The Marauders: Year Six #Wattys2017

Did You Say That To Jasper Too, Mr. Potter?

Did You Say That To Jasper Too, Mr. Potter?

"Help me..."

James lay upon the floor... a cold, stone floor, face down, curled about himself, holding a shattered arm, blood pouring from his nose and lip. He could barely gasp oxygen... he was shaking. "Help me," he pleaded into darkness that surrounded him.

Lily saw him through barred doors like he was in a spotlight - one pale hoop of moonlight pooling about him as he lay there, making noises - grunts and whimpers of pain. She struggled to open the door, but it would not budge. She tried to reach through the bars, tried to grab hold of him, to pull him closer, to fix him, but she couldn't reach and when she tried to send a healing charm to him with her wand, no magic would come out and she sobbed his name. "James! Please, James! Please be okay! Please be alright!" The bars clanged beneath her desperate shakes.

James trembled, coughed and spit blood onto the stones beneath him.

His glasses were across the cell, the lenses shattered so badly Lily doubted even magic could fix them. They lenses were opaque and looked white from all of the cracks.

"Help me," James begged again, crying quietly.

"James I'm here. I'm here," she whispered.

He struggled to look up, his cheek scraping across the stone, the blood smearing... and he squinted blearily at her, his entire body shaking, convulsing, as he stared... "Evans?" he choked the name.

"Yes, yes, I'm here, James. I'm here, love. I'm here to help you."

His voice shook. "Anybody but you Evans!" he begged, "You'll only make it worse! You're the one that's gotten me here in the first place - you're a jinx! You'll only make it worse! Please anybody else!"

Lily woke up with such a panic that she fell right out of her desk chair, where she'd been working on a paper for Slughorn's class and she hit the carpet with a yelp of pain. "Oww," she moaned, sitting up and rubbing her shoulder as she looked around the room. Her lamp had gone out and outside the sun was going down. Her belly growled and she realized it was probably dinner time. She pushed herself up from the carpet, still a bit dizzy from her fall, her heart still beating fast from her terrible dream.

She pulled the photo of her and James out of her pocket and she stared at his smiling face, needing to see it without the contortion of pain it had been in the dream. Lily's fingers were tight around the edges of the photo, which was becoming battered from being carried about recently, and she said, "You're okay, it was only a dream. He's alright." Her voice shook a little and she pushed the photo back into her pocket. "He's alright."

She put a bit of powder on her nose and went down to dinner.

James Potter was more than alright. He was talking loudly and the four Marauders were laughing and Sirius kept proposing toasts over pumpkin juice, and none of them spoke to her as she went and sat down next to Ali Prewitt. Lily kept sneaking glances down the table at James, though, as he laughed and his eyes sparkled and his lip caught on his tooth. She laughed to herself when he laughed, enjoying just seeing the happiness and joy on his face - on all their faces.

James and Sirius were setting off tiny fireworks with their wands, low enough to (hopefully) not be spotted from the staff table and Peter was clapping as the itty bitty fireworks burst colourful sprinkles of sugar over the cups of never-melting ice cream that had appeared on the table. "Should market that, they should," muttered Frank, seeing it, "Fortescue's would love it."