Lily Evans has hated James Potter for a while.

Some might call it her natural state of being, her default mode, her factory settings.

His stupid windswept hair, nimble fingers sliding through it make it even more disorderly. His forget-me-not hazel eyes, glowing behind rectangular specs. His lopsided grin, upturning his lips slightly—he looks like he knows a joke she is desperate for him to share.

His intelligence, unencumbered by misplaced textbooks, unaffected by the number of times she has seen him fill in the last of his homework assignment just as class begins. His arrogance, exuding from him in that languid self-assured gait of his, students eager to give him space like he is Moses parting the Red Sea. His athleticism, winning nearly every match he plays in, stealing the show as the top Chaser in the school, and he bloody knows it.

He infuriates her. All of these parts and pieces of him roll together and set her aflame.

Which is why it is all the more frustrating that her body has decided, acknowledged, that he is incredibly fit and she can’t seem to muster an ounce of self-control.

Her new life mission is—apparently—to snog him as often as she can.