Author's Note: For the Jily Secret Santa on tumblr! I got tippecanoeandnikkitoo as my secret santa, and she asked anything Christmas-sy. I know it's not typical Christmas; but everytime I even try to make something of this prompt my fingers turn to stone and I can't write. I am horrible at writing holidays.
Anyway - it's been quite a while since my last oneshot, or my last typed sentence. I hope you like, Nikki! Have a wonderful holiday and a great new year =)
"I wondered if a memory is something you have or something you've lost."
ANOTHER WOMAN, 1988
She kind of saw it coming.
It was inevitable, he would say, with his cocky, stupid, adorable grin, reaching his hand to mess up the locks on the dark hair up there. And than she would say something sarcastic in return, but both of them would hear the smile in her voice, the happiness dripping like chocolate drips of the border of a cup - melting melting melting. It was inevitable, and she knew it, so she tossed all the logic and sense out of the window and went along.
Slowly, Lily falls in love.
It was snowing outside; if she just got up and looked throw the window next to her bed, she could have seen it, white and soft, covering a lot of the outsides of the castle. Some of the first years were there still, in the middle of night, and the light shinning of their wands could reach the glass of Lily's almost view.
"Lily"? It was his voice, warm and broad, echoing throw the Hospital Wig. She smiled, still a little weak from the sickness she had been having the whole week, and replied a slow "Over here".
His eyes dart across the room instantly into her, and something on her chest roars. He looks so much like – well, like himself, with warm eyes and broad shoulders – that it makes Lily feel safer, at home, like nothing had happened the past days.
"So what brings you to my enchanted chambers?" She tries to say it as a joke, but it ends sounding horrible with her still raspy voice and ragged breathing. Since the Avery attack on her – she still could hear the crucio on his voice, feel the cold, icy shivers passing throw her skin, all of that before the excruciating pain began – no one except him, Remus and the other Marauders had bothered visiting.
"I brought you homework, books and hot chocolate. No one deserves to pass Christmas Eve without chocolate." He pauses, getting closer to her bed, pushing a chair and exposing the books on his tanned arms. "I know how you hate to miss classes."
He smiles a little and her heart melts. She take the books and places them on her lap, still blown away by the gentleness he was treating her. After the beginning of their seventh year, they had begun to form a strange sort of friendship, with all of the Head duties, shared rooms and eventual studying sessions. But it wasn't like this; nothing was like this – this gentleness, and this constant contact, and this lack of negative snark on his words.
"Thank you." She says, beginning to get emotional. There was a silence, and she could point out he was ready to get out; but she just couldn't let him go, not now, not when she finally knew why she needed him so badly. "Could you, uh, help me with some of them? I lost some classes and -"
"Evans." He was now grinning, amusement clearly blasted over his face. "Are you asking for help?"
"Oh, don't be such a prat." She says, blushing furiously. "I'm going to wait for Remus to come, than."
"NO!" He said too fast, grabbing the books that she was holding, his hazel eyes wide. The vision is too much, and suddenly there is laughing scaping from her lips, tears in her eyes and Merlin She couldn't brea-
"I'm glad I can amuse you, Evans." He murmurs with a straight face, but his eyes are smiling, giving him up.
"So we start with Transfiguration?" She asks, and it's there again, the glow on his eyes. He starts to talk and she is lost on his voice, his face, the concentration look that he assumes when he is thinking.
The rest of the evening is filled with laughter, work and some more laughter, and even tough it doesn't seem like time has passed, eight o'clock is already there.
"Evans!" He grins, and she suddenly thinks that besides the patrols, four hours is the longest time they've spent without bickering each other. It's nice. It feels right. "You really trapped me here, didn't you?"
"Say what you want, Potter, but-" Her talk is interrupted with a yawn, and she realizes that even though she spent the whole day on a bed, she's tired.
"Oh, Sleeping Beauty." He looks funny. She vaguely remembers that James isn't supposed to know Muggle tales. She blinks. "It's time to rest."
She tries to protest, but she is too tired. James takes the books over the bed and places them on the ground. He pauses, and she's suddenly aware of everything on him; his breathing, his warm body, his silence.
There is something on the air and she's shy, too shy, nervous, too nervous. He turns around, than hesitates and turns back. Her eyes are following all of his movements, closer, closer, closer. She can't talk.
"I know it must be bloody annoying to have to spend your Christmas here." He begins, his hands closed on tight fists. "So I brought you a present to get throw the night."
She just stares at him.
"It's a book of Wizard's Christmas Stories, you see, because I was going throw your junk at your room - "
"James! – "
"Just to get some of your books for you!" He brought both of his hands up "So I found this very strange book of Muggle Tales, and red some of it, and I just thought you would like this one."
His last sentence was kind of fast, too fast, and she realizes he is nervous; James Potter is nervous, and all because of her. It's a wonderful, breathtaking scene, and she struggles to remain composed not to embarrass him.
He takes a bright red wrapped up paper from his robes, and handles to her, getting closer. She opens it, and there is the cover, a beautiful moving image of a snowing hill with a dragon, two wizards and a couple of Trolls.
And it's not the gift that makes her this appreciative of him – is just the sigh of the boy, spending his holiday time with her, getting out of his way to bring her words and sweets and gifts. She drinks the moment, too happy and too tired to even think properly, but she knows – the kind of way some people just know – that this memory of him would be her first. She would erase all of the old, bad ones, and replace with this one, and she would play it again and again and again, whispering stupid to her eleven-years-old self.
"Thank you." – She says it honestly, clutching the book on her arms, and says it again, looking at his eyes. – Thank.
He kisses her forehead and she closes her eyes.
What he says next is barely a whisper, but she catches it in the air, a warm memory among the winter.
"Goodnight, Lily."
She tosses all the logic up and than catches it when it's falling, fast, caring; because it's not even a risk, not with him, not when she gets to really know James.
Not slow, but fast, sweetly – Lily falls in love.