ᴅɪsᴘᴇʟ ᴍʏ ʙᴏʀᴇᴅᴏᴍ | ᴍᴀʀᴀᴅᴇᴜʀs' ᴇʀᴀ

Chapter 7: A Little Journey

Gryffindor dorms, early Saturday morning

Strange thoughts were swarming in Lily Evans's head, who stared wistfully out of the window. She thought of nothing else but love. Rather, she tried to understand what it was and how to distinguish it from simple affection or liking. Eternal question.

The wind outside was gaining strength, swinging tops of the trees, causing those to shake the leaves on the ground, cold and moist after the rain. 

Waking up early in the morning, Lily was already thinking about canceling trip to Hogsmeade with Severus and staying in the castle, settling somewhere in a cozy niche on the fifth floor with a book and mug of tea. But she decided that Marauders will bother them in the castle. 

It's been a little over a week since she and Severus started to be close to each other. First that unexpected conversation, then several messages to each other, then daily correspondence made Lily realize how much she missed her friend and, at last, their first meeting held a couple of days ago. They lay on the shore of the Black Lake, staring thoughtfully at the clouds that floated above them, and as they had done a long time ago they were trying to come up with an Animagus form for every cotton swab swimming in the sky.

A trip to London would've complete her happiness.

Somehow it happened that every couple of months throughout the school year, she needed a considerable amount of time to get used to this closed place and inability to just run out into the street and walk through wonderful little shops with all sorts of goodies. At Hogwarts, Lily had too little room, she couldn't "artificially expand" it, crossing all the boundaries and rules as Marauders did.

The only drawback in all the idyll that developed in her life were James and Sirius, who immediately noticing sudden rapprochement between Lily and the Slytherin, seemed to have flew off the reels.

Over the past couple of days, there wasn't a single moment when they wouldn't have waited for Severus around the corner whether he was coming out of the Great Hall, his common room or from classes. Beata, who quickly realized what was happening, followed grumbling Slytherin, crunching her knuckles every time she passed by Marauders. They didn't dare to confront Sprinkles, knowing full well that Beata can threw some kind of curse at them and run away before professors and Madam Pomfrey show up.

All these thoughts revolved in Evans's head, but as soon as she glanced at the bedside table, a little more headache was added to them.

A magnificent bouquet of her favorite bright blue hydrangeas lay there. She discovered it in the morning right after awakening. Lush, wondrous smelling flowers seemed to radiate a special soft glow. 

"Merlin, what a beauty," Lily thought, lifting her bouquet impatiently and burrowing her nose into soft petals. 

Note, hidden between the stems, fell directly to her knees. The girl grabbed it, expecting to see familiar angular handwriting of Severus. But this handwriting was quite different; large, sweeping and sharp, she could've recognize it anytime because of thousands of letters that James Potter sent her for all years at Hogwarts. 

"Good morning, dear Lily," the inscription said.

"How did he know?" she muttered grimly under her breath, however, not very successfully hiding a smile.

"Wow!" Marlene said, who just woke up. "Who sent it?"

"Potter, who else," Lily said with a slight grimace. "I can't even imagine how did he know that hydrangeas are my favorite flowers, and precisely this color."

"Well, my friend," McKinnon said sarcastically. "It's Potter. Won't be surprised if he knows what color your underwear is."

The Gryffindor laughed merrily, easily dodging heavy Herbology textbook that flew over her head.