〖i wanna write you a song, one as beautiful as you are sweet...〗

♬𝘪 𝘸𝘢𝘯𝘯𝘢 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢 𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘨 ~ 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 ♬

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The first time Lily heard James song was in her seventh year, at around quarter past one in the morning.
Lily didn't realise her sleeping habits were such a disaster until she moved into the Head Girl's dormitories. Sleeping in the room above the other seventh year girls, alone, made her realise just how little she really did sleep. Hearing the other girls deep in various dreams seemed to give Lily the false illusion that she too was managing to sleep when the hours of silence were now showing her that was not the case.

Staring at the ceiling wasnt all that bad, though. It made a good time to get thinking done. Days were darkening in Hogwarts, attacks in and out the school were becoming more frequent and here Lily was in the middle of it all, lying awake, wondering what sort of world she'll be flung into when she leaves this place...

Perhaps she wound have stayed in her bed and looked at her fourposter's curtains until the sun rose if she hadn't heard the faint strumming of a guitar. The sound travelled into her her bedroom like a lullaby, and seemed to be accompanied by a soft singing. She couldn't make out the words but the voice was as sweet as honey.

What compelled her to discover the source of the voice and guitar was perhaps an external calling from on high, or perhaps it was just her nebby nature?

Nevertheless, Lily crept down the stairs of the Gryffindor tower to find the common room empty save for one of the loveseats. It was facing the fire but Lily could recognise that shock of messy hair anywhere: the Head Boy continued to play his guitar, clearly impervious to her presence.
James Potter, Head Boy, Quidditch Captain, Lily's boyfriend, clearly didn't get much sleep either.

Lily crept down the stairs further as he began to quietly sing the same tune she'd heard earlier, making her heart flutter.

"I wanna write you a song, one as beautiful as you are sweet."

There was something undeniably special about his voice, his tone was airy and light, like a gust of fresh wind through ones hair. Still, he was apathetic to her presence until she stepped in front of him. Surprisingly, he didn't jump, he didn't even cease playing the melody.

"Lily?" He gazed up at her, fingers still plucking the strings carefully as if his attention weren't consumingly focused on her.

She noticed that her presence had stopped his singing.
"Don't stop on account of me, I want to hear the rest of it." She folded her arms over and sat crosslegged on front of him, her back warmed by the fire and her cheeks warmed by the devastating smile he gave her.

"I... I'd rather not show you like this."

"What do you mean?"

James cocked his head to the side, as if it were obvious and she were being obtuse.
"Well, we've been going out for two months and I'm already writing you a song?"

"This is for me?!"

This finally caused him to stop playing. His eyes were wide and mouth slightly open. "I... I thought you'd guessed?"

She shook her head, feeling an involuntary smile pull at her lips.

"What?"

"Nothing."
In truth, she could hardly believe she could be so in love so disastrously quickly...
"Well, aren't you going to show me? I already know now."

James shrugged, his eyes meeting hers once more and finding reassurance in them.
"Okay, here we go:" a short intro that she would remember every night before she slept for as long as she lived filled the room. His smile filled up her heart.

"I wanna write you a song, one as beautiful as you are sweet..."

He played her the song over and over, until he swore she must have been sick of it but somehow she wasn't. Each time she only became more and more mesmerised.

It was nearly dawn when he finally stopped playing. Lily had shifted to curl up against his shoulder and his head was resting atop of hers.

"Are you scared?" Lily whispered, almost so quiet that James missed her words entirely.

"Of course I'm scared. There's a war on, Lily. I don't know who we're supposed to be when we leave this place."

There wasn't much to say in response to that, so instead she shifted closer, nestling under his arm and breathing in the smell of driftwood from the fire and something that seemed to be unique to James– it was woodish and expensive.

She wanted to tell him she loved him, but it seemed too early. Then again, there was a war on. And he'd just written her a love song...

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Lily heard that song a number of times over the years. Random Sunday afternoons in their living room, sometimes surrounded by their friends, other times alone. The middle of the night on their bed, moonlight streaking the guitar and the bare skin of his back as he played it. In their garden in the summer time, the sun beating off the wood of his guitar and discolouring it, James squinting against the glare.
On days like those it was easy to forget there was a war on. It was easy to allow the bloodied nights, the fallen friends, the distrust to melt away. When James played his guitar it felt like they were back at school, too young to know who they were; too young to know much, but still in love with complete certainty.

Lily heard that song a number of times over the years, but her favourite ever rendition wasn't sung to her at all. She stood in the doorway to their son's nursery as her husband sat on the floor beside their baby's cot, his guitar settled in his lap.

"I wanna build you a boat, one as strong as you are free."

Harry gurgled in delight as he watched his father sing for him, his little hand reaching out to pat his fathers knee, which happened to be the only part of James that he could reach.

"So every time you think that your heart is gonna sink you know it won't."

Lily leant on the doorway, allowing her eyes to shut for a moment and pretend away the war. While James was singing nothing could hurt them; while James was singing there was no war, there was no hiding, there was no danger. While James was singing she could only feel safe.

It didn't take long for Harry to fall asleep whenever James sung to him, and when he begun to softly snore, James stood up and crept out the nursery.

"I love you," she told him in a hushed whisper once they'd successfully snuck out Harry's room and into their own.

"I love you too?" He seemed startled by the proclamation, "what's inspired this, then?"

"Can't I tell my husband I love him without a follow up?" She asked, climbing into their bed and rearranging the pillows.

He chuckled, clambering in after her and pulling her in close.
"I suppose I'll allow it. Say it again just in case?"

"The moments passed."

Lily could feel him smiling into her hair, "I'll create a new one."

"Just go to sleep, Potter."

"Fine, Potter. I love you."

"Whatever."

In reality, she'd told him she loved him because  they had little else these days. Lily could tell just how much being trapped in Godric's Hollow was affecting him, how much he itched to get out, to do something different.
She felt it too, she wanted to see whatever friends she had left; she wanted to take Harry to the Muggle shopping centre to buy him a Halloween outfit; she wanted to have a normal life.
But despite that, she loved what she had and it was vital that James knew just how much. Because any day, it could be snatched from under her nose.

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The last time Lily heard James' song she wasn't sure if he was even singing it. He couldn't have been singing it.

He was dead.

She'd heard him die, his body hit the floor with a thud that tore through her world like a knife, it cut into her, burning.

Harry watched her in his cot, his green eyes wide, alright with fear. Her's filled with tears. Harry was scared, Lily was terrified.
Whenever Harry was frightened, be it a nightmare that had woken him up, or the cat scratching him, James had always been the one to calm him down, and he'd do it with his song.

"I want to write you a song, one to make your heart remember me." Lily whispered softly as the footsteps drew closer. "So anytime I'm gone, you can listen to my voice and sing along."

She hoped Harry would remember her voice. She hoped he would remember James'. But above all, Lily prayed that her son would live long enough to remember any of these things, to have memories at all...

Green light was still filtering through the gaps in the nursery door. Green light that Lily knew perfectly well meant James Potter was dead.
But when the nursery door was knocked down, and just before another flash of green light took over her world, Lily could have sworn she heard the soft strumming of a guitar, beckoning her home.

"I wanna write you a song."

The green light took over. Harry be safe, be strong. Everything went black. Nothing. Nothing but the soft strumming of a guitar...

"I wanna write you a song."

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too early for the death ones? regardless I should be forgiven cause it's 1D? (;