Learning to Love by There you are Peter
Something shifted against James’ side, stirring him from sleep. Slowly, he opened his eyes and, yawning, looked down. Lily Evans, the girl of his dreams, was cuddled against him; her red hair was fanned out over his shoulder and she was breathing deeply, clearly still sleeping. James smiled to himself and glanced out of the window at the pink and orange sky. It looked as though dawn was just breaking and they should probably be back in the dormitories before anyone -especially his friends- came down to the common room and saw them.
He shifted gently on the sofa in an attempt to wake her up as pleasantly as possible. Lily turned her head towards him and blearily opened her eyes.
“What time is it?” she mumbled quietly.
“I’m not sure,” he whispered. “It’s almost dawn though. We should go up to the dormitories.”
She nodded and slowly pushed herself away from him to stand up. James’ robes were warm from where she had been leaning on him. Lily rubbed her eyes, put a hand to her hair in attempt to flatten it (not that she needed to) and straightened her robes.
“Thanks for last night,” she said.
“Oh...no problem,” James replied.
“I mean it. You saved my life,” she muttered shyly.
“It’s my fault that you had to be saved in the first place.”
They both looked away awkwardly. Lily hovered at the foot of the stairs, clearly trying to ask James something.
“Are you going to Hogsmeade tomorrow?”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Well…I might see you there then…anyway…good night…I mean good morning.”
James chuckled.
“Morning Evans.”
Lily smiled and turned away to walk up the stairs. At that moment, the portrait hole swung open and Remus, Sirius and Peter tramped in. Remus caught sight of James and immediately rushed over to him.
“Is she all right?” he gasped.
Lily turned around and said:
“If you mean me ““
“Oh, thank God,” cried Remus, rushing over to her and giving her a swift hug. “I’m sorry…I wasn’t in control…oh…I should have told you before…I’m sorry…are you hurt…are you sure you’re all right?”
“Yes I’m fine!” said Lily as she batted Remus away, who was now trying to check her for any sign of a bump or scratch. “James fixed me last night.”
“James!” snarled Sirius from the corner. He was cradling his left arm; James could see that his robes were ripped and bloodstained. He didn’t look happy at all.
“You idiot, Prongs,” he shouted. “You could have got her killed!”
“Shut up, Sirius, you’ll have the whole castle up.”
“I don’t care! What the hell were you playing at?! What could you have possibly been doing that was so important that you forgot to turn up before dark?!”
James glanced at Lily before looking back at Sirius and saying:
“Nothing, I err…just lost track of time.”
“Well thanks to you ‘losing track of time’ I’ve got this,” he held his injured arm up to James. “And Remus has got bite marks on his back from when I had to stop him from killing you and her!”
“She has a name, Sirius,” said James warningly.
“Boys,” interrupted Lily. “Sorry to stop this little chat but …what happened last night was my fault…”
“Well that figures,” muttered Sirius under his breath.
“What was that?!” said James loudly, taking a step closer to his friend.
“James…”
Lily looked at him pleadingly and reluctantly, he backed off.
“I made James late cause…” she tailed off. “But…I followed him…even when he told me to go…it was my fault…”
There was an awkward silence in the common room, interrupted only by Wormtail shuffling against the wall.
“What’s the time?” said Remus quietly.
“Half five,” mumbled Sirius.
“Let’s go to bed…Lil I’m sorry,” Remus said and he climbed the stairs to the dormitory, followed by Pettigrew and Sirius, who was glaring at both of them. James hung back, knowing that Lily might not like what he wanted to tell her.
“Um…Evans?” he said apprehensively.
“What happened to Lily?”
James shrugged and looked at the ground.
“I…um…I don’t think we should tell them about…about what we did last night…”
Lily looked up at him, confused.
“Not that it wasn’t…you know,” he said hastily. “It’s just that…well you saw how Sirius was…I don’t want them to be any madder at me.”
He ran his hand through his hair and waited for her to speak.
“Well, Potter,” she said coldly. “I wasn’t exactly planning on telling the whole of Hogwarts.”
“No but they blame me for what happened.”
“So what they think of you is more important than what you feel?” she said angrily, green eyes flashing.
“No Evans, come on, you know how I feel. It’s just-”
“Don’t give me excuses, Potter. I know you care about your image more than you do about the people around you.”
“That’s not true! Of course I care about you! Didn’t I prove that last night?” James said exasperatedly.
“If you cared about me then you wouldn’t have left me like that… with no explanation! It was like…it was like you didn’t think I was worth it.”
“Of course you’re worth it! Come on, I-”
“I don’t want to hear it,” she said as she turned back to the stairs. “Let me know when you get over yourself.”
*
Lily was one of the last people at breakfast the next day because she had got up late after the events of the previous night. It had taken her a while to drop off to sleep; she was so angry with James but then so…attracted to him. He was big-headed and arrogant and inconsiderate, but she still fell for his charm, his sweetness, his looks…Lily was so deep in thought over her cornflakes that she didn’t notice the four boys sit down next to her.
“All right Lil?” Remus said as he settled himself on the bench and picked up a croissant.
“Yep,” said Lily cheerily, ignoring the others. “Sleep well?”
“Mmm,” he replied, with his mouth full of food. Swallowing, he said: “Has the post come yet?”
“Oh err…yeah,” said Lily and she passed him the newspaper that had been delivered. “This came for you.”
“Why do you bother with that?” said Sirius grumpily from Lily’s left. He was staring moodily across the table. “Nothing ever happens.”
Remus shrugged and began to read, leaving the rest of them in silence.
“Let’s do something tomorrow at Hogsmeade,” said Sirius, suddenly.
“Like what?”
James spoke for the first time and Lily looked at him; he looked thoroughly miserable and his hair was all over the place. Trying to ignore the strange sensation in her stomach, she went back to her cornflakes.
“Like anything that will be more interesting than just wandering around.”
“The Shrieking Shack?” squeaked Peter from the far side of the table. Sirius looked at him blankly.
“Yeah cos we’ve never been there before (!)” he said, casting Peter a weary look.
Peter shrank back to his slouched position.
“Come on. We’ve got to do something before the end of term.”
Silence fell again.
“Well...”said Lily slowly, ignoring James and talking directly to Sirius. “If you wanted to do something because it’s the end of term then you could always just have a party…”
Sirius looked at her and Lily felt uneasy.
“I know it’s not very…’rebellious’,” she said quickly. “But it would be fun and…you could get the whole house down and…yeah…” She tailed off as a strange look fell over Sirius’ face.
“Lily Evans…you are a GENIUS!” he cried. “Oh, I could kiss you but James would probably kill me.” Lily laughed slightly and didn’t look at James. “Oh this is gonna be so good,” Sirius said and with that he left the table and dashed out of the hall.
The rest of them sat in silence; Remus reading the paper, Pettigrew stuffing his face with toast, Lily finishing her cereal and James watching her miserably. She was trying desperately hard not to look at him and she was all too aware that he would follow her out of the hall for a ‘chat’.
Putting down her spoon, she quickly got up from the bench and muttered goodbye to Remus. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see James get up and follow her on the other side of the table. She sped up “ so did he; they were almost racing to leave the hall. Lily, being on the side furthest away from the doors had a disadvantage and as she tried to round the end of the table, he stepped in front of her, blocking her way.
“Move, Potter,” she growled.
“No,” he said simply.
“So shall we stand here all weekend?” said Lily putting her hands on her hips.
“If that’s what it takes.”
He stared down at her, his dark hair flopping down over one of his eyes. Once again, she was so tempted to reach up and push it away and she felt that familiar jolt in her stomach. Trying to ignore it she said:
“Fine. I’ll talk to you. But not here “ the common room.”
“No, they’ll be people there.”
“There’ll be people everywhere…it’s the weekend…”
“Look will you just come with me?” James said quietly. Lily looked at him suspiciously.
“All right…but don’t take me to anywhere I might die…”
*
James led Lily past the crowds of people, who were outside enjoying the grounds before they had to go home for the summer, and walked down, beyond the lake, to the Forbidden Forest. At the edge he stopped and waited for her.
“I thought we were going somewhere I wasn’t going to die,” said Lily nervously.
“You won’t die,” he said seriously “And if anything likely to kill you comes our way then you’ve always got me to protect you.”
Lily looked less than enthusiastic at this.
“Come on,” he said eagerly. “We’re not going very far inside.”
Reluctantly she stepped forward and, after James had looked around to check no one had seen them, they began to make their way through the trees. A strange green glow surrounded them as the sunlight fell through the leaves and onto the path ahead. James looked back and noticed Lily peering through the trunks apprehensively.
“There’s nothing bad this close to the edge of the Forest,” he said reassuringly. “I promise.”
They turned off the dusty path and continued down a narrower one, until they came to a small clearing where the floor was covered in moss. On the far side of the clearing was a cluster of tree stumps and James now made his way over to sit down on one.
“Come on,” he said.
Lily went and sat down beside him and stared around.
“Where did you find this place?!”
“It was ages ago,” James said wearily. “When we were looking for somewhere for Remus to transform.”
“Oh,” she said sitting down.
“I wanted to talk to you,” said James awkwardly.
“Yeah I’d worked that one out already,” she said sarcastically. “And, Potter, I’m warning you “ if you’re going to say that you’re sorry and expect me to instantly fall in love with you then you’re wrong. I’ve already fallen for that once…”
“Well I was going to say that I was sorry…but I guess I’m not allowed now.”
“Feel free…all I’m saying is that it won’t necessarily change anything. I’ll probably still think that you’re too full of yourself to realise why I don’t like you.”
“Maybe I am. Maybe you need to tell me.”
“You want to know why I don’t like you?” asked Lily.
“Yep.”
“Ok.” She took a deep breath. “It’s pretty simple. I don’t like you because…” Her green eyes flashed in his direction. “Because…” She trailed off.
“You don’t know do you!?”
She glared at him.
“So what if I don’t?” said Lily, fiercely. “Am I allowed to just dislike you?”
“Well you are but I think it’s pretty stupid seeing as I know that you secretly do like me.”
“Oh grow up! Why would I possibly be interested in you?!”
“I don’t know, but you’ve been acting pretty keen this past week!”
“Oh yeah it’s been so much fun (!) I really enjoyed almost BEING KILLED!”
“Oh come on! That wasn’t my fault! If you hadn’t followed me-“
“So it’s my fault?”
“NO! That’s not what I’m saying!”
“Well what are you saying, Potter?”
She was staring straight at him with those incredible eyes. Her hair was fanned out across her shoulders.
“I’m saying…”
He looked into those eyes. “I’m saying…I’m saying that I don’t know what I’m doing…I don’t know how to…how to win you over…I don’t know if I’m ever going to get it right…but…I do know that I want to…get it right, that is, and…well I am trying here so could you just…I don’t know “ bear that in mind?”
He looked down, embarrassed by giving so much away.
“All right, Potter,” she said coolly, “I’ll bear it in mind.” With that, she got up and walked out of the clearing. He sank his head into his hands and sighed despairingly. If only he could turn back time and arrange for that night of Quidditch to happen on some other night. He sat like that for a few minutes, thinking about all the mistakes he’d made, when he heard a small cough from somewhere to his right.
“Yeah um…I don’t know my way out of here so could you just…”
Lily looked at the ground as he stood up and began to lead her out of the Forest.
Disclaimer: Tis not mine.
AN: Ok I hate this chapter cos nothing really happens, but it means we are getting closer to my favourite chapters so far: 6 and 9! Bear with any chapters that might be a bit slow because it really does get better. Please review! Thank you xxx