Proving Me Wrong

PROVING ME WRONG

LAST CHAPTER:-

When he arrived at 'chuck' however, the note caught in his throat when he realised what, or to be exact, who, was sitting in the mouldy grey chair with the stuffing coming out.

James Potter lifted his head from his hands and in a suspicious tone asked,

"Done what?"

Remus closed the textbook, ignoring the impulse to beat Sirius around the head with it.

CHAPTER 12

" Blood, Sweat and Tears."

Lily Evans had been sitting in the top seats of the Hogwarts quidditch pitch for the best part of an hour, trying to think of a way to get down. The steps were not an option, as merely looking over the edge of the first stair made Lily lose her balance.

No. Steps were out.

Although her flying skills were pretty pathetic, she had actually considered summoning a broomstick. Aside from the fact that the only thing between her and the ground was a wooden stick and a bundle of twigs, ("very reassuring!" huffed a fed-up Lily) the broom shed was locked during class time. And even so, she couldn't just yell, "Accio broom!" or she would find hundreds of ready-made javelins zooming through the air towards her from within the castle itself. One broom was dangerous enough, thank you very much. She wasn't even sure if she could catch the broom if she did summon it, let alone dodge a hundred others.

No. She needed to summon a specific broom. And she only knew of one.

James Potter's Cleansweep.

He had gotten it for his seventeenth birthday at the end of their sixth year. Now, Lily wasn't remotely interested in broomsticks or in James Potter's capability on them, (as if!) but it's hard not to notice when he rolls into the great hall during dinner, carrying it over his shoulder, (positioned at such an angle so that you could not miss the gilt inscription 'Cleansweep 2') chest puffed out, striding to his seat like some conquering hero returning from battle.

She remembered muttering dryly to herself, "Clap, clap Potter. You unwrapped it yourself. Order of Merlin First class for you."

Lily wouldn't be surprised if she summoned Potter's broom and it arrived with twenty-five hexes on it and trailing an anchor of some sort. God, he really loved that broom. If she didn't know any better she would think he was insane. However, she did know better and realised it was just Potter being Potter. She wondered vaguely if his mother and father were as barmy as he was. She wouldn't be surprised if they were holed up in St. Mungo's.

Lily instantly regretted that; it was an awful thought to have.

Anyway, borrowing ("stealing!" cackled her inner-voice with delight) the most prized possession of a lunatic who was already pissed off at you for some unknown reason would be an incredibly stupid thing to do. He would kill her if he found out- wait, first he would proclaim the state of Lily's home-life in front of the entire school and then he would kill her. But if it got to that stage she'd probably do the job herself. It also wouldn't help her situation to have to worry about another person who was out for her blood. They were piling up quite nicely these days.

She supposed that levitation could be an option, though not a very appealing one. She decided to do a practice run on herself, just moving out of her seat and sideways along to the end of the row. Directing her wand at her chest she cried, "Wingardium leviosa!"

A tingling sensation spread through her body as she hovered a few centimetres above the bench. With an almost imperceptible flick of her wand, she rose to a foot above her seat. Lily's fear melted away as she took in the stunning Scottish landscape that surrounded her, the imposing Hogwarts castle set in the distance. It was perfectly lovely to be sitting there in mid-air, knowing that if you fall, it's only a short drop onto your seat.

Lily couldn't resist the urge to cross her legs and hum ("Ohmmmmmm") like she had seen the Buddhist monks do in a film once. Chortling quietly, she opened her eyes. Giving her wand a tiny wave to the left, she slowly sent herself over towards the commentator's bench. When she was satisfied that she could control her own movement, Lily waved her wand to the right, returning to her seat.

She landed on the wooden bench with a plonk, but immediately leapt up again as she realised she had sat on something.

Looking round she let out an, "Oh!" of surprise, and bending down a little, said in an uncertain but definitely friendly voice, "Er- hello, I'm Lily."

***

After a few seconds of stunned silence, Sirius smiled as though he had not heard clearly, "Sorry Prongs, what did you say?"

The grin was not returned. With a stony expression on his face, James repeated, "What have you done?" The question hung in the air, as though James thought the word 'now' should be added onto the end.

Remus jumped in before Sirius could open his mouth, "He's found a way to get the ash winder eggs for Halloween, to make the plates move about the ta-"

"How?" James directed at Sirius.

After catching Remus's discreet headshake, which informed him that he was not to tell James the truth, Sirius began shakily, "W-w-well...you see the- the thing is Jam- Prongs," James stared dubiously, "I've found this lad - well man really... who can- can get us the eggs. Like Moony said," he finished rather lamely.

"Does this man have a name?" asked James in tone, which made it clear that he didn't believe that this man truly existed.

Sirius bit his lip as he tried to think; "Er- his name's Mundungus Fletcher, yeah, but I call him Dung for short. He's a bit dodgy but-"

"I know who Mundungus Fletcher is, Padfoot. Where did you meet him at?"

"Hog's Head."

"Why didn't you tell me you were going?"

"I thought you wouldn't want to go. Thought you wouldn't want to risk losing your badge in the first month."

James snorted and raised an eyebrow. "If I had gone then we could have used the Cloak. What's all this rubbish about losing my badge? Since when have you ever cared about anyone other than yourself?"

"Look who's talking," retorted Sirius jokingly, trying to steer away from the subject.

James smiled, but it didn't reach his hazel eyes. Sirius was lying. Badly.

He sat back in his chair, appearing content with the response from Sirius, who was now rummaging through his pockets for something.

"Are you coming to watch the quidditch practice tonight, Moony?" asked James casually, keeping his eyes fixed on Sirius.

"I always do," he replied with a grin.

Sirius then crawled underneath the table.

"What're you looking for?"

The sound of Sirius's muffled voice came from somewhere below them, "Um...I think I left a packet of stink pellets under here last week, for safe-keeping."

"Safe-keeping?" asked Remus, the corners of his mouth twitching.

"So, how much does Dung want?" James called down.

They heard a clunk, followed by a few colourful swearwords.

Returning from beneath the table and rubbing the back of his head, Sirius said distractedly, "For what? Dung? Who?"

"I knew it," said James resentfully. "You're bloody lying."

Sirius froze, realising his mistake.

James waited for an explanation, but it didn't come.

James said in a weary but bitter tone of voice, "Come and find me when you've stopped talking crap, Sirius."

He left his seat and strode towards the portrait hole, dragging his bag on the floor behind him. He crawled through it without a word, leaving the two boys in the common room.

Sirius shot the sandy-haired boy a contemptuous look, saying, "Good going Moony. Look what's happened. I should have just told him the bleedin' truth!"

Sirius jumped off the sofa and jogged after James, speaking self-assuredly over his shoulder to Remus, "Wait and see. He'll be pleased when I tell him- he'll thank me!"

Out in the corridor, James was nearing the corner when Sirius fell out of the portrait hole, landing on the flagstones with a hard thump. He picked himself up off the floor and bounded after the Head Boy, yelling, "Prongs! Prongs wait!" James walked on faster than before, ignoring his best friend, "James! POTTER! Will you wait for Merlin's sake? It was Evans! It was Evans, Prongs!"

James stopped dead in his tracks.

"Thank you!" Sirius heaved an exasperated sigh. "I thought I'd have to chase you the whole way around the school. Anyway," he steadied himself, "Moony and me think she's the cause of all this! We think it's her that's messed up your head! After you put that itching hex on her she must have hit you with a confundus charm or something, 'cause...you've totally changed Prongs, your personality's done a fuckin' U-turn if you really want to know!" James's shoulders visibly tensed.

"And I don't like the new James one bloody bit, so at breakfast I went to tell Evans to...to fix you. Brought her up to the quidditch pitch, sat in the stands and tried to find out how she'd done it. I even called her Lily," James's grip on the leather schoolbag strap tightened.

"She played dumb though, acted as though she didn't have a clue- but I know she was lying. She knew bloody rightly what I was on about. She screamed at me to leave her alone, so I did, but not before warning her that she'll get a nasty dog bite if she does anything else."

Sirius looked over to Remus for support, giving him two thumbs up. At this Remus gave a groan and put his hands up to cover his face. He removed his hands and moved over to the open window, gazing longingly out of it. As if he thought that his chances of making it to his 17^th birthday were better if he jumped out of the window, rather than if he stayed in here with a crazy James and an idiotic Sirius who didn't know when to keep his fat mouth shut.

Hearing sounds from behind him; Sirius looked over his shoulder and saw the Fat Lady and her friend Violet the witch huddled together in the centre of her gilded picture frame. The pair was whispering excitedly while shooting furtive glances at the back of James's head. They had obviously been listening.

Sirius cleared his throat loudly and their heads snapped up to face him, the little painted witch dropping her broomstick in surprise.

This reminded Sirius of something.

"Oh yeah," he said, now laughing between gasps, "I brought Evans up to the top seats down at the pitch and when we got up she told me...she told me that- that she was afraid of heights!" Sirius let out a bark of laughter and leaned against the wall, unaware that he was alone in his chuckling. "She's probably still stuck up there!"

Then the bell rang, signalling the end of first class (Remus gave another groan) and by the time it had stopped, James had turned around, and Sirius was quiet.

James Potter's eyes were fixed on the ground, afraid that if he looked at either of his friends' faces he would kill them.

His voice trembled with fury as he spoke, "You're my best friends, but you can be sly bastards when you want to be."

Sirius's face lit up unthinkingly and the beginnings of a smile appeared in the corners of his mouth-

James kicked his bag up from the floor into the air and caught onto the strap. Hauling it over his shoulder he spat, "And no Black, that was not a fucking compliment."

It took every ounce of strength James possessed to walk around the corner and away from the two boys he called his friends. Even though his fists were telling him to run back and pound both of them into equally bloody pulps.

After about ten minutes James slowed from his furious stride down to an irritable saunter. When he noticed that he was in the cavernous entrance hall, James stopped altogether. He pulled from his bag a blank piece of parchment. The Head Boy didn't really feel like going to class now, so he needed to check where McGonagall was, so she wouldn't find him wandering the corridors.

With a tap of his wand, and a muttering of, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good," glistening lines of black ink began to appear on the surface of the parchment, fanning out in every direction like a spider's web.

He saw that the dot labelled Minerva McGonagall, was currently teaching a class of first years. His eyes wandered to the History of Magic classroom, where he was supposed to be now. He watched as two dots entered the room and took seats at the back of the class, going unnoticed by Professor Binns. There were only two empty places now, his own and Evans's.

James knew that Sirius ("the devious prick," thought James) had probably scared her, but a trivial thing such as a death threat wouldn't stop Lily Evans coming to class.

Maybe the prick was right and she was still stuck in her seat, too afraid to move. He looked over to the quidditch pitch and saw that she was running down the steps of the stands. She seemed to have lost her fear of heights.

Well, of course he didn't actually see that she was running per se, because right now she was just a back dot.

James suddenly remembered Wormtail suggesting, one late night during their sixth year, when the map had been created, that they use miniscule bodies rather than dots to represent people, because it would be much more original and informative.

As the Marauders were notorious for their originality, this idea had been met with great interest from the rest of them; earning Peter a few slaps on the back, and a "Good one, Wormtail," from James himself.

The high regard that Peter had then been held in lasted a spectacular fifteen minutes, coming to an end when Sirius looked up from reading a map on the floor, a look of utter revulsion on his face.

"What if, I dunno, we see someone doing something... er- private?"

James remembered laughing uproariously at this with Peter and Remus. He remembered asking Sirius what was so bad about seeing people doing 'private' things.

He had replied shortly, "What if it's Snivellus?"

The three of them continued chuckling but with disgusted expressions to match Sirius's.

"Or us?"

That shut them up.

Ergo, they decided to just use plain, boring, uninformative dots.

James knew that Lily Evans was running down the steps of the quidditch stands right now because of how fast the dot was moving.

And it was moving extremely fast.

Her dot even skipped a few millimetres once, so she must have taken the steps five or six at a time.

Hang on, James thought, who can jump five steps in one go? On the way down? Who can even jump two steps on the way down?

She's not running, he decided after the dot skipped another few millimetres.

Well how is she going so fast then? he asked himself, more than a little irked that Evans was currently outstripping his prized Cleansweep and he had no idea how she was doing it.

She doesn't even own a bloody broomstick! To be going that fast she would have to be...

The sheer horror of his next thought seemed to put the world on 'pause', like it was waiting for James to make a decision; to accept or deny that the thought was true, and happening at this very moment.

He made his choice, and somewhere, someone pressed 'play.'

James Potter started running towards the quidditch pitch.

Even though his legs felt like jelly, and his stomach like a lead weight dragging him down, James burst out of the vast oak doors into the fading autumn sunlight. And with the bag and map streaming behind him, like a man possessed; he tore down the stone steps, across the crisp grass, along the gravel path, and headed for the stadium.

Between breaths he desperately whispered this mantra,

"The map made a mistake - the map is wrong. Evans is in class, Evans is in class."

His lungs seemed to be filled with fluid rather than oxygen five minutes later, as he hurtled past the changing rooms, ditching his possessions at the door.

When he made it onto the silent pitch he skidded to a halt.

James frantically searched the lowest row of stands. Then felt his stomach lurch as he became sickeningly aware of a black bundle of robes at the bottom of the Northeast stand.

He sprinted over, each heavy footfall echoing in the deserted stadium.

Halfway across the pitch, when he had gotten close enough to catch a glimpse of the fiery red hair, his knees gave way as realisation set in.

Like a ghost from another time; a time when James had never bothered to go and turn off the light in the Heads bathroom on the 3^rd of September, the voice of a sixth year Remus Lupin resonated in James's head, the words seeming to come from the quidditch pitch itself.

"This map will never be wrong."

The denim of his jeans burned his skin as he slid forward a few feet on the dry earth, but the pain didn't register in his head. Acknowledging it would only slow him down. James scrambled to his feet and tripping in his haste, he rushed to her side.

There she was.

My mystery lady.

Lily Evans's broken body was sprawled upside-down across three rows, her head hanging limp over the lowest step. She had fallen from the top, where Sirius had taken her just over an hour ago, to the bottom row.

James felt himself pale, and his chest constrict.

He reached up and placed two fingers to her neck to check for a pulse. Gripping his right arm tightly with his free hand, to steady it, because he was trembling.

Calm down, he ordered himself, focus.

The shaking subsided, and for the first time in his life, James prayed.

His own heart skipped a beat a second later when he felt her pulse.

Yes.

He opened his mouth to murmur some words of gratitude to God or whoever it was that listened, but all that came out was a ragged sigh of semi-relief.

She was alive.

Subconsciously, James remembered how he had counted the number of steps back in his first year. He had been in a state of euphoria for the first few weeks, ecstatic that he had finally arrived at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He was home.

It was seven years ago this month that he had tried to commit to memory everything he could about the Hogwarts quidditch pitch. He had known then that one day he would fly here, and he would give Hogwarts something it had never seen before. He didn't know then that he would be the only Hogwarts student to ever win Witch Weekly's Most Charming Smile Award, but for that first year he had been content with simply getting to know the pitch. The home of his future victories (first-year James didn't plan on losing any matches.) He had memorised every smell, and sound, even every taste...and step.

James wished now that he had not learnt the number off by heart, as he recalled it with disturbing clarity.

Two hundred and eighty three.

283

You can break your ankle by falling two steps.

Multiply the damage by one hundred and forty, and you can try to imagine what James Potter saw before him.

Can you?

Maybe. Maybe not.

Add to that some aching muscles, skinned knees, and the overwhelming sense of fear that surged through James's body like an electric current:

It's enough to make anyone sick.

James was.

He fell forwards onto his hands and knees and retched violently, emptying the contents of his stomach (toast, butter, and a copious amount of Chivers lemon shredless) onto the dusty earth of his beloved quidditch pitch. The acrid stench of bile lingered in the air, along with the disgusting feeling of responsibility that had been following him around for the past few weeks. Later on, James wished he hadn't vomited right beside Evans, he didn't know why, he just wished he had turned away from her or something.

When he sat up again his head was reeling, a jumble of terrible thoughts pounding in his ears. He pushed them away.

They can't help me now.

His black hair was matted with sweat, sticking to his forehead. His glasses had slipped down to the edge of his nose; he pushed them back up. He wiped his face with the sleeve of his shirt and brushed the dirt from his hands.

James knew he would have to leave her in a minute to go and get someone, but first he had to check her over, make a list of her injuries.

Taking a few deep breaths, he turned around to face her again. He shuddered as he was hit with another wave of nausea, but steadied himself.

Concentrate.

Imagining he was Moony, just rhyming off the twelve uses of dragon's blood, he started making the list.

One.

It seemed as though she had tried to stop herself from falling by hooking her leg around a bench, though she couldn't hold it for long. Her leg had more than likely snapped from her own body weight, causing the bone to pierce through the flesh, protruding through her knee and leaving a bleeding gash. Her socks were soaked through with blood. If James tried hard he could pretend they were meant to be red, for Gryffindor. He had to admit the facts; Hogwarts school socks were grey.

James knew he was no Healer, and that he couldn't risk using magic on her in this condition. So, wrenching off his red and gold tie, James wrapped it around the wound on her knee and knotted it securely to stop the flow of blood. His own hands were now covered in it.

Two.

James tentatively lifted up her jumper, and through her white shirt he could see numerous bruises. Broken ribs. He suppressed a grimace and lowered the jumper again.

Three.

Her face was the worst; she was barely recognisable. There were dark bruises all over her face, and on top of that hundreds of scratches from the wood chippings that littered the steps and a large swelling on her forehead that was almost black. He noticed one particular cut in the corner of her left eye. A drop of blood had run from there to her chin, leaving a crimson track across her sallow cheek.

Like a tear.

At this thought James tore his gaze away from her; this was too hard.

He couldn't do this. He needed someone else. Anyone would do, just not him.

He... he couldn't.

Hagrid could.

He got to his feet, and giving the unconscious Lily a shaky smile, dashed out of the stadium.

He ran so fast that when he arrived at Hagrid's hut he couldn't slow himself down in time and ended up slamming into the weathered oak door. He grunted on impact, but immediately started pounding on the door, calling for Hagrid.

"Hagrid! Hagrid -come on! Come on quick, hurry! It's me- James! She- she's on the pitch, c-covered in blood- Hagrid!"

No answer.

His voice took on a tone of quiet desperation when he next spoke.

Leaning his forehead against the door, James said, "Please Hagrid, come on. I c-can't look after her by myself - I d-don't know what to- to do."

But all he heard from inside the hut were the whines of Hagrid's new puppy, Fang.

Hagrid wasn't there.

The prickling sensation James had been feeling in the corners of his eyes stopped and his vision blurred. He blinked once, and was angry when he felt tears spilling onto his cheeks.

They streamed down his face, mixing with the dirt and grime from the pitch. He wiped them roughly away with the back of his hand.

Crying won't do Evans any good.

"Please. Come on."

James closed his eyes, and swallowed, trying to think what to do. He was so tired, and afraid, and hurt, that he didn't think he would make it up to school if he tried to run. Maybe he could break into the hut and floo up to the sch-

His thoughts were interrupted by the sounds of boys shouting orders to each other, was it lunchtime already?

He gave a jolt when he realised where the shouts were coming from.

He gasped, "Lily!" before shoving himself away from the door, and with a spurt of newfound energy, sprinted towards the stadium.

As he got closer, James thought he recognised some of the voices.

Slytherins.

He pulled out his wand, preparing to stupefy the whole of Slytherin house if any of them had so much as touched her, but when he reached the changing rooms, he stopped.

James saw seven green-cloaked figures (the Slytherin quidditch team) gathered at the bottom of the Northeast stand. Presumably they had arrived down to have a lunchtime practice and found Lily there in the stands. One of them had probably hopped on his broom and flew back up to school to get help.

James wished he had thought of summoning his broom, he would have gotten here a lot faster; he could have caught her before she hit the bottom.

There was an eerie silence as tiny Professor Flitwick and Madam Pomfrey emerged from within the group of Slytherins, ashen-faced, levitating Lily's body between them.

James didn't know why he was still standing there. He didn't know what was stopping him from running after Flitwick and Pomfrey.

He just didn't.

The Slytherins didn't follow the two teachers; James had expected them to laugh or make a joke about Lily, but no one did. Surprisingly, no one found it funny that a muggleborn had nearly died, and if they did they were keeping it to themselves.

He supposed laughing about stuff like that is easier when they're safe inside their dungeon. But seeing it right there in front them was a different story altogether.

They didn't seem to be in the mood for practice now, so picking up their brooms and with bowed heads, they sloped off towards the changing rooms.

Right where James was standing.

After hastily grabbing his bag and map, he stole inside the Gryffindor changing room. Closing the door gently behind him, he whispered, "Colloportus," to lock it.

Once safe inside the dimly lit room, James collapsed onto one of the benches.

Exhaustion had finally set in.

Tapping his wand to the map, he murmured drowsily, "Mischief managed."

By the time the parchment had gone blank; James was sleeping fitfully, and it had slipped from his loose grip to rest on the gritty tiled floor, a crimson smear where he had held it.

While he was asleep, James had a dream. He dreamt that he was back on the quidditch pitch, alongside the unconscious Evans. Suddenly she was sitting bolt upright, and squealing with laughter at the sight of him crouched over on his hands and knees throwing up. It had all been a trick.

Then Sirius was beside her on the step, his arm draped across Evans's shoulders, and he was dressed like a house-elf. James tried to ask him what was going on, and why was he wearing that old sheet like a toga. But all that Sirius would say was, "Lily, Lily, Lily."

After that the two of them disappeared, only to be replaced by an irate Remus, who was shouting at James for not knowing the twelve uses for dragon's blood and began beating him over the head with that huge book he had been reading earlier.

Thump

"Hey, cut it out."

Thump

"Moony, stop it."

Thump

James opened one bleary eye, ready to take a swipe at Remus, but realised that he was alone in the changing room, and someone was banging on the door.

The banging stopped, and he heard a familiar voice mutter, "Alohamora."

The lock clicked and the door swung open to reveal a thoroughly irritated Remus Lupin, a large book clutched in one hand and his wand in the other, and what appeared to be the entire Gryffindor quidditch team piled up behind him.

"Come on in then and wait," he said glumly, gesturing to them to follow.

The six players pushed and shoved one another in through the doorway, seeming anxious to get away from the pitch. Once inside some began a discussion about last week's Harpies-Wanderers match, some swapped chocolate frog cards, and others did a bit of last-minute homework.

This was all carried in an unnaturally subdued manner.

No one had noticed James lying on the bench yet, and he wondered groggily if they were all blind. He forced himself up into a sitting position, and went to rub the sleep out of his eyes when he noticed the blood on his hands.

Her blood.

My mystery lady.

Then it all came rushing back.

With a mournful sigh that finally alerted everyone to his presence, he leaned forward, resting his head on his knees, and gasped for air.

Images began to flash before his eyes like some horrible slideshow.

The bundle of robes at the bottom of the Northeast stand.

A glimpse of fiery red hair.

This morning's breakfast coming back up.

Bone piercing through skin.

The broken ribs.

A scarlet teardrop.

Hagrid's hut.

The Slytherins.

In the changing room.

And darkness.

When it ended he was struggling to breathe, James reached up to pull off his tie but found it wasn't there. Sitting up straight again he realised he was shaking. He tried to calm himself like before but this time it didn't work.

James scanned the room for Remus's face, and when he found him, croaked miserably, "I-I didn't know what to d-do, Remus, th-there was no one there but me," he held out his red-stained hands, "There was s-so much blood...so much-"

Without breaking eye contact: Remus turned his head to the team, and sharply said, "Wait outside."

The six of them obeyed, filing out of the room quickly, but each stared at James before passing through the door.

He could see the worry in their eyes, the fear too...and the suspicion.

As soon as the door had closed, Remus was across the room and kneeling on the floor in front of James.

"James, the whole school's been looking for you since this morning. Something awful has happened," with a meaningful look at his friend he continued, "but it seems you already know."

Remus had just withdrawn a large bar of chocolate from an inside pocket of his robes when the changing room door opened again.

"I thought I told you to wait out-"

It was Sirius, looking a bit worse for wear.

"Oh, Padfoot, it's you. Close the door wou-"

Before anyone realised what was happening, James had leapt out of his seat, right at Sirius. After driving him back through the open doorway and onto the ground, he started punching every bit of his body he could.

The quidditch team looked on, frozen in terror. Was this really happening? Was it some sort of sick joke the Marauders were playing? Remus Lupin didn't seem to think it was very funny as he tried in vain to restrain their team captain.

They had never seen James Potter lose his temper like this before, but whatever his best friend had done to seriously piss him off like he was now, they knew...

Sirius didn't stand a chance.