You Used to Make Sense

"...I feel you more than ever now, throwin' me off somehow..."
-Lucy Woodward, Blindsided

Life sucks.

This is, in most cases, an undeniable fact that we all somehow manage to live around, but today it was the foremost thought in the mind of James Potter. He drummed his fingers on the table aimlessly as he stared at his plate; the mashed potatoes and green beans ran together with the corn in his mind and none of it seemed to matter.

He had been so close. So friggin' close to making Lily like him. He had backed off, been charming but not overbearing, and under the close tutelage of Sirius Black and his ex-girlfriend, Sarah Faye Angele, been everything a girl would have dreamed of. And it had almost worked. The day before he had been exposed, Lily had smiled at him and even mentioned a study group for Transfiguration, since O.W.L.s were so close.

And it was all Jordan McKinnon's fault. James glared at his mashed potatoes, stabbing them with his fork. If only Peter hadn't let him into the room, if only he had asked someone else for a quill, if only Sirius had put up the stupid papers, if only he had killed him before he could tell his dorm mates...his mind ran in a million directions. If he had been normal, he would have been mad at everyone; and in a small way he was. Everyone but Lily, Sirius, Remus, and Peter. He could never be angry at them.

It was so stupid, he thought angrily as he swirled his mashed potatoes on his plate. He had started it out in an obsessed attempt to get Lily to like him, but that wasn't how it ended up. He had really started to care about her in the end, and not in a crush way--he had learned about her, her family, and felt like he had gotten to know the real Lily.

And then Jordan McKinnon had told everyone about how he had been 'using some stupid program' to try to 'get her to sleep with him'. That was the worst bit. James would never have done something like that to Lily, and anyone who really knew him would know that. Lily should know that, he thought angrily. But Lily had believed Jordan.

And she had been upset about it. She had been angry, of course, and that was the most obvious sign; the red face, the fact that he had bruises on both cheeks, the cut above his eye, and the memorable flipping off. But he had watched her, and she had been upset about it--Sarah had told him that she heard Lily was crying that night, and since that Lily had avoided him.

James glanced over at her. She was sitting next to Chelsea Madding and Sarah; that was a good sign. She was smiling half-heartedly; she didn't really smile when she was sad, and her hair was pulled back elegantly. Her face was made-up extra thick, which Sarah told him was a common thing; when girls felt like nobody loved them, they wanted to look their best to attract attention. It was amazing that he had actually listened to all of this, but he had been desperate.

She smiled and pushed her plate away, picking up her paper with some excuse of going to mail a letter. James's face lit up. Mailing a letter!

He turned to Sirius, only to get hit in the head with a fork. He blinked. "What are you doing, Sirius?" he asked, puzzled.

"You were staring at Lily again. I was going to see how many serving utensiels I could balance on your ear," Sirius said matter-of-factly. James nodded.

"Um, do you have that letter to Maddy I wrote earlier? I need to go mail it."

"Why, because Lily needs to mail a letter too?" Remus asked, glancing at him shrewdly.

"I love my sister and feel need to have contact with her through mail," James said, sounding dignified and indignant. "Is that so hard to believe?"

"You better hurry, then," Remus advised, sprinkling pepper over his mashed potatoes. "You'll miss her if you don't."

James looked up to see the door of the Great Hall swinging shut. "Later," he said, running out the door. Remus rolled his eyes. Sirius looked disappointed.

"I didn't even get to balance a fork on his head," he said dejectedly before going back to his chicken.

James rushed out of the Great Hall, letter in hand. The way to the Owlery seemed to take forever, and he skipped up two steps at a time, allowing himself a calming breath before he went in.

The Owlery was hardly a romantic place. There were owls hooting everywhere and droppings on the floor along with dead mouse skeletons, and the general aroma of owls was not very conductive to candlelight dinners and confessions of love. But it was better than nothing.

He walked over to his owl, Nena, just a few feet away from Lily, who was pointedly ignoring him. "This goes to Maddy, okay?" he told her softly, attaching it to her leg. She gave him a 'do you think I'm supid' glance before flying out.

"Who's Maddy?" Lily asked cuttingly. "Your prostitute?"

James flinched. "My sister," he said, trying to keep his voice even.

Lily subsided and glared down at the owl she was tying the letter to. The owl hooted, annoyed, before flying off. Lily turned around to walk out the door, only to find James blocking her way.

"Move," she said expressionlessly.

"No," James said, and his voice was even. "I will not move until you listen to me. You deserve to know the truth."

"I know the truth, okay? I don't have to listen to you to find that out. I'm more likely to get the truth anywhere else," she said cuttingly. James flinched but didn't move.

"You don't know the truth. Jordan lied. I wouldn't use you that way."

Lily looked up at him with anger etched in her face and tears in her eyes. "Don't give me that shit, Potter," she said in a low voice. "The best thing for you to do would be to leave me alone."

"Lily, I'm sorry," he said sincerely. "If things would have worked out, you would never have known."

"Oh, so you would never have told me you were going to use me?" she shouted angrily. "Yeah, I really wish I hadn't figured out that you didn't give a shit about me, only wanted me so you could have some prostitute. I really wanted that ignorance, that heartbreak when you dumped me for some blonde bimbo because I had ceased to amuse you!"

"It's not like that!" James protested hotly. "I didn't even want to use you! I wanted to get to know you, and you never even gave me a chance because you wrote me off as some arrogant Quidditch player! I like you, Lily, why won't you see that?"

"I don't know," Lily burst out. "Maybe because they found it written on papers in your room on your bed that you wanted to use me to sleep with me? And you think that you can just tell me 'that's not true' and I'll just go off and everything will be like it was before. You used to be nice, you used to make sense! Maybe I can't just write you off as some arrogant Quidditch Player anymore because you actually acted like you cared about me, and mabye I started to care about you!"

They both froze. James stared at her with a mixture of hope and despair rising in his heart. She had started to care about him? And now she thought he was a total girl-user and hated his guts. He stared down at her; strands of her hair had fallen out of its hairdo to fall into her face, and he wanted to brush them back behind her ears. Her eyes were glistening and her cheeks were bright with color.

"Just move, Potter," she said wearily.

"No," he said automatically.

She didn't even look up. "Why can't you just let me go?" she asked, and it was barely above a whisper, a tired whisper of a child who didn't understand why something had to be.

"Because I like you," James said, and suddenly he found words tumbling from his mouth. "I didn't mean for things to get out of hand. Jordan lied and I don't know how to make you understand, but I would never do that to you. Sure, I used to dream about it, but I wouldn't do that because it would just hurt you and I don't want to hurt you. I don't understand why I can't stop thinking about you, but I can't, and it bothers me, and you hate me. I wanted to know you but you never wanted to know me and it bugged me because it's not fair, because you mean so much to me and I mean nothing to you..."

he trailed off. There was silence and his cheeks reddened, realizing he had said too much. Lily was staring up at him now, a scrutinizing gaze that made him uncomfortable. He turned his head away, all too conscious that she was only standing a foot away from him. Finally she dropped her gaze.

"Truce, Potter," she said, then laughed. "I mean, truce, James. We both said too much."

"Agreed," he said, seizing upon the possibility of honorable retreat. "Let's just go back to dinner and forget all about this."

Lily smiled at him in the dark, and it wasn't a half-smile, and that made him glad. "Okay." She paused, then looked up at him and asked, "Well? Aren't you going to escort me?"

James, speechless, took her hand on his arm as they exited the Owlery. Lily smiled at him in the dark, and as the door closed behind them, she began: "Now, I think I need to know some things about you...."

Notes: Did you like it? I did. It was quite fluffy and nice at the same time. And 'Blindsided' is a great song.