the girlfriend experience, james potter
𝒔𝒆𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒎𝒃𝒆𝒓, 𝟏𝟗𝟕𝟕
chapter sixteen, DRINKS AND JEALOUSY
✧ ━━━ · ✦ · ━━━ ✧
AS QUICKLY AS JAMES HAD BECOME EXCITED FOR A MISCHEVIOUS night out in Hogsmeade with his closest friends and an unlimited flow of alcohol, his anticipation was shot down in the worst adrenaline kill ever.
"How is that fair exactly?"
He was standing outside of the Gryffindor common room, ─ Sirius, Remus, and Peter eagerly waiting at his feet ─ his invisibility cloak in hand, dumbfounded while Bronwyn and Andromeda waited impatiently for him to hand it over.
It seemed the two childhood friends hadn't fleshed out their deal they made on the Astronomy tower earlier on and now James found himself with no way to actually get to the Hogsmeade-unlimited-flow-of-alcohol.
It was the worst kind of predicament.
"We had a deal," Bronwyn asserted. She was growing more tempted by the minute to just snatch the device from his hands. The way she saw it was that James was supposed to give her the cloak to get into the village and then he got an invite to her party. She's aware that she hadn't hired the Three Broomsticks or whatever but she was paying for the drinks. Not to mention, it was very inclusive and not a lot of people knew about it. In that sense, it was her party.
She didn't care how they got there. That was their problem. She's just giving them free drinks.
James jutted his neck out and he almost couldn't believe that Bronwyn thought him letting her borrow his most prized possession meant he didn't have access to it for the evening. "But how are we supposed to sneak out without being seen?" He asked and Remus noted the tone of hopelessness in his voice. Remus was perfectly happy going to bed like everyone else in the Gryffindor tower was but oh well.
"You're the Marauders," Bronwyn said, her brows furrowing as if this fact was an obvious factor as to why she and Andromeda weren't going to come back for the four of them to sneak them out of the castle. "Figure it out."
James' lips twitched frantically as if he were searching for the words to argue his way out of this and maybe come up with another way to get to the hidden tunnels without the protection of invisibility in the process. But he had no such luck.
Knowing his frozen demeanour meant she had cracked him, Bronwyn took a cautious step forward and plucked the cloak from his grasp effortlessly. She smirked as she took a step back, victorious. James was yet to move an inch. "We'll meet you there then, yeah?"
Bronwyn thought she'd at least give him another couple of seconds to respond and as she cocked her head to the side, her patience slipping further and further away, James finally came to, shaking his head to snap himself out of his confused daze.
His eyes flickered back to the cloak now in her hands. The three boys behind him shuffled about awkwardly and Sirius was just about ready to take a step out from behind the portrait when James finally got in the right state of mind to say, "I'm going to break your bank for this, Ward" very calmly, although Bronwyn detected the slight shaking of his chin where he was very close to going red in the face.
Now that James could look at her straight on, Bronwyn brandished her shiny white teeth in a triumphant grin. "The drunker the better, I say, Potter."
✧
"I LOVE YOU FOR BEING EIGHTEEN. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY BEST FRIEND."
The drinks were flowing, the booths were full and Madam Rosmerta was most definitely reconsidering Tequila Tuesdays.
Bronwyn was only a couple of drinks in, but it was enough to make her giddy and confident and pink in the cheeks. An hour in, when she stood off to the side, she liked what she saw. A happy life, a teenage bliss, void of the dangers of the Wizarding World even for just one short night. Her friends sang and danced, squashed onto the same stool, pressed up against each other.
It didn't feel like a common school party. The sweat wasn't the overpowering scent it usually was. Now, it was replaced with the sweet aura of Butterbeer and the worn cosy smell of the wooden planks beneath their feet. The music wasn't garish and disturbing; it was background noise, serenading them into a good time, minus the earache.
Bronwyn was just thinking how James Potter would love to be trampled on and squeezed into a booth right about now. He would watch with wide, bright eyes as the waiters carried trays full of drinks, the contents splashing about until they were in his grasp.
She just wondered if they were ever going to get there─
Just as though she had summoned him, James, followed closely by his three usual companions, burst through the door into the pub, letting a nippy draft float in with them.
"Filch. Cat. Hay." James was panting, as were his two other friends, Sirius and Peter (Remus seemed just as he was earlier: tired but unbothered all the same).
James looked as though he were in pain as he gasped out the three random words, his hands collapsing on his knees, his back slumping over giving him an uncomfortable hunch.
As Bronwyn approached the door, apparently the only one who noticed the unhinged new arrivals, beads of sweat across the four boys' faces ─ Remus included this time ─ came into view and the wheezes for air got even louder.
"Are we playing scrabble, I'm confused?" Her eyes flicked from one boy to the next, noticing how each of them heaved for breath in different ways. Peter's whole body shook, Sirius's hand seemed glued to his chest, Remus' mouth ballooned as if he were trying to savour the air he did manage to gather and James was sort of just a ragged mess that Bronwyn was expecting to collapse on the floor at any given moment.
He just about kept it together as Remus explained James' previous incoherent explanation as to how they had got there in the first place.
"We tried to escape through the normal exit but Filch caught us, let Mrs Norris chase after us I assume because his cat can run faster than him and then Sirius pushed one of the hay barrels from the stables into Filch's face and then we made a run for it."
Bronwyn half-expected Remus to yearn for more air after that long-winded story time in which he didn't once come up for a breath. He didn't, once again being the most unfazed boy she had ever met, but she was unimpressed either way.
"Genius plan, boys. Truly flawless."
If it weren't for the excitement unfolding behind her ─ the excitement these boys had worked so hard for when they ambushed the caretaker of their school with horse bedding ─ James would have commented on the unstirred look on Bronwyn's face. He would have defended his honour, mentioned how she had abandoned him at the castle to go have fun without him.
But he was here for one reason only: to drink copious amounts of alcohol and now that they had slipped away from Filch's grasp, that was actually possible.
James was off like a whip, disappearing into the swarm of woozy teenagers. By the time Bronwyn had turned around and relocated the brunette boy, he had a glass of whisky in his hands and was raising it in the air in her direction.
"Cheers," he mouthed.
From that point on, it was more or less a blur. At least for James Potter and Sirius Black who were drinking their way to ecstasy, manning the karaoke and at the centre of every dance circle in the entire pub.
Peter had passed out within half an hour and everyone was incredibly alarmed until Remus informed them that Peter was the lightest weight you could possibly imagine. Madam Rosmerta put him down on the staff sofa out back and yet the party appeared exactly the same afterwards.
At one point Andromeda questioned whether inviting the four of them was a good idea or not and yet not once had Bronwyn ever thought that it was a mistake. They were having a good time and as much as James scratched at her nerves like no other, their moods were all that mattered.
"Thanks for this, Bronwyn," Remus perched himself on the empty stool beside Bronwyn. It seemed the two of them were the only ones that could control themselves while under the influence. All Bronwyn had seen the Lupin boy drink that night was heavy liquor and yet he appeared, as per, very composed.
Bronwyn too had drunken enough to make the next person fall to the ground and yet she was perfectly content with her level of tipsiness. It was no doubt that Andromeda would sneak some tequila into their dorm that night to make sure the birthday girl had her head in the toilet by the end of the night if Bronwyn didn't stumble out of this pub later anyway.
The two of them observed from a distance once more. Andromeda had let her hair down and twirled in a whirl of long dark hair, her cousin not so dissimilar. Frank Longbottom had never looked so carefree in his life, Alice Fortescue at his arm. Marlene McKinnon and Mary Macdonald were making out by the fire, not so far from the action. And Dorcas Meadowes seemed lost in her own world of serenity.
"You're very welcome, Remus."
"Good luck with the bill," he chuckled. "I'd hate to see the number on that."
So would she, but seeing her friends so elatedly unconcerned by what would happen if Filch resurfaced ─ and with backup ─ from his haybale slip-up, made it worth it somehow.
"Well, I have my ways, Remus," she smirked over the rim of her glass, referring to her surprisingly successful business. The room was only slightly spinning but that made the next sip even more satisfying. She now spotted Freddie Novak, in all her long blonde locks, sharing a table with Regulus Black. Bronwyn could feel her teammate's heated cheeks from here. "You know that."
"Speaking of," Remus got up from his stool now, and faced her. "James just won't shut up about you. It's rather annoying actually. Sort it out will you?"
Bronwyn had hardly swallowed her drink by the time Remus disappeared into the crowd, engulfed by the throng of intoxicated teenagers to join his friend among the masses.
She could hardly process the words ─ not that she wanted to if it solely involved James Potter ─ because Lily Evans had now taken up the vacant seat at the bar that Remus had left behind.
"Hi," she smiled at Bronwyn, placing her cup (orange juice, from what Bronwyn had unexpectedly deduced) on the countertop at her side.
Bronwyn swivelled in her seat to greet the redhead in return and in doing so, she found herself studying the girl James liked so much.
Lily's hair brought out her green eyes, both vibrant in colour. The red locks cascaded down her back, framing her softly shaped face, a few stray strands lightly falling in front of her view. A sprinkling of freckles covered her pink cheeks and dimples formed on either side of her mouth where she no doubt never stops smiling.
Bronwyn could see why James fancied her so much.
"Thanks for inviting me," Lily said.
"That's okay. I hope you're drinking more than orange juice though, Evans," Bronwyn joked, her head nodding to the cup on the counter beside the Gryffindor.
"I'm afraid this is it," Lily chuckled. "Drinking is not for me."
Bronwyn was very suddenly put off her drink. She decided not to touch it again until Lily was no longer in her vicinity.
"Well, that's the best way to be, I suppose."
Bronwyn eyed as Lily toyed with the ends of her hair, wrapping the strands around her finger as she looked sheepishly to the floor and asked, rather out of nowhere, "I heard you and James are a thing now, is that true?"
Bronwyn found herself glancing over at the boy who was now laughing with his friends in a booth. She thought about the endless conversations they had had about how it would be wrong to try and make Lily jealous. But when she looked back at Lily, there was a curiosity in her eyes, a longing to know the truth.
Without even thinking about the possible consequences, and knowing it would make James happy, Bronwyn said: "It's not serious."
Maybe Lily wasn't aware of Bronwyn's business. It happens more than you would think. And Bronwyn didn't technically lie. It isn't serious ─ once this week was up, her time as James' tutor would be over. Lily can think what she wants.
"Oh," the redhead said, the look in her eyes now that of disappointment. "Interesting." Lily smiled at Bronwyn, but the smile seemed fake, almost like a coverup, as if Lily felt like it was what she was supposed to do in that situation.
Lily was jealous. Or at least a little peeved. Bronwyn wasn't sure whether it was because the girl liked James (which she highly doubts, in all honesty ─ the boy's a lot to handle) or whether it was because, as annoying as it seemed, Lily may have liked James' constant attention. She may have liked that he had a huge crush on her and that everybody knew about it. Did it satisfy her confidence? Make her feel liked? Confirm a sense of popularity? And James having a girlfriend would mean that he wouldn't give Lily the attention she had previously secretly enjoyed.
"Why's that interesting?" Bronwyn asked, hoping her neutral expression would mask her intense nosiness.
"Oh it's nothing," Lily said, trying to laugh it off despite it being very obvious she didn't think it was nothing. "It's just, I always thought you two hated each other?"
Was it possible Lily was annoyed by the fact that a candidate for James' undivided attention who was previously the least likely possible to be in a romantic relationship with James Potter just became Lily's biggest threat?
"Oh, you know how it is," Bronwyn joked (she did not "know how it is"), "opposites attract, and all, that kind of thing." The Slytherin took a sip from her cup slowly, abandoning how wrong it felt to drink in front of a girl so opposed to doing so, trying her best to hide her widening eyes and her uncomfortable face behind the rim.
Lily seemed even more confused by this statement. "You guys aren't exactly opposites, Bronwyn," she said with furrowed brows, and this time, there was no hint of amusement laced in her tone like before. "You have loads in common. You both love Quidditch, you're both annoyingly competitive," she then scoffed, as if everything she was saying was blindingly obvious. "I mean you grew up together."
Growing up together meant to Bronwyn: I'm the grandmaster at getting on his nerves. Their mothers being the best of friends equalled to the pair of them that they got short-tempered around each other. Not anything Lily was currently suggesting.
"I guess you're right," Bronwyn lied with a nervous chuckle. The only blindingly obvious fact the Slytherin knew right now was that she was lying to a friend about dating a boy she would never even dream of going near.
They would never work ─ they were Bronwyn and James, Slytherin and Gryffindor, Seeker vs Seeker; both desperate to look the best for both of their sets of parents and eager to crush the other in any competition that could possibly arise in their annoyingly tangled lives. Why did nobody else see that?
And as Lily awkwardly excused herself, quite clearly uncomfortable talking with the Slytherin now that the redhead knew the supposed truth about her and a certain Gryffindor seeker, Bronwyn stood still, just as awkwardly.
It was her eighteenth birthday and despite nothing having changed in the pub around her, as she now watched the same setting from the sidelines, she was no longer as enthusiastic.
Had she told a lie that was detrimental? A stupid mistake? What about her business? Her friends?
Bronwyn was not sure how she was supposed to get around this one.
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