A/N: HI guys yes...well I have a live journal now where one can read my procrastination in typing and where am I and so forth. I mention in one of the postings that some of you may want to beat me to death for not updating until now. Yes um I'm sorry about that. I have no real excuses. SIGH i hope u can forgive and well say hurray that there is well another Chapter.

See um, while typing I realised that this chapter is going to be too long...so the is going to be a CHAPTER 13!

AND its gonna be up in about a week! I want to try and type more for Back in his bed!

Yes so I hope u forgive me and u'll have the final chapter soon!

YAY right?

RIGHT!

So um here u go and remember there is ANOTHER CHAPTER


Disclaimer: I own nothing


Simply Friends

Chapter 12: Mistakes

Oh Lord, as if things could get any worse than they already are. He looked at Erin stare at him expectantly.

Was he in love with Lily?

It was a question he hadn't seriously asked himself. He wasn't ready to know why he had lowered his defence walls and allowed her to mean so much more to him than that of a friend.

Did he love her?

A part of him does, as a friend yes, that feeling was not in question. How did the rest of him feel about her? She was his lover, his friend and his attraction to her seemed unquenchable even now, so was he in love with her?

"James," Erin said impatiently, "Didn't you hear what I just asked?"

"Of course Erin, the last time I checked I was sitting next to you when you said it."

"Don't get sarcastic with me James Potter. I want to know the truth. You and Lily have been seeing each other behind our backs haven't you?"

"I wouldn't get your knickers in a knot if I were you," he replied annoyed. "You're the one to blame after all."

"What the hell do you mean by that?"

"Nothing—look, just leave me alone. I'd like to wallow in my self pity by myself." He said leaving no room argument in his tone. But to his consternation, she remained seated where she was.

"I'd rather not thanks." She said before signalling to the bartender. After ordering some sherry she sat there waiting and James knew she was waiting for him to make the first move. Well he wasn't. What he and Lily did was no business of hers, so she could very well keep her nose out of it.

It wasn't long, however, before the silence began to wear on him.

"For the love of God, don't you have a date to be on or something?" He exclaimed.

Erin nodded smiling a little, "Or something."

When her order was set in front of her Erin didn't take a sip, but instead played with the rim of the glass.

"Talking helps you know."

"You're not a psychiatric healer, so stop trying to analyse me."

Erin swore. The idiot was being obstinate and it was starting to wear on her nerves. "Just answer the bloody question James."

"I don't know, maybe." The frustration evident in his voice.

Men. Why the hell can't they open up? Is it really a crime to own up to their own feelings?

"James!"

"What?"

"James?"

"Fine! Yes, damn it. Yes, I love her. Yes, I'm in love with her." He exclaimed, before growling at her. "Happy now?"

"Very," Erin said and she was. But why the hell did he look so depressed about it? Saying nothing, she waited. He had to explain sooner or later, but it didn't stop her from wondering why he was feeling this way or what happened between them to make him slink to a bar—a classy bar but a bar nevertheless— and drink fire-whiskey as though it was water.

Yes he loved her, James knew and as shaken as he was in realising it, it just made his predicament more upsetting.

Sighing, he told her in a few short sentences what happened on the night of the Gala and how it was her fault indeed.

"Lily isn't serious," he continued after a brief pause and then noticed Erin's questioning glance. "She's not serious about us, wasn't ever. I mean I know she's not the type to take sex lightly and if I'm honest with myself I never took making love with her lightly. She had meant too much to me."

Erin swallowed a protest. She was never one to talk sex with a bloke about his girl; it was just too odd for her even if he was a good friend, but to talk about it when the said girl was her best friend?

She shuddered and tried to focus. It wasn't good to have those images in her poor mind. And Lily loosing her virginity to James…well she'd have to have a serious talk to her best mate about that. Honestly, one of the biggest events in a girls life and she didn't tell anyone.

Speaking of which, she agreed with James that there was no way that Lily would take any kind of intimate act lightly but for him to think that she didn't consider them as a couple seriously, well that had to be untrue.

"Go on," she said.

"What else do you want me to say? We agreed that this thing between us wasn't permanent and she was the one to even suggest that arrangement in the first place. How can that not make you understand that things aren't they way it should be?"

Erin still didn't understand. That explanation was hardly logical, if anything she was even more confused. He was talking in his head and the words spewing out of his mouth didn't make any sort of sense.

"Lily's just waiting to move on with her life. There is no way she'd ever fall for a bloke like me, so when the sex fizzles out she'll go on, find the man of her dreams and get married."

"James, do you love her?"

"What kind of a stupid question is that? I already told you I did."

"Then go tell her you dummy—I think you'd be surprised of how she really feels." Erin said. He may doubt things now but she bet if he actually told Lily how he felt everything would work out for both of them.

"It's not that simple Erin," he said putting down his glass to face her.

"Then make it simple you prat. What have you got to lose?"

"Oh I don't know, my self respect, my pride."

"James, you need to settle things now? Tell her the truth and if she doesn't feel the same end it and focus on your friendship. You don't want to lose that do you?" she asked and shook his head mutely. "Good then go, tell her."

"Okay!"

"Okay?"

"Okay, as in yes I'll go talk to her." He said nodding at the bartender.

"I meant now you know," she said.

"I know, I know I'm going." He said swallowing one last drink before getting up from the stool. "You better be right about this." Then he tossed a few sickles on the counter.

"I am, don't worry about it." She said hurrying him out the door.

Well, truthfully she wasn't sure about being right that things would work out. All she really was sure about was Lily.

James almost ran out of the restaurant, and passing Matthew on the way he gave a hurried wave before moving quickly forward.

He should have realised this before, wanting someone like Lily in his life didn't make him delusional it just made him want what every man who cares about permanence wants and that is love, home family.

He was fooling himself all along if he thought he didn't need the kind of life his parents had.

They had been made to love each other, to grow old and even die together. What made him think that he wasn't susceptible to feeling that kind of love for another person?

Even though this past few weeks had been the oddest of his life with all the hiding, he couldn't imagine not going through it. He should have realised that he'd loved Lily all those years ago at Hogwarts. He never should have lost hope; he should have fought for her.

Well he had to try and now it's better late than never.

Stepping out of her bathroom, Lily dumped her clothes that had been strewn on the floor into the hamper. She needed to get out and from more than just her flat.

What she really needed was no reminder of James Potter, and that was a feat that was nearly impossible, even if she used all of her imagination. Her daily life had been Potterized and to get out of it she would probably have to move to the Himalayas or Antarctica or something.

Moving to the kitchen Lily took the lasagne dinner she had made for them and shoved it in the ice box. She didn't want to eat it. Never mind that it was loaded with cheese, she wanted nothing to do with it.

When she finished set everything back in its place she was left with nothing else to do. Leaning against the sink, she thought of her flat. What did she used to do when she was bored?

Try as she might she couldn't think of one thing she would rather be doing than standing in her kitchen staring out into the night.

Glancing away from the window to the clock above the dish cabinet she noted that James had already been gone for over an hour.

Damn it, she thought as her eyes began to prick. There was no way she was going to cry over James Potter.

What good was he anyway? She didn't really know him now did she? She knew there were parts of his life that he didn't share with her and whether or not he did with the rest of the group should really matter to her.

After all, starting now, he didn't mean anything to her at all.

What he did or didn't do was none of her concern, not anymore.

She took out her chilled wine from the ice box and filled a long stemmed glass with the Pinot Noir. Taking a sip she savoured the flavour of the full fruit in the palate just like her father had taught her.

As always she felt herself calm slightly and then taking another sip she took both the glass and the bottle to her bedroom to sit on the night table. Knowing she wasn't about to fall asleep anytime soon, she propped herself on the pillows with the murder mystery she had started a few days before.

Minutes past but Lily couldn't seem to loose herself in the plot as she had done many times before. Her glass of wine had finished and she set about refilling it before drinking some more from it.

As its alcohol level was only medium, she only felt a sense of calmness but that still didn't stop her from thinking about other things. The Boudicca wine may only have stopped her from giving into her emotions and bawling her eyes out but she was still feeling a bit fragile.

As soon as she settled back into the pillows, a knock sounded at her door. Who could it be at this time of night? Although it was only just a little after eight, all the people she knew were busy doing other things, so no one should be visiting her.

Getting up, she padded to door.

"Who is it?"

"Lily? It's me, open the door." James called out form the other side but she remained rooted to the spot.

What was he doing here? This was too soon. She hadn't prepared herself to face him yet.

"I don't think so James. You made it perfectly clear before you left that you had no intention of returning, so how am I to know if it really is you who are standing out there."

"Lily you're being difficult. It is me and you know it. Open the door, we need to talk."

Of course she knew that it really was James outside her door but gathering strength to and sure she was being purposely thick but she needed more time ending a relationship with the man you love took a while.

"I don't think so." Lily said gritting her teeth. Besides he should know that women knew that anytime their men said it was 'time to talk' that meant "goodbye, adios and sayonara".

"I know you're probably vexed at me for leaving just now but I had a perfectly good reason." He coaxed.

Sure and Hippogriffs were the offspring of a cow, she thought sourly. And then, before she had a chance to change her mind Lily unlocked the door and swung it open. She'd just end it now and cry herself to sleep.

Right.

"Yes, you wanted something?" she asked coolly, not bothering to let him step past the threshold.

"Yes!" he said earnestly. "For one thing I need to apologise for walking out the way I did, I had had a lot on my mind you see."

"Go on."

"There are a few things that had been worrying me for sometime now and I think we need to talk about them. Settle everything you know, so we know where we stand with each other."

Reading her silence as an affirmation he continued. "I've been very confused about us. Our relationship is not conventional by any means but we've crossed that invisible line that stands between being friends and being lovers. Aren't you worried about the way things were before we became involved?"

This is it, she thought, now is the time to finish it. He created the opening—for what she knew had to be his move to end things between them.

"Well James," she put in before he had the time to add anything. "I can honestly say that in the beginning I thought that things might work out between us, you know? Of course, now I've come to the understanding that I was deluding myself about that. I mean, come on, out of the blue we have sex then just as inconceivable, we start a mutually pleasurable relationship, that would make no sense to an absolute stranger let alone the people we know." She said frustrated. "We don't have a normal relationship and we know nothing of each other outside our sex-friend type role. I don't really know anything about you the things you do and the places you go. Those little trips twelve times a year must mean something.

"And another thing, us sleeping together, wanting and needing to, was so random I don't think that even if our mates knew what's going on they'd understand what made us do what we're doing. I don't understand why we did what we did and I know you've been having trouble accepting this as well because besides you saying so, your brooding was noticeable. It was like something out of a bad romance novel, that night."

"You can't really believe what happened between us was as trivial as that, surely?" James was stunned. He thought he knew her. Surely she couldn't be that jaded about life, about what they mean to each other.

"What else am I supposed to believe James? I mean, you've been a good friend to me, and I love you for it but I think that the both of us let adolescent feelings get in the way of reality." She said moving to walk further inside her flat. "Can we honestly say that if Erin hadn't reminded us that once upon a time we had the hots for each other that we'd have gotten to this point? Made love, or even kissed? I don't think so."

"So what are you trying to say?"

"What's trying to say James, is that I think its best if try to forget. To go on as though we've never kissed let alone," she waved her hand, "well you know."

James moved closer, facing her, before taking his right hand to hold up her chin for eye contact.

"Do you even know what it is you're trying to say here?"

"I do James; I'm saying that it's over." She said looking on as his hazel eyes became stormy. Oh how she wished that meant that he didn't want to lose her; that he wanted and needed her.

Lily's eyes widened as he moved the further few inches down and deftly covered her mouth with his. Tasting, probing and moving in tortuous motions.

Then, as quickly as he started, he stopped and stepped back.

He trailed his knuckles across her smiling faintly.

"I guess you've made up your mind huh?" he said as a spark appeared in his eyes.

"Y-yes," she said, proud that her voice sounded relatively normal. After that kiss, she knew he needed to leave now; she would start crying other wise.

"I see," he said.

"Good, then I think you better leave. The less we have to do with each other the easier it'll be to get back our old camaraderie." She pronounced although the bravery in her words didn't echo her inner feelings. Her heart was constricting and her breath was starting to become shorter.

"Right," she said and although she couldn't understand the expression in his face she went and ushered him out to the front door. Whatever reaction she expected from him, this was not it. His lack of anger and agitation confused her making her feelings roll around in turmoil. She needed to be alone.

Now!

"See you around James." She mumbled quickly and shut the door, leaning back hard against it.

Sucking in a deep breath, she rushed to her bedroom and eyes burning she threw herself onto the bed. Confusion, shock, heartbreak and disbelief fought to the surface. How the heck was she supposed be strong and survive losing the love of her life on her own?


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