living with them, ginny weasley & the marauders

sixteen

chapter sixteen; music, fights and a whole lot of other loud noises.

Lily and Remus were sat down in silence in the head's common room, and began studying for History Of Magic. Honestly, why they took such a pointless subject was beyond either of them, but they did it anyway. Plus, it wasn't exactly hard to be top of the class when half the class usually fell asleep.

They'd both previously gotten head starts on their assignments, and were just finishing them off together now. Lily was more than half way through her 10 inch essay on the peace and war of the goblin community in the late 1600's, when she finally gave up.

"Alright, that's it!" Lily huffed, leaning back in her seat, and shaking her wrist. "I've got four inches left and my hand is killing me!"

"Here, I can help with that," Remus said happily, taking her quill and muttering a spell under his breath. Handing it back to her, he added, "There you go, now it will write whatever you're thinking."

Lily took her quill back and beamed at her friend. "Thanks, Remus. You're the best. Where do you learn to do that?"

"It's a simple spell, really. I read about it in a charms book that I was flicking through the other day." Remus lied, shrugging nonchalantly. "There are many alterations of the spell, but that's the most commonly used one."

"You'll have to teach me them," Lily said, intrigued. "Merlin knows I'll need it, with all the studying I have to do leading up to exams."

"Yeah, I'll teach you some other time," Remus sighed. "For now, I have two inches of this essay left to finish."

The two of them lapsed back into a comfortable silence, which remained peaceful for quite a while. Then, out of nowhere Lily paused and frowned.

"Where's that music coming from?" Lily asked Remus frustratedly, not being able to concentrate with it. She couldn't make out the words to the song, nor could she decipher a clear tune, but from the way it flowed, it was very obviously someone playing or listening to music.

"Uh, I don't know," Remus shrugged.

"Is that coming from James' room?" Lily growled, standing up. "I'm going to go up there and tell him to quieten down so that I can hear myself think for once."

"No, it's okay, I'll do it," Remus panicked and rushed up the stairs to James' room.

He knocked quietly on the door and heard a whole lot of scrambling behind the door before James spoke. "Um, who is it?"

Remus rolled his eyes, opening the door. "It's Remus."

"Oh, hey Moony," James said, giving a huge sigh of relief, as Remus entered the room and closed the door gently behind him. "Is Lily with you?"

"No, she's downstairs, in the common room."

"Oh, good. Ginny, you can come out now," James called, and Ginny suddenly crawled out from under his bed. "Ginny says she has a plan that could win me Lily's heart forever, but it may take a while."

"How long is a while?"

"A few months," Ginny responded, dusting her clothes off. "But we'll get her to fall for him in the process. You know, like falling asleep. Slowly, and then all at once."

"That's like poetry," James said, scribbling it down. "Maybe I can add that to one of my songs."

"Songs?" Remus asked, raising his eyebrows.

"James is a singer and a songwriter," Ginny blabbed. "He just played one of his songs for me on the guitar. He's amazing!"

"Ginny, I told you that in confidence!" James complained.

"You have to tell your friends eventually, James," Ginny said. "And if you don't, they'll find out on Valentine's Day anyway."

"What's happening on Valentines Day?" Remus smirked.

"Just the best plan ever," Ginny smiled back, discreetly tickling her chin.

"Well, I'll leave you two to plan then," Remus said. "I just came up here to pass on a message from Lily. She says you're too loud, and she can't hear herself think and blah blah blah. She's just annoyed at anything James does these days, to be honest. Just used the muffliato charm and you should be good."

Remus bounded back down the steps, two at a time, until he got back to Lily. "Thanks for that, Remus. I don't think I would've been able to face him."

"Lily, he didn't do anything wrong, you know."

"He kissed Ginny, Remus," Lily responded dully, as she held her struggling quill to stop it from writing her thoughts.

"He didn't mean to, Lils," Remus sighed. "And I think that deep down inside you, you know that. The only part that I don't understand is why you're not choosing to believe it."

"Remus, do you remember why I was reluctant to go out with James in the first place?" Lily asked, her voice rising slightly. "It was because I didn't want to be just another snitch in his game of quidditch. I didn't want him to catch me and move onto his celebrations, and just let me go. And that's exactly what he did."

"James is actually a chaser—" Remus began.

"That's what you got from that sentence?" Lily asked her friend in disbelief. "You're unbelievable!"

"You didn't let me finish, Lily," Remus stated sternly, grabbing her wrist to prevent her from walking away. "He's chased you for years on end because he likes you. Maybe he even loves you. But you know what you are on his quidditch team? You're the keeper. Trust me, Lily. He had every intention to keep you. James would never hurt you on purpose."

"But he did hurt me. Not only did he kiss her, but then he didn't even bother to tell me. And after that, when he found out I knew, he didn't even try to apologise for or justify his actions," Lily explained.

"Maybe that's just because he knew you too well already," Remus shrugged. "If he had tried to talk to you, what would you have done? Shouted at him? Crushed him? Hurt him? End it anyway? Do you really think it needed to be any worse?"

"But he crushed me! He hurt me!"

"Not on purpose Lily!" Remus shouted. "Are you that blind that you can't see that it hurts him to be separated from you? Are you going to hold this grudge forever and deny the fact that you love him too?"

"Shh, he'll hear you!" Lily hushed. "And I do not love him! We dated for three days!"

"Oh, please," Remus scoffed. "Your eyes were dating for three years."

"What's that supposed to mean!?" Lily shouted, outraged.

"Just think about it Lily." Remus said calmly, before gathering his things and leaving.