Pretty Mouth and Green Her Eyes

By: Nicole Jeanine

Disclaimer: The original characters and storyline are mine. I do not believe I am JK Rowling, or that I own Harry Potter in any way, shape, or form. I also do not believe I am JD Salinger and would like to thank him for the use of his title (I switched one word, though).

Summary: Five years after graduating, James Potter returns to Hogwarts as the defense professor. The residing Head Girl, Lily Evans, catches his attention and becomes irresistible yet seemingly unattainable.

Chapter Six: Detention or Bust!

Friday night held the tradition of 'Poker Night' in the teacher's lounge. Most of the players were the male teaching staff, as the women took little interest in their card games. James sat at a round table between Kettleburn and Blake, across from Vector, Slughorn, and the school caretaker, Filch, while the table next to theirs sat more of their colleagues. James, however, took little notice of them and concentrated on the hand he had been dealt.

"Anyone got any interesting stories so far?" Blake asked, establishing himself in James' mind as the gossip of the group.

Kettleburn sighed and looked over his cards. "Miss Giotonee's fish died."

"No, no. I said interesting. Your little girlfriend's problems are of no concern to me," Blake laughed.

"Her father gave it to her just before he was killed, and she's left to give it a proper burial next to his grave this week," Kettleburn said, glaring slightly. "She's very upset about the whole thing."

"Well," Blake said, tossing a few sickles to the center of the table, "that's a tad over dramatic, and thus, more promising than I thought. Continue."

Kettleburn put his cards on the table after James raised. "I fold. She's having her teachers omit her assignments while she's gone, and I, as tactful as I am, refused and told her it was just a fish. Well, she started sobbing, threw the door open to leave just as Potter was walking past. Split his nose right in two."

"No way," Slughorn chortled, the excess blubber on his neck jiggling. "Now that's funny."

"I fail to see the humor," James responded, raising again as the bet came around to him. "Took Madame Pomfrey an hour to properly rebuild my nose bridge. Well, I was clearly knocked senseless. I ended up giving Lily Evans detention in my hysteria."

Slughorn threw his cards on the table, angrily growling, "You will not do any such thing to Lily Evans. I won't stand for it."

James' eyebrows rose. "Delicate subject? What's wrong with me giving out detentions?"

"There's no possible reason for it," Slughorn said, sitting up straighter. "She's too well behaved. She's got a spotless record."

"Not anymore. Ooo, stakes are getting high," Blake said in a sing-song voice, eying the large pile of silver between James and Filch, the only two competing players that round.

They stared at each other for a moment before James asked, "Care to make things interesting?"

Flich creased his forehead. "What do you have in mind?"

"I'll raise you one detention with Mister Rockwell tomorrow night. Two hours," James said, smiling as the onlookers giggled, excited.

Flich smiled elatedly, mentally mapping Whispering Boy's torture. "Make it three."

"You can't raise my side of the bet."

"Fine, fine," Filch said, glancing back down to his cards. "I'll raise you one hour of plumbing services, whenever I need them."

James grinned smugly. "Shall we lay the cards down?"

Filch spread his cards into a fan over the tabletop, his face falling as James laid a royal flush in front of him. Although he was disappointed to lose the coins, Filch reveled in the thought of a two hour detention... how he loved detention giving...

"Well, I think I'll leave on a positive note," James said, interrupting Filch's distant pondering while shoveling the silver into his carrier. "What time is it, anyhow?"

Kettleburn looked to his watch. "God, it's already three o'clock. It'll be daylight soon," he said, standing with James. "Think I'll head off, too."

They waved their goodbyes, and stepped into the cold hallway together, traveling by the moonlight streaming through the corridor's long windows. Kettleburn turned to James with something clearly on his mind.

"I'm guessing you didn't coincidentally decide to leave the same time as me," James said, noticing Kettleburn's fidgeting.

"I've been thinking," Kettleburn said, stopping in a rarely traveled hallway. "About what happened yesterday."

James shrugged in the darkness. "The fish?"

"No. Well, yes, but no. Just about her... in general, you know?"

Stuffing his hands in his pockets, James figured they had stopped in a shadowed place to conceal Kettleburn's face as he asked a rather intimate question. "Where are you going with this?"

James heard a loud sigh and clumsy pacing. "She said she wants to have kids."

"With you?"

"That's the thing. I don't know," Kettleburn spoke hurriedly. "I think that's what she was inferring."

"Inferring?" James repeated. "What did she say?"

He treaded a circle into the rug, his shoe sole sliding a tad on the loose fringe. "After you left, I followed her into the bathroom where she was crying—said I was sorry if she was upset. She didn't like that, and she told me it was my fault, not hers, and to stop twisting my words to make her feel bad. I apologized again for God knows what, and I told her it was really just some goldfish. She said that she knew and that I was right—said she wouldn't want her kids to be this upset if she had died over a year ago."

James squinted into the darkness and threw his hands upward in frustration. "And you got 'please father my children' out of that? You're the mental one. Talk about paranoia."

Kettleburn stormed toward the staircases, James in tow. "Forget it. You don't understand."

"That's right, I don't. Blake's getting to your head. I don't think she even likes you period, let alone likes you likes you."

"She does! He's right. You just don't understand," Kettleburn sulked, pausing on the staircase as it lurched, beginning to change.

James caught up to him, and asked, "How can you tell?"

Kettleburn shrugged and started walking on the new landing the staircase had chosen. "She does certain things... for one, she watches me."

"Well, she's supposed to. You're her teacher, and she's supposed to watch you teach. That's kind of the whole concept."

Shaking his head, Kettleburn unlocked his classroom door, turning sharply and saying, "No, she watches me. She watches me grade papers, and erase the board, and drink my coffee at breakfast, and read the newspaper, and organize my quills, and... Forget it. You don't know because you're new. You've never had one of them stare at you like that—you'd know if it happened."

James caught the door as Kettleburn tried to slam it. "Plenty of people stare at me."

"They stare; they don't watch," Kettleburn said, wrenching the door out of his grasp. "Let me know when they do, and then we'll talk."

The door closed in James' face, and he backtracked to the staircases. People watched him all the time; it was Kettleburn who 'didn't know'. James walked agitatedly to his rooms, remembering to carefully look for everyone watching him the next day, so as to prove his point.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The Saturday Lesson came rather rapidly, as James pulled himself out of bed around one o'clock that afternoon. He laid in his four-poster bed, counting ceiling beams, and thought back to the roof of the Gryffindor tower. It had been made of tin and shook fiercely as the rain fell above them. Sirius and he had always claimed they could count the raindrops during light sprinkles and had many childish contests to prove their superior hearing capabilities.

James swung his feet lazily over the bedside, standing and dressing in preparation for their lesson. Looking into the floor length mirror he had propped against the wall, he decided to overlook the tie and leave the first few buttons undone. He grabbed an apple from the plate atop the kitchen table as he sauntered past in a type of skip, inexplicably happy that morning. Keeping up his dance down the stairs, he took them two at a time while nonchalantly spinning, finishing with a full pirouette at the bottom.

He heard giggles and looked up to see Lily Evans and Mirina McDowell waiting near the door. They always seemed to enter at the most inconvenient moment for him.

"Good afternoon, ladies. How are you this fine day?" he asked, trying to cover his reddening ears.

"We're very good," Mirina said, flipping her hair, which was clearly her selling point. James had to give her credit for attempting cleavage by undoing her top buttons, but her bust really was too small. "How are you?"

"Splend-iferous" James responded, trying to spice up their conversation. "Come in, come in."

The two girls walked to the middle of the room where he was standing, Mirina swinging her hips widely. "Did you sleep well?" she asked, staring saucer-eyed at him.

James arched his eyebrow. "Err, yeah... I guess so. Did you?"

"Very," she said, her voice much deeper.

"And you, Miss Evans," James asked, coolly spinning a chair around and sitting in it backward. "How did you sleep?"

"Not so well," she said, grinning back. She had pulled her hair back that day into a loose bun, complete with a few tendrils falling from the mass. This view allowed James to fully appreciate her high cheekbones and sculpted eyes, which sparkled to him as she spoke. "I woke up with a knot in my shoulder." She illustrated by reaching behind her back and rubbing her shoulder blade, elegantly arcing her back.

James was enticed. "Really? Well, we'll have to fix that before you can start, won't we? Can't have you waving a wand around; it might further your injury."

Mirina turned green as James pulled a chair in front of his and patted the back of the seat. Lily softly sat in the chair, facing away from her professor, as he roughly began kneading her shoulder.

"So how do you like my class?" James asked colloquially. "Dreadfully boring or fantastically inspired?"

"Depends which day," Mirina said tartly.

"We have a critic," James commented. "What was your favorite part?"

Mirina smiled fiendishly. "Lily enjoyed when you stumbled out of the lake, dripping wet, shirt clinging."

"Mirina!" Lily protested, turning to James behind her. "That's not true."

"Sure it isn't," James said, leaning forward to whisper alluringly into her ear.

She covered her face with her hands as James laughed. She was so adorable, and Sirius was sure to like her, which was a very important factor for James.

"Well, I enjoyed it," Mirina said, regaining her deep voice and purposely gaping her shirt again. "Do you work out a lot?"

James raised his eyebrows. She certainly was blunt. "When I can. I used to have to because I was in Auror training, but now I just like to stay fit. It gives me something to do."

"Why didn't you become an Auror?" Lily asked shyly.

James sighed, hoping he could double back and avoid that question. "I couldn't have a regular service outfit to fight with. Apparently I was a target and a high-level risk to my unit. They were going to send me on special missions with the more experienced fighters, but that's not what I wanted to do. I guess the reality of the war hit me all at once, and after Sirius—Sirius Black, my friend—came home injured one night, I didn't want any part of the whole thing."

"What'd you do then?" Mirina prodded, looking at him skeptically.

Sighing, James shrugged. "I took a job at the ministry and sabotaged Sirius's job, so he got fired and had to work in the office with me. He wasn't too pleased once he figured it out, and he had me fired for falsifying official reports. Took him forever to speak to me again."

"That wasn't in the papers," Mirina said.

"True," James acknowledged, looking at Lily's hair. "I use some discretion. It's kind of personal. Not my shining hour, you know?"

Mirina nodded and looked through the windows, not knowing what to say.

"Well, how's your shoulder, Miss Evans? Better?"

Lily nodded as he patted her on the back. She stood next to Mirina, and he flicked his wand to clear the desks.

"Alright, so I thought we'd start with stunning. I know it's kind of basic in the big scheme of things, but if you can't throw a good stunning curse, you're in trouble."

They paid attention as he demonstrated wand motions and listed their accompanying hexes. Soon, they were sending them toward small bricks James had lined on the far desks, so as to emphasize precise aim. After the hours passed, Mirina waved goodbye to them as Lily sat at a desk, readying herself for her first detention.

James refiled the classroom's desk rows and sat in chair at the desk preceding hers, angling it toward her and resting his arm in the vacant space beside her. He thought of apologizing, but firmly decided against it. It wouldn't do him any good even if he did; it's not as though he could just announce she'd been punk'd and send her away.

They sat in an uncomfortable silence waiting for her partner in crime to join them. He focused his eyes on the grains running through the thick desk surface, fixed in a permanent wave formation. His fingers ran the length of them, tracing their flowing pattern, as he glanced to Lily, whom he noticed was watching his hand. Watching. Remembering Kettleburn's words, he suddenly felt pressured and unsure of what to do while she stared intently at his fingertips moving smoothly in the shallow grooves on the desktop. He nervously gazed at her as her green eyes followed his hand. Could she see him watching her out of the corner of her eye? Was he making her uncomfortable, scaring her? Was she as tense as he was? Why was his hand so interesting, and why wasn't she looking away? James knew she could see him staring at her.

The door flung ajar and in stepped the awaited party, wearing a white undershirt that read 'Detention or Bust!' in large, sloppy handwriting. He plopped himself on the desk next Lily, and smiled casually, provoking James, who stood to signify his authority.

"Hello Professor," Nathaniel said confidently. "I would say, 'How nice to see you', but as it happens, it's really not nice to see you, so I will say, 'How awful to see you'."

James repressed an eye roll at the boy's feeble attempt to sound cool, but he noticed Lily bite back a smile. He sneered viciously to Nathaniel and inquired, "What are you wearing, Mister Rockwell?"

Nathaniel looked down and took on a surprised face, pretending to just remember his wardrobe choice. "Oh, it's my new shirt—made it myself."

James stared at him, baffled at how Lily could be impressed by this. "Why?"

"Well," he started, looking to Lily to ensure her interest with him. "I had one that said 'Gryffindor or Bust!' that I was going to wear to the quidditch game tonight, but seeing as how I'm not going, I figured that shirt would be inappropriate now."

"So you've fashioned yourself a new one?" James asked bitterly.

"I think it better suits the occasion."

Lily's slight giggle enraged James, and he lost his remaining patience with the boy. "You'll serve three hours detention with Mister Filch tonight." He flicked his hand sharply toward the door in a superior gesture. "Run along, you're already late."

Nathaniel playfully tapped the desk next to Lily as he walked past her and said, "Good luck, babe." He saluted James just before exiting, during which, to James' delight, he tripped over the base of the door frame and stumbled to the floor, out of sight. Sticking a hand back into the room, he gave a 'thumbs up' gesture. "I'm good."

Lily hid a smile as Nathaniel retreated, and looked to James for an assignment.

'Babe? What does that mean?' he thought, grabbing his name plate off his desktop and twirling it. "Well, Miss Evans, now that's taken care of, I suppose you'll have to start your detention," he said, feeling a wave of regret.

She nodded and looked down, understandably embarrassed.

James sighed at her sad expression. "You'll have to relabel the shelves in the defense storage room. It shouldn't take you that long. Okay?"

"Yes, sir," she said, standing solemnly and walking into a large closet at the rear of the room.

At first, James thought he should sit with her, but he figured he would seem overeager. He decided to check on her in thirty minutes, chatting then. For now, he would sit at his desk and not watch her, but read instead. He grabbed a copy of Combative Curses and flipped the cover open.

However, it was a widely known fact that James Potter had an attention deficit, and he quickly became bored with his reading, the words lulling him into a deep slumber.

- - - - - - - - Five Hours Later - - - - - - - -

"POTTER!" Slughorn bellowed, standing over James and slapping him with Combative Curses.

James jerked perpendicular to his chair and grimaced at the forming welt on his arm where Slughorn had assaulted him. "What the hell are you doing?" he shouted, standing to tower over his short, round co-worker.

Slughorn threw the book atop the desk and continued yelling, "Where is Miss Evans? She never misses my after-game parties, especially when Gryffindor wins! You know, you can't detain them for more than four hours. What have you done with her?!"

Staring back vacantly, realization suddenly passed over James' face: she was still there. She had never left. James ran quickly into the storeroom and found her asleep on the ground, slightly propped against a corner of shelving. He did not have the time to take in her beauty under the dim torch light, as Slughorn was bumbling along behind him, and he knelt beside her. The clipboard she had been using was still gripped slackly in her petite fist, and James placed it on a near cabinet before gently shaking her arm.

"Miss Evans," he called softly. "Miss Evans."

Her eyes flickered open as she sat up worriedly. "Oh goodness, I'm sorry. I'll finish. I'm almost done," she slurred, half unconscious, while reaching for her clipboard.

"You will do no such thing," Slughorn said, pushing James into a wall of shelves and lifting Lily from the floor. "It is past curfew, and your detention has been completed. I will escort you to your dorm," he declared, throwing a scornful look to James.

"Oh," Lily commented lightly.

James obstructed their exit and pried her arm from Slughorn's corpulent fingers, not wanting Lily to leave with him. "I will escort her. She is still under my watch," he said defiantly as Slughorn fumed.

"Very well, Mister Potter. But I'll have you know, I will report you for this," he spat, the angry red glow of his face creeping down his neck. "I don't know what you're trying here, but I'm going to find out."

James curled his lips; he never had liked his ex-professor. "Unclench. I fell asleep," he snarled, guiding Lily sternly into the hallway and turning back to Slughorn. "Goodnight."

Slughorn scanned over him, sizing him up, before warmly smiling to Lily. "Goodnight, Miss Evans. I shall need no praise for rescuing the fair maiden from her imprisonment."

"Goodnight, Professor," Lily smiled tiredly, with a faint wave.

James spun Lily quickly away from Slughorn and started down the hall with her.

Rid of Slughorn's presence, James sighed in relief and slowed their walk as he watched her stretch her arms above her head.

"I'm tired. What time is it?"

"Half past ten," he said, noticing her blink at his answer. "I'm sorry about this. I fell asleep."

She nodded. "As did I. If I need to finish my detention, let me know."

James laughed lightly. "I'd say you've served enough time already."

She turned sharply around a corner, bumping into his arm. James' flesh burned from the contact as they walked through the dark hallways in silence.

Suddenly, Lily squinted her eyes and looked around the darkness. "Where are we?"

"Halfway to the Gryffindor tower."

"No, I sleep in the Head dormitory. I'm Head Girl," she proclaimed, stumbling into James around another corner. She tugged his sleeve and pointed limply down the staircases. "It's this way."

In her jaded swagger, she sashayed in a unladylike manner down the stairs in front of James, who looked on, amused. 'She's more entertaining like this,' he thought, as she waited for him at the bottom.

"It's very late," she observed while they continuing walking. "I would make small talk, but I'm not terribly articulate at the moment." Tripping over an armor suit's foot, Lily added, "Apparently my grace has also taken a turn for the worse this evening."

James chuckled. "Apparently."

She abruptly halted beside of a door with a large brassy handle. "Well, this is me," she said, glancing between James and the doorknob. He did not take the hint, and she repeated the action.

"Oh, right." James heaved the door open for her to find the eyes of Mirina McDowell, Braden Ardsley, and Emmeline Vance staring at him. He smiled at the notion their sleepover, and backed down the hallway. "Goodnight, ladies."

Lily slipped inside and waved over her shoulder to him.

Starting down the hallway, James heard his name, stopped, and retraced his steps to the door.

- - - - - - - - Inside the Room - - - - - - - -

Lily closed the door and smiled to everyone. "Hello all."

Mirina flopped herself onto the bed, stomach down, supporting herself on her elbows while kicking her feet girlishly. "So."

Taking her sweater off, Lily shrugged and reiterated, "So."

"So... what happened?" she asked as everyone giggled. "You were gone an awfully long time. We've been waiting since nine."

Lily rolled her eyes, knowing what was being implied. "I was relabeling the defense storeroom shelves, and I fell asleep—I stayed up way too late last night finishing my transfiguration paper. Apparently Professor Potter fell asleep too, and by the time he woke up and found me, it was after curfew. So," she repeated, raising her eyebrows, "he walked me to my rooms."

Braden, who was sprawled across the carpet, flipped over and moved her feet up to the front armoire door, where they rested as she made a gesture. "So you slept together, literally?

"Not even," Lily said, sitting in a chair laughing. "We weren't in the same room."

Mirina stared at her before casting her judgment, "You're lying. You did it with him."

Lily rolled her eyes yet again. "Oh yeah, that's me: seductress extraordinaire."

"Look, you're either a liar or an idiot. Who falls asleep when James Potter is overseeing their detention, and who doesn't jump James Potter when they're alone with him?" Mirina said, flinging her arms into a mock scale to weigh Lily's options.

"Stop saying his full name."

"I can't!" Mirina exclaimed. "It's just so perfectly lovely. James Potter... Mr. James Potter... Mr. And Mrs. James Potter... Mrs. Mirina Potter—"

"Ugh, come on," Lily groaned, crossing her legs tightly. "You can't be serious. He's a teacher, and six years older than you."

Mirina scoffed. "I know, that's the best part. He's so mature, so sophisticated, so worn-looking... so sexy. I bet he has loads of battle scars. Oh, if I could just trace my nail along the raised flesh on his stomach, and maybe the one I'm tracing ends a little south of his stomach, so I'd have to unbutton his trousers—"

"Stop! Stop it. I can't believe you would say something like that! How do you know he's not still standing right outside the door?" Lily pointed toward the door to depict her point.

Braden laughed on the floor. "Of course, because that's what James Potter does on a Saturday night: he eavesdrops on teenage girl's bedrooms."

They all giggled feverishly as a humiliated James blushed heatedly from just beyond the door. He began to walk away as he heard shouts of "Could you imagine?" and "How lame would that be?", when Mirina beckoned him.

"Oh, Professor Potter," she called to the closed door. "Please come in. I can't seem to get the fireplace started. Care to light my fire?"

The other girls cackled as Lily threw a random object from the nightstand at Mirina. "Don't! It was just a hypothetical thing."

Braden laughed giddily and stood up, thrusting her chest out with her hands behind her back. "This'll be fun. I'll be Professor Potter." She gestured to the armoire (or 'chalkboard') and thrust a quill to it. "As you can see from what I've written on the board," she spoke in a deep voice, underlining an invisible phrase on the wood, "Today's topic is defense against magical creatures. Now, who can—"

Emmeline, who had been sitting at Lily's writing desk, threw a random book to the floor and gasped. "Opps! Professor, I seemed to have dropped my book."

Braden smiled. "Well, just let me pick that up for you," she said, turning around and bending over so that her pajama pants stretched tightly over her bottom as she retrieved the fallen textbook.

Mirina hooted and hollered, while Lily giggled.

"We shouldn't do this you guys—" Lily said, only to be cut off by Braden.

"DETENTION, Miss Evans! There is no talking in this class," she shouted over the laughter.

"Ooo," Mirina sounded, looking to her friend with wide eyes. "Lily you're such a troublemaker. Two detentions in a row! Tsk, tsk."

- - - - - - - - Outside the Room - - - - - - - -

James turned down the hallway as he heard a pillow fight erupt within the room. How pathetic was he? In disbelief with his own actions, he looked up from the ground and saw Kettleburn leaning in a shadow-covered alcove, snickering at him.

"This is what I'm talking about," he said quietly to James, smiling. "You watch her."

James looked to the dust-smeared floor and kicked his foot into the air defensively, watching the debris stir into a rising twister. "Do not."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Author's Note: Thanks for the awesome reviews. I'm trying show Lily's thoughts (the whole eavesdropping thing), but I'm writing this from James' perspective, so I can only go so far with Lily's PoV. Personally, I prefer some ambiguity and the Henry James approach.

Thank you for your kind sentiments toward my dog. Surgery went fine, and she's doing much better. In answer to the question, no, I don't have an editor. I edit it myself while watching Rachel Ray in the afternoon. Daytime television es el mejor.

I'll probably update every five to seven days because I have classes starting next week, and it takes me a while to write (obviously). I'm thinking of giving James an extracurricular activity to run. What do y'all want him to do? Chess? Debate? Coach? Referee? Start a Cooking Club? Please review and let me know!!