From Eden - Regulus Black (Complete)

Chapter Fifty-Two

SAVE THE DATE

James Potter was panicking.

Lily's green eyes were curious and nervous, watching his face and looking for every single reaction he might have. Her fingers were twitching and grasping to one another, clearly anxious for his answer.

But how could he answer a question he had never expected to hear? "Do you want to go out with me?" Lily had asked. His whole life, he had thought he'd be the one to ask that question and he had done so several times. After he stopped asking it, then she went and asked him that. No. He knew no words. He knew only 'hm'.

James had been making weird noises for almost a whole minute at that point.

"You know what?" Lily asked, upset. "Forget about it. I'll just go now, okay?"

She started to turn, ready to walk away and cry herself to exhaustion on the bathroom out of embarrassment.

Fear and panic choked him up.

"No!" he almost screamed.

The Ravenclaw students walking by on the corridor glanced at him, but kept walking.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Lily said blushing, wanting to disappear out of shame.

"No! I mean, yes!" he said loudly. "I want to go out with you, please. I just forgot how to speak for a moment."

Lily looked at him, blushing and then just smiling at him, hoping that would make her have enough time before answering anything. She was too happy, too nervous and too confused – everything seemed to be going on all at once. She knew James was a very dramatic person, but she knew that this time the 'I forgot how to speak', he really meant it, which only made her smile even more.

"Oh, okay. Thanks," said Lily, nodding to him. "Hogsmeade?"

"Yeah," James answered. "That'd be nice. We can meet on the Common Room and go there together."

"Sure!" she said, she stopped for a moment. She sounded a bit too excited, she thought, so she controlled her voice a bit better before keep going her sentence. "We can meet on the Common Room and we can just get the carriage together. Tomorrow at ten?"

"O'clock," he added, nodding.

"Nice," she said.

"Nice."

And she walked away, forcing her body to act like nothing different was happening, though her heart was skipping several beats over pure anxiety and excitement.

James just stood there and walked her walking away, still in shock that it all had really happened. That had only happened before in the best of his dreams and in his nightmares when he was unable to control his mouth as he said 'no' to her request several times and his soul screamed, unable to do anything to change the outcome. And now, it was real, and he was going out with the love of his life – the girl that he was going to marry and the woman who was going to the mother of his children, though he knew she didn't know those things yet.

Once he noticed he was just standing in the middle of the corridor, he turned and ran as fast as he could towards the Gryffindor Tower, completely forgetting of the rounds he was supposed to do with the Ravenclaw prefect of fifth year in half an hour. He needed to talk to his friends and he needed to talk to his daughter right away.

Stumbling and almost falling down the stairs, he managed to get to the dorms in one piece.

Opening the door at once, he ignored that Sirius had jumped away from Remus, who was quick to put on a shirt.