A/N: Hello, all! Only two chapters left! It's going to be so weird not coming back every Saturday to update… But, never fret! I've got something else I'm working on in my free time. The first two chapters are done, so I'll get those up as soon as this one is done. But, anyway, this chapter is a bit longer than the other ones (7 pages in MS Word), and it was going to be longer, but I decided that I wanted to end it with a bit of a cliffy! R&R please! Thanks!
In the last chapter:
Her eyes widened in alarm as she spotted the object in James's hands. "What's that for?" she asked, pointing a shaky finger at the item.
James grinned.
"It's a broomstick—a Silver Arrow three-point-oh," James answered matter-of-factly, grabbing her head and dragging her out of the common room.
Lily rolled her eyes. "I know what it is, I was just wondering what it is for," she replied, like this was the most obvious thing in the world.
"We're going flying," James said, mirroring hertone.
Lily halted automatically, jerking James to a stop as well. "What's wrong?" he asked, confused by Lily's sudden indignation.
"Nothing, I just thought you'd said that we're going flying, when, obviously, you're the only one who is," she explained, chuckling quietly to herself.
James eyed her amusedly, a small smile playing around the corners of his lips. "Obviously?"
"Well, you've only got one broom, and both of us will hardly be able to fit," she said, waving her hand towards the Silver Arrow James was carrying over his shoulder. She grinned at him, proud of her clever logic.
"Rubbish! You're small; we'll fit just fine." He tugged on her hand, but she dug her heels in again, refusing to go anywhere. James sighed, and turned around to face her. "What now?"
Lily's eyes were dancing wildly between James and his Silver Arrow. "Me? I can't fly!" she shrieked, lunging forward to latch onto his arm. "You saw what happened first year! Madam Hooch had to fly up and rescue me! I'll fall and die, and break my neck!"
James bit his lip, torn between laughing at her crazed expression, or taking pity on her and relenting. He worked to pry her fingers off of his arm, and squeezed her hand reassuringly. "You'll be fine," he soothed. "You'll be with me."
"Oh, great, so, instead of falling off from 50 meters up, I'll fall off from 150! How does that solve anything?"
James pursed his lips and looked pleadingly at Lily. "Come on, Lils, have some faith."
"It's a bleeding stick of wood!"
"I meant in me," James pointed out, glaring at the frantic redhead.
She tried to smile apologetically but it came out more like an unsightly grimace. With a large sigh, Lily nodded reluctantly, her shoulders slumping, and moved to stand by his side. "Alright, but can we please just…start out slow?"
"Of course."
Lily took a deep breath, and nodded her head again, with more conviction this time, and let James lead her out the front doors.
Camey was right. It really was a beautiful October morning. There wasn't a cloud in the light blue sky, and the sun rested high above their heads. But there was also an edge of coolness to the air, hinting at the coming of a very cold, long winter.
Lily pulled her cloak tighter around her shoulder, glad that James had stopped along the way so she could grab one, and smiled.
"Beautiful day," she noted happily, eager to break the silence that had sprung up between them once they had started walking.
"Definitely," James agreed, shooting a sideways glance at the girl beside him, and grinning. "Perfect weather for flying."
Lily rolled her eyes. "Every day is a perfect day for flying in your mind," she pointed out.
James chuckled and pulled her to the tunnel that led out to the Quidditch pitch. At the end of the tunnel, Lily could see the edges of the green field, and the base of one of the huge metal hoops.
"We're just flying, right?" Lily clarified timidly. "You're not going to try to teach me how to play, are you?"
He shrugged. "Only if you want to. Personally, I think you could be a great Chaser. You've got just the right body type. Have you noticed how most girls are Chasers? That's because—"
"James."
"Their bodies are—oh, did you say something, Lily?" James asked, turning his head to look at her with wide, confused eyes.
Lily laughed and shook her head. "Remind me not to get you talking about the game of Quidditch while trying to have a conversation."
"Oh, I'm sorry. Moony always said that Sirius and I tend to ramble when we get talking about something we're really passionate about. The boys all get pretty annoyed with me when I start rambling about y—er, maybe we should get going," James suggested quickly, ducking his head so she couldn't see the blush creeping up his neck.
Lily cocked one eyebrow. She had been fairly sure that he was about to say 'when I start rambling about you' but stopped himself before he could reveal how utterly infatuated he was. "Alright," she agreed, smiling a little.
They stepped out into the bright light at the end of the tunnel. Lily, though she was squinting like mad, gasped at what she saw.
The empty pitch seemed a lot bigger than it had on the rare occasions that Camey or Alice dragged her to come see the matches. With the stands deserted, she could see just how many hundreds, or maybe even thousands, of seats lined the sides of the stadium. The hoops—three on each side—towered over everything else, making the rest of the pitch seem almost small.
The sheer size was nothing short of amazing.
"Wow," she breathed, marveling at the sight in front of her.
James beamed proudly at the pitch. "Come on. We'd best get you on that broom."
"Okay, grasp the handle like this," James instructed, taking Lily's hands and placing them on the smooth wood. They both tried to ignore the tingles that shot up their arms when their skin touched. "And scoot forward a little bit…there. Alright, do you remember everything I've told you?"
Lily nodded, even though she actually had no idea. She found it a bit hard to concentrate on his words when his hard chest was pressed up against her back, and his warm, rough hands covering hers. Honestly, how did the boy ever expect her to learn a thing when he was so…there? Just his presence made it difficult to breathe properly, and now he wanted her to learn how to fly? He was utterly bonkers!
James reached his arms around her body so that he could take hold of the broom if anything went wrong. He was practically surrounding her, encasing her. It was like she was a turtle and he was the shell wrapped around her, protecting her.
"James, I have a question," she blurted out suddenly, much to her dismay. She looked down, hoping that her cheeks weren't as red hot as they felt.
"Yes?" James asked, amused as to her sudden outburst.
"Well, I was just wondering how, um, Quidditch players stay so…fit…when all they do is fly around on a bloody stick of wood," Lily said, stumbling over her words as she rushed to get them out.
James smirked, not oblivious to her discomfort in asking the question. "Quidditch is a lot more than just 'flying around on a bloody stick of wood', Lily. You have to do that as well as be able to throw a heavy, red ball, and be able to throw it accurately. Beaters have to have the strength to carry a five-pound bat and whack Bludgers at the players on opposing team," he explained, his awe for the sport obvious.
"But what about the Seekers, and the Keepers? Their jobs aren't exactly physically vigorous," Lily argued.
James chuckled lightly, muttering "physically vigorous" under his breath and shaking his head. "I suppose you're right…in a way. You see, Keepers need to be very agile and quick in order to protect each of the three hoops, not to mention superb fliers. Seekers have arguably the hardest job of all, but they also get all the fame and glory, because they hold the sole power to end and, most of the time, win the game, and because of that, they are the focus of the Beaters. And the captains of the team have to be able to do all of that, so they understand what can be improved on, and how to draw up the plays.
"Basketball and baseball are 'physically vigorous', right? Quidditch is those two sports mixed together but played on brooms, therefore it's 'physically vigorous' as well."
Lily stared at James bemusedly. Of course, she knew the rules to the game James loved so much, and she knew—roughly—how to play it, but she had never thought of it like that before. She could have never imagined how hard it actually was. It always looked so easy from the stands to her.
And how did he know what basketball and baseball were?
"Now that you've sufficiently distracted me for a good five minutes, can we start flying?" James asked her.
Lily nodded, eager now; she wanted to see what it was about the sport that made James love it so much. She wanted to see for herself just if it's just as hard as he claims it to be.
"Okay, I'll push us off. On the count of three," he said. "One…two…three!"
Lily shrieked as the broom rose into the air, and tightened her relaxed hold on the handle. James laughed, partly at her reaction, and partly from anticipation. He released one hand from the broom to rub her arm soothingly.
"Open your eyes, Lily, we're not that high up," James coaxed.
Lily cracked one eye open and glanced down; they were only about 10 meters up. She breathed a sigh of relief and opened the other eye willingly.
They—well, mostly James—were flying slowly around the perimeter of the pitch. The slight wind was whipping her hair around her face, making it hard to see, and stinging her exposed skin, but she found that she was actually enjoying it.
"Ready to go faster?" James asked her, grinning.
Lily nodded, her eyes alight with exhilaration. The look on her and James's faces were almost identical. She laughed happily as James leaned forward and pushed the broom to go faster.
The feeling was incredible.
Lily wondered randomly if this was what it felt like to be a bird, and felt the irrational desire to lift her hands off the handle and spread her arms out. But fear kept her hands firmly in place.
Half an hour later, when they landed back on the ground, it felt like they had just started flying not five minutes ago. As soon as they were both off the broom, and it was sitting on the grass, Lily rushed over to James and threw her arms around his neck.
He wrapped his arms around her waist hesitantly, and pressed his face against her hair. "I'm glad you liked it," James said with a chuckle.
"Next time you'll have to teach me how to play. If just flying was that fun, playing must be amazing! Wait—there will be a next time, right?" Lily inquired, pulling away from him.
James wasn't having any of that; he clutched her closer as she tried distancing herself from him. "There will be as many next times as you want," he promised. Then he let go of her, and took a step away. "Lily, I have something I need to ask you."
Lily smiled and clasped her hands together. "Yes, James?"
James took a deep breath, and glanced quickly up to the castle. He could just barely see the Gryffindor tower from where they stood. This ought to be far enough away… he thought. "Would you like to go out with me, Lily?"
A/N: There you have it! I added that little conversation between Lily and James about the physically demanding aspects of Quidditch because some people don't exactly understand how flying around on a broom can lead to a very…fit person. So that was for those people!
You guys are absolutely crazy, you know? 15 reviews in 5 hours. I don't know about you, but to me, that's pretty fan-bloody-tastic. It doesn't really seem like a lot, but it means a lot to me, so I'm no longer going to beg, or threaten for reviews! One reviewer pointed out that this could be turn-off to some readers (thank you!), so I'm only going to ask nicely now.
Okay, this is getting ridiculously long, so I'm going to shut up in about 4 words. Thanks for reading! R&R, please! Damn, that was five.
With oodles of love,
~Livelier~