Author's Note: Doing one of those prompt things. This one is the OTP Bootcamp Challenge. It may take me awhile, who knows. Life is crazy and I'm just now beginning to post stories on here. Haven't done much James x Lily ever before but they just have a lot of potential and I love it. So here's number one!

i. acrid

She can still taste it on her tongue.

smoke burning white-hot in her eyes, ashes collecting on her eyelashes, unable to move, unable to think

Her hands shake as she makes herself a cup of tea, and the hot water splashes, scalding her. She curses, quietly, but hates herself for it. After all, what's a little more pain?

all those dead bodies, snapped wands, showers of sparks, her ears ringing, and the frantic feeling when she lost sight of him in the crowd, lost him in the turmoil

She had flooed home from the Ministry as soon as the Aurors had finished identifying bodies. She had protested, when they insisted, not unkindly, that she head back and get some sleep. She knew he was safe, now. In another wing of the building, releasing curses and wrapping up bodies. Packaging the bodies of loved ones like gifts, like offerings.

"We'll tell James you're gone," one of them had said, and she'd nodded, robotically.

She swallows the acrid taste in her mouth, and bitterly wishes she could have done more.

She doesn't want to be alone tonight.

And if he hears this though, as if she's said it aloud, she hears a faint pop from the living room of her flat. She doesn't even have time to turn around before his arms are around her, smoothing down her back, smearing the ash into her clothes and he buries his face in her neck, breathing her in.

He smells of smoke and ash and blood, but also of James and she can't begin to explain how safe this makes her feel.

"How did you know I couldn't sleep?"

She asks against his shoulder, and she realizes it's the first words she's spoken since the attack began.

"Because I couldn't either."

He responds, and pulls back from her, a hand reaching up to brush her cheek. His touch is pressing, but not rough. His eyes are tired and fearful, and she finds herself unable to meet them with her own.

grey and ash and nothingness, falling and screaming and broken bodies. so many broken bodies.

"Lily." he says, tenderly, brushing a strand of hair from her face, and she finally locks her eyes on to his, a promise, and a plea all at once.

"Stay tonight," she insists, and so he does.