"Nothing ever pleases you, does it?"
"Nothing you do," Lily said with a smirk, flicking her hair over one shoulder as she turned away.
James grinned despite himself and found himself standing in place, staring at her back, before snapping into action and running after her. He reached out and snagged her wrist, pulling her around to face him. Lily raised an eyebrow and crossed her arms, staring defiantly into his eyes: an obvious challenge.
"What, Potter?" she asked.
" 'Potter?' Aren't we past the formalities?" James asked with a cheeky grin, hooking both of his hands onto the strap of his bag.
"Not in public we aren't."
James rolled his eyes while Marlene and Dorcas snickered behind Lily, both wearing the same knowing smile and eager eyes. James nodded to them both over her shoulder with a pointed glare, a grim and sarcastic greeting, then turned his full attention back to Lily.
"But… we're dating. Doesn't that usually call for first names at least?"
Lily shook her head. "We're not dating."
James blinked at her, trying to comprehend what she was saying while a heavy stone settled into his stomach, making him ache with dread. The words themselves made sense; it was the way she strung them together that confounded him.
"What do you mean? You asked me out. I said yes. Doesn't that mean we're dating?"
"Oh Potter," Marlene lamented.
Dorcas shook her head sadly and sighed much louder than necessary. James scowled at them both and took half a step closer to Lily, a misbegotten effort to make their conversation a little more private.
"You're not regretting asking me out, are you? This isn't some sorry way of telling me you're backing out or something?" James asked quietly, obvious concern hiding behind his glasses.
A flicker of guilt and pity flared up in her stomach and Lily instantly dropped her crossed arms, reaching out so that her fingers brushed his arm. "No, no, no!" she said hurriedly. "Not at all."
A flood of relief washed over James' face. "Oh. Good," he said weakly, unable to hide his sudden panic.
"I was just teasing you over the technicality of it. We're not dating yet," she explained, leaning into the word. "It was just a stupid joke."
"But you still don't want to call me James?"
Lily shook her head again with a sad smile. "Not in public."
"Not in public," he parroted with furrowed brows. "And why is that?"
"I just… don't want to start any trouble before we need to. The gossip train is bound to go crazy, plus I tend to draw a lot of attention from certain crowds and-
"Trust me. I know," James smirked.
Lily rolled her eyes, belying her smile. "From certain prejudiced crowds, I mean, and I don't want to drag you into all of that before we even go on our first date."
"I'm not exactly the shining idol of what those Death Eater creeps strive towards myself, you know. I can handle a few taunts."
"Yes, I'm aware. I've seen you in enough detentions from fighting with them for a lifetime. But let's not add fuel to the fire just yet."
"What difference does it make? It's barely more than a week until the Hogsmeade visit," James protested.
"Exactly. It's just one more week."
James blew out a frustrated breath and cocked his head quizzically, his eyes narrowing. "Compromise. I won't say anything about our" -his voice dropped to a dramatic whisper and he raised one hand up like a child with a secret to share- "assignation" -his hand dropped and his voice returned to normal- "and I won't act any differently if we can use first names."
"Assignation is going a bit far, don't you think?" Lily laughed.
"Deal or no deal?"
She sighed. "Fine. Deal."
"Excellent. See you around, Lily."
"If 'around' means right now since we're going to the same class, then yes, see you around, James."
Lily turned on her heel and fell in step with her friends, turning the next corner with one last backward glance and smile. James grinned back, letting the sea of students part around him, knowing that just that brief smile, the flutter of her fingers on his wrist, her laughter at his jokes, were more than enough to keep him going until their date when according to Lily, all hell would break loose.
"Oi! Earth to idiot!" Remus called loudly.
James flinched, his expression a mix of surprise and lingering joy at the sight of his friends now standing right beside him.
"Sorry to bring you back to reality from what I'm sure was a tantalizing, romantic conversation, but we're about to be late to class," Remus said with a wide, obnoxious grin.
"Unless you're planning on cutting class, which I'm always down for," Sirius cut in.
"Nah. It's Minnie's. We can't skip, she'll miss us too much," James replied, his old confidence flowing back into him.
Remus rolled his eyes. "That or you admit to actually enjoying her class."
"Or she'll put us all in a week of detention," Peter added, already walking ahead towards the classroom.
"I'm going with Prongs on this one. She'll miss us too much," Sirius said, nodding emphatically and walking after Peter.
Lily squirmed in her seat, adjusting so that the barely risen sun threw its light perfectly onto her pages, illuminating the words and half of her face. If she was the type to tan, she'd have a line of bronze skin on the left and pale skin on the right. But she was far too immersed to worry about freckling or burning. She was curled up in an armchair biting on her thumbnail near the window when footsteps skipped quickly down the dormitory staircase and yet she did not stir from the novel she clutched in her hands.
"Lily?" a familiar voice asked in the quiet morning. Her eyes darted up, clearly startled, but she relaxed when she saw who it was.
"Good morning, Potter," she responded, uncurling her legs from under her. She tried to keep her voice casual, though her racing heart was determined to make that impossible, as if it knew that it was just the two of them alone in the room.
"What are you doing up so early?" he asked.
"I could ask you the same thing," she said, eyeing the broom held over his shoulder and trying not to get distracted in the way the morning sun brought out specs of gold in his hazel eyes. She bit the bottom of her lip to keep herself from smiling like a lovestruck idiot.
"Well I asked you first," he said grinning, trying to keep his gaze on her eyes and not the way she was chewing on her lip.
"Fine," she scoffed. "I always wake up early, and I like the common room during the mornings on the weekend. It's never this quiet." Lily closed her book after carefully marking the page and she stood to face James.
"Fair enough."
"And why are you off to practice Quidditch so early?"
"Oh, I was just going to get in a bit of extra practice in. Flying just clears my mind, you know?" he said with a shrug. Lily nodded, even though she could not relate at all. She's never gotten the hang of flying, or heights for that matter, and had to focus far too much to ever clear her mind.
"I'm just surprised you're up so early since I heard your voice late last night when I came down to check on some loud noise. Do I even want to know what you were up to?" she teased.
"Surprisingly, I was actually up to nothing terrible."
She rolled her eyes. "Oh please."
"No really! There were just some tiny first years about to start crying over their transfiguration homework so I helped them," he explained and shoved his spare hand deep into his pocket.
"Really?" she asked in disbelief, eyebrows soaring to hide beneath her messy hair.
"Really! I mean I like transfiguration and they clearly needed the help and I am Head Boy so I'm supposed to help…" he mumbled on. Lily crossed her arms in front of her chest and scoffed. All James could notice was how her green shirt matched her sparkling eyes perfectly.
"What!?"
"Nothing! It's just… maybe you aren't such an arrogant toe-rag anymore," she smiled, peering at James.
"Umm… thank you?" his lopsided smirk emerged. Lily felt the heat rise to her cheeks, but couldn't bring herself to look away.
James cleared his throat and rocked from toe to heel. "Well, I'll be going then," he said just to end the uncomfortable silence. He turned and walked to the portrait hole.
"James!" Lily called, not knowing where her sudden burst of confidence came from. Maybe James' was contagious. "Wait," she finished lamely.
"Yeah?" He turned back expectantly and looked at her with his head cocked, a question raising to his lips.
"I was… would you…" she took a deep breath and stared intently into James' eyes, flicking her gaze to his perpetually messy hair. She closed her eyes, breathed out, and opened them once more. She clenched her fingers around her novel, clutching it to her chest to stop her hands from visibly trembling in nervous fear. "Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me on the weekend trip coming up?"
His eyes grew wide in shock as he processed what Lily had said. His jaw opened ever so slightly.
"You don't have to! If you don't want to… I just-" Lily blabbered on, instantly embarrassed at James' lack of response. She looked down and didn't notice his shock turn almost instantly into euphoric glee.
"Are you asking me on a date, Evans?" His smile grew and he took a step forward, lowering his broom from his shoulder so that it trailed on the floor beside him.
"Well, yeah. I thought that was obvious since I did just ask you out," she responded and met his gaze while he opened and closed his mouth without a sound coming out. "But, you haven't given me a response yet."
"Sorry, I'm just trying to savor this moment."
Lily rolled her eyes at him, but couldn't stop a smile from escaping."Don't make me regret asking you," she threatened, leaning forward towards him.
James inclined his head respectfully, his smile never diminishing. "Lily Evans, I will most definitely go to Hogsmeade with you next weekend."
"James Potter, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I am genuinely looking forward to it."
Somehow, James' smile grew wider and he nodded slowly before walking towards the portrait hole again, still clearly elated and not quite believing his luck.
"How long will you be at the Quidditch pitch, do you think?" she asked casually. He whipped around instantly at her voice.
He shrugged, a pink glow still lighting up his face. "Probably not too long. Why?"
"I was just trying to decide on if I should wait to eat with you or not." She smirked, secretly loving the effect that she was having on the most popular boy in school.
"You know what? I can practice later. Give me one second and then we can go down together." Without waiting for a response he sprinted up the stairs as Lily giggled and shoved her book back into her bag before straightening up. She walked to the portrait hole and leaned against the wall when James raced back down, panting slightly, his hair even more disheveled than before. All she wanted to do was run her hand through it and mess it up even further, but she had to stop herself.
We haven't even been on one date yet. Get a grip, she thought to herself.
"That was fast," she said, pushing forward off of the wall.
"I didn't want you to change your mind," he grinned as he followed her out of the common room, feeling like he was floating on air.