The thing is, ever since the start it's been like they've been racing against some clock, something with invisible hands and numbers but undeniably there, nonetheless. They start dating and Lily tries on James's glasses before he has the chance to react. Some things just have priority.
They slot onto her face and she blinks, taken aback by the blur that fights against the magnification, and James grins at the sight.
The second hand starts silently ticking.
-
Sometimes, days feel like dreams - the sun too bright, colours super-saturated, everything emphasised. Movie-screen sharp, except with the safe, secure barrier of a lather-rinse-repeat routine he loves, the edges can't reach him.
-
They lie on the top of the Astronomy tower, and Lily doesn't remember the last time she was this cold. She doesn't really care, as she tiptoes her fingertips up James's arm, watches the stars, says, "Are you wishing?"
The specks of light are reflected in Jame's glasses as Lily twists to look at him. "Maybe," he says, smiles sort of sheepishly, and adds, "okay, okay, I totally am. But you're trying to figure out the second star to the right, right?"
"Maybe." Lily can't stop the grin from spreading across her face, and her hang stops moving, curls around James's fingers instead.
"You've got stars in your eyes, though," he tells her, grin even wider, sees the corners of Lily's eyes crinkle.
She doesn't say anything in reply, but James isn't really expecting her to; he isn't expecting the kiss, either, though, clumsy and brief, but he's not surprised. It doesn't make it unwelcome, in any sense of the word, and he tightens his grip on Lily's arm slightly because he doesn't want to let go.
-
Lily isn't porcelain, and James can push and push; she never breaks. Never even starts to crack, even when time starts to catch up with them, trying to seep between them from the edges.
-
When someone is looking for James, they come to find Lily first, if they don't know where he'll be. They expect them to be together, like it's something normal, natural.
It gives him, just that alone, (almost as much as the rush of the Quidditch final, his last game) a twist of his stomach, the rapid thudthudthud of his heart.
-
They stay up together to watch the sunrise one morning, just because they can; it feels like they're the only two people in the world.
"Me and you, girl," James says, because he can, and Lily just laughs, smile bright even in the watery rays of a six a.m sun.
-
The sky looks like it stretches on for an eternity of sun and summer, crystal clear blue. "You and me," James says, "we can have this," and their hands entwine in too-green grass, this means forever and it almost doesn't taste like a lie (he has no idea why it still does, because he's trying) as it rolls off the tip of his tongue.
-
If it's a dream, James doesn't exactly want to wake up.
-
Sirius says, one day, "James, do you know what you're doing?" It's another one of those impossibly hot days, where the air seems to shimmer, and Sirius is irritable, ill-tempered from the heat, sleeves rolled up, trying to look concerned.
"Padfoot," James grins, just grins, because he knows what it usually means when Sirius wears his concerned eyes, but he feels too far away from all of that now. Like it can't touch him. "Do I ever?"
And the answer is no, always no, and something deep inside of him that the sun can't touch wonders when that will start to become a problem.
"Dude, don't worry," James adds.
And he means it, for the most part.
-
Most nights when she can't sleep, Lily tries to write it out, empty herself of her thoughts so she can maybe manage to be tired, but the summer feels too hot for that. While they're still at school, she'll sometimes go and find James instead, who is sometimes awake and always ready to be, if she needs him.
She tiptoes up the staircase, knocks tentatively, not wanting to wake anyone else. James answers (knows to answer, really, by now) with bleary eyes and sleep scruffy hair, without glasses and looking like he just woke up, but when Lily offers to leave and let him sleep, he shakes his head. "Don't b-be stupid," he says, a yawn breaking through the words, and he sits with her in the common room, the same room they've spent the last seven years of their life in.
They end up curled together on the couch, just fitting. Lily's eyes get heavier, and heavier, her blinks longer, and James's breathing is already sleep steady when he whispers secrets into her collarbone, pleas: "Hold onto this forever," and, "don't forget it," and, "let's just keep going, please."
He yawns, eventually, lets his eyes stay shut, soft and warm with Lily's elbow digging slightly into his ribs. "Promise."
-
"Promise," Lily whispers, by means of waking James up in the morning, before people start moving in and around. James is sleepily startled, had thought she was asleep, that she couldn't hear him; it makes something twist, sharp in the pit of his stomach, and it's hard to manage a smile in return, like the corners of his mouth are too heavy, weighed down (and he still can't work out why).
-
He grabs the mini-calendar from his room, rips out the last month of term (of the school year, of NEWTs, of this) and shreds it.
-
"We can have this," James says, endless sky stretching around them. They're lying and staring up, out into eternity, and it almost doesn't feel like a lie.
-
a/n: to the kids who review my crappy stories and call me out on my stupid mistakes – thank you.
to the kids that I can't go a day without talking to – I couldn't love you less if I tried. I know I say 'I love you' a lot, but I mean it every time. you're what every greatest hit has ever been about. thankyouthankyouthankyou for sticking around.