March 10, 1979

It couldn't have happened to two lovelier people.

That's what everyone kept saying throughout the funeral and in the condolence cards Lily skimmed afterwards.

They'd received the news on a Thursday, six days past.

Snow had packed high outside their safehouse, and the wood floors had been frigid.

She'd been reading a status report from Mad Eye, always painful since he had the habit of redacting nearly everything as need-to-know.

James had been reading a book on defensive spells, studying.

The message had come through the floo.

Just Arthur Weasley's head in the fireplace.

His breath was visible and green in the cold.

Then, the news.

Fleamont Potter was dead.

Regardless of exigent circumstances, James would have been devastated by his father's death; but, the situation had horrifically, impossibly worsened.

Travel in wartime was difficult, and there'd been a particularly nasty attack using the floo system only the week before, so it took them nearly an hour to travel to Stinchcombe, where Euphemia was meant to be waiting. James had sprinted out of the fireplace, racing for his mother's bedroom. A groundsman, who lived in a cottage on the property, caught James before he could make it up the stairs and delivered the terrible news.

Fleamont had succumbed to Dragon Pox. The same strain that had ailed Euphemia. The same strain that had ultimately killed her a half hour before they'd arrived.

In a world where Euphemia Potter had lived, Lily believed James would have closeted his grief in order to be a rock for his mother. Without her, he was untethered.

It had been six days since they heard the news, and he hadn't so much as smiled once.

The funeral that morning had been a miserable affair. Wizarding Britain had become inoculated to death, so the sound of James' crying had carried all the more for everyone else's sobriety. James' pain wrecked Lily, and she was the only one who sobbed louder as they bade their final farewells to the Potters.

Afterwards, the mourners had retired back to the Potter estate. People milled about, telling stories of Fleamont's temper getting him into trouble and Euphemia's struggles with an errant son. The guests laughed as they looked at a life in review and deemed it well spent.

James wasn't much of a host throughout. He sat in a corner of the parlor, chin propped on his hands and eyes cast aimlessly toward the wallpaper. Filling in for James' reticence, Remus ran through the house, thanking people for their attendance and giving some order to the event. James had been no help in preparing the funeral either. The task had been split between Remus and Lily, each taking turns away from James' side to make sure the instructions Euphemia had detailed in her will were followed.

They – Lily, Sirius, Remus and Peter – all felt helpless. James couldn't be consoled. They'd all given it their shot. Sirius had plied James with enough booze to fell a giant, but James just wept when the alcohol hit his system. Remus had reminisced about his best memories of Euphemia and Fleamont, but James had retracted further at his attempts. Peter had talked about his own experiences with pain, a commiseration that James had squashed.

For her part, Lily had mostly been a steady presence at his side. When the silence grew too unbearable, Lily would tell him how much she loved him and make promises to never leave him alone. She tried to comfort him with tactile reminders of her promises, constant hand-holding and backrubs. On the fourth night, she'd tried sex, and James had seemed to lose a sliver of his shell of numbness at the suggestion, but his libido was shot, and they'd had to give up. Immediately, he was back to the same muted agony.

Occasionally, guests walked past where the two sat and whispered at James' isolation. Everyone was all sympathy for the orphaned son.

Lily lifted James' hand from his chair's armrest. He didn't so much as look at her, wrist limp. She was startled by the ice of his fingers, and rubbed her own hands around his to generate some heat.

Suffocating fear was starting to rise up in her, along with the bile in her stomach. Six days and not a sign that James was processing his grief, not a sign that he would come out okay on the other side. He was wallowing in his heartbreak, and maybe that was allowed. Lily wasn't exactly an expert on mourning. Still, she needed a sign from him that he was going to recover.

The night before, she'd met the other Marauders in the pantry to discuss James' condition. They were uniformly frightened for him. Sirius had concocted a number of wild plans, all designed to break James from his lethargy. James had fallen apart, and they all agreed he couldn't wait too long before reassembling the pieces.

Lily decided on a new tactic to draw James out.

The floor was uncarpeted and cold, but Lily knelt down in front of James' chair all the same, bracketed the chair with her arms. She waited until her unusual posture drew James' attention. His eyes didn't lose that glassy unfocus, but he did look at her, an emotion less strong than curiosity in his eyes.

Quietly, Lily said, "James, ask me to marry you."

"No."

It was a minor victory these days just to get James to speak.

"James, I want you to ask me," Lily said again.

"I don't want your sympathy," James said.

"Good because that's not what I'm offering. See, I want you to ask me to marry you, so that I can reject you for the bazillionth time. I figure your week's not going bad enough as it is. Why not add a rejected proposal to the mix?" Lily said. It was a strain to smile, but she managed to show teeth and everything.

"Not bad enough…" James murmured the words, caught somewhere between a question and a statement.

"Yep. After I reject you, I've paid Remus to come over here and kick you in the kneecaps," Lily said.

James didn't smile, didn't even blink, but he did say, "Lily, will you marry me?"

Her throat vibrated shut and an unexpected wave of tears burst through her. She recognized that it wasn't a serious proposal, but she couldn't bear to say no all the same. He was so soft and vulnerable and motherless. But then the immensity of what James had said swept through her, and Lily was smiling.

"That was a joke. You just participated in a joke," Lily said through a wet chuckle.

"It is funny you brought that up," James said, ironically devoid of humor. "Because I've been carrying this around all day."

He unballed his fist to reveal the gaudiest ring Lily had ever seen. The diamond in the center was a hulking piece, worth more than Lily's parents would earn over the course of ten years. Along the edges, milgrain beading had been welded to the band. The more carefully Lily looked, the more details were revealed to her; the ring was as intricate as a Faberge piece.

"My mum always said…she always said she almost refused my dad, when he put this on her finger. She'd wanted something more elegant, less…loud," James said.

"Your mother was –" Lily cut herself off. She couldn't bear to use the past-tense. "I've always admired your mum's taste."

"She hated it, she said. But from the day they married on, she never took it off for any reason."

James flexed his hand compulsively, the tendons of his arms rising to the surface and then disappearing again. He did this a few times, like he couldn't stand to look at the ring for too long, or like he was afraid a thief might tear it away, the ring as lost as his parents.

"She never took it off, Lily. Never. And now…I don't know what to do with it. I can't stand just leaving it to sit in a drawer. She wouldn't want that. It should be with her. I have no right to…" James trailed off miserably.

Euphemia's will had explicitly forbidden the ring be buried alongside her. Not because she thought it was too tasteless for the afterlife, but because she wanted James to bear it, a reminder of her and her husband. Perhaps, the ring was too effective a reminder because James looked as if he'd swallowed the ring and was choking on it. The ring was a symbol of legacy, a symbol of their expectation that James should continue to live his life and forge a path beyond them. James wasn't ready to face the reality of living with his parents no longer in the world.

"I don't know what to do with it. I don't know," James repeated.

A foreign calm settled upon Lily, the wisdom of millennia of women – Euphemia included – possessing her. They told her what to do, when she was stumbling in the dark of pain. Gently, Lily closed her hand overtop of his, so that the diamond edges cut into her palm.

"I'll wear it, okay?" Lily said. "I'll wear it, and I promise, I'll never take it off. Never. Just like your mum."

He didn't put it on for her; she had to slide it onto her left ring finger herself, but he held onto her at the wrist, his thumb crushing into bone. Fixated on the diamond glittering on her slim finger, James was silent. Behind her, the clamor of the wake continued: the ding of china and the laugh of a drunken uncle. All of it faded to nothing, so Lily only heard James' labored breathing. Slowly, he bowed his head, so that it rested atop her outstretched hand, the ring digging painfully into his skin.

Something wet slid down her arm. His tears.

They didn't move for a long time.

A/N: Would you believe it if I said this is actually a happier ending than the one I initially intended? Also, technically two proposals (of a sort) in one here.

I have every intention of finishing this series, but updates will be slow (in case you haven't all figured that out from the months in between lol) because I've finally started posting my new multichapter, which is my bigger commitment. If you aren't already reading it, please do.

Anyway, hope this was enjoyable on top of being heartbreaking. Reviews are always appreciated