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Lily was avoiding him.
Which would be nothing new to James except they were dating for two weeks now and she was his girlfriend - she had said yes when he’d asked her, twice, so James was sure of that - and James had thought everything was fine between them.
It seemed like that when he’d meet her for breakfast - she had kissed him softly on the lips, her eyes closed a second longer when they broke apart as if she was still savouring that kiss and she had beamed at him. They had gone together to Potions class, but then, in the middle of class, when her potion was brewing, she had withdrawn suddenly, edgy on her spot, and she had briefly talked with Professor Slugnorn before vanishing her potion and abandoning class.
That was it. She had left with barely a wave to him, just telling him she would see him later.
But she wasn’t in the Common Room in their next free period and she hadn’t showed up for lunch either. None of her friends seemed to know where she was, which meant James had to resort to search for her in the Marauder’s Map.
‘That’s a little bit stalker, don’t you think?’, Sirius asked, his eyebrows raised and a smirk on his face. He always thought it was amusing when James freaked out about Lily as if he could see something James was blind to.
‘I am worried’, James said, very reasonable. Lily was missing - maybe something had happened, maybe she was in the Hospital Wing, maybe she had met someone who was far more interesting than James and…
Well, maybe he was overreacting a little.
But finding Lily was easy - her dot was still on her bed, alone.
On the one place James couldn’t get to her.
‘Oh, Merlin. This is bad’.
‘What is bad?’ Sirius asked, coming to sit on James’ bed and following James’ trembling finger on the Map. ‘She is in her dormitory’.
‘I can’t go there - don’t you see what that means? She is avoiding me’.
Sirius blinked, not impressed.
‘I think she is avoiding everyone, Prongs’.
It could be, but not everyone was her very concerned boyfriend.
‘Probably she was just tired and took advantage of Slug’s love for her to drop out of the class’.
‘That’s it, Lily loves Potions. She wouldn’t leave class unless there was a reason’.
‘Tired, like I said. Aren’t you two overworking to finish that Christmas event?’
James nodded, hoping there wasn’t any guilt showing up on his face. Sure, the Christmas event was one of the things the Heads had to organize, but he and Lily were taking way longer that it was needed just because they had been too entertained with each other in the past two weeks - it turned out that the Prefect’s Room was empty if all Prefects were out in patrol rounds and it turned that James and Lily were responsible for defining those rounds.
All in all, they were taking weeks to do something that they could have finished in two nights - but it provided them a nice excuse to all these moments together.
‘Yeah, maybe’.
‘Just relax, Prongs’.
He wished he could, but Lily didn’t show up for Charms either - another of her favourite classes - so, under his friends’ amused looks, he went to talk to Mary McDonald, asking if she could ask Lily to meet him.
‘Sure, James’, she said, giving him a funny look. ‘But I think she just wants to be alone’.
‘Do you know what’s wrong?’, he asked, biting his lips. Alone, Mary had said. Alone sounded bad.
‘Oh, it’s just - you know what? I will talk to her and we’ll see’.
That sounded ominous too. He nodded, quiet.
There was another free period that afternoon after Double Charms. They stayed in the Common Room, and James was supposedly finishing an essay, but his head kept turning to the stairs to the girl’s dormitories.
‘You are going to break your neck, Prongs’, Remus noted when James turned once more after hearing steps on the stairs, but it was just two Second Year girls that had come down.
‘I am fine’, he said stiffly.
‘No, you are not’, Sirius disagreed, reaching over to grab the parchment James had been writing on. ‘You got back to doodling “L.E”’.
‘It’s short for Law of Elvendork’, James said. ‘The theory that says every object can be turned into another as long as the elements are proportionally observed during the transformation’.
‘You are making this up’.
‘I am making this up’, James conceded, ignoring Sirius’ look. ‘I am just - I wish there was some way of going upstairs -’
‘I know’, Sirius said, a grimace on his face. That was the only thing they had never managed to accomplish in their seven years at Hogwarts. ‘Maybe we can restart that project - did we try the Confundus Charm on the stairs?’
‘Fourth year’, Peter answered him, without raising his eyes from his essay.
‘How about our animagus form? If -’
‘First thing we did on Fifth Year’.
‘Polyjuice Potion?’
‘We tried to brew on Third Year’, now Peter glanced at Sirius, shaking his head. ‘I looked like Anne MacMillan for three days!’
‘Oh, well, she was pretty’.
‘I had half her body. The left part of her body. I had to hide it for three days!’
James almost smiled at the memory.
‘Half of you was pretty then’, he said to Peter, who rolled his eyes. Then James sighed. ‘Well, I can’t finish this essay today, so I will - Lily!’
He raised immediately, a hand grabbing his own hair nervously as Lily came down the stairs. Her face was pale and she smiled at him when she saw him, but there was something restrained on her smile.
James thought she looked like she was really uncomfortable with something.
‘Hi, guys’, she said, not meeting anyone’s eyes. ‘Can I talk to you, James?’
When he nodded, quiet and still, she raised her eyebrows a little bit. ‘Alone, I meant’.
‘Oh, sure’, he said, looking around for a quiet place, but Lily surprised him going in the direction of the boy’s dormitory. He glanced around, finding his friends equally surprised, and followed her upstairs.
Lily didn’t turn to him until they reached the top of the tower. There, she looked around the room - James was grateful that the house-elves had cleaned up their mess, because the room looked decent - before turning to him.
She wasn’t smiling. That didn’t look good.
James felt something pressing his chest, putting all pieces together in a puzzle he wasn’t sure he wanted to finish - Lily avoiding him, the grimace on her face, the way she was closing her eyes now and then as if to steel herself to do something and her request that they would talk alone, in a place no one could witness their break up -
‘Which one is your bed?’, she asked, stopping his reverie. James blinked, confused, and pointed to the nearest bed. Lily nodded. ‘Control your thoughts, okay?’, she said, sitting on his bed. ‘But lay here with me’.
There had been a considerable number of scenarios that James had imagined Lily on his bed, but on the verge of her breaking up with him was not one of them.
‘I think I prefer to stand up, Lily’, he said slowly.
‘We can’t do it with you like that’, Lily answered him as if it were obvious. ‘Just come here, please, James’.
He frowned, unsure, but he sat on the other side of his bed. Lily looked at him as if James was missing something very important, and when he didn’t move, she sighed.
‘Are you mad at me?’, she asked, sounding tired. ‘I am sorry I went away without -’
‘I thought you were mad with me!’, James interrupted her, shocked. She looked confused.
‘Why would I be mad at you?’
‘Because - yes? What else would you break up with me?’
‘Break up? Did you take that Essence of Insanity in class today?’
‘If you are not breaking up - why did you call me?’
‘Oh’, she blushed, the sweetest shade of pink colouring her face and James imagined he could feel the heat coming from her body. ‘I wanted to cuddle’.
‘… cuddle?’
‘Yeah, you know’, she put her legs on the bed and he saw she had taken out her shoes. Lily laid on the pillows next to him, her hand supporting her head. ‘Mary told me you were worried about me and I thought - instead of being miserable alone in bed, I could be here with you’.
‘You wanted to be miserable with me?’, he asked, but there was a shadow of a grin on his lips now. He took off his own shoes, lying in the bed too, and Lily nestled against his chest, closing her eyes.
‘It’s really hard to be miserable next to you’, she assured him, pressing herself more against him and inspiring heavily. ‘You smell so nice’.
With her lying so close to him, the scent of her shampoo so strong and intoxicating, James thought he could say the same about her.
But he just raised his hand to touch her hair, combing it softly, watching the strands of dark red hair. ‘Lily? Are you ok?’
‘I am, it’s just -’, she paused, unsure. ‘It’s cramps’.
‘Cramps?’, James repeated, confused, and then he opened his eyes. ‘Oooh’.
‘Yeah, sorry about oversharing’.
‘What? No, I - well, I want to know when you are not feeling well or - I mean - can I do anything to help?’
James tried to think of whatever he knew about female biology. His father had explained some things to him a few years ago and he understood the basics, but he hadn’t been paying attention very much if he was honest. Female body looked much more complicated than his.
‘You can keep hugging me’, she whispered and he pressed himself closer to her. ‘Sorry about scaring you today. I just wanted to suffer alone’.
'Don’t. I mean, I’d rather you don’t suffer but - if you must - I am always available for some cuddling’.
She raised her head a little to place a kiss on his neck that gave him goosebumps all over his body.
'I will keep this is mind’, she told him warmly. Then Lily sighed. ‘It’s been a while since I have this crisis… I usually take my potions the day before, but - well, I was a little bit distracted yesterday’.
She broke away just enough to wink at him and James suddenly remembered exactly what they had been doing last night on that empty Prefect’s Room - how he had pressed her against the door of the room, his mouth exploring her neck and any exposed skin there, how Lily had moaned softly and how that had driven him crazy -
‘James?’, she called him and he realized he must have drifted off in the memories, judging by how his body was reacting too quickly. He turned slightly, urging his mind to stop recollecting that moment. ‘Maybe now is not the moment?’, she added, a knowing smile on her lips.
‘Sorry’, he said, feeling his neck reddening. James forced himself to focus on the present. ‘I will help you remember next month’, he promised. ‘No distraction, Marauder’s honour’.
‘Maybe just a little distraction’, Lily said, winking at him again. He laughed softly, kissing her forehead, and she rested her head under his chin. ‘I will pay attention next month, don’t worry - I mean, you don’t need to know my cycle, James -’
‘Nonsense’, he said lightly. ‘I already know Remus’, what’s one more?’
She let out an amused laugh, the one that was James’ favourite.
‘Well, wait until you experience my mood swings’.
‘PMS? Is that real?’
‘Very real’, she assured him. ‘I may need to hide again -’
‘I hope you don’t’, he whispered, massaging her neck now. ‘I meant it when I said I want to be there with you’.
‘I may get really stressed’, Lily warned him. ‘Like I may want to throw things - it’s better if you are not close’.
‘I have very good reflexes’.
‘Or I may get really sad and cry, and you’ll think it’s because of you, but it’s not’.
‘Then I will give you chocolate’, he promised. ‘Chocolate is the solution for everything’.
Another laugh; James smiled to himself, satisfied with her reaction. Discovering her reactions to him was really his favourite part of the last two weeks of dating her.
‘Well, you can’t go wrong with chocolate’, Lily agreed. ‘And this massage is really good too’.
‘Oh, I have magic fingers’, he teased. ‘I can show you’.
‘James…’
‘I meant a massage in the back, Lily’, he said innocently, and she chuckled once more, not believing him much. ‘Here’.
He sat more upright, helping Lily’s head on a pillow next to him, and started rubbing the base of her neck and then her shoulders, feeling the tension on her muscles and letting it guide him.
‘Hmmm’, she sighed. ‘That’s actually good’.
‘See? Magic fingers’. He kept rubbing her back, feeling her relaxing under his touch. He beamed - even after two weeks of them going out, there was still that disbelief in knowing Lily fancied him back and trusted him and wanted to be with him. ‘So, those mood swings - care to tell me beforehand?’
‘Oh, you’ll notice’, she said distractedly. ‘Two weeks from now probably’.
‘So - two weeks ago you were in one of them?’
‘I guess’.
‘Then our date and all that snogging later - just one mood change?’
‘Oh, it certainly changed my mood’, Lily said, turning her head in his direction and he was relieved to see her green eyes sparkling. ‘There were some hormones involved in kissing you, but I promise you none of them were fleeting’.
‘I’m glad to know’, he answered, grinning too. ‘Or else we would kiss just one week of the month’.
‘That would mean three miserable weeks’.
James laughed. Lily watched him, a smile on her lips that died when she closed her eyes, grimacing.
‘Are you in pain?’, he asked, worried.
‘It’ll pass, just some more minutes for the potion to take effect again’.
He laid down again, this time with her back for him, and Lily curled up against him. He put a hand under her head, careful to entwine his hands with hers.
‘You are so warm’, she whispered.
‘Is that bad?’
‘No, it’s good. I might nap though’.
‘You can - I’ll wake you up later for dinner’.
She sighed softly.
‘Thanks, James - I know this is not how you imagined us being in your bed’.
Her voice was heavier now with sleep, though he could hear her teasing. James let out a soft laugh, kissing the top of her head, and hugging her closer. Lily was quite warm for him too; there was something very cozy in being next to her like that, even if all they were doing was just cuddling together.
He thought of sharing nights with her where they would just do this - lay together, his arms around her, quiet and serene, and somehow those nights looked as appealing as the most creative nights he could dream of.
‘You are wrong, you know’, he whispered, but she didn’t move and James thought she had fallen asleep. ‘I want to be with you in every way’.
And he closed his eyes, letting her warmth and perfume lull him into a quiet sleep too.