"Lily, stop it," James said sharply, making her pause. He grabbed the entire pack from her and stuck them in his own pocket. "Maybe I should be one of the pieces in you life."
Lily froze and stared down at her wrist. While her eyes absorbed the image of his large hand wrapped around hers, she was examining every possible flaw with his proposal. There were too many. "Define that, please."
"I think there are too many things between us for you to pick up a life without me. You're withholding too many things from me, Lily. I cannot with good consciousness, let you divorce me without answers."
"But you'll let me divorce you?" Lily asked coolly. Obviously she had overestimated their past.
James stared at her silently, and that had more of an effect on her than most words he could have used. His silence was similar to Albus Dumbledore's, it supplied you with the answers to your questions, and many times, it wasn't the answer you particularly wanted to hear. It also made her remember so many, many things. Then Lily made the fatal mistake of looking up into his eyes. They were captivating and binding.
"Lily?"
"Hmmm?"
"Why don't we go get something to eat? I think we should talk."
"No, James. Not tonight, some other time," she said slowly, as if she wasn't really there, but merely a spectator. Lily walked away and apparated to her building, and sat down for some serious thinking while Celeste slept fitfully.
*~*~*
"How did it go?" Penelope asked as James walked in the door. She wasn't working the late shift at all; instead she was reading in a chair with a blanket thrown over her lap, tea steaming beside her. This was what James had imagined and wanted when he had married again-someone to be there when he got home, someone to keep him from feeling the darkness that seemed to be pressing nearer each day.
"Hello. It…went. Is the entire world well or what?"
"What. I decided I needed to spend some time with you, I feel like there has been a growing chasm between us ever since Lily was found. I thought maybe we could spend the evening together, do whatever you wanted to do. Dinner, dancing, a movie, whatever you want. Or we could just stay in." Penelope smiled, looping her arms around his neck, "And I think I'm ready?"
"For what?" James asked blankly.
"I'm twenty-seven, James. My career is stable, is as yours. I believe now would be a perfect time to start a family."
"Oh my God," James muttered. Why did this have to happen now?
"I think it's logical, James. We need to move on, sweetheart. I didn't really realize how short life could be. A lady my age died of cancer today. She wasn't a patient of mine, of course, but I was one of the few mediwitches unoccupied when she went into shut-down. Her husband was all alone, they waited to have children too, they thought they had forever."
He couldn't speak, there were no words for his emotions. It was too much too late. Penelope leaned back and studied James, her clear blue eyes seeking his hazel ones. She gave a slight smile, "I'm losing you, aren't I, James?"
James kissed her forehead and held her close, sighing as she rested her face against his chest.
"I always knew I had to compete with a ghost, and I thought that that was hard, but the real woman is too much. I didn't realize it until I was too late. I didn't accept the possibility that you could try to have her again. The odds were never with me, though."
"Penelope…I think I should leave."
"No, James stay," she said, and James watched helplessly as a tear slid down her cheek. She knew she had lost, but she had too much pride to sob or scream or even get mad at him. "Why don't you think about it for a couple days first? You can have the spare bedroom."
"I-I'm truly sorry," James said, closing his eyes, feeling deep regret.
"I know, and I am too. Just think of my rotten luck, I chose the only man in the world immune to my Veela charm…it's even more rotten I had to fall in love with you."
"It's equally rotten I'm not in love with you. I love you, Penny, and I expect that won't change, but I'm not in love with you. I should have done something sooner, but I didn't want to have to make a command decision like that."
"And I didn't want to do anything about the situation. It was easier to think that it wouldn't matter that she came back. I…James, I just want you to be happy, and if it's with her instead of me, I can't stand in your way. After all, she was your first choice. She's a good person, isn't she?"
"One of the very best."
"If I'm to be upstaged, then it should only be by the best. I won't deny that I hate it though."
"You deserve someone that can love you without being haunted by a ghost of the past that isn't really a ghost, Penny. I'm not that someone."
"I think I know that now."
*~*~*
Lily had a list of things she needed to do that she had been putting off, and three of them were rather important. One was easily accomplished, it had only taken about an hour with her solicitor to arrange for a divorce…grounds of adultery and estrangement. James would be given the papers in three days. It was rather ironic, it had taken months for their wedding to be arranged and carried off, hours to be divorced. The next was also rather easy, contacting her best friends…or former best friends. It would be rather interesting to know what was keeping them away.
The last was a family matter-she had to visit her sister.
So it was that Lily finally made the plunge after her morning appointment with the solicitor. She got out of a hired car at number four, Privet Drive, and knocked firmly three times on the door. It was opened by Vernon Dursley, her sister Petunia's husband. "Hello, Vernon."
"Lil-Lily," he stuttered, turning purple with shock. "My Lord, I thought you were dead!"
"You and the rest of the world. Is Petunia here?"
"I'm sorry, she-."
"Vernon, I know we stopped talking, but I think this is a notable exception. I'm the last person in her family, not counting yours, of course."
"Of course. I, well, I suppose, but I don't know…"
"I'll wait in the living room, Vernon."
Lily seated herself on the oldest looking piece of furniture, a chair that had been here when she lived with them, and waited quietly, wringing her hands nervously. At a slight noise, she saw her sister standing in the doorway, looking like she had seen a ghost. In a way, she had. "Petunia."
"Lily!" Petunia rushed at her sister, and Lily met her halfway in a tight hug. "That awful boy told me you were dead! I thought he probably killed you himself!"
"No, Petunia, James had nothing to do with it. It was all Voldemort's fault, James was blameless."
"That's a first. Are-are you okay?"
"As good as could be expected, I think. Petunia, I know you can't forgive me, and I'm not going to ask. I just wanted you to know that I'm okay and that I love you."
"You still haven't learned your lesson, have you?" Petunia asked coolly, obviously put off.
"I don't think I ever will. I'll see you, Petunia. Good-bye."
"Good-bye. Be careful."
"I always am."
*~*~*
The meeting with her sister left Lily expectedly sad and lethargic; a cup of coffee and a slice of toast sounding like a delectable way to wrap up the evening. Surprisingly, though, it seemed to work for Celeste also, who muttered about not being hungry. As she watched her daughter sleep restless, tossing and rolling over on her blanket in the living room, Lily felt guilty. She had been so preoccupied with her own problems that she had foisted Celeste off on Professor Figg, who seemed glad enough to take her.
Lily's guilt increased as she decided Celeste must be coming down with a cold or something, the toddler's face becoming flushed with a low fever. She hastily made a Pepper Up potion and had to spoon feed it. Her guilt turned to alarm, however, when Celeste started making wheezing noises in the middle of the night, audible from Lily's own room. When she went to check on her, the alarm escalated right to panic. Celeste's face was sweaty and pale and slightly tinged with blue.
Without hesitation, she raced from her flat and next door to James's, where she started pounding on the door as hard and she could. "James! Penelope! Wake up, it's an emergency! Hurry quickly!"
A rather wild-looking James answered the door, still wearing day clothes, but looking worried. "Lily! What's wrong, are you okay?"
"Celeste isn't, hurry James! Or maybe I need Penelope, I don't know. I don't think she can breathe, please help her!" Lily pleaded, tears rolling down her cheeks as she tugged on James's hand.
"Just one second, let me get my wand and some medicine." James ran from the door and she could hear the sound of glass bottles being hit together, and then a loud shout of, "Penny! Celeste is sick, help me!"
Lily, still standing in the doorway, saw Penelope quickly run out of what was presumably a bedroom, her hair perfect even just rising. James came out first, his arms full of a large bag of medicine and his wand. "What's wrong with her?"
"She hasn't been sleeping well for a couple days, and she didn't eat much today, and she had a fever, and she started wheezing, and she's sort of blue! I just thought she had a cold, so I made her a Pepper Up potion!"
"That was an excellent thing to do," James said distractedly, coming to kneel beside Celeste, frowning. Penelope rushed in an incredibly long minute later, and she too started examining Celeste. After that, Lily couldn't see what they were doing, and the tears didn't help much either.
"Lily, we're going to have to take her to St. Mungo's," Penelope said, standing with Celeste in her arms.
Lily glanced to James for confirmation, and he nodded. "Lord Hubert's doesn't have the pediatric staff that St. Mungo's has. I can oversee her treatment that way."
"O-Okay." Lily heard Celeste's wheezing in the silence of the room and watched helplessly and as Penelope whisked her out. "I need to be going with her."
"It can wait a minute, Lily. Penny can get her admitted easily, you can get your things first."
Lily did just that; she crammed her feet into a pair of already laced sneakers and grabbed per purse, and James was waiting on her. This time, she didn't mind his steadying hand against his back, and she honestly didn't notice it much. Once at the hospital, Lily was given a piece of paper to fill out about Celeste's medical history, and she took it blindly, letting James lead her to a corridor outside the ward he said Celeste would be in. The chairs were filled, and many people were sitting on the floor, so Lily did the same, James sliding down nest to her and wrapping an arm around her shoulder.
Lily started filling out the paper, getting nervous. "James, all this information is confidential, right, they can't tell anyone, can they?"
"No, they can't."
"And do I have to fill it all out?"
"If it has an asterisk beside it, you do." James was staring curiously down at the paper. "It's for her benefit, you know. They can check for family illnesses," he said.
"I…oh God." Lily filled in the patient's name and address blanks, and then she saw the ominous little words: Father's Name.
Trying to shield the paper from view as best as she could, Lily put the quill against the parchment.
"You do realize I have access to that piece of paper?"
"You wouldn't," Lily said through gritted teeth.
"I definitely would."
Sighing, Lily sat the quill against the parchment, and listened as it emitted an irritating scratching noise.
*~*~*
A/N: I'm back! I actually got back a few days ago, but I had a million and a half things to do when I got home. Since I wasn't working, I got a lot accomplished, my favorites being completely cleaning my room, which includes throwing away stuff that I never use and vacuuming. I also completely redid my website, I encourage you to look at it, I like it about a million times more now. My vacation was great, except for being lost about 1/3 of it. Seriously, we got lost in Gettysburg, Boston, and Canada. In Canada we got lost lost. Even my dad asked for directions. My big revelation was put off for another chapter. It has to do with the intro of a character, but it would have made this chapter too cluttered. So no guarantees when it'll be. Okay, now for the reviewers, I had some good ones.
Glitteringlion; ty-fan-06, LiannesLily, Katelyn*8, Slythie Diva Anna, B. Nonymous, everblue3, Saiyoness Angelisa Snape, kantomon, RBFfreak22, EbonyQuill, hpandkiki, Julie Anna, Kelly, Kelly, Jessie xxx, izzybelle4line, maria, none, The Elfin Child, cara-melissa, rainfire, Trish28, Nicole, maddy, dolphingurl1, Kira6.
I have a special thanks for nattynatterz who read this chapter for me and reassured me that my Penelope thing wasn't stupid.