He was late. Totally, completely and infuriatingly late. 'Mr. I-can-do-anything-and-everyone-will-still-love-me' James Potter was late. I knew he was not Head Boy material. Did I express my concerns to Professor Dumbledore? Indeed I did. Did he care? No, he did not. "Mr. Potter possesses many qualities that have not yet surfaced Miss. Evans. Yada yada blah blah blah." And yet here we are today. Me, standing by a fifty-foot tree I have to decorate by tomorrow morning, and no James.

Grumbling to myself, I went to unwrap the various ornaments I would be hanging on the branches of the famous Hogwarts tree. See, this is the problem. Famous Hogwarts tree. If all the students wake up tomorrow and there is no enormous tree towering over them, there will be some issues.

When McGonagall first approached me about my duty as Head Girl to decorate the Great Hall with various snowflakes and whatnot, I thought it would be a fun time. I always loved decorating my Christmas tree at home, so why not? Right? Wrong. It will take at least 4 hours for me to decorate this, not to mention I'm doing it by myself.

I picked up an enormous red and gold ornament (got to start with my house colours, right?) and hung it on the tree. I had done about half of the tree when- can you believe it? James finally decided to show. Running into the Great Hall and the whole dramatic debacle.

"Evans! Christ Evans I'm so sorry I'm late." He panted.

Hm.

Well.

"And where were you, Potter?"

"I was on my way when I ran into McGonaga-"

"I hope you realize nothing you can say will make it okay." I snapped. I'm sorry, but I was angry. I was cold and tired and not in the mood for his antics.

"Lily if you'd just listen-" Hah! Listen! Not bloody likely. So I may have unceremoniously chucked an ornament at him. Sue me.

We worked in silence for a while. Well, I worked. I'm pretty Potter was attempting to charm the Slytherin ornaments red and gold. Until, the git started humming. Yeah, humming. It started off pretty quiet, but soon enough he was singing. Singing.

"When we finally kiss goodnight, something something something something something. La la lalalalalalaaa"

Despite myself, I smiled. My first mistake.

"What?" Asked James.

"Your singing is atrocious."

"Excuse-me! I thought I was pretty good." He smirked.

"Good for killing off innocent children, yes."

"Ouch. Harsh words, Evans. Well, I'd like to see you do better!"

"Fine then." There goes my mouth, blabbering with no permission. Which brings us to problem #2. I can't sing! Curse you uncontrollable desire to accept whatever challenge may be thrown in my direction.

I cleared my throat. "I'm dreaming, of a white Christmas." I cringed internally. One would think their voice would improve as life progressed. One was wrong. As my face turned into a fiery red ball of embarrassment, I stole a glance at James, ready for whatever insult he had prepared for me. What I saw was, well, not expected. He was smiling. Not the 'ha-I-am-so-much-better-than-you-go-on-bask-in-my-glory' kind of smile you'd expect from James, but more of a 'wow-I'm-a-nice-person-who-is-genially-impressed-by-your-singing' kind of smile. Which I must admit, was different form the James Potter I knew. I hate different.

"Wow, Lily. I didn't know you could sing." Hold on, Lily? He doesn't call me Lily! He calls me Evans and I call him Potter. End of story.

"Evans." I corrected.

"Pardon?"

"You call me Evans. Only my friends call me Lily." I continued to decorate the tree.

"Oh come on. We're practically adults! We work together! Don't you think it's time to ditch the surnames?"

"No." Stubborn, thy name is Lily Evans.

Still red as a beet, I picked up a large yellow ornament and levitated it near the top of the tree. Just then, I heard a crash.

"POTTER! What was that?"

A guilty face emerged from behind a large branch. "Nothing! Christ Lily, calm yourself." He smirked.

"Merlin! If you call me Lily one more time, I swear I will-"

"You know, your kind of cute when you get angry." Ah there he was. The old Potter who would unceremoniously flirt with me any chance he got just to humiliate me. After that, I just kind of lost it.

"STOP IT!" I yelled, "Just stop! Don't call me Lily, don't call me cute, just don't.. don't talk to me. Just stop."

His entire being just sort of, well, drooped. His shoulders slumped, and his smirk dropped. But only for a second. Immediately he regained his cool composure, shrugged and turned away from me.

"Christ, Evans. Cool off."

That quick slump, those sad eyes I saw for only a second haunted me for the next half hour.

See the thing with James, is that you love him and hate him at the same time. For me, the meter was turned a little closer to the love side, but I absolutely could not have him know that. I could not let him know that his smarmy fake flattery had gotten to me, like the rest of the female Hogwarts population. At the same time, every little thing he does infuriates me. Whether he terrorizes a student, or drops his quill, it all makes me want to strangle him. And the hair. Oh the hair! His stupid bloody hand lives on his head, I swear! But at the same time, I wouldn't say no to brushing those luscious locks-. No, no. Stop it Lily! Be better than that. Be better then James. Phew, Okay, sanity recollected. Sorry about that.

I couldn't like James. I just couldn't. Absolutely not. I have my whole life planned out, and he does not fit. He's just so, unreliable. Unpredictable, un-a lot of things. Not to mention he's been trying to humiliate me with strange Hogsmeade proposals since I was thirteen. You know, the first time I thought he was genuine. I politely told him no thank you like a proper young lady and went on my merry way. The second time went the same. The third, well, let's just say his skin colour changed a bit. Okay, changed a lot. Alright, changed purple. It's not my fault he decided to ask me out by showing off his hexing skills on Snape.

Maybe, well, maybe I didn't need to yell at James. Maybe I overreacted. Oh, I overreacted, didn't I? But I'm Lily! I overreact! It's what I do! I can't help it! Although, maybe I could apologize. A tiny little 'I'm sorry' hasn't killed anyone, yet. Ok, Lily. You can do this. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

"Potter?"

No reply. Ok, I see how it is.

"James Potter!" I tried again, with a little more force.

His head poked out from behind the tree.

"You bellowed?" He smirked.

"Yes. Well. You see. I may have-, er, I mean. Sometimes my temper gets ahead of me. And by that I mean, well, I'm an angry kind of person. And-" Oh bugger. Articulate, thy name is certainly not Lily Evans. Meh, I never said talking was my strong suit. "What I'm trying to say is, I'm sorry. For yelling, I mean." I looked away, my face hot.

"Lily Evans, apologizing? That's something I haven't heard." He said dryly.

"You know, I'm trying to do a nice thing here. If you don't want my apology you can shove it up your arse."

"Relax. I'm joking. I accept your apology. Thanks, Evans." He smiled. That nice smile again. Maybe I could… yeah.

"Lily."

"Pardon me?"

"I was thinking. Maybe you should call me Lily. We're almost adults, and we work together. I think it's time we ditch the surnames." I mimicked.

His eyes lit up in recognition behind his glasses.

"Where have I heard that before?" He smirked.

"Haven't the foggiest." I told him.

He laughed. So did I. We laughed like a right pair of loons. I don't really know why, I mean, there was nothing all that funny. Maybe it was the tension we had just gotten rid of.

"And so Peter was left in the passage way for the whole night!" James finished.

I burst into laughter. We had been at it for the last hour. You wouldn't believe how many stories that boy has. I swear, whatever I say, he has a story to go with it. Before I knew it, we had gone through the various boxes of ornaments for the tree.

"The star." I muttered softly. Always my favourite part.

"Pardon?" James asked.

"All that is left is the star. For the tree." I motioned to the top of the pine. "I used to fight my sister for it. It was always the best part of Christmas."

"Well, I'm sure you'll have a lovely time watching me put it up." He smiled.

"Absolutely not!" I shrieked. "Mine!" I clutched the large glass star to my chest possessively.

"Let's make a deal. We'll put it up together." He suggested.

"Well, I suppose." I grumbled. James just laughed.

We levitated the star to the top of the tree. As it settled on the top branch, I flicked my wand, and all the lights turned on.

"Wow." I breathed. It was pretty impressive.

"Wow, indeed." He agreed.

I looked at him. I guess James Potter wasn't all that bad of a bloke.

"Thanks for helping, I guess."

He smirked. "You guess, eh?"

"I'm serious. You're not so bad James Potter."

"Oh yeah? How'd you figure that one out?" He asked, dryly.

"Well, I mean, once you stopped asking me out to humiliate me in front of the entire Hogwarts population, your inner goodness shone through your macho exterior." I joked.

"Wait, what?" He croaked. James wasn't smiling. "You think I asked you out to humiliate you?"

"Well, yeah. That was your intention, wasn't it? You can't have possibly wanted to go out with me." I was slightly confused now.

"Shit. Shit. Fucking shit." He muttered.

"Er, James?" I asked timidly.

"You thought it was a joke? You thought I was making fun of you?"

"You were. Weren't you?"

"Fuck. You have no idea, do you?"

"I'm sorry James. I'm a little lost here."

"You have no idea how much I fancied you." He said through clenched teeth.

"Fancied me?" I laughed. The idea was so ludicrous. When I saw he was in no way kidding, I stopped laughing.

"James, what are you saying?"

"Wait, if you knew I was serious, would you have said yes?"

I hesitated. "Well…" Whatever hope was in his eyes had immediately extinguished.

"I mean, you were a bit full of yourself, and…"

He was quiet. Then his shoulders started to shake. Before I knew it, he was full on laughing. I couldn't help but smile. Soon I joined right in and laughed until I was wiping tears from my eyes.

"You are one strange bird, Lily Evans."

"How so?"

"I mean, here I am thinking 'I'm an idiot' and that my life was over, when I realized how ridiculous this whole thing really was. I'm not even mad anymore. You have this quality, to make every bad thing seem insignificant. Like I said, strange."

"Well, I'm glad." I told him. "You know, maybe, maybe I could, you know."

"Could what?"

"Yes."

"Yes?"

"Yes." I repeated. "Yes I'll go to Hogsmeade with you."

"Lily, are you asking me out?" He smirked.

"No. I am simply accepting a previous invitation."

"You're totally asking me out."

"No I am not!"

"Alright, alright. Think what you want." He laughed. Git. "So what changed your opinion?"

"I don't know. After realizing the pitiful amount of effort you put into asking me out, the least I can do is go on one date."

"HEY! I was not pitiful!"

"Hmm."

"I resent that."

"Alright." HA! My turn to smirk.

We continued our banter all the way to the common room. When we got to the fork between our respective stairways I turned to him.

"Well, good night Lily." He said awkwardly.

I leaned over to kiss his cheek. "Merry Christmas Eve." I told him.

"Merry Christmas Eve." He repeated.

I couldn't help myself, and gave him a quick hug before bounding up the stairs to bed.

All in all, it wasn't a bad night. I actually enjoyed myself in James Potter's company. Hah! Christmas really is full of surprises.

Written for Jily Secret Santa. Merry Christmas Katie!