The scrimmage match goes just about as expected - the six-player first team scrapes out a victory thanks to Mari being a miracle worker of a Seeker, but having only two Chasers does put them at a marked disadvantage otherwise.
Lily sits and takes notes the whole time, and as usual, she's the only one of the coaches who does. But watching matches always gives her ideas - weaknesses to work on, new formations to experiment with, new plays to try. It's perhaps unorthodox compared to her counterparts, who don't take quite an academic approach to the game, but she knows she'd be missing out if she didn't keep record of things.
In literally any other situation, Lily would be absolutely thrilled that they're finally getting a third Chaser again. There are so many plays and drills they've been unable to fully execute with two-thirds of a Chaser team, and the full first string team will undoubtedly be a force to be reckoned with.
The entire rest of the program is thrilled when they find out, as soon as the scrimmage comes to an end. The players are incredibly excited when it's announced that the search for a third Chaser has proved fruitful, and even more so when it's announced just who that third Chaser is.
Corinne's the only other person to show even the slightest bit of reservation at the name 'James Potter,' but that look of concern fades as quickly as it'd come the moment that Charlie starts reciting some of James' stats from the previous season.
The first practice he's set to attend is a small, Chasers-only session on a Monday, designed to work on getting the three of them more familiar with each other before doing a full team session. Lily's attendance at that practice is entirely optional, and while she's normally the type to attend even the optional sessions on her work schedule, she chooses not to this time.
She's delaying the inevitable, she knows this, knows that she'll have to see his stupid face in person soon enough, but she likes the idea of waiting for a full-team practice - there, at least, she can direct most of her focus to everything else that isn't him and hopefully avoid having to interact with him one-on-one.
She's got enough self-awareness of her short temper to know that she won't be able to hold back her frustration with him the moment she's alone with him. She's normally great at faking a smile when she needs to, but it was always different with him. He always seemed to know exactly how to get under her skin.
And that, she imagines, is one thing that hasn't changed.
The night before he's set to start at Puddlemere, she dreams about him. And unfortunately, it's not some sort of acting out a revenge fantasy type of dream, which is what her conscious brain would've massively preferred. Rather, it's a lights-down-low, wandering-hands type of dream. She wakes up in the middle of the night, sheets twisted around her legs, breathing hard, and full of a profound sense of irritation - mostly at herself for her subconscious for daring to conjure any of those images.
It takes her a long time to fall asleep after that - she eventually takes half a Sleeping Draught to get through the rest of the night, because her mind just won't stop racing. She keeps imagining all the potential ways she could see James for the first time in three years, and she starts to think that maybe the dread of it is even worse than actually seeing him again will be.
Despite not attending the Chaser session, she still goes into the coaching offices the next morning. One of the other assistants - McGinty, maybe - is running a ground session later in the day, and she figures she'll probably go help out at that one. It'll make up for her guilt for skipping the first optional session.
It seems, for all intents and purposes, to be a calculated decision.
However, it proves to be a poorly calculated one, because Lily fails to consider the contingency that James might make an appearance before practice. The offices are, after all, adjacent to the locker rooms - and share an access hallway with them.
She pushes the main door open and walks into the building, slightly zoned out from her lack of sleep and not really paying much attention to her surroundings. And so it's not until it's far too late that she looks up and realises that walking down the hallway, towards the exit and therefore right towards her, is none other than the very person she'd set this whole plan in place to avoid.
At this discovery, she experiences two very distinct trains of thought.
The first is that fuck, he's really gotten fit since school. It's not like he wasn't back then - though he was a bit wiry and hadn't quite filled out his height yet - but now… Merlin and Morgana. His shoulders are noticeably broader, and even under a long-sleeved shirt she can tell that he took whatever weight-training sessions they did at Portree seriously. His hair is as dark and wild and messy as ever, and the round wire frames that once were an ever-present feature on his face are gone entirely. None of this is new information - she's seen photos of him in the paper over the past few years - but seeing those changes in person is somehow significantly more alarming.
He's a thief, running off with girls' hearts and never saying sorry, and for the briefest of moments, Lily understands why they let him.
And somehow, that manages to annoy the shit out of her. He shouldn't have been allowed to get this hot while also turning into a massive dick. Karma should've done something about that.
The second train of thought is that she would very much like to not run into him right now, but there are exactly zero doors in this section of this godforsaken hallway, ruining any chance she might've had of making a convenient detour. She's got half a mind to just turn around and make a run for it, but she knows it's too late for that, and running off now will only make their inevitable meeting more awkward. She may want to avoid him, but she's not going to act like a fucking coward to do so.
So she sticks her chin up just a little bit higher, hoping she'll be able to walk past him without him recognising her - or worse, talking to her.
She's massively unlucky in that regard though - her whole morning's proving to be an unrelenting series of cursed events, really - because he notices her almost as soon as she's within a few metres of him. He actually freezes at the sight of her, eyes going wide in a way that she'd probably find comical if it didn't also ignite an anger that's significantly stronger.
Fuck, he hasn't even opened his mouth yet and he's already destroyed her self-restraint.
He blinks a few times, like he doesn't really believe she's standing there and that she's very well just a figment of his imagination. "Lily? Lily Evans? What are you doing here?"
So much for making it past him unnoticed.
She huffs, and it's oddly reminiscent of the way she used to address him in their early years of school. She didn't like him much then either. "I'm on the coaching staff."
If it's even possible, he somehow looks even more bewildered at that answer. "You're... what? Since when do you care about professional Quidditch?"
It is, more or less, exactly what she expected out of him. In a slightly more rational state, she might've understood his confusion - at least partially. People don't usually just dive straight into Quidditch coaching positions right after Hogwarts; they usually play in the league for a couple of years or start off with coaching teen summer programs. And Lily hadn't exactly shown an interest in coaching or even any sort of investment in a pro team while they were in school either. So by those standards, Lily's presence is an anomaly, but by god, he would've known this if he'd kept in touch with her, or hell, just at least bothered to even slightly care about what people he once called his friends were getting up to after they all graduated. It's not like she's a new face around here.
"Since about six months after graduation, when I got this job," she answers icily. She's not going to give him any more information than that - both because she doesn't owe him an explanation and because even if she wanted to, there are many details about the way she ended up here that she can't talk about with him anyways.
His eyebrows scrunch together, and one of his hands jumps up to his hair - it seems that particular habit hasn't faded with time. "Huh, well, that's news to me."
"You know, that doesn't surprise me... at all." She doesn't try to conceal the simmering fury in her tone - and she vaguely thinks to herself that even if she'd been trying to hide it, she would've failed miserably. Her instincts had been right - he's always had a way of bringing out the rawest version of her emotions, and that talent is yet another thing that apparently hasn't changed in three years.
He recognises the hostility in her tone, and matches it with a coldness of his own as his hand drops abruptly back down to his side. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
She squares her shoulders at him - she refuses to let herself be cowed into submission by the simmering threat in his tone. "I mean that you're a self-absorbed prick who doesn't care about anyone but himself."
It's evident that he wasn't expecting that response - he looks as though she's just slapped him, mouth agape as he struggles for a response.
She doesn't wait around for him to come up with an answer though, just turns in the direction she was originally heading and walks away from the scene as quickly as her legs can carry her.
There will probably be hell to pay at some point for snapping at their newest 'star player' like that, but Lily can't really find it in herself to be worried about that just yet. Right now, she's riding on an adrenaline high; telling James exactly how she feels about him now has given her a strange sort of rush.
She feels wholly alive, in a way only rivalled by flying.
When she gets back to her office and sits down at her desk, lets her breathing and heart rate slow, the rush of it gradually ebbs away.
Logically, it was probably the best first interaction with him that she could've asked for - she's made it abundantly clear that she has no plans to tolerate his bullshit, and she can't help but be proud of the stunned look she left him with.
She's not inclined to think of this thing with him as any sort of game, but if she did deign to think of it that way, it'd be safe to say she's won the first point.
The one positive outcome of running into James first thing in the morning is that there's no point avoiding the Chasers-only practice anymore. And while she may not like James, she loves the team, and she's incredibly interested in how the new trio will work together.
She doesn't go into the air like she would in a normal practice, like Harrison is right now. Instead, she lurks at the back of the stands, out of view of anyone on the pitch.
The three Chasers start off with a few laps, then some basic drills, then some free play. And with every move they make, it becomes more and more evident that James was a perfect choice to round out the trio. He's got so much of Michael's natural leadership, and the other two Chasers fall right back into that easy dynamic they'd gotten used to with their previous third.
James himself is… enchanting. From a purely professional standpoint, she can admit that he makes a broom look like an extension of himself, steering and controlling it like it's the most natural thing in the world. He's graceful, even as he makes sharp turns or jumps for a Quaffle catch.
She's mesmerised by it; she usually watches Quidditch with the eye of a coach, looking for things to nitpick and potential flaws, but right now, she just lets herself enjoy the show, taking in the magic of it all. It's easy to see why people flock to these games, why tickets sell for sky-high prices, why everyone clamors to meet these players in person, when you let yourself get sucked into the beauty and excitement of it all.
She loses that, sometimes, being around it all the time.
After losing track of how long she's been there, she begrudgingly admits that James is the perfect addition to Puddlemere. She still doesn't think his skills should entirely erase the fact that he's a self-serving asshole off the pitch, like so many of the Quidditch commentators do, but he's exactly the kind of player on the pitch that they need to dominate the English League this year.
She turns to head back to her office - she doesn't want to stay here too much longer and risk someone discovering that she's just lurking in the shadows instead of either helping with the practice or actually getting work done.
Never mind that she doesn't actually have much work to do at the moment anyways, but it's more the principle of the thing. She'd never want to be accused of slacking off in any way; she doesn't have the luxury of half-arsing her job - not here, not with these people, not with the way she got her start.
So when she gets back to her office, she closes the door most of the way, to give off the illusion that she's hard at work. But as soon as she's behind closed doors, she slacks off entirely. She uses the enchanted notepad on her desk to send a brief message to Benjy - my place, 9pm - and reads the entire Daily Prophet cover to cover.
She uses the kettle in her office to make a cup of tea - strong, because she's exhausted and needs all the caffeine she can get - and sips it while she reads.
Finally, when she's exhausted all of her other options, she grabs a miniature Quaffle out of her desk drawer, tossing it up in the air aimlessly. She's not sure when she picked this up as a means of entertaining her boredom, but it's gotten her through a lot, and she's gotten rather good at trick throws.
Lily's got no idea how long she keeps that up for.
Eventually though, her attention is captured by the sound of Harrison's voice coming down the hallway. He's talking to someone, giving them a tour of the facility, and Lily realises with a shiver that the person he's guiding around is almost certainly their new Chaser.
She abruptly drops the miniature Quaffle, letting it roll under her desk. She may not technically have anything that she's working on right now, but if Harrison and James are about to stop by her office, then by god, she's going to do her best to look incredibly busy.
Suddenly, a new worry strikes her - will he tell Harrison about the things she said to him while she's right in front of them?
She shakes that off almost immediately - James is a lot of things, but he's never been a snitch. He'd always been the type to solve problems by taking them into his own hands rather than going to an authority figure - something that got him into quite a lot of scrapes and frustrated the hell out of Lily when they were in school, but that she's quite grateful for right about now. Trying to explain to Harrison why she'd insulted their new player within minutes of meeting him would be an unmitigated nightmare and require far more oversharing with her boss than she'd ever like to indulge.
Sure enough, in less than a minute, there's a courtesy knock on her slightly-ajar door.
"Come in," she calls out, trying her best to act like she's not expecting this.
Her door swings open, revealing Harrison and James, the latter of whom is visibly freshly showered. She quickly turns her attention away from him, focusing on the head coach instead.
"I'm giving Mister Potter here a tour of the premises," he tells her.
Lily puts on a fake smile that borders on a simper. "Mister Potter, welcome to Puddlemere."
When she looks over at him, he's already got his eyes on her. He's studying her intensely, and if he's surprised by her change in tone from just a few hours ago, he doesn't show it.
"This is one of our assistant coaches, Lily Evans," Harrison explains, sending a shallow grin her way. "Don't be fooled by the pretty face - she's one of the toughest we've got."
Lily cringes internally at his words; there's no way in hell he'd be talking about any of the other coaches like that. But externally, she keeps up the artificial smile as she looks over at her boss.
Harrison suddenly looks between her and James, wheels in his head turning. "Now that I think about it, if my math is right, you two were at Hogwarts around the same time, yes?"
"We were - Evans was Head Girl my last year." James grins at her, and it's almost devilish - teeth bared and a glint of something practically predatory in his eyes.
"Oh, you must've given her hell then, I'm sure." Harrison laughs and looks at James, like they're both in on some inside joke, entirely oblivious to the tension in the air.
But James still doesn't look away from her, and there's an unmistakable challenge in his eyes. She looks right back at him, careful not to betray any emotion while Harrison's in the room. "I imagine I did," he says eventually, finally breaking eye contact with Lily to look back at his coach.
Lily has to bite back a bitter laugh at the fact that he's conveniently choosing not to mention the fact that he himself was also Head Boy that year. He'd been working with her, not against her.
Does he really care so much about his new life, his new reputation, that he'd rather act like the things before it didn't happen? Does he really think the fact that he was Head Boy - the supposed pinnacle of a model student - would damage his present-day identity so much that he has to rewrite his own past?
The idea that he's ashamed of that person, and is proud to be this one - so opposite to Lily's feelings about past and present-day James - sets off another wave of anger under her skin. She tightens her grip on her quill, almost to the point of breaking it.
She sees James' gaze drop to her white knuckles, then come back up to her face. He smirks at her - he knows he's riled her up and he's proud of it.
"Yes, we'll have to reminisce on our Hogwarts days some time," she answers diplomatically, even though she has no intention of doing anything of the sort. "But it can wait - I wouldn't want to keep you from finishing your tour of the training complex."
"Yeah, I'll see you around," he replies, the smug look on his face seemingly becoming a permanent fixture. "It's good to see you again, Evans."
Her quill does snap at that - although luckily, Harrison has started talking to James again as they move to the next office, so no one else hears it.
How dare he say it's 'good to see her again' that casually - like they were merely acquaintances in school who just so happened to run into each other after graduation, and not close friends until he'd unceremoniously cut her off.
And the goddamn self-satisfied grin on his face the whole time, like he was intentionally picking his words to say just the things he knew would piss her off the most. Like he was trying to bait her, like he wanted to see if he could make her snap.
If that's how he wants to do things, then so be it. If he wants to turn this into some sort of challenge, she'll gladly take him up on that; not only that, but she'll win.
If he wants to play with her, then baby, let the games begin.
Seventh Year, August 1977
Lily sits alone in a booth at the Leaky Cauldron with two butterbeers in front of her, occasionally looking up at the door while also trying to avoid eye contact with anyone else in the bar in the process. James had owled her a few days ago, asking to meet her here. She should've expected he'd be late.
Not that he's actually late yet - she's just early - but he's never exactly been known for his punctuality.
She's just resigned herself to waiting at least another ten minutes, when suddenly, a dark-haired boy with glasses is sliding into the seat across from her.
She checks her watch. "You're… early," she blurts out, in lieu of an actual greeting.
"Yeah, well, new year, new me," he replies, with a grin.
"I think that's more of a January thing."
"I think it's perfectly applicable for new school years," he reasons, before looking at the mug in front of him. "Is this for me?"
"Well, I certainly didn't order two for myself," she says, taking a sip of her own drink. Truthfully, she'd bought her drink ahead of time on purpose - if she'd waited until James had arrived, he'd undoubtedly try to buy her drink for her, and that'd just inevitably end up feeling far too much like a date for her to be comfortable with.
And buying James' as well was a last-minute decision after the man by the door had openly ogled at her as she walked up to the bar and made her feel distinctly uncomfortable; the second drink on the table made it clear that someone else was joining her and that the seat across from her was not up for grabs.
"Thanks, Evans." He takes a sip of butterbeer, and Lily takes the moment of silence to study him for the first time since he arrived. She's almost positive he's gotten even taller since the last time she saw him - the boy's never going to stop growing, it seems - and his hair is shorter than it was at the end of term, although no less manic.
"So, what was it that you needed to talk about that you wanted to tell me in person?" Lily doesn't cut any corners, and gets right to the reason that they're here.
James sets his mug down slowly, his hand burying itself in his hair. That hair mussing annoyed her in the past, but she's come to realise that sometimes it's just a nervous habit of his, not something he's doing for her benefit. He's stopped obnoxiously showing off and persistently flirting with her, but the hair thing has remained.
"Congratulations on Head Girl, by the way," he answers, avoiding answering her question directly. "Remus told me you got it - although really, I wasn't exactly surprised. There's no one else in our year who deserves it more."
She can feel her cheeks warm at the compliment. "Thank you," she says. "I've still yet to figure out who Head Boy is, and Remus said he didn't get it and didn't know who it was, so I've been trying to pull a list of who all it could be and determining whether or not I'm going to be miserable working with them, and - "
He interrupts her rambling. "I'm Head Boy."
She's not quite sure she heard him right, so she says nothing, waits for him to elaborate or repeat himself.
"That's why I asked you to meet me before we went back to school," he says, not really meeting her eyes. "I even owled Dumbledore about it, just to confirm he hadn't, you know, completely fucked up and sent the badge to the wrong person, but… yeah. I wanted to tell you in person, because I know I'm probably the very last person you would've ever expected to have to work with this year, and throwing that on you right before the first prefects' meeting seemed like too much of a shock to put on a person, so… here we are."
He looks out of breath when he finishes, which kind of makes sense - she doesn't think he took a single breath in that entire speech.
She has to think about her response before answering him. "You're definitely not the last person I would've expected," is what she eventually leads with.
And it's genuine - while it's true that Heads are most often chosen from the prefects of that year, the whole point of a Head is that they're a leader, someone who can take charge in a situation and influence the student body. And both of those are things that James is undeniably good at.
"You've been Quidditch captain for two years now," she continues, "and no one can say you don't have significant sway over most of the Hogwarts student body. It's an unorthodox choice, but it makes sense, in a way."
He looks up at her. "Really?"
He seems so genuinely befuddled by her reaction that she almost wants to laugh. "Sure," she tells him. "I mean, you're probably going to go down in history as the Head Boy with the largest detention record while serving in the role though."
Something shifts in his expression at that, and suddenly, he's incredibly serious. "I don't want that record," he replies. "I… I still don't really understand why I'm Head Boy, but since it seems like the title is sticking, I'm not going to fuck it up. If I'm going to be Head Boy, I want to be a good one."
If it weren't for the look on his face, Lily would think he's taking the piss. James Potter, model student? The concept is laughable - seeing just how many ways he can get into trouble with his mates has been a central mission of his since first year. But the usual sparkle of mischief in his eyes when he's messing around is completely gone as he addresses her now.
She exhales. "Wow. New year, new you, indeed."
"Mind you, I'll almost definitely still end up in a couple detentions this year, just hopefully not quite as many as years past."
"Of course," she nods. "Sometimes you just have to sneak out past curfew and booby trap the Slytherin common room, you know?"
He chuckles, serious demeanour beginning to fade away. "Hey now, there was never any proof that I was the one responsible for that."
She'd never admit it to him, but all of the Slytherins showing up to breakfast the next morning with their robes covered in really bad lion drawings had made her laugh so hard she'd choked on her pumpkin juice.
"I'd say the fact that you spent half of Charms the day before doodling atrociously proportioned lions is some solid proof, but that's just me." She takes a sip of her butterbeer, looking at him coyly.
James coughs. "You saw that and you didn't turn me in? Consider me stunned, Evans."
She shrugs. "I'm not a complete killjoy, even if I have been a prefect for the past two years."
"You know, that's actually what I wanted to ask you about," James replies, then backtracks when he realises the implication of his words. "Not the killjoy thing, I don't think you're a killjoy at all - I mean the prefect thing. You've been a prefect for two years already, and I've got no idea what I'm getting myself into, and if I want to do this well… I figure I should probably learn what's actually expected of me."
Wow, he's really committed to taking this seriously. And she respects him a lot for that. She'd never expected there'd come a day where she'd be teaching James Potter the ropes of how to lead a group of prefects, but she finds that she's completely forgotten the names of anyone else who could've been Head Boy. The idea of having him as her partner in this endeavor for the next year seems… almost downright pleasant.
"Alright then, class is in session," she says, clasping her hands together on the table. "How to be the best Head Boy Hogwarts has ever seen, taught by yours truly. Are you ready for it?"