A/N: So, Microsoft Word has chosen today to mess me around, so I had to find a very creative workaround to get this posted (my boyfriend laughed like hell). Hopefully it hasn't messed up the formatting too much, but it may look a little funky. On the plus side, Chapter 11 is written and is currently being edited, so the next update isn't too far away.

Disclaimer-that-I-have-forgotten-to-do-on-several- chapters: This may come as a shock, but I am not J K Rowling; she owns James and Lily, I merely ship them.

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Lily paused outside the kitchen door, mentally rehearsing possible answers that might derail her mother's questioning. Fat chance of that though, she thought, remembering the interrogation that Petunia had endured the first time she had mentioned Vernon to her parents. The Soviet Secret Police would have been thrilled to have Rose Evans in their team; the woman had the same sense for evasions and lies that a Great White had for blood, and she was probably more ruthless in pursuit too.

And this could only be worse than Tuney's grilling; Tuney had just come home and told her parents that a boy she'd met had asked her out to dinner. Lily had spent the last week at the house of a boy that she'd known for six years but had previously barely mentioned to them, and had just been spotted wearing what was obviously his sweater. This could only end badly - Say nothing, deny everything, and make counter accusations - the military didn't know how right they were. Gritting her teeth, she set her face in her very best 'innocent' expression and pushed open the kitchen door.

She knew immediately by the disapproving look on her father's face that whatever intelligence her mother had gathered had been shared with her husband. Feigning total ignorance, she joined them round the kitchen table. 'Hi Dad. Sorry about hogging the bathroom this morning.'

'Hmmm.' William Evans narrowed his eyes as he looked at his daughter over the top of his newspaper. He knew his girls, and he knew damn well when one of them was being deliberately nonchalant. If she thought that was going to deter her mother, he'd obviously put too much faith in her intelligence; Rose had bent his ear all morning about James Potter, whoever the hell he was, and he was prepared to bet his life savings she would extract some answers from their youngest daughter.

'So.' Rose put a plate of toasted sandwiches down in front of Lily then sat down opposite her. 'Tell us some more about last week. What did you all get up to?'

'We already talked about this Mum, I really didn't leave much out. Marly wasn't exactly up for a lot you know? And there was only really me, Alice and Sirius there for the week.'

'And James.'

'Well, of course he was there, it's his house. I didn't really think I needed to mention that he was there.' Lily silently congratulated herself on managing to sound so composed and unconcerned.

'And of course you met his parents while you were there. Charlus and Dorothy wasn't it?'

'Dorea. Charlus and Dorea Potter. Yes, they're very kind, they've been really good to Marly.' Feeling herself to be on relatively safe ground with this topic, she continued. 'Of course they are related to the McKinnons somehow, so I suppose that does make a difference. And they have the room – having an enormous house does make it easy to have houseguests.'

'Ah, of course, you did say that James and Marlene are related. You know, I think that makes it even stranger that we've never met him. After all, we've met Marlene several times. And he's introduced you to his parents dear; don't you think it's strange you've never introduced us?'

'Mum.' Lily found herself unable to prevent the hint of exasperation in her tone, and she just knew that her cheeks were starting to flush with embarrassment at her mother's implication. 'It wasn't as if he marched me off to meet his parents deliberately. It was unavoidable because I was staying in their house. And you haven't met him before because there's no reason for you to have met him! We're not exactly close friends, I explained that yesterday, and I've never seen him outside of school before. When would I possibly have introduced you?'

'Well, you could invite him over and introduce us! He could come for dinner, Tuney could bring Vernon, it would be a lovely family meal.'

'You're joking?' Lily stopped the hand holding her orange juice in midair and gave her mother an incredulous look. 'You want me to invite a wizard to dinner with Tuney and Vernon. Seriously? Because that would go so well. Back me up here Dad.'

'She has a point there love.' William looked pointedly at his wife. 'Vernon doesn't know about Lily yet, I think it would be best to space out the shocks a little. I wouldn't think you'd get Petunia to agree to it either.'

'Hmph. But you could still invite him for dinner with us Lily. We'd like to meet him, wouldn't we William?'

'Would we?' muttered William darkly. Rose might be thrilled about the possibility of Lily having a boyfriend, but he was less than delighted with the idea; especially since she'd just spent a week in his house, more or less un-chaperoned by her own admission.

'Mum. You're missing the point. I'm not hiding him from you, there's just no need for you to meet him. It's like I explained yesterday, we don't even know each other very well. I'm not really getting why you find this so interesting - you haven't asked me a single question about Sirius, and you've never met him either!'

'Yes, well you weren't wearing Sirius' sweater earlier either were you?' Rose lifted her chin and dropped this question with the finesse of a poker player showing a royal flush.

'Is that what this is about?' Lily ignored the growing swells of uneasiness in her stomach. This was not a conversation she was comfortable having. How could she possibly explain the shift in her relationship with James without also explaining all the things she'd been shielding her parents from up to now – the blood status movement, Voldemort, the disappearances? More, how could you possibly explain your emotions to someone else when you didn't even have a solid grip on them yourself? Too much had changed in a short space of time, and she needed to think it through for herself before she could even consider confiding in someone. And, much as she loved her parents, Lily was forced to admit that neither one would be her first choice of confidant.

Pushing down her discomfort and agitation, she continued. 'James gave me his sweater the other day when I was cold. It must have got muddled in with my clothes and I packed it by mistake. I was wearing it because, if you hadn't noticed, my room is an incredible mess and it was the first warm item of clothing I came across!'

Mother and daughter glared at each other for a moment, each exasperated by the stubborn wilfulness of the other. William cleared his throat and they both turned to look at him as he addressed his daughter. 'So your mother tells me that you've decided to do some extra reading for your classes over the summer? Very dedicated.' With a pointed glare at Rose, he added 'Concentrating on your schoolwork.'

While she was grateful to her father for the attempt at diverting her mother off her chosen subject, Lily couldn't help but feel aggrieved at the topic he'd chosen. The level of guilt she felt about keeping the dangers of the wizarding world from them was almost worse than the squirming sense of unease she'd gotten when they were discussing James, and talking about the piles of additional reading material in her trunk was not making her feel any better. The subject churned up all kinds of feelings she wasn't ready to deal with, and it was hard to avoid the subject of Marly, or Sirius, or Voldemort, or Remus popping up in her head while she lied breezily about extra credit and advanced applications for jobs.

To add insult to injury, Lily could almost see the wheels turning in her mother's brain as she worked out how to work the conversation back round to James, and her father had unwittingly given her an opening since her mother knew that her 'additional reading' had come from James' library. Sure enough – 'It was very kind of James to let you borrow those books from his library dear. Won't he be doing any additional reading over the summer? Or does he take different classes?'

Merlin, the woman was relentless.

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It may or may not have cheered Lily up to know that at the approximate time she was being cross-examined by her mother, across the country in Gloucestershire the subject of the interrogation was being blasted across the library of his manor house for the seventh time that afternoon.

James was discovering that his father's reputation as a formidable auror was extremely well deserved, as he failed yet again in his attempt to raise a shield charm of sufficient strength to repel the older man's extremely accurate stunning hexes. Having been woken by a quick spell from his father, he winced slightly as he picked himself back up off the floor, dusted down his clothes and returned to his position opposite Charlus, who was valiantly trying not to smirk at his son's troubles.

'You're flourishing your wand slightly too much to the left; try to give it more of a sharp flick, and you'll get your shield up quicker.'

James nodded, and Charlus sent yet another stunner at him in a lightning-fast flash of red light. This time James' shield deflected it away from himself, and sent it barrelling directly into his mother's favourite standard lamp, which promptly toppled over backwards and shattered.

'Bugger! That belonged to your aunt Penelope, your mother will have my head.' Charlus aimed his wand at the lamp and watched as the shattered pieces amalgamated themselves back into shape. He examined it critically. 'Is that what it looked like? Still looks a bit lopsided to me.'

'Don't look at me.' James answered. 'I turn it on and off, I don't look at it. It's a lamp. You mean Mum can tell the difference?'

'Your mother, my boy, could write an inventory of the contents of this house blindfolded. Exact locations included. Never believe for a second that she does not notice if you move or damage something.'

'Sirius and I have done plenty of damage that she's never noticed.'

'You have not. You have done damage that she hasn't bothered to reprimand you about, presumably because you have damaged something that she doesn't particularly care for. My ears however, have never quite recovered from the battering they took when I broke her crystal jewellery box and foolishly thought I could replace it with a similar one before she came home from work. Take some words of wisdom my son: women are mysterious creatures, and one can never be entirely sure of what their reaction will be until it is too late.'

'Tell me about it.' James muttered under his breath. Charlus grinned at his son and flung an arm around his shoulder.

'I presume that comment refers to a lovely young redhead who has recently departed this very house?' He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively at his son, who burst out laughing.

'Merlin, it's no wonder I don't know what to do with her when you're my example.'

'I'm a fantastic example. Ask your mother. Actually don't. Speaking of your mother, we should find somewhere else to practice – somewhere with less breakable things preferably.' He steered his son towards the doors. 'Let's have us a manly chat in the kitchen while we think about this.'

'Think about what? Lily or somewhere to practice?' The two of them wandered companionably along the hallways to the kitchen.

'Both excellent topics of conversation, but it has to be said that one problem is significantly more solvable than the other.'

'Lily isn't a problem. She's more... an intriguing puzzle.'

Charlus threw his son a grin that could best be described as wolfish. 'The best ones always are.'

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James drummed his fingertips rhythmically on the countertop while his father made tea. He was worried, and while he could pretend he wasn't he couldn't totally control the nervous twitches his body habitually fell into in times of stress. The messy strands of hair falling every which way on his head were silent testament to that fact. Charlus watched him carefully, trying to decide exactly how much prying his son would let him get away with.

'Here. Tea. Drink up, it's good for you. Full of...something good.' He plonked a mug unceremoniously in front of James' still drumming fingertips and took a swig from his own cup. 'Though I notice you definitely seem to have gone off the green stuff that Marlene likes.'

'Yeah, well, so would you if you'd spent the best part of an hour mopping a load of the stuff off the hallway floor after Lily dropped it everywhere.' James grumbled.

Charlus didn't quite suppress a laugh. 'Well, the things we do for love. You needn't think your mother hasn't noticed her missing tea service either.'

'Thought for sure I'd gotten away with that one.' He sighed. 'Padfoot startled her. She felt really guilty, and I couldn't make her feel worse, so I just tidied it up and didn't tell anyone. I'll confess to Mum.'

'I wouldn't worry about it. Trust me on this, if she was bothered, you'd have heard about it by now. Besides, she rather likes your Miss Evans. Girl's got spirit. A real spark.'

'Hmm.' James sipped his tea and prepared to spill his guts to his father. He'd known all along that "a chat in the kitchen" was actually an invitation to voice his worries. 'She has. Maybe more than is good for her. And...maybe I've gotten her into something I shouldn't have involved her in.'

'I presume this is the same something that has you so eager to practice schoolwork in the summer?'

'Yeah. But I can't tell you about it properly. I promised.'

'Okay.' Leaning back against the kitchen counter, Charlus surveyed his son. He was always startled by how much of an adult he was now – whenever he was out of his company for a while he reverted back to thinking of James as a teenage boy, all idiocy and lacking in attention span. 'Can you give me the general gist?'

James pursed his lips and clenched his hands round his mug a few times before answering. 'You know how I'm good in classes Dad?'

'Course I do. Your mother and I both saw your OWL results. And we're proud of you, you know that don't you?' Charlus clapped his son soundly on the shoulder.

'I do. I've always known that. It's just...that isn't going to be enough is it? I'm the best in the year at Transfiguration, and I'm pretty hot on DADA and Potions too, but in the end, I'm only competing against other seventeen year olds.' James looked up from his tea to meet his father's eyes. 'What happens in the real world? I can't keep up with you, can I? Even the McKinnons couldn't protect themselves. I know we're all safe at Hogwarts – even Voldemort isn't going to line up against Dumbledore – but in a year's time we're out on our own.'

'You know that's not true. We'll still be here, and Potter Manor is almost as well-protected as Hogwarts. You don't need to worry.'

'I know Dad... but I won't hide myself away here. I'm going to be out there fighting – like you are; neither of us is going to sit aside while the world goes to hell are we? And you know a lot of my friends feel the same – Sirius, Remus, Frank.' James took a deep, sucking breath. 'The thing is, Dad, I think I may have talked some of the others into feeling the same way about things. Including Lily. And what if that was wrong? What if none of us are up to this; you know, just not good enough? I don't know what I'd do if I was responsible for getting one of them killed.' He took another long sip of tea and stared at his mug as if it held the answers. 'Especially her.'

Charlus looked at James, and felt a stab of sadness that he had such worries on his shoulders at only seventeen. He did the only thing he could think of that might help; he told the truth. 'James. You are one of the most talented wizards I've seen for a long time; that's not me being biased, I've spoken to some of your professors. You are good enough; you're just not practised enough.' He reached out and placed his hand on his son's shoulder, and waited for him to look up and meet his eyes again before continuing to speak. 'But you will be. Go open up the ballroom, we'll practice in there. Plenty of space, and I guarantee you'll have this down by the end of the afternoon.' He gave James' shoulder a reassuring pat.

James felt the beginnings of a smile for the first time that day. He finished his tea and dropped the mug in the sink, paused to put his hand on his Dad's shoulder for a minute in a silent thank you and left the room quietly, re-energised and with a new determination.

Charlus continued drinking his tea quietly, resting his elbows on the kitchen sideboard. 'How much of that did you hear?'

Dorea Potter slipped into the kitchen from the dining room and put her arms around her husband, resting her head on his back. 'Just the last bit. But it was enough. I've never been prouder of him.' She tightened her grip on her husband. 'Or more terrified for him.'

Charlus put his mug down and closed his hands over hers. 'He'll be alright. I'll make sure of it.'

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A/N: I know, not much happens this chapter -I'm mainly establishing James and Lily's emotional state at this point before we run with the main plot again. Besides, their parents are fun to write :)