Lily Evans and the Marauder's Secrets

Chapter 28: Heading Home

"Should've woken up sooner, should've woken up sooner," I chant to myself in undertone as I scramble about the dormitory, locating my shampoo in the showers and my Gryffindor scarf under Marlene's bed. However, no matter how hard I look, I can't find the invitation to the wedding. I don't think I've seen it since Barnaby delivered it weeks and weeks ago, and I threw it onto my desk in disgust when I got up to the dormitory at the end of the day. Not that it matters, but I'd wanted to have it on me just in case I needed the address or something. Or if I needed it to somehow rub it in Petunia's face that, try as she might, she can't keep me out of the wedding. Oh well. I can't really be surprised that I can't locate something from last month when I can barely remember which textbooks I need for classes every morning.

No one else was even in the dormitory when I woke up, and I panicked for a moment thinking I'd missed the train. But I checked the time and saw it was still 7:00 am. Everyone must have been at breakfast and I had an hour to get to the Hogsmeade station.

However, an hour sounds a lot longer than it is. By the time I'm locking my trunk up, I'm starting to sweat.

There's a sound at the door and I turn to see Carol and Mary coming into the dormitory. Carol stops in her tracks when she sees me.

"Hey," I say, straightening up. It makes me uncomfortable hunched over my truck with my back turned while she's in the room, like how they tell you to never crouch around a predator. Makes you look like prey. "I thought everyone was already heading down to the station."

"Most people have," Mary says. "I just forgot my brush." She hurries into the bathroom, but Carol stays in the doorway, blocking my exit.

"Where were you last night?" Carol asks.

"Oh, I got in late from Slughorn's party," I say carefully. I think about how she'd dropped hints all week about going, and then she hadn't been there last night. I don't want to anger her if something had gone wrong. I'm too wrung out from last night to fight today, even with Carol.

"Have a good time?"

"Um, I guess?" I say, because she does not need to know how miserable it actually had been.

"Well good for you," she snaps.

"...thanks?"

"Even if it was your fault I didn't get to go."

Ah. There we go. I was waiting for the attack.

"How do you figure?" I say tiredly.

"James didn't take me, and I know it's because you've been telling him lies about me."

"Carol," I say. I really don't have the energy for this this morning. "Potter and I do not talk about you. If you want to blame anyone, blame Peter – that's who he took as a date. Or Sirius. He really doesn't like you."

"It's just your fault, Lily!" Carol says. Then, abruptly, she says, "I'll be in the common room." She turns and I hear her tromp back downstairs.

Mary comes out of the bathroom a minute later as I'm gathering up Barnaby's cage and getting my cloak on. "Your mad mate is downstairs," I say as I do up the buttons.

"I heard," she says. She crosses the room but pauses in the doorway to look back at me. "You shouldn't hate her so much."

"What?" I say. "Why? She's been nothing but nasty to me for years."

"I know but..." she trails off and I wonder if she'll finish her thought, but she glances down the stairs to where Carol is waiting and lowers her voice. "She just really loves him, you know? And it's killing her that you're messing with him."