September
It starts with a letter.
Well, it's more of a text, really. But it's lengthy and long-winded and formal - it checks all the boxes of what a proper letter should look like, so James is interpreting it as such.
He has, after all, always been a hopeless romantic, no matter how many times Evans calls him a frigid dunce. It's all in good fun though, or at least that's what he tells Sirius in hopes that maybe just this once, he won't take the mickey out of James. He's never successful.
Surprisingly, said letter-slash-text comes from none other than Lily Evans herself, and it boils down to pretty much one thing: Creepy Snape has been bothering her again, and she wants to know if he could please pretend to be her boyfriend, just until she gets her sanity back.
James is unsure at first, but then he remembers the extent of Snape's creepiness and decides no one should be forced to suffer through it. As long as they lay down some ground rules, James is game.
They meet the next day at school, just outside the cantine. The two of them sit on a bench, under a random beech tree, and James procures a crumpled-up sheet of paper from his backpack, attempting and failing miserably to straighten it out.
"I've made us a contract," he says, smoothing it out on his lap.
"What?"
James isn't sure if the expression on Evans' face is one of disbelief or just plain confusion, but either way, he carries on.
"If we're going to do this, we have to do it right," James explains, a serious expression on his face. "There's nothing worse than a poorly thought out ruse."
"It's more of a shenanigan, actually."
For a second, James actually gasps, but quickly reigns it in and instead says, "agree to disagree." It's not like he wants Evans to think he's completely insane. Which he totally is, but that's beside the point.
He takes a deep breath and looks back to the wrinkled sheet of paper currently on his lap. "Hence, the need for a contract. A guidebook. A manual—"
"All right, I get it," Evans says, and though her words could be a sign of impatience or general annoyance, she's laughing, and so James laughs with her. "What's in the contract?"
"So far, all I've added is the obvious No Snitching rule."
"Well, duh," Evans deadpans, unimpressed. "But if I can't confide in Mary, you can't tell Sirius, either."
"That's fair," James concedes. There's a pause, and after what feels like forever but was only really a few seconds, he adds, "I also don't want you to kiss me."
It's not like James wouldn't love for Evans to kiss him. It's just that, well, James is already a little infatuated with her, and he doesn't feel like feeding that particular wolf. Especially not when Evans is, hopefully, unaware of the predicament he's found himself in.
Evans stops for a second, but then nods. "Sure. But we'll need to figure out a game plan, because we live in a ridiculously heteronormative society and no one will believe we're dating if I'm not allowed to like, touch you."
James snorts.
"You can touch me, all right. There just won't be any making out." Then, he wiggles his eyebrows, and Evans laughs once again. "Also, you have to come to my football matches."
"I already go to the football matches."
"Of course, but now you'll have to wear my number painted on your cheeks or something. I don't know, how do teenage boys mark their territory nowadays?"
This time, it's Evans who grins, face lit up like a Christmas tree.
Slowly, she loosens her hair from the ponytail and wraps the gold scrunchie around her wrist. "You have a point… Oh, and you need to come with me on the trip to Brighton."
"That's two months away!" James says.
"Look," Evans starts, "school lets out for Christmas in less than three months, and after that, Snape's transferring to a different school. But if we stop doing this before the Brighton trip? There's no way in hell he'll leave me alone over break."
He sighs, but agrees, "all right, fine."
Three months. James can handle three months.
October
The first few weeks are tricky. They're still trying to figure out how to fit each other into their respective routines, but James is nothing if not dedicated to a good ruse and so they make it work.
It takes a lot of instagramming and frankly, a ridiculous amount of lying, but in a short time it becomes clear to any interested parties that James Potter and Lily Evans are together.
At first, Snape seems doubtful of the whole thing and even goes as far as to call Evans out on it, but she holds her own and eventually he leaves her alone.
Soon enough, though, they get into the rhythm of things.
Not only does Evans paint his jersey number on her cheeks, she also stays behind to watch some of his practices. In turn, James brings her a cup of tea every morning, and pretends not to swoon when she gratefully takes it from his hands and pecks him on the cheek.
He knows exactly the right kind of saccharine nicknames to give her, sweet enough to be nauseating but not so much that Evans will actually mind them, and she knows not to mention the weekend's football match before James has had a chance to eat some waffles on Monday.
It's all very domestic, and it does nothing to lessen James' ridiculous crush on Evans.
One particular Wednesday, Evans tells him she's got to rush home after English Lit, and so she can't make it to practice that day. That's all fine with James. He won't pretend he doesn't miss seeing her face whenever he glances up from the ball, but he knows he's not Evans' entire life. So he sends her home with a note and a protein bar. Pathetic.
Just as James returns to the locker room, his phone pings.
[06:32 p.m.]
Lily: Are you busy right now?
James' eyebrows shoot up. He's still not used to seeing Evans' contact info casually pop onto his screen.
James: well i had practice but i should be done in abt 20 mins? i jst need to take a shower
Lily: Can you come over after? Maybe pick me up? We could go for coffee, my treat
James' heart stops. Even if they've already been doing this for a while, and are together more often than not, Evans is still more than a little closed off. She's trying to be sneaky about it, but he can tell she's asking for help, and it's unusual enough to set off some kind of alarm.
Furrowing his brow, James is quick to reply.
James: is everything ok?
Lily: Yeah, it's just my sister
James: give me 10 minutes
Lily: You said twenty
James: lily, give me ten minutes
It takes him nine minutes to get to Evans' front porch. The sky is blue and the sun is shining, and James' heart is beating so fast he can feel it everywhere - from the tops of his ears to the tips of his toes.
He doesn't even bother to park properly, just haphazardly stops the car somewhere in the vicinity of the Evans' driveway, and promptly texts her.
[06:41 p.m.]
James: i'm outside
Lily: Coming
Evans strolls out of the house in the tan skirt he likes so much, a scarlet scarf wrapped snugly around her neck, and James lets out a breath. She seems chipper enough, but James can tell the difference. After all, for all the spring in her step, the smile doesn't quite reach her eyes and there's a certain heaviness on her shoulders that's too obvious for him to ignore.
Swiftly, Evans climbs into the passenger's seat of James' car (or rather, James' mum's car) and the pair make their way to the coffee place near their school, The Three Broomsticks. Once inside, he gets Lily's favourite waffles and a chocolate milkshake for himself.
"So," he starts, and it's so bloody awkward James doesn't know what to do with himself.
"Thanks for picking me up."
James shrugs it off, choosing instead to ask, "what happened with your sister?"
Evans takes a deep breath, and even though he can see her trying to come up with a way out of the conversation, he's pleasantly surprised when she complies.
"She was just being her usual prig self. Except this time she had Vernon over, and so it just made her particularly, huh… aggressive, let's put it that way."
"I'm sorry, Evans. Family can be a bitch."
"Oh, I hate her. But I love her."
"Well, you can be mad at someone and still care about them."
"Yeah, I know."
"I mean, just look at Sirius. If I didn't know any better… he hates his family. Like, he truly loathes them. But there's always this one week out of the year, in June, on his brother's birthday, where he just gets really down about everything. It's shit, but there's nothing we can do about it, y'know?"
Evans nods. "Did you know that Snape used to be my best friend, growing up?"
It takes a lot of effort on James' part to keep his eyes from bulging out of his sockets.
"I didn't, actually."
"Yeah, he was. We used to live on the same street, back when dad still worked at that Barclays branch on Oxford Street. He always used to hate my sister, so I reckon that's when things really started going to shit with her. Petunia had just gotten into a fancy new school and suddenly all she cared about was impressing her posh new friends and forgot all about me. But Snape always kept me company. Eventually we moved, year eight happened, and now here we are."
"I remember."
James swallows the rest of his milkshake, and Evans snorts.
"It'd be hard not to. It was quite the spectacle."
James only hums. But then, Evans gets up to use the loo and proceeds to trip on her own shoelaces, and suddenly, the world is back on its axis.
November
Being with Lily is so easy, sometimes he forgets they're just pretending.
It's especially hard to remember that their entire relationship is fake when she's at his place more often than not. No matter how much Sirius tries to pretend otherwise, his mates absolutely love her. It's unnerving how well she gets along with his mother, and James knows that if his father were here, he'd also be a part of the Lily Evans Fanclub, which James proudly leads.
The thing is, James knows it's not healthy. He's actually gone and fallen in love, the ponce, and he knows he probably should have put an end to it already. But, fake or not, being with Lily is the best thing that's ever happened to him, and he'll take what he can get. Even if sometimes the whole situation makes him want to rip his admittedly gorgeous hair out.
Soon, one month bleeds into two, and they go on the Brighton trip.
And it's lovely. It really is. Sure, the butterflies inside his stomach refuse to stop fluttering around, and sometimes it's so intense it kind of feels he's got food poisoning, but it's fun and he wouldn't trade it for the world.
He sits next to Lily on the bus to Brighton, much to Sirius' chagrin. Sirius can suck it, though, because he's curated the perfect 90's playlist and James knows no one else would appreciate it as much as Lily would. The lot of them visit the shops, and after stopping for a quick bite at a local pub called The Hog's Head, head off to the beach.
There's a moment, by the sea, where Lily lays her head on James' shoulder and he swears his heart skips at least a couple of beats.
It's nothing new for them, physical intimacy. Whenever they're together, there's always some sort of string pulling them closer and closer, and it seems that at least once a week she finds a way to fall asleep on his sofa and pull him in to nap-slash-cuddle with her.
She's always playing with his hands, too, and stealing his clothes. Eventually, James starts nicking her socks and her scarves—her beautiful, giant collection of scarves that are so soft and so big, they may as well be blankets—and it gets to the point where neither of them knows that's James' and what's Lily's anymore.
James can't really say he minds.
December
The winter holidays arrive suddenly, and it takes James by surprise. Usually, he'd be all up for some snowball fighting or impromptu present shopping, but this year, James greets the Holidays with little more than disappointment.
Because now that they're not at school, and Snape is transferring to Norfolk, there's really no point in them continuing their ruse, is there? And even if you completely take James' infatuation with Lily out of the equation, she's still one of his best mates, one of the most important people in his life, and he's sad to be letting it all go.
Of course, the first chance she gets, Lily rings his doorbell and invites herself over for a spot of Christmas baking. James can't help but marvel at how lovely she looks, flour on her face and all, at how much she fits in his home, and his life.
"I can't believe this is our last Christmas at home. Everything's going to change, isn't it?" she asks from underneath the blankets they've laid out on the sofa. They're watching Rudolph (the 1998 version, of course, they're not animals) and despite being seventeen years old, Lily still gets scared shitless whenever Stormella makes an appearance.
"Sometimes change is good, you know?"
"But maybe… maybe sometimes things are perfectly good as they are. And maybe even if there's no rhyme or reason behind it, we shouldn't just go about changing things for the sake of it, yeah? Why fix something that isn't broken?"
It may just be wishful thinking on James' part, but he doesn't think they're talking about going to uni anymore.
"Well, sometimes people don't know they—it isn't broken. So, they wonder. They think everything to the ground and then dig it up again to do some more thinking, and when they realise what they've done, how much time they've wasted on the aforementioned thinking, it's too late."
Eyes trained on the screen in front of them, Lily says quietly, "I don't want to waste too much time."
"It depends on what you consider wasted time. I mean, every choice you've ever made has led you to this very moment." He's rambling now, but that's only because well, not only is it one of his many flaws, James' heart feels like it's going to burst out of his chest. If he lets Lily speak and she ends up not saying what he really hopes she does, not only is his heart going to stop, it's also going to break.
"The thing is, Potter," Lily starts, "I'm crazy about you. I think it's time we give this a proper go, don't you think?"
"You mean for real?"
"Well, it hasn't been fake for a long time, has it?"
"No," James says, attempting to give Lily his trademark smirk. In reality, he can't remember the last time he smiled this widely. It's especially grating considering he was aiming for some sense of suave, but that's obviously out of the window now. Given he's about to get together with Lily bloody Evans, though, he's not too upset. "No, it hasn't."