#extremely self-indulgent fluff i've got for you today fam

[sunshinemarauder]

what would you do?

what would you do? (AO3)

written for @thegobletofweasleys's Jily Week 2023 day one (it's still technically july 31st where I am, I swear)! fluff/angst day, because this fandom needs a laugh every now and then. gifted to the lovely lovely @kay-elle-cee <3 playlist here!

James has always thought that Lily Evans looks exceptionally breathtaking when she’s angry.

It’s the sort of thought that he keeps shamefully locked-away in a crevice of his mind with all his other foolish Evans-induced blatherings. He wouldn’t dare say it aloud in front of his own mates, let alone Evans herself. After all, he hardly needs to hand her more reasons to dislike him. The post-OWLs incident sends a miserable shiver down his spine every time he recalls it.

Right now, the intensity in Lily’s bright green eyes, staring him down with enough force to bore a hole through his Quidditch gear, reminds him of the fiery expressions she’d worn that were precursors to all their fights last year. 

They would all begin this way: he, a bumbling prat desperate for her attention, would say something thoughtless to garner a reaction from her. Evans, prouder than a Hippogriff and sharper than a Basilisk fang, would take the bait immediately, eyes flashing with affront, and volley a creative insult his way. James would comfort himself with the thought that she never seemed to mean her insults seriously; every so often he'd catch her hiding a smile as they parted, and sometimes he could coax the occasional laugh out of her.  

But since the beginning of their sixth year, things have been different between him and Lily Evans. They’re friendly, sort of, and rarely argue these days, but it’s tenuous. Fracturable. He inevitably seems to screw up every normal conversation they have and leave an awkward tension in his wake.

Today, as Lily stares him down with an intensity he hasn't seen from her in months, James hasn't a clue what he said to garner such a strong reaction from her. 

He had been heading to the Quidditch locker room for a quick shower post-practice when Evans — an occasional spectator at their team drills, thanks to her friendship with the Gryffindor Beater, Marlene — had fallen into step with him. He immediately straightened to his full height, hyper-aware of her presence beside him. 

James, as always, is desperate to impress her.

Thankfully, she hadn't seemed to notice his apprehension. She struck up a conversation about their assignments, which soon devolved into James waxing poetic on NEWT-level Transfiguration theorems. It marked the longest civil conversation he’d had with Lily Evans in ages, and he’d thought it was going swimmingly — he was just starting to tell her about tutoring younger kids in remedial Transfiguration essentials — when she abruptly stopped walking, placed her hands on her hips, and fixed him with that fiery, indignant look he’s come to both yearn for and shrink from over the years.

Now, James gulps. Shit. What had he done now? 

“You know, Potter,” Evans begins innocuously, but her eyes flash in his direction and James knows he’s in seriously deep water. “Sometimes I have no idea what to make of you.” 

James stares blankly. 

“You can be such a prat, you know, when you go around hexing people for the fun of it and acting like you’re the king of the castle. Sometimes I want to—” and here she starts getting agitated, her pale cheeks reddening rapidly: “—to shove your head down a toilet and leave you there until all that arrogance seeps out of your stupidly large skull.” 

His heart drops instantly. He’s only half-aware that the rest of the team is long-gone into the showers, and that it’s been only him and Evans for several minutes now. 

He thinks: arrogant, bullying toe-rag.  

“But sometimes,” Lily continues in a way that he can’t describe in any way other than heated, and then says: “Sometimes I want to cut off all your air circulation.” 

That’s typical, James thinks, picturing her hands locked around his throat, staring him down with that scorching stare as he slowly perishes. 

Then: “With my mouth on your mouth.” 

His brain flatlines. 

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#jily week 2023 #james potter #lily evans #jily #jily fanfiction #jily fic #kat recs #my stuff #extremely self-indulgent fluff i've got for you today fam #this summer has been fun and i wrote a surprisingly decent amount BUT #don't know how much more i can write consistently because shit has hit the fan and i am Busy