Jily one shots

how to owe a favour

disclaimer: written by Wilhelmina Willoughby

"Do you know what this class should be called? 'What Am I Even Reading?' Because, really, what is this?"

Lily rolls her eyes as Potter flops down next to her on the couch, slouching like he's got no bones left. He stares at the fire, glares at it like it's done him some great injustice, like it's the fountain from which all of his problems in life pour forth, and even though Lily would really rather him not, he keeps on. "I mean, if I wanted to do maths, I would've gone to muggle school. What's this stuff got to do with being an Auror? Or with playing Quidditch? We're in sixth year and it's only now relevant? Explain that to me, Lily Evans."

He continues on whinging as Lily scoots further away from him. It's hard to care about his Arithmancy problems when she's busy studying for Ancient Runes. It's also hard to care because it's James Potter, and he's sitting on her couch during her prime homework time, when everybody is sleeping in their dorms and the common room is quiet, and he's whinging at her, and she'd almost rather throw herself into the lake and have the merpeople take her away than listen to him whine some more.

"It's just like Divination wanted to ruin my life further so it took some numbers as disguise and hid itself as another subject."

"Mmhmm," she responds finally, going back to read the same paragraph over again.

Potter groans and pulls off his glasses. He tosses them onto the coffee table, on top of some of her notes. The movement catches Lily's eye, and she watches as he rests his forearms on his thighs, leans forward, and looks at the floor. "Numbers," he grumbles.

Lily doesn't feel bad. She doesn't. She is reading her book, and she is going to take more notes, and she is not letting his pathetic drama get to her because obviously he is exaggerating his problems to make them seem much worse than they are. It's just Arithmancy. He's ace at everything else because he sits down and studies—she's seen it happen. She's seen him spend hours hunched over Transfiguration books, seen him come back from Quidditch practice bruised and bloodied and sweating, and these things he's good at because he puts time into them. He's not good at Arithmancy because he won't sit down to learn it.

Not that she tells him this. Not that it's interrupting her studying at all, either, but the more she tells herself this, the more often she has to keep going back to the same paragraph to read it over and over again. Each time she looks at it, her eyes glance over the words, skim over the shapes of the letters and then the repetition of the lines and then it just blurs into blocks after blocks of text and, hell, it's hard to focus with a depressed Potter sitting next to her.

"I just don't want to fail," he mumbles. He runs his hands through his hair so that it all sticks straight up like he's been struck by lightning. That, and his crooked, loosed tie, and the sad curve of his lips that indicate surrender, and his dumb sad eyes—it all makes for a sad and miserable picture and maybe, if she just helps him and gets it over with, he'll leave her alone.

This is what she tells herself, anyway.

She sighs heavily and puts her book down in her lap. "Oh, for heaven's sake. I will tutor you in Arithmancy. As long as you shut up and go away after."

Potter slowly looks up at her, a gradual look of happy disbelief prickling all over his face.

"Go get your book before I change my mind," she tells him.

He jumps up. His enthusiasm is obnoxious, and she's not sure if his excitement is from the possibility of not failing his Arithmancy exam or because Lily is actually offering to help him with something without being forced to do so. "Alright," he says, putting his glasses back on before splaying his hands out in front of him, as if doing so would keep her on the couch. "Alright. I'll be right back. Don't move, don't go anywhere." And then he runs upstairs.