Chapter 1
They passed restlessness months ago. James and Lily are properly stir-crazy by now, each seeking ways to cope. As August slowly eats its way towards autumn, Lily spends more time in the potions lab and James rearranges every room in the house multiple times. Lily is sure Harry will be the brightest kid at Hogwarts, simply due to the amount of time they have to dedicate towards him. She wouldn’t be surprised if he’s reading within the year.
They fight, sometimes, reliving simpler days. Lily will feel annoyance flare up at him every time she sees that old lazy boastfulness turn up. Sometimes she feels annoyance flare up at him for no reason at all, other than that she’s seen him sip morning tea in the exact same way for so many days straight. One particularly bad evening, she locks herself in Harry’s nursery and cries against the door as she holds her son. She can feel James, sitting right on the other side of the door, but for once he knows better than to say anything. Finally, she says, just loud enough for him to hear, “I’m sorry. This is too hard. I shouldn’t blame you.” And she doesn’t, usually.
Sometimes, things seem almost normal, though, and on a particularly pleasant day in mid September, they sit outside and watch the early morning sun cast shadows and light on the garden, each other, Harry. Lily rests her head on James’s shoulder and pretends they’re all safe. She hasn’t been paying much attention to what James is saying, but he’s fallen expectantly silent. “Sorry?” she asks, hoping he won’t mind her inattentiveness.
He doesn’t, just smiles fondly. “I was talking about the owl I got yesterday. From Peter? He wants to come visit.”
Lily grimaces. “Again?” At James’s reproachful look, she rolls her eyes. “I’m sorry, you know I love him, but he’s been so...dreary lately. Dreary and all over us.” This was true. If Peter Pettigrew had always been a little more clingy than Lily had liked, lately, he had been positively dependant. Not many days passed between his letters, and not many more than that passed between his drop-ins. It was touching, she supposed, and his concern for his friends was visible each time. But it seemed, too, that he could barely make a decision these days without asking James’s opinion.
“I know,” James admits, “But this is hard for him.” He ignores Lily’s pointed snort, instead bouncing Harry on his knee. James grins suddenly. “What about a dinner party?” Lily can tell as soon as he says it that it’s an idea that he won’t be letting go, and she notes with resignation and fondness as it spreads across his whole face. “Oh! Wait, can we? That’s excellent, like we’re proper, normal grown-ups. A dinner party.”
“James,” Lily tries to contain her laughter, because he’s so excited and she hasn’t seen him this genuine in weeks. “Slow down. How--or, why--”
“No, Lily, this is brilliant.” Harry, suddenly neglected, begins to fuss as James grows kinetic with an idea. “We can invite Peter, and Sirius, and Remus, and cook--god, I don’t know, what do posh people cook for a dinner party?”
“What, now we’re posh? You’re the one with the pedigree, you should know more than I what to serve.” Lily can’t deny that it’s a little infectious, this energy he has going. “I think it would be fun,” she concedes. “What about Alice and Frank?”
“Brilliant.” He gives her a look of relief and then a kiss. Then he seems to hesitate. “Is it too conspicuous?”
She knows what he means; Dumbledore has been reticent to let them do approximately anything, but fuck it, they need some kind of change. “I think it’s okay.” She looks at Harry, who is suddenly fascinated by James’s glasses. “He won’t know. And these are all our best friends. And Dumbledore trusts them enough, right?”
James needs little convincing to pursue his plan wholeheartedly, and while Lily herself is not wholly swayed by her logic, James begins to rattle away about invitations and menus. Moments like this remind her that when it comes down to it, they’re still just kids, playacting. A dinner party is far more sophisticated than any of his schemes, but James is applying himself in the exact same way he used to at Hogwarts.
Months of laying low have left Lily jumpy. She wants to go, somewhere far away, anywhere really, but at the same time the thought of not being with Harry and in the relative safety of their home is terrifying. She hates this. Lily is not supposed to get nervous. She’s not supposed to panic about having five or six friends over. And yet as James continues to talk, she finds herself digging her nails into her palms and staring fixedly at the ground.
James notices, eventually, and changes his tone. “We don’t have to, Lily,” he reassures her softly. “It’s just a silly idea. I understand.”
“Don’t be an idiot,” she manages. “I think it’s a good idea. It’s just--look at him, James.” They watch their son for a moment, and she is afraid. After a pause, Lily says softly, “And Marlene.”
James breathes in sharply. Marlene’s death is recent enough that it still twists like a knife every time Lily thinks about it, but enough months have passed that she doesn’t think about it constantly. James squeezes her shoulder as she takes a few shaky breaths. “It’s just the kind of thing we’d have invited her to, you know? It’s hard.”
James kisses her forehead. “It is.” For all that she resents about their lives now, she’s grateful for this change in her husband. Hemmed in and forced to think more than he acts, he’s stopped trying to fix everything. He knows that right now, all she needs to hear is that confirmation and all she needs to feel is his warmth next to her.
Moments pass, several of them, and Lily feels like an enormous ship is sailing slowly by. But it too passes and she’s able to collect herself enough to smile at her husband, pick up her child, and stand. “Let’s go inside. Write some letters.”
James beams at her. “Brilliant,” he says once more.
__________
Remus stares at his wardrobe like it’s an arithmancy problem and it stares right back, offering no help whatsoever. He knows this should be easy--it’s just James and Lily. But he feels something gnawing away at him as he tries to find his most presentable outfit.
The problem with having no prospects and a live-in boyfriend, he thinks as he looks for a tie, is that he hasn’t had an occasion to dress up in three years. They’ve moved twice in that time, and after he gave up on job interviews, he figured it would lighten the load to give up his nicer clothes.
Finally, he finds a pair of pants that he spells the wrinkles out of and a deep green button-down shirt. Still no tie, and his nicest shoes wouldn’t sell for love or money, but it’s a better starting point. He wonders why this thing in the pit of his stomach won’t give up and he hates himself for it. “It’s fine,” he says out loud, trying to believe himself. “There is nothing wrong.”
Louder, he shouts, “Can I borrow a tie?” Even this makes his throat tighten, because at some point it became hard to ask Sirius for anything.
From the kitchen, Sirius assents with a short “Yeah,” and this only puts Remus more on edge but he tries to shove the entire knot in his chest comfortably down to the bottom of his stomach where it can’t bother anyone. He digs around and finds a brown silk tie and as he picks it up his fingers remember it on Sirius, months ago, when things had been normal and they had tried to go on a real date to a real restaurant. They had come home, laughing and tipsy on sweet wine and Remus had removed this tie from Sirius’s shirt as they kissed in the doorway.
He tries to shake the memory, now, and ignores how unnaturally tight it feels around his neck. He checks the time but is unsure whether he’s relieved or frustrated that they still have ten minutes before they have to leave.
After standing stock still in the bedroom for a few minutes, he forces himself to walk to the kitchen, where Sirius is finishing up the Devon pie they’ve promised to bring. He glances up when Remus walks in but is displaying a remarkable amount of focus on their contribution to the dinner. “Is it almost done?” Remus asks. He knows it is.
“Nearly,” Sirius responds, with a brief and unenthusiastic smile aimed approximately at Remus. “Be ready in two, three minutes, and then we can go.”
Remus gives Sirius a once over as he stands there in his leather jacket and torn jeans and those fucking boots and his throat tightens because he’s mad, but does he have the right to be mad, and isn’t this a silly thing to be mad about anyway. “Are you going to change?” he asks, his voice tight and his tone sharp.
Sirius gives him a withering look. “It’s just James and Lily. We’re not going to see the bloody queen or anything.”
Remus’s fists clench at his side and he makes his voice as even as possible which, given years of practice, is pretty damn even, he thinks. “They specifically asked that we dress up, just a little. Are you really going to show up like this for James and Lily? Make an effort, Sirius.” He thinks he might vomit.
“Jesus Christ,” Sirius mutters, then continues, louder, “Yes, okay, fine. Finish the pie.” As he brushes past Remus, knocking him against the doorframe, Remus wants to stop him and demand something, an explanation or a kiss or just one look.
A few minutes later Sirius calls, “Ready,” and Remus emerges with the pie all wrapped up. Sirius was always able to wear his upbringing with casual pride, and he’s doing the same with his clothes tonight, a white shirt and black tie and pants that manage to look as expensive as they do rumpled. What really does Remus in, though, is the eyeliner Sirius has smeared on, which he must have known would have this effect.
So Remus, despite everything, reaches for a genuine smile and finds it. “You look amazing,” he says and hopes Sirius can hear that he means it. He thinks he must, because something uncertain seems to flash across the other man’s face before he returns the smile with Remus’s favorite grin, the one that looks like a surprise.
“Shall we?” he says, offering Remus his arm, and they apparate to the safe point in Godric’s Hollow and walk towards James and Lily’s house. They don’t speak as they walk, and Remus feels the silence like a vise. He burrows further and further into his head trying to find something to say that won’t make one or both of them mad, but by the time they knock on the Potters’ door he still hasn’t found anything.
James throws the door open and beams at them. “Brilliant!” he says it like it’s true. “Alice and Frank just got here, come on in!” He steps aside to let them in.
“Security question, dear,” Lily calls from inside the house. Remus can hear the inseparable fondness and frustration in her voice, neither one diminishing the other. Lily’s always been good at that, he thinks, at allowing contradictions without feeling a need to resolve them.
James, chastened, turns first to Remus. “Most recent meal we ate together?”
“Indian takeaway at the flat, only you wouldn’t touch their naan because it wasn’t as good as your mum’s.”
James grins and nods, then faces Sirius. “What did your mum call me the last time I saw her?”
“An insufferable inbred ingrate. Pretty rich coming from her.” Remus can feel Sirius fairly buzzing, kinetic in the presence of friends. “Can we come in now?”
James waves them through, almost giddy, and hugs both of them. “Bloody hell, it’s been too long.”
Remus laughs a little. “It’s been two weeks.” He feels Sirius’s eyes bore into him and he hates it, so he starts to walk towards the kitchen to see Lily.
“Sure, two weeks since I saw you,” James argues, following him, “But how long since all of us were together? Must be ages.” That, Remus thinks, is probably true, and this too invites anxiety, because it’s possible that in that time something has fundamentally changed, and probably for the worse. With that thought swirling in his head, he smiles and greets Lily and Frank and Alice and Peter as warmly as he’s able to.
__________
At the first opportunity she gets, Alice leans into her husband and whispers, “He looks terrible.” He meets her eyes, level with his, and raises his eyebrows in assent.
Alice hasn’t seen Remus Lupin in several months. Between his missions and hers and her child, it just hasn’t happened. It’s not like they were ever best friends or anything, of course, but as two of the planets closest in Lily’s orbit they shared an affinity and some secrets. Now, the boy she used to think was imperturbable is sticking as close to the wall as he can, as tight as a swollen cork in an old bottle. He’s laughing a little too hard at Peter’s jokes but his smile is never reaching his eyes.
Frank has turned to Sirius, who’s regaling him with a recent exploit. Alice is sick of exploits so she wanders towards Lily, who’s sitting near the babies’ pen with a glass of wine and a look of contented exhaustion.
As Alice sits, Lily smiles warmly and leans her head on the taller woman’s shoulder. “Look at them,” she yawns. “They’re already friends.”
Alice looks at their sons, each playing in opposite corners, and raises a skeptical eyebrow down at Lily. “Of course they are. Whatever you say.”
Lily reaches out and grabs her friend’s hand. Alice is not the sappy sort, but she can tell that a combination of sleeplessness, restlessness, hopelessness and wine have done a number on her friend, and so she lets Lily do what she must. “Oh, Alice,” she sighs. “It’s not fair.”
Alice steels herself, because she knows where Lily is going. “Few things are, these days.”
“I mean Marlene.” Of course she does. Alice knew that already. Lily continues. “She should be here. The three of us, taking on the world, right?”
Alice nods slowly. “I know, Lily. It’s terrible. But we keep going.”
“No, Alice. Don’t do that tonight, please.” Lily has always preferred to take her feelings and hold them up to the light, peering at them from every angle. She’s never understood Alice, with her orderly arrangements. Some things could be controlled, and some couldn’t, and Alice is very sad about some of the latter things but that doesn’t change the truth of them. Her feelings are blocks that stack neatly on top of each other, while Lily’s are multifaceted, each one a different shape and none of them interlocking.
Alice doesn’t have anything to say that might make Lily feel better, so she just squeezes her friend's hand and they sit in it, together. The enormity of what their lives have somehow become. But they sit and look at their sons, and that, at least, is good. Two boys who will inherit whatever world they’re able to save, two reasons to keep fighting.
After a few minutes, Lily abruptly stands. “I need to check on the kitchen.” Alice barely has time to rise before Lily is gone. Bemused, she sits right back down. The room is dim, and the noise is muffled in here. Alice has had little enough of a social life in the last six months, and this small party is enough to tax her patience. Sitting alone in the dark with only the sounds of Harry and Neville for company is a necessary break.
It doesn’t take long for James to wander in, though. He can’t go more than about ten minutes without physically holding Harry, reassuring himself of his son’s safety. Alice gets it, of course. She’s not quite so obsessive as James, but she too fears for her child. Seeing Alice, James furrows his brow. “Is Lily okay?” he asks.
Alice shrugs. “We were just sitting and having a chat and she up and left. For the kitchen, she said.”
James plops down next to Alice. “I think she was crying,” he mumbles.
Alice snorts. “Too much wine and too much wallowing. She’s thinking about Marlene.”
James nods slowly. “I wish…”
“I know.” Alice bumps her shoulder against James’s. “I wish.” Their lives are so different than they had planned, all of them. She usually doesn’t mind, but being here with her friends, as they pretend they can pretend things are normal, gives her a glimpse of that other life. The one where Harry and Neville play together all the time. The one where Marlene is alive and gets to marry Dorcas. The one where Frank’s silence holds nothing worse than daily troubles. The one where she is as fearless as she now pretends to be.
James picks up Harry and makes noises at him to the boy’s delight. Alice marvels that the same boy who less than five years ago turned the raisins in her scone into ants is now a doting father. And a good one. Overcome with a wave of affection, she puts an arm around him. “It’s good to see you, James.”
__________
Peter isn’t nervous. He isn’t. He’s not nervous, he’s not ashamed. He’s enjoying the party as much as he can. He’s talking to Remus, then to Sirius, planting different doubts in each one’s mind. He talks to Frank and Alice, which is fine. He avoids talking to Lily. The glass in his hand is emptied, then refilled, then quickly emptied again.
He’s not nervous but the drink isn’t doing its job properly, and that’s annoying. The drink isn’t working, Sirius won’t stand still long enough to listen, and Remus doesn’t seem to hear a single word anyone’s saying. James is being kind. James is happy. Peter pours himself another drink. When will they eat? He needs to sit.
From the dining room, a voice like a gong. Frank. “Dinner is ready!” Peter drifts into a seat, Alice on his left, Remus on his right. He isn’t nervous.