Okay, I've been on vacation, so this has been written in bits and pieces. Maybe it flows; maybe it doesn't. Whatever. I'm still basking off of my success of having posted more than one chapter in one week. I don't think you guys get how important that is to me. I'm like, pumped. I'm getting myself out of crippling procrastination! Kind of! Mostly it's been my beta, honorary-marauder-1 who's been getting me out of my procrastination, do cheers. Check her out, she deserves all the love.
Anyways, please review! Please tell me what you think! Thank you, and enjoy!
The three students stumbled in the door, laughing and singing, quickly followed by a staunch couple with their lips pursed and brows pointed downwards. James, Sirius and Lily tripped merrily up the stairs, shouting a rousing chorus of "It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas". She stopped at her door, red-nosed and eyes sparkling.
"Well, gents, this is me. Meet you downstairs in five for the gift exchange?"
Sirius waved her off. "Gift exchange? More like, y'all fall at my feet in astonishment of the gifts I bought for you!"
Lily smiled. "I take it that your shopping trip with my dad went well?"
Sirius smiled. "Are you kidding? The stores are the finest in the entire universe! Where else could I buy a- wait, I can't say that. Whatever. I met a nice-looking bird behind the counter of Emmet's too-"
Lily's face suddenly drained of all color. James frowned at her, and made to grab her arm, but then seemed to think better of it. "Are you alright, Evans?"
She looked over at him, a hint of hurt in her face. Evans? You idiot!
"I'm um, fine. Meet you downstairs in a second."
The two boys went upstairs. Sirius shut the door, his smile melting off his face. "What the hell, man?"
James turned around from his stack of presents, confused. "I'm sorry?"
"I said, what the hell?"
"Yes, I understand that, I'm just not sure why."
"You have been chasing after that girl for four years. You have done everything in your power to make her like you, and you have dragged me and Remus and Pete and sometimes even Frank and Alan in on it. We did not suffer for nothing. I did not scatter a thousand rose petals outside Kellynch in the shape of a giant heart for nothing. I did not hide a thirty part scavenger hunt- which she never finished once she figured out it was from you- for nothing. I did not wake up at four in the bloody morning every day for two months to go with you to watch her in the orchestra for nothing. I didn't go out and find a carrier pigeon for you to ask her out with for nothing. I don't know what's going on in your mind, but you just hurt that girl by not trying to comfort her when she was quite clearly upset. Get your act together, James. You're an idiot, especially when it comes to Lily Evans, and you clearly have never had a good way to read her feelings, but she's finally starting to like you, and you are going to blow it."
"Sirius, you don't understand. It's for her own good."
"Bullshit. You're scared of another rejection."
"Am not!"
"You are so!"
"She deserves a smart, funny, kind, capable man who can support her. I am none of those things."
"We both know you can support her. You're funny, and you get the best marks in the class, other than her. You are incredibly capable- you've been basically living on your own ever since your mum took that position in the government when you were- what, eleven? Prongs, I'm only going to say this once: Lily Evans is meant for one person and one person only: it's you. You can match each other in wit and wisdom, and you balance each other out in your types of common sense. There's no escaping it, James. You're meant to be. You can't pull away now." He paused. "Also, she loves Christmas about as much as you do, and trust me when I say it takes a special type of person to tolerate that much nuttiness."
James scrutinized Sirius for a minute, then pulled him in for a hug. "Thanks, Padfoot. You really are the greatest."
Sirius laughed into James's shoulder. "We didn't even have to find a ping-pong table this time."
"Well, I'm not an arrogant berk who can't admit when he's wrong."
"Or you just wanted to boost your ego."
James shoved him. "Get your presents downstairs, you idiot."
Sirius smirked back at him. "Takes one to know one, jerk." His eyebrows creased in the middle as he took in the present on the top of James's stack. "What the bloody hell is that?"
A large, square package balanced precariously on the top of the present pile in James's arms. It was wrapped in newspaper, but was bedecked with Christmas baubles, ornaments, and garland galore. Sirius choked back his laughter. "What is that?! It looks like the ugly Christmas sweater of Christmas presents!"
James turned his nose up. "At least I tried. Yours is just the usual lump of newspaper and masking tape."
Sirius clapped his hand to his heart. "I'm so glad you care for me."
From downstairs, they could hear the faint strains of Lily's very out-of-tune Carol of the Bells. Sirius chuckled again and clapped a hand to James's shoulder. "That sounds like our cue, mate. Let's go."
James and Sirius tripped down the stairs, with Sirius still loudly making fun of James's wrapping job. Upon reaching the entrance to the dining room, however, Sirius stopped short in his teasing.
"Looks like Lily likes ugly Christmas sweaters after all," James said smugly.
And it appeared she did. Arranging presents in front of James's masterfully decorated Christmas tree, Lily was wearing a home-knitted, overlarge Christmas sweater with a sleigh and reindeer worked on the front, complete with miniscule jingle bells sewed onto the reins. Her scarlet hair was bound by a length of garland and accented with holly, and her green and red plaid skirt was worn over a pair of tights with snowflakes on them. Sirius whistled. "Man, your wrapping job was one hell of a lucky guess."
Upon hearing them, Lily turned around and caught sight of the two boys. Smiling and their bemused expressions at their appearance, she walked over to pick up their gifts. "What, never seen a Christmas sweater before?"
"Um, you seem to have forgotten that my parents are fun-hating lunatics," Sirius mumbled, still taking in her garb.
Mr. Evans rolled in. "How are my three favorite university students this fine Christmas Eve?" he said, adding his presents to the pile.
"Mr. Evans, I have some bad news," Sirius said.
Lily's father frowned, pushing his spectacles further up his nose. "Is something wrong, my dear boy?"
"I have to go home tomorrow."
"Surely not! I simply will not allow you to live with those people anymore. You shall stay with us."
Sirius smiled. "Oh, no, I'm never going back to Bitterwood. I inherited a decent bit of money from my Uncle Alphard last semester- he was banished from the family, too, and he bit it. He was old though, so- well, that's not the point. I was just there this break to gather my stuff. I bought an apartment, and I'm going to move into it after graduation."
"Then where on earth are you going?"
"James's. One of our other friends, Remus, is getting back from Australia tomorrow and I'm going to keep him company."
"This Remus, is he a musician like you?"
"Yeah, he's the bassist for the Marauders."
"That's a silly name for a band," Petunia said, coming down the stairs in high heels and a snowy white blouse, balancing a small pile of presents in her hands.
"Really? I seem to remember you coming up with significantly sillier band names when you and Lily were children," Mr. Evans said from behind the tree, causing Petunia to lift her nose haughtily and stain her pale cheeks red.
Sirius gasped. "Petunia Evans, creating a band? The notorious music-hater? Shocking!"
James smirked. "Ah, so many layers to the Petunia onion."
Lily looked at the other two sarcastically. "However will we peel them all away?"
Petunia sniffed dismissively, then talked to her father. "Since I did all my shopping early, like any normal person, I don't have anything for those two."
James grinned. "Ah, excellent. That makes it so much easier for me and Sirius to give you our present." He looked over at Sirius. "Speaking of which, did you acquire the present of which we discussed for Vernon?"
Sirius nodded soberly. "Of course, Prongs. Could I ever forget something so important?"
James looked at him. "You once forgot to bring your guitar to a gig. Of course you could forget."
"Yeah, well, this time I didn't."
Mr. Evans sighed. "Petunia, this is why we always shop the day of Christmas Eve. You know that our house has always been open to friends, so we have presents for everyone we know is going to be here."
"Vernon and I already did our Christmas shopping."
James leaned on the arm of the sofa. "Really, Mr. Evans, it isn't a big deal. It probably would have been a set of vases, or something."
Vernon came down the stairs as Petunia opened her mouth to retort. Pulling his coat from the hook, he addressed Mr. Evans.
"Lawrence, I have to go to my sister Marge's. One of her pitbulls died, and she needs the family there. I'll see you around the twenty-sixth."
James and Sirius scrambled to their feet. "Hello, Vernon," James said. "We have something for you."
Vernon looked suspiciously at the two, eyeing the matching smiles adorning their faces.
"It's a present, for Christmas," Sirius added, holding out a lump of newspaper held together by layers and layers of masking tape.
Still suspicious, Vernon took the present and began to unwrap it. Out of it fell a two-pound arm weight, a toy soldier, and a fire alarm.
"What are these?"
"These are all for helping your drill company," James said innocently.
"The weight is for your body building drills-" Sirius said.
"And the soldier is for your military drills-" James continued.
"And the fire alarm is for your fire drills," Sirius concluded.
James smirked at the increasing purple of Dursley's face. "We still aren't quite sure what sort of drills you work with, so we covered all the important ones."
"Cheerio, and have a happy Christmas with your family!" Sirius said, nearly shoving him out the door and locking it behind him. He slid down the surface of the floor to the ground and sighed.
Mr. Evans chuckled. "So this Remus chap is one of your friends, then?"
Sirius smiled. "The best. Other than Jamsie over there, and Pete. But Pete's in France with some chap with a creepy name."
"Well, any friend of Lily's, and subsequently James', and subsequently yours, is a friend of mine. Invite him to the wedding."
"Father!" Petunia gasped. "It's my wedding!"
"Which I am paying for," Mr. Evans said calmly. "I feel like I should be able to invite a few bright young people to cheer myself and Lily up."
Petunia gaped, mouthing wordlessly at her father. He clapped his hands.
"So, let's get to presents, people!"
-x-x-x-
The Evans family living room was strewn with wrapping paper and littered with laughs. Lily was happily surrounded by new sheet music from Sirius and a gold-plated mouthpiece from her father. A new teal beret was perched upon her head from Petunia, and off to the side, a rather ugly vase was sitting from Vernon (to James' endless amusement).
Lily tossed James a package wrapped in paper with images of mistletoe and holly. Perched atop the immaculate package was a tag that read:
To: Flyboy
From: Lily-flower
Happy Christmas, Idiot
James smiled and tore the paper open, pulling out a Puddlemere United football jersey. "Bloody hell, Lily, how did you know I tore mine apart?" He stopped to look at her. "Unless you were checking my shredded shirt out to see my shredded abs."
Lily blushed. "No, Remus was complaining about how you were whining about how it got ripped in an Ultimate Frisbee tournament during our Edu term finals. So I picked one up for you. Mostly for Remus' sake."
"Sure, that's your story."
"It's the truth!"
"Mhm. Anyways, here's yours."
He handed over the large, cube-shaped box, outrageously ornamented with Christmas baubles galore. Petunia turned her nose up and sniffed in disgust (although James thought that was leftover resentfulness from the singing curlers and pamphlet he gave her). Lily, however, laughed in delight and carefully cut the paper apart.
"I don't want to ruin it, it's so… you," she said, laughing. James caught his breath at her statement.
Could it really be?
Her smile froze when she finally unwrapped it. Beneath the swaths of paper, ornaments, and garland was a stack of records- at least twenty. She leafed through them.
"Best of Tchaikovsky- Stravinsky's Greatest Works-" she looked up at James. "How did you know I wanted all of these?"
He shifted uncomfortably, running his hand through his hair. "Well, I ran across this record shop in Exeter, right? It had a picture of last year's summer orchestra in the window, and, well, your hair sticks out like a sore thumb."
"Rude."
"So I went in and asked if he had anything that the group had played on vinyl, and he asked why, right? So I told him I was looking for something for my fri- er, girlfriend, and he asked who, because apparently everyone knows everyone around here. So I told him, and he pulled out this stack of records he said you had on reserve. I hope it's okay-"
She flung herself across the paper-strewn room, hugging him so tightly he had trouble catching his breath. From behind them, Mr. Evans began to whoop.
"Oooh, look who got caught under the mistletoe!"
The two looked up to see the offending plant dangling above them. Lily closed her eyes and let out a breath.
Damn.
"Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!" Sirius and Mr. Evans began to chant. Petunia huffed and stood up.
"I'm going to bed, we have to go to church tomorrow."
Mr. Evans looked over at her and held out his arms for a hug. Petunia reluctantly stepped over and obliged. "Good night, my flower."
"Night, Dad."
As Petunia walked up the steps, Mr. Evans looked at the two frozen under the mistletoe. "Well, I don't think you two need much convincing to kiss, do I'm going to zip off to bed. Goodnight, kiddos, and happy Christmas."
He sped out of the room, his new wheelchair flags whipping along behind him. Sirius stood up to follow. "Well, lovedoves, you two can do… whatever. I'm going to bed. Night."
Lily snorted. "Lovedoves? He's nearly as bad as Marlene."
James smirked. "They have more in common than you'd think."
Suddenly, his closeness to Lily and their situation registered with James. With his newly bolstered confidence, he leaned closer to Lily.
"Isn't it bad luck to not kiss under the mistletoe?"
Lily caught her breath. "I think so," she whispered, her eyes darting to his lips.
His lips bent up in a smirk. "We better not risk it, then. Right?"
She didn't have time to respond as he closed the space between them, catching the corner of her mouth with his. Her lips quirked up into a smile as his hand curled around her waist, softly jingling the bells on her sweater. His other hand tucked up underneath her hair, his finger feeling the clasp of the necklace he had bought her around her neck. She moved closer to him, sliding one hand on his shoulder and exhaling softly.
He finally broke away. "That should keep us safe, yeah?"
She gazed at him. "Probably." The clock in the hallway chimed midnight.
"Happy Christmas, James."
"Happy Christmas, Lily."