Earthquake Drills

by ennabellapotter

Sequel to Summer Girl 1977. Summer is over. Lily Evans and James Potter are in their seventh and final year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The world around the castle shifts, unmoored. Love and friendship become urgent, imperative concerns—become, perhaps, the difference between life and death.

12. Chapter 12

A/N: Hello! I realize the only consistent thing about my updating is its inconsistency. This is to say I lack all the things a smarter writer would—primarily, the ability to plan ahead! Regardless: Thank you for patience, support, and reviews. Thank you, also, to the sweet readers who nominated me for Jily awards! What a shock and honor to be included. Thank you thank you!

Also: After some deliberation, I've created a secondary tumblr exclusively for updating/other related things, as I realize it's confusing that my main blog is mostly just Renaissance paintings and Mitski songs (lol). My url is now the same as my username here, which I hope clears up any confusion: efkgirldetective

Also also: If you have a tumblr and blog about fanfic/Jily/HP/etc, interact with me please! I need Jily writing & reading friends!

OK I am done rambling—to the main event. I love these idiots with my whole heart.

---

12

I wanna burn down a house

I want you to kill my time

I want to meet you somewhere right now in the dandelions

—Matt Berninger, "Silver Springs"

---

Lily

James re-ties his tie three whole times before, apparently, the quality of the knot is to his liking.

"You know," I say from the doorframe, where I've stood not five minutes watching the laborious process ensue. "There's magic for special little tasks like that."

"Some things are better with a physical touch, Evans," he tsks, shrugging on his sweater, then his robes, correcting a small out-of-place hair in the mirror above his armoire.

"Hmm."

He grabs his bag and regards my stay near the door: Arms crossed, ponytailed, leaning. Perhaps he reads, here, my appreciation for his physical form, hidden may it be beneath several layers.

"I'm not taking all of this off. I just put it on."

"Yeah, and Merlin forbid I have to stand here and re-watch the tying process," I deadpan, rolling my eyes and spinning around to take the stairs. "Imagine if you'd paid such close attention to your Care of Magical Creatures grade third year."

"Not even going to ask about that mental recall," James says as we exit the common room, step out through the portrait hole. "Instead, choosing to linger on you paying me any attention at all, bad scores aside."

"If poor academic performance was a part of the scheme to get my attention, Potter, it did work."

"It was at least 75% of the game. Almost flunked Muggle Studies because of how often you talked. Arithmancy, too." He considers, then adds, "Although, to be fair, magical maths are ludicrous and should be outlawed. So that poor performance wasn't entirely on you."

"None of the poor performance was on me, you prick," I say, though I turn an affectionate smile on him. I can't help it. "Listen." I hold his eyes intensely. "Speaking of Arithmancy."

This light in my eyes he reads like lightening. "Fucking hell, Evans," he says, immediately taking hold of my arm, tone low and warning. "I urge you to take great care, here, in the hallway."

I seize my arm from his grip. "Would you calm down? It's just there's an unfinished discussion, involved."

His labored exhale is barely audible as a crew of Ravenclaws shoulders past us, loudly debating the idiocy of preliminary O. , and then the idiocy of O. , overall.

"Again. Evans." He rubs a hand along his brow. "Hallway."

"It's just that I've spoken to Mary," I say, pursuing my course unperturbed. "And she and I both agree that I won the bet."

James barks a severe laugh. "I'm sorry—you're going to have to repeat that."

"I've spoken," I say, slowly, pleasantly. "To Mary. And she and I both agree that I," I reach behind me, tighten my ponytail. "Won the bet."

Fingers pinch at his nose. "I'm sorry, do forgive me. Where does Mary fit into this?"

I shrug. "Objective third party."

"Objective—?" he laughs again, hands gesturing in front of his body in exasperation. "Right. And I'm Godric Gryffindor himself, right?"

I shoot him a mild look, but do not humor him with a response.

"And besides, I'm sorry, you've been off telling her about—about what happened?"

"Don't be such a prude, Potter. I outlined in very vague terms. Besides, the only real important part is what happened after we left for the library."

"And what," he asks, eyes daggering in my periphery. "Do you think happened after we left for the library."

"Well." I clear my throat. Glance at him briefly, then re-center my gaze, straight ahead. "You tried to appeal to the past, and my subconscious body language, and then I, admittedly, went a bit mental, and dredged up a...memory I hadn't thought of in a while, and it really got all my frustration and anger mixed up and—well, then I left, and, well, you followed." I shrug. "Meaning I won."

As we pass Hufflepuff tower, the corridor turns into a steady stream of yellow-and-black-tied students traveling in pairs, trios, clumps. We weave our way to the far right, where the hoard subsides. James leans into my side so our conversation isn't shared now with the entirety of Hufflepuff house. "I don't see in there, anywhere, where you won. You'll have to be more specific."

I look up at him. A small smile carves a lilt of my own. Can hardly help it. "You followed me. I told you to fuck off. You stayed. You came to me, you kissed me, you initiated what happened next."

His jaw twitches, clenched. "You're conveniently leaving off the part where you said come here."

Against my better judgment, I am back in the room, in the moment, seeing him striding toward me, starved. I run a hand along the back of my neck, as if that could negate the flood of heat. "You were already walking toward me."

"You—" he drags an aggravated hand through his hair. "I disagree. I disagree vehemently!"

"Shall I consult Mary, again? Perhaps we can get a hold of a pensieve, and extract the memory from each of us, and go in and watch and, maybe, take some notes to compare—"

What I am not expecting is him grabbing me by the arm, urging me along with him to an elbow in the corridor, shielded halfway from the morning commute. "You," he says, pointing an accusing finger at me, "are so dead set on getting—how did you refer to it?"

I rub my lips together. "Finger-fucked."

"Finger-fucked," he seethes, accusatory fingers curling into a fist, "that you are ignoring all of the physical evidence to your own personal benefit, which is neither very judicious nor righteous of you!"

"Oh, don't go using words like judicious and righteous, right now, James. If you want me to kiss you all you have to do is ask."

He stuffs his face into his hands and shakes his head back and forth. When he emerges, face wild with exasperation, the only word he can come up with, apparently, is, "Fuck!"

"I'll admit," I begin mildly, stepping closer to him. "That I am quite keen on claiming my prize. Not just because I'm stubborn, or a sore loser—though, I am both." His jaw twitches, meeting my eyes steadily. "But I have had a pretty moment or two to relive that final tension. I was so near my own edge, all I needed was one single word from you—but I watched you break, I practically heard you break—and I know, too, and with hellish certainty, that if you hadn't followed me into that classroom I could've survived the rest of the night just fine. But you followed me. You lost."

James' chest heaves with manic irritation. "I can't even begin to—" he stops, laughing sharply. "The only option is the pensieve, now. Hell, I'll invite Sirius to come along and take a vote!" He steps closer to me, contrary to all his frustration—or, perhaps, because of it. "You can't just—you can't just say you felt me break before you, and so therefore, without a single doubt, you won the bet!"

"You're just saying that because you're also stubborn, and also are a sore loser, and you want so badly for to be sucked off in the stacks!" I counter, breath right on his chin now, the physical annoyance manifesting all along his throat, which I can see at work, clenching.

"You—you—" His eyes blazing, our bodies no more than a breath apart, inevitable victims to indisputable tension; in fact, the exact kind that got us into this situation in the first place.

James, perhaps recognizing the danger, steps back immediately. Props his hands apathetically on his hips. Shakes his head. "You're never going to relent, are you?

"You underestimate me," I scold. "I'm perfectly willing to relent."

"And how the hell is that?"

I set my jaw in a hard line and cross my arms across my chest. "We call it a draw."

"A draw?"

"Yeah. A compromise."

I watch his face change as he considers the proposition. "What kind of compromise?"

"Well," I say, demeanor loosening minutely. "I might be willing to overcome a certain...aversion to certain storage spaces in this castle meant, primarily, for those tricky sticks with the bristly ends."

This gets his attention. His throat jerks. "Please don't be joking."

"I'm the furthest from."

"Lily."

"What?"

"I feel like you're taking me for a walk."

"Chrissakes," I exhale irritably. "I am not. I solemnly swear that I am not."

This sets a sparkle at the edge of hazel eyes. "That's a hefty swearing, there."

"So you agree to these terms?"

His eyes rove my face. Finally, he rolls his shoulders back. "Yes."

"Yes? Brilliant." I reach out a hand. "Draw?"

"Draw." He takes my hand gently. We stare. He adds, "Is this immature?"

I let out a laugh, long and relieved. "Oh, yes." Then I add, "But I think it's delirious fun."

"Crikey, good, me too," he says, and then he pulls me in by the hand for a kiss, and I exhale appreciatively along his lips. He smiles into the sound, my fingers finding his arms, and I wish with every ounce of my being that the day of responsibilities in front of us would dissolve into a fine dust, so that we could scurry off to the nearest broom closet; make good on our compromise.

---

James

Post-Wednesday-morning practice, the team is remarkably wrung-out, grumbly, irritated, and bone-tired thanks to a pre-dawn wake-up call caused by a very-much-not-in-my-control scheduling mix-up conveniently affecting every house captain save Slytherin. And the morning, even as it comes to fruition, will just not relent, thin band of sunrise tampered by an oppressive grey expanse. The general mood is aggravation—treading a careful and bleary line toward anger—so I send my teammates off to their showers with what I hope is a half-convincing "really fine effort" wrap-up and the most encouraging smile I can muster.

Sirius, in rare form, sticks back to help tidy up equipment, muttering "ruddy morning," as we quarrel with the wily bludgers, trying to make quick work of packing the balls—which he follows up inelegantly with a "fucking ruddy week, you ask me, anyway."

Something in his tone that makes me look over. His hair, knotted along his cheeks, blusters in the cold morning wind. He wrestles a bludger down into its confines, jaw clenched in concentration as he battles the thing with the strap. When he finally succeeds, he sits back on his heels, heaves a breath, fingers tense on his thighs. He stares at the bludger, strapped in, still restless for freedom. A trapped thing. "I know you want to ask," he says, looking up at me after a second.

"I don't know—"

He snaps, "Hell, Potter, you've been wanting to ask me all week. I can't take one more withering look."

I huff an impatient breath as I spell the snitch closed and secure it in the trunk. He isn't wrong. I caught half a conversation between him and Remus Sunday night, just before I joined them in the library, and he knows. I really hadn't heard much at all, except Sirius saying he wasn't "interested in some half-thing."

"If you know I want to ask, why don't you just answer?"

He exhales and pitches an arm to the opposite shoulder, balling a fraction of jersey in his fist. "I've got no good answer, that's why, genius."

I heave the top of the trunk up and over till it clicks, then pull the fastenings tight, slam down the two large, brass locks, cast an Anti-Tampering Charm. Sirius gets up from the ground. Rubs his hands over his face. Turns to the weak excuse for a sunrise.

"It's no use trying to cut me out," I say, gently as I can.

And that is what I feel: Cut out. Getting snippets here and there from Remus, cobbling together half-conversations and context clues, little glances or snide remarks shaded in differing levels of suggestion—it does me no good for continuity, for what Sirius is thinking and feeling. He's withheld. And I don't expect him to always tell me everything—except for the small, aching part of me that says but he always has.

"Not that you...owe me anything, any explanation, but—I dunno mate. I'm not just invested in you, here. I'm also invested in him." I watch his throat bob with swift swallow. "I know you both. I know you. You reach the edge of some massive thing, some real thing, and you trip over the edge and once you're at the bottom, you panic. And I don't know, now, where you are in that realm. And I think it's—really grating at me. I'm no use being useless."

"It's not—" he begins, sharply, then snaps his mouth shut, closes his eyes. "You're not going to solve anything. You're not—you've got to get that savior complex out of your head."

"Savior complex?" I laugh, briefly, before I see his unmoving face, see that he's completely expressionless. "Come on, Sirius. It's not nothing that the two of you are conducting some...something that we all know about but it's never addressed, and you fight and make up every other day, and it's like there's this half of everything that's fake—it's not that I want to swoop in and solve everything, I just want..." I shrug. "To listen. Hear it out."

He stuffs his hands into the waist of his pants and scuffs a foot into the ground, but remains silent.

I swallow against the uncomfortable lump in my own throat. "I'm sorry. I'm making this me, and it's not." I admit, sighing. "I just want you to be okay."

"I know that, but—It's going to hurt no matter what." His voice is sharp, now, eyes turned back toward the weak light of new day. "It already hurts."

This depth, I know, untrackable. I can't climb in next to them. It's their bog. I want to. I want to hold their hands and ask them to look into each other's eyes and feel. Let that feeling lead. But that's—that's not my place to operate. It has to be self-surgery.

I switch tactics. I ask, "Are you scared of what people would think?"

"Yes," he says, immediately.

I resist the urge to refute the point. Instead I say, "It's not as though there aren't blokes dating blokes at school, Pads. If anyone's a git about it, then, well, I've an in with the Headmaster. And Head Girl, for that matter."

Sirius is shaking his head. He's no laughs, which is how I can tell there's something true buzzing around his edges. "Not for me, mate, c'mon. You've gotta know what shit he's already up to his head in." He props his hands on his hips. An unfathomable something pulsing behind grey eyes. "It's on him, anyway, the secrecy. And that's—we've fought on that, sure, but I have to be fine with that. I have to be, it's not going to be some easy thing. I don't—it's fine."

He looks up at me. "Don't look at me like that. What am I supposed to do?" he demands, voice rising uncomfortably and breaking, right in the middle. He repeats, adamantly, "What am I supposed to do? I can't change it. It's—you can't just walk into something blind and walk out seeing clear. You of all people so know that, yeah? And anyway, if it's him you're worried about, be my guest. But I—" he's exhaling, long, full. "Deserve to be chewed out. I know. I haven't dealt with it in any mature or reasonable way. But I'm—I'm not used to feeling like this. I can't be expected to know, right away, how to do it exactly right, and—really, if it's me in relation to him you're worried about, I would tell you not to worry. Because I've got him, okay? I'm not—just going to go away. I'm not going to run away. It's like—shouldn't you know this, too, knowing him? He's the rock. He's so easy to hold onto."

Black hair blown clear across his eyes, he might be some other boy, one I've never met. A face I've never seen. But then I blink, and it's him again. After all, I do understand. If I was slipping into a wave, some angry water, it's Remus I would reach for. Solid and rooted and true. He's the rock.

"I know I don't...deserve him," Sirius says, this part quiet, just another tongue of wind. The crest of horizon is bloody, now, red and orange. It winks at me over his shoulder. "I wouldn't pretend to."

He scuffs the toe of his shoe, again, to the ground. "I'm trying just to be whatever he needs. I'm learning."

I am still learning, and the learning is slow.

"Sirius," I exhale, heavily. "You do deserve him. You...deserve to be loved." I fidget fingers down my chest guard, squint up at him through the harsh flash of sun. "Do you—?"

"Small steps, Potter. Let's not get ahead of ourselves."

I smile. Laugh a little. Nothing short of bizarre, seeing him sure of nothing but uncertainty. It's a good change. Healthy. "It's strange, hearing you talk like this. But I'm—" I shrug, tell him aloud.

"It's a good change."

"I think so too, yeah?" He breathes in, in some relief, and pulls out his wand to levitate the equipment trunk as we step off the pitch. "You know all about changes in gravity, mate." He laughs, a full and familiar sound that warms me through, despite the chilly January air. "Bout time I tried it, myself. Emotions. Being a bigger person. Getting into it, not through it."

"Changes in gravity?"

The trunk is rid of in the Gryffindor shed on the outskirts of the pitch. Sirius falls in next to me, grins over. "Yeah. Center of gravity being, I dunno, the soul, whatever. Someone shifts it. Fucking boom. Change in gravity." He creases his brows and his smile widens as I come to terms with this. "You invented that shit. Second I saw you this summer, post-Evans? Bam. Gravity change." He punches me less-than-lightly in the arm. "Leaving off, course, the part where you didn't tell me till she'd already sacked your sorry arse."

We're at the edge of the locker rooms. Sounds of our teammates showering, shouting, lockers slamming. "Your center of gravity feels different?" I ask, rubbing my arm. "Sure it's not medical?"

Sirius shoves me again. "Merlin's saggy balls, Potter, I'm being solemn for once in my miserable life."

"Sorry, gods, I'm sorry, I am," I laugh, shaking my head. "It's poetic, honest. And true. You described it better than I could've." Gravity shift. Like everything slants, subtly, toward her. "Also, I'm absolutely telling Moony you said that."

"You'll do no such sodding godamn—"

But I'm already gone, out of his reach, ducking into the locker rooms. Grateful, without humor, for his language.

---

Lily

I'm three-quarters through a Transfiguration essay when James returns from a mandatory "turn about the castle" with the Marauders, a Thursday-night tradition Sirius had pitched, developed, and instigated all within the first few weeks of second term. The night always works quite well in my own favor, given the quiet and concentration I can achieve without a companion—conversely, it always seems to leave James in a cheery mood, a good break from his own work, a stress-reliever, time spent with friends that he won't have much longer to spend in this time and place. I sometimes dwell on the idea that I unfairly capitalize his time, and so, selfishly, the break also serves to sooth my own anxious proprietary.

Tonight is no different; he's a wide smile and a relaxed demeanor as he rolls into the room, a subtle spring in his step thanks to a long string of quips and jabs and elbowed-ribs whilst recounting good pranks and potentially performing more pranks, which I absolutely, in no way, ever want to hear about—and have frequently told him as such.

I know from the way he sits right down next to that his immediate inclination is to share his good mood, and to snog me, and then, perhaps, if he's lucky—which he most often is—to shag me; but Transfiguration is quite on my mind, and I say, "Pleasant evening? I'm very tangled up in this."

He kisses me only once, chastely, and says, "Alright."

I look at him oddly now, expecting more of an explanation, or more of an effort; lack of either is bewildering. "What have you done?"

"Haven't done anything. I'm glad to sit here, keep you company."

I meet his mild, pleasant gaze with one of suspicion, then return my attention to the essay. I'm barely three sentences back in when he lays himself down, vertically, head coming down along my arm.

I blink down. "Can I help you?"

"Can I just lay here? I won't be a bother." It's difficult to say no to him. I sigh, nod, lift my arm. He settles comfortably into my lap, smiling up. "I won't talk, I promise."

"You're talking right now."

He rubs his lips together and shakes his head.

The pressure of his head atop my thighs is familiar and pleasant. I start back in on the essay, balancing my reference text best I can between my elbow and the arm of the couch, ink pot hovering dutifully nearby. My free hand, almost unconsciously, lays down along his neck, a finger tracing the length of his shirt collar. His hand comes to my elbow to take a gentle hold.

"You'll need to close your eyes," I murmur. "I can feel them."

He obeys. Eyes close. And though I want to, I do not bend forward; I do not take off his glasses; I do not kiss his eyelids.

The essay comes easily, then. The final quarter, in some ways, is always the easiest for me. Maybe it's the fingers, climbing up into his hair, unable to rest, curling through. His breath softens, evens, elongates. He might be falling asleep.

I indulge myself a small smile when the work is done. Completing something well, thoroughly, and to plan always leaves such a feeling; contentment, a pleased, steady thrum, along my skull. The parchment, book, quill, and ink I levitate quietly to the ground.

Though my legs feel heavy with staying too long in one place, I do not move. I watch shadows of firelight throw themselves to their death on the carpet, the couch, the sleeping boy. I look at his face, find its youth; keep it for later. Both hands thread through his hair; I think this might be the first time all week I've sat and just breathed. Without agenda, without ends. Just breath.

I shift my legs, subtly, and am immediately disruptive. He is blinking, inhaling, turning toward me.

"Did I—was I asleep?" He shifts upward on his elbows, rubbing fingers underneath his glasses over bleary eyes. "I only intended to stay a minute, really."

"You seemed so peaceful, I didn't want to move." I take advantage of his stay off my lap to resituate myself around him, his body between my legs. He leans backward gently, head cushioned somewhere between my belly and chest. His arms slide over mine, draped to his chest.

"Finish Transfig?"

"Yes."

"Must be O-level with that tone."

"I've no...tone," though I definitely do, and I'm hiding my smile at the back of his head, flush in

brown waves.

He kisses my wrist, right where the veins coalesce. Underneath, all my blood. His other fingers skitter at my knee, right where sock meets skin. "Will you tell me something about you that I don't know?"

I think for a moment, self-examining, sifting through parts of myself that aren't always near the surface. "I've been told I've a lovely singing voice," is what I land on. "I had to sing solos for every Christmas night service growing up, it was miserable."

"Alright, then, let's hear it."

"No, no, no," I laugh, and my socked feet slide up and over his legs. "I'm unbearably self-

conscious."

"I can't even see you! I'll pretend I'm not here. Sing me some Muggle tune. What about something by that one band, the one with—The Bugs?"

"The Beatles," I laugh again, and even with his hands sliding down my calves, applying such attractively firm pressure, I refuse, on principle, to do as he asks. "And the only way you'll ever get me to sing is drunk, or in church. And I don't suspect I'll much be in church, with you or otherwise, so alcohol may be the ticket."

"But—what if I'm ill, and my only hope of recovery is your song?"

His hair catches my laugh. His thumbs press to the back curve of each knee. "I'll consider it."

"Consider it?" The thumbs embark upward, catching the cinched edge of my socks, pushing under.

"I'm lying on my death bed and you won't sing to me and save my life?"

"It's just embarrassing," I say, letting my head roll down against a shoulder, into his neck. "I'd have to be sure no one else was in the room."

"Okay, Evans, noted, you'd rather me die than you be embarrassed."

I vibrate all along him, laughing, guiding his hands with my own underneath the sock, fingers along the sensitive sides of each thigh, where the knee bends. "Tell me something about you I don't know."

He exhales. "Well, I've a terrible singing voice."

"That doesn't count. I already knew that."

"How?"

"C'mon. I've been subjected to your serenade on numerous occasions."

"Numerous—name one time other than Quidditch that you've heard me sing—and even then, I wouldn't called that singing, it's really more of a chant-yell sort after wins."

"Second year, Muggle Studies, you assumed I wanted to hear a boldly off-tune rendition of "You Charmed the Heart Right Out of Me," before, during, and after class."

"That...okay," he concedes. "I was on a bit of a Warbeck kick, yes, I remember. Remember the hex, as well."

"And then, if that wasn't enough, not the next week you're following me from the common room all the way to breakfast belting "A Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love—" which earned you twice the hexes, if I'm remembering correctly."

"I was twelve, Lily, I thought every girl wanted to be sung to in public!"

"Don't know where you got that idiotic idea, honest, were other people doing that? Or was it just

your own special brand of logic you were working off of?"

"I hope you're feeling good about yourself, love. I didn't ask to re-live this humiliation."

"Okay, fine, I'm sorry," I push my feet down over his, put a soft kiss to his neck. "Tell me an actual something I don't know."

"Fine, fine." He sighs. "I'm no good at singing, but I'm decent at piano."

"No, really?"

"I will not stand for this tone of utter shock."

"I'm not—I'm surprised, sure, but go on," I offer another quiet kiss along the neck, in the dip of skin above his collar, as consolation. "I'm sorry, please tell me."

His fingers have worked the socks back down over my knees and are making slow circles at the top of my calves. "Mum told it me it was either piano or violin, because she, and I quote, 'wouldn't allow a knut of Quidditch if I didn't balance it with fine art.' I didn't want to do either—I obviously just wanted to fly—but I picked piano. And I didn't love it as well as I should've, or work at it as hard as I should've, but it did help me learn how to concentrate, and a bit about the value of patience." After a second, he adds, "Just a bit, mind you. Got a long way to go."

"Well, this is a phenomenal turn of events, I have to say." I brush my hands back through his hair, watching as his eyes close in appreciation. "Seeing as I've always been particularly enchanted by piano. I'll be needing to hear you play."

His eyes snap open. "Mmm, not likely, Evans, give you won't sing to me even in the hour of my death."

"You're being—it's different, singing is vulnerable, and playing piano is—"

"What's this sudden aversion to being vulnerable around me, huh? I don't remember any such protest not days ago in an Arithmancy classroom."

I am silent at that, given he's not incorrect. "That's...that's different."

"I wish I could see your face."

"I'm hiding." I am, face-down in shoulder. His fingers push my socks halfway down my calves.

"Maybe you'll let me turn around."

"I won't," I say, curling a hand along his jaw, feeling the subtle scrape of cheeks and chin not shaved for two days, maybe three. "Maybe you'll grow a beard."

"You'd like that?"

"I think so, yes." Fingers edging jaw fall to the small slip of chest; slide under shirt buttons. "I like how hairy you are."

"Fucking hell," he grumbles, fingers pressing down into my calves, gliding up, up, up, meeting the edge of my skirt. "Please let me turn around."

"Only if you vow, here and now, to play for me next time we're both in the vicinity of a piano."

He scoffs, "oh fine, very well," and I grin and obediently retract my legs and he sits up and turns around and climbs down over me, careful, skipping my offered lips in full favor of my neck, which is at the same time very rude and very nice, and I'm thinking that he's got his snog after all, and—with this mounting luck—will probably get his shag, as well.

I'm three stacks away in the Magical Artefacts section when I see her first time.

My intention: Returning to the library table I left not five minutes before to consult Remus on an upcoming Alchemy exam I keep forgetting to chat with him about.

My pause: Not three stacks away, between the Marauders at their table and me, approaching, is a head of long, swinging white-blonde hair, a pair of slender, sheer-tighted legs.

Kerstin Finn, Slytherin. Fifth-year girlfriend of one James Potter.

I stop where I am, step further behind the stack, and watch.

I'm too far to hear anything, but I see James looks up, surprise flashing over his face for just a moment before he replaces it with an amenable smile and says something. I watch her head tilt, long hair shifting pleasantly with the effort. She moves subtly to the side, hip almost resting against the table. Even from this angle, just a hint of her profile is enough reminder of her distinctive beauty: Thin nose and sharp cheekbones, effortless eyelashes and thin, curling mouth.

Sirius, next to James, watches the interaction with what I think is trepidation. He says something, and James looks over, nervously, laughs. Pulls a bit at his collar. Kerstin says something else to him and rests a hand, briefly, on his arm.

Something ugly raps at the back of my throat.

For a second—just a miniscule second—I am seized with the urge to leave my post, stride right up to the table and interrupt this little reunion, putting my own hand on James, maybe around his shoulder or through his hair, letting Little Miss Slytherin know exactly who he's currently entangled with.

But I do not move from my spot. I shove my eyes shut and turn away quickly, back pressed hard into the spines of books. The impulse frightens me, deeply. I am not a jealous type. I inhale slowly; force myself to recalibrate. It's ridiculous for me to feel insecure to begin with—and especially when observing a moment I shouldn't even be around to see.

I open my eyes, exhale all my held breath, and leave the library.

The second time I see her I'm in the loo round the dungeon staircase to the first floor.

I'm washing up thoroughly post-brewing, having finally finished an incredibly frustrating batch of Exstimulo Potion replenishments for Slughorn. The month-long process was not only finicky, detailed, and exhaustive, but was rather under-the-table to begin with given the spell-boosting effects and the Professor's constant reassurance that the users of the potions would be both of-age and in dire need. I am relieved to finally be done with them—though the good feeling doesn't last long.

The second I catch sight of the pale blonde head coming out of a stall in the back, I feel something lock up in the back of my throat. I've slather soap all the way up to my elbows and aim to rinse it off slowly and without fear.

Kerstin looks at me oddly to begin, then contorts her face into a polite smile. "Little far from home, Head Girl."

I lean my forearms onto the sides of the sink to turn off the faucet. "And how're you, Kerstin?" The tone—I realize after it's out—is a bit cheeky.

She quirks an eyebrow at me, turning on a faucet and dispensing a dash of soap into her palms.

"Well. You?"

"Really well."

I take out my wand and cast a quick-dry charm, rolling down my sleeves hastily, eager to be rid of her spearing side-gaze. I'm retrieving my bag and robes from where I left them near the sink when Kerstin says, "You make a really lovely couple."

I turn and meet her eyes; find the compliment not entirely free of vitriol. Her mouth is tied up in a smirk that unravels a ribbon of anger down my spine.

"Very kind of you to say so," I say mildly, wanting away from her as quickly as possible. "Have a wonderful evening."

Perhaps a good use of my strange seething hike back to the Heads quarters would be contemplating where my irritation is coming from, and treating it at the source. Being thoughtful. Being reasonable. Being adult.

But the jealousy flares up from a part of me I can't name or place. It pulses and slithers. It feeds itself into a notion of possession so strong and sudden that I've no choice but to feel it, hard and aching, borne down in the center of my chest.

By the time I'm banging through the portrait hole my head is empty of anything except the irrational impetus, encouraging me toward one thing and one thing only when I find an entirely unsuspecting James hard at work—and not even his look up, his smile, his "Hi, Lily," can stop my strange approach, the quick seizing of his face in my hands: The burning, resolute kiss.

James startles initially but recalibrates, mouth sliding open, a groan of pleasant surprise slipping around my tongue. His chair scrapes the floor as it skids backward, my body eagerly rounding the edge of the table to slide onto his lap, into his frantically circling arms. I know I am coming on strong—but I don't care. I pin myself to him with tactless fervor, battle with his clever tongue. The image persists: A hand placed delicately on his arm. My breath whines with razored greed—he is mine, he is mine. I am shocked by myself. Hips canting barbarically, bruising his crotch, my hands scrubbing frantic through his hair; his hands pressing into my waist but not hotly enough, not chaotically enough. I slant myself ruthlessly, grinding, the groaning both his and mine; different frequencies, same song. I want to burn her hand out of my head. I want to set myself on fire. I clobber a hand to his jaw and bite his lips, lashing along his mouth with neither tact nor care for the whimper trembling through us both. I lick along his mouth; I buck forward on his lap; somewhere in between, his glasses knocked sideways on his nose—and this, strangely, is what makes me pull away, suck in a funneled breath.

I let my fingers go slack on his lips. He looks like he's been taken up by a twister, blown away, miles from home. "I'm sorry," I breathe, unable to look from his red-stained cheeks.

"Sorry," he echoes, voice rough, pupils dilated beyond saving. Hands tighten minutely on my lower back.

"Do you—" I bite my bottom lip, feel his recent and brutal imprint. "Do you want to take a study break?"

"Oh, I'm giving up studying for the rest of my life."

Then I'm pushed up and off of him and he's leading me, hand first, up the stairs and into his room. He turns to me as I lean against the closed door and look into his face, watching as he scrambles to take his shirt off.

In that secret place, still, an undulating version of what brought me here in such fury. I exhale, slowly. Try to rid myself of contempt for a girl I barely know. Turn away, mentally, from the image.

"You okay?" James asks, fingers pausing on buttons.

I nod. "I want to watch."

It's a display I rarely see in full form, given my own participation or inevitable distraction. And now, with my heightened awareness of him, I want to see him, fully. I want to watch.

He ducks his own head, almost shyly. He must know that the modesty only serves to heighten my affection. I rub my lips together and tuck my arms behind my back. I urge, "Go on."

He exhales; relents. I pin my eyes to the measured movements of his long and lovely fingers down the rest of his shirt, paying close attention to the act of its removal, the subtle rotation of shoulders as it falls away. His arms, lithesome and blue-veined, bend at the elbow, pause over his hips, sun-starved skin almost white in the ill-lit room. I trace my eyes along the tenuous muscles of his torso and stomach, unpretentious but unmistakable—as if formed through routine rather than intention—and patched intermittently in hair, a scintillating trail of which disappears into waistline.

When I look back up at his eyes, see his trepidation. I remind him assuringly, "I have seen you naked before."

"I know," he answers quietly, hands beginning to undo his pants, my eyes on the site of unbuckling, the deft unzipping, pants discarded in favor of strong legs, patterned in the same hair as above. He tucks his thumbs into the sides of blue briefs and those are rid of, too. I watch his cock fall out, heavy and pink and already half-eager, nestled in its own tussle of hair.

Here, I swallow. A shiver originates behind my knees and springs all the way to the back of my neck. Heat blooms over my chest and I rub a hand across my collarbones, feel myself flushing, pulling the collar apart.

I blink up into his eyes and approach, pressing light hands to his hip bones. Kiss his shoulder.

"Have I ever told you?" I whisper into the shoulder. "You're beautiful."

A gentle hand on my neck, pressing my face up to his, lips parting underneath. I retreat, again, to stare. Maybe his cheeks, pink along the tops, have always been this pretty. Maybe I haven't looked close enough. "I can't explain it, but there's something... intense in me, right now. I don't know how else to get it out."

He stares, trying to understand, and even if he doesn't, he sees it, he sees my eyes. Kisses me softly.

"Okay."

"Will you lay down on the bed?" He lays down on the bed. Props up on his elbows to watch me.

Fifth year feels forever ago.

I kick of my shoes and unroll my socks. I undress slowly as much for his benefit as mine. The sensation of fabric sliding off is serving as a reminder that I am grounded, that whatever maniacal carbonation buzzes through each time I remember her hand on his arm, I am the one who is here, in this room, skirt falling around my feet, shirting fluttering off, underwear quick to follow.

I climb up onto the bed and James reaches for my lower back, trying to draw me over him. I quell the motion with a firm hand to his hip, kissing him, instead. "She wants to be in charge," he murmurs.

"She does," I break away. "That okay?"

He exhales and nods and runs his finger along my lower lip.

I lean back in for his mouth, slanting the kiss into something heavier, more serious, fingers crawling up to span his chest. I guide his hand to my breasts so he will pinch and knead nipples, so he will spread his rough fingers over each swell and make it sing. He plucks the groan from my mouth. My thick braid falls along my shoulder and along his neck and I watch his face change as he looks up at me. It's a look that means looking. That means seeing. I don't think the feeling—the carved-out fire, heated and adoring all at once—is something I'll ever get used to. It burns me the same second it heals.

He once asked, you know I would never hurt you, right? That is this look. That is this feeling.

I reach between his legs to take hold of him and his breath stutters. I watch the shadow of baser lust pass cleanly over his face; settle into its stay. He opens his eyes and I bring my free fingers to the crest between lips, push inside. He takes the fingers in gently, blinking up at me and turning them over with his tongue. Need glitters hard and quick, low in my abdomen. My lips part as his tongue runs up and down my fingers, wraps around. When I retreat, a thread of saliva falls onto his chin.

He watches, foggy-eyed, as I take those fingers right to my cunt and spread. I lean forward on my knees to catch the fallen spit and he urges me, moaning, into a kiss, tongue urgent, thorough. I feel him hardening in my hand, my fingers slow, barely moving. His wet work on my fingers is near unbearable between my own legs: I need more friction, and soon. I lean over him fully, breasts brushing his chest and with their weight, he groans my name.

I lean fully backward, up and away from him. He looks desperately put out by my absence, but I allow myself a full and heavy second of observation. His repose is astoundingly sensual: Mussed hair and tense forearms and lips swollen through with the work. "Holy hell, Potter," I murmur admiringly. "You ever look in a mirror?"

"Sometimes," he chokes out. Red cheeks and prick pulsing under my hand. I push my braid over my shoulder. He watches me closely.

I want him to come for me, because of me.

My own body I swing around his torso backward, one thigh along either side. James makes a sound of acute agony, hands immediately climbing the backs of my legs. I smile. A small pool of spit gathers on my tongue and I fold my body forward, let the wet fall down onto his length. "Shit," I hear him breathe, behind; feel his abdomen convulse under. I rub the spit over him slowly, then set myself upright and settle over him, rather than onto him. The slick hardness feels impossibly good on my sensitive folds; I feel my eyes close, hear my breathy "ooh," and begin, languidly, to move. James' warm and plying hands roam my thighs, thumbs indenting the skin of my hips, fingers gripping the flush of my arse. He mutters "fuck me," and I lean one hand back onto his chest, ask,

"Everything alright back there?"

"Gods—yes, lovely—unh, yes lovely view." His voice is underwater, lust-struck.

I laugh and pause over the broad tip and its burgeoning heat, the suspension something wicked to my biting, vibrant need. I spread a hand over his cock and encircle the underneath, oft-ignored, with gentle, tentative fingers. His throaty groan is encouragement enough, the gasped-out "Lily," aside, my hips curled tightly in his hands. I resume my sliding, bearing down on him quicker, now, body leaned forward so the friction hits just the right place, my whimpers bent between his thighs, balls fondled swifter in my fingers. I am, perhaps, distracted by my own good sensations to remember what I am here for—it takes only one image to bring me back around.

Hand on arm—arm his, hand; not mine.

I slide off his cock completely, letting it spring free in favor of my hands, my hips shifting backward so I can bend over, wrap my lips to the veiny base, lick a slow, upward path. James curses, and I whine in shock when I feel fingers slide under my arse, along my pulsating need. I take him deep and desperate into my mouth, letting the fullness prod at my throat till I can't stand it and release him in favor of a swift and urgent tugging, a two-hand job, a slippery, tit-jostling job—and for all my energy and work he is killing me slowly from behind, fingers pushing inside unexpectedly, my breath lodging fearfully in my lungs; I gasp, "Christ," and grind my hips down onto the sudden hold, his fingers crooking slightly, immediately and unpardonably hitting right at the crux. "Christ, James, I'm—" I tug his cock with determined vigor, bearing down again with my mouth, sucking along the base in a way I know will make him moan, twirling my tongue at the tip with insistent, sucking kisses, pleased when his hips shift under me impatiently, writhing.

But he works too fast. He knows me too well. I am twisting in his hands. I have to reach behind me and still his fingers with a hand to his wrist. "It's—" but it feels good, painfully good, irrationally good. "I'm supposed to be—I want you to come, James, fuck, not me, not yet—"

"Merlinsake, alright," he pants, fingers leaving me. I return to my task with adamant lips and fingers working in messy tandem with every swoop of my throat and a special little palm maneuver on his balls that seems, in the end, to surprise him into finishing, a quick and shuddering end that I feel when his fingers dig into my thighs and he cries out, chest bucking under my weight. My lips leave his cock just in time to watch the frenzied coming, all along his stomach. I slow my fingers but do not remove them, bringing my tongue around the tip to lap, whining at the pressure of his fingers on my thighs. I kiss along his pelvis, the tops of his thighs, the salty wet along his belly.

"Blimey, love," he says, my teeth soft at one hip. His hands spread up my lower back, lethargic and warm. "Will you—can you—" and if he wants my mouth on his he's in luck, I need just the same; lifting one leg off so I can spin around, share my blushing grin, bend over him completely, breathe deeply into his mouth. "You gorgeous—" I tease along his tongue and my hips splay kindly, tortuously over his so recently loved cock, warm and slick; he groans, absurdly loud, arms coming up around my waist. "I liked that," he says, as if I need it said, "I liked that quite a lot." I laugh into his mouth and succumb, for a few moments, to the sweet slowness of his kiss, the safety of it, the all-encompassing warm of him.

But in the back of my head, still, like a spider crawling down my skull: What brought me here. It pushes on me, unsettling, and I feel, without freedom, a strange sort of dishonesty. I know myself, and I know I will not feel good until I share it with him. So I kiss him once, delicately, touching the heat of his neck, then lift myself off, stare down. "James?"

"Yes," he says, hands floating gently up my back.

"Um," I swallow, already uncomfortable. "I ran into someone, earlier."

His face changes at my tone. "Who?"

"Kerstin."

"That's—" his eyebrows meeting in the middle. "Really? I—saw her today, too, actually—" I sit clear up and press my hands to his chest. He follows me up, arms around my back, appearing, now, concerned. "Did something happen? Are you upset?"

"No, um, not upset," I say, feeling stupider and more ridiculous by the second. "I was just—she was a bit snarky, I suppose, and it just made me—"

"Made you what?"

I am startled, momentarily, by his tone of expectation. It jumps at the side of his neck. I bite my lip and try to temper the stupidity of the confession by running my hands over the back of his neck.

"Just a little bit...possessive."

Rarely do I see his eyes light like this, all in an instant. "Just to, um, clarify," he says, clearing his throat, hands sliding between my shoulder blades. "The person you were feeling possessive of, in this scenario, was...me?"

I eye him, carefully. "Yes."

His inhale is deep and long.

"I know it's juvenile, and unhealthy," I say miserably. "And I really don't mean to sound whiny, or jealous, it's all very—much in the past. I just—it was just the idea, I guess, of someone else...with you. I don't know what came over me."

"Lily," he says, voice low and pressing.

"It—just really burned me that she would ever have been—" I look away. "Where I am, now."

"She wasn't—fuck, she wasn't ever—" James tries, frustrated, to get something out. "We dated for like two months, tops, and she was just—it was mostly an exercise in getting over you, if anything, and you have to believe that no one—no one has ever come close to you." A soft hand on my cheek, turning my eyes back to his. "Is that—" he's searching my face, trying to connect one dot to another. "Is that why you came in and kissed me like that?"

I can still feel the sticky memory of him on his stomach, at the place where our bodies meet; and between my own legs, still, an anxious buzz.

"Yes."

"And so—that was all, er, in your head when you were telling me I was beautiful and then...everything?"

"Yes, gods," I groan, impatient and embarrassed. "I know it's immature. It's the very last thing I should be—"

"—but you don't understand, Lils," he says, eyes burning into mine, head shaking emphatically. "I really, really, really like it."

"Of course you like it," I mutter, pushing him down onto the bed. "It's irrational, and you're the crown prince of irrational logic—oof, James, what're you—" he's pulling frantically at the backs of my thighs, attempting to maneuver them closer to his face.

"Would you—get these—" he struggles through the words, as if short on breath, so lucky for him I get the general idea and can finish the job myself, scooting up till my knees are balanced on either side of his face. He looks up at me from this precarious new situation, grinning very stupidly. He places a lingering kiss on each thigh. "You heard one snide word from my ex and came sprinting up here to get me off, just to prove that I was yours to get off." Just the fact of his breath on me from this angle is dangerous. I shiver, thighs shaking under his fingers.

"I'm never going to forget that, Lily Evans."

"I should never have fucking told you, it's—" His tongue dashes briefly up. My eyes fall shut and I lean one arm forward, searching for a steady grip on the headboard. "It's gone—" A kiss, now, right at the sensitive crux of me. My other hand swift through his head, clutching. I look down at him, find him vexingly mild behind glasses. "—straight to your head."

His mouth begins an infuriatingly slow cadence along my inner thigh; each kiss on one side carefully mirrored on the other. Soft hands sweep up and around my legs, stroke the curve of my ass. I spread my fingers clear through his hair and sweep it off his forehead. His head falls onto the pillow behind him; I watch him blink up. "You know," he murmurs, a hand sliding covertly around the arc of one thigh, fingers too lethargic for so sensitive a place, "that I'm yours."

His hand is too still; his mouth is too far. My whimper is preemptive. Trembling hips brought down, closer, hungry for contact. "If you're mine, then why don't you—" He does. He takes his lips to my cunt and constructs an immediate and blistering heat, one that washes up through limb and lungs and throat.

And then he's gone, head fallen back on the pillow, brow crinkling. "I'm sorry, were you—was there something you wanted?" I stare down, feverish. If I were in any state to roll my eyes I would roll my eyes—but my grip in his hair is enough, here, to stroke a thumb along his forehead, and wonder at the extraordinary circumstance of having his lovely eyes dilated to black-gold, lips parted in a pleased half-smirk.

"I want you," I begin, evenly as I can given his fingers roving a cruel path, front to back, "to make me come." I swallow against the tension along my neck. I add, for the sake of courtesy, "Please."

"Could hardly deny such a polite request."

His tongue a wanting streak down the center; I inhale quickly through the resulting jolt— and this he is kind enough to follow with new and stunning speed, fingers intrepid and probing, almost breaching just where I want them most, then retreating in salacious circles from the place most desperate for tension. James, unfortunately, knows how to work me up and around an orgasm, pulling tight all my strings just to retreat, lavishly, pull me back from the edge. I want him to speed up. I want him to take me there quickly. But every time his fingers stretch along my entrance and his tongue flicks painfully to the hottest point, he retreats, and I gasp, and I tug at his hair, and I demand, agitatedly, "Potter." His unoccupied hand meanders my thigh, and in any effort to boss him around—never mind I'm at the direct mercy of his mouth—I yank the hand up along my back, pinning it to the curve of my hip so I can lean forward, forehead hitting the headboard, my egregious whining intercepted by breath that feels harder and harder to breathe.

Maybe he wants me to beg for it. "Please, James, please," I implore, hips rotating helplessly along the exasperating modes of friction, all too little, all leaving me open, exposed, a livewire. "I'm so—oh, fuck, will you—I need—" The glittering is brutal, now, chaotic along my hips and furious at the sight of his lips—and still, even now, I can't forget the smirk of the other girl—what did she think she had? What did she think she had?

The image of her touching his arm. Absurd.

My mind, however, goes blank with it. My thighs squeeze and hips dart quicker, frenzied, bold with a new and unfortunate motivation. "Please, baby," I gasp, headboard stuttering roughly on my cheek.

His throat convulses and I hear a barely audible response—what with his lips full of cunt—and am rewarded graciously with a quick switching of motions: His tongue, warm and wet and unruly, darts inside of me and his fingers, elastic, sticky, press down, finally, to the livewire peak. I buck into the new friction, fevered, whining a chorus of yes yes yes and realizing, distantly, that the jumble of emotions and the intensity of his movements and the rocking of my hips may be thrusting me headlong into an unusual reaction, the kind achieved through this exact insistence and vigor, this exact bold tongue. I crumple forward, choked on my own cries, pleading breathlessly for release.

The wash comes unexpectedly.

His delight just a sideways groan, tongue spinning through it, fingers parting along the site. "Fuck, Lils—" I gulp in air as he spreads me open with fingers and licks at the flood, my hips trembling with the force of such a forceful end; I twist my head and press it achingly to cool wood, fingers in his hair like a necessary anchor for unsteady legs; his hand on my back the only thing keeping me upright. His chin rubs along me now and I lift my hips immediately, the firm, stubbled edge too much for still-sensitive heat. And him—as usual—with this stupid, smug grin. Knuckles brushing back through me and coming away wet with pleasure, the echo of his words pulsing up through me like waves, like pretty, desperate waves—you know I'm yours.

"That's—" I inhale, deeply, attempting any semblance of regular breath. My nipples are razor sharp. I am absurdly thankful, in this moment, for the sensible braid of my hair down my back. "You—"

He's really back in there, ignoring me—licking me up. I try to move off of him, but his hands fly to my hips and keep me firmly in place. One handy sticky at the side. Rivulets of gratification pulse out from his fingers and tongue, like the sparking embers of a fire recently put out. I am hot to the touch. I ignite, latently, as he swallows. "James," I murmur, begging, appealing, now, to his lazy, affectionate eyes as they look up at me. On his glasses, a spot of me.

I gulp. "James," I repeat, helplessly.

Now his fingers loose and I roll down his body and am subsequently brought, softly, onto my back, his arms delicate and strong all at once, torso clipping the painful peaks of my unexamined breasts. I pull impatiently at his neck for his mouth and bask, unerringly, in the fact of him. In his hands, slight and brushing along my sides. I stroke my hands under his chin and kiss him till my breath needs me more.

I can't ignore what I've done to his glasses.

"You came...so hard," he murmurs, amazed. "You came all over my face."

I groan in equal parts mortification and retroactive pleasure; he takes it from my mouth as I twine my legs around his hips, exhaling dramatically. "It's—it's you. Your magic tongue. I lost consciousness for half a second."

"Oh, gods, Lily," he groans, kissing me deeply. "Will you do it again, right now?"

I laugh and my hands, unable to stay away, fall along his face. And though I'm abuzz in lethargy, I can't ignore the feeling of his body on mine, or that I've another go in mind—and by the way his thighs tense, he likely does, too. I mutter accio, wand, and then wordlessly clean his glasses.

He chews at smirk. "Cheers." The next second the smirk falls away; my fingers are moving slowly on his throat. He looks at me with softer eyes. "What is it?"

In another world, this is where I say I love you. In this world I just say, "I'm so fond of you," and he laughs now, too, brushing our lips together tenderly, spreading a hand over the slope of one hip. "I'm rather fond of you, too, Evans," he whispers, dotting my jaw with his mouth.

"Could've guessed," I murmur, pelvis bucking up just slightly, just enough to feel his half-hard cock slip along my abdomen. His resulting groan taken to my ear; punctuated by shifting thighs. "But I do so hate to keep you from your studies. You were deeply concentrated when I tore you away."

"I've dedicated myself to a new study," he admits, tongue dancing down my neck, throat, chin.

"Mmm? What's that?"

His head lifts and the gaze, here, my favorite. Fingers down the flushed heat of my cheek. "The study of your beautiful eyes," he answers, kissing me. "And your beautiful skin." Hands spread out along my abdomen, move upward to fill with breasts. I sigh; hips curve at the touch. "And your beautiful incapacity for patience," he chuckles when I pull him closer, take his lips again, feverish.

"I wonder," I murmur, "if you could simply study this place here," I bring his hand along between my legs, then take his cock in my other hand, bring it to the same place, "with this thing, here?"

He gazes down at me, glowing. "Thank Merlin you're so much smarter than me."

---

James

"Clear now?"

"Nope, just the same as not two bloody seconds ago when you asked me the same."

"I thought maybe they'd—"

"It's Hufflepuffs. They're not likely to leave till they address a feeling, or solve a little riddle as a

group over tea."

"If you're going to belittle a house, Pads, I'd prefer it be Slytherin. What has any single Hufflepuff

ever done to you, personally?"

"You're just saying that because Evans is here. You know as well as I do that one single Hufflepuff

couldn't—" Sirius cuts off, perhaps because of the look Lily gives him. "Fucking whatever."

"Clear now?"

"No."

"But now?"

"How about I just tell you when it's clear, yeah?"

Sirius and Lily and I are on a seventh floor mission when we ought to be in study period, loitering around the corner from the Barnabas the Barmy tapestry, supposed location of the room that—supposedly—disappears and reappears depending on the need of the summoner. Our only obstacle, it seems, is waiting for a clump of giggling Hufflepuffs to go on about their day so Lily can show us this enchanted room. "Why're you so hopped up?" she wonders, now, hand on my arm.

"I'm not hopped up," I answer, though I'm straining over Sirius' shoulder to check the map, myself.

"You've got a peculiar look in your eyes. Also, your leg is shaking."

I look down, clamp a hand around my shaking leg. Look back at her. "Just excited, is all."

She looks skeptical, but doesn't pursue the issue. "Also, how come the levelheaded group members are missing?"

"Lupin's pre-resting," I muse, straining to see if the Hufflepuff mass has left the corridor yet. Sirius bats at my shoulder to get me away from him. "And Pete's a sympathetic napper."

Lily is quiet. I turn toward her this time, see her complicated expression. "Full moon already?"

"Yeah. Happens every month."

She gives me a look. The shadow of the corridor paints her hair dark burgundy. She folds her arms.

"Why are you acting weird?" she demands.

"I am not acting weird."

Sirius mutters, "Definitely jumpy."

I look past Lily, down the empty corridor. I am definitely jumpy. It might be the unsettling Defense

Against the Dark Arts lesson earlier in the day, discussing the repercussions of badly cursed injuries, or maybe the poor score I got on a simple Astronomy writeup, or maybe it's just remembering the reason we're figuring out where to go for a meeting that may or may not be a total fake out, or a total trap, or could—if it turns out to be real—lead us into an insurgency that could potentially change the course of our entire lives. Could be, too, remembering that the last time that Lily went into this room was with Owen, and Merlin only knows what they got up to.

It's any combination of weird anxieties, knitted tight along the skin of my skull. Regardless, I've no energy to explain, and my leg is back to its shaking. I say, "I'm fine."

Lily knows better, again, but, again, doesn't press further. And Sirius is saying excitedly, "Fucking finally! Evans, you're on."

Lily slides past Sirius and I around the corner into the now-empty end of hall. She looks briefly at the tapestry, depicting the strangest sight; the troll teaching ballet. Too delicate a thing for so large a creature. She spares us a smile, then close her eyes and paces, three times in total, in front of the empty wall.

Sirius and I look at each other, perhaps both waiting for her to turn and say, really had you going, didn't I? But she doesn't. And when we look back, turns out she's told the truth. A door has appeared where it wasn't before, opposite the tapestry. Understated, smooth oak with a brass knob.

Lily turns to us, motions to the door. "Gentlemen. After you."

"Merlin fuck," Sirius says.

I second the motion.

He leads. I spare a nervous glance to our surroundings, making sure no one else is around to witness—then look to Lily, who has a poorly-suppressed look of excitement, then follow Sirius through the door.

On the other side of the door is a room walled in bookshelves and abutted in a large window with a plushy-cushioned seat. Outside the window, a lovely summer scene, someplace I recognize: Lily's backyard. Her mother's garden, the leafy willow. A green armchair across the window seat, a steaming cup of tea set atop a pile of books.

"Your house?" I ask.

She nods. "Dad's favorite room."

Sirius approaches the window and looks out into the garden, drenched in sun. Lily joins him, sits down at the window. He says something to her in a low voice. She laughs. I wander to a bookshelf, touch the spines of different books. The Stranger. Moby Dick. Wuthering Heights.

If the Marauders had known about this room, we would have abused its powers endlessly. No question in my mind. Lily, on the other hand, knows how to take good things in measured doses. She owns patience like none of us have. It perplexes me—and is truly one of the things I admire most about her. Perhaps it has to do with her coming into magic as a child, rather than growing up around it. She knows the value of a gift. She knows how to make the most of it, treat it well. Not take it for granted.

I only hope I can do the same for her, forever.

I join them at the window and peek out into the garden. I feel her hand at the back of my knee, and it takes away a cut of the weird pain I feel thinking of the last time we were both there; sunny day, grass underfoot. She is looking up at me. I say, "I was jumpy."

"I know."

"I feel better now that you were right about this place."

"Did you think I was lying?"

"Not lying, exactly," I admit. "I did think half a jot you might've been having us on long-term, which would've been justified, given all the trouble we've put you through."

"I've never once put her through any sort of trouble," Sirius protests, flopping backward onto the cushion seat and drawing his legs into his chest.

"Right," she looks at him, brows raised sardonically. "Because it was Remus who masterminded the majority of said trouble."

Sirius crooks an eyebrow of his own. "If you think he was an innocent party to any of that trouble, then you're gravely mistaken, Evans."

I laugh a little—I can't help it. "Most things we got away with were thanks to him, anyway."

"If you're admitting that the two of you lack the common sense needed not to get caught, then I

couldn't agree more."

"Hey, I never once claimed to have common sense," Sirius admits, opening his palms in innocence, or peace, or some misguided interpretation of both. "So, who feels stupid, now?"

Lily grins, despite how dumb he is. I relate to that feeling on a cosmic level. "You're lucky, I think, that despite all—" she waves her hand around him, as if to indicate his being in its entirety. "This, you're still liked. That I still like you."

"Bloody hell, Head Girl, he's standing right there!"

This laugh is shared by all three. I touch three fingers down the back of her upper arm. She looks up at me, mid-laugh, eyes alighting—I miss you, too.

---

Lily

"How're you feeling?" I ask Remus as he sits down next to me in Alchemy. He's a bit pale, but nothing else seems out of the ordinary physically. Yesterday was the final day of the full moon, and I've heard enough from James about how Remus usually operates post-last day to know he's fighting mad exhaustion to be here, now, in class.

Contrary to this assumption, he smiles at me energetically. "Lily," he begins in earnest. "Your potion—it helped immensely."

My heart lifts. "Really?"

"Yes, it was truly—it made recovery half as painful, I don't—I don't know how to even begin to thank you."

"Oh, Remus, I'm—" Dorcas slides into the desk on the other side of me, so I lower my voice just a bit. Squeeze his forearm. "I'm so glad. No need to thank me. It's truly the least I could do."

Dorcas is poking me in the side now, saying, "Oi, Evans, I need to just, perchance, borrow the last two lines of your work, just there, can you turn the parchment—"

After class—a long and numbing lecture on the positive and negative effects of unintentional faux-gold consumption, numerous of which involve the very dangerous concept of partial-immortality—the three of us return to Gryffindor tower to make quick work of post-lecture reflections and follow up essays in which we're to take a definitive stance on the subject, pro or anti.

Much to the endless chagrin of Dorcas.

"I can't be bloody expected to shelve my opinion entirely on either side! Where's the breathing room for nuance, here, in anti-versus-pro-land?"

"Clearly, you'll just have to write the essay solely on that, Dor."

She spreads a hand all along her parchment, considering. "I might."

"You will."

"Meadowes? Hello? Meadowes?" It's Marlene, flying in with her curls and startlingly pink lipstick. She flops her arms around Dorcas' shoulders and leans in to whisper, salaciously, "Someone waiting for you outside the portrait hole."

"Oh, for Merlin's—" Dorcas huffs. "Tell him I'm in the middle of godamn Alchemy assignment that really can't wait."

"Actually, you'll have to tell him that yourself, sweet girl," Marlene says, smacking a pink lipsticked-kiss right onto Dorcas' cheek. "I'm off to an empty dorm and a needy girlfriend. Lils, Lupin, always pleasure."

"Bye, Marlene," I roll my eyes. Dorcas is rubbing aggravatedly at the stain on her cheek, so I reach out and lend a helping thumb.

"Thanks," she grumbles. She sighs, adding, "Guess I have to go get rid of a Doyle," as she begins to gather her belongings.

"Get rid of?" I ask, keeping my eyes on my essay. "Or neck for approximately three hours?"

"Shove off, Evans, you're really one to talk."

Remus smiles down into his own work.

On her way from the table, Dorcas points an accusing finger at the two of us. "Hey, neither of you

better go for my nuance angle, alright?"

"Wouldn't dream of it," I say just as Remus says, "Would never think of it."

With Dorcas safely gone from the table I turn to Remus and ask, "So, really, you're alright? Feeling okay? Not injured?"

"Yes, Lily, I'm fine," he smiles reassuringly. "I've been doing this for an awful long time. It's not something you get used to, necessarily, but it becomes a routine."

"Okay. Good—I mean, not good but, well—you know." I rub my lips together. "I'm sorry. To be overbearing. It's just—I'm playing empathy catch-up, here."

He laughs, shaking his head. "You have nothing to be sorry for. Your concern is a welcome relief, actually, to the blithering idiots that react apocalyptically to any small scrape day-of."

I look over at him, and feel, suddenly, the magnitude that he brushes off. He doesn't wear any outward badge of anger or the grief—he chooses, among any handful of rightful reactions, optimism. The cavern of kept-in things, inside of him—it must be immense. Catastrophic. I vow, silently, to always be a patient witness to that, to dip into it if I have to, if he needs someone to help. He can only carry so much on his own.

He catches my pondering look. "What?"

"It's just—you've been through so much. You carry it like it's nothing."

He exhales, smiles ruefully. "I haven't been alone, Lily. And now look at you—you're here, too. It's

not so bad. There's worse things."

"Like Alchemy essays?"

"Like Alchemy essays," he laughs, a full and burgeoning sound, one that warms along the edges of my deepest worries for him—for all of us.

We're silent for a moment, ruminating, perhaps, on the strange balance between schoolwork and other more menacing truths. The common room is fairly empty given it being the middle of the day, most Gryffindors sill in class or taking study periods in the library or great hall. There's a group of three younger boys in a distant window seat, ones I recognize by face but not year. They huddle over a textbook, chatting in low tones. My heart, against its better interests, hurts at the sight.

"You know, Remus, you can—you can talk to me about...other things, too, if you ever need to. I mean—I'm here if you need to just talk about...you know, whatever." I shrug. "Anything, really."

A corner of his mouth ticks up. He stares at me. Something flutters in his brow. "Anyone ever told you you're too observant for your own good?"

"Oh, I've been told that consistently my whole life."

He brushes a hand through the neat wave of his hair. Taps his quill mindlessly against the table. He looks at me placidly for a second, then sighs. "Can I show you something?"

We take the stairs to the dorm the Marauders-minus-James share. Remus kneels next to his bed and pulls a small crate out from underneath. From the crate he hands me a stack of letters, bound together in twine. I peer at the letter on the top, its first line reading Dear Remus.

"Every letter he's sent me," he says, then hands me another stack. This one is even thicker, somehow, the twine tying it together frayed and molted, barely holding on. "Every letter I almost sent him."

I look up at him, confused.

"Telling him how I felt," he clarifies.

This I feel somewhere strange: The flats of my feet. They tingle. I stare.

"I know," he says, sitting down on the bed.

"How long?"

"It's hard to say in exact terms, but...sometime third year."

I sit down on the bed next to him. "And he didn't know until...?"

"This summer."

"And Peter and James didn't suspect?" I find this ridiculously hard to believe given how obvious Remus' affection has been to me the majority of the year—and, on top of that, given the intimacy of their foursome. "At all?"

Remus laughs. "I taught myself to hide it, around them. And in general, I suppose. It couldn't—I didn't want it to muff up the group dynamic, or my friendship with any of them. And Peter—well, you've met Pete. And James means so well, and is really attentive in certain ways, but—I think he developed, especially last year, a sort of selective blindness to this particular...situation."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, Sirius was dating Helen, and it seemed at first just like one of his flings, but the longer it went on," he shrugs, laughing. "It wasn't as easy for me to deal with as I'd originally thought. I was going a bit mental not having any way to deal with my feelings, which James did notice, to his credit, but he completely missed the mark on why I was so irritable. He blamed it on how irregular my transformations became in the winter months—which, I later decided, had much to do with my, er, inner turmoil, regardless. It was a weird year."

"On top of N.E. ?"

"Yeah. Jesus."

I stare down at his knee, shaking a little. I try to imagine what it was like watching someone he'd fancied for so long date someone else, and not be able to talk about it with close friends. "I'm sorry, that must have been rotten. For them all to be so oblivious, and no help. In addition to—well, Sirius and Helen."

"It—I mean it was hard, yes, but I'd expected that from fancying anyone really, I knew it wasn't going to be easy with...everything. I was setting myself up for failure, really. It seemed like the safest thing was to hole it up." His hand comes down on his own leg, tempering the shake. "Anyway. It all seems a bit melodramatic now. Things are different, and school is almost over, and—" he looks over at me. "Everything else, after, is one massive lack of clarity."

I almost laugh, here, because it's almost painful, the lack of clarity—but I don't.

"Did he tell you?" Remus asks, suddenly. "I mean—did James tell you?"

I shake my head and smile ruefully. "I just...saw."

Remus rubs his lips together and nods, absently. Then he clears his throat and collects the packets of letters, returns the crate under his bed.

"Do you ever think of giving those to him, now?"

He stands up, sighs. Stuffs his hands in his pockets. "All the time."

"Do you—" I stop, because don't know if this is a question I am allowed to ask Remus. I have always considered him a friend, and even more so, now—but still, this question is something I'm not sure I deserve to ask.

This I hope he sees somewhere behind my eyes. His chin dips downward, head swaying. His chuckle is humorless, long-suffering. "I wish I didn't, sometimes."

"Remus," I whisper, and then, also, because I can't help myself: "Don't say that."

"It sounds horrible, I know. But—it feels, sometimes, like a losing battle, even when it feels good."

I exhale audibly because I understand the sentiment—I feel it for an entire summer, trying to get a grasp on what my feelings were. Maybe I'm more like Sirius than I realize.

In the pause, Remus scuffs a shoe to the ground. He says, "He's like—did you ever have trick candles? Growing up?"

"Yeah," I say, smiling weirdly. "The kind that act normal and then go out, and then come back on?"

"Yes," he affirms, laughing. "God, I hated them. I just wanted them to be what they were supposed to be—but that on-and-off, the tricky part, that feels like Sirius. Glowing for intermittent moments—and you never know when, but he'll go out, just like that." He sighs. "His lows, his insecurities, they're sudden, and alarming. A light out in a real, true dark. It's thanks, in part, or in full, really, to his family. He had to cope, somehow. Compartmentalize."

"I can't even imagine what he had to deal with," I murmur. The familial punishment for a pureblood child rejecting the tradition and trajectory of their pre-sanctioned lifestyle—in ways, I'm sure the feelings of ostracization are similar to my own, just in reverse.

"You understand being made to feel other. How it hurts everyone differently." Remus says gently.

"Yes, of course," I agree, nodding, though I add, "But pureblood rage...it's unlike any anger I've ever encountered."

He shudders, slightly, in the shoulders. "It's rage without empathy. It's disgusting."

My smile is sympathetic. "At least—not all of them are like that."

"Thank god," he laughs in relief, his breath rushing out.

There's a sudden sound of footsteps and excited voices outside the dorm, and a joyful holler and banging open of the door precedes Peter and Sirius as they tumble into the dorm, eyes alighting on the two of us. Sirius strides directly to Remus and clutches his arms with such a force that I almost feel it myself, just from proximity. "You won't fucking believe it, Moony."

"He passed the bloody exam!" Peter clutches at a windblown chest, cheeks red in exertion, pride cracking at the sides of his words.

"No," Remus' eyes blazing, now, as he stares at Sirius, mouth unable to resists an openly shocked grin. "Really? That exam?"

"That fucking exam!"

"You—" and then with a callous, bright laugh, Remus hugs him, hard, tight, their hold on one another so desperate and immediately personal that I walk right past them to join Peter.

"What exam, now?" I ask, quietly, hands twined behind my back.

"Divination," he beams, shaking his head. "He was teetering on failure seeing as he's never once tried in that class and it's shown, but—but he bloody aced this one, dunno how he did it. Although I in fact do know, before you ask, Evans, that he didn't cheat. It's a mid-winter miracle. And—oh, crikey, okay, they're full-on snogging, yeah, typical."

I turn in to find that Sirius and Remus are, indeed, full-on snogging, a sort of vehement, jaw-clasping kiss that I am instantly sure isn't meant to be witnessed or ogled, especially in a room to which I have no sort of claim to live. "Yeah, erm," I turn to Peter. "That's my cue."

"Evans—fuck, that's my cue," Peter scuttles after me as I flee the dorm, and I say, "How often does that happen?" and he just shakes his head, rolling his shoulders back, saying, "I don't want to talk about it."

I laugh and gather my notes and books from the study table Remus and I abandoned. "Heading to lunch?" I ask.

"Yeah, you?"

We walk down to the great hall together and Peter launches into a description of the soon-infamous Divination period in which, somehow, half the class failed a major exam and the other half passed, the latter, of course, involving Sirius Black and his miraculously salvaged overall score.

I make a mental note to carve out times like this, to seek Peter out. Perhaps I've been unfairly biased toward the other three, and their domineering personalities. Peter has been, thus far, the Marauder with whom I've spent the least time. But being around him feels good; it calms me. His demeanor is jovial and goofy and easy to read on the surface, and though his head is often high up in the clouds, most of his observations and commentary are keen when he's not in the limelight, under close scrutiny. It's hard to feel uncomfortable around him. His affable disposition has always felt like a true buffer between the implications laid between me and the others—tension with James, aggravation with Sirius, philosophizing with Remus. With Peter, it's just Peter. He's a blank slate. He's easy to talk to about anything—he's a good listener, smiles are dimpled and plentiful, insight thoughtful and guileless. He seems to unburden others, just by being there. James once said he's like the glue that melds them all together. I feel the effect of the joining ability even with him alone, the quiet assurance with which I feel him as a friend, as a listener, as a support.

In the hall we find Mary and James already seated, and the way Mary's hands are gesturing, her eyes afire, I really can't tell if they're arguing or getting excited. I ask them just this as I sit down. "We're planning your birthday party, and we're not telling you a single detail," Mary responds, setting in on a coffee that looks to me to be 99% foam. A bit sticks to her upper lip.

"Is that so?" I turn to James, who is wearing a smile that means he'll be sticking to Mary's vow, for fear of death-by- Mary—which I can't blame him for. "Not even a hint?"

"It involves unthinkable amounts of Quidditch. It's Quidditch-themed."

"You wouldn't."

"I most certainly would."

"I'm averting my eyes, this time, because I see it coming," Peter is muttering to Mary, who might look confused—but I'm not looking at her, because the next second James and I are kissing, though not quite as demonstratively as the display I'd witnessed not ten minutes earlier.

"What's he talking about?" James whispers when I pull back, reach for a plate and a sandwich.

I don't answer him, but I do say, "I had a really lovely chat with Remus, just now."

"About what? Me?"

He receives a playful elbow to the ribs, here. "No, you self-centered dolt, not everything is about you."

"Fine, then, if it wasn't anything interesting, allegedly, what'd you chat about?"

I make him wait until I'm three bites into the sandwich, which is divine, and far and beyond my own exploration of paprika as a sandwich-spice. "You know—Pureblood rage, trick candles. It's so nice to talk to someone that understands Muggle culture halfway."

"Alright, nice try, Evans, you're not just smoothing over Pureblood rage, snuck in there."

"I certainly am," I say, glancing at him. He's fork-deep in Shepard's pie. I knick a bite for myself, then say, "We were mostly talking about the torrid affair."

"Torrid affair?" James bats my fork away when I come back for another bite of pie. "Is that what we're calling it, now?"

"You've a better term?"

"I would call it just a big bloody mess, but I suppose that's inelegant."

"They full-on necked in front of Pete and me."

"What?" The force of this reaction sends the plate of pie clear off the edge of the table, but luckily,

I'm quick enough with a freezing charm before it tumbles to a short death. "What?" James hisses, again, apparently unconcerned with the mid-air pie and plate. "You're taking the piss."

"I am not," I shake my head, laughing, righting his lunch in front of him.

"Everything okay, Potter, you absolute maniac?" Mary inquires from across the table.

"He's being dramatic."

"Yeah, yeah—anyway, Pettigrew, what's this about sexy hippogriffs?"

James is still staring at me in clear disbelief. "Why are you losing your marbles about this?" I ask, genuinely confused.

"Because I've—I've bloody well only seen them look at one another in a—you know, loving sort of way, and you just waltz in and see them kiss? Yeah, I'm put out by that. I think I've a right to be!" His cheeks are pinkening with the effort of just how put out he is about the turn of events. "They're my mates!"

"Good Lord, love, take a deep breath or you'll burst a bloody vein."

He takes a deep breath. Rubs his palms at his eyes. Shakes his hair out. I watch the whole display, amused. He closes his eyes, then opens them. Turns to me again, calmer. "So? What was it like?"

"It was—" I stop a moment, thinking. "Do you remember how I kissed you after you'd all sat me down and told me you-know-what?"

His eyes soften with the memory, voice soft alongside. "Yes."

"Bit like that."

"Bloody hell," he murmurs. "I'm going to demand they do that in front of me."

"Since when are you so perverted, anyway?"

"It's not perversion, Lily, it's justice! I've barely heard a godamn mutual word about this thing from the two of them in a group setting, I think I deserve physical evidence!"

"James, honestly," I implore. My sandwich so rudely abandoned. "It's a bit weird of you to be so demanding, like that. Can't you just let it take its natural course? How would you feel if Sirius or Remus had forced us to go on kiss in front of them when we were still—you know, figuring things out?" I watch his throat move as he swallows, eyes on mine. "Surely you remember that was like. Well—what it was like, for me. Isn't it enough to know they like each other and are learning how best to go about it?"

He blanches, stares a second, then sighs heavily. "You're right." I run my hand around the back of his neck and stroke my thumb along his hair, a familiar, soothing gesture. "How is it you're always right?"

"I'm top of my class," I answer, smiling.

"How about, and hear me out, here," he leans over, hand on my thigh, mouth by my ear. "You consider being on top of me, soon, here, in the future?"

"Uh, hullo, great hall, lunchtime rush?" Mary is leaning over the table, palms-first, appeasing to us desperately as I giggle somewhat shamelessly.

"Heads ought to have some semblance of decorum, I second her, there," Peter pipes in.

I ignore them both, as I'm well-practiced at, and kiss James soundly, then return, finally, to possibly the best sandwich I've ever had the privilege or joy of eating.