The Marauders: Year Five #Wattys2017

Throwing Stones

Throwing Stones

It seemed like it had only been minutes since he'd fallen asleep when James felt Bubo's beak pulling at his ear lobe to wake him up. He tried waving her off at first, but she was relentless, and finally he'd rolled over and Bubo had dropped a letter onto the bed beside him. It was in Lily Evans's handwriting and a leap of excitement twisted James's stomach and he grabbed it up, tearing open the envelope with a rush of joy. He couldn't imagine what she would possibly have sent him - but it was enough to get his blood pumping just seeing the curl of the J in his name in her writing. So he took the parchment out of the envelope, and he shook it out quickly, his heart thumping with expectations... and his eyes hastened to go over the letter:

Dear James,
I know what you did.
I can't believe how terrible a mistake I almost made, falling for your charm! A load of lies and pretty magic. You're a horrible person, and until things change I don't know that I can even look at you. I'm so angry!
Lily Evans

He stared at it, positively dumbfounded. If she hadn't have dated it in the top corner, he would've wondered if Bubo had somehow lost this letter from some time ago and perhaps this was something out of context. His hand shook and he wondered what had changed her mind about him this time. What had he done?

And even as he thought the words, he knew.

"Snape," he whispered.

James Potter stood in the snow outside of Lily Evans's house, his trainers soaked through and his nose red from the frigid air. It was so cold that his breath hung before him in great billowing puffs and he patted his hands together to stay warm. He stared up at the window that he was fairly certain was Lily's, and looked up as Bubo landed on his shoulder. "Here," he said to the owl as she clicked her beak around the note he held out to her, "Deliver this up there to Evans."

The bird took off from his shoulder and circled 'round about him for a moment before landing on exactly the window sill he'd been staring at and pecked her beak against the glass. James stared up, rubbing his fingers together and blowing his breath between them.

It was early - possible that Evans wasn't even up yet. The sun was barely up, for that matter, but he'd received that letter from Lily the night before, and James Potter had not slept a single wink that night for all the sickness in his stomach. James had been thinking about what Sirius Black had said about how mental he was for not kissing Evans when he had the chance - he should have done, especially now in retrospect. There was nothing to it - Severus Snape had to have lied to her about what happened. It was so obvious to him. But he had the proof that Snape had attacked him all over his face in great bruises and the cut lip. He knew it looked bad - his mum and Sirius had both let out exclamations of horror when they'd seen it. Surely Lily Evans would understand and tell him she didn't mean all she'd written in that letter once he had the chance to explain to her what happened.

Finally, he'd just left a note for his mum and he'd snuck off before morning light to go and collect his kiss from Lily.

He just hoped she'd think it was romantic that he couldn't wait another minute.

Bubo pecked the glass again and there was a shadow that cast over the glass and there was Lily, bundling a sweater 'round her shoulders as she pulled open the window and took the note from the owl. She looked it over.

Look down.

Lily looked down. And there in the glistening snow stood James, staring up at her hopefully, his hair messy and glasses eternally crooked on his nose.