"Hey, Evans!" James exclaimed, sitting down next to the redhead at the Gryffindor table. Sirius was right behind him.
Lily, who was talking to her friends while buttering a piece of toast, looked over at him exasperatedly. "What, Potter?"
James grinned at her. "I have a proposition for," he reached out to tap the tip of her nose, "you."
Lily stared at him stonily for a second before she sighed again and returned to her toast. "Go on."
"If I can beat you at saying tongue twisters, you have to go on a date with me."
"All right, and if I win, you have to go without asking me out for the rest of the term," Lily said, smirking.
James was smirking too; a smirk that said all too well he didn't expect Lily to win. "Deal. Sirius?"
James looked over at Sirius, who he had brought along to supply the tongue twisters.
"Let's see . . . we'll start with an easy one. She sells seashells by the seashore."
James and Lily both repeated it back to Sirius word for word without stumbling.
"Imagine an imaginary menagerie manager imagining managing an imaginary menagerie," Sirius said.
James said it perfectly, while Lily hesitated when James and Sirius looked over at her. After a moment, though, she had said it back just as well.
"Many an anemone sees an enemy anemone," Sirius said with a little grin.
James's eyes widened, while Lily smiled before repeating the tongue twister as easy as blinking. When it was James's turn, he didn't speak. Both Lily and Sirius stared at him.
Sirius gestured for him to go, so James stuttered, "Many an anem—anemen . . . Many an a—anemone sees an enemone—arg!" He threw his hands into the air.
Lily patted James on the shoulder. "It seems that I've won. Remember, no invites until the end of the term." She turned back to her friends.
"You were supposed to say only the ones I practiced!" James exclaimed, glaring at Sirius.
Sirius shrugged, helping himself to breakfast. "She was beating you anyway."
This was written for TrumparrotPansy's Tongue Twister Challenge on the Harry Potter Fanfiction Challenges forum. Please review, and be kind. :)
