A/N: I'm not even going to ask if you want the long story or the short, so here it is: life is busy, college is busy, and love is complicated, especially when your boyfriend moves away to get chemotherapy for his recently diagnosed cancer. That's my life in a nutshell for the past few months. As always, a big thank you to Zayz, and an enormous, HUGE thank you to everyone who keeps reading, favoriting, and reviewing. I read every one of your reviews, and every one of them has brought such a smile to my face. I'm so sorry for the longest wait possible for this story to continue, but thank you for hanging in there. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

So, well. I suppose I'll just leave this here, then... ;)

Always,
Mina

(Also: lyrics sung are humbly borrowed from Daniel Bedingfield.)

TWENTY ONE: SWAY

"Will you hold still?"

"I'm trying to fix my hair, Evans."

"What's more important: your hair, or your face?"

Sirius paused at that. As I stared, my wand poised in midair and pointed at the bruise under Sirius' eye, James grabbed my elbow and started pulling me towards the door and down the hall.

"Hey!" Sirius and I protested.

"Sirius, you can fix yourself, and Lily, there's someone I want you to meet and we have to hurry before - " James cut himself off as we rounded a corner and almost ran into a group of what looked to be ministry workers. He smiled at them, excused us, and escorted me through them. He continued, "She's really excited to meet you, and I wanted to do it earlier but Sirius rang on the mirror and, well. Yeah. But she's excited."

Entering the ballroom, I pulled on his arm to slow him down. I don't know why, only that it was still odd to me that I was here, with him, in this beautiful place. We paused just inside the doorway, next to a bright, glowing fern, and I looked up at him. Charming Potter. He smiled back, easy as you please, and just let me look at him with that cute little what? lighting his eyes.

"Just looking," I said. I straightened his robes and lightly pressed my hands against his chest. "Thanks."

"For what?"

I shrugged. For this feeling. For not giving up. "Nothing in particular."

He smiled again, all melty-like. Once upon a time, yeah, that smile would've caused me to roll my eyes and walk away, but now... I shook it off. Though this whole situation was probably surreal for the both of us, I was enjoying it. Sore feet, Sirius, and all.

"Well, you are welcome," he said, kissing my forehead and grabbing my hand. "You ready to meet my second favorite - well, third favorite - lady in the world?"

The girl in the orange. The beautiful blonde stunner in the gorgeous orange dress. With the bangles and the pouty lips and the perfectly curled hair that, for others, would take hours, but she probably just rolled out of bed and put her hair up, which was so unfair. That had to be her, right? Third favorite lady in the world, hopefully third to me and his mother.

Right?

"Uh, yes," I said, because I was. She was likely to be a lovely girl. "Yes, sure."

James nodded, then led me towards the elevated platform where the string quartet was still playing. It was indeed the girl in the orange that he was leading me towards, where she was standing next to a man who was, like her, very tan. The man was scruffy and had dark bags under his eyes. There was a long scar stretching across his cheek. He wasn't entirely unhandsome, but then again, he was standing next to a very beautiful girl. Anybody who stood next to her probably paled (even literally) in comparison.

"James!" she trilled as we neared. She reached out a hand to meet him and grinned when she touched his palm. "Is this her?"

"This is Lily," James said, gently pulling the girl closer. Her shoulder stayed close to his side as she, again, reached out, this time to meet me. Her eyes, a deep blue-green, weren't exactly meeting mine. James nodded his encouragement.

Her hand was tiny but took mine firmly. "Hi," I said. "It's nice to meet you…?"

"Valarie," she said, laughing, shaking my hand. Though her voice was soft and sweet, she had a funny American accent. "James must not have told you much about me, but I've heard a lot about you. So like him, isn't it? Forgetting to tell his girlfriend about his best cousin from across the pond."

Valarie? Valarie White? His cousin! From America! I sighed a little sigh of slight, embarassed relief and tried not to show it too much on my face. I'd been jealous - I'll admit it, a tiny part of me had been jealous - of his cousin. I remembered earlier this summer, when Mrs. Potter and Marlene McKinnon spoke about having Valarie over to sing at the gala, but it had never occurred to me that this was her. She and James looked nothing alike.

"It's nice to meet you," I repeated again, more warmly. "I've heard your songs on the wireless, and your voice is so lovely."

She blushed, waving that off, and then gestured to the man beside her. "This is my friend Mason, he's accompanying me from Salem."

Mason nodded his greeting at me, and then continued to not pay attention to any of us. I guessed he was security for Valarie, for whatever reason she'd need security here, amongst socialites and professionals and the elderly. And, you know, muggle-borns.

"Sorry. He's very quiet," Valarie said, smiling, and then looking - almost, but not quite - back at James and I. "Would you two like to dance? I can go ahead and start singing early, if you'd like. Any requests?"

James looked at me. I shook my head, not picky, and he shrugged, then said, "Nope, it's all yours, Val. Please, just your presence and voice alone are gifts enough for us humble Brits."

She laughed, and James left my side momentarily to help her up the short set of stairs. He kissed her hand as she reached the stage; her hand searched the air for a moment before finally finding James's hair, and she ruffled her fingers around for a few seconds before turning away.

"Ladies and sirs," Mason, a wand to his throat, announced to the crowd. His voice, like Valarie's, was also soothing. Surprisingly. "I am pleased and honored to introduce to you tonight Miss Valarie White, a graduate from the Salem Witches Institute. She's happy to be here with you tonight to sing to you all several songs, both old and new. Without further ado: Valarie White."

The crowd applauded. Some, like Dorcas, standing with Sirius and Remus near the buffet, gave whistles.

Valarie smiled to her audience and grasped the old, standing microphone before moving closer to it. "Thank you all, I'm so very glad to be here and so happy to meet new faces from around the world. You've made me feel so welcome. I'd like to sing a song inspired by a person very close to me. He asked me to write this song for his own special person, so please enjoy."

I looked up at James. "You didn't."

"Nope. I didn't. I did not do any such thing."

I watched as couples met on the area in front of the stage. Mr. and Mrs. Potter, Dorcas and Remus, Sirius and the woman in black that I had almost bowled over earlier. The mustard man took a very slight blonde woman in his arms. The string quartet started up behind Valarie; a slow, rhythmic, calming melody, and the lights that were floating around the room dimmed.

James spread his arm toward the dance floor. "My lady? If you'd like to, of course. We can always go back to the study and continue what we were doing earlier. Actually, maybe we should just go and - "

"As promising as that sounds," I said, shaking my head, not so much at his proposal but at his ridiculousness. We joined on the dance floor, my hand on his shoulder and his on my waist, our opposite hands intertwined, and started swaying, only just.

"So I lied earlier," James began, resting his chin on my head. I felt his voice vibrate on my forehead against his throat. "I really did have Valarie write this song. Surprise."

"You are - " Sweet. Out of your mind. Amazing. "Just dance, James."

"But - "

Valarie, amidst the violins and cello and bass, the soft piano, the light-as-air drum, opened her mouth, and magic came out. "If you're not the one then why does my soul feel glad today? If you're not the one then why does my hand fit yours this way?"

James tried again. "Thanks for coming tonight. It really means - what I mean to say is that I appreciate… you… and this? And you coming and being here and meeting my parents and my cousin. And understanding about Sirius, that was really great of you." He slowed down. "You're really great, Lily. You know?"

I sighed. Valarie kept singing - "I'll never know what the future brings, but I know you're here with me now" - and everything seemed, at that moment, perfect. Maybe too perfect. The too-good-to-be-true kind of perfect that intimidated me when James and I started whatever this was. But I was here, and things were nice, and I didn't want to ruin things by second-guessing myself. I just needed to let go and enjoy things. James and I. Together. Holding hands. Dancing. Breathing the same, our hearts beating the same, moving the same.

It was nice.

I couldn't help it, though. "Is this right?" I said.

His head rested more heavily upon mine. "Is what right?"

"This. You and me."

I could tell he heard the doubt in my voice from the barely noticeable tensing of muscles in his shoulder. He kept swaying, kept me close. "Yes."

Yes. Yes. Yes, this is right. Yes, this is okay. Valarie sang, "I don't want to run away but I can't take it, I don't understand," and I felt it, I heard it in my mind and my breath and my heart and I was confused within all of these emotions, of right and wrong and doubtful and certain and happy and scared and loved. It was making me a little lightheaded.

"Are you okay?" James asked. When I didn't answer, he pulled away to look at my face, then squeezed my hand harder than normal. "Lily? Hey. You alright?"

"Is there any way that I can stay in your arms?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I'm okay. I just… I feel a little funny?"

"Nauseated-funny?" He frowned, then felt my forehead. "Did you take any punch from Sirius? Or inhale near that mustard-suit man? He does smell quite nauseating…"

"No, I mean confused-funny, in my head," I said. Now I was frustrated at being so inarticulate. Did Sirius spike any of my punch? I didn't even drink that much of it. "I don't - "

"Oh," James interrupted, shaking his head. The worry in his face disappeared. He nodded towards Valerie, who was singing with her eyes closed, swaying gently to the tune of her own song. "No, it's okay. It's Valarie. See, she's blind - "

"Wait, what?"

"I don't know why you're so far away, but I know that this much is true: we'll make it through."

"She was born blind," James explained, pulling me closer and allowing me to rest against him. "They tried to restore it many times when she was younger, but nothing worked, and now she's just content to be how she is. And she's, well, you see her. It hasn't stopped her. She's been all the more brave and determined for it."

"What does that have to do with anything?" I asked.

"Yeah, sorry, getting to the point. So you know when one of your senses is weakened, the other ones pick up the slack? Kind of like if Peter was on the Quidditch team, the rest of us would have to play loads better to make up for him being so terrible?"

I laughed. Focusing on his words felt much better than focusing on Valarie's, though I could still hear her voice running through the back of my head.

"Yeah. So ever since she was a kid, her voice has this… quality to it. Imagine that she's a Veela, except without the scary harpy thing, and she can sing like they can."

"So I am being seduced by a Veela."

James chuckled. "No, she's not a Veela. It's just that her voice is a bit magical since she's blind, is all. I'm guessing it's affecting you more because you're not a full-blood, or because you've never heard her sing in public before? Or you're just so in love with the song and with me that it's touching you more? I don't know. But you'll be okay."

"And I breathe you into my heart and pray for the strength to stand today, 'cause I love you, whether it's wrong or right," Valarie sang, right into my head, and I thought, okay. James asked this Veela-witch to sing this magic song of all of my feelings and it's making me feel how I really feel and I wish I could get a grip already, please.

"Well," I said.

Still swaying, he slowly guided us towards the left end of the stage. The only reason I noticed was because I was carefully paying attention to the rhythm of our feet and not the song, trying to get my mind in the right place. James, again, tensed.

"What - " he started to mutter.

I looked up at him. He was staring, narrow-eyed, at his parents, who were talking to two Aurors. Another Auror, rushing in from the entranceway, said something to them all and then rushed off again, leaving Mr. Potter's jaw rigid and Mrs. Potter looking exasperated, scared, and angry all at once.

Glancing around quickly, I saw that nobody else noticed this, or were, at least, pretending not to. Not any of the guests, not Dorcas and Remus, not Sirius and the dark-haired woman. They were all still swaying along to Valarie's voice, entranced. James, still holding on to my waist with one hand, was groping around for something in his jacket with his other.

"What's going on?"

Ignoring me, he pulled out his pocket watch, looked dissatisfied with something on it, and put it in his trouser pocket.

"What time is it?" I asked him, now too suspicious to let anything go.

"Uh, half past nine," he said. He looked over the top of my head, spotted someone, and then looked back at me. "Do you mind if I go talk to Sirius for a minute?"

"Not at all, I'll come with you," I said, picking up my dress. "Go on."

For a moment he looked like he was going to say no, but he nodded, because I was stubborn and we both knew it, and allowed me to follow his direct beeline to his best friend. I stood back as he interrupted Sirius and the dark-haired woman. Sirius said something to her and she glared at James before walking away. They whispered to one another for a brief second before I joined them.

"What's going on? Does this have anything to do with your parents? Have they come after you? Is it him?"

"Parents, probably," Sirius said.

"Are they here?"

James said no. Though still listening to me, the two of them had already had a whole conversation just by glancing at one another. Six years together and they had it perfected.

Which, I mean, come on. Not fair.

Valarie's song ended, on some kind of solitary, lingering violin string - at least it sounded like it as it reverberated in my mind - but it was soon crushed by the silence and then by voices atop voices. I shook my head free of Valarie's song, perfect though it was, and focused.

And it hit me, finally, what James had said. "Wait. You said it was half past nine earlier."

"Lily, please," he said to me. Sirius pointed over his shoulder, toward Mr. and Mrs. Potter and the two Aurors, who now looked frustrated as well, and started off towards them.

James bent down to my eye level. "Do you mind staying with Dorcas for a few minutes? I just need to figure out - "

I stared at him. "Are you joking?"

He frowned, taken aback. "About what? This is important - "

"I understand that. So why do I have to go stand with Dorcas? Why can't I come with you? Why do I have to stay in the dark?"

"That's not what I'm saying - "

"That is what you're saying, Potter." I tried to keep my voice quiet. A hand rested on my shoulder, but I was too annoyed at being pushed aside for whatever reason. Maybe he was trying to protect me, maybe he was trying to figure things out on his own, but it wasn't fair. Not when he wanted us to be an us, not a James and Lily but only sometimes. He could be sweet, but he could also switch right back to the way things used to be. "That's exactly what you're saying. 'Stay with Dorcas. Hang back while I go solve everything.' I know you have a big head, but you know what? You can't do everything. "

James looked like I smacked him. "That's not fair."

From behind me, smooth, calm, and female: "Lily."

"Take her to Dorcas, please, Val," James said to her, thrusting his pocket watch into my hands and turning away without speaking to me. He stomped off, like a little boy, to his parents.

"I can't believe him and his stupid, big head that's just - he is such an enormous prat and he can't even - ugh!"

Valarie rubbed her hand up and down my arm. "It's alright. He's just trying to take care of you."

I watched him across the room. He was standing next to Sirius, talking to Mr. and Mrs. Potter. I guess they were explaining to them what was going on, because both guys looked grave. Maybe he was just trying to take care of me, but I couldn't help but feel our past six years creep up on us. I trusted him. I trusted him with a lot of things, not exactly wholly, but I did. It's just...

"I don't know."

Valarie, gracefully, put her hands directly on my face without fumbling and was close to meeting my eyes. "He loves you, Lily. He loves you. I know James, and I know his compassion, and I have never experienced that kind of love in my life. I feel him look at you and it is so powerful and moving, and I can feel it every time he says a word about you. I can feel it in the air, Lily, and I know you're getting to understand it, but you have to know that it is true."

Her voice is magical. She's like a Veela. Don't -

"Lily?"

Dorcas and Remus found us. I pulled away from Valarie, politely as I could, and said to them, "Do you know what's going on?"

"Sirius thinks his parents and some of their friends are out 'hunting,'" Remus explained. Dorcas shivered. "Probably because of the gala tonight, like a reciprocal thing. We party, so they wreck some lives."

Valarie's hand tightened on my arm. "Are we in danger?"

Surrounded by all of these unbelievably trained, highly gifted witches and wizards, and having her own, personal body guard, I doubted that she was going to be harmed. Even so, we were in a secure place and unless something unexpected occurred, I doubted -

"They're in a neighborhood," Valarie whispered. "It's not just a raid, they're after something."

Dorcas, Remus, and I looked at her. She was very still, her ear turned toward the Potters and the group around them. The gala was still in full swing; the quartet was still playing, people were still mingling, and there were different sounds all around us, but Valarie could pinpoint their voices from across the room without any magic.

Enhanced senses. Huh.

"Near Manchester?" Valarie's eyebrows twitched. My heart started beating faster. "Acker Lane?"

I felt many pairs of eyes on me at once. Dorcas' and Remus'. From across the room, Mr. and Mrs. Potter. Sirius'. James'. Valarie could feel the tension. She squeezed my arm again, questioning.

I swallowed. "That's - I live on Acker Lane. My mum live there."

Nobody said anything. What was there to be said? It wasn't going to be alright. That'd be a lie, flat-out, and completely uncomforting. Nobody was ever alright when Death Eaters attacked a muggle neighborhood.

And this was my neighborhood. My house and my parents and my sister.

James was suddenly right next to me, his energy all over the place, and I looked up at the many different messages in his eyes and picked the one I disliked the most: resistance. He didn't want me to get involved, but I'd be damned if I sat by. Even if I had to go around him and his parents and the Aurors and the entire Ministry to do it.

"No," I told him. "No. You are either with me or you aren't, but I am going."

He pressed his lips together, McGonagall-like, and stared at me. He was still angry from before, I knew that, but he was also scared for me, scared for everyone else, and determined as hell to do something about it. Defiant. He was probably told to stay here, too, and let the Aurors go. He and Sirius both. Sirius, his eyes alight with fury, who had relatives out there. Sirius, so full of hate, and ready to do something.

"So?" I said.

James glanced around us, his jaw tight, and lowered his voice. "There's a place we can Apparate from inside the house. We can go in pairs. Me and Lily. Remus and Dorcas. Sirius, I need you to get Val with Mason and then meet us there."

Sirius looked disgruntled for a brief second, then rearranged his face. "Can do." Valarie sought his arm.

"Are you sure about this?" James asked me.

I was frightened out of my mind, but if they were looking for something and we could find it before they did, we could use it against them. If they were just on a spree, then we could try to stop them until the Ministry got there or they fled. Or we could just find my mum and Petunia and keep them safe. Or… I didn't really have a plan, but I felt like I had to do something, even if this was poorly thought out and reckless and irresponsible.

"I'm sure."