For the 'some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall' competition.

Prompts: James Potter, 'commits arson for the fun of it'.

She's just a girl.

Just a girl with coral-coloured lips and hair like flames and a smile like heaven -

Just a girl.

( But you're just a boy, don't you know that? )

-x-

You like to think you're extraordinary.

You like to think that your black hair is special, not like your mother's or your father's or anyone else's. You like to think that you're not just a boy, you're That Boy.

The Marauders made you feel like you were That Boy.

( She makes you feel like just a boy. )

-x-

You like watching things burn.

Textbooks, quills, forgotton homework – it doesn't matter. You like watching them burn – watching them cower, shrivel, die under the flames ( that you lit ) .

It's not that you're a pyromaniac or anything – it just makes you feel extraordinary.

And you like feeling extraordinary.

-x-

"I'd rather go out with the Giant Squid, Potter."

The words echo in your head, tauntingly. You scribble those hateful words in your messy scrawl and make to light them on fire.

You want to feel extraordinary, 'cause she's taken it away. Ripped it away with those words, sharp and cutting as a knife to the heart – torn it to pieces with just an utter of those coral-coloured lips.

But you can't.

Because she's like a drug, and she's taking away your extraordinary-ness, but you're addicted and it's too late, you can't pull away.

-x-

In your fifth year you've faded away.

You're just a boy now. Not That Boy, not That Marauder. You make the fire flare up with desperation, but that extraordinary-ness is gone, forever slipping out of your reach.

But then she corners you.

And asks you out.

First, you're taken aback, and demand to know if she's playing some kind of sick joke ( because you're not even extraordinary any more, how could she like you? ). She simply smiles, an upward-curve of pink coral, and says,

"I never liked you as That Boy, you know."

heartstop -

"And you may be just a boy, Potter, but I'm just a girl, so does that really matter?"

It doesn't.

-x-

And she's your drug, but she's not like heroin – more like paracetamol, actually.

Because when you have Lily, your own personal fire-girl, you don't need arson.

( flame-hair / coral-lips / jewel-eyes )

And when the fire-girl is really just a girl, you don't need extraordinary.

Not anymore.

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