V
The Cure.

-x- Lily Evans & James Potter –x-

'I must be dreaming
Or we're onto something
I must be dreaming
For I don't fall in love lawlessly
I must be dreaming
Or pinch me to waking
So undeniably yours
As long as I'm losing it so completely'

Much to the annoyance of red haired, green eyed Lily Evans it was a Monday.

Merlin, she hated Mondays.

It wasn't so much the fact that it was the start of the week, but more the fact that Mondays entailed the worst set of lessons imaginable: Double Potions with the Slytherins, History of Magic, Arithmancy, Transfiguration and Muggle Studies.

And even worse yet, Mondays at Hogwarts seemed to be the day for things to happen… "things" in this case meaning "highly unusual and quite unwanted events".

She had first obtained this slightly unorthodox opinion of Mondays a few months ago, when in the middle of a Charms class, she had found herself becoming quite fixated with the back of someone's head. The afore mentioned head had become a point of fixation for her, as she had come to discover that she found it most attractive, what with its messy, pitch-black hair and strong, muscular stature. In fact, she had found it almost lust-worthy and spent countless minutes grinning like an idiot as she tried to place the undoubtedly gorgeous face that went with it; that is, she had until its owner had turned around to look at her, and to her utmost horror she'd discovered that it was, in fact, James Potter's head.

Sickened with herself, she had snapped some kind of insult at him, which had not only deeply offended him, innocent as he was, but had also landed her a detention… in fact, her first detention ever.

And the Mondays just kept on getting more and more obscure… Why, just last Monday, she had spent a good hour or so in Transfiguration animatedly chatting with Black and Lupin, Potter's two best-friends, and had even become so thoroughly involved in the conversation as to ask after Potter himself, who had not been present in the class (he'd been injured at a quidditch practice). The reaction gained by this little slip-up had been profound, and now, suddenly, not only was Potter greeting her cheerily in the hallways, but Lupin and Black also, whose entire attitude towards her had changed significantly.

And today? Oh yes, today was worst of all… Not only had she managed to land herself a detention with McGonagall on account of not doing her homework – something unheard of in the six and a half years she'd attended Hogwarts – but she was sitting next to James Potter and enjoying it.

Yes, she knew it was quite unheard of, but nevertheless, the truth needed to be faced… Potter was proving himself to be quite good company. He hadn't once asked her to Hogsmeade, nor had he preened himself once. He hadn't even asked her why she hated him; he'd merely gotten on with his work, and then, at a prompt from Black, who'd been sitting in front of them, had managed to carry on a conversation between her and himself for about ten minutes now, a conversation that she was finding most enjoyable indeed. It was mostly just nonsense: speculation on whether Madam Pince or Madam Pomfrey would be better suited to Filch and childish things such as that, but she was finding herself laughing hysterically and genuinely smiling.

And now, even as the bell rang for lunch, she found herself packing up her things and wandering out to the Great Hall with him, his band of Marauders or whatever they called themselves these days, following along in their wake, jaws slightly ajar.

Lily couldn't help but find him arrestingly interesting when he talked: the way his mouth seemed to stay in a permanent smile, even while he was chatting away, was inexplicably adorable, and – wait. Adorable? Oh dear Merlin, she was becoming one of them. One of those girls… the ones that worshipped the ground he and Black stood on simply because of their physical attributes and arrogant charms.

'So then, he says "oi, Prongs mate, what're you doing?" and I say – wait, Lily, what's wrong?'

Pausing mid-sentence, James looked at her curiously, mistaking the disgusted, shocked look on her face for one that was meant for him and not for herself.

'Wha-? Oh, nothing James, it's nothing.'

It was her turn to look at him curiously now, because his face had instantly lost all of its worry and had split into a smile of pure joy.

'What? What's happened? Did one of your little fan-girls just strip or something?' she asked, glancing around half-expecting to see a topless fourth-year or something of that nature.

'No,' replied James, laughing softly at the crudeness of her question, 'you called me "James"; you've never used my first name before…'

Feeling quite horrible, she smiled weakly.
'Oh… well, I – I should use it more often then, shouldn't I, really?'

'Yes,' he said, still smiling goofily, 'you should… I like the way you say it, it sounds so… nice.'

Normally, this kind of talk would have had her up and running away as fast as she could, stalker-like and deranged-yet-sweet as it sounded, but today, she found herself smiling with pleasure instead. Really, she thought to herself, she'd been too hard on James Potter, after all… nobody had ever said she sounded nice when she talked before.

'We – well, I'm glad,' she found herself stuttering, looking up at him and feeling something jolt in her stomach – something she'd never quite felt before.

'May I escort you to lunch, Miss Evans?' he enquired sweetly, taking her book-bag from her and slinging it over his shoulder before offering her his arm.

Giggling – wait, giggling? Since when did she giggle? – she accepted his offer and walked with him through the entrance of the Great Hall, where Black, Lupin and Pettigrew were already sitting, hoeing into their lunch with indecent enthusiasm.

Well, at least they had been before she and Po-James had walked through the door, arm in arm. Now, they were less indecently stuffing themselves and more staring shamefully at them as she and James walked the length of the Great Hall and sat down on the other side of the long bench.

Laughing along with James at the look on his friends' faces, Lily smiled to herself, and as she leant forward to serve herself some shepherd's pie, she decided that she would have to reconsider Mondays… after all, they could no longer be defined as the day for "highly unusual and quite unwanted events" to happen, could they?

More like, the day for "rather too late dawning realisations ensuing after an attack of the love-bug"… Insane, yes, but after all, what better way to be when realising one is quite in love with James Potter?

A/N: lyrics used - "Must Be Dreaming" by Frou Frou.