On the day of the game, James found it incredibly difficult to swallow anything. He wasn't usually nervous before playing Quidditch, but this time was different. He hadn't talked to Marlene since their wonderful and heartbreaking date, and at this point he was too afraid to even look at her in the eyes.

Needless to say the two practice sessions they had had since then had been quite awkward. James had not dreaded a game this much since his first ever one.

"Quit staring at your plate and eat something!" said Peter. "You have a big game this morning, you want all the energy you can get!"

"Don't mind him Pete, he's still sad about McKinnon," said Sirius, nudging James with his elbow.

"I'm not sad!" he protested. "Just anxious about the game."

"Oh please," snorted Remus. "You're never worried before a game."

"Well I am now. Let me be."

James' tone should never have been this cold and he immediately regretted it.

"Sorry Moony, I didn't mean to snap."

"Don't worry about it," replied Remus carefully. "Are you okay? Do you want me to go down to the kitchens?"

Suddenly incapable to speak due to the growing knot in his throat, James nodded. Remus knew him too well. In first year, he had figured out that the only thing that made James feel instantly better was chocolate. It cheered him up when he was sad, soothed him when he was angry, and never failed to appease the worse of his fears.

As a child, his father always made him hot chocolate when he was sick. It was a memory of comfort, of home. As a teenager, it was almost the only thing he drank during winter.

"I'll go down right now," said Remus. "Tell them to have as much hot chocolate as possible ready for when the game is over."

James mouthed a sincere thank you. He felt so grateful to know his friends would always stand besides him, helping him deal with emotions he could barely comprehend himself. Encouraged by Peter, he even ate a little before getting up. Ever since the Whomping Willow incident and that terrible scar stretching across his chest, he liked to arrive early to the games, so he wouldn't have to change in front of anyone.

Further down the Gryffindor table, Lily was braiding Marlene's hair into a hairdo that wouldn't be disturbed by the wind. It was with a tug to his stomach that James noticed that neither of them looked up when he passed them.

Sirius and Peter were right behind him, chatting light-heartedly to try and calm his nerves and only went in a different direction once they got to the locker rooms. James changed quickly into his Quidditch robes and spent his spare time polishing his broom until the rest of the team arrived.

Marlene was last. She gave a short speech James was too distracted to listen to, and like that, they were off.

They marched together to the centre of the pitch, and the team mounted their brooms while the two captains exchanged the customary handshake. It was their first game without Alice.

As Madam Hooch blew her whistle, James kicked the ground and flew upwards. One of the techniques they had discussed intensively consisted in him trailing the lead Ravenclaw Chaser, McLaren, from below. He took to his new position enthusiastically, as the thrill of the flight started to rise in him.

McLaren was great, if not incredible, and quickly understood what James was trying to do. On several occasions, he veered off his course brutally, challenging James to recognize a pattern to his unpredictability, as well as a game of high level acrobatics.

McLaren dived, spiraled and accelerated before realizing he could not get rid of James. Trying out a different approach, he flew at high speed straight to Marlene, who was holding the Quaffle, then pulled the handle of his broom up and avoided a last second crash by flying above her.

Trailing behind McLaren, James angled his broom down and zoomed below her, missing her by a hair, as she dropped the Quaffle to him. He caught it with the tips of his fingers and barely held on, before sprinting towards the Ravenclaw goals. Reaffirming his grip on the ball, he tried his chance and threw to the Quaffle to the left goal, but his attempt was immediately defected by the Keeper, Cornell-the-fourth-year, who tossed the ball back to McLaren.

James felt his heart drop to his stomach as McLaren sped towards the Gryffindor goals. He had abandoned his position to try to score, and had left an open space for the opponent to fly freely. James started speeding to him, aware he would be too late to prevent him from scoring anyway when Marlene cut McLaren's trajectory and he dropped the Quaffle out of surprise.

After twenty minutes of intense game, the score remained unaltered. None of the Gryffindor Chasers could seem to go through Cornell's impeccable goalkeeping, and no one on the Ravenclaw team could bypass Marlene and Alvarez's brilliant defense. They were at a dead end.

Their talents perfectly equal as it was, everything relied on the Seekers. Not only were they the only ones capable to put an end to this close game, they would also be the only ones responsible for their team's victory. Or defeat.

James came to a stop and remained stationary for a short moment, catching his breath as he looked around for the Snitch. He was ready to chase it right into their Seeker's hands if he needed to. Marlene seemed to have had the same idea and was flying in circular motion above the pitch, while further down, Alvarez was in possession of the Quaffle and was making progress zigzagging between the Ravenclaw Chasers.

James was scanning the air for the Snitch when something in the stands caught his attention. Lily had her arm around Mary, who was squirming nervously in her seat as she watched Marlene. But far from imitating Mary and looking at her friend, Lily was staring at James, smiling, cheering him on.

Her cheeks were pink from the cold or maybe the excitement, and her dark red hair was gathered in a long ponytail behind her. He noticed the red and gold scarf wrapped around her neck, her piercing green eyes widening, then nothing.

Nothing but pain.

He was falling.

He woke up in the infirmary. The sharp pain he had felt just before falling was almost completely gone, but he couldn't open his left eye and he could feel a swelling on the left side of his face. He didn't have his glasses.

There was a feminine figure sat near the bed and he blinked several times to clear his vision.

"Lily?"

The silhouette leaned towards him and slapped his arm from above the covers.

"No, you arse, it's Marlene. You were hit in the face by a Bludger."

"Oh, so that's what that is," said James slowly. He tried touching his cheek with the tips of his fingers but the contact made him wince painfully. "Did we win?"

"Yeah, I caught the snitch and tossed it to Herby when everyone was watching you fall. Don't tell the Ravenclaws. Or Madam Hooch."

"Great news," grumbled James, resisting the primal urge to touch his swollen face again. He reached for his glasses on the night stand and put them on extremely mindfully, getting most of his vision back.

"He's awake!" Marlene called to the nurse.

"Oh thank Merlin, poor lamb!" said Madame Pomfrey, emerging from her office and rushing to his side. "I gave you something for the pain, so you shouldn't be able to feel it but you do have a fractured cheekbone."

"That doesn't sound good," said James. As much as he loved the school nurse, he hated the infirmary as much as everybody else.

"No. I thought I warned you about coming to me with any other Quidditch related injuries Mr. Potter!"

"But it wasn't my fault this time!"

Marlene coughed and looked at him intensely. Of course it was his fault, and he knew it. He never should have let himself get distracted from the game by the people in the stands. Or by someone in particular.

"Do I look like I care whose fault it was?" continued Madam Pomfrey, unaware of the silent exchange. "You are going to get yourself killed one day! If it were up to me, Quidditch would be banned from this school altogether. So you best believe that while I am still at Hogwarts you will not touch a broomstick again!"

She grabbed a few empty bottles of ointment from the night stand and left, looking genuinely annoyed.

With a knot in his stomach, James watched her disappear inside her office. Had this game truly been his last at Hogwarts? Worried, he bit his lip, unintentionally mimicking Marlene, still sat next to him.

"I'm not going to let her kick you off the team James," she said with a concerned look on her face. "I'll talk to her, don't worry."

"Really?"

"Are you kidding? McGonagall would kill me if I let that happen. You're our best Chaser, I'm not trying to lose this tournament for my first year as a captain."

"I thought..." hesitated James. "I thought that maybe because of Saturday you wouldn't want anything to do with me any more."

Smiling, Marlene leaned forward and placed her hand on top of his.

"James, with Alice gone, you're the only one of my friends with who I can talk about Quidditch. I'm not cutting you out of my life just because you won't date me. Besides, we're in class together every other day, so trying to ignore your existence would be really hard."

James smiled back at her. He didn't know what he had done to deserve someone so understanding and kind. She had every reason to hate him.

"Thank you," he whispered. Unfortunately, his words were drowned out by the sound of the two great wooden doors blasting open, and of precipitated footsteps.

"James!"

Lily's voice echoed through the infirmary as she ran to his bed. Her neatly tied hair had been messed up by the wind and she had not taken the time to take off her scarf or even unbutton her coat.

She stopped dead in her tracks as she set her eyes on Marlene's hand, still on James's.

"Oh."

Marlene pulled her hand away quickly and so did James, but it was seconds too late.

"I just came to tell you that..." Lily hesitated, and James could tell she was struggling to come up with a reasonable explanation for her heaving chest and the fact that she had just blasted through the doors with such speed. "Hum, your friends are on their way, they were in the kitchens," she blurred out finally.

"That's what you wanted to tell me?" asked James. Something in Lily's attitude told him that it wasn't the whole truth. "That's why you ran here?"

"I didn't run," said Lily, clearly out of breath. She tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear and adjusted her messy ponytail. "And yeah. That's it."

With a last look at her friend sat near the bed, Lily turned heel and walked out. As soon as she disappeared behind the wooden doors, Marlene leaned forward with a guilty expression on her face.

"James, I'm so fucking sorry," she whispered. "I swear I didn't mean for it to look like that. I'll go after her and explain everything, I'll fix it, I promise."

Before James could say anything, Marlene was gone and he was left alone in the empty infirmary. With his broken heart and fractured cheek.