It was four forty and both Lily and James were in their dorms, lying on their beds, stomachs full of anticipation. Lily thumbed through her old journal from first year. It was there that she had written the precise words the Sorting Hat had whispered into her ear that amazing first night at Hogwarts seven long years ago…

"Hmmm…" the Hat said in its distinctive wooly voice, "you have every quality for every house…you're a special one. The one Dumbledore told me about."

"Well, if it's any help," Lily had thought, "I'd like to be in Gryffindor with my friends."

"Yes, yes. Gryffindor is the place for you. You should meet your true love in that house." "Really!" she had asked, with the strangest combination of feelings she'd ever experienced in her life up till then, and all time past, "Who!"

"Ah-eh-a… not telling. But you're a bright girl…you'll figure it out. GRYFFINDOR!"

But the part that still gave Lily the willies was the exchange between Sirius and James, moments later.

"What took so long?" Sirius had asked James.

"Oh," he'd answered, "Nothing much. Only Dumbledore told the hat something about my future and he was giving me hints."

Lily remembered her first reaction to the information that she and James shared a bond closer than that of casual schoolmates. Dumbledore had told the Sorting Hat about both of them. If it was somehow determined that she and James were intellectual equals, supposed to work as a team in life, and the idea was quite appealing to her, why fight it any longer?

Had she been paired with someone else, say, a Slytherin like Snape, "destiny" would have been immediately, unquestionably thwarted.

'After all,' Lily thought, feeling quite grown-up and independent 'this is my life—I am in the driver's seat.'

With this note of confidence and a surge of accomplishment already invading her veins from her absolute belief in an impending victory, Lily walked, head held high, classic Roman nose out, leading her way down into the common room at five past five.

Always prompt, James had arrived in the common room at exactly five seconds past five and quickly claimed his choice table in the corner near the fire. He sat with his back to the room, too distracted with his wild thoughts to be bothered with the scene of his schoolmates.

He was doing all he could to stop from switching his head—his tick. Where was she? Who was she kidding, being … (here he stopped to check his watch) two and a half minutes late? Was this some kind of joke? All these questions plagued his mind as he waited, ticking.

Finally, five minutes past five, Lily emerged from the girl's dorms, walking proudly down the spiral staircase, looking ridiculously like some kind of international diplomat.

She hurried around the various games of Exploding Snap and Gobstones to join James at the small rectangular table they usually resided at. His occasionally switched his head—his old tick had apparently returned. This, paired with his still elfish ears and still residing child-like freckles, made him look more the part of puppy than ever.

Lily internally giggled, remembering her birthday several years before.

"So," James began, "You wanted a word?"

"Yes. I'll get right to the point… don't want to go beating around the bush… last thing we need…"

"Good." James concurred.

"Okay, good. James, do you know what the Sorting Hat said to me first year, when I was sorted into Gryffindor?"

James began to answer no but Lily cut him off. Her question had apparently not meant to be answered.

"In addition to telling me I had every quality for every house, just as Dumbledore had previously informed it, it told me I truly belonged in Gryffindor because I chose it as the house I felt most affinity with and because of the people in Gryffindor. One of which is, as he put it, is meant to be, will become my love.—"

As Lily had done seven years earlier, James went a slight shade of green.

She continued, "Later during the feast, right after you were sorted, I heard Sirius asking you what took so long and you responded to him that Dumbledore'd told the Hat something about your future. At the time I logically thought that you must be the one the Hat was refering to when talking to me. I wished, though, that you weren't. Not because I didn't like you, but because…"

For the first time since she started her monologue, Lily paused, collecting her thoughts, emotions, and breath.

"You don't know how it is to live knowing something could possibly be inevitable! I continually asked myself if I should fight the feelings I had for you away, simply so I wouldn't be dominated by something outside myself. I put a temporary, though seven year stopper in the dilemma by deciding to be friends with you. I reasoned that people can be friends without romantic love. Being just friends with you didn't mean that I wasn't in control of the future of my life. It would quench my undeniable attraction to you without giving in to destiny or providence, or whatever it is that is causing this problem! But now I realize I was both right and wrong in my thinking. It is possible to be friends without being in love. There is an exception, though—you and me. It is impossible for me to be friends with you without being in love. So there it is—I really like you. So much in fact that I've decided to let my stupid obsession with remaining independent and in control of my life kick the bucket. If I'm indisputably drawn to you, and don't at all mind the idea of considering you an equal and teammate in all my endeavors, why keep the obsession? Why is not being in control a problem? Why does being with you equal not being in control? It doesn't. It feels so good to say it—I reckon I love you; I love everything about you, the way you walk, your elfish ears, and the things I don't like, well, they don't really seem to matter at all, do they? Inconsequential, trivial. I guess it's all out now. What do you think?" Lily breathed in deeply, there had been very few significant pauses in her speech.

James's previously green face was now somewhere paradoxically between stark white and very red. His eyes were wide, his mouth relaxed. He drew his breath as though he were going to deliver his own monologue.

"You know Lily," He said his heart, stomach, kidneys, kneecaps, everything overflowing with joy, "I've been waiting to tell you this for a while—I think your eyebrows are absolutely divine."

They both smiled.

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