Lily's Tears

Lily paced back and forth in the empty Transfigurations classroom, waiting for Professor McGonagall to arrive with her tutor. She had been there for twenty minutes already, and was freezing because she had forgotten her cloak.

"I don't see why 'Livia couldn't have been my tutor. Just because McGonagall thinks that it would distract her from her other studies," Lily thought irately. "I wonder what rotter she's rooted up to be my tutor…I hope it's not a Slytherin." She crossed the room and looked out of the massive diamond-paned window. The stars were softly shimmering in the pale moonlight, and the cut of the glass made the light refract so that Lily was bathed in a gentle pool of light. The brilliant glow of the full moon contrasted sharply with the menacing trees of the Forbidden Forest. Lily was scared of the forest, but at the same time, thought it was dreadfully romantic. She had always wondered what it would feel like to walk through the forest at night, in the cover of darkness. The forest called to her, aching to have its mysteries discovered. Lily yearned to creep out the door and down the hallways, slip through the giant doors in the Great Hall, and enter the Forbidden Forest. It sounded crazy but something about imminent danger had always appealed to Lily. Lily knelt beside the window, resting her cheek against her hand, which was as cold as ice. She glanced at her watch. Ten thirty, forty minutes had passed since the proposed meeting time.

"McGonagall is curiously late," Lily thought, tracing a pane of glass with the tip of her finger. One would not expect a woman like Professor McGonagall to be late for anything. Lily shifted her weight so she was now sitting on the floor instead of kneeling and stuffed her frozen hands in the folds of her robes. She decided that she would wait for the professor until eleven, then she would return to the warmth of the cozy Gryffindor Common Room, with its roaring fire and plump, cushiony chairs.

"Fire! What a dolt I am! I'll conjure myself a fire," Lily thought sheepishly.

Here she was, shivering on the floor of a classroom when she could have been sitting next to the comforting glow of a fire.

"Incendio!" Lily muttered, pointing her wand at the cobblestone floor. A small spurt of electric blue flames sprung up from the floor and waves of heat rose up, thawing her face and hands.

When her hands were working properly again, she rose and looked at her watch. Eleven thirty. Lily walked over to her desk and picked up her book, wondering why the professor never showed up. She exited the classroom and tiptoed down the hall, hoping she wouldn't run into Peeves. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Once she reached the portrait of the Fat Lady and said the password, (flying fish) she climbed gratefully into the common room, heading for the squashiest and most comfortable armchair to do a little reading before turning in for the night. As Lily settled into the armchair, James watched her from the armchair directly across from her, concealed with the invisibility cloak.

"Lily looks so pretty. Her hair makes the fire look pale," he thought lovingly.

James had known she would come here tonight, because he had watched her curl up with a book here many times before. He had taken to sitting in that very armchair when she wasn't around, just so it would feel like she was with him. James thought it was a sweet idea, but his friends found it obsessive. Sirius had passed through an hour ago on his way to the dormitory, and muttered something that sounded like "stalker."

James, of course, was offended. "I'm not a stalker," he thought to himself. "Sure, I sometimes cover myself with the invisibility cloak, tiptoe up to her dormitory and watch her while she sleeps. True, I've already picked out names for our first five children. And there was that time with the Mr. And Mrs. James and Lily Potter embroidered hand towels…but does that make someone a stalker?"

A sudden movement interrupted James' non-stalkerish thoughts. He looked over and saw that Lily had discarded her book for a large photograph album. She sighed dejectedly. James knew why she was here tonight and what was in that album. She would come down to the common room late at night when something was upsetting her, and he knew exactly what was upsetting her tonight. It had been two months since that rotter Brendan had dumped her.

Brendan was an excellent Quidditch player, and the hero of Ravenclaw. His prowess on the Quidditch pitch had captured the Quidditch Cup for his house (as well as his position as captain) for the last two years. He was their powerhouse chaser, scoring an average of 70 points a game. This wasn't enough to thwart Gryffindor however. James and his team always beat the Ravenclaws by at least 60 points, which infuriated Brendan. He swore to take revenge on James after his first Quiddtich match against him, when James scored 90 points for Gryffindor and stole the spotlight.     

Brendan was a vengeful person, and he didn't care who he hurt as long as he got his revenge. He came from one of the richest and most respected families in the wizarding world, and he had never been denied anything, even victory on the Quidditch pitch, up to this point. Brendan had searched for months for a way to give James his 'just desserts' and always came up empty. Finally, in the beginning of James' fourth year at Hogwarts, Brendan found it. He had tormented Peter Pettigrew, threatening to tell everyone about his crush on Olivia unless he told him who James liked. Peter panicked, and told Brendan the whole story of James' infatuation with Lily. James knew this because Peter had run up to the common room afterwards, stuttering and apologizing for what he had done. Now that his secret was out, James knew he was going to watch out for Brendan's next move. Unfortunately, James didn't find out until it was too late.

Before he knew it, Brendan had asked Lily out. James couldn't believe it, it was the last thing he was expecting him to do. James assumed that Brendan would tell Lily in front of the entire school or do something else to embarrass him—not date her! James was a little disappointed in Lily. He couldn't believe she could fall for that jerk. "It's just not possible," he thought. "Clearly Brendan had her under some kind of love spell."

It was obvious she was in puppy love though. James knew that it was only a matter of time before Brendan would make his move, and when he did, it tore James in two. After their three-month anniversary, Brendan seduced Lily in a broom closet. Two days later, he dumped her, saying it had more to do with Quidditch than anything else.

James found all this out after it had already happened. One day while James was in the library, he had come upon Brendan's books, and picked them up to leave them with Madame Briggs, the assistant librarian, when a thin navy blue book slipped out from one of his Arithmancy books. It was Brendan's diary. James opened it and read: "I've decided that I'll seduce and ditch Lily instead of revealing Potter's little secret to the entire student body. Potter'll suffer far more if he thinks his precious Lily had been tainted than if I publicly embarrassed him in front of the whole school. If I can break that little bitch's heart, it will be even better. That way, he'll suffer for as long as Lily does."

James slammed the diary shut and stormed out of the library in a rage, knocking people out of his way as he went. He pulled out his Marauder's Map. "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good," he muttered, tapping the parchment with his wand and searched hastily for the tapestry that marked the entrance to the Ravenclaw Common Room.

James rapidly searched for the dot that represented Davies. He was indeed in his common room, as James had suspected. He then saw the little dot that signified him saying "eagle talon." James repeated the word and the tapestry rolled up slowly, revealing a door.

James stormed into the common room, ignoring the surprised cries of it's occupants, grabbed Brendan by the collar and swore that if he ever came near Lily again that he'd beat him within an inch of his life. Brendan shoved James to the floor and kicked him brutally in the stomach. While James was hunched over in pain, Brendan laughed, picked up his diary, and told James to get out before he really hurt him. He walked out of the Ravenclaw common room as best he could, considering he'd just had the wind knocked out of him. Angry and embarrassed, James headed back to the common room, swearing revenge on Brendan.

James stomped around the school for days while Lily hid herself in her room, weeping forlornly. She neither slept nor ate, and missed a week's worth of classes. Brendan, on the other hand, had acquired a new girlfriend, a leggy blonde named Winter from Slytherin, who had a reputation for being quite friendly with the boys. James wanted to tear Brendan apart, limb-by-limb, because he walked around the school like nothing had happened, while Lily cried herself to sleep.

After a week, Lily came downstairs and returned to her normal schedule. She went to Quidditch matches, did her homework, and chatted with friends. Despite her affirmations that she was fine, James and Olivia seemed to be the only ones who noticed that she wasn't.

Olivia tried in vain to cheer Lily up, she had taken Lily to Hogsmeade on weekend visits, even bought her the black and white kitten named Hera from Mistress Madeline's Maudlin Magical Menagerie that she had desperately wanted, yet nothing seemed to bring her out of her melancholy state.

Lily's depression had hit James hard, even harder than it had Olivia. It frustrated James to see Lily suffer like that. Lily and James were like two opposing ends on a harp string…when something happened to her, he always felt the effects. James wanted to be the one who she ran to when someone or something had hurt her, so he could destroy whomever or whatever it was that made his darling Lily cry. He wanted to be the one who comforted her, who held her tight and kissed away her tears, who bought her presents to delight her. He would have gone through hell and back for her. He just wanted to be a part of her life, to mean something to her.

In fact, Lily's life had already been affected by James a mere two hours ago. James had learned from Skylar that Professor McGonagall was in the process of acquiring a tutor for Lily. "What better way to get close to Lily than to be her tutor?" James thought.

So, he had taken matters into his own hands. By enlisting the help of his friends Remus, Sirius, and Peter, James had no problem finding out who was chosen as Lily's tutor.

The first "victim" was a pudgy little Hufflepuff boy named Watson Wilkins. Watson was an intelligent and nice boy, but he was gullible and a pushover. Sirius told Watson that Lily cursed all the other students who tried to tutor her, and he had seen her in the library earlier researching the Iryusus Curse, which would cause you to lose your eyesight for 24 hours. Consequently, Watson decided to stay in his dormitory that night, and forgot to inform Professor McGonagall that he wasn't going to be there.

"With any luck the rest of the candidates will be this easily swayed." James thought hopefully.

It was only a matter of time before the professor requested his services as tutor. James' prowess in Transfigurations made him quite popular with all the struggling students. James's skills as a chaser made several teams across Great Britain take notice, yet he wasn't as well-liked as Sirius or Remus were. He was well known, but not popular. Although teachers favored him, and certainly Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs (and some brave Ravenclaws) adored him, James was hated by Slytherins, a majority of Ravenclaws, and Professor Tavish Tavington, or "The Bollock-faced Bastard" as James liked to call him.

Professor Tavington was the potions master, and James knew that he loathed him with every bone in his vile, decrepit body. Tavington was a classic Slytherin Head-of-House, following in the tradition of loathing all Gryffindors, mainly because they outshone his prized Slytherins in everything they did, except potions, of course; Tavington made sure of that.

Unbeknownst to James, there was a greater reason to why Tavington detested him above all others: it was because James embodied all things Gryffindor. The bravery, the achievement, the chivalry, the nobility, and the cleverness (albeit that was a Ravenclaw mannerism) would all bring James greatness. Tavington had been a great wizard in his time, but now he was a shadow of his former self. Renouncing the teachings of Hogwarts, he left to pursue 'a greater calling.' Tavington, having squandered away his best years and his money in a futile attempt to start his own wizarding school that specialized in the Dark Arts, had failed dismally, but Dumbledore had the heart to take him back. Tavington was now a bitter old man who lived vicariously through his protégé, Severus Snape.

Snape, like Tavington, hated James Potter. James could never figure out why. He assumed it must have been because of those frog livers he put in his pumpkin juice during his third year. It had never occurred to him that Severus Snape might actually have human emotions, and for good reasons. Snape treated everyone as a lesser being, and didn't have many friends. In fact, he only had two people whom he could truly call "friends." Lucius Malfoy, a seventh year, and Lily Evans, only counted as a friend because she always agreed to partner with him in potions class.

James' mind (and eyes) wandered back to Lily. She was now sitting in the chair so that her head was resting on one arm of the chair and her feet were hanging over the other. She was still studying the photo album. Even though he had already been sitting there for hours, James knew he could sit there a lifetime just to look at her.

The closing of the album interrupted the silence of the Common Room. Lily stirred in her chair and stood up, and walked over to the fireplace. She yawned, and tossed the album into the fire with a satisfying thud. "G'bye, Brendan," she said with a smirk. Then she leisurely made her way over to the staircase. As Lily was about to ascend, she paused, and turned towards where James was sitting.

"I could have sworn I heard a noise," she muttered, and continued up the stairs.

James waited to hear the creak of the door closing, and climbed up the stairs to his own dormitory.

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