"I'll have a triple cherry candy flossed nutcracker to go, please."
"Coming right up," Lily Evans smiled far too brightly at her newest customer and turned, wand in hand, to Florean Fortescue's premium Ice-cream mixer, which had been appropriately decorated to match the festive Christmas season. It was truly amazing what the famous ice-creamer did to his shop every year; he really was a Christmas connoisseur. Lily got the shock of her life when she was bustling down the crowded Diagon Alley on the first of December, hastily screwing the spiral-shaped contraption that was the secret to Florean's success onto her wand and fighting to keep her fifties style red and white striped waitress hat on her contrasting crimson head when she stopped in front of her work, only to see the window painted with a moving nativity scene, magiked snowflakes drifting hazily onto the newly painted green-and-red umbrellas, fairy lights-or possibly real fairies-drooping from the old-fashioned store sign and a poster floating mid-air, advertising several new sundae holder shapes, ice cream flavours and prices, including Waffle Toboggans and Christmas Candy Cane Cranberry Crème Custard Clusters. A small crowd of children wearing a range of colourful earmuffs playing with a snowman made of ice-cream singing "The Twelve Days of Christmas" completed the strange scene.
Lily entered the shop and demanded of Florean an explanation for this unnaturally festive behaviour. Florean, a thin man with a lined face that came from smiling too much, wavy brown hair that was falling out with age (but you couldn't see that; his hat, identical to Lily's, covered it entirely) and warm brown eyes, passed a small smiling girl her Marshmallow pecan caramel meringue chocolate toffee delight and turned to Lily, flipping the bench top open and letting her into the workshop.
"It's Christmas, Lily," he began patronizingly.
"I know its Christmas, I'm not an idiot." Lily snapped. She didn't like being talked down to. Florean continued, not without giving her a look that said, "Watch your tone." Lily grumbled.
"Well, with this war and all, I just decided that this place needed more cheer. People need to remember the true spirit of Christmas. And that," Florean pointed outside, where the little girl with the Marshmallow delight was making snow angels with a little boy, her ice cream held by the Snowman, who was stealthily painting on eyebrows with the chocolate section, "is as close as we're going to get."
Lily raised her own eyebrows. "An ice cream snowman using chocolate to make parts of his anatomy?" She questioned sceptically. Florean rolled his eyes and his body sagged in defeat.
"Why can't you just enjoy Christmas, Lily?" He asked tiredly, shaking his head, as if she had paid to get into the carnival, but refused to get on any rides. Lily's face hardened and she turned to the ice creamer, frowning.
"Because my parents loved Christmas," she said quietly, twisting the spiral cream-twirler onto her wand until it snapped into place and walking to the back of the shop, ready to master the new menu. Florean sighed and shook his head sadly, before turning to his next customers with a broad smile.
"Welcome to Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour, where the Christmas Cheer is always near! What would you like today?"
And so Lily had spent the entirety of December attending customers covered in snow and good cheer, letting their children run wild in Florean's winter wonderland and resting their own shopping-tired legs. All in all, for someone who would be quite happy to hide under a rock until New Years, Lily was experiencing possibly the worst Christmas ever. Every morning she would stalk past the ice cream snow-man, who, it appeared, had only been enchanted to sing one Christmas carol, glare at the angels hovering over the nativity scene – they would give small shrieks and hide behind the three wise men, one of which looked suspiciously like Dumbledore - Lily would then continue instore, where Florean would be frantically trying to tame the mass flocks of owl orders whilst keeping the under fives out of the workshop. Sure, Florean had other workers, but Lily was by far the most efficient; the parlour just didn't seem to work without her.
This Wednesday was no different. It was mid afternoon, the parlour's busiest time slot, and Lily was contemplating her Grinchy Christmas disposition as she mixed the nutcracker together. Ever since Lily's father had died when she was fourteen, she, her mother Angelina and sister Petunia had made the most of every holiday season, in memory of the warm-hearted Jonathan Evans. Then, two years ago, when they were hanging up Christmas lights, Angelina fell from the second story of their Surrey home, landing fatally on her blue car. In a flurry of sorrow and grief Petunia threw Lily out of the house, and she was left to fend for herself after graduating from Hogwarts. Enrolling in Auror College and landing the handy job at Florean's to pay it off, Lily moved in with her good friend Dorcas Meadowes and severed all other Hogwarts ties, including, unfortunately, her boyfriend James Potter.
James Potter. That name brought back memories. The clearest one in Lily's head was of that very morning, when she had opened up the Prophet to the Entertainment section, and there he was! Grinning like the fool he was with his fellow Bats. James had become a Quidditch star, rising to the top and taking his team, the Baycastle Bats, with him. James was considered England's best Chaser, and had made it to the national team, which was in the semi-finals of the Quidditch World Cup, a tournament long overdue for a hosting in its home country. Potter had crazily made that his aim, and he wasn't shy about either.
"All of Britain's gonna be cheering, you'll see," he was boasting in the page-long article, "this will be the greatest cup England's ever seen." Lily, who James' rugged determination, reminded herself to get Dorcas a ticket to the final as well.
Lily was happy for this new life James had made for himself; she remembered seeing him in a corridor a couple of weeks after the messy break-up, and the picture he painted was disturbing, to say the least. Messy hair pathetically tamed, shoulders slumped, lanky frame somewhat deflated, and ever present glasses haphazardly sitting on the vicinity of his nose, James Potter had hit an all-time low, and Lily had felt more than a pang of guilt as she walked past him, completely ignoring his murmured "hello" and not-so-subtle longing look he threw her way. Lily would never tell anyone she had turned back that day, that the emotions on her face were identical were to those of the then unknown Quidditch fanatic.
It wasn't an easy split, for anyone, including James' better half, Sirius Black. He had thrown a fit and actually cursed Lily (it was a Bat-Bogey, Lily recalled, or was it Jelly Legs?) shouting such nonsense as, "he loved you!" and "you've ruined him!" These actions caused Dorcas, who was beginning to get serious about, well, Sirius, to break it off with the temperamental Black, thus throwing the Seventh Year Gryffindors into a feud of sorts against each other, which ended when everyone went their separate ways, after Graduation.
Lily had never seen James since.
And now the closest she could get to her high school sweetheart was the various articles and World's Most Magical Mavericks editions about him. Oh, she didn't cut out James' pictures and stick them to her wall, but it was good to know what he was up to...where he went....who he dated....not that she minded, of course. She, Lily Evans, had set James Potter loose on the world, and the women of England were better for it. The only downside was the pang of feeling Lily couldn't define whenever she thought of him. Guilt? No, she knew guilt. Anger? Pain? No and no, Lily decided firmly. No, this feeling – dare she say it – was something worse. Something akin to –
Loneliness.
It hit her like a ton of bricks. She didn't like looking at couples because she was lonely. She didn't like cheery, far-too-long ice cream titles because she was lonely. She didn't like Dorcas' unindented charcoal turkeys because she was lonely! She was being a complete Grinch because she was completely, utterly, irrevocably and totally lonely!
And there was only one person who could remedy that.
As if on queue, as soon as Lily had waved goodbye to her customer, he swept into the quaint little shop, bringing a flurry of fake snow with him. Lily froze, her face turning the same shade as the vermillion stripes on her hat. Here he was, James Potter, standing in front of her, in the flesh! Oh, god, she thought suddenly, what am I wearing?!
Of course, Lily knew exactly what she was wearing, it being her work uniform, after all. And what an unfathomable, unflattering and unfashionable set it was: red overalls, a plain white t-shirt, candy striped apron, matching hat, and a prancing Christmas tree shaped waffle that was supposed to be a badge, which sang Lily's name at every new customer. All in all, not the most smashing attire to be donning whilst encountering your one true love and retractor of all things Grinchy. He moved closer, and Lily could spot those things she used to love about him: the dimple in his left cheek, those long, sooty eyelashes not done justice by wiry glasses, and a little, barely-there freckle on his right earlobe. God she loved that freckle.
There was still snow in James' hair, and he was still looking down when he shook it out, much like a dog. Lily still hadn't moved. She was trying to think of what Dorcas, ultimate man-handler and cool cat, would do. Then, suddenly, Lily remembered a conversation – lecture, really – they had had one night over fondue and toe-nail painting.
If you ever come into contact with your ex, always keep you head down, Dorcas had instructed, and never, EVER call out to them. If they recognise you, bear through their small talk and get outta there, fast. But it's best not to confront them at all. And if you have two exes in the one place...oh, wait, you only have one ex. Dorcas had laughed herself silly after that one.
Lily's thoughts were jumbled with loneliness, freckles and Dorcas' eerily Petunia-like laugh when he looked up. She looked down, pretending to be busy with menus. Why did an ice-cream parlour need menus? He was frowning, she could tell. Don't recognise me, Lily begged silently, let your urge to have a double dark chocolate dream go away, please...oh god, she even remembered his ice cream flavour!
"Hi, I'll have a double dar – wait, do I know you?" James asked. Lily spent five glorious seconds taking in that warm voice and comforting smell that was James, then she was all hair-in-face awkwardness, shaking her head and shuffling the holly decorated brochures around the snow-white bench.
It all would've been fine, really. Lily would have followed Dorcas' directions and James would have left with only a slight sense of déjà vu and a double dark chocolate dream. Unfortunately, would've beens don't have excellent outcomes for one Lily Evans.
"Hi, I'm Lily! Welcome to Florean Fortescue's Ice Cre-ARRGH!" Lily's stomach dropped as soon as her badge opened its squeaky waffle mouth, so she did what anyone would do – grabbing the tree off her apron by the icing star, Lily shoved the annoying little waffle man...woman...tree...thing...into her mouth, whole. And it didn't taste that bad really. But that look of realisation on James' face and the massive failure of Dorcas' plan was enough to turn the crunchy waffle into vat of Polyjuice Potion for Lily.
"Lily?" James looked shocked and somewhat...pleased at this new information. His features turned confused after that.
"Did you just eat a badge?"
Lily almost choked. "Well, yes," she barley got out, her mouth was so full; she sounded like a toad coated in honey, "they're quite...tasty? Yes, tasty. Yummy badges! Would you, er, like one?" Lily screwed her eyes shut and swallowed the waffle tree badge down forcibly. Would you LIKE one? What kind of person-but James was saying something, so Lily diverted her attention back to the handsome youth.
"No, thanks...so, how are you?" Oh, god, the dreaded small talk. He was being polite. Polite. POLITE!!! After everything they had been through and he was using manners. Lily wouldn't have minded if she shoved her against a wall, quite frankly, but small talk? Surely he put their relationship on a higher level than small talk? She at least graded it a coffee, maybe even lunch...
"Fine," she squeaked out, playing with her apron tie. James nodded understandably, and then the awkward silence ensued.