For reasons both them and I are very well aware of, I cannot leave this room.

Lily sat on her carefully made four-poster bed while searching her brain, not feelings, for the appropriate words for her sister to read.

I am well and I hope you are too. School is great and I hope yours is too. I am learning a lot and I hope you are too. I miss you and father and mom too.

You can send a message back to me if you like. Aerostoph wont bite or of that sort.

Without wax,
Lily

To say Lily was deeply depressed or even emotionally effected in the days after the breakfast incident would be slightly too dramatic. She had a life before she knew James. A perfectly fine life with friends and owls from home and classes just as exciting as they had been in the past month- things she could very well go back to. The only difference between James and the other friendly empires that had risen and fallen in the same amount of time, was that Lily did not want to go back to the way things were before.

But she did anyways.

She woke up in the morning, ate breakfast along side Jessica and Alice, who engaged in conversation with both Lily and the Mauders. She went from class to class, just as she had before. Stopped second years from setting dung bombs in the hall, just as before. Lily ate lunch, sat under the same tree to read, went to the rest of her lessons, did homework, chatted with Hufflepuffs and went to bed, just as before.

And in the allotted time, in the appointed space given to her to do such, and only then, she allowed her brain to wonder who that boy was who stood tall and mighty and confident and intimidating and scary at breakfast that one morning. And who it was that told her to stand up and lifted her wand and made her speak the spell that would stop James 'Prongs' Potter from talking to her.

In the time given to her and only then did she think and realize that the spell that came form somebody else mouth that morning also meant the end of conversations that didn't have to do with the opposite sex, or the weather, or the sad deaths of shoemakers or someone's aunt. The end of discussions that actually had purpose and meaning. Conversations that she came out of with that high she got, or being able to look at something a different way.

She wondered what would have happened if she hadn't raised her hand in history class, or, on the other hand, if she had chosen to accept Remus' offer to sit on the train with him and the group.

As it turns out, she thought, I was a good judge of character.

JAMES POV:

It had been more or less a month since the happenings in the great hall and James was still serving detention every Saturday night. James had absolutely no regret about what he did to Snape- he only regretted no informing Lily why he did it.

It was definitely not intentional that James would go so long not talking to Lily. The only reason why was that he was embarrassed. He must have looked awful to her. He had also intended to tell her why he did what he did that morning, but the time was never right. She was now placing herself furthest away from him in class and at lunch, and she was never quite in the common room at the same time as him. Just the way she didn't talk to him made him feel low.

He had always felt at home with Remus, Sirius and Peter. There was a brotherly bond there that even if they did get in a row, it didn't really mean much. With Lily it was different but the same. He had been able to talk to Lily about the same things that he could talk about with any of the guys, but with her it made him think differently about things. Yet life still went on after the conversations ended. And he wasn't quite sure what he missed about Lily. Was it possible that he had, in those two- almost three weeks, began to feel at home with her too?

But still, he kept quiet. Who am I to talk to her? She is great and why should she even look at me when she thought that he had just picked on some lonely little kid? Besides, he thought, She probably has loads of friends and she doesn't need me… billions of friends she could be having those conversations with… a boyfriend she could be having those conversations with…"

The thought flowed through his head as he stood in line to get his permission slip for Hogsmade checked. He looked over and saw Jessica and Alice a little behind him in the line. He stuck his hands in his pockets and purposely too- innocently whistled his way over to them.

"So… ladies…" He itched his head, looked around. To Alice and Jessica and anyone else who happened to be in line waiting, James looked as if any second he was going to open up his robe and ask them if they wanted to buy some watches. "Lily would be… where?"

"Ohhhh…" Said Alice. She took in a deep breath as if she was about to tell a long story, she let it out and in that single breath she said quickly, "She's-with-her-boyfriend-I'm-Just-kidding-she's-not-coming-go-get-'er-Romeo."

"Thank you!" James replied as if Alice had just given him water after he had spent a month and a half in a desert, and with that he rushed upstairs.

Lily wasn't in the Common Room. He knocked on the door to the girls' dormitory.

"Mum mim" a muffled voice said. Guessing that meant 'come in' he opened the door and leaned against the frame. Lily sat on her bed organizing one thing or another. That was all he saw before he looked away. He couldn't bring himself to look at her, so he looked just about everywhere else, scratched his head, stuck his hands in his pockets…

Say something! She was staring at him. He closed his eyes. When I open them, I've got to say something…

He opened them.

LILY POV:

Lily sat on her bed, enjoying the quiet. She had no particular need to go to Hogsmade today, and sort of fancied a day to herself. She was folding clothes when James walked in.

Oh, god. Okay, say what you're here to say. Say "I'm sorry" or whatever just don't yell like you did and don't look at me like you did when you were on the floor. I'm sorry too just don't scare me.

He wasn't looking at her. He fumbled. He closed his eyes and when he opened them he looked straight at her. Then he said something with a voice that made her forget how intimidating he was before.

He looked at her for the first time in two months and said simply,

"Wanna get some ice cream?"