Chapter Text
I want you to want me.
I need you to need me.
I’d love you to love me.
I’m beggin’ you to beg me.
“I Want You To Want Me”, Letters to Cleo
Mary Macdonald was practically perfect in every way, James thought as he sent furtive glances in her general direction to see if he managed to impress her with his insane eye-hand-coordination, catching the Snitch he had nicked after the final Quidditch match of the season – which won him and the Gryffindor team the Quidditch cup, the first one under his captaincy – over and over again. Mary, unfortunately, seemed far too busy laughing with Lily Evans – fellow Gryffindor and pathetic goody-two-shoes – to even notice him.
That was, perhaps, the only thing, he thought, which was not absolutely splendid about Mary: her choice in friends left something to be desired. For Lily Evans was not only a stuck-up prefect, she was also practically a house traitor, being close friends with a Slytherin in their year – one that was greasy and slimy and definitely friends with some of the most pure-blooded bigots around. As far as James could see, Lily Evans’ only redeeming quality was the fact that she had been sorted into Gryffindor at all. It probably meant that she wasn’t actually a terrible person, despite the fact that all evidence pointed to the contrary.
The worst thing was that he often found himself contemplating Lily Evans. For Mary’s sake, of course. He liked Mary far too much for her to have to rely on less than stellar friends. He supposed the one thing that Lily Evans brought to her friendship with Mary Macdonald was a level of understanding, since they were both Muggle-born witches, and for that he would refrain from throwing hexes Lily Evans’ way whenever she would pass him in the hallways with Severus Snape at her side. (Obviously, he didn’t actually extend this same courtesy to the Slytherin, brown-nosing fanatic himself, which – in turn – would always infuriate the redheaded Gryffindor. But, at least, he told himself, he tried.)
He had only just finished this thought when he felt as though his hand had been hit by a bolt of lightning. He yelped, shaking the sting off as he looked around, his eyes falling on Severus Snape who sent him a challenging snarl. In an instant, he was up on his feet.
“Prongs?” he heard one of his friends ask - he was pretty sure it was Remus - but he didn’t respond, too busy stalking over to Severus Snape, stopping only an inch away from him.
Luckily, due to a well-timed growth spurt in the past few months, he could now literally look down upon the Slytherin.
“What’s your problem?” he hissed in his enemy’s direction, narrowing his eyes behind his glasses.
Snape quirked an eyebrow. “Quite frankly,” he began, “it is and has always been you.”
His nostrils flared as he fingered the wand hidden beneath his robes. He opened his mouth to throw the remark right back at him when he felt a hand on his shoulder and heard his best friend’s trusted voice let out a lazy: “Pretty sure that’s how the entire school feels about you, Snivellus.”
There was a swift change in the expression on Severus Snape’s face, his hand curling around his wand, raising it high, his mouth already forming half an incantation when – fast as always, his eye-hand-coordination truly was bloody impressive, if you asked him – James disarmed him with a booming “Expelliarmus!”
Snape’s wand flew twelve feet into the air and – with a little thud – landed in the grass behind him. Sirius barked with laughter before pointing his own wand at Snape, who had started to scramble towards the patch of grass where his wand had fallen: “Impedimenta!”
Snape was knocked off of his feet and James almost grimaced at the sight, knowing full well how it felt to get the breath knocked out of you, but he soon recovered, remembering all the times the roles had been reversed. All the times Snape had watched on as his mates hexed Muggle-borns, half-bloods and others they deemed inferior to themselves alike. He remembered the spell that Snape had come up with and which had hit Peter a couple of weeks ago, blood seeping through his robes, as James had begged the Slytherins for the reverse incantation.
He braced himself, crossed his arms in front of his chest, his wand still firmly gripped in his right hand, and took a step towards the Slytherin still panting on the grass. “How’d the exam go, Snivelly?” he asked.
Sirius stepped up beside him. “I was watching him, his nose was touching the parchment,” he smirked as he said it. “There'll be great grease marks all over it, they won't be able to read a word.”
Several people around them laughed, making him feel justified in his actions, while Snape attempted to get back up, his face one of pure and utter loathing.
“You – wait,” he said through gritted teeth. “You – wait!”
“Wait for what?” asked Sirius coolly. “What're you going to do, Snivelly, wipe your nose on us?”
James felt the corner of his lips twitch, about to turn to Sirius to tell him “good one” when Snape snarled: “Fucking blood traitors!” followed by some more insults and hexes that would have caused serious harm had his wand been nearby.
Angrily, James pointed his own at his opponent: “Wash your mouth!” before muttering a careless: “Scourgify!”
It was at that point – as pink soap bubbles streamed from Severus Snape’s mouth – that he became aware of another person’s presence.
“Leave him alone!” Lily Evans’ startling eyes – a shade of green that rivalled the emeralds Salazar Slytherin favoured – narrowed in his direction.
Suddenly, he felt a little uncomfortable, but at the same time – he truly was an idiot – he found himself checking if Mary had followed her friend. To his great disappointment, however, she was still seated near the edge of the lake. His hand flew to his hair, aware of his audience, for – while Mary Macdonald may not be beside Lily Evans, she was certainly watching her friend’s every move and, as a result, him.
“All right, Evans?” he deepened his voice on purpose, aiming for a pleasant tone with which he hoped to impress Mary. See what a nice person I am? he directed this thought at Mary, hoping she had a talent for Legilimency.
This change in demeanour, however, did not go over well with Lily Evans, whose eyes flitted briefly in the direction of her female friend at the lake before she crossed her arms in front of her chest, chin up. “Leave him alone,” she repeated. “What’s he done to you?”
He wanted to ask if she was joking, but swallowed the impulse. “Well,” he said, drawing the word out a little, before settling on something that was sure to make most of his peers laugh: “it’s more the fact that he exists, if you know what I mean…”
His words had the desired effect and he found himself checking if Mary had also laughed. Before he could do so, however, Lily Evans’ venomous voice caused his head to snap back.
“You think you’re funny, but you’re just an arrogant bullying toerag, Potter.” She took another step towards him. Thank god, he thought, he had been blessed with his father’s height for the look in her eyes was so unsettling that he felt ridiculously out of his depth. It made him feel something in the pit of his stomach that he had never felt before, stirring something to life that he couldn’t identify, but certainly did not like one bit. “Leave,” she said forcefully, “him,” jabbing her finger into his chest, “alone,” his heart beating rapidly as she finished the phrase.
He was at a loss for words momentarily, reeling from the fact that she managed to evoke emotions in him that he had trouble distinguishing and then – inexplicably – he said: “I will if your friend goes out with me, Evans.” He took a step away from her, swiftly turning towards Mary as he did: “Go on…” he flashed a grin at the pretty witch near the lake, raising his voice: “go out with me, Mary Macdonald, and I promise never to make Evans here angry ever again!”
Before Mary could even open her mouth, he heard Lily Evans snort in disbelief. He twirled around, incensed.
“She would never go out with you,” she mocked cruelly. “She wouldn’t go out with you if it was a choice between you and the Giant Squid!” This earned her a few laughs.
James, who hated it when other people laughed at him when he couldn't laugh along with them, narrowed his eyes at her and was about to open his mouth, about to give her a piece of mind, about to defend Mary and tell Lily she had no right to speak for her friend, when he was suddenly knocked sideways by Sirius, a jet of light hitting his cheek, blood spattering his robes.
Severus Snape had – in all the commotion, while he had been thoroughly distracted by Lily Evans – gotten up and had aimed his wand right at James, firing a spell his way.
His fury peaked – never one to be bested, he would not take this lying down, he was a Gryffindor for Godric's sake – and he pointed his wand at Snape, shouting: “Levicorpus!”
Within seconds, Severus Snape dangled upside down, showing off his truly hideous underpants. James would almost feel sorry for him if the sight of Snape’s knobbly knees was not enough to make him want to vomit in the first place.
“Let him down!” Lily shouted at him, her face as red as his hair – truly not a very attractive look at all, he reminded himself, but unsure as to why he had to remind himself of such a thing at all.
“Certainly,” he said, jerking his wand upwards and allowing Snape to fall to the ground in a crumpled heap. He didn’t even have time to laugh for a raging Severus had his wand out a second later, pointing it straight at him.
“Petrificus Totalus!”
For a second, he had braced himself for the spell to hit him, but then he realised he recognised the caster’s voice as his best friend’s and noted how the jet of light hit Severus Snape instead, much to his relief, but to Lily Evans’ distress.
“Leave him alone!” She pointed her wand at both him and Sirius, clearly furious, obviously upset at the sight of her Slytherin pal, rigid on the grass.
Something tugged at his heart as he looked at her, hesitating. He really didn’t want to use his wand on a fellow Gryffindor, on his dream girl’s best mate, but he also knew the extent of her talents. “Ah, Evans,” he began, grimacing, “don’t make me hex you.”
“Take the curse off him, then!” she told him firmly, using the voice she liked to use whenever she caught him out of the Gryffindor Common Room after curfew.
He sighed deeply, turned towards Snape and muttered the counter-curse under his breath. “There you go,” he said, all emotion disappearing from his voice at the sight of Severus Snape scrambling back up to his feet. “You’re lucky Evans was here, Snivellus –”
“I don’t need help from filthy little Mudbloods like her!”
You could hear a pin drop. It was as if all noise had been sucked from the Hogwarts grounds, as if a powerful Silencio had fallen over them like a blanket. His eyes immediately found Evans, who blinked at Snape, wide-eyed, shock clear on her face before - and it was only a matter of seconds, really - she slipped on a mask.
“Fine,” she told Snape coolly. “I won’t bother in the future.” She flipped her hair over her shoulder, looking Severus Snape up and down. “And I’d wash your pants if I were you, Snivellus…”
He didn’t know what possessed him, but suddenly he shot forward, his wand pointed threateningly at Snape, rage overtaking him. “Apologise to Evans!” he roared, finding himself standing half in front of the Gryffindor girl, as if shielding her from the vile creature that Snape was, protecting her from any more verbal harm he wished to inflict.
“I don’t want you to make him apologise,” her voice sounded from behind him and he turned slightly to look at her, confused. “You’re as bad as he is.”
His eyes widened at that, heart pounding so hard that he feared his ribs would break with the sheer force of it. “What?” he spluttered. “I’d never call you a…" he found it difficult to even think the word, much less speak it, "a... you-know-what!”
She had narrowed her eyes at him. “Messing up your hair because you think it looks cool to look like you've just got off your broomstick,” she spat, pointing at his hair as if it offended her, “showing off with that stupid Snitch,” for a second he wondered if that meant that she and Mary had been watching him after all, but even the thought of Mary couldn’t distract him from her best friend’s ire at this very moment. “Walking down corridors and hexing anyone who annoys you just because you can,” he opened his mouth to protest here and say that it was only ever the Slytherins he targeted, but she didn’t let him get a word in. “I'm surprised your broomstick can get off the ground with that fat head on it.” He thought it couldn’t get any worse, but then she went on to add: “You make me sick.”
He felt as though he had been slapped in the face, punched in the stomach, hexed to such an extent that he needed to go to the hospital wing. She felt sick, maybe, but so did he.
He gaped at her, unable to say anything at all, completely helpless as he watched her turn on her heel and hurry away from him.
That woke him up. “Evans!” he yelled after her, desperate, taking half a step forward. “Hey, Evans!”
She ignored him, not stopping to turn back to him, to shout at him in admonishment for alerting the whole school to his presence as she so liked to do, successfully putting him into his proper place.
He was so preoccupied watching Lily Evans’ retreating form, that he hadn’t even noticed Mary Macdonald rushing after her.