Chapter Five: Sleepover
By Natali K. A.
On the first day back home from school-for good, this time-Lily woke up and new instantly that something was wrong.
What was it? Maybe it'd been something she'd dreamt about? She'd dreamt about her wedding last night, she was sure. No, that was three days ago. Was it the wedding night? No, that was the night after that. Harry's birth? No, that was her last night in Hogwarts… So what had she dreamt about?
"Nothing," she realized out loud. "Not a fucking thing." She wasn't sure whether to be scared or not. These dreams had been with her all throughout her Seventh Year, and now they were gone.
"Lils?" James stretched and yawned next to her. "Something the matter?"
"Shh, someone will hear you," Lily whispered. "James, I didn't have a dream last night."
James grinned proudly. "I don't know. I heard you call my names a few times. Even that name I like you to call me."
"James, I didn't dream."
"I never said you were sleeping, babe."
She grabbed her pillow and hit him over the head. "Lucky I'm a witch. Oh, bright idea, huh? Muffliato."
"Smart," James yawned. He reached out and pulled her to lie down with him. She spread her hand over his heart, thinking all the while.
"No dream. What do you think that meant?"
He shrugged. "You've got the real thing. What does it matter?"
"It's got to mean something, that's all. What if something's wrong?"
James turned his head to take her lips and kiss her. "I thought you didn't like having the dreams, Lily."
"I bloody loved those dreams!" she said somewhat hysterically. "They were hot! It was the only way I made it sane out of the exams this year."
"There's me, too."
"Yes, but I didn't have enough time to shag you as much as I did in the dreams."
"I resent that you had the dreams and not me. What little you've told me sounds very nice."
"They weren't prophetic-or at least they haven't been proved yet," Lily mused. "So what could it be? Should I take it to Dumbledore?"
"Lils, let it go."
Lily thought silently to herself, trying to come up with solutions. It wasn't the first time she'd had sex with James-nowhere near-but this time it hadn't felt so… desperate. They knew they had the time to enjoy themselves. He'd apparated home with her and her mum had invited him for dinner, infatuated as her parents had been. When Mr. and Mrs. Evans had gone upstairs to bed, Lily said they were going to watch TV a bit before he left.
She'd only lied a little. She hadn't even meant to, but things happen when you're virtually alone with James and privacy can be attained. Or at least more privacy than they had at Hogwarts.
Had her feelings toward him changed in some way? She turned her head up so she could look as his face, peaceful in that place between sleep and consciousness. His arm was possessive around her but left her enough room to be free if she needed some wiggle room.
No sense denying it, she supposed. The fact he'd "met the parents" indicated something. The fact she hadn't cared if Petunia Dursley (as she'd discovered her sister had married the month before) was there or if she said something rude to him.
Truth was, she knew that was another step in their relationship. They'd never discussed breaking up or seeing other people after school. Technically, the titles weren't even there. James had stayed true to his word. They'd never called each other girlfriend or boyfriend and they'd never felt the pressure of keeping something up.
They had hung out when time allowed them to and if that wasn't for two weeks, it wasn't a big deal.
Now she'd shared her bed with him for the first time (they'd always used his). She was sure it was somehow symbolic, but didn't fool herself into believing that James would see it this way as well. It'd always been her experience that blokes didn't read into stuff nearly as much as girls did.
But it didn't hurt to ask. She wasn't the type of person to guess someone's feelings, especially when it was something as important as this.
"James, have your feelings towards me changed since our last night at Hogwarts?" she asked tentatively. She could almost sense him lifting just one eyelid and staring down at her.
"What the bloody hell are you talking about? If you think that for some reason I don't like you anymore, you're off your rocker. Just so you know."
"No, that's not what I meant."
He seemed to ponder the question for a minute, and when his body stiffened just the slightest bit, Lily looked up at him curiously. He was actually blushing.
"Ah, why would you be wondering about that?"
"I thought that might be the reason that my dreams have stopped."
"What do my feelings have to do with you?"
"Magic is a very complex thing, James. I hardly pretend to understand every facet of it."
He gave a sort of short nod and muttered something under his breath.
"I didn't catch that, James."
"Yes, something has changed," he said in a strained voice. "But that's all I'm saying and there's no need for you to worry your pretty little head about it." He shut his eyes as if that ended the conversation.
How little he knew.
"What are you talking about?" Lily asked as she sat up, hugging the sheet to her chest. "What's changed? Why aren't you telling me, James?"
"Lily, don't worry about it."
"Don't you tell me not to worry about it, you ugly little prat," she snapped, poking his chest with a finger. "You are required"-poke-"to tell me"-poke-"every little sodding thing"-poke, poke, poke-"that pops into your head."
"According to what?"
"The rules!"
At this, he seemed almost to smirk. "Rules for what, Lily?"
She felt cornered. Well, the rules would depend on what they were exactly, which she didn't know. What could she say now?
"Forget it," she shrugged. "You're perfectly right." She lay back down and turned onto her side.
"No, no, no, now you've got me awake," James chortled, leaning over her. "Rules for what?"
"I said you were right, isn't that enough?"
"No, it's not. The rules state that you're required to tell me every little thing that pops into your head." He poked her multiple times mockingly.
"So, rules for what, smart ass?" Lily said somewhat irritated, trying to stop his poking. "Stop the poking, James."
He did, laying his hand on her arm. "Rules for boyfriends and girlfriends." He gave her a handsome smile, then laughed rudely while she blushed a horrible shade of pink.
"I wasn't aware I'd agreed to be your girlfriend."
"School's over. A man can only be so patient, my dear."
Lily snorted, rolling even further away from him. "Patience is not a virtue you ever attained, sorry to break it to you."
He shrugged, climbing on top of her despite her grimace.
"I can show you just how impatient I can be," he said in a devilish way, proceeding to kiss her neck and her face. Lily laughed.
Knock, knock, knock.
"Lily, dear?" Her mum rattled her doorknob. "Did you lock it?"
"Shit," Lily hissed, shoving James off her. With a chaste kiss, he disapparated. Lily took the charm off the room. "Coming, mum! I'm changing."
She searched in vain for her pajama but couldn't find it anywhere. She walked to her closet and pulled out the first outfit she could find.
Opening the door she asked, "Yes, Mum?"
*~*
"Alright, mate, what'd you do?" Sirius blurted out the moment he saw James. "You look like the cat that swallowed the canary."
James grinned at his best mates, all three that were there. "I figured something out last night, fellas. It was of the highest importance."
"Well, why don't you tell us?" Remus said lazily, leaning against Sirius' counter sipping a Guinness at nine in the morning.
"I've decided I'm going to marry Lily."
There was a strained silence in the room.
"You just graduated yesterday," Sirius said, almost in a frightened voice. "We haven't finished shagging girls left and right, James, or drinking ourselves into a stupor legally every night, or-"
"I don't want that. Or at least, not as much as you do. I want her." James took a seat on Sirius' couch. "Let's look at this, shall we? This idiot Dark wizard's going around killing people and we can't seem to stop him. There's no time to waste. I want her, I like being around her, and I love her."
Sirius looked almost disgusted, Remus looked amused, and Peter looked confused-as usual.
"I love Lily to death, James, but you're just seventeen. How can you expect to marry her so young?" Sirius asked.
James gave him a plain look, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Because I love her."
He heard Remus snort a bit, and glanced over at him.
"Have you told her that? As far as I know, you guys haven't even made it official yet," Remus said.
If he wasn't mistaken, James had blushed.
"That's been taken care of. And no, I haven't told her yet. I literally just figured it out last night. She's stopped having her dreams and everything because of it-or so I suspect."
"Dreams? What dreams?" Peter asked. Sirius threw him a glare. Peter hadn't been clued in on Lily's dreams as the other Marauders had felt that would violate her privacy.
"Don't worry about it."
*~*
"The dreams have stopped, Vicky," Lily said over the telephone as she prepared her breakfast. "Or at any rate, I didn't have one last night."
"That's good, right? You wanted them to stop," came Vicky's reply.
Lily made a half-sigh, half-irritated noise. "At the beginning, yeah. But that was nearly a year ago, Vic. Now that we're together-oh, speaking of, he called me his girlfriend. Sort of."
"Sort of?"
"Yeah. He alluded to it."
"How?"
"Long story. But that's the deal."
"That's a good thing, right?"
Lily smiled at her eggs. "Yes. That is definitely a good thing. The dreams I'm not so sure about."
"Lily, what's the worse that could happen? You've got the real live thing right in front of you-what the fuck do you need the dreams for?"
"Yeah, he said that too."
She could hear Vicky giggling. "You've seen him already today? Must've really liked your parents."
"Don't be stupid, Vicky. You know exactly what happened last night."
"Lily, that's sick! Your parents were home!" Vicky gasped. "I cannot begin to tell you how wrong that was on how many levels."
"They didn't hear anything," Lily muttered, making sure to keep her voice down so her parents wouldn't overhear from the next room. "Anyway, we hadn't planned on it, it just happened."
"Oh, you just happened to strip off your clothes and shag?"
"Yes. We were watching the telly. You know how those things go, Vicky… I know you took Jonathan home yesterday and I know you just got back from your flat, you skank."
There was an offended sound from the other side. "Excuse you, Miss I-Fucked-A-Guy-Who-Wasn't-Officially-My-Boyfriend-Under-My-Parents-Roof-Most-Likely-Multiple-Times."
"Shove it, Vic."
Lily rolled her eyes a moment before Vicky replied, because she knew exactly what was coming, what Vicky always replied to that comment.
"How hard?"
*~*
"Lils, you home?"
Lily whipped her head around to look at the glowing fireplace. "I didn't know my fireplace was attached to the Floo Network. Hi, James."
She sat down in front of the glowing face.
"I did it just for you-just your bedroom's fireplace, however. And there's a safety lock so that your parents don't shit themselves if a head accidentally pops in."
"How thoughtful of you."
"I thought so."
"You didn't have anything planned for tonight, did you?"
"Nope," Lily shook her head. "Why?"
"Get out your best dress robes. I'd like to take you out to dinner for our first date."
Lily smiled. "Alright. Seven sound good?"
"Sounds great. I'll ring the doorbell. Later, Lils."
*~*
A/N: Alright, I had wanted to mention something in the last chapter that I'd forgotten to mention-why didn't Lily and James use Voldemort's name? It's quite a simple thing, but I hardly ever do these sorts of symbolisms, so I just wanted to point it out. While some people might paint Lily and James as indestructible and perfect and just fan-bloody-tastic, I wanted to kind of change that. While I don't think I list either of their faults in specific, I didn't want them to be above using "You-Know-Who" and "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named". Even though they would later fight in the Order and they would try to defeat him, who's to say that they were shaking in their panties at the very thought of Voldemort? So, yeah. Just wanted to mention that.
Um… This chappie kind of surprised me. I skipped a lot more time than I'd planned to, but I like the outcome.
Everything kind of surprised me actually. What happened between them, and the whole dreams stopping thing (yeah, don't know how I'll end that, by the way…).
So, review because you love me? You know you do. Might not want to, but you do.
Mucho amor,
Natali K. A.
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