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Ali Prewitt’s Scare


Thursday morning dawned bright and beautiful and the boys found it very hard to concentrate at their classes with the sunshine coming in through the windows. All James could think of was getting his broomstick out onto the pitch that afternoon and how bloody good the air out there would feel on his face when he did. So he dutifully did his work in Professor Binns’ class, charmed the slacks off Sirius - literally. Poor thing - let James use his belt to charm to act like a snake and underestimated how functional the thing was at holding his slacks up so that everyone got a quick flash of his knicker shorts before he pulled them back up, flushed about the face as James mocked him.

“It’s alright,” Remus whispered, “He’s just jealous he doesn’t look so brilliant without his slacks.”

“Oi have you seen Potter in his knickers?” Sirius demanded Remus, who shook his head, “Trust me, he hasn’t got anything to be jealous of.”

“Um, you have seen Potter in his knickers? Do I have something to be jealous about?” Remus asked, raising an eyebrow.

Sirius snickered, “Oh most certainly not.”

Remus grinned.

After lunch, James was really frustrated that they still had Herbology to go to, but he did get to work on the trimming of the Viper Vine with Maryrose, who tended to him when he got bit by the vicious thing. He milked his supposed injury for every kiss and utterance of “Poor Jamsie!” he possibly could.

“What a bloody whiner,” Lily muttered, working opposite Peter, looking over James’s direction as Maryrose kissed his bandages to make it better, as James had asked. “He’s fine! I mean honestly, he barely bled.”

Peter looked up at her.

“I’m just saying, he’s overreacting and she’s making him worse!”

Peter smirked and turned back to the Viper Vine, cutting its head off just before it bit Lily’s wrist without her noticing because she was so busy watching James and Maryrose.

Finally, classes were over and it was time to go up to the dorms to get ready for the flying lessons. Lily had dirt on her nose from Herbology and was looking forward to taking a hot bath before going out on the pitch. She was halfway up the stairs when Ali Prewitt came running up beside her. “Lil, can we talk?”

Goodbye bath, thought Lily, but she nodded and Ali pulled her down the hallway to an empty classroom. “Everything alright?” Lily asked. But the moment she’d asked, she knew something was the matter as Ali’s face folded in. “What is it?” She pulled her friend into her and hugged her tight.

“It’s Frank,” Ali choked.

“Frank? What’s the matter with Frank? Is he alright?” Lily asked.

Ali’s voice trembled, “Oh Lily. You don’t know… I haven’t told you, of course, you were gone to Florryder and everything with your sister, I didn’t want to upset you.”

Lily squeezed Ali all the tighter, “What happened? Tell me now, I’m here for you, darling Ali.”

“Well Frank and I... we, we spent a lot of time together, you know, dealing with… everything… what happened last term. He - he was really upset. Fighting with Rudolphus Lestrange really bothered him back in February, he never would’ve let on to you lot, but it really did. He was so frightened of Rudolphus getting him back for it, he’s had horrid nightmares… And… and seeing the Dark Lord - he’s so much more terrifying than either of us expected, I don’t think…” Ali clung to Lily, crying as she spoke, “And then Andy, blinded by Orion Black… and... Dumbledore asking Frank to help save Remus and he - he fought Greyback for Rey and he did so well, of course, but… Oh Lil, he was so upset. I had to do something to make him feel better… so we… we both lied… each told our parents we were staying with friends. I told my mum I was staying with you… but really Frank and I… we… we took a room at the Leaky Cauldron for a night…”

“Oh Ali,” whispered Lily.

Ali was shaking, “I thought I was pregnant, Lily… I skipped. And… and I told Frank and he got really frightened looking and he suggested I see a healer to find out. Said all this stuff about being there for me if I was, but when I went to St. Mungo’s last month - you know, the day we met up in Digon Alley - and they said it was too soon to tell and I had to wait. I just went to Pomfrey yesterday and she said I’m definitely not and I told Frank… He looked really pale and he - he’s acting so strange since. He’s barely looked at me, and he’s all nervous and twitchy and odd and --” Ali’s voice broke, “I think he might...break up… with me…”

“Nooo,” Lily whispered, “Noo, Ali… Shhh. Frank’s probably just feeling a whole lot of things about what happened. You know boys - especially strong boys like Frank - they don’t show their emotions about stuff like that really well. Frank’s going to come around once he’s processed everything and got it all sorted out in his head.” She petted Ali’s hair.

Ali pressed her face into Lily’s neck.

“Frank Longbottom loves you far too much to go running off the first sign of trouble, don’t you doubt that for even a moment,” Lily told her firmly.

“Thank you,” Ali cried.

“It’s okay,” Lily said thickly. “It’s going to be alright.”

Ali nodded.

After a long few moments, Ali pulled back. “I think the worst part of it was that… that for the week I thought I was… I… I sort of… got excited a bit. I mean Frank said all sorts of wonderful things. We were going to get married and we even came up with names and it all sounded so wonderful, Lil. I found myself wanting it so much. I mean, in the future would be better, of course, when we’re older, but… but I wanted it. And I think Frank did, too.”

Lily smiled sadly, “But you know you want it later now.”

Ali nodded.

“What names did you choose?”

“Noelle if it was a girl and Neville if it was a boy,” Ali answered.

Lily smiled, “Those are wonderful names. You should save them for the future.”

Ali smiled. “Thank you Lily, you’re truly the best friend I could ever have asked for.”

Lily hugged her tight again. When the hug ended, she said, “Do you want to come watch flying lessons for the first years?”

Ali shook her head, “I’m going to go to bed, I’m tired from crying just now… but… Lil, if you could, please tell Frank I love him and wish him luck for me.”

“I will. I promise.”

Lily stayed in the classroom for a few minutes after Ali left, regaining her breath. She couldn’t believe it - how close Frank and Ali had been to having their lives forever changed. She couldn’t imagine what she would’ve felt like in Ali’s shoes and she hugged herself as she gave herself goose pimples just imagining it… The goose pimples only heightened when she realized who she’d imagined it with.




Remus was following James, Sirius, and Peter down the stairs, James clutching his broomstick, shamelessly wearing his Quidditch robes, his goggles up on his head, leather gloves on his finger… He jogged merrily down the stairwell. James was positively thrilled it was finally time to go flying and he was particularly excited to show off for Maryrose, who had agreed to come and spectate the lessons from the stands.

Remus had fallen a bit behind because of his knees still bothering him, when he felt someone come up beside him. He looked over to see Lily. “Hey,” he said, “You’ve got a spot of something on your nose.”

“Oh no. Do I? Where?”

Remus paused, letting the other three Marauders pull ahead and drew a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her. “On the left. Must be left over from Herbology. Are you alright? You look a little upset?”

Lily wiped the dirt away. “Yes, I’m okay. Just been having a sort of hard conversation with someone, but everything’s okay.”

“That’s good.”

Lily drew a deep breath, “I do need a bit of comfort, though… I was thinking of going to see if my Stag’s eaten the deer feed we put out there.”

“Tonight?” asked Remus.

Lily nodded.

“I’ll go with you,” Remus suggested. “We can bring the Marauder’s Map this time. Yeah?”

“Okay.” Lily smiled. The worst that could come of it would be getting to spend some time with the wonderful Remus Lupin.

“C’mon,” he said, putting an arm about her shoulders, “The others are probably out to the pitch already, the way James is running.”




The pitch was full of nervous energy as Remus climbed the steps into the stands, where Sirius and Peter had already claimed a couple of the benches. Sirius was laying across his and Peter sat nervously on the other. Remus sat by Sirius’s head and leaned back so his arms rested on the bench where Peter sat. “What took you so bloody long? I thought you were right behind us,” Sirius said.

“Bumped into Lily Evans, and my knees are rubbish,” Remus replied.

Sirius shifted and shimmied until his head was in Remus’s lap and he wrapped his arm around Rey’s knees, “These knees here? Bloody hell, Rey, I love these knees.”

“Alright, we’re here for sports, let’s at least try to act manly,” Peter pleaded.

Sirius looked up, “Is it not manly to love my boyfriend’s knees?”

Peter looked scared to answer.

“It’s manly as fuck to love my boyfriend’s knees. So shut up Pete,” Sirius said.

Remus nudged him, “Be nice.”

Sirius grinned.

Out on the pitch, the first years were clustered around watching Lily Evans, who was helping James and Frank carry the broomsticks across the grass. Dexter stared at the broomsticks in her hands, “Whoa, they really are brooms.”

“What did you expect, aeroplanes?” asked Liam. “Of course they’re brooms.”

“I didn’t know what to expect,” Dexter replied.

Darcy stared hungrily at the oodles of brooms the older kids had brought out. “I can’t believe I’m about to learn how to fly. Hey, once we’ve been trained, we ought to play this quidditch thing Sirius Black was going on about.”

“You don’t learn how to fly in one day,” Liam said, rolling his eyes. “Especially not well enough to play quidditch.”

“Well boo,” Darcy said.

Vivian said, “I’m just glad I’m not the only one that’s never been on a broom before!” she said.

“None of us have,” said Oliver.

Liam cleared his throat, “Well, I have. I’m very good, actually.”

“Big shock, guys, Liam thinks he’s very good at something!” Wally said, smirking. “Tell me, Li… is there anything you’ve ever done that you aren’t very good at?”

Liam thought a moment. “Not that I know of.”

“That ego, though,” muttered Macy.

“OI! FIRSTIES!” James bellowed suddenly, his voice carrying over the pitch. Suddenly alert and paying attention to, all seven of them - plus the clusters of Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin first years - looked at James, Frank, and Lily eagerly.

“Everyone come and get a broom,” said Lily, pointing out the pile of them before her, “And we’re going to get started!”

“Yesss,” hissed Wally and they all ran forward to fight over who would obtain the best of the school brooms.

“Here we go,” Sirius said, sitting up with a grin, “Now it’s about to get interesting.”

“Interesting?” Remus asked, eyeing Sirius curiously.

Sirius grinned, “Yeah, Rey, don’t you remember how many times we fell off our brooms the first time?” He himself, Sirius, hadn’t of course, he’d grown up with broomsticks. He’d been alright. What he really meant was the other students in their year - especially Peter - had fallen off their brooms dozens of times…

“And why is that interesting?” Remus asked.

“Well, for heckling of course.”

“Sirius, no.”

But he grinned evilly just the same.