In June, shortly before we sat the last of our N.E., Professor Dumbledore called me into his office. Professor McGonagall came to collect me from Arithmancy. And I was scared. Over the past few years, we'd seen lots of our classmates taken out of lessons to be told that someone in their family was dead. My thoughts went immediately to my parents. They were by no means young. Their reactions were slower. They were marked as blood traitors. And of course, I was an even bigger blood traitor. I'd befriended the Black that had made himself an outcast from his pureblood supremacists of a family, and Sirius and I had spent our most recent holidays generally getting in the way of the Death Eaters' fun. It was dangerous and reckless and stupid, but it gave us both an adrenaline rush. We'd even managed to save a Muggle family once. But then, as McGonagall led me to Dumbledore's office, I thought, has what I've done cost my parents their lives?

You'd grabbed my hand as I left the classroom, squeezed it tight, and I knew that you knew what I was thinking.

Imagine my surprise - and relief - when Dumbledore had told me about the existence of a secret organisation called the Order of the Phoenix, who did basically what Sirius and I had been doing. Imagine my pride when he'd told me that he wanted me to join. This was an exception, he'd said, he didn't want to bring an eighteen-year old into an adults' war, but the Death Eaters outnumbered the Order, and they needed the best. That inflated my head, all right. The best! I'd known I was good, of course. But that good? That good that Dumbledore needed me?

I'd said right there and then, though, I'd join if my friends could join with me. Sirius would want to - he'd be insulted that he hadn't been asked in the first place, because he was just as good as me. (He never quite forgave Dumbledore for that, in fact.) And Remus, as much as he liked to keep out of trouble, was brilliant at duelling. And Peter - well, Peter had talents. His Animagus form could be useful, though of course I didn't tell Dumbledore about that.

I didn't mention you.

Another reason for my blood-traitor status was my choice in girlfriend. A Muggle-born! How scandalous. And what was more, a Muggle-born who was just as talented, just as brave as any pureblooded wizard! But still, I didn't mention that you might want to join. Stupid of me.

I didn't want you to join. By then I cared about you enough to know that I would not let you get hurt. I would go out and let myself be killed if that was what it meant (and at that time, I didn't realise that was what it did.) - but you would not be touched. At this point we had only been going out for a few months, but I knew already that you were the one I wanted to marry. Eighteen, and talking about marriage! That was how fast I'd grown up.

I went back and I told Sirius and Remus and Peter about this opportunity we'd been given. Remus was doubtful - he didn't have the inheritance that Sirius, Peter and I had. He needed to earn money, and the Order wasn't a paying job. Simple. I would support him. He could live at home with me if he wanted, or at Sirius's place. No problem.

Peter was nervous, but he agreed.

Sirius was delighted. He couldn't wait to leave Hogwarts and start fighting. This was how he got his excitement, by taking risks. And until a point that I couldn't quite place, that was how I got mine, too.

It was only when you rushed up to me in the common room and said fearfully, "James? Is everything OK?" that I remembered you. And my plans to marry you. Would you want to marry someone who was putting his life on the line?

So I told you. And you had said yes, of course you would. But there was a glint in your eye I didn't like, and my fears were confirmed when you came to me the next day and told me that you had been to see Dumbledore.

"I won't hide," you said to me scornfully. "I won't run. I want to be with you, I want to marry you, and you've got to accept that we're in this together from now on. I'm always going to be by your side."

"But you're going to be in so much danger," I'd protested. "You're Muggle-born! They're going to target you anyway, if you're in the Order -"

"Don't you realise that I feel the same way?" you'd said fiercely. "You're a blood-traitor! You're almost as much as a target as I am. I just can't run away while you could be getting yourself killed. I have to do this."

You were right - you've always been by my side. You're going to marry me. Every day we do something that makes a stand against him. Voldemort. And he's asked us to join him - I won't. You won't. How did we grow up so fast?

Lovely Lily. How could either of us have ever guessed that it would end up like this? I'm sorry for being a prat, but I'm glad you made me see what I was doing. We could die any day, but I'll die knowing that Lily Evans loved me and I loved her. Sounds stupid … but at least I know. Beautiful Lily. I fancied you since I was thirteen - how sad is that? I wonder if we'll ever get to have children. Eighteen and thinking of children! But that's what this does to you. It makes you think, makes you see everything that you could miss tomorrow. It makes you grateful for everything you've had, and regret everything you could have done better. It makes you, apparently, poetic and grown-up. Seriously, though - who would have thought it'd turn out like this?

I'm not going to lose you. I had enough trouble getting you. But that's not what you say, is it? You say you got me. Maybe. I love you anyway, Evans.

So - a lot longer than Lily's, and maybe not very James-like at the end. But while we saw little of Lily, we saw even less of James, and I like his character. I like how he changed. But I wasn't really able to portray him properly in this ...

Hope you like it anyway.