Sorry for the later update – I've been away for a week!
Chapter 7
"You can't ask that!" Alicia squealed.
Elsa folded her arms and stared at her. "I just did. If Sirius asked you out, would you say yes?"
"Elsa, he's right there!"
"So?"
They were sat in a circle in Elsa's room. Sirius himself was lying back on her bed, his head propped up on one hand, staring at Alicia, obviously trying to make her uncomfortable. Lily looked away from him and caught James watching her from his place at the end of the bed. He looked away quickly, and she felt even more guilty. He'd been doing that all day: watching her, and then looking away when she tried to make eye contact. It was as if he was trying to find the courage to say something to her, but not quite managing. It wasn't like him at all.
"Fine." Alicia fumed. "If Sirius asked me on a date, I'd go."
"That's not what I meant!" Elsa complained.
"Well it's all you're getting."
"Anyone for a cup of tea?" James asked, trying to disrupt the developing argument. It worked at least briefly – the majority of the room immediately started shouting out their drinks orders. 2Slow down! So that's milk and sugar for you three, milk and three sugars for Mary, black for Sirius – oh the irony – and a hot chocolate for Remus."
He left, and Elsa moved onto her next truth or dare victim: Mary.
"Truth."
"If Evan had asked you to sleep with him in order for him to help you with work would you have done it?"
There was stunned silence before Sirius burst out laughing. Remus sighed, and looked at him sadly.
"Is that really necessary? Besides, Mary, if you wanted help you could have just asked."
They heard James swear loudly from downstairs, and Lily stood up. "I'll go teach him how a muggle kettle works. Back in a bit."
She walked out of Elsa's room and headed downstairs to the kitchen. James was stood staring at the electric kettle, utterly confused. He obviously had no idea what to do with it. He swore again. To give him some credit, he'd at least found the right number of mugs, and some sugar.
"Need a hand?"
He jumped, then saw who it was and stepped back, hitting the counter. "Oh... Hi Evans. I've tried everything, it won't work! Look, I pressed the thingy like Elsa said, and I put the teabags in the mugs, I can't find the hot chocolate, do I just have to melt –"
"Calm, Potter. It's just a few drinks, don't get so worked up." she leaned past him and grabbed the kettle. "You might want to fill it up though. And then try plugging it in at the wall."
She filled the kettle at the sink, then set it on to boil. She started searching the cupboards for instant hot chocolate. There wasn't any at the bottom of the first cupboard she tried, and she was about to move on to try the next one when James came up behind her and grabbed something from the top shelf. Lily turned around. James was stood right there – if she leaned forward she'd be touching him.
"It was right at the top." he said. "I'm such an idiot; I didn't even think to try to cupboard. Everything else was on the side."
He gave a sheepish grin, but didn't move. Lily was suddenly very aware of the kitchen worktop digging into her back, and the couple of inches James had grown since last she saw him. He looked really tall from this angle. His dark hair was flopping into his face and she had the fleeting urge to brush it back.
"You never wrote." she blurted out.
James looked confused, but didn't move an inch. "What?"
Lily blushed, feeling even more embarrassed than before. "I thought... Moony said –" she looked away. "It doesn't matter."
She felt his hand on her cheek, pushing her face up to look at him. "I tried, Lils. I've got at least two dozen pieces of parchment with your name on crumpled in the rubbish bin. I guess I'm just too much of a coward to want to face rejection."
Before Lily knew it, her hand was on his face too, and suddenly she was on tiptoe, her eyes were closing and she was kissing him. She was kissing James freaking Potter and his hand was on her back pulling her closer, but she couldn't be any closer, she was pressed up against him, and why hadn't they done this before? Why hadn't she let him in before? She heard the hot chocolate jar hit the floor and didn't care – Merlin this felt good!
They broke apart and Lily gasped for breath. She couldn't believe that had just happened. She looked down at her feet and saw a small heap of spilt hot chocolate powder. She looked up at James blushing, and he kissed her again. She tried to concentrate on breathing, but he broke it off fairly quickly, kneeling down to clear up the mess on the floor. Lily heard the kettle boil and turned around to deal with the tea-making. She grabbed another mug to make one for herself as well, her mind racing.
She'd kissed him. James. She'd bloody kissed him, something she'd thought for years she'd never do. Although recently she'd been getting closer to it... But did this mean she wanted to be with him?
"James?" she said nervously.
He gulped, looking up at her from his position kneeling on the floor. "Yeah, Lils?"
"It was... It was just a kiss." she saw his face fall. "No, I don't mean... Hell, I'm doing this all wrong. What I mean is, I'm still not ready to be in a relationship with you. So, could you please not tell anyone? I don't want the pressure the others would put on me."
James stood up and hugged her. "It's ok, Lily. I won't tell anyone. I don't expect anything." he laughed weakly. "Though obviously I'd like to be kissing you a lot more often."
Lily smiled. "I will promise one thing. Right now, you're the only guy I want to be kissing."
"So you do want to kiss me then?"
"Don't get cocky, Potter. It was one kiss, not a promise of anything else." she turned around, her back to him and finished adding milk and sugar to the mugs in front of her.
James grabbed the hot chocolate powder and put a few spoonfuls into a mug. "Do I get another kiss if I promise not to tell, Evans?"
She stuck her tongue out as she passed him the kettle to refill. "I said no promises. But maybe. I'll give you a chance, if you can keep it between us." she plugged the kettle back in and passed him three of the five mugs the kettle had been enough for. "Just a casual thing. See how it goes."
He took the mugs, attempting to hold three cups of tea at once. "Course, Lils. I... I don't want to ruin this. I'd rather keep it quiet, at least at first." he grinned. "I promise not to kiss you in front of the others just yet."
"For the last time, I do not fancy Saskia Lee!" Remus said angrily.
"Well, you have been doing lots of Prefect duties together..." Lily teased. "Joking, Remus. Calm down. We get it."
He glared at her. She smiled back sweetly, and he soon rolled his eyes and looked away, having a sip of his hot chocolate. Lily picked up her own mug of tea and took a gulp, before noticing Elsa watching her.
"Your turn, Lily."
"Elsa, you're sat next to Remus. How is it my turn?"
Elsa leaned back, tossing her wavy brown hair. "You missed your turn when you were getting drinks. It's your turn."
"I'm not the only one who missed a turn! James, you haven't had a single go yet."
James looked her in the eyes and she had to fight the urge to blush. "That, Evans, is because I was purposefully avoiding playing." he sighed. "Apparently I'm just not good enough at slipping beneath your notice –"
"For sure he's not complaining Lily's noticed him." Mary quipped, earning a stony glare from Lily.
"Dare!" James called out, before Lily could decide what to say to Mary.
"We haven't had one of them yet, have we?" Lily followed the subject change, glad to avoid Mary's teasing.
"Yeah we have." Sirius told her. "While you and James were...busy...we got Wormy to lean out the window and sing the school song wearing Elsa's pink hat." he paused. "It was fairly lame."
"Agreed." said Elsa. "We need something better for James."
James rolled his eyes and leaned back against the wall. Nothing they'd come up with would be that bad. He knew people who'd jumped in the salamander box in Care of Magical Creatures and had half their skin burned off just to win a bet. There wasn't anything that dangerous in Elsa's house, he was fairly sure, and he wasn't easily embarrassed. He noticed Elsa mouthing something at Padfoot, who grinned eagerly.
"No way! You can't do that!"
Remus had obviously caught what they were talking about.
"Can and will." Elsa replied, grinning like a Cheshire cat.
"Come on Els', that's a dare for her as well as him."
Lily's heart sank. She had a pretty good idea what was coming, and she didn't think it was going to be a nice, simple dare like Peter's had been.
Sirius sat up and looked at his best friend. "Go on then, Prongs. I dare you to get your bloody act together and kiss the girl."
James raised one eyebrow, trying to play it cool and refusing to look at Lily in case his face betrayed him. "Any particular girl? Only there's a few to choose from in here."
"Come on James, you know which one he means –"
"You can't make them so that, it's just wrong!"
"Go on, kiss her –"
"This isn't fair on Lily –"
"Oh, shut up all of you!" Lily spoke over the noise, and the complaints and encouragement stopped. She looked at James, trying to act completely nonchalant whilst fighting memories of him snogging her while the kettle boiled. She could see him attempting his usual swagger.
"What d'you say, Evans? Quick kiss to make them give it a rest?" he looked at her from across the room, not really sure what he wanted her to say.
She laughed. "Only if this counts as my dare too. And it doesn't leave this room." she looked at Elsa, who had the grace to look apologetic. "Go on then, Potter. Give us a quick kiss."
The wolf whistles and cat-calling started as the pair of them stood up and made their way to the middle of the room. One quick peck on the lips and it was done.
What Lily wasn't sure about was why that didn't feel like enough.
"Lily." Mary whispered.
"Mmm?"
"Are you awake?"
Lily rolled her eyes, rolling over in her sleeping bag to face her friend. "No." she said sarcastically. "I'm just replying to you in my sleep."
The vague glow from Elsa's nightlight allowed Lily to see Mary glare at her. "I think we're the only ones awake."
It was true. Alicia was lying on her back on another section of floor, her sleeping bag discarded. Elsa was on her bed, facing them, eyes closed, sucking her thumb the way she always did when she was really tired.
"That's because the other two are sleeping like sensible people. Go back to sleep, Mare."
Lily turned over, but could feel Mary's eyes on her back, watching her. She turned back and propped herself up on one elbow. "What?" she hissed.
"I was just thinking..." Mary looked at Lily and gulped. "Nothing really. Well, I –"
Lily snorted and shook her head. "Spit it out."
"Earlier. The dare with you and James."
"What about it?" she narrowed her eyes.
"For sure, it's probably nothing. It was only that you didn't seem to be complaining too much. Didn't need a huge amount of convincing."
Lily was silent for a while. Mary had almost given up on a response when she spoke quietly.
"If I hadn't done it they'd just have dared both of us worse things. They'd obviously planned it, Sirius and Elsa, and they'd probably planned something even worse as a backup." she paused. "Besides, he's got a lot less bigheaded lately."
"So you two -?"
"Oh shut up." Lily snapped. "Even if we were, it would be our business. Besides which, we're not. But even if – "
"Calm yourself. I was only asking. I'm not Elsa, out to make a sickle and spread rumours about your love life."
Lily looked at her guiltily. "Sorry."
"It's fine, Lils. I know you're sensitive when it comes to James. I won't ask what's going on if you don't want to tell me." she smiled. "Night."
"Night. And, well, thanks."
"Padfoot? Is that you awake?"
Sirius groaned, stretching out an arm and narrowly missing waking Peter up by punching him in the head. "The moon isn't even half full, Remus. Cease your howling and let me sleep."
"I can't! And you haven't slept yet either. You've been tossing and turning for hours and you're grouchy."
"Well, my patch of floor isn't exactly comfortable," Sirius hissed, "how's yours?"
Even with Elsa's parents away for the weekend they hadn't let them all sleep in the same room. The boys had been relegated to the living room floor, too far away to hear any whispers from the girls. Sirius had expected Elsa to argue with her parents about that, but she seemed to be fine with it. Most of his friends were happy to agree with what their parents told them when it came down to it. Sometimes he had to wonder if leaving had been the right thing – people were supposed to love their families, but all he felt for his was hatred of them and their pureblood mania.
"I was thinking –"
"Not again, Moony." Sirius drawled.
Remus glared. "About James."
"What about him?" Peter piped up, surprising the others with his being awake.
"That dare earlier..." Moony said slowly. "It felt a bit too easy to convince them. I told you not to do it because I assumed Lily would refuse and you'd just embarrass them both."
"So?" Sirius replied.
"So it was too damn easy! Come on, how much money has Elsa taken off you both in the past five years through them refusing to have a quick snog?"
"Five galleons, eight sickles and three knuts."
Sirius and Remus both turned to stare at Peter, who twitched his nose, obviously uncomfortable.
"Wormy, you need to control your gambling habit."
"That's beside the point, Padfoot. The point is that –"
"That it should have been harder to convince them to kiss for the first time, even if it wasn't a full on snog."
"Exactly."
"Right." said Peter. "So that means..?"
Sirius sighed. "That they might have kissed before. And the traitor never told us that he'd finally kissed the girl. But anyway." he yawned. "I'm too tired for an interrogation just now. There's a lumpy rug and cushion with my name on it. Goodnight."
The others bid him goodnight and rolled over to try to get back to sleep. Whereas James lay awake, staring out of the window at the moon, cursing his friends for paying attention the one and only time he needed them to be totally oblivious.
