Lily Evans was not used to peaceful evenings.
Now, this wasn't a fate she had chosen for herself, mind. It's just something that happened to her, and something that usually involved shenanigans she had no hand in starting but would have to fix because of course she would. If it were up to her, she would spend her evenings curled up with a book in the corner of the Common Room and read. She wouldn't have to deal with dungbombs that someone (read: Remus and his band of idiots) had set off, or a second-year that had gotten their hair turned purple by some kind of charm on the library doors that someone (read: Remus and his band of idiots) had placed there, or griffins running amok on school grounds because someone (read: Remus and his band of idiots) had decided it would be hilarious to set them free.
Unfortunately, when every evening is filled with disaster, it makes her quite suspicious that she has been able to just sit here for exactly one hour and forty-three minutes entirely uninterrupted now. Sooner or later, something had to give, right?
And yet she stood there talking to Remus right before starting their rounds of the school (why anyone had thought it a good idea to make one of the marauders a prefect was a question she often lay awake thinking about, though she supposed Remus was the best option out of all of them), and nothing had gone catastrophically wrong yet. She was almost starting to get worried about the state the world was in if nothing of note happened at Hogwarts when the predicted disaster came in the form of a small group of first-years.
"Miss Lily? There's a problem." One of the students, a girl named Miranda, said carefully. She took a moment to steel herself before turning to face the inevitable. If nothing was on fire, she'd just ignore it, she decided.
"What's wrong?" She asked, her voice a mix between annoyed and resigned.
"There's this girl on the second floor; we think she was doing some kind of potion experiment." That got her attention. She happened to know someone who tended to do her experiments in any abandoned classroom she could get her hands on on the second floor, but surely she wouldn't have... "Anyway, something must've gone wrong because we heard a loud bang. When we went to look, she seemed really out of it. I think her name was Pandora?"
Fuck.
"Remus, you're doing both of our rounds today." She ordered. She would've felt bad for being rude, but Remus seemed to understand, plus she had much more important things on her mind right now than social etiquette. She turned to the girls. "Show me the classroom."
The human brain was rather interesting, in her personal opinion. See, she knew what Pandora had been working on—had helped her out with most of it, actually. She knew that none of the materials would put her in any real danger, and that she was probably concussed at worst. But she still barely breathed until they arrived at room B134 and saw Pandora for herself.
She was staring out in front of her, eyes unfocused, but seemed otherwise unharmed. Lily willed the tip of her wand to light up before shining the light in Pandora's eyes to check for a reaction, sighing in relief when the pupil constricted like it was supposed to. Pandora looked at her with unfocused eyes for a moment longer than Lily was comfortable with before recognition dawned on her face.
"Lily!" She beamed. "Hi."
"Hi, 'Dora." She sighed. It was odd. She always aimed for her signature scolding or disappointed sigh when Pandora did things like this, and yet it always came out inexplicably fond.
"Miss Lily, I thought it was against school rules to experiment with potions outside of classes." One of the girls—Dahlia?—said. "Shouldn't you report that?"
"Yes, but so is sneaking out to see that Hufflepuff friend of yours, and I haven't reported you for that yet." Lily said, casting a look over her shoulder at the girl, who now looked a whole lot more flustered than before. They seemed to pick up the hint, though, and quickly left the room. Pandora was still smiling at her, and it was doing odd things to Lily's stomach. Seeing as that was something she couldn't fix right now, she instead focused on something she could: the fact Pandora was still sitting on the floor.
A quick look around the room helped her deduce most of what had happened. Pandora had, with an uncharacteristic stupidity but an entirely characteristic recklessness, decided to add the Billywig wings while the fire was too hot, causing her cauldron to explode. If Lily had to guess, she had inhaled the fumes and was on some kind of high from the potion's effects.
"Y'know, it's very convenient that you're here right now." Pandora stated as Lily helped her off the floor and onto an old couch in the corner of the room.
"Yeah?" Lily asked, looking over her shoulder to confirm that most of the other materials they'd used for the potion were still unbroken. Pandora might not care right now, but when the effects of the potion wore off she'd probably care more about being able to retry than she'd be about her own health. If Lily thought her own work-life balance was bad, Pandora had quickly taught her how bad it could be. She'd never met anyone more dedicated to their studies.
"Yeah, you need to write things down."
"I—what do you mean?" Lily asked, looking back at Pandora.
"Your observations! I'm influenced by the potion; you need to write down what you're observing. Obviously." Pandora explained impatiently. Lily almost laughed at her, before realising that would be a rather insensitive thing to do to someone in a state like this one. Only Pandora would get in a potentially dangerous accident and then use it as an opportunity to collect data. Still, she dutifully grabbed a piece of paper and quill, sitting down at the nearest desk.
"I thought we'd agreed not to work on potions without the other there, Pandora." She scolded lightly as she wrote Difficulty focusing on the scroll of parchment in looping cursive.
"We did." Pandora agreed solemnly. It seemed Pandora didn't think her behaviour warranted further explanation, and Lily vowed to ask her when the potion wore off instead.
For a while, she wrote mostly in silence, occasionally asking Pandora how she felt or if she was experiencing any noteworthy symptoms. With anyone else, she wouldn't have gone along with this. She'd have told them to visit the infirmary or to at least go back to their dorm to try and sleep it off. She knew Pandora well enough to know she'd never listen to her about that, though, and she would probably be very upset if Lily didn't write her observations down. Also, loathe as she was to admit it, the accident would provide them with a lot of insight into the potion and how to get it to work. This could become a breakthrough, even if she hated that it came at risk of Pandora's health.
Pandora was possibly the most intriguing person Lily had ever met, she mused. First and foremost, she was an absolute genius. Slughorn liked to call Lily the most remarkable witch at Hogwarts, but Lily was convinced that was because he hadn't bothered to get to know Pandora. Not many people did, and Lily would never understand why. Sure, she had some less...conventional work methods, the more dangerous of which Lily had been slowly trying to talk her out of, but that didn't have anything to do with her as a person. Pandora was beautifully complex, an enigma, if you will. She was brilliant and reckless and curious to a fault sometimes and very stubborn and in love with the world and kind, so very kind in her own way. Not many people understood her; even Lily wasn't sure she'd ever fully understand the person that Pandora Lovegood was, but she wanted to. In all honesty, Lily was kind of obsessed with her. At some level she knew what that meant, but she'd chosen to ignore it so far, so she might as well keep it up. Little bit of denial had never hurt anyone.
Sometimes, Lily thought about Pandora's namesake and how the name fit her quite well. Pandora had been curious, more so than any other human being had been up until that point. She'd opened the box (jar, Pandora had corrected her during one of many late nights before explaining the entire myth and its mistranslations to her) out of a thirst for knowledge, out of disobedience for the people telling her that pursuing that knowledge would be wrong. Her Pandora was like that too. Lily had never met a more distinctly Ravenclaw person in her life. Plus, if anyone was shaped personally by the gods to enamour mankind, she didn't find it hard to believe it would be someone like Pandora.
"Why do you hate me?" Pandora asked suddenly, in the same way one might ask about the weather. Lily's head snapped towards her so fast she could hear it crack.
"I don't hate you; where'd you get that idea?" She asked in disbelief. Pandora frowned.
"Well, you're sitting all the way over there, and I'm sitting all the way over here, so clearly you find me repulsive." She whined. It took Lily a few seconds to realise what she was trying to say.
"Sorry, is this you asking me to come sit next to you?"
"You're forgiven, and yes, it is." Pandora replied matter-of-factly, shifting to the side and expectantly patting the space next to her and—well, how could she say no to Pandora?
Almost as soon as she sat down, Pandora leaned her head on her shoulder.
"Uh, 'Dora?" She asked hesitantly, freezing up. Pandora was always a very tactile person, but this was a whole new level.
"Can you tell me about muggles?" Pandora asked, completely ignoring Lily's question. She found it hard to follow Pandora's train of thought on a good day, so many seemingly disconnected pieces moving separately that only made sense to Pandora herself, but it was especially hard to follow now.
"Didn't you take Muggle studies?" She asked, slowly easing into the contact. Pandora was unpredictable sometimes, and she found the best thing to do was simply to go along with it all. Plus, she never minded being swept up in Pandora's orbit.
"Sure, but I want to hear it from you." She said, pointing towards Lily's face and almost poking her eye out. After some thought, she added, "I like hearing you speak."
Lily wasn't sure what to say to that, so instead she stumbled into a stuttering explanation of what a microwave was, storing the compliment away to think about later. Had she been talking to anyone else, she would've assumed they didn't mean it. Pandora never said anything she didn't 100% believe in, though, and Lily doubted a potion would change that. Which meant she actually did mean it, and she wasn't sure what to do with that information.
She'd hoped that her explanations of muggle inventions and culture would bore Pandora to sleep; Merlin knows she needs it, but she listened attentively throughout the whole thing as if trying to commit it to memory.
"Did you like growing up with muggles?" She asked after a moment. Lily thought about that. She never really considered her own opinion on growing up the way she had. It was just something that was; it was a fundamental part of her. People had tried to make her feel bad about it, of course. Tried to tell her that she would've been a better witch if she'd grown up with other wizards or that she was 'an impressive witch, for a muggleborn.' But that had always motivated her to do more, work harder, and be better. Then there was the matter of her actual childhood. Making daisies bloom in fields, making friends with Severus, it was all part of her. She wouldn't have traded it for anything.
"I think I did, yeah. It made me who I am today."
"I'm glad. I like who you are today. I like who you are today a lot." Pandora decided.
Lily's cheeks felt warm.
"We should get you to bed; it might help to sleep it off." She said, getting up and pretending she didn't miss the contact. After helping Pandora off the couch, it quickly became apparent she would not be making it back to her dorm alone. Actually, she probably wouldn't even be able to make it into the Ravenclaw Tower. Pandora was in no state to answer any riddles right now, and Lily was fairly certain the bronze knocker wouldn't even let a Gryffindor try to answer.
She sighed in resignation before turning to Pandora. "Alright, I'm taking you to my dorm."
"There are easier ways to get me into your bed than to spend months helping me with potions, you know." Pandora joked absentmindedly, seemingly distracted by the ceiling tiles. Pandora might genuinely be trying to kill her, she decided.
The journey to the Gryffindor tower took far longer than it had to due to Pandora's stumbling and Lily's brain being reduced to a mess that only registered the burning points of contact between them, but eventually they made it to the girls' dorm in one piece. Lily quietly opened the door, peeking inside. Both Mary and Marlene were already asleep, which wasn't entirely unexpected as she'd somehow talked to Pandora until 2 AM.
She dragged Pandora into the bathroom with her before handing her one of her sleepshirts to change into for the night. Before she could offer to go into the other room to let her change, Pandora was pulling her uniform off over her head.
"Pandora!" Lily exclaimed, scandalised, before remembering the time. She quickly turned around, eyes to the wall as she tried to calm her frantic heartbeat.
"Oh, I don't care. You're allowed to look." Pandora shrugged before pulling the pyjamas on. By the time they were both ready for bed, Lily still heard her heart beating in her ears. There was a sort of awkward tension that Pandora either didn't pick up on or didn't care about, but Lily definitely felt it as they settled into her bed. She tried to stay as close to the edge of the bed as she could get without falling off to make it less awkward, but it didn't quite work. Or perhaps it would've, had Pandora not immediately pulled her to the middle of the bed, whispering about how ridiculous she was being. Now, they were pretty much pressed together while Lily cursed whoever made these beds for making them so ridiculously tiny.
She'd just about resigned herself to the fact she wasn't going to sleep tonight anyway when Pandora started poking her arm.
"Lily."
She didn't react.
"Lily."
Pretending to sleep was probably the best course of action, right?
"Lils."
She'd have to think about all these emotions soon, but Merlin, could it just wait a moment?
"Lily, I know you're awake; you breathe like an awake person. Awake people and asleep people breathe very differently, Lily. Did you know that?"
She still didn't reply, though her resolve was quickly crumbling.
"C'mon Lily, this is important! I might forget in the morning!"
"What's wrong, Pandora?" She sighed, turning towards her. At some point, Pandora had also turned to face her, and—wow, their faces were very close together.
"You're stupid." Pandora stated. Lily blinked in surprise.
"What?"
"Wait, no, that's not right. You're really smart, but you're also really stupid." Pandora corrected proudly.
"Why's that?" Lily asked, deciding to indulge her.
"Because you like me, and I very obviously like you, but you're pretending that we don't." Lily's heart sank. It was one thing to just think about it in the comfort of her own head. How much she adored Pandora, what that meant for her, if she could possibly feel the same. It was an entirely other thing to have not only her own feelings but also Pandora's thrown in her face like this. For all her wit, she was fairly certain she knew absolutely nothing beyond 'I really don't want to have this conversation right now. Not while you're like this'.
"Pandora, you should sleep." She muttered, turning away from her and closing her eyes.
"Oh." Pandora whispered, sounding entirely too sad for Lily's liking. Before she could do anything to attempt to salvage things, though, Pandora had fallen asleep. It would take quite some hours to do the same.
The first thing she felt when she woke up was the fabric of the curtain tickling her nose. That was particularly odd because she never closed the curtains.
That train of thought was quickly abandoned when she recognised the second thing she felt, which was another person in her bed. That's when she remembered the events of last night.
Because you like me, and I very obviously like you, but you're pretending that we don't, still echoed in her ears.
"I closed the curtains before your roommates woke up; I figured you wouldn't want to explain why I'm here." Pandora whispered from entirely too close to her ear. Then, as an afterthought, "Oh right, good morning."
"I—Panda, hi." Lily said eloquently. She tried to move, but Pandora's arms were still tightly wrapped around her middle, and she wouldn't budge.
"Before you go, we should talk about what I said last night." Pandora said.
"I know you didn't mean it; it's fine. It was probably just the potion. Speaking of which, I should probably go write that down as one of the symptoms; hold on—" She rambled before Pandora cut her off.
"Lily."
"No, really, I get it, it's fine—"
"Lily."
"I left your equipment in the classroom, though, you probably need to go get it so if you just let me—"
"Lily!" Pandora exclaimed, finally cutting off her increasingly embarrassing word vomit.
"Yes?" She asked.
"I meant every word of it."
She briefly thought that Pandora might still be under the influence of the potion, but her eyes were focused, and she seemed fine. So then why...?
"What?"
"I meant every word I said. I like you, Lily Evans. Quite a lot, I might add." Pandora said slowly, as if willing the words to make an impact. Whatever expression she currently had on her face must explain quite a lot, because a look of understanding dawned on Pandora's face.
"You didn't know that." She stated. Lily almost laughed at the genuinely baffled expression on her face, though that would not be appropriate for the situation.
"No, I did not." And now she did laugh, because this was an absolutely ridiculous situation to be in, and then Pandora was also laughing, and then they were kissing and kissing and kissing until Pandora pulled away.
"For the record, I stand by the other things I said yesterday, too. It baffles me how you can be the smartest person I know and also this stupid simultaneously. I genuinely don't know how you picked up on the fact we both like each other this late."
And Lily adored Pandora, but that didn't stop her from throwing a pillow at her and pushing her off the bed.