Assignment 12: Gardening 3: Task 3: A Pond - Write about someone fishing.
...
Lily is putting sunflowers in a vase at the center of the table when James comes home, kissing her on the cheek.
"Hello, beautiful," he says easily.
She smiles back. "Dinner's almost ready," she says. "Get cleaned up."
He grins, bright and easy, and whistles as he makes his way into the bedroom.
Lily knows there's a war on, but it's moments like these where she can almost forget it. It's moments like these where she loves her husband and her job and her home, and the world seems like sunshine.
James comes back into the dining room just as she's setting the last pan down. He wraps his arms around her waist and she turns, smiling up at him.
He kisses her, soft and sweet, and she wants to crystalize this moment in amber and keep it forever.
She knows she can't, so instead she pulls away and takes a seat, waiting for him to do the same.
"How would you feel about fishing with my dad?" she asks as she scoops herself a pile of mashed potatoes.
"I'm pretty sure he hates me," James says, because he's weirdly insecure about this and only this. She still remembers the way he looked when waiting to meet her father for the first time — twitching with nerves, convinced it would go poorly.
She rolls her eyes. James says this every time. "He loves you. He's just… not a very effusive man."
"He never says a word to me!"
"He doesn't say much to anyone, hun."
"I don't know how to deal with that," James whines.
Lily narrows her eyes. "James, come on. We haven't seen him in a while, and…" She sighs. The truth is, she's thinking about the fact that there is a war, no matter how much she wants to ignore it, and if something happens to her… well. Fishing with her father is the least she can do.
James reads it on her face. She doesn't even need to say it.
"I still say they need to know," he says. The argument is familiar, well worn. But Lily can't bear to tell her parents about the war. She wants to keep them safe. She wants to keep them out of it.
"I'm not telling them, James. And it's my decision."
He sighs. "It is. But what if… Lily, people are torturing Muggles. I know you don't want to think about—"
"The answer is no, James. Drop it."
His eyes meet hers, and she knows he means well but she can't.
He looks down, cutting his chicken.
She sighs heavily. It doesn't feel like a victory.
"Will you go fishing?"
James breathes out without looking at her. "Sure, Lily," he says, and that doesn't feel like a victory either.
…
The lake that her father likes to fish on is small and usually quite abandoned. Today, the only evidence of anyone but them having every been there is a crumbling sandcastle on the one small patch of sandy shore.
The world is quiet out here.
The three of them take up the full length of her father's narrow fishing boat, each on a bench to themselves. Lily makes James sit in the middle, though he gives her a look of terror at the thought.
He's wrong, though. Her father really doesn't hate him. He's just never been verbose in his affections. He's a quiet man, a fan of the simple things. Quite the opposite of James, really, but Lily loves them both.
She gives James the closed-face reel, hoping it will be easier to learn to cast with. She takes an open-face for herself, deftly hooking a worm on the end and changing out the bobber for a sinker.
The motions are familiar, soothing. Nostalgic, in a way. She is reminded of soft summer days spent in this same boat, the silence peaceful and the skies pale grey.
James watches her hook the worm with a grimace. She grins wryly, and hooks his as well.
She pitches her voice low and soft as she teaches him the motions of casting his pole out into the water, waiting for the bobber to dip under or the pole to meet resistance, and then setting the hook and reeling it in.
When she looks over, her father is smiling at them, his wrinkled, craggy face lined with joy and Lily knows that she will not have forever but at least she has right now. At least she has this image of her father's face split with joy, her husband beside her.
She hands the pole over to James. His fist cast drops into the lake a mere foot from the boat, and she cannot quite stifle her giggle. His face is the picture of disappointment.
"Try again, love," she says, flicking her pole out and watching the bait sail out in front of her.
He scowls at her easy success, but the smile is fond.
She smiles back and then feels the tug on her line. She pulls back, setting the hook, and reels the fish in with a small fight. It tugs her line left and right, but in the end she triumphs, pulling a small blue-green fish into the boat.
James stares at her, wide-eyed.
She smiles.
In the end, it takes James half an hour and two lost fish before he pulls his first fish into the boat. He doesn't care that it's maybe six centimeters long; he smiles like the sun.
Writing Month: 886
Dragons: 886
Seasonal: Days of the Year:World Ocean Day: Write a story that takes place in, on, or under the water. / Summer Prompts: (object) Sandcastle / Colour Prompts: blue-green / Element: Pairing: James/Lily / Shay's Musical Challenge: The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee - write about being forced to do something / Gryffindor Themed Prompts: James, Lily
World Cup: For Switzerland, James
Disney: S2: In Summer - Write a story set in summer. / Buttons: O4: Sunflower / Lyric Alley: 6. But we're stuck floating in between
Sherlock: emotion: insecure
Insane House: Location: Godric's Hollow
Funfair: Amber's Hook a Ship (East): (word) sandcastle / Bumper Cars (Southern): "They need to know." / Balloon Wall (North): Object: vase