Chapter 19: The Potters Marry

It seemed wrong to appreciate the quiet. Moments of peace. Even so, Lily craved this quiet, peaceful moment here, now, with her boyfriend of close to a year.

She couldn't believe they were both graduated from Hogwarts. Nine months on, and she still couldn't quite believe that James Potter was her boyfriend. To think she had once despised him so! It hadn't been without good reason. It made her proud that in seventh year, she had to admit…. James had grown up. Being appointed Head Boy may have had something to do with it, but she also liked to think he had changed for her. To be worthy of her, not just to win her.

They had gotten to talk more deeply with each other on patrol rounds as Head Boy and Head Girl. When he had first asked her out a few weeks into term, Lily had hesitated, skeptical. But she had seen how he was trying to mature, how he had ceased hexing students in the halls, and how he was growing a healthy distance between himself and his mates (Sirius was all right for a laugh, but even now, Lily believed the man wasn't the best influence on James). Taking all of that in the aggregate, Lily had decided to give him a chance.

He had taken her to Hogsmeade on their first date, a bit of teatime at Madame Puddifoot's. The setting and atmosphere might have been romantic to the point of schmaltzy, but James was sincere, and it had come off as sweet. They'd ended up forgoing the threstral carriages back to the castle and walked the whole way back, chatting quietly. Later, when he'd dropped her off at the girls' dormitory and asked to kiss her, Lily had shyly granted her permission. His kiss was astonishingly tender, coming from the big, strong man who had up until recently moved through life in such a rough-and-tumble fashion. She'd accepted the snog sweetly.

James had barely restrained himself for a full day before asking her for a second date, the next evening on their patrol rounds. It might have been woefully transparent, suggesting a surprising amount of insecurity for someone who carried himself with such swagger, but Lily also found it cute.

Before long, before she even fully realized it, they were dating, and she was wearing her boyfriend's Quidditch jumper to every match.

Now, they were both beyond the gates of their education, being thrown into the real world at a time fraught with danger. Lily had been pleased when James had joined up with her in Dumbledore's new Order of the Phoenix group. James called it a guerilla band, and while it scratched that lingering itch for adventure (a quality his maturation had never quite been able to shake), he had confided in his girl that he yearned for that kind of danger in a venue of more respectability. He intended to enlist with the Aurors, go through the training, while still keeping his hand in with the Order on the side. Sirius was apparently doing the same.

"There will be more opportunities with an Auror's badge, Lil," James had explained to her. "And besides…. I want to provide for you on something more than a volunteer guerilla fighter's wages."

She'd laughed at that – James was descended from one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight. Even if his family was risking the ire of Voldemort by taking the side of half-bloods and Muggle-borns, she still knew her boyfriend stood to come into a fortune of an inheritance once his parents passed.

Now, it was a sunny day, out here in the quaint little wizarding village of Godric's Hollow. James and his parents, Fleamont and Euphemia Potter, had been ever so generous in letting her stay with them while she steadily moved much of her life out of her parents and sister Tuney's house in Cokeworth. Sirius had apparently lived here for a time, when things with his own parents and brother had been really bad, and the impossible mangy man had still been frequently flitting in and out of the Hollow this summer. It was over these difficult home lives that she and Sirius had bonded, beginning the start of a nice friendship. Sirius had shown her every way in and out of the Potters's home, winked at her and told her, "Don't do anything I wouldn't do, Lily, old girl."

James fished around in the picnic basket and pulled out an orange, silently offering it to her. Lily shook her head with a beaming smile, watching the sunlight catch the glass on his spectacles, making them shimmer.

Taking a deep breath, she decided to ask, while telling herself she was keeping such a question casual, "Have you been thinking about getting your own flat?"

"Oh no," James dismissed, then stopped. "Well…. maybe. For now. Once Mum and Dad have…. passed on, I stand to inherit the house. Then I would move back here."

Lily bit her lip in sympathy. His mother, who insisted on Lily calling her 'Effie,' had recently taken ill, and was quite frail. It was generally understood but not discussed that the Potter matriarch didn't have much longer to live. When she inevitably passed, there was a good chance that Fleamont would follow in short order, from a broken heart.

"You may have been unable to wait to get out of Cokeworth, but I'd like to stick around here." James lay down on the picnic blanket, hands behind his head. "Godric's Hollow always was a fine place to live. It's popular for settling down…" he turned his head to study Lily in a way that might have been meaningful. "Raise a family…"

Lily flushed as scarlet as her hair. Now that she thought about it, she could picture living here…. with James. Sirius might pop in every now and again and gnaw a trail through the kipper, but even this wasn't exactly a deal breaker. Maybe….. maybe someday soon, there might even be little ones scurrying about the place, although Lily still wasn't entirely sure motherhood was in the cards. At any other time, she would want to have a family, but bringing children into this world seemed entirely irresponsible.

She stood up to stretch, lifting her head towards the sky and feeling the warm sun on her face. The hem of her airy sundress swished at her ankles.

A rustling as she heard James shift beside her. "Lil-Lily…." The tremor in his voice was what caught her attention, making her turn her head.

"Yes? What is….?" Her voice trailed off as she drew both hands to her mouth in astonishment, upon seeing James kneeling at her feet, a diamond ring pinched between his thumb and forefinger.

"I…. I know we…. haven't even been dating for a year…" he stammered in a manner that was entirely uncharacteristic and quite adorable. "But I've been in love with you for far longer, and I'll be in love with you even longer than that if you will let me…"

Lily whimpered, the sound turning into a sob. "Oh…. Oh my god…. Oh…. Oh, Merlin…."

"Will you marry me, Lillian?"

Lily giggled wetly. "You know I don't like it when you call me that…" Though she really wasn't that upset.

"True," James smiled weakly. "But I still think it's a beautiful name, just the same." His deep, hazel eyes searched hers anxiously when she didn't respond right away. "So…. will you?"

Lips pursed in a bemused line, Lily held out her hands and helped James to his feet. She reached out a shaking palm to run her fingers through his long, wavy, dark hair, sizing him up. She had not expected for their relationship to progress so fast, though she hadn't minded – James was quite the romantic, and a bloody damn fine kisser.

As she sized the man up, she couldn't help but have her thoughts briefly wander to Severus for a moment. He would be horrified by James proposing to her, never mind how she was actually… considering it.

Sighing, Lily cleared her head of such thoughts. Severus had chosen his path – he was gone, and he wasn't coming back. As she studied the earnest suitor before her now, she decided that, although they were still quite young, war was making some things – like waiting – rather pointless. It was high time to grab happiness now, while they still could, and hold onto it, for however much time they had left before Voldemort burned the entire civilized wizarding world down.

Tilting her head, peering deep into his green eyes, Lily finally allowed herself a beaming smile. Took a deep breath, and leapt.

"OK….. Yes!"

James happily gaped at her, let out a kind of strangled whoop and encircled her waist to pull her close. Throwing back her head, Lily laughed musically, gaily as she let James slip the ring on her finger. Her laugh turned into a startled shriek of surprise as James picked her up off her feet and swirled her about.

Setting her gently down, smiling into each other's eyes, James and Lily leaned in and shared a long, sensuous kiss…

…. And when they broke the kiss at last, it seemed, it was their marriage kiss, on their wedding day, in a quiet and intimate ceremony in the Godric's Hollow church.

The wedding may have been hurried, held a mere three months after the engagement, in the last gasps of summer during September. It may taken place in total secret, in the dead of night, in fact, but that didn't stop Sirius, the Best Man, from taking his Animagus form and using his licking tongue to break up Lily from sharing another chaste peck on the lips with her new husband. Lily's giggle tinkled like bells; it was quickly drowned out by the applause and hearty Huzzahs from Fleamont and Euphemia, the latter now quite drawn and gaunt (her mother-in-law would ultimately pass just over a month later).

Dumbledore glanced between the newlywed couple from where he had happily presided. The only other guests present were Lily's parents and Remus Lupin, home from the front, with Mary MacDonald, Lily's Maid of Honor, on his arm. Both of James and Lily's friends came dashing forward to shake their hands and offer congratulations, well wishes.

Lily tried not to scan sadly in the vain hope that another person might have shown up: her own sister. She had sent an invitation to Tuney, even as a small part of her knew her sister wouldn't be coming, not even to politely return the favor of when she had attended (with James as her date) Petunia's wedding to one Vernon Dursley.

She had tried to hide her sadness, but James had still tried to comfort his bride. He'd reminded her that he had a boycott too: Peter Pettigrew, one of his best mates, was also missing.

And there was one other person Lily would have liked to see attend her nuptials, in a more perfect world than this. But she knew, even if he wasn't a Death Eater, Severus would probably clung to his principles as an excuse to sit out the wedding of his best friend, in protest over her choice of groom.

Even on the happiest day of her life, Lily let out a melancholy sigh. No matter. It was pointless now. As she now turned to her husband, looping a hand around his neck to reach up and kiss him soundly, the new Mrs. Potter decided she would not apologize for finding her happiness. What's more, she would do everything in her power to keep that happiness as James sank into her kiss and gathered her in his arms to hold her close.

She had no more doubts. There was only James, and the scent of the dying roses and lilies in her wedding bouquet, now tossed over her shoulder to land in Mary's grasp before then tumbling to rest at the foot of the altar.