A/N: Because apparently James needed to have his say too. This is an extraneous chapter, feel free to ignore it completely.
James knew it was wrong. He loved Lily. Snape just got on his nerves. Under his skin in a way no one else did. He was an itch to scratch, that's all. Nothing more than an itch.
He couldn't ever be more.
But Lily. Lily was the perfect girl for him. She was a prefect, with good grades and Merlin, she was gorgeous. With long ginger hair and green eyes and that smirk…
No. The smirk was Snape. Lily smiled like she was constantly happy. Now he had her, she smiled at him like he was her everything. And he was. They would spend the rest of their lives together, just him and Severus.
No. He didn't like Severus. Snape. He was just a distraction, stress relief from exams. Lily wouldn't sleep with him yet, and he was a teenage boy. He had needs. Snape would never tell. He could do plenty of things with that mouth though…
Lily. She was the important one. He had to forget about Snape. He tried. He tried so hard. He managed his whole honeymoon, spending the time with Lily and learning her body fully. He found himself comparing her to Snape, trying so hard not to. She never managed to come first in his head. There was always something wrong.
He had been back barely a week before he sent an owl to Snape. It said nothing, only a date and time. When they met up, his breath left him and James found himself coming to the sudden realisation that he loved Severus. Loved him in a way he could never love again.
James was terrified. He couldn't love Severus. They would never work. Even when they were together, they only worked when they weren't talking. As soon as conversation started, James remembered all the reasons why he hated him before.
Besides, Severus didn't like him back. Severus had his Death Eaters and his Voldemort and they just wouldn't work. It wasn't possible.
And then Lily fell pregnant. And James was so happy. All he wanted to do was tell Severus. But how do you tell the man you're in love with that your wife is having a baby? How do you tell him that no, you can't make the meeting this week (because they moved from monthly to fortnightly when James couldn't stop thinking about him) because she's having a scan at the hospital and then you're going shopping for a cot? How do you tell him that the baby's arrived so you don't know when you'll be able to get away for who knows how long?
It was hardest when they were on the move. He couldn't see Severus for months, the longest since his honeymoon. He tried so hard to keep his focus on his wife and his baby, his little Harry, but he was constantly worrying about Severus. He lost weight, which made Lily suddenly refuse to move again. She wasn't having her husband worry himself sick. She thought he was worried about Harry and her.
They moved to Godric's Hollow, and James dared to write to Severus. He told him where the house was before the Fidelius Charm went up. He brought him to see Harry, saw how Severus cooed over the baby and wondered for half a minute what it would be like to bring Harry up with Severus. Would they work if they had something to stay together for?
When Voldemort stormed the house, terror froze James for a moment too long. He shouted at Lily to get upstairs as a reflex, images of Severus being tortured flooding his brain. He didn't know how they had been found, and he prayed that Severus was alive. If he and Lily had to die, Severus could take Harry and look after him.
James Potter's last thoughts weren't of his wife and child cowering upstairs, but of his lover who stood outside the house, tears streaming down his face behind the mask.