Chapter Text
Mary: September, 1977
It wasn't supposed to happen like this.
She wasn't supposed to roll her eyes yet smile, to accept the bouquet, to grin at the mention of the good news, to say "yes". There was supposed to be a hex or a clever remark, the swatting of the flowers in his hand, a scoff, a "no".
Mary knew what it looked like to see Lily Evans reject James Potter, but she could've never imagined what it would look like to see her agree to dating him.
But now, here they stand in the common room, looking at each other with ridiculous smiles on their faces, Lily's freckles tinted red, James scratching his neck like he always does when he's embarrassed-
Mary hates it.
Of course, as much as she hates it, she can't bring herself to hate James. She can't even be mad at him, nor can she be mad at Lily.
Without drawing attention to her, she stalks off, feeling anger in her step as she makes her way out of the common room. As to be expected, all eyes are on Lily and James, the Head Girl and Head Boy, the redhead that had rejected every one of Potter's attempts to make her his. Nobody even notices Mary slipping away.
She finds herself in the girls' bathroom, sitting against the wall with her knees pulled up to her chest, her arms wrapping around them.
The worst part is not even knowing why she's so mad. Now that she's dating James, Lily won't be around as much. She hasn't been this year already, although they've only been here for a couple of weeks. Every night getting to the dorm so late because of her Head Girl routine, getting home with that ridiculous grin on her face because of stupid James Potter and his probably-not-even-that-funny-jokes.
Okay, James is funny. Mary knows that. They're friends.
But right now she'd really like to punch his face.
Perhaps for simply having the audacity to ask her again?
Last year, they'd seemed like friends. Nothing more, nothing else. Just friends. Lily had appeared to be content. They never flirted, they just laughed at one another and had playful banter. James never asked out her out once, and Lily never had to hex him or snap at him for being an idiot. He was, for Merlin's sakes, respectful!
And what had happened this year? Now he was all over her again, wanting to be with her? And the feeling was mutual?
Maybe it was that Lily had never told Mary, her best friend, that she had feelings for James. It seems like the thing a best friend ought to know, doesn't it? They talked about Sirius all the time when Mary and him were dating.
Does she not trust me anymore?
Now Mary's head is filled with these insecure, terrible, rather annoying thoughts.
She sighs. It's awful that she can't even bring herself to be there, excited for Lily as a friend. She can't celebrate and hug Lily and scream like little girls. Mary chuckles at the mere thought of that. Of them behaving like children again. When did they grow up? Lily feels like a proper adult now. She's Head Girl, she commands respect, people look up to her. She tutors the younger years, and even some seventh years. She's friends with nearly everyone, and she's very intense about her career path after Hogwarts. Sometimes Mary feels so behind when it comes to Lily. Like Lily has her entire life figured out, she knows exactly what she wants to do. She's organized, she doesn't want to waste time. Meanwhile Mary has absolutely no idea what she's doing. Will she end up working in some rundown Muggle bar, or will she join the Ministry and be looked down upon for being a Muggleborn her entire time being employed, or will she just... The point is, Mary doesn't like growing up, because a part of her still feels like a kid, trapped in an adult body.
After a few too many minutes of wallowing in her sorrow in the loo, Mary decides to stand up, pick herself up off her feet, and head back to the Gryffindor common room. She'll run into Lily, congratulate her, and they'll talk about it all night, and Mary will fake a smile and be nice.
It'll be nice.
And then she runs into Sirius.
"What's wrong with you?" Is the first thing he says, completely out of the blue.
"What?" Mary asks, voice full of disbelief, defensive.
Sirius raises an eyebrow. "I saw you hurrying off when Lily said yes. Don't act like it didn't happen."
"It's nothing. Felt weirdly sick, you know? Awful timing, too," Mary lies, and she knows it's a bad lie, and Sirius is very obviously not convinced, but she doesn't care.
"That is most certainly not true, MacDonald. I knew you to be a better liar than this?" Sirius says, following her as she strides down the hallway.
"Go back to Potter, Black," Mary says with a roll of her eyes. "He's probably jumping up and down out of pure joy right now. Shouldn't you be there to... I don't know, make sure he doesn't do anything idiotic?"
"You sound mildly disturbed as you talk about James right now, MacDonald," Sirius says, laughing as he says it. "Have you suddenly decided you hate him?"
Mary scoffs. "No."
"Okay, so you have," Sirius muses. "Could it be that you have feelings for... my dearest Prongs?"
Mary looks over at him, stops walking, and can't determine if she's amused by the accusation, or offended. "No," she resolves to say bluntly.
Sirius nods. "So it's not that. Are you ever going to tell me why you're mad at him?"
She shakes her head. "Nope."
"Come on," he whines. "It's Prongs!"
"Not even for your dearest Prongs."
"But why," Sirius laments.
Mary turns around again, her arms crossed. "I know you think you have the right to every one of my secrets and thoughts, but spoiler alert, Black, you don't! I am perfectly allowed to have things I keep to myself. You don't have to be nosy to everyone, you know that, right?"
"You are one to be talking, MacDonald! You are just about the nosiest person I've ever met!"
"And I'm self aware, at least."
"And a hypocrite?"
"Whatever," Mary sighs. "You're really bothering me right now."
"When do I not?"
"Very true," Mary responds.
"Been my habit since fourth year, Mary, my love," Sirius says with his signature puppy dog grin.
Mary laughs. "We are not returning to that, Black."
"Of course not! You can't stop me from flirting, my sunshine."
"You keep adding 'my' before these nouns, when I am definitely not yours. Have you any correct concept of possession?"
"I do. You are mine. You cannot fight it, MacDonald. From the moment I saw you, I decided, 'yes, it's that one'. We will be friends until the end of time."
"Friends?"
"Friends! Whatever that may mean."
Mary hums. She can accept that.
Sirius does not pause, however. He is a machine when it comes to talking. "Anyways, I do have the right to all of your thoughts. I think I ought to know them! After all, how are you supposed to make sense of any of them without my godly advice? I simply know the best option out of any selection of options always, so I would highly recommend seeking out my intuition."
"You talk a big game."
"Because I play a big game."
"That makes no sense whatsoever."
"That's what you think."
"Ah, look! We're here, at the common room, so you can leave me alone now. Go play pattycake with one of your mates or whatever you boys do," Mary says with a tight smile, pats his arm, and says the password, leaving Sirius standing outside with the Fat Lady.
Lily is sitting in a sofa inside, a book in her hands, although she's just smiling at the page, not seeming to be reading.
Mary takes a deep breath, and decides to be a decent friend. That's what Lily deserves, after all. She probably already had a nice chat with Marlene and Remus and Dorcas and she's probably written Alice, and Mary is just here, being a shitbag that ran to the bathroom as soon as she heard the news. What kind of person does that?
She sits down in the sofa beside Lily, who puts her book down and looks over, her eyebrows raising in joy as soon as she realizes it's Mary.
"Oh! You're back!"
Mary chuckles self-depricatingly, nodding. "Yep. I'm back."
"Where did you go? I saw you walk off," Lily says, pouting slightly.
It doesn't mean anything that she saw me- "Oh, I felt sick for a moment. Had to run off, you know?"
This lie is bad, and she should stop using it, because Lily doesn't seem to believe it either, but she takes it anyway. "Oh, alright. I'm sorry."
"No, it's fine," Mary waves it off like it's nothing. It's nothing, that's why. "Erm, I missed most of you and Potter. But I'm asssuming it went well?"
Lily smiles again. "Yeah, it did. You know, something in me was just telling me to say yes to him. It just felt right this time."
"That's-" she chokes a little, "-great, Lils."
"Thanks!" Lily replies, her eyes all lighting up like stars, and Mary's chest hurts at the simplistic beauty of them. "I didn't even know I had feelings for him before he asked me today, to be honest. But it's been so nice being Head Girl with him. He's gotten a lot sweeter in these past couple of years."
"I bet," Mary says. "Wait, you have feelings for him?"
Lily scoffs, almost like a laugh. "Erm, yes? I agreed to a date with him. 'Course I have feelings."
"Well, you just-" Mary begins, but that's silly. She shouldn't even be having this conversation. "Never mind. I'm happy for you."
"I'm happy for me too," Lily grins, and then opens her book again.
Mary feels like she's lying. She doesn't feel too happy right now. She feels unsettled, she feels wrong.
Everything about this feels wrong. He was never meant to get her. It was supposed to be unrequited pining, countless failed attempts that amounted to nothing, not an accepting, not an agreement. She had never liked him before, she'd never said yes before. Why now? Why did she change her mind?
Why today did it have to be in the cards?
Why?
Mary's head is hurting. "I'm heading up to bed."
"This early?" Lily asks as Mary stands up.
"Yeah, sorry. I'm feeling drained. See you in the morning, yeah?"
Lily nods, and shortly waves.
Mary falls right into bed, letting a few tears hit the pillow before exhaustion overtakes her, and she becomes privy to a deep sleep.
---
Lily: September, 1977
To be honest, Lily isn't quite sure what made her say yes to James. She was just about to curl up on a sofa in the common room with a book, heading out of her dorm room, eyes already set on her favorite spot to read in the corner by a fireplace, when James Potter interrupted her stride, jumping right in front of her with his ridiculous, lopsided grin.
"Will you be my girlfriend, Evans?"
At first she hadn't really processed it. He hadn't asked her in, what, a year? A year and a half? She hadn't thought of James as anything but a friend ever before, and she had assumed he'd stopped liking her by sixth year, and yet there was this.
How could she be surprised by this, though? It was true that she and James had been spending a lot of time together recently. On the train, she kept glancing over at him, nervously speaking to the younger Prefects, the words barely getting out. Meanwhile James was his bodacious, loud and hilarious self. He got all of the younger years giggling at him and his jokes during the meeting, of course.
And then there were their Head Girl and Boy rounds they completed nightly, which Lily had been dreading when she'd discovered who her partner was over the summer. It wasn't that she wasn't happy to spend time with a friend, because that's what she and James were. Friends. But there was that looming feeling in her that he was going to ask her again. Maybe it was automatic to have that, built in since third year when he began nagging her.
But when did that looming feeling turn into pleasant anticipation? When did she want to say "yes" instead of "no"?
Even Lily herself didn't know.
"Sure, Potter," she had said then, standing with her arms crossed, and her lips curling up into a slight smile.
At first James hadn't said anything. He'd blinked, looked at her, and after a couple of moments, said, "wait, was that a yes?"
Lily snickered. "It was, James."
His mouth dropped open. "James. You called me James."
"That I did," Lily responded. Although they'd begun being friends again, she usually kept to her habit of calling him by his surname. For some reason, calling the great idiot that was Potter anything but Potter felt weirdly foreign. She could hardly imagine calling him by his first name, even if everyone else did. Maybe it felt nostalgic, made her feel young still. Maybe it was nice having one thing to herself, one thing about them that never changed.
In the corner of her eye, Lily had seen Mary slip out the doorway of the common room, not even looking back. Lily's chest tightened as she saw Mary walk away. She'd have to ask her about that later.
Lily's attention was brought back to James as he called for Sirius, his extremely loud voice echoing through the room. If people weren't watching before, they were now.
Sirius came barreling down the stairs, tripping as he fell into a spot next to James. "Are you taking the piss, Prongs?!"
"She said yes! She actually said yes!" James cried. "Evans, tell him you said yes."
Lily rolled her eyes. "I said yes."
Sirius burst into laughter, with several shrieks thrown in. "I cannot believe this! Who are you, and what have you done with our Evans?!"
Sirius began to shake her shoulders furiously, and she only giggled. "Stop that, will you? It's still me of course."
"Why the sudden change of heart, my darling Lily flower?" Sirius asked. Funnily enough, James was the one in love with her, and Sirius used the most audacious, loving nicknames.
"I'm not sure, really," she said, looking back at James. He was grinning at her madly. It was sort of... sweet. "Just felt like something I should do."
Now it's the day after, and Lily is sitting at the dining hall, eating breakfast with Marlene. Marlene always wakes up far earlier than the rest of them, but Lily was having trouble falling asleep last night, and she awoke with the sun, not having enough will in her to force herself back to sleep. She was sick with worry for Mary last night. She knew Mary wasn't really "sick". They were too close to use silly excuses on one another, they knew each other better. But what was it Mary wasn't telling her? It was killing Lily not to know. They used to tell each other everything, didn't they? Why not now? Why were there secrets between them? Lily had always knew honesty when it came to Mary. Mary's one of the most honest people to exist.
"You alright, Lils?" Marlene asks.
Lily looks up from her plate to meet Marlene's eyes. "Yeah, I'm fine."
"Waiting for your beau, are you?" Marlene teases.
Lily rolls her eyes, and decides not to answer. Her eyes find the way to the entrance of the dining hall. She notices a few familiar faces walk through. Regulus and his friends. They used to spend more time around the Gryffindors, but not this year, it seems. She's not sure what changed. Godric, Lily isn't sure of anything now.
The Marauders walk in a couple of minutes later, but Lily's stare doesn't falter. James is beaming at her again, and she forces a little smile, but she feels empty still. There's a certain hollowness in her as she waits for Mary to arrive.
And-
Oh.
This feels all too familiar.
"Where is she?" Lily grumbles.
"You know she's all busy with that one Ravenclaw bloke," Marlene says. "Or is it Sirius now?"
"How long have they been on and off for?" Alice asks.
"Godric, it's been years, hasn't it?"
"Since fourth," Lily murmurs
"Yeah, fourth," Alice repeats.
Mary walks in, finally. She slides into her seat. Her hair's all ruffled, and her makeup is smudged, especially her lipstick. And Lily can see spots on her neck blooming-
"Hey, girls," Mary says, grinning. "How are we this morning?"
"I assume you're doing wonderful," Lily sneers. She's tried to pretend to be nice, but... that didn't go so well.
Mary shrugs. "Sirius is decent enough. You know how it is."
"Oh, we do," Alice giggles.
"You've told us plenty," Marlene teases.
Lily rolls her eyes. "You've told us enough."
Mary pouts. "Oh come on, Lils. Don't be in a strop, yeah? Show me a little smile."
Mary was too close. Too, too close.
Lily couldn't help but smile.
Mary claps. "There it is! Ah, that lovely smile."
Lily hates being pale. Her cheeks probably look like red peppers.
Then came Sirius, and Lily hates her life even more.
He places a sloppy kiss on Mary's cheek. She pushes him off of her playfully. "Black! You smell wretched. You didn't even shower?"
"You didn't mind this scent a couple of-"
"Okay, enough of that, you two," Alice reprimands them, and Sirius smirks, winked and then sits down.
Lily catches Remus' eye from across the table-
"Lily?" Remus' voice rang through her head, interrupting her thoughts.
Lily turns her torso around to face the boy currently sliding into the seat beside her. She and Remus have sat together during meals for as long as she can remember. Sure, he's always joined by the other three Marauders on his sides, Sirius usually cramped up next to him, Peter in front, and James across from Sirius, but Lily and Remus have been inseperable since forever.
"You alright?" He continues to say.
She shrugs. "Better than ever."
Eventually, Mary walks in. She sits down on Lily's other side, but she doesn't look very pleased. Lily finds herself staring, watching as Mary scoops potatoes onto her dish and picks at them with her fork, almost glaring at the food through her eyelashes. Her hair is mess - it's weirdly flat on one side, and then extremely poofy on the other, and it's so endearing, strangely enough, that Lily finds the urge to laugh-
"You're staring," she hears a voice in her ear. Lily abruptly faces Remus again.
"What?"
"You were staring," he repeats. And then, after a pause, "at Mary."
"I wasn't," she says plainly, though her tone shelters defensiveness. She stuffs a bite of toast in her mouth, chewing intensely. She refuses to acknowledge Remus' knowing look in his eyes, and the way one eyebrow is raised at her. She refuses to even glance at him.
Lily wants to ask Mary what's wrong, but she knows she'll receive the same response she got yesterday. Maybe another slightly altered one, but an poorly written excuse nonetheless. And honestly, Lily is tired of excuses. She wants honesty. She wants what they've always had. To be able to lie down beside one another in one of their beds and spill out everything in their brains. That has been the nature of their relationship. Knowing that there will be no judgement, there will be no faults in each other's eyes. That love is all they will ever have for one another, and an honest conversation won't change that.
Lily has never been afraid of talking to Mary, but why does it feel so foreign now? Why does she feel tentative, hesitant to reach out? They'd be smiling at one another on a normal day. They'd whisper short phrases while they munch peacefully on their breakfasts, they'd walk side by side to class and even leave the dormitory at the same time. They'd laugh and giggle, sharing secret inside jokes that only they would understand.
Mary finishes her breakfast before Lily can, and she stands up suddenly, huffing and walking away.
Lily watches her the whole time, and yet again, it feels terribly familiar.
"What's she all in a bad mood about?" Alice mumbles, sitting close enough to Lily to where only Lily can hear.
Lily just shrugs, her eyes keeping their position on Mary. "Dunno."
Mary looks about as glum as ever, her arms crossed on the table and her head lying on top of them. She's hardly even eating. Mary loves food more than anything!
"Sirius looks a bit miffed as well," Alice comments, nodding her head to where Sirius is sitting, several seats down. His expression matches Mary's, and he seems to be comforted by Remus.
"They probably broke up again," Lily decides. "Or just fought."
"I can hear you, you know," Mary snaps, lifting her head slightly to look at them.
Lily blinks, glances quickly back at Alice, who has her hands raised as though she's in arrest. "Sorry, Mary."
"S'fine," the other girl sighs, and lets her head fall back down.
"I think we were right," Alice whispers, rather loudly, causing Mary to raise her head again and glare at them. "Sorry, last time."
"On the fucking target, Fortescue," Mary responds, and that's about all they hear from her that morning. She stands up, pushing her plate in front of her and knocking into her pumpkin juice, which rattles a bit then settles, spilling some orange liquid out on the sides. Then she walks off, her boots clacking on the floor. Lily watches as she goes, somewhat in awe, somewhat in despair. And she thinks about how she really, really hates Sirius.
"Wonder what she's all pissed off about," Marlene muses. She seems to be watching Mary as well.
"We'll find out soon enough, yeah?" Lily suggests, and Marlene shrugs, paying attention to her food again.
Lily knew seventh year wouldn't be easy. They had NEWTs to worry about, and the thought of leaving Hogwarts. Having to figure out a career for next year, wondering where they would live, who they would live with. Lily had tried to be as organized and planned as possible, but she couldn't determine everything over the summer. Some things would have to be thought about now. She knew she'd have thinking, difficult thinking, to do.
But she never thought friendships would be a hard part. Lily knows who her friends are. She loves her friends! Of course, people have bad days. But she thought they'd gotten to a place with one another, having known each other for seven years now, where things went unspoken. Where Lily could simply look at Mary and know everything that went on in her head. When things happened with Mulciber back in fifth year, or when Sirius was making her angry during their fights and break ups, Lily thought she knew it all. She thought she could read Mary like a book, but now it seems she can't. Now she doesn't know anything at all, and that stings more than anything.
Eventually another warm body is seated beside her, in the space that Mary had left. Lily, for a short moment, thinks maybe Mary returned. She feels that hopeful burn in her chest as she looks over, and can't help but feel slightly disappointed when she sees James.
She masks this, wonderfully so, with a playful lie. "Oh, it's just you, Potter."
"Just me?" He cries, pretending to be baffled. "However could you say such a thing, Evans? You're my girlfriend now, you may as well act happy to see me."
That hits more than it should. Lily forces a giggle, and nudges his shoulder lightly. They barely touch, and yet she feels like it's too much. Is this too much? Dating is harder than she thought. It's supposed to be easy when you like someone. You're supposed to just know. She thought she'd just known. "Of course I'm happy to see you, idiot."
She hears a gag from her right side. "Ew!" It's Sirius. "Disgusting! Public displays of affection! Someone needs to separate these... wrongdoers before they curse our eyes with these sights again!"
"Shuddup, Sirius!" James shouts back, and Sirius cringes once more, then looks away.
"He always has something to say, doesn't he?" Lily chuckles.
James shrugs. "Suppose so. It's my favorite thing about him."
"Oh really?"
To her surprise, James proudly nods. "Yeah. I love that he's not afraid of voicing his opinion. It's been great for all those times when I didn't know what he needed. You know, before he moved in with me."
"Oh," Lily murmurs. That was when she wasn't very fond of Sirius. Fifth year had been an absolute catastrophe for their friendship. There was... all the things with Mary, and then there was everything with Remus, which only got worse by the end of fifth year, and over the summer she hated his guts. She hated James' guts too, though. When sixth year came around, she calmed herself down, and tried to really befriend them. Remus loved them, so she could too.
Sirius and her talked a lot about their siblings. It was sort of the only thing they had in common with one another, and it was nice to speak to someone that understood. Regulus is out of that house now, she thinks. She's pretty sure he moved in with the Potters over the summer. She likes that he and Sirius are getting closer again, because if she can't have that with Petunia, it's nice that Sirius can have that with Reg.
James smiles at her. "Anyways, enough about that. How are you on this fine morning?"
Lily thinks back to Mary, images flashing in her mind. She thinks about her terrible, restless night. She thinks about Mary on that sofa, her eyes hanging low, dark circles beneath them. How exhausted, how drained, how depressed she had seemed. How Lily tossed and turned with worry as the moon hung high in the sky.
"I'm alright, I suppose," she decides on saying. "Didn't sleep very well."
"That's unfortunate," James says. "Less time for you to be having sweet dreams about me."
"As if I would ever, Potter!" Lily snorts, and James chuckles too.
The morning passes on like this. It's a Saturday, so they don't have classes, but it seems that James, the captain of the Quidditch team, is hosting tryouts this morning, so he'll be pretty busy. They agree to study together later that afternoon, and then do their rounds at night.
Lily likes spending time with James. She really, truly does. He's lovely to be around, honestly. But she already misses- her other friends. There's a dark, empty hole in her heart now that Alice is gone, and that's horrible enough. But Marlene will be busy with Quidditch soon enough, and Mary too. Wouldn't she be studying with them on a normal day?
Whatever. Her mind can be cleared with a nice, romantic book. She's always fond of those.
Lily sits on her reading sofa, and drifts away.
---
Outro, Marlene: September, 1977
Something is up. A week has passed since Lily and James began dating. That was a whirlwind enough, something Marlene could've never guessed. Lily seemed content! She didn't have feelings for James! They were friends! No relationships in their sweet little circle of friendships, and that was perfect. Nothing messy. Nothing bothersome.
And now there was this.
Mary was all pissed off, for reasons nobody could explain. Marlene has been trying, very hard, she might add, to get inside Mary's head, but it seems she cannot be reached. Mary is just distant. She runs off whenever you try to talk to her for more than five minutes, and she's finding many excuses to be away from Marlene and Lily. Not to mention she won't stop glaring at the boys. The Marauders are their friends, and last year, and even in the beginning of the year, Mary loved them! She joked with them, she laughed with them. She disappeared away with Sirius to talk for hours and she chased James through the hallways and she listened to music endlessly with Remus and played chess (she lost, terribly) with Peter.
Marlene does not know what is happening, because being around Lily and Mary is like being around two ferocious storms that cannot be calmed. So Lily has been obsessed, and constantly around her boyfriend now. Marlene can't blame them. They're happy together, they're sappy, whatever. But Mary has absolutely no valid excuse. She's not dating someone publicly, and if she is in private, she won't say anything about it. And believe her, Marlene has asked.
Marlene has infiltrated Mary's bases and interrogated her to the extreme, and her results have been... disappointing, to say the least.
So something is most certainly up. And Marlene is going to get to the bottom of it.