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The night of the match was the first time Lily went to the Gryffindor common room after an awful long time. She never forgot the coziness and warmth of the room, as she spent many sleepless nights studying or trying not to get into too much trouble in there. Their party lasted for hours until an annoyed Professor Blossom (he was the new Head of their House) sent them to sleep and escorted the Gryffindor eight years to their own dorms.

The Gryffindors had a cheery attitude for most of the week. Nothing seemed to kill their good mood, not even the amount of homework they were still receiving, even if the Christmas Holidays grew nearer.

The Great Hall had been decorated and it looked spectacular. Festoons of holly and mistletoe hung all around the walls and no fewer than twelve towering Christmas trees stood around the room, some sparkling with tiny icicles, some glittering with hundreds of candles.

Lily couldn't help but cheer up, despite the fact that her afternoons were spent in the library, reading big books and writing long essays.

In the end, the trio had given up and decided to have a free weekend in which they spent their time walking through the corridors, alongside Ginny, Luna and Neville.

They also paid Hagrid a visit who was peeling potatoes for his soup even more happily once the six each received a cup of tea.

Their afternoon ended with a snow fight in which only Hermione hadn't joined. That was at least until Neville aimed wrong and sent a snowball right into Hermione's face, making the girl raise her eyebrows furiously.

'This is war,' she said firmly and took out her wand, charming a dozen of snowballs and sending them at the others who had to run for their lives.

'Mione, you are cheating!' Lily managed to yell just before she hid behind a pillar, saving herself from the snow attack.

'RON, CALM YOUR GIRLFRIEND DOWN!' Ginny cried loudly as 6 snowballs hit her painfully, 2 square in the face.

'Hermioneee!' Ron joined the shouting contest, but the girl wasn't impressed one bit.

'This is so much fun!' Luna exclaimed happily and in the moment the others turned their attention to her, Lily nonverbally disarmed Hermione, running with her wand inside.

She heard a faint yell of 'Oh Lily Potter, I'm going to murder you!' while she ran, laughing.

And he saw her, carefree and happy as she burst into the Great Hall and neared Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas. A few moments later a furious Hermione, followed by Ron, Ginny, Luna and Neville, burst into the Great Hall and Lily made an 'O' face, hiding herself under the table.

Too late as the bushy haired girl already noticed her and was approaching her angrily. At the last moment Lily was able to get from under the table on the other part of it, she caught Draco's eye and winked before she took off in the direction of the great oak doors.

Professor Blossom shortly appeared at Ron's side, who was watching his girlfriend following the redhead, and demanded an explanation.

'She is trying not to get murdered by Hermione, Professor.'

Most of the Gryffindor table erupted into laughter while Draco snorted in his pumpkin juice.

In the end, Lily gave Hermione's wand back with the promise that she wouldn't do anything to her in her sleep.

It was the last day of term and also the last class. A two hours of Potions was always stressful to the 12 people that still took it, but this time, Professor Slughorn wanted to amuse himself even more.

'Amortentia is the most powerful love potion in existence. It's considered to be a powerful and highly dangerous potion. As stated it's dangerous to underestimate a powerful infatuation. Despite its power, Amortentia doesn't create actual love; it's impossible to manufacture or imitate love. The person under the effect of the potion will only hold an obsession for the person who administered it,' Slughorn explained with excitement something they also learned in 6th year before all hell broke lose. 'But we are not here to use it, are we? You are just going to attempt to brew it as your last work for this term. I reckon only theoretical question would be given in your NEWTs if that's the case, but brewing the actual potion brings you one step further to discover the antidote. Now chop, chop! Page 54 and you know the drill.'

Lily had dealt with Amortentia so she decided to get this job over with as quickly as she could. With the ingredients at her side, it was not that hard to follow the instructions and let herself get lost into the art of potion making. After the first class she ever attended, Lily took an interest in the subject so she made sure to study it even with the fact that she hated Snape.

But did she still hate Snape, despite his sacrifice? Well yes as he could of not treated her like shit for 6 years of school, yet he still did.

Colorful fumes filled the classroom as the others got through each step of the potion, most of the potions looking rather appealing.

While he was stirring clockwise his potion, Draco was stealing a few glances at Lily who talked quietly while she was crushing some sloth brains. Her hair was falling on her shoulders in delicate waves, almost threatening to become curly, because of the steam.

'What's up with that idiot?' Ron muttered under his breath and nodded in Draco's direction just when the blonde had turned his attention on his potion.

Lily shrugged, but she didn't miss the look of 'I don't believe you' that Ron sent her way as she moved to stirring her potion.

In seconds, it became a bubblegum pink, the stage it said it was finished.

'How'd you manage to finish it up so quickly?' Hermione asked curiously as Lily turned off the fire under her cauldron.

'I just did, I guess,' the redhead whispered and took a look at her friends' potions. Hermione was halfway done with the potion, cutting some valerian root furiously. But Ron, oh boy Ron had a disaster going on so Lily approached him and looked for Slughorn. He was thankfully talking with Padma Patil about her own work.

'Let me do something about this, Ron,' she muttered and the boy nodded, shielding her from view as she put powdered root of asphodel, the potion turning to a pale purple.

'Read the instructions from now on, Ron, please or you'll cause an explosion Seamus would envy you for,' she chuckled and turned to her finished potion, only to catch Draco's eye, who sent her way a wink.

She smiled softly and decided to see if her potion was truly done correctly. When she was sixteen she smelt her favorite, treacle tart and the woody smell of  a broomstick and cinnamon, Will. Now only the last smell had changed and a new one appeared and strangely those were, apples and some kind of strong cologne, amber. Her eyes grew wide with realization as Slughorn approached their table. He caught her shocked expression.

'Are you alright, Lily?'

'Yes, Professor, amazing.'

Slughorn sent her a smile and while he was happily rambling about her potion and how she got her talent from her mom for maybe the 100th time, Lily rolled her eyes and Draco caught it, chuckling slightly and earning a grin from the redhead.

'Oh yes, and what does attract you the most, what do you smell, Lily?' Slughorn asked curiously. The whole classed turned their attention to Lily who blushed crimson.

'Treacletartthewoodysmellofabroomstickapplesand-,' Lily spoke so quick that Theo and Blaise burst into laughter.

'Now dear girl, can you say it again, slower?'

'Oh, yes, sorry professor,' Lily said quietly, even her ears turning red. 'It's treacle tart, the woody smell of a broomstick a-and apples.'

'Apples my dear?'

'Yes, I l-like the fruit,' she tried to hide the embarrassment in her voice as both Ron and Hermione raised their eyebrows.

Meanwhile, Draco was having the time of his life, having learned this thing about Lily. She looked cute, blushing like that and he smiled to himself as realization sinked in.

Was Lily Potter possibly liking him?

As the bell announced the end of the lesson, Draco couldn't help, but catch the scent of rainy days, fire whiskey and some flowery scent, lilacs?

Lily was really surprised by that turn of events that after dinner she went straight to her dormitory, reading her book of love novels yet again, after a painful packing session for the holidays.

A smile formed on her lips as she read the letter from her father yet again, the man she loved so much yet she never managed to properly meet him.

She also listened to music, pieces by andrew belle making its way on the tape, causing Lily's smile to grow even more.

The girl fell asleep after some hours and it was not even 9 am. Something made its way into her head and it wasn't a nightmare, it was a dream. A tall figure was making its way to her and Lily wanted so hard to find out who was he that she begged herself not to wake up hours later at the loud voices of her best friends.

'Damn it, Ron,' she muttered as she drew the curtains of her bed. Only the moonlight that was peering through the window aloud her to see that it was 1 in the morning. She had a good 4 hours of sleep.

She took her wand with her in case she had to hex Ron and Hermione for waking her up, the book in her other hand seemed a bit forgotten there as her steps echoed through the corridor.

When it came to an end, Lily stood in the entrance of the corridor with her arms folded against her chest.

Five people turned to look at her. Hermione and Ron had rosy cheeks while Pansy and Blaise were breathing sharply. The only one who wore an amused expression was Draco, who was siting on the back of the couch.

'What's going on here? I was trying to sleep,' Lily asked curiously, raising one of her perfect red brows.

Draco slowly took in her appearance; her hair had a wild look to it, as it was falling in waves on her back, just as it did in potions. Her hands were bare because she was wearing a large grey T-shirt that was hiding half of her dark-blue shorts. Her feet were bare and she was holding her wand and a book he had seen before, against her chest. Her emerald green eyes were sparkling with tiredness.

'Your lovely friends,' Pansy started in a bitter tone. 'Tried to have a snogging session in the kitchen and they caught us, who just wanted to get some sweets for the night.'

'And yet,' Blaise continued. 'We are the only ones who got detention from Slughorn.'

'We were on patrol for Merlin's sake! It is our job-'

'To search the corridors, not to have a snogging session in the kitchens!' Pansy yelled, and their argument started yet again, in which Ron joined angrily.

'It is not your business where-'

'Ronald Bilius Weasley, you shut up right now!' Lily gave the redhead a sharp look and turned to the Slytherins. 'So do you unless you want a whole common room of eight years yelling at you to shut the fuck up, because it's 1 in the damn morning, honestly!'

Damn it, Draco was so stunned by Lily being bold that he forgot about the world for a moment.

'It is not your-' Pansy started, but Lily cut her off with a wave of the hand with which she was holding her wand, causing some scarlet sparks to emerge from it.

'Parkinson I know it is not my business, but if you want to have fun at 1 am, have fun quietly, alright? Now I suggest you all go to bed before I decide to murder someone,' Lily said calmly and Pansy and Blaise left, throwing some last angry looks at the redhead and her best friends.

Ron also went to bed, rambling and cursing under his breath while Hermione appeared at Lily's side.

'You coming, Lils?'

'In a moment, good night.'

Hermione looked between Lily and Draco with furrowed brows, but let it go and they heard her steps along the corridor.

Draco was still dressed in a white shirt that wasn't buttoned all the way to the top. His sleeves were rolled slightly, showing only a bit of his mark as the boy folded his arms against his chest and the girl approached him.

'Tell me Parkinson and Zabini weren't having a snogging session-' she started, earning a chuckle from Draco.

'They went at my request, I couldn't leave because of Theo so they said they would help me.'

'I'm actually shocked I wasn't right,' she grinned and as she walked closer to him, she smelled the same scent of cologne she had smelled in class. And she realized; amber cologne.

'I see you were reading before falling asleep,' Draco pointed out, making Lily remember about the book in her hand.

She gave it to him. The boy scanned the cover for a moment before he opened it to the first page.

'Prongslette?' he smiled and looked up to meet Lily's eyes.

'This book is from my dad so, as I told you he was Prongs and it looks like I am Prongslette.'

'It sounds sweet.'

'I know,' she said quietly, taking the book back from Draco.

'You should go to sleep too, it's late,' Draco muttered and Lily chuckled a little.

'Well, are you going as well?'

'I intend to do just that, mom,' the blonde teased, earning a roll of the redhead's emerald green eyes.

They walked together until they arrived at the two different corridors that would take them to their dorms.

'Good night then,' Lily said softly.

'Good night, and oh Potter,' Draco said and Lily turned on her heels to look at him.

'Merry Christmas.'

'Merry Christmas.'

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