Jily side blog

Staring out at the glow of the full moon, she understood why poets had often dedicated odes comparing women to the moon. While beautiful, it wasn’t her beauty that made her worthy of the anthropomorphizing of men, allowing them to yearn obsessively after women and be called artists rather than cads. The moon’s mystery was what truly drew them all to her, the secret they all wanted to uncover and own. Yet, the secret they depicted was whimsical in nature, the sort of unusual Petunia told Lily would never capture a well-breed man’s attention.

But the moon’s covertness did not point toward a femme playfulness. Rather, her skeletons would reveal her to be the final suspect of an Agatha Christie novel. And Lily couldn’t help but wonder how something so beautiful could bear causing so much pain. If it could just reverse its phase in the sky, Remus’s bones wouldn’t be forced to bend against his natural state as screams escaped the soft-spoken boy’s mouth; the pain of nonrecognition wouldn’t grace the face of his three closest friends who transformed to show the best of their souls. Of course, this information she learned from James in the aftermath of the group’s—but really Remus’s, James emphasized—confession to her following New Year’s. Her heart ached for Remus as much now—watching the source of his pain—as it had the moment she swore secrecy about his “furry little problem” as James called it.

Moving toward another window, she angled herself to face the Whomping Willow. Unlike the lies of the still night, this tree exuded its perversion even now with the still branches undisturbed. She thought back to the moment James had walked her through the tree’s passageway and into the Shrieking Shack where the rest of the boys had waited for them. On the walk back to the castle, the crescent moon captured her eyes. If it were possible, she would have taken the sliver out of the sky, even if it meant being condemned to days full of darkness. She would do anything for a friend—had done what seemed liked everything at some point. Since that night, she’d imagined the brutality of his change in great detail that, at times, passed into her nightmares. She confided this to James one evening as they patrolled.

“He’s got us, Lil,” he uttered with his chin on top of her head. “We’ll keep him safe.”

“But who’ll take care of you?” she hadn’t dared utter lest he think she couldn’t handle the truth. Although, it wasn’t the truth she couldn’t handle but the image of his brutalized body laying somewhere in Hogsmeade where she couldn’t get to him. She knew Remus wouldn’t purposefully hurt him, but she had seen the hesitancy on their faces as she asked how they managed the process every month unscathed. The way James’s eyes met Sirius’s, then Peter’s matched the words that escaped Remus.

“They don’t.” The words were full of self-hatred she knew, and James’s eyebrows furrowed as he spoke words of comfort to Remus. This small act alone made her love for him grow at the unconditional love for his friends. “Sometimes the werewolf wins,” Remus finished in a soft voice, though the self-deprecation was still present as Sirius and Peter chimed in to reassure him.

It wasn’t just the risk they ran with Remus, but what if the townspeople saw them and became frightened, sending a spell their way before they could change back.

She sighed as she tried to get her thoughts under control, moving from the window to her boyfriend’s bed. It would be hours before the boys returned. She smiled as she fingered the material of his sheets, covered in snitches James had charmed himself. With her head resting on one of her arms, she titled her head to stare at the copy of Tales of Beedle the Bard. James leant her the copy when she visited the Potters on Boxing Day. With her on his lap in his father’s study, he read her some of the tales as they waited for Sirius to arrive.

With the memory of James’s animated voice as he distinguished between characters, she began reading out loud to herself, “There were once three brothers who were traveling along a lonely, winding road at midnight.”

***

An infectious laugh made its way into her dream, the image of dream James already fading as her eyes begin fluttering open, yet the laughter was still too far away for her liking.

“Will you shut it,” she heard James say as the laughter in his voice, the one in her dreams, swelled. Sirius’s response was drowned out at the commotion she was sure he caused, followed by more laughter that warmed her heart. Her lips tilted up as she pushed the book aside and began sitting up in time for the door to crack open, Sirius coming through first with a grin on his face despite the gashes covering his face and arms.

“Evans?” he questions as the grin fell from his lips, a worried glint in his grey eyes.

James was next, in tandem with her name falling off his best friend’s lips, but her eyes moved to the last member who trudged in, shutting the door behind him.

In spite of the softness as he uttered “Lily,” she couldn’t look at him. Not yet. Not knowing she would not be able to focus on anyone else if she looked at James first. So instead, her eyes glanced at Sirius first, making an inventory with the severity of his injuries.

“What are you doing here, Red?” Sirius asked as he pulled open his drawer, no shame as he began changing from his now-dirty, grey tee to the Queen one Lily gifted him for Christmas. He winced as his arms went into the designated openings. Her eyes returned to Peter who looked unharmed aside from the circles under his eyes.

Finally, as if doing anything but went against her very nature, her eyes landed on James who moved to stand before her. She noticed the gash above his right eye first as his hand came down to cup her face.

“I came to make sure you were all right,” she responded to the earlier question as James’s thumb brushed against her lips. “I was worried,” she admitted. Her eyes scanned his face and frowned at the small bruise forming on his cheek. Her need to make sure James was okay masked whatever reply Sirius aimed her way.

“How long have you been here?” James whispered as she eyed the blood staining his white shirt. Against her will, she moved her hand there and heard a groan from her boyfriend—whether from pleasure or pain, Lily couldn’t say. Rolling the shirt up revealed a small cut on his stomach and a blue bruise forming to its right.

“I snuck in at eleven.”

“Evans,” he admonished as she turned to grab her wand from his bed. Her fingers tightly grasped it, hovering it over the cut and whispering a quick charm. Slowly, the skin began joining together until returning to its previous state. “It’s four in the morning, cariad,” he tilted her chin to meet the hazel eyes that darkened as he studied her face with a perplexed look, lightening a bit when he seemed satisfied at what he saw. “You silly girl,” he whispered affectionately with a kiss to her head.

She hummed but proceeded to work on his abdomen, her wand once more lingering over his stomach. “It’s my first time knowing you were out there,” she reminded him as she watched the blue bruise lighten to yellow and back to the usual paleness of his skin. She leaned in and pressed her lips to the spot the bruise had been, then pushed him back with her palm against his stomach. Standing up, she headed toward the two boys—now changed in the minutes it had taken her to heal James—who stared at her, one in wonder and the other confused. Her boyfriend gave a brief squeeze to her hips as he passed toward the boys’ bathroom.

“How’s Remus,” she asked as she approached Sirius’s bed and quickly positioned her wand over the first of his cuts, watching as it disappeared as James’s had.

“A few scratches but nothing Madame Pomfrey can’t handle,” Sirius answered as she progressed to the next cut. “You know you don’t have to worry about us, right? We’ve been doing this for over two years now and, well, we’ve managed.”

She paused over the next laceration. “I’ll always worry about you four, you idiot.” She healed the last of the slashes on his face before pressing a kiss to his cheek. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

He grinned up at her, before rolling his eyes and thrusting out his arms at her. “You’re mad, Evans.” That, she knew, really just meant he loved her but was too stubborn to admit it.

“I love you too,” she responded instead as she made haste on his arms and stepped back to admire her work. “Now was that so bad?”

“Excruciating,” he replied, leaning back on his bed with his hands behind his head. “Not sure I’ll recover, so you might have to stay and nurse me back to health.”

She threw her head back laughing as James walked back from the bathroom. A tone of faux annoyance as he uttered “Padfoot” and aimed a pillow at his face, which Sirius expertly blocked.

“You okay, Pete?” she asked once she was done laughing, dashing toward Peter’s bed.

“Yeah, just sore,” he said with a yawn. She kissed his cheek too. “Get some rest.” He nodded slowly and seconds later was already asleep, the soft snores escaping him. She closed the curtains around his bed and stood before her boyfriend who opened his arms out for her, which she gladly settled in.

“Hi,” she mumbled as he pressed his lips against hers softly, his palms pressing onto her back to bring her in closer. She sighed against him, interrupted by Sirius’s wolf whistle snapping her out of it.

“You’re a prick,” she told him. He just chuckled, throwing the curtains around his own bed closed.

“Use the spell,” Sirius said, and her cheeks reddened at the implication.

Turning to James again, Lily placed her hand on his face, removing his glasses before bringing her wand over the last of his injuries. “Are there any more?” she asked, placing his glasses back on him. Her fingers lingering here as she took him in, reminding herself he was safe now. He was here with her. She resisted the urge to bury herself into his arms, resisted the urge to never let him leave her embrace again.

His gaze on her was slowly breaking that resolve, as he leant against his bedpost. The soft, crooked smile she had once assumed he aimed at her to provoke her into a fight. “Nothing visible,” he said, the gold in his eyes overpowering the green and lulling her into the tranquility she had not felt since he had left the castle. “A little soreness but nothing I can’t handle.”

She sighed, dropping her hands from his cheeks. “I guess I should head back to my dorm and let you sleep.” She brushed a stand of red hair, that surely looked as frazzled as if she was finishing up a potion, behind her ear.

Without hesitating, his arms pulled at her waist flushing her chest against him as her arms landed on his chest, before moving around his neck to deepen it. “Stay,” he sighed against her lips before taking her lower lip into his mouth.

She slightly distanced herself against his protests, not able to think with his ministrations causing her to feel as if someone had cast a jelly-legs curse on her. “What?”

“Stay with me—stay the night?” A small awkward chuckle escaped him as his fingers tapped against her waist. Aiming another crooked smile her way, he added: “If you want.”

If she wanted.

Even in the days she had stayed at his house, Lily and James had never spent the night in the same bed. Yet, it had never been her against the arrangement in the name of proper courting. Never her who wanted to pull her lips away from him as their kisses developed insatiated minds of their own. Although, she didn’t know how proper their behavior could be considering they had fooled around—leaving her more bothered than she would care to admit—and her thighs had often been brought over his shoulders, showing her how desperately he wanted her even if they hadn’t taken that final step.

All things of which her Catholic mother should never find out.

No, it was never her, so the word “Okay” slipped out of her lips almost too fast.

“Okay,” he replied back, a flush now on his cheek as he let her go, grabbing the book she had left at the end of his bed. He slid in first as Lily took off her dressing robe and threw it on top of his desk. James chuckled at the revelation of his Quidditch jersey.

“I do like seeing my name on your back,” he mumbled against her lips as she climbed in next to him, wrapping her arms around his waist as he shifted the covers over her.

“Hmm…keep winning, and you’ll see more of it.”

He laughed, placing a kiss on her shoulder as his hands trailed down her side. “Not sure more is exactly what I want to see, Evans.”

“Mm… that can be arranged too, Potter,” she uttered, bring him in closer for another kiss, not being able to get enough of him now that she was in his arms again. “You let me know when.”

He broke the kiss apart, grinning down at her. “Okay, so where did you leave off with this?” he asked waving the book in his hand.

***

In the morning, they decide to skip their first class, opting for an additional half hour of sleep. Or, in actuality, another half hour of James kissing her after Peter and Sirius went down to the kitchens where they were set to join them before checking in on Remus.

With the invisibility cloak wrapped around her, James walked Lily back to the girls’ staircase, gripping her hand as best as he could without seeming too suspicious to the few students lingering in the Gryffindor Common Room.

“I’ll see you in ten minutes,” he whispered under his breath, his other hand coming up to ruffle his hair. With a quick glance over his shoulder, he pulled her into him, brushing her chest against him as his chin came to rest on the top of her head. “I love you—you have no idea how much, Lily.”

She pressed her palm against his chest, feeling for his heart beat and gripping at the robes there. “I love you, James,” she sighed, knowing these words were an understatement, knowing that no words could ever really hold the weight of her love for him, her fear for him, her hope for him.

He let her go after a moment, stepping back as if to restrain himself. “Ten minutes, Evans.” She nodded, though he couldn’t see her, and slowly headed up the stairs as if she were tethered to him and the growing distance was resisting the pull. Moments later, she was happy for the pull.

“Are you still there?” he asked and she turned back to look at him, standing where she left him. She didn’t say a word, unsure why. She stood there, looking at him as he messed up his hair even more and chuckled as he stared at the spot she had been.

With a gentleness to it, he sighed and said, “I’m going to marry her.” She waited for him to head back toward the boys’ staircase before turning and continuing up her own, a new giddiness to her step as pushed open her dormitory door.

She’s going to marry James Potter.

“This one.”

“Huh.” Lily’s eyebrows draw together. “Not what I had in mind.”

Nevertheless, she plucks the deerstalker out of Sirius’s hands and tries it on; luxuriantly soft, brown checked tweed that works perfectly with her hair. She flaps the front visor up and down, looking in the mirror from different angles, winking flirtatiously and batting her eyelashes.

“I wonder if—”

Cautiously, she peers around the shop; her gaze catches James Potter at the back, modelling a jacket, all smirks and broad shoulders. Not a look at her. Her smile falters.

“Well, I couldn’t wait for you! We thought you weren’t going to make it onto the train at all. I had to tell them,” Mary said, shrugging with a guilty smile.

“Alright, I forgive you.” Lily grinned at her friends, rolling her eyes affectionately. She had missed them, even though they had seen each other a few times over the holidays.

“The question is whether we forgive you for not telling us and telling only Mary!” said Dorcas, pulling an offended face.

“Well, it happened only yesterday, and Mary and I were on the phone, so she knew first,” Lily said apologetically.

“Okay, fine, we forgive you. Now tell us everything!”

“His name is Eric. I met him at my part-time job. He’s a kitchen helper. He’s very handsome. We kissed yesterday,” she said quickly, looking at her fingers and fiddling with her bracelets. She was never embarrassed in front of her friends, but talking about kissing boys was usually Marlene’s role. She felt strange telling a story like that.

“Any details? I don’t think the fact that he’s a kitchen helper is the most important part of the story, Lils!” Marlene teased, leaning forward eagerly.

Lily took a deep breath and blushed slightly. “Well… it started when we were cleaning up after the dinner rush. He asked me if I wanted to grab a coffee after work. I thought, why not? We went to that little café near the station, you know, the one with the tiny booths. We talked for hours. He’s really funny. He keeps making these ridiculous jokes and then looking all serious.”

Dorcas squealed softly. “Ooooh, sounds like a proper date! And the kiss?”

Lily smiled sheepishly. “Yeah… well, we were walking back to the station, and it started raining a little. He, uh, leaned in, and we kissed. It wasn’t perfect. I was laughing half the time because I was nervous, but it was nice.”

The girls gasped and squealed, all talking at once, asking questions, laughing, and teasing her. Lily laughed too, feeling a warm glow of happiness and forgetting about the anxiety she had felt just minutes ago.

Suddenly, the train carriage door slid open, and familiar voices could be heard talking loudly in the corridor.

“Hello, girls. We were walking our dear Remus to the prefects’ carriage and thought we’d grab Miss Evans on the way. Mind if we join for a while?” James Potter suddenly appeared in their compartment, with the rest of his group following behind him.

“Yes, we do. Besides, I can walk by myself, thank you very much,” Lily said firmly, crossing her arms.

“May I ask why?” Sirius asked, feigning offense and leaning casually against the wall behind James.

“Just because we don’t hate you anymore doesn’t mean we want to spend time with you, Potter,” Lily replied, her tone sharp but controlled.

“Besides,” added Mary, trying to soften Lily’s harshness, “we’re talking about private stuff.”

“We’re talking about Lily kissing Eric,” Marlene said casually, as if Lily kissing Eric were the most ordinary thing in the world.

“What?” James’ voice cracked, and his face immediately turned bright red.

“Marlene!” Lily hissed through gritted teeth, glaring at her friend. She wanted to sink into the ground.

“Who’s Eric?” asked a resigned James, trying to sound casual.

“He’s my friend. A close friend. From home. That’s all the information you’re getting.” Lily stood up and tried to close the door in Potter’s face, but Sirius blocked it with his hand.

“Right, mate, we should get going. Remember, you’ve got that meeting with a certain Ravenclaw girl,” Sirius said pointedly, putting extra emphasis on the last words and shooting James a knowing look.

“Wha—” James started, but Sirius immediately stepped on his foot.

“Ow! Oh. Right. Yeah! Good thing you reminded me,” James recovered quickly, forcing a grin. “Come on, lads. I’ve got to, er, change first, and all that.”

“What Ravenclaw girl?” Lily asked suspiciously, folding her arms.

“And does Potter actually know whether she exists at all?” Marlene added, barely holding back her laughter.

“Do you think I’m stupid, McKinnon?” James shot back, clearly buying himself time.

“Do I even need to answer?” Marlene replied sweetly.

“So,” Lily said coolly, eyeing James, “who’s the lucky girl?”

“You wouldn’t know her. She’s… er—”

“Alice,” Remus murmured urgently into James’ ear, careful to keep his voice low.

“It’s Alice!” James blurted out.

“Alice who?” Dorcas pressed.

“Er—”

“Penhallow,” Sirius whispered into his other ear.

“Penhallow,” James repeated, nodding quickly. “Alice Penhallow. Ravenclaw.”

“Alice Penhallow?” Dorcas burst out laughing, and the other girls immediately joined in.

“Oh yeah? And what’s so funny about that?” James asked, though his confidence was clearly slipping now.

“Well, if you actually knew her,” Lily said calmly, a smug smile tugging at her lips, “you’d know she’s been going out with Frank Longbottom for months.”

“And they’re completely mad about each other,” Mary added with a grin.

James blinked once. Then twice.

“Oh. Oh yeah? Well, then I suppose I’d better go and, er, have a word with her about her little tricks,” he said weakly. “Come on, guys.”

Sirius grabbed his sleeve, barely containing his laughter as they backed out of the compartment, while Remus shook his head in quiet disbelief.

As the door slid shut behind them, Marlene turned to Lily with a triumphant smile.

“Well,” she said, “someone’s definitely jealous.”

Lily huffed, her cheeks warm. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

"Potter," said the blond one — Mulciber — turning. His voice had shifted, sharpened. "This is none of your business."

"No," James agreed easily. "It isn't."

He pushed off the wall and walked forward. Not quickly. The unhurried walk of someone who had never once in his life worried that a corridor wasn't wide enough for him.

"So why don't you walk away," Mulciber said, "before I make it yours."

"You know what's funny," James said, not answering, stopping at a distance that was a foot closer than was comfortable, "is that I had Flitwick's essay due Thursday and I was actually on my way to the library to start it. So I'm already in a terrible mood."

"Is that meant to be a threat?"

"It's context." James tilted his head slightly to look at the first-year girl, and something in his voice went different — not softer exactly, but deliberate. "You alright?"

The girl looked at him with the specific expression of someone who doesn't know whether a new adult is better or worse than the current one. Lily recognized that look too.

"I'm fine," the girl said. Her voice was smaller than her chin-tilt.

"What's your name?"

"Anne."

"Anne." He nodded like he was filing it away. "Nice to meet you. You can go. I'll be right here."

A beat. Mulciber laughed — the kind of laugh that was just contempt with sound attached. "She's not going anywhere until I say—"

"Mulciber." James looked back at him. He still hadn't reached for his wand. "She's eleven. She's going to class. And you're going to let her, because I've got a very clear memory and Slughorn's got a very open ear, and I'd really rather not spend my evening getting someone's prefect badge revoked."

Silence.

Lily, frozen in the mouth of the corridor, watched Mulciber's jaw work.

"This isn't over," he said, but it had already deflated, the way threats do when the person making them knows they've lost the room.

"Sure," James said, in a tone that meant I've already forgotten you.

The three Slytherins left. There was some shoulder-jostling and muttered words she couldn't make out, but they left, and James stood where he was until the sound of their footsteps faded.

Then he looked at the girl — Anne — and his face did something Lily couldn't entirely name. Easier, maybe. Like he'd set something down.

"You've got ink on your chin, by the way," he said.

Anne touched her face. "I was taking notes."

"Noble work." He fished in his bag, produced a handkerchief that had Property of Sirius Black written on it in green ink, and held it out. "Don't ask."

Anne took it, wiped her chin, held it back out.

"Keep it," James said. "He's got about forty of them. I nick them constantly." He paused. "Which corridor are you supposed to be in?"

"The — the main one. I turned around somewhere."

"Right. Come on, I'll walk you out. I've got to go past it anyway."

Anne looked at him. Lily could see her deciding. Then she picked up the bag that had been dropped at her feet — at some point during all of this, someone had knocked it there — and fell into step beside James Potter, who was at least a head and a half taller than her and was already pointing out where the second left was.

"If you take this passage," he was saying, leading her toward where Lily was standing, "and you turn at the—" He stopped.

He'd seen her.

For a strange, suspended moment, they looked at each other. Lily was still holding her own bag. She was aware, suddenly, that she'd been standing there for the entirety of that exchange, doing nothing, which was not something she would typically do and had no explanation for except that she hadn't wanted to interrupt something she didn't understand yet.

"Evans," James said.

"Potter," she said.

He looked at her for a moment longer. There was something careful in his expression — like he was reading the situation, checking whether she was about to say something that would require a response. She'd done that to him before. Called him out mid-act. He knew her voice at twenty paces.

She didn't say anything.

He nodded once, slightly, and walked past her with Anne at his elbow. "Second left," he was saying again, "and then you'll see the painting of the fruit bowl, and after that it's—"

Their footsteps faded.

Lily stood in the corridor alone.

***

She thought about it on the way back to Gryffindor Tower. She thought about it in the way you think about something that doesn't fit properly into the category you'd put it in — the way a note lands wrong and you keep running the melody back to find where it shifted.

She'd seen James Potter do impressive things. He was objectively talented, and she had spent a lot of years not giving him credit for it because it seemed dangerous to, because he wore it like armour and pointed it at people like a weapon. She'd seen him duel. She'd seen him take the most complicated Transfiguration problem in their year and solve it in twenty minutes on a Tuesday morning like it was nothing. She'd seen him make an entire room laugh.

She had not seen him do what he'd just done.

Because the thing that didn't fit — the thing she was running back, trying to find the shifted note — was that there had been no audience.

There was no one in that corridor who mattered. No one he needed to impress. Black wasn't there. McGonagall wasn't there. She hadn't even announced herself. He hadn't known she was watching. He'd walked into a dead-end corridor, found a first-year backed against a cupboard door, and—

She can go. I'll be right here.

He hadn't made a speech. He hadn't hexed anyone. He'd just — stood there, until the space was clear, and then handed over a handkerchief that wasn't even his and pointed out a shortcut.

She thought about the word Mulciber had used. The way James's face had gone when he heard it — and she'd been watching his face, she realized, because she'd been waiting for the performance, the moment he made it about himself. That slight stillness. Not dramatic. Not performed. Just — something settling into place, a decision made.

She thought about Anne's face when he'd asked if she was alright. The way the girl had looked at him like she didn't know whether to trust it yet.

I know that look, Lily thought. I've had that look.

She had never, in six years, seen James Potter make anyone feel like that.

She thought about that for the rest of the walk back, and then she stopped thinking about it because she didn't want to think about what it meant that she'd noticed.

***

She saw him the next morning at breakfast.

He was at the far end of the Gryffindor table with Black and Remus and Pettigrew, and they were doing something with a piece of toast that seemed to involve a bet and some kind of levitation charm. Black was laughing so hard he'd knocked his goblet over. Peter was trying to catch it. Remus was reading.

Completely ordinary. The exact James Potter she had a decade's worth of opinions about.

She sat at her usual spot, opened her Transfiguration notes, and did not look down the table.

"Lily." Diana Fosh dropped into the seat beside her and stole a piece of toast. "You look like you're doing maths."

"I'm reading."

"You look like you're doing maths at your reading." Diana poured herself pumpkin juice. "What happened?"

"Nothing."

"Mm." Diana bit into the toast and looked at her with the expression of someone who had been Lily's best friend since second year and knew exactly what nothing sounded like. "Is it the essay?"

"Yes," Lily said. "It's the essay."

It was not the essay.

Diana let it go, because Diana was tactful in the way that people were tactful when they'd decided to wait you out. They talked about other things — Quidditch, the Charms homework, whether or not Professor Slughorn's dinner invitations had a hierarchy. Lily ate her eggs. She kept her eyes on her notes.

She looked up once.

James Potter was watching her from the far end of the table.

Not the way he usually looked at her — that particular look she'd learned to return with a flat stare until he glanced away. This was different. Shorter. Like he'd just checked that she was there, the way you check on something you've been half-wondering about.

When he saw her looking, he didn't grin. Didn't raise an eyebrow. He just turned back to Black.

Lily turned back to her notes.

The maths she was doing, she thought, was very simple.

She had spent six years categorizing James Potter as a very specific kind of person, because he had given her every reason to, because the evidence had been consistent and loud. And last night, in a dead-end corridor, with no one watching — or so he thought — he had done something that did not fit the category.

That was all it was. An anomaly. One data point didn't rewrite six years.

She picked up her quill and underlined something in her notes that didn't need underlining.

The maths, she thought again. Very simple.

She just couldn't figure out why it kept coming out different.

***

Maybe, she thought. And then didn't think it again for two weeks.