for kristina, who pushes me to write, and for chloe, who is modern!lily incarnate.

james is bold, lily is italics

It's three in the morning (honest-to-God three in the morning) when she is woken up by the incessant buzzing of her phone. She picks it up and the bright light very nearly blinds her, and when she reads the message she groans.

It reads:

in all honesty how big do you think the hulks dick is? like do you think it would be proportionate to his body? or what

This is unreal. It's ridiculously late (or early, depending on how you look at it), she had the worst fucking day in the history of worst fucking days and someone (she doesn't even have their number!) literally woke her up to talk about the size of The Hulk's dick. Like, she's sure that would make for some pretty stimulating conversation, but not at three in the fucking morning, and so she tells them so.

It's three in the morning, mate. Piss off.

Pretty much instantly, she gets a reply.

cmon sirius

this is a huge deal okay

So it's just a case of mistaken identity. She's been woken up from her much deserved sleep for a case of mistaken identity. She feels like punching something, but then she remembers how tired she actually is and quickly scraps the idea.

No Sirius here.

oh

sorry evans

i must have woken you up, right? im sorry

its just that my mate and I have this thing where we

crap you probably dont care

im gonna let you sleep

The phone finally stops buzzing (and thank God because she has the biggest hangover and every message feels like a punch in the face), but well. Whoever texted her is absolutely frantic and it's actually quite endearing in this strange, sleep deprived state of hers, and so she can't very well go back to sleep now, can she?

How do you have my number?

you gave it to me when we were partners for that lab project

So the elusive, mysterious, three-in-the-morning texter is Potter from her chemistry class. She doesn't know much about him, other than the fact that he's tall, that his hair is messier than hair is allowed to be, and that for some reason, he is ultimately fit as fuck. Her phone buzzes again, and when she looks at the screen, her mouth stretches into a grin.

but well, what do you think?

What do I think about what?

She's messing with him now and she knows it, but the bloke is too cocky for his own good and she's enjoying making him sweat.

the hulks dick

I don't know, mate. Discourse such as this one ought to be saved for the fine hours of the evening.

There's a few minutes of silence, opposed to the nearly on-the-spot replying from before, as though he's considering his options. Her phone buzzes and her screen lights up, and she hopes he won't take advantage of the fact that she somehow is still answering.

elaborate

It's a fairly neutral response. Not too eager, not too passive. Sort of like he's showing interest, but doesn't want to pry. And so, for some weird reason that is way beyond her control, she feels compelled to give the most personal answer thus far.

You know,

when it's eleven pm and you've had a terrible monday and so you and your mates go out for a pint and you get so sloshed you end up passing out on someone else's bathtub.

we're not talking about superheroe's genitalia anymore, are we?

Bloody fuck I should hope not

at the risk of being slightly invasive

what's wrong?

She doesn't know if she should downplay it or take the opportunity to complain freely to someone who hasn't heard the story yet. She's about to reply when she hears retching sounds, and so she puts her phone down and dashes to the shared loo to hold Mary's hair while she vomits. It's nearly four in the morning when she gets back to her room, and notices a new message on her screen.

shit, i shouldn't have asked.

No, it's cool. My flatmate puked and I held her hair back.

That's why I took so long.

Not missing a beat, as though he had been staring at the phone, anxiously awaiting her response, (Lily is a fair bit cocky as well,) potter-from-chemistry-class replies.

is she okay?

Yeah, she's better now. Thanks

oh, good

And I'm fine, by the way. It's just my sister's a prig and my best mate's a bloody berk. Also my ex showed up, and let's just say, she likes to yell.

Then, because it's late, and she's bored and lonely as fuck, (and it's not like she's about to go back to sleep when her best friend could drop dead at any minute now,) she launches herself into a story that surprisingly enough, envolves cheese, cacti, and a shattered pair of sunglasses.

you weren't kidding when you said you had the worst Monday

i mean no one deserves that

Damn fucking right you are

i could make it up to you

She'd been waiting for the typical fuckboy message ever since he asked her to "elaborate", but surprised he lasted that long, she actually considers taking him up on his offer. Only because for all his faults, he is exceedingly good-looking, and not because she has anything to prove to her sister. She has some morals. She's about to reply when she gets a new message, and when she looks at the screen, she smiles.

i meant that i could tell you a story about one of my embarassing escapades and then we'd call it even

partly so you have something to laugh about, but mostly because i have no shame and i crave attention like a monkey at a circus

He's sweet, not at all like she thought he would be, but she swears the feeling in her stomach isn't butterflies, only the lasting effects of the tequila. Still, she finds herself becoming more and more nervous, because the annoying boy who always arrives late to class is actually funny and considerate (a far cry from the people she's dated in the past), and she resents the fact that she's never bothered to get to know him before, not even after working on the labs together.

She doesn't know what she is going to say next, but her fingers seem to have a different opinion, because when she finally looks down at her phone she is hitting send.

Maybe you could tell that story over coffee? To keep the mystery and all that. Wouldn't want to leave it in writing.

yes

when are you free

She's more giddy than she has any right to be, because it's four-thirty in the morning, and she has an important lecture in less than five hours, but she doesn't care, and so calls him.

"Hi," she says, quietly, because she doesn't want to wake up Mary who only just managed to fall asleep.

"Hi." She can hear the smile on his voice, and she's glad this is as exciting for him as it is for her.