The beginning isn't all that important. It doesn't start with love or even liking and it doesn't start with the phone call or at his front door. It starts at a sketchy bar in a less than favorable part of the city. But it continues with the phone call, at his front door, and in the worn leather chairs at the nearby coffee shop. The beginning doesn't matter and it continues from there.
"Hullo?" A gruff male voice, still laced with sleep despite it being close to two in the afternoon answers the phone.
"Is this James Potter?" Asks the female caller.
After a pause the man replies, "Depends who's asking."
"Look, mate," Her tone suddenly changes from a shy prodding to something demanding, "I've called thirteen different James Potters and I have a list of at least twelve more to go through. I need to know if you're James Potter. I need to know if you're the James Potter who was at the Leaky Cauldron Bar a few weeks ago and I need to know now so we can either talk or I can call the next James Potter in the phone book. Got it?"
There's a rustling on the other end of the line and voices in the background before a different and more alert, posh sounding man answers, "Hello?"
Again, the caller asks, "Is this James Potter? The James Potter who was at the Leaky Cauldron Bar a few weeks ago?"
"Unless there was another James Potter there a few weeks ago as well, yeah, that'd be me."
A quick, "Thank god," follows the woman's heavy sigh.
"Um," James asks, "Can I ask who's calling? Because if this is about the tab I swear I paid it off-"
"No," He's quickly cut off, "This isn't about the tab. This is, um, this is Lily. Evans. We… god I don't even know if you remember this… we were together that night at the bar."
"You're the bird from the bathroom!" He exclaims, remembering her.
She sighs, "That'd be me, yeah."
She can almost hear the grin in his tone, "I gave you my number but you never called. It's been, what, two months? I am glad-"
Again she cuts him off, "Can we get together?" Her words were phrased as a question but her tone made it clear it was a demand, "For coffee or something?"
"Yeah. Sure. When's good for you?"
There's a knock at James's door and as he goes to answer it, the woman on his phone replies, "Right now."
He swings the door open to find the red-haired beauty that he kept dreaming about standing in front of him, her cell phone still up against her ear. She is the last person he expected at his door at that exact moment, despite feeling unsure about the fact that she managed to track down his address, he agrees to go out to coffee with her. A lot could be said about James Potter, but nobody could claim that he had good self-preservation skills. There's a small coffee shop only two blocks from his flat, they walk in complete silence. Every few moments they each glance toward the other, looking away when their partner catches their gaze. They don't speak between the time they order their drinks and when they move to the back corner of the shop. Both of them settle down into the worn leather chairs that are angled towards the small table between them where James places his coffee. Lily pulls her legs up and tucks them under her, resting the mug with her tea in it against her thighs.
"I'm pregnant." She doesn't say the words like a death sentence. Instead, they come out like a sigh, a weight lifted off her shoulders as she finally has someone to share the burden. The words don't sound like a death sentence, they sound like an endless list of possibilities, but not a death sentence. They probably should sound like a death sentence, they both think, but they don't.
James is so glad that he had put his coffee on the table because if he hadn't it would surely be covering the floor as he would have dropped it from shock. As it is, he's jaw is hanging loose and his eyes are wide. He gasps and tries to speak but in the end it's really just a bunch a stuttered out words that implied he intended to ask a question.
Sighing at his inarticulate reaction, Lily continues, "I'm pregnant and you're the father."
Without thinking, James blurts out, "Are you religious?"
"I'm sorry?" Lily asks, "I tell you I'm pregnant and your first reaction is to ask if I'm religious? Are you asking me if I'm going to have an abortion-"
"No, no," James interrupts, running a hand through his hair from a mix of habit and nerves, "It's just I'm Jewish, you see, and I plan on raising my kids Jewish and if you're a super religious Anglican or I dunno, Buddhist or something, we might have some parenting issues?"
Surprised by James's answer, Lily settles a hand against her stomach. James follows her hand with his eyes and realizes right there is his child her hand is resting over a baby that in eight or so months would be brought into the world screaming and crying and look a little like him or a lot like her.
"You are keeping it, right?" James asks, "Because if you don't want to raise the baby, I will." He can't believe he just said that. He's barely twenty-two, how could he possibly commit to raising a child by himself.
Lily nodded her head, "No matter what I'm keeping this baby," Her hand tightens a little across her stomach as if trying to protect the little life force within her, "I just wanted to know if you want to be involved."
"I want to be involved," James responds, despite his fear he answers without any hesitation.
It continues from there. They exchange phone numbers and addresses and go their separate ways for the time being. James returns to his flat and Lily returns to hers. They agree to meet the next week to talk more about what they're going to do and get to know each other. They both agree that they need to at least know basics about each other, it would be impossible to raise a child with a complete stranger.
He bursts into his apartment; the ultrasound she gave him held in his hand as if it is the most precious object on the planet. Sirius, Remus, and Peter all turn to look at him as if he's deranged. "I'm going to be a father!" He declares, thrilled.
"What the fuck," Remus says.
"That kid is going to die," Peter says.
"We're all going to die," Sirius says.
James is grinning as he clears out all the alcohol in the fridge. His flat mates are screaming at him as he pours the last of the vodka down the drain. If she can't drink, James decides, neither will he. He falls asleep with the ultrasound resting atop his heart. He's terrified. He doesn't feel like he'll be ready in nine months. But he's going to be a dad and despite the mess he decides fuck it all and he's happy.
She returns to her flat in a different manner. She finds it empty, her flat mate and longtime friend Severus is out with only a note left behind telling her not to wait up for him. She sighs and her hand drifts to her abdomen. She had no idea what she's doing. She sits on the edge of her bed in a daze. She calls her sister but no one answers.
It continues. Lily and James both start buying baby products. A bassinet is added to his bedroom. They meet up on the Thursday after James found out he was going to be a father. They sit in the same leather seats at the same coffee shop and down the same drinks. They talk longer than they did last time, the shock worn off it is easier to hold a conversation.
He learns that she was born in Cokeworth. She got her name because her mother was a florist. Her sister is also named after a flower. As were the five different cats she had while growing up. He learns that she dropped out of uni but is a semi-successful web designer. She's working on it, she explains. She's made some websites. She's being asked to make more. He learns that the night in the bar she was drinking because she had just returned to London after her parents' funeral. He learns the died in a car accident. He learns their names were Harrison and Betsy. He learns that once when she was twelve she ran away from home. He learns that when she's embarrassed she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. He learns that when she laughs all the air seems to leave the room because it seems too perfect to be real. He learns that she already loves their baby.
She learns that he grew up in London. She learns that he met his three best mates at a posh boarding school in Scotland. He claims they were the most popular boys at school but she doesn't believe him. She already knew he was Jewish but she learns that at his bar mitzvah he dropped the Torah. She learns that dropping the Torah means you have to fast for forty days. The burden is usually split between forty people, one person fasting for a day. She learns James couldn't eat any of the food at his bar mitzvah because he had to fast because he had, as she had already learned, dropped the Torah. She learns that he is a rugby player, slowly making his way up in the leagues with the hope of making the national team. She learns that he runs his hand through his hair when he's embarrassed, when he's proud, when he's thinking. He seems to always be running his hand through his hair. She learns that his smile seems to light up the room. She learns that he already loves their baby.
It continues with three months already gone and a friendship that seems to bloom from nothing. One day they were strangers then, what felt like the next day, she was eating Chinese take out on his couch and fighting over what movie to watch with his best mate. Lily slips into his life seamlessly. James does the same into hers. He goes with her to her OB/GYN appointment. Later James denies it, but Lily tells everyone that he cried when he heard the baby's heartbeat. It was okay though, Lily cried too.
It continues with James holding her hair back as she throws up because of morning sickness. It continues with James driving across London at three in the morning, after she calls him with a craving, to get her a burger from that one twenty-four-hour place that she went to the one time. It continues with him swinging by her flat to give her foot massages. It continues with them watching more movies and telling bad jokes. It continues with her calling him again at three in the morning when she can't sleep because his child won't stop moving. He stays awake on the phone with her because if the baby is keeping Lily awake, there is no way James is going to sleep. His decision to stay awake is both made by him and Lily. If he dared fall asleep, he believes Lily will drive across the city just to wake him up.
It continues with rugby season starting up and James needing to travel. It continues with James calling her every day when he's on the road. It continues with James being gone when the worst happens.
Sirius makes his way to the door, expecting the knocking on the other end to be the pizza he ordered forty-five minutes ago and that should be free at this point for making him wait. Instead, he opens the door to see Lily, a few bags beside her, a hand resting protectively over her now protruding stomach, and tears still in her eyes and on her cheeks.
"Sev kicked me out," She sobs, flinging herself against Sirius. Through sobs she explains how the two of them had been growing apart over the past few years but once she told him about the baby he had been as loyal and reliable as when they were young. She tells him how Sev had been hanging out with the wrong sort, the racist sort. The ones who were against immigration, against her, and against anybody like her. Sev always insisted he wasn't like them though. But clearly that isn't true. Lily tells Sirius how Sev gave her thirty minutes to pack her bags once he found out the baby's father was Jewish and dark skinned and dirty. Sev gave her thirty minutes to pack her bags or to cut James out from her life. Lily was out of the flat in twenty minutes.
Sirius calls James once Lily finishes crying herself to sleep on the couch. Despite the game the next day, James drives back to London in a heartbeat.
It continues with searching through the papers for a flat. It continues with her moving into James's shared flat, the newspapers with circled ads forgotten. It continues with James asleep on the couch and Lily in his bed because they aren't together and she's pregnant with his child so there's no way she's spending every night on the couch. And the nights where he falls asleep beside her in bed is clearly just friendship, they're talking and they drift off. The fact that she wakes up with her head pillowed against his chest and her hand covering his heart means nothing. The fact that he wakes up to his arm wrapped around her waist and his hand pressed against the small of her back means nothing. Really. They swear.
It continues with James travelling for rugby games and Lily sitting on the worn down couch making websites. It continues with Sirius joining Lily to eat take out and Lily helping Remus edit his dissertation and Peter playing cards with Lily when she can't sleep because the baby keeps kicking. It continues with James coming home from games exhausted and happy because there was a talent scout there and he might be moving up and he might make the English national team. But the real reason he's happy is because Lily greets him with a tight hug and a kiss on the cheek and places his hand against her abdomen where he can feel the baby kick.
It continues with discussions of names and setting up a nursery in James's room. The room which he shares with Lily but is definitely not their room. It continues with Lily asking questions and James making suggestions.
"I thought Jews didn't name babies after someone still living?" Lily asks after Sirius suggests the baby's middle name be James if it's a boy.
Ruffling his hair James chuckles, "Nah that's just the Eastern Europeans. Us Moroccan Jews don't really care about that. But why does that matter, really, when we're naming the baby Elvendork?"
"We are not naming the baby Elvendork." Lily replies.
It continues with the months flying by and suddenly they're a family. James's flat mates and Lily. They're as prepared for the baby as they could possibly be. They're all absolutely terrified.
It continues with James being away at a game when the contractions start. It continues with James being eight hours away at a game when the contractions start. And Lily is rushed to the hospital by Sirius and Peter while Remus is trying to contact James to no avail. Sirius is in the hospital room with Lily as the hours tick by and the contractions get stronger and Remus and Peter still can't reach James. It continues with Sirius trying not to wince as Lily squeezes his hand with all her strength and she screams bloody murder. And the nurses and doctors are telling Lily she'll be able to push soon but through the pain she insists, "No, not without James."
And is if by a miracle there he is. Peter had gotten through to James and while the drive would be eight hours the flight was only one. Sirius is leaving her side and James is coming to her side. Suddenly her tears are no longer tears of pain but of relief because he made it. And before she knows it she's pushing and she's screaming. Then her screams aren't the only one in the room because their son is born and he is screaming too. Before they know it he is cleaned off and placed in her arms and they smush together on the too small hospital bed and just stare at him because he's there.
James alternates between kissing her forehead and kissing his as he murmurs prayers in a foreign language that Lily doesn't know or understand but she can tell from the wide smile on his face and the pride in his eyes that the words are beautiful. For a split second she thinks that Sev should be there but then she looks at James radiating absolute joy and she dismisses it because she would pick this one moment over every second she had spent with Sev and fuck him for thinking James is below her, honestly. It continues with James kissing her on the lips then freezing. They're both blushing and turn to look at their son, pretending the kiss didn't happen, even though it did.
It continues with them not mentioning the kiss for another five months until exhausted from their son and from life and filling with emotions they're kissing and they're stripping and this time they remember a condom.
It continues with three years down the line, James embracing his wife and son after winning gold in Olympic rugby with the English team. It continues with James not only being thrilled that he is wearing a gold medal around his neck but being thrilled because his perfect wife and incredible son traveled the world to just see him play. It continues with James leaping off the podium before any of the other players once the medal ceremony is done just so he can kiss his wife again. It continues with James lifting Harry onto his shoulders and spinning in circles cheering because his life is perfect.
It continues with not a fairytale ending because those don't exist but it continues with something pretty damn close. It continues, and that's why the beginning doesn't matter. The beginning doesn't matter because it doesn't matter that it started in the bathroom of a sleazy pub, what matters is it continues with James and Lily asleep in the same bed, blissfully in love, with their son snoring softly between them.
It continues.
A/N: I'd like to apologize for anybody who expected this to be an update for one of my Mer/Der stories however I've become is disenchanted with the show at the moment that I just can't bring myself to write it. At the same time Jilytober has pulled me into a deep dark cavern of Harry Potter love once more. I can never escape Harry Potter, honestly. So those Mer/Der fics won't be updated anytime soon. But there might be more Jily fics. Who knows. All I know is I'm trash. Thanks for reading.