Solution Three: The "Fairy Tale" method
Lily had, of course, spent the next week sitting rather tenderly on her pins and needles, just waiting for someone to show up and give her detention for what would probably amount to the rest of her life. And when no one had, well, she was rather surprised. After all, the only way that she could think that she had gotten out of all of it was if James hadn't told, and of course he would have.... After all, she had attacked him with so many spells....
But then, maybe he had felt that he had deserved it. Or-and this was much more likely in her frame of mind-he was trying to blackmail her somehow or get into her good graces by refusing to blackmail her. (How and why such stark contrasts could exist was never thought about-that was simply the way that it was.) And so she had determined to most pointedly and coldly ignore him when he got out of the hospital wing.
Of course, she had a while to wait. And when he actually did get out, she failed miserably in the ignoring part. The fights between the two became legendary in Hogwarts, the more advanced students teaching the new little first years to hit the ground when they saw the two of them approaching each other. Not, of course, that James ever did much on the offensive side, and didn't even try that hard to defend himself, it always seemed, despite the fact that it was the rare event for Lily to actually hit him. And she blazed so much at that... well... it was said that every time Lily Evans and James Potter fought, her temperature rose and broke another record. ((A/N: For those of you wondering, yes, this was modified from Penelope's line in See How They Run-which, similarly, I do not own.))
As I said, though, all this took a while. In the end, it had taken nearly a month to untangle all of the spells that Lily had layered on James, but he (as he had promised) had only laughed. Once the shock of finding himself looking the way that he had had worn off, of course.
Needless to say, this had just made Lily despise James the more, and from that day on she became the founder (and basically only member) of the Unofficial I Hate James Potter Club for Gryffindor. James actually laughed even harder at this, and redoubled his efforts.
There are several long and complicated stories in all of this, but the end result was that, by the beginning of their mutual seventh year, there were few people who had ever had such a share of unadulterated loathing (agreed Gryffindor House and most of the rest of the school, almost without exception) heaped on one person as James David Potter had daily piled on him by Lily June Evans.
James was somewhat bemused at all of this but still took it in his stride, and that took Lily to the point of screaming in frustration more then once.
And then, at the beginning of the seventh year, after only about a week of half-hearted attempts to get Lily to go out with him, James did an amazing thing.
He seemed to back off.
Lily was (understandably) shocked, and didn't really understand this move. He had, after all, been asking her out since basically the day that she had turned 14, (when he was almost 15 and swooned over by practically every other female member of Hogwarts) and she just could not seem to believe that he had just given up after all of those years. He had to be planning something! Something simply horrible! He was concentrating so hard on that that he was slacking of in making her daily life a misery. He was thinking of some huge, cataclysmic thing that he could do that would ruin her life in five new ways before she would have time to twitch! This would make the love potion seem as nothing!
Understandably, Lily had become rather jumpy around James.
Actually, James was doing no such thing. He hadn't given up, not by any means, but he had decided to leave Lily on her own for a while, making her decide that she was in fact madly in love with him (and always had been). You know, the whole "absence makes the heart grow fonder" thing. And, simply because she was suddenly paying him so much attention, he had thought for a while that he had succeed. He, needless to say, gained a new swagger in his step, one that Lily was simply aching to throw out on its ear, but given that she still wasn't sure what was going on, she didn't. Thus James strutted around the school more and Lily got more and more annoyed, and yet didn't do anything.
This was about the point that it dawned on James that something wasn't working in exactly the way that it should. After all, if it was, then why hadn't Lily admitted to undying love for him yet? Then again, Lily hadn't even really insulted him recently. But she still wasn't acting like she liked him or anything. But then, neither was she really acting like she hated him any more. At least, not to the extent that she had been before.
James David Potter had rarely felt so confused. Most things just seemed to come naturally to him, this was the most trouble that he could remember having with anything for... well... it was a long time, anyway.
"What on earth is she doing, Padfoot?" he murmured one day in charms, as the two of them sat peering quizzically down at her.
"I dunno. Maybe just trying to confuse you?"
"Well, if that's her aim, she's succeeded."
"Or maybe she's just worried now that you don't like her anymore." Sirius said after a few moments of serious contemplation.
James started, and his head snapping around as he turned to stare at his friend. "You think that could be it?"
"Well, you certainly haven't been paying her as much attention as you used to, maybe she just thinks you're not interested. Maybe she thinks you finally got the hint to move on, and now she wants you sticking around, but is too proud to admit it."
"Do ya know," James said when he could finally speak again, for he had been stunned by this revelation, "I think that must be it."
Sirius grinned. "And not only that, but think of the reputation she has to uphold. If she doesn't think you like her, she's not about to go and ruin it."
"And she has seemed rather half-hearted about insulting me lately. I don't think that she's even yelled at me for... a few days, at least."
Sirius sat back with a smirk. "There, you see?"
James sat back, thunderstruck. "Well, what should I do about it then?"
"Why not prove that you still like her?"
"But how? Most of the time she just seems annoyed with me whenever I do anything along those lines."
Sirius looked thoughtful once again. "I dunno. Maybe just wait for it. Something will probably come up."
Two rows down, Lily Evans fidgeted and wished that James would get it over with, whatever it was he was planning. She didn't have long to wait. A week later, that opportunity he had been waiting for presented itself.
It was getting close to the end of the year and... well... it was the year that the students would take their N.E.W.T.s. The students, indeed, could not forget this if they wanted to (as many did) as the teachers seemed to talk of nothing else. It was impossible to forget even for those students who slept through most classes, the amount of homework saw to that. Therefore, all things considered, it really wasn't that unusual to see overworked upper-years paging frantically through a book, their eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot, ink stains coving their hands. And it was even more common to see them slumped over half finished essays, a quill with drying ink still resting gently in their hand, dead to the world.
So what happened to Lily really wasn't that abnormal. At first, at least.
She was writing a particularly nasty essay for Transfiguration and could barely keep her eyes open. Normally, of course, Lily was hardly one to fall asleep doing homework, but these were hardly normal times. Over and over she repeated to herself that she would not fall asleep, she would not fall asleep, she would not fall asleep. The spell diagram she was copying with notes to show how it worked and how else it could be applied, seemed very far off.
Ah well.
Could not fall asleep. Would not fall asleep.
Still, she decided, she could rest one eye. If she rested both then she would fall asleep, but surely not just one....
Within minutes both eyes were shut and her breathing was deep and rhythmic as her quill sat gently on the table, looking forlorn.
Nearly an hour later, James climbed through the portrait hole (the password at the time was Houle, one of the words that the uppers were supposed to know by then anyway - consequently, the Pink Lady didn't let anyone in their seventh year through unless they both named and defined the current password), Sirius on his heels. It was nearly one on the morning and they had just gotten back from their respective detentions. Both were tired and sore and just wanted to go to bed, but James had frozen when he saw Lily.
She was asleep, curled up and looking peaceful and kind and even more pretty then she usually did, which was saying something.
"Sirius," James had breathed.
"Yea?"
"I know what I'm going to do."
"What?" Sirius asked, looking over at James with an eyebrow cocked.
"I know what I'm going to do. I know how to show her."
Maybe he had been maturing in the past half a year. Maybe it was that he was tired. Maybe it was something he had eaten. Still, whatever it was, this was not the James who had laughingly fed Lily a love potion.
At least... not entirely. There was a small corner of that being left, but most of him wanted something else, something different, something that would convince Lily that....
She was a sleeping beauty, really, and deserved to be treated as such.
And with this final thought, the vague inclination that had planted itself in his mind the moment that he saw her solidified. She needed to wake up and finish her essay, and she deserved....
Gently, James walked up and kissed her.
At first, Lily had relaxed. Nice... it felt... nice. Then, as she finally came out of the foggy veil of sleep, she realized what was happening.
James Potter was kissing her. On the mouth.
With a gasp and splutter, she pulled away, feeling her face turn red as a tomato. For a moment, as she put her hands over her reddening she wondered if she was more angry or mortified, before settling on anger. Anger was easier.
"Potter, what do you think-"
"Aw, come on, Lily!" he'd said, cutting her off. "You were - are - a sleeping beauty. And she deserves to be woken up with a kiss." He sounded aggrieved and almost as though he was pleading.
"So you like fairytales, then?" Lily yelled. "Well then try this!" She had been thinking of that transfiguration essay that she had been writing, and almost before thinking, she cast the spell. And set conditions, so it would be almost impossible to break without fulfilling them. Every spell needed a loophole, after all. It almost always was the normal `out,' the one that the designers of counter charms had written into their spells. Those, however, who understood how a spell functioned, the poetry and language of it, could set their own conditions. They just had to exist, that was all. In any case, it was much more difficult then it sounded. Not many people could do it, and they not for many spells. But for those who could....
A frog, green and spotted, gazed sorrowfully up at Lily and croaked. She stood over it, breathing heavily, a few strands of her copper-red curls sticking to her face as her emerald-green eyes wavered.
Then, without another word, she turned and fled the common room, running pell-mell up the stairs, the essay that she had been working so hard on lying forgotten on the table.
Once in her room, Lily threw herself down on her bed and buried her face in her pillow, her cheeks still afire. She felt... confused. Angry, certainly, but hurt and disjointed as well.
The main problem was how good it had felt when he kissed her. That had thrown her, and she could still feel the soft warmth of....
Furiously she shook her head and then rolled over onto her back and sighed.
* * * * * *
I FINALLY DID IT! I UPDATED! HOORAY FOR ME!!!!!!
I will finish this story, I will I will. Don't worry, `tis now almost done.
-->