Beginning of fourth year

"Look Mum, there she is!" A very excited James Potter said to his
mother, as he saw Lily Evans approach the platform.

"Oy! Evans!"

Lily let out a small groan, before turning around.

"What, Potter?"

James, who was so ecstatic about seeing her after the whole summer,
grinned, and said, "did you get my letters?"

"Uh-huh. Thanks. My fireplace loved them. They warmed me up when I
burned them."

James hadn't expected a nice response, because she was Lily, and if she had read his letters that he had sent her every day, she would have
sent one back, but it still hurt to hear. He pretended it didn't though.

"You burnt them for heat? In the middle of the summer? I forgot how
cold it is in JULY!" he said. If she was going to try to come up with
excuses, she may as well come up with good ones.

"All right, I didn't burn all of them. I burnt the first one, but my
Mum found out, and she wasn't exactly pleased" Lily admitted.

"Speaking of parents, where are yours?" James asked.

Lily gave him a strange look. "Over there, talking to Alice's parents,
but why do you wa-" Lily said, but James had already walked away.

James was approaching the Evanses, to start his next stage in "operation impress Evans". It was time for stage two- impressing her parents.

"Hello Mr. and Mrs. Evans, I'm James Potter," James said.

"Oh, I know who you are,I've seen you on the platform before, and Lily's mentioned you," Mrs Evans replied.

"Yes, she thinks you're quite rude and irritating" added Mr. Evans. If this boy thought he could just ask his daughter out, without facing the wrath of Richard Evans, he was in for a surprise.

"Well, she's entitled to her opinion, but I'm gonna change it" James
replied, looking cocky as ever.

Mr Evans was considering strangling the boy, but before he could decide if it was worth being arrested over, he was distracted by Sirius.

"James! Hey mate! What are you doing?" Sirus yelled from the other side of the platform.

"Meeting the future in-laws!" James yelled back, nonchalantly.

Lily, who had been talking to Marlene and Remus, gasped, and screamed,
"EXCUSE ME?!?!?"

"You heard me" James said, enjoying the fact that he could get a
reaction like that out of Lily.

Lily regained her composure,smirked, and said "I didn't know you had a thing for Petunia"

James faked throwing up, causing Lily laugh.

"Just accept it now. I'll never go out with you. You're wasting your
time," she said, with a look of pity on her face.

She felt bad that the boy had to be rejected every day, but the other
option was saying yes, and she didn't consider that an option.

"You're just saying that because you're embarrassed to admit that you
have a crush on me!"

Just like that, the pity Lily had for him was gone.

"I will give you three seconds to run, before I come and strangle you
to death," she threatened in an evil sounding voice.

James, having his ego, simply gave her a look that said, "I'm not going
anywhere."

Lily, having her pride wasn't going to let Potter get away with that.
"3,2,1" she counted each number making everyone on the platform except James shudder in fear. James simply smirked.

That did it. Lily lost it, and jumped on James and tackled him to the
ground.

All the parents on the platform screamed, but all the kids, used to
this, started taking bets on who would win.

They wrestled for a minute until James decided to prove that he had
won. He kissed her.

All the marauders started wolf whistling, and every kid on the platform laughed, but the minute Lily stood up, everyone was silent.
She stood there, giving James a death glare for 10 full seconds, and
nobody moved.

Finally, she broke the silence. She walked up to James and punched him
in the mouth, letting her fist collide with the part of him that had
just been on her lips.

"I win," Lily said simply.

James stood there, dripping blood, in awe of the girl he loved.

End of fourth year

"Just go out with him already Lily! He obviously really likes you, why
won't you just go to Hogsmeade with him?" Marlene McKinnon asked her best friend.

"Has it occurred to you that I really hate him? This isn't the 18th century. A girl gets a say in who they date now, meaning I will never go out with Potter."

It was the end of fourth year, and everyone was sick of the constant
fighting between James and Lily. Not a meal went by where they weren't
yelling, or throw food at each other.

"Ah, come on Evans" Sirius said, joining the conversation. "The boy
can't concentrate on anything because he's too busy thinking of ways to
woo you. Do you want it on your conscience that he fails his tests, or
we lose a quidditch match? he continued, pointing out the two things he knew Lily cared about the most.

"Oh please" Lily scoffed. "Gryffindor didn't lose a match all year, and
James passed all his classes, and even got a better grade than me in Transfiguration."

"Stalking me now, huh Evans" James said, approaching his friends."Keeping track of my grades and my quidditch team?

"You wish Potter. I happen to know you passed because you felt the need
to let me know yesterday that if I ever date you, I'd be dating an
"intellectual" man" Lily replied, making quotation marks with her fingers. "As for the quidditch, it's not YOUR team. It's the Gryffindor
team. It's my team too, and if you say that because you're on the
team, it's yours, then by that logic, it's Marlene's team. Anyways, I love
quidditch, NOT you."

"Why though?" James said, irritated.

"Why what?" Lily responded.

"Why do you not like me? What is it about me that makes you hate me?"

"Where do I begin?" Lily said "I hate you because you think you're
better than everyone, I hate you because you don't care about other
people's feelings, I hate you because you try to impress me by doing
stupid things-"

"Not true!" James yelled. "I always come up with brilliant plans to
impress you."

"Oh really?" Lily said laughing. "You call those ridiculous poems you
would send to me in howlers genius? They were so bad, McGonagall
eventually banned sending howlers to fellow students!"

Everyone who heard that laughed, remembering the howlers quite clearly.

James had thought that if she couldn't stop him by walking away while
he asked, she would say yes, so he sent her a howler that would go off,
and make the school beg Lily to go out with him to make them stop. All
it did was cause howlers to be banned, and it earned James a black eye.

"Admit it," James said laughing. "They were pretty great."

Lily had a very different opinion. She remembered the humiliation of
getting a love letter from Potter in the middle of breakfast every day
for a week, the Slytherins mimicking it every time they saw her, and
Severus not speaking to her for two weeks for "letting him send those
letters". It was ridiculous; how was it her fault? Did he think she
ENJOYED those letters?!?!

"Apparently, we have very different definition of the word great" Lily
started. "My definition is not public humiliation, and getting love
letters from a boy I hate" Lily continued, looking smug.

"Could you just stop saying that?!" Don't you realise that I also have
feelings, and MY definition of great isn't being reminded by the girl I love how much she hates me," James said, his voice sounding desperate.

The smug look on Lily's face was immediately gone.

"Potter-I-I didn't mean to- I just meant-" Lily stuttered, unsure what
to say.

"Whatever Evans" James said, not looking her in the eyes. "I've gotten
used to it, it just bites to have to be reminded every two seconds. Oh
well, it'll be a good story to tell at our wedding," he said, suddenly smiling again.

Lily laughed. She was no fan of Potter, but she had to admit, he was
determined, and she respected that. Also, when he wasn't asking her
out, he was all right. Nice, even, although she would never admit it
out loud.

"Oh, shut up Potter." She said, giggling
James was shocked to hear that noise from her. She was Lily Evans, she
didn't giggle. She screamed, she yelled, she was serious, but never
giggly. He was enjoying this side of her while it lasted.

"Well guys" James said, looking around at his friends "I think my
parents are waiting."

It was true. The Potters were standing, watching the kids. They were
bamboozled, watching the two enemies talk.

"Those kids just don't make
sense," Mrs. Potter murmured under her breath. "One minute they hate each other, next they're in love, then fighting again, then friends. What
next?"

Meanwhile, James was saying good bye to all of them, except Sirius who
was going to spend the summer at his house.

"So Evans, how about a goodbye kiss?" James said, wiggling his eyebrows.

"Don't push it Potter. I'm going home to spend my summer with my
DARLING sister Petunia. I'm not in the mood to be messed with."

"Come on sweetie" Mrs Evans yelled. "Your friends are waiting at our
house. Anna, Allison and Josh organized a party!"

James suddenly looked suspicious. "Who's Josh? A muggle? Are you two
dating?"

Lily frowned, remembering Snape saying similar things to her a year
earlier.

"They're my muggle friends. Got a problem?" she said, sounding
irritated.

James knew better than to respond.
An awkward silence fell over the group of Gryffindors.

"Well, I guess we have to go now, James" Sirius said, breaking the
tension.

"Ya me too" Lily added "apparently I have guests at home"

James grinned at her lack of interest in these "guests", and said "I'll
write to you this summer. Just out of curiosity, will you actually open
them this time?"

Lily smiled back. "I'll think about it" she called back to him, as she
approached her parents.

James turned to the marauders. "She so wants me."

Sirius laughed, Peter nodded his agreement, and Remus just rolled his
eyes..
Alice did the same, and said, "the day she wants you is the day
Dumbledore and McGonagall get married."

"Well, he always struck me as gay, but I'll start using my match making
skills to make it happen," James replied, unable to keep a straight face
while saying that.

"Lily's right." Marlene added "you ARE pathetic. Your match ma-"
Marlene stopped in the middle, seeing her parents approach. "There are
my folks. Bye guys! See you next year"

The group all walked away, joining their parents, and telling them all
about their years. All except James. Sirius was telling the Potters
about their year. James was already thinking about what he would write
in his letter to Lily.