Lily Evans was just there. Just there, at the table in the darkest of the Common Room corners, head in arms. Head in arms, utterly vulnerable and utterly absorbed in the symptoms of her head cold. And James, two feet away and too carefree for his own good at this particular moment in time, was unsure of what to do.
And so James did what any boy of sixteen would do, should he come across the girl he fancied more than any other utterly absorbed in the symptoms of her head cold.
He turned around and ran towards the portrait hole.
Fled, would be a more appropriate word.
He fled to the kitchens, where his tickling of the pear more resembed abuse and his request for chicken noodle soup may or may not have come out as a dying gasp.
His journey back was a balancing act appropriate to one in a circus act of amazing heights. His clambouring through the portrait hole was something akin to a Roman General, returning triumphant to parade through the streets. And his placing of the bowl silently before her was done with a smug sort of satisfaction in one's own work.
She didn't look up.
James stood there a moment, and tried to think of something to say. Something caring and nice. Something a toerag would not say. But he couldn't, and so instead he poked her arm lightly and said, "Evans. Soup."
She looked up at him, red-nosed and puffy-eyed and flushed and crackle-voiced. She looked at the soup, warm and hearty and about half as full as it had been upon leaving the kitchens. She smiled at him. "That just might be the nicest thing you've said all year."
And so James did what any boy of sixteen would do. He grinned, turned, and sauntered back to his place before the fire, challenging all takers to a game of Gobstones as he went.