#summerofjily

[constancezin]

Sirius: Oi Evans! There's a nasty bug on your shoulder!

James: fuck off Pads...

She's reading a book titled ''Werewolf Symptoms and Cure'' i'm sure that if she had lived, the wolfsbane potion would have been discovered much earlier

For the @efkgirldetective summer jily

Late evening in Scotland sunset a 11pm

[emeralddoeadeer]

this time I'll remember

chapter 1: golden hour

Frank and Alice, due to wed at the end of summer, invite their wedding party to Frank’s aunt's house on the Norfolk coast for a weekend of getting to know each other before the big day.

on Ao3

For @efkgirldetective Summer of Jily 2022 prompt #1

Lyric: all that I know is you caught me at the right time —"golden hour" (Kacey Musgraves) Scenario: late evenings with friends in the garden

[efkgirldetective]

welcome to summer of jily 2022~~~

i was so thrilled with the turnout for this little mini fest last summer, so let's do it again! the first prompt will go up just in a bit—in the meantime, some reminders about how it works—

🍋🍊🍋 who: absolutely anyone who wants to participate! 🍋🍊🍋 what: these prompts are meant to inspire: there are no hard & fast "rules" other than try to use the lyric & the scenario given in the prompt somewhere in your piece—& be sure to tag #summerofjily when you post so i can rb & boost! 🍋🍊🍋 when: 6 summer-themed jily prompts posted every 2 weeks, june-august (no time limit on the prompts!) 🍋🍊🍋 where: tumblr & beyond :)

so excited to see what lovely wonderful writing comes out of this! remember: it's meant as a generative, supportive, & fun event—so let's hold each other up!

[the-dream-team]

Can I Try Again

Another ridiculously fluffy one-shot for @efkgirldetective's summer of jily week four prompt: picking berries // I know I've kissed you before, but I didn't do it right // the entire song, pink in the night <3

She is beautiful and he is in a perpetual state of falling. Down and down and down the goddamn rabbit hole, but somehow the further James plummets, the brighter his life becomes. It’s the kind of brightness that blinds him- somewhat painfully- and leaves his vision spotty, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.

Lily Evans walks ahead of him, a spring in her step, sunshine pouring through her hair. She’s cut it short for the summer, just above her shoulders, and he’s mesmerized by the way it bounces around her neck as she walks through the gardens of his family’s home. It’s an image he’s played over in his head an infinite number of times, but his rosiest daydreams don’t hold a candle to the real thing. The afternoon light hits his glasses just right and suddenly there’s a halo of glowing stars framing her as she tucks a dark red strand behind her ear. He can’t even see her face, but it doesn’t matter. I could stare at your back all day.

He is the luckiest boy in the world and every moment is made up of the sweetest form of torture. Agony and exuberance whipping his heart back and forth like a rogue Bludger.

She must know, he thinks. Must have some sort of clue that she’s occupied every corner of his mind for well over a year now. Even more so now, after the platform. He wishes more than anything for the ability to read minds as she glances over her shoulder with those startlingly green eyes, that friendly grin.

He can’t help but smile back- or maybe he was already smiling before she even turned around. It doesn’t matter. By some miracle, she’s here, and he can only marvel at the kindness of fate.

***

It had been a passing comment. One of those early morning conversations as his friends frantically scribbled out unfinished essays while shoving waffles down their throats. Chatter muffled by mouthfuls of eggs and yawning. Remus had commented offhandedly about the fruit bowl being passed around, and then-

“Oh, raspberries are my favorite.”

He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t already looking at her when she spoke. But truthfully, he was always looking at Lily, a habit he’d long since stopped fighting once he realized how fruitless his efforts were. She was beautiful and he was hopeless. Simply lucky to be in her presence. She was the sun, and he, but a lonely planet, entirely reliant on and endlessly seeking out her light.

Sirius spoke the words James should have if his mind hadn’t gone fuzzy from hearing her voice.

“You know, the Potters have a raspberry patch in their gardens.”

“Oh, really?” She glanced from Sirius to James with a brilliant smile and excited eyes, so purposefully glued to his that he had to duck his head and rake a hand through his hair to hide his heating cheeks.

“That’s right,” he said more to his plate of sausages than to her. “They’re usually ripe to pick by early August.” When he peered back up, she was still looking his way.

“You should come over this summer and take some off our hands,” said Sirius casually, turning towards James as if it had been his idea.

“Yeah,” he jumped in a little too eagerly. “I mean- if you’d like, you’re more than welcome.”

Her smile widened, rounding the apples of her cheeks in a way that made his stomach flip pleasantly. “That sounds like fun.”

He assumed she’d forget the conversation, it had been just another morning, just another casual chat among housemates, but that didn’t keep him from daydreaming about the potential of a far-off day in August rather incessantly during the following months. But then as the school year ended and summer rolled on painfully slowly (and Lily-less), an owl arrived. And her handwriting crawled across the page like a message written in the clouds.

***

Lily swings the woven basket back and forth in her pursuit of the best raspberries. There’s already an impressive bounty growing in her basket, far more than he’s managed to collect- too busy watching her kneel down and pluck berries off their delicate branches to pick any of his own.

He turns to a leafy bush, green and lively and swaying slightly in the warm breeze, and quickly pinches off a handful of berries in an attempt to catch up with her. When she spins around, he’s thankful for the distraction. A minute earlier and she would have caught him staring. Again.

She smiles pleasantly and brushes her fringe off her sweaty forehead with the back of her wrist. James’ heart leaps into his throat.

“You’ve been quiet,” she says, but not accusingly.

“No I haven’t,” he responds, voice gravelly from underuse. “Just been busy picking raspberries.”

She glances at his measly basket, then back to his face with arching brows and an amused smirk.

He can’t help his own guilty grin. “Alright, Evans, I’m sorry we can’t all be unreasonably talented at everything we do.”

“It’s berry picking, Potter,” she laughs, “not advanced Arithmancy.”

In retaliation, he plucks a raspberry off of the nearest branch and playfully throws it at her. She somehow has the gall to lean her head back and catch the goddamn berry between her teeth. His brain short circuits. He’s quite certain his jaw is on the ground. She acts as though this is no big deal, swallowing the fruit with a satisfied smile, her tongue brushing her lower lip before tossing another into her mouth.

“Oh, these are delicious!”

He can’t form a response even if he wants to. Even if it was a matter of life or death, which it sure as hell feels like. He can only stare at her mouth, at her lips stained raspberry-pink, and lose himself in the knowledge that he knows how they feel against his own- even just briefly.

***

The platform teemed with students stretching their legs after the long journey home from school, saying their goodbyes to friends as their families greeted them for the summer.

A pit sat in James’ stomach- heavy and demoralizing- the entire train ride back to London. He knew she’d be gone soon. Back with her parents in Cokeworth for two excruciating months before their seventh year began. He’d taken their close proximity for granted during the school year, and as he faced a summer without the promise of her warmth, he wondered if it was even possible living in the dark.

He laughed loudly at a joke Peter told, overcompensating for the fact he’d missed the punchline while his thoughts were spiraling over her. Sirius shot him a look that suggested he wasn’t doing a great job of masking his emotions. Had it been so obvious the entire way home? Could she have noticed the despondency in his eyes, heard the heavy thumping of his heart? He rolled his eyes at Sirius and mustered up the most unbothered smirk he could manage.

But then, without warning, she was in front of him.

“Alright, Potter, don’t let your head overinflate while I’m not around to keep you grounded.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it, Evans,” he laughed, thankful his voice sounded steadier than he felt. “Just so long as you promise to consider switching your loyalties to Puddlemere. There’s no way the Harpies even make it to the semi-finals this season, and I can’t bear seeing you heartbroken again.”

“Oh, piss off, Potter,” she replied, but the way she threw her arms around his neck seemed to argue she didn’t mean what she said. Instinctually, he hugged her back, and thank Merlin he had her to hold onto as the wind was knocked out of his lungs at her touch. An overwhelming warmth sparkled across every surface their bodies met, and it took every ounce of control he had to restrain the truly pathetic sigh that threatened to escape his throat.

“And I haven’t forgotten,” she spoke into his shoulder, breath hot thorough his t-shirt, “you promised me berry picking this August.”

It would be impossible to miss the rapid beating of his heart through his chest pressed up against hers. “I’m already counting down the days.”

When she pulled back, hands resting on his shoulders for a beat longer than expected, his body moved faster than his brain could keep up with. He leaned forward, aiming for her cheek, but miraculously landing against her mouth- connecting for the briefest of moments before parting again, as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened between them. If it weren’t for the ghost of her lips still burning against his own, he might have thought he’d dreamt it.

“Lily, I’m not waiting any longer, we’re leaving, now,” came the unpleasant voice of her sister from across the platform.

Lily’s disoriented smile faltered slightly before she composed herself again, meeting his eye. “I’ll see you in August?”

“Yeah, August,” he somehow said with his mouth still tingling, forever changed by what they now knew.

***

The memory of her lips, how they feel pressed between his smile, is harder to ignore when they’re in front of him. He can remember the warmth where they touched him over a month ago and absentmindedly he brings a raspberry to his mouth so he can imagine how she must taste.

His emotions were hard enough to control before he knew what he was missing, but now they are impossible to reign in. He forgets how to breathe, and as a result, his head spins maddeningly. Unsure of how much longer he can stand up straight without making a fool out of himself, he walks forward and lays a hand on Lily’s back- partially to lead her forward, partially because the desire to be connected to her in any way is driving him mad.

She lets him guide her through the rows of bushes, under an ancient wooden archway, and across a courtyard of blossoming poppies and forget-me-nots enclosed by walls of hedges. Yellow and purple petals reflect brilliantly in her green eyes, creating their own fields of wildflowers within her irises. He walks her towards a wide, circular fountain in the middle of the grass where bubbling water spills over onto stone tiers and pours into the basin below, its floor littered with glinting coins, dancing under the water’s rippling surface.

He sits down and she follows suit on the stone ledge surrounding the water, partially shaded by an impressive plum tree. Cool droplets spray off the fountain, refreshing like summer rain singing I love you, I love you, I love you. Lily glances his way and he wonders if she can hear his thoughts.

“Are we finished picking berries?” she asks, eyes squinting and nose crinkling in the sun.

“I figured you had enough to feed a village.” He reaches over and grabs a raspberry from her basket and she gasps in faux outrage.

“Are you really stealing my raspberries, Potter?”

He adores his name on her tongue. “My apologies,” he says, pulling a silver Sickle out of his pocket and sliding it over to where she sits. She looks at him like he’s lost his mind. “For your troubles. Go on then, make a wish.”

“Oh!” Her eyes light up and she takes hold of the coin, lifting it to her heart as she closes her eyes in search of a wish.

He thinks he could look at her forever. Happy, sunkissed, an unconscious smile playing across her lips. With her eyes shut, he uses a minute to take a deep breath, attempting to calm his racing heart and compose his dopey grin. They’re sitting close together, knees almost touching with the basket of berries between them. As she tosses the Sickle behind her shoulder, he smells the faint scent of her vanilla shampoo.

She noticeably tries to hide her smile when her eyelids flutter back open.

“What did you wish for?” he asks, unable to stop himself.

She freezes with her eyes locked on his. A pink blush spreads across her cheeks, growing darker the longer he stares back at her. “I can’t tell you,” she says, words sounding choked, “or else it won't come true.”

Her flushed face awakens something in his chest, a confidence that blooms magnificently, turns his nervous, pattering heartbeat into a steady, powerful drum.

His voice drops to a hoarse whisper when he asks, “Can I guess?”

Her breath hitches. “I think you might already know, James.” Her words, the sound of his name, melts him down to a puddle. By some miracle, she continues speaking. “Look, I know I’ve kissed you before-”

“But I didn’t do it right,” he says frantically, his hands finding her face and brushing through her hair. He starts to understand why people advise against looking directly at the sun because being this close to her fills him with such astounding emotion he thinks he might explode. She stares up at him, blush deepening, lips parting, and he takes a ragged breath. “Can I try again?”

This time, when she smiles, he knows exactly what he’s doing.

He leans in slowly, letting their breath mix together, their noses bump lightly before he closes the space between their lips. She’s soft and warm and beautiful and radiant and he’s never felt a happiness quite like this one, never experienced a kiss this perfect. His fingers travel over her scorching skin and brush her neck as he deepens the kiss, tasting the raspberries on her tongue, his heart soaring as she responds blissfully until they’re both left breathless.

“And again?” she asks, pulling him back with a smile against his lips.

“And again,” he smiles back, marveling, once again, at the kindness of fate.

[maraudersftw]

Fall Gentle; Fall Soft

Words: 7,751

Warning: Rated E

Submitted for @efkgirldetective's Summer of Jily 2021 prompt: thunderstorm/summer rain + nothing has changed me quite like you 🖤

Summary: “Please.” She clutches onto the front of his shirt, and it’s unfair because he’s the one who’s drowning; he’s the one who needs an anchor. “Please, don’t ask anything. I just—I need to feel something.”

It all starts during their train ride back home after sixth year.

She pulls him out of the compartment under the guise of needing to relay a message from Professor McGonagall, a lie no one questions, or more likely, no one calls out because they’re all worried about her; worried about the life that has dimmed in her eyes, the spark of energy and vibrancy that has gone out. James worries the most, so he’s sliding open the doors and stepping out without a moment’s hesitation, the words to ask her how she’s doing already resting on the tip of his tongue.

But she simply turns around once he’s by her side, red hair long and swinging as she walks down the length of the train, just a glance spared over her shoulder that asks him to follow her.

And so he does; a strange trickle of thrill and a hum of nervous anticipation swirling in his stomach.

He knows he’s right to fear her, knows the apprehension is well-placed when she’s suddenly got him shoved against the wall, close to the train door and away from the open view of any prying eyes. But this rough handling barely bothers him, not when he’s got other things to worry about. Like her hands sliding up into his hair, her mouth covering his; the press of her chest warm and soft against his front.

All of this bothers him quite a bit.

Read on: AO3 || FFN

[thequibblah]

summerboy

i DO NOT speak italian <3 this is for @efkgirldetective​‘s summer of jily, prompt #4: berry picking + i know i’ve kissed you before, but i didn’t do it right :)))) 

Not that James knows why anyone else is on this trip — reasons of their own, none of his business, et cetera, et cetera — but he has (so unfairly) been called the nosiest boy that Mary Macdonald has ever met, so who can blame him for accidentally living up to her perception? Not to mention, maybe girls just talk too loud. 

Mary certainly does. Her words still ring in his mind, weeks later: “Lily, we’re there to bag Italian blokes, that’s literally it.” And then she lifted her hand in that quintessential Italian gesture, and said in the worst accent James has ever heard, “Lee-lee, my looove…”

So, anyway, he doesn’t want to make assumptions, but he’s fairly sure that bagging Italian guys factors somewhere in Lily Evans’s priorities. Even if it’s right at the bottom. That’s a sure sight better than bagging him, which is likely not on the list at all. 

Not that he wants her to. His whole unrelationship with Lily can be summed up thus: one horrible drinking-game snog at the start of their time together at uni, one and a half years of ferocious pining, half a year of mercifully-restored sanity and friendship. It would be regression if he goes back to that pining business. At least, Remus and Sirius and Peter would be very disappointed in him. 

All that being said, she looks very pretty today. It’s not a crime to notice it. 

Their massive group has become even bigger, thanks to the friendliest of them inviting over people they’ve met here in the four days it’s been, and everyone’s drinking alcohol that is not designed for consumption at this hour of the morning. James is no exception. Some absolutely nasty vodka-based concoction is in his hand, his second, and the glass is already half-empty. 

He can see Lily at the kitchen island, her hair twisted at the nape of her neck, her dress (cream and blue, frayed hemline) swirling as she avoids a wildly gesticulating Peter. She laughs at something one of Remus’s debsoc mates says. James inwardly scoffs. Then, because he is well-adjusted, contrary to popular opinion, he focuses on draining his glass instead, turning to the sprawling garden behind the house and the warm summer sun. 

“Hey, you,” says a familiar voice. Then she’s beside him, glass in hand and hand on hip. There are freckles on her bare shoulders. Coppery strands of hair stick to her sweat-damp neck. 

This is the feeling of being slowly unspooled, the last coil of good sense unwound and tossed away like so much rubbish. 

“Hey yourself,” James says, looking back at the garden. 

She looks too and sighs, not unhappily. “Tragic, isn’t it, how gorgeous Italian villas happen to questionably good people?”

Against his will, he laughs. They both turn to look at Sirius, his shirt unbuttoned and his lazy charm at work upon the four or five people in his orbit. 

“Technically, the gorgeous Italian villa is happening to us right now,” he says to Lily. 

She tips her glass at him, then takes a mouthful of whatever murky amber thing she’s drinking. By her grimace afterwards, it’s probably what he’s got too. “On second thought, I could live with being questionably good if it came with this.” She sweeps a hand at the garden below. 

“Have you explored it properly?”

She quirks a wry smile at him. “Mary’s here. Do you think I get time for introspection in gardens?”

James casts a backward glance at the villa. Through the French windows, he can see Mary engrossed in conversation. He leans a little closer to Lily and whispers, “I think you’re safe now.”

She laughs, and the sound makes him think please undo me but also please do me. “Let’s walk, then.”

There’s nothing to it. He will go on this walk and he will return to the villa a man thoroughly obsessed with Lily Evans yet again. She casts him a coy, are you coming? sort of look as she starts along the garden path. James decides it’s totally worth it. 

Past the rows of shrubs and stout lemon trees are the berry bushes, he reckons, and this is where Lily stops with a gasp until he catches up. 

“We’ve had berries here all along, and I’ve been going into town buying them?” she says, examining a strawberry on a vine. 

“I don’t think Sirius has ever in his life eaten a fruit right off a tree.” In fact, James himself wants to tell her not to eat the berry without washing it. Who knows what’s in Italian dirt?

But she rubs at the berry with the hem of her dress (he politely averts his gaze from her exposed thighs) and bites into it. He’s so busy thinking it is safe to look at her again, the hem having been dropped, that he doesn’t realise he’s watching her eat a berry until it’s too late. He can only blink at her, can only watch the red fruit on her red lips, the way her eyes close, her appreciative mmm. 

Mind, out of the gutter, please. 

“I can’t believe I’ve been speaking my shit Italian in that nice market,” she says, laughing, “when we’ve had perfectly good berries this whole time.”

“I’m sure your Italian isn’t shit,” says James. It seems like a safe direction to take the topic in. “Try me, I’ve got some Italian.”

She gives him an incredulous look and begins to wander down the row. “That makes it worse. Now I can’t disappoint.”

“I've just said you won’t disappoint, c’mon.”

“Okay…” She laughs to herself and clears her throat. “Vorrei— oh, how rude of me, buongiorno—”

James nods solemnly. “Buongiorno.”

“Vorrei un kilo di fragole.” She speaks slowly, but by the end arches a confident eyebrow at him. 

“What about that was shit? That was great!”

She rolls her eyes like she doesn’t quite believe him, and plucks another strawberry. “Vorrei…un’altra fragola.”

He narrows his own eyes at her, playfully. “Did you read a guidebook or something, Evans?”

She blushes and laughs, self-conscious. “I'm a bit of a try-hard.”

“Well, if you trying hard has been what’s getting us Remus’s berry mojitos every night, I’m not fucking complaining.” Not that he’d complain at all, when it comes to her. But she doesn’t know that. 

Her smile widens, and she holds up the berry to him. 

“Oh, sure,” he says, and for some reason there is no miscommunication about what’s going on here — he doesn’t try to take it from her, she waits for him to duck his head, and then he takes a bite of it. He’s less aware of the burst of tartness than he is of her fingers on his mouth, feather-light. 

“Good?” she says. 

James is slowly beginning to realise there are more dangerous things than Lily Evans not wanting to bag him — for instance, Lily Evans possibly wanting to bag him. She’s caught him unawares, and he’s unprepared for the full force of her powers. 

“Good,” he says, and if he sounds dazed she lets it slide. 

With a quick smile, she’s turned around and strolling along, la-di-da as ever. “You know what’s funny? We associate strawberries with sweetness but they’re really quite sharp.”

If there’s some meaningful double entendre there, it’s so far beyond him. But he has to contribute something. James says, “Did you know a strawberry’s not technically a berry, since its seeds are on the outside?”

My God. What an idiot. 

She looks back at him, an interested furrow between her brows. “Oh, I didn’t know that, actually.”

“Yeah, a banana’s a berry,” he says, encouraged. 

“Huh.” Lily picks another strawberry and bites into it. 

James suddenly wonders what’s wrong with him. This incredibly beautiful girl has just fed him a fucking strawberry, and all he can do is tell her fruit facts. 

He blurts out, “Posso baciarti?”

She blinks at him, hand on a bit of wooden fencing. They’ve reached the end of the row. “My Italian doesn’t go very far beyond fruit names.”

Thank goodness that whatever chemical response in the body that produces embarrassment is constantly underperforming in James. “Then the blokes in the market must not have been flirting with you.”

The rosy flush is back in her cheeks, and she’s visibly suppressing a smile. But her tone is arch as she says, “Should they have been?”

“Yes, because you’re you, but — also no.” He stops there. 

“No?” she prompts. 

“No, because…I want to kiss you, and there’s a chance that you’d go for some guy and a cartload of fruit instead, I don’t know. I don’t know how handsome the fruit sellers are. Probably pretty handsome.” He’s rambling. 

She says, nonchalantly, “Yeah, pretty handsome.”

“Right! And then the last time we kissed—” the thing they’ve never discussed “—I didn’t, like, acquit myself very well—”

She laughs. “Acquit yourself!”

“Well, yeah!” he says, defensively. 

“It’s not as though I made it better,” Lily says. “We were both just really— It’s not as though I made an effort to kiss you the way you should be kissed.”

He’s mid-argument, but it falls right out of his head. “The way I should be kissed?”

“Yeah.” Her vivid green gaze, fixed upon his lips. “So, can I try again?”

“You’re— Yeah.” 

He doesn’t even care that he sounds that enthusiastic about it. She’s smiling, closing the few feet of distance between them. His arms go around her as she presses her mouth to his, tentative then more urgent, her lips parting, the strawberry tartness everywhere. It makes sense, suddenly, that this is how they are supposed to kiss. 

His one hand is in her sweet-smelling hair, tilting her head back, and the other dips below her waist to the curve of her hip. She murmurs something — approval? — and pushes his hand lower, beneath her dress. Okay, approval. 

They’re sort of leaning against the fencing, and half of James is concerned about the structural integrity of said fencing, but the concern is rapidly fading to the back of his mind. He traces his fingers up the outside of her thigh and is rewarded by how she presses closer still. Lily sighs his name into his mouth, and he’s so, so gone. 

“I think we should — go inside,” James says, pulling back with effort. 

She’s similarly breathless, arms still draped over his shoulders like she doesn’t want to move any further from him. “Oh?”

“Yeah, or we’ll have to do over whatever comes next.” He’s pretty sure that going any further than snogging against this fence would turn out a mistake, anyway. 

She smiles. “I’m okay with do-overs. Practice makes perfect, yeah?”

His brain is going to shut down entirely if this keeps up. But he manages to say, “I can be a quick study.”

“Take your time,” says Lily. 

He leads her up the garden path and back to the house. 

[keepingupwithpotters]

come swim in my ocean

For @efkgirldetective ‘s second week of summer of jily 🌊🌊🌊 with some minor wolfstar thrown in there

swimming with friends + today we're younger than we're ever gonna be (✨vibes✨)

Lily didn’t think they would actually do it.

Sure, it was a fun concept to joke about with your friends, but that’s all it was supposed to be — a dare everybody laughs at but does not try to execute.

She tries to gauge whether it’s too late to chicken out without losing her dignity. She can hear clothes hitting the sand as they’re thrown over carelessly between laughter.

Welp. No turning back now.

She realizes her mistake when she’s the only one left standing with clothes on.

“Well, c’mon Evans. This was your brilliant plan.”

“A plan that made me reevaluate all my previous assessments of you. Who knew Evans had it in her?” She can’t see his face in the dark, but she knows Sirius just winked at her.

She pathetically tries one more time to bring them back from this terrible decision. “You know, I’m starting to think this isn’t such a good idea after all.”

“Ah, come off it Lily,” Marlene yells from… somewhere. “What? You can talk the talk but won’t strip for the walk?”

“It’s not the skinny-dipping part that’s the problem,” she insists unconvincingly, “it’s the night part. The water is probably freezing right now.”

“I’m happy to do this with you again in the morning, Evans.” She tries to resist the usual urge of looking at James when he talks. “But if that’s your only excuse, the water is just fine.”

Peter helpfully flicks some water to Lily to prove James’ point.

Damn it. The water is actually rather nice.

Feeling ganged up on, she sighs deeply to show her displeasure with the turn of events, and starts to work on her clothes quickly. She won’t give them the satisfaction of turning her back while doing it though or acknowledge Mary’s loud whoop – which she shouted in the wrong direction.

Finally out of her last piece of clothing, she grabs the closest hand she can find, and tugs on it once before running into the water.

The loud splashing they make alerts the others to their new location. One by one they come into the sea, sometimes with shrieks and sometimes with swears.

Her companion laughs when the last two dark figures dip into the water as well, it was Remus after all, and turns to her general direction. “I gotta hand it to you, Lily. You’re really committed to cause maximum damage to James’ brain.”

Before Lily can answer him, they are interrupted by Sirius’ loud bellowing, “Wherefore art thou, Moony? Tell that red headed wench it’s not nice to steal my boyfriend for herself.”

“Tell it to the wench yourself,” Lily shouts back before realizing her mistake. Now located by the others, loud splashes fill her ear from everywhere as they all swim to their direction. She makes an honorable attempt to escape with Remus before giving up, not feeling ready for a swimming race with five people on their tail.

James and Sirius are the first ones to reach them, because of course they are, and she leaves Remus to his boyfriend before Sirius starts yelling more Shakespeare quotes. She is just about to swim towards Mary and Marlene to meet them halfway when a hand on her ankle stops her.

“You’re not cruel enough to leave me alone with them when they are naked, are you Evans?”

“Hate to break it to you but I’m very much naked as well, Potter,” she grins cheekily.

“Oh, believe me, I’m aware of that.”

She curses the new moon once more for although providing a very nice opportunity to look at the stars, doesn’t let her see James’ expression.

She can hear the girls catching up to them slowly with Peter not far behind. “Let me save you then, Potter. Are you up for a little swimming?”

Not waiting for his answer, which she can only guess is an enthusiastic nod, she starts to swim away from the upcoming party, knowing he’ll follow.

They are careful not to go deeper, only sideways, until they leave their friends’ earshot. With an unspoken agreement they stop, Lily finally allowing herself to gaze at the sky. She assumes that’s what James is doing too until he interrupts her thoughts.

“I’d hoped it would be brighter.”

She doesn’t answer him, her silence prompting James to explain himself. “The starlight, I mean. Don’t get me wrong, it's beautiful, but it’s not the scenery I want to be looking at right now.”

“Yeah, it’s jarring not to see your face when you’re speaking. Who knows how idiotic you actually look right now?”

James takes her right hand without speaking, bringing it to the edge of his brow. She doesn’t understand what he’s doing until he passes it over the slight lines of his forehead – he's letting her feel his facial expression.

Emboldened by his explicit permission, she lets her fingers rake through the hairs that have stuck on his forehead with water, combing them back with care. She follows the line of his brows, paying special attention to smooth the furrow in between. Her fingers fall dawn to his nose next, and it feels like his breathing had stopped a long time ago. She lovingly touches the cheekbones, wiping drops of water from them slowly. Careful not to skip a line, she trails the arch until she reaches his jaw, feeling it tense and ripple beneath her hand. When her thumb finally touches his lips, she finds them slightly open, just like how she envisioned, and she swears neither of them are breathing in that moment.

But Lily doesn’t want to stop there. She didn’t get James naked to touch his face. She lowers her hand.

If he had stopped breathing before, he certainly starts back when he gasps as her hand passes over his neck. She adds her other hand to grip both of his shoulders, their feet touching every once in a while as they try to stay afloat by just kicking them back and forward. That’s when she realizes James is not using his arms either, standing stock still, afraid to move.

Feeling bolder than ever, she glides her hand until she reaches his, placing it somewhere above her waist, sliding it upwards to encourage him. He practically chokes.

She goes back to outlining his collarbones with her fingers, feeling him shiver underneath her. Or is that her shivering when he slightly caresses the skin over her ribs? She doesn’t know where she ends and he starts under the water.

Which is why she doesn’t react immediately when she feels something touching her foot. A head emerges out of the sea, causing both of them to splash apart. She doesn’t see who it is, but the devilish voice tells her it’s Mary soon enough.

“Oi, lovebirds, pack it up. We’re going back to the house, and we’re leaving no man behind.”

More splashing comes behind Mary, causing all heads to turn that way. “Peter and I lost the water fight, pulling the metaphorical short stick in a sense.”

Peter finally reaches them, and they wait for him to stop his wheezing. “Sirius wanted me to tell you that he and Remus have dibs on the shower first because they are a superior couple who can keep it in their pants while swimming with friends.” An uncomfortable beat. “His words.”

They swim back to the shore soon after that, but she can still hear James grumbling about what pants as they make good use of their time waiting for their turn to shower.

[sunshinemarauder]

Raspberry Sorbet

for the lovely @efkgirldetective's summerofjily prompt #7: (Ice cream + "I don't want anybody else touching you like I do)

And, in the blink of an eye — body pulled flush with hers, hands gripping hips tight enough to go straight to her core, hazel eyes in an unflinching stare.

“Don’t you dare, Evans,” he says lowly, and she — she shivers. She shivers at the feeling of his chest rising and falling against hers, of her arms winding loosely around his waist, of his face mere inches from her own, close enough to bridge that distance with a modest tilt of head, part of lips, breath mingled —

Lily flinches, snapping her head away as fast as she can. Heaving breath, unsteady; fingers curling and uncurling, shaky.

continue reading here on AO3!!