Where Toads Could Be Vampires

Chapter 4: Doubt

Tuesday, 21 September 1976

"Is Remus trying to make me kill him?" Lily dropped her bag on the rug and slumped down into the red sofa, rubbing her fingers over her temples.

Karen dropped down beside her and rummaged through Lily's bag. "I'm sure that's high on his priority list, Lily."

"That's what he acts like."

"What are you talking about?"

Lily groaned and looked up. "It's like he's trying to aggravate me on purpose."

"How's that?"

"For starters," she ticked off her first point on her fingers, "he missed another Prefect meeting."

"I thought Remus had to go visit his sick aunt."

"That family must breed like rabbits. You'd think he'd run out of relatives at the rate they get sick and die off."

Karen frowned. "That's not a nice thing to say, Lily. How would you feel if it was your family?" She pulled a small pink box out of the depths of Lily's bag and poked around inside of it, finally withdrawing a long nail file.

Lily wasn't about to be put off. "How about the way he's late for our rounds?"

"He's not the first boy to lose track of time when he's with a girl."

"That's another thing," Lily said in disgust. "He's going out with Margie Lufkin? Hasn't he any taste at all?"

"Apparently not." Karen didn't look up from her nails. "It seems he prefers a big chest over brains."

"Obviously. And then he helps James make a fool out of me every chance they get."

Karen did manage to look up at that. "You didn't look like a fool just because they tried to handcuff you to James," she insisted. "They made themselves look stupid. Especially when James went after them for it once he got loose."

Hugging a gold cushion to her chest, Lily scowled. "I was still embarrassed. And then what they did today takes the cake. Remus just proved, once again, he doesn't make any effort at all to control his wild animal friends."

Karen snorted. "How is anybody supposed to control James and Sirius?"

"How indeed?" James asked. He leaned his forearms on the back of the sofa and grinned. Lily had been talking about him with her friend. In James' mind, nothing could be more priceless.

"Didn't McGonagall ask something along those lines last Saturday?" Sirius said, ambling up beside James.

Both Lily and Karen looked at the boys who had snuck up behind them. Karen raised her brow, shook her head, and went back to her nails. Lily coloured deeply.

James looked to Sirius. "What is it that makes all of these women want to control us?"

"Animal magnetism," he answered, and winked at Lily. She looked away and rolled her eyes.

James scratched his scalp. "Do you think maybe we should just let them have their way with us for a while?" That would be an adventure worth having.

"Are you talking about McGonagall," Sirius asked, "or about these lovely Gryffindors? Because that definitely affects my answer."

"Ha!" James chuckled. "If McGonagall had her way, we'd be back on the train and headed home to rot."

"Nah." Sirius waved his observations away. "Deep down, she loves us. Really, really deep down."

"You may be right. McGonagall has never actually expelled us.

"Of course I'm right. Just like, really deep down, Lily here wants to snog your face off and bear your children."

"Shut-up." James kicked Sirius hard in the shins and jogged around the sofa, apologising. Lily had already begun to turn red again and James wasn't about to let Sirius ruin another perfectly good conversation with her. His stupid friends had already done enough damage for one week. James dropped to his knees on the rug. "I'm sorry Lily. Please don't be mad. He's a moron. I don't even know why I let him hang around with me."

"Because I'm your best friend, you idiot. Or I was until you kicked me!"

"Not if you're always going around trying to embarrass me." James shot Sirius a glare and turned his eyes back to Lily. She looked refreshingly amused.

"Are you guys over here for any particular reason?" Karen asked him.

Sharing a meaningful glance with Sirius, James shifted on his knees. He was dying to know how funny Lily thought Operation Repelling Gits had been. He shuffled his fingers through his hair. "Did you happen to notice anything unusual about Regulus and Mulcibur today?"

Her eyes narrowed and she leaned back in her seat. "I noticed that other people were carrying their things for them."

"I heard their classmates were taking notes for them in class," Karen added.

"And that a bunch of their assignments were excused," Lily told him, "being that they couldn't hold a quill and all."

Karen waved her file in the air. "At dinner," she said, "I saw the girls in their house were feeding them by hand. They looked quite delighted."

Sitting up straight, Lily looked closely into his face. "We also know that you guys did it, and that it was Remus' idea."

"We, um...er." This wasn't quite the reaction James had been hoping for. Under Lily's reproachful glare, he couldn't manage to unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth.

Thankfully Sirius came to his rescue. "We were trying to come up with a way to get back at them for hexing you last week."

Rolling her eyes, Lily made a disgusted sound in her throat. "What I don't understand is why you felt the need to do it to Snape too. He never did anything to us."

"But he's Snivellus! He deserved it."

"Why?" she demanded.

"Because he's an evil grease ball." What better reason did she want?

"Luckily," Karen cut in, "Pomfrey is supposedly having the antidote owled over first thing in the morning and all of the thugs will be off the royal treatment."

James leaned back on his heels. None of this had gone at all as planned.

"Lily, sweetheart." Sirius propped his elbows on the sofa-back and leaned in to her ear. "If James couldn't use his hands for a whole week, would you feed him at mealtimes?"

"Only if I could flick the food at him from across the table."

He snickered and straightened up. "That would definitely be a sight I'd like to see."

"Oh no." Sirius was not allowed to plot against a fellow marauder. "Don't even think about it."

"Come on James. It would be fun!"

"No way. I will personally hex your guts out if you even try it."

"Not if you can't hold your wand!" Sirius was practically bouncing with excitement.

"What is wrong with you?" James wondered if Sirius had he gone completely mental. "Repelling Ointment is a punishment. It's not for fun!"

"Sirius," Karen said. "Lily can flick food at James' mouth anyway."

"I can?" Lily looked as startled as James felt.

"You see," Karen elaborated to Sirius, "Lily lost a little bet with me today, and she owes me a dare."

He lit up even brighter and leaned back down for the explanation. "Do tell."

"Lily didn't think Edgar Sykes was going to ask Jane out unless Jane made the first move. But he worked up his nerve and asked her for a walk around the lake this afternoon. So Lily has to do whatever dare I pick for her."

Sirius stuck out his hand for a high five from Karen. "I like you girls. That is too cool!"

Lifting her head from the cushion she'd buried it in, Lily sighed. "So you want me to throw food at James?"

"Close. At dinner tomorrow you have to feed him every bite of his food. I don't care how you do it, or how long it takes."

James wasn't sure what to make of the idea. Lily appeared to be in the same boat - he couldn't tell if she was disgusted, or trying to swallow a laugh.

"I can do it however I want?" she asked. Karen nodded quietly. "Thank you."

"No problem." Both of their faces erupted into grins. James was beginning to get nervous.

"Er...what if I don't want Lily to feed me?"

"Don't be an idiot James," Sirius told him. "Being fed by a beautiful woman is every wizard's dream."

Lily threw him an innocent look. "You don't think I would do anything to make you look foolish, do you James?"

"Of course he does," Sirius answered, snickering. "That's what makes it fun."

"Sirius." James' patience was wearing thinner than Professor Binns' hair. "Is it possible for you to shut your stupid mouth for just five minutes?"

"Only if you stop being an oversensitive git."

"I'm not sensitive!"

"Is it possible for you two to argue somewhere else?" Lily asked.

"We're not arguing. Just having a friendly exchange of aggravation."

"Here." Karen interrupted them. "Have you ever tried a Fire Ant Fresher?" She pulled a roll of sweets from her pocket and popped two sticky red discs from the end. "My aunt brought them back from her holiday in New Orleans. They're really good."

The boys took the sweets, but didn't put them in their mouths. "Er...thanks." After years of jokes on other students, James and Sirius both were highly suspicious of any food offered by another student - too many bad experiences.

"I'll take one," Lily said. She slipped it into her mouth and grinned.

If Lily could eat it, however.... Suspicions allayed, the boys popped the sweets into their mouths. Within seconds, their eyes began watering and they started breathing heavily through their mouths, looking at each other with shock. James was surprised there weren't actually flames spilling from his lips.

Lily leaned back against the armrest, cool as a cucumber, and Karen grinned wickedly. "Those Freshers aren't too hot for you guys, are they?" Karen asked politely. "I would have thought you big tough wizards could take it. Lily likes them."

Lily parted her lips to reveal the Fresher between her front teeth. She winked at James and he coughed. Not for all the world would he allow himself to look like a wimp in front of her, but at that moment he was sure his head was about to explode. "I, um...it's good. I just need, er..."

"A glass of water," Sirius finished. And they dashed up the dormitory stairs, spitting the sweets into their sweaty palms.

"Do you think I should have told them that Freshers only burn when you aren't biting down on them?"

Lily carefully took the Fresher out of her mouth to speak. "Not unless you wanted them to hang around all day. That was brilliant, by the way."

"Thanks. I'm just full of brilliant ideas today."

"Speaking of your ideas, did you really have to choose that particular dare? I mean, of all things, did you have to make me feed James Potter?"

"If you're thinking in a larger, cosmic sense, then I don't think it's really absolutely necessary to do anything at all - other than simply existing, of course."

"If you keep it up, you aren't likely to exist much longer," Lily told her. "I get enough of these boys trying to set me up with James without you helping them."

"Lily." Karen waved her file around again. "You constantly growl about how annoying James can be. I just handed you an opportunity to embarrass him in front of the whole school if you want. That's hardly trying to set you up with him."

Groaning, Lily slumped back into the sofa cushions. "Maybe I'll feed him Fire Ant Freshers for dinner," she said. "That should get it over with rather quickly."