Lily breathed in the smell of night from under the invisibility cloak. The thing about this cloak, she had quickly noticed, was that it was not very large, and in order to avoid her feet sticking out she had to lean in quite close to James; in fact, she'd better hold his hand, just to be safe, and when she slipped hers into his, he squeezed it slightly.

"Are you okay?" James' voice was soft, right in her ear.

"Yeah," she said.

"You sure?"

"I don't really…" she let the words trail off into the darkness. "I don't want to talk about it, I think."

"Okay," James said softly.

They walked in silence for a couple minutes, only it was a strangely comfortable silence, and Lily could not actually remember the last time she'd heard James Potter be quiet.

"We can probably take the cloak off, now," he said after a moment. "I doubt Filch'll show up out here."

"Good point," said Lily, ducking out from under the cloak. "I still can't believe you have one of these."

"Yeah, it's crazy. I mean when my dad showed it to me I was shocked. Like, it's not really something you expect to have lying around. Comes in handy, though. This thing's been through many years of mischief with me." James grinned.

"I can imagine," Lily said wryly. "Hey, speaking of mischief, the windows were enchanted yesterday in Binns' classroom to play Lord of the Flies, you wouldn't have anything to do with that, would you?"

"Lord of the Flies?" James asked, bemused. "What is that?"

"Oh, sorry, er, it's a muggle book. Movie too, recently. It's awful in my opinion-"

"Probably Remus, then," James said with a smile. "I'll ask him later, because if he didn't do it, I'd like to get in touch with whoever did- that's genius magic, really."

"Yeah, that's why I thought it might've been you," Lily admitted, before realizing what she had said.

"You think I'm a genius, Evans?"

"Shit, I have to be careful what I say around you. Don't want to inflate that already overly large head."

"Yeah, yeah," James said.

They stood there under the stars, looking at each other, and Lily wondered how she had ever questioned that she was in love.

Oh, be quiet, she told herself. No she wasn't. That'd be ridiculous. She was seventeen, she didn't know what love was, and yet…

She felt the words on her lips seconds before they came out, hoarsely echoing in the empty air.

"Potter, er, will you go out with me?"

He laughed, and suddenly her face was bright red even though he couldn't see it, how could she have ever assumed this was something real, a 7-year long game and she lost it because she was punch-drunk and wearing a shiny dress-

"Sorry," James choked out, "for laughing, I just-"

"No, it's okay," Lily said, embarrassed, and turned to run-

"No! Wait, Evans, yes, of course, I would love nothing more in the entire world to go out with you, I just never thought it'd be you who asked me, after all of that."

"Really?" Lily said.

"Of course really, jesus, you'd think a million times would be enough," said James, groaning with what would've been a convincing show of exasperation if only he wasn't beaming.

Lily could feel herself blush and, not for the first time that night, reflected on how happy she was that it was dark. "Er," she said, "well in that case-"

James took her hand in his, finishing her thought. "Can I kiss you?"

Lily nodded and, remembering that he could barely see her, leaned in.

And James smelled so strongly of mint shampoo.

And now Lily was thinking about her own shampoo, and what if James didn't like the way it smelled, and why did she ask him out before kissing him, and why did she ask him out at all and holy hell he was a good kisser and she could barely even feel her feet on the ground and her head was spinning and, pressed up against James Potter as she was, she felt as if it was impossible to get close enough to him.

"Evans," James said softly, pulling away.

"Sorry, er, do you not like my shampoo?" Lily blurted out.

James' laugh was more of a bark. "What?"

"I don't know why I said that, only your hair smells like mint and it's really nice, so-"

"Your hair smells like cinnamon."

Lily's nose scrunched as she felt her normal confidence return. "What is this, Christmas gum drops?"

"Basically," James said, but he was clearly not thinking about Christmas gum drops when he looked at her. "Uh, Lily, I'm sort of… I'm sort of scared."

"Why on earth would you be scared?" Lily said, genuinely bemused.

"I don't want to mess this up," said James.

"Yeah, Potter, that's a valid concern, especially with you," Lily teased. "Kidding!" His eyes shone in the dark; he looked like a wounded puppy. "I mean, okay, people mess things up all the time. Like, for example, you just pulled away from the best kiss of my life-"

He laughed sheepishly. "Sorry-"

"Right, and that was absolutely tragic, but if you're talking about some horrible, life-altering mistake, well…" she trailed off.

"Well?"

Lily laughed softly. "It's too soon," she said, "to say this, but, Potter, I just really can't see myself running away from you."