#vivaciousncharming

cheiloproclitic - being attracted to someones lips.

    ‘What,’ she says, her voice insistent, and it’s only then that he realizes he’s been staring, a bit. Just a bit, but how can he be blamed, how could anyone expect him not to stare when she’s got a bit of honey, just there, from the pastry she’s been eating, just at the corner of her mouth where her smile creases the soft skin, and the golden syrup catches the light and makes them shine?

He’s always loved her lips. Loved the taste of them, loved the way she purses them just so when she’s thinking, loved running the pad of his thumb along them as she lies next to him in bed. 

She licks the honey away, slow and unthinking, an unconscious movement, habit or instinct, like one might brush away a crumb, and he might mourn for it, only he could never mourn for anything when it came to Lily, not when she smiled like that, like she’s about to tease him within half an inch of his life, or maybe say she loves him. Quite possibly both.

Tarantism - The urge to overcome melancholy by dancing.

Alice missed the days that the announcements section in The Daily Prophet was equally divided between two sections - births and deaths. Now, the latter was overrun - the names pouring from the pages, as if the suffering would never end. Later, she would cut out the snippets and paste them into an already stuffed journal. That way, even if entire families were decimated, their memory would somehow live on. Someone would remember.

Folding up the paper and tossing it across the table, Alice reshuffled her position, arms rested on a swollen belly. Across, Lily adopted the same position, feet resting on Alice’s chair. Soon, she thought, the births column will have two more additions, all is not lost after all. Neville and Harry. They had exchanged names earlier that morning - each gushing to the other. A lighthouse, beaming out into the vast dark expense. Both boys… she had said, they might even share a dormitory at Hogwarts. As Lily made a motion to grab the newspaper (or rather, accio it, since she was far too comfortable), Alice shook her head.

“Trust me…you don’t. Not today.” Tears were becoming a permanent fixture. It seemed a shame to ruin happiness, if just for a moment. Sighing, she sipped her tea. “Sometimes it feels like it’ll never end.”

“I know.” A momentary silence fell, then Lily spoke. “Everything ends.” She pointed out. “One way or another.”

“For the better.” It had to be. To bring life into a world of death? It seemed too cruel. They needed a better future for their children. They deserved it. 

Lily nodded. “For the better. You know, we’re verging precariously close to dancing it out territory.” A flash of glee and a cheeky smile. It seemed to have become a recurring trend - at both of their wartime weddings, when the first order member fell, even back in the Gryffindor common room. Some traditions you don’t want to break.

Pointing at her stomach, Alice shook her head. “Oh God, I’m too fat to dance.”

marry, cuddle, sleep with

“Since I’m pretty sure polygamy is still not legal in our society, I’d marry Amelia. I’d cuddle Alice, cause she’s a good person to cuddle. And lastly, I’d sleep on the couch with Lily. A nice long nap. I think we both could use one right about now.”

druxy - something which looks good on the outside, but is actually rotten inside.

Things are fine.

Things are.... fine. The funeral’s over, everyone who attended the small private ceremony -- their closest friends, Minerva and Dumbledore and a handful of other Order members, nothing overwhelming or public -- has gone home. And the two of them are left, in their black robes, alone in the flat they’ve been staying in since the house was destroyed. There’s food, on the counter, lots of it. Merlin, there’s so much food. A curry that’d last the two of them a week even if they were both well enough to eat, three casseroles of various kinds, a nicely wrapped box of cookies, a basket filled with fruits. 

Lily is cleaning the counters off.

He doesn’t know what else there is to do, so he grabs a piece of fruit. A pomegranate, just for something to do with his hands. He’ll crack it open and spend the next twenty minutes picking out all the seeds into a bowl, even if he never gets around to eating them. Maybe Lily will want some, when he’s done. At least it will give him a task to focus on. 

He sets to work, cracking open the hard shell of the pomegranate. His hands are shaking, just a little, from exhaustion, or something else, and its harder than it should be. Like he can’t get a good grip on it. 

     ‘I can’t do this,’ Lily says, from the sink. She’s facing away from him, her hands on the edge of the sink. She’s looking at something -- something out the window, there? someone on the wall? -- or maybe at nothing. Her voice is just loud enough for him to hear. 

The pomegranate comes open in his hands, at last. He looks down at it, expecting to see the rich red of the fruit, but instead the seeds within are blue-black with rot, as if all the color has been seeped out of it. 

     ‘What?’ he says, though he’s not aware of saying it, hadn’t planned to say anything at all. ‘Lil...’

      ‘This, James. Us,’ she goes on. ‘I need to-- I can’t...’

He sets the pomegranate down on the table and stands, and goes to her, moving to stand behind her, to rest his hand on her shoulder-blade. She flinches away from his touch, turns to face him, turns as if to withdraw, only she can’t, now, with the counter behind her. She opens her mouth to keep talking, but as her eyes meet his the words falter, and she falls silent again. Her eyes are wide, as she looks at him, vacillating between determination and fear.

So he steps away, takes a step back so that she can move away from him if she needs to, so that he isn’t trapping her between his own body and the counter. 

basorexia - an overwhelming desire to kiss.

If you asked him, he would’ve said something about it being the dress, but he would’ve been lying. Sure, the dress is grand, just a shade off white and fit perfectly to flatter every part of her that he loves, and sure, he can’t take his eyes off of her. But it’s something more than that, so much more than that. 

It’s, he thinks -- not that there’s all that much space for thought, at all -- that it’s maybe her smile. It’s maybe that he’s not sure he’s ever seen her quite so happy, the unselfconscious way she laughs at Sirius’ Best Man speech, the energetic way she spins her way across the dance floor. The glances she keeps shooting his way, across the room, when they’re stuck talking to separate relatives on different sides of the party. 

     ‘How’s it going, handsome?’ she asks, when they finally find a second alone, and he takes her hand and tangles her fingers in his.

He opens his mouth to answer her, but he finds that he can’t. There’s something else, something other than words filling his mouth. Something else his lips, unbidden, have decided they’re determined to do. 

He feels it like a fire, smoldering and warm, like the swell of orchestral movement at the climax of an opera, a too-big feeling that there is no room for in his chest. He can’t help himself; he leans in and kisses her in response, one hand moving to cup her face, and nothing in the world could be better than the feeling of her smile against his lips.