"Evans, will you go out with me?" James asked her again. He had asked her every day, like clockwork, since the beginning of third year. Her answer was always the same, and he knew it always would be, but he didn't care. Even now, nearly seven years since they first met on the train, he felt the same mysterious pull as he had then. Only this time, no longer a naïve eleven year old, he understood its meaning.
Like clockwork, Lily glanced at James' tanned face and messy back hair, and glanced away again. She turned towards her friends, rolled her eyes, and strolled into charms.
James dreamed of the day when Lily would say yes. He would turn to her, a familiar mischievous sparkle in his eyes, and ask her the same question he had been repeating for years. She would look up at him, past his glasses and into those same sparkling eyes with her deep green ones, then look down at her feet. He knew that if she ever did agree, it would be with some mumbled excuse about having changed her mind. She would want to mask her shyness, but her stuttering and looking down at her feet would give her away. James would grin his usual dazzling, lopsided grin and reach for Lily's hand, but he would change his mind in midair, and their fingers would barely brush together. James would finally realize the full weight and implications of her words, and laugh awkwardly; he had been waiting for this for years.
James couldn't foresee any time when Lily would accept his offer, but he kept asking anyway. When he first met Lily on the Hogwarts Express as an eleven-year-old, he had felt a strange urge like none he had ever felt before. He wanted to go into her compartment and ask her name, sit with her, and talk with her. He was turned off only by the sight of the greasy-haired boy in the compartment with her, and pulled away only by Remus, his long-time friend, who tugged him through the train to their chosen compartment.
So much had changed since that first day. James had met Sirius, a boy so unlike him yet with so much in common. Peter had later joined the group, rounding out their foursome for complete domination of the school. James had grown into his gangly legs and shaggy hair, and had gained popularity with everyone in the school. Even the teachers, who punished the marauders on a regular basis, had fallen for the boy with round glasses and messy hair.
Most of this didn't matter to James. Besides his friends, there was nobody in the school he wanted to be near more than Lily Evans. No, there was nobody in the world. James had everything a teenage boy could ever want, except for Lily. She was the only person in the school who wouldn't fall for his witty jokes and good looks, but she was the only one he wanted. He dreamed of the day when she would accept his offer.