He was annoyed at her. The anger in his stomach bubbled menacingly and he had to stop himself from reaching for his wand and hexing her into oblivion. It was hard to face reality, really, how he was feeling this sort of feeling instead of his usual undying love for the girl. But here, he was hugely pissed off at her.

"Lily." he said shortly, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He tried to make his tone friendly, but he ended up sounding even colder than he'd intended.

She looked up.

"James." she greeted.

"I need to talk to you." he was struggling not to speak too loudly.

"Go ahead." she turned around so he was looking directly into her stunning, bright emerald eyes. It threw him off for a second, but he regained feeling once she blinked.

"How thick are you?"

"I'm sorry?" her tone dropped to levels of iciness which scared him slightly. He knew deep down that this was stupid and dangerous, he was the thick one for challenging her at an argument.

"Taking on Avery, Mulciber and Snape all by yourself?" he shoved his hands in his pockets to stop them from shaking, "Pretty stupid decision if you ask me."

"Well, I wasn't asking you, Potter! And in case you didn't notice, Alice Longbottom was lying in front of them in a pool of blood!"

He shivered. He'd heard about Alice's extensive injuries and he'd just thanked the lord that they weren't Lily's injuries. Although, due to her ridiculous intervening the odds of that happening were pretty high.

"Three against one, Lily! Do you realise how dangerous that is?"

"Oh, would you look at this. The noble, heroic, superstar James Potter is telling me not to save someone in need." her laugh was like cold water, "What a plot twist!"

"I'm not – I – for gods sake! I'm trying to protect you here. You could have easily joined Alice on the floor!"

"I can manage myself. Besides, Severus doesn't hex me and you know that."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?" he asked, "That just because one of them still fancies you from six years ago that I should just let you run into danger like that?"

"You're being absolutely ridiculous!" she shouted, "What would you have done if that was Remus or Sirius or Peter in the middle?"

"That's different -"

"How the hell is it any different?"

James was silent. Words threatened to spill out his tightly pursed lips. He pushed a hand through his unkempt hair and adjusted his glasses, watching her tightly fold her arms.

"It just … is."

"What is the point, then? Why don't I just glue myself to you and declare myself your third arm? You'd like that. I'd be with you all the time."

"Lily! This isn't a joke!"

"I know it's not. Because Alice is in the hospital wing right now with such a bad concussion she hasn't spoken in two days!"

"That could have been you!"

"What do you expect me to do? Walk past her and let them nearly kill her? Just incase you haven't noticed, I saved her. Hexed the bastards until they couldn't walk straight!"

"Lily ..." he almost begged.

"You know that you would've done the same."

He said nothing.

"That's what I thought, Potter." she turned around and began to stamp away, auburn hair flying out behind her.

XXXX

James waited up for her. His head was nodding and his eyes were heavy, but he kept himself awake and sat up until she would walk through the portrait hole.

Lily didn't come to the common room until late that night, much to his annoyance.

"Lily." he started the second she walked in.

"Oh. Here to tell me that I shouldn't be out so late?" her green eyes sharpened.

"No." he shook his head, "I'm not."

"Then what?"

"I wanted to apologise, I guess –" he swallowed, moving forwards so he was closer to her, " - for all of that. It's just those those lot are so disgusting, and if anything happened to you then I'd feel so bad. It would be all my fault, and not only would I get expelled for killing all of them, you'd be hurt like Alice is right now – and I couldn't have that. Seriously, Lily, Snivellus and Mulciber and Avery – I'm not kidding, I wouldn't need a wand to knock them out -" he breathed deeply, "If you were in the hospital wing and I couldn't visit you, I'd go insane – I care about you too much to let you do that, that's all -"

"James." she stopped him. He breathed a sigh of relief that she wasn't calling him 'Potter' any more.

"What?"

"Apology accepted." she put a hand on his chest, her fingers gripping his tie.

"Really?" he asked, relieved.

"But you have to let me defend myself. It's extremely noble and everything, but also extremely irritating. I can't let you be my bodyguard. They'll think I'm weak."

"You aren't weak."

"Exactly. When you aren't with me they'll find more reason to get me, won't they?"

He nodded as her fingers curled around his shirt, pulling him down to her height. He had to bend his knees quite an amount, but it didn't matter because she pressed her lips against his for one second before letting go.

"If they hurt you, though, Lily … promise you'll say something."

"I promise. And they won't hurt me. I've already given them a taste of what I can do today."

"I love you." he said suddenly.

She was only slightly taken aback, instead smiling widely and showing her teeth, "I love you too."

And she pulled herself up and wrapped her legs around his waist, to kiss her boyfriend out of his senses.