AN: Obviously, props to F.R.I.E.N.D.S for the title inspiration. Might even be naming my oneshots like that from now on... Anyway, this is for an anon's prompt based on a text post by feralrosa on tumblr. If you've read it on my blog, reviews are still welcome and very much appreciated :-) Happy reading xx

The potion's name is not supposed to be divulged until they have brewed it—something about their ability to follow instructions and their accuracy in measurements, etc etc—but Lily figures it out the moment the first three ingredients are enumerated. She doesn't know why this particular potion has latched itself onto her memory at some point in the past apparently—it doesn't seem like the type of thing she'd make a mental note of—but it's there. She's sure of it.

Slughorn flicks his wand with a flourish, done with the listing, and faces the class. He folds his hand over his protruding belly. He looks chuffed, alright. He singles out Lily from the expectant seventh years, like he is wont to do, and grins at her. As she returns a polite smile, her brain zeroes in on a lazy Saturday afternoon some two years ago. Notes scattered on the table, a Transfiguration essay finally done, and an elbow resting on a mouldy page of a Potions textbook.

Amortentia. Curious.

She glances at her partner-for-the-day, whose arms are now folded over his chest, eyes skimming over Slughorn's clumsy scrawl on the board.

"Potter."

"Hm?"

"Any idea what it is?"

"Vague," he mutters, a hand coming up to adjust his glasses.

That is all.

He just—he literally just moves the damn thing up his nose with his fingers, and she finds herself half-smiling like an idiot, fixated, every time. Every time. She lingers on his hands, or on his eyes, or—or on some other parts of him sometimes... Bloody hell, Lily, stop it right now—

"I mean, we've dealt with moonstones before," he's saying; Lily discreetly clears her throat, "but—"

"Really?" she asks, grateful for the passing sliver of distraction. "What for?"

And then there's that trademark smug grin of his. "Sorry." No trace of apology in his voice at all. "Top marauder secret. If I tell you, I'd have to kill you."

"How original."

"And I'd grow bright purple wings and have painful blisters on my arse."

Lily, who has taken the liberty to start weighing their ingredients, if only to dispel her guilty ogling away, snorts into her brass scales. "I would pay a galleon to see that."

"I can show you my arse anytime, Evans, you need only ask. Perfectly blister-free, too. Or of blemishes of any sort, mind."

"Say that one more time and you'd have blemishes of all sorts on your face."

He laughs. "No kidding, though." He picks a glass jar off the table, inspects the label, pops the lid off and passes it over. "There were magical contracts involved. Remus made them."

Lily only rolls her eyes. "Sure he did."

James's hand suddenly freezes over the next jar. He bends down to level his gaze with hers, suspicious. "Hang on—you do, don't you?"

"I what?" The fire is lit, the cauldron is set, and all around the pair the class descends into a murmuring bustle.

"You know what the potion is!"

It's Lily's turn to smirk. She holds out a hand and gestures for the ashwinder eggs on his side of the table. "What did you use the moonstone for?"

He narrows his eyes and shoves the container into her hands. "Prat."

"Weird."

"What?" asks James, standing close. His sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, and his hair—oh dear Godric, the fumes have made it epically mussed up, even more so than its usual cyclone-zone glory, and she giggles at the sight of it upon looking up.

"Oh my god. And I thought it couldn't get any worse!"

"You love it." Still, with a half-hearted self-conscious scowl, he attempts to flatten it with both hands. He doesn't succeed even a bit. "What's weird?"

"Well," says Lily, reluctantly tearing her attention from his fingers raking through his hair. "See those spirals?"

Their potion has been brewing for a while, a concoction of melted moonshine and pearls in the palest shade of pink. Their shoulders brush briefly as James leans against Lily even closer to inspect it. The smoke swirls up from the hot bubbling surface, rising in puffy spirals that trail off in the air and fog up his spectacles. He's so close Lily can smell his conditioner. "Yeah, what about them?" he asks, wiggling his fingers experimentally over the fumes, the mist dissipating in nondescript shapes around his knuckles.

"It usually means we're done."

He stands upright, removes his glasses to wipe them with his tie. "So do we bottle it up now?"

"Hmm, no… I don't think it's finished yet."

"But you said—er, why are you doing that?"

"Doing what?"

"You're—I don't know—what are you sniffing me for?"

Lily's cheeks colour. Faint, but James is near enough to notice. "I am not."

"Yes, you—what? What is it?" He takes a step back, wary. "Do I smell?"

"No!" she looks away, hastily picking up the ladle to prod at the potion. "No."

"Oi, what?"

"Nothing!" And then, in spite of herself, she laughs. She can't help it; he looks genuinely worried. "Nothing, really. Sorry. Let's—let's just wait a bit more, yeah?"

He hesitates. But he does come back to her side, albeit the crease on his forehead and his lower lip slightly jutted out. "Alright."

"And I wasn't sniffing you."

"Yeah, no. You definitely weren't."

"I wasn't. Really."

"Weirdo."

A little later:

"You know, it would help us plenty if you tell me what it is."

"Nope."

Lily drops the ladle in exasperation. She really wants to know what her Amortentia would smell like, and she's been inconspicuously sniffing the air for a whiff of something pleasant the last how many ever minutes, but there's nothing. She thinks there was a hint of gingerbread for a bit there, and something woody, and something like pine groves, but none of them was strong enough to linger on her senses for too long.

"Okay. Okay. Just—is there something different?" she asks James, who up until then was just waiting in patient silence at her side.

"What?"

"Just answer the question."

He blinks at her. "Did you… cut your hair?"

"No! I mean—the air. Is there something different with the air?"

"What?"

"James!"

"The air."

"Yes. The air."

"I don't know! The question doesn't make sense!"

"Merlin—fine, do you smell anything different?"

He frowns. "Okay, now it's just getting offensive."

"Concentrate,Potter."

But he only looks at her like she just grew a pair of purple wings. "Is there a right answer to this question?" he asks, tone treading the matter with care.

"There's nothing different at all?"

"Erm—" he looks around at the class, "—Snape's been glaring at me for the past hour, nothing new there—"

"Potter—"

"Sorry."

"And?"

"And—let's see… Remus and Peter aren't doing very well over there, poor gits… Selena just singed her hair, nothing new about that as well, I guess… hmm, I'm pretty sure Sirius just scored a date with Mary…"

"Wait, what?"

"I said, I'm pretty sure Sirius just—"

Lily whirls around to check Sirius and Mary's table. Mary is chopping rose stems while Sirius lazily stirs their potion, and, sure enough, in the short while that Lily's gaze are on them, the two manage to exchange an ample number of wistful glances and wide smiles. "How can you possibly know that?"

"Telepathy."

Lily glares at him. He laughs at her.

Story of their life, really.

And then he fishes out a note stuck under one of the now-empty bottles and slides it down the table. Just scored a date with Mary, it reads, and Lily crumples the scrap of parchment and throws it at his face. The git just chortles some more.

"So what is weird, Evans? Blimey, your attention span is worse than Pete."

"This!" exclaims Lily. "We should be done by now! Look, it's glowing, and—there, see, perfect spirals—and it's Tuney's favourite colour already, Merlin's sake—"

"What's the problem then? Did we miss something? Step three maybe?"

"No, I'm sure we did everything right. I just…"

"You just?"

"Can't see any difference yet."

"What sort of difference exactly?" He eyes the potion curiously.

"A good difference."

"Very helpful."

"I try."

"Did you fly today?" she asks him, getting bored waiting.

"Did I fly?"

"Yeah? On the pitch?"

"No, why?"

"Nothing. You just smell like…"

"Yeah, I've been wondering about that," he says. "It's not me, though…" He picks up a rough brown chip of something off the table. He holds it up for closer inspection. He then hands it to Lily, who stares at it blankly sitting there on her palm. "I think it's that one," he tells her. "The wood smell's strong."

Lily brings the chip up to her nose. It does smell like wood, like—like brooms? Broom handles maybe? Hence flying…? But no. No, not really. "What is it?"

"I don't know. Bark of something."

"Very helpful, Potter."

"I try, Evans."

She punches his shoulder. "Mahogany?"

"Nah, not mahogany." He takes his wand out of his pocket and holds it up. "I would know. Ash, maybe."

"Right." She drops the chip and resumes the wait.

He snaps up quite suddenly, tilting his head towards Lily's direction. "Did you have plans today?"

She almost drops the phial she's about to put away. "What do you mean?"

"Oh, er—" he licks his lips, smiles sheepishly at the implication of what he just said. "No, I just meant—you're wearing that perfume, that's all. The one you wore on that ministry thing last summer—?"

"No, I'm not," counters Lily slowly.

His eyebrows shoot up. "Yes, you are."

"I'm not!"

"That's odd."

Funny, really. If Lily's paying the least bit of attention, she would have figured the whole thing out. But nope. She's looking too closely, waiting too eagerly for something she's not expecting, and so she misses it.

"This is ridiculous!" she bursts out, flailing her hands about over their potion. Then she purses her lips and shoves the ladle into James's hands. "Fix it."

He rolls his eyes. "I don't even know what it is. How do you expect me to fix it?"

"I don't know! Keep stirring or something."

Lily scoots over to the side. "Nutter," James grumbles, but he takes her place and does as he is told.

Slughorn ambles toward them, hands behind his back as he leans in to examine their work. He closes his eyes rather dramatically upon straightening up, and then grins at Lily with pride. James nudges Lily, eyes waggling with meaning, but she ignores him.

"Ah, perfect," Slughorn announces, and Lily, who usually would have smiled back, only stares up at him. She was sure they'd botched it up somehow, because she didn't get anything from their work. "Excellent as usual, Miss Evans—and Mr. Potter, of course—" James gives him a mock salute, and then he side-glances Lily with a worried frown, because she's now blinking at their potion in confusion, "—good work, well done," Slughorn drones on, oblivious, "you two can bottle this one up now. Full marks!"

And then he strides off to Selena Finnigan and Ivory Fletcher's table, whose potion is spilling over their cauldron and onto their work table in congealed blobs of bright orange.

"Evans."

Lily doesn't answer.

"Lily. Oi."

She just stands there, sort of dazed. James prods her arm.

"Hello?"

"Yes, sorry, what?"

"I'm going to clean this up now…"

"No, wait."

She takes a deep, slow breath, hands clearing the air on either side of her, eyes screwed shut, expectant—and—and there, okay, there's pine, that's definitely pine, and… and gingerbread, tobacco, and something that reminds her of late-night patrols—musty corridors, the breeze sweeping over the Hogwarts grounds and in through the arched windows, the Head Office?—that bark of mahogany or ash or whatever… Flying? Quidditch? Why on earth would Quidditch be in her Amortentia?—there must be something different, something new, something she's not expecting—

"Lily Marie Evans, if you don't stop acting funny right now, I'll haul you up and carry you to the hospital wing myself—"

"Next time," she cuts him off, eyes still closed, annoyed, "don't use too much conditioner on that horrendous hair of yours, do you hear?"

"Says the witch who wears excessive amounts of perfume and denies it—"

"I told you—"

"—which I don't see the point of, by the way; if you're meeting Terrence Hunter in a broom cupboard later today you can just tell me that—"

"I am not meeting anyone in a broom cupboard later today! Or ever!"

"I don't use conditioner on my hair!"

They're both silent. Well, for about two seconds.

"Really," deadpans Lily.

"I don't—well, not too much."

Lily gives the potion one last frustrated look, and then sighs. "Fine. Go turn it in. I'll clean this up."

Only James, Lily, Severus Snape, Lilith Perkins, Sirius Black, and Mary Macdonald managed to brew their love potions correctly, so the rest of the class will have to make it again next time. Slughorn doesn't tell them what the potion is. Not yet, he says, and he requests the class to not look it up if they can help it. The effect is better, he assures them. It's a pleasant surprise when you do it right.

As is the course of such things, however, more than half the class hurry to the library to search for it anyway. The remaining students find out some other manner, but needless to say not one seventh year doesn't know what the potion is the second time around.

This is how it goes for James:

"You didn't count the rose thorns," accuses Remus, sat on a couch in the Common Room later that night.

Peter is beside him working on a Charms essay. He hurriedly swallows his food before answering, brandishing a half-eaten apple in Remus's face. "I did! You didn't stir it counterclockwise the seventh time!"

"I did! The potion went from pink to green when you added the rose thorns!"

"Why on earth," interjects James, who is on the floor and presently losing a round of wizard's chess, "are we talking about this?"

"I wanted to know what mine would smell like," pouts Remus. "Wouldn't that be ace, smelling the things you love all at once? I can't even imagine—"

"Watch the sap, Moony," mutters Sirius. "Queen to C2," he plays, and then, "it wasn't terribly exciting, if you want to know."

"What was yours like?" Peter asks Sirius.

"Leather," he answers, reverent at the memory. "London night air at an altitude of a good hundred feet, dear Mrs. Potter's Christmas cinnamon buns, my bed sheets after a wild night with—"

"Okay, thank you, we get the picture," says Remus, grimacing, precisely the same time Peter interrupts with, "You can stop talking just about now, mate."

Sirius barks out a laugh at their faces.

James, meanwhile, has sat up, momentarily disoriented in a glorious moment of late epiphany.

"What was yours like, Prongs?" asks Remus, and James snaps.

"It was Amortentia." His mouth remains slightly open after utterance of the word. "That was Amortentia!"

Sirius snorts. "What did you think it was?"

James's shoulders sag. "I—I don't know!"

"Oh, come on," says Remus. "There's no way Lily didn't figure it out."

"She did! She wouldn't tell me!"

"Why?" the three ask simultaneously.

"Hell if I know."

"How was it though?" Peter presses on.

"I… erm, right, is it possible to not get anything when you don't know what it is?"

Sirius cocks an eyebrow at him. "I don't think so. I didn't know what it was until Mary told me. Class was nearly over then."

"You didn't smell anything?" asks Remus, incredulous.

"I didn't! I'm… not sure. Dunno if I did."

"But Slughorn said—"

"Yeah, he said it was, 'ah, perfect—'"

"'Well done, Miss Evans—'"

"'Oh, and you too of course, Miss Evans's nameless boyfriend, Mr. what's his name—"

"Oh, lay off it."

"But you got full marks," Peter points out, frowning. "How did you get full marks?"

James only returns their puzzled looks with a shrug. And an even more puzzled look of his own.

"Evans is sleeping with Slughorn," Sirius declares in conclusion, which earns him James's chess bishop, Peter's apple, and Remus's hand hurled at him.

"Only kidding! Honestly. What a touchy lot."

"Seriously though," Remus proceeds, "What about Lily? Did she say how it was like for her?"

"No." James pauses, thoughtful. "She was waiting for something as well. Now I know what. But…"

"But?"

"I don't think she got anything different either. She was really frazzled about it."

Silence falls among them. And then, at the risk of another rain of blows from his mates, Sirius breaks it with a hearty chuckle: "She's definitely sleeping with the old blighter."

Meanwhile, upstairs in their dormitory, Lily comes to a different conclusion for herself.

"My heart has disintegrated," she whisper-yells at Mary, convincingly horrified, gripping the other's arm. They are on Lily's bed, sitting against the headboard, an assortment of textbooks and notes and Muggle novels in front of them. "I am incapable of love, Mary. Amortentia doesn't work on me. I don't love anything. I am officially, eternally, emotionally incapacitated."

"For the last time," assuages Mary, covering her friend's hand with her own but not bothering to take her eyes off her battered copy of her favourite Austen novel. "You probably just weren't into it enough."

"What if I'm not wired like everybody else?" Lily wails still. "What if my heart has shrivelled up and I—I'm living on pumpkin juice flowing in my veins, or—"

"Alright, you're bonkers." Mary drops the novel, shifting in her place to face Lily. "It's impossible that you didn't smell anything from earlier. You're just overthinking it."

"But I didn't! Just gingerbread, and—"

"There you go!"

"Yeah, but Mary, I should have gotten a whiff of… I don't know, something different! Gingerbread? Honestly. It's love potion, and I wasn't inclined to drink it at all. I wasn't—"

"Drawn in?"

"Yes. The potion just sat there." She glowers at nothing in particular, crossing her arms. "It's James's fault. That prat with his stupid hair and his stupid conditioner—you know, at first I thought Sirius would be more obsessed about his hair than—"

"Hang on, what does James's conditioner have to do with anything?"

"It was all over the place! He probably drowned in it this morning or something. I could have gotten a glimpse of my soulmate, Mary, my soulmate, but because of him and his compulsory daily course of vanity, all I could get a whiff of is his stupid shampoo! It doesn't even smell all that good—okay, so it does a bit, like menthol or something, but so does yours, and so does mine, and so does my future husband's, maybe, I'm not sure, and it's all because James bloody Potter's hair was impeding my way to the scent of the love of my life, Mary Macdonald, can you believe him? How many times do you get to have a peek at what… why are you looking at me like that?"

Mary is pursing her lips hard to keep a laugh in. The second Lily asks, a giggle comes out. And then it doesn't stop.

"What?"

"Sorry," Mary chokes out, doubling over. "Sorry. Okay. No, sorry, sorry… nothing."

Lily glares at her. "Mary…"

But Mary just keeps laughing. She gets off Lily's bed, not without struggle, leans against a post and shakes her head at Lily in mirth and disbelief. "You're impossible," she says. "I'm going to bed."

"What? What are you laughing at? Oi! Mary! No—don't—"

But Mary is already drawing her own four-poster curtains close. The red fabric has hardly ceased rippling in the sudden movement and Mary is heard giggling from behind it again.

"Come back here right this second, Macdonald!"

"'Night, Lily," Mary calls out. "Maybe in the morning."

"Maybe in the morning what? What? Mary! Bugger."

In Defense Against the Dark Arts the following day, practicum is suspended in way of a few lectures the seventh years have to catch up to, and Sirius Black receives a note—a letter, really—in the thick of the ensuing boredom.

Okay, Black, it says. First things first. Smile. Like I just sent you something funny.

He cranes his neck to stare questioningly at Mary a couple of seats away. She smiles and nods at the rest of the note. Beside her, Lily catches the exchange and rolls her eyes at them. Worthy of mention as well, from not very far, are James and Remus, who are busy sparring with their quills beneath their desks.

To Sirius's right, Peter leans over, ever the meddler. Sirius pushes him away by his face with his free hand. Despite Peter and the note-sender herself being the only members of Sirius's audience, he smiles at the message like he's ordered to. Like Mary just sent him something inappropriate, by the way, but she'd deal with that bit later.

Second of all. DON'T look at James. Or catch his attention. Peter and Remus are fine, I guess, but maybe not right now. It's so hard to wrench you away from your boyfriends, mind you, so I'm resorting to this. I have to spill something.

Sirius considers sharing it with Peter, but ultimately decides against it. The other two are bound to notice for sure.

Guess what? He reads on, You know how we made Amortentia yesterday in Potions?

Lily claims she didn't smell anything off it.

Oh, does she now? Interesting.

Says gingerbread doesn't count. She's insane. But want to know something even better?

SHE KEPT COMPLAINING ABOUT HOW ALL SHE COULD SMELL WAS JAMES'S HAIR.

It takes a moment—and then Sirius grins like Mary indeed just said something funny.

"Say, Prongs," Sirius nudges James at dinner, "In Potions yesterday, are you sure you didn't catch anything?" Remus and Peter look up from their plates, intrigued at his random choice of subject.

James, equally befuddled, chews his chicken slowly in thought. "No," he drags out. "The dungeons were crazy, though. I think my Amortentia scents just got lost in all the…" He trails off, finishing the sentence with an ambiguous gesture of his hands.

"Alright," says Sirius. "But, say, how exactly did the dungeons smell to you?"

James fixes Sirius a suspicious glare. "What is this about?"

"Curiosity," answers Sirius smoothly. "Can't have me thinking Lily goes around doing unspeakable favours for professors now, can you?"

"Do you want to drown in your pumpkin juice, Black?"

"Kidding," sniggers Sirius. "But really, how was it?"

"What," James insists, "is this about?"

"Listen, I'm just worried, alright? There might be something wrong with you."

"What?" James drops his fork and sits up straighter. "What do you mean?"

"I just thought, if, you know, your Amortentia doesn't smell like anything, maybe you're… what if you're emotionally… incapacitated?" Mary shared some more details earlier; thank Merlin for Sirius remembering Lily's exact terms at the last moment. "I'm just looking out for you."

"He's got a point," mutters Remus, and Sirius nods in earnest. God bless Remus Lupin. "It's just impossible. I mean, if you did do the potion right—"

"We did."

"Then you should have gotten something," says Remus. "And you said even Lily didn't."

James thinks about it. "I did get… something. Little whiffs of—I was reminded of flying, alright?" he informs them defensively. "There was something like wood. And Quaffle leather. But even Lily smelled that, so I thought… I don't know, I thought it was just something around. And there was something like… like tinsel, and swamp reeds, but I thought the dungeon sort of always smells like a swamp…"

"It does, yeah," mutters Peter, making a face.

"Why a swamp?" Remus is curious.

"He goes fishing with his dad in the summer," answers Sirius at once. James's mouth twitches, amused, but Sirius is too engrossed with something else to notice. "Right, so, you think you didn't smell anything different because—because the dungeon was crazy, and—"

"And Lily also smelled that wood thing. So it can't have been exclusively mine."

"What, you can't both love flying?"

"Well… Quidditch, maybe, but… I don't think—I mean, have you seen her fly? Have you heard her the moment she gets thirty feet off the ground? She turns into a bloody banshee!"

"Point taken." All three of them pause for a moment to revel in the memory.

And then, "Also she was wearing that perfume from summer," says James.

"What?" asks Peter, who, like James, completely missed Remus and Sirius exchanging glances at this new piece of information.

"Remember that mixer for incoming seventh years? By the Ministry?"

"Wasn't she with Terrence then?" recalls Peter.

"Yeah," confirms James, forking another bite of chicken with a little more force than necessary. "Wanker McCheekbones. He left her alone after a bit there, the tosser… What's wrong with you two?" For Remus and Sirius have started a bout of throat-clearing.

"Nothing," they respond in chorus.

"What? Do you really think I'm emotionally incapacitated? Come on."

"You might be," nods Remus. He chews on the inside of his cheek, the suppressed laughter evident on his face.

"Tragic, really," says Sirius, shaking his head in feigned moroseness, but his lips are twitching upwards and his shoulders are quivering.

"Something is going on and I'm not sure who is and who isn't in on it," says Peter slowly, gaze flitting from one marauder to the other. "Am I in on it?"

"You know what, Pete, that's a good question," says Remus enthusiastically. "Let's see who's in on it then," he pauses to give Sirius a questioning look, and the other nods. "James thinks his Amortentia smells got lost in the confusion of all the other scents yesterday, because he couldn't catch anything but the dungeons—"

"Swamp," Sirius puts in.

"—some potion ingredients—"

"Flying. Quidditch leather."

"—and Lily's perfume."

"Some rubbish about Hunter McCheekbones."

"Wanker McCheekbones," corrects James.

"No one cares, Prongs."

"Do you think he's emotionally incapacitated?" Remus finishes, pointing at Peter with his spoon.

"I… yes?" answers Peter uncertainly.

"What is going on," groans James. They all ignore him.

Remus and Sirius grin at each other, and then Sirius says, "I think we'll give him a moment."

"Indeed," says Remus.

"What?" Peter is thoroughly confused.

"Why am I friends with you?" asks James, narrowing his eyes at the lot of them, proceeding with his dinner in frustrated indignation.

It takes until dessert comes, but halfway through his slice of chocolate mousse, Peter stops chewing, chokes on a mouthful, eyes wide.

"Oh. Oh."

Remus claps him on the back. "There. Now you're in on it."

They all start laughing, and James refuses to give them the satisfaction of having him grovel for answers. So he just sits there scowling miserably at his treacle tart while they torment him with a joke he doesn't for the life of him get.

"You are emotionally incapacitated, Prongs, bloody hell—how can you—Merlin! You're emotionally crippled!"

"It's a lapse."

"Yeah, we'll cure it."

"I. Bloody. Hate. All of you."

"What?" this from Sirius, who, in the apparent height of his emotion about the matter, feels the need to rise from the Common Room couch to glare at his companions, one after the other. "What do you mean we're not telling them?"

"Exactly that. And sit back down, will you?" chides Mary, perfectly calm. She flips a page of the book she's reading. "We're not telling them."

"What—why?"

"Because they'll figure it out sooner or later."

"Do you approve of this, Moony?"

Remus, from the floor, shrugs. "I think it would be fun to see them figure it out for themselves, yeah."

"What?" He sits back down, but he remains fidgety. "Okay, well, what if they don't?" he challenges.

"'Course they would," answers Mary confidently. "They're not daft."

"Everyone is daft in love!" bursts out Sirius, and Peter, who is just arriving, late to this convention due to a make-up essay he had to personally turn in to Professor Flitwick, stops in his tracks a few yards away from the couches by the fire where the Mary, Remus, and Sirius are.

"Did something happen?" he asks, eyeing Sirius anxiously. "Did Mary and Sirius swap bodies?"

Mary is chuckling and shaking her head. "No, he really just said that!"

"He did, didn't he?" adds Remus, immensely delighted as well.

"I mean," Sirius tries to amend at once, but is cut off by Mary and Remus, who can't help but exclaim: "Everyone is daft in love!"

"You could write a novel," Mary further suggests.

"Shut it."

"What's this about anyway?" Peter catches up, taking the space beside Remus on the floor.

"Prongs and Evans," answers Sirius, still flustered.

"Oh, have they caught on to it yet?"

"No, and these two won't let me go and tell them."

Peter actually looks scandalised. "Why would you tell them, Sirius Black?"

"Right on point, Wormy," says Remus, and Mary grins at Peter, too.

Sirius is affronted, but he won't relent. "Oh, I don't know; because we've all proven they're idiots when it comes to each other?"

Peter thinks about it. Then he shakes his head. "Nah, they can't be that thick."

"Everyone is daft in love," Remus and Mary say unintentionally at the same time, and then they burst out laughing.

Sirius sits in bitter silence for a while. Mary flips another page, and then he decidedly gets to his feet and starts for the Common Room entrance. "I'm going to tell them."

"NO!"

"Okay, so… pairs, flush, straight flush, straight, full house—" cites James, rearranging the cards in his hand.

"And four of a kind. But we can just stick to single cards and pairs for now, dummy."

"Prat. And… so the two's kill everything?"

"Yes."

"Why the two's?"

"Erm, I don't know. It's always been that way."

"And the diamonds are strongest?"

"Mhmm… And then hearts, then spades, then clubs…"

"Wealth over love then?"

She chuckles. "Dunno. I never thought of it that way. No one ever has."

"And why are two's the strongest? That doesn't make sense."

She rolls her eyes. "Merlin, just pick a card, James."

"Okay. Right…" He drops a king of spades.

"What?" snaps Lily. "But I just played a three! Of clubs!"

He scratches his jaw, confused. "Yes… and a king sure beats that right?"

"Yeah, but… it's going to restart this whole round! Don't you have a four? Or a five? That's still going to beat my three."

"Hmm, I have a two."

"That's worse than playing the king."

"You just said it's the strongest!"

"Yes, it is, but—oh, never mind." She drops an ace of hearts.

James happily puts down his two of spades. "Ha."

"You are five," mutters Lily, but she's smiling. "I'm not beating that. Start a new one."

He picks a five of hearts. "So. You're not wearing your perfume today. How did that date with Terrence go?"

Lily beats his five with a seven of spades. "I did not have a date with Terrence at all, you doofus," she admonishes. "I didn't even put that perfume on—I don't think I still even have it with me!"

He huffs disbelievingly and plays a seven of hearts.

Lily drops an eight of clubs. "Unlike you, by the way," she says, brandishing her remaining cards at him. "With all the conditioner thing."

"Yeah, about that, I couldn't find it today." Ten of hearts. "I think Sirius hid it. He was laughing when I got out of the bathroom."

Jack of spades. "Why'd he do that?"

"I don't know. Something about—hmm—can I drop a two again?"

"You have more than one?" asks Lily, crestfallen.

James smirks at her. "I'm brilliant at this game."

She narrows her eyes at him. "Did you jinx the deck?"

"No. Sore loser."

"Oi, I haven't lost yet."

"So I can use a two?"

"Go ahead, I'm still going to win."

He does play a two of clubs, the idiot. He starts another round with a six of clubs; the bloke hasn't got any strategy at all. "Yeah, anyway, Sirius said something about curing my emotional incapacitation…" he mumbles, carrying on the interrupted line of conversation.

His diction catches her attention. "Your what now?"

"My emotional incapacitation."

She picks nine of hearts. "He said that?"

"Hmm…" Ten of clubs. "Yeah, why?"

"Nothing, just… familiar, I guess."

He looks up curiously. "Oh?"

"I think I told Mary that exact same thing, actually. Maybe she—oh, hang on…"

James laughs, catching on. "Yeah, she and Sirius probably—"

"Right. Yeah."

"You told Mary what exactly?"

She doesn't immediately respond, but then she decides it's not going to make much difference if she kept it from him anyway. "I sort of told her I might be emotionally incapacitated for not having—"

"Smelled anything off the Amortentia?"

"Yeah." She shrugs. "But I thought it probably just got lost in all the haze, you know?"

"That's what I told them!" He nods at her cards. "It's your turn."

She smirks at him and drops a two of hearts.

"I thought you said you didn't have two's!" James accuses her.

"I never said that," counters Lily slyly.

"Git," he mumbles. "Pass. Obviously."

She giggles and drops a pair of fours.

"But I don't have any pairs!"

She shrugs, smile wide. "Then you lose your turn."

He leans back on his arms, shoulders sagging in defeat.

"I told Mary it was your fault, by the way."

"Good reckoning," he mutters, grimacing at his cards; or the lack of useful ones, by the looks of it. You only beat a pair with another pair, and he's been dropping cards without thinking about his moves the entire game.

"It was, though," explains Lily. "All I could smell was your hair."

James snorts. "All I could smell was your perfume, you nutter. And pass, because you, Lily Evans, are a cheater."

But Lily has all but frozen, staring vacantly at her one remaining card—a two of diamonds, the strongest of the deck—suddenly not keen on winning anymore. She drags her gaze up to James, lets it graze along the edge of the card, her breath cut short, and it feels like she's seeing him for the first time, and—oh my God, what did he just say?

"What?"

"Hey, what's wrong?" He is quick to go over to her side, alarmed.

"You—my—your hair—"

"What is it?"

She can't answer.

The hearth spits a sharp fiery crackle that sounds all too much like mocking laughter—you're so stupid, James, you're so stupid, Lily—they both jump at the sound—

And, finally, James seems to get it, too. His eyes widen beneath his spectacles—all I could smell was your perfume!—face gradually smoothing out and morphing from alarm to shock, and he just blinks at the floor, unmoving save for his fingers absentmindedly sliding his remaining cards with each other—

Lily gets to her feet, dazed and breathless, her face hot, the realization catching up to and washing over her in a staggering swooping feeling—

"I'm over you," James told Lily as the tedious ministry mixer was just getting ready to wrap up, swaying idly with her in a corner of the dance floor. He laughed nervously, feeling like a right prat. But it just needed to be said, didn't it? Just needed to be out there, so they could finally, at least he thought, hopefully, just properly be friends. Terrence Hunter had left, James couldn't give a single damn why, but Lily was alone, and James—well, apparently, he was over her. And he needed to say. Summer was almost drawing to a close, and he reckoned a clean slate for them was due before the next year at Hogwarts, their last, started.

"Oh. Right." Her hand tightened ever so slightly in his own, on his shoulder, but he could have just imagined it, for she was smiling right back at him; tight, nervous as well… and he tried not to breathe her in, tried not to linger on the dip of her waist beneath his palm or the quiver of her lashes as she shifted her gaze, but her perfume was sweet and cold and Lily and all over him, and he just—he reckoned he loved her so much still, so much that he hated it, hated how he always always came back to her green eyes and her red hair, to those freckles on her clavicles and that diamond birthmark on the back of her palm, everything about her starkly vibrant against all his grey-shaded self-convictions that he should let her go once and for all—

"Well, that's—that's great!" she said. "Thank you, I… it's about time, I guess…"

"Yeah." He smiled. He wanted to take it back, but he didn't, because everybody's daft in love.

"What is your problem?" Mary demands from Sirius, struggling to keep up with the boys. It's already past curfew, and they're making quite a racket in the empty corridors.

"You can't tell them!" insists Remus, walking briskly beside Sirius.

"I don't see why not," explains Sirius, not breaking pace. "If they do realize it eventually, telling them now would just speed it up!"

"You can't speed it up!" says Remus.

"He's my best mate, he ought to know!"

"That he's in love with Lily? I think he does know that," puts in Peter irately from Sirius's other side, a little out of breath.

"Yeah, but what about Lily?"

He came in—clad in a black and purple Quidditch attire that suited him fabulously, if Lily did say so herself—and the room seemed to shift at once. The lighting, the scent, the mood. There's just something about him.

"Late for a costume party?" she quipped.

He didn't return the jibe, and Lily looked up to check on him at once. He must have noticed his off-moment, for he grinned at her, albeit weak and fast and with no trace of humour. And then he proceeded to look over the schedules they had to sort that day. His fingers kept folding and unfolding the top corner in agitation.

"James."

"Yeah?"

"Alright?"

"Mhmm."

"So what's up with the whole…?" She gestured vaguely at his ensemble.

"Oh, just Quidditch."

She ambled closer to him and made a show of inspecting his right elbow pad. "Did Gryffindor change house colours while I was asleep then or…?"

"Nah, I'm not playing for Gryffindor," he explained. "I'm playing for Hogwarts. I—there are scouting members of the National Quidditch Association here today, and some of the members of the different teams here have been invited to try out."

Lily started. "Why are you here then? What time is the game?"

"In… roughly forty five minutes?"

She clicked her tongue. "Alright, get out of here."

She then proceeded to tug at his arm and lead him towards the door. He smelled heavily of new leather and polished broom, and Lily found herself leaning towards his pressed uniform unconsciously to get a whiff of that more, that was, until she caught herself, internally groaning at her stupid urges.

"Evans—"

"No, you go prepare for it! I can take care of this! Merlin, I would have understood, you know, I'm not all that bad!"

He let himself get pushed out of the room, but once on the threshold, he didn't move. He looked at the floor, then at Lily, undecided about something.

"What? Go!"

He rubbed the back of his neck, thoughtful. "Look, the thing is…" He took a deep breath and dropped his hands to his sides, his fingers curling and uncurling into a slack fist, his arms set in awkward angles. "I—I've always wanted Quidditch. It's brilliant. It's life. I want—I wanted to live on it, you know?"

"Yes, so let's go! Hogwarts, fight! Go, Potter!"

He grinned weakly at her, eyes warming at her enthusiasm. He bit his lower lip and braced himself for the continuation of his tirade, and Lily raised both eyebrows at him. "But, see," he continued, "the problem is, I sort of… don't know, if I still want that now, what with this—the whole Voldemort business, and the muggle-hunting… it's horrible, and I… feel a bit selfish."

She was silenced, not quite expecting that. When she got to her senses there felt like a million things she wanted to say to him, but when she tried to choose one the words to phrase her line of thought all but escaped her. She did finally understood why he had come here first, though.

"You said Voldemort," she noted lamely, letting out a shaky laugh.

He only chuckled softly, shrugging.

"Well, I… so that's what you're antsy about then?"

"I'm not antsy."

"Yes, you are."

He opened his mouth to retort, but she closed the breadth between them and quieted him with a hand. "Look," she began, choosing her words carefully. "It's not selfish, okay? It really isn't. This has always been your dream. Go for it. Don't let this chance pass. If we… if we have to be out there, after Hogwarts—well, we will be, but—you don't have to let go of anything yet. We'll… I'm sure you'll figure out all the other stuff later."

He looked down at her with an expression that she couldn't read entirely; he wasn't smiling, but certainly not displeased either. She couldn't tell what it was, couldn't name it, but she could feel it, his… pride? Affection? Gratitude? It swept through her stomach and seeped into her heart, warm and pleasant and tingling, and she welcomed it, wholly, thinking, you'll figure it out, James, we both will, with all her heart, and she knew that something had changed then, but she was too enamoured in the moment to properly contemplate it.

Everyone is, after all, at ordained moments, daft in love.

"You're a good best friend," he said, ruffling her hair.

She slapped his hand away, but she couldn't help but smile. "Not the best friend?"

"Nah, Padfoot would freak."

She laughed. Then—she didn't give herself time to think about it—she leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. "Good luck."

His eyes widened and fixated on something over her shoulder for a second, and she swallowed, thought she had gone too far—He's over you, you idiot! What did you just do?—but then he sought her gaze and grinned wide.

"Later, Evans."

And then he was gone, and Lily found herself missing at once the smell of leather and wood, of flying and Quidditch and James Potter.

"Lily will come to her senses too, okay? I am sure of it!" Mary assures Sirius, hauling him back by the arm.

Sirius slows down, but doesn't stop.

Mary draws her wand.

Sirius halts at last, raising an eyebrow at her. "Seriously?"

She purses her lips—and then drops her wand. "Well, you're being really difficult! This is important to Lily, and she's my best mate, okay?"

"Really, Moony?" For Remus has also drawn his wand.

Remus shrugs. His eyes are alight in mischief, however, and Sirius's look of incredulity turns into understanding. "Race to the office?" proposes Remus.

Peter fishes out his wand. His evidently reluctant resignation makes Mary think this isn't the first time he got caught up in his mates' silly antics. "We don't have to do this, you know," he says, "we can just let him—"

"Absolutely not," cuts in Mary, grinning now as well, wand back up.

"Fine then."

"You're on," says Sirius, grinning smugly.

"Do you lot do this often?" asks Mary.

"Once or twice," shrugs Peter. "When these prats get bored."

"On whose mark?" asks Remus, crouching down, concentrated on the corridor ahead.

"We are so going to detention for this…" mutters Mary.

"Mine," Sirius answers Remus's question, "Go."

And then—with a resigned sigh from Peter, an ambiguous exclamation from Mary directed mainly at Sirius, a carefree chortle from Remus—they all sprint down the empty hallway.

"Evans…"

"But you're over me."

He looks up, eyebrows furrowing. "What?"

"You said—you said you were over me."

"Right. I… yeah, I said that."

"Oi! Get back here!"

"Sorry, Pete—!"

"I can't believe you just levitated him!"

"We'll come back for him later, promise—"

"Stop cheating, Sirius, Merlin's sake—"

"Sirius, you git—"

"Almost there—"

I could have gotten a glimpse of my soulmate, Mary, my soulmate, but because of him and his compulsory daily course of vanity, all I could get a whiff of is his stupid shampoo!

No wonder Mary was splitting sides laughing last night.

Oh, bloody hell.

Bloody hell…

You're wearing that perfume, that's all. The one you wore on that ministry thing last summer…

It's so silly. Everything just seems so silly. Of course that's—of bloody course she would be the one—how can he have been so thick—?

Next time, don't use too much conditioner on that horrendous hair of yours, do you hear?

It was so embarrassing. Just how much of a moron does he think of her now? Should she leave? Should she address it? What would he say?

"Evans—" James manages, getting to his feet. He dusts himself off and adjusts his glasses.

"Oh, good Merlin—" she starts at the same time, snapping, embarrassed and overwhelmed, covering her face with her hands—

"I'm over you."

"You're not winning this, Moony, get—"

"No—"

"Stop—bloody—using—hexes! Damnit!"

Sirius's laughter echoes down the halls. "Language, Macdonald—!"

"Good luck."

At precisely the same time, half a second before the inevitable crash takes place:

James, walking swiftly and with purpose towards Lily, hands grasping her shoulders and head tipping down to level his eyes with hers: "I was never over you."

And Lily, hands still on her face, wailing through her fingers: "I'm bloody in love with you!"

Sirius falls face first through the door, managing, thank Merlin, to hold out his arms before him last minute, but the impact is still sound and strong, especially because Remus isn't far behind, and—

He falls down on top of Sirius, arms flailing, yelling, grabbing at Mary, who tries her best not to topple down, but who is she kidding—Remus has gotten a hold of her arm, and—

Mary's tripping on their tangled legs, nothing to grab onto, just thin air, and there's the sight of James Potter and her best mate standing ahead, facing each other, and she thinks she just heard Lily say… but she can't have, can she—? Oh, hell, here comes the floor—

A groaning, cursing heap of bodies lie on the threshold of the Head Office, not far at all from James and Lily, who are absolutely at a loss to what the bloody sodding hell just happened—

Not over…?

In love…?

"What…" begins James, but he doesn't know which thing to address first. His heart is thumping ridiculously fast in his chest, and his best mates are here and Lily's best mate is here and Lily is in love with him, bloody in love with him—that's what she said, right? He didn't mishear, right? He's in her Amortentia—

Lily peeks through her fingers, hands slowly leaving her face, eyes wide in surprise and confusion and all the other mixed emotions melding into just one crashing big ball of what the hell—

"I don't—what—?"

Sirius tries to move, but he can't, because Remus and Mary seem to find it enjoyable just lying there on top of him, whining intelligibly. He feels lightheaded, and he thinks he broke a finger or two, but it doesn't even matter because he got here in time to see it—thick, thick James and Lily, Merlin; but no matter, no matter—she's in love with him, too, he heard it, knew it, he bloody called it—

He lifts his head up best as he can under Remus and Mary's combined weight and yells, finally, in a voice dripping with years' worth of exasperation, crediting himself for the moment gloriously laden with a by-now epically heavy weight of grazing touches and almost there's and bad timing:

"Now kiss, you idiots!"