Chapter 11

James walked Lily to the bottom of the stairs and stopped.
"Maybe this is as far as I should go," he said, pouting slightly.
"Yeah, maybe," Lily replied. She looked up at him. "Look, James, I had an amazing time tonight." She paused. "I forgot how sweet you are."
He grinned slightly and then let his face relax. "But.."
"Well, the thing is, I really want this to work again and I really like you, James." She stopped suddenly and looked down at her feet. When she looked up again she saw James' waiting face. She sighed. "I just want to take this slow...very slow."
James' face relaxed and he smiled slightly. "Oh," he breathed. "I thought it was a lot worse than that. No, slow is good - great! Slow is perfect." He paused. "You're perfect."
"James..."
"No, you're amazing and I wouldn't do anything to hurt what we have, or we're trying to have again." He smiled. "Slowly, slowly trying to have again." He added.
"Okay," Lily figeted with her purse.
James waited and then asked, "Is it too fast for me to kiss you?"
He waited anxiously while she thought it over and then she looked up into his eyes.
"Yes."

The next morning Lily awoke in her bed and smiled. The night had been perfect. Lily was content with not kissing James good-night because she really did want to take things slowly.
She stretched her arms up over her head and sighed. As she sat up, she saw the black dress hanging in her closet where she had hung it last night as she recalled every detail to the other girls. Liz and Carmen had told the other two all about it as soon as they came back to the room.
Lily breathed in the light scent of flowers on her pillow and finally got herself out of bed and grabbed her robe. As Lily stepped under the running water in the shower, she smiled.
Today was going to be a good day.

Lily hummed to herself quietly as she turned the water off and stepped out of the shower stall. She quickly dried her hair off and threw the towel into the dirty clothes bin and walked back towards her room. Her flip-flops squeaked as she crossed the hall and pushed open the door.
"You have something on you bed," Jen told her as she walked in. She was sitting in front of her mirror and was using her wand to curl her hair into little ringlets.
"Yeah, it's from lover boy," Carmen added, looking up from her magazine.

Lily crossed the room and picked up the note off her pillow. The extra weight was explained when she open it and saw that James had taped a pair of chocolate lips to the parchment. Lily removed it and placed it back on her pillow before reading the note itself.

Lils,
I have a surprise for you if you care to join me by the lake at 9 o'clock this morning.
Don't eat breakfast before you come; I've attached a little treat to hold you over until then. : )

Love,
James xo

Lily looked at the chocolate on her pillow and smiled; that was James, leaving her just one chocolate to make sure she was hungry when she met him.
Lily went to look at her watch before realizing that she had taken it off for her shower.
"It's 8.15," Liz offered as she buttoned her bell-bottoms.
"Great," Lily smiled as she opened her wardrobe to decide what she would wear.

The event called for casual dress, especially considering all the dressing up Lily had done the night before. She eased into a pair of her flare jeans and pulled on a peasant top. Sliding a little lip gloss onto her lips, Lily brushed her now dry hair and checked the mirror.
"What are you guys doing anyway?" Liz asked from across the room.
Lily shrugged. "I dunno..Just hanging out I think...we might be getting breakfast too, he told me not to eat before I met him."
"So you can't eat twice?" Carmen asked, taking another bite out of the twinkie in her right hand.
Lily rolled her eyes. "Not all of us can eat 24 hours a day and stay bone thin like you, Carma," she replied as she grabbed her perfume and sprayed some onto her wrists.
Carmen made a noise from across the room and went back to painting her toenails.

"Alright, I'm going," Lily announced as she slid her feet into the sandals lying next to her bed.
"Why are you going now?" Jen asked, checking her watch. "You're gonna be on time!"
"Shocking, I know," Lily joked as she headed out the door.

As Lily walked out of the main doors she paused to breathe in the spring air. The sun was shining down on her face; Lily loved the springtime. As she made her way down the grass, she saw James standing at the side of the lake. There was something at his feet but from so far away, Lily couldn't figure out what it might be.
When he spotted her, James smiled and began walking towards her.
"Morning," he said as they met a little distance from the lake.
"Morning," Lily replied. She eyed the thing that James had brought. "What's that?" she nodded her head towards the lake.
"That," James took her hand and led her down the small hill, "Is breakfast."
"You made breakfast?"
"Well, no." James confessed. "But I did go all the way to the kitchens and watched as the elves made it for us!"
"Oh, what a gesture!" Lily joked. James smiled and picked up the picnic basket.
"So, where do you want to eat it?" He asked.
Lily thought for a second. Then she pointed to the quidditch pitch. "There."
"I am so lucky," James commented as they towards the pitch.

"Yumm, this is so good!" Lily said as she took another bite of the sandwich in her hands. "I can't believe you had them make us cheese sandwiches!"
James swallowed his bite and licked a bit of ketchup off of the side of his mouth. "Well, I'm a classy guy like that."
Lily laughed and took a sip of her iced tea. "That you are." She dipped the last piece of her sandwich into a glob of ketchup and stuck it in her mouth.
"What elshe do you haf in here? she asked without bothering to swallow. She peered into the basket.
"How do you eat so much? You already ate both of your sandwiches and one of mine!" James looked perplexed at the amount of food Lily was able to put away.
"Mmmm, strawberries!" Lily ignored James' comments and pulled the strawberries out of the basket. She took a bite and smiled.
"Delicious!"
James tried a strawberry and smiled at her. "Did you like it?"
"Cheese sandwiches and strawberries? What more could a girl want?" she giggled and reached for another.

James and Lily walked hand-in-hand towards the town. James had announced that they were going shopping and just the sound of the word made Lily smile excitedly.
"So, what store are we going to?" Lily asked as they strolled past a few stores devoted to parchment and other wizarding office supplies.
James lowered his head to whisper in her ear. "You'll see," he said, softly.
Lily could feel his breathe rush past her ear and closed her eyes for a second. She wished they didn't have to take it so slowly but quickly pushed the thought away.
"Ok," she said, giving in to him as she let him steer her around a corner. Lily could see the store they were headed towards but couldn't quite make out what it had for sale until they came closer. On display in front of the shop were an array of accessories; belts, jewelry and purses all made out of beautiful materials. Mixed among these were a few odds and ends that didn't really seem to fit. The quirkiness made Lily smile. Lily bit her lip excitedly as she pointed to the door.
"We're going in there?" she asked, smiling broadly.
"Yes, we are," James replied as he opened the door for her.

"Oh my, James, all of this stuff is so great. I don't even know where to start!" Lily looked over at James.
He looked back at her through a pair of ridiculous sunglasses. They were bright pink with wide rims and a flamingo on either side. Lily did her best not to burst out laughing at the sight.
"You can have anything you want," James paused as he plopped a Robin Hood hat onto his head. "Baby," he added, raising his eyebrows at Lily.
She giggled. "I'll remember that."

Almost two hours later, Lily and James left the store with several bags of purchased items. Lily was laughing so hard she had to hold onto James for support. He put his arm around her back to steady her as they turned the corner.
"That was a blast. Do you know how long it's been since I've had that much fun?" she asked, taking a lick of the giant swirled lollipop with a picture of a cartoon mouse on the wrapper.
James smiled at her and gave her a kiss on the forehead. "I'm glad."

"Hey look!" Lily said, pointing down the street to a store with pink flyers all over the windows. "It's that new store that just opened up last week. It's supposed to have tons of muggle stuff in it to keep wizards like that Arthur Weasley busy. Let's check it out!" she asked excitedly.
James feigned a look at his watch. "I dunno, Lils..I mean I have a lot of work tonight-"
"Shut up!" she exclaimed, hitting him lightly on the chest. He rubbed the spot in mock pain. "Let's go," she said as she dragged James over to the door and pushed it open.

"What's that?" James asked, wrinkling his nose at the thing on one of the tables.
"That," Lily said matter-of-factly, "is a washer dryer."
"Well, what's it do?" he asked inquisitively.
"It washes dirty clothes and then dries them for you. They run off electricity, see?" Lily said pointing to the chord running out of the back of the big white machine.
The two wizards also looking at the washer-dryer nodded excitedly.
"See," one of them whispered to the other, "I told you they used eelecktricks." He grinned happily and Lily suppressed a large smile of her own.
"So, muggles don't actually do their laundry themselves...these robots do it for them?" James asked, his brow still furrowed. The two wizards were leaning in their direction, the better to hear.
"No, no. These aren't robots and, contrary to very popular belief, neither are those," Lily said as she pointed to a row of vacuum cleaners against the far wall. The taller wizard sighed heavily and reached into his pockets. He handed the other guy five galleons and glared at Lily. The smaller man looked very pleased with himself.
"So, how do they work?"
"Well, you put in your clothes and some detergent," she pointed out a self on the other side of the display where a wrinkly old witch with an owl on her shoulder poured a thick blue liquid back into the carton and beamed. Lily continued, "And then you set these dials to the right temperature and load size and then you pull this out and it rinses the clothes and spins them to get the extra water out. Then you move them into the dryer and it takes about an hour before the clothes are dry enough to wear."
"Sounds like too much work for me," replied James. He turned and something caught his eye. "Hey, I've seen one of these before!" he exclaimed, walking across the room. "They're called...com-poot-ers.." he gazed at one of the screens longingly.
Lily turned back to the two men. "Excuse me, I have to go deal with that one" she jabbed her thumb at James and headed off after him. He had found his way to the printers where a mob had gathered around one of the displays which was currently printing something out.
"How do these work?" he asked. Everyone looked up at Lily. The old woman had ambled over and was staring intently at her.
Lily took a breath. "Ok, well this is called a computer..."