Word Count: 718
Summary: The air in the room is clearer than it has ever been and in this moment of clarity, Alice wishes she was back in the chokehold.
Author's Note: Written for Static Lull at the Drabble Request Thread at the HPFC. Different format on this one, I guess I just wanted to try something new. I know I owe you updates on chaptered fics- I have half-term next week so hopefully I'll update them then. I really, really hope you like this one. It's an obscure pairing but don't worry, it'll all turn out canon in the end. Feedback is appreciated.
the chokehold
for Static Lull
Alice can't remember a time that she wasn't going out with Frank and best friends with Lily. It's like, before them, she didn't even exist; like without them, she wouldn't now.
This thought is running through her head as she follows James Potter, the boyfriend of her very best friend, through dark halls and into even darker classrooms.
(The Queen of Hearts is tired of the King and the Joker is the only card unplayed.)
-
Frank has crystal clear blue eyes. Sharing looks with Frank is different than sharing them with James. Frank's eyes are clear and show everything, they tell her he's in love with her and will be forever without him even having to voice the words (but every day he does).
James' eyes are intoxicating pools that can harden in an instant and barricade her forever, or soften and drag her deeper within. She can't tell anything from his eyes (and he won't voice anything either).
-
Lily and James are the most beautiful couple anyone has ever seen. Dorcas and Remus and Peter and Frank jabber on about it all the time and she's sure that if Sirius wanted to show that he cared then he would too.
Of course, Lily is beautiful, in her lily-white hands and her orange hair, and James is as well, in his confidence mixed with his one vulnerability that everyone can see (that Lily will never love him as he does her) which just makes you think he's beautiful even if he's just a lanky kid with glasses and a bad hair cut.
Alice can see past vulnerabilities and confidence, though. She knows that James isn't beautiful, but she can see past that, too.
-
She isn't in love. She knows that it would be stupid seeing as they're just using each other. James needs someone to be himself with until Lily loves him for who he is and not just what he makes himself around her. Sometimes Alice likes this because it means she's the only person that knows the real James Potter. And then she remembers that he's just testing himself on her.
Alice just needs a bit of excitement. Something to tide her over until she has to marry Frank and play the wife.
(James knows this and has to pretend it doesn't hurt, for both their sake's.)
-
Kissing James is like breathing dust. It makes her breath catch in her throat and her head spin and everything falls away until her legs can't support her and it's James' strong hands on her waist that are holding her up. Even her eyes leak a little but at least that she can control by keeping the lids tight shut as she tries to memorise the feeling of James' lips on hers and the smell of his dark hair.
-
And then Lily tells James that yes, she does love him after all and that isn't everything just dandy? The look on James' face is pure glee and as they come back into the common room together Alice is there to see it. He doesn't look at her in the soul-searching way he usually does but in the way of Lily's boyfriend telling Lily's best friend that after two months, just two months, of being in a relationship with Lily that Lily has told him that Lily loves him. (Is it just Alice or is everything, always about Lily?)
Alice recieves half a hug from James and a big hug from Lily and then Frank loops his arm around her back and everyone is happyhappyhappy. She knows full well that everything will go back to normal now: it will be FrankandAlice and JamesandLily and unlike in games you can't trade cards, and Jokers don't play.
The air in the room is clearer than it has ever been and in this moment of clarity, Alice wishes she was back in the chokehold.