Title: Where the Flowers Bloom
Pairing: James/Lily, Severus/Lily, Lily centric
Rating: R
Word Count: 9,410
Summary: Face paint and sweat dripped in dilated eyes and down sun stung cheeks, marchers protested, young blood spilled on foreign soil, and the euphoria of free love lingered in the air. It was the summer of Eggmen, white rabbits, and R-E-S-P-E-C-T. She stared out of the bus window at the rolling green hills and open highway, hoping her thousands of miles of travel would be worth her escape from that town. She never expected that hot, madcap summer of 1967—the summer of love—to change her life in ways she never thought possible.
Warning: AU MWPP (that should have been clear from the summary), drug use, sexuality, language, damn dirty hippies. And in this chapter, name dropping like crazy.
Disclaimer: I obviously don't own HP.
A/N: I really have mixed feelings about this chapter. I thought I could have done better and I like some parts more than others but I REALLY wanted to get this out of the way, especially since I'm on vacation in London and Parisf at the moment. So what I have to say on this version of this story, I'd suggest reading it on communityDOTlivejournalDOTcomSLASHacciosalmon, so you an see the photo(s) and such used for this story. Also, no, I haven't abanoned The Long and Winding Road. It's just on a bit of a hiatus as I work on this after this fic/stop having a bit of a life.
SO ENJOY AND PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW!
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JUNE 17, 1967 DAY 2
The so-called June Gloom she remembered hearing about was true. The peach-colored wall in front of her, which seemed so intensely bright the previous night, was now diluted with dull grey overtones. It reflected her mood perfectly. Lily woke up on the opposite end of her high feeling dizzy and disoriented, shortly forgetting where she was but soon realizing the flowery wallpaper and large windows of her bedroom were thousands of miles away. So was her comfortable bed. She gingerly rubbed a knot in her back, sore from poor sleep, and her dry tongue licked chapped lips, bringing muddled memories of last night to the forefront of her mind. Lily still felt disgusted by what she did with a boy she had only known for sixteen hours at the most. Despite the awkward interaction between them, contrived intimacy was there. She blamed the drug and her low tolerance for her behavior, but the illicit scapegoat didn't dissolve the truth. She didn't hate the experience of feeling outside of herself for once, she reckoned it was what she needed most. But God; she hated what she became under it, not to mention the burning sensation still in her throat and lungs.
Lily crawled out of bed and took off her clothes and stood still, naked before her bed. She often spent much time examining her body in front of mirrors and turning and staring at various angles and poses like some sort of life-size doll or model in Vogue or Harper's Bazaar. The one she placed on her small dresser was large enough to reveal most of her body to her sleepy eyes. Everything was the same: she had the same thighs, same breasts, same bottom, same arms, same stomach, same legs and knees. She made faces at herself in the mirror, showing her teeth like an animal, smiling like Miss America, pouting and puckering her lips with her lipstick and eye makeup still smudged from the night before so she looked like a tousled tramp.
She was so different from her sister. There was similarity when they were younger, be it eye shape or nose. But as they both grew, the differences strongly outweighed the similarities. Petunia was always rather skinny ("Slender, Lily. Slender.") and danced ballet regularly for a time. The slightly underdeveloped look of her breasts and hips when she was a teenager sometimes reminded Lily of some sort of trendy model from all the papers and magazines. Petunia's pale blue eyes and perfectly manicured shoulder-length blonde hair made up for her less appealing features, like her long neck ("Oliver says my neck is exotic") or her natural lip-curled frown whenever her face was relaxed. Lily on the other hand lacked the look of her favorite models like Twiggy or Penelope Tree. Her body was fuller than her older sister's and she had a few stray freckles Petunia always told her could easily be bleached off with lemon juice, an assurance which led to an incredibly painful incident when Lily was twelve. Her hair was auburn, slightly darkened with age from its former bright red. Petunia often told her she should dye her hair a much more "soothing" color ("Why would you want all that unneeded attention, Lily? Especially when mom and dad don't have that hair color themselves. It makes us all look suspicious, really, if you think about it!"). Lily often told Petunia she should shut up about her hair and its level of soothing.
Her body was like a sort of storybook: each scar, freckle, and extra fleshy spot told had some tale to accompany it. Lily's fingers slowly traveled from her neck, around each breast, and down her sides until her fingers gently pressed on her hips. The pain wasn't there anymore unless she pressed her fingers roughly along the tender muscles. She was unsure of her reasons, but she almost wanted to feel the pain, as if to remind her of the reality of what happened, to convince her that night wasn't a lie or part of her imagination—a contrived nightmare weaved and spun for her own escapism.
Sighing, Lily rummaged through her unpacked trunk for underwear and threw on a flower
patterned dress and a sweater. Leaving her room she passed by Severus's bed, but in the dark wasn't sure if he was in bed or not and she didn't want to stick around to find out. She descended the creaky stairs towards the kitchen, feet treading heavily.
After heating the coffee percolator on the stove, pouring herself a cup and adding milk and coarse "organic" sugar to the cup, she sat atop the kitchen counter. The sugar wasn't dissolving fast enough for her liking despite constant stirring of her spoon in the steaming tan liquid.
"Damn organic shit," Lily hissed irritably and resorted to crushing the crystals with the head of the spoon before slamming the cup on the counter and glaring at the churning liquid. "Dissolve!"
A loud yawn from the hallway ceased her sugar crushing, and a man she hadn't seen last night during dinner stepped into the kitchen, looking exhausted and sporting nothing but a pair of plain green boxers. He didn't seem to notice her as he rummaged through the fridge, scratching his bottom from the open refrigerator door, unaware of Lily's stifled giggles in the dark corner of the kitchen. The man looked to be in his mid-twenties with brown hair and a bit of a belly. He pulled out some leftover cold pasta and turned around, nearly dropping the plate as he noticed her.
"Shit!" he exclaimed. He was English. "Hello?"
"Hi, sorry I was just fixing some—"
"Who are you?" he squinted, turning on more lights.
"I'm Lily. Lily Ev—"
"Oh, right, right! That girl Alice was talking about. I'm Frank," he said, holding out his hand for a firm handshake with an apologetic smile, which Lily returned. "Sorry 'bout that."
He was really quite sweet, she decided. He had a genuine smile, told silly jokes, and had a carefree air about him which she appreciated in contrast to Severus who took everything so damn seriously.
And speak of the devil, as the two were in the middle of laughing, Severus came into the kitchen scratching his own scalp and ignoring the pair, pouring the coffee Lily brewed for herself.
"All right, Severus?" Frank asked.
"Yeah," he replied. He didn't add any sugar to his coffee, let alone creamer. Lily wanted to be surprised, but she wasn't surprised in the least. Bitter, dark coffee matched the bitter, dark-haired man perfectly.
"You certainly look bright eyed and bushy tailed this morning," Frank said sharing a smile with Lily.
"Mmph."
"You've met Lily, of course," Frank said. "A real firecracker, this one!"
Lily hoped to hide her red cheeks with her coffee cup. The sugar was still grainy.
"Yeah, we've met," Severus muttered, taking a sip from his own steaming cup.
"Great!" Frank exclaimed, hitting him on the back in what could have easily been a sign of some sort of brotherhood or mutual friendship if Severus hadn't been so weak shouldered and sloshed some coffee onto the floor as his body buckled from the impact of the polite gesture. Frank, however, remained oblivious to the tension between them. "Hope you two are ready for the concert today. It's amazing, really amazing. A true blue pop festival. I'm going to go get Alice ready."
With that he ran up the stairs, making as much noise as possible in the process, and leaving Lily and Severus standing awkwardly on opposite sides of the quirkily decorated kitchen. She folded her arms across her chest and took a long sip of her coffee; still not sweet enough for her liking but enough to get her through the morning with a kick.
"Good morning," she said into her coffee cup.
"Good morning," he replied into his own.
The back of the van was the most uncomfortable place to ride. It may not have been if the back hadn't been completely customized. The sturdy, cushioned camper seats had been gutted and replaced with colorful cloths and pillows with painted symbols and magazine clippings on the walls which were clearly Alice's design. The shag carpet didn't help matters. Lily attempted using every pillow available to comfort her aching back against the hard trunk door, but with no avail. Even more awkward was that she was stuck in the right hand corner of the back of the vehicle while Severus, who looked just as uncomfortable, sat squeezed in next to her and a load of camping supplies with his chin resting on his bony knees. The ride was brutal; each bump in the road made her body shake, and with each shake Evan Rosier, on the other side of the trunk, seemed transfixed.
The pervert, she thought darkly, just before her head was suddenly whacked against the metal door.
"Ouch!"
Severus appeared unfazed by the outburst as he lit his cigarette. Lily contemplated a scenario in which the bump caused her to bleed profusely from her skull, getting blood all over him and his damn cigarette, and he still probably wouldn't pay attention to her.
With Alice and Frank speaking heatedly to each other in the driver's area and Evan blabbing on to the other people squeezed in, like Joan and a few others she had met during dinner last night, she couldn't stand Severus' silence next to her.
"Look," Lily said in a low voice as she rubbed the back of her head with a wince. "I'm sorry about last night. It was stupid. Really stupid, okay? I…I don't know what came over me."
"You were high, but you know what came over you." Severus' said, lips muffled around his cigarette.
He wasn't going to make this easy for her. She leaned in closer to him. "So I did, but it was wrong of me regardless. It didn't feel right, of course. I shouldn't have thrown myself all over you like a cheap coat. I…I think maybe it was an act of nerves. I'm sorry."
"Sure," Severus shrugged, not looking at her. "I, on the other hand, find it amusing that you assume that I was so…damaged by it. Speak for yourself. Don't presume that just because you're attractive any physical involvement you have with someone else is automatically some sort of fucking religious experience."
Lily immediately felt as if she was just punched in the stomach and doused in ice-cold water, the wind knocked out of her. After spending all night and all morning feeling disgusted with herself and preparing an apology for the bastard, he felt nothing. Nothing. He didn't even care.
"You know what, Severus?" Lily laughed humorlessly, lips twisted with anger. "You're right. I should speak for myself. Why should I worry myself about your feelings anyway?"
"Exactly."
"You mean nothing to me. I don't even know you. I don't even like you."
"Fantastic."
This was not the reaction she hoped for. She wanted to hurt him. Watching him staring off smoking, unconcerned, she felt a pang of failure. But what did she expect him to do? Cry?
She scoffed at her fantasy and turned away from him. A book lay face down at her feet, likely Frank's. She managed to flip it over with her feet.
HOWL
AND OTHER POEMS
ALAN GINSBURG
Introduction by
WILLIAMS CARLOS WILLIAMS
Lily remembered ages ago when her best friend Emmeline's mother came home from work ranting and raving about a book being banned at the library in which she worked. Emme's mother was a genuine lover of books, the sort who would cringe at dog-eared pages and turn beet red if a page was wrinkled; a banned book was an unloved book. This was the book she was so livid about. Lily grunted as she strained to reach the book and picked it up, regarding the simple black text against the white cover.
"Hey, Frank?" Lily called over the incessant talk of Evans' tall tales.
"Yeah?"
"Can I borrow Howl from you? It's just sitting here, after all."
"Sure, I've read it a million times. Bloody brilliant, that man Ginsburg. Bloody fucking brilliant."
"I think you'll like it, Lily," Alice concurred from the passenger seat, her feet atop the dashboard and right arm out the window, appearing a ghostly gray against the waning morning fog. "If you like poetry."
"I love poetry," she replied, and stuffed the book in her purse. "How much farther?"
"Not much. When you notice traffic, we're close."
As the van whished past a police car on the side of the road, something hit her.
"Frank, how long have you been in this country?"
"I don't know, little over a year and a half, I reckon."
"Do you have a driver's license?"
Frank quickly turned his head towards her from the driver's seat and smiled. "Nope."
Traffic was awful, as Frank predicted. He started to argue with Alice, suddenly upset that she made him leave the ongoing festival to pick them all up this morning as a punishment. While Evan and Severus were talking about nothing in particular, Lily found herself staring out the cracked-open window at the various other cars waiting in traffic, trying to get to the concert. The scene was like something she only saw on black and white television sets at home: several cars of all shapes and sizes painted with images of flowers and peace signs and phrases.
After about forty-five minutes of waiting around in a car exhaust-induced stream of filth coming in through the windows, the van was finally able to park on the massive festival grounds.
"Just park the fucking thing by the grass! See, right there! Perfect spot, now go!"
"Fuck, Alice, stop shouting!" Frank yelled, a chord in his reddened neck throbbing with each syllable.
"I think I have every right to shout at you! Do you know how much I had to clean up with no help whatsoever? Huh? Do you?" Alice fired back.
"You're still going on about that? You're absolutely mad."
"Mad?"
"Yeah, barking mad, making me go and get you lot. You could have gotten here some other sort of way."
"Your van is the biggest, Frank. I can't fit this many people in my car and you know it, you idiot."
"If you're going to ruin this concert for me—"
"The concert, the concert, the concert. Well that's just swell, Frank. I see what you care about more!"
Frank finally parked the Volkswagen van and Alice jumped out, slamming the door and walking briskly onto the festival grounds. Nobody else seemed phased by the outburst from the young married couple. In fact, they all acted as if they didn't hear the deafening exchange at all.
After eavesdropping on Frank's string of curses towards Alice, Lily took off her sandals and treaded the deep green grass. The cloudy haze had just let up but the grass retained the cool morning moisture, dampening her wiggling toes and heels. The grounds were huge and they seemed to be in a popular area of cars and eating booths. She spotted the stadium of chairs with a full audience already in the distance but close enough to not be a huge hassle getting from the seating to the car. The number of people milling about the festival shocked her; she'd never in her life been around so many people, literally thousands of different people. Fashionable men and women promenaded around from booth to booth, people lay in the grass or against trees, state troopers and cops lurked in shadows and by facilities, and even children and babies clung onto their young, bohemian mothers.
And the beards. She'd never seen so many scraggly, out of control beards in her life.
"Lily," Alice said, catching Lily by the shoulder softly. "We'll meet back here at five, okay? Just to check in."
"Okay," Lily agreed. "But are you all right? You and Frank…"
"Oh, don't worry about that," Alice said, swatting her hand in the air with a reassuring smile. "We fight all the time. It's as if we've been married for decades. Now go have fun and meet some cute boys."
Alice gave her a friendly pinch on the arm and wiggled her eyebrows suggestively and, with that, Lily set off on her own towards the various booths at the festival grounds, enjoying the music in the distance. As Lily walked with the crowd, she felt a sense of freedom. She wasn't Lily Evans, Petunia Evans' baby sister who lives on Oak Lane and listens to her records too loudly. She was just one of them, one of thousands just enjoying the ride, the sights, and the sounds. She walked along the grassy field without a destination in mind for an hour or so, finding herself performing small tasks along the way: holding a woman's items as she struggled to put a sweater over her son's head, picking up fallen paint brushes, and even spared a particularly attractive boy around her age a few cents. As the afternoon dragged on the sun began to project elongated shadows on the many walking and lounging in the sun. Lily stared at her shadow as she walked, noticing how tall and narrow her other self was. Unable to help herself she stopped in her tracks, not so nonchalantly striking small poses with her hands on hips, watching her shadow mimic them in much more graceful, lithe manifestations.
"You know, my mother said I was afraid of my shadow as a baby."
Lily froze mid-pose and turned her head around to see none other than "the bastard" himself: James Potter leaning against a nearby tree, grinning from ear to ear at the look of surprise on her face. He appeared rather pleased with himself that he managed to startle her.
"Really?" Lily played along and stared at both of their shadows in the grass, suddenly plain and lacking the life she felt her own possessed seconds ago.
"Oh, absolutely. Terrified. I'd cry every time I'd see it and there's plenty of photographic evidence to support it. But I say it builds character. And at least I wasn't a bed wetter, right?" James said, pushing his glasses higher up his nose before offering her a hand shake. "James Potter."
Lily returned the polite gesture. "Lily Evans."
"I haven't seen you around the city before yesterday when you were with Sni—Snape."
"I just got here yesterday, actually," Lily said.
"Ah. So, where are you from, Lily?" he asked, hands in his pockets. He looked silly standing there with a tie knotted around his head like a headband, square glasses slightly askew, hair even messier than the day before, and red and gold plaid shirt half tucked into the narrow-legged jeans shrouding his thin legs. He sure didn't seem like he was rich or exceedingly arrogant as he waited for her response with genuine interest.
"Ohio. Suburb of Cleveland."
He whistled and scratched his scalp. "Wow, you came pretty damn far."
"Yeah, I guess you can say that," Lily nodded.
"So what's Ohio like?"
"Boring," she shrugged. "Trees, malt shops, and traditionalists."
"Sounds like Connecticut, minus the malt shop part of course," James said. "That would be too fun for the stiffs."
"You're from Connecticut?"
"Might as well be. But no, I'm from New York City. Parents sent me off to boarding school in Connecticut though to get a good education and all. Pfft," James snorted. "God I hated that place. It's like a fucking gulag there."
"Wow, the Big Apple, eh?" Lily marveled, visions of Breakfast at Tiffany's manifesting once more in her head.
"Just from a tiny bite of it. Central Park West."
Lily blinked.
"It's on the upper east side of the city. It's where all the rich, over-privileged bastards like me live," he explained before smirking. "But before we get back to talking about me, where's ol' Sni—Snape?"
"I don't know," Lily shook her head, suddenly sour. "And frankly I could care less. Why?"
"I thought you two looked pretty chummy yesterday," James said flippantly as he put his hands in his jeans pockets and shrugged. "Figured you'd be here with him."
"That's before I found out what a jerk he was," Lily said.
"Jerk is right," he concurred. "In fact, it's one hell of an understatement if you ask me."
"But you know," Lily started slowly and quirked a brow, tilting her head and peering at James with newfound scrutiny. "He did say a few interesting things about you."
"Oh, really?" James said, running his hand through his hair as he regarded Lily intently, relishing her curious stance. "What did the little grease bag have to say about little ol' me?"
"Said you're arrogant," Lily counted off on her right hand. "And pretentious, and rich, and live off your parents' money."
James chuckled. "How do you feel about honesty?"
"It's important," Lily said. "Without honesty… you're just a fraud...I guess. Or maybe just a liar. Or both."
"Do you want an honest response to that from a relatively honest guy?"
"All right then, let's hear it," Lily said.
"Good," James said, taking a step closer to her and counting off his apparent grievances with his fingers. "One, yes, I'm pretty loaded if I do say so myself. The Potters come from a long line of bankers and that's that. No point in lying about it, right? Nothing to be ashamed of. Two, yes, I do live off my parents' money since I've yet to find a job which suits my interests. Three, pretentious? You be the judge of that. Lastly, if arrogance is unabashed self-confidence then yeah, damn straight I'm arrogant. But I'd rather have confidence than feel down about myself all the time, wouldn't you? And besides, it's hardly my fault if know-it-all little morons with incurable social-ineptness like Snape are jealous at the mere prospect of a self-assured young man of nineteen, now is it?"
Lily shook her head and tried to withhold a smile, an attempt which she discovered, to her dismay, was extremely difficult when James looked at her so seriously while simultaneously looking like an idiot with his hair a complete mess and smiling at Lily with a boyish, lopsided smile saccharine with innocence. "You really are something, aren't you, James Potter?"
"Ah! So my reputation precedes me!" James said excitedly, readjusting the tie on his forehead. "That's good to know."
"You'd best hope I don't judge you based on your reputation or else you'd be competing with Severus for the jerk title," Lily said tartly. "What a speech that was. You're absolutely shameless, aren't you?"
James suddenly clutched at his chest through his shirt and stumbled about, with a pained expression on his face. "You've wounded me!"
She watched him with embarrassment as he began to roll around on the grass making gruesome contorted facial expressions while still clinging to his invisible wound, ignoring the people nearby moving cautiously away from his convulsing form.
"You're such a ham!" Lily chortled, standing over him, her shadow covering his lean frame. "I sure admire Mrs. Potter for putting up with you for this long."
He stopped, opening one eye and then another before peering up at her with his tongue out, mouth slowly creeping into another smirk of his. She decided she hated when he did that. That crooked smile immediately warmed her cheeks and made her breathing wonky.
"Say, if you're alone you should enjoy the concert with me and the boys," James persuaded, now upright and running his hands through his black hair, capturing elusive blades of grass. He must have noticed her lack of interest because he quickly added with a challenging stare, "Or would you rather be alone, checking out your ever so lovely form in the grass?"
No, she'd rather not. She had no one else. Frank and Alice were likely still arguing, Evan probably already found some poor girl to harass, and Severus could be on the moon for all she knew.
"The boys?"
"Oozechi?"
"Sorry, Sirius, not all of us have the ability to talk completely out of our asses."
Lily watched as one of James's friends quickly swallowed his hotdog and nodded towards her.
"I said who's she?"
He had the looks of a heartthrob to any sane female on God's green earth: a classic
look about him yet a little rough around the edges, almost as though he went out of his way to obtain such an appearance as it contrasted from his natural look of haughtiness and grandeur. His defined bone structure, tall stature, cold grey eyes, and a superior countenance could hardly be destroyed even by the crumbs around his mouth or the mustard smeared across his chin.
"You know that girl I was telling you about yesterday? Who I ran into at that shop?"
Sirius gave Lily another look over. "Oh, right! Red hair, a chest like Raquel Welch, and 'legs that went on for miles'," he nodded, and peered at her legs for confirmation before giving James a withering look. "Her legs aren't that long. And nobody has a pair like Welch. Nobody."
Lily promptly folded her arms across her chest, slowly crossed her legs, and looked incredulously at James, who promptly punched Sirius in the shoulder. "You know, if I'd had known you were talking about me behind my back, acting like a chauvinistic pig I never would have agreed to come with you."
"You'll have to excuse my moron of a friend. He's got a big imagination and clearly a bit of a hearing problem. Lily, my idiot of a best friend Sirius. Sirius, Lily. Lily from Ohio!" he added as though Ohio was an exotic location like Bora Bora or somewhere highly refined and cultured like the south of France - not just south of Lake Erie.
Sirius gave her a little wave of acknowledgment before returning to his lunch.
"Where's Remus and Peter?" James asked, sitting down on the grass, patting the ground next to him for Lily to sit.
"Peter had to go take a piss," Sirius shrugged and finished the last of his food, licking his condiment-slathered fingers before wiping them on his jeans. "Forced Remus to go with him.
"Well, you know about him and Porta-Potties," James reminded.
"True," Sirius shrugged and lit a cigarette with an air of coolness Severus lacked tremendously. He was like a James Dean of the 1960's: some sort of pseudo-rebel without a cause. "I'd rather piss anywhere else than those things to be honest."
"You just like pissing places where you aren't supposed to. Period," James said, about to snatch one of Sirius's cigarettes until he saw the brand. "Man, Lucky Strikes again?"
"Fuck off," Sirius said, shoving James into the grass and exhaling.
James settled for the cigarettes. "Could you be any cheaper?"
"Where are your cigarettes?"
"Forgot them," James said, searching through his pocket for a lighter.
"Then you can't complain," Sirius said, thrusting the cigarette carton in his face while James tried to light up. "These here are the people's cigarettes. And they explain a lot, you know. Like the commercials say: 'Lucky Strike separates the men from the boys...but not from the girls.' Explains why I'm the one getting all the girls and you're not."
"What girls?"
"Shut up."
"And besides, it's a commercial. They're meant for you to believe that bullshit," James said, clearly miffed at any implication that he lacked competence in the art of attracting women.
"But I mean it was in the jingle. It has to be true. Lying in commercials is probably illegal or something."
"Do you ever listen to what comes out of that pie hole of yours?"
"Oh, you're one to talk!" Sirius snorted. "Tell me, what was it that you said to that cop the other week?"
"That doesn't count."
"Damn straight it fucking counts."
"Says the guy who believes a television commercial with dancing cigarettes."
"'Sorry, officer. I didn't understand the speed limit sign. You see, I'm, er, illiterate, sir. Illiterate with numbers,'" Sirius mocked in an attempt to sound like James.
"At least I tried to get out of a ticket. I just wasn't thinking through to my…full potential. You just wanted to start a criminal record."
"Oh, how disappointed Mother would be," Sirius said with a smile and another slow, long drag, eyes closing shut as he exhaled the tobacco: the epitome of relaxation.
"The people's cigarettes," James repeated with a snort. He took a drag, promptly offering Lily one as well. She accepted but quickly coughed and handed the cigarette back to James, blushing and feeling her eyes begin to water.
"Her eldest boy corrupted into a felon, eh? Just think of it! Me with my gangly, half-blind, candyass partner in crime," Sirius ended affectionately, ruffling James' hair before directing his attention to Lily, who sat idly by amongst the smoke, pulling at the grass and laughing quietly to herself at the dream team scenario. "So, James told me you were with Snivellus yesterday. Hope he didn't get any grease on you. I hear it's contagious."
"You call Severus Snivellus?" Lily frowned. "Why?"
"He's a big sniveling baby, that's why," Sirius said as though such a fact was written in black marker across Severus's forehead. "You'll find out soon enough."
"I don't think that's very fair," Lily said defensively.
"Says the gal who is as far away as possible from him right now," James reminded her. She turned her head to face him, not quite sure how to respond. Something was at the tip of her tongue. Something rude, most likely; or snide. But she remained miserably tongue-tied, mouth slightly slack, and watched James quirk a smile at her speechlessness.
"Yes but…why greasy?"
"Have you even seen his hair?" Sirius asked.
Whether she liked it or not, that pseudo-James Dean mustard-covered slob had a point.
To call these boys "men" would be disingenuous. Incredibly so. Though men on legal documents, though old enough to be shipped off to the other side of the world with a gun and a helmet and a perfume-scented letter in their breast pockets, the four boys—the Marauders they liked to call themselves—were still teenage boys. Teenage boys with sprouting facial hair, a blemish here and there, and boyish smiles; shameless discussions of sex, violent films, and jokes about flatulence were the talk of the day. However, the two newcomers were different from James and Sirius. Peter was a slightly chubby boy with blonde hair and watery blue eyes who seemed to idolize the very air James and Sirius breathed as he nibbled away at his sticky Cracker Jacks. He laughed at every joke spewing from their mouths and hung on their every word and ridiculous story. And yet, despite them ragging on him now and then, the others seemed to accept him into their group. Remus was quieter compared to the other three raucous boys. His skin was pale and dark circles lurked under his eyes, making him appear slightly sickly. His sandy-colored hair seemed trained to remain in a conservative short cut despite his clear intention of growing it out past his ear lobes. He was the only one of the boys who thought enough to talk to her about topics which didn't include bodily noises as the afternoon weaned away.
"Hey, you know that Owsley guy? Really weird, with the glasses and the brown hair," Sirius asked.
"Yeah, heard of him," James nodded.
"Isn't he in jail?" Remus said, stealing a handful of Peter's snack. Peter stared at Remus' hand as it traveled to his mouth. "I heard he was in jail."
"Well, he isn't today. Got something for us. The weirdo decided to name this batch Monterey Purple. Giving it away like it was candy," Sirius grinned, holding up a small plastic bag of small pills. He glanced at Lily and scoffed. "I guess for you too if you're willing. But you don't really strike me as the type."
"I'm already a type?" Lily retorted. "And what type would that be? Female unlike you all?"
"Hey, hold it. Don't get all feminist and Joan of Arc and all that shit on me for no reason. I meant the type wouldn't be dropping acid with strangers," Sirius replied.
"Get that stick out of your ass and let her at it," James said and took another drag from his cigarette before stubbing it out with a frown.
Sirius picked through the bag and handed Lily two of the pills into her palm. She stared at the two little pills, feeling a heavy weight of mystery, intrigue, and worry put upon her. Moving the pills around her palm, she examined the color and shape before looking back at Sirius with a guarded look.
"Go ahead, prove you're so brave," Sirius coaxed with a handsome, toothy smile. "Surprise me."
Lily stared evenly back at him, aware of the less than friendly tension officially drawn between them. "Well," she sighed. "Here goes nothing."
She picked up one pill and quickly, gingerly placed it on her tongue and swallowed it, eyes crinkled shut as it traveled down her throat.
"So take one now and—"
Lily, not listening, tossed the second into her mouth and took a deep swig of her Coke.
"—take the second one later."
She nearly spit out the soda as she heard the boys clap and hoot with laughter. "What?"
"Somebody was eager!" Sirius exclaimed, slapping his knee and throwing his head back with more laughter. "Well, this should be interesting."
"If it makes you feel any better," Remus said, accepting the bag and taking out a pill when it was passed to him. "I don't think it'll work much faster. You all right?"
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," Lily sighed, shaking her head and cringing at the lingering acrid taste stimulating her taste buds.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
"Don't sweat it, Red. You probably won't drop dead," Sirius said, swallowing his first pill ostentatiously and stubbed his now nearly non-existent cigarette on the heel of his black ankle boots. "Ha, that rhymed."
--
She finally understood why people raved about this drug. Really understood.
It was truly extraordinary, the power in those two tiny tart pills.
At first the four boys and Lily continued to lounge around the tree, on their backs or sides, or climbing trees (Sirius), listening to the music in the background. After over half an hour of sitting and waiting for this so called "amazing, out of this world, positively groovy experience" no such results came. But it came eventually, starting from the tips of her toes and moving slowly north like an elevator in an old hotel. Her world as she once knew it slowly became brighter, as though the colors and their respected hues were playing a game with her.
Lily's surroundings resembled a child's coloring book, with bright markers and crayons coloring outside the lines and much brighter than they would appear in real life. She found herself spinning round and round in small circles to watch the flowers of her dress move and shudder as if blown by the wind or gathered in a large armful and thrown up in the air, then gliding to the earth below. When she grew bored of such mind tricks and her calves grew tired, she pulled out from her purse the book she found in the trunk of Frank's van. She read biting her lip, never gazing upon words and lines and stanzas so provocative and daring in her life or so blatantly sexualized and yet so thought provoking. Lines stuck out to her like sore thumbs as they stared at her on the page, and the lifeless black print was so alive on the milky white paper. The writing wasn't just any sort of "poetry" as Alice flatly described. It was more than just describing lavender strewn moors or love; it was a raw experience not purely meant to be interpreted or picked apart metaphor by metaphor, simile by simile, or stanza by stanza. It was meant to be appreciated. She felt like weeping, unsure whether to feel empowered or to wallow in the caliber of gritty, unadulterated sincerity.
She closed the book and turned onto her stomach while James lay on his back, eyes closed and smiling. Lily caught sight of James's plaid shirt, the pattern and lines moving like liquid streams of different colors; the red like lava, and not the lava you make up as a child, jumping and hopping from furniture piece to furniture piece pretending the floors are lethal molten rock. No, real lava. She wondered if it would hurt to touch, burn her, so she lightly fingered his shirt.
She felt no heat and suddenly felt incredibly silly.
Yet she reveled in the feel of it beneath her finger tips. The material felt so unrefined, the shallow grooves of the shirt making all the difference.
"Lily?"
"Mmmhm," she replied.
"Are you groping my shirt?" he asked, opening one eye to peer down at her. She was enthralled, fondling the fabric with serious consideration.
"I like it," she said. "It reminds me of childhood."
"Did you ever live in Scotland?"
"No."
"Maybe you did in a past life. And you were, I don't know, eaten by the Loch Ness Monster. You can see it in that cloud right there," James said, pointing at a fluffy white cloud above them.
"That doesn't look like Loch Ness."
"No, no, no, you have to squint," James insisted, narrowing his eyes so tightly until they were nearly closed.
Neither talked for a while, and Lily simply engaged herself with the wind hitting her face, and how each breeze felt like a million little fingers tickling her skin and lightly brushing her hair, sending shivers up and down her spine. Her senses were on fire. But that was the point of this drug, wasn't it?
"You know how people say the world is so big and we're so small and all that?" James asked quietly, just after a loud thump from behind them; likely Sirius falling from the tree.
"Yes."
"I've never liked that bullshit. Yes, I'm small in comparison to the universe; that's the most fucking obvious fact of all time. But why do people have negate their existence like that? They shouldn't feel so helpless. They shouldn't feel like they can't make a difference in the world just because of the stars mocking you. That's the problem with people. They think too small. They think that they're so helpless. If that's so true why is it that even the smallest groups of people can change history and laws? Huh? Explain that to me. Once people stop thinking they can't contribute something to the world, and I don't just mean big things, even…you know…little things, then maybe we'll start being happier people. I want to look back at this time, this moment when I'm old with gray hair coming out of my ears, and feel like we made a difference."
Lily removed herself from James's shirt and stared at him very seriously, eventually leaning in closer to his ear and with a broad grin breathed, "My sister would hate you."
The day dragged on and turned into evening. Lily danced to the combination of vibrations and jazzy tunes of trumpets from Hugh Masekela's band and contemplated the never-ending stream of sound from the far away stage. Contemplated the brass, their construction, their golden hue and how bright it was under the stage lights as the sun began to set over Monterey seaside town and its loaded festival grounds. She pondered who made the trumpet, how it was invented, and where the materials came from; how the players' fingers and lungs never wore out from strain and long use.
The sunset was mind blowing. Her mother told her staring at the sun for too long would make you blind, and Lily believed her until that evening when staring at the sun forced her to finally see and appreciate its beauty. After cool darkness chased away the light, and two rather lackluster performances left the stage, Lily and the Marauders made their way to the main seating area to watch Jefferson Airplane perform. The perfect structure of the uncomfortable white metal chairs soon fell apart as more and more started to stand rather than sit and budge their way as close as they could to the stage.
And there was Slick, bangs and headband giving an impression of innocence, yet her voice demonstrated something wise and strong beyond her years. Her strength and chemistry with the audience was impeccable, and Lily was suddenly overwhelmed with gratefulness at such close proximity to one of the most talented, most beautiful women she'd ever seen. She stood transfixed, lips moving along to the songs but utterly intoxicated with the sounds filling her ears and the lights of red and yellow and orange.
The last song was accompanied with dull hues of white and gray and electrifying blue spread across the band and those close enough to see each meticulous move she made. For the first time in what felt like hours, she felt James nudge her.
"If you look at the blue light long enough it looks green," James said. "Your eyes are green. But not blue first. I wonder why."
"Why my eyes are green?"
By now they were nearly whispering, reading each other's mouths. She felt him respond with a firm "yes" rather than heard the word tumble from his lips.
"I don't know. God's fault," Lily replied, half listening to James, half to the music. Neither were in synch.
"We only blame God when things are wrong. Your eyes aren't wrong. They're just green."
His hands were on her face now, his slightly pointed nose incredibly close to her own. She gasped at the sudden grasp and felt the warm air from his nostrils, his breath sweltering, causing her to shiver in a flurry of sensations. She felt the elevator moving earlier slowly travel back south to an end. But she suddenly wanted to touch him, feel him before her high was over. Her fingers gently touched the inside of his elbow, causing the skin there to prickle up and tighten into goosebumps.
His hands were on her hips, warming her hipbones through her thin dress as he swayed back and forth to the beautiful wailing voice in the background, gently rubbing Lily's cheek. This spontaneous attraction they both savored as they touched one another provided an odd sense of comfort despite their lack of familiarity.
"Your freckles are…"
"Yes?"
"They're moving."
"You should catch them then."
"You're right," James nodded, and promptly squeezed her cheeks between his dry, calloused palms. "Got them!"
Her pinned face made it hard to respond the least bit coherently.
"You have a nice face, Lily."
She knew her face couldn't possibly look lovely squished together like that.
He finally released her, proudly declaring, "They're not moving anymore."
The band was done with the set, if the clapping and hooting and Sirius's enthusiastic screams clearly heard amongst the thousands of others was any indication. As the stage crew changed sets, preparing for the next group, Lily suddenly felt a pang at her stomach; an onset of nausea.
"I think I'm going to…" Lily gasped and covered her mouth with her right hand as she attempted to escape the sea of people and clapping and white chairs. Her head ached as she pushed her way past bodies and annoyed shouts of, "Hey!" and, "Watch it!" She couldn't apologize; the slightest movement of her tongue would result in messy consequences. She had to get back towards the grass. She had to lay down. She had to stop the back of her throat from trembling so.
"Wait, slow down!" she heard from behind her, in front of her, to the left, to the right, the sky, the earth below her brown sandals. She wasn't quite sure where, nor did she really care because that voice wasn't going to make the urge to vomit leave.
Lily staggered past the bodies and tripped over chair legs before she finally reached the grass with tears stinging in her eyes. She found a large pine tree and collapsed beside it, moaning.
"Hey, hey," she felt someone shake her. It was James. "You don't look well."
Nor did she feel well. The vibrations and sounds of the music throbbed, pulsing through her ears as the next band began to perform already. She gripped her stomach again.
"I think I'm sick," Lily gasped. "I think I'm sick."
"You did take two tablets," James said, falling slowly from his high as well as he watched Lily crawl towards the nearest trashcan and throw up. Her fingers gripped the steel rim, and she felt the urge to hurl again as the day's old garbage mixed with her own result of the day's festivities. Dizziness ensued as she removed her head from the can and gripped it tightly.
"It was fun while it lasted?" James chuckled, but cringed as his laugh was interrupted with another round of puking. She raised her head out of the trash and glared at him over her shoulder, wanting to throttle him for trying to cheer her up at such an inappropriate juncture of the evening as the effects of the drugs waned but remained present and made her feel incredibly disoriented. But he was right: it was fun while it lasted.
"Hold my hair back," she said as she felt herself ready to throw up again.
He did.
By the time Lily stopped vomiting, the last performer of the night was starting his set, which, from where Lily and James were walking, seemed to inspire quite a bit of movement.
"Who's on now?" Lily asked hoarsely, making a sickened face as she chugged another coke in hopes of removing the acidic taste from her mouth. "You know?"
"Otis Redding, I think. Sounds like it from here and his name was on the posters. There's a record store I go to in the city with the best soul albums in the city, I'm telling you. Played this guy in the store the other week. He's great! And he just makes you want to—" James took Lily by the hand and attempted to spin her around. "—dance."
"Don't make me throw up again," Lily warned.
"Feeling better?"
"Not entirely, no."
"Good enough. Let's get up there."
The two found Sirius, Remus, and Peter where they left them, her hours-long high now diminished and instead of heightened sensory or intense colors, she saw and listened for what it was. She moved her feet and her hips along with the drums, the guitars, and the soulful tunes, never wanting the music to end, and feeling utterly enthralled by his last song of the night. And with a great roar from the ground and a final strike of the instruments, Redding said his goodbyes and the crowd began to disperse.
"Fantastic, that man." Sirius smiled broadly, arms around Remus and Peter's shoulders. "Fantastic. If only I could move my hips like that. I mean, wow. Did you see his hips move? You know, guys, we should practice tonight. I bet I'm best at it."
Everyone seemed to either loiter around the grounds, smoking, or huddle in sleeping bags, the few scattered tents, or head back to their cars to sleep. It didn't take long before Sirius and James started to walk and wrestle at the same time.
"Well, it's been," Lily started, watching Sirius manage to get James into a headlock on the ground, "an interesting day. Nice meeting you all but I've got to go find the people I got here with."
"I'll help!" James offered, half-strangled but determined to escape from Sirius' clutches. "Catch up with you guys later at the car."
"Oh, you really don't have to—"
"Chivalry isn't dead to a Potter," James said as he stood and brushed himself off somewhat daintily, comically sweeping off tiny particles of dust. "Two heads are better than one. So who are we looking for? Snivellus and company?"
"Oh, stop with that silly name, already," Lily said with a cringe, feeling the damp sea air chilling her arms and legs. She shivered.
"Cold, huh?" James noticed, and took off his flannel. "You seemed to take a liking to it earlier."
"It's lost its flair," she replied, but eagerly wrapped it around her shoulders and chest. It was warm and smelled like him, and for a boy it was rather pleasant. "Thanks."
"No problem," he said, smiling as they walked through the noisy grounds. The dozens of flash lights and haze of smoke made the shadows and incessant chatter eerie during their search in the dark.
"I'm starting to think you just like doing things for me," Lily noted, glancing up at him but quickly returning her focus in front of her when she saw him looking back at her. His overabundance of confidence should have bothered her, and it did, but she couldn't help but enjoy his presence; or at least not mind it. But what worried her was the fact that she felt shy when he looked at her. Lily figured she was just out of her element: she wasn't normally so shy.
Another part of her wanted to scream for being so trusting of the people Severus seemed to know more about than she. She was too naïve for her own good. And yet the littlest quirk of James' lips or regard of his warm hazel eyes made his glaring faults—her glaring faults and lack of judgment—seem irrelevant. At least he's nice to you, she told herself. Unlike Severus.
"Lily! We've been looking all over for you!"
The two spotted Alice jogging up to them with a flashlight in her hand. She immediately rubbed Lily's shoulder. "Hi, James," Alice added.
"Alice." James nodded. "How's that tailbone? Still smarting?"
"Its fine, thanks." Alice flushed, lightly touching the small of her back. "I guess I have you to thank for that. So what are you two doing together? Both lost?"
"Actually, I ended up spending the whole day with this oaf," Lily said.
"Oh, but it was this oaf's pleasure. And look," James said, pointedly nodding his chin in front of him. "The party's really getting started now."
Lily looked up to see Severus stalking up to them in his awkward, slump-shouldered gait.
"What the hell are you doing here?" Severus spat. He looked absolutely livid.
"Came just to see your shining face, Snivellus," James bit back with a nasty, false smile. "But unfortunately I suddenly feel like puking."
Severus glanced at Lily and then James…then Lily again…and then James.
"Were you with him all day?" Severus asked, gesturing wildly towards James. "Or was he just stalking you? Wouldn't put it past him. Want me to alert the pigs?"
"As a matter of fact, Severus, I did spend the day with him," Lily said defiantly.
"She had nobody else to be with but herself and her shadow, after all," James said wryly.
"Shadow? Shadow? You had us, you know," Severus told her.
"Oh yeah, like I was really going to go off with the likes of you after what you said to me in the van," Lily scoffed.
"What did he say about you?" James asked.
"None of your business," Severus and Lily said simultaneously, glaring at each other.
"Well, here you are," James said, clapping his hands together and bowed slightly at the waist. "I'll hopefully see you tomorrow, eh?"
"Says who?" said Severus, whose voice was now breaking as he looked at James like he sprouted two heads.
"Says me!" Lily defended and addressed James again. "Tomorrow then."
"Goodnight kiss?"
James shifted his weight to his left foot as he leaned comically puckered lips down towards Lily, awaiting a puckered reply.
"Don't get carried away," Lily said, pushing him lightly in the chest so he'd lose his balance.
"You never fail to wound me, Lily Evans," James crooned, touching his chest and walking backwards slowly with a mischievous smile. "Well, goodnight! You, too, Alice. And greasy dreams, Snivellus."
James sauntered off with a spring in his step and the trio stood watching him until he became lost in the bustling crowd.
Alice looked at Severus angrily as they began to head back to the area Alice had staked out for them to sleep. "You and James just can't keep your emotions in check, can you?"
"What happened to five o'clock?" Severus suddenly reminded Lily. "We said we'd meet at the van at—"
"Five o'clock, I know. I just lost track of time," Lily said. "Last I checked that wasn't a crime."
"Stupid, idiotic, son of a—" Severus huffed as they walked back to the group's small circle where they'd be sleeping tonight. In the darkness Lily could see moonlight shining on Severus' cold sweat on his forehead and his eyebrows were tightly knitted. Severus's thin lips were downturned like a child's pout with much stronger emotion tied to it than dissatisfaction. "What do you see in him anyway?"
"I don't see anything in him."
"You two sure looked chummy."
What is with these boys and the word "chummy"?
"Give it a rest, Sev!" Alice snapped. "Leave her alone. She's fine. No need to be paranoid like you usually are."
Lily sighed as she glanced at Severus, incredibly frustrated. "He and his friends showed me a good time, that's all."
"What sort of a good time?" he pressed. "Or rather, what drug?"
"And how do you know drugs were involved?"
"Well we're here. So what was it?"
"What is with you clucking at me like a mother hen? Like my own mother!" Lily groaned. "Fine, Monterey Purple mean anything to you?"
"You dropped acid with that clan of idiots? Are you crazy or just stupid?"
"At least they didn't act as though a genuine apology was just an attempt to bulk up my own confidence and sexual repertoire," Lily said. "So I'd say that's already a step up from you."
"I—"
"And for your information, you're absolutely right, he's the most arrogant person I've ever met, BUT—" Lily emphasized when Severus opened his mouth. "He had the decency to at least try to help me when I felt sick. And once you get past the superiority complex and the bad jokes he wasn't all that bad. And we even danced a bit. I think."
"High off your asses."
"And what were we last night?"
"Well, I hope you're happy," Severus snarled, throwing her sleeping bag at her. "You've got four new idiots to call friends."
"They aren't my friends," Lily repeated. "They're boys I spent the day with. They were completely…harmless."
"Harmless, sure," Severus said, fishing out a cigarette from his pocket and promptly lighting it. "You're just another one of their little playthings. Potter and his lemmings'll chew you up and spit you out like the other girls they use for a week or two."
"You don't know what you're talking about. I'm going to bed," Lily said, trying and failing to ignore his last comment. She turned her head towards him, red lips parted ever so slightly. She licked her lips quickly and sighed. "I would say good-night, but I don't think you deserve it."
She threw down her bag, looked through her sack for some warm pajama bottoms, and settled into the bag on the soft grass. It was hardly what one would call quiet, and it likely wouldn't be for hours. The big black sleeping bag was huge but felt safe as she burrowed into it, idly staring out the opening at vague flashes of light and feet and grass and smoke and damp fog rolling in. Just as her eyes began to droop, with a start she realized she was still wearing James's warm red and yellow plaid shirt and vaguely wondered if he purposefully forgot to get it back from her or if it was an accident caused by the sudden hullaballoo between him and Severus.
And yet, she found herself not caring, and engulfed in that unique smell of clean boy and grass stains she fell asleep happy.
--