Chapter 22 ~ Love
"We all suffer from the preoccupation that there exists ... in the loved one, perfection."
~ Sidney Poitier
"Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. It is not rude. It is not self-seeking. It is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrong doing. It does not delight in evil, but rejoices in the truth. It always protects, trusts, hopes, perseveres."
~ Corinthians 13
"The best thing about loving and being hurt is that you get to know what true love really is. For as gold is tested in fire, and so will love be perfected in pain."
~ Marvin Jay M. Torres
James was still sitting by Lily hours later. He was stricken with grief. But after a few hours there was a glimmer of hope. He felt something on his hand, the hand he was holding Lily's in.
"SHE SQUEEZED MY HAND!!" he yelled happily. He jumped out of the chair he was in and was sitting on the bed almost immediately. "Lily, can you hear me?" he asked, his voice barely containing his excitement.
"What is all of the noise?" Madame Pomphrey asked as she paraded into the room. "What is all this yelling about?"
"She moved! She squeezed my hand!" James said happily, not looking away from Lily.
"Are you sure?" she asked looking at him skeptically.
"Yes… and look, she's smiling!" he said, pointing at her face.
"So she is," the nurse said, looking at Lily with a smile
on her face. "If you could move Mister
Potter, I'd like to check her out again."
"Yes ma'am," he said, backing
away from the bed to give her room. The
nurse quickly scanned Lily and smiled.
"It seems she woken from her coma, but is asleep. I'm going to have to ask you to leave Mr. Potter. She needs her rest. Using her magic to keep her alive has made her extremely weak," she instructed. When James began to protest she interrupted him. "Now, now, I promise to send for you the minute she wakes up. But you need to go tell the others about her progress. Is that understood?" James just nodded his head and bid goodbye to the nurse and Lily, kissing her forehead.
He quickly ran out of the infirmary and threw the empty corridors to the Gryffindor Common Room. When he burst in it became evident that they were the only ones here for vacation. Mollie, Remus, and Sirius were sitting in front of the fire, just staring. No words were spoken. But when they noticed James, they all rushed up to him and bombarded him with questions.
"Is she okay?"
"What's happening?"
"Did she wake up?"
"Whoa! Slow down people," James said, still smiling. "Yes she's okay and no she didn't wake up. What's happening is she's asleep. She woke from the coma but is still asleep. Madame Pomphrey says she's weak from using her magic to keep herself alive, or something like that." He was still smiling and everyone let out a breath when they heard the progress. Soon all of them were in a better mood.
"You know what we need to do?" Sirius asked, turning back into his usual goofy self. "It is Christmas, is it not? I know for a fact that none of us have opened our gifts… so what do you say?" he said, looking at everyone expectantly. Soon they were all thundering up the stairs to bring their presents down.
"I've got an idea. It's what we used to do at my house," Mollie suggested, thinking back to her parents. This was also her first Christmas without her family. "We'll put all the gifts in a pile and take them out, one at a time and see what everyone gets… what do you think?" she asked. James somehow knew this was a tradition with Mollie's family and he knew it was her first time without it, so he decided to go along.
"Sure, sounds better than just tearing threw them anyway," he said. His mood was surprisingly brighter than he thought it would have been today. First his parents are murdered by an evil git, and then the girl he loves tries to commit suicide.
They piled all of the presents in the middle and Mollie grabbed one. "James, it's for you," she said, handing it to him.
"Wonder who this is from?" he said curiously while looking at it. It was wrapped in shinny gold and red paper. It was pretty heavy. "Feels like a book." Mollie looked at him. She knew who it was from and what it was.
"Open it!" she urged. She wanted to see his reaction. He tore off the paper and looked into a picture of himself, Remus, Sirius and Peter from first year.
"Oh wow! This is amazing," he said, running his hand over the dark leather and gold designs. He opened the cover and was met with an onslaught of memories rushing threw him. There was a picture of him covered in whipped cream with a sour look on his face. There was a caption underneath that read: Look at our Sour Puss. Poor guy got foiled again by Lily ~ Remus. "You gave this to me?" he asked, looking at Remus.
"Nope," was all he said in reply. They all knew who it was from… but they wanted him to figure it out himself. He turned the page and saw a picture of him and Lily. They were sitting in the Library 'studying'.
"Who gave this to me?" he asked, shocked at the amount of pictures in it.
"Read the back," Remus urged him. James flipped to the inside of the back cover and found an inscription written in the same gold plating as the designs on the front.
Merry Christmas James,
I thought you'd like something a little more sentimental than junk from Zonko's. So I bought this album for you and got all our friends to help me get some pictures together. It's pretty much packed full, but I left some empty for you to put more in. The one in the front can be changed, but I thought that one would be the most memorable. I hope you enjoy all of the captions too… I thought they'd add some spice to it, make it unique. ;)
Love Lily
James had tears in his eyes when he finished reading it. He tried to wipe them away without the other guys noticing, but if he failed, they said nothing. He read over it again, his fingers running over the engraving. His eyes lingered on the ending: Love Lily.
"Who's next?" he asked suddenly. Everyone looked at him, but he pulled out another present. "Here Remus," he said handing it to him. They continued opening presents, but James kept the album close to him the whole time.
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Her eyelids fluttered open and she took her surroundings in. She noticed she was in the hospital wing and that she was lying in a bed. Everything came crashing down on her. She remembered. The tower. The jump. The cold biting air. The crash. The pain. And then the dream.
"Oh shit! What in Merlin's name have I done?" she moaned as she tried to get up. The aching in her body prevented her from getting half way up. She groaned and fell back into the pillow, making the bed creak. Madame Pomphrey came running out at hearing the noise and looked at Lily in surprise.
"You're awake?" she said, although it sounded more like a question.
"No! Really?" Lily said sarcastically; when Lily was achy, she was also a bitch. "Do you have ANYTHING for these god damn aches?" she asked impatiently.
"Yes I do, hold on a minute Miss Evans," the nurse said as she ran to her cupboard, which was only about two beds over. "You gave us quite a scare Lily, but thank Merlin for small miracles, eh?" the nurse said a little too cheerfully for Lily.
"Small miracles?" she asked, not feeling up to beating around the bush.
"If it weren't for the fact that you were a witch or the way you landed, you would've been dead a long while ago," Pomphrey said as she grabbed a potion bottle.
"That was the idea," Lily said under her breathe, but the sound of Dumbledore screaming while under the Crucraticus curse came to her ears and she remembered that she needed to be an optimist. Fat chance there, she thought glumly.
"Here you go dearie, now drink it all," the mediwitch said, handing her a blue potion. Lily took it and quickly threw it into the back of her throat. It instantly had a cooling effect and her throat felt as though she were eating ice cream, only without the taste.
"Thanks," she said quietly. "So what are the damages?" she asked as though it were as simple as a car crash.
"Well, you have a misaligned back, which will be hurting for a bit. You're left arm had pretty much been snapped in two. And you have concussion, plus a few broken or cracked ribs… other than that, nothing really," the nurse said a little nervously. Lily noticed that she wasn't looking at her at all, but looking around the room.
"Nothing really? What's that supposed to mean? What else is there?" Lily asked, trying to sit up, but her back gave way.
"I think I need to get Albus down here," she said more to herself.
"What else is wrong with me?" Lily asked, almost yelling at the nurse who had gone to the fireplace and was quickly talking to the headmaster's head. Soon his whole body appeared and he walked up to Lily's bed, brushing the soot off his star and moon robes.
"Nice to see you awake Lily," the headmaster said cheerfully, but his face looked worried. "We weren't expecting you to wake up so soon."
"Well I'm awake obviously. And this damned nurse won't tell me what else is wrong with me besides my broken bones!" Lily said angrily, her bitchy side showing yet again.
"Miss Evans," the headmaster said formally. His voice told her to be quiet and quick. "Please don't exert yourself; we don't want you passing out again now do we?" he said with the fake cheerfulness that made Lily sick. She gave him a look that clearly said she hadn't fallen for the facade. The old man took a deep breath before continuing. "That was a long fall Lily," his voice was now a little tenderer. "You're lucky to be alive. The only reason you survived is because you landed a certain way and your body used magic to keep itself surviving." Here he paused, looking at her straight in the eyes. "But for your baby, the case is different." At this he put a hand over her own and looking into her eyes deeply. It took Lily a while to fully understand what he actually meant. Tears slowly came to her eyes and fell down her face silently.
"I'm sorry Lily," the headmaster said quietly. Lily just looked at him through her tears and griped his hand back.
"Don't be sorry," she said, barely above a whisper. "None of this is your fault, it's all mine. If I wasn't so stupid…" she trailed off, not able to finish the sentence because the tears came on even harder.
"You aren't stupid Lily; you just became overwhelmed with grief," he replied kindly.
"Thank you, for everything," she said, looking down at her lap as tears fell off her face. "How long have I been asleep?" she asked, looking back up to the headmaster.
"It's about dinner time, Christmas."
"Some Christmas," she murmured. "This is my first Christmas without my parents and it was worse then I thought it would be; two innocent people get killed, then I find out it's because of me, then I go and try to kill myself, failing miserably, but killing my baby instead. Can it get any worse?" she asked mainly to herself, the tears flowing even more. "Oh wait, things always get worse."
"You need to have a positive outlook on things Miss Evans. Things are only as bad as you make them out to be," her guardian said compassionately.
"Yea… I guess," Lily said without feeling.
"I'll leave you now," he said, starting to get up. "You get some rest." With that he walked out of her curtains, leaving Lily alone to cry herself to sleep.
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"Poppy, make sure that she is left alone. She's going to be… unstable for a while," Dumbledore whispered as he walked past her.
"Yes sir. How did she react?" the nurse asked, looking at the aging headmaster who looked older if possible.
"Not good Poppy, not good, as was expected. She just needs time alone; to sift through everything she's learned. She's had a hard Christmas. No one's to see her. The only reason for her to be disturbed would be for you to give her medicine, is that understood?"
"Of corse, I understand, of corse," Madame Pomphrey said as Dumbledore walked out of the room. The nurse walked up to the curtains. She looked in and saw Lily curled up in a ball, hugging her pillow as she cried quietly. The mediwitch shook her head sadly and closed the curtains.
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James was in the Great Hall, but he couldn't eat at all. His mind was on Lily. He couldn't help but worry about her. Is she okay? When's she gonna wake up? He just couldn't stand it. He stood up and walked out without telling anyone where he was going. He just upped and left. He walked through the halls at a brisk pace, taking the stairs three at a time. When he reached the doors to the Hospital Wing, he barged in. He started walking strait towards the curtains that hid Lily's bed, but was stopped the mediwitch, who was about a head shorter than him.
"Mr. Potter, you must go back to your common room or where ever you came from. Miss Evans is not to be disturbed."
"Is she awake?" he asked, trying to get around the short woman.
"Yes… but she's supposed to be left alone."
"But you said when she woke up…"
"I know what I said, but I do believe that the headmaster overrules my decisions."
"But… you promised!!!!"
"Mister Potter!!! I can't help what the headmaster decides!"
"It's alright Madame Pomphrey," Lily said as she stepped out from behind the curtains. "I don't mind."
"What are you doing out of that bed!!! You know you shouldn't be up and about!" the mediwitch said as she rushed over to Lily and ushered her back into the bed.
"Let him in… I can take a visitor," Lily said quietly as she let the nurse cover her with the blankets.
"Miss Evans…" the nurse started warningly.
"I don't care what Dumbledore says! He says a lot of things. Most people go behind his back and do it anyway. So please, just… let him in," Lily pleaded.
"It's your own doing if you get sicker," Poppy said waving for James to come in.
"Thanks," Lily said, burying her face in the pillow again.
"Hey, you don't look so hot?" James asked as he sat down quietly.
"Thank you Captain Obvious!" Lily said sarcastically, turning away from him and burying herself further into the blankets.
"Sorry," James said quietly. "It's just… I was worried about you and all." He put a hand on her shoulder but she shrugged it off. "What's wrong?" he asked as he heard her sniffle.
"Oh I dunno," she said as she turned to look at him, tears shinning in her eyes. "Maybe the fact that this is my first Christmas without my family, someone else has dies because of me, I tried to kill myself and fail miserably, and then I found out that I kill-" she stopped abruptly.
"What? Who did you kill?" James asked, looking at her intently.
"No one," she said quietly. He doesn't need to know now that it's gone… not that he'd care.
"Lily."
"James… it's nothing okay? Just… don't bug me about it. I've got a lot going on," she replied, turning over again.
"You know you can tell me anything," James said as he said down beside her on the bed.
"Really? I thought I couldn't trust you at all until a while ago… but that all changed when I started to know you. But James… I'm not sure of anything any more," she said, turning to look up at him.
"Lily," he started, "I love you." He pulled her head up by her chin and leant down to give her a kiss. His lips feather light on hers. When he started to deepen it she pulled away, turning around yet again. "What?" he asked, shock evident in his voice and on his face.
"I can't do this right now… I can't," she said, tears coming to her eyes, choking her voice.
"Why Lily? You said you did, in your letter. I love you Lily. This I'm sure of," he said dejectedly.
"You may be, but I'm not. You hurt me… I loved you long before James, and I still do. It's just…"
"If you do then what's the problem?" he said, his hot temper showing.
"The problem is I don't want to get hurt again… The problem is I'm not ready… The problem is… I'm scared," she whispered. The problem is I just lost your baby and don't know how to tell you.
"But Lily-"
"James, I'm not ready for a relationship and that's all there is to it. Give me time, be there for me, but most of all be my friend. I need those more than anything right now."
"Okay Lily… but I'll still love you, I always will."
"Then just wait, wait for me."
They sat there for a while, talking about anything and everything. They talked about their families and James told her about Lana. She smiled inwardly at this, but said nothing. They just sat there, comfortable with each other as friends, forgetting for a while everything that had transpired between them.
"So where are you going after school's out… I mean, your parents are gone," Lily said cautiously.
"I suppose I'll go to my grandparents," he said. "I can't believe they're gone though… how did you deal with it?"
"I dunno… I just kept thinking that they're in a better place, that they're okay now." She smiled a little, remembering her 'dream'. "And they are… yours are too."
"I guess so… but I mean, how can you be so sure?" he asked curiously.
"I used to be a devout catholic… they went somewhere… I don't know if its heaven or what, but there's somewhere everyone goes. It's just something I feel. I don't know it, I can't see it, but I can feel it."
"I guess that makes sense. Where are you staying? I mean your parents are gone too," James asked.
"I'm staying here. Dumbledore's my legal guardian. Petunia's not really old enough or capable of being a guardian and she's my only other relative. So Dumbledore went for guardianship."
"That's cool, you get to stay here all year long."
"No it's not… the castle gets boring when you're the only kid." They both laughed at this a little. They talked for hours after that, until Madame Pomphrey finally came in and said that Lily needed to sleep.
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The next day Mollie and Remus came in with condolences and presents.
"We thought that we'd bring them over since you didn't get to open them yesterday," Mollie said, dropping a pile of gifts on her bed.
"Aww, thanks guys," Lily said. Her mood had improved greatly after just talking to James as a friend.
"You gonna be okay?" Remus asked, sitting on the edge of the bed as Mollie sat on the other side.
"I'll survive. The thing that really bugs me though is that I didn't really want it anyway… and now that I've lost it… it's just sad," Lily responded, sitting up Indian style.
"Let's not talk about sad things… this is your make up Christmas! So start ripping!" Mollie said, trying to lighten the mood. Lily gladly conceded and started unwrapping. She got a jewelry box from Mollie, a bottle of perfume from Remus, a pair of socks from Dumbledore and a few other knick knacks. There was only one present left then. It was a small box wrapped up in beautiful green paper.
"Who's this one from?" Lily asked curiously, turning it over and inspecting it.
"Well find out! Open it!" Mollie urged.
"Fine fine!" Lily tore the paper off and looked at a box with Blarney inscribed on it.
"WOW! Lily that shit's expensive!" Remus said in awe. Lily knew of Blarney Enterprises, but she never really bought name brand jewelry or clothes. She lifted the lid and looked at the most plain and yet exquisite pieces of jewelry she'd ever seen.
"It's beautiful," Lily said in amazement, her fingers grazing over the lilies.
"Who sent it?" Mollie asked, looking into the box with the same look as Lily.
"There's a note," Lily said, picking up a piece of parchment. She started reading aloud.
Dear Lily Flower,
Hey, it's me, James… this is for you. I hope you like it. I picked it out especially for you. The real reason I'm writing this letter to you is to apologize. I should have never said what I did that day. I just hope that you will forgive me.
I hope that we can be friends again… There's more to this, but I'd like to talk to you in person. Happy Christmas and I'll see you soon.
James
Lily had tears in her eyes. She knew what he had wanted to tell her. He had told her earlier yesterday. She quickly grabbed them and put them on, the ear rings, the bracelet and the necklace.
"These are beautiful Lily," Mollie said, examining them more closely.
"Yea," Lily sighed. "Look! It's changed colors! It's… half yellow and half red."
"I've heard of this!" Mollie said. "It's a mood charm. The colors stand for the moods you are feeling."
"So what mood is she in?" Remus asked.
"Well red means love… and yellow mean… bliss," Mollie said, searching her mind for any memory of it.
"How in Merlin's name do you know that?" Remus asked.
"Any fashion sensed witch would know it. Jewelry like that is rare. James gave that to you?" Mollie asked, looking at Lily again.
"Yea… he did."
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"Okay James, you have to do this," James said to himself as he looked at himself in the mirror. "You don't want to lead her on… you love Lily, not that piece of trash." He took a deep breathe and walked out of his dorm, out of the common room and out to the lake where he was meeting with Arabella.
She's a slut… and that's the truth… so why is this so hard to do?
Lily's made you soft, you're more worried about other's feelings than before.
That's it… I'm a different person, not the player I used to be.
"Jamesie!! You wanted to see me?" Arabella said as she ran up to him and threw herself on top of him.
"Yea, I needed to talk to you," he replied stiffly, pushing her off.
"What's wrong?" she asked, noticing the set look in his face.
"I can't go out with you anymore… I don't love you," he said looking straight in her eye so she knew he wasn't lying.
"You're dumping me? YOU are dumping ME???" she almost screamed. "NO ONE dumps me!!!"
"You need to get over yourself," James snapped. "You're not the only person on this planet. You better get used to people dumping you, cuz this won't be the last time. I've heard tales that you're even seeing someone on the side. Go run to him with some sob story and use him. You need to grow up Arabella. Grow up and get a life."
"B-but you wanted me! I saw you looking at me for the longest time! Wh-why? What changed?" she said, tears streaming down her cheeks.
"First off, the guilt trip isn't gonna work on me," he said, indicating to the tears, they stopped almost immediately. "Second off, yes I wanted you, past tense. I had gone for looks and just wanted someone who looked perfect to make me look good. But now I know what perfection really is… it's being the best person you can be, loving with all you can. What changed was I fell in love, real love. You were just an infatuation, a faze I went through. And that faze is over," James explained.
"Who? Who's the little bitch? Oh, wait don't tell me! Evans! Right? It's Evans." All James did was nod. "Fine, go to her, leave me be," she said, bringing on the tears again. James walked away, feeling good to have that task done, but still feeling bad for some reason.
Damn conscience!
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Merry Christmas all!!! I hope you all got what you wanted. I got you all two gifts. The first is that this chapter is much longer than most. By my word count it's the second longest so far. This is going to be the second to last chapter… I think. The next one will be an epilogue. My second gift for you is that I'm going through all of my other chapters and fixing all of my type-o's, or trying to. I've noticed that I've got a lot. So far I've gotten up till chapter 11. I'll work on the next ones later on. If figured you'd want this chapie as soon as possible. I hope you all liked this chapter. It was pretty much just wrapping up some loose ends. Kinda boring I know. Any way, my New Year's Resolution, just so u know, is that I try and proofread all of my chapies before I post them. I'm not doing my thank you's, one b/c I'm tired as hell and two I know you all want this.
Love ya
Fran