Chapter Text
Set Ablaze
Chapter 2
The Aftermath
Not a word of sense penetrated her mind in class that morning.
As Professor Vector droned on and on about advanced Numerology and the complex mathematics behind spellwork, topics that would’ve normally had her spine snapped straight in attention, all she could focus on was the golden light streaming in through the window near her, warm and glowing. A generous patch of brightness fell over the back of her palm, rested on the desk, stirring woeful surprise in her over the fact that such a brilliant morning could feel so acutely grey.
From her third-floor view, she could spot a group of young witches who’d braved the November breeze to have a little picnic by the lakeside. She wished she could be out there too, comfortably lost in her thoughts instead of uncomfortably lost in them in the stifling setting of a classroom.
“Lily.” A nudge on her elbow pulled her gaze away from the window and to the boy sitting next to her. Remus frowned, concern etched onto his face even as he stared straight ahead. “You alright?”
James’s closed-off expression flashed in her mind, unbidden and aching, but the lie dropped easily. “Sure.”
“Only, you’re not even pretending to pay attention,” said Remus, his mouth barely even moving. She wondered how much practice it’d taken him to perfect such a skill. “If Vector wasn’t so fond of you, she’d have called on you ten times over now.”
The truth of that statement wasn’t lost on her, but a sigh was all she could manage, fingers of her left hand carding through scalp, tugging lightly at the roots. Haptic memories of darker hair, wild and soft, gliding between the same fingers pulled her up short. “I’m just a little distracted, I guess.”
Remus hummed, not the least bit appeased. “That would explain the furious note-taking.”
A begrudging smile cracked over her face, eyes slipping to the parchment before her, inked with nothing but the date and subject name. “It’s probably the hangover.”
She’d given him the partial truth; her head hadn’t stopped pounding since she’d first embraced consciousness to find James’s arm wrapped around her, his length nudging her backside tellingly. Though the discomfort in her skull was probably more attributable to the worry and tension plaguing her thoughts than the alcohol she’d consumed at the party yesterday, the latter certainly did not help matters.
“How’s James?”
“Fine,” her voice clipped, any attempt at nonchalance falling flat. Subconsciously, she hooked her fingers around the scarf that sat around her neck, draped over the love bite that had blossomed angrily on her skin and refused to disappear under her light-toned makeup. At least the drafty weather prevented any raised eyebrows at her choice of wardrobe. “I mean, not that I’d know. I don’t keep a track of his every movement.”
“No,” Remus’s voice was carefully quiet, “but you do live with him.”
She dipped her quill into the inkpot, poised it over the parchment as if she held even the faintest idea of what to write in the first place. A dark blob dripped onto the sheet, remained bubbled up on the surface. “I had class. I left.”
“Right.”
“What’s that tone for?”
“Nothing,” he assured, eyes widening marginally. She instantly schooled back the vehemence of her frown, realizing the reaction was a pinch too cranky to be considered normal, and relaxed the grip on the quill. “Is—and please don’t get mad—is everything okay?”
The cautious tone of his question gave her pause, eyelids shutting momentarily, heart weighing a ton. “Not really.”
She didn’t have to look up to know the sad smile on his face when he spoke next. “It’s about James, isn’t it?”
A deep breath. “Yeah.”
“And I’m guessing you don’t wanna talk about it.”
“What gave it away?” She rolled her eyes.
“Honestly!” The sharp exclamation had her eyes jumping up, caught onto the displeased scowl adorning Professor Vector’s face as she stared right back at them. Several students had twisted around in their seats to observe the culprits as well. “I’ve been waiting for you two to stop your chattering for the past five minutes. If there’s something really that important, I’m sure you wouldn’t mind sharing with the class, Miss Evans. Or perhaps you, Mr Lupin?”
“Sorry, Professor,” they chorused with a wince, falling dutifully quiet.
Having given them a final glower, Vector resumed the lesson.
She waited a few moments for everyone to re-enter the trance that came along with a theory class, and then stole a quick glance at Remus, found the corner of his mouth twitching. A press of her lips concealed her own amusement, gaze darting away again, chest feeling lighter than it had all morning.
Several minutes later, when she’d almost started to find herself actually immersed in the lecture and following along, Remus silently pushed a scrap of parchment towards her on the desk with his forefinger.
A single look at it had her mind welcoming back the disquiet.
Whatever happened, I’m sure he didn’t mean it.
And therein, she mused, lay the problem.
**********
Deterioration of her mood underwent a natural progression; the gloominess shackling her heart experiencing a spike when lunch rolled around and she walked into the Great Hall possessing only a wisp of courage. Friday’s relaxed timetable had meant that she’d been able to avoid James—though certainly not the thoughts of his lips and tongue lavishing her chest—throughout the morning. She’d strategically timed her return to the dormitory; ambling back to the sixth-floor only after she was sure that James had left for his Divination class with Sirius.
She need not have worried about concocting such elaborate plans to skirt around him, however, for one glance down the Gryffindor table told her enough: he was avoiding her too.
The flash of hazel that had jumped straight from her approaching form to an empty plate on the table had her contemplating the merits of forgoing lunch for one day. Fate, it seemed, was determined to put food in her belly, however, for Mary’s brown eyes had spotted her silently debating near the doors. In hindsight, that spot hadn’t been particularly inconspicuous.
“Lily!” she called, arm waving madly in the air as she sat next to Peter. “What’re you doing? Come on over.”
Hardly left with a choice, she trudged closer to them, bookbag slung heavily on her shoulder as the clatter of utensils and boisterous voices echoed around the hall. Already having decided that she couldn’t possibly survive sitting next to James, she found herself sandwiched between Sirius and a fourth-year named Jonathan Renshaw, who looked equal parts delighted at sitting next to her and put off at being torn from the Marauders.
“Evans,” said Sirius, voice solemn as he thumped her on the back. She grunted slightly, but otherwise didn’t look up, having suddenly realized that this seat gave her an unrestricted view of James’s discomfort. “Help a mate out, would you?”
“With what?”
“Prongs, here, is hiding something, and he refuses to tell me what. A true blasphemy, if I’ve seen one!” he grumbled, no true bite behind the complaint. “Perhaps you can shed some light on it, or at least get him to fess up.”
Something churned in her stomach, a combination of nerves and nausea that had her eyes dragging up, looking across the table despite every logical cell in her body demanding otherwise. Surprise zapped through her—though she didn’t understand why—to find James staring back, gaze hard. “Drop it, Padfoot,” he said, not even looking Sirius’s way.
A breath, tight and silent, rose out of her with the effort to keep looking at him. It was inexplicable what the fact that he hadn’t shared anything with even Sirius did to her; she was relieved and disappointed alike, unable to decide whether it was a sign that he regretted the previous night entirely or couldn’t bear to voice the events for the same reasons as her. Reasons, it turned out, that she couldn’t articulate herself.
Any such deep introspection on the matter was tossed out the window when James pursed his mouth, went back to his food. Suddenly, all she could see, focus, and think about were his fingers, long and steady as they held a fork, bent over a knife, cut through whatever he ate, and she was in no state to check what exactly that was. The way his forefinger lay flat against the handle, thumb supporting from the other end, middle fingers curled to the side, had heat climbing up from somewhere deep inside her, making the air swelter. It was ridiculous; an act as innocent as eating shouldn’t have had her recalling the way those hands had gripped onto her hips, fingers dipping inside her, pulling out, coated in wetness up to knuckles. But the shouldn’t have did not translate into reality, for she was doubtlessly recalling those events now, recalling much more than was appropriate in company.
“You alright, Lily?” asked Peter, mid-chew. At his question, everyone’s heads swivelled to look at her, and the flush that had stolen over her face didn’t support the indifference she tried to portray.
“Fine,” she answered, voice only slightly raspy, and pretended not to notice Mary’s suspicious gaze. Thankfully, Remus sat on Sirius’s other side, unable to level any knowing glances her way. “Still a little hungover, I suppose.”
“Completely worth it!” Sirius cheered. “Wasn’t it, Prongs?”
James looked up, jaw set with a sort of gravitas that the jovially posed question definitely did not warrant. “Worth it,” he answered, almost quiet, as if he’d allowed some secret to drop from his lips. He might as well have done just that, she thought, if the way her stomach jumped right to her throat was any indication.
Of course, such a blatantly strange reaction from him would’ve been impossible to dismiss, and it was only natural when Sirius continued, his voice slightly concerned now, “what’s going on with you?”
But she couldn’t care less about their audience right then, heart pounding madly as she looked at the boy across the table. James’s eyes caught onto her neck, alerting her to the fact that she’d taken to skimming fingers over her scarf again. The way he’d ceased all movement, it felt quite as if he could see right through the material, to her skin beneath, where the evidence of his mouth having touched her sat inarguably.
“Changing your style, Lily?’ asked Mary, eyebrow cocked as she looked between her, the scarf, and James pointedly.
Warmth kissed her cheeks some more, but she kept the reply even. “Yeah, it’s gotten a bit cool outside, hasn’t it?”
“Oh, right,” Mary tittered, eyes gleaming, chin propped up on hand. “For a second, I was reminded of the way we used to cover up love-bites in fifth-year. Boy, are we a collectively dumb bunch at that age.”
A unanimous rumble of agreements rung out around the table at that, the fourth-year sitting beside her bristling openly at the insinuation, but it was James—always, always James—and the blaze that burned in the hazel that held her attention. Fork dropping back to his plate, he suddenly stood up from the bench, shoulders visibly stiff with tension. Her lips parted.
“Where are you going, mate?”
“Evans, can I talk to you for a second?” he asked, ignored Sirius. The affronted, almost bitter scoff that sounded from beside her coiled the dread in her gut even more. “Alone. Please.”
Not seeing much choice in the matter, she nodded, because James had left no room for misinterpretation amongst their friends as to the reason behind his terseness or her flushed skin. While she hoped that the boys were unable to glean the exact nature of the problem, given their naturally dense disposition when it came to reading the room, Mary’s stare as she made to follow behind James was entirely too knowing, entirely too bright. In a rare moment of tact, however, it seemed that she’d decided to stay a silent spectator.
They stopped a ways away from the bluster of their lunching peers, in a quiet corner of the entrance hall.
“Hi.” She bit her lip, feeling strangely shy, nervous, anxious, and a trove of other emotions that couldn’t’ve possibly co-existed within one person, but somehow managed in this case.
“Lily,” James started, a hand dragging over his face roughly, another propped on his hip. “I’m going fucking mental, alright?”
“What?”
“I can’t stop thinking about last night.”
Hope, she learned, was a quick thing to bloom. “Oh,” the sigh dropped.
“I don’t know what to do.” He stepped closer, brows pulled in the middle. “Evans, you’ve got to tell me—I’m really lost right now. I can’t figure out what you’re thinking, and it’s driving me mad! You know it’s always been you for me. I’m going to ask you just once, and if you don’t want anything to do with me after this, then—”
“No!” she blurted, finding her voice. James pulled in a shallow breath. “No, I—I want—I wanted last night, James.”
He licked his lips, instantly drawing her eyes there. “And now?”
“Now…” she whispered, “I’m hoping that we can do it again.”
A distant part of her mind perceived the pinch of James’s mouth to be a little irregular, considering the nature of her words, but sense was misted in the face of his proximity, the heat she’d tasted and now found addictive.
“The sex?” he asked, inflexion faintly strained.
“The sex,” she confirmed, unable to look into his eyes.
The vulnerability, the quietness of the situation was certainly odd when placed next to the vehemence with which they’d jumped each other less than twelve hours ago, but she supposed there was something about admitting to these intentions in the daylight that often felt easier, less monumental under the blanket of night. Not to mention that they’d had the influence of alcohol to fall back on as a safety net before. But here, right now, the admittance made it indelible; there would be no going back after this.
In light of such musings, when James widened the space between them rather than diminishing it, she felt quite akin to having cold water splashed over her head.
The confusion must’ve been evidently splayed on her face, because James sighed, ran a hand through his hair. “Just give me some time to think about it,” he implored, eyes troubled behind glasses. “It’s not—I’m sorry, please don’t take this the wrong way. I want to, of course, I want to. But I’m not sure if I can live with just that.”
She continued to stare, eyebrows furrowing, befuddlement brewing healthily as she tried to sort through his words, find meaning. James barely granted her the requisite time, however, already turning around, some strange form of regret written on his face.
“I’ll see you later,” he promised, somehow making it sound like an apology.
It was only after he’d left, only after the bell signalling the end of lunch had rung, only after students had spilled out of the Great Hall, and Mary had shaken her shoulders to pull her out of her trance that the pieces fell into place: she’d told James she wanted the sex, and it seemed he’d taken her words as an exhaustive offer. He thought she didn’t want him, not fully.
Merlin, she fancied a fucking idiot!
The Outcome
Curfew had well and truly fallen by the time he ventured into the Heads’ Dormitories for the night.
In a bid to keep his promise to Lily, he’d taken on the task of thinking, weighing, mulling over their conversation from lunch with hysteric intensity at the Library, which was the one place Sirius hadn’t followed him to. After a whole day of warding off intrusive and meddlesome questions, he’d finally snapped, driving home the message that all he wanted was some peace and quiet. The dismissal had clearly grated on Padfoot’s mind, if the betrayed look he’d thrown while marching away was any indication.
But, truthfully, he could only deal with one issue at a time; Sirius’s pride would just have to wait its turn.
Carrying the knowledge that Lily didn’t regret their drunken hook-up from the previous night and the happiness it brought forth had dulled with the realization that the sex had probably not been what had tensed her up at all. The confirmation he’d received from Lily, even while uttered in the company of her darkening eyes, had sent his chest crushing under some invisible weight. The feeling hadn’t abated even after a good three hours spent unspooling the threads of his brain after classes in silence. No longer able to deny what he knew he ought to do, coupled with a flickering sense of self-preservation and Madame Pince’s fourteen attempts to get him to leave the Library, he’d decided to finally talk to Lily.
The only trouble—beyond the infernal turmoil that raged inside—was that he found her asleep on the couch upon his entrance.
Red hair combed into a careless braid, tendrils kissing the slope of her neck, Lily slept on one end of the sofa, head propped up against the armrest, lips parted softly, a book lying half-open on her chest as fire danced in the hearth. Even unconscious, she continued to tug on the strings that tethered him to the world, pulling him closer, stealing his thoughts, breath, logic.
He watched, almost pained, as the knitted grey dress she was wearing bunched somewhere halfway up the milky skin of her thighs; thighs that he now knew felt glorious when wrapped around him, moving against him, trembling as she came undone by him. The picture was somehow made even more torturous by the thick socks she’d pulled on, the edges riding up to her shins. The near-silent air floating out from between her lips drew his eyes to her face again. The fact that he’d tasted that mouth, shared that breath, suddenly felt like memories unbearable to clasp onto.
It had been much, much easier to have lived in his fantasies and never known how utterly and completely the reality of her stumped any of his feeble imaginings.
“James?”
His fingers dug into the plushness of the couch, unable to understand how he’d missed her waking up. But Lily blinked at him sluggishly, tongue darting out to wet her lip, and though the action had been innocent, the consequence of it was felt directly in his prick, decidedly not innocent. “Hey,” he choked.
“What time is it? I must’ve dozed off.” Her voice was still a little raspy as she sat up straighter, closed the book that had been resting on her chest and placed it on the table. It looked like Muggle literature. “Didn’t get much sleep last night.”
Of course, he knew. And from the way colour bloomed on her cheeks half a beat later, it seemed Lily had caught onto the fact as well.
“It’s alright,” he sighed, waving a hand. “Go to bed. We can talk tomorrow.”
“Absolutely not,” she protested immediately, almost glaring. Alertness shone in the green of her eyes. “We’ll talk now. Come here.”
Eyeing the space she patted beside her on the couch with dread unlike any he’d encountered, he stepped forward to follow her directive nonetheless, dropping the bag and robes he carried onto an empty armchair. The fact of the matter remained that his mind grew fuzzy around Lily, unable to hold fast to any reason or sanity. He sat down, reminding himself that he’d survived seven years of her presence without succumbing to baser impulses, so he had more reason to trust himself around her than to not.
It didn’t help assuage the tension in the slightest.
“Okay, so, I’m sorry for not saying anything to you earlier during lunch,” she started, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, and somehow managing to look, impossibly, more beautiful than he’d ever seen her. “But I was just...figuring out some stuff in my head, and I realized—at least I think I realized—that we’re probably not on the same page here.”
He inhaled some courage. “Yeah, I think you’re right. I did some figuring stuff out of my own.”
“Yeah?” Lily chewed on her cheek. “And?”
“Evans, I’m sorry,” he whispered, loathing the way her face instantly fell. “I just can’t do it. You’ve no idea how fucking excruciating this is for me. You’re all I’ve ever wanted. Since fourth year, you’ve been sitting stubbornly inside my thoughts, and being your mate this year has been...well, not perfect, but pretty damn amazing. But this—what you’re asking—this is too hard—”
She was shaking her head, looking annoyed. “James, wait, stop. You’ve got it wrong—”
“I haven’t! Lily, please, don’t try to convince me to change my decision, because I’m not sure I could resist that.” The confession felt beyond pathetic when voiced into the air between them, brought to life starkly, stripping him naked. “Please, just, try to understand. I—I can’t possibly be with you and not want something more, every fucking minute, every fucking second. I’ll always want more, and you wouldn’t want that—”
The words scorching through his throat died off with a surprised strangle when he suddenly found himself being hurled towards Lily, her fist twisted around the front of his shirt, eyes ablaze as she held him barely an inch from her face.
“Shut the hell up, Potter,” she hissed, looked at his mouth, and almost as an afterthought, caught his bottom lip with her teeth and tugged. Even planted against the couch thanks to his half sprawled position, his cock jumped painfully when she ran her tongue over the lip, a slow, wet trail, and then pulled back again. Neck flushed, lashes fluttering on a blink, she breathed, “will you let me talk now?”
Merlin, fuck.
Some sort of affirmation must have made it out of his system, because Lily nodded, let go, planted her hands on her lap. It was maddening to reconcile this calm side of her with the person whose saliva still clung to his mouth.
“I don’t know how you got it into your thick skull that I wanted some fuck buddy form of arrangement with you, but it’s completely bonkers and untrue.” She glared, instantly triggering surprise within him. “James, I—that’s exactly what I was talking about! It’s not what you’ve been thinking at all! I want you. I want all of it with you, not just the sex. I mean, obviously, the sex was good, and I couldn’t stop thinking about it either, not with the way my thighs still ache, but it was only so good because it was with you! The only reason I kissed you yesterday, shagged you yesterday, despite being drunk off my head, was because there was no chance of me regretting it come morning.”
“But you did regret it in the morning,” he blabbed, unable to hear anything beyond the roar in his ears, the pound of his pulse. “You couldn’t have gotten out of the room faster if you’d tried.”
“No!” Lily cried, and he stupidly wished that she’d grab him again. In the passage of a single breath, she’d moved closer, fingertips like feathers on his chin, eyes like sunset on flare. Under the touch, something in him cracked, permanent and vital, altering everything he was. “No, I thought you regretted it, or didn’t want anything more! I thought if I didn’t say anything, didn’t panic, everything would be okay. But when you acted like it was some stupid, drunk mistake, I was miserable. And scared. Because—” her thumb dipped into the hollow under his lower lip. “I fancy you, James. A terrifying amount.”
In that moment, even as he assumed that the fabric of the universe remained untouched, the workmanship undisturbed, his own sense of being underwent a change so mammoth that he was folding with the repercussions of it, reaching forward to slide his hands over Lily’s face, pulling her onto his lap. She clambered over him easily, legs bent on either side of his hips, dress ruching around the tops of her thighs, and allowed him to kiss her with a ferocity that would’ve alarmed him had he not felt so consumed by her, for her.
Lily groaned into his mouth, fingers immediately sifting through his hair, breasts pressing to his chest. He took several seconds to pull the silk of red loose from the braid she’d restrained the strands into, a task made difficult since he’d busied one of his hands with running over her jaw, chin, down neck, and collar, and sternum, until he could feel the thunderous beat of her heart right under his palm. Lily’s back arched slightly, evidence that she wanted his touch lower, but his hand retreated, climbing back to her face, intent on taking his time, cherishing every inch of her skin devotedly.
“James,” she wriggled, gripped the back of his neck, stole the oxygen from his lungs. The planes of his stomach scorched when she slipped one hand underneath the hem of his shirt. Seemingly unhappy with the limited access this provided, Lily took to quickly unbuttoning the garment, an action James could only pay a wisp of attention to, given the fact that she had started running her tongue over the shell of his ear, teeth scraping over lobe. “You’ve ruined me, Potter, do you know that? Fucking ruined me.”
“How so?” he whispered, knuckles grazing the sides of her breasts, enjoying the tormented air she expelled.
She popped open the last button of his shirt, fingers ravenous in their desire to touch skin; devour, burn, destroy. Seconds after, a restless whimper pressed into his neck, as if she was tortured by the pace he’d set. In confirmation of his thoughts, Lily slipped a palm south, cupped him firmly over the trousers. He groaned, low, bit down on his own lip.
“You know what I thought about when I saw you during lunch?” she teased in lieu of a proper reply, and the lilt of her tone—confident, cheeky, fucking smug—rode over on the current of her heated breath as she circled a thumb over where his tip strained against pants. The game had suddenly flipped into her favour, and he’d never been happier to have lost, not when she seemed to bask in the victory so fantastically. That he’d never heard anything quite as sultry as the huskiness of her voice in that moment proved to be more effective in wrecking his patience than even the hand between his legs had been.
“Tell me,” he said, and then made the request arduous to fulfil by capturing her lips in a messy, open-mouthed kiss.
“I thought about your fingers.” Lily broke off, eyes so dark he could barely see the green anymore. The hand on his chest disappeared, found his own that had been lazily brushing closer to her nipple. In a movement so dream-like that he was certain he’d need verbal proof of it later, she brought his fingers up to her mouth, sucked the middle two inside, tongue rolling over them wetly. The gaze she’d pinned on him never strayed, not even when she dragged her mouth away, wetness clinging to lips, his fingers, and not even when his cock throbbed obviously underneath her wicked palm. “I thought about these, inside me, making me come.”
“Fuck.” His brows stitched in the middle, the image she’d painted shoving him closer to the cliff that tipped into madness. Lily had started unbuckling his trousers now, and to retain some form of control, he used his free hand to massage her breast, circling around the bud that strained against her dress. “Were you wet for me? During lunch?”
Her answer dropped on a moan. “I’ve been wet for you the whole fucking day.”
“Lily.” He bucked into her hand when she squeezed him gently over his underpants. “You’re killing me.”
“Good,” she huffed a laugh. “You’re killing me, too.”
And as if to prove her point, Lily caught his wrist, the fingers still dripping with her saliva, and slowly guided his hand under the hem of her dress, now almost lying around her arse. The wave of heat that caressed his skin before he’d actually touched her centre should’ve prepared him for what he found. It did not.
Eyes squeezing shut, he regulated his breathing, forced himself to hold it together, to not embarrass himself. The fingers he dragged over her soft, bare, sweltering pussy, were effective in discovering viscous wetness that had his mouth dropping open, mind tossed off that cliff, finally. “Fucking hell! How long have you been without knickers?”
Her cheeks blushed, the hint of modesty somehow made lascivious in light of the way she rubbed herself against his hand, deprived of friction. Unable to help himself, he slipped two fingers inside that molten core, groaning in tandem with her wanton sigh when he felt her walls tense around him, tight. “Ever since I was hoping we’d get to do this again,” she admitted on a choke, and it was as if she’d barely managed to push the words out, instantly slamming her lips back to his, moan wrenched clean from throat.
His desperate grip on any semblance of lucidity slipped out entirely when he curled his fingers inside her, setting off a searing chain of events that had Lily tugging down his trousers, his underpants, gripping him firmly by the base, pumping with pressure so perfect that colours bloomed before his eyes. “Fuck, Lily, fuck, fuck,” he muttered nonsensically, hiss caught between teeth and tongue as he rushed to pull her dress up, enough that it revealed the flat of her stomach, and pink of her pussy as she continued to ride his hand. With the way his length grew unbearably heavier, he knew he’d be coming against her fingers ridiculously fast.
“James,” she keened, quickly licking her palm and placing it back over his cock, now sliding faster between her hand thanks to the added lubrication.
“Wait, wait, stop, stop, fuck,” he panted harshly, slipping his fingers out of her to halt her phenomenal wrist, aware of the liquid stickiness he was transferring, but truly uncaring. Lily all but wailed in outrage at his interruption, but he gently pushed her hand away, quickly tugged the dress over her head, and brought her closer to him with hands pressing into her arse. The protests extinguished as soon as his length prodded at her pussy, the feeling so maddeningly good that he sunk his nails into the soft flesh of her bum. “Shit, I need to be inside you, Lily. I want to come inside you.”
“Yes.” She sobbed into his mouth, licked over his tongue, hips lifting immediately to poise over the tip of his cock. Right before she slid down around him, stretched deliciously, muscles of her centre tight and hot, Lily dropped her forehead against his, strands of hair stuck to her skin from humidity birthed by their feverish actions. “God, James.”
He couldn’t respond, couldn’t even remember what the hell words were when she started moving over him, pace punishing, moan sinful. The only reasonable thing to do was duck his head, drag down the skimpy, lacy bra that barely restrained the generous swell of her breasts with his teeth. He was starved, desperate as he latched his mouth onto the revealed nipple, tongue flicking and sucking so ruthlessly that Lily rolled her hips, awash in her own sense of mounting frenzy.
“Merlin, Evans, I’m close—” he gritted, sounding almost angry to his own ears as she continued to slide up and down, breast bouncing against his lips. He reached between them to find her clit, and rubbed small circles over the bundle in the way he’d noticed she responded best to. Soon enough, Lily was clawing through his hair, scalp, shoulder; a moan, pleasured and loud, shattering against the walls of the common room around them.
When the muscles of her arse under his fingertips eventually stiffened with tension, thighs quaking with the force of her orgasm, he came hard, a long-drawn groan muffled against her chest, even before she’d cried out his name.
He remained buried inside her for moments after, Lily’s hands gentle and lazy as they brushed the hair from his forehead, played at the nape of his neck. She dotted light kisses against his face as he licked over the bruise that had dulled on her neck, now salty with the taste of sweat. A prolonged heartbeat later, his lips found hers again, warm and buttery as she smiled against him, sending a jolt of honeyed happiness right into his chest. Promptly overcome, overrun, with the need to convey a fraction of what stirred inside, he lifted her slightly, biting back a moan, and waited until she’d settled beside him on the couch.
He looked at her: hair mussed, lips swollen, eyes bright, bra straps hanging off shoulders, body bare and aglow with satisfaction.
“You’re perfect.” The honesty spilled before he could think through the words, breaking the silence. “Absolutely, fucking perfect.”
Lily laughed, collar flush with happiness, head tossed back. “Sex making you go a bit mental, Potter?”
“Not sex. You.” He smiled, voice softer than he’d intended. When she looked at him again, some emotion had shifted on her face, a hand reaching out to trace his cheekbone, feather-light. “Lily,” he said, throat barricaded by the heart that pumped there. “Will you go out with me?”
Air ballooned in her chest in her next inhale, teeth clamping down over lip but unable to hold back the grin that spread widely. “Yes, please.”
And though he wanted to spend the next hour sitting on that couch and replaying those two syllables to his heart’s content, he wanted to kiss her a fair bit more. Kicking off his shoes, trousers and underpants completely, he moved to close the space between them once again. There was something quieter, slower, more intimate in the touches they shared now. Lily’s mouth glided over his, achingly soft, something profoundly sweet even as his tongue traced the inside of her mouth, patient and deliberate. When he pulled back after a fashion, her eyes roved his face, breath hitching momentarily at whatever she found during the search. Her own gaze on him had become stomach-clenchingly intense, and broke only when he reached for the clasp of her bra and removed the barrier completely.
Hands planted inside the thickness of his hair, Lily sighed noisily when he rolled his tongue around each nipple, slowly making his way down her body. As if sensing his intent, she grew still, anticipation zipping through the air when he passed lower than her navel. He held her steady, palms landing on her thighs and keeping her rooted as he quietly dropped to his knees in front of the couch. Fingers dipping into the edges of her socks, he slowly dragged them down, taking a few seconds to scatter soft kisses over her legs and thighs before he climbed higher again.
Lily gulped. “James—”
“I want to taste you,” he said, voice unwavering. “Can I?”
While he’d doubted that she’d refuse, her nod of assent still sent surprise swimming through veins. That he was being allowed to go down on Lily Evans, to have her at the mercy of his mouth, was a fact he knew he’d never get accustomed to, especially not if she continued to look at him like that; like he was a goddamned miracle or something. Kneeling on the carpet of the Heads’ Dormitories, his breath fanning hot against Lily’s pussy, and eyes trained unflinchingly on her, he felt like he’d floated right out of his body and into some dream too good even for his imagination.
Lily’s fingers threaded into his hair, as if bracing herself against the feeling of his mouth on her, and he took it as the sign to brush his tongue over her for the first time. She gasped, and that sound, along with the intoxicating smell and taste of her, the knowledge that he'd been inside, there, just a few minutes ago, had him lapping at her heat in measured strokes. It seemed like her restrain was well and truly broken when a moan bubbled out, growing only louder in volume when he clamped his hands around the backs of her knees, pulling her legs apart for better access.
“Fuck, James,” Lily whimpered, hips bucking as his tongue travelled a delicious path from her opening to her clit, again and again, interspersed with precise flicks and sucks on the spots she especially enjoyed or encouraged with a roll of her hips. A groan rumbled in his chest when her grip on his hair tightened, and he buried his face more firmly inside her, nose brushing against the bundle of nerves, tongue circling the entrance from where she continued to leak.
“Merlin,” he panted, one hand wrapping around his hardening length, aroused completely by her response to his mouth on her cunt. He slipped his tongue inside her, mad in his hunger for more. “Lily. Fuck. Look at me.”
With her gaze on his, she wriggled faster against his mouth, searching for release. “Don’t stop. I’m close—” her voice cut off on a cry when he increased his pace, sucking on her swollen clit with a single-minded focus. Lily’s hips writhed against the couch, and he laid an arm over her stomach to keep her in place. “James!” She shuddered against him, waves of pleasure crashing through her steadily. He lapped at the heat dripping straight into his waiting tongue, drawing out her orgasm.
Lips and chin still wet with her come, he eventually pulled back, watching as Lily lay panting on the couch, completely flushed scarlet from head to toe. “Jesus fucking Christ,” she half-breathed, awe abundant, “I don’t think I’ve ever come so hard in my life.”
Pride erupted in the form of a beaming smile on his face. “Is that right?”
“Shut up, Potter,” she laughed, reaching out to help him back to his feet. Inevitably, her eyes strayed to his hardened cock, and she raised a brow. “Need some help there?”
“Do you really expect me to answer that?”
Lily smirked, a look so perfectly salacious that he felt his insides twist with want. “Come on, then. Let’s give you the best orgasm you’ve ever had in your life.”
He didn’t doubt her for a second.