Dissonance in A Minor

Chapter Ten

"Can't Fight This Feeling"

Lily felt like the world was a snow globe turned upside down. The flakes of snow had begun to settle back to the ground, but none where they had been only a minute ago. She had been so sure James Potter was a one-dimensional little prat who had it coming. Then, with just a few whispered words, she found out who he really was behind all the blustering and strutting.

Gryffindor Tower was on its way to bed, and the clock told Lily she was running out of time to face the truth. She was not a girl unable to see what was staring her in the face nor afraid of confessing that she was wrong. But there was stubborn streak in her that she couldn't always overcome. That part of her liked to dig in even when there was no hope.

"Good night, Lily," a sleepy voice called.

The redhead started and glanced around their dorm room. Three of the five beds had the hangings drawn already. When had the other girls come up to their dorm? She found it incredible that her mind could travel so far away from here that she had totally missed the nighttime routine of three seventeen-year-old girls.

"Night," she said absently. "Did you see Dorcas in the common room?"

There was no answer. Everyone was already asleep. After the Tower had gone quiet, Lily wanted nothing more than background noise to occupy her thoughts. The minute hand of the clock had managed to turn another quarter of an hour. Lily's eyes locked onto it, watching as the second hand ticked up another minute.

Thinking that she would go find Dorcas for another chat—anything to fill up the minutes to midnight—Lily crossed the room and tiptoed past the six other dormitories down the spiral staircase. The common room was still except for the flames dying in the grate. A house-elf would come by soon to stoke it back to life. Maybe Lily could talk to it for a little while. They weren't great conversationalist, but they were very polite.

Lily's foot froze just above the floor, leaving her oddly positioned in mid-step. There was someone occupying the battered old sofa in front of the fire. She didn't have to study the shadow cast against the wall for long to identity the only other person in the room as James Potter.

She was tempted to book it back to her room, crawl into bed, and pretend to sleep. But she knew she'd be clock-watching and restless. There was a foreign compulsion urging her to stand right here on the stairs, uncomfortable as it was.

The sharp crack! that broke the silence nearly made her scream, but she caught herself in time. A small house-elf with elephantine ears and widely spaced eyes had appeared in front of the fire. When it spotted James, it gave a high-pitch screech and bowed low.

"Evening, Roma," James said, a little chuckle in his voice.

"Good Evening, young sir," she replied, bowing again.

"Jilly asked if I would say hello to you, if I saw you this year. So … Hello from Jilly." The little elf called Roma looked utterly scandalized, and James quickly started sputtering something else. "I don't mean that she asked me. She would never, never do that because she's a good elf. I mean, that I asked—ordered—her to send a message for you."

Seeing the mighty James Potter, King of the Marauders, tripping over his words to make a house-elf feel more comfortable brought a laugh to Lily's lips. She couldn't hold back this time. The sound spilled from her throat.

Roma bowed once to Lily before Disapparating again, but James stayed where he was. Lily couldn't see through the mirthful tears, but she had a sense that he might have looked somewhere between incredulous and miffed.

"It's not funny, you know. My house-elf would die of humiliation if her sister thought she went around asking her masters for things."

"Oh, I know," Lily said, finally falling out of her frozen position and trotting into the common room. "It's not that. It's …"

She trailed off, her laughter ebbing away. It was replaced with Dorcas's whispered words. Suddenly, the scene she'd just witnessed wasn't humorous anymore. It was a singularly serious moment that she had misinterpreted so many times.

"Umm … can we talk, James?"

The simple question startled him, and he didn't respond for several minutes. Lily crossed the room and curled into a squishy armchair perpendicular to James's couch. While she tucked her legs beneath her, she watched him gather his composure. It was another moment that would have looked so different to her half-an-hour ago.

"Sure, let's talk," James said, getting some of his swagger back. "Want to plan our date in Hogsmeade?"

Lily shook her head. She thought the lack of flaming cheeks and knitting eyebrows disconcerted James because he lost the cockiness again. He looked so vulnerable without his attitude.

"After spending all day with you, James, I've come to a realization. It's not the one you were expecting, but neither was I." He opened his mouth, but Lily held up a hand. "Please, let me finish." To her amazement, he stayed silent. "What you need to do to win me over is the simplest thing in the world, but the hardest to do. You just have to tell me the truth."

"I've never lied to you!"

He was getting angry, Lily could see. She had a strange desire not to provoke him tonight. She felt, why she could not say, that it was vital they not get into another fight right now.

"There are only two times I've ever even liked you, James. The first was today when you told me about your dad and Quidditch. The second was just a few minutes ago when Dorcas told me about … about … about why you're called Prongs."

Oh, that had been a mistake. James looked like he was about to explode in a rage like Lily—nor anyone in Hogwarts—had ever seen before. She rushed on, hoping to divert his attention.

"And I know that if that's really you—the son who wants to make his dad proud and the friend so loyal he'd risk everything—then, yes, James, I want to go to Hogsmeade with you."

There was silence. Lily bit her bottom lip. She hadn't meant to ask James Potter on a date. It had just come out, and now that it had, she couldn't believe how badly she wanted him to say yes; how badly she wanted to know this person who would become an Animagus for his werewolf best friend.

"Never a minute early, are you?" James asked.

The clock chimed midnight.

The End