He'd always hidden it well, his secret collection; it resided in a very nondescript wooden box in his room, by his text books. Anything he came across at school was hidden in a sock, shoved to the bottom of his trunk – but he never did come across much during term-time.

James Potter collected coins; not wizarding currency – he wasn't a complete loser – but Muggle money, in all its different variations. It had started when he was seven, visiting his Uncle Alphonse who lived in Italy. The elderly warlock had shown his little nephew his collection of lire – so different from the huge, glittering Galleons and bronze Knuts. James had been fascinated; a coin worth one thousand lire? Magical. Just the fact that their currency changed from country-to-country was enough to blow seven year-old James' mind.

Since then he had saved his Muggle money after his family holidays, not bothering to go to Gringotts and exchange it for his day-to-day golds, bronzes and silvers. Instead the coins were slipped into his box.

Really, James didn't look at the assortment he had amassed over the years very often. Yet when he did, he felt a childhood sense of excitement – juvenile and silly, but thrilling all the same. That nostalgic sense of realising that there's so much out there to do; you'll never manage it all but it's out there waiting for you anyway. It excited him, although he'd never admit that to anyone.

In fact, it was not just the coins and notes themselves that he had hoarded over the years. He'd managed to accumulate a fair amount of knowledge as well, about when various currencies had changed and certain momentous historic occasions – but only if they'd had a special coin produced in their honour. Mr and Mrs Potter had been quite impressed with their son's contributions to the village quiz that they had dragged him along to.

However, James' collection remained a very well-kept secret. No one knew about it, not even Sirius – or rather, James thought, especially not Sirius – who would have given his best friend hell, if he'd found out about his "poncy" hobby. In fact, James was so studious about concealing his covert hoarding that it's quite a miracle that he should have forgotten to hide his precious box on such a significant day: Lily Evans' first visit to the Potter house.

After touring the whole of the rest of the house and the gardens (and once James' parents had stopped gawking and retreated to the living room to analyse his girlfriend), Lily was finally allowed into James' room. She was quietly impressed; it wasn't the Quidditch-poster-covered-pit that she had, perhaps somewhat disdainfully, expected.

Instead it was quite tastefully decorated (although, credit where it's due, Lily suspected Mrs Potter had given a fair amount of input into the décor) with pale blue walls and modest, but quite clearly expensive, oak furniture. There were lots of pictures around, mostly of James with his Marauder mates but Lily was pleased to spot one of her right on his bedside table.

James really should have thought to conceal his box of coins, he realised as she finally found his secret sitting innocently on the bookshelf; he knew what she was like. Lily Evans was one of the nosiest people he knew and it was a facet of her personality that he abused quite a lot – James realised that the humiliation he was about to receive could be considered karma for this. Whenever Lily annoyed him, or got sarky with him, James would simply withhold information. It didn't matter what the information was, Lily just despised not being in the know.

All the times he had deliberately teased his girlfriend were racing through James' mind as he watched her open up the casket and begin to paw through its contents. He waited for the inevitable barrage of laughing questions and well-meaning mockery to begin. She surprised him.

"I didn't know you'd visited Peru," Lily mused as she turned to face James, rolling the small sol between her fingers. "I've always wanted to go – was it fun?"

James was slightly taken aback but instead of questioning her, he just responded, "Yeah, I really liked it there. My parents weren't all that fussed and we haven't visited South America since but I'd love to go to somewhere like Bolivia one day."

The redhead nodded thoughtfully, sitting down at the desk with the box still in her hands. She ran her fingers through the coins, making the metal click together with an almost river-like sound.

"This is really cool," Lily said, indicating the coins. "You're so lucky. I've never been abroad before; there are so many places I want to visit."

James smiled. "Never left England? That's so weird – I'd hate that. You know what, Lils, you should come down to our house in Italy; it's near the Alps and it's seriously beautiful round there. Maybe we could go near Christmas?"

Lily laughed, but her eyes were alight with enthusiasm and something akin to longing. "We could go whenever we wanted, James. No more school to hold us back now; we're here, we're out there in the big wide world now."

James' grin mirrored Lily's and he came to join her at his desk, sitting close beside her. He twirled a strand of her vibrant hair that he loved so much, around his finger.

"I wonder what's waiting for us out there, eh, Lily?"

"Let's find out."

A/N: Blahblahblahhh. Felt like doing a little L/J fluff. Procrastination for the win.

Review and let me know what you think of my work-deploying tactics?

Elle xx