The Very Last Minute

Two ~ Multiple Concussions

James woke up to the blurry, startling white of the Hospital Wing and was briefly met with utmost confusion. What had he done to land himself in the place this time, he thought as he groped around for his glasses. He went through his options:

Prank backfiring horribly wrong? No, that wasn't it.

Getting into a duel with Snape? No, that wasn't it, either.

Quidditch? No, he was too fast on a broom to be injured.

James cringed as he came to his last option: Lily Evans.

Suddenly he remembered everything; walking into that door and breaking his glasses, the Head Girl fixing them, him falling down the stairs...this had to be the worst thing that had happened to him yet.

He placed his glasses on his nose and managed to jump a foot in the air whilst lying down. The object of his affections was sitting there next to his bed, smiling that adorable smile and looking absolutely gorgeous as she always did to him.

James would have then given anything to be swallowed up by his disinfectant-smelling mattress.

"Hi," she greeted him softly. "How are you feeling?"

James would have said something like "appallingly humiliated," but he didn't think he'd be able to get those long words out of his mouth in a relatively short time. He was spared from answering, however, by the arrival of Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew.

"Greetings, everyone!" Sirius announced, intent on always making a big entrance.

"How are you, Prongs?" Remus asked, a tad of amusement in his voice.

"Ooh! Company!" Sirius exclaimed, giving Lily a little bow of the head, which she returned with a smile. "And FOOD!" he added excitedly, spotting James's pile of confectionery on his bedside table. He looked at James and winked. "You seem pretty sussed here, Prongs. Want us to come and get you at the end of term?"

"He'd miss his NEWTs," Remus pointed out.

"Pff," Sirius made a noise and flopped his hand.

"H-how long have I b-been in here?" James asked quietly.

"Six days," Peter said proudly.

"S-Six days?!" exclaimed James, sitting up rather fast. "That means..."

"That your first exam is tomorrow? Yes, it does," admitted Remus.

"Bloody Hell!" James jumped out of bed and turned red when he realised that he had, once again, said the wrong thing in the presence of Miss Evans. She, however, only located his clothes, handed them to him and pulled a set of curtains around his bed, making him go, if possible, even redder. He got dressed and Sirius pulled the curtains back, telling him he was just in time for the first lesson of the day.

"Why didn't someone enervate me?" he asked.

"We didn't think we should risk it; you fell down eighty steps and you could have had a concussion," Lily said, a trace of worry in her voice. "I don't think you were even breathing when I got you to Madam Pomfrey."

This information in mind, James almost concussed himself again, purely because he was in a hurry to got his socks on in the presence of Lily Evans.

***

NEWTs came and went. James scraped past mostly because he had come across things when researching for one of his infamous practical jokes. After the last exam, the seventh years were immensely relieved that the exams were over, but a little melancholy to realise that they only had two days of school left, one of them devoted to lessons and the other to the Graduation Ceremony.

The Graduation Ceremony! James had remembered on the morning of their last day of lessons. He had a speech to memorise! In a wash of blind panic, he threw all of his belongings out of his trunk to retrieve the parchment from where he'd tossed it the night he'd come out of the Hospital Wing. There it was, all long, thirty lines of it, half in English, half in Elfish. Elfish! James asked you, Elfish!

Sirius stumbled over, having just got dressed, and peered over his best friend's shoulder.

"Whoops, those the Morals of Magic?" James nodded wordlessly. "Friend of my brother's had to learn them, took him about six months."

"Thanks, Sirius," James said sardonically.

***

She was clearly bored. Well, wasn't everyone in History of Magic? James Potter breathed a chuckle as she idly flicked blots of ink at her palm and blew upwards so that a stray lock of hair floated up and landed on her curly, garnet head.

He sat two rows behind her and one row to the left. If they were on a chessboard, if he was a knight and she was a queen, he could take her on his next move.

"Prongs. . .Prongs. . .Prongs!"

Sirius Black had to nudge James quite hard in the ribs to get his best friend's attention.

"What?" whispered James, annoyed.

"Stop staring at Evans, man, or she's gonna know you like her!" Sirius hissed, a definite evil star in his eye.

"She's more likely to find out that I like her by you telling her, Padfoot," James retorted.

"Ha! You admit it!" his friend whispered triumphantly. "Seven years and you finally admitted it!"

"N-" James got halfway through his first syllable before he realised what he'd said. "Dammit. So now I suppose you're going to tell her?" he said gloomily.

"I might, depends," Sirius said, inspecting his fingernails. James frowned.

"On what?"

"On whether you tell her first, m'friend," Sirius grinned. "Say, by the end of today?" James opened his mouth to argue, you didn't just tell the girl you'd liked for seven years that you liked her on the spur of the moment like that!

"Is there a problem with the four hundred and fifty B.C. discovery of wand cores, Mr Potter?" Professor Binns asked, stopping his drone mid-sentence.

"Huh? Oh, no, sir," James said in a bit of a wobbly sentence. "It's...fine, brilliant, in fact...yeah."

Professor Binns sunk back down into his flat lecture as James frowned at Sirius, who was red in the face from trying not to laugh. James shook his head lightly and his gaze was yet again drawn to her. He found her looking at him; James got the shock of his life when she pushed forward a small smile; he fell off his chair. Once he had apologised to Professor Binns for the second time, he tried to get down to some serious learning of the Morals, but Sirius leaned over and hissed in his ear:

"Well, I have sorted out a few of your problems," he grinned. James did the exact opposite.

"What in Merlin's name have you done now?" he asked in a low, dangerous voice. Sirius pretended to look a little hurt, but it wasn't really working when his eyes were shining with excitement and mirth. At that moment, something hit the side of James's head, he looked down and frowned at the parchment aeroplane on the desk in front of him. Glancing over at Sirius, his best friend was on the verge of giggles and nodding towards the plane suggestively. James rolled his eyes and unfolded the parchment. He discovered that the plane was in fact made of two sheets of parchemnt, one inside the other and was surprised whem he saw Sirius's writing on the first.

Dear Miss Evans,

Please sit down, you may be shocked and offended to find that our dear Head Boy has neglected to learn his assigned Morals of Magic for tomorrow's graduation ceremony. In fact, he has not even read them through once yet, because he has had other, more attractive distractions on his mind. Therefore, on behalf of a very dear friend, I, Sirius Black, whom you know and love so well, have taken it on myself to request your aid.

Please assist Mr Potter in commiting the Morals of Magic to memory tonight in the library, where he will be at eight o'clock sharp.

Many thanks and wishes of good luck,

Sirius

James breathed out very slowly as he switched the sheets with trembling fingers. His fears were confirmed as Miss Evans's loose, curly handwriting met his eyes from the second page.

Dear Messers Black and Potter,

While deliriously terrorised at the mere notion of the Head Boy leaving his duty neglected in the said manner, I am, once again, called upon to perform my duty as Head Girl and to help any student in need. Therefore I will be in the library at eight o'clock tonight to assist Mr Potter in his commiting his speech to memory, but for the sole reason of being the generous, kindhearted creature that I am and seeing a chance to milk this event for all it is worth at a later date.

Regards,

Miss Evans.

Oh dear magic, thought James as he glared at Sirius who was reading Miss Evans's reply over his shoulder. Screwing up all his Gryffindor courage, he chanced a look at the pretty redhead to his right. She glanced up and tossed him a smile. Sirius grinned back while James tugged at the sides of his mouth. Once Miss Evans had looked down once more, he moved his arm to try and strangle Sirius, but couldn't because he knocked over his ink bottle.