Chapter 28: Stars Above You
Before: 15th October, 2.17am
Moony was snoring, as he always did after drinking. Pete had mumbled in his sleep a while ago, but had quietened since. It was dark, it wasn't too hot or too cold: it should've been the perfect environment for sleeping. Especially after the busy week James had had.
He knew it wasn't just the adrenaline of a fun evening or the effect of the alcohol on his system that was keeping him awake. His mind kept drifting back over the events of the night, and it wasn't even the memory of the girl of his dreams kissing one of his best mates that lingered the most. (To be honest, he was keen to forget that particular section of the evening anyway, and judging by Remus' behaviour as they'd stumbled back to their dorm an hour or so ago, Moony was keen to forget it too.)
No, instead he was revisiting laying there on the floor next to Lily, watching her, the soft smile on her lips, the way she looked at him, the things she said…
He felt, with an almost ironclad conviction, that if Mary hadn't interrupted them, they might have actually…
But was that just wishful thinking? James was guilty of looking back on things with a rose-tinted view at the best of times, and certainly when it came to a particular redhead, he always tried to be optimistic. How else would he have survived this long, after all? And it wasn't as if he could just ask someone if he was imagining it, because it had just been the two of them—and asking Lily seemed so far out of the realms of possibility that even just the faintest suggestion of such an act made him feel a bit queasy.
(Although that could've been the booze, too.)
Suddenly that ironclad conviction seemed more flimsy.
He knew he wasn't going to get to the bottom of it himself, here on his own in the dark of the dormitory in the middle of the night. He knew that he would just spiral around and around it all until his head started to hurt, and that sleep was a much better plan. The trouble was, every time he resolved to close his eyes, minutes passed and he found he was staring up at the ceiling of his four-poster again, thinking about red hair against flagstones, about candlelight reflecting in sparkling green eyes.
He was about to just give up altogether and wander down to the common room—maybe he could work on his Divination essay, or at least look at some quidditch plays to run in their next practice—when a sound made him fall still: the door of the dorm was slowly, slowly, creaking open. A pause, and then it slowly, slowly creaked closed, the click of the lock sliding into place seeming deafening in the otherwise silent room.
James took a moment to calm his frantic heartbeat. Obviously it was Sirius, who had presumably been playing the pureblood prick since he'd left the party a few hours ago. There was no need to panic.
And yet something compelled him to open the curtains around his bed, and grope for his glasses and his wand. "Pads?" he whispered, as the sound of footsteps shuffled past the end of his bed. "'sthat you?"
The footsteps paused a moment, and the familiar voice came back, a low murmur of, "yeah. Go back to sleep, mate."
A normal thing to say; a sensible thing to say. It was, after all, the middle of the ruddy night. Except that James had asked a daft question—who else was it likely to be, for Merlin's sake—and it was not at all like Sirius not to point that out, even at gone two in the morning. And so, with a faint, creeping sense of unease, he lifted his wand and murmured a soft Lumos minima into the night around them. The dull light barely reached past the end of his bed, but it was just about enough to see his friend. His friend, who slowly turned towards him, blinking even in the faint light of James' wand…and his stomach sank at what he saw.
Sirius' face was pale, he could tell that much even in the darkness, paler somehow than it usually was. That pallidness was offset by a small slash of red on his brow: a gash that slowly oozed blood down his face. A bruise was splattered—almost like an afterthought—across his temple.
"Pads," James murmured, confused and tired and still a bit drunk, but most of all horrified. "...what the fuck happened?"
After
James was used to being fobbed off, and especially by Sirius, who had always been reliably laid back about things which James deemed much more, well, serious. So he hadn't been shocked when his best friend had murmured that he was fine, that they'd talk in the morning, before clambering into his bed and firmly pulling the curtains closed around him.
Unsurprisingly, James slept fitfully that night, waking several more times—squinting over at Sirius' bed, just in case, but the curtains remained resolutely closed as they had been before—until he finally gave up around six, hauling himself out of bed and into a hot shower.
The Marauders had a dorm breakfast that morning (Pete volunteering to fetch the supplies) so that Sirius didn't have to face the Great Hall yet, which gave James and the others plenty of time to try to convince him to go to the hospital wing. In the cold light of day, the boy looked even worse, tell-tale dark circles under his eyes showing that he hadn't slept much better than James had done, and, now visible, an odd green mark at the back of his neck, something left behind from whatever hex they had used to knock him out.
"I don't need to go to see Pomfrey," Sirius had insisted, chewing listlessly on a slice of toast. Remus had patiently spread it with butter and strawberry jam, just how Sirius liked it, but apparently his appetite had waned. "A bit of bruise paste and a well-aimed Episkey and I'll be good as new."
Remus and James shared a dubious look. "You can't Episkey your own face," James said. "What if you take your nose off by accident?"
"Then I'll have a lot of trouble smelling the roses of success," was Sirius' blithe reply.
Eventually, through judicious application of nagging from every angle (even Pete joined in, and he usually liked to stay out of these things), Sirius agreed to stop in to see Madam Pomfrey, "if it'll shut you all up."
He seemed to think that was all they needed to talk about. It would've been an impressive level of denial, if it weren't so bloody infuriating.
The denial showed no sign of going away over the following fortnight. Professor McGonagall had reacted in horror on seeing his face ("hard not to take that personally, Professor," Sirius had replied, as if it were all highly amusing), but not even she could get him to talk about it properly. The poor fifth year who'd brought Selwyn and Greengrass' note up to the dorm that night got one hell of an interrogation, not that it brought much to light—the note had just appeared outside the portrait hole, and he just happened to be trudging back from the library to find it. Nothing useful to direct the blame squarely in anyone's direction.
And the smug gits knew it, too. Evidently, McGonagall had gone to Slughorn, who had kept Persephone Selwyn and Calliope Greengrass back after their next Potions lessons, and who had in turn merely blinked innocently and claimed to have done nothing of the sort. Their dorm mates all backed up the claims that they were tucked up in bed at the time of the attack, and all the usual suspects of Slytherin house followed suit, shoring up alibis and insisting they would never dream of doing something like this.
It was pointless, James knew. None of them were ever going to admit to anything, and Sirius wasn't going to push it. The embarrassment was already too significant.
The only people who truly knew what had happened were the perpetrators themselves, and they closed ranks with their usual ruthless efficiency.
The news of what had happened to such a high-profile student burned brightly for at least a week after it had happened. Of course, not all of it was even remotely accurate, but that didn't seem to stop anyone talking. After all, Sirius Black was considered by most to be untouchable, cool, the sort of boy that others emulated and/or lusted after. For someone like him to be ambushed…it was big news almost immediately.
And news like that always travelled fast around Hogwarts.
Sirius, for his part, didn't seem too bothered by the gossiping. James guessed that he was putting a front on for the crowds, knowing it would only play into the Slytherins' hand if he kicked up a fuss. Sirius never even bothered to stop by the hospital wing (something James felt he should've seen coming). For someone who didn't want to make a big 'thing' of it all, he apparently had no qualms about letting the bruises and cuts fade the old-fashioned way.
And so they just carried on, trying to ignore the fact that one of their friends had been hexed unconscious and left bruised and battered in an abandoned classroom. Sirius went back to sitting with them at mealtimes, walking with them down the corridors, sitting with them in lessons. It was almost like nothing had happened at all. Or it was, until one evening about ten days later, when they uncovered another consequence of that night.
Sirius and Pete were battling through their Magical Creatures essays, grumbling intermittently about Professor Montague and his "unreasonable expectations" when it came to homework. James was, for once, taking a break from homework, choosing to unwind instead with a low-stakes game of Exploding Snap against Remus, who'd finished his own assignment an hour earlier.
Not the sort of evening that tended to get tense, even with the inclusion of an explosion-based card game.
"I can't focus," Sirius declared, kicking back on his chair and tossing his quill haphazardly onto the desk. "I knew I should've had a second helping of crumble."
"I never said you shouldn't have it," James pointed out without looking up from his cards. "Just that you'd been complaining about how much work you had to do."
"Sometimes your tone can say it all, Potter," the boy replied airily, rocking his chair back onto four legs and standing up with a stretch. "Okay, that does it. I'm to the kitchens—anyone want anything?"
Pete didn't look up from his essay to reply, "anything that's covered in chocolate, thanks Pads."
"Chocolate-coated miscellany for Monsieur Queudver," Sirius nodded. "How about you two hard-working fellows?"
James glanced up at last, distracted from his (frankly, poor) cards by Sirius now at the end of his bed; a quidditch jersey came flying in their direction. "Oi, what're you rifling through my trunk for?" he asked. "Where are your manners—were you brought up or dragged up, eh?"
Sirius fixed him with a quelling look. "Let's not ruin things by bringing up my upbringing," he replied. "I'm getting the cloak, aren't I, you prat."
"If there's crisps," Remus piped up, "then I'll have some—any flavour."
"He's a man of the people," Sirius smirked, tossing some balled-up socks over his shoulder.
"I don't have the cloak," James said with a frown. "Haven't had it since—"
He stopped. Sirius stopped, too, elbow-deep in James' trunk. Remus stopped, a single card starting to smoke between his thumb and forefinger.
The quiet, the pause, was long enough and heavy enough to make Peter look up from his frantic writing. "What's on?" he asked, eyes darting between them. "This silence's a tad unsettling, lads…"
Sirius swallowed, hard enough that James could track the movement at his throat. Any good humour had drained from his face. "I wore it…to meet the Slytherins," he said, voice painfully quiet.
Remus looked equally pained. "...bugger."
"But you've—you must have used it since then," Sirius moved closer to James, desperation in his eyes, even in his movement. James couldn't remember the last time he'd seen his friend like this, tense, like a gentle breeze could knock him clear over. "That was ages ago…"
Now that he thought about it, it was unusual for none of them to have to use the cloak in all that time. There were always kitchen runs to partake in, or Hogsmeade dashes to stock up on contraband, or the need (innocent or otherwise) to circumvent the rules and get about the castle undetected. But, for whatever reason, the need hadn't come up—James certainly had plenty of other things to be getting on with, after all—and he'd never thought to check who had it.
"I haven't," James replied at last, and watched the last remaining hope fall from his friend's face. "Which means…"
Peter's sigh felt like it was amplified around the dorm. "Bugger."
"Prongs…" Sirius started, his face, for once, an open map of emotions—regret and guilt chief among them.
James wanted to feel angry. Wanted to feel frustrated. But what was the point? It wouldn't get the cloak—his father's cloak, he thought with a pang—back any sooner.
We might not be able to get it back at all, he thought, and quickly tried to banish that possibility to the back of his mind.
"It's fine," he said, apparently unconvincingly, since Sirius still watched him, anxiety coming off him in pulsing waves; even Remus and Peter looked on with a degree of wariness. "It is. You didn't mean for it to…" He sighed, scrubbed a hand over his face. "We'll work out how to get it back. It's fine."
What else could he say?
"It's a bit odd," Lily said, her gaze caught on something over his shoulder. He was tempted to turn around to see what it was, but that was surely too obsessive, even for him.
"Is it?" James asked, not that he really needed to—she was going to explain herself either way. A trait that had long endeared and infuriated him.
"It is," she confirmed. "Muggles think of Halloween as being about witches, and ghosts, and stuff like that. But that's just life in the wizarding world, isn't it—so why bother celebrating it?"
They'd had many rambling conversations like this lately. They were only in the third week of their 'time for a chat' outreach program, designed to give muggleborns the chance to talk, to find some solidarity if they needed it, which meant parking themselves in a designated room and being ready to talk or listen or distract pupils who stopped by if they needed it. Mary's idea in the common room in the leadup to her birthday had been gladly signed off by McGonagall, and even Dumbledore himself had said during their recent Heads' meeting what a good idea it was.
Of course, they hadn't advertised it as solely being for muggleborns (that seemed like a good way to make the weekly event a target, something of which James was especially wary after what had happened at the SWEN swap shop last year), being sure to make sure everyone knew it was open for anyone to come along and talk if they wanted to, but so far the take-up had mainly been muggleborns from the first and second years. The first week had seen a mere two visitors, a pair of nervous-looking Hufflepuffs who seemed even more anxious when they realised they were the only ones there. Luckily, with the careful application of hot chocolate topped with freshly-whipped cream, and a huge sack of sweets from Honeydukes, the pair soon relaxed and felt able to share some of their worries.
Word must have spread, because over twenty students turned up in the second week—the room they were in, the one off the Great Hall, had to expand itself mid-session as more pupils arrived—and this week, a gaggle of first years had already been and gone, with half the time slot still to go. James was relieved that the offer was being taken up, that the SPMI and other nefarious actors hadn't managed to put everyone off. And it didn't hurt that it meant a few extra hours a week with Lily.
Watching her talk to other students, listening with an empathetic ear, he was reminded yet again of the sort of person that she was. Unerringly kind; generous with her time, with her warmth and patience. A fierce advocate, a protector, when she needed to be.
Not that he needed more reasons to fall in love with her, but he was pretty well helpless at this point.
The trouble with thought processes like these was that he sometimes most likely ended up looking like he was in a half-asleep daze, something Pete had pointed out to him a week or so ago in the common room. ("You look a bit like your brain's leaking out your ears," his friend had said supportively, before turning back to his task of lobbing bits of balled up parchment at Sirius' head.)
He blinked himself back to life and nodded, keen to prove to her that he was listening. "Yeah, I suppose that is a bit weird," he agreed. "I've never really thought about it before. Why we do it, I mean."
She nodded sagely. "Well, that's what I'm here for," she said, a smile playing on her lips. "To make you question everything about your own existence."
How could he not smile at that? It stretched across his own face, as easy as breathing. "Oh, of course."
She fell quiet again, aside from the gentle tap of her idly drumming her fingers on the table. James was just pondering how little she really knew of the effect she had on his existence—on the air he breathed, on the thud of his heartbeat, her own special form of gravity that pulled him in inexorably—when she spoke again. "How's Sirius?"
He raised his eyebrows. "You sat next to him at dinner," he pointed out. He was aware he was being ever so slightly obtuse. "And you two played chess together in the common room yesterday evening."
"We did," she allowed. "But I have to imagine he's a bit less cagy when he's in the dormitory with just you lot. I've not been able to get anything but small talk out of him lately."
This was hardly a surprise to James: Sirius had always been one to keep his truest thoughts and feelings out of the public eye. For someone who said so much, he said surprisingly little. It was only his closest friends, his brothers, who got the full truth of him—and sometimes, James suspected, not even all of it.
He knew that his friend had an odd sort of bond with Lily ("what can I say, Prongs—she was my Valentine last year, after all," Sirius liked to remind him smugly whenever James had brought their connection up) but evidently the bond didn't quite stretch to digging into the raw emotional truths of being hexed unconscious by unknown assailants.
"He's…okay," James replied carefully. "I think he's mainly embarrassed. Which is probably exactly what they were after, to be honest."
Lily hummed her agreement. "Greengrass has looked unbearably pleased with herself ever since."
"That might just be the default pureblood expression," he joked.
"Maybe for some," she replied, "but you're pureblood, and I've never seen you look that smug." She paused, and smirked. "Well, not outside of a quidditch context, at least."
He laughed. "Thanks." He paused, reaching for a fizzing whizbee from the bag on the table between them. "He'll get past the embarrassment. My worry is if he decides to try to get back at them—he can't afford to get in any more trouble."
A frown flitted across her face. "True. Hopefully he's learned his lesson on that one."
The sound of footsteps in the hallway outside made them both still, turning their heads in the direction of the noise. But whoever it was, they were just passing by, and the sound faded slowly away again.
He wasn't sure, in hindsight, what made him blurt out what he said next. "I've been invited to Sluggy's Halloween bash this year." She looked around, seeming surprised if only for a moment. "Looks like being Head Boy is finally paying off."
Lily leaned forward, and for a brief flash, he thought she was reaching for his hand. Alas, of course, she was reaching for a fizzing whizbee of her own. "At last, the moment you've been waiting for," she said with a wry grin. "Access to the upper echelons of society."
"Can you imagine?" James affected a look of wistful hopefulness, gazing off into the middle distance. "By the end of the month, I could have a Ministry internship lined up."
"What's your preferred department?"
"Surely it's obvious," he chided, with a raised brow.
"My apologies," she replied. "Games and Sports?"
"Evans," he tsked. "Clearly it's Public Information Services. Can't you picture me at a podium, delivering devastating news?"
Her laughter echoed off the stone walls, like the most beautiful music in canon. "You know what, I can, as it happens."
"It's my face," he nodded.
"Yes," she agreed. "It says 'prepare yourselves for pain'."
They shared a smirk. "So, am I likely to bump into the head of Public Information Services at Sluggy's shindig?" he asked. "Do I need to start practising the handshake where I palm off a Galleon, tip the scales, nudge nudge, wink wink and all that?"
Lily tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Can't say I've come across anyone from that department yet," she admitted. "You might have to save the bribery for someone else."
"Shame." Another fizzing whizbee, if only to give him something to do with his hands. "You're going, right? I don't want to be marooned down there with only Potions swots and Slytherins for company."
"I'm a Potions swot," she pointed out. "But yes, I'm going. Slughorn wants to introduce me to some brewing genius visiting from Luxembourg."
He smiled. "Good. I won't be alone, then."
She smiled back. "You won't."
Maybe now was the chance. What better opportunity, after all, to bring up how he felt, and how he thought she might feel, and what they might do about it, all things considered? A kind of, say, Lily, do you happen to remember when we were laying on the dormitory floor and you looked like you wanted me to kiss you, and I would've done if it weren't for your friend so rudely interrupting us? Any thoughts on all that? It all seemed so straightforward in his head, so surely—
Fate was not on his side. He watched as she turned away, towards the door, a friendly smile lighting up her features…because of course, a trio of third years were lingering awkwardly at the threshold, looking unsure if they should step inside or not. "Hi," she greeted them warmly. "I don't suppose you lot like fizzing whizbees, do you? Only there's no way James and I can scoff these all by ourselves…"
Sugar always worked. The tallest of the three, wearing a Ravenclaw tie and, now, an interested gleam in his eye, led the way fully into the room. Lily was so good at winning people over, at making them comfortable—breaking down barriers and finding common ground. Not that this surprised James in the least; she was just so easy to talk to.
Their own conversation—if James could find the bravery required—would just have to wait.
October picked up its pace, and homework continued to pile up. It was almost as if the professors thought they were at a school, or something.
James had thought he was safe to hide away in the Heads' office, trying to finish his Defence essay, to think up a way to get his cloak back, and not get too distracted by the entertainment of the common room along the way. Apparently not, for there was the deputy headmistress, standing in the doorway and looking ever so slightly pinched.
It was nearing eleven, breakfast a distant memory and lunch feeling similarly out of reach, when the knock came. Not in itself out of the ordinary, the usual short sharp knock of which McGonagall was so fond: she had never been one for a rhythmic flourish. Far too time consuming.
(James, as it happened, had always favoured either a jaunty rat-a-tat-tat, or the rhythm of the chorus of the seminal Mad Elves hit, Rock My Love To Gosport, a song he had insisted on listening to over and over again at home when he was ten until his mother "accidentally" snapped the record into sixteen irreparable shards.)
Still, it was unusual for her to come to the Heads' office—a room she hadn't been to, as far as he knew, since she'd shown them how to access it back in September—and even more so on a Saturday. James didn't know what the professors got up to at the weekends; honestly, he didn't care to find out. It was an unsettling thought to consider them having personal lives, hopes and dreams and shopping errands like the rest of the outside world. It was much more pleasant to imagine they just faded away into the ether, only reappearing for meals, between Friday dinner and Monday breakfast.
"Morning, professor," he said, because it seemed impolite not to. He could hardly pretend he hadn't seen her, could he? "If you're looking for Evans, I think she's back in the tower."
There was no think about it: he knew it for a fact, given that he kept glancing at the map hidden in the drawer of his desk, checking to see if maybe she'd decided to wander over to the office, too. Alas, each time he'd looked she'd been resolutely parked in front of the fire in the common room.
(He'd spent what must have been an hour, an hour he should have spent writing his bloody essay, worrying that he'd missed his chance after their…moment, at Mary's party. He'd decided to call it a moment, because 'near-miss' felt too certain, and when it came to Lily Evans, he was certain of absolutely nothing. The more he thought back to that evening, the more distance he gained from it, the more he wondered if he'd misinterpreted the look in her eyes, if he'd let alcohol and drowsiness sway him into thinking something that was categorically wrong. After all, she'd given him no indication that anything had changed between them. Case in point, at lunch the day after the party, she'd been deep in quiet conversation with Marlene, never once glancing his way, not even when he'd been so distracted by shooting glances in her direction that he accidentally dropped a spoonful of cottage pie into his pumpkin juice instead of onto his plate. That had to mean something, didn't it? Even if it meant that it meant nothing.)
(A thought that only made his headache worse.)
"I was looking for you, Potter," McGonagall replied, and paused, lips pursed. He couldn't read the expression on her face now. "I'm afraid I have some bad news. Ms Harrison has left Hogwarts."
Shit. Caroline Harrison was one of the Beaters for the Gryffindor team, a small but mighty fourth year who was even more competitive than James was. "What?" he asked, standing up; he couldn't stop the look of dismay from crashing across his face. "Why?"
The professor looked, suddenly, tired. "She was found outside the library yesterday evening, unconscious. Unknown spell damage," she said. "Madam Pomfrey revived her quickly, thank Merlin, and there seems to be no long-term physical damage… However, her parents, rather understandably, no longer felt it was safe for her to remain here."
James frowned, glancing down at the prefect duty rota nearby on his desk. Two Slytherins had been on duty. Something that came as no surprise. "She's muggleborn," he recalled quietly.
McGonagall nodded, silent for a moment. "It is a loss for the school—she was a remarkable student." She cleared her throat. "Nonetheless, I thought you should know, so you can find a suitable replacement."
"Right," he agreed. Their first game, the usual head to head with Slytherin, was fast approaching. He had no idea if they had the time or the talent pool to find a new Beater before then. "Okay. Thanks."
McGonagall nodded, turning back towards the door—but she paused when James spoke again. "They're getting more brazen, aren't they?"
She pursed her lips, but nodded again. "So it would seem, Mr Potter." She paused again. "It may be prudent to mix up the houses on the duty rota, if possible. And perhaps increase the number of prefects each evening."
That was bound to go down well with the group. James wasn't too wild about it either, given that he was already almost run off his feet with his current duties, lessons, homework, quidditch… But if it meant making it harder for these pricks to hurt people, well—he'd sacrifice sleep if he had to. "Of course. Evans and I will get that sorted right away."
McGonagall gave him the faintest of smiles. "Good," she said. "Thank you, Potter."
As he listened to his teacher's footsteps fade away down the corridor, he felt a strong urge to stride off to Dumbledore's office, to insist that something be done. How was it that these people kept getting away with it? Sirius, and Caroline, attacked in the halls. Last year, Charlie Swift—sent away, expelled from Hogwarts for a crime she clearly didn't commit of her own volition. And yet apparently no one was to blame. The slippery bastards kept creeping around, operating under some kind of cloak of secrecy in a system that seemed set up to let them get away with it. Lily had been sent those abusive notes—Merlin only knew what other muggleborns were dealing with that just hadn't come forward about it.
It was enough to make him feel helpless. Useless. Angry.
Because ultimately he knew there wasn't any point in storming into Dumbledore's office. If the greatest wizard alive couldn't stop these things from happening, right there under his very nose, then what could James do about it? He was of age, but he'd never felt so young.
James just wasn't used to feeling powerless. He knew that came from a place of privilege, that many of his peers had to swallow down their lack of agency, of control, purely based on the beliefs of others. And if the Head Boy couldn't do anything about the injustices that whirled around them on a daily basis, then who could? What was it going to take?
He had a feeling he wasn't going to get this essay finished today.
The end of October brought with it a few distractions: the next full moon, which would be more difficult than usual given the loss of the cloak; Slughorn's Halloween soiree, something James had unexpectedly found himself saying he would attend; and extra quidditch practices, trying to train up their new Beater before the season kicked off with their match against Slytherin on the 5th November.
Try-outs had been slow and painful ("haven't you run through every quidditch-playing person in Gryffindor by now?" McKinnon had asked helpfully over dinner after the fruitless first trials session) but they'd finally landed someone who could both fly and hold a Beater's bat at the same time, something which James would never take for granted again. Cynthia Agwuegbo—Cyn, to her mates, and a nickname Sirius thoroughly enjoyed—had been a quiet, unassuming sixth year as far as James had been concerned, at least, until the third afternoon of trials rolled around and her friends badgered her onto her broom. Up in the air, she looked how James often felt when flying: free, exhilarated. And the ferocity with which she swung the Beater's bat was a sight to behold. (She'd nearly knocked poor Kasim off his broom, but then, he hadn't been paying enough attention.) She needed work on her aim, but that was something James felt hopeful would come through diligent—and relentless—practice.
The diligent and relentless practices, then, had to be built in around the myriad other things in his schedule, what with the outreach sessions, plus increased patrols. Sometimes James wondered if he would be better off handing the quidditch captaincy to someone else, although these wonderings never lasted long; he liked to be in control, and surely asking him to hand his team over to someone else would be akin to asking a mother to give away their child. Their favourite, much-loved child.
"You know it's not normal, don't you?" Remus had asked him earlier, as they made their way down the stairs—Remus heading to the library, James to get set up for practice. "Your love for the sport borders on fanaticism."
"I take that as a compliment," James had replied. "You can't have fanaticism without a fan, Moony."
"Well, no, because—"
Luckily, they'd reached the third floor by then, so Remus didn't have the opportunity to launch into a lecture on etymology before James had waved goodbye and carried on his merry way.
The team were coping with the extra practices with good grace and civility, considering how exhausted everyone seemed to be. But James knew that they cared as strongly about quidditch as he did; that the promise of claiming the Quidditch Cup was nothing to be sneered at, and the sooner they got Cynthia acclimatised, the better. That meant getting her used to Raj's unique method of communicating mid-match, and Kasim's blinkered approach when he got near the goals, and any number of other quirks and peccadilloes.
It was nearing six by the time practice had finished, his teammates having already trudged back up to the castle in search of dinner ("I heard it's lamb stew with dumplings tonight," Ornella had said dreamily even before they'd got back to the ground; running drills was hungry work), James left behind to dutifully lock away the balls and brooms in the Gryffindor kit shed. Alf had offered to stay back and do it instead, but James liked to make sure it was done himself. Not that he was paranoid, and not that he didn't trust his fellow Chaser, but he didn't want to leave anything to chance when the game with Slytherin was fast approaching.
And so he was alone, post-shower and pondering what type of potato would be on offer in the Great Hall tonight (he hoped for roasted, as he always did, but would settle for mashed, like the brave resilient soldier he was), when he heard a familiar voice call to him from a little way away. "You look knackered!"
He stopped, squinting in the semi-gloom to see Cadence emerging from Greenhouse Six, pruning shears tucked under her arm. "Hello to you, too," he laughed, and paused as she caught up with him. "Battling with the tentacula again?"
She arrived at his side, flashing him a knowing grin. "I'm going to ace this Herbology project if it kills me," she replied, adding thoughtfully, "which I suppose it might." She cast a quick glance at the kit bag he was carrying. "I'm sure I don't need to ask what you've been doing."
He smirked. "Am I that predictable?" he wondered. Something had obviously shifted with Cadence since his run-in with her in Hogsmeade. She wasn't bothering his friends anymore (at least, as far as he knew—he was fairly sure they'd be telling him if she was); she seemed brighter, more like the smiley, sunny girl he'd known last year. He bumped into her on patrol and they'd chat, trading war stories of essays they were battling through; she stopped by the table at dinner to tease him about Puddlemere's recent losing streak. James wasn't sure what exactly had changed, but he was relieved all the same. He much preferred being her friend than feeling guilty every time she turned her sad blue eyes in his direction.
Cadence snorted, flipping her hair over her shoulder. "Yes," she teased back. "You are." She paused as they traversed the slope that led up to the entrance hall. "I was sorry to hear about Harrison."
James nodded, his smile fading. "Yeah…"
"She was in Runes Club with us," Cadence added; they'd reached the castle steps now, and both had stopped as if in silent, mutual agreement. "Bloody clever, and sharp as anything."
He nodded again, hands shoved deep into his pockets. He hesitated only a moment. "Make sure you're being careful," he said; she looked up, surprise glinting in her blue eyes. "I know we're not the main targets, but…"
"Yeah." Cadence gave him a soft, sad sort of smile. "You too."
It felt strange to stand there much longer, the only light the flickering warm glow from the candles inside. They were friends, maybe—friendly , certainly—but he didn't want to give her false hope. Maybe that was an arrogant supposition on his part, but there was something in the way she was looking at him in that moment, a gaze that felt like it belonged in sixth year, that told him it wasn't as arrogant as all that.
"Well," he said, and turned back towards the door; she followed suit, climbing the remaining steps in tandem with him. "I don't know about you, but I'm starving."
She laughed as they made their way into the entrance hall, which was already buzzing with students heading in for their dinner. "You've always had a healthy appetite."
He cut her a quick look—this surely is not just arrogance, now—but had no chance to reply, because they both came to a stop, a familiar figure blocking their path. A red-headed, bathed-in-candlelight figure, who was watching them both with a strange look of apprehension on her face.
"Sorry to interrupt," Lily said, her gaze darting between James and Cadence. "James, I was hoping for a quick word before dinner?"
"Head duties call," Cadence smiled, batting her long lashes up at him before a brief, odd brush of her hand to his arm. "Have a good evening, you two."
She gifted Lily with another warm smile as she headed into the Great Hall; Lily, for her part, watched Cadence go for longer than James had expected. He couldn't quite parse the expression on her face.
"Sorry," she said again, and nodded towards a little alcove to the side of them. They shuffled over, leaning against the cool of the stone; James did his best not to think about the way the dim light made her eyes look a deeper shade of green than normal, the green found in the depths of the forest, where it was quiet and still and calm.
"Nothing to be sorry for," James replied, meaning every word. Lily Evans could interrupt him any time she liked, frankly, and it was getting harder and harder to ignore that fact, or conduct himself with any level of decorum. "Alright?"
"Yes, I—" She stopped, glanced around again: most students were in the hall by now, hopefully not eating all the potential roast potatoes. "I was looking over the patrol schedule again earlier, and I realised you're on as an extra on Thursday."
At first, he merely frowned, his mind clearly distracted by her, and post-quidditch fatigue, and the smell of gravy drifting out of the Great Hall. "Okay, but—" His brain finally allowed him to catch up: Thursday. The full moon. "Oh. Bugger…"
She watched him, a hint of worry at her brow. "Look, I can cover your patrol," she said. "I…don't know how you help Remus, but you do, and that's more important—"
James' frown deepened. "But you're already scheduled most of this week," he pointed out. "You're going to burn out, Lily."
She shrugged, as if it were as easy as that—as if she wasn't doing yet another thing that made his heart feel like it was about to burst for her. "It's one more night, and it's important," she said. "Seriously, James. It's fine."
He squinted at her with some suspicion, but she held fast; they were, it had to be said, probably about as stubborn as each other. "Alright," he said at last. "Thank you. I'll pick up one of yours next week, yeah?"
She shrugged again. "We can worry about that next week," she suggested, then paused. "Dinner?"
He couldn't hold back his smile. "Dinner," he agreed.
(And—a sign of his good fortune?—there were roast potatoes.)
Some might have said that the 29th October was not a particularly spooky day, not nearly scary enough for hosting a Halloween party, but given that this year, Halloween fell on a Monday—notoriously known as the least frightening day of the week—the attendees of Slughorn's soiree had to put aside their two-days-early concerns and commit to the cause. But then, they most likely hadn't had to negotiate a full moon just two days prior, without a helpful invisibility cloak to get around the grounds undetected, so maybe they cared more about these sorts of things than James could ever hope to do.
The full hadn't gone too badly, all considered, although Padfoot had been noticeably more erratic out in the forest that night. James suspected the residual guilt about the cloak was still gnawing at him, but no matter how many times he told Sirius that he didn't blame him, that it wasn't his fault, it didn't seem to sink in.
At least a party—even if it was a Slughorn one—was a decent distraction. So much so that James had slipped away from dinner early, determined to get himself ready without the heckling and teasing that was likely to come if his mates were all there, too.
He would've liked not to care too much about how he looked. That would've been nice, wouldn't it? Slip on some dress robes, run a comb through his hair in a nod to presentability, and hey presto, he'd be ready to go.
Well, he'd put on the dress robes, a new set his mum had insisted on buying in the summer holidays ("you never know when you'll need them!" Euphemia had insisted, as if he were likely to spend half of seventh year attending masked balls or something), and, admittedly, he thought he looked alright in them. The wonder of clothes that fit—these sat snugly around his shoulders, his chest, reminiscent of the muggle suit he'd borrowed to wear at Lily's mum's funeral. Although that was probably not a comparison he wanted to draw.
He'd tried, too, to comb his hair into some semblance of orderliness, even adding a hearty dollop of Sleekeazy's for good luck. But he'd been standing at the mirror in the (thankfully empty) dormitory for fifteen minutes now, and all he'd managed to do was make it somehow messier.
"Two drops tames even the most bothersome barnet, my arse," he muttered to himself, as all the sanest people liked to do.
He was going to have serious words with his father when he saw him next.
The peace was broken just moments after James gave up on his hair, switching to straightening his tie instead. Sirius swaggered into the dorm, leaving the door slightly ajar behind him; he often behaved as if someone else was going to follow after him, tidying up his messes. Seven years of sharing a dorm hadn't managed to shake that habit out of him. "You've changed," his friend announced, stopping next to him at the mirror and casting his reflection a look of such disdain that it almost made James laugh. Almost.
"Yes," James replied. "Well spotted. I couldn't exactly wear my jim-jams to a party, could I?"
"You know that's not what I meant," Sirius replied with a scoff. "You never used to go to these parties and you've had invitations before. You sold out to the man."
"And which man would that be?" James asked, checking his tie alignment in the mirror. "Dumbledore? Slughorn? It would be helpful to know for future reference."
"Do you know what, you've become less fun since you became Head Boy," Sirius declared loftily, collapsing onto his bed. "We used to make fun of people who went to these sorts of parties."
"Yes, and I also used to dance around the kitchen with my pants on my head, but I don't do that anymore, do I?"
"I don't know," Sirius raised an eyebrow. "Do you?"
"Fuck off," James replied.
They grinned at each other.
"I know why you've had a change of heart," Sirius told him a moment later.
"Do you indeed," James murmured, not looking away from his reflection in the mirror. An irritating crease in his shirt didn't seem to want to be flattened, no matter how many times he prodded at it.
"I do," Sirius confirmed. A pause. "Don't you want to know what I think the reason is?"
"I imagine you're going to tell me whether I want to know or not."
"That's the spirit." Sirius propped himself up on his elbows, a Cheshire cat grin on his face. The Marauders all knew it was never a good sign when Sirius was so pleased with himself. "You've had a change of heart because of a certain other attendee."
James rolled his eyes, finally stepping away from his reflection—this was as good as it was going to get—to fix his friend with a look that he hoped conveyed his irritation and weariness. "That certain other attendee has gone to every other party I've been invited to," he pointed out.
"Yes, but that certain other attendee hadn't just had an up close and personal moment with you," Sirius replied, waggling his eyebrows suggestively. "On the floor, by the way, have you no class, Prongs?"
"Apparently not," James sighed. "Look, I'm Head Boy now—"
"Oh, don't try to turn me on."
"—and there's some things that are expected of me," he barrelled on. "You're reading too much into this."
"Am I?" Sirius asked sweetly. "You're not hoping for another go at it in some candlelit corner, nerves quelled by Sluggy's famous grapefruit rum punch?"
James frowned just a little. "How do you know about this famous rum punch?"
"Oh, it's the talk of the town," Sirius waved a dismissive hand. "Stop trying to change the subject. You want to lay one on—"
There was only so much a bloke could take. Especially a bloke already compromised by hair potions and close-fitting robes. "Alright," he said bluntly; even Sirius looked surprised. "Maybe I do. What of it?"
A short pause, before Sirius solemnly raised his arm, holding it out to James indicatively. "Pinch me," he said. "I must be dreaming, because you've finally admitted to—"
"This has been so much fun," James batted his arm away. "Just the support I needed."
"You should've thought of that before you became my friend all those years—oh, hello Evans!"
James spun around, his heart thudding in his chest, because sure enough (although he wouldn't have put it past Padfoot to be having a laugh at his expense), Lily was standing in the open doorway to their dorm. "Lily! Hi…"
She looked… there weren't words enough to do it justice, he thought. She wore deep blue robes, layers of gossamer-light fabric that smoothed over her curves, moving like the waves of the ocean with each breath she took, each minute movement. Her hair was gathered in a simple knot at the nape of her neck, and he thought he could see something silvery, sparkling at her ears.
There had never been anyone so beautiful. Never would be, ever again.
He swallowed all this down, though. "You look," he started, embarrassed to find his voice was hoarse; he cleared his throat, sure the tips of his ears had turned pink by now. "You look lovely."
"Thanks," Lily returned with an almost timid smile. "You do, too."
Now that he thought about it, that timidity…she seemed a bit off, somehow, and it was only now that he considered—his heart dropping through his stomach, into his boots —she had been standing in the open doorway. Which meant…
She could have heard everything he and Sirius had been saying.
"You two scrub up very nicely," Sirius piped up, ambling over to stand at James' side. "Look after him, will you, Evans? He's not used to these high-faluting shindigs, he might trip and fall over the names Slughorn'll be dropping."
Lily looked away from James (torture, he decided; he'd just noticed the delicate smudge of eyeliner on her lid, and why was that somehow more arresting than anything else?) to offer Sirius a patient smile. "I think he'll be just fine," she promised him, before facing James again. "Ready?"
No.
"Yep," he said, and gave Sirius an ever-so-slightly pointed jab to the ribs as he stepped away. "Don't wait up, dear."
"Make good choices!" the bastard called after them.
"...of course, your father wouldn't be convinced! We couldn't have pried him away from his cauldron with all the riches of Gringotts. And I suppose I might not be where I am today, if I'd been in competition with old Fleamont…"
James didn't have his watch with him—he'd taken it off before having a shower, and left it behind in the bathroom, something he did more often than he cared to admit—but, if pressed, he'd guess that he'd been stuck at the end of the buffet table, talking to Terrence Travers, for at least forty-five minutes now. Truth be told, Terrence had been doing most of the talking, constantly mentioning his role as the head of the International Magical Trading Standards office at the Ministry as if he were a heartbeat away from being Minister for Magic himself. From the sounds of it, it wasn't a job that James' dad would've particularly cared for, despite Terrence's never-ending references to their apparent 'friendly competition'.
"...once you've graduated?"
Oh, bugger. He'd not been listening (distracted, this time, by what looked like a fresh tray of Spooky Scotch Eggs that had just been placed on the buffet table), and now he was being stared at, eyebrows raised, waiting for an answer. "Sorry, I didn't catch that…?"
"You must have started thinking about what's next, after you graduate," Travers repeated with a patient smile. "A boy of your pedigree—I'd think you have the Ministry at your disposal, what with Euphemia and Fleamont's connections."
James tried not to bristle too much at the suggestion that he would use his family name and status to advance his own agenda. "I'm not really a Ministry man, to be honest," he replied brightly, draining his goblet of the remaining dregs of grapefruit rum punch. "Too much paper-pushing."
"Oh—well—" Now it was Terrence's turn to try to not look offended. "I suppose it isn't for everyone—"
Whatever else the man wanted to say, it was wasted, because at that moment, James spotted Lily again, across the room. They'd had a slightly stilted walk down to the dungeons, James desperately trying to make conversation whilst simultaneously wondering if she was freaking out having heard him say how much he fancied her; once they reached the party, she'd been dragged off by Slughorn and he hadn't seen more than a few glimpses of her since.
That had been three hours ago.
Of course, he hadn't been stuck with his dad's old rival for the whole time. For most of the party so far, he'd found himself chatting to Cadence and her friend Lambeth Shaw, Slug Club veterans of old themselves. Lambeth was the least frustrating of Cadence's inner circle, much easier to talk to than gossipy Lucy (who James still hadn't forgiven for talking shit about Lily last year), and although it wouldn't have been his first choice of ways to spend an evening, it was a decent enough way to pass the time. At one point, laughing at something Cadence had said about her brother, he'd spotted his fellow Head student across the room: she was standing between Slughorn and some other Ministry wonk, but was looking over towards James, and seemed startled to be caught in the act. She'd looked away hurriedly, and James spent the next ten minutes trying to understand the look that had been on her face before she'd realised that he'd seen her.
Anyway, he couldn't get to the bottom of it, not with the combined distractions of drinks, a well-stocked buffet, and his ex-girlfriend's admittedly sparkling conversational skills. But, just when James thought he might have avoided the nonsense of having to talk to people he had no interest in, Cadence and Lambeth had been pulled away to talk to someone high up in the DMLE, and left James open to cornering by boring old wizards with axes to grind.
And while he wasn't one to ditch a polite conversation—he'd had manners instilled in him from a young age, of course—now that he'd noticed Lily again, he found it even more challenging to pay attention. He also couldn't help but notice that she was, at last, miraculously, alone.
"Great to catch up," James interrupted Travers, handing the man his now-empty goblet; Travers accepted it, looking mildly stunned. "I'll be sure to tell my dad all about our chat. Take care now!"
He moved with purpose across the crowded room, determined not to get drawn into yet another chat with yet another contemporary of his parents, and came to an almost skidding halt at Lily's side, clearing his throat.
She looked up from her drink, blinking in surprise, as if she'd forgotten he was even attending the same party as her. "Oh, hi," she said. Her gaze flickered over his shoulder—at what, he wasn't sure. "Having fun?"
"That's one way to put it," James replied. He wanted to ask if she was okay, because, for whatever reason, she didn't quite seem as if she was. It wasn't anything glaringly obvious: she wasn't crying into her drink, or anything like that. The times he'd seen her—their current interaction being the only exception—she'd been smiling, conversing, seemingly at ease.
But by now, James knew Lily Evans. Knew her very well indeed. And he knew when the smile was artifice, when the chatter was made to cover the cracks of something else entirely; how could anyone not realise, when a real smile from her was like being bathed in warmth, her eyes glinting like emeralds? He sometimes had to remind himself that not everyone was a student of the ways of Lily Evans like he was.
"Are you having fun?" he asked next, for want of anything better to say.
She buried a wry smile into the rim of her goblet, taking a slow sip of her drink. "Of course."
Somehow, he didn't believe her.
She was looking, now, around the room, her gaze flitting as if not keen to land back on him. "Cadence looks lovely tonight."
James paused, a frown furrowing his brow. Even held at wand-point, he couldn't have told her what Cadence had been wearing. "Erm, yeah?"
Lily's gaze finally returned to him. "I think I need a refill," she said, holding her goblet aloft. She'd already started to turn away from him. "Thirsty work…"
Maybe that was a brush-off; maybe James ought to have stayed where he was. But he had never been one to be cowed by a maybe, and so quickly moved to catch up with her, reaching her side again as she made it to the drinks table a short distance away—moved quickly enough, in fact, to accidentally jostle elbows with a pair already standing by the drinks. "Ah, sorry, don't mind me…"
Two heads turned his way, and James became very aware of Lily's stilled, stiff presence at his side as she took it in, too: because there, next to them, dolled up in expensive-looking dress robes and drinking wine, were Rafe Thicknesse, the smarmiest bellend to cross Ravenclaw's threshold (and that was saying something), and Evan Rosier.
Rosier had graduated a few years prior, and James had not been the only one glad to see the back of him. Considering who Rosier was up against, during his time at school he'd given his fellow Slytherins a run for their money in the vicious, cunning, ruthless stakes. How he came to be palling around with Thicknesse was a bit of a mystery—James couldn't remember them interacting at all at Hogwarts.
"Thicknesse," James said, giving the bloke a short nod. "What an unmitigated pleasure."
Rafe just smirked, the smug prick. "Potter," he replied. "Didn't know you went in for this sort of thing. Run out of Zonko's stock?"
"What brings you here?" James asked, choosing to ignore Rafe's comment. "Free booze? A chance to relive your heyday?"
Thicknesse didn't reply; Rosier didn't give him the chance to. He'd been watching on with thinly-veiled amusement so far. "Enjoy it," he advised, his voice an easy drawl as he lifted a goblet of wine to his lips. His gaze dipped briefly, disdainfully, to Lily before returning to James. "Your heyday. While you can."
James couldn't decide how threatening to find the bloke; it was hard to take him too seriously, when he was sipping on a plummy Merlot and brushing Scotch Egg crumbs from his fingertips. "Life not quite panning out for you post-school, Rosier?" he asked, his words heavy with faux sympathy. "Rotten luck."
Rosier merely smiled, albeit a smile that did not reach his cold, grey eyes, and turned his attention to Lily once more. "You know, Rafe," he said conversationally, as if Lily weren't even there, "I can see the draw now. Muddying things up a bit before you settle down with something purer."
At his side, he felt Lily tense; James knew he had tensed, too, and not least because Rafe said nothing in defence of his ex-girlfriend, just letting out a laugh that verged on the awkward, like he didn't quite know how to react.
"But that's all they're good for," Rosier continued, letting his gaze drag down Lily's form. James' hand tightened on his wand in the pocket of his robes. "So get your kicks while you can. Things are finally shifting out there in the real world."
James was not like Thicknesse, not in any way. For one, he'd never use a girl to get the interest of another; he'd never fool around behind said girl's back. He'd never embarrass and belittle a girl just to get his own way.
And he'd never stand there, gawking into a potted shrimp canape, rather than stand up for what was right.
"Shifting towards the sort of fucked-up ideals of—"
"Erm," Rafe said, shifting from one foot to the other. He seemed to be looking desperately for an escape hatch. "This is a party, chaps, let's not…"
"Although what sort of party lets the mudbloods rub elbows with their betters?" Rosier wondered idly. "Not one we have to worry about ruining, I'd say."
If he were feeling charitable, James might have thought that at least Thicknesse looked uncomfortable, now, unable to meet Rosier's eyes while the other man radiated a superior aura, the kind of man who knew he could say what he wanted and most would just let it slide past.
"Their betters?" James repeated, almost spitting the word. "I hope you're not including your self in that description, Rosier, you inbred little tw—"
"James," Lily's voice cut in, quiet, but urgent. "Don't."
James frowned, glancing between Lily's pale, still face, and Rosier's self-satisfied smirk. "Lily, he can't just—"
She grabbed his arm—well, his elbow, to be exact, as he always made it his business to catalogue where and when she happened to touch him—and yanked him away; away from Rosier's stupid, punchable face, away from Thickness' useless, punchable face. Away, until he noticed they weren't in Slughorn's rooms anymore, but in the quieter, cooler corridor that led out of the dungeons, lanterns flickering their only light.
She turned to face him. "How exactly was that going to help?" she asked. Her voice sounded brittle; worn thin. "Starting a fight in the middle of a bloody party?"
The colder air did nothing to cool the fire that still felt like it was raging inside him. "Are you joking?" he asked, a baffled frown on his face. "You think pricks like him should just be allowed to say whatever terrible thing they want without any consequences?"
"Of course not! But you have no idea—sometimes you just have to swallow it down and move on." For a frightening moment, he thought she looked like she might cry. But the moment passed; she seemed, somehow, even steelier. "I don't have the luxury of reacting however I want, whenever I want. There's a time and a place for—
"Not for doing what's right," he insisted. "If you thought I was just going to sit back and not help you when—"
"I don't need your help," she insisted in return; he couldn't understand the look of distress on her face, why this was all being turned around onto him. "I'm not helpless!"
"I know you're not," he replied, holding his hands up as if in defence. "I never said you were! Lily, you run rings around me in almost every class, you're the cleverest bloody witch in this school—don't you think I know that? This isn't about you needing help, I want to help!"
She scoffed, clearing gearing up for another round. "I don't—"
"Merlin, Moony's the best at duels out of all of us, he doesn't need my help, but I don't leave him to sort himself out when he's under fire!"
"Well I don't need your pity either," she insisted fiercely. Her eyes seemed to flash even in the dim candlelight of the corridor.
"I know you don't," he replied. He felt like he was bargaining with her now; negotiating without a full understanding of what was at stake. On the backfoot, in danger of falling, falling and not being able to get back up. "It's not pity—you're my friend. I care about you!"
"Friend," Lily repeated; she was smiling but it didn't reach her eyes. She glanced away, back down the corridor where the sounds of the party still filtered weakly through. "Right."
His heart sank. Fuck, had everything that had been happening lately all just been in his head? Yet more desperate use of an overactive imagination, reading far too much into things because it was too painful to face the truth? She was staring resolutely at the floor, as if she couldn't even meet his gaze.
It took him a moment to find his voice, and when he did, it came out quiet and scratchy. "Is that such an awful prospect?"
Now she really looked like she might cry. "No," she said, words only just audible. "Of course not."
He could only frown: lost, and aching to reach out to her, but unsure of the dangerous waters he was wading into. No sign of the shore. "Lily—"
"I'm going to bed," she interrupted, softly, decisively. She couldn't meet his gaze. "You should go back in. Find Cadence, have some fun…"
She had started to walk away before James had even fully processed what she'd said. Cadence? Where the hell did Cadence come into all this?
And then, the pieces sliding into place; a frazzled mind, suddenly made clear...
...and he'd never moved so quickly in his life. "Lily, wait!"
He caught up to her at the top of the steps, a spot that remained defiantly in shadows, too far away somehow from the flickering lanterns on the entrance hall ahead or the dungeons corridor behind. She paused, her face tilting towards him, and even in the dim light he could see the strange mix of emotions that ran rampant. His stomach was in knots.
"Lily," he said again, because it calmed him; it always did. The word was soft on his tongue, a breath of music. "I need to tell you something."
She swallowed hard, already ducking his gaze. "It's okay, James, you don't need to—"
"No, I do," he said, and reached for her hand. They both looked down at it, at his fingers curled delicately around hers, each as surprised as the other, and for a moment, that was all they could do. "Lily, I…it's okay if you don't feel the way I do—I'm sorry if I—"
She drew in a breath: a faint sound, but enough to halt him. She stared up at him. "Feel the way you do?" she asked, a murmur.
James could feel his face getting warm. Now or never, young Gryffindor. "I…really, really like you," he said plainly. Why say a little, at this point? It might as well all come out. "I always have. I never stopped."
She blinked, stunned silent, and the silence felt too much, too embarrassing for James to swallow past, so all he could do was barrel on. The only way out was through. "But I'm not—I don't expect you to—I'll always want to be your friend, Lil, even if that's all it is, so—"
Her hand, then, at his jaw: fingers brushed so lightly it could almost have been a dream. "James," she said, and he felt his field of vision narrow solely to her, to the way she looked at him, like he'd hung the stars by hand. Which, if she asked him to, he would. He could. "I really like you, too."
An exhale, a breath of hope and worry and other tangled emotions, determined to rush out of him at her words. "You—?"
"Really, really like you," she amended, and then there was only one thing for it.
He closed the gap between them, and pressed his lips gently to hers.
It was like seeing for the first time; like the feeling after a long day of stepping into a warm bath; like the exhilaration of flying, and the safety of home, and the way he felt when he made his friends laugh. But it was also like nothing else he'd ever experienced—the soft plush of her lips, the way one hand still lingered at his jaw, the other tentatively placed over his chest where surely she could feel the frantic thump of his every heartbeat. It was drowning, and never wanting to come up for air.
They parted reluctantly, his hands resting at her hips, hers still brushing his skin as if it were nothing at all to do so, as if it didn't make him breathless and delirious all at once. And maybe with others, he'd have worried about their reaction, about what would happen next.
But she smiled up at him, awe in her eyes that he knew was reflected in his own, and he smiled back, and he didn't feel worried.
"You like me too," he murmured.
She let out a soft laugh, a surprised laugh, like she couldn't quite believe it herself. "You like me," she added, faintly, hope and happiness awash in her eyes.
"Just a bit," he said. She was already tilting her face back up to his, her gaze drifting with intent to his mouth. "Just a lot."
"A lot," she whispered, an echo, and brushed her lips against his.
And everything else just melted away.