A/N: I don't...I don't even know.
It's been five years since he last saw her. Five years, to the day, since she walked away. And now she's here, dressed in a gown of emerald green, on the arm of his enemy.
His hand clenches into a fist around the glass of wine as he glares at the floor. This is all his mother's fault - it is her ridiculous notion that 24 is far too old to be single and that he ought to find a nice young woman to settle down with that founded this soiree. The Potter ballroom is brimming with the eligible bachelorettes of wizarding high society, but he only has eyes for her.
Why did she captivate him so? She'd made it very clear that she wanted nothing to do with him on their last meeting, that she was going away to France with her fiancé and he'd better not try to contact her - so why had she come back? She had obviously left because the war - her husband (for surely they were married by now) whisking them off to the safety of foreign lands, and of course, it was him that had brought them back, of course. No doubt he controlled everything about her.
Shaking his head to rid himself of her influence, the man sets his glass down on a passing house-elf's tray and sweeps onto the ballroom floor. The musicians strike up a lively tune, and soon the majority of the attendees are dancing.
He's not quite sure how, but they end up in each other's arms. Her red hair is contained in an updo, speckled with pearls, and he remembers how it used to flow freely down her back when they were in school. Her elegant dress is modest, made of velvet, making him wonder where the brazen gowns of their teenage years have gone.
Yet it is her eyes that surprise him the most. Their color - a bright, bright green, - is dulled, their laughing sparkle missing, a hungry, searching look about them. He wonders where the vivacious, happy girl that he knew is, because this woman in front of him is not her.
"James," she states, finally looking up.
"Lily." It's not a question, though he has so many to ask her.
She nods, and then her face crumples. It's the first sign of emotion he's seen from her all night, the first ray of hope that the Lily he knew does still exist.
"Look, is there somewhere we can - "
"Follow me." James cuts her off, and leads her out a set of double glass doors, onto a balcony. "Lily - "
Suddenly she's on him, fingers clutching, vulture-like, to his shoulders, tears that she hasn't let fall for five years soaking into his best dress robes. Somehow, his hands find their way to awkwardly pat her back. He has no idea how to do this - the only way he knows her is when they're screaming at each other or fucking. This is a new side to her, something he doubts she shows anyone - except for him.
And then he knows everything's going to be all right. She loves him, he knows that, and it feels as if a weight he didn't know was there has been lifted. They are going to make this work, together, somehow. They may make a dysfunctional, fucked-up couple, but they're each other's and that's what matters.