How You Get The Girl
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Chapter 2. How To Know If A Bloke Fancies You (Spoiler: Ask His Best Mate, He'll Snitch)
Lily,
I know.
Sirius
...
Sirius,
Stop being cryptic and tell me what you know.
Lily
...
Lilyflower,
Something that seemed to have happened on the last night of the term? *wink wink*
Sirius
...
Sirius,
He told you, didn't he?
Lily
...
Lils,
Uh huh he did. That is not the only thing I know.
Are you telling him or should I?
Ecstatic now the unthinkable has happened, Sirius
...
Sirius,
BLACK IF YOU TELL HIM, I SWEAR TO MERLIN AND DUMBLEDORE I WILL END YOU!
So now that you have figured it out, help out a poor soul, will you? Does he still, you know, fancy me?
Waiting impatiently, Lily
...
Lils,
Relax, Red. I'm not telling him.
I will help you, darling. After all, I am the godfather to your first child who you will so kindly name after me.
Sirius
...
Sirius,
Black, you delusional little git. I DON'T EVEN KNOW IF HE STILL FANCIES ME HOW ARE YOU THINKING ABOUT NAMES OF CHILDREN??
About to commit a homicide, Lily
PS. No child of mine will be named after you.
...
Lily,
Ofcourse, he does. He's fancied you for years.
Homicide is quite frowned upon in the society, darling, Sirius
PS You wound me. I'll be talking to James about it.
...
Sirius,
…he does?
Lily
...
Red,
A hundred percent sure he does.
Awaiting red haired babies with Quidditch abilities, Sirius
...
SIRIUS
THANKYOU. You put me out of my misery.
Ignoring the babies jab and prancing around, Lily
PS I should probably stop prancing lest I break my leg.
...
Red,
Keep dancing, but there might be just a teensy bit of a problem.
Sirius
PS I'll send James for your rescue if you do break something.
...
Black,
I’m sending hexes you’ve never heard of in the next letter if you don’t spit it out.
Lily
...
Lily,
He might have not EXACTLY said he still fancied you.
A toad would be highly preferable, I'll have you know, just in case. I hate cockroaches. Sirius
...
Sirius,
.
Lily
...
Lily,
I swear to Merlin’s pinkie I’ve never been frightened more by you.
Alright. He said he's moved on and didn't fancy you anymore.
Also, he might have said he's asking out Emily Cooper from Hufflepuff the week we get back. Might. I'll neither confirm nor deny that for the fear of red heads popping out from underneath my bed and hexing me while I sleep.
Sirius
...
Sirius,
HE'S ASKING OUT EMILY THE TART?!
Insulted, Lily
...
Lily,
Now, now Lilyflower, let's not disrespect others. They've already been on 3 dates this past summer and I'll have you know she's a completely fine bird. Blonde and blue eyed without any anger management issues.
Sirius
...
Sirius,
3 DATES? WHERE DID THAT INFORMATION GO WHEN I ASKED YOU WHETHER HE FANCIED ME OR NOT SIRIUS SODDING BLACK?!
Lily
...
Lils,
Told Isis to peck me, didn't you? She did, and since her temper quite matches yours, I'll have permanent scars from this ordeal.
Just tell him, would you?
Highly annoyed, Sirius
...
Sirius,
No, thank you, I'd rather not get rejected.
Lily
...
Lils,
Trust me, he does. He's just protecting himself from your rejection, it's not the other way round.
In any case, you have a week before September starts. Tick tock, Red, time is ticking. Tell him or you'll lose your only chance. Who knows? Maybe it'll be blond babies I'll be godfathering.
Sirius
...
Lily Evans sat on her desk, the book in her hand long forgotten, with her gaze locked onto the clouds rolling above the little town of Cokesworth. She loved sitting at her study, which had a perfect view of the countryside behind their little house, reading another classic or stargazing.
But today, she sat by the same window, her mind in a whirl, half of her heart hoping to see a grey feathered owl heading towards her house and the other half wanting to fling herself off the darn window and end it all.
Usually, when she was home for breaks, her window always had traffic from a certain female owl delivering colorful little letters and small, friendly chocolate treats from a bespectacled black haired boy she had come to adore. But this summer was a long, hard, dry spell, and Lily often found herself looking out the window with a sorrowed expression, waiting for something that apparently wasn't coming anytime soon.
The summer when she actually wanted to hear from him was when he decided he preferred the silence between them. And Lily was sure this silence would end in her booking herself a ward in psychiatric care at St Mungo's.
She was pulled back into reality when she heard a familiar pecking on her window. Looking up, a barn owl flew right outside her window, with a letter attached to its talons, looking expectedly at her with big brown eyes. She promptly opened the window, her heart sinking just a little and Odin, Marlene's majestic owl, flew in swiftly and landed in front of her.
"Hello there, Odin." Lily spoke, as the owl nibbled Lily's hand gently. She untied the letter attached quickly, stroking Odin's feathers as he cooed.
Lily Evans,
This is an intervention. If I receive another letter about you moping around, I'm going to set your flaming red hair on fire and I'm not kidding.
Meet me at the Leaky Cauldron tomorrow at 12pm sharp. Don't be late. There's something you need to know.
Marlene
"Marlene is such a bossy little thing, isn't she?" She asked Odin who hooted in response.
Lily sighed. She had no desire to go out, much less change out of her 3 day old pajamas. But she needed to complete her school shopping. And she was shocked at how low she let herself get. Sod him.
Hastily scribbling down an affirmative reply, she sent Odin on his way before going down to the kitchen to fix herself a bowl of ice cream.
...
The streets of Diagon Alley were bustling with last minute shoppers on this last weekend of August. September 1st was a mere few days away, and the excitement of a new year lingered in the air. As Lily wove through the crowd behind Marlene, ducking here and there from things flying overhead, she realised how much she loved to see Diagon Alley in its full dramatic flair. After 7 years, this magical world still hit her by surprise sometimes.
The pair made their way through the crowd to reach the entrance of The Leaky Couldron, a popular wizarding pub and inn.
"Ooh c'mon, or we'll be late.” Marlene exasperated, urging Lily to catch on with her quick. She was busy inhaling the sights of the street.
"Late for what?" Lily asked, confused, as she increased her pace.
Marlene didn't answer as she pushed the heavy door of The Leaky Cauldron open. The aged pub attracted both young and old alike after an exhausting day of shopping.
Scanning the crowd, she smiled at two guys sitting in one of the booths, nursing butterbeers with smirks plastered all over their faces as they spotted the girls.
Lily's heart stopped as she registered the familiar faces of the Marauders. No, no, no, no, no, no, her heart thumped in rhythm with her thoughts.
She pulled Marlene back by her clothes violently; she stumbled backwards into Lily but she paid no heave.
"You called the Marauders?!"
"Yes." Marlene answered, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Mar!" Lily exclaimed loudly. Her cheeks were boiling hot by this point, and the heat in the pub wasn't making things easier.
"Oh my god, you've got it bad." Marlene snickered, then stopped when she saw her best friend's vicious glare. "Don't worry, he's not here."
"He's not?" Lily's face visibly fell as Marlene shook her head.
"C'mon!" She tugged Lily along as they reached the booth.
"Hello boys!"
"McKinnon!" Both boys sang together.
"Red." Sirius said mockingly with a giant smirk.
“Hi Remus,” Lily said, completely disregarding the presence of Sirius Black.
Lily and Marlene sat in the booth opposite the boys as Peter came trodding, carefully trying to balance three butterbeers in his hands.
“For you, girls.” He said, as he put down the mugs.
“So, Marlene, ready for your last year on the pitch?” Sirius started the conversation.
“Oh, absolutely. I trained all summer. Need to leave Hogwarts with a bang,” Marlene replied, the excitement of a new quidditch season evident in her gleaming eyes.
The conversation drifted into the nitty-gritties of Quidditch, which Lily did not particularly understand. They discussed, nay argued, about Chudley Cannon’s new beater formation strategy, how the tragic fall of Harpies is going to affect the coming years of Quidditch World Cup and the incoming seeker of Puddlemere.
When the conversation finally died down after a good hour, Lily plucked the courage to finally ask, "Where's James?”
"A little too excited to see James, are we, Lils?" Remus smirked, giddy like a little kid.
"I thought I could expect some maturity from you, Remus."
"I'm still a Marauder, Lil.” Remus shrugged, lifting his mug to her.
"James is otherwise occupied." Sirius answered, as he gulped down the last of his butterbeer.
"What?!" Lily's head perked up at that, shock colouring her face. She looked like she was about to break down.
Remus, Sirius, Peter and Marlene promptly burst into laughter. Everyone in the pub paused to look at them howling with laughter for a moment, then turned around to their conversations.
“You were right, McKinnon, this was totally worth it,” Peter spat out between his laughs. Marlene gave him a high-five.
"My apologies, Evans," Sirius tried controlling himself under the murderous gaze of Lily, "By occupied I meant sneezing and coughing his bloody brains out."
"He's poorly?"
"Just a nasty flu. Courtesy of a thrilling game of Quidditch in the rain."
Lily nodded and shook her head, now embarrassed to have been caught red-handed, though her mind couldn’t help but wonder Quidditch in the rain, such a James thing to do. She really has got it bad.
"So, Lily, how do you plan to tell him?"
"Tell who what?"
"James."
"I'm not telling James anything."
“And why in Merlin’s pants not?”
“I don’t know."
“You have to tell him.”
“I don’t HAVE to tell him.”
“But why wouldn’t you?”
“Because-“ Lily tried, but her heart hurt thinking of James with Emily. Happy. She sighed, and shook her head, playing with her nails instead. Sirius, Remus, Peter and Marlene exchanged glances.
"Alright, I knew she wouldn't be convinced. You're as stubborn as James." Marlene said, shaking her head. "And that’s precisely why I brought you here." She turned to Sirius. "That's your queue."
Sirius nodded, and produced a piece of parchment from his robes and passed it to Lily. It was crumpled and then smoothened out. Surprised, she took it.
"What's this?"
"Just read it."
Lily opened the folded piece of parchment. There were just a few lines in a very familiar scrawl.
Lily,
I don't know how to start this letter, but it's high time we talked, shouldn't we? I know you must be mad at me, you should be really, because of what I did. And you know what? I'm not sorry I kissed you.
I've fancied you for a long time now, and truthfully speaking, I don't know remember a time when I didn't.
Just wanted to get that out of the way.
James
Or Potter, whatever you prefer.
"I don't understand, was I meant to read this or..?"
Sirius thought about it for a moment. "Yes, and no."
Lily raised an eyebrow in question.
"A few days ago, I found him in his room writing a letter to you. Well, trying is the key word here. The room was filled with half finished letters, some were just a pain to read, you know how cheesy James can get. Well, this one particularly piqued my interest, and I kept it. He burned the rest of them because I threatened I’ll send them all to you."
"What if he wrote I don't fancy you anymore Lily, it's best we just stay friends on the last letter he wrote?"
"But he still wrote this." Lily furrowed her brows and Sirius sighed. "He wouldn't have written this if he didn't fancy you. Doesn't matter what he wrote on the other, he wouldn't have been spending so much thought into what to write if he wasn't scared of hurting your feelings, or his own."
"I've never seen this insightful side of you, Sirius. I must say, it's rather frightening.” Remus remarked. Sirius grinned at Remus.
"He just doesn't want to be hurt again, Lil.”
Lily nodded, staring very hard at the parchment in her hand. She swallowed. There was silence for a moment as the group stared at Lily as she read the words on the parchment over and over again.
"So? What’s the verdict? Can we expect some Potter babies soon?" Remus asked.
Lily glared at him. "It's like there are two Sirius' now." She shook her head in disbelief but laughed in the end.
"So?"
"Lils?” Marlene urged.
Lily looked at each one of them. They looked so hopeful that she didn’t want to break their hearts by saying no. But more importantly, she didn’t want to break her own heart by not trying.
"James Potter wouldn't know what hit him." Lily stated and gave a small smile.
Marlene cheered and hugged her best friend. The Marauders’ grinned and cheered on. Remus pointed his wand to the ceiling and produced confetti while Sirius whistled. The bartender brought around another round of butterbeers.
“Here's for the future Potters.” Sirius took his mug and raised it in the air. Everyone else followed.
"To Lily and James!” Marlene and Remus piqued together, and they clinked their mugs together and drank.
"5 Galleons says James will shit his pants when he hears.” Peter added, and they all dissolved in laughter again.
