#jilymicroops

“Hilarious, Potter. Left again.” James made a face and did as she said, playing it off like a laugh, still barely able to believe that she was in his car, in his proximity, breathing the same air as him.

“It’s like a rollercoaster.”

“It should be shut down.”

“Oi.” He jabbed his pinkie finger at the indicator and nudged it up, though the street was deserted. The blinker click-click-clicked, and a cat watched him from the top of a faded brick letterbox, tail flicking.

These roads were unfamiliar. They nestled together only a few blocks from the beach, but they were distinct from the shiny rows of glassy mid-rises, with their acai shops and coastal boutiques tucked beneath sprawling apartments. Sad single-storey brick homes dominated the little suburb of Cokeworth, gutters wonky, red-tile roofs slumping in the blunted sunlight. A leather lounge teetered on the curb, its peeling seats and flaking arms praying for a good home. James’s foot hovered on the brake, idling them along.

“Your joint’s around here?” he asked, frowning. In all his daydreams, he had never imagined Lily Evans living here. None of these places had room for the Beauty-and-the-Beast library her good grades demanded, or a pool for her to lay by in summer’s heights. No old ladies fidgeted, waiting for a reckless do-gooder to escort them across the street. A dog barked through the missing panes of a grey-wood fence.

“Nah,” Evans said, shrugging hard. “Just thought we’d take the scenic route.” She rapped her knuckles on the window. “Entertained?”

James swallowed. Touchy. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, cruising along, squashing down the sinking feeling that her sharp little remarks always wrought. She was just some girl in his class. She wasn’t Lizzie – Lizzie, who would be coming round later to ‘study for Chem’ in the media room, Lizzie who James had just invited to Pete’s birthday, Lizzie from the netball team, Lizzie who he reckoned he might properly ask out soon. Lizzie, not Lily.

Sure, some girl he’d liked when he was thirteen was sitting in the front seat, dark red hair pulled back in the swish of a ponytail, one knee slung over the other at the edge of her regulation black skirt, but it was whatever. She shifted, and her maroon jumper rose with the arch of her back and the stretch of her arms, revealing a swathe of the white cotton blouse beneath. Tiny gold hoop things glinted in her ears, and the light caught the flecks of forest in the emeralds of her gaze –

“Bump!” As Evans shouted, the car hit it, and the car hiked awkwardly over the raised crossing. “Jesus, again. It’s not GTA.”

“GTA’s not allowed in my house,” James answered flippantly. “It’s offensive to women.”

Evans guffawed; in the corner of his vision (because he really was trying to focus on the road now), she folded her arms indignantly, cheeks red. Bugger. Truth be told, he couldn’t say precisely why he had offered up his vaguely-illicit chauffeur service when he’d seen Snape stalk off without her. Evans had working legs – no, James wasn’t going to think about them, moving on – and was capable of walking herself home without that idiot hanging around. His eyes sharpened, raking down the sides of the street, as if the git might materialise. But in any case, it wouldn’t be dark for hours. Evans could have got herself home no worries. The words had just flung out of James’s mouth before he could think, and then he’d nearly keeled over with shock when she’d accepted, and so – here they sat.

Maybe the guilt from lunchtime had crept in. James had copped a week of detentions and a call home, but Lily had been hauled into McGonagall’s office, despite being innocent in the whole matter. She hadn’t destroyed Snape’s project. That fucker deserved it. James’s knuckles whitened around the wheel. Where the hell did he get off, talking to her that way? And now the whole school was muttering about prissy prefect Lily Evans getting a talking-to, and she’d not done a thing wrong – she was the one who had been wronged. His fingers itched for Snape’s throat. Half of James wanted to chuck a u-turn and speed back until he found the sulky little Slytherin, and then he could land one right in the middle of his stupid, petulant, ugly –

“Are you kidding?” Oh, shit. James was doing fifteen over. Not that Evans’s eyes were on the speedo – she grinned at him, mirth sparkling, and his heart somersaulted. “You don’t play GTA because you’re such a feminist?”

James made a rude hand gesture, swerving a little as he looked back at her. He scrambled to correct it.

“I am a feminist,” he said, a little offended. “Mum banned it besides. She goes mental whenever Sirius sticks the girly pictures up. Bad for body image. And what would Lizzy think, if I spent all my time murdering hookers and dealing drugs? In real life, sure, it’s street cred and money, but online that’s just depressing.” That wasn’t an exact summary of why he avoided it, but he wasn’t about to imitate a video essay. He watched too many of those. Really, though, Lara Croft has gone through the wringer! He’d nodded along with the Youtuber’s words while Sirius killed cultists on their Xbox.

Evans’s eyes narrowed. “Next right, and it’s two from the end on the left,” she said off-handedly, gaze still roaming across the planes of his face. He slowed, waiting for a car to pass before he made the turn. “I don’t know if I believe you.”

“Believe me?” James took the gap and lurched down the cul-de-sac. “I mean it, Evans. Street cred is everything. If I was a loser, I wouldn’t be a Marauder, would I?”

She rolled her eyes. “You are a loser. Nobody who’s actually cool gives themselves such stupid nicknames. It’s not like you’re a band.”

“We’ve considered it.”

“I remember Remus on the clarinet at the ANZAC assembly; please stop considering it.”

The brakes screeched; James stopped halfway down the lane, head whipping around. Evans clapped her hands over her mouth, cheeks flaming.

“Oh my god,” she said, irises as wide as starbursts. “Shit. Oh my god. That was a horrible thing to say.”

Electricity crackled from the top of his head to the tips of his fingers; had Lily Evans really just said that? Laughter burst from his lips, chest aching, stomach spasming as he gasped for air. Perfect prefect Evans thought Remus was shit at clarinet. Of everything today, that was the strangest.

“No,” Evans said, “shut up, don’t laugh – I didn’t mean that –”

“You did, though,” James gasped, eyes swimming with tears. Her red hair swirled into the air like tendrils of smoke, in the blur of his vision.

“It was a mistake,” she insisted. “I meant…”

“That Remus’s performances make you envy the deaf?”

Evans whacked him lightly on the arm. James lost his breath. The warmth of her touch burned like embers in a hearth, long after her fleeting fingers knotted together, far from his skin.

“He’s your mate,” she accused. “Shouldn’t you be defending his honour?”

James’s tongue poked at the fleshy inside of his cheek. “He works hard, he’s a laugh, he keeps us on track… sort of. I’ll defend that. But honesty is my policy, Evans. Sirius and I have fantasised about throwing that bloody thing in the creek.”

“So we have the same fantasies,” Evans grumbled. “Fantastic.”

His nails left crescent moons on the leather of the wheel. Probably not, he thought. Definitely not.

“The truth comes out in your mistakes, Evans. When your guard’s down.” He lifted his foot, rolling the little way down the rest of the street. She inhaled - the change of tone in his voice had been clearer than he'd intended.

“When people are angry, they say things they don’t mean.” He pulled up outside the second house from the end. This one was timber rather than brick, older than the others, raised on a brick platform. Low shrubs and strangled flowers lined the concrete path from the curb, and further down, gravel tracks rolled down the side of the house and out the back. Rickety stairs led up to the front door, the security screen rusted and faded. Yellow curtains hung in the windows. An old wooden chair waited on the porch, beneath two hand-painted signs – one welcoming all, and a second warning off ‘Jehovers’. Bits of hose littered the front garden. The red-lidded bin bulged with black rubbish bags. Evans shifted, turning her body as if to block the view of the house out the passenger window. The colour leeched from her face; her eyes were luminous. She tugged at the collar of her school jumper.

“I don’t know if I agree with you,” James said frankly, shifting the car into ‘park’ and pulling the handbrake. Evans’s hand rested on the handle of the door.

“I fight with my sister all the time,” Evans said. “I don’t really hate her.”

“Not now,” James said, “but in that moment… I don’t know. Maybe. It’s a feeling, not a resolution. I don’t think you say anything you haven’t felt before. Anger doesn’t make you a different person, you know? It just sort of… sharpens bits.”

The door opened, and Evans scooped up her backpack, halfway out the car.

“Thanks,” she said sharply. “For the ride.”

“Evans –”

“Thank you.”

James unclicked his belt, climbing over the gearbox. He caught the door as it swung shut, opening it again.

“Evans!” She stilled with her back to him, standing on the browning grass, bag hanging by one strap. James took a deep breath. “Evans, you have to know that – that word doesn’t just slip out.”

She whirled around, face hard, eyes wet. “It’s not really up to you to decide what I have to know, actually, Potter.” But she was listening to him. He ran his fingers through his hair, the gearstick digging into his stomach as he leaned across. He looked like an idiot, probably. He didn’t care.

“You deserve better,” he said. Evans flinched. Her lips curled cruelly.

“What, someone like you? I heard what you said to him. You’re not any better –”

“I didn’t call him that –”

“He’s been my friend since I was seven, Potter.” Her face crumpled; she turned her face to the sky, eyes shut. “You don’t get it. You could never get it. He’s the one that knows.” An angry arm flicked at the street. “I bet your bedroom’s air-conditioned.”

James frowned. “Yeah,” he said, flummoxed – what did that have to do with anything? “I mean – not me. I didn’t mean me. We would never… but not Snape. You deserve better than him. You have more than two options, you know.”

Slowly, she looked down at him. Trails shone on he cheeks. James pushed himself up on his hands, awkwardly manoeuvring back to his seat. Her mouth moved wordlessly; she rubbed her face, wiping the tears.

“Please don’t tell Remus what I said,” she said quietly.

“I won’t,” James said. “I promise.”

Evans smiled tightly, and then the door swung shut. James took a shuddering breath, watching as she crossed the grass and slumped up the stairs, shoving a key into the door and letting herself in. His mind churned. What didn’t he get? What didn’t he understand? The answer was beyond his reach, tantalising. He pressed his forehead to the wheel, sighing.