Drunk Confessions ; James Potter
“Drunk words are sober thoughts” they said.
pairing: f!reader x james potter
summary: Y/N and James Potter have been in love with eachother since 3rd year and it’s common knowledge to anyone except them. But what happens when James gets a tad bit too drunk on a party?
warnings/notes: fluff fluff fluff, idiots in love, use of y/n, girlhood, marauders banter, alcohol consumption, idk what elsee
a/n: oh my god in genuinely so mad it literally erased the WHOLE STORY AND I HAD TO REWRITE IT WHST TJE FUCK hope you enjoy anyway chat 🙏🏻
The sky over the Quidditch pitch is an angry gray, rumbling low and threatening, but it doesn’t stop the crowd from roaring like a stadium on fire. Rain drizzles steadily, soaking scarves and robes, but no one seems to care. Every eye is locked on the blur of red and blue circling high above the pitch, faster and faster—bludgers whizzing past, players shouting, the wind slicing through the stands like a knife.
You’re at the front of the Gryffindor section, heart thudding so hard you can barely hear the chant thundering around you:
“POTTER! POTTER! POTTER!”
There’s no mistaking him.
Even from here, you can see the wild mess of black hair, the scarlet robes plastered to his skin from the rain, the glint of determination in his hazel eyes as he leans into the dive of his life.
James Potter looks like a firework seconds before it explodes.
And then—he catches it.
One hand, mid-air, golden wings trapped in his palm.
The pitch erupts.
Gryffindors launch to their feet like they’ve been stunned. Red and gold streamers shoot from somewhere above, and someone behind you yells so loudly they lose their voice on the spot. You don’t realize you’re screaming, too, until your throat burns.
The sound of celebration rises like a tidal wave—but your eyes don’t leave him. Not even for a second.
He’s grinning, eyes wide, hair dripping, arm still raised with the Snitch clenched between his fingers—and then he’s looking straight at you.
And your breath catches.
⸻
In the professor’s box…
“There it is,” McGonagall murmurs, a little smug.
Slughorn groans and drops three Galleons into her hand. “Every bloody time.”
Sprout passes Flitwick a folded bit of parchment with something scrawled on it—probably a prediction. “I had them getting together before the end of the match.”
“Too optimistic,” Flitwick says. “He’ll probably declare his love by Christmas. Or next century.”
Kettleburn frowns at the field through his rain-splattered spectacles. “Are we still talking about the Quidditch score?”
“No,” McGonagall says flatly. “We’re talking about Potter and Y/L/N. The will-they-won’t-they of the bloody decade.”
⸻
Back on the pitch, James doesn’t even acknowledge the rest of his team dogpiling each other in celebration.
He doesn’t stop to gloat, or bow, or wave at the crowd like he usually does.
He runs straight toward you.
Through the mud, through the noise, through everything—and you’re barely down the stairs when he barrels into you, arms wrapping around you, lifting you off your feet like you weigh nothing.
“Did you see that?!” he shouts, voice buzzing with adrenaline and disbelief.
You can’t stop smiling. You’re soaked to the skin, freezing, and buzzing like you’ve been hit with a cheering charm. “James, that was insane! That dive—I thought you were going to die!”
“I would’ve died dramatically!” he declares, spinning you in a ridiculous circle, his laugh echoing against your ear. “And you would’ve said I looked brilliant doing it.”
“You did look brilliant.”
He pulls back just far enough to see your face, his hands still on your waist, warm even through the rain. His grin falters just slightly, like he wasn’t expecting you to say it so seriously.
“You really think so?”
“Of course I do.”
“Say it again.”
You roll your eyes, but you’re laughing. “You’re brilliant, James.”
“Again.”
“James—”
“One more for luck, come on.”
You swat his arm, and he catches your wrist and swings it gently between you two like you’re seven years old again on the playground.
⸻
Somewhere a few feet away, Sirius Black is groaning dramatically into his hands.
“This is torture. This is literally slow-burn hell.”
“They’re going to kill me with this,” Peter mutters, wrapping his scarf tighter around his head to muffle the scene in front of him.
Remus crosses his arms and sighs. “They’re standing in the rain. Holding each other. Making heart eyes. And neither of them has any idea.”
“Tell me again why we’re not legally allowed to interfere?” Sirius asks.
Remus shrugs. “I think it falls under cruel and unusual punishment if we force them to kiss before they figure it out.”
⸻
You, meanwhile, are still standing there with James, the rain now falling in soft silver sheets around you.
He’s grinning, breathless, flushed from the cold and the win and something else—something softer.
“You’re my lucky charm, you know that?”
“Is that why you always play better when I’m watching?”
“Exactly,” he says, not even pretending it’s a joke.
Your heart stumbles.
But before you can say anything, before you can even breathe, Sirius whistles from the sidelines.
“Oi! Lover boy! Save the swooning for the afterparty!”
James flips him off cheerfully and takes your hand.
“Come on, Y/N. Let’s go get absolutely wrecked.”
You let him drag you off the field, hand in hand, heart still thudding against your ribs like a snitch trying to escape.
You don’t know it yet, but that’s the moment every professor marks on their mental betting sheet as the beginning of the end for your denial.
..
The Gryffindor common room looks like a postcard from chaos.
Laughter ricochets off the walls. Firewhisky sloshes dangerously close to priceless magical tapestries. Red and gold streamers dangle from floating lanterns, and the Fat Lady is two notes into an off-key drinking song from her frame before someone silences her with a silencing charm (she keeps singing anyway).
You’re curled up on the couch now, legs tucked beneath you, cheeks flushed from the heat and the firewhisky and maybe the fact that James Potter has just collapsed beside you like he belongs there.
(He does. But don’t say that out loud.)
His head lands against your shoulder with a groan. “Merlin, I can’t feel my spine.”
You snort into your butterbeer. “You just won a full-on war match. What’d you expect?”
“A parade. Chocolate. You serenading me.”
You roll your eyes. “You’re delusional.”
He lifts his head slightly, just enough to glance up at you with that lazy, lopsided grin. “Delusion looks good on me, though, yeah?”
He’s too close. Not in a bad way. Just in a dangerous way. His face is warm, hair still damp from rain, and his cheeks are flushed a little from drink and laughter and you.
He bumps your shoulder lightly. “You haven’t told me yet.”
“Told you what?”
“That I was brilliant.”
You stare at him.
He stares back. Wide, innocent eyes. He’s not even joking.
“I literally told you that on the pitch—”
“I know. Say it again.”
“James—”
“One more time. For my ego. It’s fragile. Ask Remus.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“I’m yours,” he says brightly, and then immediately frowns at himself. “Wait, no. Not like— I meant, like—your ridiculous. As in. You own me. Platonically. Friendly-like.”
Your face burns.
He blinks at you, like his brain is just catching up to his mouth. “Unless you don’t want that? The—uh. Friendly ownership?”
You open your mouth. Then close it.
Then open it again, because he’s looking at you like you’re the only person in the room. And it’s maddening. And wonderful. And unfair.
“James,” you say, voice a little softer, “You’re always brilliant. Match or not.”
His entire face lights up. Like a sunrise, like a Patronus, like you just gave him a love potion by accident. His grin is all teeth, all joy, like he just heard something he didn’t even know he needed.
“Well,” he says, blinking hard. “Now I definitely need you to say it again.”
You groan and drop your head into his shoulder. “You’re insufferable.”
“Say it with more affection next time.”
You don’t move. It’s warm here. You’re tucked against him like it’s the most natural thing in the world, and he’s just—letting you. His hand comes up instinctively, curling over your knee like you’ve sat like this a hundred times before. Like this is just what you do.
You’re both quiet for a beat.
Then—
James shifts, speaking into your hair, barely above the music.
“You looked really pretty today.”
You freeze.
“What?”
“After the match. Or during. Or always.” He says it like he’s thinking it out in real time. “In the rain. With your hair all messed up and your voice all loud. It was really distracting. I nearly flew into a goalpost.”
You pull back to look at him, heart beating a little too loud in your ears.
His smile wobbles, almost shy now. “It’s not fair, you know. How you make it so hard to focus.”
You’re about to say something—what, you’re not sure—when Sirius crashes down onto the couch beside you both, dramatically sprawled like a dying Victorian maiden.
“Will you two just kiss already?!”
You and James spring apart like you’ve been hit with a Stunning Spell. Your knees knock. The blanket slips off your lap. James nearly falls off the couch. Your face is on fire.
“Sirius!” you hiss.
Remus appears behind him, dragging him by the collar. “Sorry, sorry, he’s had four drinks and zero impulse control.”
“I’m right, though!” Sirius yells as he’s hauled away. “This has been a seven-year buildup! You’re killing me!”
James is still staring at the spot where you were just curled into his side, like he’s unsure if it happened or if he dreamed it.
You clear your throat. “Anyway. Butterbeer?”
“Please,” he says hoarsely.
You both stand awkwardly, side by side.
Neither of you says what you’re thinking.
Neither of you notices the way you mirror each other’s nervous gestures.
Neither of you knows that the whole common room is quietly taking mental bets now.
You just walk toward the drinks table—shoulder brushing shoulder, cheeks pink, trying very hard not to fall in love again in front of everyone.
Too late.
..
It’s been, maybe, thirty minutes since you last talked to James — maybe less — and he’s now reached the level of intoxication where he’s bouncing from couch to floor to table like a golden retriever stuck in a Quidditch locker room. A loud golden retriever.
And you, unfortunately, are the center of his universe.
“Y/N,” he’s saying to a poor first-year who clearly only came over for crisps. “Y/N Y/L/N is a genius. A gift to magical academia. She’s rewriting the rules. Have you read her last essay on spell layering? I read it for fun. I highlighted things. I made notes. NOTES.”
The first-year bolts.
Across the room, Sirius groans. “He’s reached stage four.”
Remus raises a brow. “Already?”
“He’s talking about her footnotes again.”
You, meanwhile, are curled into a chair with Lily and Dorcas, sipping from a butterbeer and watching this trainwreck in motion.
“I didn’t even do anything,” you murmur, wide-eyed.
Dorcas snorts. “That’s the problem.”
James turns next to Marlene, wild-eyed and swaying like a tree in a hurricane. “She’s going to change the world, Mar. I’m just some twat with a broom, but she’s—she’s like a wand-core in human form. Powerful. Regal. Glowy.”
“Glowy,” Sirius repeats, deadpan.
“She deserves her own holiday,” James says gravely. “With no homework. And themed pastries.”
Peter, lying starfish-style on the floor, just mutters, “You said that already.”
James ignores him.
“Moony,” he says suddenly, stumbling over. “Did you know she reads magical theory books for fun?”
“I did, yeah,” Remus says calmly. “She’s in our study group.”
James gasps. “You’ve studied with her?! In real life?!”
“Every Tuesday.”
“Why wasn’t I invited?”
“You were.”
“I WAS?!”
Sirius kicks Remus under the table. “Don’t answer that. He’ll cry.”
James wipes his face. “No, no, I’m fine.”
“I would pay to be in a group with her,” James continues, wildly unaware. “Like actual Galleons. Maybe my Firebolt.”
“You’d trade your broom for study rights?” Sirius asks.
“I’d trade my dignity,” James replies, deadly serious.
“You already have,” Peter mumbles.
“Okay but she’s just so incredibly amazi-”
Sirius sighs so loudly his soul escapes for a second. “Mate, please, for the love of Merlin—take a breath.”
“I can’t!” James cries, hand on his heart. “She just talked to me, Sirius. She said I looked brilliant out there. Brilliant. She said it. Out loud. With her mouth. To me.”
He’s swaying. There’s a butterbeer bottle dangling from one hand and a crumpled bit of parchment in the other — no one knows where it came from, or what it says. He keeps trying to read it dramatically, but it’s blank.
He lurches toward Lily now, grabbing her shoulders with too much emotion for someone this off-balance. “Evans. Lily. You’re smart. You get it. Tell me she’s the most magnificent human being to ever live.”
Lily looks him dead in the eye. “She’s alright.”
James’s jaw drops. “Alright?! You take that back right now.”
Dorcas cackles. “Lily, you’re going to send him into cardiac arrest.”
“I just think Marlene’s got better cheekbones—”
“HOW DARE—”
James starts climbing the arm of the couch like it’s a podium. His butterbeer spills onto Sirius’s leg.
“I would die for her,” he declares to the room, fully ignoring Sirius screaming “MY TROUSERS, JAMES!”
“I would go to Azkaban for her!”
“I think you’d go to Azkaban for knocking over that table,” Peter says mildly.
“I would invent new spells for her! Emotional ones! With poetry built in!”
“You don’t even remember the counter-hex for hiccoughing,” Remus mutters.
“I’d learn!” James insists. “For her? I’d learn anything. Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, Goblin dialects—anything.”
Marlene sips from her cup, eyeing him like a science experiment. “Should we be worried he’s going to propose tonight?”
“No, no,” James says quickly. “Not tonight. I have to make it special. You only get one first proposal. I’ll probably need a broomstick and a dragon.”
A pause.
“Maybe two dragons.”
“James,” Sirius says slowly, like speaking to a spooked Hippogriff. “You do know she’s still here, yeah? At this party?”
James freezes.
“What.”
“She hasn’t left,” Remus adds. “She’s literally by the fireplace.”
He turns slowly.
Y/N is laughing again — head tipped back, eyes squeezed shut — and it hits him all over again like a rogue Bludger.
He turns back to them, hand over his mouth. “Oh my god.”
“What?”
“I have to tell her she’s amazing.”
“NO!” all four of them yell at once.
Sirius grabs him by the collar. “You already did! At least five times! Just now! You were very loud!”
“I was?!”
“James,” Remus says gently. “If you tell her again tonight, she’ll never take you seriously ever again.”
James frowns, gaze flickering. “But she’s just so—look at her. How is a person allowed to be that capable and that pretty? At the same time?! While breathing?! It’s not fair.”
“Neither is this hangover you’re about to have,” Peter mumbles.
You’re across the room, sitting with Lily, Dorcas, and Marlene near the fireplace, laughing at something. Your head’s thrown back, hand curled over your stomach, cheeks flushed from drink and heat and happiness.
James sees this.
And promptly gasps.
Loudly.
“Did—did you see that?” he whispers furiously to no one in particular, swatting at Sirius’s arm.
“See what?” Sirius blinks.
“She just—” James gestures vaguely in her direction. “She laughed. Like a—like a goddess. Like something out of a romance novel. Did you see that?!”
Remus raises an eyebrow, sipping from his butterbeer. “James, she’s laughed like that since First Year.”
“Yes,” James says, grabbing Sirius’s face. “But this time it was at my joke.”
“It wasn’t,” Peter pipes up from the floor. “She was laughing at Marlene.”
James doesn’t hear him. He’s too busy sinking deeper into the cushions, clutching a half-empty bottle and sighing like someone just recited a Shakespearean sonnet into his soul.
Sirius grabs him. “Alright, Casanova, let’s sit back down before you give McGonagall a reason to revoke your Prefect badge.”
James collapses onto the couch but doesn’t stop talking. He’s now mumbling into a throw pillow.
“She’s so smart. Her brain is like—like a Pensieve made of diamonds. And her eyes? Unfair. Illegal. Should require a license.”
You bury your face in your hands.
“Don’t look at me,” you groan. “Don’t even look at me.”
Dorcas leans into your side, grinning. “You’re not embarrassed. You’re thriving.”
“I’m combusting.”
Across the room, Lily narrows her eyes. “Okay. Who gave him the last bottle?”
Dorcas smirks. “He nicked it from Peter when he was doing that thing with the singing frog.”
“Oh no,” Marlene says, already turning to watch.
“Oh yes,” Sirius says gleefully, patting James on the back like he’s winding up a toy.
“Did I ever tell you,” James says, swaying forward with the glass raised like a toast, “that in Third Year, Y/N got an Outstanding on that bloody Transfiguration essay—without extra credit? And then she apologized for ‘only’ getting one foot over the minimum length. Like some sort of modest academic angel.”
“You have,” says Remus, dryly. “Twice a month. Every month. Since Third Year.”
“She’s just so…” James trails off, blinking at nothing, trying to summon language that doesn’t exist. “She’s like… if the library came to life and had really nice hands.”
“Poetic,” Peter murmurs.
James leans his head against the back of the couch, watching her from across the room like she’s the only star in the sky.
“And her handwriting,” he slurs, dreamy and devastating. “She dots her i’s with perfect little circles. Not hearts, thank Merlin, she’s not insufferable. But like. The neatest circles you’ve ever seen. I’d kill to be one of her i’s.”
Remus spits out his drink.
Sirius is laughing so hard he has to bend over.
“Mate,” he wheezes. “You are so far gone you’re about to become a sonnet.”
James frowns, eyes still locked on her. “She deserves one.”
“Write her one, then,” Remus says, exasperated.
James shrugs. “Couldn’t do her justice.”
Across the room, you start to stand up, clearly preparing to come over. James perks up immediately, nearly launching off the couch, except Sirius holds him down with one hand.
“She’s coming this way,” James whisper-shouts, scrambling to fix his hair and elbow Remus in the ribs. “Do I look tragic? In a romantic, yearning sort of way?”
“You look like you just got hit by a flying book,” Peter says.
“That’s very her-coded,” James whispers urgently. “She’ll love it.”
Y/N appears in front of them, hands on her hips, eyes narrowing. “Are you drunk?”
“Depends,” James says brightly. “Are you real or did I dream you up in Charms class again?”
You blink. “What?”
“What.”
Everyone freezes.
Lily, from across the room, covers her face. “Oh my god.”
Dorcas kicks Marlene under the table. “We’re witnessing a historical event.”
“James,” you say slowly. “You dreamed about me in Charms class?”
James’s face goes bright pink. He blinks. “No.”
“James.”
“…Yes.”
Remus drops his head into his hands. Sirius is making a strangled keening sound beside him.
You don’t say anything for a second. Just stare.
James, meanwhile, is staring up at you with the dumbest, dreamiest smile in all of wizard history. “Y’know, you have the best laugh I’ve ever heard. Like music. Not like bagpipes. Like—like harps. But funny.”
You press your hand to your face. “James, you’re sloshed.”
“But still honest!” he says, raising a finger. “And if I die tonight, which is a real possibility—someone needs to tell you. You’re absolutely—stunning. And terrifying. And the best person I’ve ever met.”
You go very still.
“You deserve everything,” James says, serious now. “Every top mark. Every bloody award. And—and someone who worships the ground you walk on.”
Sirius points dramatically at James. “Like this guy, for example!”
James waves weakly. “Hi.”
You stare at him.
Then you shake your head with a disbelieving smile, cheeks burning.
“I’m getting you water,” you mutter, turning on your heel.
As you walk away, Sirius leans in. “Well?”
James is still smiling like an idiot.
“I love her,” he mumbles.
“You think?” Remus says, pinching the bridge of his nose.
Across the room, James looks up like he’s just spotted a unicorn.
“There she is,” he whispers reverently, eyes locked on you. “Look at her. Laughing. Being intelligent. Breathing air.”
He turns to the boys. “I’m going to tell her she’s amazing again.”
“No, you are not,” Sirius says, throwing an arm across him.
“You already did,” Remus adds.
“You said you’d invent spells with poetry built in,” Peter says, eyes closed. “That’s enough vulnerability for one night.”
“But I didn’t even tell her about the way her nose crinkles when she’s annoyed,” James insists, distressed.
“YES, YOU DID,” the entire group yells at once.
James flops dramatically back onto the couch, gaze still on you, hand pressed to his heart.
“I hope I never get used to it,” he mumbles.
“To what?” Sirius asks, too tired for this.
“Her. Being… her.”
Silence.
Then:
“That’s it,” Lily whispers to you. “I’m putting a Galleon down that he confesses within the week.”
You snort. “He’s not going to remember any of this.”
“Oh, he will,” Remus says, already conjuring a camera. “Because we’re going to make him.”
..
James is soft in the firelight.
Slouched on your lap, staring at you with those dreamy eyes while you run your hands through his hair. His eyes are glassy, smile sleepy. There’s an empty butterbeer bottle rolling somewhere near his foot.
You think he might fall asleep mid-sentence, right until he says it:
“I’m in love with you.”
No teasing. No grin.
Just the truth — dropped into your lap like a glass heart he doesn’t think you’ll keep.
You stare at him. Everything in you flickering, still, glowing.
And maybe he’s tipsy, and it’s way too late, and maybe you’ve spent years convincing yourself not to say anything — but your mouth opens before your doubt can shut it.
“I’ve been in love with you since third year.”
James turns to you fully now, dazed.
“You have?”
You nod, heart thudding so hard it nearly knocks you over. “You—” your voice catches, and then it softens, wavers at the edges. “You helped me carry six books back from the library. I was too proud to ask anyone. You didn’t even say anything. Just took half of them out of my arms like it was nothing.”
He blinks. “You’re telling me I won your heart with library logistics?”
You laugh — really laugh — the kind that curls into your cheeks. “It wasn’t just that. It was the way you smiled at me like I already mattered. I think I’ve been trying to catch up with that moment ever since.”
James stares at you like you just rearranged the stars.
And then you add, softer, thumb brushing along his knuckles:
“You’ll probably forget this tomorrow.”
He shakes his head so hard his curls flop. “No. Not this. Not you.”
“You said that last time you got drunk.”
“Yeah, but that was about pineapple on pizza, which is totally so wrong by the way, and this is about you, and you’re my favorite person in the world.”
You blink, throat tightening.
He exhales like the truth has been sitting on his chest for years. “You make everything better just by existing. Like—I look at you and forget what I was mad about. Or scared about. You just—calm the chaos.”
You nudge his knee with yours, voice watery. “You’re drunk and romantic and a little bit sappy.”
He nods solemnly. “And I still know you’re the girl I want to marry.”
Then, quieter:
“Kiss me tomorrow, okay? Just to make sure it wasn’t a dream.”
You smile, curling closer to him like it’s the easiest thing in the world.
“Only if you remember the third year library incident.”
“Deal.”
He tucks his head into your shoulder.
And in the dying firelight, with the castle quiet around you and the taste of unsaid things still sweet in the air, you let yourself believe it.
Tomorrow, he’ll remember.
Because love like this doesn’t get drunk. It waits.
..
James wakes up like a man reborn.
Which is to say: violently, dramatically, with a sharp inhale and a jolt upright that knocks his glasses off the nightstand and sends his pillow flying to the floor.
He blinks at the ceiling, hair sticking up in twelve different directions.
And then—
“OH MY GOD.”
The sound echoes through the boys’ dormitory like a spell misfired. Peter lets out a strangled yelp and rolls off his bed with a thud. Sirius groans, dragging a pillow over his face.
Remus, who’s reading some poetry book, even with a hangover, doesn’t look up.
“Unless Dumbledore’s tap-dancing at the foot of your bed, I swear to Merlin, James—”
“SHE LOVES ME.”
Silence.
Absolute, stunned, not-this-early silence.
Peter pokes his head up from behind his blankets. “Who? The librarian?”
“Y/N!” James yells, launching himself out of bed and spinning like he’s in a Disney film. “Y/N loves me. She told me. Last night. Right here.” He points aggressively at his chest. “In the heart zone.”
Sirius groans louder. “It’s too early for this level of optimism.”
“She’s loved me since third year!” James says, nearly tripping on his own shoe in excitement. “Third! Year!”
“You’re shouting,” Remus says, very dry. “Please don’t shout.”
“I REMEMBER EVERYTHING!” James howls with glee, climbing onto Sirius’s bed. “She said I make her feel calm. I make her feel calm! I am a human soothing draught!”
Sirius whacks him with a pillow. “You’re a human disaster!”
James falls dramatically to the floor, arms spread wide like he’s been shot. “A loved disaster!”
Peter squints. “Wait, are you sure this wasn’t a hallucination?”
“Hallucinations don’t tuck their heads into your shoulder and promise to kiss you in the morning.”
Sirius sits up at that. “Wait. Did you kiss?”
“No,” James says reverently, like it’s sacred. “We’re saving it.”
Sirius throws himself back down. “Merlin, just kill me.”
“I’m going to marry her,” James says suddenly, with the confidence of a man who can barely tie his tie in the morning.
Remus finally puts his book down. “Maybe eat breakfast first.”
“I’m going to buy her breakfast. Then marry her.”
Peter groans into his hands. “I hope she knows what she’s signed up for.”
“She does,” James says, dreamy, like the thought of you just rewrote his entire brain chemistry. “She’s perfect. Life is perfect. Life is great.”
And then he sprints to the bathroom singing something that vaguely sounds like a love song but might also be the Gryffindor Quidditch chant.
The Marauders exchange a look.
Sirius sighs, rubbing his temples. “You know what the worst part is?”
Remus raises an eyebrow.
“He’s not wrong.”
..
You find him by the lake.
He’s sitting under that same tree you always gravitate toward when the castle feels too full — hair still messy from sleep, tie loose, legs stretched out like he’s been waiting all morning. Because he has.
When he sees you, his face lights up like the bloody sun.
“You came.”
“I figured you’d be here,” you say, soft.
He grins. “Course I am. This is where I first realized I was doomed.”
You blink. “What?”
“Third year,” he says, sitting up straighter. “I watched you lug about twenty kilos of books up the hill after the library kicked us out. I tried to help, and you gave me that look — the one that’s all, ‘I’m fine, but I’ll murder you if you tell me I’m not.’”
You can’t help laughing. “Sounds like me.”
“You dropped a book on my foot,” he says fondly. “A heavy one. Arithmancy.”
“I remember.”
“And I remember thinking—” his voice dips lower, gentler, “—that I wanted to carry your books forever. Even if you hexed me for it.”
Something warm stirs in your chest.
You sit beside him in the grass, close enough that your knees brush. The lake glitters beside you like it knows this is a moment worth shining for.
“Did you really remember everything from last night?” you ask, quieter now.
He nods immediately. “Every word. You said you loved me since third year. That I make you calm. That I smiled at you like you already mattered.”
Your breath hitches.
“You do matter,” he says. “Always have.”
There’s no one around. Just the wind and the water and him looking at you like you hung the constellations he memorized for Astronomy.
You lean in.
“You asked me to kiss you, remember?”
“I said to do it if I meant it,” he murmurs.
“So I will.”
And then you kiss him.
It’s not a firework — it’s a sunrise. Soft. Certain. Familiar in all the ways a first kiss shouldn’t be, but is, because you’ve loved him for so long you’ve practically memorized him.
He exhales into it, like he’s been holding his breath for three years straight.
You pull back just slightly, resting your forehead against his, both of you smiling too hard to speak.
“You’re not dreaming,” you whisper.
His voice is just as quiet, just as real. “No. I’m finally awake.”
You link your pinky with his — that’s all it takes.
“Let’s go back,” you say. “We’ve got Charms in ten.”
James smirks. “I’ve already won.”
You arch an eyebrow. “Oh?”
“I got the girl who dropped an Arithmancy book on my foot.”
You laugh, shaking your head, and he grabs your hand properly this time as you both head back toward the castle — together, finally, ridiculously, completely in love.
..
Up on the Astronomy Tower, half-hidden by a stone balustrade, six faces are squished into a far-too-small window view, watching the scene unfold by the lake.
When you and James finally kiss, Sirius lets out an unholy screech.
“YESSSSS! FINALLY! THE ENEMIES-TO-BEST-FRIENDS-TO-SOULMATES PIPELINE IS REAL!”
Marlene punches the air so hard she almost falls off the ledge. “WE CALLED IT. WE CALLED IT IN SECOND BLOODY YEAR.”
Dorcas screams into her scarf. “Do you know how long I’ve had to listen to Y/N say ‘It’s not like that with James’ while doodling his name in her notes?!”
Remus smiles, smug and knowing. “Took them long enough.”
Peter nods solemnly. “I would like financial compensation for emotional damages.”
Lily is beaming, arms crossed, looking like the proudest mum of two tragically slow children. “I’ve had a toast prepared for this day since Fifth Year.”
Sirius wipes an imaginary tear. “They kissed like they’ve been in love since third year.”
“They have been in love since third year,” Lily, Dorcas, Marlene, and Remus chorus at once.
“Oi!” James shouts from below, turning around with you still tucked under his arm. “We can see you, you know!”
Sirius immediately cups his hands around his mouth and yells, “WE DON’T CARE! GET MARRIED!”
“NAME YOUR FIRSTBORN AFTER ME,” Dorcas adds.
Remus chuckles. “Get ready for uncle Moony!”
Meanwhile, in the staff lounge, Flitwick glances out the window and gasps so loud he almost falls off his stack of books.
“They did it! They finally kissed!”
McGonagall doesn’t even look up from her tea. “About bloody time.”
Sprout pulls out a dusty betting chart from under her gardening apron. “Alright, who had post-Quidditch-match, lakeside, mid-June?”
Slughorn sighs dramatically and tosses a Galleon into her palm. “I said Hogsmeade weekend. Close, but no cigar.”
Kettleburn peeks over his newspaper. “Still talking about the students?”
“Yes,” they all say in unison.
Flitwick smiles fondly. “They were always going to find each other.”
McGonagall watches you and James walk back toward the castle, hands clasped, smiling like you’ve just cracked the code to the universe.
“They just needed a few years. And a few footnotes.”
THE END
a/n: hope you guys enjoyed reading this as much as i enjoyed writing it—twice—, please reblog and give feedback! / requests are open!
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