the love potion

by Amirea

one

Lily Evans was too kind.

It was a fault she would usually gladly admit to – she considered it one of her greatest attributes, generally.

Not today though.

Today, she regretted it immensely.

The second attribute to regret was her smartness.

If she were less smart, she never would have realized what really was going on with Jonah Patterson. She would have kept her mouth shut and she wouldn't be sitting here in Gryffindor's first Quidditch match of the year with the massive confusion that was slowly evolving into a splitting headache and bewilderment.

"Morning, Lily!" an enthused voice greeted her upon her arrival at the Great Hall in the morning. "Thanks for the sample, it really helped us."

Patterson was a tall Ravenclaw with sandy blond hair and a dazzling smile he tended to use to his advantage. In his extended arm he held a little glass vial filled with a pink liquid. Lily took it from his hand, brushing against his fingers accidentally – the unfamiliar warmth made her heart thump just a tad bit faster; but then again, she was at an age where touching much anyone of the other sex became all possible preludes to great love stories, so she didn't read much into her reaction. It was him being a guy, rather than him being Patterson.

"You're welcome," she said softly, hating how shy she sounded. He winked at her and turned to the right, heading outside instead of towards the stairs.

Of course, Lily realized, today was the match of Ravenclaw against Gryffindor. She almost forgot. That might explain why he was so uncharacteristically flirtatious with her. Lily knew Patterson was a bit of a womanizer, but he had never before turned his charm to her. She was after all, the rumoured ice queen of Gryffindor, the girl with the iron knickers, the goody-two-shoes prefect.

She was still quite confused when she reached the red-and-gold table, hopping down onto the stool.

"Hi, Lily," Marlene frowned at her, "what's that?"

Lily glanced down, only realizing now that she had been playing with the little vial, turning it over and over between her fingers absentmindedly. She was about to answer Marlene when something struck her as odd.

The vial was two thirds full.

She could remember quite clearly that she had filled it almost to the brim – this particular potion didn't keep very long if in contact with air, so she had submerged the vial in her cauldron... she must have. Lily stared at the bright pink liquid with horror. Her thoughts were running a mile a minute. That wink earlier on... that smirk on Patterson's lips...

"Hey Marley, have you seen Patterson leave earlier on?"

She frowned. "Of course, why?"

"Has he... I don't know, has he talked to anyone?" Marlene stared at her as if she had lost her mind, her toast lifted halfway to her mouth. "Please Marlene, think. It could be very important."

"Well," she started hesitatingly, dropping her toast back to her plate, "he had stopped earlier at the Marauders'. You know, to wish luck to Potter."

Potter.

The Quidditch Captain, obviously. Why go for anyone else?

Lily turned her head towards the end of the table where he was sat with several of his friends and teammates. They were already dressed for the match, sporting the red and gold uniforms girls were constantly sighing and daydreaming about. Potter was positioned right in the middle of the group, his goblet raised to his lips.

Uh-oh.

Lily scrambled to her feet, almost tripping herself in the process. Her less than graceful stumble raised a lot of heads. Not that she particularly cared right now. She was going to raise a lot more with what she was about to do.

"Potter."

He was quite immersed in his conversation, not realizing she had called his name, his goblet coming into contact with his lips.

"Potter!" she cried out, desperate now, but her voice was drowned out by the raucous laughter that erupted from his group in that moment. Lily pushed her way through many of his admirers that seemed to cling to him in a tight circle. She was managing to catch the attention of most of the people around her now, what with her persistent shrieking of his name – only the one that should have heard it, the one that would have needed to hear it...

Lily shouldered her way into the middle of the group, her heart beating madly against her ribcage.

"JAMES!" She shrieked and finally, finally he turned – his goblet lowered, his face as confused as ever, his eyes comically large. Unfortunately, her aggressive approach had just attracted the attention of the entire circle, the laughter dying down one second before her epic high pitched shriek.

For a minute, the entire Great Hall was silent. Potter blinked at her through his glasses confusedly. Lily suddenly wasn't sure what to say.

And then, he swallowed.

He swallowed.

Lily could clearly see the bobbing of his Adam's apple and she belatedly realized that she had been late: he had already taken a sip when she grabbed his attention. She heard a few snickers around her and she closed her mouth that had dropped open with a decisive snap.

"Yes, Lily?" Potter asked, pointedly ignoring everyone else but her. His hazel eyes were boring straight into hers – and this fact coupled with the calm assurance in his voice registered somewhere logical in her brain letting her come to an uncomfortable conclusion.

"That's impossible," she whispered, her stomach giving an uncomfortable lurch.

A few bystanders laughed out loud; Potter furrowed his brows. "Excuse me?"

Lily could feel all her blood rush to her face, tinging it to quite the colour in all probability. He had drunk the potion. He had looked at her.

And he was being nowhere near the lovesick puppy he should have been.

She was close enough to him to see the speckles in his eyes, but she leaned in even more – ignoring the look he gave her and any possible meaning she might have read into it – and took the goblet he had drunk from. There were murmurs and whispers all around them, Potter being the only one that didn't give an opinion and Lily forced her trembling knees to scamper out of the Great Hall as quickly as humanly possible. It felt like coming out of a trance when she left his gaze behind and she only ever felt she was actually hyperventilating when she finally collapsed against a wall right outside.

What the hell did just happen?

He had drunk the potion. He had looked at her. And he was normal.

He had drunk the potion. Her potion. Her perfect potion. And he had looked right at her.

The only solution must be that Patterson had put the love potion into someone else's goblet, someone that hadn't drunk it yet. The effects of Amortentia are immediate and with one third of the vial of the potion she had made only the day before... Lily did a quick calculation in her head. A few sips might act as expected and make the person that drank it "fall in love" with the first person they glimpsed afterwards. But with the quantity that Patterson had nicked from her... Why had she believed his excuse of studying her sample yesterday in the first place?

She was much too nice of a person.

Back to the poisoning.

Whoever would drink that spiked juice would be probably knocked for quite a while. But who was it? It must have been a member of the Quidditch team, the whole scheme had no merit otherwise. She tried to remember all the students that had been gathered around Potter but she couldn't recall which – if any – held full goblets and there was no way she could go back inside and make even more of a fool of herself. But Potter... She had been so sure that he had been Patterson's target!

Someone cleared their throat right next to her and she jumped a little in her fright. Looking up from her musings she saw one James Potter standing in front of her. From her vantage point on the floor where she had collapsed to she could easily admire his... masculine presence; he towered high above her and she had to confess that his shoulders had quite filled out during the past few years.

Lily blushed again, with approximately the same ferocity as beforehands.

"Hi." He said softly, as if afraid that she might bolt. Again.

She lowered her gaze in shame. She had stolen his goblet and screamed at him in front of all his friends – for no reason. She was beginning to feel pretty stupid all of a sudden.

"Hi," she whispered back, looking up in surprise when she heard the rustle of his robes on the wall as he sat down next to her. Lily risked a sideway glance and saw that he was smirking a little.

"Is there any particular reason you shouted my first name and then just stole my goblet?"

Okay, she was definitely reaching the tomato phase right now.

"Er, well. I thought it was poisoned."

"Poisoned?" asked Potter, his tone betraying his surprise at that particular answer. He must think she was fibbing, Lily understood. "I have drunk from that goblet and I'm perfectly fine," he reminded her.

"Well, yes."

That essentially put an end to their brief discussion and Lily felt more miserable about her assumptions than ever. How could she be so wrong?

He had drunk the potion. He had looked at her.

She picked up his goblet that was still between them on the ground and frowned at it. It looked completely normal, just plain average pumpkin juice. She brought it closer to her nose and took a cautious sniff.

It smelled like sandalwood and... her mother's special orange-cinnamon Christmas cookies?

Amortentia. And an unhealthy amount too, if the ferocity of the enticing fragrance was anything to go by. This single goblet contained all the missing potion, and no one was hurt in the process of her finding it. She sighed in relief. Patterson really ought to be less cocky.

"Lily." She whipped her head up to Potter and he looked at her with a sort of pity in his hazel eyes. "There's nothing wrong with my pumpkin juice, you know."

Lily's gaze turned into a defiant glare, "Yes, there is!"

He looked her deep in the eye and before she could fathom what he was about to do he twisted the cup from her hold and downed its contents in one go. Lily was so shell shocked she could only gape at him. The nerve of him!

That amount of Amortentia would knock out anyone within the minute...

"See." Potter just kept staring into her eyes with a challenging lilt to his eyebrows, but she couldn't force a single word past her lips to counter him.

After a few silent minutes of staring he stood and trotted down to the Quidditch pitch without so much as a backward glance.

And so began her endless contemplation of just what exactly had happened that fateful morning.

Marlene had found her almost half an hour later and being a good friend never asked what really happened after seeing the state she was in. She just pulled her up and together and made sure she made it to the stands in one piece. Unfortunately. Lily only came to her senses when she heard the roar of the stadium close in around her. After her slip up this morning – however justified it might have turned out afterwards – she definitely hadn't wanted to come and watch as star chaser and Gryffindor captain James Potter ruled the game.

Too late now, she hurried to inconspicuously find a seat and disappear from other people's line of sight. She nonetheless heard some murmurs rise as she pushed to the end of a row with Marley in tow.

The game was a long one.

It went on for hour after hour until they missed lunch and well after that. It gave her plenty of time to come to a conclusion. A conclusion she'd have rather not drawn.

Lily tried to chase the thoughts away but they buzzed around in her head like a herd of angry wasps.

Yesterday, she had brewed Amortentia perfectly. Patterson asked to borrow for study purposes. He put a generous amount into James Potter's morning juice. Potter looked at her, right as he swallowed. He had in fact consumed the entire dosage.

And now, he was up in the air, playing Quidditch without a care in the world. If anything, he was better than previously.

Alright, Lils, let's look at the facts. Again.

The Amortentia was perfect. Professor Slughorn himself had commented on it. It was also stronger than usually since she had been experimenting a bit. And then, James Potter had consumed it. No doubt about that either.

Which took her to the uncomfortable conclusion...

She glanced up to the game for the first time in what felt like hours. Her eyes easily settled on Potter – he was, after all, the star in this game, always in the middle of Gryffindor action. He scored another time, throwing the Quaffle through the loop lighting fast. He turned around for a lazy lap in front of the celebrating red-and-golds. Was she imagining it or did he search her out on purpose? Whatever his intent, their eyes met and Lily was sure even through the distance that his hazel eyes were boring into hers of all the students in the stands.

James Potter was immune to love potions. And much as Lily wished she would have to look up some obscure facts for a reasonable explanation, she knew Potions better than anyone in the castle other than Slughorn itself. There was a perfectly easy and probable reason for his immunity.

He flew above her, missing the pass to Wilkinson as he stared at her instead of his teammate.

James Potter was already in love.