the cadence of part time poets

Chapter 15: Felix Felicis

Well in the middle of the night on the open road,
The heater don't work and it's oh, so cold;
You're gettin' tired baby, lookin' kinda beat,
The music off the street drive you off your feet...

- "Once Bitten, Twice Shy" Ian Hunter, 1975

November passed, and Snape didn't so much as whisper in any of their directions. He glared—Remus didn't think he was capable of any other expression—but they were silent glares, full of loathing and contempt. After discovering the doors to both of the gym's shower rooms had been inexplicably jammed, Snape's walk back to his dorm had been met with plenty of confused and disgusted stares. It would've been a more genius plan, had he not been the only one.

Rightful in her anger, Lily shunned them for the better part of the week that followed, and not even Remus was immune to her wrath. While Sirius and Peter remained indifferent, content to ride the wave of infamy they'd garnered after shaming Snape, James had only become more distraught over his and Lily's already frayed relationship. He sought her out before and after classes to apologise and even tried bringing her cups of tea at breakfast which were ignored or else thrown in the bin. Finally, when Lily's pencil kept breaking during quiet study, James slid down the table and offered his own. Lily took it silently before snapping the pencil in half and getting up to march across the room to the wall sharpener with her own. Her friends all stifled their shock and laughter behind tight smiles as James sadly slunk back to his seat. As he did, Sirius pushed a roll of sellotape in his direction with a hopeless shake of his head and James started taping his pencil back together in the middle.

"She hates me," he sighed.

"Nah, she already hated you, mate," Sirius pointed out. "Can't get much worse than that."

"What about despised or repulsed?" Peter added.

"There's no way this is helping," Remus said.

"What I meant," Sirius drawled, "was that hate is a strong word, sure, but there are other more powerful emotions."

"Such as?"

"Desire, passion—lust."

"Dear god."

"Nothing to do with God, Lupin!" Sirius grinned, clapping a hand on James' shoulder next to him. "This is plain old animal magnetism, and clearly Evan's abhorrence is just a thinly veiled disguise for how badly she wants to shag our dear friend Mr. Potter."

Despite Sirius' confidence, James' luck with Lily did not improve. Remus didn't bother to ask if her invitation to study for end of term exams still stood, but it did feel rather odd to spend every geography lesson next to a seat partner who was so keen on pretending that he didn't exist. It wasn't until several days later, when Remus discovered he'd forgotten his textbook that Lily finally broke her silence.

"Lily," he whispered, "Lily, can I borrow your text? I forgot mine."

She didn't answer at first, and Remus accepted that he'd just have to struggle through the worksheet without, but finally Lily's voice whispered back; "Generally people say sorry rather than pretending to leave their textbooks behind."

"I didn't—" Remus stopped, because he'd forgotten how good it felt to be snapped at. "I'm sorry," he tried, and Lily huffed lightly before sliding the textbook between their desks.

After class he apologised again—with more than just two words—and that was that. She never outrightly said it, but eventually he got the feeling that Lily did think the prank was funny, once she'd at least gotten the grease stains out of her uniform and they'd scrubbed the gym to a shine. She wouldn't come around the other boys, but Remus was allowed to join her and Marlene for exam prep, which he didn't really care for but didn't want to her offend her by refusing.