Chapter Text
“Pads where is my other sock?”
“No idea. Where’s my bow-tie?”
“Do you think I can get away with wearing odd socks?”
“To a wedding? Moony that is scandalous!”
“Shut it and hand me a sock.”
“Guys!” James banged on Sirius’ bedroom door exasperatedly. “Hurry up!”
“Right, sorry Prongs, almost done,” James heard Sirius say from the other side of the door. “How much time do we have?”
James glanced at his watch. Ten forty. “Minus ten minutes!” he told them.
“Welp! Ready when you are!”
…
When he Sirius and Remus got down to the garden, James had to admit that it was very well decorated. Pale pink and green streamers ran through the trees up to the small alter that consisted of a table covered with a white table cloth in front of a light green garden shed (this had also been decorated with more streamers). James probably would have appreciated it more if there hadn’t been a very angry Marlene McKinnon in a pale green bridesmaid’s dress marching towards them.
“Where’ve you been?” she demanded.
“Uhhh well-“
“There was like… you know -“
“The ring - and the owl…”
“And then the cactus…”
“Never mind! Forget I asked!” She made to push past them but Sirius stopped her.
“Woah - where are you going?” he asked.
“To get Lily -“
“No no no no no no no no no no no no!” James grabbed her arm. “No - there’s, umm a bit of a mess.” He told her about the ring and the owl and the vet and how they couldn’t start the wedding until Peter and Mary got back.
When he had finished Marlene looked dumbfounded. “So what do you want me to tell Lily? I mean the wedding was supposed to start what - a quarter of an hour ago?”
“I don’t know,” James closed his eyes to try and think. “Uhhh… tell her that we’re just having some technical difficulties with the uhhhh…” he glanced around the well-decorated garden. “ The levitating charms for the streamers.”
Marlene looked at him skeptically before sighing. “Fine!” she conceded before marching down the stone steps and into the house.
“Tell Lily everything’s fine!” James called after her.
…
Everything was not fine. It didn’t take James long to gather as much. The guests had already arrived: the Longbottoms, Andromeda and her husband Ted, professor McGonagall, quite a few members of the Order including Mad-Eye Moody who double checked every protective spell that they’d put on the house and, of course, family. This last one only consisted of Lily’s mother, considering her father had passed away three years prior due to lung disease. Petunia and her husband had refused to come and James’s parents had died of dragon pox during his seventh year at Hogwarts.
He grinned to himself as he imagined his mother’s expression and how much his father would have taken the piss if they’d known what was happening. People wanted to know what was going on and where Lily was and if they were early, Potter, because they’d double checked the invitation and it said ten o’clock.
Yes, they would have loved this.
He, Sirius and Remus kept telling everyone that it shouldn’t be long now despite the fact they too had no clue when Peter and Mary were going to arrive.
“Turn into a dog,” James told Sirius as they discussed what to do next with Remus. It was already half past ten and they were getting desperate.
“Prongs, I’ve known you for almost ten years and this must be one of the stupidest ideas you’ve ever had,” Remus said.
“Do you have a better idea?” James demanded.
Remus sighed and looked around at the guests. “Yes- well… sort of.” His tone was somewhat guilty.
“Oooooh I know that tone!” Sirius said excitedly. James knew that tone too. It was the tone Remus used when correcting their pranks to make them all the more efficient. Unfortunately it was not the tone James wanted to hear on his wedding day.
He sighed reluctantly. “Ok what is it?”
“Well…” Remus started fiddling with the sleeve of his dress robes, fraying the hem, and James slapped his hand away. “We could ask someone if they’ve got a ring.”
“Ok let’s do it,” James said.
“What!” Sirius yelped. Remus was also looking surprised, his mouth hanging slightly open.
“Let’s do it!” James explained. “Listen, Dorcas and Marlene are probably restraining Lily by force by now and I don’t want my future wife’s memories of our wedding day to be having to stun her two best friends!”
“Ok then!” Sirius smiled and cupped his hands around his mouth. “Does anyone have a ring that we could borrow?” he yelled.
The guests stated talking among themselves, asking each other if they had one.
“What kind of ring?” asked Elphias Dodge.
“You know the kind that goes on your finger,” Sirius replied. “Preferably round!”
“I have one!” Dedalus Diggle proudly held up a silver ring before promptly dropping it.
The small crowd made to go after the ring, knocking over several chairs in the process. Edgar Bones tripped over someone’s owl, opening the cage. The tawny owl flew out of its cage and got caught in Emmeline Vance’s hair who let out an awful shriek.
“What’s going on?” a worried voice said from behind James, who spun round.
“Lily!”
Lily had appeared with her wand out. She was wearing a beautiful white satin wedding dress with long sleeves, a v-neck and cream colored flowers embroidered around the hem. Her auburn hair was done in a messy-yet-elegant updo and her veil was pinned underneath it. She looked stunning. James was pretty sure he’d forgotten how to breathe.
Oh no - wait.
There it was.
Ok.
“James, what’s going on?” Her voice was shaking slightly. James noticed that she’d gone pale and her green eyes were wide with worry. “Is it - is it the -“
James realized what she was implying. “No! No, don’t worry!” He ran up to her. “No it’s just -“
“What’s going on?” she demanded. “Why haven’t we started? Why’s everyone standing up? Why are Remus and Sirius trying to get an owl out of Emmeline’s hair? Where’s -“
“Shh shh,” James attempted to calm her even though he could tell it was pretty useless. “It doesn’t matter -“
“Doesn’t matter? James how could this not matter?”
“It doesn’t matter, because,” James closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “We’re starting. Who gives a damn about that merlinforsaken ring anyway?”
“Ring? I - “
James didn’t feel like explaining so he elected to ignore her. “Go get Frank, Marlene and Dorcas and be back here in ten minutes, ok?”
Lily gasped.
“What? What is it?”
“Dammit James! You’re not supposed to see me in the wedding dress before the wedding! It’s bad luck!”
“Trust me,” James took her hands in his. “We’ve had pretty much all the bad luck we can.” He nodded towards where Sirius was struggling to get the large tawny owl back in its cage.
Lily smirked slightly. “I guess.”
“Now go!” he told her and nudged her towards the door.
She was halfway into the house before she turned around and said. “Potter? You are aware that if you don’t tell me later I will hex your misters off.”
“Absolutely.”
…
Not long after, Remus found himself seated in the front row next to Mrs. Evans. Emmeline had been calmed down and was now sitting with her arms crossed looking evidently disgruntled at having had a large bird tear her hat to shreds. James was rocking on the balls of his feet, looking nervous while Sirius grinned and patted him on the shoulder. The crowd’s murmuring subsided as the music started.
Marlene and Dorcas walked down the isle in their matching green satin dresses, holding baskets filled with green and pink flower petals which they threw onto the ground. They were smiling but when they got to the altar they shot James and Sirius looks that said something along the lines of: I’m not murdering you because there are witnesses but if we were alone I’d hit you with a shovel.
Then came Lily, arm in arm with Frank. Being two years above them at Hogwarts, he and Alice had always been role-models to them, so when Lily’s father had died, she’d asked Frank to give her away. The crowd let out a small gasp. Even Emmeline stopped sulking and swiveled around in her seat to get a better look at Lily (having been a bit busy when she came out into the garden the first time). Lily’s cheeks were flushed and her smile was so wide she looked like she might cause a small nuclear explosion of happiness that would blow Cornwall off the end of England.
Remus noticed James’s legs shaking slightly as he nervously ran his hands through his hair. It calmed him. When Lily reached him the bald wizard in dark purple velvet robes standing behind the altar cleared his throat: “We are gathered here today to celebrate the union of two faithful souls…” the man started. The wedding continued uneventfully until eventually they got to the I-dos.
“Do you, Lily Evans, take James Fleamont Potter to be your lawful wedded husband?”
“I do,” Lily said trying not to laugh at the grimace on James’s face. His parents really had been cruel to him with that middle name.
“And do you James-“
But before he could pronounce James’s awful middle name again the doors to the garden burst open.
“Sorry we’re late!” Mary yelled breathlessly.
The crowd turned to look at them in shock.
“We’ve got the ring!” Peter added holding up a ring that glinted in the sunlight.
The two of them ran up to the altar and handed the ring to James, whose mouth was hanging open. Lily had crossed her arms and was eying her literally-almost-husband-if-they-hadn’t-been-so-rudely-interrupted skeptically.
James recovered from his shock just enough to smile at her. “Funny story-“
She put a hand up. “I don’t wanna hear it.”
“No, you really don’t.”
“Let’s just get married shall we?”
“Good idea.”
“Let’s continue,” said the man marrying them as Peter sat down down next to Remus.
“You couldn't have made a quieter entrance?” he asked.
“How about: Thank you Peter for being an amazing friend and fixing everything that we messed up in the first place! Why, it’s no problem Remus you’re very welcome.” Peter crossed his arms indignantly and threw himself down to Remus’s left.
Remus smiled. “Thanks mate.”
Peter didn’t reply and instead turned his attention back to the wedding happening before them. Things proceeded peacefully with no major interruptions or owl-related inconveniences. Finally, the happy couple exchanged rings while Remus silently prayed that Mary and Peter had taken the time to sanitize Lily’s.
…
TWO YEARS EARLIER
Everyone in the Gryffindor common room had gone up to bed at least an hour ago. Only James and Lily had remained due to the amount of head student duties. It was half past two in the morning and Lily was beginning to feel delirious with exhaustion. As the words on the page started to swim before her eyes she considered going up to bed and finishing tomorrow. If only she had the time. James had quidditch practice on Monday and Thursday evenings and she was studying for her NEWTs every other day of the week except Saturdays, which she had kept free so as to maintain her sanity.
That plan was failing. Her body was already in critical survival mode but only thanks to eight cups of coffee a day and ignoring useless things like brushing her hair in favor of sleep. Unfortunately this plan had also backfired as her hair had got so matted she’d had to ask Marlene to cut it. Now it was shoulder length, though awkwardly longer on the left than on the right.
She tried rereading the paragraph in front of her for the fourth time, this time grasping some more information.
“So…” she said rubbing her eyes. “It says here that to calculate the average of the points lost, you need to… sum all the points lost together and then divide that by…” she squinted at the page. “The amount of times that the points were docked.”
“Which is…” James checked his notes. “…exactly what we’ve been doing.” He was also looking exhausted, which was strange since he normally looked and acted like he had enough sugar and caffeine in his system to kill a small whale.
“So how…” Lily checked her notes. “Is Ravenclaw’s average 600 when they never lost more than fifty at a time.”
“What?” James scooted round next to her to read her calculations. “Evans - six times three isn’t thirty.”
“What - oh crap! It’s eighteen isn’t it?” She buried her face in her hands and groaned. “Why don’t you wizards have calculators?”
James frowned. “Have what? But also -“ He swore loudly. “You’ve been multiplying all this time! You only had to sum the numbers together!”
There was a moment’s silence.
Then Lily burst into a fit of hysterical laughter. She laughed until her stomach hurt without even noticing the tears of pure tiredness streaming down her face. They had spent the past four hours trying to figure out what the answer was when the problem was in the sum. The situation was so pathetically sad that it was borderline hilarious. Honestly she’d felt that feeling way too often for her liking: NEWTs, her sister and of course the war. In that moment all of the stress and fear of leaving Hogwarts that had built up inside of her just burst out. It wasn’t long before she full out sobbing.
James was looking panicked as he patted her awkwardly on the back. “It - it’s okay,” he was saying. “We’ve found the problem. Now we just need to - you know - solve it.”
Lily remembered spluttering something along the lines of: “That’s the problem… tired… wasting time… NEWTs… I need coffee.” That last one was desperate.
“You know what -“ James said and stood up. “You just need a break.”
“No time for a break.” Lily sniffled. She really was trying to regain her composure. The whole situation was really very embarrassing. But for some reason her brain no longer had control of her brain. She felt like she was freewheeling down a slope on a bike but had accepted her fate of crashing into the tree at the bottom.
“Yes there is!” he said while seemingly scanning the room for something. “Look, five minutes so you can calm down and then we’ll get right back to it - there’s one!” He reached for a record. “ABBA..” he read slowly. “No idea who they are - must be a muggle group.” He shrugged and put the record in Mary’s muggle record player.
He pressed play and turned the sound down to almost the minimum so that it wouldn’t wake up the entirety of Gryffindor tower.
Lily recognized that the song was Dancing Queen. The song instantly made her want to jump on the nearest piece of furniture and sing over-dramatically into a bottle of hairspray. Nevertheless she remained seated with her arms crossed.
“This is stupid.” Lily declared, but she could feel the corner of her mouth twitching slightly.
“So?” he asked. “Come on -“ He took her hands and attempted to pull her up from her seat.
She gave a halfhearted protest but allowed herself to be dragged up off her chair.
“See?” said James knowingly. Lily realized she was smiling and quickly wiped it off her face.
“It’s still stupid,” she said stubbornly.
“So? When has that ever stopped me?”
“Touchè.”
Eventually it became hard not to smile as they danced - well from an outsider’s point of view they would have looked like two drunken teenagers waving their arms around to barely audible music. But Lily honestly didn’t care - a feeling she hadn’t felt in far too long. It was so… free. For some reason, the same braincell that had decided that it would be a good idea to eat grass when she was four, remembered that in German, to say ‘I don’t care’, they said: “Das ist mir Wurst.” Which roughly translated to: “This is sausage to me.”
The thought instantly made her start giggling.
“What?” James asked amused.
She didn’t answer, she could hardly breathe, her giggles were getting so hysterical.
“What is it?” Disappointment at not getting the joke had replaced the look of amusement of James’s face.
She mustered all of her self control to stop the giggles enough to speak. “This is sausage to me,” she gasped before bursting into another fit of laughter.
“What?”
Lily reached out to grab the back of a sofa to steady herself but with her vision obstructed by the tears of laughter in her eyes she ended up missing, losing her balance and falling over onto it. She lay there for a while shaking with laughter, covering her face with her hands.
“Hey hey hey!” James accentuated every ‘hey’ by jumping over the sofa and plopping himself down on the floor on the other side with his back against a coffee table. “What does ‘this is sausage to me’ mean?”
“I don’t care,” she answered.
“Ok - but then how do you find it funny?”
“No - I mean it means: ‘I don’t care.’”
“How?”
“In German they say: ‘Das ist mir Wurst,’ which translates to ‘this is sausage to me’.”
Apparently James’s brain must have been just as fried as hers because he shook his head and laughed. It took Lily a minute to calm herself down before putting her hands behind her head and staring up at the ceiling. She was about to doze off when James spoke.
“Don’t you wish that it could all be sausage to you?”
“What do you mean?” she asked sleepily.
“You know…” he gestured vaguely. “Everything.”
Lily thought about it for a while. “I mean it could be to you.”
“What?”
“Well… you know with you being a pureblood and all.”
James made a noise that was somewhere near a choke and a scoff and scrambled to his feet indignantly (for dramatic effect probably). “Evans do you really think so little of me?”
She propped herself up on her elbows and raised an eyebrow at him. “Well, to be fair, nothing that you did in the first five years of knowing you made me think very highly of you.”
“Are you joking? Everything that I did in the first five years of knowing you was to try and get you to think highly of me!”
Lily swung her legs down from the sofa and sat up. “Well, it failed miserably.”
“It was the thought that counts,” he muttered and threw himself down next to her. He ran a hand through his hair (Lily resisted the temptation to slap it away) and exhaled deeply. “To be honest I’ve never really considered it.”
“Considered what?”
“Not joining the order. I mean my parents always told me that blood superiority is a bunch of bull - and then there’s Sirius and Moony and Peter who aren’t going to be in the death eaters’ good books any time soon and then there’s you know…” he made the same awkward gesture he had a minute ago.
Lily frowned. “What?”
“You.”
“Oh.” Lily was stunned. Dancing queen had finished and Fernando had started playing. “That’s - that’s nice of you.” Of course it was more than ‘nice’ of him but that was all she’d been able to get out at that moment.
“I mean - how would our friend group stay together? How would we make plans like: ‘Can we go out to lunch next Tuesday?’ ‘No sorry we’ve got to go and try and defeat Voldemort that week - can we reschedule for the week after next?’ Like it’s weird to let you go through that alone.”
Before Lily knew it she’d thrown her arms around him and was hugging him. “Thank you,” she said before quickly letting go. “I mean - you have no idea how much it means to me that I’m not going to be alone.”
James took a second to recover from his shock. “Yeah - I mean - no. I mean like yeah, no. You’re not.”
“God, sorry, I didn’t want to make it awkward -“
“It’s not awkward -“
“It’s just nice to know that someone is gonna be there for you.”
“Until the very end.”
…
“So what happened then?” asked Marlene who was listening eagerly.
The ceremony had ended. Lily and a large portion of the female wedding guests were sitting around a table at the reception. Mary had insisted on knowing the reason for choosing ABBA for their wedding. Over the course of the story more and more people had dropped in to listen until Lily had accumulated a small army of well-dressed romance addicts.
“Well, that night was the night of our fist kiss. It was wonderful, so sweet and passionate.”
“Did he touch your face as he kissed you?” asked Mary breathlessly.
“Of course, and then he wrapped me in his arms, and held me close...” She blushed as a chorus of awws, oohs and aaahs rang through the crowd.
…
Unbeknownst to Lily, her now-husband was telling the exact same story to her now-brothers-in-law at the bar.
“And then we kissed,” said James.
“Huh,” said Remus before taking another swig of butterbeer.
“Tongue?” Sirius asked with his mouth full of chips.
James thought about it. “Yeah.”
“Cool.”
THE END