile and made a motion for the portrait hole.

Lily saw Ralph Venkmen reprimanding a couple of third years for using their wands on the grounds to hex a squirrel.

"We wanted to make it dance!" Lily could hear one of the boys shrill at Ralph, who was nearly two heads taller and looking down at him with condemnation.

The boys were not afraid of this.

"Yeh Ralph- Like that girl in Gryffindor does with them things that gone belly up..."

"LILY!" Ralph bellowed so loudly that both boys, scrappy and mischievous as they were, started with shock.

They turned and when they saw she was there, both their mouths dropped open and then one began to say something when Ralph said, "Just sorting this lot out... Turn around for five minutes and everything with four legs in a mile of grounds is in danger from these two... And by the way, what are you two even doing out this far from the castle!? Get back both of you before I have Tomoko Satori deal with you!"

"NICE TO MEET YOU LIL-LEE!" The boys called raucously as they spiraled off merrily, not at all disturbed by Ralph´s threats.

"Charmed, I´m sure," she replied back with a grim smile.

"You think you have problems as a Gryffindor prefect? Try Ravenclaw. This last few batches they´ve sent up to us have been a nightmare..." he muttered earnestly as the pair walked down the cliff towards the gates.

"I bet Dumbledore will let you send them back. Manufacturer´s error," Lily said with a sly smile.

"I only wish," Ralph replied. "That sad thing is that it´s true. About manufacturer´s error, I mean. It´s these parents... You´d think half the kids in Hogwarts today had been raised by wolves!"

Lily didn´t see things as being that bad, but enjoyed the entertaining analogies. After he went on for another five minutes on the subject, her nodding and laughing, she realized that she and many of her mates could be counted among the unruly youth. After all, she had served detentions galore, had been in at least a square dozen wizard duels, had even broken into a forbidden room that ended up being a trap made by Rowena Ravenclaw for the Heir of Slytherin (and for that one Lily, Remus and Ada among a few other students´ names had appeared in the latest and extremely boring Rowena Ravenclaw biography).

"Oh! We´ve passed the Three Broomsticks I think!" Ralph suddenly interrupted his humorous tirade.

"Yes, why don´t we go to that little charming-looking place down there?" Lily asked, in her infinite ignorance, of Madam Puddifoot´s.

"Lily, Ralph imparted darkly, "If that place were to be under Adsuefacium it would immediately turn into a ruffled doily that had been soaked in cheap perfume and sprinkled with glitter glass. It would then be wrapped around the heart of some large mammal, probably a cow, and be wrapped up in a garish ribbon."

Lily accepted this with openmouthed awe. The Adsuefacium hex was something Ralph had taught her just this year. It was a Class A-Prohibited Jinx that when used caused the victim to become a lifeless object that their personality most resembled. Ralph had quite naughtily demonstrated it for her, turning Mrs. Norris into a grotesque plum pudding with bits of gravel in it.

The reason the hex was forbidden was that hardly anyone could do the spell, and even fewer knew how to properly reverse it afterwards. Nearly all cases had to be sent off to St. Mungos where Lily imagined there was a entire wing of jiggling puddings and those plush dice that people hung in car dashes waiting to be changed back to their human forms.

"Well, we should probably avoid that joint," Lily replied after a long pause. "Want to go to the Hogshead?"

"The Hogshead? Are you mad? I´m not taking you in there!" Ralph cried in abject horror. "Who do you think I am? Oh, right... I bet some Gryffindor bloke has tried to drag you there for kicks... Am I right?"

"Well..." Lily tried to answer. "It is a good place for local color!" She had only been on the one date and her goal on that day had been to end up at the Hogshead, but he she had been diverted into the Three Broomsticks.

"Let´s go get some candy," Lily suggested, already walking towards the opening doorway of Honeydukes.

Before she could step inside a dark whirlwind came billowing outward and landed nearly at Ralph´s feet. The figure looked up quickly and shot up off the ground, fumbling clumsily for what Lily instinctively knew was a wand. She recognized Severus Snape before he began cursing loudly as two boys came out of the doorway after him.

The first was Frank Longbottom, he stood aside as the next boy, which proved to be Sirius, pointed his wand at Snape´s face and with a simple flick caused his nose to gush blood.

Lily stared in shock at this scene and Ralph stepped away with distaste and confusion.

Severus was still letting loose a stream of frantic curses but could no longer try and dig his wand out of his baggy black robes as he was holding back the flow of blood.

"Filthy, filthy mouth Snivellus..." Sirius muttered, concentrating as he flicked his wand again.

Potter and Peter Pettigrew came out of the shop then, both holding wands and looking merrily on the scene.

Lily felt slightly ill and looked over to see if Ralph, the eldest and most capable with a wand would step up and stop the attack. But he was too busy watching it.

"Ahhh!" Potter cried to Sirius. "Did you do that nose-leaking spell without me? I wanted to see that one!"

Apparently Sirius had had the small bit of sense to stop the hex before Severus passed out and had to be taken to Madam Pomfrey.

"I can do it again if you want," Sirius offered with a grin and both Potter and Peter nodded.

Lily let out a exasperated gasp and Potter looked over. "Wait, Padfoot!" He quickly held up a hand to his friend before Sirius could flick his wand a third time.

Lily wondered if Potter was starting to feel guilty. But then he said loudly, "Let me do it!"

Sweeping a hand through his hair so that it flew up even higher then it usually was, he stepped forward and aimed for Severus´ nose but by this time Snape had found his wand and Potter had to dodge a series of strange hexes that Lily couldn´t recognize. Potter and the rest of the boys (a few more had poured out of the shop) were laughing uproariously at this predicament. Potter dodged a curse that sent a resounding shock into the far wall of Honeydukes and shook it. This stopped some of the laughter but Potter simply looked excited, aimed his wand at the impacted wall and did some sort of trick that made the air look as if it were being pulled where the curse had hit and then Potter very quickly spun and hurled it at Snape, who was sent flying head over heels into a pile of some sort of very large animal poo.

This had people on the ground in wild fits of mirth, Sirius and Peter prime among them, who Lily thought were both possibly in tears.

Lily ran past Ralph and Frank Longbottom to see if the spell and broke Severus into a million pieces (as it had cracked the stone wall of the sturdy sweets shop) but a voice rang out from behind, "Don´t fret... The hex is never half as strong when you pull them off anything but the person´s wand!"

Lily turned and saw that this was Potter. Staring at him she wondered if he had lost his bloody mind. He could have easily killed Snape! And the stupid attack had caused a huge crack in the side of the shop, which had the owner and her husband outside yelling at the group of boys who were busy pointing and looking meek.

"Help me, Ralph," Lily called impatiently as she made for Severus.

"What should we do?!" Ralph replied. "He looks too heavy to carry-"

"Use a charm," Lily sighed.

"Oh, right! Good one! Why don´t you get his bag and follow behind? Hopefully we can get back in time for a quick drink after!"

As Ralph dragged Snape through the air he led Lily through a conversation about their backgrounds. People stopped and stared at this odd procession, a tall slender seventh year towing a seriously injured slytherin and a shorter, attractive girl following looking angry about the whole thing.

"So all muggles, huh?" he was saying about her family. "I never realized that. But how many mates do you have that have left school?"

"Just the two. Dale Percy and of course Mac Fusty as well."

"Yes, I´ve heard about her. Do you think she murdered those people?"

"I don´t know. I haven´t seen her in years," Lily said sullenly.

"Yes, but you knew her didn´t you?" Ralph insisted, looking over his shoulder at her.

"I thought I did."

"But she wasn´t... Normal, was she?"

"I wouldn´t accuse her of that. Why?" Lily replied and this time there was no mistaking her annoyed tone.

"I´m glad to hear that she isn´t around frankly... She could have easily hurt you."

Lily didn´t think of anything of this statement and didn´t respond.

"Well, here´s the Infirmary..." Ralph announced as if Lily hadn´t lived in the castle five years.

"Why don´t you take him in. And give this to Madam Pomfrey," Lily handed Ralph the worn book bag back that Snape had been carrying before he had been knocked out.

Realizing he was being dismissed, and rightfully so, Snape slammed to the ground and he walked around to block Lily´s path.

"Woah!" he said holding up both hands. "I guess this means were not going back to the village?"

"Are you going to make me state the obvious, because I hate doing that," Lily said with a pout fixed on her face.

"Oh, okay. Those boys upset you didn´t they? I´m sorry about them... I wish I hadn´t cruised past the Three Broomsticks like I did, blabbing on and on... Then we would have never been around when that happened."

Lily felt a little bad now. But only a little. "Well... It is only four o´clock..."

"There we go! Let´s go back! Come on... Look," Ralph gestured to the pile of robes that was Snape, who had now commenced in snoring. At this Lily couldn´t help but be amused. "That little slimeball probably deserved a good knocking around... I´ve caught him doing things that would make you sick."

"Yeah, he´s not very nice but that´s no reason to try and off him," Lily mumbled.

"Well he was trying to do just as bad to Potter," Ralph said. "You can´t hold it against him that he won the fight."

"I can if he started it," Lily argued as they climbed back down towards the village.

"But we don´t know if he did. I don´t see why any reasonable bloke would just attack someone like that unless there was a good reason."

Lily couldn´t come up with anything to dispute this, but she had the feeling that it was that line of thinking that got some people in trouble. For one, assuming Potter was reasonable! Lily found that it was unlikely he was anything of the sort, used to getting his own way with everyone as he was.

Gradually they found more stable ground and ended up having a good time at the Three Broomsticks and even more fun outside of it under a overhang at the backdoor of the bar where they were out of sight until server interrupted them by suddenly dumping a vat of pig fat into the rubbish barrel and causing them to run off roaring laughter.