For @jilytoberfest, for prompt #11: First time flying.
A series of vignettes, rated T, 3K of a love letter to flying.
(i)
James’ first memory is of flying.
That’s probably not his first real memory—over the years he has the impression that most of it were built based on his parents’ retelling of the story, for that was one James always asked about: how was his first flight, how from the moment his parents put him in that broomstick at the age of two, he flew around the garden with all the easiness of someone who felt very comfortable doing it.
His mother would laugh saying that only on a broomstick James—that energetic two-year-old child who ran even before he walked, too quick for his aged parents—would relax. His father would add that his calmness didn’t last much; soon they were chasing him through the garden, because it turned out James loved speed during his flights as much as he did on land. Despite the trouble, it was a memory his parents shared happily.
And it’s one that James wonders if he will share with his son.
It’s a dark thought and one that Sirius reprimands when James voices it out loud.
“I’m just being practical,” James says bitterly, looking at the shed where he just stored his broom, that professional model that he kept since school, that won him the Quidditch cup for two years in a row, that saved him from Death Eaters. A gift from his parents, locked away like most things they are keeping stored while in hiding, things that won’t be really useful for them.
“No, you’re being dramatic. And we all know there is room for only one dramatic Marauder, mate, and I’m not planning on vacating it.”
Sirius’ tone adds to his words, but James doesn’t crack a smile.
“Let’s be real, Sirius. At the very best we are going to be hiding for years. At the very worst—”
“Don’t say it.”
James doesn’t. He can’t really voice that fear that always lingers on the back of his head, a frequent visitor in his dreams lately.
“I won’t be flying any time soon. Neither will Harry, not while we are on house arrest,” he finishes rationally, and Sirius just frowns.
Harry’s birthday, a few years later, is a quiet affair, none of his friends able to visit them. Lily tries to cheer him up, promising him that Harry won’t notice their absence.
“I don’t think he even knows it’s his birthday, James,” she tells him, and James knows she is right. Harry is clapping happily, copying the adults he saw clapping during the birthday song, and he tries to let that give him some solace.
Then an owl flies in, bringing a small package. For Harry, says the note, and when James opens it, they find a toy broomstick, floating two feet above the floor, the perfect size for Harry to fly in.
There’s a small note attached to it. “Go make your own memories, Prongs.”
(ii)
James always thought flying was something lonely until he came to Hogwarts.
It wasn’t that he minded, but his parents couldn’t join him and he didn’t know people his age on Godric’s Hollow. He loved Quidditch, of course, and he had practised some movements on his own, but it’s when he goes to Hogwarts that a world of possibilities opens to him.
Quidditch becomes just an extension of flying. Why not add some obstacles, why not add some objective to it? It was fun. And better yet, people admired him for his prowess and James liked to be admired.
School is easy for him and Quidditch is even easier. He doesn’t let people forget about it (it’s the one thing he can brag about shamelessly, since despite being much cooler, his animagus form has to remain a secret). He comments about the Quidditch games all the time, enjoying the attention it brings him. He makes sure to score as many goals as he can so they don’t ever depend upon the seeker catching the snitch; James shines. Solo.
And it’s also where Lily Evans doesn’t care about him at all.
She is there during the matches, cheering for Gryffindor, screaming when there is fool play, her face painted in red and gold, looking lovely in the crowd. She cries his name, James swears he can hear it. But as soon as the whistle blows and the match is over, she is back to not sparing him a moment of her attention.
And yet James tries.
“Hey, Evans,” he calls when he finds her by the drink table at the post-match party.
“Potter,” she salutes, not very excited. “Good game.”
“It was, wasn’t it? Twenty goals, that must have been a record—”
“Yeah, I saw it, I was there. Jones and Wood were great also.”
And that’s it. Jones and Wood? They made four goals if you count them together…
The captain badge comes next year, during a summer that’s mostly quiet even with Sirius’ company, during a summer that James doesn’t feel like flying (“I’m surprised your broomstick can get off the ground with that fat head on it, you make me sick!”). He eyes the badge with trepidation, when if it came one year ago, it would have exhilarated him.
Turns out being captain is different. He needs to work with others, to guide them, to make sure they are all in position because if anything goes wrong, it’ll be his fault. So he schedules practices, makes sure he, Jones and Wood can read each other’s minds, offers himself as a target for the beaters and stays overnight—or something like that—with the Third Year muggleborn girl who is a brilliant seeker if only inexperienced.
The night before the match finds them returning a few minutes after curfew to the Common Room.
“You did great,” he tells her, the same encouragement James has said after every practice.
“What if I screw up tomorrow?” Emily asks him, with all the insecurity that James never had at thirteen.
“You won’t. You caught the Snitch in less than five minutes every time tonight.”
“It’s different in a game, isn’t it? I might fall off my broom—”
James laughs. “You fly as if you have wings, Em. Damn, a little more practise and you’ll fly like me.”
“I can’t,” she says, sounding astonished. “Anthony Selwyn says muggleborns can’t fly well because of our blood.”
“What!?” James stops in his tracks, disgust flooding him. “That’s the most bull—nonsense I’ve ever heard!”
“I—I didn’t even touch a broomstick until I got here, James, I get that—”
“Look, I don’t know Selwyn, but he isn’t in the Quidditch team, you are. And you are a witch, an excellent flyer and when you catch the Snitch tomorrow, we’re gonna make Selwyn swallow it, okay?”
Emily blinks at him, her face breaking into a determined smile, and that’s when they turn the corner to find Lily Evans in the middle of it, her prefect badge reflecting the lights from the hall, her eyes staring at them with a most thoughtful expression on her face.
There is a moment of silence.
“Evans?” a voice asks from another hall. “Found anything?”
She looks at James for a second—he thinks this is the first time they’ve really looked at each other since term returned, considering Evans doesn’t usually care for him and James made sure of being out of her way—, her green eyes glint, and Evans turns away.
“No, Mark, no one here. Let’s patrol another floor and call it a night.”
(iii)
James always thought flying was something natural to everyone.
Sure, there were a few exceptions—Sirius got bored, Peter was scared of heights—, but they were wizards and witches. Flying on broomsticks was expected of them.
Until he comes to Hogwarts and a Slytherin boy makes fun of Emily, the only muggleborn on his team, and asks her if she shouldn’t be sweeping the floor with the broomstick as her mother does.
The detention he gets from turning that boy’s hands into a mop is worth it, but doesn’t really solve the problem. It stays on his mind and for once he barely registers when it’s Lily Evans that’s supervising his detention.
“You forgot that spot, Potter,” she tells him, the first thing she has said all night, pointing to the point in the floor below the window.
“Merlin forbids I don’t clean the whole floor,” he says annoyedly, sweeping the mop through it (an irony that isn’t lost).
“I don’t mind,” she tells him calmly. “But yesterday the new caretaker gave Bulstrode another detention for not brushing all shelves in the History of Magic classroom—Filch is rather nasty.”
“Oh, I didn’t know.” James purses his lips. “Thanks for the warning.”
“No problem.”
Now they’ve engaged in some sort of conversation, James feels strangely aware of Evans—or weirder, of the fact that Evans seems to be aware of him. And it looks as if she is fighting some kind of internal battle that she loses.
“Selwyn is a jerk,” Evans says and then she seems surprised that she said it. When James turns to her, a crimson flush—one that he is sure he never caused before—spreads over her cheeks. “But you shouldn’t have hexed him.”
“It made Emily laugh,” James says, shrugging. Her eyes soften just a little, but Evans doesn’t crack a smile. “It didn’t matter anyway.”
Evans bites her lips, her conflict still evident, and once more she loses it. “Why?”
"Because Selwyn is still a jerk no matter how much I hex him."
"He is just a Death Eater in training," she notes, her disdain evident now. James shivers but he doesn't question her. Selwyn is a kid, but a prejudiced one already. "It's this whole system that is wrong."
"What do you mean?"
"Muggleborns are excluded, Potter. We don't get to practice magic every year for two months when we are at home. We are just shoved into this world with the minimum knowledge--and flying! We get flying classes once a week in the First Year and that's it."
"That's… not fair."
Evans grimaces. "It's not supposed to be."
James thinks of all Quidditch players he knows and realizes one or two, at most, are muggleborns. He thinks of Emily's radiant face when she caught the Snitch last game and how against the odds is the fact that she plays. How different she feels amongst the other players.
"Do you fly?" He asks her.
She hesitates. "I know how to, I mean, First Year classes."
It doesn't feel enough somehow.
"Have you ever played Quidditch?"
Evans denies with her head, her expression now closed as if she is wondering if James is mocking her. He isn't.
The day after detention, James searches for McGonagall, attempts to charm her with his best compliments (it doesn't work) and asks her if there is anything they could do to increase the number of flying classes for the First Year's.
There isn't, not officially.
"I could give them classes," James hears himself saying. "On weekends."
McGonagall looks suspicious, which James considers fair after six years of mischief.
"Most students don't even fly after the First Year," he explains. "And there isn't any class that teaches about Quidditch!"
Professor McGonagall stares at him for a long time, but at last she nods, and he is given permission to start a small Quidditch club Sunday morning, when there is no practice scheduled by any House.
James pins an announcement in the Gryffindor board and because McGonagall tells him that he should open to everyone else, he also pins it in the general board outside the Great Hall.
"Nice drawing," he hears a voice saying and when he turns around, Evans is looking at the advertisement, a tiny smile at the corner of her lips as she takes in the sight of the witch flying in a broom that he doodled. "What prompted you to start this club?"
James gulps, shifting one foot to another before he answers it, his voice light.
"Just thinking ahead. Making sure the next Gryffindor Quidditch team will keep our good results."
She lifts one eyebrow at him, her expression showing that she knows he isn't telling the whole truth (he is opening this club to anyone in school, even if he hopes no Slytherin will show up), but Evans just blinks.
"Anyone can join? Or First Years only?"
"Hmm, anyone."
"Okay."
And with a tiny nod, she departs quietly.
Sunday morning, Evans is there along with five other students who decided to give him a chance. James tries to not grin too much when he offers her one of the school's brooms.
(iv)
The summer before his last year finds James with a group of friends enjoying the last of the warm long days.
They are at Godric's Hollow, enjoying the privacy and their ability to do magic freely now, and amongst dozens of activities they share that summer, James finds himself flying with Lily by the sunset.
He doesn't do it on purpose, and he vouches they are just friends--no, he swears he just wants to be her friend--but for some reason both his friends and her friends keep finding reasons to leave them alone. If Lily notices it, she doesn't say anything.
They are just friends after all.
And if his heart does somersaults when they are near, well, it happens. He can't control his heart after all.
What he can control is his speed and how high he flies, so James takes note to not get too close to Lily, watching as she practices some movements he showed the club last semester, some mid-turns and even a drop that has Lily laughing the whole way.
His heart jumps again, this uncontrollable traitor.
"Come on, Potter," she calls him when she recovers from her dive. "Let's play something."
He really can't refuse her. "Racing?" He suggests. "Or catching the Snitch?"
Lily nods at this last one. James grabs a Snitch in the middle of his Quidditch balls and gives it to her when Lily extends her hand. She watches transfixed the fluttering of the wings, then releases it to the sky. In seconds they lose sight and then the game is on.
They fly around each other, never drifting away, and James thinks this is a smart technique for Lily, to make sure she will be close if he ever finds the Snitch. As it turns, she is the one to see it first, rushing towards the sky and rolling on her broom to grab the Snitch, coming back to James with a grin on her lips.
"Oh, that's unfair," James says good-naturedly, laughing, when they land on the ground. "You see far better than I do."
"Well, you fly better, I'd say we are even."
"You fly perfectly, Evans." When Lily gives him a funny look, James shrugs. "You had a great teacher and all."
"I did," she agrees without hesitation, then she bites her lip, her face suddenly vulnerable. "But I meant it… it's not really about good or bad, it's just… you fly as if you dance, James. I swear I can hear the music."
"Oh." He isn't sure what she means by this. Lily's face is flushed after all their flight and she looks both flustered and determined following her comment. "Is that good?"
"It's beautiful," she says, eyes shining warmly, and even though they are on the ground, safe, his pulse quickens, blood rushing down his veins, and he feels just as he does when he is about to score a goal or grab the Snitch.
At the edge of something.
(v)
James can’t really remember how his first flight was—was he afraid? Did he just put his legs around the broom and took impulse? Did he knock something on the way?—but he swears he remembers the feeling of elation that came with the wind rushing through his hair, standing above ground, challenging gravity.
He probably didn’t notice all that—his broomstick likely turned the air into a soft breeze, not wind, and got as high as two-feet only—but he can vouch for the gravity. He may not have known the concept behind it, but the pull of the ground was very familiar to a two-year-old boy who couldn’t stay still for long.
And he knew he was supposed to be on the ground. He did not have bird wings and no matter how much he jumped, the ground reclaimed him. Except when it came to flying.
Flying was freedom. Flying was mocking gravity. Flying was what James really was made for. He didn’t think he could ever be that happier on the ground than he was in the open skies, flying faster and higher than birds, watching ant-sized people on the ground, the wind rushing by his ear.
And then he kisses Lily Evans. On the ground.
By all means, sometimes James thinks he shouldn't feel about Lily as he does. He had always run from gravity after all, hating that unseen force that he couldn’t escape from. And Lily, from the first moment he noticed her—as pale and poor as it seemed later when his feelings really blossomed—, had him at her grasp. He tries to move on, he tries to be just her friend, he tries to keep it platonic.
But James gravitates towards her. It’s unstoppable. It’s cosmic. It’s the only attraction he feels happy to accept.
And for all its inescapability, kissing Lily reminds him a lot of flying. Her lips are soft, her breath as refreshing as the cool air fifty feet above; his heart thunders in his chest as if he has just take a deep dive, one of his famous risk-breaking-neck falls that makes the crowd holds its breath in suspense—except that this time there is no crowd and James is the one that can’t breathe, can’t take his mind away from her; and adrenaline runs through his veins, bringing that elation that should feel familiar to him, that he has been feeling ever since he first flew, but yet feels new every time their lips meet.
Actually, being with her is even better than flying.
____________
Since this story bordered too close to angst, here is a small piece of happy Quidditch family moment for Harry and James to remind all is well.
will never get over canon james potter drawing L. E. inside a snitch on his paper. he's the HP version of a girl drawing her initials w her crush's inside a heart. anyone who tells you that your sparkly glitter pen, romantic, sweetheart james potter isn't an accurate characterisation of him can go to hell.
Love you, canon Sirius. Sirius, who loved his motorbike and leaned back in chairs. Sirius who suffered 12 years in Azkaban while being innocent. Sirius, who missed crossword puzzles and turned into a dog to escape. Sirius, who bonded with other animals and magical creatures. Sirius, who wanted to commit a murder in front of children. Sirius, who is tall and terrifying. A pureblood heir. The bad child. Sirius, who is top of the class. Sirius, who chose his own family. Sirius, who bullied other students for fun and told Snape about the willow because he was a noisy git. Sirius, who doesn't apologize for who he is. Sirius, who ate rats to be closer to Harry and fought Molly who tried to question his parenthood. Sirius, who is brave and energetic and didn't do well just sitting in the house when others are in danger. Sirius who didn't lose his mind in Azkaban. Sirius who was a competent wizard, loyal friend and loving godfather. Sirius who is moody and drank alcohol to cope and lost his temper. Sirius who never wanted to be apart from James. Sirius who hated the dark arts. Sirius who was mean to Kretcher. Sirius who risked his life constantly for people he loved and died protecting Harry.
I’ve been thinking, and I decided to put this together, the actual canon picture we’re given of what James and Lily were like as a couple. Not what other people had to say about them. Not what they were like before they got together. Just the very little, tiny bit we see and know of THEM, together and with Harry. Let’s start:
PS Ch. 17
It seemed to be a handsome, leather-covered book. Harry opened it curiously. It was full of wizard photographs. Smiling and waving at him from every page were his mother and father.
PoA, Ch. 11
[Harry] stopped on a picture of his parents’ wedding day. There was his father waving up at him, beaming, the untidy black hair Harry had inherited standing up in all directions. There was his mother, alight with happiness, arm in arm with his dad. And there … that must be him.[Sirius]
GoF Ch.34
And now another head was emerging from the tip of Voldemort’s wand … and Harry knew when he saw it who it would be … he knew, as though he had expected it from the moment when Cedric had appeared from the wand … knew, because the woman appearing was the one he’d thought of more than any other tonight… .
The smoky shadow of a young woman with long hair fell to the ground as Bertha had done, straightened up, and looked at him … and Harry, his arms shaking madly now, looked back into the ghostly face of his mother.
"Your father’s coming …“ she said quietly. “He wants to see you … it will be all right.. . hold on… .”
And he came … first his head, then his body … tall and untidy-haired like Harry, the smoky, shadowy form of James Potter blossomed from the end of Voldemort’s wand, fell to the ground, and straightened like his wife. He walked close to Harry, looking down at him, and he spoke in the same distant, echoing voice as the others, but quietly, so that Voldemort, his face now livid with fear as his victims prowled around him, could not hear….
"When the connection is broken, we will linger for only moments … but we will give you time… you must get to the Portkey, it will return you to Hogwarts … do you understand, Harry?“
"Yes,” Harry gasped, fighting now to keep a hold on his wand, which was slipping and sliding beneath his fingers.
"Harry …“ whispered the figure of Cedric, “take my body back, will you? Take my body back to my parents, …”
"I will,“ said Harry, his face screwed up with the effort of holding the wand.
"Do it now,” whispered his father’s voice, “be ready to run … do it now. …”
(I included this scene because while we’re never actually told whether these are the “real” spirits of these characters or just some sort of spell-imitation, Harry certainly seems to treat Cedric’s shade (and its request) as though it were really Cedric speaking, so it’s only fair.) (plus James and Lily are dead and they’re still all about comforting and protecting their baby as a team that’s adorable)
DH Ch. 10 (Lily’s Letter)
Dear Padfoot,
Thank you, thank you, for Harry’s birthday present! It was his favorite by far. One year old and already zooming along on a toy broomstick, he looked so pleased with himself. I’m enclosing a picture so you can see. You know it only rises about two feet off the ground but he nearly killed the cat and he smashed a horrible vase Petunia sent me for Christmas (no complaints there). Of course James thought it was so funny, says he’s going to be a great Quidditch player but we’ve had to pack away all the ornaments and make sure we don’t take our eyes off him when he gets going.
We had a very quiet birthday tea, just us and old Bathilda who has always been sweet to us and who dotes on Harry. We were so sorry you couldn’t come, but the Order’s got to come first, and Harry’s not old enough to know it’s his birthday anyway! James is getting a bit frustrated shut up here, he tries not to show it but I can tell – also Dumbledore’s still got his Invisibility Cloak, so no chance of little excursions. If you could visit, it would cheer him up so much. Wormy was here last weekend. I thought he seemed down, but that was probably the next about the McKinnons; I cried all evening when I heard.
Bathilda drops in most days, she’s a fascinating old thing with the most amazing stories about Dumbledore. I’m not sure he’d be pleased if he knew! I don’t know how much to believe, actually because it seems incredible that Dumbledore (rest from Ch. 33) could ever have been friends with Gellert Grindelwald. I think her mind’s going, personally!
Lots of love, Lily
DH, also Ch. 10
At last, lying facedown on the floor, [Harry] spotted what looked like a torn piece of paper under the chest of drawers. When he pulled it out, it proved to be most of the photograph that Lily had described in her letter. A black-haired baby was zooming in and out of the picture on a tiny broom, roaring with laughter, and a pair of legs that must have belonged to James was chasing after him.
(rest from Ch. 33) Then [Snape] ripped in two the photograph he was also holding, so that he kept the part from which Lily laughed, throwing the portion showing James and Harry back onto the floor
DH Ch. 17 (Voldemort’s memory)
And along a new and darker street [Voldemort] moved, and now his destination was in sight at last, the Fidelius Charm broken, though [James and Lily] did not know it yet… And he made less noise than the dead leaves slithering along the pavement as he drew level with the dark hedge, and steered over it…
They had not drawn the curtains; he saw them quite clearly in their little sitting room, the tall black-haired man in his glasses, making puffs of colored smoke erupt from his wand for the amusement of the small black-haired boy in his blue pajamas. The child was laughing and trying to catch the smoke, to grab it in his small fist…
A door opened and the mother entered, saying words he cold not hear, her long dark-red hair falling over her face. Now the father scooped up the son and handed him to the mother. He threw his wand down upon the sofa and stretched, yawning...
The gate creaked a little as he pushed it open, but James Potter did not hear. His white hand pulled out the wand beneath his cloak and pointed it at the door, which burst open…
He was over the threshold as James came sprinting into the hall. It was easy, too easy, he had not even picked up his wand…
“Lily, take Harry and go! It’s him! Go! Run! I’ll hold him off!”
Hold him off, without a wand in his hand!… He laughed before casting the curse…
“Avada Kedavra!”
The green light filled the cramped hallway, it lit the pram pushed against the wall, it made the banisters glow like lighting rods, and James Potter fell like a marionette whose strings were cut…
He could hear her screaming from the upper floor, trapped, but as long as she was sensible, she, at least, had nothing to fear… He climbed the steps, listening with faint amusement to her attempts to barricade herself in… She had no wand upon her either… How stupid they were, and how trusting, thinking that their safety lay in friends, that weapons could be discarded even for moments…
He forced the door open, cast aside the chair and boxes hastily piled against it with one lazy wave of his wand… and there she stood, the child in her arms. At the sight of him, she dropped her son into the crib behind her and threw her arms wide, as if this would help, as if in shielding him from sight she hoped to be chosen instead…
“Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry!”
“Stand aside, you silly girl… stand aside, now.”
“Not Harry, please no, take me, kill me instead–”
“This is my last warning –”
“Not Harry! Please… have mercy… have mercy… Not Harry! Not Harry! Please – I’ll do anything –”
“Stand aside. Stand aside, girl!”
He could have forced her away from the crib, but it seemed more prudent to finish them all…
The green light flashed around the room and she dropped like her husband. The child had not cried all this time. He could stand, clutching the bars of his crib, and he looked up into the intruder’s face with a kind of bright interest, perhaps thinking that it was his father who hid beneath the cloak, making more pretty lights, and his mother would pop up any moment, laughing –
He pointed the wand very carefully into the boy’s face: He wanted to see it happen, the destruction of this one, inexplicable danger. The child began to cry: It had seen that he was not James. He did not like it crying, he had never been able to stomach the small ones whining in the orphanage–
“Avada Kedavra!”
JKR’s Pottermore blurb about Vernon and Petunia:
“The first meeting between Lily, her boyfriend James Potter, and the engaged couple [Vernon and Petunia], went badly, and the relationship nose-dived from there. James was amused by Vernon, and made the mistake of showing it. Vernon tried to patronise James, asking what car he drove. James described his racing broom. Vernon supposed out loud that wizards had to live on unemployment benefit. James explained about Gringotts, and the fortune his parents had saved there, in solid gold. Vernon could not tell whether he was being made fun of or not, and grew angry. The evening ended with Vernon and Petunia storming out of the restaurant, while Lily burst into tears and James (a little ashamed of himself) promised to make things up with Vernon at the earliest opportunity.
“This never happened. Petunia did not want Lily as a bridesmaid, because she was tired of being overshadowed; Lily was hurt. Vernon refused to speak to James at the reception, but described him, within James’ earshot, as ‘some kind of amateur magician’.
JK Rowling on James and Lily’s Patronuses
Chely: James patronus is a stag and lilys a doe is that a coincidence?
J.K. Rowling: No, the Patronus often mutates to take the image of the love of one’s life (because they so often become the ‘happy thought’ that generates a Patronus).
Coupled with this:
You know, for the next time some asshat tells you we don’t know from canon if James and Lily were in love/happy together/James was a good father/etc.
(If anyone thinks of any I’ve missed, let me know and I’ll add!)
andulkaphoto
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