A Pearl For Arrogance

First year - September

“So do you think I’ll get put in your room?”

Remus’ sister asked from over her left shoulder. She was pretty. Nice light brown hair that looked blond in the sun, quite similar to Remus if she thought about it. They both shared the same nose and lips but the similarities ended there. Eliana had clear skin while her brother had a small collection of freckles dotted across his nose and cheeks. Eliana had blue eyes while her brother had hazel. It was quite beautiful actually.

“Maybe. I hope so.”

Lily lifted one of her shoulders as she provided her response, to say ‘I have no idea’. They had walked through the door to the boarding house before the boys, so the corridors were mostly empty. Some older students were still roaming around, most of them greeted Molly and smiled at the group of first years as they travelled down a hallway to the right. The boys' dorms are probably down the left hallway.

“Ok our first four. Room 112. Lily Evans, Eliana Lupin, Mary MacDonald, Marlene McKinnon. Get settled girls. I’ll come collect you when we need to leave for lunch. Make sure there’s uniforms in the cupboard as well. See me if you need anything.”

Lily could already feel the blue eyes staring at her, as they had been since Molly called out their names, but she wanted to make sure she heard everything the older girl had to say. Finally turning to Eliana she saw the shy smile filled with excitement twinkling in her eyes.

“I’m so happy! First me and Remus are put in the same house and now I already know one of my roommates. The universe loves me today!”

A quiet giggle escaped Lily however it was drowned out by a loud cackle behind her.

“The universe?”

A tall girl with two blonde braids mused. She was wearing sunglasses on top of her head and an oversized mens blazer in black. It looked good. But her manners were poor.

“Yeah, you know how some people believe in bigger beings or whatever. Maybe someone wanted me to have a good day.”

Eliana said with an amused expression, obviously not bothered about how the blonde girl had phrased the question. The latter looked delighted by Eliana’s response and even offered a hand out to her.

“I’m Marlene.”

“Eliana. This is Lily. We came from the same primary but today’s the first time we’ve ever talked.”

Lily shot her a playful glare and smacked her lightly on the shoulder.

“And whose fault is that?”

She asked in mock exasperation, but she was relieved Eliana had implied they had left primary school to attend secondary. Instead of the truth about Lily transferring. Although that would mean she told them she transferred as well. But she shook the thought and let it go.

“My brother’s.”

Eliana supplied in retaliation.

“Yes, actually.”

No matter how many times Lily tried to say a simple ‘hello’ to Remus he always shut her down with a closed smile, before returning to his book or walking away. Until today at least, where he spared her more than five seconds. It wasn’t that he was rude or arrogant, otherwise Lily would have left well alone a long time ago. No, Remus was just shy, a loner, no friends to hang around with except Eliana. So Lily tried to be nice and hopefully become his friend. It hadn’t worked so far, but now living with Eliana the odds were in her favour.

“I’m Mary by the way. I know you guys were all wondering who this gorgeous person’s name was.”

She had one arm propped against her hip and a leg stretched in front of her as she held her head up. Her hair was breathtaking, the tight curls created a circle around her face. The black coils compliment her dark, bronze skin. Mary was either warm blooded or very set in her outfit choice because the short red summer dress that looked amazing on her was making Lily shiver.

“Yes. Gorgeous. I’m calling my bed first!”

Marlene declared as she crossed the threshold of their new room and threw herself down on the bed on the far right. This left the other three scrambling to follow her and get their own choice of bed. Lily made it to the one opposite Marlene with Mary splayed out on the bed beside her. Eliana sitting cross legged to her diagonal.

Then they burst out laughing. It felt so natural with these girls, to have fun and laugh until tears spilled out and their stomachs started to ache. When they started to calm down one of them would make eye contact and the wave of laughs would start all over again. Lily was so worried about trying to stop it that she had no idea when Marlene ended up on the floor with Eliana’s head dangling from the side of her bed. Mary had disappeared but an echoed snort signalled her location from the bathroom.

It was a few minutes before they all let out varying sighs of relief from the pain in their cores and sat against the headboards of their beds to catch their breath. Lily was no longer worried about attending Hogwarts if this group were the ones she got stuck with. Makes life easier. She suddenly remembered what Molly had said and jumped off the bed to the cupboard beside her bed.

She let out a breath of relief at the sight of a full wardrobe, filled with formal and sporting school wear. There were shirts, skirts, shorts, tracksuit bottoms, blazers, cardigans and ties. At the back in a small bucket were a pile of school socks. Quickly sorting through them she made a note of how many they had each to make sure it was equal. Twenty pairs of socks in total, they weren’t labelled so Lily guessed they were unisex; one size fits all.

_ _ _

Room 112 had spent two hours unpacking their needed belongings into the bedside tables next to each bed. They all exchanged numbers and added each other on social media as well but otherwise left their phones alone. She was glad none of them had said anything about her old iPhone that had once belonged to her older sister Petunia. From what she saw all of their phones were newer models, Mary's being the newest. It was much bigger than Lily’s and had a red exterior with a clear case.

Marlene had a purple case that had glitter which moved when the phone did. So cool. Eliana had a pink exterior with a clear case that showed a polaroid picture of her and Remus from when they were a few years younger. Lily looked down at her own brown battered fold over case. It was ugly and worn from use but her parents didn’t see a need to buy a new one. Neither did Lily if she was honest, but comparing it with the ones her friends had made it look so much worse.

She pocketed her phone and busied herself by rearranging the books on her nightstand once more before there was a knock at the door. Before any of them could answer it a loud voice belonging to Molly Prewitt, squawked from the other side.

“Lunch now ladies. Wait outside in the courtyard with the boys while I collect the others.”

And then her footsteps continued on her journey to the upstairs dormitories.

“So does anyone know what the menu is like here?”

Mary asked from the floor, leaning her back against the foot of her bed. The rest of the girls looked at each other waiting for a response before turning back towards Mary and shaking their heads. She let a groan fall out of her dark lips, her eyes falling shut and raising an arm to drape across her face.

“Well let’s go see for ourselves. Shall we?”

Lily opened the door to their dorm and found four pieces of paper on the ground. Timetables. She quickly sought out hers and carelessly passed the other three over to Eliana. Her eyes quickly scanned over the teachers list, but stopped upon seeing her science teacher, Ms M. Bagnold. A sigh of annoyance left her lips, that was not the teacher she had hoped for.

“Hey! Guys!”

A quick shout from Marlene made all of their heads snap in her direction. Even Lily was pulled away from the intense staring contest with her timetable.

“I want to know if we’re in the same classes. Does anyone have Mr. Michaels for english?”

Marlene asked after a quick snoop at all their papers. Mary started to nod excitedly with an equally excited smile.

“No, I have Miss Taylor.”

Eliana replied with an expectant look towards Lily. She found herself shaking her head slowly to the unspoken question. No, I don't have Miss Taylor.

“I have Mrs. Yaplish.”

“Unfortunate name.”

Marlene supplied in response. The girls quickly ran through the rest of their timetables to see if they shared any other classes. Mary was in her maths, P.E, science, geography, and french class. Marlene was in her history and music class, and Eliana was in her P.E and geography class with Mary. Lily hoped that Remus was in at least one of her classes, that way he wouldn’t be able to ignore her and she’d make a new friend.

They were all quick in navigating their way out of the building and into the courtyard where some other first year Gryffindors were waiting to head down to lunch in the Great Hall. It was easy to spot Remus, shuffling his feet a few paces away from three boys. She felt sorry for them because it looked as if they were trying to provoke a response from Remus and include him in the conversation but he wasn’t budging.

As she made her way closer towards them, with her dormmates closely following behind her, she realised why Remus might not be conversing with the group. One of them was the prince, another his cousin and the other was surely a member of the monarch or something like that, with some sort of title. Unperturbed Lily made her way towards them in a few succinct steps.

“Remus!”

Eliana flew past Lily and collided into her brother's chest. Lily saw a flash of surprise leave his face just as quickly as it had come and heard the audible relieved sigh that left his lips as he wrapped his arms around Eliana. She felt herself smile at the exchange before her eyes drifted to the other three who were watching on in curiosity.

“Hey Remus, did you get your timetable as well?”

Lily directed her focus back towards the small boy with curly hair and hoped he wouldn’t shy away from her this time. By some miracle he gave her a small nod with a smile and pulled out the folded paper from his trouser pocket.

“Yeah, here. Um see if we have any of the same classes. Um if you want…”

He ducked his head down towards his chest as his ears turned a light shade of pink. Lily hid a laugh behind her hand at his awkwardness and reached out to grab the piece of paper before pulling out her own and analysing them.

“We have english together… maths… citizenship… design and technology… and I think that’s it.”

She gave the papers a final once over before giving a firm nod and returning Remus’ timetable back to him. He himself looked over it quietly before folding it and returning it to the same trouser pocket. Eliana made a noise of indignation from her spot beside him. She watched as he rolled his eyes and retrieved the paper once more before handing it over to his sister. As they exchanged a few words Lily’s attention was drawn back to the rest of the group by her name being called out by Mary.

“Lily! This is the prince, James, and his cousin Peter, and his friend Sirius. They’re in your friend, Remus’ dorm. Isn’t that exciting!”

“Yes, very exciting Mary.”

Lily replied in amusement, trying to calm her nervousness at being in the presence of three very important people within the country.

“Why don’t we all sit together for lunch? Maybe we can start our friend group.”

“That sounds like a great idea Mary!”

James shouted in agreement. Lily watched as his round glasses fell down the bridge of his nose, from his excited smile scrunching his nose and the corners of his eyes. He seemed nice enough, not how she would believe a prince would act like. But she had never met a prince before so maybe her assumptions were wrong.

The group of eight moved along with everyone else as they meandered along through the corridors. Marlene was talking animatedly with James and Sirius, all of them cutting each other off in the rush of excitement. Their loud laughs could be heard echoing throughout the halls, often being hushed by one of the prefects walking alongside them. Mary was talking to Peter in a similar way but he just listened with a small smile and a few nods here and there to indicate his involvement in the conversation.

Lily was situated towards the back of the group talking-well trying to at least- to Eliana and Remus. She was trying to keep up with their incomprehensible accents. It sounded Scottish almost. Or Welsh perhaps? Either way their vowels and consonants were slurring together in a way Lily couldn’t understand with all her might. Finally she interjected to try and include herself into the siblings exchange.

“So is that a Welsh accent? I didn’t even pick up on it earlier.”

Both Eliana and Remus turned their gaze towards her, looking surprised. By her presence or the question, she didn’t know. Remus spoke first, obviously broken out of whatever thoughts had seemed to produce such a reaction.

“Welsh. Yes. Our mam grew up there. Cardiff.”

Lily was delighted by this news, she had never met anyone else from outside of Britain before. She wondered if any of the others had parents from different parts, or if they themselves grew up elsewhere.

“That’s so cool! My mum’s Irish, she speaks Gaelic sometimes but not enough for me to pick up. It’s mostly only when she talks to her parents. I’m hoping she’ll teach me soon though.”

The thought of learning her mother’s language was always promising to her, she enjoyed Irish culture, or what she knew of it. Her sister didn’t care much to learn new things and often got annoyed at their mother for not using English, that’s why she hadn’t taught Lily. Being the youngest was always a test to her patience and temper because of Petunia’s disagreeable opinions.

“I’m sure she will, that sounds good.”

Eliana replied from her spot in between Remus and herself. She offered Lily a smile before her attention moved to the blonde boy a few metres in front, talking with Mary. He was talking now, turned towards Mary with a small red hue donning his cheeks as his eyes averted downwards.

“So Remus, you wouldn’t happen to know what’s for lunch. Would you?”

Remus lifted up his left shoulder in response, softly shaking his head before lowering his gaze once more. Lily let out a disappointed sigh and continued following the crowd until they made themselves back into the Great Hall. It was different from this morning. There were now four large wooden tables that stretched along the hall to accommodate all the students, with matching benches on either side. On the right side as she entered through the doors there was a smaller table with a coffee and tea layout, where many uniformed students were lined up.

Following the Lupins they sat down next to Mary, on the opposite side of James, Sirius, Marlene and Peter. In front of them were large plates holding assortments of different sandwiches and fruit, sitting on top of a red and gold table runner. Lily picked up what looked like a ham sandwich and bit into it to confirm her suspicions. She was pleased to find there was also mustard on it.

Everyone followed suit taking a sandwich each, the boys taking two. Lily reached over to pick up an apple at the same time the prince did.

“Oh I’m sorry.”

“No, no. My apologies. Here.”

He placed the apple into her hand and went back to the fruit bowl to retrieve another. Lily stared at him with her mouth agape until he looked back at her and sent a wink over the table. Her cheeks grew hot and she quickly shut her mouth as she looked over to Mary.

“Which one did you get?”

“Cucumber. My favourite.”

Mary took a bite from her sandwich and laughed with her mouth full, which made Lily start to laugh alongside her. Their attention was soon pulled away though by an obnoxiously overly pronounced voice.

“I don’t mean to be rude but I don’t think you lovely ladies introduced yourselves.”

Sirius’ blue eyes were directed towards Mary, Lily and Eliana. Mary took charge, decidedly undisturbed by the abrasiveness in which the question was delivered.

“Well I am pretty certain I did introduce myself but I’m Mary. This is Lily and that’s Eliana.”

“Right, right, I remember now Mary. Sorry. So Eliana, are you Lupin’s girlfriend or something?”

The question brought an abrupt halt to all conversations within the group. And then Lily and Eliana were laughing quite loudly, soon joined by Mary and Marlene a beat later. Remus looked horrified by the notion and even scooted himself a bit further away from his spot next to Eliana as if to prove a point.

“Ych a fi!”

Now Eliana was the only one laughing. Everyone looked at Remus in utter confusion. Was that Welsh? It had to be. Sensing their confusion Remus let out a disgusted sigh and answered their question.

“She’s my sister!”

Sirius let out a jolt of laughter, like something of relief or embarrassment, she couldn’t tell. After the humorous perplexity of the Lupins dating, the group found themselves becoming quite comfortable with each other. Asking questions about where they went to primary, where their parents were from, what sports or hobbies they liked. It was all so exciting to Lily. She had never had so many friends, and to make them so quickly at a new school seemed to squash any previous doubts about coming here. It would be a good year at Hogwarts, she’d make sure of it.