Chapter Text
Lily can feel the music pulsing all over her as she stands in the middle of the common room. Her heartbeat still hasn’t calmed down after dancing for two hours straight, and she swears it’s pounding in her chest simultaneously with the rhythm.
When she attempts to drink from the cup in her hand, which she miraculously still hasn’t spilled, she finds it empty. That explains the lack of clumsiness on her part, she thinks, or the fact that her whole body is throbbing like something red, raw, and alive.
The sweat is making frizzy curls stick to the skin around her neck, and it suddenly feels too hot among all these people she can hardly breathe. Escaping seems like a good idea now, to get away from this stifling air and maybe to get a drink for her parched throat.
It takes a moment for her to locate the makeshift bar but when she does, she finds herself buzzing for a whole different reason with a mouth drier than before.
It really is not fair on her addled brain for him to look this good.
She imagines herself now looking thirsty on another level, but she can’t find it within her to care as she drinks in James’ relaxed posture from afar. He is slouching against the table with a loose grip on his bottle and she admires the easy smile on his lips, so different from the intensity of it just mere hours ago. She notes with desperation he’d also changed from his Quidditch robes, which she can’t decide whether is better or worse.
His arm flexes under the t-shirt as he ruffles his hair.
Worse, then. Definitely worse.
She could try to reason with herself about how she was already going there anyway and how James has no effect on the speed of her steps. But she’s not fooling anyone, least of all herself, not with this much alcohol in her system and want in her blood.
“Now why are you not dancing at your own victory party, captain?”
He doesn’t look startled to see her beside him. “I think you’ve danced enough for both of us out there, Evans.
“I would’ve danced more if you were there with me too.”
The sad thing is, she doesn’t even get nervous about making these remarks anymore. The excitement to see whether he’d flirt back has faded away after her first few tries, his obliviousness to Lily’s all pitiful attempts now just a game for the girls to see how far she can take it.
“It’s not like I was miserable over here,” he chuckles. “I was just… enjoying the ambiance.”
“Is that what they call it now? Watching pretty girls dance from afar?” She adds a hair twirl for emphasis. Marlene would be proud of her.
He laughs wholeheartedly at this, a little too much if you ask her. She tries not to take offence.
“Guess I just needed a moment to take it all in. It’s the last year, y'know, trying to burn the good memories into my brain.”
She is certainly aware it’s the last year, thank you very much. The reminder prompts her to face him as she leans on the table like he does, debating whether a hair flip would be too much.
Ah, what the hell, she had passed too much two weeks ago.
“I’m sure we can make better memories than skulking in the corner of a crowded room and what? Drinking butterbeer?” She finds enough courage in herself to touch his arm as she adds the next part, “Well, no wonder you aren’t on the dance floor with me if that’s how you’re celebrating.”
“I think you have also drunk enough for both of us, Evans.”
“Nonsense.” She turns to face the various booze bottles and starts to add some firewhiskey in her cup to prove her point, a delayed mission on her part. “We wouldn’t be standing here talking if that was the case.”
Which is why she completely misses his face when he teasingly asks, “Are you flirting with me, Evans?”
She stops pouring the firewhiskey.
“What gave it away, Potter?”
The words alone could be considered a part of their usual bantering if it wasn’t for her deadpan voice. When she finally turns her head to gauge his reaction, she can see him trying to decide whether to laugh it off or panic as his joking question has now turned into something much more. She decides to press on.
“Was it the hair twirling? Cause I’m pretty sure I’ve been doing that for at least three weeks now.”
No answer. She isn’t sure he’s even breathing at the moment.
“No? Asking you to dance then? Something I’ve done at the last party too and got rejected again I must remind you.”
She knows it’s irrational for her to be angry at him about this, but it’s been too damn long, she has endured too much teasing, and she just wants to understand what has changed. James Potter stopped making sense to her a while ago.
“Guess not. Oh, it was touching you, right? Though, I’ve been doing that since almost the year’s started. Would be a real dark horse if that was the one.”
He gulps painfully, she really does feel sorry for him for a split second.
“It was probably the alcohol,” he chokes out at last.
“What? You only fancy me when I’m drunk or something, is that it?”
“Not– not your alcohol,” he stammers quickly. “My alcohol.”
Maybe Lily has drunk enough for the night. She definitely won’t admit he was right or that she can’t understand a word he’s saying though.
He apparently sees it anyway. “I don’t think I could accept you were flirting with me when I was sober, Evans. I still have a hard time believing it now.”
She gets a sudden calculating look in her eyes. “How far gone are you, Potter?”
“Alcohol-wise or you-wise?”
“Oh, now he flirts back,” she grumbles, the blush she feels rising in her cheeks ruining the disgruntled effect she’s going for. “How much of this will you be remembering tomorrow?”
“I don’t think I’ll be forgetting any of this till the day I die, Evans.”
“Good.” She stands up straight abruptly. “There is a chance I won’t have a clear memory of this moment.”
He wants to object to this vehemently, she can tell, but she doesn’t let him. “Knowing myself, I’ll probably be doing all of these in the foreseeable future too.”
“Which part?” he quips back.
“All of it. So you better get your act together.” She fixes some invisible wrinkles on her blouse before taking her cup back from the table. “I want you to bring your A game tomorrow.”
She leaves his side with a wink over her shoulder. She can’t wait to see the look on her friends’ face when she tells them her glaring success.