Stargazing

Exams were already approaching and Lacie found herself, along with Marlene, trying to keep up with Lily’s studying frenzy. They had taken to one of the empty classrooms on the first floor reserved for practice. It was mostly empty save for a few desks and chairs that had been moved to the side and the chalkboard up front.

They had spent the earlier part of the day in the library finishing up the final essays for their classes. Lacie was feeling pretty good, although she was a little concerned about Potions.

“I think, I’m just hoping it’s any potion but the Girding Potion,” Lacie shuddered, “the dragonfly thoraxes really get to me.”

“You are fine with rat tails, but no, it’s the dragonfly thoraxes that get you?” Marlene exclaimed.

“We don’t have to cut the tail off ourselves,” Lacie said. “But Professor Slughorn gives up the whole dragonfly and we have the pluck off the wings!”

Lily shook her head and set her book down. “Maybe we should actually start studying for our practicals then. I know Marlene wants to work on Charms and I need to work on Transfiguration.”

“I still need to work on that spell from Defence Against the Dark Arts,” Lacie added. She pulled out her wand from her pocket and jumped off of the desk she was sitting on.

“I can start with Defence with Lacie,” Lily offered, pushing back her chair to join Lacie in the middle of the room.

They started with some first year spells to warm up before moving into the second year spells they had learned this year. They stood at opposite sides of the classroom and on the count of three they both cast the disarming charm. Lily’s struck first causing Lacie to have to bend underneath a desk to grab her wand.

The next round, Lacie got her spell off first. Lily sidestepped just as the door creaked open. The spell hit the door causing it to slam shut again. There was a moment of silence before the door opened and James and Sirius came running in.

James smirked and held his head up proudly, “It must be fate that we find ourselves together once again, Tiger Lily.”

Lacie watched as Lily rolled her eyes and put her hands on her hips and she glared back at the two boys. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to see you-” James started just as Sirius was replying with, “-running from Filch.”

Marlene looked up curiously, tossing her reddish-brown hair over her shoulder. “What did you do this time?”

“We were just having some casual fun with water balloons,” Sirius said and now that he had mentioned it, Lacie could see the hem of his robes were damp and patches of James' hair seemed to be flattened, likely due to water.

Lily hummed in an unimpressed manner. James hastily said, “What are you up to?”

“Practicing for our exams,” Lacie said.

“Reducio,” Marlene waved her wand at an apple that she had snuck out from the great hall. They all watched as the apple seemed to quiver for a moment and then kind of sag in on itself as if it was getting past its best by date. “Dammit.”

James burst out laughing and Sirius wasn’t far behind. “I mean, when you get older you start to shrink.”

“Lets see you do any better,” Marlene rounded on them and threw the apple in their direction.

James easily plucked the apple from the air and held it in one hand and pulled his wand out. Tapping the apple he said, “Reducio.”

The apple shrunk.

Sirius called out, “Engorgio.”

Sure enough, the apple returned to its original size. James winked at Lily and tossed the apple back to Marlene who huffed, but did nothing else.

Lacie doubted anyone would argue that the boys weren’t clever. They were often able to answer questions when the Professor called on them and they seemed to perform each spell they learned after only a few tries. As a fellow Gryffindor she had the… pleasure of sharing her classes with them. Although, they did bring a certain level of excitement to their classes. For the better or for the worse, who was to say.

After a few minutes, Sirius and James got up to leave, claiming they had promised to meet their friends Remus and Peter that afternoon.

Marlene returned to her charms with surprising vigor as she was determined not to be outdone. By the end of their practice session Marlene seemed to be able to reliably cast those two charms. Lacie and Lily got tired of having to fetch their wands and turned to transfiguration.

They each had a piece of green cloth and were working to turn it into a leaf and then back into cloth. Lacie had picked it up quickly in class. Lily had as well, by the end of the lesson, but wanted to make sure she wasn’t going to struggle on the exam if it was asked. It was more likely they’d be asked to transfigure an animal into an object, but they weren’t allowed to practice on animals outside of class. Honestly, Lacie thought, that was probably for the best.

She smoothed out the cloth again. “Colovaria.”

The colour remained a leaf-like green, although it got a shade darker. It was a spell she had been working on recently; it allowed someone to change the colour of an object or even someone's hair. She didn’t dare try it in first year as the spell was supposedly intermediate transfiguration, however, her confidence had grown. She was fairly sure with a little more practice she could master it.

Lacie laughed to herself, causing Lily and Marlene to look up. “I was just thinking about what colour I should dye my hair next and what everyone's react would be if you two dyed your hair.”

During their first year, there were a handful of students who mistook Lily and Marlene for being cousins. They both had red hair, although Marlene’s had more of a brown tint, and stood at a similar height.

“We could swap,” Lily said. “You could take the red hair and we’ll go dark navy.”

“We should totally do it,” Marlene agreed. “I would pay to see James’ double take. His precious Fire Lily's red hair is gone.”

Last summer, Lily had introduced her to muggle hair-dye which worked fantastically well and stayed longer then the Hair-dying potion she had been using. The muggle dye was also much more affordable, although messier to apply. As a result, she had some extra potions left over which she stored in her trunk.

“I’ll probably need to touch up my hair next week. We could take the potions then, and then they’d wear off before we go home for the summer or we just take another potion to change it back.”

The plan was set, but what's a good plan without some changes.