Olive

Chapter 1

Disclaimer - James and Lily are not my characters, though I sorely wish that they were.

The first time Lily meets him, it's on the night she's destined to break up with her boyfriend of six months. Quite ironically.

Brandon is the one who's made the reservation, of course. He did it in front of his friends, never one to miss an opportunity to show off what a wonderful, lovely person he is.

Lily knows otherwise.

She's seen it coming for a while now, the breakup that is. Brandon was never as tiresome as he's become now obviously, but Lily has to admit that she'd never seen much potential in him to begin with. It was only because he'd seemed so sweet initially, someone really willing to try for her. She thought she could possibly overlook his gaping lack of personality and dullness.

She could snort at that now.

He tried as much as a sloth, perhaps even worse.

He forgot her birthday, made her cancel her plans for him and slept with his shoes on.

And despite being quite well off himself, Lily almost always found herself paying his bills, even on dates.

She didn't mind it all that much, given that she was quite the strong, head-fast modern woman, a firm believer of gender equality and shared responsibilities and whatnot. But she'd once seen money in his wallet when he'd claimed to have had none on him at that moment, and that was just absurd.

Lily hated liars.

Money was the least of her issues though. Brandon was phony to boot—he almost never texted her, and she was quite sure he didn't actually care for her either. He just loved boasting about her around his friends, often heard him say 'oh I can't take my eyes off her sometimes, she's so beautiful', which might have warmed Lily's heart if it weren't for the fact that she could sense the falseness in his voice from miles away.

It was inevitable.

Destiny, some might say.

So that night, when Lily enters some fancy ass restaurant named Elia, one she's sure Brandon's friends had been boasting about, she isn't the least bit surprised by the events that follow.

No sooner have they seated themselves on the posh-looking chairs that Brandon turns to her with comically wide eyes as if the thought has just occurred to him now, when they're already inside and a server is walking towards their table purposefully, and says, "Shoot! I forgot my wallet again. I swear I get clumsier by the day. Would you be a doll and take care of the cheque tonight, Lily? I promise to pay you back."

She pastes a sweetly-sick smile on her face, one which any bloke who knows a whit about her would see it for what it was. A red signal. "Sure," she replies.

But Brandon remains oblivious, seemingly satisfied with having gotten that out of the way, and goes back to his phone, his conversation with Lily apparently over for the night.

Lily glares daggers at him, feeling her red-headed temper rush to her head. But then she takes a deep breath and turns to the waiter standing patiently near their table…

Only to find the most alluring pair of hazel eyes she's ever seen staring back at her with amusement.

The blood from her head suddenly rushes to her cheeks, heating her face. Lily blinks. And blinks again.

As if doing that would somehow prove that her eyes were being deceitful and he's not the most handsome man she's ever encountered.

"Good evening, ma'am," he greets her, his voice just as amused as his eyes and sending all sorts of wrong feelings to her stomach. Wrong because she's quite sure the sensations aren't at all normal to be induced in her within a five second span.

He looks to be in his early twenties, around her own age, give or take a year. He wears a pair of rectangular shaped glasses, his body lean, almost a little lanky, but unfairly fit. His hair though…it's like nothing she's ever seen—a chaotic mess of black strands which just beg to touched and pulled and…

Lily coughs then, realizing that she's been staring openly and feels mortified when his lips tilt up into a smirk. "Good evening," she finally replies.

"What would you like to have?"

Lily hums contemplatively, scanning the menu for a while before responding. "I'll go with—"

"Bring a plate of the garlic and butter lobster along with a plate of risotto," Brandon says loudly, cutting her off.

Lily rolls her eyes, long used to such behavior from him. It's not even that he does it maliciously; he's just never paying enough attention to care about what she wants.

"What would you like to have, then?" The waiter speaks again, even louder, not even acknowledging Brandon's presence, and Lily's head snaps to him in surprise. Her jaw drops open, as does Brandon's.

But the man continues to stare at her with a pleasant smile, as if nothing out of the ordinary has happened, and Lily can't help it.

She laughs.

It's only a single burst of uncontrolled laughter, but it's enough.

He grins back at her, revealing a breathtakingly-scrummy dimple on his left cheek and a set of perfect white teeth. It's almost enough to make her disregard Brandon's offended gasp as he turns to her.

Almost.

So Lily schools her features back to normal, trying to look sober for his sake, but she can't find it in herself to be quite as contrite as she should be. "Sorry," she tells Brandon feelingly, and then turns to the waiter, keeping her voice smooth, "And I'll have a grilled chicken salad with extra olives, please."

The man notes down her order with an enigmatic smile on his face. "Interesting," he murmurs, so low that Lily isn't sure she actually heard it.

But before she can ask him what he means, Brandon cuts her off.

"What's your name?" He all but snarls, glaring at the man. Lily's eyebrows shoot up at his tone. "I ought to complain to your manager—treating your customers with disrespect like that! Just see if I don't."

The man frowns. "James Potter," he replies, his voice sounding bored despite his irate expression.

Lily bites her lip, really unwilling to create a scene at the restaurant, and—though she doesn't want to admit it to herself—not wanting this stupidly reckless yet absolutely charming man to get into trouble because of Brandon, of all people.

So she shakes her head, placing her hand gently on Brandon's, and forcing him to look at her. He pauses in his gloating, his satisfied smirk of 'ha! I've got you now!' slipping away as he turns to her. "Let's just leave it," she whispers to him.

To her surprise though, Brandon shakes her hand off, huffing out an annoyed breath. "No I can't just 'leave it', Lily! This—this lowly waiter dared to insult me!"

Lily's eyes flit worriedly over, but James Potter looks completely unbothered, staring back at Brandon dryly. He catches her eye then, and though Lily might have imagined it, she's quite sure he winks at her.

Dear God.

Her face burning, she quickly looks back at Brandon, who seems to not have noticed what just transpired. Lily isn't surprised. "I'm sure he didn't mean it, Brandon, you don't have to be quite so rude—"

"I'm being rude?" He all but screeches, blue eyes narrowing, and Lily feels her irritation growing. Granted, she understands that his pride was wounded, but Lily can't sympathize with him, not really. Not after having spent evenings upon evenings being ignored for his friends and his phone.

Someone coughs loudly, and Lily looks up to find James looking uncomfortable now, clearly realizing this was not something he wanted to be witnessing. She felt embarrassed too, face reddening again.

"Can we have two glasses of Merlot, please?" she asks for his benefit, and he smiles at her in relief.

"Sure, I'll get it right away," he replies, and Lily knows well enough that his 'right away' is probably closer to 'never, thanks'. She expects him to bolt immediately, but to her surprise, he half-turns towards Brandon, and though she can see that it pains him to do so, he apologizes to her boyfriend.

"I'm sorry for my rude behavior, sir," he says and simply walks away upon not getting a response. Lily's certain she catches him rolling his eyes once he's turned away, and has to rein in her laughter again.

"What a ponce," Brandon barks, capturing her attention again, and she frowns.

"He apologized," Lily says patiently.

"Ha! He had to. I had him by the throat."

"Or maybe he was just doing the right thing. Selflessly," Lily grits out, sipping on water from her glass.

"Why are you taking his side, Lily?" Brandon asks, frowning.

She raises her eyebrows at him. "I'm not taking his side, I'm just being reasonable. You're dragging this on unnecessarily."

"I'm your boyfriend! You should be agreeing with me, no matter what!"

Lily wants to really let him have it then. Should be he says.

"I'm surprised you're even bothering to convince me right now," is what she says instead. "Regardless, if you'd bothered to know me at all, Brandon, you'd know that that's not the kind of person I am."

"What's gotten your knickers into a twist today?" He says bitterly.

And then she loses it.

Her green eyes flash in anger as she looks at him, and Brandon has the good sense to look worried. She can see that he wants to take back his words, but it's too late now. "First of all,I've had my knickers in a twist for quite a while now, but you wouldn't know, would you? And second of all, what's stuck up your arse, Brandon? Why does it feel so bad when you're treated the same way that you treat others?"

"I don't understand what you mean—"

"I mean how you're the biggest hypocrite I've ever met!" Lily fumes, "You've spent all this time talking over me, ignoring my presence, except when you're not busy flaunting me to your friends like I'm an object and not a living, breathing person. And the worst part is that you don't see any of it! Don't see how it's wrong and hurtful."

"Now, listen here, Lily, I'm not—"

"And," she holds her hand up, stopping his no-doubt unintelligible argument, "I saw you leave your wallet in the car deliberately, so don't pretend otherwise."

She has him there. She knows that he knows it when his face flushes horribly and he sputters, flustered. "I—I didn't—I must've forgotten—"

Lily's loud sigh breaks him off though. "It's over, Brandon. It has been for a while."

"What?!" He squawks, having the audacity to actually look surprised. Lily wants to laugh at his face. "You can't just—just—"

"You don't even love me! We just don't work, don't you see it?"

"We could. We really could," He says meekly then, not even bothering to deny her accusation. They both know it's true.

Lily sighs again, gentler this time, and gives him a sad smile. "I'm sorry, Brandon. You're a nice guy, but we're just not right for each other."

"I understand," he replies, and Lily really hopes that he doesn't cry because she wouldn't know what to do then.

To her relief though, he stands up, gives her an awkward nod, turns around and leaves.

Just like that.

She stares at his retreating back for a while, stumped, before falling back against her chair with a relieved giggle. God, what a strange man she was dating. She couldn't believe she'd held on for as long as she had.

Lily suddenly feels her spirits lift, and with a cheerful smile on her lips, she picks her phone and dials a number, deciding that she doesn't want to be alone tonight.

She wants to celebrate.

A/N - Hello, lovely people! I'm back from the dead. Please do leave some reviews for me on this chapter, and tell me how you like it so far.

Lots of love,

Claudia