petty trifles
However enjoyable a ball might be at its climax, the inevitable crash following such an occasion falls as swiftly and brutally as an executioner’s axe. Remus was pondering this rather romantic bit of imagery come breakfast the next morning, nursing a ghastly hangover and doing everything in his power not to retch into his porridge.
“Oh excellent, Lu, he’s sent you a letter!” Mary declared enthusiastically, entering the breakfast parlour with the post and her typical early-morning cheer. Remus flinched at the sound, fairly resentful of Mary’s wise decision not to drink the night previous.
Lily hacked out a cough, choking on her morning tea. “Who? Surely not—”
Mary nodded gleefully, ripping open the letter without a moment’s thought. She scanned its contents quickly, delighting in the room’s rapt attention. “Ah, the classic ploy,” she sniffed, feigning disinterest and discarding the letter into Lily’s lap. (Here she turned to Remus and Marlene with renewed vigour, deepening her voice and elongating her vowels in an amusing impression of Mr. Potter.) “‘Oh Dearest Lily, I’m so lost without you! My posh sensibilities simply cannot handle the trials of the Meryton market! Please be my companion, most Noble and Virtuous Lily. I want you, I need you, I lust for your guidance—’”
One look at Lily’s murderous expression and Mary was on her feet, racing to hide behind the shield of a cackling Marlene (previously nodding off into her plate of eggs; now joyously awake).
“Mary Macdonald, as God is my witness, you are going to regret that—”
Mary shrieked with laughter, taking off around the table again just as Remus teased, “How much would you like to bet he was giggling and kicking his feet when he wrote that message?”
“Spritzed a bit of his cologne inside the envelope, did he?” joined in Marlene cheerfully, making no attempt to aid either of her sisters.
“You are so dead—”
“What’s this, all of you?” Hope cried, entering the parlour with a basket of washing on her hip and what Remus knew must be a terrific headache from her many cocktails the night before. “Who’s killing who in my house?”
Mary and Lily had the decency to look at least slightly ashamed at the commotion they’d caused, but Marlene was still stifling giggles behind her hands.
Hope promptly noticed the letter lying forgotten beside their breakfast, plucking it from the table and skimming a few lines despite Lily’s half-hearted protests. Then, just as Remus suspected, a devilish smile took over her features.
“Well done, Lily,” she remarked cheekily, winking at her daughter. “Carry on then!”
She bustled from the room without further comment, much to Lily’s dismay.
“Honestly, you three.” Lily snatched the letter off the table and slipped into her pocket disapprovingly. “He’s new in town, it’s only polite to show him around! Markets can be very—” Remus could hear the barely concealed mirth in her words, “—Well, they can be disorienting! It’s not—” Mary hooted with laughter, wrapping her arm around Lily’s shoulders and pulling her in. “You can’t even finish that sentence!”
“Saints, this is so humiliating—”
“Oh please, it’s cute, Lu. He just wants to spend time with you.”
“It really is very sweet,” Remus admitted, taking pity on his distressed sister. “We’re not trying to humiliate you. Right, Lennie?”
Marlene shrugged, taking a sip of her morning coffee. “Two things can be true.”
—
Lily rocked on her toes nervously, stationed next to the butcher’s shop where Mr. Potter asked her to meet him. It was around noon that Saturday and the cobblestone streets of the town square were bustling by Meryton’s standards, shopkeepers hawking wares from storefronts in every direction amidst a sea of milling townspeople, expressing urgency and impatience the situation really did not require.
“Busy to-day,” Mr. Potter mused from somewhere to Lily’s left, shocking a small squeak out of her. She hadn’t noticed his approach.
“Sorry, did I surprise you?” Mr. Potter looked embarrassed, carding a hand through his hair. “It drives Reg half-crazy, he says one shouldn’t just walk up and start speaking without properly announcing one’s presence first.” He offered Lily a wobbly bow that was more endearing than it probably should’ve been. “Well, er. Here I am! And here you are! And how lovely it is to see you!”
Lily laughed, all nerves melting away at once. She was getting used to Mr. Potter now, and there was no doubt he possessed the innate and intangible quality to set all those he spoke to perfectly at ease. She briefly wondered if ‘Reg’ was the name of Mr. Potter’s prudish old tutor or some sort of hyper-critical butler, but decided not to press him on it.
“That’s quite alright, Mr. Potter. It’s nice to see you again too, especially so soon,” Lily replied honestly, smiling at the man. “I wouldn’t expect a fancy Londoner like yourself to consider this busy, however.”
She’d expected Mr. Potter to seem pleased, but the comment only made him sheepish, scratching the back of his neck. “Fancy Londoner, huh? I’m flattered, Miss Evans, however…” He glanced around as if expecting spies and saboteurs to pop out of the bushes around them. “Well, can you keep a secret?”
Lily tilted her face upwards towards him, squinting against the afternoon sun and reaching up a hand to shade her eyes. “Go on then.”
“We’re not really from London at all. We’ve only lived in London this summer, Sirius and I, just a few months or so. We’re from Derbyshire, actually, give or take a hundred miles North from here. Sirius made me promise not to mention that to anyone, but I confess I can’t quite see the harm.”
Lily frowned. “Why doesn’t Mr. Black want people to know he’s not from London, if I may ask?”
Mr. Potter wrung his hands unhappily. “It’s more the being-from-Derbyshire part he objects to, if I’m honest. We didn’t leave home on the best of terms, and Sirius never considered it much of a home anyway. I can’t say I’m particularly enthusiastic about the place either at present, but that’s neither here nor there.” He paused thoughtfully, pondering. Lily pondered too. Was that why Mr. Black had been in such a terrible mood the night previous, trouble at home? What could’ve possibly—
“In any case!” Mr. Potter burst out abruptly, shifting the conversation onto cheerier topics. “I’d love your expertise on the very best establishments around here, Miss Evans, if you wouldn’t mind.”
She nodded at him, willing but still unsure. “I’d be happy to show you around, though I wouldn’t exactly call myself an ‘expert’. I’m not positive I’ll have any sort of outstanding insight into this place, I hardly understand it myself.”
Mr. Potter gave her a sweet, almost shy smile. “Nonsense, Miss Evans, I’m sure that isn’t true.”
She looked sceptical. “What makes you say that, Mr. Potter?”
He shrugged. “Well, I don’t know. I just have a feeling about you.”
—
As promised, Lily spent the afternoon carting Mr. Potter around to all her very favourite spots in town; the empty chapel where he oohed and ahhed at all the right stained-glass pieces, somehow able to pick out the one Lily loved most with ease (“Simply magnificent, it’s got to be that one right there — No, I’ve got it, the smaller one to the left. Yes, that’s it. Gosh, it’s just lovely how they’ve done the dove, isn’t it?”); the tavern Lily frequented, if only to visit her dear friend Alice, the pubkeeper’s daughter (“I see Miss Evans keeps good company, though I’m not surprised. Quite a nice ambiance you’ve got here, if it weren’t so early in the day I daresay I’d fancy a drink.”); the seamstress’s shop (“I simply couldn’t believe my eyes at the ball last night — Gorgeous dresses you’re making, truly, one and all!”); the old schoolhouse (“I was always too distracted by daydreams during my school days to actually pay attention, my head too full of carriages soaring through the air pulled by winged horses and other such nonsense. I could never sit still, anyway. What sorts of things did you like to study?”); the apothecary (“You’re doing the Lord’s work here, Mr. Slughorn, really. Where would England be without men like you?”); and so on. Mr. Potter found something to compliment at each stop, no matter how dull Lily thought any ordinary person might find them.
She tried to reciprocate with comments of her own, personal descriptions of the locations she loved most — the bush where Remus had plucked the wrong berries and given everyone a dreadful bout of illness one summer; the bench Marlene whiled away her first homesick weeks in England on, admiring the horses trotting past for hours on end; the newspaper stand Mary visited obsessively, always on the hunt for news from London — but Mr. Potter’s rapt attention and clear delight at these stories only made it more difficult for her to tell them. He was like some sort of monolith of goodwill, the perfectly-trained gentleman, always saying the right things and flustering her. It was almost exhausting being around someone so pleasant.
At last they stopped at a bakery, where Mr. Potter insisted on purchasing an array of desserts for Lily to bring home to her family. “Oh nonsense, nonsense, it’s only the proper fee for such an excellent tour,” he replied when Lily tried to reject this generosity, winking and bringing a smile to her face. “Which would you like?”
Lily hummed thoughtfully. “The strawberry sponge cake will be appreciated back home, I think. It’s very kind of you.”
Mr. Potter fished around in his pocket for his coin purse, smiling back at her. “Are you always so considerate of others, Miss Evans? And so humble? Rather, do you never think of yourself?”
That caught Lily off guard. She gaped at him, amazed, gesturing at the counter where he’d already piled a mountain of biscuits and scones for his companions back at Netherfield, as well as Lily’s selections for her own family. “Are you, Mr. Potter? You’ve shown me nothing but kindness to-day, and I can’t say I understand why you’ve chosen me to—”
He looked momentarily confused. “What, the cake? You should raise your expectations of kindness, Miss Evans, you deserve far better.”
It was exceptionally bizarre; everything they said was meant to be complimentary — it could not be denied that they enjoyed each other’s company, after all — but the words exchanged had the cadence of an argument, as if the pair were falling into the ruts of a petty squabble they’d had hundreds of times before. It was not unpleasant, this feeling. There was something profoundly comforting about its puzzling familiarity.
“Oh please, don’t give me that. You’re merely humouring me, it’s obvious. You’ve found something nice to say about every square inch of Meryton — Don’t tell me you really found the grocer’s dirty pile of squashed vegetables as exceptional as all that?”
Mr. Potter scoffed, looking properly offended at the insinuation that his enthusiasm for produce was anything less than authentic. “I always say what I mean, thank you very much. I do love it here. And I was only rambling because I couldn’t get a read on you and had to fill the silence somehow — You’re like an impenetrable wall of politeness and charm, of course I’ve no idea where I stand with you!”
Lily downright bristled. “That’s ridiculous. You come here, all rich and fancy and trained to woo young ladies like me — or versions of me with higher social standing, naturally — and I’m expected to believe you when you act like I hung the blasted stars in the sky every time I show you some run-down old building I’ve got childish attachment to? I’m not that foolish, Mr. Potter.”
Lily didn’t even really mean that. It was just sort of fun to say, like they were some bickering married couple who’d grown sick of each other over the years and now caused a scene at every gathering. From the mischievous glint in Mr. Potter’s eye, she could tell he felt the same. It was more about the performance of hostility than anything else. She liked that he understood that.
Mr. Potter shook his head with exasperation. “I like it because you like it! I like to see it through your eyes, is that so wrong? And anyway, it wouldn’t seem so shallow if you would actually talk to me about why they matter to you. It’s like pulling teeth to get you to say anything, and I feel like I’m holding you captive! If you hate being around me so much, then leave.”
“Lest I remind you, you’re the one who invited me? You’re too perfect to talk to, anyway, perfectly inauthentic. Maybe I will leave.”
“Fine; go. I’m sorry I made the grievous mistake of trying to befriend a nice girl I met at a ball. How absolutely horrid of me, really, I’ll rot in Hell for this one.”
“You’re aggravating and conceited!”
“You’re withholding and cold.”
Lily glared at him fiercely. “You’re wrong, you know. I do like you.”
Mr. Potter threw his hands up in the air. “Well, I like you too!”
They could resist it no longer. The pair burst into raucous laughter, startling the elderly woman hobbling her way down to the storefront to ring up their order. She gave Lily a nasty look as she wrapped the parcel, but Lily was enjoying herself too much to care.
They stumbled out of the shop together, boxes of pastries tucked neatly under their arms and still giggling like school-children.
“I don’t know why that was so fun,” Mr. Potter commented when he finally regained control of himself. “I didn’t want to fight with you, honest — I didn’t even really believe half the things I said. I just sort of liked the idea that we knew each other so well we could fall out over something as silly as a cake.” Lily snorted. “Is that terrible?”
She grinned at him. “I felt the same. I really am sorry if I was withholding. I guess I figured you didn’t care all too much what I showed you. The memories attached to those places are silly anyway, just childhood folly with my family. I was embarrassed, I guess.”
Mr. Potter smiled too, as bright and happy as the afternoon sun. “Don’t be sorry. I’m sorry if I was conceited! It’s probably my worst trait; other than that I’m pretty much perfect, you were right.”
Lily laughed again. “Why don’t you think long and hard about it, come up with a comprehensive list of flaws to present to me, and then I’ll have proper ammunition for our next fight and won’t feel so dreadfully inferior when speaking to you.”
Mr. Potter shifted the box of sweets under his arm so that he could count the list off on his fingers. “Well, let’s see. I’m conceited, as you know. Apparently aggravating as well, that one stings. I’m terribly selfish, and oftentimes greedy, too. Idealistic to a fault, stubborn, and competitive, for sure. Reckless, impulsive, obsessive, thoughtless, and irritatingly theatrical.” Lily nodded along seriously, as if jotting down a mental note at each word.
“Go on,” she said at his pause. He shrugged, grinning.
“That’s about it, I’m afraid. Still like me? Think you can put up with me long enough to bicker like that?”
Lily pondered it for a bit, making him sweat. Finally, she said, “Yes, I think so. I’ll be putting up with you for quite a while yet, James Potter, if you’ll let me.”
“Oh really?” He arched an eyebrow at her. “And so what about you? What are your fatal flaws, Lily Evans?”
“Oh, I don’t have any,” she answered innocently. “I’m perfect.”
—
They soon found themselves in a quiet courtyard shooting off from the main market square, sitting on a wide, stone bench laced with ivy. Mr. Potter passed her a slice of the strawberry sponge and unwrapped a lemon tart for himself, wrinkling his nose a little at the pastry’s sourness.
Lily smiled at him. He was really quite cute. “Not a fan of the tart, Potter?”
He looked amused at the dropped honorific, but chose not to comment on it. “I suppose I’m just not a lemon tart man at heart, but I’m determined to get myself to like them. I believe in training the taste buds.”
Lily snorted. “But that’s demented! Why not just get something you actually like?”
James seemed to consider it. He looked a little embarrassed now. “It’s just this friend of mine, he— He really likes them. And so I want to really like them. He’s sort of furious with me right now, but hopefully when I see him again, I’ll be a lover of lemon tarts. And then we’ll have something to talk about.”
Lily shook her head incredulously. “That’s mad, Potter. Why don’t you just apologise?”
“Evans, why do you automatically assume I’m the one who’s at fault?”
“Well, are you?”
James sighed. “Yes.”
Lily nodded, satisfied. “Well, there you go.”
James took another bite. Chewed thoughtfully. Swallowed. “See, that bite wasn’t so bad. It’s working, Evans, have faith in me.”
Lily decided not to press this obvious evasion. She tasted a bit of her cake, the sponge as light and sweet as ever.
“So, tell me about yourself, Lily Evans. What is it you want to do with your life?” James asked. “Picture yourself in a decade or two. What is it that you’re doing?”
Lily wiped a bit of frosting from the corner of her mouth. “Well, I dunno,” she said. "It’s not like I’ve got rights to inherit Longbourn, but I don’t expect Remus to exactly kick me out if the time comes. I always figured I’d end up running an orphanage of my own when my parents pass, God Forbid. The others, they— I know they’ll move on eventually, move away. But I like it here, in Meryton. And I love children.” She shrugged. “It just makes sense.”
“You want it because it makes sense, or because you really want it?” James asked. Lily wondered if he was more self-aware than he let on.
She considered it. “I want it because I want it,” she said simply, letting her eyes flutter closed. “In a decade I see myself — I don’t know — hanging the washing. And there’re children running around the grass, chasing each other, and inside, one of the older kids has a pie in the oven because Aunty Mary is coming for supper or something. Maybe we’re not rich, but we get by. And all those children who would’ve been alone have a family now.” She smiled, opening her eyes. James was listening closely, captivated by her.
“And in this world,” James asked teasingly, “is there someone else in your home? A husband, maybe?”
Lily thought it over genuinely. “Perhaps,” she said truthfully. “But it isn’t like he’s the missing puzzle piece to my life. I’m not helpless without him. Not every woman needs a husband, or don’t you agree, Mr. Potter?”
“Of course not,” James said hurriedly. “No, of course not.”
“And what do you want, Potter? What will your life look like?”
James brushed a few stray crumbs from his lap and smiled at her, practised and insincere. “Oh, what everyone wants,” he answered vaguely. “You know.”
Lily raised her eyebrows, intrigued. At last, she thought. A crack in the armour. “Which is?”
James suddenly seemed very interested in his shoes. “Sizeable estate near my parents’ home. Big family. Nice wife. Maybe a dog for the children to play with. Extravagant holidays in the summertime. Well-paying job.” He shrugged, almost sadly. “The ‘Great English Dream.’”
Lily nodded sagely. “Hm,” she said. “Interesting. I guess I never figured you for a coward, Potter.”
That shocked a laugh out of James, albeit a slightly indignant one. He almost choked on a bit of tart.
“Pardon me?”
“Oh yes,” Lily declared, continuing to nod matter-of-factly. “Yes, something is very wrong. Here I was, expecting you to spin wild tales of daring adventure and intrigue, and you offer me that load of rubbish. Frankly disgraceful, Potter, I expected better.”
James did chuckle then, but it was not at all the contagious, unrestrained James Potter tumult of laughter she’d grown used to. It was a hollow, weak little sound, and Lily saw that her comment had troubled him. “What makes you so sure it’s not the truth?”
Lily immediately felt guilty. “Maybe it is, James, I don’t know. But I have a funny feeling you’d be bored with that life. I mean happy, sure, but bored. Unfulfilled. Sort of… trapped.”
James looked uneasy but didn’t deny her words. “It’s what I’ve always wanted,” he said quietly. “Ever since I was a little boy.”
“Since you were a little boy, or when you were a little boy?”
James cracked a small, genuine smile then. “Now there’s a question.”
Abruptly, Lily asked, “Do you really want a plain, obedient wife who will bear you children and never complain, or did you just say that?”
“I never described her like that!”
“But you meant it.”
“I didn’t. You know I wouldn’t care for that, Lily.”
“All men of your social class want that.”
“I certainly don’t.”
“Of course not,” Lily said, snapping her fingers. “You need someone who will challenge you, don’t you? Someone who makes you grow.”
James shot her a little smirk, but they both knew he was only joking now, like their little act before. “Well, that’s very forward of you, Lily,” he teased. “Should I clear my schedule, for the wedding?”
Lily wrinkled her nose, laughing. “Don’t be presumptuous, Potter, I wasn’t talking about me.”
“Well then, who were you talking about?”
“I don’t know,” she said honestly. “I just don’t think you want a nice, boring life like that. I think you crave adventure.”
James checked his watch then, beginning to gather his things. “Perhaps I’m just a boring fellow, Evans, have you considered that?”
Lily felt horrible for a moment. “Have I offended you?” she asked genuinely.
James laughed affably, surprised at the question. His lingering melancholia seemed to have left him for the moment. “No, Lily, you’re quite alright,” he reassured. “But I told Dorcas and Sirius I’d be back before now, I’m sure they’ve spun up wild tales about which tragedy has befallen me by now and worked themselves up into quite a dither. It was lovely to have this day with you, however. I hope we may meet again soon, Miss Evans.”
James tipped his hat to her and was gone before she could reply. Lily licked a bit of frosting off her thumb.
No, she thought. James Potter was not boring at all.