An Account of Kissing

An Account of Kissing

By Margaret MacEaver

This is the first time James kisses Lily.

He kind of smushes his lips against hers and she stares right at his eyelids. She jerks back and he opens his eyes fast.

"James Potter!" she says, because really that was all she can think as his eyes stare right into hers. She knows she is feeling something like shock and anger and embarrassment, but all she can actually think is JamesPotterJamesPotterJamesPotter.

"Right," he says. "Sorry." And he leaves her there with her Transfiguration homework and returns to the cluster of other second-year Gryffindors across the Common Room.

She doesn't think he'd really been sorry. He'd smiled too wide for that. And she still isn't sure what she thinks about it, though when Remus passes by later and whispers that it had been a dare, and he hopes she isn't mad, she feels a little cheated, and a little offended, and a little like she would rather Remus hadn't told her that.

This is the first time Lily kisses Remus.

She kisses hard, and Remus thinks he kisses back, but he's not sure. And then she stops kissing him, and stares down at the Potions text open on the table. Her hair has fallen to hide her face, but Remus knows she isn't reading.

"Lily?" he finally says, after they've sat there too long in that post-kiss silence, pretending they can't feel their thighs touching. But then he doesn't know what he planned to say after that.

This is the first time Remus kisses Lily.

He reaches past that veil of hair and tilts her face toward him and his lips find hers. This time they kiss long enough for Remus to think, funny, I guess I thought it'd be more difficult than this. With noses bumping, and all that.

But the difficult part comes after the kiss ends, and they sit silently side-by-side, each intensely aware their thighs are touching. And aware that the other one is aware their thighs are touching. Which makes it more complicated.

"Maybe we'd--" Remus starts.

"Probably best--"

"I mean, it was nice and all--"

"Assignment done anyway--"

"Right," says Remus.

"Right," says Lily, and she starts to gather up her work with hands that are maybe shaking just a little.

Remus wishes he had had it in him to pretend, if only for a little while, that he has never seen the way James looks at Lily. He and Lily will not be studying alone together anymore.

This is the first time Sirius kisses Remus.

They are both, really, a little surprised at how good the other one is. Their mouths might have opened just a bit, their tongues might have flirted briefly. And when they stop kissing, after justlongenough, they are both breathing a little heavier and staring into each other's eyes, because if they weren't staring, they would be looking at the cracks in the floor or the folds in the bedcurtains or anywhere but at each other.

"W-why?" Remus says, and he immediately wishes he'd added another word to make it sound less harsh. Like, now. Or, me.

"Um," says Sirius, who has probably never said 'um' before in his life.

Remus smiles.

This is the first time Remus kisses Sirius.

He kisses Sirius gently, then more fully, and he slides his hand into the other boy's thick, black hair, and feels Sirius relax, open his mouth. They kiss longer this time, long enough for Sirius to let his hands slip around to Remus's back, for Remus to twist a strand of Sirius's hair between the fingers of one hand and lightly stroke the back of his neck with the other. Then there's more tongues, and some nibbling, and bodies moving closer together, and

This is the secondthirdfourthfifthsixth time Remus kisses Sirius.

This is the first time Lily kisses James.

"Well," he says, when she steps back and drops her hands from his face. He grins. "Wow."

Lily laughs nervously, her fingers tugging at the tassels of her scarf. She likes the way she has transformed James's mouth into that brilliant smile by simply pressing her lips to his. She wonders, and her heart beats faster, what would happen if she were to kiss him again. She wonders if it would be appropriate, or maybe she's supposed to wait for him to go next.

She doesn't have to wait long.