"James," Lily said, with surprise when he appeared on her doorstep.

He looked rather drained and for a brief second, rather old. But then he smiled and he looked like James again.

"Aren't you going to invite me in?" he asked.

"Oh yeah…right," she said. "Sorry."

"Are you okay?" he asked, a little worriedly. His sister seemed weirdly jumpy.

"Yeah," she said, rather too quickly. "Of course, why wouldn't I be okay?"

"Is this a bad time?" he asked.

"No no," she said. "I'm fine. Everything's fine."

"Lily," he said, understandingly. "Its okay to be upset. I mean you're going through a rough patch but it happens to everyone."

"Huh?" she said blankly.

"Your break up," he said, looking at her strangely. "Merlin. What's gotten into you?"

"I told you I was fine," she snapped.

"I just came to see if you were doing okay," he said slowly.

Her face softened at that. If he didn't know better he'd say she looked positively guilty.

"Have you talked to Al recently?" she asked, changing the subject abruptly.

"Haven't really had much time," James said. "But speaking of family time, I'm throwing a party this Saturday."

"A party?" Lily asked, abstractedly. "Oh."

"Do you want to come?" James asked.

"Yeah sure," she said, obviously not really listening to him. Lily had been trying to figure out what to do for hours now. The fact that James had suddenly decided to play big brother wasn't really making her decision any easier. He was just standing there, with such concern in his eyes as she practically betrayed him.

"It'll be fun," he said. "It'll take your mind off all of this. Speaking of all of this. Why aren't you staying at Mum's or Gran's? I mean sure they can be kind of annoying but it has to be better than this dump."

"I don't expect you to get it," Lily said waspishly. What was wrong with her brother tonight? He was acting practically parental.

"I seriously don't," he sighed. "Anyway I thought you wouldn't mind going out for a drink. Getting trashed is always fun after a break up."

"But getting trashed with your older brother is a bit odd," Lily remarked, giggling at the slightly hurt expression of James' face.

"Hey I'm a cool older brother," he said. "Not a stick in the mud like Al."

"You're the most conservative person I know," she said laughing, because James had gone from looking hurt to downright indignant.

"I'm the opposite of conservative," he said firmly. "I mean you've read the papers haven't you?"

"I don't need to read the papers to know you," Lily said. "We did in fact share a home for the better part of our lives. And you're a conservative at heart."

"Come on Lily," James said, coaxingly. "Lets go out and have a good time."

"Not a chance," Lily said firmly.

But about twenty minutes later, she found herself sitting in the Leaky Cauldron with her brother, who seemed determined to set the record for the number of bottles of Firewhiskey consumed in a single night.

"Don't you have practice tomorrow?" she asked, with a raised eyebrow as he ordered a second bottle.

"Possibly," he said, downing a quarter of the bottle.

"You're going to die," she said.

"Nah Sophie has cupboards full of Hangover Potions," he said casually. "We need it."

"Sophie makes Hangover Potions?" Lily asked, impressed in spite of herself.

"She's not dumb," James said. "Even though you treat her like she is. When I met her she was studying to be a Potioneer."

"You've never told me that," Lily said.

"You never asked," James replied.

"James?" someone said from behind him and suddenly he felt tightness in his chest.

"Hey," he said quietly, turning around to face the woman who had haunted his dreams.

They looked at each other, not saying a word, until Lily who certainly didn't have time for her brother's nonsense on a night as bad as the one she had been having knocked him on the back of the head.

"Stop staring at her like you're looking for ways to skin her," said Lily acerbically.

Ariana blushed and, to Lily's horror, so did James.

"It's good to see you," James said softly.

"You too," Ariana replied.

Lily raised an eyebrow. Well this could complicate things couldn't it? The last thing she needed was her brother having an affair with her best friend while her other idiot brother screwed around with aforementioned brother's wife. Honestly with the crap her family pulled she didn't even have time to think about the fact that she had just broken up with someone who she thought she was going to spend the rest of her life with. Where was her week on the couch reading bad tabloids and crying into tubs of ice cream? Instead she had to run after her practically brain dead brothers and make sure they didn't do something ridiculously stupid.

"Do you want something to drink Ariana?" Lily asked pointedly, after she thought the intense staring had gotten rather out of hand.

"Oh I'm here with work friends," Ariana said, gesturing to a group of athletic, rather handsome wizards sitting at the end of the bar.

"You work with those guys?" Lily asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I do," Ariana said, a hint of a smile playing on her lips.

"They're fit," Lily said, looking a particularly muscular looking bloke with evident appreciation.

"That they are," Ariana agreed.

"Do you think so?" James asked, sounding oddly choked.

"How's Sophie doing?" Ariana asked, abruptly changing the subject. James' intensity was making her incredibly uncomfortable. It had been an age since she had last seen him but nothing had changed. She still felt almost indecently attracted to him. You would think that all the debauchery that had been meticulously described by every tabloid from both sides of the Atlantic would have some affect on his face. But no, he was still as unbearably appealing as ever. At the very least, she reasoned, he ought to have a couple more lines on his face. At least a couple.

"Sophie's good," he said, rather shortly.

"That's nice," she said. "Well I had better be…"

"Yeah you probably should," he said, his gaze as intense as ever.

His eyes followed her as she made her way to her friends. It was only when Lily whacked him in the arm that he looked away.

"What was that for?" he asked, his tone injured.

"I thought it was a one off thing," Lily said, her tone distinctly pointed. "It was a wedding thing. Everyone falls in love at weddings."

"I don't know what you're talking about," James said.

"I was getting married," Lily said. "I was distracted, not blind."

"I swear, nothing happened," he said. "Nothing."

"That's because she has morals," Lily said, whacking him in the arm again. "Honestly I just had an incredibly awful and serious break up and I can't even be sad about it because I have brothers with the brains of Flobberworms!"

a/n: Yes it has been terribly long and I am a terrible person. Terrible terrible. But I've had lots of scary scary exams which are over and annoying college problems but its all settled now and I'm going to King's College London in September! So that'll be funfun. Anyway tell me what you think, and I promise I'll try to write quicker.