#this is so long djfkhgjkshkhsdg

[thequibblah]

Would love directors cut on ch39? Your favorite moments OR Lily tripping in front of James LOL OR the scene Sirius is asking James what he'd do if Lily fancied him back :0 and how he's given up hope - but that might be too spoilery! Idk anything you deign to share I will love! <3___<3

ooOooOoOoOoh i'm gonna give this a reread and pull out any fave moments BUT u best believe we'll address the trip

it is my solemn belief that when a character realises they have feelings for another character, the BEST bit is when they're like OH noONoooOOnoooOOoOOoOOo oh NEOENOOOOOOO and obviously given the baggage it's even funnier when it's lily with james

the first part of this chapter i wrote was after the first section break, with lily in the office, and obviously i had myself a week-long laugh over this:

This pleasant state of tiredness meant she was not worried about how she looked, slumped on the sofa in the Head office with her legs dangling over one armrest, when he came into the room. Well, mostly not worried. For a brief, crazed moment Lily thought, my hair must be frightful. Then she thought, what is wrong with me?

this, to me, is lily realising her feelings in a nutshell. just a whole bucketload of convoluted and contradictory feelings all tangled up together, turning a normally put-together, sensible individual into a disaster. or so, of course, it seems to her, and that's what i love more than anything: when she's like oh my GFDOODOOD OH MY OGODODO he kNWOOWWOOWS and james is like damn . her balance is rly off these days .

anyway not to derail my own town-crier moment

another way this realising-feelings bit is so fun to explore is that i love bringing up things lily notices about james and has a little panic about — except we know she's noticed those things about him forever, and is only just starting to realise why she's been paying attention. the obvious thing is the hand in his hair, but my personal fave james-idiosyncrasies that lily has always been suspiciously attentive to are his restlessness and his way of walking

from ch. 4:

He leaned back, drumming his fingers on the chair’s armrests.

to this in 39:

Nor did she think anything of the funny little squeeze in her chest at the sight of him, splayed across the rug so carelessly, fingers drumming against his thighs as though he simply had to be in motion.

and also from ch. 4 (this is possibly my favourite james description of mine, i am so proud of it):

He always walked the same way, she noticed: hands in his pockets, head tipped back. As if he didn’t need to look where he was going. Tripping was for other people.

from ch. 25:

She could see it in her mind’s eye: James walking down the dark corridor, hands in his pockets, one corner of his mouth tipped into a half-smile.

from ch. 31:

He was standing in that very James way of his, hands in his pockets and chin tipped upwards like he was watching something a little bit higher than everyone else was.

and at last........ in 39:

Lily had already noted how very James he was that evening: hair perplexingly tousled, smile easy and ever-present, hands in pockets.

sidenote: i got some beautiful comments (FROM YOU TOO POSSIBLY????) about people theorising what their experiences with the patronus charm might mean — that lily is making progress because she's being emotionally honest, while james closing himself off is making him struggle. cannot confirm or deny, but it was really fun to read those!!!

oh and another thing: i love weaponising the patronus thing as a way to have them easily and casually compliment each other

“I know it’s difficult for you to cope with things not coming naturally—” He inclined his head to her in concession. “True.” “—but it’s quite normal for spells to require practice, not pure, blind instinct.” “Pure, blind instinct,” he repeated, “like you in Potions?” Lily felt herself flush, and frowned all the more reprovingly.

and they do so even when they're not arguing....

They’d propped each other up in their respective best subjects (“Evans leaves us in the dust in Potions, you know…” “Oh, hardly. That’s James in Transfiguration.”)

...though i'm sure lily would say she was just MAKING A POINT. ok girl

the more i reread the more i think my favourite bits are just. the conversations between them (of which there are a LOT here haha) and the drama i got to shamelessly sneak in.... HAVE YOU EVER BEEN IN LOVE

now. to the tripping.

it is a truth universally acknowledged that a key moment in any jily fic is when lily realises she actually like.... is into the messing-up-your-hair. (side note, for james himself this is less often a conscious attempt to impress someone [or her, like it is in swm], and more a nervous tic or a thoughtless gesture, like a filler word in an action. he does it a lot in chapter 27, when lily brings up the not-kiss, and also in chapter 21: He ran a hand through his hair. “If you need distracting, over Easter, owl me..." and in 22: He ran a hand through his hair. “Just, you know you can always write me, yeah?” and of course.... in case any of you forgot the latter is the only moment this absolute clown realises he does have feelings for her.)

this is a Deep Moment of Denial in 38, where she lists it off as a moment she was briefly attracted to him in fifth year:

When he had run his hand through his hair in the corridor, and she’d had the misfortune of looking right at him, and had felt, for a moment...distracted.

of course, i was not going to let the poor girl live this down, and the hair had to be a factor in her real, actual realisation. what made this so funny to me was how innocent the gesture is on james's part: they've just been talking about agathangelou, and who might be sneaking out of the castle. when he runs his hand through his hair, he's just...... frustrated.

and even though lily's the one throwing a wry smile at him — which he's crazy about — she's the one who's burned, because he wasn't really looking at her. so it goes, babey!

i am also overfond of the literally-falling-for-you trope, and you best believe it'll happen again! in fact i could probably write like.... five times lily evans "fell" for james potter (and one time she actually did)

wow

i should go do that right now