I took the miracle move-on drug, the effects were temporary
I was a functioning alcoholic
Till nobody noticed my new aesthetic
And no one here's to blame
But what about your quiet treason?
⊹⊱•••《 💫 》•••⊰⊹
It's a lavender marriage, James knows it, and he thinks Lily knows it too. It's not like that makes it any less painful.
He places his hand on her waist, takes her remaining hand, a pretty song starts playing, and all he can think about is lavender.
He's been doing this for years; by this point, it's now a tradition to have a little dance at their apartment during the anniversary. But James still thinks about lavender.
He loves her, of course... But he's not in love with her. For James, that distinction is very important. He loves her for the person she is and enjoys her company. But he could never say that her red hair is beautiful and shines in the sunshine and makes her look angelic, Pandora did and would.
If she were still here, thinks James
One, two, three
James can only speak with profound romanticism of the love of his life. The life he still dreams about.
James can only say that he loves the black-as-night curls that have slight shimmering reflections during the day or when the sun shines on him. James can only say that he loves the smell of incense, lit candles and goes crazy exploring to find a new mole and leave a soft kiss right there.
That he loves finding the constellation of the Lion's heart and seeing his precious star, even if it's from a distance. That he feels this feeling of hopelessness seep into his bones and rot his skin as time marches on.
He regrets it
And can do nothing
Regulus is married
To Barty
To Remus
Regulus is no longer his
And James is trapped in a lavender marriage.
He doesn't know what's going on until a snap brings him back to reality, Lily and her worried eyes are watching him. Apparently he's crying, he's ruining the anniversary.
He's ruining Lily's happiness.
He's been doing it ever since he first kissed her in the tower.
And he's ruining himself too.
He knows it, he feels it
He sits on the couch and Lily kneels in front of him. She's asking him questions and James would answer if it wasn't so hard. He would if it didn't mean admitting the series of mistakes he's been making since he let Regulus leave his side.
Why had it mattered so much to him that he was a Death Eater?
James had sworn to go to the ends of the earth for him but let him go the first trouble that came in the picture. Maybe Regulus was right and just saw him as an inconvenience.
No
He loved Regulus. He still does, dammit.
Why was he getting short of breath?
Lily forced him to look at her, now she was crying too.
My fault, James thinks
And in the midst of it all, he still tried to wipe Lily's tears away, she took his hands in hers and cried harder. The air was coming back, the spiral was ending and reaching solid ground.
“I'm sorry” he whispered
“Me too” Lily replied. And it felt surreal to James because he's pretty sure that, at least three years earlier, Lily would never have responded something like that.
“I can't do this anymore, James” She looked him in the eyes, James swallowed, his throat stung with guilt “I'm done with this, I can't go on with this life where you stay home all day because you're too depressed to do anything but barely taking care of Harry while I work to try and keep us afloat”
She continues to hold his hands; James lets her do it, and even if he wanted to -because it's too uncomfortable for him- he doesn't look away, Lily needs this, needs to know that, for once, he's genuinely listening and not pretending he is like when he kisses her and only thinks about his star
“We have to think about Harry too, did you lose Regulus? Well, I lost Pandora and I'm not using that as an excuse to not move on with my life because I'm not such a coward to not continue on without her, what would she think of me if I didn't, what would Regulus think of you if he saw you now?”
James pulls his hands away, and after a few seconds he averts his gaze as well, when he hears her sigh he decides to go back to looking into those brown eyes that torture him. Frustration is a little kettle simmering and quickly getting to the point where it makes that annoying noise that always makes you regret buying one in the first place.
“But he can't see me, do you know why?” starts James, and he could try to be nice, but he's sick of it, of sitting here and being soft and squishy for the sake of others ”Because he's too busy in France being happy with Lupin and Crouch! Forgive if I tie us to this life of misery because I needed to know that I still had some love left, that I wasn't just empty because who is the great James Potter if he can't love the ones he loves and please them! Forgive me for thinking about how it could be different because at least Regulus is still here to try!”
The slap comes just after, when he is only inches away from Lily's face, that makes him take a step back in shock. Lily seems to instantly regret it. James does too, he regrets it.
Tension rises in the air, like a great mist that fades very slowly.
“I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that.”
“You did anyway.”
“And I'm sorry.”
“Fuck off, Potter.”
Lily starts walking away from him, straight to their room. James doesn't follow her, he's been there first year and it wasn't nice, he never knew what to do when Lily was crying because of him. He could be good at being supportive when it was someone else but if it was him? The guilt was too strong to at least try. Lily is walking back, James watches her with the intention of actually seeing her, at least once in three years because he stopped himself from doing it before.
Messy hair, dark circles under her eyes, her makeup slightly smudged, traces of tears on her cheeks and.... some papers in her hands.
“What's this?” he says after a long while of just standing there, looking at her.
“I want a divorce. It's enough. I don't want to be your hiding place anymore, your little hideaway so you can deny the world and yourself what you are. Face it, you don't love me and it's killing me to love you and stay. So I'll stop doing both, the simplest for now is to leave. Just sign the papers.”
The new version of Lily in front of him has a frown on her face extending the papers to him, James doesn't bother to take them, instead he kneels in front of her with his mouth open and tears rolling down his cheeks, resting his head on Lily's legs together.
“Please, Lily,” he whispers haltingly because the knot in his chest that is creeping up to his throat and curling into his lungs is too much to bear. He thought of Sirius, of Peter's betrayal, of Regulus and Remus and the words came out like who opens a water tap without thinking and makes it all splash “Choose me, Lily, no one ever chooses me, please” His hands clutched at the fabric of Lily's pants.
“You're wrong, James” He raised his head to look at her, she had tears forming in her eyes again “I did it, I chose you, and look at all it has cost me and will continue to cost me because I can no longer have Pandora back” She paused and James flinched wanting to say something but just couldn't then, he went on to listen “I can no longer have my life back because that no longer exists. I am the mother of a child you didn't want, I am the wife you didn't want, I am the person you didn't want and yet I chose you, James Potter, even if you never chose me back.”
With that she pulls away from him and James' hands end up on the ground, barely keeping his balance.
“What about Harry?” maybe it's the lowest thing he can do, to fall into bringing the boy into it but he was running out of options, if he was left without Lily then he had nothing and James refused to have an empty life.
He'd rather one filled with pain if it meant he could at least feel something
“You can see him whenever you want, if you ever want to see him.”