Oct 20, 2005

A/N: I'm…how should I say? Disappointed? Yeah. Disappointed works. Disappointed because it seems no one is taking an interest in this fanfic. True, I originally had it published under my first account, then when I uprooted it and transferred it into this one, I lost a couple readers, but now I'm getting the feeling that nobody is reading. And that makes me sad.

So, if I'm sitting at my computer two, three hours a day updating this story for no one, then I just don't see the purpose in continuing writing, especially as I've got enough things to worry about every day. This chapter here is sort of an interlude to boost my own morale and because I'm starting to get sick of writing for no one. As in, I'm loosing interest in the story. I'd like some reviews, just to show that people have at least read it. Call me egotistic, call me greedy, whatever you want, but I'd like some acknowledgement.

Somewhere along the line, if I decide to continue the story, I might decide to delete this chapter, but for now, read and please please review.

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Chpt 4.5: Birth of a Name

(Very fluffy drabble of the reason I chose the name I chose for this first part of the fic, To catch a shooting star. Years later, James Potter reflects on his love while he sits guard next to his wife in the delivery room."

Just because you can't see the stars in the day, doesn't mean they're not there.

Just because I didn't realize I loved her, doesn't mean I didn't.

But now I do.

Any self-respecting clichéd fairy tale would pronounce that I'd loved Lily since I'd set eyes on her.

I didn't.

Any romanticized poet with a star crossed heart would exclaim that we were lovers born and bred, and meant for one another from the onset.

We weren't.

When I first laid eyes on her, I hated her. Hated her for being better than me, hated her for being smarter than me…hated her for hating me. Hated that I was the always the one that brought a frown to her face, hated that I was always the one who took her sunshine away.

And so I let myself wallow in a dark pit of hatred and spite and deception, and quelled whatever liking for her that may have taken root.

And for the next few years I made her life miserable.

I think it was the Hogsmede trip that finally had me falling head over heels in love for her. "What is love?" she had asked me then, and I took one look at her, took one look at her big green eyes, took one look at the intelligence and serenity and depth in them, and I fell in love. And knew it right away.

It was a gentle love, not one of those cataclysmic revelations that every lovelorn fool now talks about. It came creeping upon me, soaking into my skin, wrapping me in its hold, but it was a sad love.

Because Lily didn't love me back.

She hated me. She always had, and I was beginning to believe she always would.

Lily was a jewel, a gem, a diamond. She may not have been perfect (and many an old classmate could testify to that) but that never mattered to me. And though I suppose any male could say this about his mate, she was the most beautiful creature I'd ever seen.

But getting her to see me in the way I saw her was a task that was near impossible.

Anyone who has ever sat upon a grassy knoll on a late summer night would know what I mean.

Anyone who has ever witnessed the passing of a shooting star and wished they could reach out and touch it and clasp it in their hands and hold it and call it their own would know what I am talking about.

Lily was my shooting star. I observed her beauty from a distance, but I knew nothing about her save that she was beautiful…and so I couldn't catch her. I had no means to, I had no idea how to approach her. She was so different from all the other girls I had serenaded over the years, so it was almost unfeasible that one day she'd be mine.

But there she is, here and now. Mine. My Lily. And now sometimes she turns to me, and looks at me, and in her deep green eyes I can see, really see the depth of her feelings.

And that makes me happy. So that when those eyes open, and those perfect lips open and part and form my name, I'll go to her and love her and hold her and hand her the bundle that is the product of our love and smile and tell her congratulations and Lily I love you.

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A/N: I'm especially corny and cliché and fluffy. You should know that by now.

Review before I lose my self confidence and abandon the fic.

By the way, for anyone who is wondering, a 'rhapsody' is a musical composition characterized by vast unpredictability, irregularities, and many separate, changing movements; or a literature piece written in an impassioned or exalted style…or, of course, anything along those lines.

A rhapsody of the soul. A turbulence of the spirit, a changing of hearts.

I thought it would be appropriate. )