Jily Oneshots (pt2)

In it For Me

by mppmaraudergirl on archiveofourown.org

Going through a break-up is never pleasant.

Being famous when your long-time beau shatters your heart into a million glittering pieces that paint every social media platform, gossip site, and tabloid red with the gory remnants? It is the cost of being in Hollywood.

Having only one or two trusted confidants with whom you feel comfortable enough to show the rough jagged parts of your heartache? It is the unfortunate truth about being in the business of acting.

Finding out your ex-boyfriend, two months later, is now engaged to a fucking model? Finding this out on Twitter no less? It is beyond the worst nightmare one could dream up.

You okay? comes the tentative message from her oldest—and only—friend Mary.

Fucking incredible Lily replies, never having felt further from incredible than she does at the present moment, half debating shucking her phone across the room.

It is a well-practiced rule to not even check social media but Lily’s never been one to follow the rules, and her thumb continues its scrolling through the trending hashtags. Her stomach drops when she sees #TwoForPrew trending. Gideon and Fabian Prewett, famous twin actors and Lily’s close friends from the movie saga she is filming, are just a month away from their double wedding. She has tried not to think much about the wedding since she and Amos Diggory—her plus one—broke up.

Now the prospect of going to the wedding alone sinks her chest with renewed weight. The hits keep on coming.

I have an idea, says Mary in her next text message, followed quickly by But you’re not going to like it.

***

“Can you stay out of the tabloids for a month? A month would—”

“You have reached the voicemail of James Potter—”

“Do not even think about it, Potter,” comes Minerva McGonagall’s waspish reply. “You can find a new manager if that is how you are going to react to my calls.”

James sighs. “I’m sorry, Minnie. I’ve tired of hearing about it.”

“Then imagine how tired I am fielding inquiries from all of your existing and future producers.” Minerva meets his sigh with an exasperated exhale of her own. “We need to do damage control, James. A reputation of volatility and being difficult to work with can—and will—blacklist you from the projects you want to do, if not ruin your career entirely.”

“You know it was nothing to do with me and everything to do with Um—”

“Of course, I understand, James. But not many share the same opinion as you, and we must act according to that.”

James ruffles a hand through his hair. “What are you suggesting, Minerva?”

“To start,” says Minerva, voice still tight with something unspoken, “we give them something else to talk about.”

***

The second time Lily Evans meets James Potter, it is in a private dining room of one of the most frequented restaurants by Hollywood’s actors, The Stix.

Lily dresses the part, a light floral dress, pulled in at the waist with a generous neckline—the type of dress one might wear to a date.

Because that is what this is, at least to anyone who bears witness to it. A date.