Author's Notes: In the wise words of James Potter: "Day Six has proven to be one of those endless endeavours that seems to be made up of two thousand hours rather than twenty-four..." But the opus chapter has finally come to an end. HUZZAH. I apologize profusely for how long this has taken, as well as...um, the rest of it.

You know you love me and my dramatic angst. ;)

DAY SIX (End)

The tentative knock sounds against James's hotel room door at approximately 6:58 p.m.

Rap. Rap. Rap.

From inside the tiny hotel loo, James pauses, fingers stalling halfway down the placard of shirt buttons he'd been in the midst of fastening. His hair still hangs straggly and wet from his shower, he's got only one sock on, is uncertain of the location of the other, and in the small rectangular mirror above the quaint loo sink, he watches his features curl into resigned exasperation.

It's Hoff again.

Instinctively, without question, James is certain it's Hoff again.

For a brief (disgraceful) moment, James contemplates escaping through the nearby window—lone bare foot dangling out the opening, arse wriggling as he scurries over the side and jumps down into the prickly bushes below. It'd be worth it, wouldn't it? The shame and the scratches and the soggy toes? Hoff would forgive him. Eventually. The bothersome blighter was already regretful and chagrined about the interruption. James knows that. The agent's bashful, stagnant knock said it all.

Rap. Terribly sorry to disturb.

Rap. Couldn't be prevented.

Rap. Profuse apologies.

But bloody well returned he'll be all the same, and James knows any acrobatics out the nearest narrow building exit are sadly not the answer. But possibilities for what may await on the other side of the door seem bleak at best. What would it be? Another blistering lecture? More owls to reply "no comment" to? This time of evening, James's worst worry—word from Puddlemere—seemed highly unlikely. The knock had been too tentative to be good news, and Hoff had an almost comfortingly set routine when dolling out bad news: early morning tea and pastry with a useful helping of overblown flattery and alternative plans. None of that fit here. It couldn't be Puddlemere. But they'd been at the rest of it all sodding afternoon, from near the second James had returned from lunch with the lads to find his beleaguered agent haunting the corridor outside of his hotel room like an ominous poltergeist. And while James is not so arrogant as to refute that the necessity of such things is entirely his fault…well, he's still allowed to gripe and frown about it a bit now, isn't he?

"This is why you need a publicist," a battered Hoff had griped himself earlier, giving James a stare (harangued; superior; undoubtedly tallying up all the surplus billable hours he could squeeze from this with vengeful satisfaction). "Rogue press lines. Telling off reporters. I've told you."

"This was all a one-off," James had argued, dashing another no comment to some reporter from a publication called Quaffle Questions who wanted to know if James and Lorri Jackson were having a scorching hot affair (Lorri is happily married, and old enough to be his mother besides, but it's obviously the logical conclusion. Ace reporting, QQ.). "I don't do press. Why would I need a publicist when I do no publicity?"

Hoff's response—aptly—had been a pointed look at the chaos around them.

Which, James concedes, is fair.

Bothersome, but fair.

Fairer still, Hoff had really been more than generous regarding the Dalton situation as a whole. Besides even the utter catastrophe of insulting tosser lead reporters on the press line in the first place, it had been truly beyond the pale for James not to have at least dashed off a warning note to Hoff after things had gone so south. As effectively James's only representation, Hoff was instantly besieged with questions, questions, questions, and James had unkindly left him blinking owlishly with his trousers round his ankles. If the agent hadn't been so used to answering "no comment" to anything related to James's media presence, he may very well have refuted the admittedly entirely out-of-character exchange and caused all kinds of problems. It's why James had contritely borne through a good thirty-minute castigation about what one does and does not do in a publicity nightmare of one's own making. He really deserved no less.

They'd done their mightiest, Hoff and James, to manage the deluge of…well, uncertain if it could be termed backlash quite yet, but the possibility lingered. These kinds of media storms changed tides mighty quickly, on generally unpredictable whims, often swayed or squashed by other tempests brewing on the shores. Hoff seemed confident that they could brazen this out with their no comments, and James sure as hell hoped that was true. He did feel like an arse for being an arse to the arse…but one could hardly claim he wasn't justified in the reaction. Or, one could, but James still had cause to hope that his otherwise dependable reputation as a reluctant-but-charming sport darling earned him some lenience here. But there was almost no telling until tomorrow morning's papers hit stands. Nothing seemed to have reached the wireless stations yet, and no one published in the evenings. It would be jury by morning headline.

Fredrick Fords—Puddlemere owner, Fate Decider—definitely read morning headlines.

James knows this, but is striving to ignore it.

Honestly, he's quite sick of worrying over things he can't change.

Personal progress: check.

And in the meantime…well, he's still got an hour before he has to meet Lily and the lads at the Cornish Pixie. James reckons he owes Hoff better now than an untimely window exit.

Though he really ought to find that other sock.

"Coming!" he calls, popping through a few more shirt buttons, peeking under chairs and flipping over the bed coverlet as he walks. Perhaps he'd accidentally tossed the sock in with the laundry he'd just sent out. Wouldn't that be just his luck? But more likely it had simply been sucked into the mysterious vortex that is a hotel room, like the hundreds and thousands of lone socks before it. Elusively and inexplicably gone forever.

Admitting defeat for the moment (would a single-socked James earn a more sympathetic scolding?), James reaches the door and swings it open.

…to find Lily Evans, Junior Quidditch Correspondent, standing on the other side.

James blinks.

Oh.

(Shit. Now he really wishes he had that sock.)

"Lily." He grins widely—can't help it. He's surprised, but delighted. He's also vaguely tempted to tuck his bare foot out of sight behind the door, but quickly discerns he'll only look like a crackpot. Very attractive, that. "You're…here."

"Hi," she says quietly, almost hesitantly. She's fidgeting some, but thankfully does not drop her ricocheting green gaze down to his toes. Honestly, she's far too busy apologising. "Sorry, I should have—you'd told me your room before, so I…but this is so…I've just shown up—"

"Do you think I mind?" James laughs incredulously, shaking his head in amusement. "Fifteen minutes earlier and you would've caught me in the shower, but all's well that ends and all that. Your turn anyway, isn't it? Unexpected drop-ins. Retribution, fair play, you know."

"Right." It earns him a quivery sort of smile. "All that."

But she doesn't move forward. Doesn't say anything further, either. She doesn't do much of anything, in fact, except continue to squirm and dither on the other side of the doorway.

Which is…strange.

James's head tilts, watching her carefully. Her uncharacteristic reticence is…disquieting, to say the least. The idea that she's actually that anxious over showing up on his doorstep seems, frankly, patently absurd. Beyond even that he's done it to her (loopy! injured! stalking!), just the sight of her fills James with a haplessly giddy, floaty fierce feeling inside of his chest—and he reckons she knows it. Ought to, in any case. He's not exactly been subtle, has he? Accosting her in alcoves and on therapy tables and whatnot? Day Six has proven to be one of those endless endeavours that seems to be made up of two thousand hours rather than twenty-four, but Lily Evans has been a steadying force through it all. James is forever grateful, humbled, and—mostly—baffled by that. Despite their earlier declarations of mutual admiration, a witch can only be expected to endure so much.

Inadvertent shanghaiing, James admits, is not exactly what one can call traditional courtship.

Not, James cannot state more firmly, that he had been any kind of willing participant in that plot. And he certainly hadn't been quick to let the sleeping dog lie, either. His mates had graciously allowed him all of twelve minutes to eviscerate them at lunch for their ambushing tactics, though James isn't certain how many of his scathing rebukes had actually registered. Remus had seemed properly apologetic from the start, Peter was far more interested in his meal than in James's rants, and Sirius's mulish expression had let James know his mate had gone full Machiavelli: the end by far justified the means.

"You could've ruined it," James had argued, determined to get through at least that much. "Do you have any idea how lucky you are that she chose to find it more amusing than utterly disastrous? She ought've grabbed security and had the three of you thrown out on your arses. Then thrown me out on my arse."

"We know," Remus said contritely.

"These crisps are cracking," Peter put in.

"If she wasn't willing to get prodded a bit by the most important people in your life," Sirius maintained loftily, "then she doesn't deserve to be part of it."

"That isn't even remotely true!" James shouted. "Or up to you!"

He received only a dismissive snort at that.

But later, when his twelve minutes had expired, and Peter had waxed lyrical about the crisps to their full extent before popping into the loo, and Remus had graciously offered to pay the tab in fair restitution, James was left alone at the table with Sirius.

James knew he would likely never get the genuine repentance he was looking for—not from Sirius, the undeniable ringleader here, who was too stubborn and too validated by the lack of punishable fallout to warrant regret. James hadn't been mates with him this long without accepting that telltale Sirius obstinacy. And much as it killed him to admit, these rotters were top of the list in his life. In their horribly misguided way, they were only looking out for him. What they thought mattered. Especially this particular prat.

"If you won't admit you were wrong," James eventually ventured in resignation, "then at least concede that I was right. About Lily. You like her, don't you?"

An exasperated look crossed over Sirius's face, rankled and put-upon. He indulged in a very long sip of his beer, cupping the tankard with casual ease, then lowered it back down to the table with unhurried patience. He seemed to be considering his words, or at the very least considering how to annoy James to the utmost degree.

"Look, Prongs," he finally said, with a decidedly pompous air. "The way I see it, you've got one of two schemes running here—either that witch is the best damn actress I've ever met, in which case she deserves credit for the pure, masterful ingenuity of it…or—" he quickly added, at James's noise of protest, "you've somehow managed to find yourself a bird who is cleverer, cooler, and prettier than you, and now you've got to find a way to keep her around despite the fact that you're a right useless wanker." Sirius lifted his tankard again, clacked it against James's with a smirk. "Either way—best of luck with that, git."

It is, James acknowledges, a rather fitting summary of his current situation.

The latter portion, of course. Cleverer, cooler, and prettier sounds about right.

And he's just not certain how Lily can't possibly know that.

But eyeing her on the other side of the doorway now…James suddenly begins to doubt.

It seems useless to try claiming that everything is actually fine. She is visibly ill at ease, maybe even a bit pale. She hasn't changed from the black dress she was wearing this afternoon, and her hair has started to fall out of the graceful-looking knot she'd had it tied back into earlier. His worse insecurities want to worry that she's shown up here to call the whole thing off. The two of them. This, together. His mates are insane. James, himself, a bloody mess. She's finally come to her senses, realised how rubbish a deal she was getting, how much better she could do, with significantly less hassle. It's not out of the realm of possibility…but logic argues they'd settled that earlier. James had spewed all his nonsense on her in the alcove, and she'd taken the lot in stride. She's not the sort to go back on that now. With only…oh, a hundred and twenty hours under their belts, he somehow still knows that for certain.

Except…the last time he'd seen her, she wasn't exactly at ease either, was she?

The note.

The jittery, half-distracted parting.

It's all a bit familiar, actually.

The floaty, fierce feeling inside his chest tightens.

Nearly at the same time, they speak.

"Do you want—?"

"Can I—?"

James cracks a smile at the word-tangle, but she doesn't. Counting it as more evidence, he immediately steps back on his bare foot, swinging the door open wider.

" 'Course." He extends a hand. "Come in."

She gives a little nod, steps into the room without quite meeting his eyes.

James closes the door uneasily behind her.

He's suddenly very conscious of the fact that the room is sort of in shambles. James isn't exactly neat in the first place, and his hectic afternoon plus the absent search for the missing sock have not helped matters. There are clothes and equipment on the floor. Remnants from damage control with Hoff—letters and parchment and quills—fill most of the flat surfaces. There's still a steamy dampness in the air from his shower, and his bed looks like someone had a wrestling match upon it. And not in a particularly sexy way. Two dragons fornicating, at best.

For lack of anything else to do, he attempts to straighten up a bit.

"Sorry about the…I'm not usually this much of a slob," he says, grabbing things at whim, kicking others under any nearby furniture. "Were we not meeting at the bar? Not that I mind the early drop-in, of course. As I've said. Far from it, in fact. But…well, would've made things a bit more presentable, had I known. Myself included. Would've found my other sock, at the very least. Elusive little bugger."

"This one?" Lily offers in a small voice, and James turns to find her plucking—ah. The sock, buried beneath some papers on the side table. How the hell did it get there?

James musters a grin, takes it from her.

"Well done," he praises. "Reckon I'll keep you around."

It's a mindless quip—innocent; harmless; never mind that he teases and jokes when he's nervous, and she's making him quite nervous right now—but it seems to hit her like a gruesome insult. She very nearly flinches with it.

Well. That settles that, then.

Something is wrong.

Something is definitely, indisputably, wrong.

"Lily." He takes a step closer to her, sees no reason to skirt around it. "What is it? What's the matter?"

"I—" Her face pinches. Wilts. "James…"

She doesn't manage anything more, and James's mind races with the possibilities to fill the trailing ellipses. Truthfully, there are a thousand things that could be wrong. A hundred thousand things. He's almost afraid to speculate. His barmy brain will likely go straight to the worst, and that won't serve either of them. But she can't seem to get the words out, and the uncertainty is unbearable.

He can't just stand here in the silence. It's simply not in him.

"Has someone found out? About us?" It's his best guess. Merlin, if she's gotten in trouble for it—sacked, even—he'll feel awful. Beyond awful. He prays that's not it. "Or…is this about Dalton? Has that all gone to shit? Can't say I'm surprised, but…no? Are you in trouble at the paper, then? Something about the article?" More silence. James is beginning to grow frustrated. "Lily…give me something, will you? Whatever it is—"

"No. Please. It's none of—" She stops again, sucks in a short breath. She shakes her head jerkily. "It's none of that."

"Then what?"

"I…it's—"

"It's…?"

"James…"

"What—"

"I fucked up," she finally—incomprehensibly—says. Her hands immediately cover her face. Her shoulders slump. "James, I'm so…God. I—"

Fucked up?

James blinks, stares at her. She's said it so forlornly, so miserably, but he doesn't know what it means. What any of it means. "What?"

"I…" The hands run down her face. He's never seen her this distraught. One hand stops tight and clenched against her heaving abdomen. The rest of her is shaking like a leaf in the wind. "I'm so…I'm so sorry. I've been running ragged all afternoon, trying…trying…but it's my fault. I think it's my fault. I fucked up. I'm so—so—"

"Lily." She's not making any sense, but he can't just stand there while she's collapsing in on herself. He grabs hold of her arms, feels her trembling beneath his fingers. She halfheartedly attempts to shake him off, protests despondently, but he won't let her. He guides her toward the nearby armchair instead, shoving a pile of correspondence to the floor before forcing her to perch on the plush cushion. He kneels down with her. He's still holding the stupid sock. He drops it to the ground. "Lily, look at me. Breathe. We'll sort it, whatever it is. What do you think is your fault?"

Her bright gaze skips over his face, like she's trying to crack some code, maybe trying to memorize it. It's unnerving, to say the least. He brushes a hand over her hair as her mouth opens and closes without result. In the end, she simply reaches into the pocket of her dress and pulls out a folded piece of parchment. She holds it out to him silently.

He recognises it immediately.

It's the note. The one from earlier.

James drops his hand from her hair to take it. Slowly, eyeing her carefully, he flips it open to read.

Potter to Falmouth?

Moors meet w/ FF set tomorrow AM. Puddlemere won't confirm.

Fal says you—what do you know? To press AM.

James reads it once. Twice. It blurs a bit in front of his eyes.

Potter to Falmouth.

Moors meet w/ FF set tomorrow AM.

Fal says you.

It's mostly Mermish to him. What's not Mermish is…

No.

No, no, no, no.

"'Potter to Falmouth'?" It's his name. A team. He can process that much at least. James looks up at her, stares like he's searching for answers in her dusting of freckles. His mouth is dry. Maybe he's shaking, too. "I'm not going to Falmouth. I've never even spoken to Falmouth. There's no spot with Falmouth."

"Marcie York," Lily rasps quietly, and then swallows hard. "She's signed with the Harpies."

"No." James's brain is skittering at the edge of the cliff. Trainers scrambling for purchase. Dirt clumps sputtering into the air. Earth shifting beneath him. "That's…that's rumour. She's holding out for a higher renewal contract. Everyone's been talking about it."

Lily shakes her head. "It's not rumour. She signed two days ago."

That can't be right. It doesn't make any…but then James recalls Marcie strolling into the locker room late on Day Four. Recalls her looking mighty self-satisfied, though everyone had assumed that meant she'd successfully managed to leverage herself a pay raise, or at the very least a higher re-sign bonus. She hadn't confirmed…but then, she wouldn't.

Her leaving will be a bruising Bludger to the Falcons' offense. Theirs is a three-player production, and losing one arm of the Chasing trio is not going to be easy to replace. The front office must be in a blind panic. As far as James knows, no one actually imagined Marcie would leave.

But that has fuck-all to do with him…hasn't it?

"I don't understand." He needs to be on his feet. Needs to move. He does so, skittishly, restlessly. Now he's definitely starting to shake. "Even if she has done…what's that do to…why…"

Lily stands, too. Slowly, with weighted care, she asks, "Do you remember my mate? The one who made the poultice for your shoulder?"

I have a mate who's a trainer with Falmouth.

I fucked up.

Fal says you.

James's heart begins to pound. "Lily…"

"I'm so…I never meant—" She steps toward him, face twisting with torment. "She's my friend. We were just talking. She told me about Marcie. She knew I was doing the article on you. Your name had come up during discussions in the office, but everyone assumed it was a dead end. That you were set on Puddlemere. She only asked…she only asked what I thought. If there was any chance you might ever consider…if it was even worth reaching out. And I…I said…"

She trails off, but James hardly needs her to finish. It is now, with sad clarity, terribly obvious what she must have said. He sinks down upon the bed behind him, his entire body rioting. His elbows press hard into his thighs. He drops his head into his hands.

Shit, shit, shit.

"Fucking…Lily…"

"I only told her to make the offer!" Lily defends desperately, and James can hear the anguish in her voice, the regret weeping from it, everything. But he can't process it. Can't process any of it. "I swear, that's all I said! I didn't tell her you'd accept. I didn't even tell her you were interested! I just said she should tell the team to extend the branch. To—to just—try—"

"Why?" James shouts, because now he's angry. Actually, properly angry. His hands tremble. His voice rattles. It's trampling through him like a hippogriff stampede and he can't stop it. "Why the hell would you tell them that? You know what I want. Puddlemere. Have we not spent the past fucking six days talking about how much I want Puddlemere?"

"I know. We have. I just—"

"Just what? Thought you knew better? Thought you'd put yourself in the bloody middle?"

"No!" She's frantically shaking her head. "That's not…I had no idea it would go this far! I have no bloody idea how Puddlemere even found out. Or that they'd somehow take it as a strange point of betrayal that you'd even consider other offers. How it somehow got so misconstrued…it just…spiraled…I don't know—"

"You work in this sport," James states coldly. "You know how it works. It always gets out. Rumour is all that's needed. You know the way these things get twisted. You're hardly fucking new to this, Lily!"

"I know. I know." She doesn't even try to argue it. She bites her lip, squeezes her eyes shut. "I'm so… James, I'm so sorry. I never…"

"So that's it, then?" He feels a burning in his stomach. In his throat. Merlin love him, it could be his eyes. Maybe he's about to sob like a toddler, right here and now, one-socked useless bastard that he is. Wouldn't that just be the prime topping on this shit tower of a mess? He glances down at the note again. The words are looking wobbly. "'Moors meet w/ FF set tomorrow AM'? So that's that? Puddlemere's going with Greta Moors?"

He waits for the nod. Knows it's coming. Expects it to be coming. He doesn't know who wrote the note—someone called Hopper, he recalls. Bloody stupid name—but he's clearly a source. A reliable source. Lily Evans, Junior Quidditch Correspondent Extraordinaire, would not have anything less than an utterly reliable source.

Which meant…

Fuck.

She's too kind to make him wait. The answer is already there, in plain black and white, for both of them to see. And yet, despite all that…when he gets it—the nod—broken and slow, with Lily looking as if she might want to have a bit of a cry too…it hits James like a sudden, swift punch to the gut.

Right.

That's it, then.

It's over.

Over.

Again.

"Eleven A.M.," Lily whispers, her voice barely above hearing. "She's scheduled to meet with them while you have your match tomorrow. And they're…they're apparently calling you in at three. If you…if you haven't heard yet."

James lets out a choked, bitter laugh.

If he hasn't heard yet. Ha. Right. Hasn't heard. Quite obviously, he hasn't heard.

A sudden, vicious daydream pops into his cloudy head—what his reaction might have been if he'd heard Puddlemere wanted to meet with him tomorrow without knowing all the rest. Without knowing they were meeting with Greta first. It's painful even to contemplate, because James imagines nothing less than blind exuberance. He imagines getting the call from Hoff, running around this messy hotel room, grinning and dancing and pumping his fists like a damn lunatic. He imagines going to meet Lily and the lads at the Cornish Pixie afterward. Greeting Lily with a huge, overenthusiastic kiss. Buying old Hurley an extra three rounds on him. The whole dive, round after round on him. Getting rip and roaring drunk with his mates and his girl, because what did it matter if he played like a damn rubbish heap the next day? He was being signed by Puddlemere. Finally. Two years later. Finally.

He's such a ponce.

Such a complete and utter daydreaming ponce.

"Well, that's…that's just brilliant," he manages, biting off the words. "Perfect. Bloody perfect."

She makes a sound of protest, but James can't look at her. It will hurt to look at her. Mostly because part of him still wants to curl at her feet and wail out his anguish while she somehow attempts to make it better.

And isn't that just bloody perfect, too?

"James…"

"No. This is my fault. I lost sight of it. Let myself get distracted. This is my fault."

"It is not—"

He glances up at her. Immediately regrets it. "You're pleased though, right?"

"I'm—what?" Green eyes blink at him, perturbed. "Of course I'm not—what is that supposed to mean?"

"You never thought I should be after Puddlemere." Shut up, she already feels terribly enough. This isn't helping. You're being an arse. "You've thought it was the wrong choice from the start. Haven't bothered to hide it all that well, honestly. That's why you told your mate to let Falmouth offer in the first place, isn't it? You wanted me to consider it."

Lily opens her mouth. Closes it.

"That's not…" She sucks in a harsh breath. "This isn't what I wanted."

"No?" James scoffs. He can't stop it. "Please."

"No matter what I think of Puddlemere, of any of it, this"—Lily gestures around them—"is never what I wanted. James. You can't possibly think—"

"Can't I?"

It's a barbed taunt. A jagged one. He's wounded her with it, as he'd meant to. She flinches, her pretty face going blank. "James…"

She needs to stop saying his name. Needs to stop saying anything at all. He stands, compelled to move, to pace. He wants to get away from this. From her. He needs to think. He can't think when she's near. That might have been the problem all along. And now he needs to figure out what the fuck he's going to do…now that it's all gone.

Gone.

Fuck.

And while part of him knows (knows) this isn't her fault, not really—she didn't do it deliberately, never would have done, couldn't have figured it would all shift this way—he cannot be that logical right now. He tries, but it all fades out into the disappointment, the defeat, the resentment…it's a deep black hole sucking him in and he can't shake it. None of it.

"You should go," he tells her, and the words sound cold and dull, even to his own ears. "I'm not…I'm not going to be kind right now, and I don't want to say something I'll regret."

She pales visibly at that. "Like what?"

It's not worth considering. It'll only give him ideas. The deep black hole does not need any more ideas. "Just…go, Lily. Please."

"Wait." She moves toward him, hand outstretched. "James…I don't want to leave it like this. I know—I know I don't…but if you'd just—"

"No." He jerks away. He doesn't want to be touched. He already feels like his mind is on a high-speed broom he doesn't remember mounting, and it's too much. "I can't 'just' anything. Go, Lily. I'm asking you to go. You're not going to get what you want this time."

"Stop saying that!" she rails. "This is not what I wanted! You know this isn't what I wanted! You're not being fair—"

"Fair?" James almost laughs it. "Fair. Oh, that's rich. Because so muchof this is fair."

"Well, that's half the bloody point, isn't it?" she snaps out angrily before she can catch herself. He whips around to face her, but she's already clammed back up. The flash of fury is gone. Her face is merely pinker. She presses her lips together in a dark, grim line, then sighs, fitting her shoulders back. A regal martyr, like bloody Marie Antionette atop the scaffold. "Fine. You're right. I'm sorry. I'll…I'll go. I—"

"No. You don't get to leave on that." He stalks toward her. "Finish what you were going to say. What's half the bloody point?"

The queen shakes her head. "It doesn't matter."

"I'll be the judge of that."

"James."

"What? Silent now, are you?"

"That—"

"LILY EVANS: REPORTER, INTERFERER, COWARD."

She gasps. Never call a Gryffindor out on their honour. It's the lowest of blows. James is cross enough to do it anyway, in the most spiteful, petulant way.

It gets him his answer. He wishes he felt better for it.

"You—God. Fine. You want the truth?" The pink of her cheeks burns red. Her green eyes spit fire at him. "Fair? Do you know what's truly not fair? This…fucked up, mind-boggling game Puddlemere's been playing with you—that you've been letting them play with you." She marches on him with every word, finger jabbed at his chest. "Honestly, what kind of club makes roster decisions on this kind of bloody whim? Who the hell has ever heard of dropping a player because he may have shown interest in some other team after weeks—months—of having been toyed with like a cat after string? Who puts himself in that position to be toyed with?"

"I'm not being toyed with," James defends hotly. "This is the politics of the sport. It's how things are. Don't be naïve—"

"I'm being naïve?" Lily laughs humourlessly. "James. Are you kidding?"

"No, I'm—"

"You are the single biggest player on the market right now. You broke scoring records in your rookie seasons. Half of the bloody sport is here at this dull exhibition just to see what you do." She's glaring fiercely at him now, her fists clenched. "You have all the power here, and if you didn't have so much stupid pride wrapped up in this nonsense with Puddlemere, you damn well would have opened your eyes and realised that by now!"

They're compliments, at the base level. Some part of James registers that, might be pleased at some other time, in some other place. But she's wielding them like serrated shrapnel, and he feels them hit as such—cutting and biting and deadly.

He shakes his head, firm as granite. "You don't understand."

"What don't I understand?" she asks. "That you've had this hard-on for Puddlemere for years? That you've stupidly let them know it? That they treated you horribly two years ago, are treating you even more horribly now, and yet you've somehow continued to let them, like the kicked dog slinking back to his master thinking he'll suddenly get affection?"

Well, that certainly isn't a compliment.

"Lovely, Lily," James mutters coolly. "A kicked dog. Flattering."

"You don't need to be flattered. You need to be slapped up the head." She looks as if she might be open to volunteering to give it to him, but she keeps talking instead. "Do you know what the worst part about all of it is, though? The truly worst, most awful part?" Her lips pinch. "Even if you got what you wanted—even if Puddlemere deigned to select you after all this…this…utter bullshit…you would be so fucking miserable and you don't even realiseit."

What is she even…Christ. James is starting to feel a bit more like that kicked dog now, but he can't seem to stop coming back for more. He's an utter masochist. Or he's got too much pride to let her go on as if she's already won the argument.

She's wrong. So wrong.

"What's that mean?" he bites. "You don't even know what you're talking about."

"Why has Helen Dare left the team after only two seasons?" Lily challenges. "She broke her contract, you know. She was signed for four."

She was signed for four?

James hadn't known that. Not…exactly.

"She has that wrist thing," he offers stiltedly, evasively. "She…I don't know. What does it matter?"

"Because Puddlemere's offense is a two-man show," Lily shoots back. "And this spot they have on offer? This third position you're so bloody desperate for?" She snorts. "At best, it's a lowly back-up singer."

She's mixing her metaphors now, but James still recoils, nonplussed. "What are you on about? That is not—"

"Dawson and Leeds have been playing together for nearly a decade." She crosses her arms over her chest, tossing out the fact. "They have their strategies set, have for years, and they're paid too bloody much and have been at this too bloody long to change that now. Gebhardt was a content third for so long because he played his best as an assist Chaser, but Helen Dare—and you—" she emphasizes, "deserve so much better than to fly around up there, match after match, acting like a two-bit opening sideshow to someone else's carnival."

Oh, for Merlin's sake.

Now he's a two-bit sideshow?

James wishes—truly wishes—the witch wasn't such a writer. The words paint an effective, unflattering picture, and everything in him rebels against it.

"That's…simplistic at best," he condemns, because he doesn't need her input to make him feel like a clown—not when he's already quite convinced he's the rubbish butt of a very bad, very long joke. "I mean, yes, Dawson and Leeds are…but the whole point of bringing on new players is to shake up a strategy! It might take a bit to find a new stride, but—"

"They don't want a new stride! They want a pretty face they can sell until Dawson or Leeds gets tired or injured, at which point maybe—maybe—they'll let you play the way you ought have been from the start. The way you deserve. How do you not see that?"

Because there was nothing to see. She is desperate, wild-eyed and adamant, but he's vehement too. She's plucking details and history and reordering them in her own way—so like a bloody journalist—and James isn't buying this story. He's strumming up his Letter to the Editor, cancelling his subscription, burning the pages in a metal rubbish bin, and using the fire to warm the heated ire of his staunch righteousness. He isn't deluded enough to think she was pulling this all from nothing—Dawson and Leeds were a two-man offense, but the idea that the club would recruit him to play arbitrary handmaiden to their veterans' highborn whims was ludicrous and small-minded.

She just didn't get it. She was biased, ill-informed, couldn't see the forest for the trees.

"Were you even listening to yourself this morning? When you were talking to Sam Lockley?" she asks next, taking a step closer, talking even quicker. "James…you love to play with a team. You positively thrive on it. Marcie York and Padrig Dooster both play on three-man offenses. Falmouth and Kenmare train their Chasers that way. That's why you've been having so much fun out there this week, when you've gotten out of your head long enough to enjoy it. You are not going to get that with Puddlemere. You won't."

James is through with this. He doesn't need to hear it anymore. "That is not—"

"Yes, it is!" she cries, and catches his arm. He glares down at her hold, but she doesn't let go. Refuses to relent. She will not be dissuaded."It's exactly like that, and if you'd just think about it for a second, you'd see I'm right. For Merlin's sake, Puddlemere's already proven they're willing to cast you aside at the smallest transgression—and now you're willing to play last fiddle on the pitch, as well? For what?" She huffs, shakes her head. "Just to salve your wounded pride from the blister of their last rejection? To teach them a lesson about passing you up the first time around? Prove that you can make them want you? That's done, James. You've wonthat battle a dozen times over. But you seem to be the only one too blind to see that!"

"This is all a really fine assessment, Miss Evans," James intones flatly, bristling, burning. He wrenches his arm from her grasp, feels the scald of her touch, even now. "So glad you're suddenly the expert on everything I want and need. Six days and one paltry interview later. That's all Lily Evans requires to have my whole fucking life figured out, hm?"

"I didn't say that," Lily objects. "I'm only telling you—"

"Telling me what? That you know better than I do? That I can't see beyond my own pierced ego? And why now? If you were so ruddy certain about all of this—could peg me and my trussed-up pride so incalculably from the start—you didn't think it was worth having a bloody conversation about? Before taking matters into your own hands and selling me off to Falmouth?"

"I wasn't selling you off to Falmouth!" she cries, and James knows it's true, that she never meant for it to happen that way. But the argument is falling flatter now. Everything is falling flatter. There's a faint buzzing in his ears. "I told you—"

"It doesn't matter what you told me," he cuts in tiredly, because suddenly he is tired. So damn tired. He rubs at his eyes beneath his glasses. "None of this…I don't even know why we're arguing about it. None of it is relevant. It's over. Puddlemere's gone. I don't…I don't want to talk about it anymore. It won't fix it. Puddlemere's gone."

And there it is: the unbreakable truth at the root of all this. The bleak reality at the end of whatever runaround war of wills they've now found themselves in—this battered land of good intentions and bitter results and whatever else can be carefully salvaged from his wayward field of tattered dreams. James doesn't want to row anymore. He doesn't have it in him. Underneath it all, she is undeniably right about one thing: James is nothing if not his pride. She's challenged it, dented it, left it scuffed on the floor being stomped over by her hustling feet, and he's smarting too much already to stand here begging for more. She's reducing his whole bloody career to some vague assumptions that she's made, some middling game of cat and mouse, of spurned offers and blind egotism, and everything in him objects to the affront, but he's at a loss of what can be gained in fighting it.

She isn't right. That, he absolutely knows, because she can't possibly be right. But he's not certain what kind of victory comes from proving that to her.

He's honestly got nothing left to prove to her.

"James." She's tired, too. Dented. Scuffed. In all the rowing, her hair has toppled down around her shoulders. Her dress is wrinkled. Her eyes are dull and desperate. It's yet more ways they're evenly matched, but James isn't certain what to do with that anymore.

So he doesn't even try. He shakes his head instead.

"Lily…I just…"

She doesn't make him go on. She stiffens a bit. Nods. Seems to understand what he—even now—can't quite bring himself to request again.

"Right. I'll…I'm going to go." She tilts up her chin, takes it with dignity. She's all dignity, Lily Evans is, even now, in this. He watches her take the tentative step forward. A second. A third. She's cleared part of the room and comes to a stop beside him, and James wants to reach out and grab her hand, say I don't know how to make this right yet. I don't know what's happened here. It's all gone to hell so quickly. Let me figure out how to make it right and then we can just…but he can't even finish the sentence in his thoughts. Because he doesn't know. They can just…what? It's all turned so quickly and he hasn't had time to catch up. She's said too much and he knows too little and if they keep at this like that, James knows he'll do or say something stupid. Something cruel or belittling or…whatever it would be. She doesn't deserve that. She's wrong—Merlin, she's done so much wrong here—but she doesn't deserve that. It doesn't need to end that way.

Fucking hell, he doesn't want it to end that way.

Doesn't want it to end at all. Period.

But he can't bloody think.

And, in the end, he doesn't know if he can trust her.

Damn it, how is he supposed to trust her?

"You—" She pushes out the word, still standing there beside him, unable to properly speak, but apparently unwilling to move yet either. He glances down at her—Lily Evans, Junior Quidditch Correspondent, pretty and perfect and…pulverizing his life. "James, you are the best player—the best person—I have ever…" She swallows that. Shakes her head. "I am so sorry," she whispers instead. "I took this from you. I didn't mean to…but somehow I did anyway, and I am so sorry that I didn't…that I didn't talk to you before, that you didn't get the chance to…" Her hand touches him. Only for a moment. A second. But it's enough. "You will never understand how sorry I am," she finishes. "For all of it. I just…I want you to know that."

She rises up, busses an impossibly light kiss against his cheek.

I know, he wants to say, because he does.

I'll fix this, he'd insist, but he's rather certain he can't.

You can't be right, because I don't know what it would mean if I were wrong.

It's gone. It's gone and you took it and I'm not getting it back.

Don't go.

He wants to say so much of this—all of it, more—but he can't even manage a word. And before his mouth can muster out a paltry syllable, Lily is already past him, out the door, and closing it behind her.