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i-am-a-closet-fanfic-fiend · 4 years ago

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The Art of Love (Epilogue) ~ Steve Rogers x Reader College!AU

A/N: Hello, lovelies! Happy Monday. Here it is. The final installment. Ironically this contains all of the scenes that inspired this fic. Plus a few more that revealed themselves to me along the way. I hope you enjoy!

Summary: It’s the night of the Showcase and it’s time for some fun!

Characters/Pairings: Steve Rogers x Reader, Sam, Wanda, Bucky, Loki, Nat and others appear briefly

Rating: T

Warnings: Implied sexy times, Fluff, loads and loads of fluff

Word Count: 3027

Divider by: @whimsicalrogers

Main Masterlist | The Art of Love Masterlist | Broken Hearts and Robot Parts Masterlist (Companion Fic)

Steve filed into the auditorium with Sam and Wanda, taking his seat next to Bucky and his girl, surreptitiously sending him a thumb’s up.

“How was she feeling this morning?” Wanda asked as she flipped through the program.

“Kinda nervous, but mostly excited though.”

“That’s good. She‘s going to be amazing.”

“Damn. They gave her the last spot. That’s really impressive,” Sam commented.

“It’s well-deserved.”

“Definitely,” Steve agreed.

It wasn’t long before the lights dimmed and the show started.

The first half was all of the freshmen and sophomore performers. There was a lot of promise. After the intermission and the junior performers were done, it was time for the senior spotlights.

Natasha led off with a beautiful ballet solo, to a piano and violin duet by Carol and Brunhilde respectively. That was followed by Okoye’s fight scene, which had Steve on the edge of his seat.

The other performances were equally brilliant.

T’Challa’s one act play was second to last, and finally it was your turn.

Steve held his breath as the movement behind the curtain settled. Bucky nudged him and grinned.

“She’s gonna be great.”

“I know.”

Wanda squeezed his hand, but Steve could tell she and Sam shared his nervous excitement.

The curtain opened to reveal you and Fandral on either side of the stage with your backs to the audience. The music started and you each began to dance.

If you were watching the performance without sound, you’d likely think you were dancing to entirely different songs, but in reality the music held two different melodies that were compatible but not quite harmonious.

As the piece progressed, the music became more similar – a single melody. You and Fandral danced closer and your movements became identical, perfect mirrors.

You were drawn ever closer, and the music changed again, two harmonious parts and the pair at last began to dance together. The steps spiraled around the stage until you ended in the center, your head resting on his chest and his resting on the top of your head as he held you close.

Your heart thundered as Fandral held her close and the final cords of the music faded into the dark auditorium. You smiled as you stepped away to take your bow, linking hands as you ducked your heads to deafening applause. Fandral kissed the back of your hand before stepping back so you could take a solo bow.

You dropped into a deep curtsy before gesturing to the orchestra in the pit and beckoning for Loki to join you on stage. He hurried up the stairs, kissing you on each cheek before taking a bow. The three of you exited stage right.

Loki pulled you into a tight hug.

“You were breathtaking, darling.”

“Thank you. The music was perfect, thank you for picking me.”

“Of course. No one else I would trust.”

You hugged Fandral next.

“Thank you. You were wonderful.”

“It was a pleasure, love.”

You were quickly shuffled further back into the wings for the final curtain call. You couldn’t hold back tears as you stood between Loki and Natasha, looking out into the crowd for the final time. You could spot Steve and the others in the back half of the auditorium, cheering.

Steve mouthed an “I love you” which you happily returned.

With your performance over, you had finally gotten the chance to make it to the exhibition floor.

“He has such amazing attention to detail.”

“And his color choice is impeccable.”

You couldn’t hide your smile as you listened to people discuss Steve’s paintings.

Large hands on your shoulders made you jump for just a moment before you recognized his cologne.

“You were amazing out there, sweetheart” he murmured as he kissed the top of your head. “And you look stunning in that dress.”

“Thank you on both counts.” You smiled as you turned in his arms. “Sam outdid himself.”

“He sure did,” he rumbled, as his hand skated down your arms to grasp both of your hands, eyes roving over you. Even after two months together, you still weren’t used to it.

“Easy tiger,” you giggled before pecking him on the lips. “Everyone loves your work.”

“And what about you? Do you love my work?”

“Well, I haven’t gotten to see it yet actually. But given how I feel about the artist. I’m sure it’s a safe bet.”

“Well, shall I show you then?” he asked, offering you his arm.

“I would love that.”

After a few people moved, he led you to the first of five paintings in his collection.

The first was a painting of Sarah knitting in what you assumed was Steve’s childhood home.

“Fond memory?” You asked you leaned your head on Steve’s shoulder.

“Very. That was how she spent her evenings while I did my homework after dinner. When I didn’t have work, I’d sketch while she knit. And we’d talk about everything that was going on. She made sure I never felt pressured to talk. All the way up to when I left for college.”

“That’s so sweet. I love your relationship with your mom.”

You continued on to the next painting: Steve, Bucky, and Sam fixing up Bucky’s motorcycle.

“I still can’t believe you three got your motorcycle licenses when you live in a place where you can only comfortably ride like two months out of the year.”

“We ride from March to November. That’s most of the year.”

“But it’s so hot during the summer. And you’re in all that leather.” You couldn’t hide your appreciative sigh as you thought about it.

“You like me in leather, sweetheart?”

“Yes. Yes, I do.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

He nudged you along.

The third was you, Natasha, and Wanda during a game night. You could tell even from the painting you were all giggly and tipsy. The memory caused a bittersweet twinge as you thought of how few and far between those nights would be when your roommates of the past four years moved away.

Sensing the shift in your mood, Steve kissed the top of your head.

“We’ll see them plenty. I promise.”

Another twinge, sharper than the last. Steve’s future was still up in the air. He hadn’t chosen a grad program yet, though he’d been accepted to two in California, one in New York, and one in Seattle. He’d yet to hear from the last program in Boston, but you weren’t holding out hope. It was easier that way.

“Sweetheart?”

“I’m good.”

You shook away the sadness. Tonight was a celebration.

“What’s next?”

You bit your lip as you stared at the painting of a couple which was unmistakably you and Steve in front of his bedroom window. You recognized the reading chairs. One of your arms was locked around his neck, his around your waist. Your free hand was clasped in his grasp, cradled against his chest. Your cheek rested on his chest while his rested on the top of your head. Both of you had your eyes closed and soft smiles on your face.

“Oh, Steve,” you whispered, pulling away from him to look at his expression.

His cheeks were a bit pink as he smiled down at you.

“I think that we might have both been inspired by us.”

“Yes. That whole third part. A perfect pair. Always in harmony. Who else could I have been inspired by? You’re my muse. You always have been.”

“And you, mine.”

You unlooped your arm so you could hold his hand instead and he offered you a soft smile. You nodded towards the small crowd gathered around the final painting.

“Seems like that one is a favorite. Shall we see what’s so beautiful?”

You didn’t quite understand the expression that crossed Steve’s face as he nodded.

“After you.”

You waited until the crowd dispersed before stepping up to the painting. Your breath caught as you stared yourself.

Steve had painted you curled up in the chair in his apartment, in your pajamas with a bowl of popcorn. You recognized the details, but somehow the girl in the painting looked more beautiful than you could ever hope to be.

“Oh, Steve. It’s...”

Steve’s brow furrowed as you searched for the right words.

“You don’t like it?”

“I love it.” He relaxed, as you took his hand turning back to the painting. “It’s beautiful. Too beautiful. I think the artist took a few liberties to make his subject appear more beautiful.”

Steve chuckled, but cupped your cheek so you would face him.

“No, I didn’t. In fact, I don’t even think I did you justice. You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

He kissed you soundly, one hand cradling your cheek while the other snuck to the small of your back to pull you closer. The kiss was short, but Steve had poured so much into it that you were dazed when you finally had to break for air.

A soft cough caught your attention, and you both turned to see your respective mentors, Phil and Melinda smirking at you. Well, Melinda was smirking, Phil was finding his shoes very interesting.

“We wanted to congratulate you both on a job well done,” Melinda commented as Phil finally managed to make eye contact with you. “Your performance was perfect. I’m so proud of all that you’ve accomplished. And your collection is beautiful, Steve. I’m glad to see your talents flourishing.”

“Thanks, May.”

You surprised the woman by surging forward and hugging her. It took her a few moments but she eventually hugged you back.

“Thank you for everything. You made me the best dancer I could be.”

“You are going to have a wonderful career ahead of you. And a very happy life I think.”

She glanced at Steve with another knowing smile.

“I think so too,” you agreed.

“I hoped you two would figure it out.”

“What do you mean?”

“You think I didn’t notice the way he watched you when he’d pick you up from practice? Not to mention, I remember when you first picked him as a partner. I told you then you chose well. Even if he kept stepping on your toes.”

“Melinda May ships her students. That’s good to know.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Mhmm.”

You turned your attention back to Steve and Phil who both looked ecstatic about something.

“Really?” Steve gaped.

“Yes, they said they’d call you next week with details.”

“This is amazing. Thank you, Phil.”

“My pleasure. You deserve every bit of success. You have a great talent.”

You watched as the men embraced and Phil handed him what looked to be a business card. Before glancing at you.

“You danced beautifully tonight.”

“Thank you.”

“We’ll let you two get back to celebrating. Enjoy your night.”

“Thank you.”

Once they’d disappeared into the crowd, Steve was practically vibrating with excitement.

“What was all that about?”

“Someone wants to commission me to do a series of paintings.”

“That’s amazing. Congratulations.”

You hugged him as tightly as you could.

The rest of the evening was spent visiting the different labors of love of your friends. You ran into Sarah towards the end of the night, who hugged you tightly. You’d become quite close to her since you and Steve became official.

“You were beautiful, darling.”

“Thank you, Sarah.”

Loki was hosting an after party at a nearby hotel. He’d rented out the penthouse with his dad’s credit card. The party was in full swing by the time you and Steve arrived.

You hung out and caught up with some people who you hadn’t seen since early in freshman year. With the last big night for all of you in the books, there was an air of celebration and nostalgia in the air. Once you’d done the rounds, you found your best friends for a night of dancing.

By three AM you were exhausted. There were groups of people passed out all over the place. Some from drunkenness, but a lot just from the adrenaline crash. You were perched in Steve’s lap, half asleep as he talked to Loki and Sam. Natasha and Clint had already left and Wanda was in a very similar position to you in Sam’s lap.

“Time to go home, sweetheart?” Steve asked as he kissed your temple.

You nodded.

“I have a room one floor down. You’re welcome to stay if you like,” Loki offered. “Sam and Wanda are staying too, but I’m sure we can figure something out.”

“What do you say, sweetheart. Do you wanna stay here or do you wanna go home?”

“Home please,” you mumbled, fighting for your eyes to stay open.

“Okay, my love. Time for us to go then. I’ll get us an Uber.”

He nudged you to your feet. You hugged Sam, Wanda, and Loki before he guided you out of the room. You kept the windows down in the Uber and were feeling much more awake by the time you got home around four.

“I can’t believe we’re actually done with our last showcase.”

“I know. It’s surreal,” Steve agreed as he unlocked the door to his apartment.

“We should stay up and watch the sunrise like we did freshman year.”

Steve grinned at the memory.

“I would love that. Do you want to change though?”

“Yeah and actually I could use a shower.”

You peered up at Steve from under your lashes.

“Care to join me?”

“It would be my pleasure.”

After an invigorating shower (because you and Steve got so distracted you ran out of hot water), you changed into your pajamas and tossed on Steve’s hoodie before making your way to the kitchen where he was preparing a tray, clad in just his plaid pajama bottoms.

“What’s all this?” you asked as you grabbed a chocolate covered strawberry. “Seems like you were planning for a romantic night in.”

“I wanted to spoil you. I figured this would be some nice dessert after a late dinner. But early breakfast works too.”

“Very true. Do you need any help?”

“Nope. I’ll be in in a few minutes. Got a bottle of champagne for us too.”

“You do spoil me.”

You pecked him on the lips and stole another strawberry before heading back into the bedroom.

Steve watched you with a wide smile. He couldn’t be more grateful for how things had turned out with you. You were the best thing that ever happened to him.

After another moment of reflection, he finished putting together the tray. Chocolate covered strawberries, champagne and two flutes, and small black box with a silver bow in the center. With a deep breath, he carried the tray into the bedroom.

You’d drawn the shades and were snuggled up in bed with the tray in front of you. You had a clear view of the sunrise, and the sky was just beginning to lighten. You looked up when he entered and smiled. You looked perfectly at home, and it made his heart thud a little faster.

“You okay, Steve?”

He realized he’d frozen in the doorway. Mentally shaking himself, he moved forward.

“Yes. I’m perfect,” he promised as he placed the tray on the table.

“Ooh, what’s this?” You asked, eyeing the little black box.

“A present for you.”

“Steve, you really didn’t have to.”

“This isn’t technically for showcase. It just feels like the right time to give it to you.”

You squinted at him.

“That is a very confusing elaboration.”

Steve chuckled and crawled into bed next to you.

“It’ll make sense when you open it.”

“Shall I then?”

Steve nodded, his smile a mix of eagerness and nervousness.

“Go for it.”

You gingerly picked up the box, completely unsure of what could be inside. It looked a lot like the box he’d gifted you your necklace in. You popped open the lid and shot him a confused look before lifting the item out.

“You know I’ve had a spare key to this place for two years, right?” you teased as you turned to face him.

“I know. It’s a symbol. I want you to move in with me.”

“But, we don’t know where you’re going to end up,” you pointed out.

He smiled and pulled a folded piece of paper out of his pocket, handing it to you.

“Actually, we do. This came in the mail the other day.”

You unfolded it, immediately recognizing the letterhead from your university. It only took you a moment to read the all important words that started the letter.

Congratulations. You have been accepted.

“You got in? Here? You’re staying.”

“I’m staying,” he confirmed with a nod.

You squealed and launched yourself at him, tackling him to the bed and covering him in kisses.

“This is amazing. You’re staying. You’re actually staying.”

You hadn’t realized you had started crying until Steve reached up to brush away the tears.

“Sweetheart, why are you crying?”

“I’m just so happy. I know we would have made the long distance thing work, but now I get to be here with you. And I get to wake up to you every morning. And that’s all I’ve wanted for so long,” you rambled.

Steve beamed and pulled you in for a dizzying kiss.

“Does this mean you’ll move in with me?” he teased, subtly pointing out your lack of an answer.

“Yes. Of course it’s a yes.”

You kissed him again before hopping out of bed.

“Dance with me? Please.”

Steve was out of the bed in an instant, tugging you into his arms.

“I’ll always dance with you.”

You missed the sunrise, far too entranced with Steve as he held you close and swayed.

“This was the best gift ever. I don’t think you’ll ever top it.”

He grinned, mischievous light in his eyes.

“We’ll see.”

Steve didn’t top it. At least not for another five years, when in the early morning light of your first night in your new house that you’d purchased together, Steve got down on one knee and proposed with a little black box with a silver bow on it.

You forgot to answer then too.

A/N: So there you have it. These two get their happy ending. Or should I say a happy beginning ;) I hope you enjoyed. Thank you all for your support!

xoxo,

Naynay

#Steve Rogers x Reader #Steve Rogers x Y/n #Steve Rogers x You #College!AU #college!steve rogers #college!steve rogers x reader #The Art Of Love #Epilogue

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carry-the-sky · 5 years ago

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your tongue told me every lie

back on my brio bullshit! this is an old fic that i decided to clean up a bit, and then *ahem* add an e rating to. it’s set in some vague s2 timeline, because i miss s2. :/

inspired by this fantastic piece of art by @lindigo 🔥🔥🔥 also on ao3!!

many thanks to my dear friend @kastlecastles for looking this over. <3

The day after the cops almost find Boomer’s body, Annie suggests they take the night off, just the three of them. No work, no family—

“And no extracurricular friends,” Annie emphasizes, side-eyeing Beth as she says it, which Beth does not appreciate. She’s about to say as much, but then Ruby is emerging from the closet, holding a dress Beth has no memory of buying. It’s sleek and cherry-red, and she feels exposed just looking at it.

“No—” she starts to protest, but Ruby holds up a hand.

“You’re wearing it,” she says, fixing Beth with a stare that chases her rebuttal back down her throat. “Don’t get me wrong, you rock a pantsuit better than Hillary—”

“Way better than Hillary,” Annie interjects, then shrugs when Beth glares at her.

“—but we’re going glam, tonight,” Ruby finishes. She hangs the dress on the door. “You’re wearing it.”

And that’s the end of that.

She brings the dress to work. It hangs on the back of the door to Dean’s office—her office, now, her door—and Beth feels a small thrill every time she sees it, anticipation and nerves all blended up in the pit of her stomach.

It’s not that she‘s ashamed of her body, or the way she looks. She knows her curves are sexy. She’s just not sure anyone else does.

(Beth absolutely does not think about Rio. She doesn’t think about his hungry eyes raking up the entire length of her body, or the way his tongue sometimes darts between his teeth when he’s looking at her. She doesn’t think about that night at the bar, how firm his hand was when he grasped her thigh, palmed the curve of her breast—)

Beth keeps her door wide open the rest of the day.

She’s utterly exhausted by closing time, but it’s a good feeling. I can do this, she thinks as she packs up, doing one last circuit around the sales floor. I can do this well.

She hasn’t forgotten about the dress, but that light and airy anticipation from earlier has evaporated, leaving her stomach heavy with dread. For a moment, Beth considers telling Annie and Ruby that she forgot it, or that it didn’t fit—but that somehow feels worse than just putting the stupid thing on, so she begrudgingly yanks it off the hanger and goes to the dealership’s bathroom to change.

The sharp fluorescent lights do nothing to lift her mood, and she scrunches her nose at her reflection. The dress itself isn’t bad, it’s just—not her.

She laughs aloud. None of this—robbing a bank, laundering money for a street criminal, sleeping with said criminal, assuming management over her husband’s car dealership—none of this is her, is it? She’s not so sure, anymore.

Be a boss bitch.

Beth sizes up her reflection in the mirror, the sleek dress with its sweetheart neckline.

Yeah. She can do that.

Beth almost doesn’t see him. She’s shoving her work clothes unceremoniously into her bag when movement flashes in her periphery, and she yelps—

“So I guess y’all don’t do casual Fridays,” Rio says, a smile spreading wide across his face as he eyes the dress, her red pumps.

Beth blows out a shaky breath. “You scared the shit out of me. Don’t you ever, I don’t know, use a cell phone?”

“Nah, I’m old-fashioned.” He’s sitting at her desk, a smirk still playing at his lips, and Beth is torn between wanting to slap him or do something else to wipe that expression off his face.

“What do you want?” she says. “We’re closing soon, which for most people would mean come back tomorrow—”

Rio quirks an eyebrow. “I’m not most people.”

“Look,” Beth snaps, “as much fun as your drive-by visits are, I don’t have time for this tonight.”

“What, you got a hot date, or somethin’?”

Beth scoffs. “Maybe I do, yeah.”

Rio just looks at her for a second, his eyes hazy even in the glow of early-evening light filtering in through her office windows. Beth doesn’t like the way it’s stirring something up in her gut, warm and slow like sun-warmed honey.

“What,” she sighs, “do you want?”

Rio shifts in his chair, legs spreading slightly. “Just wanted to see how my business is doin’.”

“Excuse me, your business?”

“Sixty-percent, yeah? Last time I checked, that’s more than half. Which means it’s more mine than yours, sweetheart.”

Anger sparks in her chest, hot and fast. Her cheeks are warm with it. “Get out,” she demands. “Now.”

Rio leans forward. “You gonna make me?”

She’s not sure how it happened, but she’s standing almost directly in front of him. From this angle, she can see the shadow that the collar of his shirt casts across his throat.

From this angle, he has to look up at her.

“You don’t scare me,” she says, her voice a low scrape of sound.

He wants to touch her—she can feel the want radiating off him, can see the lines of his tendons as he clenches his fingers against his knees. But he doesn’t move. When it comes to—this, whatever the hell it is, he’s always let her take the lead.

She should leave, now. She should—

She can’t explain what makes her reach out, what makes her brush the tips of her fingers against his arm. His skin is smoother than she expects, the muscles of his forearm taut beneath her hand.

“Right,” he says, voice hoarse. His eyes are fixed on her. “Right, ‘cause you’re the boss, now.”

And then he’s got a hand on her, his palm curved around the meat of her thigh. His fingers skate upwards, teasing around the dress’s hem. Beth feels each point of contact like a laser, every one of her nerve endings attuned to where he’s touching her.

“Annie and Ruby are waiting for me,” she breathes.

Rio’s eyes are wildfire. “So let ‘em wait.”

His hand skims higher, and Beth spasms when the pad of his thumb slips beneath her panties. He huffs a laugh, looking so goddamn pleased with himself. “You like that, ma?”

Beth narrows her eyes, but it’s useless—her legs are quivering beneath his hands, and she knows he can feel it. “You are such an asshole,” she hisses.

“ ‘S one school of thought,” he murmurs, the words slow and husky. His eyes don’t leave her face as his fingers graze her inner thigh, and her breath catches in her throat. She still hasn’t closed up shop, and yeah, it’s the end of the day, but someone could still walk in, someone could see—

It’s dangerous, what she’s doing. It’s bad.

Pleasure sparks between her legs, and Beth has to resist the urge to clamp her thighs together. Her nails dig into his arm, and something bright flashes behind his eyes, something predatory. He’s looking at her like he wants to open her up, see what comes spilling out. See exactly what she’s made of.

You’re the boss, now.

She draws herself up slightly, chin jutting out. “You gonna take all day down there?” she says, proud that her voice stays steady. “Like I said, I have somewhere to be.”

Rio makes a noise in his throat, rumbling low like thunder, and she knows she has him. Satisfaction unfurls in her chest—and then he’s sliding a finger into her, and all coherent thought is driven from her head, lost to the rush of her pulse in her ears, the delicious stretch as he eases his way in.

It’s muscle memory that has her grasping at his shoulder, her pelvis canting into his palm to chase the friction. Rio pushes deeper, and she has to bite her lip to keep quiet. She slants her neck up toward the ceiling, her eyes shuttering.

“Like it when you boss me around,” he’s saying, dragging his finger out before pumping into her again. Beth can’t help it this time—she shudders, a soft whimper breaking past her lips. Slowly, Rio slips his finger out again, teasing lazy circles around her entrance. Beth’s hand jumps to his wrist, tugging emphatically. “Yeah,” Rio laughs, “yeah, just like that.”

“Didn’t—tell you to stop,” Beth gasps.

“Loud ‘n clear, darlin’,” Rio says, adding another finger as he plunges between the slick of her folds. Beth’s nails bite the skin on the underside of his wrist, and her stomach squirms pleasantly at his sharp intake of breath. She would die before admitting it, but the way he makes her feel, strong as steel, the exact fucking opposite of the good little porcelain doll she’s been her entire life—it’s intoxicating. She wants to drown in it, in him.

Rio crooks his fingers, hitting an angle that makes her writhe. His thumb knuckles softly against her clit, and Beth can feel the tension coiling in her belly already, everything shrinking at the edges. His breath is coming faster now, jagged like the edge of a knife, and she could come just like this, but it’s not enough. Her entire body draws taut like a bowstring at the memory of his cock inside of her, filling her up—

Beth rocks forward, rucking her dress up around her thighs as she brackets her knees around him. He tilts his pelvis to meet her, pulling his fingers out, and the sound of protest she starts to make sticks in her throat as the movement grinds her against the hard ridge of his erection. Her blood sings, hazy-hot desire jolting up the column of her spine.

Beth’s hand darts to his pants, grasping at the zipper. Rio laughs softly, both palms sliding around her ass. “I know you’re in a hurry, but damn, baby.” He squeezes, the pads of his fingers kneading into her. “I ain’t a piece of meat.”

“Shut up,” she grits between her teeth.

Rio tsks, head tilting to one side. “Manners, Elizabeth.” His hands splay, fingers caging her hips. His face is inches from hers, so close that she sees the spaces between his lashes, feels his breath when he exhales. He dips his head, mouth ghosting her clavicle. “What would those PTA bitches say,” he murmurs, each word like a brand against her skin. “Huh? You think you’re just like ‘em, but here you are, down in the shit. Rollin’ around in it.” His lips drift higher, to the hollow of her throat. “Think you’re so much better than ‘em, than me. But you ain’t.”

Anger and arousal flush through her in equal parts. He’s always known how to say to rile her up, burrow under her skin like a splinter. She can’t dislodge him, no matter how hard she tries. And the thing is, he’s not wrong. Down in the muck and the shadows, she knows who she is.

He’s shining a light on all her dirty laundry, but Beth isn’t here for that. She doesn’t owe him anything, much less the truth.

So she does the only thing that will shut him up—hooks a hand under his chin, and brings her mouth crashing down to his.

It’s not soft, and she doesn’t want it to be. They trade kisses like punches—she bites his lower lip, and in retaliation his tongue thrusts into her mouth. Her hands are everywhere; sliding around the nape of his neck, curved like claws at his jawline, pressed to his jugular. One of Rio’s hands skates up her sternum, yanking her dress and bra aside so he can tweak a nipple between his fingers. The other hand fumbles with his pants, shucking them down his thighs.

She feels when his cock springs free. He jerks his hips, and Beth gasps as the tip rubs against her cunt.

Rio snags her lower lip between his teeth, biting just hard enough to sting. “You want it?” he rasps, tongue darting out to wet his lips. He brushes her entrance again, but he pulls away slightly as she cants toward him. He’s playing with her, making her work for what she wants. Making her beg. It’s what he’s always done—why should this be any different?

Fuck that. She’s gonna take what she wants.

Beth pulls at her panties so hard she hears the fabric tear. It was a nice pair, expensive, but in this moment she couldn’t give less of a fuck. She pushes against him, swirling around the head of his cock, and she feels a pinch of triumph when he hisses through his teeth.

“You want bossy?” she says, and she almost doesn’t recognize her own voice. “Fuck me. Now.”

She locks eyes with him as he pushes inside, so she sees the moment he breaks. His jaw goes slack, his lower lip plush and jutting out in a way that’s so him, so familiar it makes her chest ache.

She’s dipping into her feelings, too close for comfort. Beth shifts her weight, pushing herself up on her knees before sinking down onto him again, and the pressure in her chest evaporates. He feels so goddamn good, stretching her out the way she remembers. Filling her up, no room for anything else.

Rio thrusts into her, sheathing his cock to the hilt, and the guttural cry that rips from her throat is entirely involuntary. She bears down on him, grinding her hips in a frenetic circle, and then he’s pumping into her harder, fucking her in earnest. The wet slap of skin on skin fills her office, punctuated by the lewd noises each of them is making.

“That’s it, ma, that’s—fuck—” Rio groans. He’s grabbing her waist so hard she’s sure she’ll have bruises tomorrow, but she doesn’t care. All she cares about is chasing the warmth that’s building in the pit of her stomach.

Beth braces her arms on his shoulders and surges up on her knees. His cock slams up into her, right against her clit, and she’s so fucking close, she can almost taste it on her tongue. He rams into her, again and again, and his thumb slips between them, circling just the right spot—

Her orgasm hits like lightning, blinding heat and static. She throws her head back in a wordless cry as all the air swoops from her lungs. She can’t breathe. She can’t—anything. She can’t remember the last time she came this hard.

(Yes, she can. It was in that fucking bathroom, his breath hot on her neck and his name stuck on her tongue).

Rio is still hard, still pumping into her, his arms solid like a wall around her. He’s the only thing holding her up. She’s still coming down, but already she can feel the embers stirring again, stoked by his nails digging half-moons into her torso, his cock inside her.

Will she ever have her fill of him?

“Desk,” she pants, jutting her chin.

His hips stutter, and his brow creases with confusion for a nanosecond before he gets it. In one swift motion, he hooks her legs around him and pivots them so that she’s on her back on the desk. Beth can vaguely feel something digging into her lumbar—a pen, maybe—but she’s too boneless to care.

Rio props himself on his forearms, framing her face. His pupils are blown wide like dinner plates, his chest heaving with how hard he’s breathing. “You cheated, mama,” he pants, fucking into her so hard that something goes crashing from her desk to the floor. “Didn’t—wait for me.”

“C’mon, then,” she breathes, digging the heels of her pumps into his back to urge him on. His eyes flash, and he ruts into her once, twice—

He spills into her with a choked-off grunt, his entire lean frame quivering.

For several moments, the only sound is the two of them breathing. The sun has dipped low in the sky outside, casting long shadows across his face. It makes him look like one of those abstract paintings, something that’s not quite real.

Beth knows what’s real. She suspects that he does, too.

But none of that matters. This will play out the same way it always does—the dust will settle, and they’ll both go back to pretending. Beth thinks they could fill up an ocean with all of the things they aren’t saying to each other.

She could do it. She could break the dam, open her mouth and ask the words that are a thorn inside her, the words she buries deep so he can’t use them against her.

What is this? What are we? Do you feel the same way I do?

What now, her heartbeat says, pounding a cadence against her ribs. What now what now what now—

Rio rolls off her, tucking himself back into his pants. She feels the loss of physical contact like a sucker punch, and it takes every ounce of restraint she has not to reach for him. For a moment, she just lies there, eyes to the ceiling as she wills her jackhammer pulse to settle.

When she pushes herself up from the desk, he’s already halfway to the door. “You got a good gig goin’ here,” he says jerking his head at the sales floor, but his double meaning is transparent as glass. You got a good thing goin’ with me. His eyes dart to hers. “Try not to screw it up, yeah?”

“Speak for yourself,” Beth snarls, and she’s all iron again, tucking away everything soft and vulnerable.

His lips twitch. “You should wear red more,” he says, deliberately looking her up and down. Even from this distance, his gaze sears against her skin. “It suits you.”

Then he’s gone.

#brio #brio fic #beth x rio #nbc good girls #my fic

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bts-fantasy · 5 years ago

Text

part twelve

Genre: Thriller AU

Characters: Yoongi, Hoseok x Reader

Previous — Next

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Being able to talk to Yoongi openly about the stalker was a big help for you. You almost felt bad when he rushed over to you in the middle of the night when you‘d told him about the message you’d received only a few hours ago. Now you were lying in bed next to your boyfriend who had his arms tightly wrapped around you.

„I don‘t understand...“

You whispered after a while trying to form your storm of thoughts into comprehensible words. Looking up at Yoongi you could see his furrowed eyebrows as he seemed to be thinking hard about the issue as well. But neither you or him had an answer.

His fingers picked up a strand of your hair as he mindlessly played with it chewing on his bottom lip.

„We have to inform the police.“

You scoffed telling how Hoseok and you‘ve already tried that but to no avail. Yoongi‘s frown deepened as he thought about your words but quickly relaxed pulling you closer to his chest.

„Hey, no matter what happens I‘ll be here to protect you.“

You smiled up at him when he slowly moved closer to connect your lips. His arms made you feel so warm and safe that you forgot everything else for a moment.

Waking up for school the next morning was unusual. You turned to your right to see Yoongi curled up like a tiny cat sleeping soundly next to you. His hair was messier than the night before and the strands were sticking out in all directions but you thought it was adorable. He looked so peaceful while quiet snores filled your ears like a beautiful melody.

Looking down at your phone you saw a message from Hoseok inviting you over for dinner tonight. You immediately agreed already thinking about bringing something with you as a gift for all the things he‘d helped you with in the past few weeks.

Not wanting to wake Yoongi up you snuck out of bed to get ready for the day. After a quick shower, you walked back into your room only to see your boyfriend looking like a total mess. His eyes were fixed on the empty spot next to him and his hands clutched at the sheets.

„Is everything okay?“, you asked quietly as he jumped up in surprise.

Without a word he rushed over to you and pulled you into a tight hug. You stood there perplexed to even react but quietly enjoying the warmth of his embrace.

„I just had a bad dream. And you weren‘t there when I woke up...“

Your heart skipped a beat while he whispered near the ear and you pulled back to look him in the eyes.

„Sorry, I didn‘t want to wake you up.“

Once Yoongi had calmed down again you both ate breakfast with your mom.

„Y/N, I‘ll be out of town for tonight. I got invited to an art exhibition.“

Your mom‘s face lit up when she told you the news and you could see how happy she was to attend the exhibition and you were happy for her too.

„I‘ll drive you to college“, Yoongi said when you were ready to head out. You knew he wouldn’t accept a „no“ and you didn‘t mind to spend some extra time with him so you both walked out and got into his car.

Everything was normal that day. The drive to college was filled with lighthearted conversations and you were able to focus in your classes more than the previous day. Hoseok and you decided to study a little bit before both of you decided to go to Hoseok‘s for dinner.

Ji Woo had already prepared everything when you and Hoseok arrived. It smelled like freshly baked potatoes and you instantly got hungry as you walked into the kitchen.

„Wow, Ji Woo... this looks incredible!“

You exclaimed happily as you sat down on the table. Her eyes followed you calmly before she smiled at you widely for appreciating her work. Hoseok did the same and now all of you were sitting around the delicious-looking food ready to dig in.

During the dinner, you tried to compliment her for her good food. It was really delicious and you wanted to let her know but something was different.

You couldn‘t point it out but the way Ji Woo‘s eyes were always on you gave you an eerie feeling. She didn‘t say much and only talked when you directly spoke to her. The awkwardness surrounded you as if you‘d just met her.

Sometime during the dinner, Ji Woo excused herself to use the bathroom. You gave Hoseok a questioning look but he only shrugged his shoulders.

„She‘s like that sometimes, don‘t worry.“

Suddenly, your phone blew up with several text messages and you opened the messages only to choke when you looked down at your screen.

You quickly showed the messages to Hoseok but you also sent a screenshot to Yoongi because you promised to inform him as soon as something happened.

Hoseok turned pale when he looked at your screen and just when he was about to say something Ji Woo walked in stopping in her tracks when she looked between you and Hoseok.

„What happened?“

Her eyes were switching between you and Hoseok. When none of you answered she just shrugged and sat down again continuing the dinner.

The weird feeling in your chest kept spreading even more as time passed by and you tried not to think of the messages you‘d just received. The air around you had suddenly turned into an uncomfortable silence and you just wanted to leave.

You excused yourself to use the restroom and left Hoseok and Ji Woo behind who were still quietly eating their food. You walked down the long hallway to the restroom but before you could put your hand on the doorknob you felt a sharp pain on the back of your head and soon everything around you had turned black.

Something in the distance was echoing through your mind as you tried to find your orientation again. The voices came closer and closer until they were loud enough for you to understand what they were saying.

„I swear to god, if something happens to her, I‘ll kill you.“

Was that Hoseok‘s voice?

„Relax, she‘s not dead. Just knocked out.“

Ji Woo?

„You didn‘t have to do that, you know?“

Hoseok‘s deep voice surrounded you now clear enough but you didn‘t want to open your eyes just yet. First, you had to find out what the hell was going on. You could feel that you were sitting on a chair and your hands were tied behind the back of it.

„And just let her run away with him? Is that what you want?“

Ji Woo raised her voice and a long moment of silence followed where nothing could be heard and you almost felt like you were completely alone.

„No, but this is not-“

Hoseok didn‘t get to finish the sentence as his older sister just scoffed and cut him off rudely.

„How many times do I have to tell you that if you want something, you have to do something for it. No matter the consequences.“

Again, complete silence.

„Hoseokie, you have to listen to your older sister, okay? I‘m all that you have now that mommy and daddy are gone.“

Her voice had turned soft so suddenly that it seemed surreal and completely insane sending shivers down your spine. You were slowly trying to piece the puzzle together but the more you dug into it the more you didn‘t want to believe your own mind.

This can‘t be real...

Slowly you opened your eyes to see that you were in their basement now with only a petroleum lamp illuminating the cold room. You stared up at Ji Woo and Hoseok who were standing only two feet away from you while Ji Woo carried a baseball bat in her hands.

You then realized the continuous sharp pain at the back of your head and winced squeezing your eyes shut. The memories came back again and now you knew what had knocked you out a few moments ago.

How long had you been unconscious? You had no idea.

„Oh look, our princess is finally awake“, Ji Woo‘s dismissive voice was nothing like her at all. The nice and joyful behavior was nowhere to be found and you asked yourself if you’d ever really known her at all.

„What.. What is going on? Why did you hit me? Why... Why am I tied-“

You got cut off by a loud mocking laugh as she just stared down at you. Her scornful grin suddenly distorted with rage and before you could react you felt a sharp stinging pain on your left cheek. Hoseok yelled at his sister for slapping you but again, she showed no remorse.

With tears in your eyes, you looked at your friend standing behind Ji Woo avoiding to look at you directly. The betrayal you felt inside was unlike anything you‘d ever felt in your life. Not even when your dad had done you wrong had you ever felt something so deeply saddening.

Unlike your own father, you had trusted Hoseok completely.

This was a different kind of pain and you were slowly but surely falling apart under the weight of it.

„You want to know why you‘re here? Ask your damn boyfriend!“

Confusion spread across your face and made her sigh dramatically in front of you.

„How dare he leave me behind in that hellhole? How dare he start a new life without me? Do you think I had a great time without him in the psychiatric ward?! Go ask him that!“

She was now screaming at the top of her lungs and you weren‘t even able to cover your ears from all the noise.

„Psychiatric ward? I thought you were in a boarding school!“

Hoseok had taken a step back from his sister as he looked at her with eyes wide open. It was clearly written all over his face that he didn‘t know the whole truth about his older sister. His eyes were glued on Ji Woo looking at her as if she was a complete stranger but she didn‘t seem to care. Instead, her voice had turned into that soft angelic mask she put on every time he told her off. Ji Woo approached him with her hand reaching out to touch his cheek.

„Hoseokie, don‘t worry I won‘t go back there anymore. I came here to stay with you forever.“

But Hoseok pushed her away before she could lay her finger on him and he looked at her disgustedly. His eyes finally landed on you and that was the exact moment when the realization hit him so hard it knocked the wind out his lungs. You could see it in his eyes as he looked at you regretting everything he‘d done. But he knew just like you, that it was too late.

Ji Woo, on the other hand, tried her luck one more time as she approached her little brother again to manipulate him.

„Stay away from me!“, he shouted loud enough for her to flinch. She stared at him saucer-eyed not believing the way he was talking to her. The power she had over him was slowly fading into thin air and she was not happy about it.

You were watching the whole scene in front of you with a racing heart thinking of ways to escape but nothing seemed possible with your hands tied behind your back. The ropes were cutting into your flesh and you could tell that your wrists were bleeding from the bruises.

„You think you can talk to me like that, Hoseokie? Well, think again.“

And with that, suddenly her hand was at your neck and you could see the shiny metal object she held close to your throat.

Your breath hitched as Hoseok let out a loud yell looking at the knife in his sister‘s hands in panic. Ji Woo just laughed at the frightened face of her younger sibling clearly enjoying the moment as her hand slowly inched closer to your throat.

You closed your eyes preparing yourself for the worst trying to think about all the good things that had happened to you in your life. You didn‘t want to die in complete fear and so many negative feelings so you focused on the first happy memory that came to your mind.

The kiss you and Yoongi shared on the rooftop.

Tears were streaming down your face by now and somehow it felt like hours to you as you remained in that position.

„Please, don‘t hurt her, Ji Woo. I‘m begging you. Whatever it is you‘re going through, we‘ll get through it together. Just please... put the knife down.“

You could hear Hoseok‘s desperate attempts to calm her down again and you dared to open your eyes slowly but the knife was still dangerously close to your throat. You couldn‘t even breathe properly because of the fear of coming too close to the weapon in front of you.

„You have no idea what I had to go through, Hoseokie. And I won‘t let this bitch take it all away from me, you hear me?!“

Ji Woo pulled you by your hair roughly and placed the knife on your throat ready to end it all while Hoseok stood there frozen in his place not knowing how to stop her.

You whimpered in her hands giving up all hope you‘d left inside of you saying goodbye to your mom and Yoongi in your mind in hopes that it would reach them somehow.

Then everything around you turned dark as you closed your eyes one last time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A/N: There‘s only one more chapter left and maybe I‘ll write an epilogue too.👀

I hope you liked this part, it was honestly so difficult to write😖

Happy reading and goodnight🙈💜

Masterlist

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solargroup09 · 4 years ago

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ari, luna, mina, please pick 5 people to go on an excursion with you and why? 🧜‍♀️

Ari: ooooh an excursion! Well, I guess the excursion would be some sort of hike (god I love hiking), and I would pick... Matthew because I can’t not take my best friend (besides my members), JiU, Changkyun, Hongseok, and probably Johnny! JiU is one of my closest friends, and I need some backup against all these boys, you know? Plus she’s super sweet and fun! Hongseok I met through Hui and Matthew, and he’s such a sweetheart, I know we would have a lot of fun! We all know Johnny can be energetic and goofy, and I think he would keep us all laughing! And Changkyun... well, I can’t leave a member of my ‘96 squad behind! 😂

Mina: oooh, well first of all, I’d love to go to a museum/exhibition! And I‘d take some of my closest friends with me - so Youngbin of course, then VAV‘s Baron, TWICE‘s Nayeon, Golden Child‘s Daeyeol ... and Inseong, if he wants to tag along 😉 Youngbin and Baron would help me organize the excursion beforehand, and Daeyeol would probably learn everything he can about the exhibition, so he‘d be our own personal guide! Nayeon always brightens the world around her, she‘s just such a sweetheart and would make everything much more fun. Inseong is always interested in learning something new, and I can totally see myself strolling through the exhibition with him by my side, having deep talks about the different (art) pieces but also definitely making fun of some of them! 😄

Luna: Dear lord... I think I would go anywhere they want really, when it comes to these activities I am probably the least likely to complain as long as everyone is okay with the plan. You already know I can't go on a little excursion without Moonbae, impossible and Kevin would just never let me live it down. I would ask Siyeon from Dreamcatcher to come with us, I think she would get along well with Kevin and Jacob. They're both similar to her and Sua unnie in mu opinion 🥰 I would also take Yiren from Everglow, I love her she's so sweet and her and Siyeon also know each other so it wouldn't be awkward. The last one would be Hangyul, him being my first friend in the industry, i don't think I could do something with my closest friends without him. 🥰

#solar #oc girl group #solar mina #solar ari #solar luna #mina answers 🌿#ari answers 📝#luna answers 🌙

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thevoidwrites · 5 years ago

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Of Radwa Ashour

I think it would be a disservice to translate the works of Radwa Ashour. Don’t get me wrong, it is an absolute necessity that everyone everywhere experience the painful art she drew from history, but what are those books without their mother tongue? One would argue, based on her stories, that we, too, are nothing without our mother tongue. (the irony of my writing this not with my mother tongue is not lost on me)

Radwa’s novels are, to me, more history than fiction. This might be the reason historical fiction exists. She tells of crucial times of Arab and Muslim defeat, of the low points of our history. The number of martyrs, the state of affairs, the oppression, are all things to read about and never understand until you experience them through a single family living in Grenata as they try to save some books from burnings, as some of them die of a broken heart, others are killed at the stake for practicing medicine, as the bathhouses are closed down, as a third generation is pushed to the ocean in exile. Pain upon pain upon pain. Pain felt through empathy, compassion.

Radwa is rooted in Arabic, her references, her words, her characters, her stories, they are based on the collective Arab experience; sadly, that experience is usually defeat, but it is something that must be shared upon all our shoulders. Radwa doesn’t tell you much about the politics of the time. She may mention the town of Tantoura putting their hope on a speech by Abdelnasser, but you know he will do nothing, you know all the rulers will betray these people. It’s about these people though, not politics. The direct effect of politics, the effect that matters, is what happens to the people. So, in a way, Radwa is still talking about politics, she‘s talking about the consequences of the collective decisions taken at the time. It’s all in the shared sense of loss that shrouds who we are right now.

Here’s what I expect would happen if this was in English, by far one of the worst languages to write compassionately about pain due to oppression and one that does not revere God as Arabic does. I recently tried to read On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. I knew nothing about this book except it was loved by many western folk I follow on Twitter and they thought this particular book is needed at this time since it’s written by an immigrant about his experience. So I started it and it was horrific. There is no denying the pain in those people’s lives, but it isn’t written for me, a person who lives quite close to pain already. Similarly, I still haven’t been able to watch the second season of The Handmaid’s Tale and I am yet to get the courage to read the book, although the book may surprise me and be kind like Radwa.

My hypothesis is this. These pieces of media, these books, these movies, these series that are loved by mostly a western audience and are supposed to be about oppression and to represent real pain felt by real people, is not made for the people in pain. It is not made to soothe, to share, to help you feel less alone in your losses. If you are being bombed, you can remember the girl from Tantoura hugging infant Mariam to her chest on the stairs while bombs rained on Beirut and remembering Darwish saying “On this Earth is something that deserves life.” When I’m in fear I remember Radwa, I remember her characters, I remember others who felt this pain as I did and I was not alone. It was still painful, traumatizing, frightening, jarring, but I was not alone in how I felt. My heart, although already weighed by the real world, can still take the burden Radwa writes in her books.

Instead, Ocean’s book was made to shock, to intensify the pain, to make sure numbed hearts feel it. These people get to see their faces, their cities, their comfort shaken on screen to try and fathom what the oppressed so far away might be feeling. To make someone who always felt safe realize how it feels to live with a constant lack, to live with the normalization of transgression, you have to jar them. I do not need to be jarred. The oppressed do not need to be shocked.

It’s like the quote “Nothing ever ends poetically. It ends and we turn it into poetry. All that blood was never once beautiful. It was just red.” The moments Radwa writes about are just red, but she made them into poetry. If someone who doesn’t know this pain only sees the poetry, they might romanticize this moment instead of seeing it for its true nature. For someone who lived here though, you need the poetry to survive. All that red? It’s my blood. It’s our blood. And if there is no escaping that it will be spilt, I can at least rest assured that it will be made in poetry. There’s no point in living otherwise, no point in withstanding this reality, but for the hope, that this is poetry in the making.

The only way out is through. Even while going to therapy, you sometimes have to relive difficult moments, have to change learned behavior, have to reach out to people despite it gnawing at your throat. You have to push yourself through this absolute discomfort and hold your quivering heart in place because what must be done, must be done. Not all pain is the same, this pain to change, to grow, to overcome is necessary. You are transformed by it, a times, you are in control of it. You choose to be in their momentary pain to reach the space beyond. Radwa’s pain is the same. It is necessary, it is beautiful, it promises a safe haven beyond it. None of her books really end well I suppose. No one gets their land back, or gets to reunite with their family, or finds someone they lost along the way. But they grow mints and rosemary under their kitchen window, they help strangers along the way, they bind wounds, and hide books. So you take refuge in those small acts that you do. She reassures you, this is enough, what you do is enough, those little acts are enough. You may not be able to do much else, and that is okay. Rest softer, for you are not alone.

#writing #radwa ashour #ocean vuong #tantouria #on earth we're briefly gorgeous #opinion

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downn-in-flames · 6 years ago

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Love, Lily Evans

In hindsight, Lily really shouldn’t have written up a list of all the boys she’d ever fancied and what she liked about each of them.

A Jily ‘To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before’ AU

Read it on: HPFT | AO3 | FFnet

In hindsight, Lily really shouldn’t have written up a list of all the boys she’d ever fancied and what she liked about each of them.

But in her defence, she had absolutely no reason to believe that any part of that list would ever see anywhere other than the inside of her nightstand drawer. That reasoning, however, completely ignored the existence of a vengeful older sister by the name of Petunia Evans.

In the aftermath of some massive fight between the two girls, Petunia had been looking for a missing tube of mascara in her sister’s room and had instead happened upon the list: five names, each followed by a brief sets of bullets about what she liked most about each of them.

And so Petunia had cut the paper into five pieces, looked up the boys’ addresses, and sent each of them off in little pink envelopes, signed ‘Love, Lily Evans.’

Lily, of course, knew about absolutely none of this until it was entirely too late.

As such, she’s completely thrown for a loop when a cryptic text message from Remus pops up on her phone.

Uhh, Lily, you know I’m gay, right?

Um, yes?

Trust me, I’ve witnessed you and Sirius snogging enough to know that.

“Lily, James is here!” her mum’s voice rings out from downstairs.

“Can you send him up?” Lily yells back. “I’m in the middle of something!”

She looks down at her phone right as the new message alert pops up.

Then what’s this all about?

Attachment: 1 image

Lily drops her phone as if it’s burned her. And then she picks it back up again, staring at the image she just received from one of her closest friends, because no, it can’t be.

But alas, it is. Looking right back at Lily is her own loopy handwriting:

Reasons I fancy Remus Lupin:

-Pretty brown eyes

-Smart, but not in an overbearing/know-it-all type of way

-Super informed and passionate about activism in politics

That’s… her note. Remus has her note. How the hell did he get her note?

When she finally figures out how to breathe again, she taps out a reply.

Where’d you get that?

It came in the mail today.

Lily instantly scrambles to her nightstand, opening the top drawer and reaching towards the back. And of course, there’s nothing back there anymore. The piece of paper is gone.

No, not gone. It has apparently been sent out into the world, which is objectively ten thousand times worse than just being ‘gone.’

Holy shit. Holy shit. She’s going to murder Petunia for this. They’ve done all sorts of petty, stupid things to each other over the years - but this... this is a whole new level of cruel.

She mentally ticks through the five boys who would’ve received one of those slips of paper.

First up was Benjy Fenwick, the sweet, slightly theatre-obsessed boy she had lunch period with in year 7. They’d bonded over a mutual love of Phantom of the Opera and Wicked, and the fact that Benjy’s mum always threw a pack of Maltesers into his lunchbox even though he hated them. Luckily for Lily, she didn’t share the same aversion.

Next up was Remus - Lily had developed a bit of a crush on him in year 9. He was bookish, soft-spoken, and cute in that slightly-nerdy way that worked really well for him. That crush was short-lived, however, because Remus came out to her a few months later and started dating Sirius not long after.

Third: Bertram Aubrey. He’s a year older than them – so he’s probably off at uni now, anyways. They’d both entered the science fair last year, and Lily was absolutely swooning at this blond, picture-perfect boy who loved talking about polymerase chain reactions and chromatography.

Fourth on that list was Dirk Cresswell. He’s younger than Lily by a year, and it’s probably a little questionable that she’d taken to fancying him anyways, because they’d first met while she was tutoring him in Biology. But she’s pretty sure the sweet boy with chunky spectacles fancied her as well at the time, so maybe it’s not that awkward.

But the fifth and final note is the one that makes Lily’s skin crawl, because she‘s absolutely terrified of how the boy in question will react to it.

She hasn’t spoken to Severus Snape in over a year, for a whole host of reasons. The boy’s politics are repulsive – he’d made more than one comment in the past about immigrants that had made Lily want to slap him – and he’d gotten oddly possessive of her in the months leading up to the severance of their friendship. And then there was the final straw: he’d called her a slut when he overheard that she’d hooked up with a random boy at a party, as if somehow that one action was a reflection of her overall virtue as a person. Lily was so hurt and offended and righteously indignant that she swore up and down that she’d never speak to him again.

But the truth is that, at one point, long before she’d realized what an arse he was, she’d had an inkling of a crush on him. She’d admired how smart he was and how good he was at chemistry, and how he’d helped her stand up to Petunia when she was being mean. And they were such good friends, too. And so his name got added to the list.

“Er, are you okay, Lily?” She snaps her head up in the direction of James’ voice. The boy in question is leaning against the doorway, watching her with an amused expression behind tortoiseshell glasses.

“You’re staring at that phone like you’ve just found out the Queen died…” he trails off, suddenly looking concerned. “Oh God, the Queen didn’t die, did she?”

“No, nope, it’s not that,” Lily answers.

It’s a much bigger fucking deal than that.

“Care to explain then?”

Lily flops back onto her bed, staring up at the ceiling. “So I kind of… wrote a bunch of love notes.”

James’ eyebrows shoot up, disappearing into his messy fringe. “You what?”

“Most of them were years ago,” Lily quickly amends. “And they weren’t even love notes, really – it was just a list of boys I fancied and what I liked most about them. It was a scientific thing, really. I was trying to see if I had a type – you know, one common thread between all of them that would explain the type of person I’m attracted to.”

“And this is causing you to panic because…?”

“Because Petunia sent them out. She cut them up and sent them out in little envelopes, and now they’ve all gotten them apparently, and… fuck.”

James frowns, and sits on the bed next to her. “So who all got a letter?”

“That’s the problem,” Lily sighs, sitting up. “Remus got one and texted me about it – that one’s fine, he’s with Sirius and he totally gets that I wrote it ages ago. Then there’s Benjy Fenwick, Bertram Aubrey, and Dirk Cresswell – and like, those are all super awkward, but they’re not the ones I’m worried about.”

“So who’s the one you’re worried about then?”

Lily can’t even look him in the eye when she mumbles out the answer.

“You fancied Snape?”

That’s actually a milder reaction than she’d expected from James. The two boys had never gotten along well – which was an absolute nightmare when Lily was still attempting to be friends with both.

Lily avoids James’ eyes and instead focuses on playing with the ends of her hair. “Sort of? It was ages ago, before I realized what a terrible person he is. But I just know he’s going to use this as an excuse to try to get close to me again, and I am so horrendously unprepared to deal with his manipulation tactics again.”

James doesn’t have an answer to that.

Lily opts to dramatically fall onto her back again. “God, this whole thing would be so much easier if I had a boyfriend or something – you know, make it very obvious that I’m not interested in any of them anymore.”

And then she gets an idea.

“Unless,” she says, propping herself up on her elbows. “James, can you be my boyfriend?”

His eyes almost pop out of his head and he just stares at her, slack-jawed. Lily quickly realizes that she’s phrased this question terribly and that he’s probably panicking and trying to come up with a way to turn her down gently because they’re childhood friends for heaven’s sake, and it sounds an awful lot like she just asked him out.

“Not, like, for real,” she adds. “We’d just be pretending. Just for long enough to get Snape and the rest of them to leave me alone. I swear I’ll make it up to you somehow. Plus, it’d be a chance for you to make that new girl you’ve been talking to – what’s her name? Hestia, right? You’d get a chance to make her jealous, so really, it’s a win for both of us.”

Lily’s a bit out of breath from how fast she said all that, and James is still staring at her, looking a bit stunned. He has, though, at least regained the ability to blink.

“Please?” she says, giving James her best attempt at puppy-dog eyes. “I’ll – I’ll go across town and find a pack of those deer-shaped lollies you like so much or something. I know it’s kind of a really ridiculous means of handling this, but I think the ridiculousness of it is what’ll make it work – I just really don’t want to have to deal with Snape after all of this.”

“Er, yeah,” he answers eventually, a hand flying up to the back of his neck. “I guess I can do that.”

Lily sits up and hugs him, before looking at him seriously. “Thank you James, you’re literally saving my ass.”

“Just don’t go falling for me, Evans,” he replies with a cheeky grin.

She laughs. “Oh, you don’t have to worry about that.”

Lily could very well be imagining it, but she swears his smile becomes a bit more forced at that.

They work on homework for a bit – James providing live commentary on his art history reading as Lily attempts to balance chemical reactions – until James gets a text from his mum reminding him that dinner’s going to be ready soon.

He grabs all his papers off Lily’s bed, careful not to grab any of hers, before stuffing them into his backpack.

“See you tomorrow, Lily,” he says, swinging his bag onto one of his shoulders.

And then he does something entirely unexpected. He leans down and kisses her. It’s nothing grand – just a little peck on the lips – but it’s enough to make Lily stare at him, stunned and at a complete loss for words.

“I – what?” she eventually stutters.

James smirks at her. “If we’re going to be pretending that we’re a couple, you’re going to have to get used to the concept of me kissing you. And I had a pretty good feeling you’d react like that the first time, so I figured we might as well get it out of the way when no one was watching.”

She throws a pillow at him, but he dodges it, laughing on his way out of her room and all the way down the hall.

When she hears his footsteps start going down the stairs, she brings a finger to her lips, which are still tingling from the contact.

Well, that was an experience.

On Monday, James is waiting in her front lawn to walk to school with her.

They’ve always done this – so the concept of him walking with her to school shouldn’t feel that foreign – but there’s something different about it this time.

It’s partly (okay, mostly) due to the fact that, before they round the corner to Hogwarts College, James grabs on to her hand, lacing his fingers in between her own.

Oh, right, Lily mentally berates herself. That’s the sort of thing couples are supposed to do.

Why is James so much more of a natural at this fake-dating stuff than she is?

She squeezes his hand just before they walk through the doors to the school, as both a gesture of gratitude and a little way of saying ‘okay, we’ve got this.’

It’s not until they get to the café that anyone really notices this new development between Lily and James.

“Did I miss something?” Marlene McKinnon asks, grinning wolfishly at the two of them as they join her at the table.

“Oh, yeah, er,” Lily stumbles through her words. As great an idea as this whole ‘fake relationship’ thing was at the time, Lily didn’t really think through the fact that she’d end up lying to her friends about it as well.

She’s saved from her awkward moment, however, by the arrival of the most dramatic person she knows. “Well, well, well – what do we have here?” Sirius announces dramatically, falling into the seat on the other side of James. “Could it be? Are you two really, finally together?”

Lily’s a bit jarred by how Sirius’ use of the word ‘finally,’ as if her dating James was something he’d been expecting to happen, but she’s got an answer for him this time. “Yeah, we are,” she replies, hoping she sounds a bit more confident than she feels.

“Well, thank fuck.” Sirius sighs dramatically. “I was beginning to think that James was never going to – oi, OUCH.”

He stops mid-sentence to glare at James, who seems to be glaring right back. “As I was saying,” Sirius starts again, “I was beginning to think James was never going to date anyone after that Amelia bird.”

Lily thinks back to James’ last girlfriend – was it two years ago? Amelia Bones was drop-dead gorgeous, with hair like sunshine and a personality to match. She and James had been rather happy together for a total of five months, before she found out that she was transferring to a school up north, and the prospect of long-distance was entirely too much to handle for a couple of sixteen-year-olds.

“Yeah, well that was two years ago,” James says, releasing Lily’s hand to run his hand through his hair.

She hadn’t realized she was still holding it.

The bell rings, and they all get up to walk to their respective classes. James has English first period and she’s got Biology, but he walks with her to her classroom anyways.

She tries to tell him that he doesn’t have to, but in the end, she’s really fucking grateful he insisted.

Because of course, as she rounded the corner to the science hall, who else would she see on the other end of the hallway but Severus Snape? And the look he gives her – oddly hopeful, full of questions – makes her stomach tie itself in knots.

“Shit,” she says under her breath, looking away from the boy she’s desperately trying to avoid. “It’s Snape.”

So she does what any totally rational person would do in this situation: she grabs James by the collar and starts kissing him.

He reacts to the surprise remarkably well – after the initial shock of it wears off, he starts to kiss her back, turning so that her back bumps softly against the wall. From this angle, there’s absolutely no way that Snape can’t see them.

Lily isn’t entirely sure how long they stay like that, kissing against the wall in the middle of the hallway, but it’s definitely long enough to make sure Snape gets the message. And then some.

“Mr. Potter! Miss Evans!” a sharp voice interrupts them. “No public displays of affection in the hallway!”

Lily breaks apart from James just in time to see McGonagall turn the corner down the next hallway. Yikes.

“Worth it,” James grins. “That should get Snape off your back for a little bit, yeah?”

Lily doesn’t get a chance to respond, because James is already halfway down the hallway before she catches her breath again.

So instead, she’s stuck with an incredibly boring Biology lecture and a never-ending fluttering in her stomach whenever she thinks about how damn cheeky James looked after she kissed him.

After the initial awkwardness of that first day, fake-dating James becomes a lot easier.

Something about being friends for six years makes it easy to predict each other’s moves, which helps to eliminate a lot of that early relationship awkwardness of ‘is now a weird time to be holding hands?’ and ‘is he going in for a hug or a kiss?’

They just… know, somehow. It’s kind of unnerving, just how well they’re able to pull this whole thing off. It’s almost to the point that Lily manages to forget that they’re faking this thing every once in a while.

They end up on a double-date with Sirius and Remus, squished into a tiny booth at The Three Broomsticks Diner around the corner from the school. It’s almost exactly like any other time they’ve all hung out, except James has his arm draped along the back of the booth behind Lily and her hand is resting on his left thigh.

“Binns had the most boring lecture on Much Ado About Nothing today,” James says, waving a chip around as he talks. “And that’s saying something, because that’s my favourite Shakespeare play. And he just… ruined it!”

“At least you didn’t have to sit through Slughorn talking about carbon bonds for an hour straight today,” Lily replies, reaching for the plate of chips herself, “as if we haven’t been talking about them since year 8.”

“Can confirm,” Remus adds. “It was miserable, and he spent at least half the lesson doting on Snape’s ‘absolutely smashing’ essay from last week.”

Sirius rolls his eyes. “Fuck, that’s enough to ruin anyone’s day. God knows Snivellus doesn’t need any more of a reason to have his head up his own ass.”

He pauses for a moment. “No offense, Lily.”

They’re all still occasionally sensitive about making comments about Snape around Lily, on account of the one time in year 10 where she’d yelled at them for being so unnecessarily rude to him.

Looking back, even Lily can admit that he’d probably deserved most of their scorn. And the fact that they’d filled his backpack with jelly just before their GCSEs was kind of funny, in a way.

“None taken. You lot know exactly how I feel about him nowadays.” She looks over at James as she says this, locking eyes with him.

Out of nowhere, James reaches up to cup her face, his thumb gently swiping against the corner of her mouth and lingering on her bottom lip.

“You, er, had a bit of sauce there,” he stammers.

There’s a softness in his eyes that gives Lily pause; how had she never noticed the specks of gold in amongst the hazel before?

Lily isn’t sure what kind of boldness manages to overtake her body, but she finds herself parting her lips slightly, taking James’ thumb in her mouth and gently sucking the aforementioned sauce off of it. Her eyes don't leave his this entire time, and she doesn’t miss the way his pupils dilate as his gaze drops from her eyes to her lips.

Out of nowhere, Lily’s hit with the sudden desire to kiss him. And not in the doing-this-for-show kind of way.

“Damn, you two, save the bedroom eyes for a less public place.”

Thank heavens for Sirius – his words are what finally snap Lily out of her (very odd, completely unexpected) trance. She feels her cheeks heat up, although perhaps not for the reason that Sirius would expect.

What was she thinking? They’re supposed to be putting on a show, yes, but what just happened between the two of them seemed a bit more dramatic than entirely necessary for this sort of thing.

“Sorry,” James mutters, quickly pulling his hand away from Lily.

“Ah, young love,” Sirius responds, sounding a bit more like he’s eighty than eighteen. “Do you remember when we were like that, Remus?”

“You mean like a year ago?” Remus responds dryly, always the realist foil to Sirius’s dramatics.

“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean,” is Sirius’s resolute response.

They’ve done a near-perfect job of convincing everyone that they’re a couple.

None of the other boys that Lily’s notes got sent to – Benjy, Bertram, Dirk, or Snape – have even tried to approach her. Just a little longer, and her and James will be able to call off this whole ruse and let things go back to the way they used to be.

But for now, she’s earned herself a spot in the girlfriends-plus-Remus club at school football games. It’s nothing but a load of girls wearing their boyfriends’ jerseys during the game and cheering extra loudly when their given boy’s name is mentioned by the announcer, but it still has a note of exclusivity at Hogwarts.

She sits next to Remus, who spends approximately half the game reading and the other half complaining about the referees. When the game pauses for halftime, Remus unexpectedly puts his book down and turns to look at Lily.

“You know, it’s awfully coincidental that you and James just happened to start dating the same weekend those notes of yours got sent out,” he comments.

Lily tries to laugh, but it comes out incredibly forced. “Yeah, funny timing, that.”

“It wasn’t a coincidence, was it?” Remus’ response sounds more like a statement than a question.

“I – it – ” She gives up. “No, it wasn’t.”

Remus’ expression changes, and his tone turns somewhat angry. “So this whole thing is just staged, then. You realize how fucked up that is for James, right? You stringing him along like this?”

“No!” Lily quickly defends. “James knows it isn’t real – he’s in on it.”

The loudspeaker crackles back to life again and the players come back onto the field, signaling the upcoming start of the second half.

“His head may know that, but I’m not so sure about his heart,” comes Remus’ reply.

Lily finds James amongst the Hogwarts team, laughing with Sirius about something as they jog to their respective positions on the football field. Objectively, she can admit that he looks really good in a football uniform.

“I… I don’t know what you mean by that,” she responds.

“Just… don’t go messing him around, yeah?”

Lily’s a little stunned by that – is he having the same conversation with James, or does Remus think that she, in particular, is really just that cruel? She wouldn’t intentionally hurt James – Remus should know that – and she’s actually a bit offended by the accusation.

But instead of fighting him, she gives a simple answer. “I won’t. But you can’t tell anyone the truth, yeah? Not even Sirius.”

“I’m not going tell your secret, Lily,” he promises.

“Thank you.”

The referee throws a yellow flag at Sirius, and the conversation is essentially terminated by Remus’s impassioned shouting of, “The other team did that two minutes ago, where’s their fucking flag!?”

Lily can’t stop thinking about what Remus said to her at the football game.

I’m not so sure about his heart.

James doesn’t fancy her – that’s ridiculous. If he fancied her, he’d be acting differently when they’re alone, wouldn’t they? James has always been an awfully blatant flirt with girls he thinks are fit, and thus far he’s pulled none of those moves on Lily – at least, not when they’re not intentionally doing it for the sake of an audience.

They’re alone at the park down the street from their house, sitting on a ratty blanket and drinking tea out of thermoses. It’s a bit of a tradition for them, this – as soon as it gets warm enough to spend time outside without losing feeling in their fingers, they relocate their study sessions to the park.

“Holy fuck,” James murmurs in the middle of reading something.

“Yes?” Lily replies, fighting off a smile at how affronted James looks by whatever he’s just read.

“So, like, you know how everyone always praises Sigmund Freud for being the father of modern psychology, right?” James says, looking up from his textbook.

Lily nods – she doesn’t take psychology, but she’s definitely heard quite a bit about Freud.

“Well apparently, a lot of his ‘research,’ ” James makes air quotes at this, “was botched for the sake of the men who were paying him. He basically invented hysteria as a psychological disorder out of thin air instead of addressing the legitimacy of women’s trauma. He literally fucked over the entire field of psychology for decades for the sake of not losing money from his clients’ wealthy husbands and fathers.”

James doesn’t get like this – as in, incredibly passionate about obscure academic facts – with people other than Lily. He likes to give off an air of nonchalance when it comes to school, likes to pretend that he’s not secretly a massive nerd about Elizabethan-era literature and psychological studies.

Lily’s always liked that she gets these glimpses at his more intellectual side.

And maybe that’s what does it – what causes her to close the gap between the two of them and press her lips to his.

He doesn’t react immediately, and Lily pulls back. What the hell was she thinking – they’re fake dating, for fuck’s sake. This isn’t part of the deal.

But then he pulls her back to him again, and all boundaries between what’s real and what’s fake completely evaporate.

She threads her fingers through the mess of black hair atop his head – it’s softer than usual, she swears – and tugs on it just a little, eliciting a groan from James as he turns the kiss to an open-mouthed one.

She’s kissed boys before – hell, she’s kissed James before – but this is somehow a totally different experience. Electricity zips through every last inch of her body, setting every nerve ending on fire.

James brings an arm around her waist, shifting their bodies so that she’s laying on the flannel blanket and he’s on top of her. Something’s poking into her back – her chemistry textbook, in all likelihood – but everything else about this situation feels so damn good that a sharp corner is absolutely the last thing she’s thinking about.

How did she never realize that her fake boyfriend was this good at snogging?

Fake.

Fake boyfriend.

Shit.

She puts her hands on James’ shoulders, pushing him away and effectively breaking the kiss. The sudden space between them allows Lily to scramble out from underneath him.

“Lily?”

She refuses to look at him – she knows he’s going to look very freshly snogged, and she doesn’t know what to do with that information. If she doesn’t look at him, she can make herself ignore it. Instead, she quickly grabs all her stuff – it was her chemistry book that she was on top of, after all – and shoves it into her bag.

“I’m sorry,” she blurts out, still refusing to look anywhere but the ground. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

And so she turns on her heel and runs home.

The next morning, James is waiting for her in front of her house, like always.

But instead of spending the walk chatting and laughing, they walk in stony silence, the distance between them palpable.

James finally breaks the silence, a few minutes before they get to school.

“Are we going to talk about this?” he asks, gesturing vaguely between the two of them.

“Nope,” she answers simply.

She still has absolutely no idea where her own head is at – much less his – and she’d very much like to pretend that nothing happened until she reaches that point.

But she still grabs his hand when they turn the corner.

The show must go on, after all.

The rest of the week continues in much of the same fashion – pretending to be fine in public, not speaking at all when they’re alone.

Lily would’ve thought that, by now, she’d have a better understanding of what all this meant. But instead, she’s still just as confused, and has taken to blocking out the memory of that impromptu snogging session instead.

It’s exhausting, all of this at once – keeping up the lie while trying to sort through where the hell her head is at. So much so, that she’s on the verge of skipping Mary McDonald’s party on Saturday night; she probably would’ve actually done so were it not for how affronted Marlene had been when Lily suggested she might bail.

And so she finds herself dressed in a short black skirt and lacy halter top, walking up the drive to the McDonald’s residence with Marlene.

Marlene has spent most of the walk here talking about Mary’s friend Dorcas from another school, who Marlene apparently met at a previous party, and Lily is doing her best to listen, even though her mind is completely occupied with the dread of pretending, again, that she and James are a happy couple.

The ‘couple’ part is easy enough to pull off, but the ‘happy,’ not so much.

“So I’m just hoping she shows up tonight,” Marlene finishes.

“Yeah, I hope she does too,” Lily responds. Someone deserves to have a good time tonight, and Lily has a pretty good feeling it’s not going to be her.

The party’s only just started when Lily and Marlene walk in, but it’s clear that there’s plenty of alcohol to go around. Lily grabs a VK – she can’t stand beer, so this will have to do – and looks around for her fake boyfriend.

“Hiya, Lily!” An overly eager voice reaches her ears, and an arm gets thrown around her shoulders.

“Hi Sirius,” she answers.

It’s obvious that he started drinking long before this party began.

“I don’t know how I’m dating someone who gets drunk by the beginning of the party,” Remus says, coming up beside his boyfriend.

“You loooooove me,” comes Sirius’ eloquent response.

“And do I need to remind you of last year’s New Year’s Eve party?” Lily adds, smirking at Remus. “You two are more alike than you like to think.”

Remus flushes, muttering something about ‘bloody pennies.’

“So, where’s your boyfriend at?” Sirius asks, dropping his arm from around her shoulders. “I haven’t seen him since we got here.”

Lily shrugs. “I haven’t seen him yet either. Have you, Remus?”

“Er, yeah,” he answers. “I, uh, think he’s over by the beer pong table.”

Lily cranes her head to look in that direction, and suddenly understands why Remus sounded so hesitant to tell her where James was.

He’s leaned up against a wall, beer in hand, chatting and laughing with Hestia Jones.

The girl in question flips her long black hair over her shoulder, laughing at something James has just said. Then, she reaches out and places her hand on his bicep. And James, it seems, is doing absolutely nothing to discourage this blatant flirting.

Lily feels like she’s been punched in the gut. And then, the anger bubbles to the surface.

What the hell does he think he’s doing?

She ditches her mostly empty drink on a nearby counter and marches across the room to where James and Hestia are standing.

“Hi, babe,” Lily says, her voice overly saccharine as she wraps an arm around James’ waist. “Can we talk? Alone?”

A mixture of emotions flashes across James’ face, starting with surprise, followed by anger, and ending with resignation. “Sure. We’ll chat later, Hestia, yeah?”

Lily doesn’t even let Hestia answer him before she grabs James’ hand and leads him into the first empty room she can find.

As soon as the door clicks behind her, she rounds on James. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she hisses. “You’re my boyfriend, you’re not supposed to be flirting with other girls.”

“Fake boyfriend, you mean,” James corrects, an unfamiliar coldness to his tone. “And this whole thing between us is going to be ending soon anyways, and as you said yourself, the whole point of this for me was supposed to be to make Hestia a little jealous. So excuse me for trying to get some sort of benefit from this situation.”

Lily scoffs. “Yeah, well you don’t make a girl jealous by openly flirting with her. So really, I’m just helping your cause.”

“Or,” James replies, stepping closer to her, “you’re jealous.”

“I am not jealous. This is a fake relationship, James. I have no reason to be jealous.”

He raises an eyebrow at her. “So why’d you kiss me then? Because you and I both know you initiated that, and it definitely wasn’t part of this whole act you forced me into.”

How dare he act like he didn’t enter into this willingly – like he didn’t go along with the idea almost as soon as she’d proposed it.

“I didn’t force you into anything, James,” she snaps. “You agreed to it. And as for the kiss, I don’t know, okay? It was a moment of weakness, nothing more.”

Saying it like that, out loud, makes it feel more true.

“You mean to say that kiss meant absolutely nothing to you?”

They’re so close that, if Lily really wanted to, she could kiss him again if only she got up on her tiptoes. But the anger in her veins is keeping her grounded to the last shred of rationality she has left, so she stays glued in place.

“Yes? Maybe?” she replies.

James steps back, throwing his hands in the air in frustration. “Then why the fuck did you do it? You just thought it’d be fun to fuck around with me and just run away?”

“That’s not what I was doing!” she cries. She’s reminded of her conversation with Remus again – the one where she swore she wasn’t going to do anything like that.

“Then what were you doing?” he asks accusingly.

Now it’s Lily’s turn to throw her hands in the air. “I don’t fucking know!”

James crosses his arms. “Well, you should probably figure that out.”

“You don’t think I’ve been trying to?” she says, her tone changing from anger to exasperation. “I – fuck, James, this has made things so bloody complicated. I shouldn’t have asked you to do this. I should’ve handled the aftermath of those notes like an adult instead of using you as a cover.”

He scoffs at her. “It’s too fucking late for that now.”

“Yeah, thanks for that,” Lily replies, rolling her eyes, “I hadn’t figured that one out yet.”

There’s a moment of silence between the two of them – stiff and distinctly uncomfortable.

When James opens his mouth again, his voice is softer and full of something that, if Lily had to name it, sounds an awful lot like hurt. “Why didn’t I get one?”

She just blinks at him, unable to find any words.

His voice gets louder. “Am I really that repulsive to you? That you’ve never once in the six years we’ve known each other even thought…? I mean, for fuck’s sake, you included Snape on that list, and you and I both know he’s a misogynistic piece of shit who you don’t even talk to anymore!”

“James, I – ”

He cuts her off. “And I get it that you don’t, like, owe it to me to be attracted to me or anything, but I just... I guess I thought after all these years that you’d feel at least a fraction of the feelings I have for you.”

And before Lily has a chance to reply, or to even begin to process the significance of what James has just said, he’s got his back to her and he’s walking away.

Lily should chase after him, call his name, something – but instead she’s frozen in place, paralysed by some mixture of confusion and fear. She doesn’t even know what she’d say to him anyways.

Lily spends most of Sunday deep in thought – which is awfully counterproductive given how much reading she has set for Physics.

Has James really fancied her for years? It seems so unlikely – he’s dated a few other girls in that time, kissed loads, and flirted with even more. And in all that time, he’d never once tried to pull any moves on Lily.

It just doesn’t add up.

But at the same time, it does. It makes perfect sense. Why James so willingly agreed to something as ludicrous as pretending to date her. Why Remus was so concerned that she was stringing him along.

And in a way, she supposes that’s what she’d been doing. She didn’t mean to do it – didn’t mean to mess him about in the way that she did – but the truth of the matter was that she had.

And for that, she feels overwhemingly guilty.

On Monday morning, James isn’t waiting in front of her house. For the first time in six years, she walks to school alone.

She feels his absence acutely – there’s no one there to make dumb comments and obscure literary references that make her laugh. And there’s no one to grab her hand as they walk into school.

Lily’s a bit surprised by how much she misses that one in particular.

She intentionally avoids James, Remus, Sirius, and Marlene at their usual table, opting instead to go straight to her first period class.

She’s busying herself with organizing her notes when her phone buzzes. It’s Marlene.

Did you and James break up? I ask bc you’re MIA and he looks like shite.

Sort of? I think so.

Typing it out like that has a sort of finality to it, making it so much more real than when the words were just bouncing around in her head.

And it hurts. Even though the relationship wasn’t real, its ending feels like genuine heartbreak. Maybe because, in the process, she might’ve destroyed her friendship with James as well.

And he’s her best friend – one of the single most important people in her entire life.

As the bell rings and the rest of her class starts filing into the classroom, Lily finds herself biting her lip and focusing all of her energy on trying not to cry.

If you want to talk about it, I’m here.

Lily looks at Marlene’s text, and realizes that maybe, just maybe, talking about it with someone is just what she needs to finally process all of this.

You’re a doll. Go off-campus for lunch and chat then?

Sounds like a plan xx

Apparently, rumours of her and James’ ‘break-up’ have spread much farther than just Marlene.

Lily’s gathering up her books from her desk when a familiar figure walks up in front of her.

“Is it true you and Potter broke up?” Snape asks, watching her intently.

“That’s none of your business,” Lily replies coldly. Her morning has already been rough enough without having to deal with him as well.

Snape apparently takes her response as a confirmation. “I knew you two weren’t going to last. You’re too good for the likes of him.”

Lily finds herself suddenly jumping to James’ defense. “If anything, he’s too good for me.”

Snape scoffs. “Unlikely.”

“What, because you think you’re so much better? Because you’re wrong about that.”

Lily starts to walk away, but unfortunately, Snape falls into step with her. “You didn’t seem to think so a few weeks ago,” he says, pulling a pink envelope out of his pocket.

She’s somewhat surprised that he’s held onto the letter for so long – and carries it around in his pocket, for heaven’s sake – but also, she really shouldn’t be surprised by that fact. That sort of obsessive behaviour had always been par for the course with him.

She turns to face him – if they’re going to have this conversation, they’re going to do it face-to-face so that there’s no doubt that she means exactly what she says.

“Severus, I wrote that over a year ago. My sister found it and sent it to you as revenge. So while I might have had an inkling of a crush on you then, I feel absolutely nothing even remotely close to that about you now. I mean, honestly, I fancy that rubbish bin over there more than I fancy you.”

She takes a deep breath before continuing. “Not to mention, James is ten thousand times the man you are; and for the record, I’m the one that fucked up our relationship, not him. So please, for the love of God, leave me alone.”

This. This was the thing she should’ve done all along, instead of forcing James to go along with some stupid plan. She should’ve walked up to Snape and made it clear just how dead her feelings for him really were, and saved everyone a whole lot of trouble.

She turns on her heel and walks down the hall, but not before she notices James out of the corner of her eye, stopped in his tracks, having clearly overheard their entire conversation.

She and Marlene are sitting in a booth at The Three Broomsticks when Lily finally tells the truth about what happened between her and James.

“So you’re telling me… everything between you two was entirely staged?” Marlene’s staring at her in disbelief.

Lily takes a sip of her extra-large chocolate milkshake. “Yes? In a sense? But I think some lines got blurred on both sides and we both kind of forgot what was real and what wasn’t.”

“So what’s the issue then? Why don’t you just turn it into a real relationship instead of a fake one?”

Lily sighs. “Because I don’t know how I feel about him. I mean, he’s definitely one of my best friends, and he’s definitely one of the best snogs I’ve ever had, but I don’t know if that means we’d be good in a relationship.”

“Bullshit,” Marlene replies immediately. “A best friend who you’ve also got great sexual chemistry with? You literally just described everyone’s dream, Lily. And fucking hell, I know you two were faking the relationship, but I refuse to believe the way you two would look at each other wasn’t real – no one is that good at acting, much less you and James.”

She stuffs a chip in her mouth before continuing. “Also, you said you wrote that list of boys to see if you’ve got a type? Well, good news for you, I can confirm that you most definitely have a type. It’s James.”

Lily cocks her head at her friend, wanting an explanation for this.

“James is literally a mashup of all the things you liked best about all those boys. He’s got Benjy’s sweetness, Remus’ passion about things, Bertram’s whole hot-body-and-great-brain combo, Dirk’s sense of humour, and the close friendship you had with Snape. Face it, Lily, he’s basically what would happen if Build-a-Bear had a boyfriend option.”

Lily abruptly stops slurping her milkshake. She can’t deny that Marlene makes a really good point. “You really think so?”

“I do,” she replies. “And here’s another hot take, while we’re at it: you’ve fancied James for years, even if you yourself didn’t realize it. And you didn’t realize it because what you feel for James is different than what you’ve felt for any of those boys you wrote on your stupid list – those were fleeting little crushes that were never actually destined to turn into anything. But James… that’s so much bigger than a flimsy little fling.”

When Marlene says it, it makes a lot of sense. James has always felt like comfort, like the best part of her day, like coming home. And kissing him may have given her butterflies, but it also just felt right.

But admitting that to herself, admitting that she has feelings for him that extend way beyond friendship, and that those feelings have been there for a while – that’s terrifying.

Especially because it means she may have hurt James for absolutely no reason other than her own denial and stubbornness.

“So, say you’re right,” Lily answers, not wanting to give Marlene the satisfaction of letting her know that she’s read Lily like a book, “what do I do?”

Marlene considers this for a moment. “As fun as playing therapist is, this is something you’ve got to figure out on your own.”

It only takes until the end of the school day for Lily to confirm that Marlene was, somehow, one hundred percent correct in her assessment of Lily’s feelings.

This is partially due to the fact that she sits exactly two seats behind James in Further Mathematics, and so she’s basically given a free pass to spend the entire class period watching him.

And everything he does is somehow incredibly endearing, from sticking his pencil behind his ear in between writing notes, to the times he ruffles up his hair while he’s deep in thought about something, and the one time he somehow tries to do both things at once and his pencil gets knocked to the floor as a result and he has to scramble to grab it.

This also comes with the realization that she has fucked things up. A lot.

And she’s not entirely sure how to fix them. How to fix the way James looked at her when he brought out years of emotion all at once, in one, painful little question.

Why didn’t I get one?

That one sentence rings in her head, all throughout her afternoon classes and throughout most of her walk home. Which is incredibly emotionally frustrating for Lily, as guilt-ridden as she already is, but it also eventually works out in her favour, because it gives her an idea.

Halfway home, she starts running. And she’s not an athlete by any means, so she’s winded as hell when she gets home, but that doesn’t stop her from flying up the stairs to her bedroom, getting out a piece of paper and a bright red ballpoint pen.

Reasons I Fancy James Potter:

She writes the title on the page, but this time, instead of writing bullet points, she writes paragraphs. She writes about the way he always knows how to make her laugh, his impassioned rants about the most minutiae details of academia, how fit he looks in his football uniform, that he’s one of the most important people in her life.

And once she’s taken up almost the entire page with her ramblings, she adds a note at the bottom.

You didn’t get a note. I reality, you deserved a whole damn page (and probably more, but my hand’s tired). I’m sorry. I’ll be at the park tonight if you’re willing to let me apologise in person too.

Love, Lily Evans

She leaves the letter in a pink envelope on James’ front porch, so that hopefully he’ll see it when he gets home from practise, and she takes her biology notes with her to the park up the street.

James is the owner of the blanket they always use, and Lily doesn’t fancy sitting in the damp grass without it, so she sits on the swingset instead. There aren’t any children on the little community playground today, so she doesn’t feel guilty for occupying a space not meant for her.

She’s rereading a section about ATP synthesis and straining her eyes against the fading sunlight when someone else enters the playground area.

“Aren’t you a little old for swingsets, Evans?” James asks. He’s got one hand in the pocket of his joggers, and the other is holding a pink square that is definitely Lily’s letter.

“On the contrary, there’s no such thing as being too old for swingsets,” she answers solemnly.

“In that case,” he replies, gesturing to the swing next to her, “is this one taken?”

“All yours.”

He sits in it, and it’s almost comical how long his legs are in comparison to the height of the swing. He pushes off with his heels, moving slowly back and forth. “I heard your conversation with Snape today.”

“So I saw,” she says. “It’s what I should’ve done from the beginning.”

James lets out a soft hum, twiddling the pink envelope between his fingers. “So, this letter. You meant it?”

Lily looks over at him. “Every word.”

James’ eyes stay trained on his feet. “Then why’d you do it? Why’d you push me away after you kissed me?”

“Because I was scared,” she replies. “Because it’s one thing to have flimsy crushes on people that won’t ever turn into anything, and it’s a totally different thing to feel what I feel for you. And denial was just… easier. Safer.”

“You know I’d never do anything to hurt you.”

Lily laughs, a bit bitterly. “And you know, I said that to Remus a few weeks ago, and I ended up hurting you anyways.”

“So what does that mean for us, then?” James asks.

“It means I’m still a little scared,” Lily answers truthfully. “But it also means that I think I’m a little bit in love with you, and that this… thing between us is so much bigger than fear.”

Lily suddenly feels herself being yanked sideways, and it takes her a moment to realize that James has grabbed onto the chain of her swing and pulled it towards him so that they’re face-to-face.

“Say that middle part again.”

“That I’m still a little scared?” she says, teasingly.

He rolls his eyes at her. “You know the one I’m talking about.”

“That I’m a little bit in love with you?”

“Jackpot.”

And then he kisses her.

They don’t stay like that for long, because swings aren’t exactly conducive to proper kissing, so Lily soon finds herself on James’ lap, running her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck as his grip against her hips tightens.

And it’s just as wonderful as before, except now it’s even more wonderful, because this time, it’s all real.

“I’m a little bit in love with you too, Lily Evans,” James murmurs against her skin, and Lily’s skin burns as he presses kisses along her jawline.

She tilts her head back to allow James better access to her neck, but apparently, this weight shift, combined with the fact that there are two fully-grown teenagers on a swing designed for children, causes the swingset to creak loudly.

Lily jumps up, slightly terrified that the structure is about to collapse on the both of them. She extends a hand to James. “Let’s take this somewhere where we aren’t at risk of breaking a public playground.”

He grabs her hand and pushes himself up to standing. “Probably a safe decision.”

“I do have a question for you though,” she adds.

“Okay, shoot.”

She steps closer to him. “James Potter, will you be my boyfriend? For real, this time?”

He grins at her, and his delight is contagious. “Only if there’s a pack of deer-shaped lollies thrown in.”

She laughs, wrapping an arm around his middle and leaning in to him. “You’ve got yourself a deal.”

“Good, the lollies were a deal-breaker,” he replies cheekily, wrapping his arm around her shoulders as they make their way out of the playground.

Lily rolls her eyes. “I figured as much.”

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