A/N: yeah this is short and it hit me at about 4 a.m. last night when I couldn't sleep.Maybe I might expand it someday, who knows?
Disclaimer: Nothing's mine
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A life without regrets is a beautiful thing but seldom does one live such a life.
There are far too many moments, often very minute details, one wishes one could have changed.
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When James started liking Lily, Remus could tell. He kept it quiet for a short while and then made it very obvious…a very James thing to do.
It became inescapable at the point when the boy actually asked Remus what he could do to get her attention given that Remus knew her better. At least that was something understood between them.
Remus however flatly declined to help James at this point, in this department alone. That was a decision he still does not regret making. It was one of the things he would not call a mistake, even now, after so many had been made.
His justification for not doing so, however, was so convincing that even James could not poke holes in it.
Remus had simply stated that if James wanted to attain Lily, he would have to do so on his own because Lily deserved someone genuine, someone who put all his own efforts into her. By helping him, he would take that away, and because Lily was too good a friend to mislead like that, he would not betray that friendship.
"Friendship." James had repeated. "That's all it is, right?"
Remus had taken this two ways and even now he's not dead certain about which way James had meant the question although he would put more money on the second. Either James was challenging the proverbial friendship or, the more likely possibility, James was challenging him…his feelings for Lily, at least. Perhaps not even challenging, but simply checking, checking to maybe not interfere had Remus felt something beyond friendship for the girl in question.
James being James did not notice the long pause before the other boy's answer or the slight quiver in his voice when he finally gave one.
And Remus being Remus, regardless of how James may have aimed the question, said yes.
In retrospect, Remus realizes, that may have been his first mistake.
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end