Chapter 4
Scene I, Lily
After her audition is over, Lily goes back to the castle to change out of her costume, but around seven thirty, she heads back to campus.
Audition tradition, she supposes. All auditions are done by eight pm, and that’s when the bar opens for the first time in the semester. She recognizes most of the people there from other programs. Evan is in the corner with Pandora, Regulus, and a girl Lily thinks might be Dorcas Meadows. James, Sirius, and Remus are playing darts--Marlene is taking a photo of the three of them. And Mary—
Mary is at the bar with Emmeline. She has this smile on her face, like she knows a secret. Lily watches as she stirs her drink, taking a sip as Emmeline talks with stars in her eyes.
It’s entirely innocent, probably.
But the worst thing is she doesn’t care if it’s innocent. Mary still feels like hers, and some ferocious beast in her stomach growls because of it.
Of course, that’s when Mary chooses to glance over. Her smile widens for a moment, eyes sparkling. Then it dims, and Lily's heart breaks all over again.
She knows she’s made mistakes.
And that a lot of this is her fault.
But fuck, she never wanted to be responsible for this. Nobody in the world should make Mary MacDonald have to look at them like that.
Still, she walks over. Because she’s shameless, and can’t help herself.
“How did it go?” Lily asks her.
“Good enough, I think.”
“So, brilliantly.”
“Maybe,” Mary smiles down at the table. “But I’ve asked Mcgonagall if I could understudy this semester.”
Lily’s chest does something funny. She’s never done a show without Mary in it. By her side, in the wings, talking to her through the scenes.
“What do you mean understudy?”
“I have some off campus auditions set up for this week, Mcgonagall spread the word that I’m looking for some work.”
“Oh. I didn’t know that.”
“Yeah, well we haven’t really been talking.” Lily looks away then. Watches Emmeline pretend not to listen to them as she cleans some glasses.
“I’m sorry about that,” she finally says.
“It’s for the best.” Mary's voice is hard, uncompromising. No room for conversation to be had.
God, she wants a drink. Or to be anywhere else. But she has to apologize again, she has to sit with it until it makes her bleed.
“I’m so sorry about everything, Mary. I really am.”
“What exactly are you sorry for,” Mary bites out, posture stiff and hands tight around her glass. “I was okay with being a secret, Lils. You know I was so proud of you when you told Remus, but I never asked you to. I wanted you to be comfortable. I wanted you to feel safe. After everything you’ve been through…” Mary shakes her head. “It’s all I cared about.”
“And I did. Mary, I did.” She’s willing to plead it. Willing to swear it on her grave.
Mary’s eyes flash violently, voice turning to a deadly hiss, “and then you went and you fucked James Potter.”
“I know.” Her chest burns with the shame of it.
“I’m so fucking angry at you,” her eyes are bright with the rage of it. But they’re on her. Pathetically, before it hurts, it’s enough.
Lily has never been very good at being able to tell the difference.
When someone loves her versus wants her.
And then came Mary MacDonald. The only person who let her be. Let her figure it out for herself.
Mary leaves, abandons her drink. And Lily can’t move.
Emmeline serves her something that looks strong, whispering “on the house.” Then leaves her to wallow.
She think’s she’s earned it. The drink. The pity party.
Maybe she even deserves it.
Scene II, Sirius
James wins all three rounds of darts, as usual. Still, Sirius sulks all the way to the bar to buy the round of drink’s he’d challenged as the prize.
“Hey Sirius,” Emmeline grins.
“Em,” he leans forward to talk to her over the noise, “one amaretto sour, and one scotch and soda please.”
“You driving again?” She asks, noticing he’s only ordered Remus and James drinks.
“Yeah, Remus deserves to have a fun night, and I’ve got his keys.”
Emmeline hums, “I can’t imagine having to speak on stage. Thank god I’m a dance major.”
“Thank god indeed,” Sirius says cheekily. Emmeline rolls her eyes and goes to prepare their drinks.
Sirius looks around the bar. Everyone seems to be having fun. He can’t find Mary or Lily though, maybe they’ve finally decided to talk about whatever it is that’s got them fighting. Speaking of, he glances over to his brother, sitting with his own friends. As if sensing Sirius’ gaze, he looks back.
His smile dims, and he excuses himself from the group.
As Regulus makes his way towards him, Sirius is suddenly very glad he’s sober. “Hey, Em,” Sirius calls over his shoulder. “Would you be able to bring the drinks over to James and Remus? I have to talk with my brother.”
Regulus is pacing.
They’re outside, Sirius is leaning against the brick wall to Hogsmede smoking a cigarette, brow pinched between his fingertips because Regulus Is Pacing, and it’s getting in his nerves.
He can feel his anger like hot coals in his chest. He wants to say so many things.
Sirius had earned that part.
Fought for this chance with his blood, sweat, and tears.
And here’s the part he hasn't even told James. Is sure Regulus hasn't either.
Regulus didn’t just audition.
He called the studio and changed Sirius’ audition time.
Took the part under his name.
I could hew up rocks, and fight with flint.
“Reg, I swear to god, just spit it out,” he finally snaps.
“They kicked me out.”
What the fuck.
“That’s why I showed up in the middle of the night. I took twelve buses, hitchhiked across—across a lot of it. I got the money from dad’s dresser.” It seems now that Regulus started talking, he’s not stopping. “For the last three years, they thought I was attending McGill, but someone—someone sent them an invitation to our spring show. They saw my name as the lead in Pericles, and when I got home,” Regulus’ voice cracks. “It was really bad. And I thought—I thought you did it. I saw your audition details written on the counter in James’ kitchen, and Sirius, I was so mad. I was so, so mad I just—“
“Whoa, wait, slow down,” Sirius holds a hand up, refrains from reaching over and grabbing Regulus’ shoulder to settle him. “You successfully lied to our parents for three years?”
“What?” Regulus genuinely seems taken aback. “That’s what you got out of all that?”
Regulus’ hands are shaking a bit, and against his will, some of Sirius’ anger abandons him. He can’t help it. Before he was anything he was Regulus' older brother. “Why didn’t you just talk to me?”
“Because it made sense,” Regulus confesses, “you were mad I got the part of Pericles.”
Sirius bristles at that. “I was jealous, Reg, not mad. I knew you earned it.”
“I just…” Regulus fiddles with the sleeves to his coat. “I didn’t know if I’d be able to do this anymore, uncle Alphard can’t afford two tuitions.”
“But James’ parents can.”
Regulus tenses, taking a step back. “Absolutely not.”
“Look,” Sirius sighs, reaching into his pocket to pull out a lighter—due to all the excitement his cigarette has gone out, and if he’s going to get through this conversation, he needs the fucking nicotine. “I’m still mad, but let’s figure this out alright? You’re not going to lose this place.”
Regulus eyes him warily, “you’re being very calm.”
James’ words from earlier come back to him. About how Sirius is free from their family, and that Regulus wasn’t. The gap between them is so wide some days that despite being in the same program, living in dorms down the hall from each other, Regulus has managed to become a stranger.
And that’s not—he can’t live with that.
“Look, we obviously have,” he gestures between them, “some shit to work through. You didn’t even tell me about lying to them. But you’re my brother, and at the end of the day, I know what fighting them is like better than anyone.”
Regulus just stares at him.
“And I guess—“ he stops. The words are tough enough to choke on.“I understand acting out when you feel…betrayed.”
“Oh.” Regulus says dumbly, and the air between them is a bit calmer.
“For now,” Sirius continues, “let’s focus on how you’re going to pay your winter tuition. I can help you with anything else you need, food, books and whatever, but twelve thousand dollars will be tough.”
“There’s something more important to figure out first.”
“Oh yeah? What’s that?”
Regulus gets a dangerous glint in his eyes, “Who sent our parents that invitation.”
Scene III, James.
Once Sirius and Regulus leave the bar, it becomes a bit hard to focus on anything. It’s only ten pm, but the air carries the urgency of later than that. After twenty minutes of waiting, James calls it. It’s been a long day, and it’s time to crash. Remus urges him to wait, seeing as Sirius is their ride home, but James argues they’re only a twenty minute walk from the Castle, and he’s not that drunk. In the end Remus relents.
James’ cheeks are flushed by the time he closes the castle’s door behind him. The place is warm, meaning someone’s probably got the fireplace in the living room going. Seeing as everyone but Sirius and Regulus are still at the bar, he goes to storm in, a scold ready on his tongue for forgetting him and Remus at the bar but—
It’s Lily.
“James, I didn’t hear you come in.” She’s rubbing at her eyes, obviously trying to make it look like she hasn’t been crying. “Why aren’t you out celebrating?”
“Uh,” he scratches the back of his head. He’s not exactly sure what to do here.
James wouldn’t say he pinned for her their first year, but he definitely didn’t hide that he liked her. It’s just not in his nature. Besides hid crush, they got along well enough, and James tried to be self aware enough not to make a fool out of himself. But she made it clear--several times--that she didn’t feel the same.
Maybe it’s because he liked her so much that when she kissed him last semester, he let her. Maybe it was the alcohol, or the party they were both at, but he let things go further. They found a room and it was messy, and he took time just the way he likes too, and it felt fucking holy. Like it was all for something.
James likes sex. Is committed to treating it like an art form. Something raw; a feeling he can’t communicate any other way. Now he finally got to show her what it had meant, all that stuff he’d had in his chest for her. He didn’t expect more from it afterwards. But they haven’t…talked. And James really meant it when he says he hadn’t wanted anything from her she wasn’t willing to give, but it didn’t go back to normal after. And that?
That he regrets.
“I thought I’d turn in. Long day.”
“Yeah,” Lily’s voice cracks. “Me too.”
“Lily, I—“ he moves into the room, sitting on the other end of the couch. She’s got her feet curled under her, looking at him. He tries to meet her gaze. “I know things between us have been weird ever since…” he trails off. “But if I’d known it would have changed us—“
Lily flinches.
“I mean, I don’t regret it, I was so…” He’s messing this up. He knows he’s messing this up.
“I liked us,” he finally confesses. “I liked where we were, before. I miss being your friend.”
Lily gives him a brief wobbly smile. “I miss you too, dickhead. But I don’t think I’m a very good friend right now.”
“What?” James laughs, “that’s just—really not true.”
“I was with someone,” her voice cracks, and James’ head is too slow. “When we—I was with someone.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
He doesn’t really know what to say to that, so he tries the silent supportive thing.
“You didn’t…” Lily shakes her head, some of that fierceness coming back. “It was getting serious, and I got scared, and I knew you were…I knew I couldn’t lose you.”
James nods, “you won’t.”
She thins her lips, fiddling with her sleeves. “You’re not going to ask who it was?”
James is dying to ask actually, but he knows Lily is an extremely private person, and probably wouldn’t tell him if her life depended on it. “What’s in a name?” He quotes instead. “Whoever it was, you were in pain. I’m sorry I didn’t see it.”
“Well,” Lily sniffs, straightening her posture, “I have been told I’m quite the actress.”
“One in a billion you are,” he says, grinning. “No one in this program is a match for you in raw talent, Lils.”
“I think you are,” she says plainly. “I think you’re going to get cast for Romeo and put on the best show this school has ever seen.”
He doesn’t blush. He doesn’t. “Well, I do hope you’re my Juliet—that is who you auditioned for, isn’t it.”
Lily narrows her eyes, “and what makes you think that.”
“You always audition for the lead, whether it makes sense or not.”
Lily shakes her head, a real smile on her face now. “Go big or go home, I guess.”
Lily goes to sleep, and James wishes he could too.
He’s always had trouble sleeping.
Even when he was a baby he drove his mum mad with it. She says it was always worth it, staying up with him in the odd hours, but James can’t be quite that patient with himself now that he’s an adult. He stares at the clock; watches the clouds pass outside; gets up, stretches, lies back down. Sirius doesn’t come back.
Finally, he goes to the kitchen.
Mary is already there.
“Grilled cheese?” He asks her in lieu of a greeting.
“Please,” she sighs, closing her copy of Romeo and Juliet with a snap.
James gets to working at the stove, pulling out the bread and cheese, a knife.
“So,” he starts, “how’d your audition go?”
She shrugs, “it doesn’t really matter, I’ve asked Mcgonagall to understudy.”
“What?” James pouts, “how come?”
“I need real world experience,” she says plainly, “If I want to make a career of this, then I need to have things on my resume besides school.”
“But it’s Delecher, surely that’s worth more than a random city theatre.”
“But I don’t want it to be just Delechher, I want to prove I can work.”
James hesitates, because he knows Mary believes what she’s saying, but somethings been bothering him. Present at the back of his mind since term started. “I’ve noticed you and Lily have been fighting.”
He can’t see her expression, due to working at the stove, but her silence is telling. “Does this have anything to do with—“ James cuts himself off, realizing he doesn’t actually know if Lily had told anyone else about whatever guy she’d been dating in the spring.
“You and her after the spring festival?” Mary finishes his sentence anyways, voice a bit strained. “You two have been dancing around each other for years, we’ve all found it hilarious.”
James can’t help but laugh, “I think I’ve been the only one doing any dancing.”
“Probably,” Mary admits, and James glances over his shoulder to see a distant look on Mary’s face.
“If she’s why you don’t want to have a main role—“
“It’s for the best, James.” Her tone leaves no room for argument, so James doesn’t push. He just serves her a grilled cheese sandwich and turns the topic to lighter things.