Started With Tears, Ended With Kisses

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, his parents, or the universe, nor do I make money from sharing this story with you all. I also don't own the song "Transatlanticism" it is by the wonderful and amazing musical talent of Death Cab for Cutie.

The atlantic was born today and i'll tell you how...
The clouds above opened up and let it out.

I have always tried to avoid my feelings. Friends, family, they could never understand, especially Petunia who seemed to think her pain was greater than everyone else's. For the longest time I tried to figure her out, tried to comfort her, but I am done with trying to fix other peoples problems, she ended that when she said it was all my fault. Now I am alone in the fight for air that seems to follow me every waking moment. I am hollow and if anyone paid any attention they would know that, but like always I am invisible, just a silly little girl who wishes she could understand why her mother died without her. I can't help the feeling that if I had been there I could have saved her, but I wasn't; I was here, at Hogwarts… why did I always return.

Lily Evans sat in an empty common room in the night time hours, grimacing over her diary, scribbling out passages that seemed too trivial now that her world had ended. The only person who ever listened to her was gone. She picked up her quill to stab the pages that hurt her the most, the ones that had been written in anger about her mother not understanding her, and she began to cry. Her tears were bitter with the taste of regret. She couldn't help the feelings of hatred as she looked around the common room that had always been a home to her. Now, she felt herself throwing her diary across the room into the fire without a chance to react. She didn't care, she didn't want it anymore.

I was standing on the surface of a perforated sphere
When the water filled every hole.
And thousands upon thousands made an ocean,
Making islands where no island should go.
Oh no.

James Potter had gotten out of bed; dragons and Dark Lords plagued his dreams. He grabbed his invisibility cloak and the marauder's map and was on his way to get a nighttime snack from the kitchen when he heard a soft muffled cry from the common room below. He tried not to make his presence noticed as he turned to go back to the dormitory, but the floorboard creaked and the sobbing below stopped.

"Potter?" She had clearly spotted him. Her voice was light and barely audible, but there was a trace of fear and hatred in her voice that made him flinch as he turned back around.

"Sorry, Evans, I was just… well… I was just leaving." He said bitterly with guilt in his voice, but she seemed unfazed by his words, or perhaps she had neglected to listen to them entirely.

"Why is it you always appear just when I don't want you to?" she asked but she did not expect an answer as she moved on. "Potter you are insufferable and if you tell a single one of those 'friends' of yours about what you have just seen, I will personally kill you with my bare hands."

Those people were overjoyed; they took to their boats.
I thought it less like a lake and more like a moat.
The rhythm of my footsteps crossing flood lands to your door have been silenced forever more.

"Lily…" he said and realized it was the first time he had called her by her first name, the shock was evident on her face as well as a small solitary tear rolled down her cheek. He was unaware of what he was doing, and found himself scaling down the stairs, still looking at her as he went, before he even noticed his feet were moving. Her eyes followed him and she found herself filled with a need for him, but she also found herself wishing he would go away. The second he was at the bottom of the stairs he felt like running. He had never faced such a perfect woman before. She looked lovelier than ever in her pale green nightgown.

He wanted more than anything to go to her, she wanted more than anything to run away from him.


The distance is quite simply much too far for me to row
It seems farther than ever before
Oh no.

"I heard…" but his voice failed before he could say anymore. He was still standing at the bottom of the stairs but he found himself trying to take a step closer to her. He wanted to wipe the tear from her face, but he could tell by the look on her face that it was not the best thing to do. He was afraid of what to do next. He didn't deal with emotions very well; he was the smooth talker not the sensitive one. He couldn't help but feel like he should be more than he was, more for this girl, this perfect girl that he had been dreaming of for years, this girl who he wanted more than anything to kiss passionately under the stars, this girl who made his heart turn to mush and caused his friends to constantly laugh at their friends change of mood every time he saw her. She was his everything and he didn't know how to help her.

"Why are you here?" she asked meaning more than what the words entailed. She was staring into his eyes again and she couldn't help but feel her heart sink and those beautiful hazel eyes were captivating as they searched her soul for an answer to the puzzle.

"Your mom… I'm sorry."

"Please," she said with tears in her eyes, "don't, just don't mention…" She trailed off and began crying.

I need you so much closer

This time he crossed the distance between them and she didn't stop him. His hand found its way to her cheek and wiped the tears that formed there. Lily found herself looking at the face she longed to hold with her own hands. He was so beautiful, and so sweet, or at least he was right now as she saw the compassion burning in his eyes. He looked at her, as she had never thought a human being could look at a person, and from here he wasn't only beautiful he was perfect. She hated the fact that she saw him this way; this was her biggest enemy for so many years. He had changed somehow, though, not only had he begun to change this year, growing up and leaving her alone, he had in this moment showed more emotion than she knew he was capable of.

The closeness of their faces was overbearing to their senses. James found himself drawing in weak breath as he pulled his face away from hers as hard as he could.

"James," she said shocking him at the sound of his name on her lips, "why are you here? Why are you sitting on this couch, in this room?" her eyes answered the question. She wanted him to tell her the thing that he knew to be true.

"You know the answer, Lily. I have always been sitting on this couch."

I need you so much closer
So come on, come on

She knew what he meant, better than anyone. Her eyes strayed to their hands that somehow had come together in the madness of what they were feeling. When she looked back up James was looking intensely into her eyes with so much passion and longing it made her heart flutter. Then his eyes strayed to her lips for one quick moment and then back to her face. It made her laugh for the first time in weeks. She realized that having him there was the cure she had needed all along.

She found her face suddenly covered by his warm loving hands. Then before she could stop him he was leaning down to capture her lips with his. All the pain of her past year was gone, she now felt like she was home again. It was the same common room, but it felt completely different to her now, like it did when she first saw it, 7 years prior.

And then, James Potter kissed Lily Evans and in so doing captured her heart and conquered her tears.

A/N: I decided to resubmit this story as a seperate intitity of the original story titled "So Much Closer". Instead I'm going to submit them all seperately and see if I get a better response. There will be 4. One for each Marauder. This one is for Lily and James combined, the next one I will submit will be "Hollowed in the Moonlight" for Lupin, but also contains some Tonks point of view. Then there will be "The Darker Side of the Sun" (I know it doesnt make sense logically) for Peter, and "Sirius Tale" for Sirius.

Well, anyway, I loved writing this, if you know the song or have access to Death Cab for Cutie's Transatlanticism album you should read this while listening to it. I swear it makes me tear up every time I listen to the song, and I wrote this while I listened to it. Hope you enjoy it! Let me know if you do or don't! Thanks