Peace&Quiet,Not~James

Ben had casually warned her this morning that she might very well become the target of Mister Potter's eyes for the dance and she was not in a mood to handle such childish banter. Almost immediately as he approached the table she got to her feet cradling her book in her arm before she headed toward the first floor. She knew there were a few abandoned classrooms there where she could be alone and enjoy her reading she had chosen for the day. The novel was thick but she knew she could finish it in a few hours as long as she had no interruptions. She entered the empty classroom, leaving the door cracked a smidge before she made her way to the very back desk and she slid into it, leaning her side against the wall, crossing her legs in an elegant way. She extracted her reading glasses from her pocket and slipped the crimson rimmed things over her eyes. She opened her book, the crack of the spine giving her chills and almost as soon as she had opened it she was not surprised to hear the door open fully and her eyes shot up to see him in the doorway. She scowled in distaste, pushing her glasses to the tip of her nose, she eyed him with a glare,"Do you mind?"

[/color] she mused but then she rolled her eyes,"Of course you don't, you have not the manners to mind when a girl is trying to be alone, you take full opportunity of their confined state and attack like some lion to its prey,"[/color] she almost growled before she pushed her glasses back up her nose and tried to return her gaze back to her book, trying to ignore his presence though she knew he would probably make ignoring him impossible.[/blockquote]

Will you stand above me?

[/i][/size][/color]

Look my way, and never love me[/center]

Ever since Ben had mentioned the whole dance fiasco James had been stuck on one thought and one thought only: Emma. Merlin, he hated that girl. Never in his entire life had he been so conflicted over a person for any reason. Usually, James "yes man" Potter had a black or white answer for everything. His go-get-em' attitude usually eliminated the grey area because the grey area meant having to think and carefully decide which he usually didn't have time for. This crazy girl though was driving him insane and making him think about her more than he'd ever care to admit. Truthfully, over the past few years, he'd asked her out dozens of times as a joke because he knew it irritated her. He wasn't really sure when everything had changed and he'd gone from mindlessly stupid to crazy. You like her, taunted the voice at the back of his head which he tried to shut up as often as possible. Because James Potter might have been in love. And he absolutely hated it. "I'm going to avoid Emma Forbes for the rest of my bloody life," he swore to Ben as he stormed out of the dorm that morning. He didn't want to see the I-told-you-so smirk on his friend's face, because it seemed like everyone had been able to acknowledge this a long time ago. Everyone except for him, that is.

In the morning, when he saw her, she left promptly and he sat down at the Gryffindor table in an uncharacteristic foul mood which Ethan pointed out, causing James to snap unpleasantly at him. He apologized and did what he always did: went out for a smoke. Smoking had the most wonderful effect of calming him down, and as James sat out on the stairs of the school by himself he all but forgot about Emma Forbes and her stupid stubborn I-won't-date-James-Potter-because-he's-a-prat attitude. James just looked up at the sky and thought about home. He thought about his mum there all by herself. He thought about how he never wrote her and how she only ever heard from Albus and Lily. To be fair, mum was probably used to that because he hadn't consistently sent her owls since his first year. It did, however, bother him that he hadn't written her in over a month, and he promptly decided that now was as good a time as ever to write her.

Unlike when he'd decided that he ought to study, he took his things somewhere he would really be alone. The room of requirement seemed like a good enough place, but he figured he'd go somewhere closer. There are empty classrooms all around the castle and he figured he'd just pop into the closest one. Unfortunately, the closest one wasn't actually empty. An apology for interrupting began to form on his lips before he recognized the redhead sitting there and the words got stuck in his throat. Emma. She turned around, giving him a cutting look and a cold greeting. "Contrary to your oh-so-modest beliefs, I'm not constantly looking for you," James held up the quill and parchment he held in his hand, exhibiting that he'd had an alternate purpose in coming upstairs besides bothering her.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]540
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Emma Forbes
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]this is absolute rubbish. sorry.[/blockquote]

She eyed him with distaste still and she looked at the things he held in his hands but what caught her attention more was the fact he hadn't even bothered with a hello, how rude, though she was being hypocritical in expecting one. She snapped her book shut and set it on the desk before her and she leaned her elbows on the desktop as she rested her chin in the palm of her hand, her eyes never leaving him but her look that of judgement. "Really? Shocking...." she said truly actually surprised that it wasn't his prerogative to look for her at this moment,"Well, no hello Emma? No how are you Emma? No, go to the ball with me Emma?" she asked raising an eyebrow though her eyes still lingered at the sight of the parchment, was he actually going to attempt to write something, no one could even decipher his chicken scratch, he was fooling himself if he wasn't fooling her. She pulled her gaze away from him and looked out the window unamused now and slightly hurt that he had not greeted her properly though she would not show it in an honest fashion, she'd hide it behind her sarcasm to him and act as if she didn't need his greetings,"Its whatever I suppose, what are you even in here for? Gonna chicken scratch out something to your buddy or something? Not that anyone would be able to decipher your illegible handwriting"

[/color] she muttered.[/blockquote]

Will you stand above me?

[/i][/size][/color]

Look my way, and never love me[/center]

To be totally honest, James was rather proud of himself because he knew that whatever she'd been thinking, he'd taken Emma aback by having real parchment and a real quill in his hands. Even in their classes he seldom cared enough to actually scratch out the notes and he preferred to just look at whatever Ethan had written down instead. If one of these days his clever mate had decided to show them the wrong lesson, just for kicks, James and Ben probably would've gone the entire week not knowing what had gone on in that class. So, if James didn't have the motivation to write what was was needed to pass his classes, it hardly made sense that he was here thinking of writing something. James wondered if there were any kind of mischief he needed paper and a quill for. But nothing that would be considered normal for him came to mind.

Now, James was thoroughly pleased with the sound of surprise in her voice when she spoke to him. It was nice to hear that she'd been expecting him to seek her out, and it was nice that he could disappoint her. James raised an eyebrow at her "My greeting needs improvement? I'm sorry, I was just stunned in the wake of your courteous hello," He shrugged into the desk closest to him. If he'd wanted, he could easily have turned and gone right then and there, or he could have turned towards his paper and insisted on writing the letter and ignoring her. He did neither of those things. Instead, James sat facing Emma with a boyish smile on his face. "And I usually don't greet people with ball invitations," he laughed a little to himself, that was a lie. James had greeted plenty of girls by asking them on a date. "But since you so clearly want to go with me, I accept." Well. That was easy. Emma had given him a perfectly good excuse not to ask her. She'd asked herself. Now he knew that turning that around on her would irritate her more than the plague itself.

Her comments about his writing might've been meant as a cutting remark, but they didn't really bother him. James' writing sucked, and he knew this. His professors over the years had reminded him of this on numerous occasions. For a second he tried to think up something clever and something cool to tell her he was writing, but nothing came to mind and instead he bluntly said "Don't reckon my mum cares too much about my chicken scratch." Well, he was nearly ready for her to fall out of her chair in shock. The great James Potter writing a letter to his mum? How unprecedented! Seldom did people actually think of James as a human being with emotions and a family he cared about, but alas, it was true. James Potter is just like everybody else.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]490
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Emma Forbes
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]I rushed this a little. Next one will be better! *crosses heart and hopes to die*[/blockquote]

At least he knew he needed improvement in some aspect yet he didn't seem to realize it wasn't just on his greetings. She rolled her eyes slightly and had her gaze out the window until her ears picked up his comment of how she had asked him to the ball and she shook her head, her tongue pressing itself against the inside of her cheek as she looked to him now with a cold gaze,"You're hilarious, I'd rather rip my own heart out and feed it to the vampires in the forbidden forest before ever going to a social event with you, being on your arm would be the pure definition of committing social suicide, not that I care what others think but I do not wish to torture myself with such a crazy idea" she said. She knew very well how stuck up and cruel she sounded, but she did not put up with the stupidity and immaturity that this boy was the pure picture of, a shovinistic pig, a naïve and clueless git. SHe narrowed her eyes as he sat close to her and she leaned further back in her chair away from him, so what if he was writing to his mother, it was probably over something ridiculous or to check on her because of the death of his father, that was nothing for her to change her view on him. She looked him over awaiting some sort of reaction that she had hurt him somehow if he had a heart. "It was not an invitiation and any proper gentleman would ask a lady not assume or allow the lady to ask him any way, I'd sooner go with Ethan before you"

[/color] she said her tongue sharp as she slid out of her seat now and she grabbed her book. She briefly leaned against the desk using the palm of her hand against its surface to hold her up as she leaned right into his face now,"You're very disappointing to the wizarding race Mister Potter...some times I wonder how that happened but that's for you to know and me to never get too deep into your life to find out" she said as she pushed herself away now and slowly made her way to the door practically daring him to stop her or follow.[/blockquote]

Will you stand above me?

[/i][/size][/color]

Look my way, and never love me[/center]

When James had set out in the morning he'd had "Avoid Emma Forbes" ingrained so thoroughly in his mind. Obviously he had failed in this regard because he was now sitting in a desk while she shot daggers from across the room. If looks could kill he would be ten feet under. The crazy part was that he hadn't been all that bad today. Some days James was an absolute moron around her (feelings do weird things like that). Some days he deserved her biting comments and rude remarks because frankly, sometimes he was an absolute idiot, and looking back at those days he felt a little bit embarrassed. In fact, the entire fifth year was pretty embarrassing because he had successfully acted like a twelve year old with their first crush nearly every time he was around her. The worst part was he'd been unable to recognize he fancied her. To him, he was just being even more irrationally stupid than usual for no particular reason. To her, he was just being a git.

James cocked his head to the side, he was, admittedly, a little confused as to what went on in Emma's head. She might genuinely hate him and this boggled his mind because he'd never known anyone outside of Slytherin who actually took his stupidity seriously enough to merit the term "hate". Yet here she was: this girl who seemed to think that his very existence was a plague upon the world. Whether this amused him or depressed him was yet to be decided. Currently, he was leaning more towards the former, because a delicate yet impish smile played across his face. "Clearly I've started out wrong." he told her in what might have been an earnest or sarcastic way and even he was unsure as to which it was. "My apologies. Let's begin again. Good morning, Miss Forbes. You look lovely, how are you?" He knew that whether he meant this in the best possible way or not all she heard was "I'm James Bloody Potter. Sleep with me." That was all she'd been hearing since he'd said it when he was fifteen (like I said, the entire fifth year was sort of a dark period for James' intelligence).

Though he was trying his best to behave, she was having none of it. To be fair, when he'd turned her invitation around he hadn't expected her to react well, but using one of his best mates against him was a low blow. Fortunately, Emma's comments almost felt normal now. He'd been hearing her scathing remarks since the fourth year, and now if felt almost like flirting rather than arguing. Years ago, he might have taken her comments to heart and gone back to the common room complaining that she was a heinous bitch, but now he reckoned that was just her uptight personality that forced her to behave that way. "Honestly, Ethan's a good looking bloke. I'd go with him over me too. Good choice." James nodded in approval. Not that she would go with the Head Boy. Marvellous as his friend was, going to any social event with him meant hanging out with Potter and Dearborn the whole evening which was something he doubted Emma was willing to risk.

Every time he had a conversation with her he waited for the climax: the part where she blew up and called him some horrible things. This time, things were a little different though. Her palms were on his desk and she was close enough to his face for him to smell her perfume. It was weird. But it was good weird. Whatever she was saying sounded angry and probably somewhat hurtful, but her proximity to him totally cancelled out every word she'd said before she stormed off. Distancing herself from him had the immediate effect of causing him to snap out of his reverie and to stand up and follow her. Naturally. James didn't know how to let it be. C'mon Forbes, I can't be that bad. Ethan likes me. And so does Molly." he trailed behind her a bit, knowing that he was walking on eggshells. Though she opposed breaking rules, she might forgo that briefly if it meant being able to hex the stupid out of him. "I know I was a prat in the fifth year, but everyone's stupid when they're fifteen." He shrugged. This was only partially true. Some people are stupider at fourteen than at fifteen, but if they're alright at fifteen it's just because they've already gone through they're teenage phase of halfwitted behaviour.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]765
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Emma Forbes
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]James and Emma are just argument after argument, aren't they?[/blockquote]

She hadn't actually expected him to follow as she was contemplating his change in words and his change in tone toward her before she had walked away from him. Apology? James Potter, apologizing? It was unheard of without some sort of catch or sarcasm behind it but for some reason a tinge inside of her wanted to believe his apology. She looked over her shoulder at him hearing his footsteps and looked at him before she stopped and she turned to face him, her book held to her chest with both her hands as if she were shielding her heart somehow with it. She looked at him for a long moment, the daggers no longer in her eyes but more of a longing curiosity filled her eyes,"Why apologize now?" she asked in all honesty and curiosity, why admit his foolishness now? He had years to admit his foolishness so why now? She looked down at her own feet, her locks toppling into her face as she let out a huff, she didn't like to think he could actually be a civil human being but she was considering it in this moment awaiting an explanation,"Is this some joke? Some sick twisted way for you to try and sweet talk me to going with you so you can go around and flaunt the fact you got the one girl who never gave you the time of day to actually go with you to some social gathering? I'm not a piece of arm candy Potter, I'm not some notch on your belt, I'm not some prize to be won...you should have thought about that years ago" she said it was a grudge, yes she held a dying grudge against him because truth was she had liked him all those years ago, back when they were so small and had just met, she had wide eyes for him until he pulled her hair and called her a bookworm and made fun of her and then when they got older he wanted to get in her pants but now? Now he wanted to be civil and actually give a damn? No it didn't work that way and she wouldn't let him ever know she ever liked him. "You really don't get it, you really don't know when enough is enough do you?"

[/color] she said her voice wasn't angered, it was actually cracking because she was inwardly getting emotional but she wouldn't let him know or see that. She stopped talking and looked up shaking her head.[/blockquote]

Will you stand above me?

[/i][/size][/color]

Look my way, and never love me[/center]

It had all started in the second semester of his sixth year at Hogwarts, this changing business. As a person, James Potter had been static from the time he was eleven years old until he turned sixteen. His life had more or less completely revolved around him and Ben and Ethan and what they were going to do next. When he was eleven he'd been mostly concerned with impressing his friends as much as possible, when he was thirteen he'd been concerned with impressing girls as much as possible, and when he was fifteen he'd been meticulously focused on both of those points. To a girl, gaining somebody's favour means behaving in such a way as to make them think of you positively; to a boy, it means being stupidly enough to merit their attention. Unfortunately, James had almost turned seventeen before he realized that he'd been going about things entirely the wrong way. What had changed him? His father's murder was certainly a good guess, the drugs which had scared him away from illegal activity were also a possibility. James couldn't pinpoint it, but standing there a few steps behind Emma thinking like an almost rational person, he knew that something was different.

See, standing there by her he saw for the first time in their acquaintance, a flash of uncertainty cross her face. Normally she was guarded and sharp around him, here she was all curiosity and sincere rawness, the likes of which he'd never seen before. In her eyes, he could see hesitancy in the biting remark that most likely hovered on the tip of her tongue. Thus far in the year, the two of them had hardly spoken. He'd seen her and he had run, because avoiding her was better than admitting that he might have developed real, genuine feelings for someone. Unlike everyone else who had already experienced the James Potter who after his father's death smoked too much and thought far more, Emma had been doing her best to avoid the old James who wanted nothing more than to snog every girl in a ten mile radius, and she still believed the former and the latter to be nearly the same person. James knew this to be false. He was most certainly different now.

Of course, it didn't last long, and soon the walls were building themselves back up, becoming a barricade prepared for the attack of idiocy that was James Potter. Just as he formulated the explanation he didn't have for his behaviour, she threw accusation after accusation at him, trying to remind him that he was not a nice boy. He was a player and a jerk and those were the things that more than anything defined his character. In embarrassment he bit his lip, because he knew that what she said was true of him a year ago. A year ago he had justified his pursuit of Emma to Ben as him simply wanting to shack up with as many girls in the school as possible. It was, however, still uncharacteristic of James to be too serious and so he let a soft smile creep across his face. "You're never going to be a notch in anyone's belt," frankly, Emma was worth a lot more than just a mark saying "look, I got her".

Of all of the things he had ever done at Hogwarts, this was possibly the weirdest. Nervously, he ran one hand through his hair and shoved the other deep into his pants' pocket. "Yeah, well, about that, listen, I'm not going to ask you to the dance." at that point he realized like he was making it sound as though she wasn't good enough for him and sort of spasmed to try and correct himself as quickly as possible, "Not that you're not pretty and all, but you don't want to go with me. And honestly, I'd rather take a girl who doesn't hate my guts." He chuckled a little bit to ease some of the uncomfortable tension he himself was feeling. Everything was a laugh with him. James wasn't sure how to phrase things because it would mean admitting he was wrong which above all he hated doing. He opened and closed his mouth a few times without saying anything as his brain tried to bypass his basic pride mechanism in vain. There was really not way to say it without admitting to having been the moron he had been for six years. Six years of stupidity require at least one more cigarette and a bottle of vodka to dissipate.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]764
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Emma Forbes
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]James is just so bad at admitting that he was wrong! Oh James.[/blockquote]

She was flustered at this point as he looked at her and seemed to be in thought for awhile, he tended to do this quite often and half the time she wondered if he was actually thinking or if all the pot, drugs and drinking had finally gotten to his head. She took a step back absently almost in a nervous and uncomfortable habit. Her head perked up a bit more at him saying she would never be someone's notch in their belt, now she wasn't sure if he was meaning this in a kind manner that she was too good for that or if he meant she was too prude to be. She narrowed her eyes slightly and sized him up still trying to wrap her arms around her chest more until her book fell to the floor. She looked down at it at his feet now and she didn't move to get it, her eyes lingering up to find his. "Oh? I won't is it because I'm too prude or not good enough to be a notch?" she asked now contradicting herself slightly but she always did that. When he said he wasn't planning on taking her now because he didn't want to go with someone who hated his guts, it stung a little, hate was too harsh a word for it, she didn't hate him. She stepped forward to him forgetting the book on the ground at his feet as she looked up into his eyes now and she chewed her bottom lip,"You...you think I hate you?" she asked her tone softening again, wow she must look bipolar as all hell to him. She shook her head slightly and looked down again dropping her arms from her chest and rubbing her left arm with her right hand awkwardly,"Hate is such a strong word....I ...I don't hate anyone...I don't hate you" she said in all honesty, slightly just hoping he wouldn't let her semi kind words get to his head.

Will you stand above me?

[/i][/size][/color]

Look my way, and never love me[/center]

Inherently, human beings are judgemental. They like to decide and make conclusions about others based on one or two beliefs, and then they like to make it very hard for that person to break out of that mould. Both James and Emma had formed opinions about one another when they were young, and frankly, they didn't much care to rethink them. Well, at least Emma didn't. Approximately a year had passed since James had stopped thinking of the short brunette as simply a stick in the mud with no sense of humour. He still thought she had no sense of humour, but she might be less of a stick in the mud than he had originally perceived. To her, it was obvious that he was simply obnoxious, arrogant, impulsive, and just generally moronic. All of these things were true of him, but the reason he wasn't one of the most hated students in the school was because, to most, those weren't his defining factors. With every person there's the matter of seeing the whole of them instead of just what you want to see. James wasn't sure if he really understood her yet, and by the way her attitude flip-flopped all over the place, he wasn't sure he could ever hope to understand her completely. To be fair, that moment of epiphany when you realize your impression of someone is wrong can be both enlightening and disturbing. Whatever it is, it merits slightly odd behaviour.

Odd behaviour was certainly what James got when he tried to consistently be a decent human being towards the girl who likely considered him her nemesis. There were certain parts of her character that were highly predictable: such as her reaction to him complimenting her. Honestly, as someone with a small degree of sense, James had realized that Emma probably didn't know how to accept a James Potter compliment and that she would foreseeably take it instead as some kind of backhanded insult. He sighed heavily and leaned cooly up against the wall as she got angry with him. "Take the compliment, Forbes." he chuckled lightly, "Merlin, is this what you always do when a bloke calls you independent? Snap at him?" James shook his head, now more in amusement than exasperation. Life, for James Potter, was all about laughing at the annoying and at the frustrating. To let things take too serious of a tone was something he tried to avoid as much as possible. And truthfully, if he let himself get too caught up in his own feelings right now talking to Emma he might just implode.

When categorizing "odd behaviour" sharp mood swings counted. Her volatile temper had taken her from defensive to a point of accusation, to a taken aback shyness. He cracked a grin, not wanting her to get too emotional. With women, you never quite knew what you would get when they started getting all feelings-y. Sometimes it was good enough to merit a snog, but other times (often times) it was just more of a reason for her to slap you. To avoid this, he did was he did best and tried to lighten things up. "You may not hate me, but you sure don't want to spend a whole evening with me." he let out a cheerful laugh, "Blimey, Snaps, I wouldn't want you throwing yourself off the astronomy tower after the dance, now would I?" Snaps. Where had that nickname come from? Of all of the nicknames he gave, that one was the most random, and yet he felt it fit. Maybe it was because when he was around her it was like his sanity snapped. That was cheesy. But it may just have been the proper reason behind the name. Merlin, he hoped she wouldn't ask where the name had come from. The explanation would sound even worse outlaid.

Taking himself away from being a corny cheese-ball and towards what he needed to say, he readjusted his legs so that he was comfortably leaning against the wall. He looked over the diminutive redhead who, for once, seemed almost shy. Her eyes were cast downwards towards her books and her feet. For a moment, he felt sort of bad for her and for how he'd made her feel guilty. "Right, so how's about this?" he began "Civility? We can just… get along?" This sounded like a shot in the dark as far as the two of them were concerned. They hadn't been completely civil to one another since before their sorting ceremony in the first year. Yet here it was, and James reckoned that he'd be better off being her friend than being the boy she loathed.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]781
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Emma Forbes
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]PS: I borrowed the nickname Snaps from Jules the writer of The Life and Times.[/blockquote]

She sighed when he didn't even have the decency to pick up her book that had fallen at his feet. She scowled and bent down grabbing her book before she stood up straight realizing now she was chest to chest with him. A lump formed in her throat and she couldn't help but to look into his eyes and she pulled her book back against her chest listening to his words and she leaned her side against the wall as he was doing, not bothering to separate their close proximity, she hadn't been so close to a boy and if she had it wasn't anything she could recall. She was silent for a decently long moment as she thought over his words,"Truly it would depend on the events of the evening and if the person I was on the arm of decided not to try and get in my pants" she said, she couldn't believe she actually hinted the possibility of not minding being on his arm at the dance. She wasn't one for attention or having eyes on her, but she did smirk slightly at the mere thought of the jealousy crossing the faces of many females let alone the shock. She got quiet again and when he mentioned friendship she came back to looking him in the eye. She chewed her bottom lip and she reached her free hand up and placed it on his chest not that there was much room between them any more any way but she slid her hand up his chest until her fingertips brushed the side of his neck,"Is that what you want James? Friendship? Correct me if I'm wrong but I kind of always thought we were already on that base, just I wasn't exactly the nicest and neither were you, so what good is friendship at this point?" she asked, jesus was she really this close to him it kind of made her stomach turn in disgust as she dropped her hand from him now and there it went again, shy, she looked down at her feet,"You never knew...and I guess you never will" she muttered as she now decided to take a step back from him, how come he never knew she liked him? Was that her fault? She shook her head, she had to forget she ever liked him, it was for her own emotional well being.

Will you stand above me?

[/i][/size][/color]

Look my way, and never love me[/center]

James was not a gentleman, and he had never claimed to be one. He was arrogant, he was a flirt, and he was charming enough to hold the door when it so pleased him. There was a certain amount of realism behind his actions, because he knew himself, and he knew that pretending to be someone he wasn't for the sake of manners would just never be his style. And maybe that was wrong, but at least it was honest. Emma picked up her own book, and he felt bad because he hadn't even thought about getting it himself. See, Ethan knew when to do those kinds of things. Hell, even Ben knew when to do those kinds of things. Sometimes, James could figure it out: but not often and not around Emma. When he wanted to charm her he was suave, but when he actually wanted to impress her he hardly functioned. That, he knew, was less than impressing. And dammit, there was that whole body proximity thing again, and he knew that unless he backed-up he wouldn't get a clever word in. He wanted to run away as fast as he could and smoke two more cigarettes, try to forget the fact that she was by far the prettiest girl he'd ever stood close to.

If he were to go out and smoke, he'd also like to forget the fact that he was pretty sure she was bipolar. There were days where James may as well have been the anti-Christ in her eyes, and there were other days where he was just flat out irritating. This whole "I-don't-hate-you" business, however, was new. He knew she didn't hate him. Over the seven years they had known each other, he'd been pretty sure she only loathed him with every ounce of her being, but it wasn't hate, so there was still a chance. Honestly, since they'd been roughly eleven and a half years old she had made it very clear that she wanted to avoid him as much as possible. That had only been irritating enough to cause him to pull her pigtails, because no one should ignore James Potter (for obvious reasons). It was probably when he was thirteen that he started liking her in a boy/girl kind of way. She continued disliking him in a baking soda/vinegar kind of way. It's already been established that he found this fact infuriating. With her roundabout answer as to whether or not she would go with him to the dance he had to stop himself from rolling his eyes. "Right then, do you want me to ask you?" he asked bluntly, because at this point his ability to read her had gone from very little to none at all. Blimey, girls are confusing.

Merlin, merlin, what the hell. Bloody hell. were more or less the thoughts rushing through James' head when her hand was on his chest. It may not have been those exact words, but for the sake of reducing vulgarity, that's pretty close. Where is Merlin's name did this come from? This touch-y feel-y stuff? It would have been so easy to reach out a kiss her, if he were Ben, he would've done it. But he was James and for the first time in his life he was scared of screwing this up. He was, in a word, perplexed. She stood there and said something. She said something about them being friends: a word he'd never thought actually applied to their relationship. Friendship was supposed to be composed of some degree of mutual liking, and as we've already established, Emma had never seemed to like James very much. She backed up and away from him, looking shy and quiet: two things he'd never known the opinionated redhead to be. "What are you, Emma Forbes?" he asked her, running his hand through his hair. It was maybe true that James had never known another girl who was as complicated as she was. In that moment, he knew that she was worth all the complicated and all the bickering. In his gut, he knew this for a fact; in his head, he didn't know why.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]695
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Emma Forbes
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]James is so confused. It's cute[/blockquote]

She scowled slightly at his questioning and she shook her head,"I'd rather cut off my dominant hand, marinade it in teriyaki sauce and feed it to the Hippogriffs before going to the dance with you James Potter," she said, totally contradicting what her mind was saying. Let him take you, you're going to die alone not so convincing was her mind especially when it wanted to be so negative toward her. She was confused though by his next words, What Am I? she licked her lips, human, obviously was the most logical answer that popped into her pretty little head. She narrowed her eyes, his question was a trick of some sort, it had to be. She looked up at him through her red locks again before speaking,"I'm human....what else should I be?" she asked raising an eyebrow but before he could even answer her back with that she shoved her book into her messenger bag and she pushed a hand through her hair,"I'm that girl that you look at and go I wonder and you wonder simply because I'm too complex for you to comprehend because I..." she cut herself off about to become emotional again, she forced her gaze to her feet and she forced another set of tears she wanted to cry back, she would not cry ever in front of James Potter. "Because I shield myself from those who..." Don't you dare say it. she scowled and she sniffed slightly, no she wouldn't cry. "Those who hurt....hurt me" she said and there it was, the truth if ever James Potter wanted more of a truth from Emma Forbes there was no greater than that she just uttered and there it was, she couldn't hold back the tears any longer either as they silently rolled down her pale cheeks. She felt as though she were going to vomit on her own shoes, such vulnerability all at once and she had just given him a mass amount of power over her. She cringed and kept her head down, no he wouldn't see she was crying.

Will you stand above me?

[/i][/size][/color]

Look my way, and never love me[/center]

There is no sense behind anything women do. Men since the dawn of time will agree on that fact because frankly, the inner workings of a female's head are probably pretty crazy: too crazy for the likes of James Potter. If he'd been confused before he was positively perplexed now. The hand he had been running bemusedly through his hair now wanted to pull that very hair out of his head in frustration. First she sort of almost flirted with him/asked him to the dance, and then she hated him enough to cut off her own limbs. Disconcerted, but amused, he sighed. "Y'know, I don't reckon Hippogriffs like teriyaki sauce much." he grinned stupidly in his typical fashion "I think you'd be better of with a lemon marinade." Merlin, that boy was awful. I mean, he didn't have mood swings, which was nice, but he was so consistently sarcastic. Seldom did anything come out of James' mouth in earnest, and if he'd been able to see past his ego he might've seen that that was one of the many things that drove Emma up the wall.

In all fairness, it's hardly right to say that there was one thing that drove Miss Forbes to the edge of insanity with her classmate. James had plenty of less than admirable qualities. That boy, however, could be as thick as a three dollar malt and really had a hard time seeing past his own ego. Honestly, as far as seventeen year old boys go, he had a lot of good things going for him: he was handsome, smart, charismatic, captain of the Quidditch team, and quasi-famous. It was enough to go to the head of any teenager. James was no exception. Unfortunately, there had been very little over the course of his life to give him any reason to believe differently. Women flocked to him and it seemed like everyone wanted to be his friend; everyone of consequence wanted to be his friend, anyway. Even a lot of the teachers liked him unaccountably considering his detention tally and the number of their classes he had single handedly disturbed. Riding on the coattails of his father's fame, he had created himself a big enough name at Hogwarts to no longer need the prestige of being a Potter. It was just that maybe sometimes that whole popularity, quasi-fame business stood in between his proper friendships and him. Even Ethan sometimes got irritated when James' head inflated so much it blocked out the sun. Without his attitude in check, he'd drive away a lot more than just Emma.

But had he really driven her away? The change from git-cheeky to regular-cheeky had clearly taken her by surprise, because her responses were… well, weird. She spoke in broken sentences which, he assumed, if they had been written would have been mostly punctuated with ellipses. In all his years of having known Emma Forbes (which was now approaching seven) he had never seen her quite this emotional. Yeah, she was a bird and birds get sentimental, but this was an uncommon earnestness and rawness that he seldom ever saw from her. Something that quite honestly, he didn't know how to react to. She wasn't looking at him, she was speaking into her feet. And thank Merlin for that, because he could tell she was tearful and he was extremely uncomfortable. Not that it was her fault. Not at all. James was just rubbish at dealing with crying women: especially sober crying women. He shifted awkwardly, trying to make it look as natural as possible while she spoke and he listened with really no tangible idea on how to respond. When she finished speaking he just sort of stood there trying to process what she'd just said: trying to order every word she'd uttered someway so that it would make sense. Considering it had been about forty-five seconds since she'd told him she would self-mutilate before she would go to a bloody school dance with him he wasn't sure what to make of everything he'd just heard.

"Y'know, Emma," he started tentatively after a long period of silence where he had come to very little conclusion about her speech, "After you've chopped your hand off for Hippogriff food, I reckon you'd still be an alright dancer." he was trying to be funny. But James Potter was nervous and the delivery of the joke just wasn't quite what he had been hoping. Damn it, James, spit it out! he thought to himself. Now was either a really good or really bad time to do this: "So maybe we could still go to the dance together. Just as mates, if you want." He exhaled heavily as though he'd just sang in front of the entire school. Damn girls. Damn their confusing ways. And damn how nervous they she made him.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]809
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Emma Forbes
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]James is pretty much just going "wat"[/blockquote]