James: Your chariot awaits.
That's what he had texted her while she watched him from the top of the stairs.
Lily: Do you frequently refer to your car as a chariot?
Because she couldn't just let that go.
Of course, he had already dropped her off, so she was replying after the fact, and when she didn't need to. She knew that. She didn't have to initiate conversation with him, but she did, and about ten minutes later, he replied.
James: Only when it's being used to escort pretty girls around the city
"Who's got you all smiley?" Mary asked, walking out of her room with a towel wrapped around her hair.
"What?" Lily asked, looking up from her phone and doing her best to stop smiling so widely.
Mary only smirked and walked over to the oven to peek in at something she must have put in before taking a shower. "If you don't tell me than I'm going to assume that it's James and then I'll have to tease you." She peeked back at Lily, who was standing there, fiddling with her phone and pressing her lips together. "Oh shit, you're talking to James right now? Marlene texted me earlier and said that she had to drag you into the writer's room this morning because you didn't want to see him, and now you're grinning at your phone like a loon because of the same boy?"
"I could also do without the commentary, Mary."
"I thought you didn't like this boy." Mary narrowed her brow and pushed her towel back a ways.
"That was last weekend." Lily shrugged. "We've been friends now for like… four or five whole days." This was said sarcastically, because it wasn't lost on her how crazy everything was and how quickly everything had changed. Her feelings didn't normally change this much, this quickly. She'd changed her mind about people before, for better or worse, but it had always taken quite some time. Bit by bit she started to change her opinion, not all at once. Smiles that she used to find as jarring and confusing weren't suddenly meant to make her stomach clench in excitement.
"You like him then?" Mary asked, tilting her head forward as though she were trying to be careful with her question, unsure of how Lily was going to react to it.
"Did Marlene or Emmeline tell you that I kissed him last night?"
"No," Mary shook her head. "No they didn't, and I'll shout at them both for that later, but…" She tilted her head back and forth and made a face. "You've kissed people you know less than James while drunk before."
"Yeah, but this is different."
"It is different." Mary agreed. "What was it like?"
"The kiss?" Lily shook her head and shrugged. "I don't remember it really, just that it happened. It was a quick peck more than anything really."
"And how did he react?"
"I left immediately afterward-"
"No, today, you git. How did he react today?"
Lily rolled her eyes and shrugged. "He was completely understanding. And calm. Which I was not."
"Yeah, I can see that. Good thing one of you kept your head."
"Seems to be a theme with us."
"Did you just refer to you and James as an 'us'?" Mary quirked a brow and pursed her lips.
"Not in the sense that you're implying." Lily crossed her arms and then felt her phone buzz again. Mary must have heard it because she gave Lily an expectant look, which Lily ignored.
"Well don't keep the boy waiting on my account. You talk to me all the time," She waved her hand off. Lily shook her head and clicked on her phone while walking toward her room.
"Fine, but don't mock me too much or I'll start making you sweat about Emmeline."
"I get to tease you as much as I'd like. It's how our friendship works, Lils." Mary called after her.
James: You're not correcting me this time, so either you rolled your eyes and tossed your phone aside or you've silently accepted me calling you pretty
Lily: Do you remember my telling you that you make everything more difficult than it needs to be?
James: I remember that, yes. You said that right before you kissed me.
Lily: I could still toss my phone aside you know
James: Is it arrogant if I say that I don't think you will?
James: Though I also understand that you might not respond now just because I said that
James: I know what you meant now
Lily: About you making things difficult?
James: Yeah. But you know I'm a git so
Lily: Does that mean I'm willing to put up with it tho? No.
James: Fair. So next time I tell you that you're pretty, I won't comment on how you react
Lily: I'm an inherently stubborn person. Most of what I do is to be contrary
James: Now you sound like Sirius
Lily: He has told me that we're kindred spirits
James: What does that say about me?
Lily: That you fancy a girl who's similar to your best mate? You have a type I guess
James: Look at you talking about how I fancy you
James: I realize that I just did it again, but I can't stop myself
Lily: That's becoming apparent
Lily wasn't usually much of a texter, she was horrible with her phone and normally texting for too long stressed her out. But she still stayed up until almost two in the morning texting James before she remembered that she still hadn't showered or eaten anything since she'd gotten home.
Her cheeks hurt from smiling and she felt a bit foolish, but one was allowed to feel foolish every now and then, weren't they? Otherwise, what was the point?
oOoOoOo
"Wishing you all a good evening, I'm Lily Evans."
"And I'm James Potter. We'll see you on Wednesday."
The red light started flashing and Lily smiled over at James while a few people clapped for the end of another successful show.
"Good job everyone!" Amelia called out, pulling her headset down onto her shoulders. "That was a fantastic show!"
"Pancakes!" Emmett called out and no one contested that, so they all started packing up the set so they could go to the breakfast diner.
"We'll see you on Wednesday," James muttered under his breath, shaking his head, as he stood up from the desk and loosened his tie. "I've got to have a better sign off than that," He said at a normal volume, looking over at Lily. He didn't seem to notice that she'd already been looking at him.
"There's nothing wrong with keeping things simple when it comes to the sign off." Lily assured him, also standing up and pulling the clip out of her hair.
"Sure, but I can be simple without sounding daft." Lily laughed.
"You didn't sound daft."
"You're just being nice."
"I don't do that when it comes to the show, James." She reminded him. "If I don't like something that you're doing, I'll let you know. For example, you were playing with your hair too much at the start of the show."
He considered her for a moment and then nodded. "I knew that I was doing it too much, but then I kept thinking about it and that just made me do it more somehow."
"What were you nervous about?" Lily asked, because he hadn't seemed nervous since his first show.
"I don't know," He shrugged, his hand in his hair again. He realized where it was and scoffed, shoving his hands into his pockets. "Last week there wasn't time to get nervous, everything was happening so fast. But it's been three days since our last show and I just let myself get in my head I guess." He shook his head.
"It happens to everyone," She reached out and touched his arm. "Now go and get changed so that we can go and get some waffles and bacon," She grinned and then turned around and walked toward her office (closet.)
When she was coming out, James was standing with Marlene and Emmett on the opposite wall. "I know that we told you it was a celebratory thing, but we really just do this every Monday." Emmett was telling him. "Tradition and all that."
"You started this tradition," Marlene smirked at him.
"I'm very proud of that too," Emmett nodded.
"You lot ready to go?" Lily asked, tucking her hair behind her ear as she stopped in front of them.
"Yep, just waiting on you." Marlene smiled stepping up and linking their arms together.
The crew always crowded the small diner, but there was always space enough for everyone to sit down. They all had their own spots by this point too, though James joined Marlene, Emmett, Amelia and Lily this time.
It was strange for Lily to be seated across from Emmett and James, and not even because she was used to being seated across from Emmett and Amelia, but because it was strange seeing Emmett and James next to each other. James had avoided Emmett for the first half of last week, and then Emmett wasn't at Friday's show because of his rugby game. Emmett had been at James' party, but Lily had been with James all night, and they hadn't interacted so far as she knew.
It was a good strange though. She figured that the two of them would be good friends. She saw James narrow his eyes at her, having caught her staring and she couldn't help but smile even as she averted her gaze.
Soon they all had their food and Emmett was telling them about his last game and Lily wasn't surprised to see James jump in, and before too long they were having their own conversation and Marlene was telling Amelia and Lily about some stupid thing or another that Benjy and Bertram had gotten into.
Mary and Emmeline showed up after about an hour and pulled chairs up to the end of their booth. Mary sometimes joined them on Monday evenings if she wasn't drowning in course work, or if she hadn't eaten yet. Emmeline said that it was both that had led them here tonight.
"Lo, James." Mary said, reaching out to shake his hand. He opened his mouth to say something, but she beat him to it. "I'm sober Mary, much more high-strung and lucid than my counterpart, drunk Mary." He laughed and shook her hand.
Emmett was the first to leave, which Lily thought was strange until he mentioned a girl named Pip. Apparently, Mary knew her, but Lily hadn't heard anything about her till now but almost everyone teased him as he walked off from the table with a red face.
Emmeline and Mary left next, off to the library to study for an exam they both had the next morning.
And then Amelia's boyfriend came and picked her up.
And then Marlene kissed Lily on the cheek and left without giving any reason aloud. Though Lily knew the reason due to the wink that Marlene threw in as she picked up her bag.
"Don't stay out too late, kids." Marlene called out as she walked out of the diner. A few people who were still there and part of the crew called back to her, but Lily felt her face heat up anyway, knowing that Marlene had been talking to her.
Lily picked up her fork and picked at what was left of her waffles. James had ordered a second batch of pancakes a few minutes ago and they looked much better than Lily's cold waffle. She was debating stealing one of them when he broke the silence.
"So what's your deal with football anyway?" James asked, causing Lily's brows to shoot up her forehead.
"What's my deal with it?" She asked, taking a small bite of her waffle. "Nothing."
"That's a lie. Everyone in this school follows along in a manner that could be considered religious."
"Marlene doesn't watch it either."
He shrugged and took another bite. "Mary and Emmeline do. Emmett and Amelia do." She shrugged as he had and he smirked at her. "I just don't understand why you go out of your way to avoid football related things."
"Who says that I do that?"
"You did." He grinned, pointing a finger at her. She leaned back and narrowed her eyes. "At the party. You told me that it was hard to go around a football obsessed school and not care about the sport at all."
"I didn't say it was hard to not care about it." She argued, fiddling with her fork.
"You said something like that."
"Well I don't know." She shrugged, even though that wasn't really the truth.
"Did you date a football player in secondary?" He asked causing her to scoff. He grinned at that.
"No. I didn't date football players in secondary." She said as though she was horrified by the idea. "Still don't," She added, for his benefit. He just kept grinning at her.
"Well then what is it? Where does your hatred for the game come from?" He was being dramatic, and she rolled her eyes.
"I don't hate the game." She huffed. "I'm actually pretty decent at it, I just don't-"
"You realize that that's the second time that you've said that," He interrupted, and she frowned.
"Said what?"
"That you're pretty good at football." He said, his grin gaining a mischievous edge to it. "You know I'm going to have to ask you to prove it now."
"Now now?" She asked. He nodded. "I'm not going to prove it now. It's almost ten o'clock and I'm tired."
"You keep mentioning it though, you have to prove it." He kept smiling at her. "I mean, unless you're lying. Trying to impress me or something."
She was quite easy to bait. That had always been true. It had almost worked when he'd said nothing but 'prove it.' Because she knew that she could damn well prove it, and even if she wasn't completely sure, she probably still would have been tempted. But then he had to go and suggest that she was lying. That she was trying to impress him. And that was just ridiculous.
"I am most definitely not trying to impress you by off-handedly mentioning that I used to play football." She snapped. "And fine, I will prove it," She stood up and tossed her fork onto the table. She was pulling her bag over to her, when she heard James laugh. She frowned.
"Lily sit down and let me finish my pancakes at least." She looked back at him and then down at his pancakes.
"Fine. But I'm taking one of them." She said, and then did just that. He laughed as she reached for the syrup and started to drown her stolen pancake in it.
"Please, I want you to take it." He said sarcastically, though he did nothing to try and get it back.
oOoOoOo
She honestly didn't know why she'd agreed to this, though the adrenaline pumping through her system had gotten rid of any and all thoughts of being tired. She might be able to go home and finish up an essay or two after this. She had other things that she needed to be doing now, but instead she was at the football stadium with James, with a much too determined look on her face and her arms crossed over her chest while she marched along beside him.
She was too competitive. She knew that. But knowing that you were too competitive, did nothing to help you to stop being that way. It only made sure that you knew you were being an idiot the entire time you were being too competitive.
"Alright, so you can back out of this whenever you want," James said, almost as if he knew that every time he said something like that, her resolve only grew stronger. "Everyone plays football in primary and I don't want you to accidentally hurt yourself or anything-"
"I'm not going to back out," She snapped.
"You know, I kind of had a feeling that you were going to say that." He turned his head to grin at her over his shoulder and then started jogging toward the side of the field where there were a few bins full of footballs.
He took out a ball and smacked his hand against it a couple of times before dropping it in front of him and slowly, almost lazily, dribbling it over to her. "So, what are you going to show me exactly?" He asked, kicking the ball a bit harder so that it rolled along the artificial turf, and toward her feet. She lifted one of her legs and comfortably stopped the ball with the ball of her foot. She was glad that she'd put her trainers on after the show. "Are you going to-"
"Make another joke about me scoring on you," She dared him, quirking a brow. He laughed, remembering what he'd said to her back in the pub the other weekend. She grinned at him while rolling her foot back, causing the ball to go back as well and then roll onto the top of her foot. She pulled up her knee, sending the ball into the air and then dribbled the ball on the tops of her knees, only twice and then kicked the ball back over to him. He caught it with his hands, his eyes narrowed slightly as he looked at her. "You're not supposed to touch it with your hands, Mr. Center Forward."
James laughed and tossed it back to her. She didn't catch it with her hands, she couldn't after what she'd just said. She took a step to the side and stopped it with her thigh. She messed around with it again for a bit. "I haven't done this in forever," She said, almost smiling as the muscle memory took over with sequences that had once been second nature.
"Alright, I'm going to have to ask you to explain yourself." He said, watching her feet. She stopped the ball again and kicked it back to him.
"I'm here to prove I'm pretty good, not to explain anything." She said. He kept the ball and gave her a look. "Well obviously I used to play," She shrugged, motioning for him to kick the ball back to her. He complied.
"If you used to play then why don't you even watch the games now? Do you watch the girl's team? You're friends with Hestia and Gwen, right?"
"I don't watch football and I don't play anymore." She said, and then swung her foot back and kicked the ball down the field and toward the goal. It wasn't hard to make it in of course, as there was no one blocking, and they weren't more than a quarter of the way down the field.
"When did you play?"
She shook her head and then shrugged. "Always."
"Well now I'm just confused." He shook his head. "You can't just not love something suddenly. Not after playing your whole life. And you have to love something to do it your whole life."
"I did love it I guess." She said. "There were a few things that happened that just… well I don't much like it anymore."
"I don't believe that." James said, taking a few steps toward her.
"Look, I don't want to sound like a cliché or anything, but…" She clenched and unclenched her fists. She didn't like talking about this, and she wasn't good at talking about it either. "I don't know. I don't have any brothers and my sister just rejected everything that I showed interest in after we were ten. So football was this thing that I did with my dad. He coached the team when I was little- I already told you that he played here when he was in uni."
"You did tell me that." He nodded.
"Well he uh- He died a few years ago and it's just not that fun anymore." She said, her words coming out a bit rushed. In her head it all made sense, but when she tried to explain things to other people, she felt as though her explanation didn't make sense or that it wasn't enough. But when she looked up at James, he wasn't looking as though he was expecting more of an explanation, he just had his lips pressed together and a solemn look on his face.
"I finished up the season after he passed because I, well I felt like I had to but after that…" She trailed off and shrugged her shoulders.
"I think I can understand that." He said after a moment. "I mean if he made you fall in love with the game,"
"It was what we did together. Almost every weekend we would go out and play and we were big supporters of our local team." She grinned and ran a hand through her hair. "But I never loved it, not like he did anyway. It was always just fun for me. And if I was good it was because I wanted to impress him- but that starts to get into the relationship that I had with my sister and how competitive we were for our parent's attention." She shook her head.
"Well as an only child I don't quite understand that, but I've heard sibling horror stories."
"So yeah, that's why I don't watch you play football," She tried to smile since she didn't want to make everything heavy. She wasn't good at dealing with heavy for too long. At least not when she was the one who people were paying attention to.
"You know that's not why I was asking-"
"Oh that's definitely why you were asking." She interrupted. "I'm actually pretty sure that you took my saying that I don't watch football as some kind of insult."
"Alright I might have, but I'm very full of myself and it's hard not to. But don't you miss it? At the very least, parts of it?"
"Of course I do," She said. She missed taking over the couch on Saturdays with her dad and covering the coffee table in snacks while they tried to watch too many games at once. She missed the rides home after the games when they would go over the game together in exhaustive detail- quite similar to how she went over the show after every airing. She missed having him help her learn a new skill, and she missed the feeling she got whenever she'd make a goal, but she got that feeling from her show now. "And I still catch bits and pieces of the games. They're usually on wherever I am, I just don't get into them like I used to."
"You don't miss playing?"
She shrugged, "Sometimes. But I'm not in great shape anymore and I really love what I'm doing now with the show. Playing football was never what I was going to do."
"It's what I'm going to do." She grinned at how sure he sounded.
"I have no doubt." She said, turning away to look around the empty stadium. "How do you play in front of all these people? And then the cameras are on you as well." She shook her head, crossing her arms over her chest and hugging herself just at the thought of it.
"Well, you gotta put on a good show for them." He said, and she was glad that he seemed to understand that she wanted to let the subject drop from her for the time being. "Actually, you have to block it out almost completely otherwise you end up choking in front of everyone."
"I can't argue with you there," She grinned and let her arms drop back to her sides.
"That's a first." He smirked, and Lily smiled a bit wider.
"I can't help myself most of the time. I have to argue. It's just what I do."
"I've noticed." He assured her. And he took a few steps toward her again. He was standing right in front of her when he stopped, and she could feel her heart rate pick up again. It seemed to do that around him a lot. And she kept feeling surprised to realize that it wasn't a panicky feeling so much as an excited feeling.
She let out a huff and nodded. "Yeah, well you argue back otherwise I'd have nothing to contest," She shrugged.
"I suppose you're right," He said, reaching up to push his glasses up his face. "You think I might be able to ask you out now?"
She bit her lip and looked down at her feet. "Didn't I just tell you that I don't date football players?"
"Well sure, but you said nothing about the singular football player." He hesitantly reached out and tapped his fingers against hers.
She laughed quietly through her nose. "You're ridiculous."
"Well that's never not going to be true, if I'm being perfectly honest with you." She looked up to smile at him again and was surprised, though perhaps she shouldn't have been, when he leaned down and kissed her.
This kiss was nothing like before. It wasn't short and simple and chaste, or over before it even started, but instead it was a proper kiss. Her arms wrapped around his neck fairly quickly as she melted into it, whatever nerves and hesitation that had still been bouncing around in her head or in her stomach were gone now, if only for a moment. And then he wrapped her up in his arms and pulled her close against his chest and she swore that she was floating.
It could have been a few moments or perhaps an entire lifetime before they pulled back and Lily felt her feet fall back to the earth. She curled her toes inside of her trainers and looked down as her arms slid down from around his neck, her hands pausing on his shoulders.
"Well I'm glad that I read that right," James' voice sounded light and like there were bells ringing within his words. He dropped his forehead down against hers, his hands on her hips.
"I know we were just talking about how I like to argue, but I'm going to have to agree with you about that." He laughed and pulled back to press another kiss against her hairline. She looked up and him and was nearly blinded by the smile that greeted her.
"I'm so glad to hear that." He reached up and pushed a lock of her hair back, which she thought was funny and a little surprising since she expected him to reach for his own hair. But she couldn't say that she disliked the feeling of his fingertips brushing over her cheek.
"Alright, alright," She shook her head and took a step back. "You are quite a distraction; did you know that?" He laughed and held his hands up as he shrugged.
"My car is out back, I'll take you home." He said, reaching out for her hand. She looked at his outreached hand for a moment, feeling as though her chest was full of bubbles.
"You mean my chariot?" She asked, lacing her fingers with his and tilting her head at him.
"I didn't want you to make fun of me for another two hours, so I wasn't going to call it that again." He pressed his lips together, but he was still smiling as he leaned down to pick up their bags before leading her toward the exit.
"I'll find other things to tease you about."
"So I should just lean into it then? Just let it happen?"
"I would if I were you."
"No you would not." He laughed, and Lily laughed as well.
"No, I wouldn't." She agreed.
She was home before long and she was sort of glad to find that she had the flat to herself for a while longer. She fell back on to the sofa and pulled out her phone. She was unsurprised to see that she had two new messages from James.
James: I never actually asked you out
James: what are you doing after wed show?
She smiled as she responded.
Lily: I guess I'm going out with a football player
AN: SO? SO? Let me know what you're thinking friends.
Next chapter is a bunch of fluff
