(The Completely Unwilling Participants on) The Bachelor

by Rude Gus

The title says it all.

8. Episode 7

Chapter 7

Remus had slept with Beatrice.

Repeatedly.

Remus. Sensible Remus. Level-headed, never charged into anything without thoughtfully considering the consequences over a cup of tea, owner of multiple sweater vests Remus Lupin had been sleeping with a contestant.

With Beatrice, no less.

Rita delivered the news when they arrived back at the house, forcing Remus to stand in the confessional room in front of James, Sirius, and Euphemia as she announced his sins.

"Betrayed at every turn," James cried.

Remus, the treacherous bastard, had the nerve to offer a half-smile and a one-shouldered shrug.

Sirius gave a few slow claps. "Well done, Remus. Never would've expected it from you."

"I admit," said Remus, "this is slightly outside the bounds of what I would consider generally acceptable behavior…" Two spots of pink appeared on his cheeks. "But like so many before me in history, love has driven me to distraction."

"Driven you to traitor town," James muttered. "Co-piloted by my other best mate."

Euphemia swept up to Remus and clasped his shoulders. "I'm so happy to see you in such high spirits. We should celebrate with some actual spirits. Excuse me, Stephen?" she called to one of the crew members, who turned his head back to her. "Margaritas all around."

"Don't encourage him," James said.

"For once," Rita said, sounding vaguely shocked to be hearing herself say this, "I agree with Potter. This sort of behavior is unacceptable. It goes against everything this show stands for."

"Does it, though?" Sirius inquired.

Rita ignored him and addressed Remus. "This news cannot reach the public before the entire show has aired. Like James and his eventual fiancée, your relationship with Booth—should it even last that long—must remain under wraps. You cannot be seen together publicly."

Remus nodded. "We will, of course, respect your wishes."

Given that Remus's contract almost certainly didn't have the same clause as James's about this—and given the too-innocent expression on Remus's sly face—Remus would be doing absolutely no such thing.

Damn, but James had to respect him for that straight-faced lie.

"Unfortunately," Rita said, "we have no choice but to eliminate Beatrice at tomorrow's rose ceremony."

"Doesn't sound unfortunate to me," James said under his breath.

He wasn't too put out to enjoy a margarita, though, especially when they were brought straight to them in the confessional room.

He ended up downing three before marching up to his room for what, he realized, would be his last night in the castle. Tomorrow they'd leave on a "grand adventure," where they'd film the remaining two episodes. After a few weeks trapped in a stodgy castle, the prospect of being held captive literally anywhere else appealed greatly.

Algernon was waiting for him on his bed, and even cocked his head at James's entrance, silently asking for the latest news.

"Well," James said, swirling the margarita in his hand. It sloshed over the sides a bit, but who cared? It was his last night in this bloody room. He could positively trash it and it wouldn't matter. That wasn't in his contract. "I know you'll be shocked—shocked—to learn that things went a bit...upside down. Today," he clarified. "With Lily."

He stumbled through a summary of his dates with Bea and Bonnie, spent twenty minutes ranting about Isabella's family, and finally got to the meat of things with Lily in the deer park.

"She's so...so pushy," he said, the edges of his words sliding together a bit as he lay sprawled on his bed. "But like...like a good pushy, you know? Like I was totally fucking up with the mosquito and the sunscreen—forgot to explain that bit, doesn't matter, the point is, she was just like, ya basic. And then when I was all, you're too good for your stupid bloody job, she was all, whyyyyyy would you pretend to be happy with your job, Potter?"

Algernon meowed in agreement.

"Shuddup," James told him. "Just—listen. Okay? Listen. She's got dreams and I—I wanna go with her. Around the world. I wanna hold her hand and kiss her and like...I wanna read her novel and tell her how good it is and pet her hair 'cause it looks really, really nice. No. No, wait. Not pet. With humans you...touch. Yeah? Yeah. I wanna touch her hair." He sighed. "I can't touch her eyes 'cause that's weird but they're pretty too."

He rolled onto his stomach, his elbows tucked beneath his chest to lift his head up. "Here's the thing, Algernooon. I told Isabella that she's like...perfect. And she's sooooooo great. Like really great."

Algernon sent him a skeptical look.

"No, I know, you never liked her, and like, I should listen to you, I should always always listen to you—" He had to pause as Algernon stood up and licked James's cheek. "But like...she is great. But she's not…"

He didn't have to finish. Algernon got him that way.

"And then Lily was all pissy because, like, I was nice to her mum. And like—like I get it 'cause I've been so...she'd say messing around, but I haven't been, not since paintball, but she thinks I don't like her, or something, and every time she goes on about how I don't fancy her I die because I like her so bloody much, but I can't tell her 'cause of Isabella, and she looks so sad and I don't want her to be sad. And she wouldn't be sad if I told her and I wanna tell her, I wanna tell her so bad—"

He tried to push himself into a sitting position quickly, but balance was so hard. Once he got there, he raised a finger at Algernon. "But maybe that's it, Algernooon. Maybe she knows I fancy her and she thinks I'm messing about by not telling her! And maybe she wanted her mum to hate me so she could, or something, I dunno...but her mum was so nice and she thinks I'm handsome and she made peanut butter and bacon sandwiches, which were a fucking revelation, oh my God, wait 'til you try it..."

He might've rambled more about sandwiches but he couldn't remember in the morning.

The terrible, horrible, no good, and exceptionally bad morning due to the tiny dwarves digging mining tunnels in his brain with pick-axes, courtesy of tequila. James staggered about groaning as he threw his things haphazardly into his suitcase. He really should have packed before getting drunk on margaritas. That would've been the sensible thing to do.

He let Algernon out to find some breakfast, and was touched when he returned with a baggie full of aspirin.

James picked him up and kissed him on the head, eliciting an annoyed noise from Algernon. "Cheers," he said. "I'm sorry to ditch you for another week, but you know how unreasonable most hotels are about cats."

Algernon sent him off with a last lick to his cheek, then bounded out of James's arms onto the ground, swishing his tail through the air. He lifted his head in a pseudo-nod that James took as a farewell, then strolled into the corridor.

He'd have the run of the castle for just a bit longer—James's dad wouldn't be by until later to pick him up and take him home. Algernon would no doubt be thrilled to finally not have to fight James for the front seat. Lucky cat. He got everything today, really.

James had to endure another pointless rose ceremony, the clatter and chatter of the production crew packing up everything, and his mum's overenthusiasm throughout.

Thankfully by the time he settled into the car, the meds had kicked in to help with the hangover. His sunglasses helped too, even if he felt like a bit of a prick wearing them into the airport

Rita corralled James, his mum, his mates, and the crew into a circle near the security gate. "Right," she said, handing a stack of slim papers to Bozo on her right. "These are your boarding passes—find yours and pass the rest along. James, the hosts, Euphemia, and I will be in first class. The women will be in economy with the crew. Bozo, if you so much as let them stand in queue for the toilet together, I'll shove plane peanuts down your throat until you choke. It should be manageable given it's a short flight—"

The boarding passes came around to James, but his mum snatched them out of his hand.

"Since you've such an unfortunate tequila sensitivity, love, I'll handle our paperwork today."

James managed to send her a faint smile.

Remus and Sirius were whispering about something and muffling their laughter across the circle, but they were traitors who were probably making fun of his sunglasses, even though they were the ones who drove him to drink in the first place.

His mum must have sensed the injustice. She made them wait at the gate while she took James shopping for snacks and magazines. He appreciated the kindness, but nothing sounded more appealing at the moment than lying down on the ground and passing out.

By the time she brought him back to the gate, he'd spent the meager bit of energy he did have, and could only keep his eyes open just enough to follow her as she elbowed her way through other passengers to the first class boarding aisle. He stood there, sunglasses hiding his temporarily closed eyes, silently chanting don't fall over don't fall over as the gate attendant scanned their tickets.

He collapsed into his seat and immediately fell deeply asleep. Only his mum shaking him awoke him much too soon after that, and he stumbled sleepily off the plane after her.

As he stepped off the jetway, a terrible, horrible voice started speaking on the airport announcement system.

He ground to a halt and grabbed Euphemia's arm.

"Mum," he said in a panic. "Did the plane get diverted?"

"Hm?" she said, much too sweetly. "No, dear. We're precisely where we're supposed to be."

He faced her fully, grasping both her arms now, looking down and pleading. "Tell me we're not."

"Not what? Come along, we're blocking the jetway." She broke out of his grasp and kept walking toward where Rita and the others had gathered near a gift shop.

A gift shop whose outer table was near overflowing with Eiffel fucking Towers.

"No," James said as he chased after her, that malicious French-speaking voice still blaring from overhead speakers. "We're just connecting, right?"

"Welcome to the city of lights," Sirius said, arms spread.

Oh, Euphemia had told him when trying to persuade him to do the show, think of the fun traveling bit of the show!

Bullshit.

This was complete and absolute bullshit.

Slowly, section by section, James sank to the floor: first his knees connected with the tile. Then his arse plopped down, followed ultimately by his head (which he was, admittedly, very delicate about setting down because damned if he was letting the French take more brain cells from him).

"That's rather unnecessary," his mum told him.

"Disagree," he said dully. "I'll remain here until you book me one ticket home on the next flight."

"I will drag you to the car," Rita said. "Do you really want airport grime in your hair?"

The grime was actually a very convincing point.

But they'd brought him to France. He couldn't just go along with that. Walking into Paris voluntarily went against everything he stood and laid down for.

"The girls will be here any second," Rita said. "We've a schedule to keep."

"And I've my sanity to keep," James said, "which can only be accomplished by departing French soil at once."

He carried on for a few more minutes, but he didn't doubt for a second Rita's commitment to pulling him by his arms to baggage claim. Also he didn't fancy either Lily or Isabella witnessing that. That said, he did have a sense one or both might understand, given how clear he'd made his feelings on this cursed country.

He stayed silent the entire ride to the hotel, eyes closed behind his sunglasses, refusing to take in more of France than absolutely necessary.

Never one to waste production time, the show planned to send him on a date with Bonnie that evening. He had a brief reprieve in his room to mourn his arrival in France, enjoy one bottle of Belgian beer from the fantasy suite's mini fridge, and prepare himself for what would be his last date with Bonnie.

At least, it would be Bonnie's last date provided no one else on set was secretly sleeping with Isabella or Lily.

Which was impossible. They were both into him. They wouldn't do him like that.

Then again, if Sirius and Remus had banged a contestant, maybe Peter was secretly wooing Isabella. It always was the quiet ones, James thought, narrowing his eyes at Peter as he waited for Bonnie to join him outside Notre-Dame.

Stupid Notre-Dame with its over-the-top Gothic architecture. That was the smug French all over, wasn't it? Them and their too-long breads and their tasteless crepes. Even Bonnie, who was usually good for a laugh, seemed subdued by the excesses of the French.

Both she and James half-heartedly took in the carved stonework that some poor sod had spent pointless hours making while making idle small talk. Bonnie at least feigned some interest in the stained glass windows, but James saw right through her.

This was what the French did to people.

Up at the top of Notre-Dame, the incredibly underwhelming Eiffel Tower well within sight, James nudged her with his elbow. "Good to know someone's on my side about France."

"Hm?" she said, the wind blowing her long black hair out behind her. "Oh. I quite like France, actually."

"Oh, er. Not much for churches, then?"

She studied him for a moment, then looked back out at the view. "Ah, yeah. You caught me."

"Me neither." He grimaced. "So much for the exotic destination, eh?"

"I dunno, I can't exactly complain about a free trip. I've been to Paris loads of times, but it's got a charm to it so I don't mind coming back, even if I've got cameras dogging my every step."

"Seems to me like you'd have been better off skipping the show and just coming here on your own."

She didn't say anything for a while, gazing out over the city, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.

"No," she said at last. "I'm glad I did this show, even though...even though it meant constantly being filmed."

He sent her a look. "Seriously?"

"Yeah. I mean, the show's absolutely bonkers, but some of the people...well." She kicked her foot lightly against the wall in front of them, her hands clinging tighter to the top. "Some people can change your whole world, you know?"

"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I do. I really, really do."

She hung her head. "I know you do."

He nearly asked if she meant Isabella or Lily—she hadn't pressured him one way or the other, unlike basically everyone else in his life—but he caught himself in time.

Instead, he told her, "Well, if you ever start missing this show, you can pay someone to follow you around and film you doing everything but urinating. Right before you check yourself into a mental health facility, of course."

"It's nice to have back-up plans," she said dryly. "But I think this'll be the end of my reality career."

"Pity. I don't think Helena hated you as much as the others, so when she gets her own spin-off show you could probably join that."

"Definitely won't miss her," she said, but then her face softened, her lips twisting, looking almost pained. "But others…"

"Yeah," he said quietly. "Yeah."

---

When their plane touched down in Charles de Gaulle—much to the relief of Peter, who was sitting next to Bonnie in the row behind, and had spent the whole flight expelling jagged breaths into a paper bag—Lily surprised herself by bursting into tears.

This time, at least, she was crying because she was happy.

She was going somewhere. Finally.

A trip taken under all the rules and caveats of a reality show wasn't what Lily would have picked for a maiden voyage, but beggars couldn't be choosers. It was more than enough that she was abroad for the first time in her life, in France, of all places, home of gourmet dining, fine wines, and centuries of artistic genius. It was new, and it was different, and James hated it, which was...slightly gratifying, if she were being honest with herself.

After planning and dreaming and saving for so many years, only to find herself handed a free holiday in a beautiful country, everything she had been forced to put up with to get there—her boss, and James, and Rita and all the rest—didn't seem quite so bad. To add a cherry to the top of the cake, there wasn't a camera or microphone in sight to capitalize on her tears.

Letting her emotions get the better of her under such circumstances was only right and natural, she reasoned, and she wasn't a bit ashamed of herself.

Nevertheless, Lily's sudden weeping came as quite a shock to poor Isabella, who had opted to sit next to her on the plane and naturally assumed that she was deeply distressed about something.

"Are you okay?" Isabella asked her softly, and gave Lily's arm a gentle squeeze.

It took a bit of effort to get the words out, but Lily assured her that she wasn't upset, merely overwhelmed by the reality of where she was, and that Isabella had been kind enough to give her the window seat, and that she'd spied swimming pools in so many gardens when the plane began its descent.

Swimming pools. In everyday gardens. One would never see such a thing in Britain, save for when the masses got their paddling pools out for summer barbecues, and that wasn't even close to the same thing.

"So, you're happy, then?" said Isabella tentatively.

Lily let out a shaky giggle in response, wiping tears from her rapidly reddening eyes. "I'm incandescent, I swear."

Rita, James, Euphemia, Remus, and Sirius had all flown in first class while the girls sat in economy with the rest of the crew, and therefore weren't present to witness her blubbing, for which she was grateful. The last thing she wanted was for James to assume that she'd been shedding tears on his account.

He probably wouldn't assume that because he wasn't a conceited ass, though Rita certainly would.

Upon disembarking the plane and exiting the airport, the girls were bundled into a car with blacked-out windows—against which Lily basically pressed her nose for the entire journey—and whisked to the center of Paris, and the most decadent hotel she had ever stepped foot inside in her life.

It was all immensely exciting, until Rita informed them that they weren't allowed to leave.

"You'll have free reign of the facilities inside the hotel for the duration of your stay," said Rita gaily, from beneath her obscenely clichéd beret, "including the fitness center, should any of you feel like toning up."

Lily responded to this generous offer by telling Rita to fuck off, which might have been why she wound up in a room overlooking the hotel car park.

It was ridiculous that they weren't allowed to venture outside the hotel. James was under Rita's ever watchful eye, so there was no danger of bumping into him in a corridor. Lily certainly wasn't of a mind to seek him out after their scene at her mum's, especially when the alternative was the entire city of Paris. He'd been put up in the "fantasy suite," a cringe-inducing name for a penthouse with no cameras or microphones inside, poised to offer keys to the women he fancied spending a night alone with.

It was deeply shameful, but the idea of James spending the night with Isabella—kissing her and holding her, and everything else that went with a romantic night in a luxury suite, unmonitored and unchaperoned—turned Lily's stomach inside out, but only when the thought occurred to her.

The thought occurred to her frequently.

Constantly, in fact, when Bonnie was taken away for yet another date and Lily and Isabella were left to fend for themselves in the hotel. Isabella was in a rather low mood and asked Lily to spend the evening exercising with her, posing the question so sweetly that Lily didn't have the heart to turn her down, lest she feel like she'd drowned a kitten.

Down to the gym they went. Isabella perked up considerably, but Lily spent her time enduring boiling, bubbling feelings of jealousy and confusion that reared up in her gut whenever she looked at her friend's beautiful, smiling face.

She couldn't reconcile her brain with the idea that James could genuinely believe he and Isabella were suited, that he wouldn't get bored, and that he wouldn't swamp her, even if he didn't intend to.

Then again, that was probably her jealousy attempting to rationalize her objection to their relationship. Without Beatrice there to speak aloud the thoughts that Lily kept tightly under wraps, she had nothing to do but examine her own motives for viewing them through such a negative lens, and it made her feel wretchedly selfish.

It wasn't in her nature to be so envious of others, but her feelings didn't seem to have an off switch. It hadn't been this bad before they'd gone to Cokeworth, before she had been forced to accept that it wasn't just a harmless crush she was fostering, and that it wasn't going to slip away unseen with any haste.

God, she'd only gone and fallen for the bloody bachelor, and that made her even more of a cliché than Rita's sodding beret.

The next morning, she was roused by a sharp rapping on her bedroom door, and a breezy, familiar voice calling, "Housekeeping!"

She scrambled hastily out of bed and answered it to find Euphemia Potter on the other side, dressed in her Parisian best and clutching a brown paper bag, from which a mouth-watering aroma was emanating.

"Good morning, dear," said Euphemia warmly, as if it was a very normal thing to knock on someone's door and pretend to be a maid. "How did you sleep? Well, I hope?"

"Um," said Lily.

"I thought you'd like to eat something scrumptious before you get ready," Euphemia continued, unperturbed by Lily's failure to produce an adequate response to her question, "so I've brought you some breakfast."

Lily shifted her weight to one foot, going slack against the door. Her tired, overworked body was aching from the weight training Isabella had put her through.

"Get ready?" she sleepily repeated. "I'm not on camera today, am I?"

"No, dear, my son has a date with Isabella today."

"I didn't need the reminder, but thank you."

Euphemia let out a tinkling laugh. "What I mean to say is that I'd like to take you out on a little excursion in the city this morning, if you're willing. No cameras, and no Rita. I know how frustrating it must be for you to stay cooped up in this hotel."

Lily's heart gave a leap at the words "excursion in the city" and several more at "no cameras, and no Rita."

"Are you—" She stood up straight. "Just me, or the other girls, too?"

"Just you, dear."

The scent of hot, buttery pastry was filling the air around Lily's head like a thick, fragrant cloud.

"Why?" she said after a beat, frowning.

"Oh, I think you know why," said Euphemia, and held out the paper bag for Lily to take. "I'll just give you some time to get ready, shall I? Meet me down in the foyer. I'll have transportation ready."

Common sense told Lily to refuse her, because she did know why she had been singled out. Almost from the beginning of the competition, Euphemia had made it perfectly clear that, regardless of what James wanted, Lily was her choice of girlfriend for him. Her offer, whilst kind, felt a little too much like an incentive to keep Lily interested in her son.

If it was an incentive, that made as little sense as James's hearty efforts to win over her mother. He was the one who didn't want to be with her, not the other way around.

In any case, Euphemia had already turned and walked off without waiting for an answer. Lily knew that she was powerless to resist such a golden opportunity to escape the hotel, and the sharp, controlling talons of Rita Skeeter.

Paris, she thought, and slunk back into her room to shower and eat her breakfast. Paris, she thought, while she rode down in the elevator, feeling like a dirty politician who had taken a bribe in a brown envelope—only in this case, it was a brown paper bag, and the bribe a freshly baked pain au chocolat. Paris, she thought, when Euphemia's transportation turned out to be, not a car, but an ostentatious silver carriage drawn by two large, beautiful cremello horses.

"So you can see the sights unencumbered by streaky glass windows," Euphemia explained, "and travel the city in style."

Seriously, Lily reflected. The Potters lived on a different planet to the one she inhabited.

"The mother of the guy I fancy is taking me on a romantic date around Paris," she said, blinking at the stomping horses, the lush velvet seats, the champagne bottle chilling in an ice bucket in the carriage. "That's not porn site territory at all."

"I do enjoy your sense of humor, dear," said Euphemia, and pushed her gently towards a waiting footman. "Hop in."

Lily had no real choice but to comply.

Once they were both seated and comfortable, and the horses moved off, Euphemia immediately produced a phone and offered it up for the taking of photographs. She promised she would forward them to Lily's email address on the condition that she join her in many selfies over the course of the morning.

"Sirius taught me the art of the selfie, you see," she said, tilting her chin down, and sucked in her cheeks, her lips pursing into a duck-like pout.

"Selfie-taking is a talent of his, is it?"

"He's got quite a knack for working angles."

"I imagine he spends many hours practicing."

"He would argue that beauty isn't a practiced art, but a natural state of being, achievable only by few," said Euphemia cheerily.

"And yet he feels the need to work his angles to take a good photo."

Lily didn't add that Sirius may have wanted to work on his inner beauty a bit more.

"Where would you like to go today?" said Euphemia, after a few moments of silence. "We're quite close to the Palais-Royal and the Louvre, and I need to pop into Dior later for a quick something—"

Pop into Dior, Lily reflected, much amused. As if that were a casual activity. Lily bought her clothes in Primark, where she could get shoes for £8 and a five-pack of socks for a couple of quid.

Euphemia Potter could pop into Dior.

"—but this is your party, dear, so speak up if there's anything you'd really like to do," Euphemia finished, then paused, looking thoughtful. "The only thing I really can't show you is the Eiffel Tower."

Their carriage turned on to a wide bridge, its wheels rumbling as it bounced across the cobblestones beneath.

"I see," said Lily blankly, gazing out across the Seine. "I guess that's tomorrow's date destination out of the bag."

"That transparent, am I?"

"I wouldn't worry too much, it seemed inevitable that one of us would end up going there." Lily turned her head and looked at her. "James really hates France, you know."

"I'm quite aware of his many quirks and absurdities."

"I suppose he didn't take too kindly to flying here?"

"There may have been a minor tantrum at the airport," said Euphemia, with a knowing smile.

"That boy," Lily sighed, and tried to sound exasperated, but it came out wrong, and fond, and terribly, shamefully soft to her ears. "He should have known he'd wind up here. I told him before that there was no imagination at work on this show. Where else were they going to bring us, some other random city that isn't known for being a bastion of romance?"

"I'd call that proof, if more was needed, that my son should heed your excellent advice whenever possible."

"Everyone should heed my advice," said Lily absently, already regretting bringing up James. Thinking of him made her chest hurt a little. "Do you think we could go to the Louvre, if we're close? I'm an absolute sucker for a good museum."

"I'll give you the Louvre in exchange for three selfies," said Euphemia. "Five, and I'll buy us audio guides."

That was too good a deal to pass up.

The museum was as grandiose and beautiful as every photo she'd ever seen had instructed her to assume, and Lily's heart kicked up a notch when she stepped out of the carriage and took it all in. As promised, Euphemia purchased the audio guides, and endured Lily's desire to stop and listen to everything they could with great patience.

"I've never seen anyone so excited to be in a gallery," she remarked, as they were wandering through a hall of 18th century European pastels.

"I know," said Lily, with a laugh. "I half-expected some staid French security guard to come up and tell me to stop making heart-eyes at the Venus de Milo."

"Is art a passion of yours?"

"Honestly, I can barely draw a stick figure," Lily admitted, and pointed to a portrait of a woman in a huge powdered wig, "but look at that. Someone was able to sit down and create something that beautiful with their bare hands, and I find that fascinating." She paused. "I'm always fascinated by other people's talents. I've got a friend, Alice, who did illustration at the Cardiff Met, and the things she can do with just a pen and paper are incredible."

"James has always been very good at art," said Euphemia idly. "Drawing, and such. I've even framed some of it in the house."

"Does he draw much?"

"Not so much now, I think. Doesn't have the time, he says."

"Then he should make time," said Lily, her gaze fixed on the powdered wig woman. "It'd be a shame to waste a talent like that."

"You should tell him as much."

"Perhaps I will." She stretched out a hand towards Euphemia. "Can I nab your phone again?"

Euphemia's phone was passed between the two of them so often that quickly started to feel as if they were playing a very strange game of pass the parcel. Lily was intent on snapping pictures of the exhibitions, as well as the general splendor of the Louvre and its surroundings, while Euphemia was more interested in taking photos of Lily in various poses. She exceeded her five selfie limit in about as many minutes.

After they left the gallery, they strolled through the pyramid and marveled at an incredible golden throne made by a Japanese sculptor, sipped cappuccinos at a café nearby, then it was back to the carriage, where Lily was gently nudged into a glass of crisp champagne before they made a start for Dior.

"I'm having a really lovely time," she said happily, snuggling into her seat.

"It's fun to get away from the menfolk for a while," Euphemia agreed, as the carriage rumbled towards the Galeries Lafayette, wherein, Lily had been informed, lay their next destination. "You know all about our difficulties in conceiving, of course."

"I did manage to glean that," Lily replied, "amongst all the talk about banging."

Fixated, he was.

That said, James hadn't been the one admitting to having sex dreams on camera, so he had Lily beat in that department. It was somewhat embarrassing to think that Euphemia knew about that.

"It's a painful thing, wanting a child so much, and believing you'll never have one," Euphemia continued, her words coming out on a sigh.

"I'm very glad you did, in the end."

"Oh, James has been beyond a blessing—"

That was one word for it.

"—but I have always longed for a daughter," Euphemia finished, and gave Lily's hand a gentle pat. "In that vein, dear, I'm quite grateful to you for indulging me today."

"Oh, sure, it was my pleasure," said Lily, wondering why Euphemia thought she was the one being indulged when it was Lily who had been thoroughly spoiled and petted.

Upon stepping inside Dior, Lily wasn't remotely surprised to find that the staff were quite familiar with her companion.

They were immediately accosted by a polished blonde woman named Camille, who greeted Euphemia by name, kissed her on both cheeks, and drew her into conversation in rapid French. Lily had picked up a few key phrases from Bonnie, but they were speaking so quickly that she didn't have much of a clue of what they were saying.

"Now, Camille," said Euphemia smartly, after they'd finished exclaiming over whatever had excited them so much. She laid one of her hands on Lily's shoulder. "This is the girl."

Camille cocked an enquiring eyebrow at Lily. "The girl?"

"The girl."

"Of course, who else would she be?" said Camille with a fluttering laugh, and held out her hand for Lily to take. "Come."

Lily looked at Euphemia. "What?"

Euphemia merely smiled, a smug smile that said things like you've been thoroughly had, congratulations, and mwah ha ha, my dastardly plans have come to pass.

Thus, Lily found herself being led boldly across the shop floor and into a room in the back, where yet another glass of champagne was pressed into her hand almost immediately. Euphemia followed her and Camille inside, beaming, and sank elegantly into an armchair while her accomplice skittered away behind a tall partition. Camille emerged a moment later with her arms full of floaty red chiffon.

"It's a dress!" Euphemia announced, quite unnecessarily, as there was nothing it could be but a dress, and a stunning one at that. "I've never seen you in red, dear, and I do think it would suit you if you'd like to try it on."

Lily stared blankly at her for a moment.

Euphemia stared unblinkingly back.

Camille draped the dress over one arm and fluffed out the skirt with a flourish.

"Please," said Lily, after a beat of silence, "tell me that you're not trying to buy me a dress."

"What do you mean, trying?" said Euphemia. "I don't need to buy you this dress. It's yours. I've already commissioned it."

"You commissioned it?"

"I don't know why you're so surprised, dear. I do it all the time. Every suit that James has worn on the show was tailored especially for him."

That explained why James's suits fit him so bloody well and why he always looked so…but Lily wasn't going to get distracted by stupid lustful stirrings in this time of crisis.

"That's a completely different situation," she retorted, and pointed at the dress as if she was about to curse its firstborn. "James is your son, and I—"

"Saw exactly what he needed, when he needed it, and gave it to him," Euphemia cut in, and rose to her feet, pushing herself up from the armchair with considerable sprightliness for a woman her age, "which I completely failed to do, though I'm his mother. He was utterly miserable until you made him better, and I won't let that kindness go unrewarded."

Euphemia said it like she'd played a winning hand, and the problem was, she had, because she was completely correct in everything she said. Lily could argue Mary's job offer until she was blue in the face, but she knew that wasn't why let their argument by the river veer so off course. She'd done it because cared about James, more than she should have and more than was good for her, even then, before she'd ever comprehended the scope of what she felt for him.

"I didn't do it for a reward," she argued weakly.

Euphemia slanted a motherly smile at her. "People with good hearts rarely do."

"Well, thank you, but be that as it may," said Lily, feeling very warm, "I can't reciprocate on this level, so I really don't know if I should be trying that on."

"If you're worried about the fit, there's no need. I sent your measurements ahead of time."

"How did they get my—" Lily began, then let out a huff of air, her shoulders dropping with the realization. "Our photoshoot costumes." Euphemia had been present for the fittings. "Of course."

Euphemia tapped the side of her nose, eyes twinkling mischievously. "If you've quite finished objecting for the minute, could you pop into the changing room and try it on, please?"

There wasn't any way to politely refuse after such profuse compliments. Five minutes later saw Lily modeling the Very Expensive Red Dress—which was light and girlish and flowing, and popped against her pale skin in a rather lovely way she hadn't been expecting—in front of a tall mirror. Euphemia delighted in snapping pictures of her from every angle she could conceive of.

"Beautiful. Didn't I tell you?" she said delightedly, circling around her like a benevolent shark.

"It is pretty," Lily owned.

"Don't be so modest, dear, we haven't the time for it."

Lily sighed, and smoothed down the front of the gown, which really was beautiful, easily the most beautiful garment she'd ever worn. It made her feel like a Disney princess, though she'd never confess to such a thing out loud. "I love it, honestly, but I don't go to events that require formal gowns like this. I'll never have a reason to wear it."

"Nonsense," said Euphemia. "You can wear it to the ballet tonight."

Lily turned around at once, her gauzy skirts spinning out around her in a scarlet flurry, like they'd caught a sudden breeze, and was immediately glad that she hadn't been forced into something tight and restrictive.

"The ballet?" she repeated, her eyes wide with disbelief.

"Didn't I mention?" Euphemia set her champagne glass on a tall, ornate stool and smiled coyly. "Box seats, the best in the house. Sadly, I won't be able to come with you as I'm somewhat busy, but—"

"I can't go to the ballet," said Lily flatly.

"Why can't you?"

"Because—" she began, and hesitated. Euphemia crooked an eyebrow at her. "Because it's too much, all of this. I can't afford box seats at the ballet, so I can't pay you back, and I don't think—"

"I don't want you to pay me back. It's my treat."

"But you don't have to treat me," Lily protested, her cheeks boiling with embarrassment. "Buy yourself something, or save your money, I don't need—"

"The tickets are already paid for, dear."

"That's really not the poi—"

"And besides," Euphemia continued, as if Lily hadn't raised a single objection to her scheme, "I've already secured you an escort for the evening."

Despite her better claims to self-respect, and despite knowing that James already had plans with Isabella, Lily's heart leapt into her throat anyway. "An escort?"

"Yes, dear. Sirius is quite eager to catch the ballet while we're in the city."

She felt a hard, clunking disappointment in the pit of her stomach.

Then she almost laughed out loud.

Sirius Black. And her. And a stupidly expensive dress that cost about the same as a week of groceries for an entire street in Dagenham. Spending an evening at the Paris ballet.

Rarely in her life had Lily heard a suggestion so utterly absurd.

"The hosts aren't allowed to be alone with us," Lily pointed out, that handy sliver of information springing into her head. She almost added a triumphant Hah! but decided against it.

"Sirius has never been one to heed nonsensical orders, and I'd wager you're rather alike in that regard."

"Rita would never sign off on it."

"Of course she wouldn't, which is why she hasn't been informed. She'll be otherwise occupied by the time you need to leave, accompanying my son and I on his date," said Euphemia. "I know he's not the escort you want, but Sirius will be a perfect gentleman, I assure you. Hands to himself at all times."

"It's not his hands I'm worried about," Lily muttered darkly, thinking of the mileage Sirius would get from taking Lily out for the evening while the guy she really wanted was gallivanting around the city of lights with the girl of his dreams. She was not equipped to deal with that kind of teasing after everything that had happened in Cokeworth.

Then again, Sirius wasn't exactly thrilled about James and Isabella.

He'd given her that book, too—his book, if the name and annotations scrawled within the pages of Anna Karenina were any indication. He had several very strong, and very negative, opinions on Count Vronsky.

Euphemia must have favored the way Lily's downturned mouth and furrowed brow worked with the Very Expensive Red Dress, because she held her phone aloft and snapped another none-too-subtle picture.

She must have taken enough to fill a few albums.

Knowing Euphemia as Lily thought she did, she'd probably make an album of the photos and post the thing, elegantly wrapped and tied up with a bow, to Lily's mum in Cokeworth, complete with pithy, hand-written captions. Lily trying on a dress. Lily objecting to needless expense. Lily mooning like a sap over my only son.

Lily knew she'd be a bit of an idiot if she turned down box seats at the ballet in favor of a night in a hotel room, watching dubbed American sitcoms on the television, brewing tasteless teas with the tiny pods of milk they left alongside the biscuits—never quite enough to make a satisfactory cup—while she ate her heart out over a bleeding boy, of all things.

Beatrice loved the ballet. She'd kill her if she didn't go.

And refuse to live with her, probably.

"The tickets are definitely paid for already?" she asked Euphemia.

Euphemia nodded, her white hair gleaming like freshly fallen snow in the flattering overhead lights. "Bought, paid for, and doomed to go to waste, if you're not inclined to take them."

God, but the woman was wily, appealing to Lily's working-class distaste for squandering funds.

She shrugged, admitting defeat with a twitch of her shoulders. "I do hate to waste money, I suppose."

"And I admire your good sense just as much," said Euphemia happily. "You'll consent to go, then?"

"I suppose I'll only regret it if I don't."

"Wonderful." Euphemia waved, queen-like, in the direction of Camille, who practically sprang across the polished floor to rejoin them. "I'll have the carriage pick you up at seven."

---

After their romantic dinner, James was supposed to offer Bonnie the keys to the fantasy suite if he wanted.

He pulled them out of his pocket up and dangled them over the table. "Somehow," he said, half smiling, "I get the sense you're not dying for these."

He thought she'd laugh, or at the very least smile. Instead she swallowed, and looked down into her wine. "I know who you really want to take in there." She took a large sip of wine and shook her head. "But in any case, you're right. I'm looking forward to luxuriating in my hotel room robe and slippers while I watch Amelie."

"Good choice," he said, and they clinked glasses for the last time.

He ended up copying Bonnie's idea by turning on Amelie, settling into the terrifically comfortable suite bed by himself. Bonnie was probably having a better time of it, though. James barely ended up taking in any of the movie, too busy agonizing over how his date with Isabella would go.

Although it was fuzzy around the edges, his drunken monologue to Algernon wasn't entirely gone from his memory. He did know where his heart was pointing him, even if it was swinging a bit like a compass needle settling in.

The thing was, he just needed to be absolutely sure of his choice. He had another chance to hang around with Isabella the next day, but if it went like he thought it would...well. That would settle it.

And then he'd have his one opportunity to let her down in private, rather than in front of the ever-present cameras, when she joined him in the fantasy suite.

It would be a terribly shocking turn for her, of course, and dead cruel since she'd have nothing but positive, fun expectations when they entered the room...but it was better than giving her no warning at all before the final episode.

As it turned out, he was not the only one reading his compass needle.

"The catacombs?" he said when he got out of the car the next afternoon. "You've no subtlety at all," he told Rita. "Have you no sense of artistry?"

"Think of the dramatic lighting," she said in a wry voice. "Fitting tone for your romance, no?"

"I could still pick her," he said under his breath.

"I don't care who you pick so long as you stick to the terms and don't tell either of them what you're going to do in the finale."

He was absolutely not going to follow those terms but she'd never know. Only Isabella would.

Dear, sweet Isabella, who practically flung herself into his arms when she arrived.

"You alright there?" he asked, gently prying himself loose from her. "It's only been a few days."

She rested her hands on his upper arms, looking up at him, a tense energy in her lithe frame. "I know," she said. "I know, I know, only…"

He quirked his eyebrows. "Right. I'm going to fill in the blank there with I missed you, but I realize that might be a bit presumptuous."

"No," she said quickly. "No. That's it. You always know what I mean."

She really was stunningly pretty, even when surrounded by literal death and despair, and exuded such a pure goodness.

He took her hands in his own, and let them hang down by their sides. "How've you been doing since, you know. Er. Our last date."

She buried her face into his chest. "I don't...I don't want to talk about it."

"Right. Totally fine. No issue at all. Forget I asked." He dropped a kiss on top of her head, feeling rather brotherly as he did so. "So. Ready to get nightmare fodder for the next ten years?"

She continued to cling to him throughout their tour, but that might've been spurred by the horrific number of skulls they'd seen, and the way the damp air chilled to the bone. She didn't speak much either, but again, it wasn't like he expected ribald commentary from her about a million dead bodies surrounding them on all sides. He tried to lighten the mood with some sly comments but gave up after his fourth failed attempt.

Curse Rita and her ability to absolutely slaughter a mood.

Isabella did brighten up after they returned to the earth's surface, where humans properly belonged, but the cuddling persisted. Even once they'd been seated in a private nook at a highly-exclusive restaurant—typical French snobbery—she held his hand over the table until their salads arrived.

"The bodies really got to you, eh?" he said.

"Hm?" she said, idly dragging her fork tines through the dressing on the plate. She stopped and looked up at him. "Oh. Yes. That wasn't...that wasn't exactly what I pictured for my first date in Paris."

"I pictured myself spontaneously combusting the next time I passed into French airspace, but sadly neither of us got what we wanted."

She did smile now, but thinly. "You really do hate the French."

"They think a grand tourist attraction is to take people through a room covered in human skulls."

"And a bridge covered in locks meant to represent a couple's love," she pointed out.

"Nah, they had to take those all down because the weight was too much for the bridge. Idiots."

The smile dropped off her face. "Oh."

"The city, I meant. Not the people who put the locks on."

"No, I—I know what you meant."

She was staring down at her plate again, much too forlorn considering they'd seen dead bodies but not the massacres themselves.

Where had that girl who'd demanded the boater hat gone?

He knew, of course. She'd been smothered under the heel of her parents' low opinion. And being in France was surely not helping. It was a country full of arrogant pricks, and sweet Isabella would never fit in with them.

But that punting girl was there. She was buried and squashed but she was there—he'd seen her.

"So," he said. "Er. What're your goals for life? Like, traveling or career or whatever?"

She met his gaze but tilted her head, a line between her eyebrows.

"I figured we should, ah. Talk about it sometime," he said. "It seems...relevant."

"Oh. Alright." She studied her salad, deep in thought for the length of time it took her to consume several crunchy bites. "I don't know," she finally said.

"Come on." He offered an encouraging smile. "You must have something. Like, d'you want kids?"

"Oh," she said, delight spreading across her face, like he'd asked if she'd like to play in a pen with a dozen kittens. "I do want kids, absolutely. No question about it."

He pointed at her with his fork. "There, see? A goal. A nice one, at that." After another bite of food, he asked, "Anything else on your general life to-do list?"

Her mouth parted slightly, but then she clamped her mouth shut. She very deliberately set her fork and knife onto her plate and pushed it toward the candle at the center of the table.

"You've definitely got more," he told her. "What is it?"

She shook her head very slightly but very quickly.

"Please," he said. "No goal is stupid. Even if it's, like, pole vaulting or something. You get to pick your own goals, you know."

She laughed sadly, tucking her hands together in her lap. "No, it's not about pole vaulting. That I actually think I might manage."

He placed his forearms on the table, one crossed over the other. "Then what is it about? Archery? Canoeing? If so, you've really lucked out and got to practice on the show."

"No, it's...it's stupid, actually."

"I promise it isn't." He kept looking at her, willing her to drag her attention up from the flickering candle, but she was persistent. "Look," he went on, "whatever it is you want to do...I think you can do it. Unless you want to become, like, an astronaut. Even though we're not thirty I have a feeling we're probably too old to start on that path."

She brought her hands up to the table, where she rubbed one thumb with her other thumb and forefinger. After appearing to pinch herself, she pressed her lips together. "It's...well."

"Yeah?" he said softly.

She pressed her palms flat down onto the table and took a deep breath. "I'd like to open my own fitness center someday."

"That's brilliant!" he said with a grin. "You definitely should."

Her shoulders slumped. "Only I don't know anything about running a business, or managing, or anything like that, so it probably won't happen."

He leaned forward, reaching across the table to pick up her hand and squeeze it. "Maybe you don't now, but you can learn how to do it, yeah? People do that all the time. My dad didn't have a degree in business or anything but he figured it out. Now look at him."

"Right, but...your dad is so clever."

"And so are you."

His mates never needed this sort of encouragement, this sort of directness. They were blokes who preferred strong elbow jabs as a show of emotional support. Except Remus, but he tended to play this role for James, and almost never vice versa.

It was nice to play this role, actually. It was so simple: she needed to hear it, and he could tell her.

Isabella met his gaze, her eyebrows drawn together, looking rather pained. "You're so kind to me, James, and I don't—I don't deserve it."

"You do, though. Not because you're a good person—which you absolutely are, let me be clear—but because everyone deserves to be treated well."

From the start she'd made him feel comfortable. She'd made him feel accepted and trusted and capable. And that was the magic of Isabella, who had not nearly enough kindness for herself, but a surfeit for everyone else.

He'd been so clear with her this whole time that she was the one, that he'd have no other and would ultimately choose her. Even when she'd been jealous of Lily, he'd reassured her. It had been true at the time, of course. He hadn't lied about it or anything, it was just…

Things had changed. He'd got to know her better. He'd got to know Lily better. And Isabella…

She wasn't the one for him. She was wonderful and kind and sweet, but he didn't feel a thrill every time he saw her. He didn't have to stay on his toes, trying to keep up with her. He didn't struggle to find new ways to entertain her, not because she demanded it, but because he wanted to.

She wasn't demanding in any positive or negative sense. If he got together with Isabella, he'd stay the same. They'd get married and have kids and he'd try to talk her out of Sunday dinners with her family. She might get him to try yoga or something, but not much beyond that. They'd sit and watch Arsenal matches and have the same opinions.

He'd told Lily he didn't know what he wanted beyond marriage and family. This, again, had not been a lie at the time.

But he did know, now.

He knew that he wanted the sort of relationship he had with Lily. With someone who'd sussed him out from the get-go, with someone who'd give him fries when he needed it, but also a piece of her mind.

That brilliant, clever, cheeky mind.

No, he didn't want to be with Isabella that way. They could be friends, yeah, but that was about it. Surely she'd come to see the sense of that in the end.

He just had to get her into the fantasy suite as soon as possible to get this over with.

They moved onto other topics during their too-fancy dinner. Honestly, everything was so dressed up and Presented in Artistic Ways that he didn't even know what he was eating half the time. He wasn't about to give the French what they wanted and ask what nonsense they'd made. Instead he ate what tasted good—which was to say, very little—and left the rest on his plate.

After a dessert that James could both identify and enjoy despite its origins—creme brulee—he took hold of Isabella's hand across the table again.

It was time to start the hard part.

Christ, it was going to be miserable to make this woman unhappy.

He took a deep breath and steeled himself. This was for the best.

"Isabella Marks," he said, forcing himself to make eye contact. "Would you join me in the fantasy suite?"

She looked back at him, her brown eyes wide, candlelight playing across her face.

Her lips pressed together.

A furrow formed on her brow.

She swallowed, looked past him, and said, "I'm sorry."

He stared at her.

Then he checked over his shoulder—no threatening Rita or anything besides Bozo there—and looked back at her.

"Er," he said. "Is that...a no?"

"Yes," she said, gripping his hand tightly. "I mean, yes it's a no, and I can't—I'm so, so sorry."

Agonized was not the expression he'd hoped to inspire in her tonight. Not yet, anyway. Maybe after the whole "I'm sorry I prefer Lily" bit, but that would really induce more hurt than agony, than looking torn as she did now.

"Ah," he said, feeling rather like the chair had been pulled out from beneath him. "I...I see." He shook his head and brought his other hand up to surround hers on both sides. "No, that's a lie, I don't—please," he said. "I just—I would really, really like it if you'd come in. For like. A bit, even." He swallowed. "Please."

She shook her head furiously and slipped her hand out of her grip. "I can't," she said. "I can't."

She shoved her chair back and flew out of her seat, her long hair trailing behind her as she disappeared out of their private room.

He kept watching the door where she'd gone, like she'd come back any second.

Surely Rita would force her to go into the suite. After all, the reversal of choice at the end would play better if they implied Isabella at least made out with him first.

But Isabella didn't come back.

The door stayed shut.

A low whistle came from behind him.

He turned around to see Bozo shaking his head and standing up, head away from his camera.

"Wow," said Bozo. "Didn't see that coming."

This, James felt, as he had the horrifying realization that he'd have no more private chances to reveal his intentions to Isabella, was rather an understatement.

---

It transpired that Euphemia had been mistaken, because Sirius Black could not keep his hands to himself.

That was less of a problem for Lily, and more an issue for the good people of Paris, to whom he persisted in waving grandly from the carriage like he was a foreign dignitary on an official visit.

Lily tried to get him to stop—whilst laughing, which hurt her cause—but Sirius merely redoubled his efforts and instructed her to "wave to the peasants, they have so little to enjoy."

He was also genuinely chuffed to be attending the ballet, which was a showcase performance from a highly esteemed dance company that Beatrice probably would have known about, though Lily had never heard of them before.

"I wouldn't have bothered coming if I hadn't wanted to, not even for Euphemia," Sirius explained as they took their promised box seats, indicating to his neatly-pressed tuxedo, "nor would I have dressed up. You're a knockout in that dress, by the way."

He wasn't wrong there, but Lily sighed heavily anyway. "I know you think it's funny to get fresh—"

"On my honor, it was a perfectly innocent compliment," he cut in, and whipped a pair of opera glasses from an inside pocket. "I prefer my women a little less classy, and besides, you seem like too much work."

"Work?"

"That's what I said."

"What do you mean, 'work?'"

"I mean you seem like one of those girls who'd do nice things for a bloke you were seeing," he said, sounding half-bored, already scanning the crowd with his opera glasses, "like cooking, or taking care of them when they're sick, or supporting their dreams, and then I'd need to do nice things back and just...nah." He waved a dismissive hand. "Too much effort."

"That's—" She groped around for something to be offended about, and came up empty-handed. "That's a strangely nice compliment, actually."

He shrugged, then handed her the glasses, pointing at something on the other side of the theatre. "That bloke over there is picking his nose."

"What?"

"Eighth row of the stalls, right by the wall. Blue suit."

Lily raised the glasses to her eyes and scanned the crowd until she found the culprit, who looked to be on a very determined excavation mission.

"Oh, God," she said, pulling a face. "Oh, Jesus. And in public? Holy shit."

"Nose-pickers drive you to blaspheme? What kind of Irishwoman are you?"

"What do you think he's looking for up there?" she asked, and Sirius snorted. "His car keys? His wallet?"

"His dignity?"

"Somebody ought to tell Rita," said Lily seriously. "That is a prime candidate for bachelorhood next year if ever I saw one."

That set Sirius to laughing in earnest.

It turned out that her companion could be wonderful, witty company when he set his mind to being amiable. He was genuinely interested in the event, and knew a lot of fascinating facts about the ballet that he would share with her as they applauded between performances.

The dancing was as beautiful as she could have hoped, though Lily found herself fidgeting a little by the end of the night and enjoying the music—which was so often emotive and moving—much more. Her hand never seemed to be without a glass of something bubbly and delightful, and it seemed only polite to indulge.

She also met several pretentious gits during intermission, which gave her and Sirius the chance to laugh heartily at all the pretentious gits when they took their seats for the second act.

All things considered, it was one of the better nights out that Lily had ever experienced. She left the theatre drunkenly convinced that she loved Euphemia Potter dearly, and would hug her tight at the next available opportunity.

The hotel was so close that they walked back after the ballet, with a champagne-plied Lily taking the lead, having taken her heels off and launched into a series of slightly unsteady twirls and skips.

"I reckon I could be a ballerina," she called over her shoulder, bouncing on her bare feet, her shoes swinging haphazardly from where she'd hooked the straps on two fingers. "I mean, very very possibly, if I wasn't nearly thirty."

"Yes, you're a real paragon of grace," said Sirius dryly.

Lily ignored him, humming under her breath, engrossed in pulling off her debut ballet performance with no formal training, and trying to avoid stepping on wayward stones and rubbish. Sirius had taken his phone out and was subtly filming her in the hopes that she'd fall over, and he obviously thought she hadn't noticed, but she had.

She didn't care. She was drunk in Paris, and she looked incredible in her fancy new dress. Several strangers had told her as much at the theatre, and that might have had something to do with the fact that Sirius kept introducing her as the Duchess of Winchester, but she figured she had charms enough to merit some genuine admiration.

"I'd probably fall prettily," she murmured.

"What was that?"

"I said I'd probably fall prettily," she repeated loudly, and spun in a circle. "I am pretty, y'know. I know that. No point pretending I don't so people will tell me all the time."

"Funny," said Sirius, "you share my principles on the matter."

"James tried to tell me, this one time. He was like, you're obviously super gorgeous, and I was like, I know, you clown." She'd thought about that moment a lot since. "What did that old bloke tell me during intermission?"

"Comme tu es belle."

"Comme tu es belle," she echoed. "Can you speak French?"

"I'm not fluent, but I manage."

"Languages weren't my thing at school. Except for English, but you don't learn that like a language because it's about opinions and stuff." She paused, considering this. "It worries me, that does. I think I should learn how to speak to people I meet when I go traveling next year, but I'm going to so many countries that it seems impossible, and I'm so crap at languages and that's a problem, y'know?"

"I don't think the residents of Ho Chi Minh City are going to take offence if you can't speak Vietnamese."

"But that's the thing, I want to go to these places and learn all about the culture, but I don't want to go there knowing nothing and accidentally offend anyone, so like, I keep thinking I should learn it all first, but then what do I learn while I'm there? And do people mind if I ask questions? I wanted to ask Euphemia about India but I didn't know if I'd offend—"

"You wouldn't. She and Fleamont go there a few times a year, and they're cool about—"

"Wait," she said, halting in her tracks. She turned to face Sirius and held one hand up to stay him, even though he'd also stopped walking. "Wait, wait, wait. James's dad is called Fleamont?"

"Yup."

"That's..." She caught herself. It would be humiliating if she was outrageously insensitive right after talking about her fear of her own ignorance. "That's not an Indian name, right?"

"Nah, it's a 'fuck knows' name."

"But that's…" Her jaw dropped. "Who would do that to an innocent baby?"

"Par for the course with that family," said Sirius, shrugging. He dropped his phone to waist height, evidently bored of filming her, and started to scroll through something. "James obviously hasn't told you what his middle name is."

"What's his middle name?"

Sirius shook his head. "Couldn't possibly share that, Evans. It's his deepest, darkest secret and he takes it far too seriously to fuck around. He'd be furious if I told you what it is. Even Remus and Pete don't know."

Lily didn't know who Pete was, or rather vaguely thought she might have. "Tell me."

"No."

"Tell me."

"Oh no, what a hard line of questioning you've taken," said Sirius, speaking in monotone. "I have no choice but to crack."

"Well, why even bring it up, if you're going to leave me hanging like that? I deserve to have something to make fun of after what he's put me through. This is inordinate cruelty and I won't stand for it," she protested, and briefly considering stamping her foot to emphasize her point, but remembered she was barefoot just in time.

"Christ," said Sirius, with a derisive snicker. "You sound just like him when he's having a fit over noth—"

He stopped talking. Frowned down at his phone.

Then he threw back his head and let out a sharp, ringing bark of a laugh, followed by several more, his shoulders shaking, waxy white throat exposed to the air.

"What?" said Lily, completely nonplussed, when he eventually calmed down enough to start typing. "What's so funny?"

"Text from Remus," he said, still chortling as he tapped out a response. "James offered Marks the keys to the fantasy suite, but she turned them down and took off."

Lily's stomach gave a quick, raucous leap, and she was seized by a mad urge to cackle like a supervillain.

Instead, she forced her hands to her sides, and her face into an unassuming expression.

"I'm sure it's not a big deal," she said airily. "Maybe she's saving herself for marriage and didn't want to be tempted."

"Urgh, of course. She seems like the type," said Sirius in disgust, then looked up from his phone with a knowing eyebrow crooked. "You all right, Duchess?"

"There's nothing wrong with waiting—"

"Not in theory, but—"

"Just because you couldn't wait five minutes to jump into bed with Charlene—"

"Deflection, thy name is Evans," Sirius accused, grinning widely. "How are you feeling about this shocking new development? Happy? Excited? I bet you're fucking thrilled."

Lily was happy, in a fickle, fleeting, drunken kind of way that she knew would dissipate when she sobered up and accepted that Isabella's refusal likely had no bearing on her eventual relationship with James. Luckily, she could explain her smile away by referencing the wonderful day she'd just experienced, or by pointing out the comedy in Sirius and Remus having both gotten laid over the course of the competition while the actual bachelor was likely to come out at the end as backed-up as a born-again virgin.

Instead, she opted to lie. "I'm not even thinking about it."

"Aren't you?"

"Not a bit. And as a matter of fact," said Lily, "what I was thinking—halt the presses—is that you're an okay bloke, Sirius Black, and I believe we shall be mates after tonight."

"Mates," said Sirius slowly, his lips pulling to the side, brow furrowing, as if he was giving serious consideration to the full implications of the word. "Does that mean I'll have to help you move or give you lifts to the airport or remember your birthday?"

"No."

"Then I'll take it," he agreed, his free hand extending out towards her. "Mates it is."

"Mates it is," said Lily, and shook on it.

She went to bed that night in an excellent mood and woke up, remarkably fresh, to the news that a mysterious benefactor—obviously Euphemia—had arranged for a morning of pampering in the hotel salon and spa. Lily spent her morning having her face slathered in beautifully-scented creams and being massaged with hot stones into a miniature coma.

The morning's activities—including a whim-inspired haircut that saw Lily emerge from the salon with several inches gone and soft, loose waves that ended just below her chin—took her all the way to lunch, which she missed because she was pulled aside to prepare for her date.

"I didn't approve that haircut," Rita said when Lily was brought to her, and practically shoved her into the elevator, "but I don't have time to discuss it. I have to leave and get James shortly, so dress for an active afternoon and be downstairs in an hour to meet the crew."

To Lily's mind, an active afternoon meant shorts, trainers, and the barest amount of makeup she could manage without prompting Rita to lose her mind and attack her with a stick of lipgloss, and that suited her perfectly. She got ready in fifteen minutes, spent the other forty-five eating overpriced peanuts from the minibar, and climbed into the car with her good mood no less diminished.

In a completely unsurprising development, she found herself waiting for James and his usual entourage—his mother, one of his host mates, and a five-man film crew, standard fare for a romantic date, really—at the Eiffel Tower. This was somewhat better than a deer park and infinitely preferable to a hot, stinky, mosquito-infested riverbank.

Minutes later, a sleek black car pulled up a few yards away and Rita emerged with her usual clipboard in hand. She threw a look of deep distaste at the wire mesh fences that surrounded the base of one of the tower legs before stepping aside to let Remus, James, and Euphemia clamber out after her. It was like a chic, Parisian clown car, only not, because Lily hated clowns, whereas she was very fond of three out of four of these people.

James's eyes found hers as soon as he stepped out, his brows raised slightly as if in question. She could tell that he was tentatively trying to gauge her mood, which was fair—she never exactly made things easy for him by withholding her thoughts on camera—but he had nothing to fear from her today. It would have been an insult to her first trip abroad to waste her time being sullen.

She smiled at him, throwing in a cheery wave, and his whole body seemed to relax before he walked over, the cameras already zeroing in on them both.

They were certainly attracting some funny looks from the tourists.

"I see being in France hasn't drained you of your will to live quite yet," she said as he approached her.

He sent her a faint smile, one hand carding through his hair as he took in the sight of her, his eyes lingering. "I was hardly about to let the bastard French drive me to death by baguette."

Lily had a sudden mental image of James being prodded off the plank of a pirate ship by a scurvy cur wielding a large baguette like a sword, and the thought made her laugh.

It really had made her happy to learn that he'd had a good time at pirate golf.

"Look at you, bearing up under great hardship," she said fondly, so he'd know she wasn't making fun of him. "You're like human kevlar, Potter."

"I've endured most of this show, which is saying something. Might even be worse than being in France—haven't decided yet." He nodded at her. "You've endured, too, it looks like. I can't believe the sea witch made you cut your hair."

"Oh." She reached up to finger the ends of her hair, her smile sliding from her face. "Does it not look—no, I decided on this. Thought it would be pretty."

"Oh, shit, sorry. It looks amazing, actually, I just made an assumption like the classic ass."

"I'll give you a pass just this once on account of France, but come on, Potter, you should know better than to think I'd blindly follow her orders."

"I really should've known better. Honestly. It's just...it's been a weird couple of days. France has put everyone in a mood."

"I'm not in a mood," she pointed out, and paused, tugging her mouth to the side. "I mean, there is a general mood, but that mood is strongly positive. The other day when the plane landed, I was so happy to be here that I actually cried, and I've had, like, so much pain au chocolat, and yesterday was the most magical day you could imagine." She sighed happily. "So, you know, not everyone."

He smiled properly then. "I like seeing you happy. Even if I have to be in France right now to do it."

Her heart rate skyrocketed, a telling warmth spreading all the way from her chest to her face.

A few days ago, Lily would have given him shit for saying things that could so easily be construed as romantic, but that Lily had been pessimistic and jealous and confused, and though she was still jealous and confused, she was also in France. Lily was determined to be fun in France, and James was probably smarting after his date with Isabella and didn't deserve to have her ire added to the pile.

She didn't think she'd ever accepted a compliment from James—just accepted it, no questions asked—without being compelled by the urge to come up with a smart remark afterwards.

"Well, that's...thank you," she said, flushed and fluttery and looking anywhere but directly into his eyes because he was smiling at her like he knew how she felt and she was making a fool of herself. "Good. Great. I was actually going to say that I like seeing you happy too, which is why I hope you can be—happy, I mean, at least for today. I know we're in France, but I don't think I'd have any fun if I thought you were miserable."

He ducked his head, but his smile didn't disappear. "I have...I have a good feeling about today. Or I want to, anyway. Could be self-delusion. That's definitely happened recently."

"What do you mean—" she began, but she was prevented from questioning further by a gentle clearing of the throat from Remus, who had a special gift for interrupting politely that Lily wished to learn from him.

"I'm very sorry to interrupt what seems to be a lovely chat," he said, stepping forward with a small smile. He looked as dapper as ever in his smart grey suit. Beatrice had snagged a good one. "But perhaps you'd like to know what you'll be doing today?"

"If anyone on this show knew a single thing about either of us, we'd be queueing for Pirates of the Caribbean in Disneyland right now," said Lily, "but this will do, I suppose."

"Ooh, can we do that instead?" James said. "I'll pay for admission if we can go there right now."

"Unfortunately not," said Remus, grinning, and gestured to the towering structure behind them as if either of them needed any reminder that it was there. "Today, you will be ascending to the second level of the world famous Eiffel Tower before taking a zipline to the bottom and later sampling a selection of cheeses—"

"Wait?" Lily interrupted—impolitely, as she did not have Remus's gift—her heart leaping into her throat. "Did you just say we're taking a zipline?"

Remus nodded. "Indeed, I did."

"Oh my God," she said breathlessly, touching a hand to her heart. "Oh my God. Are you fucking serious?"

"Language!" Rita cried predictably.

"I get to zipline off the Eiffel Tower? Like, for real? Like, when I get back to England, someone's going to ask me what I did abroad and I can tell them that I casually ziplined? In Paris? Off the Eiffel Tower?"

"On principle," James commented, "I refuse to say anything positive about this hellscape of a country. That said, holy shit."

"Holy shit is bloody right!" Lily cried, bouncing on the balls of her feet. "That's—that's real life spy stuff, that's incredible, that's like superhero—oh my God." She grabbed hold of James's arm, gazing up at his handsome face with wide, excited eyes. "I'm going to be like Ladybug!"

"I'm not familiar with insects that slide down the Eiffel Tower, but I guess they could?"

"No, not the actual insect, I meant Miraculous Ladybug," Lily explained, laughing, and gave his arm a squeeze. "You know, Ladybug, the superhero from the cartoon? Zips around Paris? She's got like, a magic yo-yo and a red bodysuit with black spots, and her partner in crime-fighting is a cat—I mean, not a literal cat, but that's his costume because he's Chat Noir and he's got these adorable cat ears—and they're in love but they don't know they're in love?"

He'd tilted his head slightly at some point during her rambling explanation of the show, but a corner of his mouth had pulled back in a half-smile. "I'm afraid I can't endorse any show set in France, but it does sound interesting."

"Well, you should make an exception for this because you are missing out on the greatest two-person love square to ever grace television," said Lily gravely, but slipped back into another smile immediately. "See, in real life, Ladybug is Marinette, and Marinette's in love with Adrien, but Adrien's in love with Ladybug, and it's just ridiculous, honestly, and every time they save the day they say, 'pound it!'" She dropped his arm and mimed bumping fists with her own hands. "And it's so cute, and I know I'm a twenty-eight-year-old woman but I am profoundly obsessed and make all of my friends watch it with me."

"If anyone could persuade me," he told her, "it'd be you."

"I mean, yeah, because the boy superhero is a cat, and he's got mad hair—not quite as nice as yours because his is blonde, but still, I figured that'd be right up your alley."

Remus raised a hand. "Again, I hate to interrupt, but the zipline awaits."

Some distance away, Rita was glaring so intently that she might have been at risk of straining her eyes.

Right. Of course. She probably couldn't air Lily's excitable musings about another television show.

The good people who ran the Eiffel Tower had evidently been paid quite a lot of money for their trouble, for Lily, James, and the rest of the crew were steered ahead of the waiting crowds and given an elevator to themselves. Mercifully, Rita stayed on the ground with Remus and Euphemia, citing a need to get set up at their next destination. She sent them up with only the silent cameraman from paintballing, a sound guy Lily didn't know, and Peter.

"So," James said, as the elevator began its ascent and Paris started to sink beneath their eyes. "Glad to finally get to see some of the city?"

Lily looked up at him curiously. "Didn't your mum tell you that she brought me to the Louvre yesterday? Even the sea witch knows about it. She had to clear it with her."

He shook his head slightly. "Can't say I'm surprised. My mum's always—well."

"She had us ferried about in a horse-drawn carriage," Lily recalled, smiling to herself, "and showed me all of her selfie poses, which were fabulous, then she took me shopping and basically forced me into—I mean, to say that it's the most beautiful dress I've ever seen would be an understatement. I felt like a princess wearing it. Even Sir—" She clamped her mouth shut. Rita only knew about Lily's morning excursion, as she was back at the hotel and sleeping by the time they'd gotten back from the ballet. "Anyway, it was really kind and generous of her."

He drummed his fingers against his leg, seemingly lost in thought for a moment, his lips quirked. Then he said, "You know when your mum is right about something, and she's been right for a long time, and you eventually have to admit she's right after all, but you really don't want to just because she's going to be so bloody smug about it?"

"I mean, yes. Of course I do. You've met my mother—she's hardly shy about doling out opinions."

"Yeah," he said. "That's what I thought." He sighed deeply. "My mum's going to be insufferable after this is all over. But I am glad you haven't been shut up in the hotel on your first trip abroad, which would be pretty torturous. Possibly even from a legal standpoint."

"Why is she going to be insufferable?" Lily asked, unsure of how the two points were connected. "Is it because I didn't believe her when she told me the Mona Lisa was overrated? Because it sort of is, honestly. Much smaller than I thought it would be."

"Another French letdown," he said absently. After a chime went off, the elevator doors opened in front of them. "I'll tell you afterwards."

They were taken through a quick safety demonstration by a rangy bloke named Julian who James kept rolling his eyes at, undoubtedly because he was so smug and French. When it came time for one of them to be fitted into a harness, James stepped back and gestured grandly towards the raised metal platform.

"Ladybugs first," he told her.

She grinned at him. "I'd call you a gentleman, but I know you're just afraid of what the safety helmet will do to your hair."

"As always, your perceptions are dead accurate," he said with a smile. "Now harness up, Ruby Raptor—the civilians at the bottom need saving."

"Can't leave the innocent public in peril," she agreed, and tapped the side of her nose. "See you on the other side, Jack."

It didn't take long for Julian to get her situated in the harness. After that, she had time for a thumbs-up from James and a squeaked, "Good luck!" from Peter, then she lifted her feet and launched herself into the air.

It felt extraordinary.

Her body knifed through the sky like a bird's, and Lily felt as free and weightless as one of their ilk. The sun was on her back and the city of Paris spread out beneath her feet, and it was amazing. Singular. She'd never done anything like this before—she'd spent her whole adult life working and saving, preparing for the day when she could pack up and leave and have an adventure, finally.

For all of the crap she'd put up with since she'd joined the show, and even knowing how shit it would be when the entire country watched her fall for someone who liked another girl, Lily had done something different, at least. She'd been to Paris. She'd shot a ridiculous romance novel cover. She'd found a smart, brilliant, wildly fun best friend.

That was certainly something.

She came to a jerking halt at the end of the line, laughing, her feet swinging in the air several feet above the ground, before being slowly pulled towards a raised platform by another man wearing safety gear. Rita was already standing close by, gesturing for Lily to hurry, as if Lily had any control over the proceedings when she was suspended from a harness in mid-air and safety measures had to be taken.

Once Lily had been taken out of her harness and left the platform, Rita pointed to a marquee some fifty feet away on the Champ de Mars. "We've set up the cheese tasting over there," she said. "Wait for James to finish and bring him over. Bozo will stay with you."

Then she turned and tottered away on her black suede heels, adjusting her headset beneath her beret. It was unfortunate that Rita had chosen to pair it with a black-and-white striped shirt. She could not have looked more like a stereotype if she'd slung a chain of garlic bulbs around her neck, and was attracting disparaging glares from the locals.

"Is your name really Bozo?" Lily asked the cameraman, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet.

Bozo shook his head sadly. "It's Brian, but she says that's too hard to remember."

"You need a new job, mate."

Bozo shrugged, looking utterly defeated, and pointed towards the tower. "Your boy's on his way."

Once James had landed and been extracted from his harness and bits of safety gear, Bozo paused to listen to some instruction through his headset, then gave Lily the thumbs-up to approach him. The blood was still pounding in Lily's veins from the thrill of having hurtled through the air at such a speed, and she practically flew over to meet him, coming to a halt directly in front of him as he was ruffling up his hair.

"You good?" she asked. "No immediate feelings of nausea? Hair all fine?"

He caught her eye and seemed to get stuck there, struck not dumb but certainly something. "I feel incredible," he told her.

On a whim, she reached out and slipped her hand into his, knowing that he wouldn't mind, that he'd thread their fingers together immediately. They'd racked up quite a history of hand-holding, her and James. It probably should have felt wrong or unnatural, but it never did.

"Even in France, I'm a guaranteed good time," she said, smiling up at him. "Now, come and eat some fancy cheese with me, because that's exactly what your stomach needs after an adrenaline hit."

He looked down at their intertwined hands and squeezed. "Lead the way, Ruby."

Lily didn't turn around at once, but took a couple of steps backwards and pulled him with her, her gaze caught on his face. He moved obediently along at her urging, staring unblinkingly back at her, until she felt herself redden and had to turn away.

She and James had been forced into close quarters on so many occasions—shoved into fairy-lit loveseats at parties, sent on excursions to rivers and parks—but this was the first time that being with him felt anything like a real, honest-to-goodness date. There was a difference in James today, a softness, or a keenness, or something in the way he was looking at her—she didn't know what it was, but she liked the way it felt.

She wanted to believe that it was real, just him and her in a strange, dreamlike otherworld where there was no Rita, no stupid reality television show, no cameras and no other girl he preferred to Lily, waiting quietly in the wings and preparing to snatch him back away from her when all of this was over.

Maybe this was what Paris could do to a person's head.

"I'm having a really nice time," she said as they walked towards the tent, hand-in-hand with a man who made her heart race, feeling as if she might be poised to babble if she wasn't careful. That would be embarrassing, considering all the shit she gave him about keeping up with her. "Why do you think they decided on cheese-tasting? Do you think it's because I stole that cheese from you that one time? Do they think it's our thing? Do we even have a thing?"

"Obviously they chose cheese tasting because one of them is poisoned, and it requires the skill of Jack Diamond and Ruby Raptor to figure out which one before the prime minister samples them at a very important banquet."

"Little do they know of the years we've spent slowly building up an immunity to all manner of poisons," Lily solemnly agreed, glancing sideways at him. "Honestly, though, that idea makes more sense than cheese-tasting as a romantic date activity. Would you kiss me after I'd shoveled down a chunk of stinky Roquefort?"

"Of course," he said, as though it were obvious. "Because I would already have the taste in my mouth so who cares?"

"No, you wouldn't, because that would require you to eat a French cheese, which you're dead set against on principle."

"If it came down to it where I had to eat a disgusting French cheese to kiss you, I'd do it."

Of course he wants to kiss you, was her first, flighty, ludicrously nonchalant thought.

Then her heart bottomed out of her chest.

Her feet had stopped moving of their own accord, it seemed, so Lily let go of his hand. For the first time since the day she'd climbed out of that very first limo—which seemed like a lifetime ago—she looked directly into the camera that was trailing them for several long moments, as if by doing so she could furnish herself with answers.

The lens looked blankly back at her, offering her absolutely nothing.

She turned around and stared at James. "What?"

He looked down at his shoes, scratching at his head. "Oh, er. That slipped out. I mean." He dropped his hand to his side. "I mean I'm not sorry, but I was trying to wait until later—but I don't know why. I guess I just thought that I had to—I dunno, build up to it, or something."

Build up to what build up to what build up to what?

Lily never normally had a problem thinking of a comeback. She was good with words, quick and sharp, and blessed with a brand of wit that made conversation easy, but James Potter had succeeded where so many others had failed, and cleared her mind completely of anything that might have been helpful to her now.

She hadn't a fucking clue what she was supposed to say.

"Then again," he went on, "it's not like patience has ever been anything like a strength of mine. Did you know I got kicked out of the school choir for always coming in too early? Anyway." He cleared his throat and dragged his eyes up to hers. "The thing is, Lily, I… I really don't know how to say it except to just, like, out and say it? Remus probably had a perfect speech prepared for Bea, but I'm not—and you know I'm not. I mean. The thing is…" He let out a breath. "I fancy you. Like I really, really fancy you. There. I said it."

This isn't really happening, said a loud, stubborn, angry part of her brain.

Of course it is, kiss him immediately, said another.

"No," she said stupidly.

His brow furrowed. "No?"

"You shouldn't—don't say things like that," she said blankly. "You can't, because—because you like Isabella. Better." It tore at her to say that. "You like Isabella better and you've always liked her better and that's why you wouldn't tell me and I knew that was why."

"I—I did like her better. At one point. And I couldn't—I didn't want to hurt her because I'd said things to her—you know. So I had to—it was weird, and complicated, and I couldn't tell you until I knew… And now I do. So, the thing is...well. You were the one who told me," he said, "that I could change my mind."

Her pulse hadn't even properly slowed from the zipline, and now it was buzzing with an intense, frenetic kind of madness. "You changed your mind? Just like that?"

"Not—not like in an instant, or like—it just...happened. I know you were angry on our last date because you thought I was—messing around, or whatever, and I'd said I wouldn't—but I wasn't putting it on in front of your mum, I was just—I was saying what I thought. Which is a lot, specifically of you. I just—I couldn't tell you yet."

"Yet," she repeated, the word clunking in her brain like an anchor dropped from the side of a ship. "Yet, because...oh, God." A horrible, ugly fear sprang from a dark recess of her mind. "Tell me this isn't because of last night, because I know you tried to give her keys, and I know she turned you down and—"

"No no no, that's not—it's not like that at all. I asked Isabella to go to the fantasy suite so I could tell her—well. I can tell her now and pretend like they won't cut this, but—"

He strode the few steps to one of the cameras, where he stared directly into the lens. "Look, Isabella. Last night—I was asking you to go into the fantasy suite so I could tell you things weren't going to work out between us. That I liked—that I liked Lily more, and that I was so sorry I let you keep thinking I was going to pick you, but I needed—I needed to be sure. Because I didn't want to take it back and then take it back again, and like...this show is bloody insane, yeah? Because I had to wait until then to tell you because I didn't want to let you down in front of millions of people, but then you didn't—and now I have no idea how I'm going to tell you…yeah."

He came back to Lily, looking sheepish. "Anyway. That's what...that's what happened."

Lily had wanted, so badly, to hear every inelegant word that was tumbling out of his mouth. She'd even imagined it happening, one too many times.

Now that she was getting what she wanted, all she wanted to do was shove it away from her in a blind panic, like a hug that had turned suffocating and invasive.

She wasn't sure if she didn't believe him or if she simply didn't want to, because if all of this went south, and if Isabella Marks snapped her fingers and he jumped at her summons, not believing him made her clever. It made her a woman who wasn't so soft that she'd fall for a lie because it was a lie she wanted to hear.

The latter would make her pathetic. Martyred. Dissected to pieces on social media, publicly scorned and widely pitied. She'd be marked as the girl who got steamrolled for the rest of her life, and it didn't matter if ninety-nine out of a hundred people knew that she'd been there to write an article, there'd always be the one who'd look at her and think her stupid.

Isabella had said that Lily understood James better than she did, and for her part, Lily had agreed with her. She still felt a connection to him that she couldn't really explain, and in all of the confusion and awkwardness that had come with falling for him, she had been able to take comfort in her belief that at least he was a good guy, at least it wasn't a matter of poor taste on her part.

He and Isabella were both right—Lily did have an uncanny perceptiveness when it came to James, and more than that, she trusted him, which left her with only one option.

But if she was wrong…

Fuck, it would hurt so much if she was wrong.

"I don't know what you expect me to do right now," she said finally, after a very long moment of silence. "Throw myself into your arms? I'm not a backup option, okay? What am I supposed to think when she turns you down and suddenly you're telling me all of this? I'm not a consolation prize."

"No," he said, smiling faintly. "You're not. Not to me."

A band of warmth settled around her heart and squeezed.

God, she was going to give in. She was going to give in so easily, and then he'd kiss her and hold her and smile at her like that a few more times, and she'd go and fall in love with him like a fool, and then where would she be?

"Don't—don't do that," she said, shaking her head. "Don't be cute when I'm having a crisis."

"Don't be cute, don't mess around, don't tell your mum nice things about you—what am I supposed to do, then, Evans?"

"I don't bloody know!" she cried, and threaded her fingers through her hair. "Why do you always expect me to have all the answers, Potter? I don't even know what I'm supposed to do."

He just kept smiling at her, all adorable and fond and much too attractive for his own good.

"What?" she demanded.

"Nothing. Just—you're really dramatic. Not that I'm not into that."

"Oh, I'm dramatic?" She wasn't going to smile, she wasn't going to—fuck, she already was smiling. "The bloke who sank to the floor in the airport and threw a tantrum over France is calling me dramatic? That's the position you're going to take, you tragic rich boy?"

"Please note that I never implied I wasn't just as bad."

"You're more dramatic. I'm normally a lot calmer than this, but you've been a terrible influence."

"You're the one voluntarily spending more time with my mum, the most dramatic of all."

"Your mum offered to take me into the city and sent me to the ballet in a princess dress," she said. "Quite frankly, she's currently got you beaten out in the romance department."

"Excuse me that I haven't been in a position to do much more than shower you with a month's worth of croissants. Being under lock and key is kinda hampering my game."

"Your mum bought the croissants too, and she—" Lily stopped herself, recalling how he'd checked to see if she was wearing sunscreen at the park, and how readily she'd take that kind of concern over posh, expensive gifts. "Forget that, I'm lying through my teeth." She sighed irritably. "She doesn't have you beat at all."

"Perfect. Glad that's settled." He stepped toward her, bringing his hand toward hers, but not quite touching—a question in a gesture. "Feeling better now?"

"I don't really know, except that I'm still not in the mood to eat bunch of stinky cheeses," she murmured, nudging his hands with her own. He caught them at once, warm fingers lacing through hers, and her heart skipped happily. "Not that I'm going to kiss you on camera. Or ever. I haven't decided yet, so don't go getting ideas."

"Getting? I already had. And you know what they say—you can't kill an idea."

"I could kill you instead," she suggested, "though I'd prefer to do it without so many witnesses around, if you know of any ways to arrange such a thing."

"Well, Ruby," he said, "we are about to go test some poisons, so…"

"Jack," she said pointedly, "are you really going to make me ask for the keys to your bloody suite?"

"Oh," he said, his cheeks tinging pink. "I'm with you now, Ruby. And no, I'd never do such a thing." He cleared his throat. "D'you want—d'you want the keys? I have to ask, for posterity's and Ursula's sakes."

"I mean, I had planned to spend my evening stealing hotel soaps," she said with a roll of her eyes. "But if you insist, I guess I can make an appearance, provided you don't drop dead while I'm there, or everyone will think it was me."

"I don't insist because I'm a gentleman who believes in consent, but you can take all the hotel soaps from the suite. I won't fight you for them at all."

"I feel like we've done more than enough fighting already, thanks." She cocked her head to the side. "I think arguing has been more our thing than cheese, really. Why d'you think that is?"

"Because we trust each other," he said. "Also because we're used to being right and letting everyone know it."

"I do trust you," she said, and let herself smile at him, "and you trust me, which means you can definitely tell me your middle name later, yes? No? Maybe?" She swayed on the spot, swinging his hands gently from side to side. "Yes?"

He froze, his eyes locking with hers and not moving at all. "What?" he said evenly.

"Oh, right. Context. Well, full disclosure, I hung out at the ballet with your best mate last night, and he mentioned that you've got an absolute stinker of a middle name."

James pulled a face. "The betrayal continues," he said. "Lowest of lows, backstabber of backstabbers—"

"In his defense, he wouldn't tell me what it was, and he got at least three amorous ponces off my back—"

"He did?"

"—plus, even if you have the worst middle name in the world, you're really hot, so I'm still going to have sex dreams about you."

"Well, fine," he said, clearly trying not to smile. "So long as that's true…I'll tell you my middle name."

"Your secret's safe with me," she promised.

---

Never in James's twenty-eight years and whatever amount of days he'd been alive had he ever envisioned himself as being anything remotely close to happy while in the cursed land of France.

But then came Lily Evans. Or Ruby Raptor, or Ladybug, or whatever other name he called her… Ever since he'd come flying down the Eiffel Tower, his heart thundering pleasantly in his chest, the wind whipping against his face, free and weightless and completely alive... At first it might have been his body's natural reaction to hurtling through the air from a height that would have killed him under other circumstances. Since he'd landed, though, it had all been Lily.

After Isabella had rejected him soundly, he'd tossed, turned, and agonized all night about what to tell Lily: should he come clean with her about how he felt? Should he continue with Isabella and then ring Lily once the show was over and he'd broken up with Isabella? Should he forget the whole show and sneak onto the Eurostar in the morning and begin a life on the run?

He'd been uncertain until the moment he saw Lily.

Things had a funny way of clarifying themselves around her.

He'd told her how he'd felt. She'd needed some persuading, but that was fair, that was totally fair, and she did eventually believe him and now she knew. She knew how he felt and he knew how she felt and it was the same: a sense of rightness, a shared laugh, a pleasant tightness in the chest that kept repeating yes yes yes this is exactly where you're supposed to be.

He'd never forgive Rita for forcing him to spend the happiest moments of his life in France. But then again, he was never forgiving her for anything, so it didn't really matter.

Although he refused to compliment anything that had come from within French borders, he and Lily devoured the variety of cheeses offered to them. It was kind of their thing, really, which was funny and ridiculous and made both of them grin stupidly. That, and the whole fancying thing.

After restraining himself for ages, he could finally reach out and touch her without immediate remorse for leading her on. So he did. And so did she. They seemed to find all sorts of small ways to ensure contact: elbow nudges and linked hands and knocked knees when sitting. At dinner she kept nudging his foot under the table, which was such a secondary-school level of interaction but it sent a small thrill through him every single time.

He couldn't kiss her, not yet, but soon. So very, very soon but all the same not nearly soon enough.

Every now and then he'd remember his mum was watching all this. If he ever glanced her way, she was starry-eyed and grinning, clutching her hands to her chest.

It was weird.

And it kept on going. The date, and the touching in front of his mum and the cameras, and his mum's pervy watching. Because Rita refused to let them cut their date short. No, she told them, they had to try all the cheeses. Even the disgusting ones.

Then they had to enjoy all three courses of their planned meal at the posh French restaurant selected for them. Not even dessert could be cut short. And it turned out Rita, ever the sea witch, had ordered them a chocolate souffle, the dessert that took the longest amount of time to prepare.

James heavily suspected this was revenge for every moment he and Lily had defied her. In fairness, though, they were providing terrific footage and he could understand from a practical perspective that she wanted it all. Still. It was probably mostly revenge. It was what James would have done.

When they were finally, finally allowed to return to the hotel together, James could hardly hear Rita's instructions to Bozo over the blood pounding in his head.

He took Lily's hand as they exited the car, not letting go even once they stood outside his hotel room door, his mum tactfully left behind in the lobby.

"It feels like I should say something meaningful here," he told Lily, "but I really have a lot on my mind besides things I need to say. I mean, I can say I'm dead relieved my mum's not here for this part, but other than that..."

"You mean you don't have a soliloquy prepared?" said Lily, feigning shock. "What have you been doing with your time?"

"Thinking about kissing you," he admitted, because any sort of wit he had seemed to have floated away.

"You know you could get to that quicker if you just...opened your door, right?"

He did not need to be told twice.

He flung the door open and stepped inside backward, pulling her with him, beaming at her so hard his face hurt. She kicked her foot back to shut the door behind them, making a loud slam that felt extremely appropriate.

Because here they were. At last. Alone.

All cameras were on the other side of the door. All other people were on the other side of the door.

He'd been alone with a girl plenty of times, but he felt like he was sixteen again, alone with Heather Jordan in his room for the first time, with the door closed and clear, mutual expectations of what was coming hanging in the air.

Without breaking eye contact, he closed the single step keeping him from Lily. She matched his footwork, hands still entwined, walking the short distance to the door. He let go of her to slide both hands alongside her face, lightly pushing her back against the door, where it connected with a very soft thud.

A vicious stab of glee shot through him: Rita and Bozo and all those other stalkers could hear them, if they were still outside—and they almost certainly were—but this was not for them. This was for James and Lily alone.

He kissed her.

Collided with her.

The door shifted in its frame as they settled against it, clunking loudly into place, a ricocheting reminder of what they were doing for everyone waiting outside, but James didn't care.

He was kissing her—kissing Lily Evans, and that smart, cheeky, brilliant mouth of hers, those soft, full lips which parted at his urging, tasted him, devoured him with a fervor matched only by his own. His hands moved to slide along her back and hold her firmly in place; she threaded her fingers into his hair to pull him closer, and the hungry little sounds she made were—Christ, if she did that with her tongue again he'd burst.

This was nothing like being sixteen and alone with Heather Jordan.

Kissing Lily was magic, better than paintball, better than the zipline, a firework display for his overworked senses. Kissing her was the electricity jolting through his veins, the raucous pounding in his heart. Kissing her put every other kiss he'd ever had to shame. Kissing her was exactly what James should have been doing all along, exactly what he wanted to keep on doing, perhaps a million more times, which might have gotten him halfway close to enough.

Eventually, tragically, James knew he had to come up for air before he met his end in her arms, so he pulled away with great reluctance, his hands lifting to gently cup her face.

"Well," said Lily, a little breathlessly, "had I any lingering doubts as to your intentions, James Potter, that would have done away with them."

Up close her eyes became even more radiant—stunning, truly, with nuanced and layered shades of green. He'd never been able to appreciate them fully before, not from a distance. Nor had he properly savored the few freckles strewn across her nose, or the curve of her lips, or the flush just beginning to tinge her cheeks.

"Have I told you I fancy you?" he said. "I think so but my mind's not working right right now, so if I haven't: you are a marvel."

"You mentioned it, I think? It's all gone a bit fuzzy, really. This is strange," she added, and tilted her head slightly, gazing past his shoulder at their surroundings, "being alone for once. It's sort of like meeting you for the first time, except I already know you and I think you just ruined me."

"I'm absolutely not telling you to stop talking because I love when you talk, but also I really just want to ruin you for a bit longer, if that's all right."

She gave a little half-shrug as her gaze moved back to his face. "I mean, we've got all night."

With great effort, he pulled his face slightly further away from hers. "So I can't kiss you again right now?"

"Oh, no, I meant—I meant you can," she said, her lovely eyes widening, "you can a lot, as much as you want, because we have the whole night, though we should really talk about things, too."

He did hear what she said after you can a lot, but it dimly registered and filed itself away neatly in the back corner of his brain.

"Okay," he said, and kissed her again. She let out a soft, surprised sound but responded immediately, smiling against his lips.

She liked him. She really liked him.

It hadn't seemed plausible, because Lily was amazing, but she laughed at his jokes and expected his best and wanted him to kiss her a lot.

Not forever, though, as after several deliriously happy minutes, she reluctantly broke away from him.

"Wait," she murmured when he moved in for another kiss. "Wait a minute. I've got—" He pulled away to let her speak, but Lily tugged his head back and kissed him again. "Stuff." Another long, lingering kiss. "To tell you. Important stuff."

She moved her hands from where they'd been tangled in his hair and gave his chest a gentle push as she pulled away from him properly, the back of her head knocking against the door.

He had never been the bloke to be constantly whipping off his shirt, but he felt a deep need to do so now, to grab the hem and tug it up over his hair so he could press his skin against hers.

But she had something important to say.

Important, he told himself, and managed to both step away and keep his shirt on. His heart kept pounding away, but he was at least catching his breath.

"Right," he said, and took several steps into the room and safely away from her. "Okay. Go for it."

"Okay." Lily took a deep breath, her fingers combing through the beautiful mess he'd made of her hair. "So the thing is—" She let out a contented sigh. "Sorry, I'm just—if I'm in any way inarticulate while I explain this, it's just because you're...you, and just unfairly fit, honestly, but there is stuff, I promise."

He shook his hands, bouncing on the balls of his feet. "Yeah, okay. And?"

"Right, so—yes. Do you remember how you said I was wasting myself at my job because I worked in a shop and you couldn't understand why?" She drummed her fingernails against the door. "Well, really you were right about that because I am completely wasted in my job, but I don't actually work in a shop."

James felt the floor drop out beneath him.

She had been holding out on him.

"Oh my God," he said, unable to stop himself from taking a step forward. "You are a secret agent?!"

"No, of course not," she said, with a laugh he'd seemed to surprise out of her. "I'd be a good secret agent, but really—and before I tell you this you should know that in no way have I misrepresented myself. I mean, I was supposed to act all vapid and flirty, but I realized almost immediately that I couldn't not act like myself, and—look, I'm skipping ahead." She shook her head as if ridding it of excess water. "The thing is, James, I'm actually a journalist, and my boss sort of...snuck me onto the show."

Admittedly, undercover journalist was not nearly as cool as a secret agent. Almost nothing was.

That said, it did throw a lot of things into sharp relief. Like why Lily was on this show at all, and why she'd been "working in a shop," and why she hadn't just left after the first couple ceremonies when they hadn't really been interested in each other and James had been so set on Isabella.

It also, however, raised a few questions.

"Wait," he said. "Is Lily Evans your real name? Or is it like Ruby Raptor? Oh my God, don't tell me your real name is Ruby, that'd be too weird."

"No, Lily Evans is my real name," she said, still tapping away at the door, her pianist's fingers drumming a quick, disjointed rhythm against the wood. "They changed it on our website and my boss knows one of the fact-checkers on the show, so he had her approve the bullshit application he wrote for me, and I hated it, honestly. I didn't want to do this, but he's such a dick and he thinks—anyway, I've been stuck here working on this ridiculously thorough Rita Skeeter takedown—"

"You're taking down Rita?" He laughed. He'd thought he couldn't fancy Lily Evans any more than he already did, and then she went and managed it anyway. "Oh hell yes, you're taking down Rita. Vengeance is ours!"

Lily laughed again, sagging back against the door.

"I'm glad you're taking this so well," she said. "I was worried that you might have thought I was being deceitful—I mean I wasn't because I haven't lied about a thing except my job. That was my real mum you met, and I still want to go traveling, and all of that other stuff."

It wasn't hard to believe any of that. She had been so thoroughly herself in every way—or at least she had once she'd given up on being boring for the first couple episodes. Even in the beginning, though, her real self had snuck in here and there. She might have thought she'd be an excellent spy, but she was certainly no award-winning actress.

He approached her again, this time offering out his hands. She took them and he led her into the room, away from the door, where he settled his hands on her waist.

"How could I not take this news well?" he asked, looking down at her and smiling. "You're going to expose this rubbish show for what it is." He paused. "I mean, that is the only enormous secret you were going to reveal, right?"

"Well, now, I don't know," she said, her arms curling around his shoulders. "I might also have been lying about my intention to have sex with some sleazy guy in Santorini."

"This news is shocking. Shocking, I tell you, and a complete and utter surprise."

"Well, there could have been a guy, but someone seems pretty adamant that he wants to come with me, and I'm sort of hoping he's serious about that because I'm still quite set on sex in Santorini as a general concept."

"Hmm. I've also heard rumors that said guy is very adamant about going with you and that he's definitely down for sex in Santorini. Possibly other locations as well. But not on the beach because sand has a habit of getting into extremely uncomfortable places. It's extremely insanitary."

"We really haven't known each other for long enough to decide if we should go traveling together," Lily pointed out. "That said, I'm crazy about you and I really don't care and you should come anyway. My itinerary is pretty flexible in that way."

"Let's see," James said, sending them swaying just a bit, back and forth, "I could stay at my job that I only sort of like while my insanely hot girlfriend travels the world alone...or I could go with her. Yeah, I think I know what I prefer of the two."

"Girlfriend," she said happily, and tipped her head back, exposing her pretty neck to all manner of intoxicating possibilities. "All I came here to do was write an article and now here I am in a hotel suite in Paris, of all places, planning a round-the-world trip with the bloody bachelor. With you." She righted herself, dipping her chin so she could meet his eyes. "Where the hell did you come from?"

"I'd explain where I came from but you already said I talk about my parents banging too much."

"I hope my boyfriend inherited their stamina, in that case. I intend to make good use of it."

"Don't worry. You weren't wrong," he told her as he lowered his face towards hers, "to start the date by complimenting my resiliency."

---

"So," said Lily, later, gazing blankly at the ceiling, "you know how I'm kind of big on self-improvement?"

"I hope this isn't a lead up to a criticism of me, because I was feeling pretty good about that."

"Oh no, it's exactly the opposite. I remain thoroughly ruined and it's entirely your fault."

"Ah, so we're on the same page. Mutually ruined, just how I prefer it."

"Mutually ruined," she agreed, and nudged him with the side of her hand, turning her palm to face upwards. "Put it there."

James didn't slap her palm as instructed, but placed his flat over hers, curling their fingers together.

Lily had been having quite the day.

She'd woken up that morning believing that an afternoon of relative harmony was the best she could have hoped for, and that it'd be an achievement if she and James could make it through their date without one of them starting an argument, but he'd blown her expectations completely asunder. From the moment he admitted that he fancied her, their date became an exercise in careless spontaneity, a series of moments in which Lily told herself not to do something, only to immediately disobey her own orders.

They were good orders, too. Sound, sensible dictates. Things like don't believe him, don't act so smitten, and don't have sex with him, no matter how much you want to.

Dictates were all well and good, but Lily hadn't reckoned on James, who flung himself into wanting her with an ardor that surprised her almost as much as it made her shiver. He wanted to kiss her and touch her all the time, and he was so good at it, and did things to her in the privacy of his suite that were sure to make her spontaneously combust with glee and shame whenever she thought about them.

She might have fashioned an uncannily clear window to the inner workings of James Potter's brain, but he sussed out her body just as fast, which made him damn near impossible to resist.

Resist. As if Lily hadn't done her fair share of instigation. By the time the sun began its daily descent into darkness, she had ignored every single one of her decrees and then some.

"Remind me to thank Beatrice for shipping us to the point of lunacy," she said after a quiet moment, once he'd taken to tracing slow circles on her palm with his thumb, "or seek vengeance against her. I'm not entirely sure. It's a really tough one to call."

"Believe me," James said darkly, "Jack Diamond and Ruby Raptor will have their revenge. It's both of their middle names."

"Actually, Ruby's middle name is—oh." Lily let out a little gasp of air, her eyes widening. "Of course—"

Beside her, James's whole body seemed to stiffen. "Shit."

"You thought I'd forget, didn't you?"

He groaned like he was dying of dysentery, releasing his grip on her to cover his face with both hands.

"I can't believe I almost let that go!" she exclaimed. Laughing, she twisted onto her side to face him, propping her head up with her hand. "Must be all the ruining you did. I'll take that middle name now, if you please."

"Would that I had ruined longer," he lamented.

"Any longer and I wouldn't be able to walk tomorrow. Keep your promise and tell me."

"Right," he said, and pulled his pillow out from under his head and pressed it on top of his face. "My middle name," he said, his voice muffled by his apparent efforts to suffocate himself, "is—" He said a word after is, but the specific sounds of it were lost to the pillow.

"To my face, please," said Lily, and gave the pillow a gentle tug.

Eventually he let her pull it off him, revealing his grimacing face. "It's Oddjob," he said quickly.

Lily blinked at him. "It's wh—"

"So, let's talk about the last episode, yeah?" he carried on loudly. "I'm not worried about us but I need to figure out what to tell Isabella on our date—"

"Don't think that you can distract me, your brilliantly clever girlfriend, with your actual problems," she protested, tossing the pillow to the end of the bed. She dropped her hand to his chest and started to trace a line along his collarbone. "Not that I don't care deeply about those, but Oddjob? As in, hat-throwing Oddjob, my favorite evil stooge?"

"Ye-es," he said, the word stuttering as he shivered beneath her touch. "That one. Anyway, I can't tell Isabella the news in front of my parents—can you imagine? 'This is my mum Euphemia, this is my dad Fleamont, and my new girlfriend is, surprise, not you—'"

"Potter," said Lily firmly, "I'm not just going to forget your middle name in the face of a more pressing issue that I can't in good conscience ignore, so please note that this victory is only temporary." She nudged a little closer to him, and dropped a soft kiss on his shoulder. "That said, I'm all ears."

He reached up to stroke his fingers through her hair. "You're gorgeous, you know? Including your ears."

After everything they'd spent the past few hours doing, it seemed unlikely that James could make her blush by simply touching her hair, but he managed it easily.

He had such a good, loyal heart, and less observant people might have missed that about him.

"I do know, but I like you reminding me," she said, smiling, "and I like that you care about Isabella. She's a good person and there's never been anything sour between us. If you want me to talk to her in private, I will, but I'm guessing you'd rather do it yourself?"

"Thanks, but yeah... This isn't exactly something I can delegate. I'm just—I hate what this is going to do to her self-confidence. You won't see the footage until the show airs, but her family—they're shit. And they make her feel like shit and I think we should go slash their tires or something later on, Jack and Ruby style."

"Jack and Ruby uphold the law, not break it," Lily reminded him gently, "and I think it would be best to leave Isabella to deal with her family because she won't appreciate the intrusion. Anyway, I'm sure she'll get there in the end, it's just—it can be complicated, when it's family. It's really hard to call your relatives out when they're being dicks, and even harder to listen to an outsider when they try to make you see sense about it."

He lifted himself up onto his elbows. "Sounds like you're speaking from experience."

"Oh, well—yes, I suppose. My sister won't speak to me because I called her husband out for being a sexist piece of shit," she explained, trying to sound as if it didn't really bother her. "She's always getting offended and freezing me out for some reason, and normally I bend over backwards to apologize, but I won't this time because I'm done lying to appease her, and she's furious about it."

James balanced on one elbow, his other arm stretching over to pull her down into a brief kiss.

"Gorgeous and morally sound," he said. "Can't say I expected to walk off the show with one of those."

"I assumed you'd be a poster boy for patriarchal bullshit when I met you," she said, responding to his kiss with another, "and look how wrong I was."

"I'm sorry your sister can't see sense. That's miserable."

"It's fine, really. Family aren't always good for you."

He flopped back down onto the bed, smiling faintly. "Well. As far as post-coital conversations go, this one's gone a bit off course. That said, I realize I'm the one who started it by bringing up another woman in bed."

"You did, but that's okay, I'll bang you again later and you can take another stab at it."

"Ah, you truly know the way to my heart." He waggled his eyebrows. "But first I need to ruin the mood the other direction by bringing up the proposal they're expecting me to give in a few days…"