DEVIL-MAY-CARE

Author: Queen Nightingale

Rating: T

Pairing: Lily/James

Passion makes the world go round. Love just makes it a safer place. ~ Ice T

You're sitting in your favourite armchair, cozily snuggled up against the red and gold threading that you know clashes terribly with your hair, but you can't find yourself to care too much. Outside, or what you can see of it through the small stained glass window, the world is slowly being covered in a blanket of white, and you grin as you envision the poor sods that decided to go to Hogsmeade.

This is your first missed Hogsmeade outing, and you giggle slightly to yourself as you stretch your lean body out on the armchair, twisting your limbs to dangle haphazardly off the furniture, your bright ginger hair sweeping the ground as you turn upside down. You've changed back into muggle clothing (a relief after the severity of Hogwarts' robes), and you know you look terrible, with dark circles under your eyes, paired with muggle pyjama pants and an old yellow hoodie. But you just can't bother yourself to care.

Dorcas and Marlene were flabbergasted when you told them that you would rather stay in the common room this Hogsmeade trip, and instantly started to badger you with questions: who, what, where, when, how … and WHY?! But you shrugged off their questions nonchalantly. Dorcas wouldn't stop pestering you, but Marlene, with her thick dark brown hair and bomber jacket, just winked at you and then ambled off, her long hands entwined with Sirius' as they exited out of the common room, one of her blood-red nails reaching up to stroke his bad-boy handsome face. Dorcas stuck her nose in the air and waddled off towards the exit, and you know that she took it as a personal insult, but you just sighed and turned your back on her.

You like Dorcas, you really do, you think to yourself in your head, flopping out of the armchair in your anguish, lying sprawled out on the ground, staring at the ceiling, but sometimes she can be a bit much. You think about her thin blond hair, and her thickset body, and you groan, turning your face into the carpet. She really needs to learn a bit about personal space, and figure out her personal style. Not that you, you dryly note, are an example of high fashion at this very moment.

You think back to Marlene, and her thick, swinging mane of black hair, the one the boys all adore. You grin widely. The only boy who ever even won a bit of her was Sirius Black, and he doesn't even realize how lucky he is, the handsome bastard. She's the type of girl who looks perfect as an accessory to a flying motorcycle, or some other sort of cool gadget (you happened to know that Sirius is the only boy in school who has a flying motorcycle), whereas you'd look uncomfortable and too young. You know that if you mounted one, some Ministry executive would instantly recognize you as being underage and you'd get in a shitload of trouble. You're incredibly jealous, in a loving way, of Marlene's ability to exude cool out of every pore in her body.

Then, still lying on the ground, your thoughts turn to James, and you stick out your tongue and pretend to barf, shaking your head and stamping your feet at the mere mention of his name.

(You realize that you might look like you're having a seizure, but you don't give a rat's ass.)

He's the boy who has caused the most trouble for you, and your face clouds over when you start to ponder him more deeply. Because of him, you're seventeen and still haven't kissed anyone, because no boy wants to date a girl so clearly stamped as his property. You haven't even gone out on one date, you grimace, and even Dorcas has beaten you in terms of boy-experience. She went to Zonko's with a boy from Hufflepuff once, and although they just bought lollys and happily parted ways, you feel despair cloud over yourself.

Even DORCAS has beaten you!

At that thought you jump up from your sprawling position, hit your head on the nearby coffee table in your sudden surge of anger, and, moaning, lie back down again, rubbing the back of your scalp.

He isn't even that attractive, you angrily think to yourself, lying back on the plush carpet, envisioning him in your head. Sure, he's tall, and he has huge broad shoulders that could plow You-Know-Who out of the way, but his black, thick hair is never completely smoothed back, and his tie is always worn helter-skelter. You know for a fact that he thinks it makes him look sexy, but to you he looks like a continual dumbass.

And just because he's the Quidditch Captain and Head Boy, you crossly tell yourself, he thinks he's the king of the world. Just because Gryffindor hasn't lost to anyone except one match with Ravenclaw (you hear his voice in the back of your head saying: "Which didn't even count!!!") doesn't mean that people have to follow him around and give him flowers. And anyways, he took your stinking Head position, since Professor Dumbledore apparently convinced the Headmaster that there should be 'house intra-mingling' (which sounds like a load of crap to you), so the Head Girl is some snot from Ravenclaw who looks like she hasn't even kissed a boy yet.

And yes, you glare at the ceiling in anger and angst, you haven't either, but you at least look somewhat cool.

And the whole student body seems to think that it's completely 'meant-to-be' whenever he asks you out in some outrageous way, whether it be flying into the Great Hall on a broomstick or be it shoving himself in between you and Frank Longbottom (who is Alice's now, true, but you DID see him first!) and threatening Frank with his big words and scary deep voice, which you know is just a farce since James Potter would never even hurt a fly.

And because of Potter, even your relationship with Severus has ended, but you end that topic of discussion in your head before you can think about what Severus did to you.

Suddenly, a voice booms into the common room, and you lift your head up (banging it again), and squint towards the direction of the Fat Lady.

"Flowerrrrr!" a male voice shouts, and you groan and fall back onto the floor, thinking that if you seem dead maybe Potter won't bother you, "I hear you're not going to Hogsmeade!!!"

You turn away from the noise and start crawling towards the girl's dormitory, but you feel his footsteps approach you, and you're quickly pulled up into his arms.

"EVANS!" he says, beaming down at you, and you hit him with your fists.

"HOW. MANY. TIMES. HAVE. I. TOLD. YOU. TO. NOT. PICK. ME. UP?!?!?"

You scream at him, swathed like a child in his arms, kicking out with your feet, your red hair swinging behind you.

He drops you carefully, but you shove him off and make a big fuss of fixing your hair and clothes. You never act this rudely towards anyone except him, but you feel that it's warranted after the great big brute ruined your entire Hogwarts dating life.

"It's nice to see you too, Flower!" he replies, smirking slightly, but you glare witheringly at him and stomp off in the direction of the girl's dormitory.

(You seem to stomp a lot around him, but you find that you're usually too angry to care that your gait makes you look like an elephant in heat.)

You storm up the steps to the Girl's Dormitories, Potter following behind you and jumping over the trip stair (dammit, you momentarily forgot he knew how to get over that), and slam into your dorm, hiding behind the curtains of your bed and magicking them shut.

"Lilllyyyyyyy …"

You hear Potter's voice but turn away from him, burrowing yourself in the pillows and aiming a well-placed stinging hex in his direction. You hear him curse, and then you upright yourself and yank open the curtains. You see James lying dramatically out on the floor, clutching his shoulder.

"Flower, you've killed me!"

"If I could only be so lucky," you retort, swinging yourself off of the bed to grab some balm from your night-stand and toss it at him. He catches it with his chaser-reflexes, and you sit on the bed and watch him yank off his shirt and put the balm on his reddened shoulder blade.

(This has happened, many, many times before.)

You find yourself staring at his large shoulders and taut six-pack, his tanned smooth skin drawn tight over his abdomen, with a trail of brown hair starting at his bellybutton and tantalizingly sinking into his boxers, which have risen over his gray sweatpants.

He notices you staring, and guffaws loudly.

"Want to help me?" he winks at you, causing you to direct another withering stare in his direction, at which he bursts into a couple of melodic chortles, causing a small grin to appear on your face at his clear amusement at his cleverness.

"I was just counting the number of pimples between your abs, Potter, and it really is an astronomical figure," you retort smoothly, catching the balm as he passes it back to you after sealing it with his large, tanned hands.

"If by pimples you mean muscles than yes, you are quite right," he says, smiling widely back at you, and you can't help but burst into a tiny giggle at his ear-to-ear grin.

"I hate you," you say, finally grinning at him and exhaling a huge sigh, hopping onto your bed, "I was hoping to spend the day relaxing and lazing around."

Without any invitation on your part, he hops into the bed beside you, and you glare withering at him once again.

"I love the fact that you have a special gaze for me," he says, talking to your pinched face (you are still witheringly glaring at him, but the big brute just moves closer to you on the bed and starts to hog all the covers), "It's really sexy."

"What do you want, Potter?"

"The way you say my last name is really hot too."

"POTTER. Wait. Shit. You bastard."

He grins cheekily at you like a child, and sits back against the headrest of your bed, twiddling his thumbs and staring disarmingly at you. You at once realize that he is shirtless, and poke his abs, which you find distressingly hard.

"Put on a shirt."

"If I put one on, will you take yours off?"

You glare witheringly at him again, and he (you swear on your life he does) giggles and grabs his checkered shirt off the ground, shrugging into it, allowing you a clear view of his abs.

Not that you want to see them.

You sink into the covers and close your eyes, your breathing evening out. You have fallen asleep in his presence thousands of times (because the bastard has a tendency of creeping into your room at night, the STALKER), and a strange feeling of safety comes over you when he starts to stroke your straight ginger hair.

Although you're turned away from him now, curled into a ball, you can imagine exactly what he looks like. He's resting against the headboard, his head just slightly higher than it, with his glasses askew and hair messed up. His right hand is gently caressing the top of your head as he stares off contentedly in the distance, his elbow resting on the top of the headboard, and his lower body is covered by your flannel blankets, his checkered shirt clashing with the plaid covers. His left arm is draped across his stomach, and you can feel his stomach rise and fall against the curve of your back.

The thought that you could stay like this forever creeps into your mind, and you don't even try to ignore it. You know it's the truth.

"I think Sirius is going to ask Marlene to marry him after graduation."

You slowly turn towards him, and sleepily open your eyes at his voice. Seeing you looking at him, he continues talking.

"But don't you think it's a little early, though? I mean, even though they'll both be eighteen and all, it's just love, right? Is that really enough?"

You hear his voice rise a bit with panic at the thought of his best mate, and you creep forward into his lap, letting him stroke your hair agonizingly slowly.

"Yes."

He looks down at you and smiles wistfully, and you smile back and close your eyes again, content to just hear the sound of his voice, this boy that you both love and hate, this one who you can't live with and can't live without.

"I mean, he told me, and so I hinted at it to Moony, who didn't seem concerned at all. And I obviously didn't even bother telling Wormtail, because he wouldn't understand my worries anyways. But, what about jobs and everything? What if they have a – " you hear his throat catch "- a kid or something? How will they support themselves? Sirius doesn't even know what he fucking wants to be!"

You stir in his lap, and you feel him stop touching your hair for a second, and then start up again.

"Marlene wants to be a healer," you quietly tell him, blinking your eyes open a bit.

"What do you want to be?" he suddenly turns his attention back to you, and you grin into the covers.

"I have no bloody idea. Maybe I'll work for the Ministry."

"Yeah, I think I'll end up doing that. Maybe something in the Ministry of Transportation. My dad has some contacts in the Persian Traffic Co-operation section where I could get a job."

"So your job title would be 'James Potter, Persian Magical Traffic Planning Co-operation Executive'?" you ask, letting out a peal of giggles into the carpet, a wry grin forming on his face.

"Funny. I guess so. But probably not that fancy, Flower."

You two stew in comfortable silence for a couple of seconds, and you nearly fall asleep until he quietly starts talking again, you still wrapped around his midsection, him still resting against the headboard.

"Are you ever scared, Flower?"

You don't reply, but merely sleepily murmur nonsense at him, your head sinking into the covers. He bends and kisses the top of your head, but you shoo him off with a weak wave of your hand, and he quietly laughs.

"You know that I'll always protect you, Flower, even if you don't want me to."

You dryly reply, "I know. It's not like I have a choice."

"That's my Flower," he says, leaning his head back against the headboard. You ignore the twinge of pleasure that courses through your stomach at his words, and concentrate on your steady breathing and his proximity.

A couple minutes later, when you are certain that he is asleep, you mumble "G'night, James," under your breath, not realizing that his heavy-lidded eyes crank open to hear your words, and a small smile is painted across his face.

"G'night … Flower."

And you hear his voice and the nickname he gives you, but you can't find the energy to correct him. And maybe you like the way he gives you that nickname? But no, you rationalize in your head, slowly drifting off to sleep. It's just that you're too tired to care.

...

Right?