All in the Family

Chapter 124: Career Advice

Still my favorite chapter of this book, and I regret nothing.

HPHPHPHPHP

Remus knocked a tin of biscuits to the ground, which opened with a clatter and sent gingersnaps in all directions. The Gryffindor banner behind the straight back chair that Regulus accidentally tore down during his fall, the Quidditch Cup sitting proudly in a nook to the left of her desk that fell on Frank's head, and the transfiguration essays that went scattering around into everyone's faces at their arrival left no one in doubt for this to be McGonagall's office, though the four Marauders had memorized this place before the first semester was up, and even Lily had been in here a handful of times to know as much.

The book sat propped up in the windowsill, looking out at the Quidditch pitch beyond, but nobody made a move towards it, as everyone was still eyeing Lily warily like they thought she was going to try exploding the castle next. She did get to her feet, but much more calmly again, going for the door and trying it. Sadly, it did not open, and she closed her eyes instead, willing herself to have enough patience to get through the rest of this.

"Lily, hun," Alice began cautiously, while Frank belatedly wondered if he should bother using the Episkey charm before trying the same again. "Are you-"

"I don't care," she enunciated clearly, also not caring that everyone in the room was now eyeing her, she'd say this in front of Snape herself if she had to. "I'm done, I quit, I'm never speaking to him again!" She was shouting by the end again, and seemed to realize it. Taking a long, deep breath she went on in a deadly calm voice that was somehow even scarier. "This doesn't happen to me in, in six years when Pettigrew gets us killed," she'd feel bad later for him flinching and Potter giving her the filthiest look for insulting him again. "This is in days! I'm glad it's his worst memory, if that part even is! He should feel bad for doing it! But he did, he's just like those other Death Eaters, and I am done."

Alice and Frank exchanged a heartbroken look as her voice cracked again, but they certainly weren't going to try and help mend this one if she really didn't want to.

"I think you should still see if he'll say it again," Regulus Black of all people said. His eyes were flickering from Peter, to his brother, and back to her critically. "If you maybe stop it from happening exactly that way-"

"No," she said flatly, there was no room for argument in her voice even as she whirled to glare him down, her skirt flaring dramatically an unintended side effect. "I'll always know he said it, I'll remember it every bloody time he tries to talk to me, why put myself through that again?"

Regulus didn't back down though, he was starting to look a little angry himself. "He could change, if he regrets it enough."

"I've been waiting for a year now for him to change!" Lily sneered, "years, even, I'm sick of waiting around!" She felt like a fool, them all standing around watching her, when there had been so many signs in her past this was coming.

It had started with him skipping out on some of their study sessions because some of the cool Slytherins noted how good he was at potions and asking for his help right after their first class, and he began trying to equally split his time while keeping both sides separate, because Snape knew both sides. He knew those cool, all pure-blood Slytherins would mock him for having a Muggleborn best friend, but he'd never wanted her to feel either obligated to go hang out with him to change their mind or feel left out, so he kept the two groups as separate as he could for as long as he could. It had almost worked, until last year, where finally the prejudices began getting so much worse as the whispers of You-Know-Who grew and sides were being picked even before the students realized that's what they were doing when they looked a moment too long at a known Muggleborn, wondering if they weren't coming back from holiday like the last one.