There’s something about the way he says it, something playful and magnetic. Something gentle. Something raw.
“Lil, pass me the salt,” through a mouthful of food.
“Lil, you look like a sunflower in that dress,” when he can’t stop looking for her as she runs down the stairs in a flurry.
“Lil, I kind of bloody love you. Just a little bit,” when she’s curled up on the couch reading while they listen to Elvis.
Or even “Hey, Lil, I ever told you about the time me and Sirius were caught painting the prefects bathroom at 2am?”
She’s always liked the way it rolls of his tongue, so easily, but something about it always feels like a kick in the gut.
Because he’s an idiot, an all-consuming nerd with lanky limbs and hair that will never behave and, would you believe, he cried in awe when she took him to see Star Wars.
He tries to cook her special dinners without magic but makes too many puns and burns the food while laughing at his own jokes. He pokes her in the ribs so she’ll pay attention to him and his belly rumbles with laugher whenever she lays on him and the boys are there. His hands are warm and he buys her flower bouquets that are filled with every flower possible.
“But, Lil, they all reminded me of you,” Lil.
Her favourite sound is his hoarse morning voice, when she’s making breakfast and watering the sunflowers on the windowsill. He’ll tumble down the stairs and throw his arms around her awkwardly, whispering morning into her ear. One time he made her knock the sunflowers over in shock.
He’s a dork, a dork that she can feel in her pulse, like he’s part of her now, like she never wants anyone else to say morning to her again, like she can’t get rid of him. She doesn’t ever want to.
He’s in love with her, the way she’s in love with him. She leaves kisses at the bottom of the shopping list and always misspells necessarily. She wears stockings with rips in them and once tried to dye a strip of her pink, forgetting how badly it would clash with the rest of it.
He tumbles over his words when he cares a lot and he pushes his hair into his face when he’s talking, trips trying to kick Remus in the shins playfully. Stays up until 4am to make sure his friends are okay and wakes up at sunrise to make sure Lily is still sleeping okay.
He knows all the words to yellow submarine and he sings it while drunk, even if his favourite Beatles song is actually she’s so heavy.
And she can feel her cheeks still go warm, she’s nineteen and she should probably be starting to figure life out, oh, but he makes her feel so young and electric, like her teenage years should be. He lets her call him several variations of Jim, whether its jimmy, Jim jams, jammy Jims, or jiminy cricket. Even if he rolls her eyes when Sirius, Remus, Peter or even Marlene walk into their flat mumbling greetings of “Oi, Jiminy Cricket,” Because lily made them watch Disney films one rainy afternoon.
They kind of make each other’s heartbeats rise and slow all at once and it’s kind of messy because sometimes she cries about the war in the middle of the night and he has nightmares about Sirius dying and he’ll cling to her for support and she’ll let him.
But then, oh then, other times he’ll walk down the stairs and her hair is alight in the morning sun as she’s watering the sunflowers, and he’s in love.
And she’ll look at him while he’s having a snarky conversation with Remus or tackling Sirius or making cookies with Pete and she’ll think there’s a reason I picked you.
