"Lily," said Marlene, slipping into the seat across from her once James abandoned it to pick up their drinks. "Are you on a date with James Potter?"

Her nose turned up in distaste, a force of habit, and she swatted the notion away. "Rubbish. What gave you that impression?"

Marlene raises her manicured eyebrow. "Lils, you're alone with him. At Hogsmeade. Where he's buying your drinks."

Lily blinked dumbly at her.

Exasperated, Marlene threw her hands up in the air. "Oh Merlin, Lily, what did James ask you to join him at every week in fifth year?"

Lily tried to laugh. "Don't be absurd, Marls, we're just friends."

"Since when are you and James Potter friends?"

"Since today," said Lily decidedly. "I dunno, hating him has started to lose its appeal, don't you think? He's not the same person he was before. It's...nice."

"Nice," repeated Marlene, flat as a pan. "James, nice. Well, I've officially seen the end of the world. Enjoy the rest of your date, Lils."

"Not a date!" called Lily after her, but the doubt had already begun to set in. Was she on a date with James Potter?

She must have had the most horrified look on her face when James returned, because he set down their drinks with a broad smile before it dropped when he looked up at her. "You alright, Lily?" asked James.

Her heart thudded in her chest. Since when has James begun to call her by her first name instead of her last? When did he become James instead of that arrogant Potter?

Oh my stars, thought Lily in a panic, is this a date?

James continued to stare at her, lips pursed in worry, and she tried to stammer out a response, but she couldn't get her mouth to form the correct words.

How in Merlin's name did we get here?!

"Lily," prodded James. "Is everything alright?"

She finally managed to clear her throat enough to croak, "Yeah, 'course. Sorry."

James smirked, and the crinkles on his forehead deepened. Gone was the worry and it was replaced by the air of relief. "Had me worried somebody had hit you with a dung bomb, Evans."

Her whole body relaxed at the mention of her last name, and Lily had the inexplicable feeling of being able to breathe again. James was still James, Lily was still Lily, this was not a date.

"Nah, that's just the reek of the clothes you haven't washed since the beginning of the year," teased Lily.

James pouted at the comment, his lower lip jutting out in a way that Lily deemed unfairly attractive.

Lily shuddered.

Marlene was putting unhealthy thoughts into Lily's mind of James and attractive.

To be fair, she bargained, she'd never claimed James was unattractive in the past. His attractiveness had simply been...brought into a recent light.

"You offend me, and just when I thought we were getting to know each other," whined James.

"Perhaps your ego is too easily damaged," said Lily innocently, placing a hand on her heart. "That's not my fault, Potter."

James grinned, a smile that ate up his whole face and lit up the room. "Perhaps you forgot that I'm the one paying for drinks, and I can take yours away if you bully me."

Lily chuckled. "Really? The bully card? Are we bickering fourth years again?"

James's face went soft. "I hope not," said James, quite sincerely. "I rather like where we've ended up."

With his one simple phrase, Lily was sent spiraling into a panic once more, and the word date echoed and bounced around her brain relentlessly. She smiled at him, stilted and awkward, and hoped he won't notice how her world was crumbling around her.

"Don't get too comfy," said Lily, and the gentle look on his face dropped in an instant, turning sour, but Lily hardly noticed. She nudged her glass with her fingernail. "These drinks won't last forever, then we've got to leave."

A tentative smile crossed his lips. "Where will fate take us yet?" pondered James.

The way he phrased it had Lily scrambling for reasons of how this was decidedly not a date.

They finished their drinks, chatting easily and he occasionally nudged her foot with his own, and Lily listed the ways this wasn't a date and was a date in her mind.

In her 'was' column, there were five, but her 'wasn't' column held only the phrase, it can't be.

As they left the 'Brooms and walked side by side through Hogsmeade, Lily asked herself why it couldn't be a date. James was pleasant. He bought her drink, which was kind. He made her laugh, he teased her when she teased him, and his touches sent electric shocks coursing through her veins.

She'd never felt so loose in years.

Was this a date?

She was biting her thumbnail as he walked her back up to the corridor, wondering if this is where it ended, when it struck her that James might be wondering the same things as her. Would he try to kiss her?

Would she let him?

Merlin's beard, she'd been thinking about his lips ever since his pout at the Three Broomsticks! They were getting closer to the Fat Lady now, and her nerves were eating her insides. She had to say something. She wasn't ready for this, she didn't know what she wanted, she -

"Is this a date?" blurted Lily, and she and James stopped in their tracks. Her eyes went wide, shocked, her hand covered her mouth in an instant. "Oh, Merlin."

James blinked at her dumbly.

"Uh," he said, looking as dazed and confused as she'd felt for the whole afternoon. He was looking through her, staring at nothing, mouth wide open. "It... We..."

His eyes widened comically and he finally looked at her. "Merlin's beard, we just went on a date!" shouted James, and Lily jumped.

"Shh!" hissed Lily, covering his mouth with her hand. His eyes stared down at her, a mixture of disbelief and pleasure. She can't believe she just went on a date with this idiot.

Holy shit. She just went on a date with James Potter.

Marlene is going to shit herself, Lily decided.

She removed her hand from James and stepped back, feeling incredibly awkward and aware of herself. Her gray sweater was patchy and worn, her denim jeans faded in an unflattering way, her hair thrown in a hasty ponytail that had fallen loose during their date. Lily began to wonder if she would have tried harder to look nice if she had known before she'd be on a date with James Potter.

"After all this time, I finally get you to go out with me, and neither of us is even aware of it!" whispered James, voice laced with excitement. "Bloody hell, I should have tried this tactic years ago!"

"Wouldn't have worked," said Lily weakly. "I didn't like you back then."

"Do you like me now?" asked James, and his voice is so soft and tentative that the sarcastic remark Lily automatically turns to becomes jelly in her throat.

"I'm rather fond of you, yes," whispered Lily.

The grin that broke James's face filled her with such a hope all of her doubts and dreads were stolen away with his sharp intake of breath.

"Really?" he asked, and she couldn't believe how much wonder was stuffed into that one word. "I'm rather fond of you, too, Evans."

Lily have him a small smile in return, and reached up to wrap her arms around his neck. She played with the hairs at the base of his neck as he tentatively wrapped his arms around her waist. "Good. 'Cause I'm not going anywhere."

-/-/-/-/-

He let her go into the common room alone, insisting that it's like dropping her off at her doorstep, and he meandered off to meet with his friends or to cause havoc, or to do something she'll roll her eyes at later.

She closed the portrait behind her and leaned against it, touching her lips and laughing at the smile that seems to have made its permanent home there.

When Marlene demanded again whether or not she'd gone on a date with James Potter, Lily simply winked at her.

And when she asked what had happened? Well. A lady should never kiss and tell.