Concert over. Band has left. Get over it, Lily.

I didn't get over it.

"Did you see the way he tousled his hair?" I asked dreamily. "Or those adorable dimples?"

No response from James. I went on.

"Merlin, he's cute. And that voice! He's such a good singer!"

Absolute silence.

"His eyes too! I've never seen a clearer shade of brown in my life—!"

"How can brown eyes be clear?" James snorted, kicking an innocent pebble out of his way.

I ignored him. "He's, like, perfection itself. No wonder there were so many other girls there. Even the great and mighty James Potter can't attract that many ladies."

"You're just wonderful, Lily. I feel so special."

"His stage name is the best too, I'm not joking. Wes Turtle. Cutest name ever."

"That's his stage name? It sounded awfully like his real name to me."

The snarky remark slid right off me. "I wonder where he lives…"

James stared at me. I stared back, realizing what I'd said. Hastily, I cleared my throat. "So, er, what should we do now?"

"Remembered me, have you?" he asked sourly, hands shoved deep in his pockets. "Well, go on! I won't interrupt your sermon on how great that son of a—"

"Y'aww, is ickle Jamsie jealous?" I prodded his shoulder. "Don't worry, you'll find someone someday. Maybe."

He glared at me. Humph. Guess my words of wisdom aren't helping any.

"So. What do we do now?"

"What else? Go home, obviously. Unless you want to try and chase after that band?"

"Where did your good cheer go?"

"It decided to take a vacation from your grumpiness."

"Excuse me!" I cried. "I am most certainly not grumpy."

"'Let's go then, before I decide this is a terrible idea and clout you over the head.'" He quoted.

"Actually, I said club, but close enough."

He reached up to run his hands through his hair and succeeded in flattening the majority of his spikes. After that, he settled for a world-weary sigh instead.

"Good choice," I said to his exhalation. "Those spikes looked sharp."

"How do your family put up with you?" he asked. "I'd go crazy after half a day of this."

"Do you really want me to answer that?"

"No. Let's just go."

I grabbed his arm. "Hey. Look at me. I didn't come all this way out here just to get a manicure, have a mini-fiasco in a clothing store, eat ice cream, then attend a concert."

"Sounds like a lot to me," he muttered.

"Don't you want to see more of Muggle London?"

"Do you really want me to answer that?"

"No. We're not going home. Not just yet."

"Oh goodie."

I frowned at him. "I don't understand you, James. You wanted to learn about Muggles. You dragged me into this thing. And now you're telling me that you wanted to forget it all and go?"

He looked around us. "We can argue later. We're attracting attention."

We were getting a lot of curious looks, being the only stationary people on the street. I nodded, and we started walking again in no apparent direction, trying to make our row look like a normal conversation between a pair of tourists.

"Fine," he said. "Fine. Let's make a deal. If I'm going to be a good sport and restore my good cheer, then you'd better not say another word about that singer."

"So you are jealous," I concluded. "All right, deal."

He looked a bit happier. "What do we do now?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. Shall we get something to eat?"

"Okay," he agreed. We wandered around aimlessly for a few minutes before settling down on an ice cream place—again. This time, I ordered a conservative sundae with one scoop and James got triple scoops. I rolled my eyes as he shoved practically the entire thing in his mouth.

"You know," I told him, "one day you're going to choke on all that ice cream. And the Healers won't be able to get it out of your esophagus, and then you'll die."

"Thanks." He set down his spoon, having finished his sundae in literally two bites. "You've got such a knack for making me feel safe."

"It's your own fault for being such a boy," I sniffed.

"Well-spotted," he said dryly. I lobbed a spoonful of vanilla at him.

"I'd retaliate," he said, clambering back into his seat, "but since I've got nothing left…"

I responded by shoving the rest of my sundae in his face.

"Thanks," he said again.

"Oh, believe me, the pleasure is mine."

"We should head back. We've done everything anyway," he said.

"What? I haven't said one thing about that gorgeous bloke, and here you are, sprouting your pessimism again."

"But it's true; there is nothing more to do."

"What you need to realize, James," I said, "is that there is way more to Muggle London. I'm sure there are more things to do, if you go all the way."

"So you're saying you want to 'go all the way?'" he asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Your mind is dirtier than the bottom of my shoes, and those shoes have walked on some filthy stuff. But yes. Let's go all the way today, shall we?"

And by Merlin's beard, we did. Every outrageous, impossible thing we did. Every disgusting, gross thing we did. Double-decker bus rides, hide-and-seek right in the middle of the boulevard, throwing apples to each other from across the Thames, and so much more. We chased passing cyclists, we paused to sample every type of food there is in the city, we loaded our pockets with souvenirs, and considerably emptied out our wallets. We even bought a Muggle camera! Nearly all the film was used up by the time we decided to stop. We did, long story short, everything.

At around three-thirty, we ended back in the same ice cream shop, each licking a double-scoop triple-chocolate cone, topped with chopped pecans and cranberry—yes, even me! I was too worn out to care about being ladylike.

"That was fun," James said finally. "What're you smiling about?"

I didn't stop beaming. "That was fun," I agreed. "Well, I suppose we can go now."

"And Normal Lily returns," he said. "Honestly, I have no clue what came over you today."

"Neither do I," I said thoughtfully. "Let's go."

We took a bus home, relatively quieter than we were on the way here. It dropped us off at a different stop this time, and it was a while before we finally arrived on my doorstep.

"Come inside?" I offered, out of politeness than anything. I knew he would say yes, but I was just tired, really tired. Tired enough to not care anymore. That's what I thought, anyway. The sight of the picture was enough to jolt up any last amounts of fire in me.

"They really did frame it and hang it up on the wall, huh," I muttered as he straightened up the Thing on the mantle. "They are so in for it when they get back."

"I think we look rather nice," he said. "Shame it isn't a wizard photo."

"The picture me would probably murder the picture you," I said. "Now, that's a nice though. A great one, actually."

"Can I keep this?" he asked, startling me.

I looked at him suspiciously. "You're not going to blow it up to poster size and hang it over Hogwarts when we get back to school, are you?"

"No, no, of course not. Great idea," he added, "but no. I'm just going to blow it up to poster size and hang it over the Gryffindor common room—"

"You would not dare" I growled.

He smirked, obviously not aware of the danger he's in. "That got you worked up. So, what color should I make it? Red and gold, maybe? Or green and hazel?"

"If you do, I'll kill you," I warned. "No, really, I will."

"It's just a kiss! On the cheek! And your hair actually looks halfway presentable!"

"It's you kissing me."

"Exactly."

"Just be quiet, James," I said tiredly. "And you're absolutely not hanging that anywhere."

"Can I hang it on my wall, then?" he asked. "I won't let Sirius or Marlene see it."

"Shove it in the back of your closet," I yawned. "Anywhere but where people can see it."

"That'll be my front door then," he said. I aimed a kick at him. My shoe fell off and smacked him right on the nose. "Whoops."

"What do you want to do now?" I asked without opening my eyes. "Do you want to…sing, dance, act, or what?"

I didn't have to see his face to know he was staring. "You didn't catch a cold out there, did you?"

"Come to think of it," I said, "I might have. It was probably when you pushed me into that fountain."

"Oh. I probably should go now then."

With Herculean effort, I managed to get off the couch. "No, I'm fine. Stay. Let's do another lesson for today. Did you learn anything about Muggle London?"

"That the ice cream there is good," he answered happily.

"Anything that could ever be even remotely useful?"

He seemed to think this over. "No, I don't think so," he said.

"Do you know anything much about…cooking?"

"I made a sandwich once," he said, quite proudly, "all by myself!"

"Oh, brilliant. You're on your way to becoming Britain's next top chef," I said. "But before your rise to the top, let's do some fundamental things in the kitchen. Then you can tell everyone about the amazing Lily Evans who trained you to become the cooking star you will be one day."

"Leave it to you to twist even that into something completely different," he sighed.

"Oh, yes. Leave it all to me."

We spent the next hour and a half in the kitchen. To my immense surprise, he was actually rather handy with a spatula, but not so much with raw materials. His first attempt at making pancakes was extremely messy, and not at all edible.

"How much should I take out again?" he asked, up to his elbows in the flour sack.

"About two cups. Wait, what are you doing!"

He froze, white-caked fingers wrapped around a plastic drinking glass on the counter.

I wrestled it out of his grip. "Two cups, James, as in the cup that's in the bag!"

"Oh. Okay."

His following actions were even less encouraging. He couldn't tell the difference between a tablespoon and a teaspoon, and as a result, half a tablespoon of salt and not nearly enough butter made it into the mix.

"I grew up in an environment where the correct amounts are conjured with a swish of a wand, Lily," he said when I tried to tell him that his cooking skills were terribly limited. "Muggles just have to do everything the hard way, don't they?"

"And wizards are reduced to the point that they couldn't even read the small print on the back of the spoon, are they?" I retorted, waving the utensils under his nose, making sure he saw the 'tbsp' and the 'tsp'. An unimpressed snort was my response.

Thankfully, he didn't argue when I took over with the mixing and the stirring. I let him have his fun with pouring the batter into all kinds of shapes, then cooking it. When we were finished, our finished product was a tall stack of irregularly shaped blueberry pancakes stacked haphazardly, wobbling in a slightly worrying way. Since there was no way the two of us could eat that much, I put a Heat-Retaining Charm over it, to save them for later.

After discovering a box of dried pasta in the very back of the pantry, he decided to try his luck at Italian. It wasn't that bad, actually. In fact, it might've even been consumable if you don't count the masses of tomato sauce and Parmesan he piled on the watery noodles. All that was solved with a simple charm. Or, rather, it was supposed to. What we ended up with was a bit too dry for anyone's taste. We stood over the bowl, brows furrowed, contemplating it.

"We should get rid of this," I decided finally.

"We should," he agreed.

Quietly, we sneaked out the back door, him heaving the bowl, me keeping watch for any overly-curious neighbors. With enough stealth and craftiness to break into Westminster Abbey, we managed to gouge out the clumps with a blunt knife, dumping it into some unfortunate raccoon's nest. Then we tiptoed back in, trying to look natural while hefting an empty mixing bowl and a meat cleaver, both suspiciously stained with red.

"We didn't have to do all that, right?" I mused. "It was almost as if we murdered someone."

"Yeah, the raccoon," he said. I laughed, cleaning off the cleaver and the bowl, and put the pasta fiasco behind us. Then we moved on to something more complex. Steak, to be exact. And it put the D in not 'delicious', no, but 'disaster'.

It was fine while we were preparing it. Conveniently enough, there was a chunk of beef of the perfect size sitting in the freezer. After letting it thaw down to room temperature, we gathered all our artillery, ammunition, and armor, and set to cooking it. He let me do my thing with the salt and the pepper and the herbs, I let him use my favorite brush to coat canola over, under, and around it. All that was fine. Even using the skillet was fine—sort of. Just remind me to buy thicker mittens next time. But still, that was fine. Then, it was time to use the oven.

"Let me do this, Lily," he said, refusing to budge from his stubborn stance in front of it. "I'm the one learning about Muggles, right? So let me do this."

"James, you don't know how to do it!"

"It's easy. You just turn those knobs, right?"

"James, don't be stupid. Steaks are expensive these days."

"I won't mess up," he insisted. "Give me a bloody chance, Lily."

I sighed, dragging my hand across my eyes before remember they were still coated with a fresh layer of herbs and black ground peppers. I hissed, instinctively groping for my wand. It wasn't there. "I've given you lots of chances. I've been giving you chances since year one. And look where all of those chances ended up. Now get me a towel."

Instead of relieving me of my pain, he took this chance to 'turn the knobs'.

"There," he said, handing me a towel—a dry one, might I add. "Just watch when it comes out all juicy and amazing and stuff. I'll make sure to get a picture of your face then."

"Or when it comes out dried-up and disgusting," I grouched, flicking tap water at him. "Well, there's nothing more we can do now. I'm going to find a safe spot to hide in until that steak is done cooking."

"Let's go outside," he suggested.

"Good idea," I said. "So when the oven erupts, we'll be out of the immediate danger."

"Everyone loves a sarcastic redhead, Lily."

"I know," I beamed. "Everybody loves me."

"No one loves a sarcastic Potter?" he asked, the corners of his mouth pulling down.

"No one," I confirmed.

"You're wonderful," he muttered for the second time that day.

"I'm going to bring a book to read," I told him. "Reading always takes my mind off of bad things."

He put on a long-suffering face. "Don't you want to talk to me?"

"Not really," I said with complete honesty.

"Why do I even try," I heard him sigh. With another yawn, I slid down onto a comfortable patch of grass and opened my book. James slumped against the brick wall next to me. I gave him half a glance and decided that he'd be happy enough with the ants and bugs in the dirt for company. I had a nice five minutes absorbed in my book before something distracted me. I stopped and held my breath, looking at the ground, where faint tremors were passing through. I waited. A few moments later, not only did it not stop, like I'd hoped, the vibrations actually got stronger.

"James?" I asked hesitantly. "Do you feel that?"

"Uhnnn" came his muffled reply.

"James," I said again. "Wake up. The ground's shaking."

He jerked upright. "What?"

"The ground is shaking," I snapped, heaving him up.

He looked uncomprehendingly at me. I growled and dragged him indoors, straight to the kitchen.

"What," I snarled, yanking open the over door, heedless of safety issues, "did I effing tell you?"

A thick cloud of smoke blasted from the steaming box; fiery sparks ran along the inner wires. An earsplitting BOOM! followed. When I dared looked up again, the oven had exploded, taking a rather large chunk of the wall with it. Through the empty gap, I saw my parents rush out from their car, their shock evident even at a distance.

"Lily!" Mum cried, her purse discarded at the edge of the lawn.

"Oh no."

AN: Hello! Missed me? I'm so sorry for the long delay; I wrote a lot of drabbles though, with the time that I was supposed to use to write this, if that's of any comfort to you. I won't take this long to update again, siriusly. Unless another drabble-writing frenzy hits me. Oh, and hooray for the unintended but awesome innuendos ;)

~Gella